“Donald, Lord Allan of Strathallan.”
A doorman announced my presence in the room, and ten heads turned as I strode across the expanse of floor, trying not to seem too eager as I made my way to the fire and got my hands as close to the flames as I dared.
Nine months in the desert had made me particularly aware of just how cold my homeland was, and on a night like this, with six inches of snow and a howling gale, I wished I had never returned. But then I would have missed my triumph.
The feeling was just coming back to my hands as I turned away from the roaring embers and faced the room. A flagon of mulled wine was thrust at me from my right.
“Here. Get this inside, o’ ye.”
Jamie, Tenth Earl of Dunnotar and Defender of the Crown’s regalia was a big man, six feet tall, broad of shoulder, with flaming red hair and a beard in which you could have hidden a family of mice.
His face flickered redly in the flames and when the candlelight glinted in his eyes he looked like the devil himself. But then he laughed, and the spell was broken.
“Your sojourn amongst the barbarians has enfeebled ye...eh man?”
A huge meaty palm slapped me on the back, almost making me spill my wine as he laughed again.
“Never mind. Come and meet the gentry...we’ve got some women here that’ll bring the color back to your cheeks.”
I managed to avoid another slap on the back as I followed him across the room. I hadn’t expected a social gathering...I had expected to get straight to the business...but Jamie obviously had his own games to play. I would just have to wait until the main player arrived.
Making polite conversation had never been a favorite pastime of mine, and I’m afraid that I bored the fine ladies of the court, but my mind was forever wandering back to the desert, back to that sepulchre where my long quest had reached its end.
I was standing alone by the fireplace, trying vainly to warm the chill in my bones, when the doorman made the announcement I had been waiting for.
“Robert, Lord of Arran, High Steward of Ayrshire, Grand Master of the Kilwinning Chapter.”
With a build up like that you might have expected a formidable figure, but the man who came in looked like he was struggling to live up to his moniker. His dress was fine enough...all wolf’s fur and soft leather, but the body inside had been racked by too much illness...he could no longer stand straight, his back hunched in a twisted curve. His hair hung across his scalp in a lank wave and his beard was as fine as duck down. Only his eyes seemed truly alive as he came across the room and took my hand.
“Donald,” he said, and there was genuine warmth in his voice. “I knew you would return. Do you have it?”
“I have it,” I said.
He did a jig of excitement, the reflected firelight dancing in his eyes, then clasped me around the shoulders. I had to stoop to allow him the embrace.
“May I see it?” He whispered, his voice so low that I had to strain to hear, but before I could reply he had already pushed himself away. “No. It must stay hidden until the right time.”
I suddenly realized just how long I had been away. There was a spread of gray in Robert’s hair, a gray that had not been there when I left, nearly three years before.
“So, Donald...do ye have tales to tell, wonders to relate? I’ll wager those barbarian beauties taught you a new trick or two.” Jamie bellowed, coming up beside me and pushing another full goblet of mulled wine into my right hand.
“Can you not see it?” Robert said, still barely above a whisper. “It shows in his eyes...he is not the boy we sent away these three years ago. Aye...he has tales to tell...and not all of them fit for polite company I’m bound.”
“But come with me Donald,” he said, taking me away from the fire. “You can tell me some of your story at least.”
I was reluctant to leave the warmth, but the mulled wine was doing the job, heating me from within, and Robert had a right to hear...he was the one who had sent me on my way all those years ago.
I didn’t bore him with details of the journey itself. It had been slow, it was mainly dull, and that wasn’t what he wanted to hear anyway.
“It was where the Knights of Malta said it would be,” I said, and the act of saying it sent my mind back, so that although I was talking to Robert, I was almost dreaming of the events in that distant land, in that dark and forbidding tomb.
We had been at the site for nearly six months, with little company but the sand and the heat and the flies. The temple had long ago been covered by sand...buried by the wrath of Allah according to the locals I had employed to aid me. With diligence and much backbreaking work we had slowly uncovered its splendor, its massive columns and the fine mosaics of its floor, the dry dead ruins of a glorious past.
Finding the entrance to the catacomb had been harder, but I had the drawing which Robert had given me and, one evening, just as the stars were bursting into the sky, I found myself standing in front of a black hole leading down into the earth.
I didn’t want to go in. I’ve never been one for scurrying around in holes...that was more Robert’s style...but if the promised treasure was within, I was going to have to go and get it. Too much depended on me for it to be thrown away on a sudden chill and a sense of foreboding.
The natives refused to go with me. I was left alone with only a single, smoking oil lamp as I put my foot over the threshold.
The flickering lamp sent shadows dancing over the walls like scampering, capering devils and my feet disturbed small clouds of dust to float, wraith-like in the air before me. Rough-hewn steps led me down to where the darkness was thicker and the silence fell over me like a shroud as I descended.
The rough stone tombs sat silent in the darkness, undisturbed for centuries, the carved recumbent figures buried alongside their finery. There were ancient swords, beautifully crafted edges of Spanish steel, there was armor glinting silver-red in the lamp light, there were faded robes, their red crosses still bright in the darkness of the tomb.
But I touched none of them. What I was looking for, if the Knights were to be believed, was yet further inside, at the heart of their ancient stronghold.
I found it several minutes later...the thick drapes hiding the shadowy recess in the wall. For a second my heart leapt to my throat as the drapes rippled, but it was only the flickering of my lamp. Nevertheless my fingers trembled as a pulled the drapes aside.
It was exactly where they said it would be, exactly where they left it all those centuries ago. As I moved towards the altar a chill wind ran through the chamber, causing the drapes to shuffle and whisper across the dry stone floor.
The shadows seemed to dance faster across the walls and my lamp sputtered and flared before finally settling to a steady flame. But it didn’t seem to be giving out much light as before.
I took what I had come for and left, hastily, grateful to get back out into the cool night.
“So the temple was there,” Robert said, talking to himself. “Just where they said it would be.” He looked up at me, and there were tears in his eyes.
He looked like he wanted to say more but he turned away from me, ashamed of his tears. I was about to reach out for him when a huge hand grasped me by the shoulder. I turned to see Jamie’s wide-eyed, slack-mouthed grin...he had drunk too much, but that was part of what made him Jamie...I would have expected no less from him. In his left hand he was holding my saddlebags.
“So, laddie,” he said to Robert, “Are you satisfied? Are you going to have your wee show?”
Robert merely nodded. “Aye. It is time,” he said. “Come with me.”
I was confused. “What is this all about?” I asked Jamie as we followed Robert’s bent figure. He wouldn’t answer at first and I had to ask him again before he deigned to reply.
“Robert has found a use for yon thing you brought back,” he said. “He is going to call up the Bruce. We will have our champion again.”
He wouldn’t say any more as led me further from th
e fire, away towards the door. I had one last look backwards as we left the room, but the rest of the occupants seemed to be pointedly ignoring us, trying too hard not to note our passing.
The snow hit me full in the face as the door closed behind me, and the wind howled its rage in my ears. Far below the waves beat hungrily at the cliffs, flecks of white spume being flung high to mingle with the white, dancing flakes of the storm.
“A fine night for it.” Jamie bellowed in my ear, even his great voice being torn away by the wind. I was unable to reply...I was having enough trouble fighting the wind to bother with speech. We followed Robert through the grounds of the castle to the chapel at the east end, high above the sucking sea below.
A great oak door, some four inches thick, swung shut behind us as we entered, shutting out all sounds of the storm and leaving us alone in thick, quiet darkness. Robert struck a light and at first all I could see was his face, lit from underneath by the candle, its light throwing the upper half of his face into deep, black shadow.
It was only when my eyes became accustomed to the darkness that I realized what was about to occur.
The windows of the chapel had been covered in thick, green velvet drapes, and all the wooden seats had been removed from the room, leaving only empty boards on the floor before the altar.
On the floor, a circle within a circle had been drawn, circles surrounded by dense Hebrew script. A five-pointed star was inscribed inside the inner circle, and a candle was placed at each point of the star.
Jamie handed me the saddlebag.
“It is time, laddie. Let’s see what your quest has brought us.”
I opened the bag and suddenly felt a chill that had nothing to do with the howling storm outside.
I took out the leather-covered package and unfolded it, taking a small pleasure in the gasps that escaped from the other two.
The ashes lay in a small pile no more than an inch high...red burned ash that could have been from almost anything. What couldn’t be misinterpreted were the teeth...just two of them, as white and gleaming as those of a child, as sharp and pointed as those of a great shark.
Robert took the bag from my hands softly, almost reverentially.
“The old books were right. And if I’ve read them right these few ashes have the power to return the dead. Rejoice my friends, for tonight we will have the Bruce with us.”
He produced a gold goblet from under his robes, its surface gleaming redly in the candlelight, and poured the ashes into it before stepping into the circle.
“Remember,” he said to both of us. “You must not enter the circle until the conjuration is complete.”
Jamie and I nodded in unison...it was not the first summoning we had attended, but I had the feeling it would be the most memorable.
Robert raised the goblet above his head and began to chant as the air above us thickened and soured.
I won’t try to reproduce the words...they were barbarous and strange, the like of which I had never heard. There was a great swirling in the air, a red mist that foamed and bubbled, lit by its own inner fire.
“The knife,” Robert said, and Jamie drew his dagger, throwing it underhand into the circle where Robert caught it with a deftness and skill he had never previously possessed. He placed the goblet on the floor in the middle of the circle and held his arm out over it.
Without saying anything else he slashed down hard at his flesh, blood welling immediately.
And as the blood hit the ashes they bubbled and boiled in fury, overflowing the goblet and spreading in a red puddle on the floor, a puddle that heaved and pulsated with each new drop of Robert’s life.
The puddle spread and grew until the whole of the inner circle of the pentagram was a pool of gore with Robert standing in its center.
“I summon and conjure you to appear before me,” Robert called out, and the red pool began to thicken and coalesce, as the mist around us grew thicker still until it was a noxious choking fug.
Both Jamie and I were almost overcome by the fumes, reduced to helpless, coughing invalids. There was a scream from the pentagram and the red mist lifted to reveal a scene of horror.
Robert was still in the pentagram, and he was not alone.
A great pale demon stood there, a creature from legend, its eyes burning in the candlelight. It looked at Robert with naked hunger and, before either Jamie or I could move, it pounced, gripping Robert in its strong arms and fixing its fangs into his neck.
Jamie screamed. “No. The Bruce. We were promised the Bruce,” and stepped forward, his right foot breaking the circle.
And hell came to Dunnotar.
Robert fell to the floor, his eyes staring blindly, and I saw that he was already dead, but by then I had other things to divert my attention.
Jamie had the creature held in a bear hug and was crushing it, his arms locked tight across its back. For a second I felt that he might prevail, but then the creature laughed and broke the hold as if he had been held by no more than two pieces of fine thread.
The fire in its eyes held me and I was unable to move, frozen still as I was made to watch it feeding on my last friend.
And when it was done it came for me.
“I am Shoa,” it said, “and now you are mine.”
That was four hundred years ago.”
~-o0O0o-~
“I served him for nearly thirty years,” the stranger said, “until one came like I came for you. But that is another story.”
Brian blinked, dispelling the last of the visions from his mind.
“What am I?” he said, his voice coming harsh and painful.
“Like me,” the stranger said. “That’s all I can say. Names mean little, as you’ll no doubt discover, but the people who can walk under the sun call us vampires.”
CHAPTER 6
“WHAT IS the matter with everyone tonight?” Bill Reid asked. “First the boy and now you Margaret. Has someone been putting something in the food up at the school?”
Margaret looked up at the Minister. She could see in the set of his jaw that he had made a decision about something, but deep in his eyes, behind the jocularity and the mask of his cloth, she saw a flickering fear that she recognized in herself.
She risked making a fool of herself, but she knew what she had seen up at the house, what Tom Duncan had become.
“I asked for a reason,” she said. “I need your help.”
“You need a doctor,” Bill Reid said. “A doctor and a good night’s sleep. And I’ll hear no more of vampires. Not tonight.”
He turned away, back to the whisky bottle, pouring himself another large measure and downing it in one swift gulp. His eyes watered, but he didn’t cough and it all stayed down.
“Have you seen it as well?” a small voice said, and Margaret noticed the boy for the first time.
“Tony?” she said. “Tony Dickie? What in God’s name are you doing here?”
The boy looked like he hadn’t slept for a week. His eyes were rimmed in deep black shadow and looked too old for his face...eyes that had seen things a boy should only ever fantasize about.
And then she remembered the scene in the boiler room...she still had the picture in her head...the still dead body of Ian Kerr lying on the floor, and the twin grooved wounds in his neck. It was only now that she realized what had been wrong with the picture...considering the nature of the wounds there had been too little blood...far too little blood.
She shivered and clutched tighter to the glass in her hand.
“There’s something going on here, isn’t there?” she asked, and the boy nodded, his eyes wide.
“There’s a vampire out there. And he’s after me,” he said, and looked like he would burst into tears. He seemed to be waiting for a response and he trembled all over.
He needs someone to believe him, Margaret realized and was about to reply when the Minister snorted in disgust.
“All that’s going on here is that there’s a psychopath running around the country. It
wouldn’t surprise me if it was him that’s causing all this mayhem.”
“He’s not a psychopath,” Tony shouted, his fists clenched so tight that the white of the knuckles was showing. “He’s not. He’s a vampire killer...like Captain Kronos.”
“That’s enough,” the Minister said, raising his voice until he too was shouting. He stood over Tony, so close that Margaret flinched, expecting him to hit the boy.
“The man Kerr escaped from a psychiatric prison earlier this week. He’s a murderer...that’s all. An insane, evil murderer. And the police are going to catch him. Maybe then we can all settle down and get back to normal.”
“Who is this murderer?” Margaret asked.
Things were moving too fast for her...she couldn’t get a handle on anything and her mind seemed to be sliding away from any thoughts that might bring everything into focus. She took another sip of whisky, but that didn’t help.
“His name is Jim Kerr,” the Minister said. “But surely you saw it...it was all over the papers a couple of days ago. The police say he’s dangerous...he killed more than a dozen people ten years ago. He shoots them with a crossbow, and always leaves a clove of garlic in their mouths...it’s his trademark. Now can we please change the subject?”
“He kills vampires,” Tony said his voice soft and low. “And he put an arrow into that old man in the churchyard to stop him coming back. I saw him.”
“What old man?” Margaret asked. “There was an old man killed in the churchyard?”
Bill Reid signed loudly.
“Old Sandy...you know, the one who walks all over the place...the one with all the stories about ghosts and ghouls. Well maybe now he knows what it’s really like on the other side.”
“That’s unnecessary,” Margaret said, suddenly angry. “If the old man is dead then he deserves your so-called ‘Christian Charity’ rather than your contempt. You should be ashamed of yourself.”
The Minister stiffened as if she’d physically struck him. He wiped a hand across his brow.
Eldren: The Book of the Dark Page 16
