Then he made his way farther along the tunnel, stopping at a stainless-steel door. He placed his forehead against a rubber buffer, pressing his eyes against the scanners. His retinas were checked. Then he entered a code only he knew on a numeric keypad, his fingers flying over the keys faster than any human could ever hope to imitate, entering twenty-seven numbers in the appropriate sequence in less than four seconds. Last, but not least, he removed what appeared to be an old-fashioned key from a chain around his neck and inserted it in the keyhole. While the key looked old, it was state-of-the-art, sending the correct electrical impulse to the last hold on the door’s locks.
With muted clicks, the fourteen two-inch-thick steel bolts holding the door in place retracted and the door slowly swung open on powerful hydraulic arms. The chamber beyond was surrounded by twelve-foot-thick mixed metal/concrete walls. The builder had assured Vampyr that there was no technology short of a direct nuclear hit that could get through these walls. It was similar to what lined the presidential bunker under Blue Mountain in West Virginia. Vampyr had thanked the builder, then had him killed.
Vampyr walked into the chamber and turned on the low-level lights. The contents of the chamber were a madman’s — or a powerful country’s — arsenal. Eight backpack tactical nuclear weapons rested on a long table. Each was small enough to fit inside a medium-sized piece of luggage. The American government had never acknowledged their theft, nor did it have a clue who had stolen them.
Along one wall was the control console from a missile launch site that he had appropriated from one that had been shut down in Montana. Scattered around the island were twelve Peacemaker ICBM rockets in working condition stored in silos, harvested from the drawdown in the Cold War. The silos were on an old Navy base that had once existed on the island, and it had cost Vampyr half a billion dollars to get them into working condition and almost as much to ensure secrecy.
On each Peacemaker was a strategic nuclear warhead, each powerful enough to take out a city. He had had them recovered from American nuclear submarines that had gone down in the oceans, using one of his subsidiary salvage companies. Such was the bureaucracy of the Pentagon that the twelve weren’t even reported as missing. Located in Puget Sound, he could reach anywhere in the United States with the missiles. He had a similar compound, staffed with Russian warheads from their lost submarines, and Russian rockets from their disarming, located just south of Kiev, with the same capability for all of Russia and Europe. He could launch those from here.
Vampyr ran a hand along one of the tactical nuclear warhead’s metal housing, almost the caress of a lover.
In the middle of the room, however, was the centerpiece of his arsenal. A triple-enclosed biohazard container. Inside were three different viruses. One developed by the Russians, one American, and one Japanese. Because of their lethality, each had scared their creators so much that immediate orders had been issued for their destruction. By the time the orders were implemented, Vampyr’s far-flung organization had already gathered samples of each. The container was truly Pandora’s box. If opened, it would spread three distinct viruses, each 99.9 percent lethal and highly contagious. One such virus might be contained. There was the remote possibility two could be. But three? The world would be dead within two months.
Money was power, and Vampyr had plenty of that. But this was power also, in a much different form. The most important power, though, was the ability to be ruthless, to be able to make the hard decisions. To be able to use these weapons if necessary. And that was something Vampyr had more of than any creature that had ever walked the face of the planet.
Vampyr had been made during the time of the Airlia Gods. He had lived through the rule of the Shadows, and the time when men thought they ruled but were actually still being manipulated by the minions of the Airlia. He had fought in many wars with many different weapons.
The humans now thought it was truly their time, given that they had defeated the Airlia. They were wrong. It was his time.
“It is time for the Fourth Age,” Vampyr whispered to himself. “The Age of the Undead.”
THE PAST
CHAPTER 1
Egypt: 8000 B.C.
Before the third age of Egypt which was the rule of the Pharaohs, there was the Second Age, when the Shadows of the Gods made by the God Horus ruled, and before that, beyond the borders of what man knew as recorded history, there was the First Age, when those Gods, known as the Airlia, ruled the humans who lived along the lush banks of the Nile.
It was the time of the Gods who came to Egypt from the legendary land of Atlantis beyond the Middle Sea after the great Atlantean Civil War. It was fifty-five hundred years before the Great Pyramid would be built by the Pharaoh Khufu according to the plans handed down by the Gods. For now the Giza Plateau was graced only by the alien beauty of a magnificent Black Sphinx, over three hundred feet long with red eyes that glowed as if lit from within. The Black Sphinx, set deep in a depression carved into the plateau, guarded the main entrance to the Roads of Rostau. The warren of tunnels and chambers under the plateau was where the Gods lived, and from which they ruled through the human high priests, occasionally venturing forth to look out upon their subjects, an event that was becoming rarer and rarer. There were whispered rumors that the Gods were growing older, but how could that be, if they were indeed Gods?
Deep under the plateau, along one of the minor branches of the Roads, was a dead-end corridor with three cells along one side. In the first cell were what appeared to be a pair of black metal coffins over seven feet in length by three wide and high. They were not coffins, however, but special prisons, each holding a body. At the head of each tube was a small glowing panel with a series of hexagonal sections on which were etched markings in the High Rune language of the Gods.
Inside the tube closest to the cell door was a half-man, half-God, whose existence was one of unending exhaustion and pain. His name was Nosferatu. He had memories of sunlight and playing in the sand while a woman — his human mother — stood nearby, keeping a watchful eye on him. He’d even played with true humans, children of the high priests, who could look forward to serving the Gods as their parents did. Nosferatu’s fate was to be one of service also, but in a much different way. His memories were of a time so long ago that he often wondered if the vague memories were not memories at all but instead a dream. Yet he held on to the concept that he could not dream something he had never seen. He must have been above ground in the sunlight sometime. He remembered palm trees and the sun reflecting off a sand dune and even the blue water of the mighty Nile flowing by. He remembered the stories the high priests told to their children, tales of Atlantis, the Gods called Airlia, and the great civil war among the Gods that had destroyed Atlantis. He’d listened to the other children being taught the language of the Gods and learned as much as he could along with the High Rune writing.
It was all for naught, though, because when he’d reached manhood, he’d been taken from the sunlight and brought below to serve. Three hundred years he’d been trapped in this tube in this underground cell. Not as a punishment, for he had done nothing to deserve this fate other than to be born who and what he was, but to serve the purpose for which he had been conceived: to provide pleasure in a most strange and twisted way for the Gods.
And although he had been the first, Nosferatu was no longer alone. There were four others in tubes in the two adjoining cells whom he could reach with hoarse whispers. And in the tube across from him in this cell was Nekhbet. His love. She was the bastard spawn of the God Osiris and a human High Concubine, brought there over a hundred years before, when Nosferatu was beginning to believe the world was comprised only of the mute priests who opened the lid and brought him human blood every new moon and the Gods who came every so often to in turn drain his blood. Now, once every month he got to sit up when the lid was opened, chains around his waist keeping him in the tube, and see his love while the mute priest held the silver flask containing blood just collected from sup
plicants to his lips. Even in the dim light and the grave circumstances, every time during that brief interlude Nosferatu always marveled at her beauty. Alabaster skin, high cheekbones, black-red eyes, she was tall and willowy, with blazing red hair flowing over her shoulders like a fiery waterfall. He always believed she represented the best of human and God.
Nosferatu’s skin was also pale white, his hair bright red. His eyes had a reddish tint to them and the suggestion of an elongation of the pupil. He was tall, well over six feet in height, and slender. His skin was stretched tight over his bones, giving him a skeletal appearance. He was indeed half-man, half-God, as were his prisoner comrades. Although he had been alive over three hundred years, he appeared to be in his midthirties, the mixed human/God blood in his veins and the sustenance of human blood allowing him a vastly longer life span. How long that life span would be he had no idea and he feared either possibility.
In the beginning he had tried to count days, a most difficult task since no sunlight penetrated so far under the Giza Plateau, along the Roads of Rostau into the realm of the Gods. He’d worked off the opening of the tube and the blood he was fed once a month, keeping track. But after the number went into the hundreds, he gave up. What did it matter? Even with the half blood of the Gods and the constant feeding, he knew he was very slowly getting older and that he would spend all of his however-long life there.
He heard the latch securing the lid slide open and closed his eyes, prepared for the invasion of torchlight that came with each feeding. He felt the shift in the air as the lid was swung up.
“The Gods must die or you will never escape this. You will die a miserable death after a long and worthless life.”
The words echoed off the stone walls of the chamber and the shocked face of Nosferatu as he opened his eyes and blinked. Leaning over him was a woman. Only men whose tongues had been cut out and ears punctured had come to feed him all these long years, never a woman. She was a human, not a God, dressed in a long black cloak with silver fringes. She did not wear the signs of the priests. She had short black hair, dark eyes, and pale skin. She was the first human other than the priests that Nosferatu had seen in over two hundred years. Looking past her, he could see a man, wearing leather armor and holding a sword, standing in the corridor, keeping watch. He too had dark hair, but his skin was tanned. He was peering down the corridor, on guard.
She looked deep into Nosferatu’s eyes, then reached up and placed a finger on his throat, feeling his pulse. She then looked at the shunt in his neck from which he was drained to feed the Gods and lightly touched it. “You’ve been used for a very long time, haven’t you?”
Nosferatu slowly sat up, the belt around his waist chained to the bottom of the tube keeping the lower half of his body in place. Around each arm and leg were straps with leads going into the side of the tube. Each time before he went to sleep, sharp pain came through those leads, causing his muscles to quiver and work themselves in tiny movements. And each time he came awake to the same pain. He had little idea how long he slept but he had no doubt it was longer than a normal night’s sleep. There was also a headpiece, shaped like a crown, in the tube, set in a small recess near the top, but Nosferatu had never had it put on his head by the priests, so he didn’t know its purpose.
He looked over at the other tube in his cell. The woman caught his gaze and went to it, opening the top and waking the occupant by tapping the appropriate hexagon on the panel. Nekhbet sat up, blinking. He could see that Nekhbet was also wondering who this stranger was and what she knew of their situation. The woman came back over to him, waiting for an answer. He didn’t reply, waiting to see if she would tell him more. He had patience — if there was one thing three hundred years of imprisonment taught, it was that trait. “You won’t last much longer,” the woman finally continued. “You have no choice. If you do not act, you will eventually die. Each time they drain you, the percentage of their blood in you is reduced and the human percentage grows. Soon you will no longer be effective for their needs. Then they will take another human female and make your replacement. They may already have a child, like you were once, growing up, guarded closely on the surface, ready to come here and be placed in this tube and drained as needed. They are very good at planning for their own needs and pleasures.”
Nosferatu finally spoke. “How do you know this?”
“It is their way. They are not Gods, but creatures from”—the woman pointed up. “From among the stars. They use us — humans — and they use you, half of their blood, half human. It is hard for me to determine which is the worse of their sins. At least what they are doing to you is obvious. Their rule of the humans is more devious, pretending to be that which they aren’t.” The woman shrugged. “There is also the possibility that the Gods may decide to go into the long sleep as their brethren have done in other places, in which case they will kill you and the others they keep down here, as you will longer be needed.”
Nosferatu tried to grasp the concept, but it had been so long since he’d been on the surface he could barely remember the sun, never mind the stars. And how could one be from them? If the Airlia weren’t Gods, then what exactly were they? And what did that make him? And what was this long sleep she spoke of?
“Why do you want to help us?” Nekhbet asked. “You are human. We aren’t. We’re half like them.”
“Because you must hate them as much as I do and more than those above,” the woman replied. “Most humans”—she shook her head—“they are like sheep. Simply happy their harvest comes in and the Gods make all the decisions for them.”
Nekhbet’s lovely voice floated from across the chamber. “You cannot kill the Gods. They are immortal.”
Donnchadh pulled aside her robe, revealing six daggers tucked into her belt. “With these you can. They were made by the Gods themselves for use against each other.”
Nekhbet still wasn’t convinced. “Even if we kill the Gods, the priests will then slay us, won’t they?”
The woman glanced over her shoulder at Nekhbet. “Not if you are immortal.” Nosferatu was the first to grasp the significance. “The Grail?”
The woman nodded. “You kill the Gods. You go into the Black Sphinx and recover the Grail, which is hidden there, then partake as has been promised by the Gods since before the beginning of time. You become immortal.”
“Who are you?” Nosferatu demanded, trying to process all that she had said. “My name is Donnchadh. My partner”—she looked into the corridor at the warrior—“and I have fought the Gods in other places. That should be enough for you. Your enemy is our enemy.”
“Your enemies are our parents,” Nosferatu noted.
“One of your parents,” Donnchadh corrected, looking him in the eyes. “Your other parent was human, taken by an Airlia — the Gods — for their pleasure and to produce you so they can use you for their pleasure also. The Gods deserve neither your homage nor your respect. They will drain you and kill you without a second thought once they have a replacement ready or if they no longer desire the pleasure your blood brings them.”
“How can we do this which you propose?” Nosferatu demanded, rattling the chains that held the belt at his waist.
Donnchadh pulled out a three-foot-long piece of black metal. “Tonight. After the Ceremony of the Solstice. You can follow the Gods who oversee it from the ceremony to their hidden places along the Roads.” She pulled the metal rod out of her belt and placed the tip inside one of the links of chain that bound him. She raised an eyebrow. “Do you want your freedom?”
Nosferatu looked across the way at Nekhbet. Even if this woman lied, even if this was a trap, he didn’t care. If he could simply hold Nekhbet in his arms after more than a hundred years of yearning, it would be worth it. “Yes.”
Donnchadh twisted the rod and the link slowly gave, then popped open. She went to work on the other chains and within five minutes Nosferatu was free. He removed the straps around his arms and a red light flickered on the console but he ignored
it. Grabbing the lid, he pulled himself out of the tube.
When his feet reached the ground, he took a tentative step and his legs buckled, tumbling him to the floor. Donnchadh was already at work on Nekhbet’s chains as Nosferatu struggled to his feet. The tube had worked his muscles, but his body was so unused to moving that he had to put a hand against the wall to steady himself. Driven by a force stronger than gravity he took a step. And then another. By this time, Nekhbet was free and the woman was helping her out of the tube. Nosferatu staggered across to Nekhbet and took her in his arms.
With the touch of her flesh against his, Nosferatu was transported from the stone chamber that had been his prison for centuries. He wrapped his arms tight around her slight frame as if their flesh and bones and blood would meld together and they would become one.
“Are you tired?” Nekhbet whispered.
“Not anymore.”
“You are weak, though.”
Nosferatu blinked as she offered her neck to him, the blood pulsing in the vein, the short tip of the shunt drawing him in. He knew he needed the energy, but from Nekhbet?
Her voice was a seductive whisper. “Take as they take, my love. You are the Eldest and must lead. You need the strength. I am younger. I can afford to give it to you. I want to give it to you. It will make us one as nothing else can. And you must lead us.”
He couldn’t stop. His lips curled around the shunt, the one-way valve opening at the touch of moist flesh on the outside. The first taste of blood was electrifying, a charge throughout his body that brought every nerve screaming alive as it coursed through his veins. Decades of exhaustion faded. Her blood, with its alien component, was so much more than the human blood he was fed each month.
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