The Beckett Vampire Trilogy: Midnight Wine, Lycan and Sanctuary

by Jan McDonald

  She matched him in strength and cold savagery during the kill, and her lust for the crimson liquor of life seemed unquenchable in these early days. So much like him. But he was also aware that he had to keep her old humanity a secret. How could he gain the co-operation of the other houses of the Born if he were to be found having not only to have turned her, but had allowed her to live – everything that was contrary to his loud protestations that all the Created were nothing more than vermin to be exterminated.

  He stroked her hair and pulled her to him. Her kiss was so much more than the mere touching of lips – it held promise of something deeper and darker and he knew that mere love-making would not even come close to satisfying his hunger for her. He made a decision. He would tell her everything – show her everything. He wanted her at his side in what was coming and he knew that she would demand no less.

  “There is someone I want you to meet,” he said.

  Lucy followed him down the sweeping staircase and further down to the crypt below them. A slight frisson erupted on her pale and translucent skin. She sensed him lying there – waiting.

  Vasile turned on the light and she was almost disappointed that the light had not come from a flaming brand on the wall. He ‘heard’ her thought and smiled – maybe there was a whisper of her old humanity there after all.

  Lucy was looking around the crypt and back again to the desiccated body of Vlad, lying in wait for the sustenance from the chalice that would wake him from the Long Sleep – long enough to almost be the Eternal Sleep.

  “I know who he is,” she said. “Your ancestor – Vlad.”

  “My great-grandfather.”

  “I would like my pendant back now, please. I know why you took it and I know what he wants. The chalice. You must know this – you gave me your blood, Vasile.”

  He nodded. “Yes. I knew the consequences.”

  “But I also know where the other half of my pendant is. Here, in the presence of Vlad, take my blood again and see for yourself.”

  She offered him her wrist, which he brushed away, reaching instead for her neck. “The old way,” he said.

  Her blood coursed through him, making him immediately aware of her incredible power. How could this be? She was Created and not of the Born, and yet her powers of psychometry and her ability to read even him, were amazing. He would need to be cautious.

  He allowed his mind to be filled with what she had seen.

  He was ‘inside’ the chapel on Snagov island and looking down onto the grave of a monk. He focussed his attention on her blood again and now the image of the skeletal hand clutching the other half of Lucy’s pendant became sharp.

  “Snagov,” he said. “I’m leaving now.”

  “And I’m coming with you,” she replied.

  He was momentarily annoyed, and then softened as he realised that she was going to be an asset not a threat. When he brought the rest of the Born to heel, she would make a fine consort as he took control.

  *

  Vampires flying through the air is pure Hollywood; effective but not accurate. They do, however, have incredible speed and also incredible networks that they call upon at a moment’s notice. It wasn’t just the High Council that had their own pilots and airplanes, and Alexis Vasilakis as head of the House of Vasilakis had command of such resources. And so, just two and a half hours after he had spoken to Nicolae, Davina, in the healing stage of the Long Sleep, had been carried from the private jet into a waiting limousine to take her to Alexis’s expansive home in Athens with its breath-taking view of the Parthenon. Alexis was in control of old money – very old money.

  He looked down at her sleeping and brushed a stray hair from her forehead, then he carefully revealed the wound in her chest – it had begun to heal well. Rage bubbled inside him at her treatment at the hands of Vasile Tepes and old scores unsettled now claimed priority attention. Vasile wanted his support in the seemingly inevitable war which was now no longer an option. He wanted a war – he would get one.

  Davina stirred and mumbled something incoherent. This was nothing unusual in this happening during the Long Sleep as the sleeper experienced visions and information from multiple vampire sources.

  “Shh,” he whispered. “Rest, Davina. I will take care of you.” And him, he thought. Time to involve the Ancients. Time to make a stand.

  She still appeared troubled and her wound had ceased to heal. She suddenly cried out and tried to sit up.

  “Davina, it’s Alexis. You’re safe, you need to sleep and heal.”

  She shook her head. “Not yet,” she managed in a hoarse whisper. “Listen. Vasile has turned her. He’s taken her for his consort and turned her.”

  Alexis was stunned. “Who?”

  “The English woman. He took her and he turned her and he is keeping her in his lair.”

  Alexis smiled at her. “You know this because you have seen it in the visions of the Long Sleep?”

  “Yes. And I saw something else, though I don’t know what it means. There is a chalice and there is a crypt below Vasile’s home where one of our kind is waiting. Vasile is going to Snagov.”

  Alexis knew its meaning; he had long suspected that the body of Vlad had never been at Snagov and every vampire House knew of the legend of the Blood Chalice, but remained complacent in the belief that it would never be found. Could it really be that Vasile Tepes was going to dare to restore Vlad by feeding him from the Blood Chalice? He dare not think of such consequences. There would certainly be a war then, and none of the other Houses would be able to stand up to Vlad. They never had. He leaned in close to Davina.

  “Are you sure?”

  She could only manage a small nod of confirmation before falling into the deep sleep of healing, her face portraying peace now she had managed to tell what she had seen to Alexis. She felt his admiration for her and she knew she had come home, however far from her birthplace that might be.

  Alexis covered her with an antique quilt and bent to kiss her before leaving the room with grim determination written on every pore. Vasile Tepes, the great reformer, the one who wanted to exterminate all of the Created as abominations, had done what he preached against because it suited him. His supreme arrogance at previous gatherings, where it had been obvious to every other vampire present that his ultimate intention was the subordination of all to the House of Tepes, with himself at the Head, had sickened Alexis. And Vlad? He shook his head. Not going to happen. Some dead vampires needed to stay dead. He had to act fast – had to find the chalice before Vasile.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN: ON THE BAYOU

  New Orleans is a city of the night, coming to life after sunset. Jazz music fills the streets and bars and the nightlife is focussed on the darker side of human and not-so-human nature. It’s a haven for vampires where they can feed on the constant stream of tourists, satisfying their hunger but leaving them intact. Most of those that provided such sustenance relished the fact. Easy pickings, so it seemed.

  Lafayette and Mihai combed the French Quarter, searching for traces of Jean-Baptiste Vincent – the oldest living vampire – now gone rogue if their eyes told them the truth.

  “What are you going to do if we find him?” Lafayette was in no mood for taking on the Ancient of Ancients – the First One.

  Mihai shook his head; he hadn’t thought past finding his maker, his mentor. Now it seemed as if they would meet on opposite sides. It hurt. But Mihai was the Patriarch of the Council and he could not forgive such callous slaughter as he had seen in Jean-Baptiste’s home. If it came to it, he would kill his maker personally. But first he needed the power of the First One.

  Like any large city, New Orleans had its teeming underbelly. This was likely to be Jean-Baptiste’s feeding ground – and he was going to be hungry if, as was now apparent, he had been in the Long Sleep since the turn of the millennium. It was also Lafayette’s city and Mihai was happy to follow his lead out of the city, towards the bayous, away from the tourist trails, and into the deeper, darker waters
cloaked in moss-draped cypress trees, trailing their tendrils into alligator-infested swamp. Out of the city and on the banks of the Mississippi, Lafayette struck a deal to hire a boat, speaking in Creole with one of the only humans locally to have any truck with the vampires of the Big Easy.

  Mihai boarded the boat that should have been condemned a decade ago with a reluctance that gave Lafayette great amusement. After a couple of wheezy coughs, the motor chugged into life and they left the shore and crossed the river to the brackish backwater.

  Occasional houseboats gave way to Louisiana wildlife, mainly of the alligator variety. Suddenly, around a bend, a floating shack came into view and Lafayette steered the boat towards its jetty and pontoon.

  A Creole woman in full traditional dress of long, layered check skirts and turban, worn out of love not commercial motive, appeared in the doorway. She looked like a rare exotic bird as she leaned against the door jamb and puffed heavily on a large cigar She eyed Mihai disparagingly.

  “So, Lafayette, you bring another blood-drinker to my door. You had better have good reason, child.”

  Lafayette grinned at her and greeted her in Creole. “Bonjour, Monique. Koman ou ye?”

  She gave a deep throaty laugh as she answered him. “I’m well, child. How is it with you? And more importantly, what do you want? Something to do with the blood-drinker that has just woken?” She laughed again at his look of surprise. “What? You are surprised the old voodoo queen knows what’s on your mind? Come on in and sit a spell, while I throw the bones. You want to know where he is? I can tell you, but it will cost you a bottle of rum.”

  “It’s yours.”

  She moved, cat-like, all hips and shoulders, into the dark interior of the cabin on the bayou. Once inside she indicated a sofa set against the wall, in front of which was her voodoo altar. Mihai remained impassive but Lafayette was obviously impressed by the tiers of candles, photos and statues of various saints, a human skull, an alligator skull, bones, sticks and beads, but most of all, candles. All were lit as if waiting for their request to be heard by the saints and Gods. Monique puffed hard on her cigar until it blazed in the dim interior of the cabin, and lit some charcoal from the bright ember. She threw on some incense and began moving in a circular motion in front of the altar, faster and faster until Mihai thought she would fall in a faint at his feet.

  Eventually she stopped, her eyes glazed, and collected the bones and shells from her altar. Without ceremony except for the muttering of what sounded like a curse, or failing that, someone had better look over their shoulder, she threw the bones and shells onto the floor. She knelt in front of them and stared at them for several minutes, all the while muttering under her breath, and then sucked air in loudly between her teeth that still clutched the smouldering cigar.

  “Many are converging on the prize you seek. The ancient blood-drinker is ahead of you and so is the enemy. Much blood will be spilled if he is allowed to steal the prize. The awakening of something ancient and evil will follow. But there is one who is young in the blood that will decide the outcome. Your destination lies across the ocean to where your enemy lays waiting. He is impatient and that which you seek was hidden where it was once proudly displayed.”

  “At the fountain?”

  Monique shrugged. “That is all the bones will tell me. The rest is up to you.”

  Mihai made an impatient noise and stood abruptly. Monique scowled at him.

  “Lafayette, you should teach your friend some manners. He needs to learn to respect the Loa of this place, or maybe they will teach him themselves.”

  Lafayette stood and hugged Monique. “Forgive him, Monique. I thank you and the Loa on his behalf and your bottle of rum will be with you as soon as I can arrange it.”

  She flashed a grin at him. “None of the tourist crap. Monique should have the best.”

  He grinned back at her. “Consider it done. I would never insult you with the tourist rum. I value my skin too much.”

  Mihai was already in the boat as Lafayette took his leave of Monique, and when he reappeared at the jetty, he spoke impatiently.

  “We have no time to waste. We need to get to the airport as soon as possible.”

  Lafayette frowned. “We? There’s a whole lot of ‘we’ in that statement. Do I get a say in this?”

  Mihai raised an eyebrow. “Of course. If you wish to assist in saving our kind then come; if not, then stay in this place and wait for the Born to descend and wipe you out. I can’t think they will take kindly to knowing your part in this so far.”

  Lafayette tipped back his head and let out a booming laugh, his white teeth flashing in the falling gloom. “You are very persuasive, Patriarch. I see my choice is no choice at all. You have a reputation of being a bastard and I see it is accurate. Where are we going?”

  “Transylvania.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT: SLEEP

  Beckett was beside himself, using all his vampire powers to try and track his beloved Darius. The boy was out of control and he should have seen it coming. He should have stayed with him despite all the curiosity about Roman Wolfe’s underground facility. He should have … should have, should have. The scenarios were endless and he had allowed his ‘adopted’ son to fall prey to instincts that he had to control or become irretrievable.

  He was mollified, only slightly, by the fact that Darius had slaughtered and fed on one of humanity’s vilest criminals. One who would never be mourned, never be searched for, and would never again prey on and torture life’s innocents. But that didn’t mean Darius wouldn’t succumb to the most predatory of instincts in a newly-turned vampire and gorge on the blood of an innocent. He wouldn’t be able to defend or protect him then from the fullest weight of the Council.

  Lane was tight-lipped as she too closed her eyes to overlook Darius and locate him.

  Both of them saw the bloodied, yet bloodless, remains of the man who had left the young child that he had just abused hunched in a corner, with nothing but terror etched on her tiny face and a blank stare in her eyes. It wasn’t far away and Lane left immediately to reach the child and erase her memory of the ordeal, or ordeals, that she had survived. She cleaned up the scene and put the child back into her bed, heavily under Lane’s influence, where she would sleep the sleep of the innocent for the first time in years. There was no trace of the incident or the man remaining when Lane left, and he would simply have disappeared. At least Darius was homing in on the unspeakable to feed, but that held its own dangers. If he continued to consume the blood of these filthy beings, it would taint him. She or Beckett had to find him before it was too late – before there was no going back.

  Beckett was calling to him across the ether, searching, tracking, and then suddenly he saw him.

  Dawn was breaking on the horizon and mist was crawling across the ground at ankle height around the gravestones. The Norman tower stood veiled against the rising dawn and Darius had tried to enter the sanctuary of the church, but found it locked against him. The hunger had robbed him of his new strength and he was huddled against a gravestone that was leaning to one side, his knees pulled up against the morning cold. Beckett ‘scanned’ the outside of the church and his mind settled on the noticeboard at the old lych-gate – St Mary Magdalene, Tormarton.

  He knew it. It was a small village just off the M4 motorway about an hour away from them, but he knew Lane would drive without care for speed limits so perhaps forty minutes. He prayed that Darius would stay hidden.

  They barely spoke as they sped towards Darius. Beckett tried to keep his ‘hold’ on him though communication had broken, but he could still ‘see’ him hunched against the cold granite.

  Thirty minutes past. Thirty-five. Forty – and the church tower drew them in.

  Beckett leaped from the car leaving the door open wide and Lane was right behind him. He spoke softly, responding to the desperate look in the young man’s eyes. “Darius?”

  Lane stood away, on the alert and ready to ward off any intruders on the s
cene, as Beckett lifted Darius effortlessly into his arms and headed towards the car. He sensed the rabid hunger, the blood-lust, rising – and the panic inside. There was only one way to dispel it.

  He opened a vein in his own wrist with practiced ease and held it towards Darius.

  “Drink,” he said, “and then sleep. We are taking you home.”

  Lane flashed a warning glance at him and he read her. They weren’t going home – they were heading back to the Strazca headquarters, to Roman Wolfe and to sanctuary. He nodded his understanding to her, picturing Darius sleeping in the next room to Roman Woolfe’s daughter, Lowell, subdued by the same cocktail of drugs that held the beast in her in check, at least until they could round up enough donated blood to keep him fed and his ravening hunger at bay.

  *

  Mike Travis waited for his friend, Beckett, at his wife’s side. She was still lost in her own world – a world where no demons existed and hell was a place in the imagination of ancient clerics. He read to her for a while, until she drifted into a contented sleep populated only by pleasant dreams. He watched her for a while and then, unable to keep his thoughts positive, he went in search of Roman.

  He had only been part of the Strazca for a short while, during which time he had been hunting minor and not-so-minor, demons whilst studying in the vast library on the first floor of Linwood House, the Strazca headquarters owned by Roman Woolfe, the head of the organisation. His old friend, Martha Treneglos, served there as librarian, but he shunned the usual peace of the library and went in search of Roman. The man had many questions to answer and Mike was angry.

  He found Roman in his ground-floor study and entered without knocking.

  “So, when were you going to tell me about her? What else have you kept from me? I think I have earned your trust, for God’s sake! What other secrets are you keeping? I mean, I have practically lived here for the past six months and only now do I find out about the underground facility where your daughter is lying in a drug-induced coma to keep lycanthropy at bay!”