Moon grinned. "I just told her you were her era's equivalent of a policeman," he explained in Whatley's ear. "They weren't too highly thought of in those days."
"Well, some things never change, do they?" replied Whatley. "Any chance of an answer to my question?"
"Rosie, how many times have you seen these men in robes?" asked Sonia, who still had her hand around the ghost girl's shoulders.
"Oh, 'bout five or six toimes by moi reckonin'," replied Rosie. "Oy was curious what they were up to, you know; with business so slack loike. Ye gets bored and wants to know what's goin' on. Hid mesel' well though, there's a lot o' 'arm can come to a girl wot's not careful."
Poor Rosie, I don't think you were careful enough… not on the one time that mattered, thought Moon sadly, examining a fine red line that ran across the pale skin of Rosie's throat. And one time’s all it takes... Aloud, he said, "Where did they take the girls, any idea?"
"Somewhere down road towards the city," vibed Rosie. "Oy doesn't feel loike goin' down there often no more fer some reasun."
Probably beyond the boundaries of your haunting, thought Moon. "Is there anything you remember about the men, apart from the robes that is?"
"Well, the one what din't wear no robe, ‘e were a skinny cove. Looked t' be in 'is late twennies, pale skin, pale 'air an' 'orrid pale blue eyes - wot you cud see o' 'em behoind them nasty steel-rimmed spec'acles ‘e wore. Oy've ne'er seen 'im up 'ere 'ceptin those few toimes 'e were 'ere doin' mischief. Oh, an' each o' 'em wore one o' these odd pen'ants. They was shaped loike a figure eight on 'is soide, wi' a starin' eye in each o' the loops, almost like one o' they 'domino' masks as the nobs wear when they goes to their balls." Rosie paused in thought. "No, that's all Oy c'n tell 'ee."
"Thanks, Rosie," said Sonia. "I wish there was something we could give you in return."
"There might be," said Moon, and then whispered conspiratorially in Sonia's ear.
"Do you think so?" asked Sonia.
"Yes," replied Moon, moving round to the other side of Rosie and placing a hand on her arm. "Hold tight, Rosie, this might tingle a bit..."
"Ooh!" exclaimed Rosie in surprise as Moon and Sonia each channelled a tiny bit of their life energy into her. "Tha's noice! Wot is it?"
"Just a bit of a boost," replied Moon with a wink. "We thought you needed one."
"Well, thank ye both, Oy feels wunnerful." Rosie beamed. She looked up the street. "An' 'ere comes some likely lookin' gents t' top off the evenin'!"
Moon and Sonia backed away as three ghosts dressed in the uniforms of Cromwell’s roundhead soldiers weaved drunkenly down the road. "'Ello, foine Sirs, d'ye fancy spennin' a bit o' time wi' Rosie?" cried Rose, sidling in between the two more sober looking soldiers. "Well of course yer do! C'mon me 'andsomes, there's a nice big feather bed an' sum good ol' cider back at Rosie's place if'n ye've still got sum silver on 'ee?" The most intoxicated of the three companions lifted up a heavy purse and jingled it hopefully. "'Nuff said, let's be off," replied Rosie enthusiastically. "Oy'm feelin' full o' energy t'night, boys, so ye're in fer a treat!" she confided conspiratorially in a stage whisper as she led her new companions away through a nearby wall.
Sonia regarded Moon with a look of astonishment. "...How?" she managed to utter finally.
"I've no idea," replied Moon shaking his head. "Perhaps she really does have a ghostly feather bed hidden away somewhere on the spiritual dimension. It's probably best not to dwell on it."
"But I thought that they couldn't communicate with other ghosts from different eras."
"From what I've seen some can and some can't; it depends on how fixed they believe they are in the time when they died. Who knows, perhaps our little 'gift' helped Rosie to see out of the box. Anyway, at least it looks like she's a bit happier than she's been for a while, poor girl."
"What just happened?" asked Whatley. The inspector sounded bemused and a little annoyed. Moon and Sonia explained as best they could. They gave him an abridged version of Rosie's description of the abductors at the same time. "Oh? It's a good thing she's a ghost then or I'd probably have been expected to arrest her for soliciting after she was picked up by half of the ‘New Model Army’."
"Yes, well prostitution was considered a little more respectable back in the seventeen hundreds," replied Moon.
"Doesn't sound good though… nutters in robes abducting young women off the streets after dark," observed the inspector. "I wonder where they're taking them."
"Wherever it is, Inspector, I'm sad to say that it's unlikely the victims are still alive," replied Sonia sadly.
"Why do you sound so sure of that?"
"Because I'd lay odds that Rurik - that's what our ‘Ghost Eater’ is called by the way, ‘Rurik’ - is behind all this. We think he's using the energy released when his victims die as a form of arcane power source."
Whatley froze in mid-step. "What makes you think that?"
"Art, Jerry and I have recently found out a lot about how ghosts interact with the energy that emanates from the life force of living things. The living work on a higher level of this energy than ghosts do so it seems logical that all a person’s life energy is released in one go when they die..."
"So if Rurik is there when someone dies or, more accurately, when he has them killed, he can absorb all that power at once," explained Moon.
"Yes," added Sonia. "That explains why he sent all those crazy people on killing sprees, so he could feed from their victims. But now he doesn't need to waste energy running around trying to be there when a victim dies because he has others to bring them to him."
"Oh, God!" Whatley's eyes widened as the implication hit him. "He's started a cult..."
Moon nodded. "Yes he has… with himself in the role of God. It makes perfect sense, and it's very similar to what Uri described Rurik doing in Russia back in the eleventh century. His followers will be his eyes, ears and hands. They’ll capture and kill his victims for him and they probably also keep an eye out for potential enemies or allies. That's what he meant when he said he had chosen Bristol as his starting place. But I doubt that he's intending to leave it at that. He may well have plans to take over the whole country."
"But I can't fight this," muttered the inspector despairingly. "You can't arrest a ghost!"
"No," replied Moon. "I'm afraid it looks like that's going to have to be our side of the job. But what you can do is track down this cult Rurik’s started. They are killing people after all and they're human – just about - so you can arrest them..."
"Right," the policeman nodded in agreement. "I'll see if I can get an ID on this 'skinny cove' that Rosie mentioned. Although I'm not clear how I'm going to pin anything on him when the eyewitness has been dead nearly three centuries. And I’ll leave you and your colleagues to sort out the other side of the problem." He pulled a reluctant face. "I can't help feeling you're getting by far the worst part of the deal. If there's anything at all that I can do to help please contact me immediately."
"Well, there are humans involved now," observed Moon, "so we’ll probably need you to call in the cavalry when we finally do track down Rurik."
Sonia hugged Whatley's arm. "Don't feel too bad about it, Art. If Rurik manages to build himself a stronghold here in Bristol everybody'll be in trouble. We're just looking out for ourselves, really."
Whatley smiled. "Thanks."
They walked down the road as far as the railway bridge but the ghosts they encountered on their way were either too caught up in their own past lives or too suspicious of strangers to be of any help. Whatley tried talking to the living prostitutes they encountered and, with a little encouragement from his police ID, they had a little more luck there. One girl, so young that it brought tears to Moon’s eyes to think what kind of life must have turned her into a street walker, had seen some men wearing what appeared to be black robes heading up the side road towards the station. "But that's crazy," commented Moon when they were alone. "They couldn't be taking their victims onto the train,
could they?"
"There's no passenger service that late in the evening," replied Whatley. "Maybe they have a hideaway somewhere near here, close to the railway track. I'll get some uniforms to look into it when I get back to the station. Now, I think that's all we're going to find out this evening, don't you ‘boys and girls’? Do you fancy a lift home?"
"Inspector, you couldn't get me away from this rotten place fast enough!" Sonia sighed. "We've touched far too many broken lives for one evening."
"Ditto," agreed Moon.
"Gets depressing, doesn't it," said the inspector gloomily. "But you get used to it."
"I hope I never have to." Sonia looked entreatingly at Moon. "No more tours of the red light district eh, please love?"
"Not if I can help it!" he agreed, slipping his arm around her shoulders as they walked swiftly back to where Whatley had parked his Mercedes.
Chapter 21
It was still over an hour before closing time so Moon and Sonia asked Inspector Whatley to drive them to the Hangman's Rest instead of going straight home. On the way Moon phoned Uri and the girls to ask if they could meet up at the pub to discuss their night's findings. Uri's cell phone was turned off but Karen Maddocks, who answered the phone at the house, said that the vampires had already gone out for the evening. She wasn't sure where they were going but it was probably the pub. "Trust Uri," Moon grumbled to Sonia. "First real lead we've had for months and he's incommunicado."
"You two take care now,” said Whatley as they were getting out of the car outside the pub. “I may not be of much help to you on the supernatural front but I don't want you taking unnecessary risks."
"If we can't deal with this I think you'll have a lot more than our safety to worry about," replied Moon grimly.
As they entered the pub Sonia asked Moon, "Jerry, do you think this could really go that far? Could we even be killed?"
Moon looked at her gravely. "Yes, I do. Face it, we could both have died a few weeks ago over in Leigh Woods and I've known that this could be a deadly business ever since I was nearly swallowed whole by that thing in St Andrew's Cemetery. The trouble is I don't think there's any way for me not to be involved. I seem to be the only man with the tools for the job... plus Bristol's supernatural Mafia has promised to come gunning for me if I back out. No one's expecting you to risk your life though. You can pull out and take a back seat any time you like if you feel it's getting too much." He gently touched her cheek. "But if I do pursue my 'gifts' like you've been encouraging me to do I doubt this is the last time it'll get dangerous… so you may want to pull out on me as well..."
"Not on your Nelly!" said Sonia, reaching up and kissing him. "I just wanted to make sure I understood how high the stakes were. You're not getting rid of me that easily, Jerry Moon," she shrugged. "Anyway, it sounds like life is going be pretty fucking awful if Rurik wins and, if you're going to put him back in the ground for good, you'll need all the help you can get."
Moon grinned. "I guess so. But I'm glad you've decided to stick with me and that’s not just because I think we work well as a team. Just in case I haven't said it recently, I love you, Sonia..."
"Hey, Moon! Stop snogging by the door and buy a drink!" yelled Kate from behind the bar. "You're putting the other customers off their beer and blocking the entryway… get your arses in here before I have to ban you both for being a fire hazard." Moon shrugged and held his head high as he and Sonia walked up to the bar to a chorus of cat calls.
They found Uri sitting in a corner, locked in hot conversation with some people that Moon vaguely recognised as members of the Goth music scene. Charli and Roanne were nowhere in sight. One of Uri’s entourage was Stroggy, the lead singer from Stoker's Kiss, who had invited Moon to the gig where he had met Sonia. Avril's boyfriend Roger was also there along with Yvonne, the female singer from Unquiet Grave, and a tall, platinum-haired, skeletal Goth who Sonia, with mild awe in her voice, whispered was Jareth, the keyboard player for Phantail.
"Do you mind if we join you?" asked Moon, trying to indicated to Uri with his eyes that they had something important to tell him.
"Yes we do, actually," replied Jareth dismissively. "Piss off!"
Moon bristled with indignation. "Now, there's no call for..."
"Jareth!" admonished Uri. "Please, there is no need for rudeness. These are friends of mine."
"Sorry," mumbled the cadaverous musician, taking a sip from his drink. Moon recognised it as an ‘Ayesha's blush’, a cocktail popular among the more flamboyant set of the Goth community. It was heavy on strawberry and blackcurrant syrup, backed up with a liberal dose of vodka to give it some kick. It tasted disgusting but looked like blood, which was why a lot of the more poserish Goths drank it.
Uri turned to Moon. "My friend, we have some important band business to deal with. It should only take half an hour or so, can it wait?"
"Half an hour? Yes," Moon nodded. "But it is important. You know… to do with your old associate Rurik?"
Uri's eyes widened. "Ah, well, I'll try to complete my business with these gentlemen as quickly as possible." He turned back to the table. "Forgive me, guys, but I'd like to wind this up quickly. Moon here has brought me news of a potential album deal that Blood Velvet has been negotiating for some time. Do you mind if we set aside the pleasantries and just get on with it." There was a variety of nods and general assents from the others. Uri turned back to Moon. "Very well, if you and Sonia could go and find yourselves somewhere to sit I'll be with you as soon as possible."
"It's like he's holding court," commented Moon as they headed for an empty table.
"He is very well respected in the Goth music scene," replied Sonia, "but I think he puts on the act a bit just to impress them."
"Or maybe that's just the way the men in charge acted in his day. He grew up in the time of serfs and overlords remember."
"And that really bugs you, doesn't it?" Sonia smiled knowingly. "You're a bit of a rampant egalitarian, aren't you, Jerry?"
"I suppose so," Moon shrugged. "I just don't believe in undeserved privilege. Or even worse privilege that's been taken by force and maintained with a mixture brutality and subjugation, which is what they had in the Middle Ages. Regardless of all the airs and graces they attached to it, when you cut to the quick the so called nobility was nothing more than a bunch of highly successful thugs."
"So, do you think Uri's a thug then?"
"No, but I'm certain that Rurik is. Uri just grew up in a privileged class of the same society and retains a few mannerisms that hark back to those times, while Rurik is your full blown, 'might is right' warlord and probably not even the worst of a very bad lot."
Sonia laughed. "That's what I like about you, Jerry. You have a really clear sense of what's right and wrong. Most of us just muddle along doing the best we can but you really think this kind of stuff through, don't you?"
"Well, I like to know all the background information before I decide where I stand on something, if that's what you mean..."
"Yeah, that's it! But when you do decide something's right you really go for it. That's probably why the 'Powers That Be' decided to give you your Gift - they knew that you have the kind of crusader-like mentality required to follow things through."
"A ‘crusader-like mentality', is it?" Moon grinned ruefully. Then he shook his head. "I'm not too keen on the old 'Powers That Be' idea either. It suggests that the way the universe is run is far more organised than I'd give it credit for. Anyway, what's a cynical young thing like you doing hooked up with an old 'crusader', eh? Aren't you afraid I might lock you up in a chastity belt?"
"Oh, I know a good locksmith," smirked Sonia. "Anyway, maybe I've a touch of the crusader myself. You never know."
"What is all this about crusaders?" asked Uri, who had concluded his other business and come looking for them. "Dreadful people! They recklessly plundered the entire Middle East for glory and gold on the whim of the Church. I never met one that I liked. Even the ones I fed from gave me ter
rible indigestion. Too much spicy food in their diet, don't you know."
"Oh, we were just discussing our mutual penchant for unpopular causes," replied Moon. "Speaking of which, we may have a possible lead on Rurik."
Moon and Sonia told Uri about their trip to Stapleton Road and explained their suspicions that Rurik was gathering a cult of followers around him. "So Rurik’s building himself a cult, eh? That would be very much his style. I mean, why waste your time hunting for victims when you can bully someone into bringing them to you? But you were able to find no suggestion of where he might be hiding?"
"One of the witnesses said she thought she'd seen a group of men in dark clothing hurrying towards the railway station late one night. They may have a hideaway somewhere near to the railway line or perhaps they had a vehicle hidden away up there we don't know." Moon shook his head. “Frustrating isn’t it? Half a clue seems worse than being totally in the dark.”
Uri sighed. "I suppose the next thing we ought to do is search the area around the station for clues that might point to where they're hidden."
"Oh? But Inspector Whatley's got the police doing that," Sonia pointed out. "Surely we'd just be going over the same ground."
"With all due respect to the forensic capabilities of the Bristol police force," Uri smiled wolfishly, "they do not have access to the range of senses that a vampire commands, or you and Moon for that matter. We must check the area for Rurik's supernatural presence and you and Moon can ask questions of any ghosts that we might encounter."
"Does that mean we have to go there again tonight?" asked Moon downheartedly, taking a deep sip from his pint of Ostrich. "Yes, I'm afraid so" replied Uri. "We need to strike while the iron is hot. Rurik may not have reason to fear the police but his ghouls do. They may decide to move their hideout when they realise the police are onto them.” He gave them a secretive smile. “Drink up, you two, and I'll give you a lift."
"I'm not keen on flying, Uri, and I doubt you could carry both of us on your own.” Moon looked at Uri quizzically. “Where are Charli and Roanne anyway?"
Under a Ghostly Moon (Jerry Moon Supernatural Thrillers Book 1) Page 24
