Children of the Night

by Zan Safra

  A wail rises over the noise. Vittoria falls to her knees at the edge of a machine, reaching for the mist where Amaranta fell.

  What did I…

  Andreas yanks me to my feet, dragging me after him. Gunshots batter my ears. Another metal ledge appears. Andreas pulls me onto it and into another passage. Each footstep seems my last.

  The corridor slopes upwards. Cold fresh air streams into my lungs. We crash through a metal door and into a sotoportego. Andreas throws the door shut and spins its wheel. The door locks.

  My hands are wet. My gown is drenched. Cold slime drips down my face. Blood.

  I am soaked in blood.

  Andreas’ face is grim. “Come with me.” He takes my hand. “Run.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Yurei

  MY SPINE ACHES, AS though a long needle lies embedded in the bone. My eyelids are sealed, numb, strengthless as the rest of me.

  Clawed hands release me. I fall onto a stone floor, the sting in my back throbbing. Weakness seeps through my muscles with each pulse, the vampire’s poison.

  Different hands grab me, dragging me over the floor. Shadows swarm about me. Bands of cold iron lock around my wrists, ankles, waist, neck.

  Shackles. Chains.

  My eyes fly open. A cell of rough stone surrounds me. A heavy ceiling bears down, ready to buckle. Chains of black iron shackle me to the wall, each as thick as my arm. The band around my neck chokes me as I try to lift my head.

  The shadows encircling me solidify, resolving into two Naturals, men in dark red uniforms. They glare down at me in revulsion, as though I’m a carcass rotting on the ground.

  I try to leap to my feet, to slip my arms through the shackles, but the chains snap tight. Solid iron digs into my flesh.

  No. It can’t be. I’m a phantom, a spirit, lighter than air, lighter than shadow…

  I wrench at the chains. The clashing of their links batters my ears like handfuls of gravel. But nothing gives. I can’t slip through.

  I’m not a specter. I’m stone.

  The sting in my back stabs me again, forcing me to the ground. One of the Naturals laughs, his voice a viscous, dripping brown. “That’s how it is to be like the rest of us, freak.”

  His boot rams into my stomach. I double over on the floor. Another of the Naturals halts him, his voice a scrape of gray. “Leave it.” A strangeness poisons the color, a distortion, an oily black string twining through the gray like the tendril of a tumor. “The lady won’t want it damaged.”

  I gather the breath I have and hiss out a command. Unchain me! Let me go!

  The black fire of my voice leaves me as a wisp of smoke. Feeble. Formless.

  I’m nothing but a shell. Trapped.

  The Naturals leave, slamming the barred door with a crash so loud that I’d scream if I had the breath. The guards sit at a candlelight wooden table, rifles across their laps. Staring.

  Mask. I heave up my arm. My mask—

  The guards leap out of their chairs, rifles aimed at my chest.

  The weight of the chain drags my arm to the ground. The guards lower their rifles and sink into their chairs.

  “La Filomena.” My voice is the color of cinders. “What did…they do?”

  A guard snorts. “What do you care?”

  “I gave…myself up. They said…they’d let them…be…”

  “Oh.” He smirks. “Did they?”

  I stare at him, mute. The guard takes a pack of playing cards from his coat. He deals them to his companion in silence, rifle close at hand.

  I rest my head against the stone. They can’t have done it. They can’t have…

  Cards shuffle. Buckles clink. The weakness abates, slowly, agonizingly, trickling from me in rivulets. My fingers curl, brushing the surface of a metal weight.

  My weapon. They didn’t take my weapon.

  I hear coats rustling, the squeak of new leather boots. The guards rise to their feet as two alchemists enter the corridor. They stop before my cell, men in long black coats, black gauntlets, black boots. One of them carries a leather bag, like a physician’s.

  The guards unlock the cell. The alchemist opens the bag and draws out a golden manacle.

  For an endless moment my eyes travel over it, its shining gold surface, its intricate locks, its engraved scorpion seal.

  “No.” Terror rips through me like claws. “No!”

  The guards unshackle me. I thrash, trying to slip, to scream in my voice. A fist punches into my stomach, bashing their air out of my lungs.

  The guards drag me towards the alchemist, hauling me like a prisoner to the gallows. The manacle unlocks in the alchemist’s hand, opening like a trap.

  One of them jerks my arm forward and rips my sleeve. The scar on my wrist burns like a brand, the same size as the manacle. It sears hotter as the alchemist approaches. Glyphs begin to blaze on the golden shackle. I know their meaning. I’ve always known their meaning. Trap.

  Not again.

  The alchemist reaches me, manacle ready—

  NEVER AGAIN!

  I swing up my leg and kick it out of his hands. My shoulder screams as I wrench my left arm free. I engage my weapon, transform it into a blade and stab it into the guard’s thigh. I rip it out and backhand him across the face, spinning him about. The other guard bends my arm, straining to wrestle me to the ground. I twist away and slash him across the face. Blood flies from the wound. He releases me with a scream.

  The alchemists recoil. One of them raises his gauntleted hand, a glyph burning white on its palm. I hurl my blade at him. It punches through his palm like a spear.

  Sparks fly from the glove. The alchemist gasps, staring at his impaled hand. I tear out the blade and grab him by the jacket, throwing him headfirst into the bars. He falls as the other alchemist backs away, screaming, “Drekavac! Dreka—”

  I whip my cord around his neck and force him to his knees, tightening it like a garotte until he falls limp. One of the bleeding guards staggers out of the cell, screaming down the corridor, mouth filled with blood. “It’s out! Summon the drekavac!”

  I let him scream and stumble to a heavy door. The world loses its color as I run into an unlit hall, turning to shades of gray, walls carved from solid shadows. Two rows of barred cells hem me in. This entire place is a prison.

  I follow the corridor. Shapes sleep in each cell, none stirring. Candlelight pulses from around a corner ahead. I slow, willing myself to fade…

  Nothing. No hiddenness enshrouds me.

  I look down at my hands, at the rest of me. My edges are sharp, solid. Obvious.

  No voice. No slipping. No fading. I’ve lost everything. I’m skinned, defenseless, a sea creature stripped of its armor.

  There’s nothing left of me.

  I grip my blade. I still have that.

  My footsteps are painful, thunderous as I round a corner. Two more uniformed Naturals sit at a candled table, guarding a single cell. Blocking my path.

  I launch my weapon at the candles. The blow knocks them from the table, extinguishing them. The guards jump to their feet, cursing. I run down the corridor, ready to dart past, but both of them move into my way.

  I dodge one guard and flatten myself against the cell door, feeling for its handle. Unlocked. I jerk it open and slip inside, shutting it just as the candles hiss again. I crouch below the barred window, trying to smother my panting. Faint bars of new candlelight stream through the window, falling upon the black coffin in the center of the cell.

  I can’t mistake it for anything else. The coffin is plainly built but covered in glyphs. Hastily-stamped symbols cover its lid and sides, incomprehensible, but for one. The largest glyph is one I know, the same one that glowed on the manacle.

  Imprisonment.

  I change my grip on my blade, holding it like a dagger. I keep out of the candlelight as I make my way to the coffin. A glass window is embedded in the lid, revealing the corpse inside.


  Belle.

  A shock slams into me like another punch. I lay my head against the lid, pressing my ear to the wood, sharpening my hearing. She breathes. Her heart beats.

  I let go of my blade and hook my fingers under the lid. It opens easily, the trap glyph flickering. Belle lies in the coffin, hands folded over her middle like a body ready for burial, cheeks hollow, skin gray.

  I slide my arms under her and lift her out. A faint vibration trembles through her, pulsing in time with her heart. I retreat into the shadows and crouch out of sight. “Belle,” I hiss, shaking her. “Belle!”

  Belle groans. I cover her mouth. Her eyes flutter open and she begins to wriggle, under her gaze falls on me and clears. She pulls my hand away. “Yurei?”

  At such close range her stare nearly numbs me, forcing me to choke out the words. “Can you stand?”

  She nods. I let her slide out of my arms and help her to her feet. She stares at the open coffin, eyes growing wide.

  With her gaze elsewhere it’s easier to speak. “What happened to you?”

  Her eyes don’t leave the coffin. “I-I…I was in the city with Jette.” Her voice is low, its soft vermillion soaked with gray. “The fiend’s servants caught me.”

  Sickness crushes my stomach. “And Jette?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t think she’s here.” She turns back to me. “But how did you—"

  Stumbling footsteps echo down the corridor. One of the guards I wounded

  rounds the corner, screaming, “The Unnatural’s escaped! Call the drekavac! Go!”

  A guard swears and grabs his rifle. One of the two follow the wounded man, leaving a single guard behind.

  “Drekavac?” Belle whispers.

  I shake my head. We creep to the barred window. The remaining guard fidgets nervously, adjusting his grip on his rifle.

  I sneak a glance at Belle. She clenches her jaw and nods.

  I throw open the door and charge out. Before the guard can lift his weapon I grab it and slam it sideways into his face. He falls dazed against the wall. Belle and I seize his arms and drag him into the cell. We pitch him into the coffin and shut it. The trap glyphs flare, locking him in.

  Belle wavers on her feet and I catch her arm, steadying her. She raises her hand. Only a few sparks flit weakly from her fingertips. She swallows hard. “The fiend stole my volta.”

  I take her by the hand and lead her after me, down the corridor, through another door. Everything changes. The stone walls turn to polished wood, the flagged floors to marble, as though we’ve entered a separate place entirely, a palace latched onto a prison.

  Belle motions to a paneled wall. “Can’t we go through?”

  I shake my head. She frowns. “You can pass through walls, can’t you?”

  I slap my hand against the wall, pressing to show that nothing happens. “Not anymore.”

  “What?”

  “The fiend sent vampires to La Filomena. They stabbed me with poison.”

  “And took your powers?”

  I nod. Belle sighs. “We’re certainly a pair, aren’t we?”

  We follow the hall, running from shadow to shadow. The building grows ever finer. Suddenly we come to a staircase grander than any I’ve ever seen, with gleaming steps, pillared banisters, and a gilded arched ceiling set with paintings.

  Belle stares at them in wonder. “Where are we?”

  I know where we are. I’ve run along its roof countless times. I’ve never ventured inside, but I know what this place must be.

  “It’s the palace of the Doge,” I whisper. “The leader of Venice.”

  Belle’s face grows even paler. “So the fiend has the Doge too.”

  “What do you mean, she has the Doge?”

  “Her moroi are everywhere. I expect everyone in this palace is hers.” She presses her lips together. “She’s rather far along in her plot.”

  “How do you know?”

  “We spoke.”

  “You spoke with—"

  A ululating howl spikes down the corridor. Another sound follows, a scuttling, skittering rush, a horde of giant cockroaches swarming towards us.

  I grab her hand. We run past the staircase. Belle pulls me to a halt and leans against the wall, breathing hard, her face graying further. I drag her after me. Heavy carved doors appear ahead. We burst through them and into another grand room, long and wood-paneled, its upper walls covered in maps. Moonlight pours through tall pointed windows, falling upon two giant globes taller than I am mounted on the floor. Twin chandeliers hang above, lights dwindled to specks.

  “The windows.” I look about for some way to smash them, but at once the doors fly open. Dark, hooded shapes explode into the room, skittering over the walls and ceiling, circling us. Needle-like spines cover their hands. Their eyes are bulging, black and faceted. Their jagged lips match the fangs behind them. They surround us, a crowd of peeling corpses with insect eyes.

  So you’re the drekavac.

  Belle raises her hands. A faint humming seeps into my ears, prickling on my skin.

  “No,” I whisper. “You don’t have enough.”

  She forces her voice through her teeth. “I can do it.”

  “No, Belle!”

  “Have you a better idea?”

  The drekavac swarm around us, eyeing us, whispering, wisps of smoke the color of old blood. The strange mixture of light plays over their faces, flickering as those on the ceiling scuttle past the twin chandeliers.

  They aren’t like those of La Filomena. Globe-shaped glass mantles encase their flames and stiff metal pipes anchor them to the ceiling. Gasoliers.

  Spark flicker at Belle’s fingertips. The scent of metal fills the air. She sways on her feet, the last of her blood draining from her face.

  A single drekavac advances on her, preparing to leap. A faint violet glow streams from Belle’s hands and the point of my blade.

  The vampire prowls closer. Belle’s breath seethes through her teeth. The humming grows, the light blazes, violet flames of—

  I grab her and jerk her about, aiming her arm at a gasolier. Volta erupts from her fingers. A roaring flash and a wall of heat throw us down as the gasolier explodes, raining glass. Flames billow across the ceiling, engulfing the drekavac. They fall with horrifying screams, plunging into the mob. Cloaks ignite. Flames swallow the vampires, leaping from creature to creature like a living force, devouring them.

  The second gasolier explodes. Fire roars like typhoon winds. I grab Belle and pull her to her feet. Beams and burning plaster crash to the floor, just missing us as the maps curdle, the globes ignite like torches. Cracks fork across the windows.

  I drag Belle towards them. A burning drekavac lurches into our way. I grab a fallen rafter and swing it into its head. The vampire falls into the cracking window and shatters it, toppling out.

  Belle begins to move on her own. We stagger to the window, step out, and fall.

  Frigid water swallows us. My feet strike a muddy seafloor. I claw my way through the water until I reach the air. Belle emerges beside me, sputtering. Cinders pelt us. Flames roar from the windows above, turning the water to liquid fire.

  I take Belle’s arm with one hand and swim with the other. The crenellated stone wall of the Palaso Ducale towers over us. We paddle along it, towards a wharf ten yards ahead. As we reach it I grab one of the wood pilings to pull us along. My hand slips through it like a ghost’s.

  I almost laugh.

  We swim into the shelter of the wharf. Bars of firelight shine through the boards as we move towards a row of moored gondolas. I hear the flames boiling behind us, the breaking of more glass. Someone will come. We won’t be alone much longer.

  We climb onto a rocking gondola and then onto the boards of the wharf. I take her hand. My fading wavers, but hides us.

  Belle and I hurry along the palace’s wall. The vast Piasa opens before us. My fading falters completely as we reach a bridge, as m
y own exhaustion swamps me. The sting in my back burns.

  I lean against the wall, fighting to clear my head, to work out what to do now. We can’t go back to La Filomena.

  I can never go back.

  Belle passes a hand over her skirt. A piece of golden jewelry hangs pinned to her waist, of a sort I’ve never seen. Belle takes one of its fine chains and opens the miniscule bottle dangling at its end. She takes out a twist of paper and unrolls it, turning it to show me letters that mean nothing to me. Palaso Rurico, San Marco.

  “I know where to go,” she says.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Ayanda

  I FOLLOW THE ALUKA and myling. Neither Dead creature moves as any living person would, Amon scampering on all four limbs, at times scuttling over the walls like a spider, Laszlo gliding unnaturally, as though his feet hardly touch the ground. The only footsteps I hear are my own.

  The night seems to tighten. The buildings loom, tilting inwards, longing to crush me. The danger pulses around me, a fist around my throat.

  Laszlo only appears human. An aluka’s ordinary-seeming hands hide barbed talons that can snap out in a heartbeat. Its jaws can unhinge and gape wide enough to engulf a head, its preferred method of attack. The aluka bites the head from its victim’s body and latches its mouth onto the spurting stump of a neck.

  Amon springs across the lane to land on the opposite building, giggling, bouncing between the walls like an acrobat. Nothing of his manner changes what he is. A myling is as savage as any other varianta, with tremendous strength and the ability to leap great distances, though its powers aren’t its primary strategy. The myling lies in wait along deserted roads, wailing like a lost infant, using the sound to lure compassionate souls into its grip.

  The fist tightens. I’ve no glaive. No armor. Only four silver hatpins hidden up my sleeve.

  I do my best to breathe, to dampen the fear. I still have my strength. That must be good for something.

  The buildings part, revealing the eastern docks and the waters of the lagoon. Across the channel lies another island, one hidden by a long stone wall and a gatehouse with turrets like those of an ancient castle. Beyond it is a wintry forest, moonlit bare branches rattling in the wind.