chapter 9
I
In the fog blurry figures met. However, above them the moon shone at its zenith, and beneath their feet stars twinkled. The two of them were in a long, long corridor with no end in sight.
“I haven’t seen Lord Danae. Where has he gone?” asked the voice of Baron Gildea.
“Might he not be downstairs in the wine cellar?” said Zangleson.
In light of where the two of them were, their conversation seemed a little strange—actually very strange.
The baron clicked his tongue loudly and said, “Ever the carefree one. Though it’s been said he was bringing the human woman Duchess Mizuki wished to meet.”
“He cares more for drink than for women.”
“Hmm,” the baron replied noncommittally. “The underground levels, you say? Had it ever occurred to you they might have a connection to the outside?”
“Those on surveillance check them daily.”
“Inside and outside are in different phases. A gap a micron wide would be a rift three feet wide in here.”
“Is something troubling you?” Zangleson inquired.
“I just have the feeling I saw a figure.”
“A figure, you say?”
The fog enveloped the pair—and then receded.
“It matters not. Surely I must be mistaken,” said the baron. “More importantly, I am most curious as to why Duchess Mizuki should wish to meet with that girl.”
“Another bad habit—one I hope you will keep in check.”
“Understood. I have been charged with another duty of great importance. Zangleson, do you think I can triumph over that man?”
Silence shrouded the aged steward. The fog crept stealthily across the ground, clung to him, and then pulled away as if realizing it’d made a mistake.
“If there is any chance of victory—”
“Yes?”
“—it may well hinge on the fact that we are dead, while he is neither dead nor alive. In a battle where lives and souls are on the line, that ambiguity is a powerful enemy.”
“If I were to input a specific field of battle into the computer, it might be able to create a new weapon. My thanks, Zangleson. I believe I feel like doing this now.”
The baron left at a good clip.
Training his gaze to the right, the aged steward mused, “Despite what I said to the baron, Duchess Mizuki and a human girl is an odd combination—bizarre, even. A conversation between a Noble and human—perhaps relating to life and the soul, I wonder?”
He murmured the words in a tone that was terribly weary, yet also full of expectation.
Meg was in the fog. She wondered if she wasn’t perhaps in a jail. But to either side of her there was only mist.
The instant Baron Gildea’s line had wrapped around her, her whole body had been paralyzed and she’d lost consciousness. The next thing she knew, she was here.
“Is anybody there?” the girl shouted, but on seeing that there was no reply she quickly got to her feet.
Oddly enough, there was nothing wrong with Meg. In fact, every inch of her seemed full of energy. She had no trouble moving around.
“So good of you to come,” said a voice from the fog up ahead.
Well, the boss is here, the girl thought.
It was a woman’s voice. Meg could tell she must’ve been beautiful beyond imagining. However, those who heard her voice had frost form on their chests, and before they knew it their hearts were dying.
“I am Duchess Mizuki Dandorian, commander of the conversion center. And I would have your name.”
“Meg Stow. I’m the darling of a fishing village!”
The girl got the worst possible reaction—no reaction at all.
She doesn’t know what to make of me, either, I guess, she thought.
But then the woman’s voice said, “Are you acquainted with this?”
Something came flying, pushing its way through the fog to fall at Meg’s feet. It made a sound like meat being tenderized. The naked woman who’d fallen flat on her back stared up at Meg with the vacant eyes of the dead.
“That’s—”
“It’s the woman who rendered you unconscious and put you into a conversion pod. What’s more, she actually had wits enough to operate that pod.”
“A conversion pod . . . ?”
A sensation of cold rising from the pit of her stomach turned Meg into a corpse. What had happened back there after she’d lost consciousness?
“Since that time, have you not found yourself different?”
The Noblewoman’s answer had been another question.
Meg didn’t know what to say.
“You give no answer. That is your answer,” said the duchess. “Very well, let me ask you this: since that time, have you felt fatigued?”
Nothing from Meg.
“How about pain?”
No reply.
“Fright, then?”
Nothing.
“When in combat, did you ever think you might be defeated?”
Silence.
“One final question,” the woman said, her voice seeming to carry laughter. “Do you detest blood?”
“Stop it!” Meg shouted shrilly, kicking at the floor.
The girl sought some outlet for the anger surging through every inch of her body. However, it was fear that propped up that anger. To rid herself of that fear, Meg was going to bring her anger to bear on the woman in the fog.
Not there. Or there. Or there.
She ran. And ran.
The fog alone went on and on.
Meg halted and looked all around.
The voice came to her, saying, “Not even short of breath. You ran eleven hundred yards in thirty-two seconds and you aren’t even tired, are you?”
“So what? That’s because I’m in good shape from being out on the sea!”
“Hmm. Well, the sea doesn’t have this.”
Meg’s field of view was dyed red. An enormous volume of liquid had been dumped over her head. It was warm, and it had that color.
“It’s blood,” the woman’s voice informed her dispassionately. “A human would bellow about how loathsome it was. They would feel filthy and need to wash it off. But what about you?”
“That’s a dumb question! I feel the same!” Meg shouted as loudly as she could.
“Whatever is the matter? I can’t hear you,” the woman replied.
“Huh?”
That’s a dumb question! I feel the same!
“I still can’t hear you,” the woman laughed. “Your voice won’t come out. Not with your tongue out like that.”
Before she’d even finished listening to what the woman had said, Meg grasped the meaning of the words. Her tongue was licking at the blood running down her cheek!
“I . . . I . . . I . . .”
Like a woman possessed, the girl pulled her tongue back in and spit.
“How is the taste?”
“Vile. It’s disgusting!”
Meg swung her head wildly from side to side. What the hell would I know about the taste of blood? It was salty. Tasting of iron. Not good. So disgusting . . . So . . . So . . . Oh . . . So delicious.
“That one came to me and boasted how she had made you just like herself.”
By “that one,” the duchess meant the woman who lay there.
“The conversion affects people differently. In your case, hmm—you are an ideal specimen. The question is, how long will you last?”
A chill pierced the girl from the top of her head down to her crotch.
“How long? What do you mean by that?”
“I wish to ask you something,” the duchess said, ignoring Meg’s question. “Do you yet wish to save your compatriots?”
“I, er, yeah, of course I do. That’s why I came here!”
“I can let you have them back.”
“What?”
A fresh shock speared through the girl’s body.
“I refer to your fellow villagers. A numbe
r of them are as yet human. And I will return them to you in that state. However—”
Meg’s body stiffened.
“—you are to aid us in destroying that man, D.”
“Stop talking nonsense. Why would I have to kill him?!”
“Because you are his enemy now.”
Meg thought her blood had actually frozen. That, because she had actually nodded at the duchess’s words.
“Your heart may not yet accept it, but your body knows,” the duchess said in a rather detached tone. “Listen to me, and deceive yourself no longer. You can already feel it. You may run him through with this.”
There was a hard clatter at her feet. It was unclear exactly where they’d found it, but it was Meg’s harpoon.
“Look—here he comes!”
Meg heard the sound of footsteps approaching from up ahead.
“This, in exchange for your compatriots. Not a bad bargain. Quickly, run him through the heart!”
When the footsteps were about fifteen feet away, D took shape. He was approaching without ever stopping.
“He still thinks you’re human,” the duchess told Meg. “You could slay him with ease now. Catch him unaware and stab the life from him. And then your compatriots may safely return to your village. You shall become my true servant. And blood will make your body tremble with the joy of living.”
D now stood right in front of Meg. His eyes were so cold they seemed to regard anyone before him as stone, but now they gazed at Meg with a gentle warmth.
A rising emotion she couldn’t keep in check made Meg’s heart quaver. He was beautiful—and that alone was enough to steal her heart.
Meg shook her muddled head and readied her harpoon. D didn’t move. The girl screamed something unintelligible even to herself. The harpoon flew. Meg watched dazedly as it sank into the stone floor and shook violently.
“I can’t do it,” the girl said. “How could I kill somebody to save somebody else? I’d rather do this first.”
Meg extricated the harpoon. It felt terribly cold when she put it against the nape of her neck. She slashed the carotid artery open, and her body toppled with a geyser of blood.
In no time the twitching had stopped, and from the depths of the fog a voice said, “When something is gained, something must be lost. However, sometimes either will do . . . Zangleson, put the girl in the cage down below.”
The pain in her throat woke Meg up. And then her eyes went wide. Watching over her was a heavy darkness. A pale green light spilled from somewhere, revealing an expanse of stone chunks about thirty feet ahead of her.
Before even wondering where she was, Meg put one hand to her throat and murmured, “I should’ve known, if it’s not a stake to the heart—I can’t die.”
Just then, across the stony blocks there was a bizarre, almost carnivorous snarl. A black shape was moving around.
“I wonder if getting my head bitten off would destroy me?” the girl mused. “Okay, bring it on.”
Meg got up and beckoned to her black foe. Her high spirits were due to the confidence she had in her now-vampiric body.
Suddenly the restless black figure leapt, landing about ten feet in front of Meg. He wore an azure cape and a mask. His right hand grasped a longsword.
Meg stood there without saying a word. Surprise had bitten off her tongue, and grief had sewn her mouth shut.
“Wesley . . . That’s you, isn’t it?”
There was no answer, and he came at her with the sword. His speed was faster than Meg’s eyes could follow. The old Meg’s eyes.
The flash of silver was aimed at her neck, but Meg bent backward just enough to narrowly evade it, then shot her foot out at Wesley’s shin.
Wesley’s shin shattered. As he fell, he spun himself around hard. His grip on the longsword had changed briefly, and Meg couldn’t follow the weapon’s movements.
A swirl of light filled the girl’s retinas, and from there the glint streaked toward her chest with a tail like a shooting star’s. A blistering heat slid into her between the breasts. A scream spilled from Meg. Her brain seemed about to explode. The world was stained crimson.
I’m finished, she thought.
Are you okay, Meg? someone whispered. I didn’t stab you through the heart.
In an instant she understood.
Wesley?!
Use the sword to stab me, he whispered to her. It’s the only way to save yourself. I’m under orders. I can’t fight them.
II
“Why you? Did that woman make you do this?” the girl asked.
That’s right.
Meg felt her whole body tremble like she had the ague. For the first time in her life she was shaken by the urge to murder somebody else.
The duchess had deduced the relationship between Meg and the man. She knew how Meg felt. And how Wesley felt, too. And that was why she’d sent him to assassinate Meg. Making him kill the woman he loved—could there be any more twisted form of entertainment?
Still gripping the longsword, Wesley twisted it around with both hands.
Meg writhed in a pain beyond description.
Take this. Stab me. Fulfill your purpose here!
“Wesley,” Meg said, almost in a whisper. “Kiss me.”
Her human lips met those of the mask. The kiss that should’ve been shared in another world here had the taste of blood to it.
“Ooooooh!” Meg shouted, springing back up. Power was filling her. For the mask had been spattered with Meg’s blood.
Wesley had been slammed into a wall a good fifteen feet away, and Meg bounded for him. In midair she grabbed the handle of the longsword with both hands and pushed. The tip of it poked out her back.
“Wesley, we’ll be together on the other side!”
Her voice spun around.
As Wesley was pinned against the wall, Meg crashed into him back first. The blade protruding from her back pierced Wesley’s chest. She didn’t know whether it was through the heart or not. It had just been instinct. However, through the blade Meg could distinctly feel the thumping of Wesley’s heart. It was quickly growing weaker. Meg hadn’t erred in her aim.
The longsword had stopped at its hilt. The tip had gone through the chests of both Meg and Wesley, and was imbedded in the stone wall.
“Meg . . .”
When he said her name right in her ear, his voice was awfully calm—the sort of voice that presaged whispered words of love.
Tears spilled from Meg’s eyes.
But that was all there ever was—
Meg extracted the longsword. There was only resistance from the wall before Meg pulled it from her own body.
When one of the vampires’ companions was destroyed, there was no telling what form they’d take. In most cases, it depended on how much time had passed since they’d first been drained and changed, though there were exceptions to this.
Meg turned around. The cape and mask were covered with gray dust.
Squatting down, Meg picked up the mask and gently pressed it to her cheek. There were a million things she wanted to say, but she couldn’t decide which to let past her lips.
“Wesley.”
That was all there was.
Though Meg wanted to stay like that forever, her self-imposed mission made her get to her feet again.
Setting the mask back down in the ash, she said, “I’ll come back for you.”
Turning around, she spotted the iron door beyond all the rocks. It’s probably locked, she thought, but a vampire’s strength might be able to do something about that.
There was no need for that. Before Meg could even touch the door it swung wide, revealing a blond man in a crimson cape.
“Ah?!” was all Meg said as she stiffened.
This was the one Noble she didn’t know how to handle.
It was Lord Danae who made the first move. Clapping a hand on her shoulder, he broke into a grin and said, “You’re safe, I see.” He then eyed her from head to toe, at which point his expression grew dour
for a moment, then quickly gave way to a carefree smile. “So, you’ve become one of us, have you? Oh, that’s splendid.”
“Spare me!” Meg shouted, all the while trying to keep the anger off her face. “It’s not like I’m one out of choice. So don’t you dare go thinking how convenient it is that you guys have got a new servant.”
“Don’t say such heartless things,” Danae said with a wry grin. “I still owe you a debt. I raced here so you wouldn’t die before it was repaid. Why, I was astonished when I heard the duchess had captured you and had you thrown into the battle cage in the basement!”
Meg’s eyes went wide. Could it be this Nobleman had come to save her?
“You’re here to help me?”
“I suppose I am.”
Conceited though Danae’s retort seemed, it didn’t annoy the girl. At the very least, he was trying to keep his promise to a human.
“But I’m surprised you were fine. Who was your opponent?”
Meg shook her head. That seemed enough for Danae to understand.
“Ah. You mean to say it was that boy? Duchess Mizuki can be so cruel. To order a man who loved you to fight you to the death.”
“That’s just how Nobles are!” Meg spat. “But he protected me right to the bitter end. Even though they made him a Noble, and dressed him like one. I swear I’ll never be like the rest of you, either. And I’ll save the villagers if it’s the last thing I do.”
“You are welcome to do as you wish in that matter. I can take you to them,” Danae said.
“What?”
“Before I could fulfill my promise to bring you to the castle, you came here on your own. That being the case, I have no choice but to bring you to your compatriots.”
“Are you sure?” Meg asked, astounded. “But that’ll make you a traitor!”
“Anyone concerned about being labeled a traitor has no business being a Noble in the first place.”
“That’s so cool,” Meg murmured, but Danae seemed unfamiliar with the expression and merely furrowed his brow. He was a Noble, after all.
“Well, shall we go?”
The two of them set off. They were in a corridor. Both the ceiling and the walls had exposed pipes running along them like veins.
Turning, Danae said, “Where has that damned Zangleson gone?”
Undead Island Page 15
