Black Scorpion (22 page)

Such beauty …

The same could not be said for the view around him, explaining why Dracu had opted to base his headquarters here. The fact that the “Black Forest” was rumored to be the most haunted wooded area in the world kept locals and tourists alike far away. And for the few that ventured or strayed too close to these woods laden with warped, dense trees that resembled gnarled arthritis-riddled fingers, well, their “disappearances” served to further fuel the legend that left this part of Transylvania the private domain of Black Scorpion.

Even those, in law enforcement and otherwise, who came looking would find their quests fruitless for good reason, one that revealed itself moments later when the road approached the Apuseni Mountains. This particular range was riddled with massive caves carved out of the rock and flora, most notably the Coiba Mare and Coiba Mica systems. These were well known, far more so than the Coiba Moarte system that Dracu had christened himself, fittingly since
moarte
meant “death” in Romanian.

The convoy rolled on, heading straight for a waterfall spiraling down the dark lower ledges of the Apuseni range. Beyond it was more of the dark sheen indicative of the unbroken jagged sprawl of the mountain, but this was an illusion, a trick of reflection off the cascading waters. The convoy slid to a halt at the shore of the shallow lake into which the waterfall spilled, apparently reaching a dead end.

Then a transmitted signal from the lead vehicle in the convoy lowered a bridge fashioned to look like a huge section of the mountain face, spanning the entire width of the lake to the shore on which the vehicles waited. The convoy eased forward, passing directly under the waterfall and into the fortress that Dracu had built from the remnants of a nuclear command and control bunker the Soviets had constructed within Coiba Moarte. It was connected to a network of silos constructed during the height of the Cold War, strategically placed beneath the ideal cover of the manmade lake that enclosed the mountain. Black Scorpion had added ten levels to the original structure and gutted the existing interior, rebuilding it from scratch.

The result was a marvel of construction in all respects, completed against impossible logistics and in half the time anticipated. A true miracle when the challenges posed by turning a long abandoned compound mired within a massive internal cave structure into a habitable and defensible fortress were considered, even with cost being no object. Each task proved more daunting than the last. Installing appropriate plumbing and wiring, for example, or a newly expanded air filtration and circulation system.

The one feature Vladimir Dracu barely touched at all was the command center itself, erected by the Soviets in a single underground layer protected by thousands of tons of steel, concrete, and natural stone fortifications. From here he intended to stage his greatest operation, one that would allow him to claim what was rightfully his.

The massive construction project also required Black Scorpion to spend vast resources on forging roads through a veritable wilderness to allow for proper passage of vehicles. This even though much of the bulkiest materials were ferried in by freight helicopter after being trucked to the nearest city. Some of those roads had been destroyed, overgrown by vegetation again in practically no time inside the Hoia-Baciu Forest. The single access route the convoy had just traversed was camouflaged and could be best negotiated by powerful SUVs with off-road capabilities.

One thing that had proven no problem at all was manpower. Black Scorpion's structural engineers were culled from the best minds the former Soviet-bloc nations had to offer, then unemployed and just glad to have a job to feed their families no matter how challenging or dangerous. Dracu had also found an endless source of labor from the human trafficking network that he'd built, teenagers mostly taken from a host of isolated, surrounding villages on the false promise that hard work was their ticket back home. Hundreds of virtual slaves entrusted with backbreaking work on ground that would eventually hold their graves.

Dracu had long lost count of the dollars the process had expended, nor did it matter to him; the mountain fortress was now an unprecedented, secured residence, one with a bevy of propane-fueled generators buried within rock. Deep within the bowels of the fortress lay stores of emergency rations, enough to feed his entire complement of men for a full year. The bridge rose after the last vehicle in the convoy had swung into a sprawling internal courtyard within the monolithic fortress built to conform to the cave's shape.

He rode the private elevator down to his suite of rooms. Once there, he left Armura posted at the door and entered his study, dominated by his art collection consisting of items stolen or taken from by force from Romania's National Museum of Art or Bulgaria's National Art Gallery. Chosen not for their notoriety, but the design and vision of the artists in crafting a world that appealed to him, the way they used light to illuminate the worlds they had fashioned. He could gaze at them for hours, always finding something new to see in each and glad for the beauty they brought to the fortress's chilly, dark confines, replacing both windows and something else.

Mirrors.

Dracu had no desire to look at himself, even in the reflection of glass, to which he avoid turning at all costs. He had learned to shave and perform other menial tasks without the benefit of viewing his reflection, hiding the view from himself just as the veil he wore whenever in the company of others hid it from the rest of the world.

His collection of paintings made for a striking contrast with the contents of a side room just off his study, housing the only reason he was still alive today. He entered it through an inner door, struck as always by the humid blast of heat in stark contrast to the ever-present chill in the rooms beyond.

The terrarium was kept always at ninety degrees to mimic the climate best tolerated by his collection of deathstalker and black scorpions. So they might thrive even more, Dracu had had the terrarium constructed to take on as much of the creatures' native semiarid environment as possible. They crawled in and under the thick sand layered with patches of recirculated water to maintain the proper levels of humidity, though most of the scorpions seemed to prefer the branches of the brush and shrub growth that thrived in the indoor climate. That climate was made remarkably hospitable for them by a combination of sprayers and incandescent sun-like lighting that burned in the very same degree and hours as the sun in their natural habitats. Within it, though, Dracu felt the makeup he wore over the thinning flesh of his face beginning to recede, thanks to the perspiration soaking through it in the terrarium's fetid atmosphere. He welcomed that heat, though, since it was one of the few times he ever felt warm.

As a result, Dracu's scorpions were able to thrive beyond his greatest expectations, even mimicking the creatures' battle for survival with endless fights for supremacy that occurred in the wild. Dracu was convinced such a practice enhanced the creatures' ability to manufacture vast amounts of the venom that was responsible for his continued survival.

He rolled up his right sleeve to reveal a host of ugly purplish bruising and extended his gloved right hand into the bramble and thickets to snare one of the creatures in his grasp. His treatment required only a single sting per day, sometimes every other, to flush their venom through his diseased blood and hold the pestilence inside him at bay.

Dracu eased the scorpion he'd snatched from the terrarium into place on his forearm and watched its stinger snap downward in an arching motion, felt the needle-like prick as is it pierced his skin and a flush of heat as its venom joined his blood. Then the pain started, an awful, wrenching agony that struck him everywhere at once, briefly freezing his breath. It had been like that the first time he'd been stung and had never abated; if anything, growing more intense over time, even as his veins blued and seemed to expand before slowly returning to normal after the agony peaked.

Dracu closed his eyes, letting the pain of the sting consume him. As a boy, from the day he'd been herded with the others into the back of that box truck, he'd learned all about pain. Sometimes when he closed his eyes, feeling his body racked by spasms as the venom spread its magic treatment through him, he was struck by visions of a past he kept both close and faraway at the same time. Close because he needed to remember. Faraway because those years had stolen everything from him.

“Domnule,”
a voice called over the intercom, shocking Dracu back to the present, his eyes jerking open. The pain had receded, replaced with the strangely soothing warmth of the venom spreading through his veins so he might continue to cheat death, just as life had cheated him. “The man has arrived and has been properly searched. He would not open the satchel he is carrying.”

“With good reason, I suspect,” Dracu said toward the terrarium's wall-mounted speaker, feeling the equally familiar rush of euphoric pleasure spreading through him in the agony's wake. “Bring him up.”

After returning the scorpion to its home and rolling his sleeve back down, Dracu moved back into his elegantly furnished study. He made sure his veil was in place and was waiting at the door when the heavy knock fell upon it. He touched the open button on the interior keypad and backed up so his guest could enter, accompanied by Armura.

“I trust you have it,” Dracu said to him.

“Right here,” said Henri Bernard.

 

FIFTY-ONE

H
OIA-
B
ACIU
F
OREST,
R
OMANIA

“Does he have to stay?” Bernard asked, eyeing Armura as he closed the door behind him.

“Why, is that a problem?”

Bernard seemed to have trouble taking his eyes off Armura's massive frame and the mask covering the ravaged portion of his face.

“I suppose not.”

“Good.” Dracu caught Bernard's gaze lingering too long on him. “Now, let's get down to business.”

Bernard held up the thickly padded satchel for Dracu to see. “The pages are inside a specially sealed chamber. Most are in relatively good condition, given their age, but they're still degraded overall and very sensitive to the elements and touch.”

“Any luck with the translation?”

“The woman was the ancient languages expert, not me. But I'm sure you'll have no problem securing someone to handle that task.”

“That was your responsibility, Henri.”

“All men have their limitations.”

“Not all men,” Dracu noted. “And my orders were to provide a manuscript
with
translation. What good is it to me otherwise? Are we certain the manuscript is authentic, at the very least?”

“Scarlett Swan believed it was, and she's the expert.”

“Then I'll have my linguistics expert soon.”

Bernard's brow rose and fell again. “You found her?”

“It wasn't hard. I'm having her brought in at first light.”

“Then you won't be needing me anymore.”

“You want to leave already?” With that, Dracu led Bernard across the floor to the terrarium. “Come,” he said, “don't be afraid.”

Once inside, Bernard was transfixed by the various cages housing expertly recreated environments for the scorpions dwelling within them, his attention so focused that he failed to notice Armura join them.

“Beautiful, aren't they, Henri?”

Bernard shrugged, stiffening when he glimpsed Armura standing just behind him. “I suppose that's in the eye of the beholder.”

“True enough. You know what else is true? That these creatures have the ability to instill life as well as death. Call it a cruel irony of nature. Trust me, I know of this firsthand.” Dracu removed one of the lids and pointed to a scorpion nesting all by itself on a branch. “This is the deathstalker, the most deadly of any scorpion. Its stinger releases a neurotoxin that paralyzes the muscles, while it inflames the nerve endings. The result is unspeakable pain, while the victim is rendered utterly helpless prior to death. In the insect world, this allows the deathstalker to feast on his prey over the course of several days, even weeks.”

With that, Armura grabbed one of Bernard's arms in his powerful grasp and jerked the other one inside the cage, straight for the deathstalker scorpion. The scorpion twisted toward the back of his hand, raising its deadly tail stinger into position before lashing it downward, digging the sharp tip in and clinging long enough to inject its deadly venom. Armura waited until the scorpion had retracted its stinger before jerking Bernard's arm back out of the cage.

He was already shaking, his knees wobbling so much they banged into each other.

“It's easier if you don't struggle, Henri. Struggling only increases the pain and the time it takes to die.”

Henri Bernard's eyes bulged. His mouth dropped. He started to scream but the sound dissolved into a horrible airless rasp. His knees locked. Agony stretched across his features, drawing a stream of tears from both eyes, as he collapsed to the floor.

“The scorpion didn't kill you,” Dracu told him, “your greed did. You betrayed your own people. This is what you deserved. You didn't really think I could let you walk out of here, did you? This is what happens when you make a deal with the devil.”

Bernard was making shallow, rasping noises now, struggling for every breath as his throat began to close, his face starting to darken to a purplish shade. The writhing turned to spasms that stilled slowly until he lay motionless on the floor for Armura to effortlessly scoop up.

“Too bad you weren't a better linguist, Henri,” Dracu said over his corpse. “It would have kept you alive a bit longer.”

Then he moved to the intercom. The euphoria was just starting to peak, the scorpion venom pulsing through his veins and feeding the nutrients to his blood that were responsible for his very survival. The rush leaving the world before him awash in color suddenly brighter and sharper, the air itself turned thick enough to grasp in his hand. His senses enhanced to the point where he imagined he could feel the wind whistling through the mountain beyond and hear the lapping of the lake waters surrounding it.