Encausse had told him that they were heading to the port before embarkation for the rest of the trip. Horst had naturally assumed he would awaken at the next dusk aboard a ship. Ideally not one called the Demeter; it never pays to tempt fate. He was therefore, astonished, delighted, and yet slightly disturbed to find himself aboard an aeroship, the Catullus, a relatively small but well-appointed pleasure yacht apparently donated or lent to the cult by one of its supporters. Horst was astonished because he had naturally understood the port they were making for to be a coastal one, not an aeroport, delighted because he had never been aboard such a vessel despite years of yearning, and disturbed because, once again, his benefactors seemed to have very deep pockets indeed.
Benefactors. No, that was looking very unlikely in itself. Presumably the bill for all this largesse would be presented on arrival at the castle.
The journey was eastwards; that much at least was apparent, and they had crossed the Channel onto the Continent as he slept the first day. Encausse was still evasive about details, and—for the moment at least—Horst was still reluctant to use methods of persuasion more supernatural than gentle nagging. For the moment at least.
Only Encausse’s two lieutenants had joined them aboard, leaving Horst’s admirer behind. This relieved him greatly. It would only have been a matter of time before he would have awoken one evening to find her fluttering around his stateroom in a peignoir, draping herself over the furniture here and there like a particularly available moth, and his life was complicated enough as it was.
The crew was small, and taciturn to a man. They wore black uniforms without any insignia at all, only the design of the clothes serving to designate rank and role. Horst, who had an eye for such things, noted the paramilitary styling of the uniforms and the distinctly Teutonic aesthetic informing them, and wondered if he was bound for the Germanys. He imagined the coincidence if they were to set down in Hesse, his homeland. He could drop in on his mother. And probably put her in her grave with shock. No, perhaps that wasn’t the best idea. His former life was gone, twice over. That Horst Cabal only lived on in memoriam and legal declarations of death in absence of a body.
So he sat silently in the yacht’s small but extravagantly appointed salon, watched the clouds go by, and accepted that he wasn’t really Horst Cabal at all, but just an echo of a slamming crypt door. He was aware of being observed at such times by Encausse and his people, and observed approvingly. The more laconic he became, it seemed, the more seriously he was taken. Certainly his brown studies were far more in keeping with the image of a saturnine Lord of the Dead, so he maintained them even when his spirits rose.
Instead of engaging his keepers in conversation, he amused himself by practising the abilities that had replaced such trivial things as being able to walk in direct sunlight without messily combusting. He did not care to practice the placing of the human will into neutral—it was too addictive a sensation—but he had always taken some pleasure in the remarkable bouts of speed of which he was now capable. They were short, a matter of seconds, but for those few seconds he could travel with such speed as to become momentarily invisible. This he tried and was pleased to discover he still did easily. Indeed, there was a distinct impression of improvement, which perplexed him. Where before he had found it necessary to apply himself carefully to navigating around obstacles, now it seemed so instinctive as to be reflexive. He hypothesised two possible reasons. Firstly, in his first bout of being vampirically inclined, he had been nervous about taking too much from any single donor in case he seriously weakened or, heavens forfend, killed them. His current experience, he realised, was the first time he had ever been truly replete. It made him feel powerful. It made him feel very good indeed.
The other theory was that, in conversation with his brother, Johannes had made reference to a steady increase of puissance throughout a vampire’s existence. Did that existence include periods as dust? Perhaps so. In any event, he found it child’s play to be out of his chair and into the corridor behind the sidekick of Encausse who had been surreptitiously watching him.
Horst saw the man start, heard him gasp, and smelled the adrenaline suddenly flush his system. The man reflexively turned to scan the corridor behind him and looked straight at Horst. Another little gift of the vampiric unlife was that of psychic invisibility. Horst pushed himself out of the man’s perception and the man accepted him as something of no interest. Indeed, with an irritated grunt, the man leaned to one side, looking past Horst as he looked for Horst. ‘Where the hell has that bastard leech gone?’ he muttered, proving that eavesdroppers seldom hear well of themselves.
As the man scurried into the salon to search behind the bar, under chairs, and beneath the cushions, Horst strolled forward at a more human speed, but still repressing his presence.
He heard voices and found them coming from the ventral observation room, a small chamber protruding slightly from the yacht’s belly, glass walled and floored but for a solid section on which were arranged a cluster of armchairs. The intention presumably was for the owner and his or her guests to gather here to look down on the world below, literally and figuratively. At night, however, the view was unengaging even to Horst’s sharp eyes. Occasionally the lights of a town might go by below, but otherwise the nocturnal landscape was disappointing.
Encausse and his other lieutenant were sitting there and watching the darkness, a half-empty bottle and a pair of wine glasses sitting on the table between them. ‘… set up for a fall,’ Encausse was saying. ‘I’ve got a couple of people who’d love to see me look a fool.’
‘Von Ziegler,’ offered the lieutenant, a surly man called Donner.
‘Von Ziegler for one, arse licker that he is. I can’t see how they can blame me, though. The mission’s a success. We have the vampire, alive and … Well, you know what I mean. Up and around. Not what I was expecting, though.’
‘Not what any of us were expecting.’
‘Did you hear what he said? He’s never killed anyone. What kind of vampire’s never killed anyone? I don’t understand why he was chosen. There must be others, mustn’t there? Even if they’re dust, we can still raise them. Vlad Țepeș. Lord Varney. And we end up getting Count Form-an-Orderly-Queue.’
He touched the side of his neck and winced at the memory. ‘Ours may not be to reason why, but I cannot help but wonder if the Ministerium hasn’t made a mistake.’
Horst raised an eyebrow. The Ministerium? Interesting. Very interesting. He had no idea what it meant, but that didn’t stop it being interesting.
‘I thought the order didn’t come from them?’ said Donner.
‘What?’ Encausse was taken aback. ‘Of course the order came from them.’
‘Well, maybe via them,’ conceded Donner. ‘I thought Her Majesty insisted.’
There was a definite sneer in Donner’s voice, and Horst wasn’t sure if the honorific was meant sarcastically or not. But then Encausse replied, ‘The queen wanted him?’ He sank back in his chair and took a draft of wine that was an indecent use of a good vintage. ‘I didn’t know. I didn’t know. I just thought … We fulfilled our orders to the letter. It’s not our fault the “Lord of the Dead” is a namby-pamby, is it?’
Donner shook his head. ‘We did as we were told. She was the one who did the choosing. She picked him, he’s her problem.’
Encausse seemed reassured by this line of reasoning. ‘Yes, true enough. We didn’t choose him. I’d have gone for a proper nosferatu if it had been left to me, not that bloody fop.’ Horst raised both eyebrows; spying was turning out to be quite hurtful to one’s feelings. ‘But what the queen wants, she gets, and she can’t blame anyone else if that’s a bad choice.’ A pause, and he added a little shakily, ‘Can she?’ He took another gulp of wine.
‘Wouldn’t worry about it. She’s hardly there most of the time. By the time she turns up again, his nibs will be the Ministerium’s problem. How he got from where he was to where he is won’t matter anymore.’
Further reassuring noises from Donner were interrupted by the arrival of the other lieutenant, Bolam. ‘He’s gone! He was in the salon and he just vanished! Poof! I was looking right at him! I can’t find him anywhere!’
The ensuing search was short and confusing for Bolam, as the missing Horst was found to be exactly where he was supposed to be, in the salon, watching the darkness through the aft windows.
‘Is there a problem, gentlemen?’ he asked as the three men burst through the door.
* * *
As dawn approached, he was escorted to his coffin perhaps more assiduously and with far more narrow-eyed suspicion than previously. To these unfriendly airs he seemed blithe and friendly, but he was markedly aware of them all the same and wondered how the night’s events might have altered their perception of him. Momentarily, he remembered standing behind the astonished Bolam, and the thought of how easily he might have reached out and snapped the man’s neck flittered across his mind. Before he could quell it, there was the flickering beginning of the next idea to follow on, a spectral carriage in a ghost train of thought. He saw Bolam’s exposed neck, saw the blood in him. How easy to drain, kill, and fling the corpse from the aeroship.
Horst paused by the coffin in the small, windowless freight hold as Bolam and Donner lifted the lid off. Encausse saw his face tighten and watched with concern as Horst swayed a little.
‘My lord? Did we leave it too close to daylight? Are you well?’
Horst swung his head sideways to look at Encausse. There was something dreadful burning in Horst’s eyes that made Encausse take a sudden breath in surprise and even fear, a sullen, dark fire that had no place in the face of anything human.
‘When we arrive,’ said Horst, and his voice was grating and unfamiliar even to him, ‘I will require blood.’
‘Yes.’ Encausse blinked quickly. He had a growing sense of danger of a sort that was alien and terrible to him. ‘Yes, my lord. It will be arranged.’
Horst shifted his gaze forward, and Encausse felt he could breathe more easily again. Horst stepped quickly into the coffin on its low bier, settled onto his back, and, for the first time Encausse had seen in their short acquaintance, crossed his arms across his heart. Scowling, Horst closed his eyes very positively, dismissing them with contempt by the action. Bolam and Donner were very happy to replace the coffin’s lid, and the three of them left the hold with haste.
They closed the hatch behind them and, without thinking, Encausse locked it—another first. He looked at his lieutenants in silence for a moment and saw that they were as pale as he felt.
‘Well,’ he said at last, unsurprised and unashamed by the waver in his voice. ‘Perhaps the Red Queen knows her business after all.’
An Interlude
‘Would you be so kind as to fetch me a notebook, Horst?’ said Johannes Cabal from his sickbed. ‘I keep a supply in the writing bureau there. Also, please charge my fountain pen and bring it with you. Yes, the black ink. It’s in the upper part, right-hand drawer.’
When he was supplied with these essentials, he settled down to fill the first few pages of the virgin notebook with a series of curious symbols, a coded shorthand of his own invention. Horst knew better than to interrupt.
Finally, Cabal looked up at Horst and asked, ‘Do you have any idea whatsoever as to how they resurrected you?’
Horst shook his head. ‘I was dead for much of it. All I saw were some people in robes. There was a bit of chanting going on as I recovered my wits, but that dried up pretty rapidly.’
‘Do you recall the language in which this chant was couched?’
Horst tilted his head and gave Cabal a wry look. Cabal pursed his lips and made another note.
‘Subject unable to identify even the language of the ritual due to lollygagging around in his youth instead of applying himself,’ Cabal recited as he wrote. He looked back at Horst to check his brother was suitably chastised, but only found him smiling and nodding.
‘I did apply myself, Johannes. Very enthusiastically. Just not on anything you’d find interesting.’ He leaned forward and said in a confidential tone, ‘My lollygagging was of a very high standard.’
‘Get away from me, you vile sewer,’ said Cabal coldly.
Horst’s smile widened. ‘You really have missed me.’
‘I…’ Cabal wavered. He closed his eyes and said, ‘Yes, I really have.’ He reopened his eyes and was relieved to find Horst looking somewhat surprised rather than smirking. ‘I bear a soul now, Horst. A wretched nuisance much of the time. Much of the time.’ He waved his pen impatiently at the momentarily befuddled vampire. ‘Carry on. What happened when you arrived at your destination?’
Horst took a moment to gather his wits, and returned to his tale.
Chapter 2
IN WHICH HORST MAKES THE ACQUAINTANCE OF HORRID PEOPLE
The arrival at the castle had been carefully timed to occur shortly after dusk, that the Lord of the Dead would be up and about and able to appreciate the power and the glory of the grand scheme to which he was being introduced. Encausse had spoken to the yacht’s captain to perhaps hurry things along a little so their undead cargo might be decanted while it still slumbered, but the captain said they were already at full speed just to stay on schedule and that they would arrive as planned, the only other option being to tarry a little and arrive late. Would that please M. Encausse? The thought of being cooped up in a small space like the Catullus with something like Horst Cabal was suddenly less bearable to M. Encausse after the events of the previous night, and so, no, M. Encausse would not be pleased by any delay. The captain had clicked his heels and returned to his post, and the yacht had sped on through the lightening skies.
Now, hours later and the darkness deepening her lines, the Catullus angled her approach and swept down towards the landing area prepared on the top of a wide circular tower, part of the great castle’s central keep.
The castle, a great looming monstrosity of clashing styles from both eastern and western Europe, stood above a small city that had certainly seen better days. Parts of it were in ruin, burnt to the ground during riots, while others were armed camps. It was a dying metropolis in a decaying country, and the castle rose above it all, haughty and unconcerned. It was a place for evil to fester, because none would or could stand against it. The castle was an abscess of corrupt ambitions in a place the world deemed unimportant and so, within it, wickedness fermented unseen and unchecked.
Horst was a friendlier creature when they opened his box; he didn’t mention that he had heard them lock the door previously and knew full well their attitudes to him had changed. Even without smelling the fear that swelled from their pores, the tension was clear in their faces, and this he sought to defuse with a smile and a weak joke about travelling cargo class. He also made a point not to mention that he had been conscious for some minutes already and could have unboxed himself quite happily before they arrived. Better to give them an illusion of at least that much control over him, he thought. The return of the silly fop persona did much to settle their nerves, although he could still almost see a little extra adrenaline pulsing around their weak, mortal bodies, to give them a head start on a fight-or-flight response should he suddenly decide that they were of more use to him as nourishment than companions. For all the good it would do you, he caught himself thinking, and crushed it down into a dark place in his mind that he did not recall being there previously.
‘We have arrived, my Lord Horst,’ said Encausse.
‘At this castle of yours?’
‘Not my castle,’ said Encausse, and laughed just awkwardly enough to obscure whether he was joking—as if he would have a castle—or truly thought Horst had believed that.
Horst was unsurprised that they were at their destination; he had known by the tilt of the yacht as it manoeuvred that it was no longer cruising and the timing fitted with what he had been told about the length of the trip. Oddly, he no longer felt very interested in exactly where they were. Such c
oncerns—borders, territories, flags, and nations—seemed very artificial and trifling. When he imagined the world now, it wasn’t as the political jigsaw of countries he had studied on maps as a schoolboy, but rather a living, physical world of mountain and forest, river and coast.
‘I have little luggage,’ said Horst, indicating the coffin and a small trunk containing several changes of clothes that had been waiting for him when he boarded. Remarkably, they were excellent fits. Less remarkably, he didn’t much care for the cut and choice of colours. They were very restrained, and black dominated throughout, with a little scarlet and imperial purple to lift affairs. But for these small peacock flashes, Horst thought they may as well have been chosen by his brother, a man for whom black and white would do until something less gaudy was devised.
‘That will all be attended to, my lord,’ said Encausse, and gave a sideways nod at the coffin while looking at Bolam to tell him that this was now his concern, thereby satisfying Encausse’s personal definition of ‘attended to’. Bolam shambled off to talk to the captain about it, thereby satisfying his.
‘It’s raining,’ said Horst suddenly.
Encausse looked at him with surprise. ‘Well … yes. How did you know?’
‘I can hear it,’ said Horst, and he could. He could smell it, too, along with a faint scent of wet stone, but this he kept to himself. He already made them nervous enough.
* * *
The rain was not heavy, but it was persistent and it swept in waves across the castle rooves. The Catullus had not set down—there was not quite enough room to do that safely—but instead had dropped off anchor lines fore and aft that were gathered up and run through heavy iron rings deeply emplaced in the stout stone parapets. Drawn tight by the gentle ascent of a few feet, she was held in position, barely moving even in the gusting wind that came in from the east. It was clearly a well-practised routine, and was carried out with familiarity and competence.
The Brothers Cabal Page 3
