The vampire transfixed his guest in unblinking eyes that were sharp and ophidian. Slowly, his lids began to close, and his head began to sway as if in a stupor. A hand clutched blindly for a silver chalice and brought it to his lips. He sipped from its stained rim, and returned it to its pedestal.
“Tell me of the Humming Bird to the Right,” urged Hommler, head still weaving.
“I will. But know first that he is the Humming Bird to the Left.”
“Ah, silly me.” The vampire grinned, and bubbles of blood squirted and burst between his teeth. “And to the ancient Aztecs, left meant north, correct?”
“No—it meant south. South to blessed Tenochtitlan.”
“Forgive my ignorance.” Hommler was silent as his prodigious intellect churned. “So,” his eyes snapped open, “how would you honor Huitzilopotchli, the ‘Hummingbird to the Left?’ You mentioned blood—surely you mean the blood of California’s fauna. Rabbits, squirrels, chickens and the like, correct? Surely you envision something like an Aztec Santeria?”
The visitor smiled, revealing enamel nearly as trenchant as the vampire’s. “No. Huitzilopotchli is only appeased by human oblations. Only they will suffice.”
“By the gods, here is a man after my own heart! Are you not a man after my own heart?”
“I am a man after your own heart.” The priest intoned sincerely, and smiled.
“Well then, you will not hesitate to drink from my chalice. Suffice it to say that animals were not drained to fill it.” He snapped his fingers, and an acolyte materialized from the shadowed periphery. Reverentially, the attendant accepted the chalice and presented it to the visitor.
“Drink,” commanded the fiend.
“And if I do so, will you trust me?”
“Most assuredly not, but it’s a start,” Hommler said, and eased forward in his throne.
The visitor’s body shook with a peculiar laugh, and he peered into the dark, viscous fluid of the chalice. It looked as if its contents had been stagnant for days. As he tilted it back, the fluid swam languidly into his mouth and down his throat. Some of it was thick as flem—the rest had the consistency of pulpy juice. He held the glass upside down until the last droplets of blood had fallen, then licked his lips.
The fiends grinned at each other, chins smeared with crimson, eyes blazing.
“What is your name?” asked Hommler excitedly.
“Mictlan.”
“Well, Mictlan, if I were to aid you in reinstituting the reign of your blood god, would you aid me in the reinstitution of my blood gods and honor them as well? Or are you a stingy, myopic Akhenaten? Tell me the truth, before my hopes soar too high!”
“My first allegiance is to the Humming Bird to the Left. But I will kneel before your Seven, and pay obeisance to your Tiamat as well. Only a fool could not see that they are stars in the same constellation.”
Hommler wiped a pale forearm over his mouth, removing most of the blood. He rose from his throne, and paced momentarily.
“You’ve researched me, it seems. Summon the wretch known as Teo,” he demanded, then pointed at Mictlan. “You talk a good game, my friend. Let’s see how well your speech translates to action. I’ve just summoned one of your brethren—though your rank as high priest seems about all you possess in common. I want you to send him to your gods with this.” Hommler unsheathed a great sword from a scabbard near his throne, and threw it down to clang at Mictlan’s feet. “Teo is a squeamish fool who serves no one but himself. He knows nothing of service to the gods—the fool is a thrice-damned atheist. So when he walks through those doors, I want you to impale him on my sword. And may the blood that seeps down between these flagstones slake the thirst of the blood gods we honor.”
Mictlan stared at the sword, how the lambent glare of flame from twin braziers livened its steel. It was a magnificent weapon. The blade sprang from a bared dragon’s maw, the crossguard consisted of flaring wings, and the hilt was a thick tail terminating in a barbed pommel. Running the length of the steel were cuneiform pictograms.
“Pick it up!” exhorted the vampire. But Mictlan only studied the weapon with folded arms.
Hommler, temples pulsing, eased back into his chair and crossed his legs. Casually, he slid his hand into his cloak and unbuttoned a holster near his hip. “We shall see if you speak truth, Mr. Mictlan. We shall see!”
Less than a minute later, the sound of feet was heard outside the double doors. They swung open, and in walked Teo followed by the servant sent to fetch him.
“M’lord, are you ready for your lesson today? I’ve just put the finishing touches on a presentation on the god Tlaloc. I’ve got it saved to disk right here—I can run it from the projector if you’d like.”
“That won’t be necessary,” snapped Hommler. “Teo, a guest has arrived today. I believe you know him.” He pointed at the newcomer.
Mictlan leaned, arms folded, against one of the Doric columns that buttressed the stone ceiling.
“You!” cried Teo, who began to stutter. “Lord, lord Hommler, he—he’s a freak—a deviant murderer! He’s sadistic—he derives pleasure from torture. Send him away from here!” The young priest retreated among the acolytes. At a nod from Hommler, the servants dispersed as if compelled by a solvent. “Hey!” Teo cried, as Mictlan began to advance toward him. “Herbert, I have so much more to teach you! Don’t make this mistake—I’m a genius. That man is a psychotic killer!”
“And just what do you think I am, Teo, a girl scout?” guffawed the vampire, as Mictlan moved near, empty handed.
“Mictlan, don’t listen to Hommler—he’ll kill you. You and I are still brothers, we still worship the same gods.”
“Necoc yaotl,” uttered the bald priest, then raked a flint knife across Teo’s throat.
For a second, the incision seemed little worse then a cut from shaving. But then, as Teo gulped for air, unchecked scarlet belched out and over the hands that sought to stop it. “Teiztlacahuiani! Necoc yaotl!” Mictlan spat, and grinned as the blood sputtered and ran between futile fingers. He then seized Teo’s wrist in an iron grip, and pulled him up a short stair and near to the base of Hommler’s throne before the victim stumbled to the floor, gurgling.
“Drink,” Mictlan commanded the vampire. “For what is better in life than chalchiuatl, the precious water?”
Hommler’s fingers quivered on the cracked skulls decorating his arm rests. His heart beat faster, and his eyes were primal planets teeming with feral, predatory hierarchies of life. With a roar he shot from his throne and seized the writhing body in a rolling embrace, and down the short flight of stairs they tumbled.
As Hommler gorged himself on spraying blood, Mictlan stared down at him from the elevation, hands on his hips, back to the throne.
“Beautifully executed!” The vampire slavered, eyes bulging, the veins prominent on his temples.
“Thank you.” Mictlan smiled, the lip of the throne’s seat brushing the back of his legs. “But there is one stipulation I failed to mention.”
“Oh?” Hommler swiped chunks of flesh from his wet lips. “I should hope it’s not so unreasonable as to sever our budding relationship.”
“I pray not,” said the high priest. “Marisela is a wayward brat. Before Aztlan can soar to its apogee, she must be sacrificed.”
For several moments Hommler’s eyes swept the flagstones. Finally, he pushed red hands through his silver curls and eased back his head as if in a shower.
“This is all too delicious. Too delicious!” he cried. “As soon as her father springs my trap, you may do with her what you will. You will stay with me in my castle, Mictlan, and together we will plunge our hands into theological ether and drag our gods back to the sun and air.”
Mictlan descended the steps and leveled his knife a foot from the vampire’s throat. “You are as my beloved son,” he declared, then sheathed the weapon. Nimbly, he seized each of Hommler’s wrists and crossed them. “You are disarmed. You are mine. You are as a child, as my belov
ed son.” He then released the wrists and stepped back.
“What deviltry was that about?” Hommler snickered.
“Protocol.”
“Protocol? Well I have protocol of my own. Until you gain my trust, you will sleep and eat with my guards. Keedu, my devoted hierophant, will show you your quarters.”
Chapter 35
Hommler freestyled through blood water. Against the red swells, he was as stark as a white snake gliding amid Amazonian verdure. His long, pasty fingers were pruned, and his curls had relaxed into a tangled, silver mane. The sky above was imperial blue, rent by lightning, and a strong wind textured the waves into an amorphous, shifting monster. The vampire gulped sea water as he swam, and each mouthful was titillating and forbidden.
In the distance he spied a black scrap of island, devoid of even a solitary palm. Standing in its center, arms outstretched, was Ursula. She was calling to him melodiously, and her fair, delicate neck was restored to pre-Halloween elegance. As he stroked nearer, his eyes lingered on her translucent gown of jet. When the lightning streaked, he could see her pert breasts and lithe, toned legs quite clearly.
The sea shuddered at regular intervals from the heart far beneath it, and Hommler redoubled his efforts to reach the woman. Suddenly, he felt a strange rush of water, and a massive adumbration passed beneath his feet. Hommler trembled; for the first time in years he felt helpless and miniscule. He swam as fast as he could, and somehow, over the lightning and waves, the sound of Ursula’s laughter haunted his ears.
He was within feet of the charred patch of island when it happened. Something speared up vertically from the deep, and seized him by the chest in gaping jaws. It lifted him high—in his own ocean—his own damned ocean! In midair, the world seemed to stop. He felt the blunt, conical snout with a helpless hand. The fish’s eyes were American black, but turned to white as they rolled back in their sockets and a protective membrane whisked over them. Face twisted, Hommler saw the gray dorsal portion of the monster, how it dovetailed with the underbelly of purest white. Where the two colors met, there was a mottled harmony.
And that was all he knew of his killer as time revitalized, even accelerated, and the great fish pulled him beneath the red depths that were suddenly hateful and choking. Plunging downward, he could see the surface retreating like a liquid door to freedom. The crimson that billowed from his chest was unending, and assimilated with the water almost as soon as it discharged. He wondered why he wasn’t dead yet.
As they swam deeper, the beat of the heart became louder and faster. It beat in tune to his own heart, which had assumed the rhythm of an overwrought machine. And there it was amid the crimson gloom—the shark brought him near enough to touch it. It governed atop a mountain of coral, beating furiously, and Hommler could only marvel at its beauty. For moments they circled its claret majesty, and with every revolution the rhythm grew faster. He couldn’t stop his own heart from accelerating, it seemed, nor its colossal analog around which he revolved in a prison of teeth. And then it stopped. The great muscle relaxed, and the ocean grew calm. Hommler couldn’t breathe—the bloody water was rushing into his throat faster than he could process—he was drowning.
His arms flailed in his coffin and he shot awake. A voice was intoning words over his body, and water splashed between his eyes and rolled off his cheeks. Was he safe in his coffin, or in that parallel blood world turned hostile? Was he deep in his castle’s donjon, or deep beneath the sea? More liquid cooled his face, and his eyes blinked wide. His coffin was open, and a figure was peering over it.
In the eldritch glow of rhodochrosite, the vampire instantly recognized the vestment of a priest. He was wearing a white surplice and a violet stole.
“Exorcizo te, omnis spiritus immunde, in nominee Dei Patris omnipotentis, et in noimine Jesu Christi Filii ejus,” the intruder spoke solemnly, “Domini et Judicis nostril, et in virtute Spiritus Sancti, ut descedas ab hoe plasmate Dei Herbert Hommler, quod Dominus noster ad templum sanctum suum vocare dignatus est, ut fiat templum Dei vivi, et Spiritus Sanctus habitet in eo. Per eumdem Christum Dominum nostrum, qui venturus est judicare vivos et mortuos, et saeculum per ignem.”
Another splash of water in his face. Hommler could hear a fight ensuing in his adjacent throne room. Then, he felt the whet point of a stake as it stabilized over his heart. The priest drew back his mallet, and his face was tensed and grisly.
As hammer fell, the vampire jerked and rolled. The stake slid from Hommler’s breast and onto the floor of the spacious coffin. The mallet continued on its original trajectory, however, and throttled the vampire soundly on the shoulder.
“Guards! Guards!” screeched Hommler, mashed a button in his coffin, and sat up. Another hammer blow whistled past his head and splintered the side of his casket. Cursing, he grabbed a corner with his hand and began the inelegant process of extricating himself. Even in more relaxed environments, it was never an easy task—Swan had seen him do it once, and couldn’t stop laughing.
As he was rising, the hammer found his chest again, and he was knocked back into the confines of his rigid bed.
“Father, I have killed the last of them.” Hommler heard a deep voice thunder from his throne room. “Did you finish him yet?”
“He won’t lie still! He’s supposed to be sleeping in diurnal hours!” The priest huffed as he swung his mallet roundhouse style.
When this clumsy strike missed, Hommler vaulted his body off the side of coffin opposite the priest and rolled down the tiny dais. Before he could gather himself the old man had cornered him, his fingers curling then uncurling around the mallet. In his left hand, the stake was raised. Hommler’s hands fanned in supplication, and his face was extraordinarily pallid.
Stooping to avoid the low ceiling, a giant shouldered into the room, bloodied and grinning. He bore a gore-spattered pike in one hand and a smoking pistol in the other.
“Now that we have time to work, I’ll complete the purging and try to save him. We’ll know it worked if his fangs disappear.” Andrade reasoned, put down his tools, then spit on each palm and moved toward Hommler. “Ephpheta, quod est, Adaperire.” He chanted, then guided his palsied hands toward the vampire’s face.
As the fingers neared, Hommler seized one and bit it savagely, until his jaws trembled from the exertion. Andrade moaned, and scrambled for his mallet. Klaus scowled and lunged forward, pike leveled at the vampire’s chest. It drilled the wall near Hommler’s ear, splintering a red mineral and the light bulb behind it.
Hommler couldn’t believe his fortune; how could the assailant have missed? Surely he wasn’t as maladroit as the priest? Then the vampire spied a dark form entangling the giant’s upper back, legs coiling around his chest. A hand passed across the giant’s throat, and a desperate gurgling sound was heard as the titan careened off the mineraled walls as if in a stupor. The priest rose to aid his companion, but before he could, the giant crashed down into the coffin, shattering what remained of its contours. Astride his back was Mictlan, dagger buried to the hilt in the thick, white bull neck.
As Andrade turned to face the vampire again, finger nails gouged his right eye. He dropped his mallet, and crumbled feebly into a corner. Hommler rose, fangs gleaming, and drove his thumbnail into the priest’s same eye again. Andrade sank low, a hand over the socket, groaning.
“Vampire hunters!” Hommler seethed. “Get out into the light where I can see you, you obsolete worm.” He grabbed a fistful of the violet stole and dragged the old man to his feet. Then he and Mictlan each seized an arm and pulled him down a mineral-kernelled corridor and out into the throne room.
Putrescence assaulted their nostrils. Each brazier was piled high with gray corpses, and the nauseous medley of flesh, sinew, and bone had evolved the fires into glorious, crackling elementals. Shadows cavorted insanely on the walls, and Hommler gasped at the scores of minions slain upon the flagstones. In death, their skin had puttied, an inverse rigor mortis, and many looked smeared like jam on bread. It was astonishi
ng that two men could have wrought such destruction.
“To the throne.” Hommler nodded to Mictlan. The heat from the flames culled sweat from their foreheads as they dragged the squirming priest across the bodies. But his efforts to escape were feeble, and within moments they hurled him onto the gilded seat. His scratched eye was permanently damaged, and gushed an amalgam of tears and blood.
“Well, are you an illustrious vampire hunter, or a purger of demoniacs? You carry the stake of the hunter but wear the stole of the exorcist. Just what kind of man are you, Father? And who sent you?”
Andrade’s good eye orbited to the vampire, and teared sympathetically for its brother. His lips pursed, and he turned his head aside.
“Fine, then, Father. I will discover that on my own. I bet you’re some twisted witch-finder general sort in the vein of Matthew Hopkins.” Hommler rubbed his chin and stared at his captive. Then, he laughed. “Actually, I’ve seen your picture before—I’ve heard tales of you. You’re Father Andrade, the so-called Great White Death of the Saracens. Isn’t that what you call yourself? Isn’t it?” he demanded, but the priest was silent. “A relic of a man steeped in occult lore and sworn to throwing off the Islamic yoke? The Sultan has a huge price on your head, my friend. Allegedly you bear a tattoo of carcharodon carcharias on your left wrist.” The vampire seized Andrade’s hand, turned it over, and studied an inked great white shark midway up the forearm. “As I suspected!” Hommler exclaimed. He then restrained the priest’s neck with his left hand and plundered the surplice with his right. After a moment of rifling, his hand emerged holding a book and a pamphlet. “Ah! A fine volume on vampire lore! I read it myself when I was ten—rather dated but highly entertaining—one of the great tomes of classical vampiric myth. Written by the most pious, or perhaps I should say impious, Father Montague Summers.”
“You fiend!” The priest snarled. “He is a holy legend, a bane to your kind. If I had had but one hundredth of his skill you would be staked, and Lucifer would be turning your soul on his spit over brimstone this very moment!”
The Gods of Color Page 37
