by Alix Adale
A thing shuffled past the window, the outdoor track lighting throwing its shadow against the blinds. The person was large, whoever or whatever it was. It tried the door handle but even after finding it locked, it kept rattling the knob. More shuffling horrors approached, crowding against the door.
“New-risen vampires,” she hissed at Dreck. “Must be!”
He nodded in agreement, turning the armchair over and laying it as a barrier between the bed and the door. Outside in the dark, the shapes started throwing their shoulders against the portal.
A horrible thought sprang to mind. How could there be new-risen vampires here, of all places? The lore was clear. A newborn vampire will rise a few hours to a few days after turning. When it arises, it awakes in a mindless, feral state, its only goal to kill and drink blood. Somebody had created these newborns tonight. What other vampire was here besides Dreck? He’d done this—but why? To test her? Make himself look like a hero? The sick bastard.
With a sudden, violent motion, the door handle twisted, the jamb and door splintering. A heavy body pushed inward: the woman from the motel lobby, the sixty-something desk clerk. The floral blouse and green stretch pants were recognizable, as were the granny glasses and the gray bouffant. Otherwise, the woman stood transformed. Blood streaked her neck, obvious signs of a recent feeding. Pallor flooded her face. Fangs glistened with the poison of vampirism. A few more shapes crowded the door behind her—more newborns.
The creatures poured in. Mustard attacked, downing the large woman and rolling over with her on the floor. The other newborns piled on, ending in a clumsy pile of writhing bodies between the window and the bed. The overturned armchair blocked the way to where she stood with Dreck, pocketknife at the ready.
One of the newborns climbed out of the mêlée and over the bed, snarling at her. Dreck grabbed the guy and flung him against the back wall, holding him by the neck. But she lost track of that struggle as a second newborn dashed toward her. This creature’s face showed nothing but mindless inhumanity in its silvery eyes. It staggered forward to attack.
Come on, closer, a little closer. As it scrambled off the mattress, she darted forward, driving her pocketknife into its chest. The blade plunged through the dead skin, sliding between ribs and puncturing the heart.
Perfect strike! Her mentor would praise that one, but no time for celebration. A third new-risen crawled across the bed toward her. Young and quick, this one—a teenage boy—made a flying tackle across the mattress. Its hands wrapped around her waist, fangs snapping.
The tackle bore her onto the ground, but she wrapped fingers in his hair, gripping the head and controlling the range of those lashing fangs. It was like handling a snake: squeeze it by the neck and it can’t bite. With a grunt, she shoved the creature’s face down into the carpet, near the bedpost. The newborn thrashed in her grasp, twisting and fighting all the way.
“Pin him!” Dreck shouted. He lifted the corner of the bed frame up. A wooden bedpost on that corner of the bed hovered over the writhing figure.
Good idea. The bedpost wouldn’t penetrate with normal strength, but Dreck’s superhuman version should do the trick. She flattened the creature out best she could, risking a few bites.
Boom! The couch came down with tremendous fury, sending a geyser of blood across her and the carpet. The bedpost plunged through the creature, destroying its heart. Three down.
They leaped to their feet. Mustard still battled the heavyset motel clerk. With a single leap, Dreck grabbed the creature, thrust her head through the window, then down, severing it across the broken glass.
Quick check of the room, but the threat was over. Carnage covered the walls and floor, but she’d seen worse. The Kyoto nightclub massacre for one, the slaughter of her mentor and the rest of her cell for another. Three hunters, all dead. And the one memory that would not go away: her family’s deaths on the flooded river.
Kneeling beside her kill, she retrieved the pocketknife. The blade had snapped in the newborn’s heart. Damn. “What the fuck, Dreck? Who turned them? Did you do this?”
“Shh!” He stood by the shattered window, staring out. She rushed over, looking out into the night.
On the far end of the parking lot, a shadowy figure in a gargantuan cape hovered several feet off the ground. He was big—sumo wrestler big. Malmardane in his new body! He roared from out the night: “Brother in blood! Do you not know you travel with a slayer?”
How did Malmardane follow her here? Where did he get that new body? How did he walk in the sun? Dreck walked in the sun too—could that be a coincidence? Were the two fiends in league? Too many uncertainties made this whole situation insane with danger. She held her tongue.
“Who are you?” Dreck demanded.
“Walk away, brother!” the hovering lord shouted. “This is not your fight!”
“It is now!” Dreck shouted back.
The cloaked figure whipped its arms up, sending a few of the cars in the parking lot bouncing toward their motel room. Then with a twist of its cape and a puff of black smoke, the creature vanished.
Her enemy—her tormentor—the destroyer of her family, of her cell. Her screams tore through the night. “Malmardane! I’ll kill you! Again and again!”
Not until Dreck shook her shoulders did she come around. He was shouting at her, eyes wide with alarm. “Jordan. Snap out of it! Come on, let’s go!”
“That was Malmardane.”
“It was a great vampire lord,” he said, his face ashen gray. “I felt the power rolling off him. I doubt I can take him.”
Take him. What did that mean? Dimly, she comprehended. “You mean you’re not on his side?”
“Are you kidding me? Let’s get the fuck out of here.”
So Dreck hadn’t turned those newborns, wasn’t in league with her enemy. It was possible—vampires fought each other all the time, guarding their territories and their treasures. “Go where?”
“To Firewater Dam. It’s the only place nearby someone like that won’t go. Too many lycans.”
Yes. That made sense. Get to the rally. Get her sword. Check on Ingrid. Then she could deal with Malmardane. “Okay.”
They threw their junk into bags and stuffed them into the sidecar again. Mustard hopped right in without prompting. Dreck mounted up front.
Logical, he knew the way and could see in the dark. She dropped the motorcycle keys into his outstretched hand. “You drive.”
“Not going to stab me in the heart, are you?”
God, no. Dreck was—Dreck. A vampire. But he was no Malmardane. She shook with exhaustion. “No. Knife’s broken anyway.”
“Good.” He fired up the engine, surveying the carnage in the motel parking lot. Two overturned cars, one leaking gasoline. Doors busted open, bloody handprints all over. Dreck pulled out a cigar, lit it, and flung it toward the nearest gasoline leak. “Best cover-up we can do.”
She mounted the back of the bike as rising flames licked the gasoline, spreading from car to car and on to the motel. But something was wrong. Dreck’s face had become a pallid mask of horror. If something happened to him, then what the hell would she do? Call Ingrid, maybe. There was no other way to this rally. “Dreck, what’s wrong? You seen a ghost?”
His neck twisted over his shoulder. “You called that creature Malmardane?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s my sire. Ferdinand Braden.”
“You said he was dead!”
“He was.” Dreck squeezed the handlebars and the Harley took off into the night.
Chapter 10: Firewater Dam
Dreck
The motorcycle rolled toward Firewater Dam, approaching the liminal zone near dawn. The point of entry was in the hills around Bozeman, Montana, right in the center line of the highway. One moment, the Harley was roaring down Highway 22N in the pre-day gloom, alone on the isolated roadway. The next moment, the air took on a shimmering quality. That meant the gateway was near. If the bike swerved too far to the left or right they wou
ld remain in the material world and continue on toward Whitefish. But running down the center line would take the Harley into the paranormal borderland.
The motorcycle accelerated. The painted lines marking the center lane blurred, the color spreading out and darkening until it seemed they drove on a road of silver. For a split second, the bike roared across nothing more tangible than air before plunging on. Then everything snapped back to apparent reality. The pines and oaks all around looked the same. The highway markers and guardrails resembled those of the physical world. Yet everything was tinged with an ancient, twinkling light. Ahead, a dirt track led off the highway down into a valley. A hand-painted wooden sign read:
Firewater Dam 2017
Welcomes Lycan Nations!
Peace Between the Packs
No Guns - No Lawsuits
No lawsuits, huh? Some lycan’s idea of a joke. He stopped the bike on a turnout overlooking the valley.
The gathering below filled a meadow the size of several football fields. A massive beaver dam—a size not seen in North America for centuries—blocked off a mountain creek, creating a vast pond. Upstream were rows of tents, wigwams, teepees, horse trailers, campers—and motorcycles. Hundreds upon hundreds of choppers and hogs stood in rows, their chrome and steel glittering in the morning sunlight. Circus tents and slapdash taverns provided entertainment. Country, metal, and norteño boomed from stereos and radios. Portable generators provided electrical power, their gas engines lending a mechanical backdrop to the raucous party atmosphere.
With a joyous bark, Mustard leaped out of the sidecar and plunged down the steep slope, her tail wagging back and forth as she sought her pack. That dog. He couldn’t blame her for getting excited. Give Moog some credit, he trained and treated his dogs well. Mustard had provided invaluable service against both the bikers and the newborns.
He pulled off his helmet. “So much for catching Moog off-guard. Mustard must smell the pack in the wind.”
Behind him, Jordan stirred. “Dreck, what happened? For a second on the highway back there, the bike flew through some weird mist.”
He dismounted, walking to the edge of the turnout to study the encampment. “We crossed over.”
“What?” Shock touched her voice. “You mean we’re dead?”
All that Church knowledge, yet no awareness of the true nature of reality. “There are borderlands, for lack of a better word, between our material world and the beyond. Places where strange things can happen. Getting in is easier for immortals.”
Understanding showed on her face. “Where one of you goes, others can follow.”
“Exactly. Get enough of us together at the same place and time and you have something solid like this Demi-World.” He gestured at the trees and mountains all around. “Something that lasts a day, a week, it depends how long people stay.”
“What is it, some kinda pagan ritual?”
Leave it to the holy warrior to assume everything had some religious purpose. He spat in the dirt. “Think of it as a supernatural biker rally. The lycans are here to eat, drink, fight, fuck.” A shrug went with the words. “To do what lycans do. They’re primal. Life is simple.”
Her gaze went to the sky. “It looks like Earth. Not paranormal at all.”
“It’s a physical world, but not your standard modern reality. Check your cell phone.” She did. “No service. Watch the skies. There are no satellites, no airplanes, no helicopters. No traffic on the highway—except other lycans coming here. Nobody can enter a Demi-World who doesn’t know the way—or isn’t brought along.”
Doubt showed on her pretty face. “And you know the way?”
One didn’t last two hundred years without learning a trick or two. He nodded. “You develop a knack for it.”
“How do I leave?” Worry still marred her features. “If I need to.”
He pointed back up the road. “Walk that away, up the center line of the highway. Stay on the road. Don’t go into the woods, though.”
“Why not?”
“This isn’t Earth. There are things in the borderlands, older and deadlier than humanity.”
“Like what?”
“The Boss of the Mountain. The Little People. The Wendigo. Shit you do not want to meet.” He studied her dark, compact profile. It was a lot to take on faith, but she handled it with composure. Give credit to this Order of Silence: they had trained her to accept the supernatural. She never blinked at the carnage in the motel room, either. Another veteran of the psychic wars. “If you want your sword, Jordan, your best bet is down there, in Moog’s hands. If he made it this far. Judging from Mustard’s reaction, he did.”
She flung her hands out in an all-encompassing shrug. “Vampires, lycans, why not Demi-Worlds?”
“That’s the spirit.” Her spunk was appealing. Hell, a lot of her was appealing. She was tough, smart, a fighter, gorgeous, and great in bed. Too bad the whole vampire-murdering part of her personality canceled that out. Still, they needed to work some shit out while their truce held. “Tell me about this Malmardane guy.”
“Now?”
“Now.”
Arms folded under her breasts, drawing attention to them—whether she meant to or not. “Why should I tell you a goddamn thing?”
“Let’s lay down our cards, pool our knowledge. I’ll tell you about my sire. The enemy of my enemy—”
“Is my friend,” she said, finishing it. “Yeah, I said that before, but I’ve been thinking. It doesn’t work that way for you. You’re Blooded. We have a truce, you and I, but you’re still my enemy, as much as Malmardane.” Her voice lowered. “I can’t play favorites.”
Goddamn her convictions. Well, he couldn’t fight a decade of Order brainwashing. “Big help you are.”
“Look Dreck, I’m sorry. You’re not always a monster, but you are sometimes. That’s how it is.”
“I get it.” He remounted the motorcycle, not bothering with helmet and gloves this time. There were no cops in the Demi-World and he intended to coast down the hill. They needed to keep a low profile here and find Moog. If Jordan didn’t have answers, the big lycan did. And those answers might loosen this annoying woman’s tongue too. Annoying in that she was a warrior and worth hanging around, but still an enemy. “Coming?”
She got on the motorcycle without a word, but her arms wrapped tight around his waist, her firm body pressed against his. What was dangerous was how much he was liking that touch.
He rode the Harley down the pavilion, a gravel track splitting the camp in two. Besides the motorcycles, dozens of SUVs, ATVs, trucks, and other vehicles lined the road. Lycans and humans moved among them, greeting friends, mates, and rivals. Lycan cubs played soccer on a nearby field.
No sign of Moog. He parked the Harley at the end of a row. Using a bedsheet from the motel, he covered the motorcycle and fastened it with bungee cords. With any luck, that would prevent any Blood Moon M.C. lycans from recognizing their stolen ride. He didn’t trust the Firewater Dam truce to hold in his case. They would not tolerate much from vampires here. He needed Moog’s protection and fast. This was no hippie love-in and there was no law and few doctors—maybe a shaman or a healer or two.
Hefting his pack, he set off toward the craft fair to get some info. Everyone knew the Circus of Blood, and the crafty promoter wouldn’t miss an opportunity to put on a show. Even without the cage, Moog could still rake in cash using Brick and Kit as fighters. The ringmaster might even have hired a replacement for Dreck.
Jordan stuck close as they moved through the crowd. Impressive lycans moved all around them. Massive werebears towered over the others, some as big as seven, eight, even nine feet tall. Werewolves were most common, lean and muscular. At one point, a group of six feline humanoids, black panthers with shaved heads, walked in a knot through the crowd, leading a lowing cow.
Someone had killed Ferdinand at a gathering much like this—or had they? Last night’s encounter made no sense. Ferdinand had appeared as someone Jordan called ‘Malmardane
.’ That was beyond bizarre. Ferdinand couldn’t hover or do the things that creature did, apart from killing and turning a few newborns. And that vampire—whoever he was—hadn’t even recognized his own spawn despite being the spitting image of Ferdinand. What did it all mean? If only Jordan would open up, tell her story.
After a particularly large and naked man-cougar sniffed Jordan’s hair in passing, the slayer pressed closer. “Dreck, I’m worried. We’re outnumbered. If they turn on you…”
“This many big uglies makes me nervous too, but try to stay calm. They can smell fear. It excites their predatory instincts.”
They paused at a booth that sold homemade jewelry and other trinkets. Lapis lazuli and rhinestone shone from pendants, earrings, and belt buckles. A wizened old woman, in human form or simply human, sat behind the display.
He picked up a trinket, a silver chain link necklace with a pendant lined with purplish-blue gems. “Amethyst?”
The old woman showed cracked, blackened teeth. “Benitoite.” Seeing his confusion, she went on. “One of the rarest gems in the world. Comes from a single mine in California.”
He held it up for Jordan. “Like it?”
Dark fingers ran along the links. “It’s beautiful.”
“Let me get it for you.” She nodded, so he slipped it around her neck. Her large brown eyes watched his, betraying nothing. He forced a grin. “Looks good.”
“Thanks,” she said, fingering it, pensive.
To the old lady, he said, “How much?”
“For you? Five hundred dollars, night-drinker.”
He grumbled, reaching for his wallet. The old woman had picked out his kindred without much effort. Cracking the wallet, he withdrew five one-hundred dollar notes and laid them on the table.
The old artisan sniffed each bill then stuffed them in her bodice. “Many moons, dark-flyer.”
“Many moons, mother. Say, you know Moog?”
