Ghost Roads

by Christopher Golden

There was a pause. Buffy realized she had been a little too blunt and hastily tried to repair the damage. “Because I wasn’t worried about door number two, there. I just wanted to make sure you were getting enough . . . iron.”

  “Because I look so darned pale,” he drawled.

  They both smiled.

  “Exactly,” she said. Then she frowned shightly. “I don’t really want to go there.”

  “Me, neither. And we’ve got bigger questions to ask, anyway.”

  Buffy nodded. “And there’s going to be hell to pay if we don’t get some answers pronto.”

  “Pronto.” Angel got to his feet. “Your vocabulary never ceases to amaze me.”

  “I’m that way.”

  * * *

  Something was wrong.

  Ian Williams stopped pacing and ran his shaking hands through his hair. He had tried to tell himself that the Slayer and her friends might have gotten lost on their way to the Redcliff mansion. They might have had a minor mishap. They might have decided not to go. He tried to tell himself it would take his brothers a long time to kill the Slayer—Skree or no.

  But his contact, Brother Ariam, should have called in hours ago.

  Hours and hours ago.

  Except for one misdialed number, the phone had sat silent for the entire day.

  Now, with the sun down, he had to decide what to do. He had to face the probability that they had failed.

  The one they served did not permit failure.

  The phone rang.

  He gave a shout, expelling a fraction of his anxiety, and raced to pick it up.

  “What,” said the voice, “are you doing there?”

  “Maestro,” he breathed, for though he had never spoken directly to II Maestro, he knew his voice, “I am honored. I am speechless.”

  “What are you doing there?” The voice rose.

  “I—I—”

  “Go.”

  Ian trembled. “Go,” he echoed, his mind racing. “Go to . . . Redcliff?”

  The phone disconnected.

  * * *

  At the last moment, the Dutchman was bound.

  Though Henri Regnier appeared in the courtyard with the vessel and her enraged crew, the Captain a black shadow of fury, Antoinette did not realize the shambling ruin that staggered toward her was her husband until he spoke in a voice so ruined she could barely understand the words.

  “The Cauldron,” he rasped. “Hurry.”

  Numb, she raced for the Great Cauldron of Bran the Blessed. Henri had recently come into possession of it while binding a pack of savages who could transform themselves into animals. The savages had not realized what the Cauldron was and had actually cast it aside because, they had informed him, it made water taste brackish. They had no idea that it could restore vigor and prolong life, or that the water tasted odd because it had been endowed with healing properties.

  Henri had been studying the Cauldron, but he had yet to actually employ it. What if it was a sham? Antoinette wondered, as she filled it with buckets of water in the entryway to the Gatehouse while her husband shivered and moaned with pain.

  To peel off the vestiges of clothing would have caused him too much agony, and so he climbed into it as he was, in tatters and covered with huge expanses of bloody muscles. Half an hour passed as she knelt beside it, clasping her hands in prayer. And then he spoke.

  “I am better.”

  He lived three more years and died at the age of 216. Jean-Marc, still a mere youth of twenty-one, became the Gatekeeper. Antoinette herself died when Jean-Marc was twenty-nine, and under her husband’s binding spell, rose from her own corpse as a ghost scant minutes after drawing her last breath.

  At the time of the ritual, she had thought only of her child. But now, over a century later, she thought often and with great longing of her husband. Where did Henri’s spirit dwell? There, for her, was Paradise.

  She assumed that once Jean-Marc came into his full powers she would be released. Like his father and grandfather, he did not marry early in life, which puzzled Antoinette. If the role of the Gatekeeper was so vital, why did the Regnier men court disaster by waiting so long to have children? And why did they have just one? What if something happened to that one?

  All she could assume was that it had to do with their legacy, that this was part of the pattern of their strangely burdened existence, and so she kept her peace as the years rolled by and she remained at his side.

  Then, at last, in 1985, he married, and Antoinette prepared herself to move on.

  But he married badly. There was no other word for it. His wife, Kathleen, was not made of the stuff to be a proper Gatekeeper’s wife. She hated the Gatehouse and all it contained. She couldn’t bear the sight of her ghostly mother-in-law. She sought solace in drugs and drink and, when he came, their son, Jacques. She announced her intention to take the baby out of the house and away from “all this madness,” but of course she could not, must not.

  In the end, believing it to be her only way out, she leaped from the third-story window into the interior courtyard of the house. Antoinette urged Jean-Marc to put her in the Cauldron, but he refused. She had made her choice, and he would honor it. Weeping, he buried her in a Boston cemetery and not at the Gatehouse, where the other Regniers had been buried.

  Though merely a spirit, Antoinette remained to help him raise his motherless son.

  Now, tenderly watching over her aged child, she wondered if she would go on when he died. Her charge had been to care for him, had it not? Or did that include taking care of his heir as well?

  Only time, she concluded, would tell.

  Only time, and they did not have much of that.

  * * *

  Ian was loyal. He was obedient. And he would accomplish what the others had not.

  His car sagged beneath the weight of heavy artillery: a rocket launcher, several dozen grenades, a submachine gun. If it took leveling the mansion, reducing it to rubble, he would capture the Slayer for II Maestro. The others he would kill.

  And if II Maestro sends something after me, I will kill it as well, a tiny voice inside him whispered.

  He drove as fast as he could, tires screeching around corners. His heart was thundering; sweat poured down his face. After so many hours of inactivity and indecision, the rush to action disoriented him. He felt as if he were moving in a strange dream that was happening to someone else.

  Against the night sky, he rounded a corner and saw the turrets and gables of the mansion at 217 Redcliff. It still stood intact, and he took some comfort in that. It also appeared to be deserted. There was not a light on in the entire building.

  At the gates he slowed, then pulled over to the curb and stopped the car. He was scarcely able to breathe.

  Then he got out of the car and opened the boot. He took out the rocket launcher and started putting it together.

  Suppose some of his brethren were inside the mansion?

  He set his jaw. Then they will die.

  * * *

  As Angel and Buffy came up from the wine cellar, Oz called softly through the darkness, “Someone’s here.”

  “Good news, bad news, you be the judge,” Buffy murmured, dashing up the rest of the stairs. She crept to the side of a window and peered out.

  “Wow, Oz. You’re Lookout Boy,” she said admiringly. The moonlight streamed down on a figure beyond the gates. “I can barely see him.”

  “He’s got something on his shoulder. Looks a little familiar. The guy, I mean. And the weapon. I seem to recall you got one for your birthday. Blew that big blue Judge guy into little pieces with it.”

  She smiled wistfully. “That was your virgin outing as a Slayerette,” she said. Then, catching herself, she added, “Not that I’m assuming that you were, um, well—”

  “New to hanging with a Slayer?” he finished for her. “No, Buffy, you were my first.”

  Angel came up beside Buffy and said, “Rocket launcher.”

  “Yeah. I’d guess Sons of Entropy,” she sa
id. Then she squinted harder. “And hey, look, I’m right. That’s Ian Williams.”

  “Our leak,” Oz said.

  “Or one of them. With a rocket launcher. I’m saying this means it’s time to hit the road.” Buffy cast a glance at Angel. “Pronto.”

  “Pronto is my middle name,” Oz said.

  “Side exit?” Angel asked.

  “Side exit,” Buffy confirmed.

  Having scoped out the entire mansion by daylight, Buffy had stacked their backpacks and Angel’s duffel by the exit they now ran to. Stealthily they crept outside, conveniently hidden by some thick bushes trimmed into a hedge.

  There was an explosion. On instinct, Buffy tucked and rolled, knew Angel would do the same, and lifted her head long enough to satisfy herself that Oz had flung himself to the ground. Several of the Redcliff house’s windows blew out. Buffy helped Oz to his feet, but when she glanced around, Angel was gone.

  A moment later, he came around from the front of the house, forcing Ian Williams to stumble along in front of him by clutching a thick patch of the man’s hair in his fist.

  “He’s not very well coordinated,” Angel said, and gave the traitor’s hair a hard tug, eliciting a scream.

  “He’d have to be a moron to come after us alone, even with heavy ordnance,” Oz added.

  Buffy stepped up to stare Williams in the eye.

  “You’re really getting on my nerves, Ian,” she snapped angrily. “What can we do to remedy that?”

  Almost on cue, Williams burst into flame. Angel shouted and let him go, and the man was immolated in seconds, burning down to cinder and ash that was blown away by the night breeze.

  The three were silent for a moment. Then Oz said, “Whoa, déjà vu.”

  Buffy grunted. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

  * * *

  “We could liberate a small nation with all this stuff,” Buffy said, as they finished taking the weaponry out of Ian Williams’s car and putting it in the trunk of their own. “And I still have no understanding of why anyone in their right mind would call a car trunk a boot. There’s nothing remotely bootlike about it.”

  Angel half smiled at her as he opened the driver’s door and slid behind the wheel. “Well, what on earth is a flashlight? They don’t flash.”

  “Kids, kids,” Oz said, as he climbed into the backseat. “My question is this: Are we taking the ghost roads, or are we driving to Paris in this car, with all kinds of illegal, unregistered weapons in the rear compartment?”

  “Trunk,” Buffy gritted.

  Angel started the car and they took off at a nice clip, but not nice enough to cause any notice.

  They’d been driving for only twenty minutes or so when something white ran into the road.

  Buffy shouted, “Angel, look out!”

  He swerved. Buffy caught her breath and stared. Something white had not run into the road. Something white had floated into the road. And it floated there still.

  With its head in its arms, like it was carrying a pile of schoolbooks.

  “Okay,” Oz said. “Ghost.”

  Buffy got out of the car. She said, “Angel, keep the engine running.”

  He nodded.

  It was a woman dressed in a flowing white garment, hovering about a foot off the ground. She was actually rather pretty in an old-fashioned kind of way. An old-fashioned, detachable-head kind of way.

  “Can I help you?” Buffy asked.

  Buffy Summers, she intoned. Listen to me.

  Buffy raised her chin. “Doing that.”

  I knew your Watcher. I loved him. Charming man.

  Oh, really? “We try to let him have his secrets.” Buffy wrinkled her nose. “So it wouldn’t be nice of you to kiss and tell.”

  The dead are whispering in their graves that another Slayer is about to lose her life. I tell you this to honor Rupert Giles . . . and because the doors to bad places are opening, and the ghost roads now crawl with evil.

  “Those crazy dead,” Buffy drawled, feeling a chill. “Is there an office pool on when I’ll buy it?”

  The ghost raised her hand and pointed at Buffy. Don’t jest. Arm yourself. Guard yourself. You are the Slayer.

  “This just in,” Buffy said, leaning toward the phantom. “Don’t believe everything the dead tell you.”

  She turned on her heel. On the night wind, the ghost’s voice traveled like a gossamer veil toward her: Tell Rupert hello from the Countess of Dartmoor.

  “Will do,” Buffy said thickly.

  And please, stay alive, the Countess added. For all our sakes. For the sake of the world.

  Buffy glanced over her shoulder. “Thanks,” she began, just as the ghost vanished.

  Resolutely she walked to the car and climbed in.

  Angel looked at her expectantly.

  Buffy shrugged. “She was lost. Asked me for directions. I had to tell her I wasn’t from around here.”

  Angel frowned. “Buffy, we could hear her, too.”

  “Oh.”

  Oz raised his hand. “Paris? I’m thinking not a good idea,” he ventured.

  Buffy sighed. “Who’s got any others?”

  “All right, but it sounds as though the ghost roads might not be very reliable,” Angel said. “I know we need to be quick. Who knows how long they might keep the boy alive . . .”

  “And Oz is going to be having his monthly cycle pretty soon,” Buffy offered.

  Oz raised an eyebrow, then glanced at Angel. “Are we going to have trouble getting the weapons and stuff through to France?” he asked.

  “I haven’t been here in a long time,” Angel replied. “But as far as I know, once you’re actually in Europe—particularly if you’re an American tourist—they’re not going to question much.”

  “All right, then,” Buffy said. “Let’s go.”

  Angel put the car in gear, and they were mobile again.

  “This is all right for now, but we’re going to need a truck or a van, so Angel doesn’t get toasted,” Oz pointed out. “Plus, if we’re supposed to be American tourists, it should be a pretty obvious rental vehicle.”

  “Car theft,” Buffy said wearily. “Giles left that out of Slayer training.”

  “Not to worry,” Angel reassured her. “It’s been a while, but I think I can handle it.”

  Oz shook his head in amazement. “Yeah. Just like riding a bike. Is there anything you haven’t done?”

  Angel glanced up at the rearview mirror. Apparently, he was looking at Oz, but it was hard to tell, because, of course, Angel wasn’t visible in the mirror.

  “Not a hell of a lot.”

  Chapter 5

  SHE WORE A MANTILLA OVER a huge tortoiseshell comb, and her gown was antique black lace. The heavy flamenco train dragged dying rose petals across the hardwood floor as she twirled her fingers and growled to herself. Black was her color, setting off her white skin and dark eyes. A stunner, his baby, if a bit mad.

  But that was why he loved her so.

  “Bulls,” Drusilla whispered, making stabbing motions in the air with her long, sharp fingernails as she dervished to guitar music only she could hear. “Oooh, Spike, how the big bulls bleed.”

  Then she slowed. She flicked her tongue at Spike and arced in a languid circle with her arms outstretched, as if she held a matador’s cape before her body.

  “Olé,” she breathed. She fanned her nails at him.

  “Now, Dru, not in front of the lad,” Spike drawled. Perched on the edge of the table in their little seaside flat, he patted the shoulder of the young boy seated beside him in a fatherly way. The dark-haired child tensed, his dangling legs jerking, but he did not shrink from Spike’s touch. Spike approved. He liked Jacques Regnier very much. The boy was his sort of person. In other words, not prone to fits of hysteria or pleading for his life.

  “What does it matter what we do in front of him?” Drusilla said, dropping her voice to a vicious whisper that thrilled Spike to his marrow, if marrow he still possessed. He was not a
ll that old a vampire, younger of course than Angel, Dru’s sire, and that old boy was 240 and change.

  Dru’s skirts rustled as she made staccato tacks on the floor with her crimson heels. She leered at the boy and made stabbing motions at him. “You’ll be dead soon. They’ll cut your neck muscles. Make you bleed, little calf.”

  Jacques raised his chin defiantly as his eyes glittered with fear. Spike chuckled and took Dru’s hands in his. He kissed the deceptively fragile-looking little knuckles. “Now, we’ve no proof of that, have we, poodle. They’ve not said what they’ll do to him.”

  Dru stood straight and made circles with her fingers over Spike’s lips. “They dart forward, you see, and stab the banderillas into all those brawny muscles.” She lunged at her man. “That’s when the bleeding starts. The bulls suffer. It’s all for art.”

  “The bleeding starts when we say it does,” he drawled, nibbling on her little finger. She hissed and smiled with pleasure. “And not a moment before.”

  “Here. But not in Madrid. Not at the bullfights.” Like a jag of lightning, her mood changed and she pulled away from him. Her jaw set and she blazed with anger. The temper caught hold of her, working its way from her forehead down to her temples to her huge, dark eyes. Her lower lip quivered, a frustrated waif deprived of her treat.

  “Your eyes are bleeding Spain,” she accused. “You promised me Spain. Everything is bleeding there, even the sky.” She hissed at him. “You said we’d go. We’d drink sangre.”

  Spike sat back on his hands and extended his legs. It was a bit warm out, too warm for his duster and his boots. The boy was dressed more reasonably, in a long-sleeved chambray shirt and dove-gray trousers. Some bit having to do with it being a casual day at the posh public school in London where he and Dru had nabbed the cub.

  “Well, that was before we knew these Sons of Entropy chaps have their HQ somewhere here in Italy,” Spike said reasonably. “This place is nice, don’t you think?” He indicated the little room decorated with heavily carved furniture, bookshelves lined with dusty seashells. Sand on the floor. Nature at its most natural. “The sea air is good for you, baby. Keeps your cheeks rosy.”

  In truth, her cheeks were ashen. They were in a village near Pisa, and Spike thought it rather cozy. There was lots of local wine . . . and no local vampires. Just the place for him and Dru to slake their blood thirst and dicker with the Sons of Entropy, who were proving to be a bit more difficult to deal with than Spike had anticipated. All the blackguards had to do was hand over the Spear of Longinus, and the Gatekeeper’s heir was theirs. What was the problem? Probably that they didn’t trust him any more than he trusted them. Sound business practice, he’d always thought.