Death Deceives: Book Three (Mortis Vampire Series) (18 page)

I decided going in through the front door would be a bad idea so kept to the shadows and rounded the building to the back. Boards had been nailed across the back door
as well. Going in that way would be far too noisy. Peering upwards, I noticed that most of the windows were missing. Picking one on the first floor, I jumped and landed lightly on the sill.

A neighbouring building
blocked the weak moonlight and prevented it from penetrating the darkness. I waited for my night vision to kick in before entering. The room was devoid of furnishings so I didn’t need to worry about bumping into anything. Avoiding broken glass, I crossed the mouldy carpet of what had once been a small bedroom.

Taking a quick
tour, I found a much larger bedroom, a bathroom and combination living-dining-kitchen area. The apartment was bigger than my old home but size was the only thing it had going for it. The walls were mildewed, the carpet squished beneath my feet and the air was stale and musty.

I smelled something else wafting through the open door that led
to a hallway. The stench of fresh and not so fresh corpses permeated the area. Unless a wild animal had taken up residence in the building, this was definitely a vampire lair. Personally, I didn’t know how they could live with the smell. It was a wonder they hadn’t been discovered by humans by now.

Following my nose, I located the cache of bodies several doors down. Ten dead, naked humans had been piled haphazardly in an empty living room. None wore looks of horror
. They seemed to be at peace, which told me they had been hypnotized before they’d been murdered.

Their pale bodies were
speckled with dried blood. I didn’t have to be a coroner to figure out the cause of their deaths. Gaping wounds had been carved into their chests. Crouching beside the freshest corpse, I studied her neck and found no signs of recently healed fang marks. Frowning, I checked her arms and legs and came up blank. For reasons I couldn’t possibly comprehend, the vamps hadn’t drained the dead. They’d just cut them open and stolen their hearts.

What sort of weirdos are they?
The only way I would find an answer to that was to sneak into the basement and spy on them.

At the far end of
the hallway, I located a set of stairs leading down. The cement steps were encrusted with dirt and I winced at every scuff noise my feet made. At the bottom, a hallway branched out in two directions. To the right was a foyer that had been emptied of furniture long ago. To the left was a heavy, rusty metal door. The door had the word ‘Basement’ printed on it in Russian.

T
hrough the closed door, I heard muffled voices. Cocking my head to the side, I tried to make out what they were saying.
It almost sounds like someone is chanting down there,
I thought uneasily. In my vast horror movie watching experience, chanting was never a good sign. Turning the aged doorknob, I pushed the door open and descended into the dimly lit basement.

Candlelight flickered on the brick wall
s below. It danced as if a breeze had found its way beneath the ground. Creeping down slowly, I reached a corner and dropped down to one knee. I hadn’t been wrong, someone was chanting softly in what I believed were random Latin words. My weird brain translated the words automatically but they made no sense. Then the chanting ceased.

“Oh
, Unholy Matron,” a male vampire said in French. “Your unworthy worshipers offer you this sacrifice. Take this human unto yourself and know that we obey your every command.”

Peeking around the corner, I
took in the dozen black robed vampires kneeling around a naked woman. Like the other victims that had preceded her, she’d been hypnotized into submission. She lay on the cold, dirty cement floor without protest. Short, fat white candles sat in a circle around her. From the amount of melted wax and layers of old blood on the floor, this was where all of the sacrifices had been performed.

Studying
the twelve shadows that were thrown against the walls or floor, the only movement I detected was caused by the flickering light. If any of these vampires had been possessed, they would have been compelled to seek out the First. So what the hell were they doing here and who were they praying to?

Kneeling close to the sacrifice, a
couple of the vamps were dangerously close to catching on fire. Personally, I didn’t think it would be any great loss if they went up in flames even if none of them were yet possessed. Sacrificing humans was a definite no no in my book.

An effigy had been placed near the sacrifice’s head. It was
three foot high, rough wooden carving of a female vampire. I finally realized it was supposed to be me when I saw the crosses chiselled on her palms. Most of my kin hated and feared me, to my knowledge this was the first bunch to actively worship me.

Chanting a string of nonsense
Latin words that must have sounded impressive to the others, the lead worshiper drew a weapon from within his robes. Raising the bloodstained dagger over his head, he moved to plunge it into the woman’s chest. With first-hand knowledge of just how painful that tended to be, I was on the move before I’d even ordered my legs into action.

Dropping my backpack, I crossed
the room fast enough to blow out several of the candles. I caught the vamp’s wrist before his weapon could tear into the victim’s flesh. Despite my speed, I’d almost been too late. The dagger point made a small dimple in the human’s breast. A tiny bead of blood welled then trickled down her side. Dazed, vacant eyes blinked slowly and seemed not to see us at all.

My worshipper’s
hood fell back to reveal his shocked, pasty face. His cheeks were sunken, black bags crouched beneath his eyes and his fangs were too prominent. It appeared that he’d skipped more than a few meals lately. “Who are you?” he asked in French.

“I’m Nat.”
As soon as I said it, I winced, knowing what the response would be.

“Did she say g
nat? Isn’t that an insect?” one of the others muttered to the vamp next to her.

I put a finger
beneath my left eye as a tiny muscle tried to twitch. Really, you would think I should have learned my lesson by now. “My name is Nat-a-lie,” I enunciated the name for them. “But you can call me ‘Unholy Matron’ if you prefer.”

“How dare you
mock our faith!” the lead vampire snarled and futilely tried to yank his arm free.

“How dare I?” I said incredulously. “How dare
I
!” I was unaccountably enraged that these strangers were killing defenceless humans in my name. Standing, I dragged the worshipper to his feet then held my free hand up in front of his face. “I dare because I am Mortis, the creature you pathetic losers are pretending to worship.” I pointed to the wooden effigy and the robed vamp flinched at the cross on her palm that matched the one on mine. “Now, why don’t you try to explain to me why the hell you’re murdering humans in my name?” I wasn’t quite shouting but my voice rang out in the small room.

“You can’
t be Mortis,” a young male robed one said scornfully. When he pushed his hood back impatiently, I saw he was young in both human and vampire years. Twenty at the most, his eyes were still mostly green. His pupils were far larger than normal but I’d bet that he was even younger than I was as a vampire. He’d probably only recently gained control over both of the hungers that raged through us when we were new.

“Really?”
I replied sarcastically and made a point of examining the cross on my palm. Releasing the lead worshipper, I turned both of my palms to the small crowd. “So how do you explain these then?”

Recomposing
himself, the lead vamp straightened his robe and pulled the hood forward again to hide his emaciated face. “They are obviously fake, heretic.”

I turned to face him and he took the opportunity to plunge his dagger into my heart
. Staring down at the blade, fresh anger pulsed through me. “These leather outfits don’t grow on trees, you know,” I said and pulled the dagger free. “Look at that!” I pointed at the tear in both the coat and the black suit beneath it. My flesh had already knitted back together. “Who is going to sew this back up?” It wouldn’t be me, that was for sure.

Backing away, the cadaverous robed one tripped over the human. Sprawling,
he scrambled backwards into the arms of his followers. “You cannot be the Unholy Matron,” he said, shaking his head frantically in denial. While he wasn’t wearing a black suit, he looked very familiar. I had my suspicions about who he might be and where he had come from.

Leaning against the carving, I cocked an eyebrow as the cringing vamp came to a stop beside his followers.
“Why not?”

“Because
the true Mortis was beheaded and then cut into pieces.”

“Here’s a newsflash, I managed to put myself back together and claw my way out of the cemetery.”

“Impossible,” he murmured.

“
I can give you a demonstration of my powers if you like,” I said coldly. “Choose one of your followers to step forward and I’ll pop their head for them just like I did to the imposter me in the Comtesse’s white marble mansion.”

Faced with the truth that I really was Mortis, he still had difficulty believing it but wasn’t willing to sacrifice one of his flock. “But
you are so…uncouth,” he said in bewilderment.

“She’s Australian!” a familiar voice shouted from outside.
Thanks, Geordie,
I thought sarcastically. I could always rely on my friends to back me up.

“Ah. That explains it,” one of the robed ones muttered.

“Aventius,” the young male vamp said to his leader as he surged to his feet. “Are you going to let this creature defile our sacrificial chamber?”

Ave
ntius’ head swung from me to the sacrifice then back to his followers, undecided about their best course of action.

“Quickly, we must kill her before her friends arrive,” one of the others said.

“Hello?” I pointed at the tear in my suit. “He already stabbed me through the heart, remember? Don’t you know that I can’t be killed with normal weapons?”

Ignoring my sarcasm, the mob stood, drew weapons
from within their robes and rushed at me. Obviously they weren’t aware of the legend that was me and just how difficult it was to put me down.

With my enhanced speed, I shifted away from the human so she wouldn’t be trampled in the stampede. Both of my swords appeared in my hands but I was reluctant to chop my kin apart. We were a rapidly dwindling breed since most of us had now been converted into imps and many more were being drawn to the same fate.

Parrying and blocking, I easily held the mob off without sustaining any further tears in my
coat or suit. Young and cocky, the green eyed worshipper lunged forward and tried to stab me in the face with a rusty sword that had probably belonged to his great-great-great-grandfather.

Thinking fast, which was unlike me
, I parried his blow then grabbed him by the front of his robe. I spun him around so his back was to me and pinned his sword arm tightly against his chest. Now his friends would have to go through him to get to me. As I’d suspected, they halted their attack.

Ave
ntius motioned for his followers to lower their weapons. “What do you want from us, fiend?”

I’d been called many
unflattering things but that was a new one. “I want every new vampire I meet to stop trying to kill me.” A shrill giggle from outside followed my words. Geordie had moved closer to the condemned brick building and that meant all of my friends were near. “You might as well come in, guys,” I called out. “None of these people are possessed.” Not yet anyway but it was only a matter of time.

Sharing disturbed glances, the robed ones huddled together as my companions kicked in the front door and entered the building. In seconds, Luc reached my side. He raised a cool eyebrow at my
vampire shield. “Have you found yourself a pet, Natalie?”

“Let me go,” the sullen young man said and I pushed him away. Now that they were faced with five of their kin instead of just little old me, their bravado had fled.

“Lord Lucentio?” Aventius said and pushed his hood back.

“
Councillor Aventius,” my one true love replied with a rather formal nod. That confirmed my suspicions about where I’d seen the robed one before. He had been one of the figures cowering behind the Comtesse’s throne when she had ordered Luc to behead me. “You have been gone from the Court for several months and we feared you had perished.” I assumed the ‘we’ Luc was referring to was the Comtesse and the other seven Councillors. I doubted any of the courtiers particularly gave a crap what happened to their leaders.

Clasping his hands together, the hollow cheeked vamp cut a quick glance at me. “When I first heard the rumour that Mortis had at last risen, I formed this small group of believers.
I knew Mortis would not truly die when the Comtesse ordered her to be dismembered. As the Unholy Matron’s true followers, we were hoping to be spared from the decimation of our species that was prophesized over two thousand years ago.”