Blood-Kissed Sky (Darkness Before Dawn) (29 page)

I walk over to him and lay my hand on his shoulder, feel him stiffen. We’ve shared so much, been through so much. “Come with me,” I say. “I could really use your help out there.”

“We don’t need to do this,” he says. “Ian is right. We have all the information we need. What’s an Old Family vampire who lives outside the walls going to be able to tell us?”

“We won’t know until we ask, until we talk to him. Like mine, your duty is to the city. We need to know
everything
about the Thirst, and
everything
about Day Walkers, and
everything
about Sin. No matter the cost.”

“It doesn’t always have to be you making the sacrifices.”

“It does,” I say. “Because I’m the only person who can. Who do I have now? Not my parents. Not my brother. I’m the person who can die for their cause, because I don’t have anything to risk.”

“But you do. We all do,” he says, looking over at Tegan.

She steps over and takes his hand. “I’m not going. I’m going to stay and watch over Ian. I’ll be fine. There are no vamps in the city, but there are plenty where Dawn is going. She needs you. You’re a Night Watchman. She comes first.”

I can see him struggling and realize that slowly during this trip his feelings have been changing, shifting from me to Tegan. And it looks like hers have been changing as well. I’m about to tell him to stay when he says, “Vamps or no vamps, keep all the doors locked, Tegan. We’ll be back. I’ll be back.”

She smiles at him. “Just be careful.”

He nods.

I breathe a sigh of relief, then look at Richard. “Can you at least move Ian to a bed?”

“Of course.” He uses the amazing strength that vampires have to easily lift Ian over his shoulder and cart him to one of the bedrooms.

Faith touches my arm, bringing my attention to her. “I can sense that you’re a little upset by our methods. He’ll sleep for a couple of hours and be just fine. We should be back before he wakes up. This way was just easier.”

“I guess it was…”

When Richard returns, he asks, “Are we ready?”

“Just to be clear,” Michael says, “I want to go on record as saying I don’t like this.”

“Noted,” Richard says. “Now, let’s get out of here.”

“How?” I ask. “There’s only one entrance into the entire city, and that’s the rails for the Night Train, which is closed with several feet of steeled gate and a dozen guards.”

“I’ve been slipping in and out of this city for years,” Richard says. “Don’t worry.”

Once we get outside, we go around a corner to where Richard parked his car. It’s a beautiful, all-white, old sedan. It shouts glamour like nothing else I’ve seen on the streets. I expect a chauffeur in a top hat and leather gloves to come out and guide me into the luxurious backseat. But Richard opens up the back door and does it for me.

The inside is cream-colored leather, the softest I’ve ever felt. The stitching is perfect, the contours precise. Michael follows me in while Richard and Faith take the front.

Before long, we’re gliding smoothly through the streets. The funny thing is, no one is looking. No one even seems to notice or care. They’re so used to these kinds of sights that we’re just another passing car. In Denver, people would have been turning their heads at every street corner.

An hour later, Richard has circled around to the only part of the city that isn’t covered with lights and people.

“Good, it’s still here,” he says, driving toward a brick warehouse with a large metal sliding door. “Now, if only this still works.” He holds up a remote and presses a button. The door rises. He drives through and the door clangs shut behind us.

The headlights illuminate the dusty floor, and then I see it: a ramp leading down. Slowing almost to a crawl, he follows it cautiously. Soon we’re in a tunnel, and he puts his foot on the gas again.

“I built this deep beneath the city decades ago,” he says. “It was the easiest way to get in and out after my father pissed me off.”

“What would you do in the city?” I ask, somewhat claustrophobic.

“I’d just go to one of the nightclubs or a nice restaurant, surround myself with beautiful women. I swear, they’re getting better-looking every year.”

I look at Faith and as much as she tries, even she can’t hide that tiny snarl at the mention of female “competition.” Not that any mortal would be competition to her.

The tunnel is just large enough to fit the car, and several wooden beams are spread out every so often to help support the underground system. It doesn’t seem the safest in the world, and I wonder when it was last used. But before long, Richard is pressing a button on the remote again and another door is sliding open. A dull blue hue appears. When we emerge, the moon is up high greeting us, casting its gaze across the deserted fields. I glance back to see the city’s Outer Ring of walls behind us.

There are no defined roads, but with Richard at the wheel, they aren’t needed. Soon we all relax, lean back, and enjoy the surroundings as we’re speeding along. I’m distracted by the mountains in the distance when Michael taps my knee and points forward. I notice something looming up ahead, and even without Richard telling me, I know what it is.

The manor is very different from Valentine’s. It’s old and deteriorating. Larger, but it’s like the entire thing is collapsing under its own weight and history. Chunks of stone are absent from the towers, which only seem to be standing by some freak architectural design. Their edges rotting away, window frames hold no glass. The front door is off-kilter, a hinge giving way some time ago.

“Man, it has been a while,” Richard says.

“It didn’t always look this way?” I ask.

“No. But my father’s been growing lazier over the years, more complacent. The servants are obviously following his lead.”

Richard brings the car to a halt so it’s facing the manor, its lights revealing a crumbling foundation and vines crawling up the sides, as if a great tentacled beast lay in the ground trying to swallow the manor whole.

If Richard is nervous, he certainly doesn’t show it as he opens the front door. Stepping in, we’re greeted with black shadows fighting against the bit of moonlight pouring in through the windows and a handful of holes in the roof. Michael turns on his flashlight, and the extra illumination reveals Richard’s concern.

“Now this is strange,” he says. “The lamps aren’t even on. Father was very adamant that they never go out.”

As we begin to cautiously move forward, the wind picks up and I feel it crawl across my body from the hundreds of tiny openings throughout the decrepit great house.

“It seems abandoned,” I say.

“I doubt that,” Richard says. “Father has just become more of a recluse. That’s all. He’d never leave this place.”

Michael stays right behind me, sweeping his flashlight around us any time we hear a noise. I figure we’re safe, though. Richard and Faith, leading the way, have highly attuned senses. If we were in trouble, they would know.

As we pass rooms, I steal glances into places that may have once been beautiful but are now haunted by decay and rot. Ragged, moth-eaten curtains hang at the windows. In the art gallery are torn paintings and smashed marble statues. The library shelves are nearly empty, the books strewn across the floor like some new and uneven carpeting. Bedchambers reveal flipped mattresses and armoires reduced to rubble.

Richard grows more tense, resting his hand firmly on the stake strapped to his belt. Taking the cue, Michael wastes no time withdrawing his own.

At the end of the hallway, a pair of great double doors greets us. Richard hesitates, maybe contemplating what he’ll say to his father. Maybe more afraid of what his father has become. Driven mad, perhaps? Led to destroy his own manor? He wouldn’t be the first Old Family to lose it. It isn’t common, but their minds can be as fragile as a human’s sometimes, cracking along hidden fissures they didn’t even know existed.

Richard opens the door.

The massive room is empty except for one throne made entirely of stone. The only light shining upon it comes from a hole in the roof that must have been deliberately placed, because the moon falls perfectly onto the elaborate chair. The arms and back are covered in ornate designs, carved by some master artisan’s ancient hand. But where the Great Carrollton Lord should sit, there is nothing except dust.

“He’s not here,” Richard says.

“We haven’t checked all the rooms,” Faith says in an attempt to comfort him.

“No. He isn’t here. This place is empty.”

“Not quite, young Carrollton.”

The air is sucked out of my lungs as a new chilly voice responds to Richard.

From behind the throne, a pair of hands emerges, and then arms, and finally the head of a demented vampire. He crawls across the throne like a spider, his feet and hands never hitting the ground, but gliding across the seat of the Old Family vampire.

“Maurice?” Richard says. “Maurice, is that you? Where is Father?”

“Gone, young Carrollton,” the vampire says. He wears only a faded loincloth, the rest of him pale and naked. Thin beyond all imagination except for a large jaw that would only fit on a man twice his size.

“But you’re his most trusted servant,” Richard says. “Surely you know where he went.”

“Oh, I do, young Carrollton. He’s all around us.”

Maurice reaches down and rubs his hand along the dusty chair, pulling his fingers up and licking them.

It isn’t dust. It’s ash. Vampire ash.

“Why?” Richard asks, immeasurable calm in his voice.

“Because he saw the future,” Maurice says, scaling the throne until he is perched on top with a balance that is mystifying and somehow adds to the small vampire’s grandeur.

“The future? No one can see that.”

“You can,” Maurice says. “Just look around, and you’ll find that you are … surrounded by it.”

Michael slowly moves his flashlight up, tracing it across the ceiling, where the stonework slowly gains texture, moving from flat rocks with grooves to fully formed limbs and heads.

The ceiling is composed of living, breathing vampires. And they have their eyes focused on us.

M
aurice’s mouth opens into a gaping black maw; rows of fangs send spittle flying as he lets out a massive roar that pours from his chest. The Infected are everywhere. The vampires descend from the ceiling, landing without grace, but with purpose. The need to feed has taken over their minds, and they only want to drink from Richard and Faith. Michael and I are mere inconveniences who will be dealt with quickly.

“We can’t fight them all,” Michael says.

“We aren’t going to fight any of them,” Richard says. “Run!”

Michael grabs my arm and we begin sprinting, but the hairs on the back of my neck are prickling and I know the vampires are chasing us. Michael eventually lets go of my arm and pulls out another stake, running farther ahead to clear the path of any vampire that gets in his way. His speed is incredible, his endurance something beyond human.

A vampire infected with the Thirst drops in front of us. Michael wastes no time dispatching him with a quick blow, so vicious and savage it’s like he’s possessed. I can hear Richard and Faith still close behind, but they, too, are fighting off this horde of the damned.

As we near the entrance to the manor, Richard leaps in front of us, kicking the door so hard that it nearly flies off its last hinge. He jumps into the car and starts it up. We get inside just as a vampire pounces on the hood.

The vampire’s claws slam into the windshield, causing a fracture. Faith, maybe more annoyed than frightened, pulls out a stake and rams it through the glass, right into the vampire’s chest, striking a deadly blow. The Infected quickly rolls off.

As Richard speeds away, the vampires have no intention of letting their prey go. They’re scurrying after us, keeping a close distance.

“Speed up!” I yell, staring out the back window.

“I’m going as fast as I can,” Richard says. “This baby was built for luxury, not speed. Besides, it’s not as though I have a smooth road to work with.”

He’s right. Without a road, we’re bumping over terrain littered with potholes and unseen branches and puddles of mud. Richard can only go fast enough to keep the terrifying monsters out of arm’s reach, but not much more. They’re close enough that I can see their eyes, and our reflection in their black pools.

We reach the secret entrance to Richard’s tunnel and dive in so fast that all four tires leave the ground for a moment and the top of the car catches the roof of the entrance, causing sparks to fly. I look back. With their increased strength, the vampires stop the door from closing and they pour in.

The narrow passageway slows us down even further, and our pursuers take advantage. Before long, they flood the tunnel, running across the ground and crawling over the walls. Like insects, they can defy gravity. Some flatten themselves and take a path across the ceiling in an attempt to be the first to reach us.

A solid thud. A vampire on top of the car. He smashes Michael’s window and reaches in, but before he can grab hold, Richard swerves the car into the wall. The vampire is dashed against the rocks, releasing a grotesque howl before crumpling away and falling below the rampaging horde.