“I did not hurt her, mon ami?” he pleaded. “She is okay, no? I did not mean to, the vampire, he was too strong!”
I touched her calf, cleaning the blood off as Frenchie hopped from foot to foot.
“Sil vous plait, mon ami, will she be good?”
I peered closer and gave a snort of disgust.
“This is barely a scratch,” I said, fetching Marie a slap on the rump. “Get up and stop scaring the poor man, you’re fine.”
Marie sat up, grinning hugely as Frenchie heaved a sigh of relief.
“You are not a nice woman,” said Frenchie, laughing. “I thought that I had hurt you, ma chéri.”
Marie gave the shaking Frenchman a quick hug and then pointed at the dead vampire.
“I know,” I said shrugging. “Who the hell was that?”
“This one’s new, I don’t think he was one of The Three,” said Norse, frowning.
Marie looked at me, a question in her eyes.
“The Three,” I explained briefly. “The three vampire Lords who rule the north of England. Glavidia, who calls herself ‘Queen of the Night,’ Johann, who goes by the title of ‘The Marquis de Sang,’ and one that we only know as Lady Lucia.”
“Yeah,” said Hacker, prodding the body with his boot. “This one was powerful. Most leeches couldn’t dominate five trained vampire hunters at once. This was someone new, and he was powerful.”
Happy was watching Marie, noting how she was favoring her wounded leg.
“You sure you’re okay, luv?” he asked, giving her one of his rare smiles.
I rolled my eyes. Women tend to worry a lot about being alone with a group of men, like we’d all turn in to slavering beasts and gang rape them. In reality, however, young women tend to turn any group of guys into overprotective big brothers. Unless, that is, she’s older than they are, in which case she usually ends up mothering them mercilessly.
I had personally seen Happy go up against three vampires armed only with an ornamental silver fire poker and here he was asking solicitous questions of a werewolf?
Marie shrugged and gave Happy a toothy grin and he smiled sheepishly in return. I rolled my eyes again. It seemed that rather than freaking out about her werewolf form, the guys were happily accepting her.
CHAPTER
6
I woke up with Marie the next morning, which, I must admit, was a pleasant experience. We’d swept the town but failed to find any more vamps. Either we’d gotten them all or we’d scared the rest off. It was after oh-three-hundred before we’d returned to the Wheatsheaf. Taffy had some good news, though. The old couple from the town, their son, his wife, and their baby had made it to safety and they were all now staying at the inn. That made me feel better.
Marie’s wound had been treated and Frenchie’s repeated apologies had been firmly brushed off. Everyone knew it hadn’t been his fault so there didn’t seem to be much point in getting angry about it.
Marie stirred and muttered something in her sleep. Then she curled her arms tighter around me and let out a contented sigh.
Once again Marie had surprised me. When she shifted back to her human form her hands and face were still streaked with the dead vampire’s blood. I’d been a little tentative, expecting her to be revolted. She had simply gone for a shower, brushed her teeth, and dived under the covers to snuggle with me.
I watched her sleeping form for a while. She was beautiful, strong and intelligent. What’s more, she accepted my lifestyle without problems and shared the risks without complaint.
I think that was the time, laying warm and happy in bed, that I finally admitted it to myself. I did love her. Love is a tough word for men to choke out, but there’s none other to describe my feelings for her.
Lying there with Marie in my arms I could almost forget about the ugly world outside. Now that’s the unattainable dream. I had to get up fairly soon. The suit from the Ministry would be here by now and he was probably waiting for me.
Marie yawned delicately and turned her face toward me, her chin resting on my chest.
“Morning,” she said sleepily.
“Morning sweetheart,” I replied. “Sleep well?”
“Well, but not long enough,” she said, yawning again.
“Well go back to sleep, if you want,” I said. “I’ve got to go down and meet the guy from the Ministry.”
“No,” she said with resignation. “I’d better come too. Aren’t John and Anna going to be there, too?”
I nodded and tried to stifle my own yawn. Marie frowned.
“How’s Anna going to manage to be awake during the day?” she asked.
“Well, in the same way we were awake last night,” I said. “She’s weak during the day and some of her abilities are compromised, but as long as she doesn’t go into direct sunlight she’ll be fine.”
“Well, let’s get going,” she said as she rolled out of bed.
Yes, I watched her go. I was tired, not dead.
While I was waiting for her to finish up in the bathroom I stripped and cleaned my FAL again. Keeping the weapon clean was simply another morning ritual.
Showered, dressed, armed and ready we went downstairs. It was something of an official event so we were dressed in what passed for our uniform. DPM trousers and black tops. Marie’s was her fighting suit; mine was a black t-shirt under my body armor.
In the bar, Norse was talking with someone who was obviously from the Ministry; he was small, fussy and going bald, clad in a dark blue suit, crisp white shirt and subdued red tie.
“Pagan,” said Norse in a tightly controlled voice.
“Norse,” I replied, careful to keep my voice flat and neutral. Something was wrong here.
“This is Alfred Quigley, from the Ministry,” he said, nodding at the suit.
“Mr. Quigley,” I said, inclining my head slightly.
“Sergeant, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you,” he said, extending one exquisitely manicured hand.
I shook his hand, noting the attempt at a firm grip. He was probably one of those people who believed you could tell everything about a man from his handshake and spent some time practicing it.
“I’m not a sergeant anymore,” I pointed out. “I retired from the military.”
“Technically, no,” he said pompously. “In actual fact you were merely seconded to the Ministry on long-term detachment. The discharge papers you signed were merely for public consumption.”
I shrugged and turned to Marie.
“Marie, this is Mr. Quigley, Mr. Quigley, this is Marie Hennessey.”
Marie politely nodded to the weasely little man. Okay, so I took an instant dislike to him. It wasn’t just who he was or who he represented—having desk jockeys make decisions that had an effect on real soldiers always set my teeth on edge—but the look he’d put in Norse’s eyes. He’d said something to make Norse angry and that made me wary.
Quigley led us to a private room in the rear of the bar. Anna and John were already in there, as was Norse’s crew.
“Ladies and gentleman,” Quigley said, clapping his hands together in a manner that made my trigger finger itch. “I’ll be brief. We have an unprecedented opportunity to deal a significant blow to the vampires in Manchester.”
I was sitting in a badly stuffed chair, next to Marie and almost opposite Norse, so I don’t think either of us missed the expression that flickered over my old friend’s bearded face. Norse didn’t approve of whatever was coming, that much was obvious.
“Glavidia has taken over and inhabited Havelock Manor.”
He was looking straight at me when he said that and I knew why. I’d been to Havelock Manor before, in my professional capacity in that unit I’m not allowed to talk about. The incident was fairly famous and the outcome fairly well known. For official purposes I am definitely not saying that I was one of the black-clad men in respirators and hoods who appeared as if out of nowhere, stormed the manor, killed the terrorists and freed the hostages.
The u
pshot of that incident—which I’m absolutely not saying I was involved in—is that I know the manor house like the back of my hand.
“We think,” the suit went on, “that an assassination might be in order here. If we can take out Glavidia in the seat of her power, the effect will be incalculable.”
“So call in the crabs,” I said, invoking the military’s nickname for the Royal Air Force. “Bomb Havelock Manor into a hole in the ground and call it a day.”
I had a nagging suspicion about where this little session was going and I didn’t like what I was thinking.
“Good idea,” said Quigley, his expression indicating that he felt it to be anything but. “There are, however, two significant problems. One, we couldn’t be sure that such an attack would kill Glavidia and two, the original owners of the manor would quite like it back in one piece.”
“Well I can’t speak to the first,” said Norse, “but that second point right there is what we call ‘tough titty’.”
Quigley smiled in an oily way as a chuckle ran around the room.
“Still, and that’s a good point, we need to ensure that she’s dead,” said Quigley smoothly.
“Get to the point,” I said quietly. “What do you have in mind?”
The look he sent me was cold. He obviously had a speech planned and wanted to air it out.
“The Ministry feels that the best chance lies in a small assassination attempt. A limited number of people could gain access to the manor and dispatch Glavidia without too much trouble.”
“How small?” rumbled Hacker, his face twisted as if he’d smelled something bad.
I knew how he felt.
“One, to be exact,” said Quigley finally.
“No, ‘me’ to be exact,” I pointed out.
“Yes, you.” Said Quigley uncomfortably. “You know the manor and anyone else would be sensed as soon as they try to get in. You stand the best chance of getting in and out alive.”
Marie was looking at me with horror in her eyes.
“You have a point there,” I said softly, maintaining eye contact with him.
“No fucking way!” said Happy suddenly. “It’s suicide! You’d never get out alive!”
I kept my eyes on Quigley. No wonder Norse wasn’t happy. There was something else going on here. Silence fell over the room as everyone looked from one to the other.
“Go on,” I said quietly. “Tell us what else you have up your sleeve.”
Quigley shifted uncomfortably.
“Glavidia won’t be the only one there,” he said finally. “There’s some big meeting with some big name vamps from out of country.”
“America, you mean?”
“Yes, and the continent. Glavidia is trying to branch out, solidify some old relationships, make some new ones. It’s the perfect opportunity.”
“So let me get this straight,” said Norse with a sour look. “What you’re looking at is a manor house full of vampire Lords, including one of the three most powerful vampires in England, and you’re going to send in Pagan, my old friend, and hope he walks out. That about right?”
“I wouldn’t put it like that,” said Quigley.
“So what do you need us for?” said Coop suddenly. “Norse and the rest of us, I mean.”
“We need something as a distraction, something to make a lot of noise a way away, so that Glavidia will be feeling nice and secure in her little castle. We need her to think that Jack is elsewhere.”
“I want to say something here,” said Happy. “If he does go on this mission you better hope he comes back in once piece. And if he doesn’t, you’d better be prepared to have the shit kicked out of you, you sniveling little pusbag.”
“You can’t talk to me like that!” Quigley exploded, his eyes bulging.
“He doesn’t have to,” said Marie firmly. “If Jack dies in this insane scheme you better start running because I’ll skin you alive.”
“And there’s nowhere on Earth that’s far enough away to stop us from finding you,” said Anna, her fangs flashing.
“That’s enough,” I said as I stood up. “Is this an order, Mr. Quigley?”
“The Ministry would prefer it if you volunteered,” he replied.
“Then it’s my decision. Give me some time to think about it.”
“You would need to leave first thing tomorrow morning,” he pointed out.
I kept my gaze level and said nothing. Eventually Quigley got the message and let himself out.
“You can’t be thinking about doing this!” exploded Norse as soon as the door shut behind the Ministry man.
“It might work,” said Coop reasonably. “They won’t see him coming, they won’t believe anything can touch them in their little fortress. It’s plausible at least.”
“Plausible my arse!” hissed Marie, on the verge of tears. “It’s suicide!”
Frenchie caught my eye and gave me an amused look.
“Got something to say, old boy?” I asked with a raised eyebrow.
“Just that I have known you for a very long time, mon ami, and I have seen you walk away from places that no man could possibly have survived,” he said in his softly accented voice. “You have—how you say?—the luck of the Devil on your side. If anyone can do this, it is you.”
He looked around the suddenly silent room.
“I do not envy you this, mon ami.”
“Frenchie’s right,” said John, and the dirty look his wife threw at him indicated quite clearly that she didn’t agree with him.
“I don’t know,” said Norse. “What do you think Pagan? Can you pull it off?”
Every eye was on me. Thank you Norse.
“I don’t know. I said I need to think about it and I meant that.”
Marie gave me a pleading look. I dealt with the problem the way I deal with most problems—I ran away.
CHAPTER
7
No, I don’t mean I took to my heels and made for the tree line. I went jogging. I’ve often found that when I have a difficult decision to wrestle with, some repetitive exercise helps clear my mind. I’ve tried weightlifting, press-ups, sit-ups, and even swimming—although I don’t recommend that last one. I tried it when I was stationed in Cyprus and ended up almost out of sight of the shore before I reined myself in.
Jogging works best, I’ve found.
I went straight from the room and out of the door. I was wearing what the army refers to as ‘boots, leg, high’, my combat trousers and my body armor. I even had my gunbelt on. I didn’t care.
If you’re going to wear kit when you fight, you’re better off training in it. You walk differently in boots than you do in running shoes and your center of balance is different with a gun strapped to your thigh. The easiest way to get used to it is to work out with it.
I pounded the pavement and tried to clear my mind. Most humans manage to master the art of walking within a few years of life, and running is just an extension of that. Letting the body take care of the intricacies involved in what is, when you really think about it, an indefinitely delayed fall really frees the mind.
As far as I could tell the problem came down to two questions. Could I do it? And, more importantly, should I do it?
Something stunk about the whole plan. The notion that the former owners wanted to avoid damage didn’t wash. Any plan I could come up with would probably do significant damage. I’d set fire to the place—at the very least—even if just as a distraction to cover my escape. There was something else here.
I ran and I thought, enjoying the crisp air and the feeling of power in my limbs. I swung through the deserted High Street, down through the shopping center, past the boarded up pizza joint and video store, past the closed supermarket, through the rubbish-choked multi-story car park, and out into the park.
The park hadn’t been much, just a moderately flat expanse of grass, a few tree-lined paths, and a rubber-floored play area with swings and a roundabout, but it was already showing signs of neglect. I jogged th
rough the ankle length grass and out towards the playground. Over the chain link fence I could see the old church that had once graced just about every official image of the town. I stopped in the middle of the park and looked up at the towering spire.
In my entire life the closest I’ve ever come to a religious experience was when I visited the ruins of St. Boltoph’s Priory in Colchester. The 11th Century building was barely more than a few broken stone walls and rubble strewn paths, but there was a feeling about the place. I had stepped through an arched doorway into what was, according to the helpful map, the nave. The sense of incredible age was amazing. There was a busy city a few hundred meters away and a busy road on the other side of a brick wall, yet there was a palpable sense of peace about the place. The sounds of the 21st century fell away and all there was to hear was the whisper of the wind and the tweeting of birds. It always seemed to me that there, right on the edge of hearing, were the echoes of those long-dead worshippers. Their songs of praise, their prayers, and their very conversations seemed to have etched themselves into the stones of the church.
Don’t worry; I’m not about to have some religious conversion. I got that same sense of agelessness when I stood under the branches of an oak tree that had been huge and centuries-old the day my great-Grandfather was born. It’s just that there are things—sights, sounds, places—that convey, more accurately than I possibly could, our place in the cosmos. The Abbey and the tree both impressed upon me the inescapable knowledge of a world far larger and far older than most realize. The spire on the church had the same quality. It had been older than living memory when Columbus set sail for the New World. It was older even than the vampires. The oldest known vamp had been centuries away from birth when that church had been built. It had survived everything time could throw at it. It had survived revolutions, earthshaking scientific advances, fires, two civil wars and two world wars. Generations had passed in the shadow of the spire and in that moment I could finally see a reason beyond justice and freedom. I was fighting for us, for all of us. I was fighting for the tiny baby down the hall from our room at the Wheatsheaf, and the baby’s parents and grandparents, and the baby’s unborn children and grandchildren. I was fighting so that the baby wouldn’t have to.
Pagan (MPRD Book 1) Page 5
