Vampire’s Waltz · Vampire’s Waltz by Thomas Staab 3 CHAPTER ONE An hour before sunrise on a sullen Wednesday morning, Armando Moreno stood at the intersection of Greenpoint Avenue

Vampire’s

Waltz by

Thomas Staab

This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to real people or events is purely

coincidental.

VAMPIRE’S WALTZ

Copyright 1999,2011,2016 by Thomas Staab

First edition: September 1999

Second Edition: September 2000

Third Edition : December 2011

Fourth Edition 2017

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including

photocopying, recording or by information storage and retrieval system

without written permission from the author, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.

Cover art by Mike Thomas [email protected]

Artwork Copyright Crazy Wolf Publishing 1999,2000, 2011

A Crazy Wolf Book

ISBN 0-9674172-5-2

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 99-90889

mailto:[email protected]

Vampire’s Waltz by Thomas Staab

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CHAPTER ONE

An hour before sunrise on a sullen Wednesday morning, Armando Moreno stood at the

intersection of Greenpoint Avenue and Kent in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. His black eyes squeezed

into slits as he peered out over the rough water at Manhattan. The Twin Towers were obscured

by an approaching storm, already a light drizzle fell Armando’s deeply lined face.

I know you did this, he thought as the wind whispered in his ears. But how?

He needed to consider that the sudden isolation of the city was what everyone thought it

was--A freak of nature.

To him, the evidence suggested otherwise.

A city that wasn’t prone to earthquakes was suddenly crippled by one of the fiercest

seismic surges in history, isolating its citizens. No power. No phones. No transportation.

Then there was the storm. According to the radio, a hurricane was thirty miles out to sea.

Its winds were so powerful that despite the distance they toppled power lines and snapped tree

limbs in Brooklyn.

The rainfall grew colder and harder, plastering Armando’s ebony hair to his head, the

lapping waters at the dock’s ridge grew frenzied as the storm marched closer. The Peruvian took

a deep draw of the sweet October air, hoping

it would clear his mind.

It didn’t.

Instead, one persistent word circled his mind, How?

He knew it was Glynis, despite his direst hopes and her seeming destruction, it was her.

This city was where the night terror, the only dream he had ever experienced, had led him. The

haven of the Twin Towers, the only buildings left on the island with any power. Before the

storm’s veil descended, the Towers had gleamed in the night like signposts to Heaven. Even now

they were distinguishable through the syrupy clouds. On the plane from Miami the dread in him

had grown with every passing mile. With the fear came rage.

Glynis was here and she had murdered a city of innocents...and not-so-innocents.

The gales accelerated, whisking grit into Armando’s eyes.


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KUNK...KUNK...KUNK...

Armando’s ears pricked at the noise. He was disturbed that he hadn’t heard the

commotion sooner. Allowing himself to become so distracted could prove fatal in the wrong

circumstance. The sloshing-bumping sound was rising from the edge of the dock where the

water’s slapping had grown thunderous.

The Peruvian strolled to the dock’s edge, crouched and leaned out over the water for a

better view. The river reeked from decades of pollution, the stench came close to making

Armando wretch, but the sodium-vapor lamps revealed something that stayed his nausea.

Armando clamped his left hand onto the pier’s landing and stretched down to catch the

object of his interest. The object eluded him until an energetic wave tossed it into range. The

object was soft and wet and something sluiced off it beneath his grip.

Armando grunted with revulsion and hoisted the corpse onto land. The body had spent

too short a time in the water for it to rot sufficiently, there was still a chance the person

was...Armando flipped the body over.

The face of a young woman stared blankly at him, a face no older than twenty, of Latin

descent judging by her physical characteristics. Armando mused that the girl could even be from

his country. It would fit Glynis’ malicious sense of humor to send the body as a warning.

Or a dare.

Armando examined the girl’s throat, arms and thighs for puncture marks and was relieved

when he found none. He was pleased that the child would not have to suffer any further misery.

The years out of action had dulled his taste for murder.

Armando rose from the girl and faced the dark city, willing his gaze to pierce the misty

shawl to the metropolis’ new Queen. His eyes remained blind to the city’s terrors.What his eyes

couldn’t see, his ears could hear; Faintly, over the rising wailing of the storm, he made out

screams.

To his knowledge, Glynis had no kin or allies, so how had she taken the city? One

vampire against a city of eight million panicked humans...Even with the Nosferatu’s appetite and

strength that would prove an impossible undertaking. Not only would she be incapable of

consuming that much blood, but the speed with which she would have to drain her victims in

order to diffuse the threat so many humans posed, would be beyond supernatural. No matter how

many ways he scrutinized the dilemma, it resulted in the same answer.


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Impossible.

Yet this was where the only dream of his life had brought him. Glynis had allowed no

room for confusion, the Two Towers were unmistakable. There was also another aspect of his

having dreamed that unnerved Armando; The witch had invaded his mind and delivered the

dream. There was no other explanation. Even during the Firefall, when the Guardians and

Humans had dreamt of the Vampires destruction, Armando and the other Immortals had slept in

pitch. The vision that had summoned him was Glynis’ construction and that meant she was

powerful enough to not only bypass his psychic defenses, she could manipulate his mind as well.

Armando glanced at the sky and watched Luna’s silver eye consumed by the storm. The

full moon would make Pastore wilder than usual, which was an asset as long as the Guardian

stayed focused on his target. Armando hadn’t summoned the Guardian himself, but he knew if

Glynis had called him, she would call John Pastore as well. Armando sensed the destruction of

Manhattan was a warning to the Vampire’s two surviving enemies, “Make peace with your gods,

because your deaths are near.”

It was a show that didn’t frighten Armando. It infuriated him.

He was angry that the witch had murdered millions of innocents to attract his and John’s

attention. What was more, he was angry with himself for not having been more thorough the last

time he’d killed Glynis. He would beg for the deads’ forgiveness and vow to avenge them, for all

the good it would do. Armando had learned a very important lesson in his youth. Regrets didn’t

bring back the dead. Or console the living.

Armando’s reverie stalled as a low, throaty growl resonated through the turbulent air.

The Immortal knew the sound and the creature from who it issued, so he wasn’t fearful.

He was, however, distressed that he had once again been caught unawares. He’d had no clue to

Pastore’s approach. If it had been

Glynis at his back instead of the Guardian, he would be dead and gone.

Armando pivoted from the dead girl to his old friend. Standing at the center of the

perpendicular crossing was a wolf with grey fur. The animal was much larger than its wilder

cousin, more the size of a dire wolf, the beast’s back was level with Armando’s solar plexus.

The animal was silver-gray with sprinkles of black across its flanks. It measured six and a

half feet long from snout to rear, a bushy tail tucked close to its sleek shape. Its bright gray eyes

blazed at Armando, its fleshy black lips were drawn up and back in a snarl. Ivory fangs gleamed


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in the wash of the street lamps.

“John.” Armando spoke the name with firm authority. In Pastore’s present state of mind,

the slightest hint of fear or aggression would spur an attack. If it were any other canine Armando

would care less...but this wolf was almost capable of killing him.

“I would prefer it if we could talk face to face.” Armando’s heavily accented voice

betrayed none of the unease he felt growing in his belly.

Pastore showed no sign of recognition. The growled went unabated, deepening an octave

as the wolf put a massive paw forward, its claws clicking on the concrete.

“Rrrrrowwwwrrllllll.”

Armando could feel the heat of beast’s bloodlust from where he stood two yards away.

Armando slowly inched his right hand along his thigh to the sheath concealed against the small of

his back.

The wolf took another pace forward, revealing more of the wicked scythes filling the

beast’s mouth. Its gray brows half shuttered its glacial eyes.

Armando’s fingers lighted on the handle of his silver- plated knife. When commissioning

the blade, Armando had hoped he would never need it; he had few enough friends as was and far

too many enemies. Time had taught him the bitter lesson that being prepared for the worst was

far wiser than hoping for the best. If he had to kill John...so be it.

The leather trench coat he wore concealed the blade from outside eyes. Armando had had

the knife constructed three decades earlier, by a smith whose name eluded Armando (in a life

filled with more acquaintances then there were raindrops in a cloud, it was easy to lose a name

here and there). The Peruvian wanted the blade in the event Pastore, the last of his kind, should

ever lose his faculties or come under the witch Glynis’ thrall, although until the isolation of

Manhattan, her continued existence had been conjecture. Armando had taken the precaution of

bringing the silver blade from his Florida home after consulting a calendar and finding that on

this night the moon would be full. He’d prayed the Hunter’s Moon wouldn’t steal the reason

wholly from his friend’s mind. Sadly, it seemed he’d prayed in vain.

Armando popped the latch on the sheath and let the handle slide down into his palm.

Weight that should have reassured him didn’t, it underscored the dread Armando felt that death,

the deaths of his friends, humanity and his soul, were hovering in Manhattan’s shadow.

Once Armando’s hand fell gently to his side, the wolf dropped its aggressive posture and


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mimicked a smile. The creature’s metamorphosis commenced a heartbeat later.

Rather than relief, Armando felt annoyance creep into his bones.

The wolf’s canine smile faltered as bone snapped and stretched, muscles bunching and

shrinking. When the change was complete, a man who looked fifty, with silver-streaked hair

knelt on one knee in the early morning hush. He was chuckling softly.

“I am not in the mood for your games John. I could have killed you.” Armando’s voice

was leaden with menace.

John Pastore continued his laughter as he rose, ducked behind a dumpster to gather his

clothes and proceeded to dress himself. When he stepped out, he was carrying a short, broad

leather case with two loops loping off one side, like straps on a back pack. Armando knew what

the satchel contained.

“C’mon guy, I was just messin’ with ya. Hell, the way I snuck up on you, I thought you

were sleepwalking. Figured I’d give you a little goose to wake ya up.

“Long time no see guy, you look good. Been down in the southern climes again?”

Some of Armando’s ire drained and an unwanted smile wrangled its way onto his face. A

heart frozen by solitude warmed a touch with John’s presence.

“Yes,” Armando said, failing to crush a chuckle in his throat. “I have been in Florida. The

land seems to grow sicker with the passing years...But it is good to see you old friend, despite the

focus of our reunion.”

Armando walked to the short, portly man and embraced him. Pastore returned the

gesture. They broke from each other and Pastore patted the taller man amiably on the shoulder

and sighed.

“Yeah, the bitch is back. I was hoping we got the last of her way back when. Looks like

we fucked up.”

Armando’s face darkened in reference to Glynis. He checked the Eastern horizon, the

pitch had shifted to deep violet. Dawn was breaking.

“Sunrise is near, let us find a place to sit and plan. She has chosen her ground wisely,

ferrying over will be difficult. Her timing is exemplary as well, the days are short this season.

Not that the sun is a fear for her with the heavy cloud cover.”

Pastore winced and groaned.

“The storm?” Armando asked, gazing over the rooftops to the flashing sky.


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“Yep,” Pastore said wincing again, the far-off thunder sounded like a shotgun being fired

in a steel drum. “Damn loud one too.”

The portly man nodded his head toward the taciturn city.

“You figure the Bitch did something to shake up the Big Apple and called up this storm.”

Armando shrugged, despairing the fact that they were facing a nemesis whose powers

were as yet unknown and for whom they were pitifully underprepared.

Underprepared?, he thought humorlessly to himself.

Blind is more like it.

“I find it too convenient that all of this is coincidence, yet we have no evidence to connect

the vampire to these occurrences. The most they have been able to conjure is mist, this...this is

unprecedented. Something must be aiding her...or she has grown powerful with the years. Either

way, we do not know what we are dealing with. Any experiences we have had with the vampire

are void. It is best to proceed with the belief that Glynis might well be unstoppable.

“In addition to the threat posed by the Nosferatu, my vision showed me someone the

Esclava de la sangre called

‘Fair Christian’, a young woman great with child. It is imperative we find her before

seeking out Glynis, both she and her babe are in jeopardy. They come before all else, are we

agreed John?”

“Shit yes!” Pastore smiled viciously and growled deep in his fleshy throat. Armondo

never ceased to be amazed by how well John’s human flesh concealed the feral entity within.

“Don’t you fret buddy-boy, the undead cunt’ll die before she lays a hand on this Fair

Christian lady,” Pastore’s grin spread wider, the cold spark in his eye giving hint to the wolf

within. “Even if I gotta strip the skin from ‘er bones an inch at a time.”

The blood hunger in John’s face drained, leaving a smile that was warm and amicable.

“Enough about the bitch though, I haven’t seen you in a hundred years. So whattaya

think?” John opened his arms.

“I took off a little weight—“

“I noticed, you look good.”

“And before I forget,” John’s smile trimmed to a smirk. “What’s with the shiv? Did you

actually think I’d come cross country in a mindless blood-fugue? You aren’t thinking Chief,”

Pastore said tapping his temple with a pudgy finger. “The fact that I found you among all these


9

scents should have told you that I was in my right mind. You’re letting all this shit cloud your

judgment. If I’d been a Blood Slave your Immortal ass woulda been drained dry and tucked

away until three days passed.”

Armando conceded that he’d had the same thought. The duo left the river bank and the

drowned woman behind. As deeply as it burned Armando’s heart, there was nothing he could do

for the girl. Wherever her spirit was, she was at peace and out of Glynis’ reach. Pastore felt

similar feelings of anger and helplessness as they strolled from the cadaver.

They walked through the early morning streets, Brooklyn’s inhabitant’s going to and from

work as if nothing special had happened in the past twenty-four hours. After an hour and a half

they stopped at the Fresh Pond Diner. After the waitress took their order, Armando noticed how

pensive John had grown.

“If you have something on your mind John, by all means...”

Pastore fiddled with his fork, glancing coolly around the diner, from the sound of the

place there were two people out of sight in a corner booth and five people in the kitchen. The

waitress who’d taken their order was sitting beside the cash register reading a movie magazine.

John sat the leather satchel containing his axe in an upright position along the wall.

“I thought we got them all.”

“We did.” Armando said, taking a sip of water.

“I don’t mean the Houses, I mean Glynis’ aspects. I thought we burned them all. Too

fuckin’ cocky.” He muttered.

Armando knew what John was talking about and shared his sense of failure...and as such

was reluctant to speak on the subject. Of course, there weren’t many he could speak to

concerning his life-long battle with the Vampire Houses without them locking him in an

institution. He had no excuse for silence or caution now though, sitting across from him was the

only being left who had survived those brutal times.

“So had I. But we were in very wild country, it would have been a difficult task for

anyone. And as usual, Glynis chose her territory well. We could have murdered every serpent,

insect and avian in that forest and still missed her. All it takes is one aspect to guarantee her

survival. Apparently, that is what happened.”

“We were sloppy man, we should have thought out the execution better. Or killed her

with a stake through the heart and tossed her into some salt water...Shit, putting the Lochaber


10

through her skull woulda been a step in the right direction. We used the only motherfuckin’

method that’d give ‘er an out! Huh! I wouldn’t be surprised if the bitch’d messed with our minds

so we would do it that way!” Pastore shook his head disgustedly, his face sour with failure.

“Like a couple o’ goddamn amateurs.”

The waitress, a lady in her mid-thirties who looked weary enough to be fifty, arrived with

their order: three extra-rare hamburgers with a side of fries for Pastore and a

large salad for Armando. John’s dour mood was lifted with the smell and taste of the

pink, bleeding beef.

“God in gravy this smells good. You don’t know what yer missin’ eatin’ that rabbit food.”

Armando chuckled, “Haven’t you heard? Red meat is bad for you.”

“Ain’t done me harm yet, just makes me meaner.” John’s face darkened a measure. When

he spoke again his voice was grave. “I hate to spoil the meal with foul talk, but why did the Witch

take so long to make her move? We both know it doesn’t take a century for a Vampire to

regenerate itself. And why is her opening move so damn ambitious? And how’d she pull it off?

It’s beginning to turn my mind to jelly trying to puzzle this shit out.”

John shook his head and took a long swig of his Coke, a distant peal of thunder sent

chimes ringing in his ears. Nearby, dogs whimpered at the cacophony of the storm’s fury.

Armando heard none of it.

“All I’ve got is the Lochaber and no way in hell is that gonna be enough to take down

eight million vampires. If we don’t hustle in the next three days,” John consulted a clock above

the diner’s entrance. “Make that two days, that’s what we’ll be facing. We’re good chief, but

we’ve never been that good.

“And another thing! How the blazes did Glynis manage to drain millions of people? I

know the Blood Slaves have an appetite, especially if they haven’t fed in weeks, but eight

million? It’s impossible...unless she had help.”

Armando nodded, “That was my thought as well, but from where? What quarter could

there be that neither of us has encountered that is powerful enough to rend the earth and fill the

sky with wind and rain? And if she possesses an army to help with the subjugation of

Manhattan’s human population, where have they come from? Out of habit I have kept an eye on

the news for any mention of mysterious deaths or vanishing corpses, but I have noticed nothing

out of the ordinary.


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“The vision she forced into my mind, the quakes and storms, none of this bodes well for

us. We must remedy our ignorance if we are to have any hope of victory. We must discover the

identity of this power she allies herself with, determine how many there are and if they can be

defeated.”

“If she does have a partner or, God forbid, an entire tribe of Vampires with her on the

island, then she’s gonna have them swarming the island looking for us. No way we’re gonna

have surprise on our side.”

Armando glanced out the window at the roiling sky, the dark blue skin of heaven was

swiftly being swallowed by the gray tide. The only indication that the sun existed was the

marginal brightening of the thunderheads. The strength of the hurricane’s breath had increased

dramatically, contorting saplings like a bully twisting the arm of an anemic child. Several passers-

by lost their umbrellas to the wind’s mischievous fingers.

“It is a moot concern really. She could have an army twice that of the island’s populace

and we would not know it, and on the third day she will have New York’s eight million to add to

her ranks. With the sun cloaked by the hurricane they will have free access twenty-four hours a

day, they could repel us indefinitely. It is vital we reach the island today, both to protect the girl

Glynis seeks and to find the Vampire’s hideaway.”

“Ain’t gonna be easy Cochise, from what I hear all points over are severed.”

Pastore reached into his denim jacket and withdrew a subway map from the interior

pocket.

Armando raised a startled brow, “How did you know to...?”

Pastore smirked and unfolded the map, moving the empty plate aside and spreading the

paper across the table.

“What’d you think, I came down with the last drop of rain? I’m always prepared. Now,

the way I see it...” John leaned down, searching the map and finally sat back with a finger

plastered to a point on the paper.

“The Queensborough Bridge is our best bet. I reconned all the bridges before tracking

you down, this’s the only one still connected to the island. It’s a narrow path and as rickety as

hell, and the storm’ll probably snap it in half before we’re midway, but it’s the best we’ve got.

Fortunately, it’s close by and...”

“We have no choice.”


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“Bingo. It’s either this or we swim.” Armando stared at John flatly.

“This planet is threatened by a plague of unimagined proportions and you can be so flip?

The most you can say for our means of conveyance is that ‘It’s closest’?”

“Hey,” Pastore smiled good-naturedly, “If you can find a better way Mr. Immortal-

Vampire-Killer, I’m all ears. I’ll be the first to admit this plan’s about as flawed as can be. Sure

we won’t drown like that poor girl you found on the dock, but the waves kicked up by the

storm’ll give us a good ass kicking. And inching our way across this piece of dental floss to

Manhattan’ll be tricky, especially with the wind trying to knock our asses into the next state, but

again, it’s all we’ve got.”

Armando said nothing, he simply stared at the map, his breath a deep, slow current. His

face was creased with a frown.

“We will also be open to an attack by the Dearg-due herself, and with our hands busy

keeping us on the bridge we won’t be in the position to defend ourselves.”

“Maybe,” Pastore said around a mouthful of juicy beef, “Maybe she wants us in

Manhattan. Why else would she go to the trouble of breaking into your mind and leaving such a

distinct message? She’s practically invited us to her lair.

My bet is she’ll wait till we’re within reach and either kill us both or drain our veins. She

probably won’t try anything big until we’re in the city proper. And where does this ‘Christian’

lady figure into the scheme of things? She wants you, or us, to find this girl. This’s a web we’re

tap-dancin’ into good buddy. The trick’s gonna be to snare her before she snares us.”

“That will not be easy.”

“Nothing is easy.” Pastore said grimly. “Nothing that matters, anyway.”

“At least we have a good clue as to where she is holed up.” Armando gave John an

extremely edited version of his vision, excluding parts he considered...embarrassing. He decided

he would tell John later and only if the need arose. Telling John of Glynis’ attempt at psychic

seduction, and his response to it, would only dishearten and distract the Guardian.

After retelling the dream, the pair finished their meal in silence; John dwelling on the

more grisly details of Armando’s dream and what the future held for the stranger Glynis pursued,

and Armando praying that Glynis had missed a scattering of humans. Even a dozen people would

be a boost to their ranks.

Armando regarded his salad and discovered he no longer had an appetite.


13


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CHAPTER TWO

Shawn Murrell awoke in the front seat of his mother’s 92’ Ford station wagon. He’d

hated taking the car into the city to begin with, driving in Manhattan was like asking for a

nervous breakdown. Now that the city had truly fallen to pieces, he gushed praises at heaven

above for having taken the hunk of metal. He as grateful for the shelter.

Especially with all the screaming in the streets.

The first scream had risen at dusk and had been joined by millions more as the night wore

on. Some had been high and shrill. Others were weary, beaten and broken from the horror of the

quakes. Shawn had plugged his ears with his fingers and screamed himself in order to drown out

the cries. After an hour his voice was hoarse and he could still hear them...their pleas to God,

their curses, their death throes...Shawn heard them all. It was only now, with the heavy, gray

firmament growing brighter in the East, did the shrieking fall off. The last scream ceased as

violently as a nightmare with the sleeper’s waking.

Murrell saw the cloud cover brightening and felt tears in his eyes, but at the same time

hated seeing the light. The rising sun meant that this wasn’t a dream, that everything he had seen

and heard the day before and during the night had happened. Dreams were clipped and jerky,

day follows night not with a gradual progression but with a sudden flash from light to dark or

vice versa. Even though the sun’s presence shattered his hope that this was all the result of a

sausage pizza eaten too close to bed time, Shawn nonetheless welcomed the dawn. If he had to

spend another minute in the wagon’s cramped confines in utter darkness, he would have gone

mad.

In between bouts of claustrophobia, Shawn wondered why no emergency lights were on.

Aside from the faint glow from the other boroughs, the only light came from downtown. Even if

he hadn’t been hiding under his dashboard, Shawn wouldn’t have been able to see the light’s

source, the streets between himself and the light were choked with the remains of fallen

buildings. It would have offered him little comfort. Whatever was emitting the glow, it was a

long way away and there was no way in Hell he was going to snake through the screaming mob

outside to reach it.


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And he didn’t want to know what was making the people scream.

Or why the screams had dwindled so sharply. Many of the rabble had run into Shawn’s

car and hurried on, unmindful of any collision, simply desperate to escape whatever it was

striking terror into their hearts. And sometimes...

Shawn blamed the illusion on his fatigue and fear, but there were times when the wind

would suddenly accelerate, rocking the car almost off its wheels, followed by flashes

of...something black. And big. And although the screams had crowded out every other sound

from the outside world, Shawn would swear that the shapes were screaming too. Not out of fear

though.

Out of rapture.

It was the lustful cry of a man on the verge of dehydration stumbling across an oasis. Of

course Shawn couldn’t be sure he’d seen or heard anything, the car’s confines coupled with the

continuous wailing, was extremely disorienting. He could be wrong, there could be no shapes

chasing down the stampeding New Yorkers.

His mind embraced the hope fervently. His instincts, however, told him he was a fool and

that he would do better to accept the impossible.

Shawn listened to his mind.

The city’s hush imposed itself with a malevolent will, accentuating the eerie baying of the

wind. The silence was so complete Shawn thought he could hear a dog barking in Queens. The

picture in his mind was so desolate he was sure he’d see a tumbleweed if he poked his head above

the dashboard. A violent gust roused Shawn from his day dreaming as the gale pummeled the

car, almost buffeting the driver’s side off the tarmac.

“Goddamn apocalypse.” Shawn muttered in the stale air of the car, his voice thunderous

in the close quarters. He started singing softly to himself, a habit he was unaware he possessed.

Shawn rose and shuffled to the passenger window, the morning light was sickly, but it was

enough to see the wreckage by. Beside the car, roughly a yard and a half away the street was

cleaved down the center, as if a giant had come along and struck it with an ax. Murrell gingerly

opened the passenger door, sighing as the fresh, rain-scented air swept through the wagon’s

stagnant atmosphere.

The creaking door shattered the sepulchral silence like a hatchet through plate glass,

squeezing a wince from Murrell. In the stillness the noise would act as a beacon to predators,


16

both human and animal. In the past few years, Shawn had lost his taste for fighting, so the

prospect of fending off looters or something not entirely human didn’t really appeal to him. With

the rising of the sun, he’d make a better target and the car wouldn’t last long under the crush of an

angry mob. From the look of the streets, however, his worries were unfounded.

Surveying Fifty-ninth street, Murrell realized he hadn’t been that far off when he’d

envisioned tumbleweeds rolling down the concrete canyons. The barren chasm had its own

variety of vagrant vegetation in the form of a crumpled and blood-spattered ball of newspaper.

Shawn watched the ball jump twice and vanish into the crevice. A short way from the paper

ball’s resting place, a street lamp lay gnarled across the divide.

Murrell had been in such a deep fugue during the night that he hadn’t considered the

extent of the damage. The Fifty-Ninth Street bridge loomed ahead, its bulk resembling the

gnarled digit of a colossal robot. Murrell could see a fair stretch down its span, surprised to see

that the bridge remained more or less intact. Shawn’s perspective was limited though and he

supposed that somewhere down the line the structure terminated suddenly. The tarmac didn’t

look any better, it seemed as brittle as snow on the bristles of a pine tree.

Murrell turned his attention to the shattered storefronts on either side of Fifty-Ninth.

Except for broken glass, the sturdy structures had survived the quake with barely a scratch, their

low center of gravity serving them well during the tremors. The marquee of the Cineplex Baronet

was askew, its right-most side obstructing the box office and several doors.

The store Shawn had driven into the city to visit, FORBIDDEN PLANET, was exposed to

the shrieking Eastern gale. A cone of torn comics spun along the fissured concrete with a dizzy

gait. Shawn had been about to enter the establishment when the first tremor struck.

In retrospect he should have gotten out of the car, the risk of a ruptured gas line and

subsequent explosion had been enormous. There’d also been the likelihood of the car being

swallowed whole by the crevasse in the street over the sewer line. He was starting to consider his

survival mixed blessing, the feeling that he would have been better off having died was growing

steadily. His trepidation was overshadowed by a single question:

Where is everyone?

He’d only napped about an hour or two, nowhere near time enough for rescue teams to

arrive and convey the survivors off the island or for the stampede to have dispersed completely.

Yet there wasn’t one living being in sight. Shawn speculated that the city’s denizens could have


17

migrated across the Fifty-Ninth Street Bridge, but it would have been impossible to negotiate in

the total pitch.

Drops of blood and strips of clothing marked where someone had been trampled. Oddly,

there was no wounded or dead cluttering the street. Shawn crouched by the dark- brown

splotches and squinted in the weak gray light. It may have been an after-effect of the fissured

concrete, but the puddles looked strange.

Upon closer inspection, Shawn picked out tracks in the coagulated gore, streaks where the

blood was thin enough to see the pebbled sidewalk through. It almost looked as if someone had

been lapping it up. Murrell grimaced at the thought and struck the picture from his mind.

A flurry of movement caught Murrell’s eye from the direction of Third Avenue. The

action was furtive and the shadows cast by the buildings made the creature difficult to identify.

“Weeeeeeeeek!”

Murrell released a startled cry as talons raked the top of his skull. He ducked and shielded

his head with his arms, warm droplets of blood greasing his short, curled hair.

Shawn watched his attacker glide down Fifty-Ninth to join its fellows among the shadows.

The creature glanced back over its wing and shrieked again, filling Shawn’s blood with ice, its

scarlet eyes cutting him to the bone.

In the grip of the bat’s eyes, Murrell felt his arms and legs grow numb, he felt his

willpower drifting away like wood on a receding tide. The borders of his vision were closing in,

his body slowly rocking to a hymn he couldn’t hear. Shawn wanted to lose himself in the tranquil

midnight, he wanted the pitch to carry him away from all the pains the world had to offer. The

darkness was good, the darkness would heal him. There was peace in the darkness. Shawn’s legs

trembled, eager to shuffle after the bat and its promise of peace...When the beast released its hold.

Through a lingering haze of disorientation Murrell watched the flying rodent bank right

on Third Avenue to take up formation with a couple of its straggling siblings. Murrell blinked

once and they were gone.

The world gradually swam into focus, leaving Shawn to wonder what in the Hell was

happening.

Jesse’s head felt like it’d been scraped across the ground under the blade of a bulldozer.

Until the wind uttered a particularly angry howl, Jesse thought he’d lost his hearing. Upon


18

waking, the store he’d slept in and the city surrounding it had been as silent as a church. He

glanced around to familiarize himself with his environment.

The thunderheads provided little in the way of illumination, but it was enough to

distinguish a Tori Amos, Meat Loaf and other posters surrounding him. The previous night’s

madness returned to Jesse with a fury.

The boy grasped the counter and slowly rose to his feet. The world lurched and his vision

churned, reluctantly settling down after the boy took a series of deep breaths.

The window Jesse had been thrown through was fanned across the bright red carpet like

carelessly strewn diamonds. Jess recalled the human tidal wave that had gathered when night fell,

the deluge of wailing faces triggered by shrieks blooming cross the city. The panic had

crescendoed the tighter night clenched its fist, sweeping Jesse and his parents up in its currents.

They’d been on the corner of 42nd and Third when the mob had hit, Jesse and his family

had been too shell-shocked from the major quake and its tremors to avoid the stampede; They

hadn’t been lucid enough to find shelter, let alone dodge the mob. Jesse had been carried ten,

maybe a dozen blocks (as close as he could tell, it had been so dark he couldn’t even see the

people pushing him along the street) before losing contact with his parents, Vinny and Teresa

Morsello. He’d been shoved a ways further before being mashed into the plate glass window of a

Sam Goodies. He’d screamed and thrashed as the crowd pressed past him, pounding the air from

his lungs. Fortunately, the glass at his back had given out before his ribcage collapsed. Even

now his sternum ached dully.

Jesse had taken advantage of the separation and stumbled behind the store’s counter,

somewhere between then and now he’d slept. Not knowing what time it was or what time he’d

dropped off, it was impossible to tell how long he’d been out. It could’ve been half an hour or

three days, either way, he had no clue where his parents were. Despite the fear this would instill

in most twelve-year-olds, Jesse found he could care less where his parents were.

Jesse cautiously walked to the vacant window frame, his back protesting with every step.

As his awareness sharpened, Jess noticed that it wasn’t a noise that had stirred him, but the

merciless silence. The contrast between the previous night’s screaming and shoving, and the

desolate keening of the wind through the wreckage sent a shiver through Jesse. Even without the

change in his auditory surroundings, Jesse would have shivered, the temperature was dropping so

fast he could almost see frost growing on his arms.


19

Jesse Morsello stepped through the window frame onto 60th Street. The boy stood

blinking at the carnage, only aware of the flapping leather when the swarm was upon him.

If the beasts hadn’t been glutted on blood, Jesse would have been shred where he stood.

As it was, he was beaten around the head and completely disoriented. The cloud of rodents grew

was so dense Jesse felt as if he’d been sucked into a mile-deep whirlpool of fur.

Jesse thrashed against the screeching tide angrily, the familiar frustration welling in his

throat. The young man’s vision clouded red as he swung at the bats, missing every one of them.

The shrieking turned to laughter in Jesse’s ears, the shrill chuckles fed Jesse’s rage. The laughter

was like biting razors, each tiny, dagger-filled mouth was screaming and laughing at Jesse, at his

worthlessness, at his foolishness. Jesse heard the voices of his parents in the high pitched

cacophony and fought harder, the fire in his blood burning hotter with every punch that missed its

mark. It was the

same sense of powerlessness he’d felt the night before when the mob had been rushing

him along, the same helplessness he’d felt countless times in his house waiting to be punished.

The fear. The fury. Wanting to hit but not daring; Now he dared but couldn’t follow through.

You never could do anything right. Could you Jess?

Jesse lashed out, his father’s disappointed and mocking voice ringing in his ears.

The punch connected, scattering the teeth of the unfortunate bat Jesse struck, breaking its

skull. The creature flew on despite its injuries, but Jesse was satisfied regardless. The contact.

The feel of the bones splitting under his fist was so incredible. That it didn’t matter whether he

could kill the things, if he could just bust a few of their heads he would feel a whole lot better. If

he imagined his mother or father’s faces on the rodents he could hit them that much harder, make

them bleed that much more. Deep inside, although he would never admit it, he wished he could

be smashing the genuine articles instead of a bunch of bats. The euphoria he experienced from

the violence ceased abruptly when his feet left the concrete.

Jesse opened his mouth to scream only to have it filled with fur and claws. His stomach

churned as his feet were thrown up over his head. Nausea rammed a fist down Jesse’s throat and

crushed his guts, giving them a good shake for extra measure. Jess lashed out at the bats hoping

to free himself, but the rodents retaliated with scores of shallow scratches.

Whether it was a blessing or a curse, the sentient cloud dissipated, dropping Jesse from

five feet in the air. The clacking of his jaws rang in Jesse’s head as he struck the pavement.


20

Jesse’s awareness receded then exploded, shedding stars across the horizon of his vision.

From the top right corner of his vision Jesse watched the bats banking at the corner and shooting

across Third Avenue. He tried to rise but his arms remained limply at his sides.

Jesse’s body was numb save for the scores of scratches on his neck and arms, the wounds

stinging like acid burns, wringing reluctant tears from his azure eyes.

“Shit.” he growled through clenched jaws.

As feeling gradually returned to his limbs, Jesse was pulling himself upright when he

heard footsteps approaching from behind. He wanted to turn and inspect the newcomer but the

slightest movement caused his stomach to quiver and his head to rattle. Jesse closed his eyes

against the tumultuous world, for the time being blotting out the separation from his parents and

the trauma of the earthquake and focusing instead on slowing the spinning in his head.

The footfalls, rubber slapping on concrete, halted for a heartbeat then sped urgently in

Jesse’s direction. Jess huffed a relieved laugh, glad to find another person in the silent city. A

sigh escaped him as the chaos behind his eyes gently ebbed. The runner skidded to a halt at

Jesse’s side, the scent of coconuts filling the boy’s nostrils as the stranger squatted. “You all right

man? They got you too huh?” The stranger asked, his voice deep and quavering. Jesse surmised

that the stranger had had his own run in with the bats.

Jesse smiled and opened his eyes, he was about to answer the stranger when he saw the

man’s face.

“Get away from me! I haven’t got anything! Just back the fuck off!” Jesse’s voice

resounded hysterically throughout the steel canyon, the rising gales shredding his words at the

higher altitudes. In the distance, unknown to either human, something older than their species

smiled and relaxed, a gnaw of doubt stilled by the boy’s words.

Despite the nausea and disorientation, Jesse gathered the strength to scrabble away from

the stranger.

Murrell remained hunched where he was, his hand stretched in a gesture of aid, his shock

evident in the frozen canvas of his face. His wide eyes craned over his shoulder to make sure the

kid wasn’t screaming at anyone else. Shawn saw that the street was empty and faced forward, his

hand extended to empty air. Shawn drew the limb back and cleared his throat. In the boy’s eyes,

Shawn saw a familiar fear fomenting.

“Aw Christ man, I’m not gonna rob you—“


21

“Right!” Jesse half-barked, half-laughed, “That’s what all you people say, next thing I

know I’ve got a knife in my throat!”

Jesse backed further away from the black man, looking frantically for a weapon. At this

point he’d settle for a sizeable shard of glass.

You people?, Murrell thought with a blend of rage and fatigue. Un-fucking-believable!

Out of an entire city the only person I can find is a fucking cheerleader for the Klan!

“Listen pal, use your head. I could go into any of these stores, these abandoned stores,

and clean out the registers. So why the hell would I mug some twelve-year-old for a handful of

pocket change?! Huh?!”

Jesse could barely hear the ‘chucker over the pounding in his ears. His father had always

told him never to show fear around these people ‘cause they were like animals; They could smell

the weakness in you and would pounce at the first opening you gave them.

“Who knows how you fuckers think! You kill for the fuck of it, for a pair of sneakers or

because someone’s looking at you funny! Maybe if you people—“

“Enough!” Murrell’s pulse-rate was racing toward two- hundred. “I can’t believe I have

to put up with this shit at the end of the world.”

Murrell stood incensed, his hands curled into talons as the veins throbbed in his temples.

His resistance had been lowered dramatically by the day’s events and as a result the kid’s

comments and fear were like barbs under his fingernails. A lifetime’s frustration tore across his

mind, tearing up terrain he’d spent years refining.

Shawn was fed up with people crossing to the opposite side of the street when they saw

him coming. He was sick of cops slowing their cruisers to drive alongside him, with security

guards in stores shadowing every goddamned move he made. Murrell was fed up with twenty-

three years of being branded as a nigger or coon or whatever. All he’d ever been viewed as was

either a threat or an inferior, never as a Human or an equal. He was a breath away from venting

his ire on this ignorant kid’s skull.

Murrell felt the burning in him screaming for an outlet, the years of being a suspect

because of his skin color had stoked his fury to a white-hot glow. A fury Shawn knew intimately.

Images scatter-flashed across Murrell’s mind; The anger coursing through his blood,

when he’d been a younger man, a boy only a few years older than the one cowering before him.

Other images followed; His brother in a hospital bed, their mother crying...and the fury...Shawn


22

and his friends out on the streets. Angry. Hungry for revenge...searching...A white couple

walking down the Boulevard...blood and rage dancing in the night air...

Shawn doused the fury the boy had kindled, recalling the price to be paid for indulging

hatred. Shawn took a deep breath and straightened himself, his muscles aching dully at the

tension that had knotted them moments before. He was disappointed with himself for forgetting

Life’s brutal lesson so easily. He absently stroked his scalp, ignoring the thin streaks of red

painting his palm.

The boy’s words weren’t harsh in themselves, but it was the rawness of their delivery.

The disgust. The hatred. It was as if the kid had been regarding a pile of shit he’d thoughtlessly

stepped in rather than a living being. A man. The aspects of Shadow in Shawn’s soul tried to

seize on the boy’s sneered declaration and encourage Murrell’s wrath. But the past had given

Shawn an effective weapon against impulsive violence, the memory of a dead man at his feet and

a tire iron with brain and bone matter clumped along its length. As eager as the Shadow was to

see blood spilled again, it had no desire to feel the guilt that accompanied it.

“Listen pal, I haven’t got the time or the patience for your bullshit so I’m going to lay it

out plain and simple. So far, you’re the only other person I’ve found, alive or otherwise, and

frankly I don’t give a fuck whether you live or die, but I intend to keep breathing. There’s safety

in numbers so if you wanna tag along, fine. If you don’t,” Murrell shrugged, the rage had

subsided enough for him to speak intelligibly. “Like I said, doesn’t matter to me.”

Shawn’s brow cowled his eyes and he bared his teeth. “But if I hear one more put down

I’ll smash your fuckin’ throat in. Got it?”

Jesse was dumbstruck. His jaw clenched and opened seeking to rail against the man for

threatening him.

He couldn’t.

He was too afraid of provoking the nigger that his tongue refused to function. His fear of

the man only spurred Jesse’s anger. Once again he was someone’s underling, crawling on his

belly like a whipped pup. He reasoned to himself that his father, who’d always had a talent for

making Jesse feel like less than slug spit, had always warned him that niggers were like rabid

animals when they were angry. He had a right to be afraid.

Oddly, it didn’t make him feel any better.

Shawn didn’t wait for Jesse’s response, he had to get some air in his lungs and let himself


23

unwind. He tried to shut down the roller coaster his mind had become, but every time he tried he

heard the boy’s words drip with loathing. When Shawn closed his eyes he saw the kid’s face

twisted with hatred, his blue eyes raw with fear.

Murrell’s fists clenched till his knuckles cracked. The peach of it all was that he’d been

relieved and concerned when he’d seen the kid bleeding on the pavement. So much so that he’d

forgotten he was an outsider. His compassion had been met with disgust The kid’s thoughtless

words more than simply offended Shawn, they hurt him.

“Fuck!” he screamed and slammed a fist into one of Sam Goody’s surviving windows.

Shawn regretted the action as soon as it’d been made, the last thing he needed was a

severed artery or a broken hand. Fortunately, the glass was brittle from the night’s bruising and

didn’t leave so much as a scratch on Murrell’s knuckles.

End of the world and I'm still on the outside lookin' in, Shawn growled to himself.

Although his thoughts were angry, they lacked their former fire, for which Shawn was

very grateful. Breaking the glass, venting his rage in such a physical way, had done wonders to

dissolve his tension. The stress was draining away so rapidly he had to fight the urge to laugh.

Shawn was afraid that if he started laughing, he would never stop. If anyone was left on the

mudball (besides the racist little prick behind him) they would find Shawn in the battered streets

laughing his lungs bloody.

Murrell stopped at the toppled street lamp on the corner of Third and Sixtieth, looking

down the Avenue the bats had barreled down. His innocuous singing started as Murrell

wondered why there were so many bats in Manhattan? And why were they so big? The last time

he’d been to the Bronx Zoo, he was sure the largest bat had measured approximately six inches

long with an eight inch wing-span.

He’d only caught a fleeting glimpse of the creature that had attacked him, and he was no

expert on the fuzzy little bastards, but the bats in that swarm must’ve been about two feet long

with a three foot wing-span. Shawn wasn’t dead certain about the specifics, but he was positive

that the fuckers were huge.

Murrell stroked his pate, smearing the thickening blood through his hair. If he squinted,

Shawn could see the flurry of leather and fur shrinking in the distance. Stragglers joined the main

body here and there off side streets and even out of building windows. Shawn wasn’t about to

delude himself by thinking they were all fugitives from the Central Park Zoo, but no better


24

answer presented itself.

Murrell’s pondering was cut short when he heard something moving in a nearby crater

that had, until recently, served as a manhole. Shawn put the boy out of his mind and approached

the source of the sound in a crouch, he wanted to help anyone who might be in trouble, but he

didn’t want his eyes gouged out by a startled animal.

Rubble crumbled under Shawn’s feet as he inched to the crater’s lip, his senses dimly

aware of the white kid walking up behind him. The kid was still a good distance away, so Shawn

didn’t fear an attack, the kid looked fast but not that fast. Nonetheless, Shawn kept one ear on the

shuffling in the fissure and another on the kid.

The commotion was picking up, filling the air was the smell of salt water, rain and green

things. Murrell was at the crevasse’s lip when the stench of sewage reared up and rapped him

across the jaw. He would have winced and withdrew but the sight within the gully held him tight.

Cats and dogs, maybe two dozen of them, were struggling up the steep slope of the sewer

wall. The color of the animals ranged from jet black to blond. In contradiction to popular

beliefs, these canines and felines weren’t feuding but working in concert. The larger hounds

stood patiently as the cats climbed their backs and leapt to higher ground. The creatures looked

impossibly immaculate for having been in the festering sludge, but that was a minor anomaly.

The most outstanding irregularity was how large the dogs were. Looking down at the

hounds, Murrell guessed they would have stood almost half his height, and they were all more or

less identical, like German Shepherds or--

“Wolves?” Shawn whispered in a soft and perplexed voice, the wind shredding the word

before it touched Jesse Morsello’s ears.

The animals, however, had no difficulty hearing the man. Until then, they had been

consumed with their ascent, now their attention was focused on the human standing above. The

cats’ emerald eyes blazed and the wolves’ golden eyes narrowed and took on a razor-edged

gleam as they locked on their prey. The mass of fur became frenzied, the animals gaining ground

faster then they had in their placid state. Hisses and growls reverberated off the sunken chasm

walls as the exodus came within feet of the street level.

Murrell had been stunned into paralysis by the animals’ sudden fury, a torpor that

shattered when a cat’s claws missed his face by inches. Shawn turned and bolted straight into the

kid from the record store, knocking the boy flat and tripping himself up on his own feet. Shawn


25

hit the concrete as the first wave of animals emerged.

The light in the beasts’ eyes hadn’t been a mirage or a result of Murrell’s shock, the cats’

and wolves’ eyes actually cast illumination. The gales stirred the animals’ fur, enhancing their

feral appearance. Movement on his left caught Shawn’s attention as dozens more cats and wolves

rose from the chasm across from Third Avenue. These new arrivals gathered on a square of

tarmac that had been an intersection.

The wolves approached with their head low, their glacial eyes tracking their prey’s every

movement, the clicking of their claws echoed off the glass mausoleums surrounding the

battlefield. The felines stalked silently around their larger cousins, their sleek muscles and fluid

motion lulling Murrell where he lay. The crisp pain of the kid crawling over his left hand

snapped Shawn awake.

Shawn searched his immediate area for a bludgeon of some sort, something that might

even the odds, no matter how infinitesimally.

There wasn’t a weapon in sight.

Shawn knew he was a dead man, bludgeon or not, but at least with a club he could’ve

given the pack more of a fight. Now it appeared he would have to do the damage with his own

two hands. Shawn smiled coldly, remembering a time long ago when fighting to the death would

have been the furthest thought from his mind. Those first years in High School when they’d

nicknamed him Rabbit, a moniker describing how eager he was to run from trouble. The Rabbit

had died though, drowned in an innocent man’s blood. There were times when Shawn thought

the only meaningful transformations came when blood was spilled.

The wall of tooth and claw tightened around Shawn and the kid, who was nowhere near as

ready to die as Shawn was. As pissed off as Shawn was at the little bastard, he couldn’t help

feeling a little sorry for him. The kid was young, there was still time for him to open his eyes and

clean some of that racist bullshit out of his head. There was a chance the kid could change before

he wound up hurting himself or someone else.

Shawn stowed his reverie as he rose from the concrete. His movements came easily, as

fluid and natural as the course of a mountain river. Shawn confronted the animals in a crouch, his

back protected by an undamaged wall of Sam Goodies. His brown fingers were hooked into

claws, eager to clamp on the first piece of flesh that offered itself.

Shawn met the predators’ fiery green and golden glares with his own coal black eyes,


26

giving them a glimpse of his fury. A grin crept over Shawn’s face when he didn’t detect the

slightest tremor of fear in the animals’ eyes. This was going to be an all out tear up, just blood,

teeth, fur and flesh. Shawn’s blood raced through his veins like crimson ice, washing his

somewhat sad physique in a tide of adrenaline. With the bloodlust on him, all Shawn could think

was, What a way to go.

Jesse, on the contrary, was far from excited at the prospect of being mauled. His old

companion fear had rested its arm around his shoulder and put him in a vice-like headlock, its

grip so tight Jesse couldn’t even scream. It was also difficult to distinguish whether the rushing

in his ears was the hurricane or his own frenzied pulse. All of his terror gathered in his belly like

a lead weight, the poison leaking into his bloodstream, infecting every inch of his body with

dread. He would’ve run, gladly, but his legs were as sturdy as butter, they were splayed before

him uselessly.

He shouldn’t have followed the nigger! He should have stayed where he was or gone in

the direction his parents had been taken in...But no!, he had to be a shithead and follow some

dumbass coon!

To be honest, Jesse had been curious. He’d been in private schools since Kindergarten

and had never, well, actually met a black person. All he knew about them came from television

and his father. And Jesse would have taken his father’s instructions to heart if the black man

hadn’t been so well spoken. Hell, before setting eyes on him Jesse had thought the stranger had

been white. Vinny Morsello had always told Jesse that niggers were loud, ignorant animals who

could barely stand upright let alone read, speak or write clearly. According to the elder Morsello,

all blacks were filthy, lazy cowards who wouldn’t do a days work unless they were beaten into it.

As for their speech, they’d mutilated the language so far it had ceased to be English.

Jesse had always taken his father’s word that these things were true. He’d never

questioned the old man because: one, it would usually get him beaten with a belt, and two, Jesse

had never seen any evidence to prove his father wrong. Any item he saw on the news concerning

blacks had to do with a mugging or riot, wherever the niggers were, they made trouble for decent

folk. Jesse could always find approval from the old man by commenting on how stupid a black

entertainer or politician looked or sounded. Those were the only times Vinny wouldn’t rag on

one of Jesse’s shortcomings. Anything that would keep Vinny off Jesse’s back was fine with


27

Jesse.

Now he found himself questioning what his father had taught him.

The black man’s (Jesus, Dad’d shit if he heard me think of a nigger as a man) literacy

wasn’t the only contradiction to his father’s teachings. It was something he’d seen in the man’s

eyes when Jesse had accused him of theft.

Anger had been prevalent in the dark orbs, true, but another emotion was carefully

concealed in rage’s embers. Jesse was a well meaning young man whose world, for the longest

time, had consisted of one point of view, a world where no other opinions were permitted.

Whatever belief held by the majority was most often regarded as the “right” way to think.

Despite his cultivated racism, Jesse wasn’t incapable of insight...which enabled him to see the

pain in the black man’s eyes.

Of course Dear Old Dad’s voice was there to crush those first stirrings of rebellion. Your

head’s all fucked up, Vinny whispered in his son’s skull. You’re seein’ shit that isn’t there. They

don’t think or feel like us Chief, that’s why they hate us. Don’t let him sucker you.

Jesse had followed the black man despite his father’s warnings. He’d been frightened by

the fire in the man’s eyes and would be cautious around him, but that flicker of pain had intrigued

him. Jesse had been shocked and somewhat relieved that his father’s voice was silent as he

trailed the black man. It was a rare and pleasant occurrence to have his old man shut up.

Jesse had known he was too close and was too late to dodge the black man’s sudden

charge.

See, I warned you. The first chance they get they’ll slit your throat!, Vinny shouted as

Jesse fell. The voice shut up once Jesse saw the cats and wolves.

Now he was close to shitting his pants, the wounds he’d received from the bat cloud

burned with his mounting fear. When the black man had risen, Jesse feared the man would bolt

and leave him to fend for himself, just like his Vinny had always told him. Fear faltered and was

replaced by awe when the black man--

(Nigger! He’s not a man dammit! What’s wrong with you?!)

--took a fighting stance against the fanged mob. Jesse felt a large portion of his

personality eager to denounce the man--

(NIGGER!!, Vinny screamed. Jesse struggled to keep his father’s voice out of his mind.)

--as a barbarian. An animal reacting to violence with violence.


28

Jesse wasn’t about to buy into such a convenient excuse. This wasn’t some mindless

reflex, it was courage.

Jesse listened tentatively for his father’s harsh voice to reprimand him for even

entertaining such a thought. He waited for the booming voice to tell him how yellow niggers

were, that that was why they only attacked in groups, terrorizing women who were foolish enough

to walk the streets unprotected. Jesse wanted to hear his old man explain why this solitary black

man was standing his ground and ready to fight, despite the hopelessness of his situation. Jesse

waited...

And heard nothing.

Although disturbed by the silence, Jesse found himself more than a little comforted. And

confused. For as long as he could remember his father’s voice had been in his head, governing

his actions as well as his thoughts. He didn’t know whether to welcome the silence...or fear it.

Perhaps the voice was silent because it was faced with something it couldn’t dispute.

And if Vinny’d been wrong about blacks—

(NIGGERS!)

--then what else was his old man wrong about?

(You wanna wind up with a knife in your lungs?!)

Jesse wanted to slap his hands over his ears, but knew that wouldn’t shut the voice out.

(You listen to me and forget what the coon’s doing! He's probably fucked up on crack

and doesn’t even know what he’s doing!)

It sure as Hell looked like the man knew what he was doing. The black man had his back

against the glass wall of Goodies’ to cut off attack from the rear, and as for the remaining

combatants, of which there were hundreds, the man faced them unflinching.

Jesse was distracted from Murrell by growls and hisses on his left. The new arrivals were

bearing down on Jesse, yellow-green saliva seeped over their teeth, matting the fur around their

jaws.

After some persuasion, Jesse coaxed his legs into action, bringing him upright. He

absently glanced at the scrapes on his arms, noticing that they were still oozing blood. Jesse’s

eyes flicked up to catch the animals licking their chops at the sight of the scarlet fluid. Jesse

shuffled toward the black man, twelve years of fear and isolation made the action difficult,

despite the threat bearing down on him.


29

The growling and hissing took on a rhythmic, lulling lilt. Jesse felt his eyelids growing

heavy, the twisted masques of the predators blurring like watercolors in rain. The blazing eyes of

the beasts streaked like Christmas tree lights through tears as the bones in Jesse’s legs melted.

Shawn was having similar difficulties. As hard as he tried, he couldn’t keep his mind

focused on fending off the pack. It was like riding on a subway after a sleepless night, struggling

to stay conscious, but powerless against the gentle rocking of the train. There was usually only

one remedy under such circumstances.

Pain.

Before another wave of drowsiness washed over Shawn, he slammed his right fist into the

pavement.

Jags of agony scrambled up Shawn’s arm, the sensation gnawed its way up his knuckles

to his shoulder. The action had the desired result. Murrell’s eyes were no longer clouded by

weariness. His mind, although shaken by the brutalizing of his hand, was nonetheless swept

clean of cobwebs. The mass of fur was temporarily distracted by the blood-speckled pavement

Murrell had struck.

Shawn shook some of the stiffness out of his digits, catching the stark hunger in the

animals’ eyes as they centered on his blood. He recalled the crimson puddles on Fifty-Ninth

Street and how they’d looked as if they’d been lapped at. Shawn was pretty sure these beasts, or

others like them, had done the deed. And they looked like they were hungry for a whole helluva

lot more.

Murrell jumped and turned as something bumped him.

Shawn was thisclose to snapping, when he realized it was the kid who bumped into him.

Shawn leaned down and shook the kid, never taking his eyes off the circling beasts. Shawn tried

to lift him, but the kid was dead weight.

Murrell put himself between the boy and the animals as the high-pitched drumming of

saliva dripping on cement joined the chorus of growls and hisses.

The hairs on Shawn’s arms stood at attention as the pack closed in for the kill. He smiled

and lowered himself for the head-on assault.

But they didn’t move.

They wanted to, Murrell could practically smell their hunger and anticipation, but they

wouldn’t act. Gradually, one fur-cloaked skull at a time, the pack turned and faced downtown.


30

The same way the bats flew, Murrell thought between his bloodlust and astonishment.

The feral lullaby crumbled into discord, giving the boy a chance to regain his equilibrium.

The animals’ ears twitched and turned toward Manhattan’s tip, homing in on something

Murrell couldn’t fathom. Scattered here and there were whines and mewls of frustration and

pleading.

The phantom voice, however, was unswayed by the animals’ petitions. As a single body,

the cats and wolves turned and followed the same path their smaller flying cousins had. Shawn

noticed with faint curiosity that all of the felines had two tails. The critters crossed over the

tarmac bridge at the intersection, the army of fur marching swiftly down the rubble strewn

streets, ignoring the gales that threatened to whip them into the fissures at the sidewalk’s edge.

Only when Shawn was positive the beasts were wellon their way, did he relax.

“Are you all right?” Shawn asked the boy stiffly, not bothering to face the kid.

“Uh?--Yeah. Uh. What-What...was all that?” Jesse’s voice trembled from the close

encounter with the beasts and his proximity to a man who might as well have been an alien.

Murrell crouched, enthralled by the crimson patch his fist had made. With the threat gone

and the adrenaline tide ebbing, Shawn found himself physically drained. He sat and reclined

against the glass wall, his thin curly hair providing a feeble cushion for his head. He closed his

eyes and sighed, praying something would happen to show him this was all a nightmare.

Rather than comfort him, the darkness behind his eyelids replayed his confrontation with

the wolves, cats and bats. He recalled with crystal clarity their bright eyes churning with hunger

and thirst, and as they turned and left, promising with soft voices that they would return and

claim their prize...His blood.

The phantoms scattered as rustling cloth, popping joints and an agonized groan tickled

Murrell’s ears. Shawn sensed more than saw the boy settling beside him, and remembered the

young man’s query.

“I haven’t got a clue to what’s going on. I’m just hoping it’s a nightmare from the

sausage pizza I had for dinner last night.”

Murrell opened his eyes and examined the damage to his right hand, the black flesh

speckled red.

“But this can’t be an illusion because pain’ll wake you out of a dream.”

“So-So you don’t know.” Jesse took a deep breath and shook his head. Despite his


31

reservations about the black man, his fatigued state left him no alternative but to relax.

Blissfully absent from his head (thank God and the angels above) was Vinny’s voice

cautioning him about how treacherous these ‘chuckers could be. At the moment, Jesse was too

tired to be suspicious.

“This-This’s...” Jesse trailed off. He couldn’t find any words to express the depth of his

confusion and frustration.

He was experiencing the same sort of denial/unreality he’d felt when the Gulf War had

begun. Disasters and wars were things you heard about in history classes or saw on the news;

when it actually happened, when it was in your face, it was like diving headfirst into concrete.

“Fucked up?” Murrell offered.

Jesse nodded his assent. That pretty much summed up his current state of mind, vulgar as

it was. Jesse would have added to the man’s comment or asked him what their next move should

be if it wasn’t for the sudden pressure of razor- keen steel against his throat.

The steel was so tight to Jesse’s flesh he was afraid to move his eyes in case the sudden

movement spurred the weapon’s master into action. From his periphery Jesse saw the black man

start to rise, only to have the lengthy blade halt him.

“Alright man, no need to get excited,” Murrell said in what he hoped was a calm,

measured tone, “We don’t want any trouble, there’s been enough of that already.”

Murrell was glad his fear didn’t register in his words. He was still so wasted from the

stare-down with the animals that he hadn’t heard the man sneak up on them. There was no way

he could move, let alone disarm the man, without having his head lopped off. As much as he

hated it, he would have to sit still until an opening presented itself.

The stranger, a short, chubby man with wild gray hair, didn’t look like a pushover. He

was wet and not at all pleased about it. His clothes, which clung to the man in places but which

were, for the most part dry, looked as if they’d been dragged from the rubble of a demolished

department store. The jeans the man wore were deep blue, almost violet, in places. The short

man’s lips were drawn back from his teeth, the tiny white squares lined like tombstones in his

mouth.

Shawn tried to identify the weapon the man was holding to his and the kid’s throats, but

had no luck. It resembled a scimitar, but the handle ran halfway up the blade’s spine. The metal

was also odd, it wasn’t one flat color like stainless steel, but had a variety of shades, all in gray.


32

The swirls and dips resembled fingerprints. It was after awkwardly inspecting the sword that it

struck home how bizarre it was that a man should be running through the city with such an exotic

weapon. Shawn supposed he’d been a bit desensitized by the tribe of wolves and twin-tailed cats

that had flooded out of New York’s sewers.

The short man’s shoulders were strong and sloped, the flab around his midsection acted to

distract an observer from the muscle beneath the man’s façade. He wielded the blade and held it

steady with no strain. The man’s wiry gray hair was plastered to his skull in wild hooks.

The stranger looked sharply aside, keeping one eye trained on his prisoners and spit up a

gout of murky water. The liquid and the man’s breath bore the same rotten, chemical fetor.

“I’m in a reeeaaalllll itchy mood today fellas, so don’t so much as hiccup or I’m liable to

chop your heads off, Vampires or not.”

Vampires?, Jesse and Shawn thought with incredulity and panic. The last thing either

wanted this man with the sword to be was insane.

“Now, my senses’ve been twisted five ways to Sunday, so I’m gonna have to test you two

the old fashion way. Sit still for a few seconds...” The little man raised his eyebrows and smiled

coolly, “One twitch and yer heads’ll be rolling in the gutter. Capice? Good.”

Pastore wielded the Lochaber Axe with his left hand, sparing his prisoners just enough

room to swallow without cutting themselves. John dug into the right-front pocket of his new,

albeit blood, rubble and dust covered, jeans and withdrew a handful of salt packets he’d snatched

in the nearby ruins of a Burger King. He ripped two of the paper envelopes open with his teeth

and sprinkled the contents over the two men, his palms itching against the pine shaft of his axe.

John was desperately torn between hoping they were Bloodsuckers so he’d be able to vent

some of the rage that’d built in him since Glynis’ kiddies had ambushed him, separating him from

Armondo. But he also hoped they were human so he’d have some allies.

He was relieved (and a little disappointed) when the men’s flesh refused to blister under

the cascade of crystals, the most severe reaction was the black man squinting and grunting in

irritation. The white kid beside him was too afraid of slitting his throat to respond beyond a

startled peep.

John withdrew the axe from their throats and hung it on the makeshift holster on his right

hip. Of his original clothing all he’d managed to save was his Bowen knife belt, a portion of

which was left loose to accommodate the Lochaber’s handle. Pastore leaned against the building


33

and smiling, offered the men a helping hand.

Shawn and Jesse were so startled by the man’s sudden appearance and his bizarre

behavior that they accepted the proffered hand without hesitation.

“The name’s Pastore. John Pastore. Sorry about putting the Axe to yer throats, but

there’re a lot of things I don’t like to take chances with.”

Standing, Jesse was almost a head taller than Pastore. On closer inspection, Jesse thought

the old man resembled one of those novelty trolls with the wild hair. Taking the man’s less-than-

threatening appearance into account, Jesse was amazed Pastore was able to wield the formidable

looking Axe so effectively. Jesse put a hand to his gullet to assure himself his throat wasn’t

damaged. When he withdrew his palm he saw a narrow border of blood.

The black man had an identical stripe across his gullet, but appeared oblivious to it. He

was more concerned with the short stranger.

“You know what’s going on?” Shawn asked, feeling hope for the first time since waking

in his mother’s car.

The sense that this man knew something blossomed in Shawn and refused to die, despite

what the old man had babbled earlier about Vampires. Another thing that drew Murrell to

Pastore, was that he neither sensed nor saw any of the fear or resentment he’d seen in the boy.

This short man with the four foot axe regarded Murrell as he would an old friend.

“That depends, what’ve you guys seen so far?”

Murrell gave John a hurried summary of his waking in the station wagon and the

confrontations with the bats, cats and wolves.

John’s reaction was miles from pleasant.

“Fuck!!” he screamed in the shattered glass and steel canyon. “How the fuck’d she drain

so many so soon!!? And how the hell’d they mature so fast?! Goddamn it! I hate when I’ve got

nothing but questions and no friggin’ answers in sight! Shit! It should’ve taken them three days

to mature, yet you’re telling me there are three hundred of the fuckin’ things runnin’ around.

Way things’re going she’s probably got Armondo locked up in those damn towers. I’m tellin’ ya

boys, this’s lookin’ worse by the second.”

John felt the change creeping into his blood, the realization gave him just enough time to

curse his lack of emotional restraint. His flesh and bone shattered and bunched, yearning to

manifest themselves into something beautiful and wild.


34

Control Johnny-boy, he railed at himself. Get a fuckin’ grip for Christ’s sake! Or do you

wanna be like the stinkin’ blood suckers who do whatever they feel like, whenever they feel like

it?

Thinking of the vampires not only failed to defuse his anger, it encouraged it. The pallid

faces of the dead coalesced before his eyes, wailing for revenge. One apart from the rest turned

his hunger for Vampire heads from a pang to sheer agony.

Murrell and Jesse didn’t see the weather-worn face of the red-head gracing John’s vision,

they did, however, hear the growl of rage and mourning building in the little man’s throat.

Control, John, Armondo’s phantom voice admonished in Pastore’s grief ravaged mind.

You know better than to enter a battle with a heated mind, it is a sure formula for failure.

Pastore tried to use his friend’s voice as a beacon to trace his way back to rationality, but

the light was obscured by a scarlet fog. His rage consumed the past like flames through tinder-

dry woodland. He failed to notice his vision losing clarity or how the two humans were

withdrawing from his fearsome countenance. All John Pastore saw were the faces of his

slaughtered kin, of the strong-willed woman he’d never had the pleasure or opportunity of

knowing, yet loved with all his heart and soul. All John had to remember her by was her name,

Eileen MacDunough, a lady he would cherish till his blood stood cold in his veins. The sweet,

gentle faces and voices of the children Eileen had fought and died for accosted John’s eyes and

rang in his ears.

The agony of transformation was drown out by the pleas of the dead, demanding

vengeance be done on the one who’d stolen their lives and condemned them to a living death.

John tried to placate them but his words escaped as a howl. Glynis’ face drifted through his

mind, the dead demanding that she suffer for her crimes.

Not much of John’s mind went untouched by the fury in his soul, but those few untainted

aspects bellowed for him to either focus the rage or suppress it. The voice counseling him was

tiny, hardly a whisper over the tumult of the dead, but it was heard nonetheless.

John opened his eyes to a world veiled in crimson. He recognized the two humans, his

muscles aching to shred their plump flesh. Mauling them would definitely sate his rage now, but

the guilt of having murdered two innocent humans would weigh on him forever. There was,

however, the glass wall.

In his long life John had discovered that there was no greater cure for a bout of the furies


35

than to shatter glass. The wall of the Sam Goody was sturdy, not as brittle as the pane Murrell

had shattered earlier, this sheet having been reinforced during construction. The proof of the

glass’ endurance could be seen in the simple fact that it was still intact despite the earthquake and

stampede of humanity. The glass was nice and thick and heavy.

Very heavy.

Pastore let the fury gain a foot more ground, knowing it was hazardous to grant the rage

so much control, knowing if he sank too deeply into the red rain he could find his sorry ass

drowning in madness. He’d be trashing and slashing until someone had the decency to put him

down. The trick was to tap into enough rage to avoid a meltdown, but not enough to suffocate

him. John usually controlled his ire instinctively, but the return of Glynis had roused a whole

mess o’ ghosts, making the blaze uncontrollable.

John Pastore, who’d forgotten his exact age two- hundred years before Columbus initiated

a Domino Effect of destruction for the Indians, gathered his fury into his balled fist and

connected it with the glass wall.

The inch-thick pane shattered like a puddle under a child’s foot. Pastore caught the worst

of the razor edged hail, the projectiles shredding his arms and all but flaying the face from his

skull.

The bright agony released him from fury’s grip as it had freed Murrell from the

Vampire’s enchantment. John’s wrath retreated, each drop of his blood -shed taking a lifetime’s

worth of hate with it.

At least for the time being.

The release was so quick and complete that John shivered and sighed. His hands, which

gradually regenerated its five-fingered configuration, mopped sweat from his face. He tried to

apologize, but his throat was still constricted with blood.

The Guardian half-suspected his explanation would have fallen on deaf ears, his audience

resembled victims of the legendary Medusa.

John was suddenly aware that his scarlet vision had not abated with his rage. This

impairment wasn’t spiritual, but physical. When the answer reared its head, a low, crackling

laugh bubbled from John’s throat, it sounded like paper being crushed in an empty metal drum.

This frightened his companions further.

John examined the limb he’d put through the glass and continued his gurgling chuckles as


36

fresh epidermis washed over raw muscles like a wave pounding a scarlet beach. The new tissue

rejected the shrapnel, bringing the sound of chimes to the wind-blown streets as glass fell from

John’s arms and face. Pastore’s laughter became clearer and more distinct as the damage to his

larynx was erased.

As Pastore’s wounds sealed themselves, Shawn and Jesse's expressions melted from

horror to astonishment.

The deteriorating Vampire situation reasserted itself on John, but this time he was

prepared for the onslaught. He left his rage simmering, only hot enough to keep his guts

churning.

“You guys may not know it yet,” John said casually brushing glass dust off his jacket

sleeves. “But you’re gonna help me save this planet from a plague.

“First thing’s first. We need weapons, there should be a sporting goods store in the city

that hasn’t been completely demolished. Then we’ll head downtown, where you said the

‘Suckers took off, that’s where the Towers are and it’s probably where we’ll find the Bitch.”

John pinched the bridge of his nose and grumbled, “Not to mention we have to find and

protect some pregnant woman called the Fair Christian. Oh man, Mama said there’d be days like

this.”

Pastore glanced at the wreckage of the Fifty-Ninth Street Bridge and the churning waters

beneath it. “Hopefully a little luck will head our way...Maybe Armando’ll hook up with us. One

more in our group couldn’t hurt.”

Although it sure as shit ain’t gonna help either, John thought bitterly.

John turned from the bridge and crossed the intersection the Vampires had used,

following a ragged trail downtown.

Shawn and Jesse stood static for a few moments as the events of the past few seconds

sank in. The little man started shrinking in the distance, extraneous garbage nipping at his heels

as the wind stirred them. Not once did the little man look back, more intent on the business at

hand than on his companions.

Murrell was the first to follow, Jesse trailing by fewer than five feet.

Both men’s motives for following the little man were the same. They both wanted

answers to the madness they found themselves immersed in, and the little man seemed to be the

only one who could supply them.


37

Pastore let them catch up and the trio followed the Vampires’ trail down Third Avenue.


38

CHAPTER THREE

An hour before Shawn Murrell awoke in his mother’s

station wagon and Jesse Morsello made his groggy ascent into consciousness, Pastore and

Armando started their trek across the Fifty-Ninth Street Bridge.

The entryways, for both pedestrian and vehicular traffic, had been cordoned off with

yellow police tape and neon orange pylons. Across from the entrance, with the lights killed, was

an unmarked police car. Pastore presumed they were there for the protection of any fools who

might be brain-dead enough to try and cross the span.

John had ID’d the cops by the smell of their gunmetal and the way their eyes

systematically picked over the bridge’s maw. They ate the landscape like hunters searching for

spoor. Your average citizens didn’t sit in Chryslers at five a.m. watching bridges.

It was child’s play for John and Armando to elude the humans’ eyes, either one of them

could sneak up and tap a nervous doe’s skull without it flicking an ear in their direction. With

humans the task was even simpler, the duo could have snuck past the humans with tin cans tied

around their ankles and not merit so much as a glance in their direction.

They entered the lower level without the cops stirring an eyelash. John started the trek

along the bridge in his wolf skin, but had to morph to human form so Armando could keep up

with him.

The integrity of the bridge had been so grievously compromised that the authorities had

not thought it worth the time, risk or effort to station any more police along the span, granting

John and Armando easy passage.

A quarter of a mile before Roosevelt Island was when they met their first major obstacle.

Segments of the upper level had collapsed during the quakes, either imbedding themselves

halfway through the steel or driving holes clean through it. Even with their enhanced reflexes

and strength, crossing the center span had taken half an hour of cautious ducking and jumping.

On the summit of one particularly large piece of debris, the pair was able to survey the path ahead

and the damage to Manhattan.


39

“I don’t know about you, but I feel like Chuck Heston

at the end of Planet of the Apes.” John quipped, desperate to shatter the mournful wailing

of the rising wind through the mangled bridgework. “Alright there Chief, how the hell’re we

gonna cross that? I’ve seen spider webs that could support more weight than that.

“And from the look of the grand old metropolis over yonder, there’s no guarantee that

there’s gonna be anyone left to save. The city looks like somethin’ out of a Ridley Scott movie.

I’m starting to wonder whether Glynis is over there at all.”

John’s eyes had been scouring the Uptown portion of Manhattan as he spoke.

“Looks like a graveyard after a stampede.” he muttered quietly.

“Do you doubt my dream? Or your own?” Armando queried, his voice as stern and cold

as the steel and concrete beneath their feet.

Pastore didn’t answer. Both he and Armando had been taught (and had learned through

painful experience) that dreams, more times than not, always held portents.

Especially if the dream had been seen by an Immortal. Armando’s vision had to be

regarded with the utmost respect, the Immortals hadn’t even been privy to the vision of the

Firefall the Guardians and Humans had had. If Armando had dreamt of the Vampire Queen, there

was no denying that the witch was behind the chaos.

On the way to the bridge, John and Armando had compared the visions that had reunited

them. Although the players and the content of their dreams differed, the foundation and meaning

behind them was the same.

Glynis had returned.

Armando’s dream had been particularly disturbing to him because it had been his first. Of

the Immortals, only one special sect had possessed the ability to see in their sleep. And these few

only dreamed when either they or their tribe were approaching a crossroads. The visions could

come during the night or in the bright light of day, although they were prevalent during sleep

time.

Until the night before the Earthquake, all Armando had known of dreams came from

others’ descriptions. Needless to say, the shifting dreamscape, disembodied voices and

constantly shifting faces had caught the Immortal off guard.

The vision had opened with him standing in his village in the Northern Highlands of Peru,

quarter of a mile from what would later be named the Urubamba and Ene rivers.


40

The village of his birth.

The huts, a common amalgam of straw, roots and mud, were carpeted in frost. Snow

cascaded over the hushed hamlet, covering the ground in tiny ivory drifts. Armando was more

surprised by the sight and smells of his home than by the inclement weather.

Even without the mists, the jungle and clearing looked exactly as he remembered it, every

detail, right down to the idiosyncrasies of the individual huts, was precise. The sweet, thin air

was colder, but familiar nonetheless. The only sensory experience unchanged by the frigid

climate was the charging of the river by the town’s edge. From where he knelt, Armando could

see the Ene’s blood cleaving centuries-old rock. The Immortal spared a smile for memories of

the shore and of romancing a young lady he had been smitten with as a stripling.

The vision took a dark turn when the love Armando had been wondering about slithered

from the freezing mountain waters.

Her dark hair was plastered to her head and shoulders, the pale, brown dress she had been

wearing the day of their rendezvous was a shade lighter than her deeply tanned skin, the sopping

fabric clung to her body like a hungry lover.

Armando’s eyes darted to her breasts where her nipples stood erect in angry relief.

The girl, Marisa, had been the most beautiful woman in the village. This conviction

hadn’t been held by Armando alone, but by every man with blood in his veins. She’d had more

suitors than a cloud had raindrops, but she had chosen Armando above them all.

Marisa had been...exquisite. She had been rich in her eyes, in her soul. Her beauty wasn’t

restricted to her face or body or how she moved, it was something about her. It was a quality that

had made Armando’s soul shiver at the thought of the woman, that wrung a smile from his stern

features whenever she met his gaze with her gentle cocoa eyes. That Something in Marisa’s soul

had left Armando trembling for hours after the woman was nowhere to be seen.

That Something was lacking from this apparition. The thing in front of him had no light

or beauty in its eyes. Just shallow orbs...

No. They weren’t completely barren. There was a hunger.

Armando instinctively reached for his sword, an ancient blade hewn from petrified wood,

where it should have been sheathed across his back.

The blade was gone.

Armando was a pure bred warrior and did not rely solely on weapons in order to win a


41

fight, the loss of his sword did not panic him in the least. His eyes swiveled across the

environment seeking a source of cover or a suitable replacement for his sword. His mind,

however schooled as it might be in the ways of war, stalled when he saw the remaining

inhabitants of his village gathering at the settlements edge. In their eyes and faces he beheld a

sight which churned an ages old grief, a pain that had been gathering dust for centuries.

They all bore the marks of The Hunger. They were all still ageless...

They were still immortal... But now they were...tainted.

They were Blood Slaves, the very abomination the Gods of Light had created the

Immortals to destroy.

The sight of his beloved friends and kin scored Armando to the marrow, so much so that

eyes that had been dry for millennia finally wept. There was one among the others that caused the

Peruvian’s throat and face to tense with anguish and regret, Armando fell to his knees beneath the

weight of his grief.

The source of this deeply rooted agony waded through the rabble, the newcomer looking

at his former pupil with scorn, disgust and...

Hunger.

NO!, Armando tried to shriek, but his throat would not obey.

This cannot be!, he cried. The sight of his loved ones so devoid of Light, of warmth, stole

the thunder from his voice, reducing it to a squeaking tremor.

Reeso is--was, too strong to fall to the Vampire. He would have put the entire village to

the sword rather than see them corrupted!

(He tried)

NO!! HE SUCCEEDED!!

(You know he tried, but-)

I saw their bodies!! I saw the stakes through their hearts!

(Not all their hearts)

I counted the bodies!

(Not all the bodies)

Reeso would NOT fail them!!

(He did)

Armando’s arguments dissolved in the face of the Vampire hoard.


42

Every face was twisted with malice, eyes that had once held emotions full of tenderness

and compassion were now bright with blood lust. Mouths that had once whispered words of love

to one another during cold winter nights and told stories to keep the children’s dreams sweet,

were stretched back over wicked ivory fangs. Saliva dangled from the lengthy hooks, collecting

on their chins and freezing there.

The silver in Reeso’s hair was accentuated by the coagulated snow. Despite the cold,

sweat streamed down the Esclavos faces, the scent of fresh food was stirring the fire in their

blood to a fever pitch.

I saw your corpses!!, Armando screamed above the din, he didn’t know which was

louder, the keening of the blizzard or the hissing-growl of the Blood Slaves.

Armando rose to his feet, hoping the posture of supplication was responsible for his

feeling of helplessness.

It wasn’t.

Standing did, however, expose more of his body to the blizzard’s teeth, clearing his head a

bit. It was at this point in the dream that Armando started suspecting that this was not, in fact,

reality he was witnessing. He had extremely vivid recollections of finding his people dead--

(Not all of them)

And even if the voice was correct, he had seen some of his people dead. Many of who

appeared in the Vampire hoard. He reasoned that if those who’d been terminated now stood

undead, this could not be real. And even if he was unsure as to who might have been put to the

stake and who hadn’t, he was positive Reeso had been staked. The aged Immortal had impaled

himself with his own two hands, even as the Vampire taint raced through his blood. Finding

Reeso’s corpse had crushed Armando’s soul, there was no way he could forget the horror of

seeing his mentor dead.

Therefore, he couldn’t be standing at the head of the Vampire mob.

The more vivid the memory grew, the more access Armando gained to his deductive

instincts. Stories the seers used to tell of the Dreamtime stole the fear from Armando’s heart, but

it did nothing to ease his sorrow. Be it a vision, reality or something otherworldly, the faces

before him were still those of his beloved dead. All bore the mark of the Blood Slaves.

Do not allow the pain to consume you boy, another voice counseled through the blizzard.

Armando recognized the voice immediately, its familiar tones warming his heart and


43

astral flesh. It was the true Reeso speaking to him, across the corridor of the years. His advice

was a tether Armando could use to find his way home to the waking world.

Armando would only run to reality if the dream grew too intense for him to handle. He

knew enough about visions, especially in relation to his race, that when you experienced one, it

was for a very, very good reason. Unless otherwise inspired, he would let the dream play itself

out.

He was confident Reeso’s advice would give him the wherewithal to suffer whatever

terrors invaded his mind.

Armando seized the pain in his heart and stretched it, washing his entire soul in its heat.

He had ample experience with retooling anguish, turning it from a crippling pain to an

unconquerable weapon. Sadly, it was a talent Armando had needed often.

The sorrow buffered his resolve, lending his heart the courage he would need if the

Vampires attacked. He tried to figure why his beloved dead were in this vision, what their

purpose was, but he was inexperienced with such things. If the dead did hold a secret, the

Immortal lacked the eyes to see it.

Armando did not have to wait long before the dream’s objective was made apparent.

The Immortal was still a newcomer in the realm of dreams, so when the sky suddenly

darkened it came as a bit of a shock. Soon, the only illumination came from the snow at his feet.

By the feeble light, Armando saw his village had vanished, replaced by a vast shattered

metropolis. The ice on his arms melted as the snow turned into rain, the heavy drops pulverizing

the ivory powder on the ground.

With the snow gone, the only light came from the reflection of distant city lights off the

roiling firmament. As his eyes adjusted to the night, Armando saw mangled street lamps had

replaced ancient trees. Automobiles that had been tossed and battered like the toys of an

overzealous child rested where time-worn boulders had sat, stones that had overheard the

whispers of a million lovers and had cherished the warmth of their entwined bodies. Gutted

buildings formed a caricature of the Highland mountains.

Armando felt an instant dislike for this new place, but no more so than any other city. The

Human nests had always filled him with a soul-deep sense of loss. When he was unfortunate

enough to be in a city, Armando sensed no life in the inhabitants or their domiciles. There was no

Light in these places, unlike his emerald mountains. In the Highlands, there wasn’t a square inch


44

of soil that didn’t glow or writhe with life.

In Armando’s eyes, all cities were glorified necropolises. The humans paved over

everything, only permitting things to take root where they thought it would look “nice”.

The thought of using another life-form as a decoration made the Immortal ill. It made him

wonder why he and his people had ever wasted their breath and blood to protect Humanity. The

answer, unfortunately, was never hard to remember. Reeso’s deep, gravel-in-a-paper-cup voice

rose in the Peruvian’s ears.

For the children son. The reason we suffer...

“Is so they won’t have to.” Armando murmured. Through the ages, Armando had watched

humanity shed any beauty it had possessed. It seemed as if the immature creatures were

engaging in spiritual amputations, hacking off the least thing that reminded them of their

connection to the Light and Shadow. To the Earth and Sky. They murdered anything in

themselves that showed them how small they were in the scope of things, and in doing so

destroyed much of their innocence and beauty. The only worthwhile contribution the humans had

to offer the Cosmos, at least in Armando’s eyes, were their young.

Sadly, with time they too became tainted and selfish. They followed in the footsteps of

their parents, acting without thought, thinking of themselves without a care for who they hurt in

the process. Through these actions they isolated themselves from the Source.

If there was one thing Armando had learned in his exceptionally long life, however, it was

that there was always hope. Armando’s wool-gathering was abruptly crushed as a rusty, yet

familiar, sensation ran through him.

Without moving, Armando’s gaze picked through the shadows of the concrete cadavers.

To human eyes, the city would have been pitch black, they wouldn’t have been able to see the

ground under their feet let alone the guts of the derelict skyscrapers.

The people of the Moreno clan, like the rest of the Immortals, in addition to enhanced

strength, reflexes and endurance, possessed an increased sensitivity of their senses, up to ten

times stronger than the average human’s. The heightened senses were necessary to successfully

pursue and slay their God-chosen prey.

The Blood Slaves.

Armando’s people had never bothered to name themselves as a people, that had been left

to the Guardians. The Guardians, a race of shape-shifters, had come across the Immortals while


45

seeking the same goal; Death to the Vampires.

Each race had its own reasons for wanting the Vampires extinct. For the Immortals it was

a concrete sense of duty to their God of Light, perceiving themselves as the Cosmos’ foil to the

abominations. It followed the logic that for every predator there was a fiercer, more deadly

counterpart. The antagonism between the cobra and the mongoose was the perfect example of

this rule. This was how the Immortals viewed themselves in relation to the Vampires.

There was no doubt in anyone’s mind that the Blood Slaves were the ultimate hunters.

They could chase down any animal alive and drain the life’s blood from its veins.

Without the Immortals to maintain the balance, the Vampires would have consumed the

ichor of every red-blooded beast on the planet’s face. And with every creature drained dry, there

would rise another Vampire. The planet would be overrun.

Occasionally a Blood Slave would tear the heart out of its victim after the blood had been

consumed. Whether this was population control or a small snack remained unclear.

The Guardians, the species to which John Pastore belonged, sought to destroy the

Vampires for a more primal and less lofty reason.

They wanted revenge.

Their wounds ran so deep that even after several centuries of friendship, John had never

revealed the complete story to Armando. From what the Immortal had heard, the Vampires had

enslaved the Guardians, dubbing the shape-shifters Mongrels. There was no clear reason why the

Vampires held the Guardians in such low esteem, but their hatred was evident in their voices and

how they had treated their slaves.

The Vampires used the shape-shifter’s remarkable stamina to build their castles and herd

their food. When the Mongrels grew too old or exhausted to serve as labor, their bodies were

drained and their hearts removed.

The Vampires would never entertain the idea of letting a Mongrel become, as the

Vampires put it, a Pure Blood. In the Vampire’s eyes, the Mongels were primitives, devoid of

emotion or thought and suitable only as food or labor. Any creature not Pure Blood was

considered weak and worthless. Anything not Nosferatu was food.

The Guardians, a moniker bestowed on them by the Immortals, had nursed their

resentment deep in their hearts, where the Vampires’ prying minds could not penetrate.

The Nosferatu’s telepathy had been unknown to the Immortals, a discovery made only


46

after contact had been established with the shape-shifters. Being in the Vampires’ proximity for

so long had offered the Guardians more insight into their “masters”, than the immortals had.

The Vampires never confided this facet of their powers to their slaves, the Guardians had

deduced the Nosferatu’s mental powers after decades of failed escapes and torture at the merest

thought of disobedience. After lifetimes of practice and more failures than Pastore could count,

the Guardians had mastered the art of cloaking their thoughts. They would only indulge their

more archaic thoughts and emotions when they were positive no Vampires were monitoring them.

The Nosferatu, of course, took the decline in rebellious thoughts and actions as a sign of

their success at breaking the Mongrels. The Vampire’s pride was so monumental that the very

concept of deceit on the Mongrels’ part would never enter their minds.

The discovery of the Vampires’ telepathy explained much to the Immortals; For instance,

why they were so difficult to track. An Immortal could be within feet of a nest, only to be misled

by a sentry’s mind-trick. It also accounted for the Vampire’s ability to seduce or hypnotize their

victims.

Armando had borne witness to such a display only twice, once he had been the

prospective prey. If Reeso hadn’t been present on that particular mission, Armando would have

been consumed like so many of his kinsmen before and after him. If the Vampires had simply

killed their Immortal victims after draining them, Armando would not have considered death at

their hands so horrifying.

The Vampire were too enamored with the taste of vengeance to let their blood enemies

escape with simple desiccation. The sweetest touch was making the noble fools who’d chosen to

fight the Vampire into the things the Immortals hated the most.

In combat, the Vampires had a greater advantage over their foes due to the mental link

between themselves and their soldiers. The Vampire generals could formulate and execute

strategies silently and swiftly without placing themselves anywhere near the battlefield. The

Vampires would also use tainted Immortals as cannon fodder in many of the clan wars, taking

perverse pleasure from their foes’ anguish. Many Immortals could not or would not fight their

undead loved ones, opting for either transformation at the hands of those they’d spared, or

suicide. It was striking their enemies through their hearts that brought the Thirteen Houses within

a hair’s breadth of conquest.

Fortunately, the Universe didn’t consider that wise.


47

Armando grinned in the nocturnal dreamscape,

recalling the details the Humans and Guardians had provided of the Firefall. The glow of

the remaining Twelve Houses reduced to ashes had kept Armando’s heart warm for centuries

afterward, a suitable tonic for those cold, lonely nights.

Armando’s present predicament reasserted itself with the whisper of leather cutting the

evening air. The sound was infinitesimal, but Armando’s ears were keen. The Esclavos were

here.

But that was impossible. There shouldn’t be any in this city or anywhere else on earth.

Armando Moreno and John Pastore, the last Immortal and last Guardian, had hunted and slain the

sole member of the Thirteenth House.

“Are you sure?” A voice as cutting as a penny on dry ice asked from the wreckage.

Armando reached back for his sword and this time was rewarded with the feel of oiled

wood under his callused palm. The petrified blade was poised along the line of the Peruvian’s

body, itching for the voice of the Shadow-hearted one to speak again. All Armando needed to pin

her heart was a solitary word.

Just one.

“You were premature to put the symbol of my House on your cleaver, butcher.”

Armando spun in a complete circle. The voice poured out of every piece of rubble,

making it impossible to triangulate where his target was.

“You were careless.”

Glynis’ words fell on Armando’s ears like hail on glass, mocking the man and his failure

to avenge his people.

“Your Mongrel should have kept its nose open.” The fissured ground below and the

weeping skies above carried the Vampire’s words as well, the angry echo clawed at Armando’s

sanity. In order to ward off vertigo, Armando centered his thoughts on the slapping of the rain on

his skin. The bawling wind was less of an ally due to its resemblance to the dead’s wailing. His

defenses were pitiful, but effective.

“I assure you I shall not be so careless a second time!” Armando shouted with a voice as

cold as winter concrete. It would take more than mercurial scenery and the flapping of phantom

wings to defeat him. Perverting the memory of his loved ones had, rather than breaking

Armando’s spirit, strengthened it.


48

“This city is beautiful at night, don’t you think?”

The voice had a definite origin now. Armando rounded on a collection of rent steel and

granite, through holes in the debris Armando would have seen the interior of a car and its

mangled occupants. He would have, if he hadn’t been so taken with the woman standing behind

the rubble.

The woman was below average height with shoulder length raven-black hair. Despite the

weight and pounding of the rainfall, her tresses flowed with the hurricane gales. The flesh over

her broad jaw and cheekbones was as pale as bleached bone.

Armando felt a tingling in his groin at the sight of the woman. He ignored the erection,

viewing it as a manifestation of a Vampire seduction. Sex was one of the many ways the Blood

Slaves had of luring prey to their deaths.

“Not death, aged-one, but rebirth.”

Glynis’ words were colored by an accent, but one which could never be narrowed down to

a single dialect.

Like Pastore and Armando, she had lived so long in so many countries and had mastered

so many languages, that whatever language they spoke their voices carried a unique lilt.

“An eternity of night, Slave of the Blood, is not what I call life.” Armando’s clothes

were so saturated with sweat and rain that they were as tight as a python’s embrace. The

abundant moisture did little to cool his temper. In his sleep, on a bed in a Miami hotel, Armando

clutched his mattress so brutally he tore out a handful of fabric and stuffing.

His passionate hatred was not powerful enough, however, to override Reeso’s teachings

or Armando’s considerable will. This dream was either a warning or an invasion, whichever, it

was paramount he pay attention to it.

Glynis read the conflict in the Peruvian’s face and received it with a smiling pout.

“Awww...Are you at odds with yourself lovely? I could cure that...” The Vampire’s tone

had altered considerably from the icy hiss she had addressed Armando with earlier. Glynis’

words were warm. Her body, swathed in a filmy dress, clung to her with a seductive life of its

own.

Armando’s eyes drifted along the modest swells of her breasts, his sex growing harder the

closer Glynis approached, her chest bouncing gently. The Immortal’s blood cooled from rage to

lust as he traced the curve of her waist to her hips and the paradise that awaited between her legs.


49

She’s got you by the balls, buddy!! Snap out of it!!

Pastore’s voice shredded Armando’s lust like a berserk wolverine through a herd of cattle.

The verbal assault freed Armando’s perceptions enough for him to impale his right foot with his

sword.

The Iron-wood blade pierced shoe leather and flesh, straight into the tarmac underneath.

The bright burst of agony helped clear Armando’s head enough for him to staunchly meet Glynis’

eyes.

Reeso’s words rose in the Immortal’s ears as the Blood Slave stepped closer, her pale

flesh supple and inviting.

Don’t give her a foot-hold boy! If you give her an inch you are lost! She will usurp your

mind and sup on your blood!

Armando heard his teacher’s words but had no interest in heeding them. He had faced the

Dearg-due hundreds of times, and Glynis herself more than once, but something had changed.

He found the Vampire more...enticing.

Armando clawed frantically in the past for the faces of his dead, of the children the

Vampires had drained and infected, children Armando had been obligated to slay. He stared at

the woman, seeking to conjure wrath at the sight of her emerald cat-eyes.

The Hatred would not stir.

Glynis was a yard from the Immortal and Armando found himself trying to retreat, but the

sword he had nailed his foot with wouldn’t let him go far.

“You feel it...Don’t you?”

Glynis’ voice was like warm honey over ice cream. Armando felt the searing in his foot

melt away as he caught the scent of the Vampire. The fragrance wasn’t flowers or fruit or

anything that flourished in the sun. Glynis smelled of the Night, the sweet perfume of a fall

evening. It was the fragrance that made dogs howl and cats rut.

Armando wanted to do both.

I do not understand this, he thought feverishly, the body on his bed sheathed with sweat

from the nocturnal seduction. Absently, he began grinding his crotch against the crumpled

sheets.

She has never been this...

(NO!, Reeso screamed)


50

...beautiful.

Glynis’ smile broadened, her pallor shining like a hunter’s moon in the dead of winter.

(‘Mondo! Wake up!! , Pastore cried)

Armando swallowed hard, it felt as if he were watching events unravel through a window.

He felt the lust raging through his blood, the throbbing in his groin, but it all seemed so unreal.

So distant.

Armando had always been able to resist the Vampire’s seduction with minimal effort.

Both male and female Nosferatu. What changed?! Had it truly been so long since he’d faced the

seducers that he no longer had the will to resist them?

“Dear, dear Armando. It has been a long time, true, but that isn’t why you feel so...”

Glynis reached Armando and placed her soft, ivory palm on the side of his neck. “...drawn to

me.”

The rain on Armando’s neck evaporated under Glynis’ hand.

They are supposed to have flesh like ice, Armando rambled in his mind.

Where was the hatred?! Where was the fire in his belly that erupted at the mere thought

of the Blood Slaves?!

Where was the hatred that had comforted and warmed him in the weeks after he found the

people of village murdered. It was as if someone had squirreled their way into that dark reservoir

and drained it without his knowing. He missed that heavy burning. He had become comfortable

with the anger, with the ceaseless rage! The passion Armando found in its place was new and

disturbing. It was almost as if he were falling in--

(NO!!)

Glynis’ left hand glided along Armando’s shoulder, down his arm to his hand where it

clutched the handle of the Ironwood sword. She caressed his bleached knuckles until they

loosened and fell away.

Glynis planted a light kiss on the hollow of the Peruvian’s throat. She followed this with

the tender lapping of the rain off his skin.

Armando’s erection strained against the brass teeth of his zipper, the sensation would

have been painful if the friction weren’t so delicious.

What is wrong with me!!?

“That wizened will of yours is finally starting to soften...”


51

Glynis’ hand floated down the front of Armando’s sopping shirt to his crotch and robustly

massaged the bulge within.

“Unlike other things.”

“I’ve always hated your kind.” Armando growled, not out of rage but desire. “I’ve always

been revolted—“

“No.” The dark angel interrupted, her breath a warm, moist breeze on Armando’s throat.

“You were taught to hate me and mine. A misguided notion or the denial of a greater destiny by

one of your ancestors is what skewed your vision.

“I have learned many things in the years we’ve been apart my husband—“

Husband? The thought of coupling with an Esclava should have made Armando retch on

the spot. Instead...Instead, it made something click in him. As if the final piece of a puzzle had

been fitted into place.

“Our kind were never meant to be at war. We are two of a kind.”

Glynis ferreted her hands up beneath Armando’s shirt, the rain becoming steam at her

touch.

“We are royalty in this world: You who cannot die and I who can sup on thoughts and

blood. We are the last of our kind, the mother and father of a whole new race. A STRONG

race!”

Glynis’ jade eyes blazed as she spoke, the slitted pupils widening with her excitement.

Armando was discovering he would not mind death as long as the Vampire’s eyes were his final

sight.

The Immortal struggled to keep his libido in check, but found that his resolve was

gradually weakening. He grasped at the past for something to buffer himself against the

seductress’ assault: He sought out Reeso’s counsel, The body of a baby pale and cold in his arms

with two sets of puncture marks on its throat. Armando willed the images to come, but they

eluded him.

All Armando could see in his mind’s eye was his body merging with Glynis’, his dark

bronze flesh intermingled with her alabaster skin. The thought of entering the Blood Slave made

the breath hitch in his lungs. He tried to crush the desire filling him...then started wondering why.

“The pieces are all in place. All I need is you. That is why I created this magnificent

playground.” Glynis withdrew from the Immortal, compounding his self-loathing by making him


52

miss her.

Glynis waved her arm, the gesture encompassing the ruined metropolis.

“So many meals trapped in their little boxes.” She said sweetly, turning from her guest

and dancing a jig. The wind roared through mangled steel.

Armando sensed millions of eyes on him, desiring to slake their thirst with his ichor. The

Peruvian paid them no mind...

(You are in your enemy’s camp!)

The only sight that consumed him was Glynis, the movement of her buttocks, her milky

complexion that was so enticing he wanted to lick every inch of her body. He was mesmerized

(NO!! KILL HER!!)

by the sound of her drenched dress sliding against her skin, flesh he yearned to

(RIP!! TEAR!! SHE HAS MURDERED--)

touch with his lips and

(--YOUR HOME!! YOUR FAMILIES!!)

tongue. He wanted to drink her in.

“This was all done for you my dearest. This mayhem is all for you, a lure to capture my

mate.”

Away from her softness, Armando was able to reclaim a fraction of his former resolve.

“What do you mean?”, he growled. He was pleased that the effort it took to speak

translated into such a harsh voice. From Glynis’ grin, though, she knew his ferocity was only

skin deep.

How is she controlling me?

“I told you. I’ve learned things, talents older than your race and mine combined. I have

recognized my spiritual link to this world we were born to rule. I have used this knowledge to

shatter this city—“

“Impossible! No Vampire has ever—“

“No.” She said sweetly. “The others never could have achieved this power because they

were too stupid. Even...Even...” Glynis stared down at the broken tarmac under her feet in

silence.

Armando felt his will return. The comforting hatred insinuated itself in the seat of his

soul.


53

“BITCH!” he cried. Armando could feel his astral body growing. His Ironwood blade

fattened from a Katana- like sword into a scimitar.

“LIFE STEALING WHORE!!”

Glynis glanced up from her pondering. The sight of the wrathful Immortal didn’t faze her

in the least.

“Oh shut up.”

She waved a hand distractedly as the Peruvian pulled his blade back for the killing

stroke...And he froze.

Try as Armando might, no muscle in his astral form would budge. He knew from his

altered perspective that he had gained height and muscle, but he could not command it.

With his “body” dead, Armando’s mind started racing. He removed himself from his rage

and examined the events that had led to his paralysis. A great deal of his and the Vampire’s

dialogue had been lost in the haze of his lust (for which he begged his ancestors would forgive

him), but the key to his condition wasn’t hard to find.

Glynis had been speaking of the other Houses: How stupid they had been...Even...

“Aldrew.” Armando muttered. He smiled when the Vampire’s temperament darkened.

“He was not one of the world’s finest thinkers. Was he?”

The heat off Glynis turned from passion to fury. Armando knew the woman had all the

advantage on the astral battleground, his stasis being ample proof of that, but the indignation

twisting her face was worth the risk.

Instead of eviscerating her nemesis, Glynis simply smiled. The grin told Armando that all

thoughts of seduction had fled her mind.

For now.

“I shall avenge Aldrew and my other cousins when all the players are in place. For now,

however, before this pleasant little reunion ends,” Glynis approached Armando. He sunk to his

original stature, but he remained immobile. “I assure you that we are meant to be together. In

time you will see this...Without my coercion—“

“Never.”

Glynis grinned fiercely, her canines elongating and retracting from the thrill of

confrontation.

“When I learned of our mutual destiny, that we were meant to be lovers and not


54

combatants, I was far from enthusiastic. But the evidence is before your eyes. We are the last of

the two great races, and together we shall be the parents of a new breed. The foundation of the

one, true House. Our blood shall be mixed in a pure vessel.”

Armando’s anger was derailed by curiosity.

“Who?” Glynis’ talk of vessels had caused the hair on the nape of his neck to rise. “What

is this ‘vessel’?”

Glynis pointed to a young woman standing on the shattered pavement at the base of a

building. The woman looked very sad and very pregnant.

“The child within the child shall drink our blood and become monarch of this world. She

will not die as our kin have. She will be a true Immortal, and though her, we shall rule.”

“I would—“ Armando was stricken dumb by the horror of what the Vampire proposed.

“Never?” She chided. “Never is a very long time.” Glynis strolled casually to the pregnant

woman, the girl, whom Armando estimated was in her mid-twenties, who simply stared forlornly

at the clouds above.

“Don’t you feel the void Ironblood, the loneliness of being the last.”

Armando did not know what surprised him more: The pain in the Vampire’s voice or the

fact that she was voicing sentiments he had been suppressing for centuries.

“The irony of all this is that the only cure for our isolation lies with the people responsible

for our loneliness.

“We hate one another, it is the tie that binds us. Our hatred is a passion stronger than

anything the ‘cattle’ call Love. You have killed mine. I have killed yours. We are both alone

now, with only each other for company.”

Something fluttered in Armando soul. The sensation was similar to the tickle he’d felt

when Glynis had called him “husband”, but this time it shook his spirit to its core. There was

something dark in him that agreed with the Vampire.

And he feared it.

Glynis stopped at the sky-gazing girl and placed a hand on the back of her neck, sending a

tremor through the woman.

“We have wasted the ages watching them. Envying them. They meet, they speak, they

couple. They have children. We two are the last of the Old Breed—“

“Not the last.” Armando’s voice sounded like dried leaves under a lion’s paw. The


55

Vampire’s words kindled despair in the Immortal’s soul. He hoped mentioning Pastore would

distract Glynis as the name of her dead lover Aldrew had earlier. He did not want the woman

seeing how deeply she had stricken him.

Glynis initially received Armando’s statement with some confusion, comprehension was

accompanied by disgust and anger.

“I do not acknowledge the...Cur, as one of us. Its kind is an aberration...But it, too, is the

last of its breed. And it will not live to create more.”

The fearsome gales grew harder and colder with the Vampire’s smile. The girl standing

bedside Glynis paid the weather no mind.

“I am eager to see you face to face, Ironblood. Perhaps then the truth will be more

apparent. Then this Fair Christian...”

Glynis caressed the pregnant woman’s cheek, drawing tears and a sob from the girl’s

throat. Glynis lifted a medallion the girl wore and trailed its chain to a small golden oval.

Through the rain in his eyes, Armando distinguished the jewelry as a Catholic symbol, an

Immaculate Medal.

“...will give us the babe that will bide us for all eternity.” Glynis crushed the medal

between her thumb and forefinger.

It dawned on Armando that he wasn’t feeling the rain or wind as vividly as he had. He

surmised that the vision was drawing to a close and if that was true, he wanted to know where to

find Glynis and protect the woman and child she sought to harm.

“Leave the child alone, Glynis. This war of ours will end with us, not some innocent

human and her unborn babe. Tell me where to find you Esclava de la sangre! And I will put an

end to your loneliness with my blade!”

The Vampire’s smile never faltered as she gestured down the rubble clogged street, wind

tugging at the fabric of her gown. Armando’s head was allowed to creak in the direction Glynis

indicated.

Initially, the sky and city were as steeped in shadow as their current location, when two

identical buildings shattered the pristine pitch. Armando recognized the buildings immediately

and knew the city to which they belonged. The Twin Towers in New York City.

“That shall be our aerie. A throne for each of us. Ample room to rebuild the Houses, and

lay the foundation for a new one.”


56

Glynis patted the girl’s belly, tearing a scream of terror and pain from the Fair Christian’s

throat.

The girl’s cry made Armando bristle. Whether the girl was an astral construct or the

female’s true soul, didn’t matter, Armando was unable to help her either way.

“She will not give you her child!” Armando felt motion returning to him, but his astral

form remained static. The only possibility was that he was finally waking.

“If the Fair Christian will not give what we desire—“ Glynis’ right hand curled into a

talon, her left hand tightening on her victim’s neck.

Armando foresaw Glynis’ intent and willed himself with every iota of his being to act.

But for all his desire, Armando’s unfamiliarity and Glynis’ mastery of the Dream Stream kept

Armando’s bones frozen.

“--I will take it.”

Armando’s roar caught in his throat as Glynis plunged her claw into the young mother’s

womb.

The girl shrieked and thrashed, her long, curly hair whipping around her head like a nest

of asps. Blood gushed around Glynis’ arm as she dug it deeper. The girl’s cries were silenced

and Armando’s dream ended when the Vampire tore the bloody child from her mother.

Armando had emerged from slumber roaring and tearing at his mattress and linens.

He’d seized his sword and swung at the shadows shrinking beneath the sun’s assault. He

knew the Vampire wouldn’t be in his room, but his anger needed venting. In retrospect it was

fortunate he hadn’t destroyed his television or he wouldn’t have learned about the earthquake

toppling New York City. Armando was on a noon plane to JFK. He had spent the time between

then and his meeting with Pastore pouring over his dream and the anguish of his past.

Armando had told John an expurgated version of the vision, telling John that Glynis had

threatened a pregnant woman and that she had hinted that the Twin Towers was her prospective

nest.

It wasn’t so much that he didn’t want to tell John about the Vampire’s attempted

seduction, but more a matter of not believing the information was important enough to mention.

John was well aware that seduction was an age old weapon

in the Esclava’s arsenal, therefore, Glynis’ futile attempt was not worth reporting. News

of the girl Glynis referred to as the Fair Christian, was.


57

Likewise, it had been a vision that had summoned John to Manhattan as well, but his had

occurred an entire month before the cataclysm. The details were sketchy at best, but Glynis’

presence, the threat to the Fair Christian and the presence of the Twin Towers, stood in bright

relief.

Armando sensed no reluctance or deception on John’s behalf. He was anxious to ask

whether the Esclava had made any overtures to him, or mentioned this so-called New Breed of

hers, but held his tongue. It was unlikely any Vampire would try to seduce a Mongrel--

Armando froze on the bridge at that instant.

A crumpled section of steel beneath his hand buckled and squealed as he clenched it.

Never in his long life had he thought of his friend or any of the Guardians, by the Blood Slaves’

slur.

The anger at his callousness was intermingled with a bizarre new sensation, one that had

never accompanied thoughts of the Blood Slaves.

He felt a kinship.

During their final mental encounter (if he had, in fact, been linked with the Vampire’s

mind), Armando had felt something...linking them. Something (empty) cold, (burning) a void

Armando had sealed long ago, when the last of his loved ones had perished. The sensation was

localized to his chest, where the glacial gales of his long isolation scoured out the center of his

heart. He felt the pit in him yawn and shriek. There were sounds in the abyss, but no sights...just

the pitch and the cold. Always the cold.

Armando didn’t notice Pastore climb over the mesh of concrete and steel, nor did he

notice himself freezing in his tracks. Rain plastered his thin black hair to his head, the razor-

jawed wind freezing the moisture on his skin.

He also failed to notice the ebony cloud zeroing in on the bridge. The amorphous shape

would have been difficult, although not impossible, for Armando to distinguish against the deep

slate sky. John would have heard its approach if the thunder hadn’t numbed his eardrums.

Armando’s breath came in short, shallow gulps, the pain in his chest grew by the second.

If he’d possessed claws he would have tried to tear the agony from his chest.

What has she done?!

(Opened doors)

Armando’s eyes sprung wide


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(doors of pain)

and he howled into the hurricane.

(rooms of blood)

Neither he nor Pastore heard the wailing

(of shame)

over the squall and the tattoo of rain on steel and tarmac.

(of failure)

“I DID WHAT I COULD!!”

(the children died last)

“SHE IS DOING THIS TO ME!!”

Twenty yards ahead Pastore finally turned to check his companion’s progress. He was

about to call Armando when he caught wind of the ebony cloud.

The core of the cloud was bearing down on them, its aft stretched like an umbilicus to the

only structures left whole and unharmed on Manhattan island.

The swarm swallowed the sky like blood over a tombstone. The cloud was close enough

for John to hear the shrieking of the bats. He damned himself and Armando for being so sloppy.

Decades of living with humans had made them soft.

No, Pastore thought, angry with himself for trying to rationalize his stupidity. Glynis’

lived with the Humans too and she’s still got a stinkin’ edge.

At the speed the bats were flying, John had no time to reach Armando let alone formulate

and execute a defensive strategy. Despite the futility of the endeavor, John started running for

the Peruvian, springing off chunks of debris as they tumbled from under his feet. He screamed at

Armando, but the Immortal didn’t respond. The man seemed occupied by the something

attacking from above. There was no threat as far as Pastore could see.

Oh Mondo man, don’t go screwy on me now. You wanna talk about shitty timing?!

Armando screamed at the heavens, where the tumultuous clouds bore the faces of the

dead.

“SHE IS MAKING THIS PAIN!”

(no)

Armando slammed his fists against his ears, direly wishing to drive Reeso’s voice from

his head.


59

(The old man died alone)

“I tried.” Armando whimpered, his strength fading from the depth of his spiritual

wounds.

Behind closed eyes Armando saw the children of his village swarming over him, their

immature teeth gnawing feebly at his iron flesh. He saw the hunger in their hollow eyes...and

their agony as he slaughtered them.

Why was the agony returning now?! Especially with so much at stake! They had less

than three days to act before the island’s inhabitants were Changed. To her credit, Glynis had

predicted

(or caused)

the earthquake and hurricane that ravaged New York. To Armando’s knowledge

Vampires had been telepaths, not precogs. If the psychic aspect of their powers had evolved

(or if she created the catastrophes--)

Armando slammed the door on the phantom thoughts, despite Reeso’s warnings that

terminating any road of investigation was extremely dangerous and would place him at his

enemy’s mercy.

Like most students, however, Armando picked and chose what he wanted to learn. If he

were to be frank with himself, Armando would realize that the concept of the Vampire mastering

the elements scared the blazes out of him. And a warrior with fear was useless.

Yet the question remained, If Glynis’ powers of perception had mutated, what else had?

The answer arrived in a swarm of Vampire bats.

Pastore drew his Lochaber Axe from its sheath across his back, the Demascus steel

cleaved through a dozen of the flying rodents before the swarm could retaliate. The corpses of

the fallen vampires smoldered where they’d been struck, the purity of the metal polluting their

blood and painfully ending the lives of the leather-winged creatures. The expiring Blood Slaves

attempted to Shift to another, more durable form, but the steel did its work efficiently. The bats

infected by the steel were dead seconds.

Armando was having less luck with his wooden blade. In order for the Ironwood to kill, it

had to pierce the Vampires hearts. A lesser warrior would have found the feat frustrating if not

impossible.

Armando was no such warrior.


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He skewered eight of the airborne Esclavos at a thrust, the dense formation of the

Vampires’ attack making the exercise that much easier. Knowing he couldn’t rely on the

Nosferatu maintaining their more vulnerable forms, he impaled as many as he could before the

creatures could become more of a threat.

The bats skimming the ground became wolves, the odd two or three morphing into twin-

tailed cats. The wolves and felines made for easier targets, but were heartier and faster than the

bats. The remaining bats formed an impenetrable curtain of fur and leather, separating John and

Armando.

The Peruvian apologized under his breath for every wolf he skewered, praying he

wouldn’t accidentally impale John in the melee. He’d made that error when they’d first met.

John had been far from pleased at the inconvenience.

Discretion wasn’t a luxury the Immortal could afford at present. The Esclavos were too

numerous for him to be selective, if he faltered for a heart-beat, they would overwhelm him.

Armando’s concern for John was, to say the least, unnecessary. Despite the fury in his

blood, Pastore chose not to Shift. His will strained against the sweet, subtle song of the Hunter’s

Moon concealed by the storm clouds and the swarm of Vampire bats. Pastore denied the raging

in his heart, resisting the hunger to teach these false wolves what the face of a true wolf looked

like. But if John shifted now, in the heat of battle with an ancient foe, he would lose control and

wind up losing his life, soul and blood to the Nosferatu. Killing them as a man wouldn’t be as

satisfying or as quick, but it was prudent.

Pastore had taken two facts into consideration as he dismembered the Vampires; One,

was that none of them were avoiding his steel, which meant that they had only recently been

corrupted. It was likely the majority of them knew only the popular myths concerning Vampires

and their weaknesses. The lethal effect of steel, or more accurately iron, was not a staple in

modern Vampire lore.

The second observation was that the creatures weren’t trying to bite him. The wolves and

cats clawed at him, yes, but none seemed driven to drain him.

Before he could explore these observations further, the Blood Slaves began pressing

against him in force, creatures that had been nipping harmlessly at his back joined their siblings

in the push. John swiped and slashed at the amorphous wall, but the immature Vampires were

quick studies. They watched how the steel burned and knew enough to avoid it. A wolf or cat


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would goad John into attack then would dash when the Guardian lunged. The bats seized the

moment when Pastore’s balance was off and pounded into him like a machine gun barrage.

Pastore toppled despite himself, surrendering any hope of finding Armando for the time

being. Unable to check his footing, John stumbled over the loosely strewn debris and went

sailing through a crevice in the upper level tarmac.

The steel mesh of the lower level walkway had been structurally weakened by the

environmental punishment of the past day, it was a small miracle the web was intact at all. That

miracle ended when Pastore went tumbling into it.

John careened through the steel like a pebble through a spider web. His left arm, three of

the ribs on his right side and his right leg from the knee down were wrenched from his body on

impact. Pastore screamed, but disregarded the agony long enough to cling to the Lochaber Axe

and sheath it.

A new arm and leg regenerated as he plummeted toward the West Channel. None of the

Vampires were diving for him, supplanting the raw, burning in his side and limbs, with a

wrenching in his gut.

John glanced over his good shoulder, searching for any sign of Armando in the raging

waterway rushing at him. The Peruvian was nowhere below or above him.

They’re after Mondo, John thought.

The hurricane did little to buffet Pastore’s decent. The explosion of wind in his ears

caused him more agony than his rapidly mending wounds. The pollution in the Channel did

double duty on his highly attuned olfactory senses, the combined assault was intolerable. His

missing limbs and ribs were on their way to being fully healed, so he could close off the pain of

those injuries, but the sensory input was something John could not censor.

“Aw fuck this burns!” John roared into the deaf ears of the wind. The silt of the island

riding the gales was sandpaper on his skin.

We were set up. She had us walking on a high wire and shook the fuckin’ rope. Shit!!!

The wind’s fury was accented by the churning of the storm-tossed Channel. John didn’t

occupy himself with the impact of his body on the water, the shattering of his bones and the

mashing of his flesh, he was more concerned with Armando’s fate.

Pastore was well aware of why the Vampires had chased him off the bridge and weren’t

pursuing him; Mongrels counted as less than nothing. Good for food or labor, nothing more.


62

Normally, the thought of the Blood Slaves’ pompous motherfuckin’ attitude would have

been enough to make Pastore angry enough to piss lava, but something else was gnawing at him,

circumventing the fury.

Why hadn’t they sucked him dry? And a less pressing, albeit a recurring and nagging,

question was, how had Glynis corrupted so many people in so little time?

The second query was easier to fathom than the first. Glynis could have spent the past two

and a half centuries silently building an army, stealing a soldier here and there. Recruiting just

enough to fill her ranks but not enough to draw unwanted attention.

That didn’t explain the convenient earthquake and hurricane. Nor did it explain why her

spawn hadn’t bit him. They hadn’t even tried. John hadn’t known a Blood Slave who would pass

up a free meal, even if the blood belonged to a Mongrel.

John’s concentration exploded as he struck the water, every bone in his body instantly

pulverized. He passed out from the agony of his shattering skeleton, so he didn’t feel his internal

organs bursting or his axe cleaving him in half.

The lower portion of John Pastore’s body spun among the currents, the lifeless legs

dancing in a multitude of angles, the powdered bones within the limbs powerless to maintain a

specific shape. John’s small intestine unraveled from his split trunk, coloring the turbulent waters

red and yellow. The lengthy tissue trailed after the legs as they sailed toward Brooklyn.

The living half of John Pastore was weighed down by the steel across his back. His

battered and unconscious bulk sank as it mended, the weapon responsible for cutting him in half

also prevented the currents from stealing him away from Manhattan’s shores.

As Pastore was consumed by the murky waters, Armando’s battle with the Vampires had

been lost.

The Blood Slaves had learned to dodge his blade as they had Pastore’s, one daring wolf

locking its jaws on the petrified wood and wrestling the weapon from its master.

Disoriented by the boldness of the attack, Armando lost his footing and fell into a cushion

of bats. Without breaking his skin, the company of Vampires closed their jaws on the Immortal

and hoisted him into the air.

For all his struggling Armando couldn’t free himself from his enemies’ grasp. As he

ascended, the Peruvian searched the bridge’s length for Pastore but saw only rubble and the

carcasses of the Esclavos they’d slain.


63

Armando watched helplessly as he was borne across the bridge and down Fifty-Ninth

Street. The city below him was deserted with exception of one man. Armando tried beckoning

the man but the beating of the bats’ wings muted his cries. Armando watched the black man

shrink in the distance, not envying the man his fate at the Nosferatus’ hands.

The bats changed course from West to South. Looming above the mangled metropolis,

Armando spied his destination.

The Twin Towers.

The bats’ elevation rose dramatically, the sudden change in air pressure stealing

Armando’s awareness. He didn’t see the swarm enter the ninetieth floor in the side of Tower

One. Nor did Armando see the shrouded corpses lined wall to wall in the steel and glass

stronghold. He didn’t see the swarm metamorph into their human forms and, with the exception

of one Esclavo, skulk to their roosts on their respective floors. If Armando had been lucid, he

would have noted how regimentally the Esclavos moved, each creature moving with the surety

and purpose of a well-trained soldier.

The sole remaining Vampire, a male about five-eleven with shaggy white hair framing a

bearded face, dragged the slumbering Immortal to a private elevator. From outside the city, no

one would have noticed that both the towers had retained not only their stature, but their

electricity as well. The florescence in the elevator highlighted the numerous wrinkles on

DeSilva’s naked flesh.

Normally, the Pure Blood were required to look presentable during an audience with the

Queen, nudity was offensive to the Lady and would not be tolerated.

This, however, was a special occasion.

The Lady had confided to DeSilva that the Ironblood would be the father of a new dawn.

She had told him that the New House would cover the globe, never again fearing the sunlight or

iron or the piercing of their hearts by a shaft of wood.

The Immortal was the key to their freedom.

DeSilva glared at the man crumpled on the elevator floor and felt the thirst rising in him.

With the thirst came hatred.

Until today he’d believed himself and his kin safe as long as they avoided garlic, crosses,

wooden stakes, etc. But this man and the Mongrel Pastore had massacred many of his siblings

with nothing more than steel.


64

And, of course, there was the Immortal’s sword. DeSilva examined the shaft of crafted

petrified wood, turning it over slowly in his hands. Colored deep crimson by the blood of his

brethren, the symbols of the Thirteen Houses stood in relief.

How many of my people have died by your hand?, DeSilva wondered, his pale, wrinkled

skin growing flushed with fury. How many have died on this blade?

DeSilva didn’t know what infuriated him more; That he had the swine at his mercy but

could not kill him, or that the Immortal was destined to couple with his Lady.

It wasn’t a physical coupling Hans DeSilva envied, in that regard he had known his

Mistress quite well. No, the Immortal would mingle with the Lady in the only way that mattered.

In the blood.

Pure Blood and Ironblood becoming one. Becoming...unique.

“The Blood”, Glynis had whispered to DeSilva, shortly before he would become Pure.

“The Blood is all we are, all we seek. Blood is life and death, the river linking all that lives. It

brings power and inspires fear.”

DeSilva had wept then, an act that angered him in retrospect. He had prayed and

screamed and wept, asking-- begging to be spared. His pleas had ceased in a hushed orgasmic

sigh as Glynis pierced his throat with her fangs.

The instant his blood entered Glynis, his cock had hardened and ejaculated, and had

continued to do so until his blood vessels were dry. Through the haze of pleasure and fatigue,

DeSilva had heard Glynis kissing away stray droplets along his unwashed neck.

“You are my first, my General. Together we will teach the cattle about the beauty of the

blood. Its color, its taste.

“Its power.”

The elevator struck floor one-hundred and five, ringing a chime and shaking DeSilva from

his nostalgic stupor. The doors opened, spilling the harsh white illumination into a world of

gloom. DeSilva heard the hurricane roaring against the windows and savored it. The music of

Her fury, of Her strength.

DeSilva emerged from the lift with Armando’s neck clasped in his left hand and the

Immortal’s Ironwood sword in the right.

The entire floor had been swept clean of debris, any remnant of human habitation had

been tossed into the streets. Several walls had been demolished by the Lady herself. I prefer


65

open spaces, she’d said after shredding a block of concrete and steel with her talons.

DeSilva could understand the preference: The open floor provided room to breathe, to fly,

to rut. He and the Lady had performed all three on occasion and DeSilva wouldn’t have minded

if they’d gone careening through the heavy-duty glass, their orgasmic bliss buoying them to the

starry sky.

The elevator door whispered shut behind the Vampire, leaving the slate shrouded

firmament as the only source of light.

It was more than enough for DeSilva.

Naturally, since Vampires were nocturnal hunters, their eyes functioned along the same

lines as a cat’s. The vertical slits in DeSilva’s gray eyes widened, permitting as much light as he

needed through the pupil. DeSilva could have found the Lady without the aid of his night-vision,

her exquisite flesh was silhouetted against the clouds to his right.

The Lady gave no hint that she had heard him enter, maintaining her gaze out the window

into Manhattan’s heart. DeSilva was about to cough when the Lady spoke.

“They’ll find her soon.”

Her voice was a carefully crafted mixture of anticipation and fear. DeSilva felt her

excitement in his blood and sex, he was forced to ignore his stiffening member in order to deliver

news of his mission.

“I have the Ironblood, Lady. And his blade.” DeSilva’s voice was husky with lust. He

wanted the Lady’s supple warmth embracing him, molding him. He wanted to taste her flesh and

pussy and blood. For anyone else his hunger would have overwhelmed him, pressing him into

action whether the object of his lust was willing or not. But the Lady was different. DeSilva had

learned early on, and in a most uniquely painful manner, that the Lady only coupled when she

wanted to.

“The Mongrel is alive.” The Lady said, her soft voice echoing in the Spartan chamber.

“And with the Humans. They’ll find the Fair Christian soon.”

DeSilva saw the Lady’s smile spread across her delicate ruby lips, yearning for her mouth

on his body. The Lady’s canines extended with her excitement, the sight sending a thrill through

DeSilva. Sweat sheathed him at the thought of her fangs piercing his neck and chest and thighs.

Glynis’ hand rose and stroked the cold, mirrored glass, shivering at the feel of the sleek

surface.


66

“Soon. So soon I can taste it.”

Glynis face fell for an instant, something akin to confusion flickered over her features.

DeSilva’s keen eyes spotted her nose twitching.

“He’s armed.”

DeSilva was thrown for an instant. He had the Immortal’s blade in his hand, any other

possessions the Ironblood had would have fallen en transit.

“M-My Lady...I assure you he’d—“

DeSilva blinked, within a second Glynis crossed the distance between her window and

DeSilva’s side. Even with his enhanced agility, he could never dream of moving so swiftly or

silently. It reminded him that he was only a gnat having an audience with a god.

Glynis brandished a talon, frightening DeSilva before she swiped at a leather sheath

concealed in the Immortal’s pants. The strap restraining the blade popped, allowing the blade to

slide free of its housing.

Glynis grasped the knife by the edge, spun it on a fingertip, flipped it into the air and

clutched it by its handle. Blood several shades darker than Human ichor seeped along the side of

her index finger.

DeSilva’s mouth dropped at the sight of his Lady’s rent flesh. Glynis displayed none of

her concubine’s distress, she simply smiled and licked the scarlet stream. Her eyebrows arched at

DeSilva’s horror, then scowled.

“Relax you idiot, it isn’t steel. Can’t you smell it?” She waved Armando’s knife under

Hans’ nose, but he panicked and flinched. He dropped Armando and the wooden sword and

backed away.

“(Sigh). Hans, if you weren’t such a coward you would find that this is silver.”

DeSilva’s face melted from horror to befuddlement. He knew that what the Lady said

must be true, even the smallest nick from the steel was death, and the Lady exhibited none of the

symptoms his poisoned brethren had displayed on the bridge. Shame at his inadequacy sealed

DeSilva’s throat, but not so much that he couldn’t voice his confusion.

“But...Why would the Ironblood want a weapon of silver, it can’t kill us, only—“

“Mongrels.” Glynis’ fangs glowed in the luminescence of the clouds outside.

DeSilva had known his Mistress for almost a century and he had never seen anything

as…chilling...in her eyes as he had at that moment.


67

“Leave us.” She said, placing the silver blade back in its sheath. “I want to be alone with

my future husband.”

DeSilva’s flesh felt as if it had been imbedded with a thousand pure iron nails, then

doused with salt water. If Vampires were capable of shedding tears, they would have trickled

from the bearded man’s eyes.

Glynis glowered at DeSilva’s hesitation. He stowed his grief and left the woman he could

have loved and a man he would love to kill.


68

CHAPTER FOUR

Glynis retrieved Armando’s sword and turned the

weapon over in the dull light. Her fingers danced along the shaft of petrified wood, the

scent of her massacred children fresh enough to sting her nostrils. Her heart’s thundering started

as softly as the drum of drizzle on leather, but before long grew as fierce and frenzied as a steel

drum at the center of a sand storm.

Thirteen symbols, seven on one side, six on the other, each character formed by an

assembly of dashes. The very first symbol was nothing more than a curved slash, narrow at the

top and growing wider along its length. Each successive symbol had an additional slash

signifying each consecutive House. The first solitary scar represented the First House, the roots

from which the other Houses had grown. Rage and grief consumed Glynis as she remembered

her slain clan.

She took a breath to quell her ire, but the exercise proved futile.

The irritation in her ancient blood had an adverse effect on the storm isolating Manhattan.

Rain struck the ground like disgraced gods, hail mingled with the rain to enhance the mayhem.

The wind’s fury increased to the point where it put the wailing of the Banshees to shame. The

gale’s cry would normally be a comfort to Glynis, as it had been during her decades of

isolation...But tonight, with the slayer of her family at her mercy and his instrument of death in

her hands, the moaning failed to soothe.

For every Vampire that died, Glynis had an intimate view of their deaths. Due to the

telepathic link all Vampires share, they lived through one another’s experiences. Glynis, having

been the last of the original Houses, housed the screams of every one of her fallen kin. One that

stood apart from the multitudes was Aldrew McCulloch.

Glynis squeezed her lids closed, savoring the agony of the tears straining to find extinct

ducts. She saw Aldrew’s skin in the starlight, the feeble illumination giving his flesh an angelic

glow. Glynis heard a high keening somewhere on the floor and realized it was a scream building

in her throat. She tried to choke it down but it dug its claws into the sides of her throat.

It wasn’t often a creature as “bloodthirsty” as a Vampire fell in love, but when they did, it


69

went down to the marrow. Such was the passion Glynis felt for Aldrew.

The petrified wood within Glynis’ alabaster fists flashed and crumbled, the pressure

stamping her fingerprints into the stone blade. The crackle-pop of Glynis’ gnashing teeth echoed

across the deserted floor. She opened her eyes wide, determined to cork her emotions. Instead

of seeing the intensifying hurricane through the Tower’s glass, she saw her lover’s face. The

image was so vivid Glynis spun to see if Aldrew was behind her...but all she found was empty air.

For a second she’d forgotten her kind cast no reflection.

The Nosferatu’s arms recalled the warmth and texture of Aldrew’s body, her flesh

bristling with the memory. A sob escaped her as the final moments of Aldrew’s life played out in

her mind, the agony of watching him die far surpassing her own brush with death.

In the black heart of her aerie, Glynis heard the wet tearing of Aldrew’s bones being

ripped from his body, his shrieks grating the air as the sunlight cooked his eyes and skin. She felt

the agony through his nerves, felt the screams shredding her core. With the vivid recollection

came the face of the filth that had slain her beloved. Aldrew’s loss was made all the more painful

by the fact that his killer had been a Mongrel.

Usually a Nosferatu wouldn’t recognize a Mongrel by its gender or chosen name, but

Glynis made an exception in the case of Aldrew’s murderer. She couldn’t help but remember the

cur’s name.

The Mongrel’s name was John Pastore.

Glynis had been ready to pounce on the mutt, sunlight or no, when the damned Ironblood

interfered. The image of Pastore’s malicious grin was etched into Glynis’ mind like fresh blood

on virgin snow. The Mongrel’s laughter had rattled through her skull as they incinerated her, all

those years ago.

Glynis’ would-be killers’ conceit had made them sloppy though, their greatest error had

lain in burning her at night. Their second had been forgetting that a Nosferatu’s spirit fragments

when threatened with fire. In her haste to escape, Glynis hadn’t had time to savor the look of

shock on her enemies’ faces.

Her aspects had burst from the charred remnants of her humanoid shell in a flurry of

reptiles and ravens. Armando and Pastore sought vainly to capture and immolate the creatures,

but there had been too many of them and the light had been too weak to search by.

When Glynis had been positive she was out of danger and the range of the Mongrel’s


70

senses, she’d gathered the sum of her ka into a fleeing raven.

“Do you remember that, Armando?” Glynis queried, her voice thick and quavering.

She did not want this. Her emotions were becoming too powerful, they were breaking

away from her. For a century and a half she had anticipated and dreaded this day, she had

rehearsed the confrontation with the sole Ironblood a million times, both aloud and in her head.

This assault by the past had never been in the plan.

She wanted her emotions to be controlled...To be cold. Instead of ice, Typhon’s blood

coursed through her veins. The Vampire struggled to check the rebellious feelings, but history

was seductive with its phantom screams and faceless accusers.

Glynis snarled at Armando’s slumbering bulk, resisting the impulse to plunge his own

blade through his cowardly spine. Her mouth was devoid of moisture as the thought of his potent

blood slithered into her mind.

“The year was 1818. I was living quite contented in the mountains, food was plentiful

and I had no desire to reproduce...Not after...after...”

The wind on the glass was the chorus of her slaughtered dead. She had been able to cope

after the Great Firefall because she’d had Aldrew and the Baobhan Sith to comfort her. After the

Celts came though, with their steel and stakes...and Pastore with his claws...Glynis had been very

lonely.

Being alone in the flesh had been nothing new for Glynis, after all, one could not spend

every waking second with their loved ones, no matter how deeply cherished they were. With the

death of the Thirteen Houses and her sweet Aldrew, Glynis was alone in her head as well.

From as far back as she could recall, Glynis had always had what could best be summed

up as “static”, in her head. The telepathy that accompanied Vampirism linked her with every

Nosferatu alive. No matter where she went, Glynis always had her family in her thoughts, housed

in her mind.

That comforting rapport had been shattered when the Firefall arrived. The wounds from

that catastrophe had just started healing when Armando led the Human barbarians to the doorstep

of the sole remaining House, the House of the Baobhan Sith, the Thirteenth House that resided in

what would become Scotland. Glynis and Aldrew had been the only survivors of the Dearg-due

clan, a House located in Ireland.

Nearly a millennium had passed between the Firefall and the extermination of the


71

Baobhan Sith, but the wounds still bled freely. Armando’s sword rattled in Glynis’ hands,

fissures riding along the shaft from her palms and casting off flakes of ancient wood. The litter

collecting at the Vampire’s feet resembled ashes...

Which was all that remained of her precious Houses.

A slight fluctuation in her guest’s heartbeat alerted Glynis to Armando’s imminent

awakening. To her relief,

her outburst and the damage inflicted on the weapon that had slain her ancestors and

children had alleviated her anger.

Somewhat.

“I was content feeding infrequently, but you and that...that MONGREL...” The word left

her lips in a spray of blood and bile. “Could not leave me be. You could not leave me with my

grief.”

The zephyr lost some of its bite as Glynis’ rage subsided, replaced by gleeful satisfaction.

“However, if it had not been for your persecution, and your incompetence in executing

me, I would never have had the scales lifted from my eyes. I would never have seen the true

power at my disposal...or the roles we are destined to play in each other’s lives.”

Glynis heard the dust and rubble beneath Armando shift imperceptibly. In the space of a

minute the Immortal was lucid and half sitting. Glynis watched the confusion on his face melt as

the events of the past hour came into focus. Once his eyes acclimated at the darkness, the first

object he centered on was his sword.

Glynis contained the smile of satisfaction that tugged at the corners of her mouth, a grin

spurred by the Immortal’s horror. Armando’s emotions weren’t obvious in any physical manner,

but Glynis could see the anxiety in his mind.

“No patience for niceties, eh? Then I’ll get straight to the point.”

Glynis reminded herself that the Ironbl--That the

Immortal was her future mate. She wanted to smother the pleasure rising in her at the

sight of Armando’s face dripping with sweat.

“I was raised believing you Immortals were devoid of emotions, and if not completely

absent of them, at least you were masters at concealing them.”

Glynis glanced at the blade, then at Armando. “Does this relic truly touch you so deeply?”

Armando’s mouth opened and closed soundlessly. Any answer was caught in his gullet,


72

the sight of his ancient weapon in such disrepair stole his voice.

“This is the sole remnant of a war, a war of which we

are the only survivors.” A shadow of a smile crossed Glynis’ lips, she was more than a

little surprised to realize it was genuine.

“The bearded one made this for you. He presented it to you on your thirteenth birthday.

What was his name...?”

“Re...Reeso...” Armando’s response sounded as flat as an oath spoken by a man in a

coma. His initial shock at seeing Reeso’s gift in the Vampire’s hands had been consumed

by...surprise. How had she come by such intimate knowledge?

Glynis smiled. “Yes. Reeso. They spoke of him, his courage and will, he was a legend

throughout the Houses.”

The attack on Armando’s village had come during Glynis’ formative years. She had

heard the tale of the Sixth House sweeping down on a village of Ironbloods. It had been during

that first confrontation with the Ironbloods that the first Nosferatu had perished.

The majority of the Immortal clan had been consumed that day, during the freak blizzard,

but few survived the three day incubation to become Vampires.

Reeso had made sure of that.

“Legend has it that Reeso rose from the dead, two days before the transformation was

complete, and slaughtered his deceased kin. A display of determination not seen before or since.”

Glynis seemed to lose herself in history, circumventing the suffering that had been commonplace

during the final days of the Houses. It was the legends that enthralled her now, tales told by

wizened men in the drafty corridors of the palace.

“The Houses were disturbed by the deaths. We had known, through painful experience,

that salt and sunlight were lethal to our kind, so we avoided them. But Reeso and the others, they

used wood; The stakes, blades such as yours, and they knew where to strike. They knew it would

kill us.

“We learned through a handful of transformed Ironbloods that the Seers had warned the

village of our existence, that spirits had shown them in dreams where to strike us and what

weapons to employ.

“After Reeso’s deed was done, we were broken by the death of our kin, all of us felt their

passing...the searing of the wood...”


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Glynis clutched the cloth above her left breast, her eyes gleaming with the recollection of

sympathetic agony. Even across the ocean of time the pain of those first deaths haunted her. Her

reverie splintered when she sensed Armando rising. When she realized he was not attacking but

was enthralled with her tale, the pale woman continued.

“It was during this era of mourning that the Mongrels launched the first of many attempts

to gain their freedom. Filthy animals.” She sneered the last sentence with all the venom in her

soul.

“Even their blood was unsatisfying. All they were good for was labor...when we could

think of things for them to do.”

Glynis sensed a change in Armando’s demeanor. The pulse in the man’s bronze temples

pounded fit to burst.

“It was for their own benefit Soulmate.” Glynis said with a smile as soft as a block of

granite. “They were powerful, but too dim to use their gifts wisely. Left to their devices the

Mongrels would have walked a steady road to self-destruction. Their number had to be whittled

down to a minimum for their own safety.

“They were pitiful, aimless creatures before we found them. Perpetually caught in the

purgatory between beast and human. We gave them direction. A focus. Instead of...” Glynis

waved her hand distractedly in the air, “Instead of sitting in the mud playing games. We took

abilities that would have otherwise atrophied and harnessed them.”

“You made them slaves.”

The Peruvian’s accented voice was deep and angry, like the protest of bedrock during an

earthquake. The retelling of his people’s slaughter had met Armando’s ears and aroused nothing

more than a smoldering in his soul. But the Guardians...

Armando’s people had lived free. They had come and gone as they pleased, working to

better their community and enjoying the fruits of their labors. The children had laughed and

played, spending the exuberance of their youth in the sun.

The Guardians had had that stolen from them. What Armando knew of the Guardians, at

least the intimate details, came from Pastore. The shape-shifter had been born a slave of the

Nosferatu. Where Armando’s childhood had been filled with warm embraces and loving smiles,

John’s had consisted of countless mental floggings.

Even if the punishment had been physical, spiked leather on yielding flesh, John’s agony


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would not have run so deep.

And the Vampires had known this.

They knew of the Guardian’s accelerated healing and that their flesh wouldn’t hold the

memory of the thrashing long. Not to mention that an actual whipping would entail contact with

the curs.

A psychic lashing, though, could delve into a soul’s most cherished dream or darkest

nightmare. There were even instances when the Nosferatu had stolen entire segments of memory

from a slave’s mind, wiping away all recollection of the people, places and events the individuals

loved most, everything except the merest wisp of a memory so the slave would have knowledge

of what they had lost.

For many, this form of punishment was enough to keep them beaten down. Others were

so shattered by the violation that they killed themselves, which was a difficult feat in itself. The

only way a Guardian could die was if their blood was poisoned by silver. Ironically, it was the

distraught Guardians, and not their Masters, who had discovered this lethal allergy.

But not for the Vampire’s lack of trying. The Nosferatu searched for centuries to find a

method of exterminating the Mongrels. If their numbers grew too great, the shifters could present

a threat to the Vampires, therefore it was prudent to have an effective method of population

control.

Decades of experimentation provided nothing but frustration and mutations. Immolations.

Eviscerations. Impalement. The Guardians had suffered every form of execution, ranging from

mauling by wild animals to being pulverized by boulders.

And they always returned.

It would take anywhere from an hour to a month for the Mongrels to regenerate,

depending on the manner of their deaths. The Mongrels would return with their memories and

the physical characteristics they’d had before their extermination.

The Vampires knew anatomical castration would be pointless, so they attacked the

Mongrel’s mind. By gutting the mating instinct at the source, they hoped to quell the shape-

shifter population.

That was when the Vampires first sampled Guardian blood.

The effects of consuming Mongrel blood had gone untested due to the fact that the

Nosferatu wouldn’t lower themselves to feeding off the Lower ones. At that point in history, the


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Mongrel’s only purpose was to serve as labor, to herd food and, only in the direst circumstances,

they were an emergency food supply. A supply they had never been forced to tap. Therefore, the

content of the Mongrels’ blood was an unknown quantity.

Until a week after the mental castrations.

The Vampires had been so bloated by the apparent success of the Mongrel’s sterilization

that they failed to notice the increase in maulings among their game. At the same time the

population of the Mongrels tripled, their number growing so high it was close to impossible for

the

Nosferatu to control or house them.

Closer scrutiny revealed that the Mongrels had redirected the energies normally spent on

intercourse into killing. Armando recalled something Pastore had told him about those times.

“It was...It was like they cut the tenderness out of us. They just gutted the Light and didn’t

think a fuckin’ thing of it! Like they were pruning the leaves off a tree! They played Cut and

Paste without fuckin’ souls because it suited them!! And as a result they made us mindless

murderers!!

“All we did was kill. No thought. No purpose. Just...kill.”

Armando recalled how Pastore’s voice had cracked, how his eyes glimmered with pain,

guilt and shame. John had never let the tears flow though, he would never give the Nosferatu that

victory.

“All we ever saw was red. The...The...We all changed into...I wasn’t a wolf after they—“

Pastore’s throat had closed at that point. Armando had sat silently at his friend’s side for

an hour before Pastore was able to speak. His voice held the tone of someone who had been

victimized...but wasn’t truly convinced they had done all they could to keep from being violated.

“I was...All of us...(choke)...we were jackals. We were like ...them. We ripped and--and

killed...and we never THOUGHT! All we did was kill!”

John had continued to tell how the Vampires attempted mass incinerations in order to

prevent the Mongrels from overwhelming them. Several Vampires had been consumed by the

rogue Mongrels, pressing the Nosferatu into desperate action.

One benefit of the Mongrel’s consumption of the Vampires, was gaining the knowledge

that the Nosferatu’s blood was stronger than the shape-shifters. The creatures that had ingested

the Vampire blood ceased to be Mongrels. The Houses were relieved to have their lost number


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reinstated, even if it was by former Mongrels. The overpowering of the Mongrel blood also

proved beyond all doubt that the Nosferatu were superior. The plague of rogue Mongrels,

however, did not last long. The Mongrels that had been incinerated and risen from the ashes were

whole. Reborn as they had been before the Vampire’s tampering. John Pastore had been one of

those immolated.

With the threat of the rogues eliminated, the Vampires were still faced with one problem.

How could they kill the Mongrels?

Pastore was foggy on the specifics, but both races’ prayers were answered when a

Mongrel had a vision. This particular Shifter’s name had been forgotten by John, but the courage

in her soul hadn’t. Armando could tell that to John, the woman’s spirit was more important by

far.

The Guardian in question had been able to metamorphosis into a golden eagle. The

Vampires used this woman’s aerial skills to collect humans for their larders. Every day the

woman fought the Vampires and every time they beat her down. The conflict reached a point

where the Nosferatu became impatient, even though the Eagle was an efficient worker, she was

becoming a nuisance.

So they stole her mother from the Eagle’s mind.

It was a simple procedure. The Vampires were a constant presence in the minds of their

slaves, so they knew the minds of their prey as intimately as they knew their own.

The Vampires erased the Eagle’s mother without her feeling so much as a tickle. It was

weeks before the side- effects manifested. Even among the other Guardians, the Eagle was

despondent. Her people tried their best to help her through the ordeal, but they could do nothing

to relieve her sorrow. There was more than simple depression shackling the Eagle’s spirit, there

was confusion.

John told Armando how, after the Vampire’s tampering, the girl had always appeared to

be listening to some far off voice. Her face would turn bright red, her eyes would crunch into

slits with her concentration. But no matter how hard she tried, the voice always remained out of

reach, a whisper in a thunderstorm. The Eagle’s condition deteriorated to the point where she

wept constantly. She would neither sleep nor eat and, on being commanded by the Nosferatu,

would shift into her Eagle form and execute her assignment.

In her final days, the Eagle’s feathers had lost their golden glow and eventually molted


77

completely. What had once been a creature of majestic beauty, was nothing more than a pale,

denuded hunk of passionless meat. She was barely capable of flight.

Her salvation arrived in the night as she slept, during the only time when the Mongrels

were truly free, the Dream Time. The change in her demeanor was noticeable immediately. She

told her siblings of her dream and how it held the key to a final, peaceful release.

The Vampire Lords had gathered and crafted a multitude of precious metals and gems that

would soon become coveted by their lesser cousins, Humanity. Chief among the Vampire’s

favorites was silver, for the resemblance it bore to moonlight.

The Eagle’s plan was simple and effortlessly executed. In order to keep the Nosferatu off

her tail, she maintained her sickly pallor and sulky disposition, all the while shielding her

intention from the Overlords’ minds (an exercise that inspired other Mongrels, such as Pastore,

giving them an alternative to suicide), and started off on her daily hunt.

In general, the Nosferatu were a narcissistic breed. They were so convinced of their

superiority that they never allowed the thought of deception by a Mongrel to enter their minds.

This fault made the Eagle’s task simpler.

After being released from the corral, the Eagle flopped into the air, making sure to give

her watchers a convincing show. Her spirit seemed so completely crushed by the Vampire’s

machinations that they didn’t deem it necessary to enforce their mental commands.

The Eagle and a fistful of other hunters were released to find prey during the daylight

hours, when the Nosferatu were castle-bound. The majority of the Vampires slept during these

hours, but a few remained alert to supervise the daylight hunts and monitor the cabal of

Mongrels.

Because there were so few Vampires available to reinforce the psychic bindings, the

Eagle was able to defy her Masters and charge the castle. She only needed a heartbeat or two to

complete her task, fighting the Vampire’s influence with every beat of her wings.

The Nosferatu’s concentration was somewhat off balance by their surprise at the eagle’s

defiance and by the fact that they hadn’t seen the rebellion in her thoughts. By the time they

regained their bearings, it was too late.

The Eagle’s dream had shown her the brilliant instrument that would release her and all

the Guardians from the Hell their lives had become.

In the Dream the eagle had seen the black sky above her, with a full moon as its only


78

denizen. The orb slowly melted and reconfigured into the shape of a woman’s face, the pitch

surrounding the masque became her cloak. The Moon-faced woman opened her arms to the

Eagle, welcoming her lost and weary child into her warm embrace. The pale moon whispered the

word “silver” and the answer stampeded through the Eagle’s mind.

The Eagle kept the dream close to her heart, using it as a talisman of courage as she rifled

through the Vampire’s castle. After finally procuring a silver blade (whether the weapon had

been a dagger or a sword was unclear, Pastore had watched the Eagle’s demise from a distance)

she launched herself from the nearest window.

John had recounted the Eagle’s death with the awe and reverence of one who had

witnesses a divine spectacle.

The Eagle’s pale, molted body ascended toward the sun, each wing-beat sprouting a new,

golden plume. Soon, (or so John claimed) it became hard to tell which shone brighter, the

Golden Eagle or the Sun. With a final shriek of triumph, the Eagle clasped the silver in her talon

and thrust the blade through her heart.

John wept as he told the story of her death, as he had the day it’d occurred. The Guardian

had had no compunctions about shedding his tears then, because the Golden Eagle had freed

herself from the Vampire’s shackles. She had beaten the Nosferatu and kept her soul intact, even

though it had cost her her life.

John had told Armando the finale with a face as dreamy as a child recalling a particularly

festive Christmas. He smiled warmly when he recalled the Eagle’s falling feathers. Pastore hadn’t

been one of the fortunate few who caught one of the feathers, but the Eagle would stay in his

heart and mind forever.

That death, that ultimate act of defiance, had been the breeze announcing a storm. The

Vampires had seen the Eagle’s death as a solution to controlling the Mongrel population, but they

hadn’t counted on their slaves killing themselves en masse. Before long, the dungeons became

three deep with Mongrel corpses. What disturbed the Vampires wasn’t the curs murdering

themselves, but that they had no clue as to how the Mongrels were getting the silver.

Even more disturbing was that they never saw the suicides in the Mongrels’ minds.

Those Shifters not inclined to self-destruction mastered the art of shielding their thoughts

from their Masters, and communicating with one another the way they would in their animal

forms...Through body language. A gesture, a tick, a wink or squint--Volumes were contained in


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the smallest movements.

Pastore’s clan had been the first of the Guardian’s to master this subtle language. Those

who possessed the skill and were shuffled to other Houses, passing the talent on to the Guardians

enslaved within. Inside a decade all the Guardians had an inconspicuous, but effective,

communications system.

The talent of mashing their thoughts was mastered to the point where the avian Guardians

could leave their slave dens and venture to other Houses without the Nosferatu ever knowing. It

was through such subterfuge that the Guardians finally achieved their emancipation.

Their freedom was fleeting, but oh-so-sweet. The Guardians considered it better by far to

die free than live a slave.

Now, after all the decades of struggle and tears, John Pastore was the last of the

Guardians. He could have initiated more, but the thought of losing his people all over again was

a pain he couldn’t bear.

Armando’s thoughts cascaded through his consciousness at lightning speed.

Remembering all John and the Guardians had suffered at the Vampires hands made his blood

rage.

“You enslaved and slaughtered an entire race because you considered them inferior. Your

kind is reprehensible and I would sooner wager away my soul than lay a tender hand on you.”

“Oh, aren’t we soooo superior.” Glynis hissed, her sarcasm wore a masque of joviality,

but beneath it the Vampire seethed.

“You Ironbloods spend your lives isolated from the rest of your ‘lowers’, only descending

from your lofty perches when you recognize a threat to your precious hides. You didn’t take

arms against us because we offended your oh-so- noble sensibilities,”

Glynis stalked toward her guest with fire in her emerald eyes. Despite himself, Armando

felt fear squirming beneath his skin. He retreated a step, pressed back by the ire in the

Nosferatu’s face.

“You fought because you were afraid of us. You knew once we drained the Mongrels and

Humans, we would hunt you down as well!”

“That is a lie!” Armando’s voice contained none of the conviction he’d hoped for.

“Is it? I see the doubt in your mind.”

The gale outside whined and clawed at the heavy-duty windows. The rain had hardened


80

into hail, the assault sounded like pebbles on a coffin.

“You’re wondering whether you were God-appointed saviors of the down trodden, or

frightened little rodents attacking a lion. Of course, your little alliance with the Mongrels was

doomed to fail!”

Glynis lent power to her statement by snapping Armando’s blade in two. The petrified

flakes twirled and fluttered as they fell at Glynis’ feet. The Vampire’s heart fluttered at the

horrified gasp of her enemy.

“As doomed as a mouse against a leopard. We would have dominated this planet if it

hadn’t been...been for...”

“The Gods?” Armando asked, his disorientation and heartbreak fleeing at the falter in the

Nosferatu’s voice. Glynis glowered at the Peruvian, desiring nothing more than to tear the still

beating heart from his chest.

“The Firefall ended your reign once, what makes you think another disaster won’t befall

you and your new army? Perhaps this time they shall wash your taint off this planet once and for

all!”

The heat in Glynis’ eyes cooled from anger to measured confidence.

“Because, dear Ironblood—“

“Stop calling me that.”

“--I have learned things between then and now. I have seen the webs within the webs. I

know the strands that connect all life as intimately as I know the pulse in a newborn’s neck. The

Firefall came because we were sloppy and proud, we could not, or would not, see the grander

forces in motion.”

Glynis’ tirade brought her to the Tower’s wall of windows, outside hail and rain raced

each for the mangled pavement. She clasped the segments of Armando’s sword in her hands and

raised them to the tumultuous slate sky.

“Isn’t she beautiful? Mother Nature at her most primal. You were wondering about your

dream and the quakes and this storm. Perhaps if you were a little more observant, you would

have noticed that these two towers are the only structures standing. That this is the only facility

on the island with functioning electricity.”

Armando struggled to mask his confusion and surprise at having missed a clue so

obvious. He didn’t allow himself the luxury of rationalization, neither his stupor from waking


81

nor the shock of seeing his sword destroyed excused his lack of perception.

“The answer for it all is standing before you Ironblood, my future mate. I forged the

storm and the earthquakes, and I spared these towers to house my children. From here a new age

will be born.”

Armando ignored the crushing he felt in his chest at the sight of seeing his aged

companion reduced to wooden scales on the loft’s floor. The blade was not metal, so it could not

be retooled. Once shattered it was lost forever. The agonized churning intensified as the

realization dawned that the last vestige of his culture, of his race, lay shattered at his enemy’s

feet. Armando’s only link to his past was nothing but a chalky residue, now he was left with

nothing but memories.

Even those treasures were unreliable. Time had a way of draining the color from history,

like sun will bleach a neglected photograph. The sword had acted as a key to his life before the

blood and loneliness. Armando would smell the oiled and tooled wood and recall his village to

the minutest detail. If he had been an artist at least he could have rendered the faces of those he

cherished on canvas, retrieving those forgotten days with a glance at a portrait.

Armando was a warrior though, and channeling emotion through creation was a talent

beyond his means. His was a destiny of destruction. He kept alive the past by slaying his

ancestral foes. Now, however, even that was impossible.

The Esclava is manipulating you boy! Reeso hollered from far away. Slay her and the

others will be aimless, hunting them will be effortless. But do not let her distract you! The blade

was a means, not an end. You must never lose sight of that.

Reeso’s guttural voice buffered Armando’s blood with ice, lending him the strength to

stash his pain, at least for the time being, in the abyss.

Shedding his malaise cleared Armando’s mind as efficiently as a vacuum eats cobwebs,

he “heard” what Glynis was saying and remembered the vision that had beckoned him to New

York.

“The woman,” he said, the old, familiar coldness returning to his manner. He had hoped

the confidence in his demeanor and tone would shake up his adversary. To his disappointment,

she took his defiance in stride. Armando didn’t allow her steadfastness to distract him.

“How does the young woman fit into all of this?” The wind howled long and mournful,

temporarily drowning out the noise of the hail. Glynis’ grin widened, exposing bright ivory


82

fangs.

“Oh yes,” she sighed, the sound chilling Armando to the marrow. “The Fair Christian.

She, or more accurately her child, plays a large role in our future—“

“I will have nothing to do with the murder of innocents.

Thunder rocked the floor under Armando’s feet, the windows rattled in their reinforced

frames.

“I have no intentions of killing mother or child. Unless the girl resists of course, I will do

what I must to help my species ascend to the next evolutionary plateau and maintain its existence

Ironblood, and that includes killing a girl. For my kin I would go to any length. I thought you

would empathize with that.”

The glacial void at the center of Armando’s heart roared again, gnawing at his core and

diverting the Immortal’s attention for a heartbeat. The mention of his departed race made his

heart, which he had thought hardened against such simplistic manipulations, felt as if it were

being twisted by a pair of iron claws.

“You know she will resist.” He growled, desperate to conceal the wound Glynis had

scored across his spirit.

Glynis clasped the wooden sword’s halves together, the wood forming a bridge between

her hands.

“The girl might not be as ‘attached’ to her child as you would like to believe, Ironblood.

She’s only a babe herself, nowhere near prepared for the responsibility ahead of her.”

“Who are you to deign who is ready for what?!” Armando growled menacingly. “Your

kind knows nothing of children or what they need to survive!”

Armando’s baser instincts were bellowing at him to run from the Vampire. This urge to

fly caught the Immortal’s

full attention, never in his memory had his instincts chosen flight over a fight. He shut his

inner ears to the alarm his fear was raising; he needed to learn more about the Fair Christian

Glynis was hunting.

“Nosferatu cannot create. Your kind exists only to destroy. Your kind knows nothing of

the bond between parent and child! This woman is human and she will fight for her kin!”

Glynis concealed her aggravation with remarkable ease. Armando’s quip about the

Vampire’s inherent sterility had raised the hairs on her neck, tiny fissures snaked across the


83

halves of Armando’s sword.

“You seem to have forgotten several important facts during the time we’ve been apart,”

Glynis’ voice was smooth and measured, her wrath held marginally in check by the knowledge

that she needed the Ironblood.

“Thoughts are but one of the many domains I command. I can see the girl’s fear and

regret, by taking the babe away from her I will be...lifting, the world off her shoulders. If only

you could see the terror and confusion in her young mind, you would see that her seventeen years

haven’t been enough to prepare her for this burden—“

“Altruism has never been your forte’ Glynis,” Armando stunned himself with the use of

his foe’s proper name, but it did not make him falter. “She could be the fittest mother in the

cosmos, both in age and experience, and you would still seek her child. Why? What does this

woman mean to you?!”

“The future.” Glynis whispered. “Let me show you something.”

Glynis closed her eyes, the emerald orbs dancing wildly beneath their fleshy sheaths. It

was a few minutes before he realized he was admiring the pale glamour of the Vampire’s face.

His millennia old heart pounded that much faster as he lost himself in the woman’s flowing ebony

locks. Instead of fighting his fascination, Armando allowed it to sweep him away. He coasted

down the slopes of her neck and shoulders like a leaf on the surface of a stream. He found

himself wondering how her skin would taste, and licking his lips without realizing it. Concern

for the young human girl and her unborn child, for the fate of the cosmos as a whole in fact,

evaporated.

Armando had been celibate since the deaths of his fellow Immortals. He’d known the

moist pleasure of his mate’s body for a decade before her death, and he often found himself

hungering for the soft, warm brushing of her tongue on his chest and groin. No human woman

could arouse him in such a way. Even in the fever pitch of his lust, once he set eyes on a human

female his manhood withered.

With Glynis, this was not the case.

Despite a history of hatred and bloodshed, Armando was aflame not with anger but with

longing. As diametrically opposed as their respective species were, the Immortals had pledged to

protect the innocent while the Vampires sought to conquer them, he and Glynis were, in a very

broad sense, similar.


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They were both ancient beyond reckoning. They were remnants of an age when the soil

teemed with life, when the air was sweet enough to make you dizzy. To quote Pastore, they

“Knew the Grand Canyon when it was the Little Crevice.”

They also shared the burden of being the last of their kind, of being isolated among the

humans. Both were set adrift in time, longing for faces and days that were beyond their reach.

They watched the world that had spawned them rot like a piece of discarded meat, their own

pathetic cousins the source of the decay.

There were sights he and Glynis shared that no human could ever know. They were

tethered by time and loneliness. For the first time in countless ages, Armando tossed aside the

teachings of his mentor and stopped looking at the Vampire through eyes of hate.

Armando continued his visual tour of the soft rising and falling of Glynis’ flesh, until her

eyes sprung open sharply.

The world was suddenly dead silent, even the squall outside was muted by awe.

Armando’s breath hitched in his lungs when he saw the green gone from the Vampire’s eyes,

replaced by the roiling gray of the storm twisted skies.

Then the windows imploded.

Armando jumped at the crashing and sudden rush of arctic air. Standing in the face of the

gales, Glynis hair resembled a nest of angry adders. Armando wasn’t sure whether it was the

dramatic change in air pressure or the sight of Glynis’ wind-whipped dress and hair that took his

breath away.

The wind gathered the shattered glass, collecting the fragments into a cone of razor-edged

hail. The tsunami of crystal spun across the loft’s entire span, sucking up every last bit of glass.

“I’ve learned so many, many lessons Armando. I’ve discovered the links that bind myself

to every other life in the universe. With a flexing of my will I can scour the earth with a monsoon

or bring a city to its knees with an earthquake. I can extend my consciousness halfway across the

world, and perhaps infiltrate the sleeping mind of a very powerful lifeform.”

Glynis glanced over her left shoulder at the row of vacant window frames. The glass cone

ceased its circuit of the floor and, one by one, pieced the fragments together in their respective

frames. A finger of fire manifested a yard from Glynis, the four inch lick of blue flame dancing

gently in the air. The fire zipped and traced a course along the jigsaw panes, welding the

fragments into a flawless whole.


85

Armando had heard of, had even witnessed on occasion, minor telekinetic activity among

Vampires, but never anything on the scale of what Glynis had displayed. After the final broken

pane was repaired, the finger flickered and died, gone as quickly as it had appeared.

Words eluded Armando as Glynis trained her gaze on him.

“I can manipulate the Air, the Flame, the Sea and the Land. I have even modified the

dormancy period for the Nosferatu. Where it used to require three days for a new Vampire to

mature, now the change comes almost instantaneously. This will prevent any repetition of

Reeso’s valiant action. The shorter the incubation, the less time it gives for the Chosen one to

retaliate.

“Of course, only my children carry this new trait. You see, the change is much like a

mutation in a parent’s genes. The affects are absent in the parent but manifest in the individual’s

offspring.”

“How...on...Earth?” Everything Glynis said touched apocalyptic keys in Armando’s soul.

The segment of his spirit that had suffered the centuries in solitude and misery was

amazed and aroused by this woman. Had she truly accomplished all she claimed? If so, she had

brought herself, and her ancestors, to a higher plane of existence. Her accomplishments spoke for

the time she had spent apart from him.

What had he done?

He had no excuse for his stagnation, Glynis suffered the same isolation he did, the only

difference being that she had not let it cripple her. While he had wallowed in his pain, Glynis had

risen from its fires tempered and carved herself a stairway to the heavens.

“As I can manipulate without,” Glynis replied, “so I can within. But the changes won’t

manifest in myself, I suppose my genetic structure is fixed to a degree, either that or I haven’t

developed the wherewithal to mold it yet.”

Armondo listened to Glynis with (and may his ancestors have mercy on him) admiration.

This woman he had sworn to kill was schooled not only in the old arts, but had also been

dabbling in the realm of modern science.

“That is why half my children sleep while the others, whom I believe you have met, are

transformed. Those now conscious are the third generation, the children of my children. While

the sleeping are those I have personally dined upon, they carry the enhanced gene in their blood.

Their victims will be transformed within minutes.


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“Granted, none of them can manipulate the elements. They possess the telepathy and

rudimentary telekinesis inherent in all Nosferatu, but my mastery is beyond them.” She smiled,

sly and sweet.

“Some powers aren’t in the blood, but the soul.” Glynis shook her head and chuckled

softly.

“It seems I’ve gotten distracted, we were discussing the Fair Christian and her child. This

baby and yourself shall be the keys to a new age.”

“But...wh...How?” Armondo was so enthralled by the movement of the Vampire’s throat

and lips as she spoke, and the gentle caress of her voice in his ears, that any thoughts of aiding the

Fair Christian and her child was the furthest thing from his mind.

Glynis clasped the sword halves behind her back and started pacing, the masque of

concentration on her face reminiscent of a teacher lecturing an eager student.

“We know what happens when a Vampire bites an Ironblood; The Immortal’s blood is

corrupted and any of its characteristics are destroyed, replaced by those of the Nosferatu. I

assume the same would happen if an Immortal’s ichor were injected into a Vampire, our blood is

just too strong.”

Armando let the comment pass. Glynis had him too curious

(infatuated)

about her machinations too bother instigating another round in their never ending conflict.

“What is required for a perfect fusion of Immortal and

Vampire blood is a pure vessel.”

“The child,” Armando’s voice emerged as a horrified whisper.

Glynis smiled. The fact that the Ironblood’s mind was travelling the same avenues as her

own, was a pleasant discovery.

“Our blood, introduced independently into the young human’s bloodstream will carry with

it the dominant traits from both our peoples. Alone, your blood would be harmless to the child,

but with my blood to augment it, to encode it...A Vampire who could walk in the sun, and an

Ironblood who could shape-shift. Not only would those she fed on be blessed with these

attributes, but she would be able to conceive. To Create!! Think of it!”

Armando’s mouth dangled in disbelief. Even if he’d been aware of his abysmal lack of

emotional control, it was unlikely he would scold himself for the lapse.


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“What you propose...Is--Is monstrous...”

“Why!? What is so horrible about giving this newborn more power than she could ever

dream of? What is so wrong with giving her and her children, her real children, an opportunity

for immortality.”

“But-But she would be a victim...She would have no say in the matter...It infringes on—“

Glynis growled and slammed the broken sword into an exposed I-beam, further

splintering the weapon. This time, Armando did not notice.

“What does life as a Human offer her?! An existence of servitude! A slave to others’

whims! And what can her mother, who is little more than a child herself, offer that I cannot?!”

Armando tried to rebut, but his throat was sealed. Any words he might have found

dissolved as he watched Glynis’ features melt from rage to tenderness. And longing.

“She could be our child Armando. She can carry on for us, our people will no longer be

relegated to legend and campfire stories.”

Glynis turned from Armando a moment and drew a shuddering breath. The Immortal’s

voice was further lost in the gleam at the corner of the Vampire’s emerald eyes.

“Don’t you feel it? Don’t you feel the cold inside?” Glynis looked at the barren ceiling

above her, her eyes yearning to feel the sting of tears, but were denied the release. If Armando

had not witnessed the depth of sorrow on the Vampire’s face, he never would have believed it.

He’d always been taught that Vampire’s did not feel, that they neither laughed nor sobbed, their

only concern was their hunger.

Nothing in Armando’s experience had shown him otherwise. Through all the thousands

of Nosferatu he slaughtered, not once had seen one express sorrow or remorse.

Or had he?

Something stirred in his mind, something older than the mortar binding the pyramids.

The something posed a question to him, to the bedrock of his soul.

Had he seen fragments of himself in the Vampires but chose to look away? Had he turned

a blind eye to a weeping wife or husband because that would have given him common ground

with his enemy? Did he block out the aftermath of the slaughter, closing his ears to the wails

raised across the battlefield because that would have made the killing less palatable.

Armando found himself questioning his memories, trying desperately to fit together pieces

of what might have been and what actually was. Time had worn away a great deal of the puzzle’s


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pieces, their edges easier to marry to one another...Whether they were intended to fit or not.

Those distant recollections were something he could never confirm, but there was no

mistaking the pain and emptiness that lined Glynis’ face. Armondo saw something in the

Vampire's shimmering green eyes, in the suffering he saw on her face...

He saw a reflection.

Armando tried to speak, but was still mute. He had to content himself with standing idly

and waiting for his companion to speak. His wait was not long.

“Sometimes...” Glynis’ voice cut on the emotion in her throat.

Armando struggled to distance himself from the emotions Glynis was expressing, he

reminded himself that trickery and manipulation had always been tools of the Vampire. Despite

the warnings of distant voices, despite the history of death, Armando was slowly drowning in

Glynis’ pain...and sharing it.

“Sometimes...I...I can almost hear the wind at my core, I can feel it wearing me away

from the inside. Everywhere I look I see aliens...beings who could never see through my eyes, or

know what I have known...” Glynis stared at the petrified wood in her hands, her voice soft.

“No one to share with.” She looked at Armando and smiled sadly. “There are times I can

barely remember what the members of my House looked like. Even--Even Aldrew escapes me,

though I’ve never loved anyone as strongly, before or since. Then...”

Glynis paused and coughed before continuing, the glaze in her eyes straining to break

free, but restrained by unyielding flesh.

“There are times when I can see them so clearly...” Glynis opened her right hand and

raised it to the level of her chest, spread her fingers and reached out to the air, as if trying to touch

a loved one through a glass partition.

“...as if I’d seen them only yesterday.

“We’re alone Armando Moreno, except for each other. Each of us is the last of our breed,

the legacy of our forebears. Tell me Immortal, doesn’t your heart crack when you see human

couples strolling arm in arm down the street, the love in their eyes almost warm enough to feel?”

Glynis took short, soft strides towards Armando, her eyes locking his in a mournful

embrace.

“Don’t you feel your soul writhe and twist when you realize anyone you might have loved

is gone and there will never be another like them?”


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“Yes.” Armando whispered reluctantly.

Glynis had summed up every ounce of misery and longing he had experienced for the past

millennia. For the first time in his existence he didn’t see the woman before him as an enemy to

be slaughtered...but as a kindred spirit.

A soul in as much need as his own. He saw salvation and an end to the emptiness.

“We were destined to be together Armando, that is why, of all our kin, we alone survive.”

“But the Humans...The child...”

Glynis rushed to the Peruvian and clutched his shoulders in her hands, the broken wooden

blade grinding into his resilient flesh.

“They will be given an opportunity to create their own Heaven on Earth. There will be no

more war or disease, no hunger—“

“Wrong. With Vampire there is always hunger.” Glynis removed her hands and retreated

a pace, dropping her eyes to the floor.

“Nothing is perfect. Yes, our progeny will need to feed, but on the animals, just as the

Humans do now—“

“And what of overpopulation?” Armando found himself regretting the flaws in Glynis’

design. In the end, he realized, their relationship must ever be adversarial.

“With no one succumbing from age or illness, or any other natural cause of death, the

planet will be packed shoulder to shoulder. The food will be exhausted in no time and our...your

children, will turn on one another, like too many rats locked in a cage.”

Armando shook his head dismally. He had wanted Glynis’ words to be true, he’d wanted

more than anything to believe there was a way his people could live on.

“And it is not merely the academics of the situation that would make your dream

impossible.” Armando’s words sounded coarse and hollow in his ears, as if they were being

spoken by a mouth other than his own.

“I...I cannot betray the will of my kin. What you propose is against everything they

cherished—“

“For the love of your soul Immortal!! Can’t you for once decide something for

yourself!!” Glynis screamed, rending the air with the broken blade. “All your life you have

followed what Reeso’s decided for you. It’s been centuries since his death and you continue to

follow his words as blindly as an idle-struck child! I was taught similar lessons, Ironblood, but I


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have broken their hold!

“I can see the reluctant admiration in your mind Armando, at how I have improved myself

while you’ve remained static. Your sorrow and hatred can only take you so far Armando, if you

let it, the past will dangle around your neck like an iron plate.

“Don’t let the depths swallow you,” Glynis held Armando’s blade out in a gesture of

offering. “This weapon represents our history. The war we fought and lost, the faces we loved

and will never see again.”

Armando’s eyes bulged at the realization of what Glynis had in mind, but it came too late

to stop her. With a gentle rippling of her pale arms, the sword was snapped into quarters.

Rather than breaking the blade into smaller and smaller pieces, Glynis tossed the flaking

wood into the air where a bolt of rogue lightning incinerated it.

Armando watched the ebony snow drift from the ceiling, unable to believe that an

heirloom millennia old, a weapon he had slept beside and maintained as dutifully as he looked

after his own body, had been destroyed in the blink of an eye.

“We can be the foundation of a new world Armando, we can teach our children the

lessons they’ll need to make their world perfect. The last of our history is dead, Immortal, Tabla

Rasa. No longer shackled by what was, we can be the authors of what will be! Don’t you see?!

We never have to be alone again. Imagine it!”

Glynis strolled beneath the shower of ash. Armando felt no anger at the immolation of

Reeso’s final gift (as much as it shamed him), instead, he felt relieved. It was as if the burden of

the years had been bled out of him. There was no more Grand Crusade to pursue, no more

Houses to be destroyed...only himself and Glynis. Two survivors lost in time.

Glynis rested a hand on Armando’s chest, the gentle contact igniting a fire in his flesh and

marrow.

“We can be parents Armando, we can learn from others’ mistakes and build a utopia from

their bones. Join me, the only vestige of yesterday, the only obstacle in our path, is in you, my

mate. It is as simple as surrendering a kite to the wind, once you do that both of us will be free.”

Armando’s mouth worked soundlessly, bewilderment and...and...

(love?)

were a cork in his throat. The slate of his mind had been scoured clean by this

confrontation with the Vampire.


91

Standing scant inches from the woman he had dedicated centuries to killing, the Immortal

saw the changes in her. Armando no longer saw the spoiled megalomaniacal child she had been.

The haughty posturing he had witnessed in the Vampire on countless occasions in the past, had

been replaced by a deep-seated sullenness. The decades of isolation had worn down the razor

edges of Glynis’ soul. Armando felt himself falling into her eyes, he felt the tundra in him start to

thaw.

And he didn’t want it to end.

Unfortunately, the past was a stubborn master. “I cannot abide the manipulation of

innocents.” Armando gently pushed Glynis back, his spirit wailing at the loss of her warmth.

“This child and her mother, it would be wrong to...There are others...I-I could not allow

them to be used. I could not allow that.”

Armando expected the Nosferatu to hiss and attack, to attempt to tear the beating heart

from his chest. Instead, Glynis smiled and cocked her head to one side.

“Have you become so familiar with the void in your heart that you can abide it until some

lucky accident frees you from your not-so-mortal coil?

“As difficult as this may be for you to believe, I can understand your reluctance. I was

less then pleased when the wind told me you were my fate.” Glynis turned and took long, slow

strides to the window. The weather had deteriorated from rain to hail, the pounding of ice on

glass was like wild horses on sheet metal.

“And yet the longer I meditated on it, the more sense it made. Then, I had this dream, a

vision that revealed the beauty of our mutual fate. Heed my words Immortal, no matter how

fiercely you deny it, you will see this is the way it was meant to be.”

Glynis’ talk of dreams and visions stimulated Armando’s mind, bringing his nightmare

into sharp relief. Where earlier it had remained a collection of vague images and emotions, the

portrait of the young woman with her abdomen torn open by Glynis imposed itself brutally. He

gaped at Glynis, horrified.

“You...You mean to butcher her...”

Glynis glanced at Armondo bemusedly, until she caught a thought-flash. She smiled and

sighed.

“No, I am not going to rip open the youngster’s belly open Ironblood. That would kill our

child as well as the woman—“


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“Not our—“ Armando managed weakly before the Vampire continued.

“The Fair one is due to give birth within the next day or two, and quite naturally I assure

you.

“I can understand how you were misled, though, your kind are unfamiliar with the

language of dreams. The key to visions is imagery. I seek to take the young woman’s baby and

that is how your mind interpreted it. A rather gruesome portrayal I grant you, but, in the end, an

accurate one.

“Once the child is here you will bring her to me, and together—“

“I. Will. Not. This has gone far enough Vampire. I concede that your...desires, touch me

in a way, but no matter how long and solitary my existence may be, I could never participate in

the corruption of an innocent. Especially a child.”

Glynis’ emerald eyes flashed in the muted light. Armando’s refusal had been met, once

more, by a kind and radiant smile. The Immortal was caught off guard by the sweetness in her

eyes, this drastic change in temperament threw him off balance.

Armando wasn’t the only one startled by the Vampire’s patience.

No more than fifteen minutes earlier, Glynis had fought the urge to drain the ichor from

the Immortal’s veins. She was noticing, though, that the longer the two spoke, the more her

hunger and hatred sobered.

The most dramatic change had come when she spoke of her long years of isolation. It had

been a ruse of course, designed to endear the Immortal to her. A Vampire was above anything as

pathetic as loneliness. Glynis had seen the void in Armando’s soul and concluded that the only

way soften his resistance was to act as if she was just as vulnerable.

Either her performance had been above par or Armando was more pliable than Glynis had

suspected.

She would have to proceed with utmost caution from here on. Glynis had taken great

pains to learn from her family’s mistakes. Strong arm tactics had been the downfall of the

Nosferatu Houses, they had been too proud and had made too many enemies.

During her retreat, Glynis learned the value of subtlety. Rather than running at her foe

with her arms flailing and voice raised, she would silently, gently, insinuate herself into his mind.

She would use his fears and hopes as her weapons, she would twist his psyche ever-so-slightly,

and continue manipulating it until the Immortal was hers. And he would never realize the change


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had occurred.

“When you see the baby, Armando; when you look into that newborn’s bright little eyes,”

Glynis folded her arms in a cradle, staring into the empty space with a gentle smile. She didn’t

notice how her body rocked ever-so- slightly or how her eyes had grown misty, she did, for an

instant, see a child’s face in her arms.

Armando was moved by the display, there was a tenderness in Glynis that he had never

witnessed in a Nosferatu. The Immortal felt the core of his soul tremble. The sight that met his

eyes contradicted everything he had ever seen or been taught about the Vampires. Could Glynis

have matured so much in so little time? Could what she said about a new, brighter future be true?

That he would never be alone again? That he...that he could be a father.

Armando was too enraptured by the promise of his dreams finally coming true to notice

Glynis snapping out of her trance. The masque of surprise on the Vampire’s face would have

sown a seed of suspicion in Armando’s mind. A seed that might have prevented a great tragedy if

had been allowed to grow.

As it was, Glynis managed to recover before Armando regained his senses. It frightened

the Vampire Queen that she had become so entrenched in her performance that she’d been

consumed by it, like tissue paper swallowed by flame.

It was true that she desired the Fair Christian’s off-spring for her own, but only as a means

to an end, namely conquest of the sphere. Not out of some sniveling sentiment or misbegotten

need to nurture.

Glynis repeated that to herself until she almost believed it.

The Vampire released an inaudible sigh when she saw Armando was wrapped up in his

own fantasies of parenthood. Never one to let an opportunity pass, the Vampire seized on her

opponent’s weakness.

“When you cradle the future inches from your face...Then you can decide whether we

would be the babe’s damnation, or her salvation.”

Armando railed against the voice in his skull whispering that Glynis was the same Esclava

that had slaughtered millions of innocents. What had her motives been then, eh? Had she had

her victims’ best interest in mind then? Where was this wondrous altruism when she cut short the

lives of thousands of babies, just like the one she wanted him to kidnap?

If it was simply a matter of her thirsting for infant’s blood, Armando argued with the


94

voice, Why would she go to all this trouble? Surely she had killed ten score children when she

overthrew Manhattan, why would she target this one child?

The variables do not add up.

“I am pursuing this particular child because she is the one I saw in my dreams.”

Armando was rapt by her words, oblivious to the fact that he hadn’t voiced his curiosity.

“’The Giver will be born to a Fair Christian’, the Wind and Earth chanted while I

slumbered. Over a century I have walked this world, fine tuning my skills, absorbing every

lesson the Cosmos has to offer.”

The Vampire’s face ignited with a child’s glee, her jade eyes widening.

“Until February of this year.

“The glow of that moment will stay with me as long as I draw breath. By that time I had

built myself a small, elite army--a few of whom you met on the Bridge--and we were mulling

about in some village in the Yukon. It was small. Cold. Isolated. It was perfect...Then the vision

came...”

Glynis’ eyes glazed over, like those of a devout Catholic recounting a visitation by the

Virgin Mary.

“I dreamt of a turbulent, gray sky, the only light to be seen came from the lighting hop-

scotching across the firmament. Without warning the heavens opened, revealing a starry

midnight canvas. A bright violet nebula blossomed amidst the flickering stars and I knew she was

here. The one I had sought after for so long was finally within reach. I was so dazzled by the

astral splendor that I almost missed these Twin Towers standing sentinel on the horizon. That is

how I knew where the Giver, as the winds Christened her, was to be born.” Glynis opened her

arms and surveyed her aerie.

“I saw these Towers and knew my fate was here, in the Empire State. A fitting place for a

new empire to begin, wouldn’t you agree? I arrived ahead of DeSilva and my brood, my

anticipation gaining the upper hand over caution and patience. I flew here from Canada in a day,

my new tribe was far too green to travel so far so fast. The attempt would have left them too

exhausted to be of any use, and for my designs I needed them alert and functional. As I said, I

came alone and cast about the City and the borough of Brooklyn with no success.

“It was my ally the wind who steered me to a small neighborhood in Queens, another

fitting irony.” She said with a smirk.


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“As soon as I set eyes on the young woman, and the child which was not yet showing in

her belly, I knew. I couldn’t take my eyes off the benefactor of our kingdom, I followed her from

above, trailing her from her school to her home.

“A week later, after DeSilva and my soldiers finally arrived, we gradually added the

unwanted and unwatched to our fold. Always take refuge in the shadows, waiting...Until now.

That is why I summoned you and that Mongrel Pastore. The time for all our destinies is at hand.”

Something in Glynis’ filibuster struck a discordant note in Armando. He was still so

shaken by the changes he saw in the Vampire that it took him a second to fathom the anomaly.

“Why did you summon John? I would think you would want him as far away as possible,

I am surprised you thought of him at all considering your low regard for his kind.” Armando

sought to edge his words with broken glass, seeking to slash the Vampire to the bone. The

shards, as well as the counsel of Reeso’s wizened voice, seemed to have been annihilated along

with his bokan.

Glynis winced at the inquiry, despite the lack of steel in the Immortal’s voice.

“I must confess, that part of the plan was mine alone. I wanted the Mongrel here—“

“His name,” Armando said, “is John.”

“I. Know. His. Name.”

It was plain to Armando that after all her growth, Glynis hadn’t seen fit to release one cast

off from the past.

“I made it my business to know his name after he murdered my heart.” Glynis wouldn’t

permit her voice to crack, or even quaver, at the thought of her beloved’s bones being ripped

from his flesh. She heard his screams as clearly in 1993 as she had in 1393. The stench of her

lover’s flesh crisping under the assault of the rising sun soiled her nostrils.

The rational segments of her mind warned her not to lose her composure altogether. The

Ironblood was practically on the skillet, if she faltered now, she would have to redouble her

efforts during their next encounter.

“I brought him here,” Glynis growled, disregarding the warning to tread softly. “So I can

finally put an end to his kind.”

Glynis saw the fire return to her enemy’s eyes and conceded that she had foolishly

allowed precious ground to be lost. Not that it mattered. If what she wanted wasn’t given, it

would be taken.


96

“You almost had me,” Armando whispered, his tone like a soft arctic breeze. A

humorless smile cracked his features.

“I must admit you almost had me convinced that you had changed. That rocking motion

in particular was a masterful touch, but in the end your mask has fallen.

“You speak of a Utopian future with equality for all, and yet you plot the murder of my

friend and refer to him by a petty, ignorant slur—“

“I don’t want to kill him because of what he is—“ Glynis snarled, enunciating every word

brutally. “--But because of what he has done. He slaughtered the man I pledged my heart to,

would you easily forgive such an offense?!”

Glynis’ attempt to distract Armando from thoughts of his comrade, failed. The Immortal

had regained his ancient resolve and would cling to it.

“You have destroyed my blade, so it appears I am forced to slay you by hand.”

Armando was in the air before the last word left his throat. Armando’s rigid fingers

sought to expend this energy on Vampire flesh.

The Immortal never reached his prey.

A gale rose before Glynis and held Armando in its grip. A man-sized tornado imprisoned

the Immortal two feet from his nemesis. In his race to destroy the Vampire he hadn’t taken her

new abilities into consideration. A fatal error to put it mildly.

Armando’s stared unwavering into his captor’s eyes, steeling himself for the killing

stroke. His wait, however, was in vain.

Glynis’ expression had not altered in the slightest. If it took any effort to conjure and

control the whirlwind, the Vampire didn’t show it. On the contrary, she looked elated.

“It will take time for you to adjust to the idea of us as a couple. And to extinguish the

Mongrel Pastore, but trust me, you will accept it.”

Above the cacophony of the wind in his ears Armando heard the elevator door open

behind him. Two sets of footfalls, faint but distinguishable, crossed the room.

“You have no choice Armondo. Either you join me and the Giver, or they will all die.”

Ice entered Glynis’ voice, as it filled the air suspending the Immortal. Even through his

resilient flesh, the wind bit into him. What cut him deeper was the threat against the innocents.

“I not only promise you that you will bring me the baby, but that you will want to—“

“Nev--Nev—“ The air was growing too cold and thin to breathe adequately, let alone


97

draw enough to form words. It was an effort to remain conscious.

“Yes. You will.” Glynis nodded. “Not simply because the innocent blood on your hands

would be too much for you to bear, but because every defense you’ve ever erected against your

loneliness; Every brick in your spiritual fortress has been torn asunder.”

Whether it was the thinning air or Glynis’ declaration, Armando experienced a lightness

in his head that spread from his cranium to his toes. At the center of it all, his spirit writhed and

spit, riled by the concept of being defenseless.

“Your determination may be considerable, but when you see the girl great with child;

When you see the Giver in all her newborn glory, those walls will crumble like so much dust.”

Armando’s vision started caving in at the edges, the shadows along the border growing

fatter by the second. Glynis’ visage became blurred and riddled with gray spots.

“I will see you in the Great Field of the Park, dear one. Now, it is time for you to sleep.”

Glynis pulled the air from Armando’s lungs, hurling him into oblivion. When she was

sure he was pliant, Glynis dispelled the tiny twister and motioned DeSilva and Hoover forward.

Hoover, a short man standing about five-five and weighing a hefty two-hundred and

seventy pounds, shuffled to Armando’s prone body, hoisted him up and tucked him under his

right arm. Before the Change, the exertion of lifting the body even a quarter of the way off the

floor would have given Patrick Hoover a mild coronary. Now, Patrick hefted the man as easily as

he would a field mouse.

“Deliver him to his friends, there is no need to be gentle.” Glynis turned her back to the

men, preferring to feast on the turbulent vista outside.

The conquered city was steadily being buried in white. The tranquility of the fallen

metropolis soothed the anxiety Glynis had experienced during her seduction of Armando. Her

loss of control made her uneasy.

The moment had been brief, she reminded herself. Perhaps the lapse was a result of her

being swept up in her performance and not the result of an actual longing.

In the window’s reflection, Glynis watched Armando’s body bob three feet off the ground

toward the waiting elevator, his escort nowhere to be seen. Glynis couldn’t help but wonder if

the New Breed would have a reflection, she thought it might be interesting to see oneself once in

a while.

Pat Hoover froze at the elevator’s mouth and wrestled with something in his throat.


98

“Um, my Lady, wh...Where are his friends.” The man’s voice was shrill and trembling

with fear. Sweat had broken out across his body as panic rocked his bones. He hated to look the

fool in front of DeSilva and his Mistress, but he wasn’t as adept at mind reading as his fellows

and had difficulty perceiving other’s desires.

Instead of the exasperated sigh he had heard from so many of his old human friends and

teachers, the Lady patiently replied with a warm smile.

“They should be...” The Mistress paused briefly, her eyes searching the air for an answer.

Her face brightened when it was finally found.

“At Forty-seventh aaaannnnd...Lexington. You should have no difficulty spotting them

from the sky.” Glynis face wrinkled with concern. “Are you sure you are up to the task? It is

quite a way.”

The affection in his Mistress’ voice made Pat’s heart leap, he felt as if lightning charged

his blood.

“Nononono. No problem at all. None. I’ll get him there.” Pat was so giddy with his

Lady’s good graces that he almost walked nose-first into the wall beside the elevator.

With a grin akin to a puppy carrying an old sock, Pat sauntered into the lift and began

metamorphing into a bat. His rapidly altering face still bore its boyish grin.

Once Pat was out of earshot, DeSilva issued a growl of disgust.

“I don’t understand why you keep him, he’s not worth—“

DeSilva’s jaw shut with a snap when he saw the steel in his Lady’s eyes. He knew if he

uttered another word, his head would bounce twice before his body struck the ground.

“It is not your place to question my decisions.” Glynis’ voice was harsher than gravel in a

coffee can.

“Patrick is a loyal child, I would never regret the creation of one of my children. Unless,

of course, they defy me.”

The sweat that spontaneously sheathed DeSilva’s naked body was flash frozen.

“I-I-I would never presume to-to—“

“Are they prepared?” The pale woman asked, her interest in DeSilva’s insubordination

dissolving after she made her position clear.

DeSilva’s heart resumed its sluggish rhythm, the Assault Team was his pride and joy.

Even the threat of death and lengthy dismemberment couldn’t dilute his passion for them.


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“They wait for your command, Mistress. Do you...What I mean is...Could—“

“A day, Hans. Perhaps more, perhaps less. A birth is a difficult thing to predict. But rest

assured I will know the moment the Giver arrives. You had better be ready for when that moment

comes. The mother will be the most vulnerable after the delivery, she won’t be a threat.”

DeSilva’s face melted into a jigsaw of confusion. “A threat? This is a young human,

‘bout so high?”

DeSilva held his hand at the level of his ear, the height he estimated the Fair Christian to

be.

Rather than being angered, Glynis was tickled by DeSilva’s expression.

“I forgot you’re from a later era.

“Long ago, a human, much like the animals, would fight to the death for their young. And

the females were the most dangerous of the lot. One such woman almost killed me long and long

ago.”

Glynis’ features softened with the recollection. True, those had been very dangerous

days, but that was what had made them so exhilarating! There had been Believers then, you

could read the fear of God in their eyes when the sun descended. Their crude talismans had been

carved with more reverence than any modern cruciform.

The Nosferatu had been loathed by most and envied by the few. The Houses had

represented Power. The Humans had known that then, and respected it. They had been more

feral then, they had been more dangerous to hunt, which, as a result, made the prey’s blood that

much sweeter.

Today, though, on the cusp of the second calendar millennium, the Human race was a

pitiful collection of slovenly, ill-mannered children.

There was no threat. No thrill.

No passion.

Even their blood had lost its tang. It was a mercy to Change them, the hot blood of the

Vampire would do the Humans good.

The animals, even the wild ones, were little better. Those the Humans couldn’t tame, they

slaughtered, with the exception of a hearty few.

All of that would change soon. It would be like it was.

No, she amended. Better.


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Glynis knew that once the New Blood were born, they would multiply quickly. But they

couldn’t consume every living being overnight, there would naturally be survivors. These

individuals would become warriors who would draw strength and purpose from their pain and

loss. They would grow cunning and swift.

They would be Animal again.

There would be those like the Scot woman.

A smirk tugged at Glynis mouth remembering the bite of the woman’s blade severing her

arm. The Vampire could still conjure the screaming of her ribs as the steel shattered them.

Before her immolation at the hands of Moreno and Pastore, that had been the closest Glynis had

come to dying.

And it had thrilled her.

The Mongrel Pastore had been present at that earlier occasion as well, that had been the

day she had learned his name. At that time, battling the fire-haired woman, the Mongrel’s name

hadn’t been important. Four days later, with the murder of Aldrew, it was seared into her soul.

The agony she often experienced while reminiscing did not, for once, rear its head.

Glynis’ focus was not on Aldrew’s gruesome demise, but on the red-haired woman with the

strong arms and ferocious blood.

Glynis had been untested in actual combat back then. Before the Firefall there had been

no real need for the Vampires to scavenge, but her natural strength and agility far surpassed even

the stoutest Human. That one woman, though...

Glynis had always regretted never learning the woman’s name. The moniker of a worthy

adversary was as much a trophy and token of honor as a skull, it was a source of pride. Lacking

even this small prize, Glynis held the woman’s memory as gently and reverently as a child would

a baby rabbit.

“In the Scottish Highlands,” She said suddenly, startling DeSilva. “After the Firefall,

Aldrew, the sisters of the Baobhan Sith and I attacked this village. We separated and, much to

my good fortune, I found a household filled with the sweetest, brightest child-blood you could

imagine.

“Only one woman stood between me and my banquet. I barely acknowledged her

presence, the mouth-watering aroma of the children’s blood had driven the caution and sense out

of my head. I charged her, intending to shove her aside and consume her brood.”


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Glynis smiled, shaking her head slowly.

“Have you ever seen a Lochaber Axe, DeSilva?” DeSilva shook his head with a befuddled

look on his face. Glynis chuckled, she was beginning to feel her age. “It’s a wicked looking

blade about two feet long and braced on a hardwood shaft. This is what the Scotswoman

wielded, a particularly nasty one forged out of Demascus steel—“

“What?” There were times during their association when DeSilva felt inadequate in the

face of his Lady’s vast experience. He had never felt more so than now. He believed some of his

discomfort might be due to the presence of the Immortal in the Lady’s plans. How could DeSilva

ever measure up to the Ironblood’s wealth of knowledge? “Let me just say that Demascus

steel burns twenty times hotter than a stainless or carbon steel cut. It was such a metal that the

Scot’s blade was forged of, the Lochaber severed my arm before I could blink.

“If I hadn’t moved as I swiftly as I had, the woman would have taken my head as well. I

retreated from the hovel to summon aid from the others.

“I’d thought the woman would remain in the house, crippled by fear, her momentary flush

of courage spent, but she followed me into the street, slashing at my legs and midsection.”

Glynis paused for a moment, gooseflesh rippling the canvas of his skin.

“It wasn’t even the sound of the steel slicing the air, the bite of it on my flesh or its

searing touch.

“It was the woman I was afraid of.”

DeSilva’s heart skipped a beat. This was the first time his Lady had confessed to anything

as base as fear. Especially fear of a Human...He realized the Ironblood held keys to the

innumerable doors in his Mistress, portals DeSilva himself could never think to approach.

“It was in her eyes.” Glynis whispered, her voice distant and gravelly, as if a part of her

was reluctant to revisit this particular place and time. Especially in front of DeSilva.

“At the same time they were brimming with fire and ice. I was stunned that this Human

would actually attack me. I wasn’t so far gone that I didn’t see her willingness to die to protect

her babes.

“I have never seen such primal rage before, at least not in a Human. Many villagers by

that time had lost the Animal in them and would offer up their off-spring as long as we spared

them.

“This Scot though...after she cut me a second time, across my stomach, I saw the Mongrel


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Pastore from the corner of my eye. My mind and reflexes had been so disrupted by the bite of the

steel, that he and the woman would have slaughtered me if my sisters and Aldrew hadn’t

interceded.”

Glynis was silent for a time, her face concealed by a caul of shadow.

“Even after I feasted on her blood...after I cut off her head...I was still afraid. I saw her in

my dreams, swinging at me, snarling...It was always her eyes that frightened me the most. Those

bright, angry eyes...

“I could never comprehend why she would throw her life away for those brats. I mean,

she could always have more, what was so special about these children? She only had one life,

she could have more brats.

“I never understood.”

Glynis’ face was suddenly animated. She realized how deeply she had opened her soul

and that she had done it in the company of another. It was never wise to reveal vulnerabilities to

an underling.

“Her breed is dead now.” The frost had returned to her voice. “This girl will not be a

problem. Weak or hearty.”

Glynis recovered from her loss of composure, but was nonetheless rattled. That made it

twice in one hour she had allowed herself to slip. She refused to contribute this loss of self-

discipline on her confrontation with the Immortal. It was simple fatigue, she hadn’t eaten in

twelve hours and it was taking its toll.

It was as simple as that. Hunger, nothing more.

“Bring me one of the Humans, I’m hungry.”

She peered out at the city, hoping the gesture would convey to DeSilva that he was

dismissed.

The man didn’t move.

A cold burn blossomed in Glynis stomach.

DeSilva had seen the flaw in her, a measure of respect had been lost.

This did not please Glynis.

The elder Vampire lashed out with her left hand, the fingers curling into talons as they cut

the air, and tore the jaw from DeSilva’s skull.

The man shrieked as much from surprise as he did pain. Dark, syrupy ichor jetted from


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ruptured blood vessels. Ragged flaps of skin wagged where DeSilva’s tongue and cheeks had

been. Scream after scream peeled from his ruined face, blood drenched hair undulated as his

throat worked. The Vampire’s eyes were pinched tight with agony as his eyes attempted to cry.

“When I tell you to move, YOU MOVE! If you ever hesitate again I will take your

head!!” Glynis bore down on the man and seized him by the scruff of his neck. In her left hand

DeSilva’s bearded mandible seeped and twitched.

“Get out of my sight.” The words struck DeSilva’s ears like slabs of granite. “And don’t

return without my meal.”

DeSilva skulked to the elevator, his skin waxen in the lift’s harsh, white light. The

Nosferatu slipped twice in his own blood before reaching the lift’s womb. He did not meet his

Lady’s eyes.

Glynis regarded the clump of meat and bone in her hand and summoned a fire to consume

it.

She didn’t like this. DeSilva’s punishment should have been more subtle, or at the least

tailor made for his particular weaknesses. If she had flayed his genitals, his most

treasured possessions, the organ that shaped the meaning of his existence, it would have

left a deeper and more intense impression on the man.

But she had lost control. Again.

She had lashed out like a stinking Mongrel and had wasted an opportunity to reassert her

dominance. She felt her perplexity and loathed it. The Nosferatu had been manipulators from the

hour of their birth, always masters of their domain.

In order to be a master at the Game your mind had to be uncluttered, every move planned

to the point of perfection, every piece in its place. To be a master manipulator your mouth had to

rattle off lies while your eyes and voice were humble and sincere. But the most important rule of

the Game was knowing where you fit in. You never! Ever!! Believe your own lies. You remain

on the outside, not thinking about what you say or do, or concern yourself with the object of your

machinations. The only thought on your mind has to be your objective. Your desire.

Glynis felt that objectivity crumbling away.

She looked at the ashes of Arman...the Ironblood’s sword and wondered if what she had

said was true. Was the past finally dead and gone? Was that bokan, the sole relic of an ancient

era, the final rope tethering them to what had been? Was she free? Was she finally--


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A sliver of gold lighted on Glynis’ forearm, the shock of the sunlight razing her skin

snapped her out of her stupor.

She drew her wounded arm close and stepped out of the sunbeam’s path. Her horror stole

the scream from her throat, permitting a dry croak in its stead.

The sunlight sparkled through the droplets on the Tower’s windows, casting a multitude

of rainbows on the ash-strewn carpet. Glynis’ face snapped toward the sky and saw a pinhole in

the gray, sky-borne shawl. She relaxed and let her essence mingle with the air. She felt her Ka

reach the hole in the heavens and seal it.

She’d done it again.

After so many centuries of deception, could the lies be using the liar?

Glynis determined that her confusion had to be crushed. She steeled herself, permitting

nothing but thoughts of the child into her mind.

The Giver was her objective. No matter the labors, the babe would be hers.

Glynis’ unease was somewhat soothed when she heard the hum of the elevator rising from

the basement, where the few remaining humans had been herded. Glynis felt her mouth grow

slick with viscous, bright yellow spittle.

It was time to eat.


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CHAPTER FIVE

While Glynis was scraping Armando’s spiritual scars open, Murrell, Pastore and Jesse

Morsello were walking South on Lexington Avenue.

If the journey downtown was any indication of how their luck was running, they were in

very deep trouble. And the landscape wasn’t doing much to raise their spirits. Every street and

structure had been marred by the earthquake. The handful of buildings not beaten into the ground

were a stiff wind away from collapse. Concrete groaned and swayed on tortured steel, the eerie

chorus making Pastore uneasy. If they were in the wrong place when a stray wind kicked up,

they’d be flattened before getting a chance to see the world die. Pastore, of course, would survive

being crushed by a concrete avalanche, but he would be trapped in the rubble for Christ-knows-

how-long. There would be no way for him to stop Glynis.

The crumbling city wasn’t his only worry.

He and Murrell were walking on the left side of the street while Jesse skulked along on

the right. The kid had walked off before John had the opportunity to brief his comrades on the

importance of their mission. Jesse hadn’t gone far, but the gesture disturbed John. Since the

separation the kid hadn’t spoken or looked in their direction. If he wasn’t careful, he’d wind up

lost and face-to-face with a hungry Esclavo. And you can’t kill a Vampire using a bad attitude.

Pastore brushed the rain drenched mass of hair out of his eyes. The weather was

deteriorating by the second--it was almost as if the heavens were tired of Humanity’s stupidity

and had finally decided to let them know it. John leaned close to Murrell, speaking loud enough

to be heard by Shawn, but not by Jesse.

“What’s his problem?! I mean, are you guys friends with some bad blood, or

something?!”

Murrell had difficulty retrieving and piecing together John’s words out of the turbulent

ether, but he recovered enough to understand John’s question. He shook his head in response.

“Never saw ‘im before in my life! He was caught up in a bat swarm and was on the

ground when I found him! I tried to give ‘im a hand up, but when he saw me...” Murrell trailed

off and shrugged, allowing Pastore to finish the thought.

The incredulous look on John’s face made Murrell curious, racism was far from isolated

to New York, this guy had to have heard or encountered bigotry somewhere along the line.

“’Cause you’re black?! You gotta be fuckin’ kidding me!!?” Pastore’s voice was colored


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on the fringes with laughter, on the border of his vision he saw the kid half-turn in their direction.

If he was going to get these guys to work together and help him beat down Glynis, he would have

to tread carefully.

Nonetheless, the sheer depth of Human idiocy astounded him.

“You mean to tell me that in the middle of all this, the city beaten into rubble and

everyone in it most likely dead, he’s got a chip on his shoulder cause you’ve got different skin

color?! You people have your priorities so far out of fucking whack I don’t know how you

evolved this far!”

You people? Murrell thought. It was the white kid who had the attitude, Shawn had tried

to help the kid out for Christ’s sake! Why was Pastore dragging him into this?

“Hey listen, I haven’t got an argument with you or him! He crossed over, not me! I got

over that color bullshit a long time ago!”

Pastore heard an edge in the man’s voice that was very familiar. It was an amalgam of

anger and pain...and regret. John couldn’t figure what had angered Shawn until he reviewed what

he’d just said. Or more accurately, how he’d said it.

“No, no. I wasn’t calling you a bigot,” John hollered over the keening gale, hail

drumming on abandoned cars adding to the cacophony. “I meant ‘you people’ as in Humanity!”

“Oh.” Murrell answered, arching an eyebrow.

Greeeaaat, Shawn laughed to himself, I’m trapped in a giant cemetery at the center of a

fuckin’ monsoon, with a junior Klan member and a lunatic with a funky looking axe. Beautiful.

“You guys have got a lotta shit to work out.” John said in a lower register, but loud

enough for Shawn to hear.

“You’re talking like you’re separate from the rest of us! What, is the rain drownin’ your

brain or something!?” Brilliant, rabbit, Shawn quipped to himself, provoke the guy carrying the

four foot hunk of steel on his hip.

Much to Shawn’s relief, John simply shook his head. “It’s too much and too inconvenient

to explain right now! Wait’ll we stop for the night, then I’ll explain the bats and the wolves and

my rather...unique physiology.”

Oh this is peachy, Shawn stewed, wiping the rain from his eyes with the back of his hand.

This guy doesn’t even think he’s Human! I’m dreamin’, I know it. The roof is leaking, I had

some spicy sausage for dinner last night and the two are ganging up on me.


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Murrell perused his ragged surroundings and reflected that this didn’t have the feel of a

dream, that...sense of distance. He didn’t feel like an observer. Then again, he hadn’t dreamt in

so long he wasn’t sure what a dream felt like anymore.

The truth of the matter was, things were too bizarre to be anything but a nightmare.

New York was in ruins. There were hoards of animals roaming the streets. The only

things that made any sense were the weather and his companion. The kid, of course, was all too

real.

The hail grew from specks to golf balls, bruising Murrell’s head. He glanced at Pastore,

who seemed oblivious to the glacial assault, the short man’s eyes leveled and steady on the

ground at his feet. Murrell wanted to ask if he was all right, but the man’s face was so contorted

with concentration Murrell didn’t think he’d be heard.

As it was, Pastore was the first to break the silence. “We don’t stand a chance in Hell if

we’re divided! It’s bad enough Armando’s been taken to God-knows-where, we have absolutely

no friggin’ clue where to find this Fair Christian the Vampire is after, and we can’t go after

Glynis with one of our number eager to see the other dead! Any weaknesses in our assault,

Glynis will find it, dig her stinkin’ claws into it and tear it wide open! I don’t know what the

bitch has planned, but I know it ain’t good and that we, and any other survivors we find, are the

only ones who’re gonna stop her!

“If we’re divided, we’re already beaten. I’m gonna see how deep this shit goes with the

kid, but maybe he’ll lighten up for a while. At least long enough for us to see where we stand.”

Murrell nodded, but had little faith that John would succeed. At the age the kid was,

Shawn guessed thirteen or thereabouts, people were the most stubborn and most rebellious. If

you told a teenage not to immolate himself, you could bet he’d track down the nearest can of

kerosene.

Shawn didn’t voice his skepticism though, he could see the resolve in Pastore’s face.

Whatever the little man’s delusions were, he believed they were real, if Shawn put a dent in the

man’s little fantasy world he took the chance of setting Pastore off.

That was grief Murrell didn’t need. He watched the short gray-haired man bound

effortlessly over the jagged gulf of the street and walk up beside the blond boy. Murrell knew

from experience that no matter how logical Pastore’s arguments were, the kid wouldn’t listen. It

was just the way kids were.


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Hell, that’s how Shawn had been.

Murrell closed his eyes for an instant, leaving behind the quake ravaged landscape for a

dark street in Queens. Blood gleamed deep purple in the glare of the Sodium Vapor lamps,

clumps of gore were splashed across the pavement and Shawn’s arms. In place of the trip-

trapping of hail on steel, Shawn heard the horrified screams of a frightened woman...and the rattle

of a dying man’s lungs.

Murrell’s eyelids popped open and he was tossing a phantom crowbar from his empty

hands.

He hadn’t listened to what his Grandma had told him and an innocent man had suffered

for it.

Murrell prayed, for Jesse’s sake, that the boy heeded John’s advice, even if it was only a

sentence that sunk in, it would be a miracle. He hoped the kid wouldn’t have to learn the truth of

how stupid his baseless hatred was the hard way.

He wouldn’t wish that on anyone.

Jesse didn’t see Pastore leap over to his side of the street; he was too preoccupied with

keeping his eyes straight ahead.

He was tempted to look back and see if they were still following the same course he was,

but he wouldn’t give the nigger the satisfaction. So what if he got lost? At least he’d still have

his pride.

Besides, his father’d beat the shit out of him if he saw Jesse walking with a nigger.

(He’d beat the shit outta you for breathing too quick)

The only drawback to this current course of action was that he had his back to the coon

and the old man, for all he knew, there was a gun aimed at his spine. This fear so consumed Jesse

that he left tracks in his underwear when Pastore touched his shoulder.

“Jesus!! What’re you doing!? I thought you were back there with...him.”

Pastore could practically see the disgust in the young man’s voice and sighed wearily to

himself. This wasn’t going to be easy.

“His name’s Murrell and what’s your beef with him. He says he’s never met you before so

I know he couldn’t have fucked you over in any way, so what’s the deal?! He said he tried

helping you out and you treated him like shit! What gives?!”


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“Roll me is more like it!” Jesse barked with a harsh laugh. “He saw me in the street and

thought he could make a fast buck. You know how they are.”

“If that’s true, why didn’t he run when the wolves showed up?”

Jesse shrugged. “Maybe he was too shit-scared to run-- Fuck, I don’t know, who knows

how those people think!”

John felt his patience ebbing, but managed to keep a reign on it. The kid’s words and the

mindless venom in his voice were too familiar.

“It’s like my father says, ‘They oughtta be in cages so we can keep an eye on them.’”

Pastore restrained himself from strangling the kid on the spot, he repeated to himself that

Jesse was still young, that he didn’t know the implications of what he was saying.

John felt the blood pulsing at his temples, that last remark about the cages had ripped him

at the core.

He’s just a kid, he’s still putting together the pieces of who he’ll be. If blow up now I’ll

be doing more harm than good. Stay cool. Be rational. Think about what he said.

The klaxons went off and John saw an opening in the kid’s armor.

“Your Father, huh? Duddn’t like black people much?!” Jesse chuckled harshly.

“Hell no! He’d kill every last one of them if he could! He says the only good nigger is a

dead nigger.”

“Clever.” Pastore muttered. “And what about you? What happened in your life that you

can’t stand walking on the same side of the street as a black man?”

Jesse glanced at Pastore with a smirk. John saw something working behind the kid’s eyes,

he thought he hit paydirt.

“Nothing’s happened, I’ve never even seen a nigger until today. Whattaya think, I live in

a sewer?”

Pastore smiled inside, but gave no hint of it.

“If you’ve never seen a black person, let alone interacted with one, how can you criticize

them? What reason do you have for hating them? Sounds to me like you haven’t done any

thinking about this at all, just doin’ what your pappy tells you—“

“Hey, fuck you!” Jesse clenched his fist for a punch at the man but thought better of it, he

didn’t want to jump the gun in case this guy was just playing around.

“I don’t have to step in shit to know it stinks, and I don’t have to take my Dad’s word that


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niggers are garbage. Just turn on the T.V., all you ever see are them killing people and stealing,

shit they’re so stupid they whack each other! They’re worse than animals. They live in shit, they

have kids when they’re twelve and drop out of school at fourteen.

Then they go on welfare, steal or sell drugs. The world’d be better off if they were still in

chains!”

John’s blood went from a simmer to a boil. He felt the

Change coming and struggled to contain it.

“Do you know what you’re talking about?” John’s voice slithered from his throat like an

angry rattler from under a rock. Despite the background noise, Jesse had no problem hearing

John’s low, menacing voice.

“Do you know what it’s like being in a dungeon? Do you know what it’s like to be beaten

down for nothing other than raising your eyes from the floor? How about seeing your loved ones,

children!, shuttled from one place to another, being lent out like fucking tools?!”

John felt his throat constricting with rage and blood, he felt the coarse, thick hairs of his

pelt boring up along his back and shoulders. If he opened these wounds any wider he would

sprout the claws.

“Do you know what it’s like—“ Pastore saw indifference flickered across the boy’s face

and grabbed the kid by his shirt. Jesse was roughly half a foot taller than Pastore, but the elder

man hoisted him off the ground with ease.

“--to have nothing!! Not even the dignity of a name!!? You’re a thing when you’re a

slave, no more important than a coffee table. You know you can think and feel, but after decades

of being treated like a lump of shit you start believing it!

“You think someone should be in a cage, huh you little shit? You’d better imagine what

it’d be like behind those bars before you go around saying other people should be there!”

John felt the muscles in his arms and legs bunching, the bones at their core a thought

away from crumbling and reshaping.

“You’d better imagine what it’s like to see your friends and family bludgeoned to a pulp

or worked till their hearts burst, or watch them murdered outright! And you won’t do a damn

thing to stop it because you’re too fucking afraid! That’s your whole life when you’re at the end

of a chain motherfucker! You’re scared shitless of feeling that leather and steel tearing your skin

to shreds! You’re terrified of the torches they jam into your eyes or the spikes they shove up your


111

ass because you questioned an order. You don’t know how much you hate yourself when you

hear someone else screaming, and you’re glad it’s them suffering instead of you!”

Pastore’s voice had grown coarse and choked. His attention was focused solely on the

young man before him. He didn’t notice Murrell watching him and if he had he wouldn’t have

cared. As for the deluge of hail and snow, he barely noticed it.

“You cower in the corner and try not to watch their blood fly, you try to close your ears to

their screams...but you can’t! And as angry as you feel only one thought echoes in your head,

‘Better them than me.’

“You better be damn fucking sure you know what you’re talking about before you start

talking about putting people in cages!

“I still hear the screams in my sleep you little maggot.” Fear stirred the hairs on Jesse’s

neck, his stomach churning as if someone had seized it with an iron glove and was rhythmically

squeezing it. The guy hadn’t looked strong enough to lay out a broomstick, but he was holding

Jesse four inches of the ground without breaking a sweat. The smaller man’s grip was starting to

interfere with Jesse’s breathing, his air coming in long, ragged gasps. If the little guy didn’t let

up soon, Jesse would pass out or asphyxiate altogether.

Jesse punched and kicked the man as hard as he could in the face and groin, but Pastore

was oblivious. His eyes were wide and distant with hatred and loss.

“It’s been centuries and I still hear them! I see their eyes pleading with me to help,

reaching for me with bloody hands and I WON’T MOVE BECAUSE I’M AFRAID!!”

Murrell had started across the concave tarmac the minute Pastore seized Jesse. He had no

love for the kid, but he had no desire to see him throttled either. And from the look in Pastore’s

eyes, that’s what the little man had in mind.

Over the roar of the squall, Shawn couldn’t hear the particulars of the conversation, but he

knew Pastore was getting in the lion’s share and that he was extremely agitated. The discussion

had started civilly enough, when suddenly, as Shawn feared, the little man stopped and attacked

the kid.

The splattered hail had formed a thin sheet of ice on the concrete and tar, making walking

a precarious undertaking. Murrell descended the slope of the street cautiously, keeping one eye

out for any stray wolves or cats, while keeping another on his footing. He inched his way to the


112

gully’s edge, keeping his weight toward the sidewalk so he wouldn’t go careening into the

sewers. The deep treads of his sneakers gripped the freshly fallen snow, easing his mind a

fraction. His major concern now was whether or not the tarmac would support his weight.

Shawn could hear the water raging in the fractured earth and figured if he fell into the current

he’d be shot into the river before he could scream.

Squinting through the hail and snow, Shawn distinguished the silhouettes of the two men,

but was still unable to decipher their conversation. He continued toward the ledge, hoping he,

and the kid, would live long enough for him to help. A wicked gale whipped up behind Shawn,

tearing a shriek from the mangled steel of the buildings. Shawn hollered as the wind nudged him

forward, tipping him toward the street’s gutted center. Reflex won over panic and Shawn leaped

with the wind at his back.

Under his own power, Murrell would never have made it over the chasm. As it was, the

gale’s shove delivered him flailing halfway up the angled tarmac.

Murrell pin wheeled his arms as he lost his footing. He threw himself flat onto the icy

ground and dug his nails into the slush. His chest and abdomen erupted with gooseflesh as the

cold infiltrated his Yankee jacket and sweatshirt.

Murrell inched himself up the street. Pastore was shaking Jesse by the throat now, Shawn

didn’t think he had much time left to act.

“You talk like you know what’s what kid! It sounds to me like you’ve got a ball of hate in

you and that that justifies anything you say or do. Let me open your eyes a little Chief, you don’t

know shit about hate! You’re just a little parrot spoutin’ off shit you heard your old man

babblin’!

“When someone locks you in a hole and doesn’t feed you for days, then you can hate!

When you’ve been thrashed for so long and so hard you never wanna get up again, then you can

hate!”

Pastore’s voice dropped to a near inaudible rumble, like a storm rolling across the

horizon.

“I’ve seen everyone, not a Mother or brother, EVERYONE I ever loved murdered! They

didn’t die on their feet in battle or in bed surrounded by loved ones; They died on their knees,

broken. Their souls had been crushed long before their bodies died. And let me tell you Chief,


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you don’t know pain until you look into a baby’s eyes and see nothing! No spark. No love. Just

emptiness.

“And all of this happened because certain people thought they were ‘better’ than us, that

we were savages who needed to be caged. Sound familiar punk?!”

Jesse’s mind was approaching the shores of oblivion, but John’s words still found their

mark.

“They did it ‘For our own good.’, ‘We were a danger to ourselves and others.’” John

growled with a hint of sarcasm.

“They stole our passion. It would’ve been better if they’d wiped us the fuck out, at least

then we wouldn’t have died by inches.”

Pastore’s fury was finally abating, as it did he lowered Jesse to the ground. The ferocity

left his face, but his gray eyes remained hard and cold.

“If you’re going to use Hate as the foundation of your soul kid, you better have a lot better

reason than the color of someone’s skin, who they screw or what kinda God they worship.”

John removed his stubby, powerful digits from the twelve-year-old’s throat. The fact that

the kid was almost listening worked to ease John’s ire. If Jesse had maintained his attitude of

indifference much longer, he would have taken a detour through a brick wall.

“Sorry I flipped kid, you just...just hit a sore spot. (Sigh) It’s just, I see what’s going on

with your species and it’s too fuckin’ familiar. Do yourself and the future a favor kiddo, question

everything you’re told. Don’t accept everything people tell you just because they wear a uniform

or have a title or because they’re older than you, you can toss that ‘Respect your elders’ shit out

the window. And don’t just swallow everything your parents tell you. Think about things. Think

about what you’re being told and who you eventually want to be.”

Pastore let out a cough and brushed a handful of sleet and snow off his head.

Murrell scrabbled his way up the pavement and was relieved, albeit a tad torqued, that

he’d frozen the entire front portion of his body for nothing.

“You’ve got a lotta time ahead of you kid,” Unless we fuck up, then we’re all gonna be

dead. “You have to choose the bits and pieces of who you’re gonna be, not your Father or a priest

or whoever. Not everything they tell you will be garbage, just the majority.

“It’s important to question what people tell you Jess-- Even why you should question.

Don’t let every asshole with an opinion tell you who or what you should or shouldn’t be, make


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your own choices. If you fuck up, if you let everyone else determine who you are, you’ll wind up

falling so hard you’ll never get—“

John looked away from Jesse, his countenance altering from those of an old man to

something canine. Murrell saw the man’s ears shrugging, attempting to home in on an elusive

sound.

“--up.” Pastore concluded, staring up at the sky. Shawn and Jesse watched the old man

curiously as his eyes scoured the skies in a systematic sweep.

“Son of a bitch,” He murmured, “Coulda sworn...”

The little man’s nostrils flared and his eyes constricted to slits, he disregarded the

intensifying squall and concentrated on the wind.

Pastore thought he’d caught a familiar scent, but the chaotic currents of the hurricane

prevented him from getting a fix. The scent had been fresh and close...but distant. Like it was

overhead or underground. John’s eyesight was obscured by the blizzard, but he was positive the

scent originated in the firmament.

John’s ears strained for any sign of a plane or a fowl mad enough to fly through this mess,

but his ears were as useless as his sight; The keening gales and distant thunder had practically

deafened him.

Still...there was something--

Yes! There it is again!!

The scent had only been clear for a second, but long enough to confirm that it was

Armando who was approaching.

And a Vampire as well. “Where the hell is he?”

“Who?” Jesse asked, his arms grown numb from the elbows up. The sweatsuit and

baseball cap he’d worn into the city were poor protection against the elements. The precipitation

formed a thin sheen of ice on his clothes, leeching the heat from his body.

His confrontation with Pastore had usurped most of his attention, so he hadn’t noticed the

drastic drop in temperature. Now that he was aware of it, he felt that much colder.

“Look,” Jesse shivered, “Could we find a warmer place—“

“Shh.” Pastore said with an impatient gesture, if he felt the cold, it didn’t show.

Jesse wasn’t the only one anxious to find shelter. Murrell’s mocha-hued flesh was

covered in goosebumps and frost. His jaw ached from the chore of keeping his teeth from


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chattering and the back of his throat was raw from the harsh, glacial air. But he wouldn’t disturb

Pastore. Whatever the man was looking for, it must be important.

Normally, Murrell was short on patience, especially when he was uncomfortable, but he’d

heard what Pastore had been saying to Jesse about choosing who he should be and that he should

question what he was told. It was wise advice, wisdom Shawn had heard from another source not

so long ago. Shawn hoped Jesse was more receptive than he’d been and at least give Pastore’s

words some consideration.

John’s eyes dove from the sky to downtown. For the first time since hooking up with

Murrell and Morsello, John tagged another Human scent. She was half a dozen blocks down and

a couple over. The wind made it tough pinpointing the woman or determining whether or not she

was alone. He did, however, detect heavy perspiration and barely a hint of menstrual blood.

He’d say the blood he did smell was roughly nine months old.

The woman was very, very pregnant.

The girl’s scent was brutally overpowered by the stench of Nosferatu. The fetor was so

strong it staggered him, he would have fallen on his back if Murrell hadn’t steadied him.

“Shit!” Pastore shouted, shutting off his olfactory senses.

He knew the stench would eventually be dismembered by the blizzard, but the memory of

that...odor, made him gag. Technically, the Vampire were living beings, with heartbeats and a

need for nourishment, but to those with sensitive noses, they reeked of decay. Standing in their

lair was like standing in a poorly tended mausoleum.

“Jesus, there must be three million of them!!” John snorted, exhaling violently several

times to get the stench out of his nostrils.

“Them who?!” Murrell shouted over the storm, backing a step from the little man.

“Vampire! From the strength of their scent, there are over two million!”

Pastore was too engrossed with wiping his nose on his sleeve and spitting out

contaminated mucous to see Jesse and Shawn exchange surprised glances.

Both men were wondering why God had chosen to place them at Doom’s Doorway with a

madman and a nigger/bigot respectively. These ponderings were circumvented by a distant

whistling. John must have heard it too, because his head popped up and his ears started

twitching.


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“Uh-oh.” was all Shawn heard before a projectile broke the cloud cover and struck the

dilapidated Chemical Bank building they stood up the block from.

The weakened infrastructure gave up the ghost under this final assault and caved in on

whatever had dealt it the death blow. Fortunately for Pastore and company, the building toppled

in towards its core and not onto the street, otherwise they would have been washed over in an

avalanche of rubble.

After several minutes of cascading brick and glass, the debris settled, leaving the only

voice in the city that of the falling snow.

“(Sigh) Oohhh this ain’t good.” John grumbled and drew a huge gulp of frigid air. That

was a friend of mine, he’d been captured by the Vampires. Guess they got tired of his company.

I don’t smell any death on him, so he hasn’t been contaminated.”

John clamored up onto the settling wreckage, his eyes, ears and nose primed for the

slightest sign of life.

Jesse and Murrell watched the little man spring deftly up the freshly condemned structure.

Shawn noticed that the old man moved damn well for his age. John bounded from one chunk of

concrete to another without once losing his footing or breaking his pace.

“This guy’s nuts. We’re gonna freeze out here and he’s picking through a rock pile for

one of his imaginary friends.” Jesse’s voice was choppy, but still audible.

“Is it me, or did he say Vampires?!” Murrell called, avoiding eye contact with Morsello.

Any look of loathing the kid threw at him might set him off. Normally, a little punk with attitude

wouldn’t phase him, but this had been an extraordinary crappy day. Every man had his breaking

point, and Shawn was spitting distance from his.

“Uh...Yeah, he did say that. Well, what do we do? Should we follow him or what?”

Despite the cold, Jesse’s face felt as if it had been doused with rubbing alcohol and set

aflame. His stomach bunched and twisted when Murrell spoke to him. When Jesse spoke, it felt

as if someone had cinched a belt around his chest. It was weird talking to the spook, but Jesse

saw no alternative. Even his old man would have to agree that this was a no-win situation.

What Jesse neither accepted nor perceived was that some of what John Pastore said had

taken root in his spirit. The little man’s words struggled for firmer footing in the rocky soil

Vincent Morsello had lain in his son’s soul. Pastore’s ideas, like the man himself, were not easily

defeated. The spiritual conflict continued as Jesse stood in a blizzard beside a man he feared and


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hated for no concrete reason.

Murrell was puzzling over Morsello’s question, whether they should follow the little man

or find a place to wait out the storm. The sane course of action would be to get out of the

hurricane...But things were looking far from sane these days.

Despite Pastore’s declarations about Vampires and regarding himself as something other

than human, he seemed to know more about what was going on than Shawn or Jesse did. The

logical portion of Shawn’s brain told him to get out of the snow and wait until he was rescued,

and most of his mind concurred. Watching the little man toss rocks from one pile to another in

the middle of a blizzard, an axe strapped to his side, supported rationality’s argument for flight.

Under normal circumstances Shawn would have heeded this voice.

But again, these were not normal circumstances. Deep in Murrell, in a segment of him

that remained feral, Shawn saw something in the wild haired little man that he trusted. There was

nothing false or flashy in the way Pastore presented himself, no masques to peek around. With

John Pastore, what you saw was what you got. Take it or leave it.

It was this realness that lifted Shawn’s legs and started him up the rubble stairway to

where the little man toiled. Without a word, Shawn started grabbing rubble and tossing it from

the area Pastore was excavating. The jagged metal and concrete chewed into Shawn’s palms, the

ice covering them numbing his skin a fraction. The labor awakened the agony in his knuckles,

drawing a series of pained grunts from Murrell’s throat. After fifteen minutes, the pain and cold

were forgotten as adrenaline raged through Shawn’s blood, before long he was sheathed in sweat

and his skin was steaming in the cold.

Jesse deliberated at the foot of the wreckage, his mild shivers becoming progressively

more violent. He looked up and down Lexington in the vain hope of finding others he could band

with.

He saw nothing but snow and debris.

Grudgingly, Jesse ascended the hill and worked his hands into the ruins.

John smiled faintly to himself, maybe these guys weren’t such a lost cause after all.

As Murrell and company tunneled their way to Pastore’s friend, Christine Ferranti awoke

from a fitful sleep in the Catalog Room of the New York Public Library. The wailing of the wind

and the rattling of the glass had filled her dreams with shadows and wolves. The malevolent


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nature of her dreamwalking wasn’t what stirred her though, it was the protesting of her bladder.

For the past six months she must have managed three hours of sleep at a stretch without

waking to urinate. The three months before that she’d been up with persistent nausea.

If anyone were to ask, she would tell them how damn sick she was of Nature’s miracle.

Christine pushed herself to the edge of the table she’d been sleeping on, threw her legs

over the edge and began the laborious task of bringing herself upright. Her back ached and

creaked with every breath. Rather than indulging her pain with a groan or a sigh, Christine eased

herself to the ground and headed for the McGraw Rotunda.

The Library had survived the cataclysm remarkably well. The granite and marble had

been built to last, leaving the stairs and walls largely intact. Christine huffed down the first flight

of stairs and rested at the landing, wishing a thousand tortures on the architect who thought a

million was an ideal number of stairs for the building. She’d almost had the baby the day before,

after scaling the mountain of steps to the Library’s entrance.

Christine’s slender hand glided along the mildly misshapen banisters, cautiously

negotiating the sleek ivory steps. She was still groggy and she didn’t want her awkwardly

distributed weight to knock her off balance. Despite her care, the girl moved with amazing grace.

The pressing in her bladder grew more insistent with the joggling of her innards. She

would have preferred sleeping on the ground floor, or more favorably on the commode itself, but

the draft on the lower levels made that unwise. Aside from the odd shattered window in the

depths of the Main reading Room North, the Third floor was moderately warm.

Christine still wished the toilet was closer.

Five steps from the bottom, a Nordic gale ruffled the orange sweatpants adorning her legs.

Gooseflesh launched an offensive over her flesh, claiming victory uncontested. From the feel of

the air breezing through the flimsy fabric, the temperature had plummeted fifty degrees since

she’d arrived in Manhattan.

Some snow had drifted in under the doors and broken glass, the scattered flakes

resembling spilt sugar. Christine was startled by the presence of the powder as it had been quite

some time since snow had fallen in October. The occurrence was made even more bizarre

considering the seventy degrees it’d been the previous day. Christine held off the brimming tide

of urine with the aid of some concentration and the Kegel exercises she’d been taught, and

investigated the world outside.


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Christine gasped at the tundra that met her eyes through the frosted glass of the revolving

doors. The world was almost solid white, a break in the curtain here and there offered a view of a

crumpled automobile or decimated building. She lightly touched the door’s brass frame.

The cold was real.

The snow beneath her slippered feet was real. That meant that the earthquake had been

real. Christine sighed, her breath emerging in a long foggy plume, and ran a hand through her

long, curly dark-blond hair. Her sleep-haze had been fully eradicated by a rush of wind against

her legs, in that comfortable fugue she had almost thought it’d all been a dream and that she was

simply caught up in its after-shocks.

No such luck.

A tremor rocked Christine. In her mind a segment of nightmare recycled, placing her in

the center of the city in the dead of night.

Christine’s heart galloped in her chest, the small life in her belly kicking at her mother’s

sudden agitation. The woman looked over her shoulder, almost hoping to see through reality into

the Dreamtime.

With a jolt, the dream broke free of its subconscious prison and ran riot over her mind.

Manhattan had been ravaged in her nightmare as well, she could see the carnage now with

chilling clarity. This had been the dream that had caused her to wake up screaming on Monday

morning, her fear and pain almost driving her into labor. In the effort to calm herself, Christine

had sealed the vision away. Now, with the danger of premature labor gone, she was reliving the

vision to the minutest detail. Her night in the library was forgotten as phantom rain danced

across her face. A short distance away two people stood, a man and woman from the sound of

their voices. Their speech was garbled but Christine could divine from their tones that there was

a lot of tension between them.

A shriek of wind in the real world matched its brother in Christine’s waking dream. She

labored to breathe, the difficulty stemming not so much from the cold, but from panic. There was

something in this dark place that threatened her baby and herself.

Her astral body was as rigid as a statue, affording her a limited field of vision.

Nonetheless, she was able to see the speakers.

The man looked just shy of six foot, had a head covered with short black hair and had

deeply tanned skin, he glared at the woman with small black eyes. To say he stared at her with


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malice would have been a gross understatement, it was obvious he hated the mystery woman.

The object of the man’s scorn was half a foot shorter than her antagonist, with flesh as

pale as the moon. Straight, jet-black hair flowed down the woman’s back to her tailbone, the

tresses thrashing wildly in the wind.

Christine knew neither of them.

Before ruminating on this further, Christine heard rustling and hissing in the gutted

structures around her. It was while looking for these ghosts that she realized she wasn’t in

complete pitch. The street was being illuminated from a distant source, like the light thrown by a

flashlight pointed at a ceiling. Straining her eyes to the far, far right, Christine saw the Twin

Towers on the horizon, the only beacons in an ocean of shadow.

Christine was in the middle of wondering whether it was this vision, and not an extra-

credit assignment, that had brought her to the city, when she was distracted by an approaching

voice. It was the woman. The closer she came, the colder Christine grew, to the point where her

lungs felt like blocks of ice.

Dread descended over Christine like the shadow of a hawk over a fleeing rabbit. She tried

to will her legs to run but they remained static. The terror in her had become so potent it was a

physical force. Christine felt like a little girl again, trapped in the basement of her Grandma’s

house. Alone. Afraid. Powerless.

A hand like an ice-encrusted vice squeezed the back of Christine’s neck, eliciting shocks

of pain across her shoulders and up over her skull. She tried to scream but terror and agony

sealed her throat. The pale woman smiled at Christine and rested a hand on her stomach.

The sensation was equal to having a cheese-grater ripped across her belly, the fringes of

the affected area felt numb with cold. Christine found her voice then and shrieked in the Library

Foyer as she had in her dream, the wail rebounding through the silent structure. She’d awakened

the entire house that morning, startling Joe out of the bed and onto the floor. When Christine

finally emerged from the dream, Joe and her Mother had told her how they’d tried shaking her

awake.

In the library, her wailing scoured Christine’s throat for a minute before her voice started

faltering, tears of anguish trailed down her face and froze in brittle streams. Christine’s silver-

blue eyes were wide and glassy as they viewed the world of her dream. They didn’t see the tiny

dervishes of snow dancing across the library floor, the dream had her in its grasp and wasn’t


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going to release her until it had its say. At the center of Christine’s attention was the pale woman

with a touch like razors. It was a miracle Christine hadn’t wet herself at the Pale woman’s dream

touch.

The breath was hitching in Christine’s lungs and she was on the brink of another scream

when she managed to pick out a portion of the couple’s conversation.

She will not give you her child!, the man shouted angrily. He had an accent that sounded

remotely Latin, but jumbled beyond distinction with other dialects.

Christine’s heart thrashed in her chest like a tuna caught in a predator’s jaws, eager to

break free from the snare of her ribcage. Her baby! They were talking about Charity! But give

her up to whom?

The pale woman responded with words as cold and hard as a killer’s blade. Christine

came dangerously close to voiding her bladder on hearing the phantom’s words.

If she will not give it--, the pale woman began. Christine felt the astral hand rise from her

belly and watched it curl and twist to resemble a bird’s talon. Christine tried to wrestle herself

free from the woman’s grasp, but was held immobile. She knew what was coming and no matter

how she struggled or strained to scream, she was powerless. She wanted to shout at the man to

help her!!, For the love of God, do something!!, but her throat was too raw to form words.

The Pale woman prefaced the end of her statement by drawing her claw back for a

powerful strike.

--I will take it.

Christine gasped as the talon whistled in a vicious arc into her stomach. Christine wailed

and doubled over.

That wasn’t the end of the vision though, the final agony came when the Pale woman tore

the child from Christine’s womb.

The stressed windows rattled from the force of the young woman’s cry. Behind her agony

shuttered eyes, Christine watched the Pale woman’s gore gloved hand rise, holding her baby in

the air.

Christine felt as if someone had taken a chainsaw to her gut, her howls giving way to a

low throaty rattle. Christine shrieked as much out of emotional anguish as actual physical pain.

The sudden, violent loss of her child was like no pain she had ever experienced, real or imagined.

The sight of Charity squirming and crying in the woman’s talon magnified her agony ten-fold.


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The dream had swallowed her whole, consuming the chilly foyer of the Library like

parched trees in the path of a firestorm. With her dream-eyes Christine looked down at her

ravaged belly, ragged flesh dangling around the mouth of her womb.

Christine tried to scream again, but she couldn’t draw a breath. A new agony, this one

rising steadily along her legs and up through center, underscored the pain from her astral wound.

the young woman’s vision wavered as the new sensation sharpened and started coming in

rhythmic bursts.

It’d been the on-set of labor that had shaken Christine out of her slumber the first time

she’d had the dream, but she was too deep in the vision’s embrace this time for the contractions

to reach her. Her consciousness had been stolen from the present by the brutal theft of her baby.

It may have only been a dream, but the...the tearing...The slashing of the claw...the sudden

absence in her, felt as real as anything

Christine would experience awake.

CRUMP-CRUMP-CRUMP!

The vision and its players flickered and faded as the mind-play drew to its conclusion.

CRUMP-CRUMP-CRUMP!

Christine dismissed the pounding in her ears as her heart’s tattoo, or she would have if

she’d been thinking clearly enough. The dream had ended, but her mind was so traumatized by

the Pale Woman’s violation that she was still stranded in the netherworld between reality and

dreams. The girl swayed gently on her weary legs, her motion as dreamy as the dance of a

Weeping Willow’s boughs. Beneath her sweatpants, Christine’s legs were numb and red from

exposure.

CRUMP-CRUMP-CRUMP!

Christine didn’t feel the cold, and she no longer felt the lingering agony the Pale

Woman’s claw had inflicted. She saw and felt nothing. Fortunately, the panic induced

contractions had ceased before maturing into actual labor, otherwise, she might have delivered

Charity without ever noticing.

CRUMP-CRUMP-CRUMP!

Christine’s eyes were open, but focused on nothing but shadows, the afterimage of the

Pale woman clutching Charity’s blood covered form was superimposed over the stark surface of

her vision.


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CRUMP!! CRUMP!! CRUMP!! crick.

Christine’s right eyebrow arched. The noise she had assumed was her heartbeat suddenly

sounded different. Higher, almost like a cricket’s chirping. It’d also sounded distant, not in her

ears but away from her person, like the footfalls of an approaching Golem. Another curiosity was

the sound that followed the thumping.

CRUMP! crick. CRUMP! CRUMP! crick!

In the distance, Christine thought she heard someone scream, “Take it easy!”

From Christine’s perspective it was as if the sun were a bulb on a dimmer switch

gradually being brightened. The sharper her surroundings became, the more aware she was of the

snow and icy draft. For once she was thankful for the superhuman bladder control she’d

developed over the past nine months, without it her legs and pants would have been sheathed in

ice.

CRUMP-CRUMP! crick. CRUMP!

Christine jumped and spun to face the revolving door at her back. For an instant her heart

froze, the shock so sudden Christine felt the baby jump.

Through the frost-ringed glass Christine saw the dingy evening sky of her dream, staring

back at her with thirsty green eyes was the Pale woman. Christine retreated a step or two,

folding her arms protectively over the babe in her belly. Beneath the terror, a base ferocity reared

its head and bared its fangs. The rage simultaneously frightened and comforted the young

woman, enabling her to meet the woman’s eyes until the illusion faltered. The stranger and the

night that shrouded her swirled and shifted as fluidly as mercury on a turntable.

Christine rubbed her eyes to ensure that the last of the dream was stricken from her mind.

When her vision cleared, she saw a short, gray-haired man with small gray eyes standing in the

doorway. His eyebrows were crusted with snow as were his shoulders and crown. A fist rested

against the pane he’d been pounding, a network of fissures branched from the door’s frame. The

little man turned and called to someone out of sight.

Christine was so surprised and happy to see another human being that she temporarily

forgot the bathroom. It suddenly struck home how desolate the Library, and the city, had

become. When she’d arrived Monday afternoon to research a home-study project, the building

had been bustling. Even during and after the quake the Library had been somewhat full.

Now, it was empty.


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Christine’s excitement almost got their best of her as she rushed forward to open the door.

(Watch it pussycat, a gruff voice warned in Christine’s head. People are dangerous,

especially as far as a lone woman is concerned. And in your condition...I don’t think you can put

up much of a fight.)

Yeah, yeah Feath, I got it, Christine answered as she shuffled to the brass and glass portal.

As irritating as his tone might have been, the voice of her Grandfather did have a point; For the

welfare of both herself and her baby Charity, she would have to watch herself.

The little man motioned to Christine’s right and made a pushing motion. Christine caught

the gist and rested her weight against the tarnished brass push-bar, the little man taking up the

same position on his side. It took some doing, but the door finally gave, ice and snow crunching

in the groves.

The little man motioned his unseen companions over before entering the portal. Christine

stood a safe distance away, although there was no way she could outrun the man if it came to that.

Nonetheless, she felt better with the distance between them.

The little man emerged from the door and immediately began shaking the snow off

himself. Christine raised an arm against the flurry.

“Hi. Uh-oh...sorry about that. I’m John Pastore, pleased ta meetcha.”

The little man wiped his hand on his jeans and offered it to Christine. She smiled and

took it. Something about the man, either the way he spoke or his mannerisms, reminded

Christine of her late Grandfather, or Grandfeathers as she and her sister used to call him. She

coughed to clear the fear out of her throat, then introduced herself.

“I’m Christine. Have you seen...I mean...Damn...I’m sorry,” She laughed, massaging her

temples with her thumb and forefinger. “It’s just, I’m a little out of it.”

“Understood. Hell, I’ve seen this shit before and it still gets to me. Oh Jesus!...Excuse me

for a second.”

John sprinted through the gap in the revolving door, admitting an arctic gale in the

process.

Christine’s bladder reasserted its need to empty its cargo with a sudden sharp pressure in

her midriff. The baby kicked in order to drive the point home. Christine squeezed her legs

together and hemmed her way to the Ground Floor stairs.

“Okay, okay.” she groaned at her protesting urethra. After gingerly descending the stairs,


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Christine felt a draft and heard the lobby fill with voices.

“--Hold on, she was here a minute ago. Hey!--Shit, what was her name? Oh

yeah...Christine?”

“I’ll be back (groan) in a second!”

Pastore heard the girl shuffle down a short corridor and enter a room permeated with the

stench of waste.

“Nothing’s working in here either.” John grumbled, strolling around the foyer and

eyeballing the Library. “No heat, electricity-sniff-sniff-no plumbing either.” He turned with an

ear-to-ear grin adorning his face.

“But it’s home.”

Jesse murmured something and grunted under Armando’s weight.

“Can we put this guy down now or what, he weighs a ton.”

Pastore nodded and waved his hand, his eyes roving over the cracked marble walls and

floors.

Jesse unhooked Armando’s left arm and let it drop. He stomped toward the rubber

stripped stairs hugging himself and bitching about the cold.

Murrell almost collapsed with the stranger’s full weight on his shoulders. The tips of his

fingers to the small of his back were one big ache. His muscles protested at the thought of lifting

anything else. Shawn was in danger of losing his balance and tossing both himself and Armando

to the floor, when his burden was lifted.

Pastore had lost interest in the battered architecture and had taken his friend’s

unconscious body.

“All right Chief,” John said brushing snow off Armando’s face and shoulders. “Time for

you to wake up Sunshine.”

Pastore hoisted Armando to the surviving stairwell, avoiding the clots of snow Jesse left

in his wake. Shawn was surprised the little man could stand, let alone haul a man single-

handedly across the floor. Of the three, Pastore had worked the hardest to dig out Armando.

Pastore had to be fifty if he was a day, by Shawn’s best guess, yet he’d torn through the rubble so

fast and hard that he literally left the younger men in the dust. John had continued working while

Jesse and Shawn had taken three breaks apiece. And while Murrell had trouble staying on his

feet, Pastore looked wide awake--Murrell thought the man could probably demolish another six


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buildings and not break a sweat. There was something bizarre about the guy. A good bizarre, but

bizarre nonetheless.

During the search for Pastore’s friend, the little man had spoken of a woman a few blocks

from them, the only person he had “tagged” other than Murrell and Jesse.

Shawn had passed off Pastore’s comment as a mangling of his words by the wind, and

after twenty minutes of hefting ice cold and extremely sharp debris, Shawn had been ready to bolt

and find a nice cubby hole to wait out the storm.

That was until he saw Armando’s head.

Its appearance had been so sudden a hushed yelp had escaped him, enough to signal

Pastore and Morsello to his discovery.

Shawn had initially thought the man was just some unfortunate employee who’d been

crushed for his troubles. Pastore’s shouts and fevered digging, however, led him to believe

otherwise.

No way this guy’s alive, Shawn had thought, retreating from the little man and the object

of his fervor.

Jesse, too, withdrew a step or two as Pastore pitched rubble over his shoulder at random.

Within fifteen minutes, Pastore had the mystery man free from his cairn.

“Oh, ‘Mondoman,” John had breathed into the wind, his face contorting with the scent of

something corrupt. “You got the stink on you something fierce.”

Pastore fanned a hand in front of his nose although neither Murrell nor Jesse smelled

anything foul.

At that point John had hopped from the rubble’s precipice to the sidewalk with the

stranger over his shoulder, moving as sure footed as a mountain lion.

Murrell and Jesse were left to their own devices as far as their descent went. When they

finally reached street level, a practice made infinitely more difficult by the snow and sleet, Shawn

noticed something he’d missed earlier.

The stranger, Armando Moreno as Pastore introduced him, bore absolutely no wounds.

The only damage evident had been to his wardrobe. Any sign that he had come sailing out of the

sky into a concrete structure was noticeably lacking.

His limbs were rigid, so Shawn assumed he had no bones broken. His skin was unmarked

by blood from open wounds.


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And he was moaning.

Murrell conjectured that if it had been the man who’d struck and condemned the bank,

and not some random chunk of airborne debris, the question was posed: Why was the man alive?

Shawn was amazed to find himself entertaining such insane notions, as if the crazy

weather had opened a gateway to another dimension, a transference Shawn had been blissfully

unaware of. If it hadn’t been for the Morsello kid’s pissy attitude, Shawn would have doubted

any of what had happened was real.

Shawn eyed the weapon strapped to Pastore’s side, the feeble light filtering through the

storm clouds played gently along the blade’s edge, and added the axe to the list of things to quiz

Pastore about.

The crescent shaped blade was approximately two and a quarter feet long with a wooden

handle starting eight inches below the steel and ending halfway up the blade’s length. The

weirdest aspect of the weapon wasn’t its shape, but the metal it was constructed of. Its surface

was full of whirls, like a fingerprint or the pattern oil makes over tarmac on a rainy day.

Shawn’s concern wasn’t over John’s idiosyncrasies, his weapon or his friend, but for the

woman Pastore insisted was holed up in the Library. The little man had screamed over the gales

that the woman was pregnant. When asked by Jesse how Pastore knew this, John replied that he

could tell by her scent.

The trio had carried Armando up and down several blocks, crossing and recrossing some

boulevards several times, as Pastore attempted to pinpoint the girl’s location.

John’s excuse for his difficulty had been that the wind made her trail elusive, tearing her

scent every which way. Just when Murrell was questioning his sanity for the seventh time since

hooking up with Pastore, John started scaling the Library stairs.

The blizzard had grown so fierce that the street signs were obscured. Murrell was grateful

Pastore’s chase had led them to a major landmark, providing Shawn with a point of reference.

Murrell and Morsello had waited with Armando while Pastore investigated his latest

hunch. The hush of the storm was shattered by Pastore’s pounding on the jammed revolving

door. Jesse had shrieked for the little man to take it easy, but John had been too absorbed by

whatever he saw in the foyer that he didn’t hear the boy. A few minutes later Pastore motioned to

someone beyond the glass and wrestled the door loose. After a brief disappearance, John

emerged and told them they had found the woman they sought.


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Shawn had heard Pastore call out to someone, but had heard no response. Glancing

around the foyer, Murrell was left wondering where this mystery woman was.

“John, I thought you said there was a pregnant woman here, if that’s true we should try

and get her some help. There has to be someone at the hospitals—“

“There’s no one anywhere,” Pastore replied over his shoulder. The look in the old man’s

eyes told Shawn that this wasn’t the time for Twenty Questions.

“You three are the only Humans left on this island. Everyone else is dead, or as good as.

Judging by the reek coming from downtown, the whole fuckin’ city’s been drained dry. Shit-

suckin’ Vampires.” Pastore returned his attention to the Peruvian searching along the man’s neck

with the tips of his fingers.

Murrell laughed lightly and sighed. “This isn’t happening...”

“Huh! Shit, you know how many times I’ve wished that?” John laughed bitterly, still

pressing the length of his friend’s throat. “Unfortunately, dreams never come true.”

Pastore’s voice lowered to a gruff whisper, his speech so soft Murrell almost missed what

he said.

“I had to learn that the hard way.”

Murrell recognized the scorn that colored Pastore’s words. It was a mating of regret and

loss. Pain, plain and simple. The rawness of the little man’s emotion stirred the anguish in

Murrell’s spirit. The grim empathy lasted only a dozen heartbeats, until Shawn saw Christine

come up the stairwell.

Every aspect of the man’s spirit stopped dead in its tracks. All the Light, all the

Shadow...ceased. The world around Shawn swam out of focus as his eyes drank the woman in.

He felt the blood coursing through his veins and arteries, pulsing faster every second he was in

the lady’s presence.

Shawn felt his throat shrink to the circumference of a gnat while his tongue turned into a

pound and a half of modeling clay. A tingling washed over his skin, like the sensation he’d get

after accidentally shocking himself in shop class. But this sensation wasn’t confined to his hands,

it sheathed him from head to toe, inside and out. Shawn felt as if he were trembling, sort of like

experiencing his own nine point quake, but his limbs betrayed no sign of such tremors.

In his mind’s eye, where he usually saw nothing but shadow, a place where he measured a

response to any attack he might experience, and all he saw was Light. Not a run of the mill


129

illumination mind you, this light was like...seeing God smile.

Another anomaly in his state of mind was a warmth that originated in his chest and

radiated outward. The Light and warmth were so foreign that Shawn had no clue as to how he

should respond. He was so accustomed to keeping himself closed and on guard, watching every

alley, car and shadow for a hint of aggression, that his mind was steeped in Shadow. There were

times when it seemed all the world had to offer was pain and misery, and a body had to adapt if

they were going to survive. In a society where ten-year-olds committed premeditated murder,

being cold was the only way to keep from losing your shit.

That was why these new feelings were so disorienting.

It was as if Murrell had been walking through a hurricane his entire life and suddenly--

BANG!! The rain stopped and the sun bathed the earth in its radiance.

Murrell’s brain felt short-circuited, in a way, he knew how computers felt after a power

surge. Gradually, Shawn grew aware that his feet were actually trying to walk away, they had

turned themselves in the woman’s direction. He was suddenly torn between running from the girl

and the emotions she elicited in him...and standing his ground. Part of him was thirsty to get a

closer look at her, smell her perfume, look at her eyes--

What the fuck is wrong with me?!, Shawn thought frantically, enacting the only physical

task he could manage, running a hand over his hair.

Shawn’s heart, mind and soul, three aspects that never truly got along, were all trained on

this one female with orange sweatpants and gray sweatshirt.

And they were speechless.

Murrell felt like smiling and didn’t know why. All the pain and fear and rejection he’d

lived through in his twenty- three years evaporated. There was no aggression left in him. No

anger. No sorrow.

It scared the living shit out of him.

And he didn’t mind.

The woman climbed the stairs without the strain usually displayed by pregnant women in

movies and T.V. Murrell had seen pregnant woman before and had never felt anything remotely

like his current euphoria. He had also seen hundreds of attractive women; black, Latin, white--

what have you, and again, he had never felt like this.

What. Is. Happening. To. Me.


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The answer arrived in the guise of his Grandmother’s soft, gentle voice.

You’re in love Shawny.

Shawn’s jaw dropped as the statement impacted. He tried to contradict her counsel, but

his argument consisted mainly of, “But that...I mean...How could...”

Shawn realized the girl had come closer during his interior dialogue and his lungs

responded by slowing to quarter speed. Murrell’s hand had a mind of its own and had become

quite taken with the practice of running over Shawn’s afro, gliding gingerly over the shallow

scratches on his scalp.

Shawn tried to turn away or open his mouth to say something profound or witty, to either

Pastore or the lady, but his body was immobile and his voice box had gone on strike. The best

he’d be able to manage was an incomprehensible string of grunts and whistles.

Murrell strained to turn his head, fearing he would make the woman uncomfortable with

his blatant staring, but his eyes would have none of it. They had never witnessed, in reality or

dreams, a sight as beautiful as the woman before him. There was no one part of the girl that

stood out from the whole. The nearer she drew the more furious Shawn’s heart pounded.

My God, he thought breathlessly. I-I can’t...No...It’s imposs...But I--

Walking up the stairs and across the foyer, the girl had had her eyes on the floor, but

whether because she felt Murrell’s eyes or that she finally noticed the man, the girl looked up.

Straight into Shawn’s eyes.

Murrell’s heart froze.

A supernova detonated in Shawn’s soul and mind, almost causing him to stagger back.

His lungs were as static as his heart as the girl’s eyes transfixed the black man.

Never, ever, in all his days had Shawn Murrell seen eyes as gorgeous as this young

woman’s. They were brighter than...than...Jesus! Shawn was stuck. All he could think was that

if the eyes were truly windows to the soul, then this woman had the soul of an angel.

Her eyes were a bright, sharp blue with bits of silver scattered in them. They were so

pure...So bright. Murrell knew that if he continued to meet her gaze he’d burn out his retinas and

reduce his brain to a pile of overcooked oatmeal.

Shawn finally, and very, very reluctantly, turned away from beautiful woman. He strolled

(with incredible difficulty, his legs still refused to move fluidly) toward Pastore, taking care that

his strides were quick but not conspicuously so.


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Murrell felt as if someone had pumped nine pints of caffeine into his bloodstream, his

brain was completely fried. Meeting the woman’s eyes had been the spiritual equivalent of

staring at the sun too long. Shawn saw the woman’s face superimposed over the library’s

staircase and two men.

Shawn had had dreams where he’d witnessed the creation of the Universe from his

bedroom window; He’d watched stark ebony skies blossom with light and sparks, the streamers

of light becoming planets and moons and suns. Nebulae, like gossamer spun by celestial spiders,

had crowded the heavens in other sweet dreams.

During these night visions Shawn had experienced a tranquility in this soul that was

lacking in his waking world. The elation had followed him even after he awoke and had stayed

with him for weeks afterward.

Neither of those dreams could compare to the beautiful pregnant woman.

Murrell had been in love twice in his short life, both times with girls he’d known as

friends. Neither had reciprocated his feelings.

During those early encounters with amore, Shawn had felt a lightness in his heart. He’d

been devoted to those girls, but he’d still been able to function like a normal human being, he

hadn’t gone tharn.

This lady though...He was stricken mute by her beauty. He hoped that when he did finally

speak, he didn’t sound like a complete ass-head.

Murrell heard the woman’s gentle footfalls behind him and to the right, the closer she

came the harder his heart pounded. His breath was coming in laborious gasps. His skin was hot

enough to melt lead on.

Shawn walked around Pastore’s left side as the woman took to his right. Murrell tried to

steal a glance at her, but his neck felt paralyzed by a series of well placed steel rods.

Armando was beginning to stir. When his eyes opened, they rested on Christine. It was

difficult to determine who gasped first, the woman or the man, but the two sounded like one.

“You.”, they said in a whisper, the word followed by quizzical looks.

“I...I have to sit down...I’m gonna go upstairs.” Christine said, her face ashen from seeing

the man from her nightmare. She couldn’t help wondering, If he’s real, what about the Pale

Woman?

“You want any help up, y’know, someone to lean on?” John asked, his mind working


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furiously over the connection he’d witnessed between Christine and Armando.

“No. No, thank you.”

Shawn watched the confusion ebb from the woman’s face, a new emotion arriving to fill

the void. She wasn’t angry or indignant at Pastore’s offer, she was simply a woman who

preferred to help herself. Shawn tried to root out something petty in the woman’s demeanor,

keeping himself open to the slightest hint of something vile.

He felt none.

He fell deeper in love.

For the umpteenth time Shawn repeated the question, What was happening to him?!

Now that the initial wave of emotion had receded somewhat, Shawn saw depth in the

woman’s eyes. Above anything else, he perceived monumental strength. Not the cruel,

unyielding hunger to control anyone who came within her sphere of influence; Instead, there was

a...a power. Courage. A strength Shawn had never encountered before.

Shawn had run across a few spiritually powerful people in his life, but this lady...

She scared the living shit out of him.

Shawn watched her mount the winding marble stairs. Not in a leering sexual way

(although he’d be a lying sack of shit if he said he didn’t feel any lust for the girl) but with

something like...Dammit! His friggin’ brains were so toasted he couldn’t contemplate anything

for long. As long as this beautiful woman was in the vicinity, he wouldn’t be able to function.

Shawn watched the woman walk. She didn’t have the gait of the typical pregnant woman,

or any kind of human for that matter. Her limbs flowed with poetic grace, every step sure and

steady. She had the bearing of a wolf.. The fresh, pristine air contributed to the sense that Shawn

was in the company of someone who didn’t belong in the city that surrounded her. Murrell

thought the girl’s long, golden tresses could have easily passed for the pelt of a predator, a

denizen of the trees and shadows.

Her azure eyes were what cemented this impression. As the woman vanished on the third

floor landing, Murrell recalled, as clearly as he did his own name, the breathtaking blue that had

captured his soul and even in the woman’s absence refused to release him. They were sharp.

Clear.

Not human. Like a wolf.

Murrell’s ribs ached with the strain his erratic heartbeat delivered on them. Whatever it


133

was about this woman; her face, her eyes, what-have-you, she frightened him. When she had

stood beside him, Shawn had felt like running for his life. He’d wanted to peel out of the library

and find a nice, warm hole to scrabble himself away and figure out what had happened.

But an equal amount wanted him to stay.

Murrell hungered so desperately for another look into the girl’s eyes that his legs almost

gave out. He would have hazarded a glance, but his damn neck was frozen. Everything was.

Now that the lady was out of sight, Murrell’s faculties were gradually returning. His

hands still experienced that same phantom tremor, otherwise he’d regained total control of his

body.

Okay, so his breath was a little hard to draw and his legs were as steady as stalks of warm

Jell-O, but his heartbeat was back to normal.

Almost.

Shawn stood staring up the empty staircase, his gaping mouth drawing inordinate amounts

of icy air, and he realized that he couldn’t recall the details of the woman’s face. Like a dream on

the cusp of waking, her face had been erased from his memory. The sensations she had awakened

were still with him, but her image was hazy.

In the span of ten minutes, maybe less, Shawn had experienced an emotion more potent

than anything he’d felt in his twenty-three years. All from one beautiful stranger.

This was one weird damn day.

“Shawn?”

Murrell blinked and looked around, the girl’s dulcet voice had had the same narcotic

affect on his ears as her eyes had had on his heart. It was only after he heard his name spoken a

second time that he realized Pastore was addressing him.

“Yoo-hoo, Shawny-boy, you with me now? Christ, you act like you’ve never seen a

woman before.”

“Not like her.” He said gruffly, settling himself on one of the snow sprinkled steps. He

didn’t feel the cold.

Pastore looked at Murrell and couldn’t help but smile and utter a small laugh. Armando

didn’t see any of this transpire, he was still in shock from seeing Glynis’ Fair Christian in the

flesh. For the first time in his never ending life, Armando Moreno experienced fear. They had

landed exactly where Glynis had desired them. What if it was within her power to procure


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anything she desired?

Including him.

What frightened Armando most wasn’t the thought of being manipulated by the Vampire,

but that he might not mind it.

“Murrell, man, your ticker was going off the charts there, you all right now?” Although

Pastore recognized the severity of their predicament, and the importance of puzzling out how

Armando and Christine had recognized one another, he hadn’t seen anyone so beaten-in-the-jaw-

with-a-jack- hammer in love that he couldn’t help but take an interest.

“I-I-I. Pfff, willya listen to me. I...It’s just...” Shawn opened his hands and shrugged,

shaking his head.

“I know,” Pastore said, satisfied that his instinct and observation had led him to a correct

conclusion. “I know what love at first sight is like, happened to me a long time ago. I’ll tell ya

about it if we live long enough. First thing’s first...’Mondo!” Pastore returned his attention to the

Peruvian.

Armando jumped at his name, he felt shame burning his face under Pastore’s scrutiny.

Glynis’ supple, milk-white flesh was still fresh in his mind, the image slithering into his mind as

smoothly and stealthily as a python into a child’s crib. Armando knew he wouldn’t be able to

conceal much from John, the Mon...Guardian’s powers of perception were keener than a razor’s

kiss. He prayed Pastore wasn’t his usual intuitive self due to the trust their longstanding

relationship had forged. Judging from the Guardian’s eyes, he hadn’t sensed anything abnormal

in Armando’s behavior.

Armando was pleased that his thoughts were still his own, and that concealing them was

so easy. Despite his temporary lapse in concentration, he found himself savoring the thought of

Glynis’ flawless flesh. He could see the Vampire draped in the sheer gown of his dream, the

soaking cloth clutching the curves of her breasts and thighs. Before Armando toppled back into

his lustful musings, he gathered enough sense to address his friend.

“You know that girl.” John said, it was a statement not a question. He’d seen a glimmer

of fear and confusion in the Immortal’s eyes, but he attributed it to Armando’s mysterious

connection to Christine.

Armando swallowed and nodded.

“She is the Fair Christian from my dream. The woman Glynis spoke of.”


135

Armando recounted his meeting with Glynis to John and Murrell. When he was though,

Shawn was as bewildered as Pastore was livid.

“Fair Christian.” Pastore growled, his temper climbing several notches at the thought of a

child being cheated of its right to choose its fate. Bitch must’ve found a sense of humor since we

torched her.”

“How so?” Armando found nothing humorous in the Nosferatu’s plans.

“The girl’s name is Christine. It means ‘Fair Christian’, cunt’s trying to be cute. I’m

telling you, if she gets within ten yards of that girl or her kid I’ll tear her fuckin’ face off and

build a tool box outta her bones.”

Pastore’s shape grew progressively muscular with every word spoken. His shoulders

were hunched, his short, thick fingers curled into claws. Thick black and gray hairs sprouted in

patches along his arms and neck.

The metamorphosis had not gone unnoticed.

After listening to Armando’s story and taking into consideration Pastore’s earlier rantings,

Shawn believed himself to be in the company of two clearly insane people. His doubts receded at

the sight of Pastore’s transfiguration.

“Holy...” he murmured and began his low, nervous singing.

“We’ve gotta bring the fight to ‘er Mondo, we do it now! Tonight!” Pastore’s canines

lengthened considerably, looking very much at home in his rapidly elongating jaw.

“No more of this waiting shit! We know where she is, we go and we skrag her ass and

every fuckin’ blood sucker in the place—“

“No!” Armando thundered. Although weakened from his recent mental and physical

trials, his voice and manner still conveyed authority.

Murrell watched the exchange with a mind swiftly spiraling toward collapse. What his

eyes witnessed, his brain wouldn’t accept; A man who should have been reduced to a fine red

mist with the occasional chunk of meat and bone, and a man morphing into what resembled a

wolf.

His surroundings felt solid enough. The marble beneath him chilled and numbed the flesh

it touched and Shawn’s heart was still palpitating from his encounter with Christine.

The relative warmth of the shelter allowed feeling to return to Shawn’s lacerated right

hand, suggesting to him with its clean, pulsing agony that he wasn’t sleeping. He drummed his


136

fingers through the air, grunting and wincing as his tendons and raw flesh wailed in protest. The

pitted cartilage of his knuckles throbbed and felt as if they’d doubled in size since entering the

library, now he knew how his Granny felt on wet, snowy days when her arthritis acted up. Shawn

clenched his fist, hoping the pain would lend his thoughts a little clarity, the way punching the

concrete had freed him from the thrall of the wolves and cats.

The flexing didn’t work. He was growing dizzier by the moment, if his disorientation

didn’t end soon, he’d probably pass out, crack his head on the floor and die from a split melon.

The thought occurred to Shawn to slam his fist into the marble, as he had on Lexington.

If he further damaged his hand and shrieked in agony, removing any doubt in his mind that his

recent encounters were products of his slumbering synapses. Either that or he’d wake up in bed,

safe and warm, with his mom bitching at him for punching a hole in the drywall.

One way or the other he would know for sure.

Shawn cocked his arm and clenched his fist tighter, the action equal to driving a three-

quarter inch drill bit through the center of his forearm. Scarlet beads shivered and fell from his

abraded knuckles.

The whirlwind in his skull had been diffused by anticipation of the impact; the snapping

of his bones, the mashing of his tissue, the splitting of cartilage. He saw himself pummeling the

step and realized what an asinine move it would be.

The bottom line was, If he was dreaming, he’d wake up. If it wasn’t...

If it wasn’t then there was a lot more to the Universe than he’d ever dreamed.

Murrell relaxed and lowered his hand, shaking out the kinks as it went. He’d been so

consumed with his agony that he’d failed to notice Pastore and Armando watching him.

“Don’t mind me,” he said gruffly, trying, with a smirk, to make light of what must have

looked like a psychotic episode.

I’m worrying about them? One flattened a building and the other could star in a

National Geographic special.

“I was just putting myself through a little reality check.”

Pastore nodded. From the look of things, the little man had taken a little inventory

himself, his features had resumed their human semblance. John’s shoulders and hands, however,

remained sheathed in muscle and fur.

Pastore had scrutinized Shawn carefully, gauging his usefulness against Glynis by his


137

reaction to the spectacular events unfolding around him. Pastore knew from centuries of

experience that humans weren’t exactly thrilled with the unknown, their reactions usually ranged

from killing themselves to killing the object of their fear.

Thankfully, Shawn did neither.

If Murrell had chosen to mangle himself further, Pastore would have counted him out of

any action taken against the Nosferatu. Anyone who put more trust in physical sensation then in

their instincts would be useless. Pastore guessed Shawn would have been more inclined to pound

his paw into mush if he hadn’t seen Christine.

Pastore could read in the man’s heart-rate, facial expressions and body language that

Shawn had suddenly and quite unexpectedly fallen hard for the girl. The woman hadn’t simply

opened new doors or windows in Murrell’s soul...she’d knocked the damn walls in.

As much as John hated thinking of people as pawns, Murrell’s feelings would be an asset

if Glynis’ threats were directed at the girl.

“So why should we wait?” Pastore asked Armando, cooling himself off and Shifting

completely to his human guise.

“The Vampire we knew is extinct. We are dealing with an untested quantity now and

must proceed with caution, despite the severity of the threat.”

John grumbled something under his breath and rose, his arms and shoulders showing no

sign of their recent metamorphosis.

“Fine, but as long as that Esclava is still breathing, I don’t wanna leave Christine

unguarded.”

Pastore started up the stairs, not waiting to see whether Armando or Murrell followed.

If you enjoyed this sample, please stop by my page on Amazon.com,

iTunes or Barnes & Noble and buy the rest of the story.

©Copyright Thomas Staab 2017

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Documents

Vampire’s Waltz · Vampire’s Waltz by Thomas Staab 3 CHAPTER ONE An hour before sunrise on a sullen Wednesday morning, Armando Moreno stood at the intersection of Greenpoint Avenue