by J. C. Diem
I shrugged, stalling for time. “I have no idea. I’m still waiting for the Mortis manual to be delivered.” Turning, I caught my shadow’s eye. Help me! I sent the frantic thought to it. I need to keep him occupied! Without my hands, I could only be hacked apart again. While it did buy the soldiers time, being chopped apart was rapidly losing its appeal for me.
Wringing its hands, my shade was almost gibbering in terror. “What do you want me to do? I can’t fight like you!”
Desperation was a powerful motivator and a crazy idea sprang into my head. If my shadow had the power to possess me then could the reverse also be true? Without stopping to think the idea over carefully, I sent my consciousness towards my silhouette. Sensing a link between us, I forced my senses into it.
Shuddering in reaction, my black clone let out a startled scream that echoed throughout the nearby area. Imps shuffled their feet uneasily, sensing that something strange had just happened. Some of those deep in slumber began to stir.
Opening my shadow’s eyes, it took me a couple of seconds to come to terms with my new vision. Instead of seeing semi-darkness and indistinct shapes, everything stood out with crystal clarity. My shadow had a form of night vision that humans could only dream of duplicating.
Understanding filtered through to the First as he realized what I’d just accomplished. He lifted his gigantic sword over his head and ran at me, bellowing incoherently. I’d managed to gain ascendency over my shadow and he wasn’t happy about it.
Both of my weapons were now on the ground. The straps to the sheaths had been cut during the First’s frenzy and one of the swords was still encased inside the hardened white leather. The other sword had been discarded by the First and lay several feet away. Flexing my borrowed hands, I stretched out both arms. They elongated, snatched up the weapons then retracted just in time to block a blow from the First’s much larger instrument of death.
My reach was far shorter than the First’s and he had an unfair advantage over me. At that thought, my shadow grew to match the size of my opponent. Now more evenly matched, I went into motion. Both swords became a silver blur as they streaked towards grey skin. Black blood spurted from deep cuts in the First’s arms, chest and abdomen.
Shrugging off the cuts, he swung his sword at me and I let it pass through my shadowy head. With a laugh that sounded hollow through my utterly black mouth, I whirled the swords in rapid circles in a flashy display of dexterity. “Prepare to die,” I told him darkly. Speaking through my shadow, the words came out in our dead father’s alien language.
Hoping I’d given Sanderson and his men enough time to break some of the humans free by now, I split my consciousness three ways as I launched my master plan into action.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Stealthy movement came from behind the bone throne as I used my shadow form to block and slice on automatic pilot. I wasn’t actually trying to kill the First with the swords. They were simply the distraction I needed to keep his attention diverted. Besides, his wounds healed almost as fast as mine did. It would take something much deadlier than mere metal to take this monster down.
Keeping to the shadows, Lefty and Righty moved towards their quarry. My secret plan had been to detach the appendages before we’d entered the cavern. Again, red lines had appeared where my wrists had previously been cut. My hands had popped free and had hitched a ride with me through the throng of imps before dropping to the ground. Skirting the edges of the cavern, they’d positioned themselves behind the throne. Now it was time for them to attack.
The First didn’t even feel it when my detached hands leaped up and grabbed hold of his loincloth. His sweat soaked skin was slippery but they doggedly made their way upwards. My quarry absently brushed at Righty when it paused for a second on his shoulder. It flattened itself down just in time to avoid the blow.
Distantly, I felt my face smiling. The First saw the smile and paused suspiciously. He knew I was up to something but couldn’t figure out what it was.
My hands, balanced precariously on the enemy’s shoulders, poised to leap the final distance. Then an imp onlooker spoke up. “Er, Father.” He lifted a clawed hand to point. “You have something on you.”
Turning his bald, batlike head, the First let out a bellow of fright when he spied Lefty on his shoulder. He began dancing in a circle, slapping and stabbing himself in a useless effort to dislodge my hands. Both held on, determined to reach their goal. Righty made a quick detour and poked the First in his eye. One of the red orbs that lit the immediate vicinity went out and the imp’s leader shrieked in pain and fury.
Whirling, he glared at me with his one remaining eye and lunged at my physical body with his sword, ignoring my armed shadow this time. The sword skewered me through the chest right between my breasts. My ribs cracked when the hilt rammed into them. The First’s face loomed over me. His breath washed over me, a stinking heat that blew my hair back from my forehead.
Concentrating harder than I ever had before, I manoeuvred Lefty and Righty into position. Poised on either side of the First’s head, balancing on the curled over tips of his ears, they flattened themselves out against his bald skull. Unleashing the power of the holy marks, I waited for his head to explode.
Wincing in anticipation of immense pain, the First lurched back, pulling his sword free from my flesh. Staggering back further, he stumbled into his throne. His children drew a collective breath. Time stretched out and nothing happened. Unlike every other vampire or imp that had received this treatment, his head didn’t implode. “Ah, crap,” I said quietly. So much for my grand plan. I was sure the holy marks would work. Why else did I have them? This was the greatest letdown I’d suffered as a vampire so far. Lefty and Righty abandoned ship, leaping to the ground and scurrying to safety.
“So, even the fabled Mortis does not have the power to destroy me,” the First gloated. He threw his head back and began to laugh. He laughed so hard he had to sit down on his grisly throne.
At first, I thought the tendrils of smoke coming from his mouth were just wishful thinking or maybe an optical illusion. Then he coughed and the tendrils became a cloud.
“What is happening to me?” Doubling over, he coughed again and a gout of black blood splashed to the ground. Sizzling, it ate its way through the dirt like acid.
“I’m pretty sure you’re dying,” I said hopefully. Lefty and Righty took the opportunity to flee to me and I knelt to reattach them.
It was taking longer than usual and wasn’t as spectacular as I’d expected but the First was definitely not well. Blood began to pour from every orifice in thick runnels, turning his throne black. He coughed out clots and wads of the essence that had kept him alive in one form or another for fifty thousand years. Just like the vamp I’d managed to cleanse of its vampirism in Japan, every scrap of the diseased substance leaked out through any means possible.
Sizzling and smoking, the blood boiled away and his hulking form began to fall in on itself. Screaming in pain and terror, the First beseeched me with his single remaining eye and held out a clawed hand. I felt no pity at all as the red light of his eye finally flickered then puffed out. His screams cut off at the same time, leaving behind a vast silence.
Only a withered husk was left of the First’s body when the ooze that had been his blood dissipated. Even that suddenly broke down to dust and became unrecognizable as having ever belonged to a living creature.
My swords unexpectedly dropped to the ground as my shadow began to shrink. I caught a fleeting feeling of gratitude from it as it became just another normal silhouette again. Now that the First was dead, the unnatural life that had powered my shadow was gone. That means the praying mantis and her cronies are also free from his possession.
Before I could properly process that thought, the first howl of grief and loss rang out. The imps had finally grasped the fact that their leader was dead. “Uh oh,” I murmured when the imps didn’t seem like they were about to go down with the First. I’d expected them to
expire right alongside him. It was an assumption that I now regretted as ten thousand pairs of orange orbs turned to me accusingly.
I bent and picked up my swords as the closest imps attacked. My hands twirled into action even as I heard the first explosion that announced the soldier’s presence. Ten thousand slumbering monsters began to wake. My leather suit was in tatters but the neck band saved me several times from losing my head again as the nearest imps attacked.
A strange thing happened as I cut my way through the throng, a feeling of blood lust began to fill me. It wasn’t an urge to drink, it was an urge to kill, maim and rend. The vision I’d had of my three reflections drifted to me distantly. The imp blood that had been introduced into my system was finally starting to have an effect. I was turning into a remorseless killing machine just like the creatures I was currently slaughtering.
Piles of limbs and bodies lay around me, impeding not just me but the furious imps as well as I killed anything that came within my reach. Enraged beyond the ability to think, the imps fought to be the one to take me down. Instead, they just died beneath my blades.
With my enhanced hearing, I made out human shouts as the army began to attack in earnest. I hoped they’d managed to get at least some of the captives free before they’d begun setting off their explosives and firing their rockets. The thought drifted up from the blood lust clouding my mind and helped me to shake it off a bit. It gave me hope that I wouldn’t remain a mindless, murderous monster forever.
Unsure of what was happening, the imps milled around in confusion. Two of the monsters swung at me at the same time and ended up stabbing each other when I ducked. Howling in rage, one hacked the other’s head off. With that, nearby clones began to turn on each other.
I backed away from the fray and tripped over something. One of the young imps had crouched down behind me. They weren’t as mature as their parents but they had the same desire to maim and destroy. I was their target and they meant to have me.
My swords became slick with black ooze as I defended myself from the nasty and freakishly fast offspring. Overwhelmed by sheer numbers, I went down beneath a squirming pile of infants and half grown imps. Some mature imps joined the pile, grinding me into the ground. More and more piled on top of me until my bones began to shatter beneath their combined weight. I was being crushed beneath their mass and the pain was excruciating.
An imp baby wriggled its way through the pile, grinning widely. Pinned down, I could do nothing to defend myself as it latched onto my cheek with its tiny, razor sharp teeth. It worried at my face like a dog with a rat. Tearing my mask off, it bit through the flesh of my cheek down to the bone. It immediately made a face and spat my flesh out but the damage was already done. My acidic blood burned right through the creature’s flesh, dissolving its cheeks and mouth. It crawled away, coughing and hacking before falling onto its side.
More of my bones shattered as another couple of imps joined the pile. Shrieking in both pain and rage, the power of my holy marks began to build. Overflowing with power, I had to let it out before I could burst apart. Groping around with both hands, I made contact with grey flesh then released the pressure that had built up inside me.
The ground trembled then the mound of monsters still trying to squash or bite me exploded. It wasn’t just their heads that popped this time, their entire bodies were torn apart and flung into the air in pieces. Body parts rained down in a black, bloody shower. The baby that had been trying to bite my face off disintegrated completely.
Chapter Thirty-Three
By the time I sat up to survey the damage, my injuries had healed. Hanging from one ear, the red mask was a ruined mess, matching the rest of the suit.
Petrified that they would suffer the same fate, most of the offspring fled from me and ran directly into the firepower of the army. Rockets, gunfire and explosions rang out in a continual barrage of noise.
Searching through the body parts, I located my swords beneath the rent remains of several imps and waded into the fray. An unknown length of time later, I cut down one of the last remaining imps and found myself facing Colonel Sanderson. A small team of men surrounded him. Several of the soldiers held grenades ready. Dripping with the black gore of my transformed kin and dressed in just a few scraps of my red suit, I waited silently to see whether my allies were about to become my enemies.
“Colonel,” a soldier shouted from the distance, breaking the tense silence. “We’ve just finished off the last of them, sir!”
Eyeing me speculatively, Sanderson debated about the wisdom of attempting to blow me up then sensibly decided not to. “Stand down, men,” he ordered and the grenades were put away. After seeing what I could do and knowing how hard I was to kill, he really didn’t have much choice. I’d only regenerate and then he would have to face a very unhappy and vindictive vampire.
“Did you manage to save any of the captives?” I asked when he picked his way over to me through the piles of corpses. Aware of the stares at my mostly naked, gore streaked body, I picked up a loincloth that had fallen off one of the imps. Tattered and filthy, it was better than nothing so I wrapped it around myself like an extremely short towel.
Sanderson signalled to one of his men. Bright lights sprang to life, showing the carnage all too clearly. “You gave us enough time to get most of them out,” he said. “The creatures didn’t even know we were there until we began our attack.”
Suddenly alarmed, I turned to view the bonfires. “Did you see any vampires during the attack?” At his quizzical expression, I elaborated. “They would have been wearing dirty, ragged clothing and look like they hadn’t bathed in weeks.”
Recognition dawned. “They were vampires? We thought they were recently captured humans.”
“Don’t tell me they got away?” I groaned in real anguish. After all the time and energy I’d put into hunting down the praying mantis, she’d waltzed right out from under my nose. With the First dead, their shadows were no longer in possession of them. The courtiers would once more be forced to obey the Comtesse’s commands.
“Are they dangerous?” Sanderson asked me.
“Only to me and my friends,” I muttered. And any good looking humans the Comtesse stumbles across. Apparently, the white haired witch went both ways and chose both men and women to torment.
“I’ll set up a task force to hunt them down,” he decided. “There were only a hundred or so.”
“I wouldn’t bother if I were you,” I told him wearily. “The Comtesse is ancient, crafty and way smarter than either of us.” And how it galled me to admit that. “She’ll find somewhere to hide and you’ll die from old age before you’ll be able to find her.”
Disgruntled at my unflattering assessment of his abilities to take down the vampires, the American kicked a lump of grey flesh away in frustration. “Do you really expect me to do nothing when I know a pack of unholy blood suckers is roaming around Europe?”
“Yep,” I told him bluntly. “Leave us alone or I can guarantee you’ll end up dead.”
“Sir!” A soldier yelled in close to panic. “A vampire has turned himself in and is asking to speak to, er, her.” He pointed at me, eyes flicking to my makeshift clothing then to my swords and finally to my face.
Debating the wisdom of allowing an unknown vampire to approach, the Colonel finally nodded. “Bring him over but keep him covered.”
I had no idea why any of the surviving vampires would want to speak to me. As far as I knew, all of the Court vamps wanted me dead.
Before the courtier reached us, Sanderson asked me a question that made my hackles try to rise. “Are you aware that your eyes are glowing orange?”
Without a mirror handy, I couldn’t verify that for myself. Then I remembered I did have a mirror of sorts and raised one of the swords. Sure enough, my eyes were glowing again. “That happens when I fight sometimes,” I told the soldier. It does now anyway.
As the six soldiers escorting the vampire reached the perimeter of lights, I had m
y confirmation that he was a courtier. His once pristine black suit and white shirt were now dirty and torn. He’d lost his red cummerbund at some stage and it gave him a less formal look.
Ignoring the guns trained at his heart and head, the vamp pushed his way through the soldiers. Dropping to his knees before me, he bowed down low. “My Queen,” he said in a tone that was close to being worshipful. “I am yours to command.” If he’d noticed the strange colour of my eyes, he didn’t seem to be put out by it.
“Your Queen?” Surely I hadn’t heard him correctly. At best, I was a lady, not a monarch. “Who are you and why are you suddenly on my side?” I asked him suspiciously.
Sitting up and tilting his head back, he stared at me with shining black eyes. “I was one of the guards ordered to dismember your body, my Queen.”
Sanderson started and his soldiers exchanged glances. “Thanks for that,” I said dryly. “You have no idea how long it took me to put myself back together.”
“When I saw that you did not die as a normal vampire should, I knew you were the one fated to rule us.” His teeth were blindingly white against his dirty face as he smiled. “I was the one who arranged for you to be buried in consecrated dirt,” he explained. “Once I saw that it did not burn your flesh, I knew it would keep you safe from our kin.”
“It did come in handy,” I said grudgingly. He has no idea exactly how handy it was. “I guess you were the one who passed the graveyard map to Igor.”
“Yes,” he said humbly and lowered his gaze modestly. “I was aware that he and Lord Lucentio were allies.” And Luc thought they’d managed to keep that a secret. “It was my hope that Igor might also be your friend and that he might be able to break you free.”
In the end, I’d broken myself free but I appreciated his effort. “What’s your name?”
“Nicholas, my Queen.” Joy shone through him simply because I’d asked.
