Heart of the Vampire (Vanderlind Castle) (25 page)

Kelly and Scott were both gripping the handlebars of their bikes for all they were worth, but that was the only indication either of them was willing to concede that he might feel tense in any way. The sound of Dave’s whistle piercing the air made them both sit up just a little, but besides that neither immediately reacted to it. “There’s the signal. Ready to go?” Scott finally asked, his voice casual.

“
If you’re afraid, go ahead,” Kelly replied.

Scott gestured in the direction of the Urchin with a half bow, “No, no, after you.”

“No, I insist. Age before beauty,” Kelly countered.

Scott kicked off and began madly pumping his bicycle’s pedals, raising a small cloud of dust. He called over his should back to Kelly, “Pearls before swine.” After stalling for a moment, Kelly started furiously pedaling in pursuit of his friend.

Back at the Urchin, Martin was trembling. He stood as close to the gate’s entrance as possible. “The others are coming. I can feel it,” he said in a hoarse whisper. “Why won't they hurry?” Without looking at him, Vance reached out and put a steadying hand on Martin’s shoulder.

“Here they come,” Dave said with some relief.

The rear guard made their appearance in the distance, using the full weight of their bodies to cranks the pedals, but still managing to zigzag dexterously around the larger fragments of rubble as they headed towards the gate. “And our buddies are right behind them,” Vance added, knowing the truth more than seeing it.

“Who?” Nick asked. He could barely make out Scott and Kelly on their bikes. There didn’t seem to be anyone following them.

As the sun was completely engulfed by the horizon, three enormous birds rose out of the darkness, flying through the air at an amazing speed. It was hard for the pilot to tell in the darkness, but they were each a good five or six feet in length and appeared to be pursuing the boys.

“Fuck.
 It's Old Gym,” Dave muttered, half under his breath.

Nick could feel Rick and Martin shifting on the ground behind him in agitation. “Asshole,” he heard Rick utter.

Vance fixed Nick with a steely glare. “We shouldn't have waited for you.”

“What are those things?” the pilot asked, too mesmerized to take offense at Vance’s words. “Birds?” No one answered him. They were intent on the efforts of the rear guard.

The creatures looked so peculiar. Not like birds at all. They didn’t flap their wings, or even appear to have wings, for that matter. An idea occurred to the pilot. “Men?” he wondered aloud. “Are those flying things men? How are they…?” he couldn’t even think of the words to finish his sentence. “What are they doing?”

The rear guard was getting closer, but so were the flying creatures. “Should we go inside?” Dave asked, his voice carried an edge like a scalpel.

“No,” Vance was firm. “We stand our ground until we can all go inside.” Turning, he thrust something into Nick’s hands. “Here, you might want this.”

Nick looked down at the sharpened wooden spike that had been pressed upon him. “What? Why?”

“Hurry!” Martin shrieked at the rear guard. Even though they were pedaling with all their might, their progress felt painstakingly slow. All of the scouting party had their bows nocked and ready for action.

Finally Scott and Kelly were nearing the gate, but their pursuers were almost upon them. “Get ready to close,” Vance shouted to the numerous faces watching from the windows.

Nick could feel the waves of tension radiating off the guys. “What the fuck are those things?” he demanded in frustration.

The largest of the three creatures swooped out of the sky and snatched a shrieking Scott right off of his bicycle.

“Vampires!” Vance shouted.

Chapter 2

Vance fired two arrows into the air in rapid succession causing the vampire to execute a feat of aerial acrobatics to avoid being hit. Scott contorted his body and wrenched himself free.

The creature looked on as his prey plummeted to the earth. Nick could have sworn he saw the vampire mouth the word, “Shit.”

Scott hit the ground and rolled. Kelly arrived at the gate and was instantly off his bike and ready for action. “Kelly. Rick. Retrieve Scott,” Vance ordered. “Dave. Martin. Give cover.”

As the two boys darted forward, each grabbing one of Scott’s arms and dragging him towards the gate, Vance, Dave, and Martin created a hailstorm of arrows to keep the vampires at bay. “Shut down.
 Now!” Vance shouted, without breaking his steady firing. Every window in the building immediately slammed closed, all enforced with heavily spiked shutters. There were two smaller vampires that hesitated out of range of the wooden projectiles, but the big one that had accosted Scott dove towards them without wavering. Vance fired off another accurate round of arrows, which the vampire deftly eluded by only twitching his body slightly to one side or the other.

“What the hell...?” Nick gulped, his throat dry.

“Get out of here, Gym, unless you want to get staked,” Vance roared. Another arrow was instantly nocked in his bow.

Old Gym fell back slightly and hovered at a distance, surveying them. “What are you trying to pull, Vance?” the vampire bellowed.

“Nothing,” the Vance growled. “Now, get out.” He drew the arrow in his bow back even further, but it didn’t appear to dissuade the vampire.

“You think that was smart?” The vampire hovered in the air with great ease as if he’d been flying since birth. “Saving some damn pilot that doesn’t even know how to fly a plane?”

“Hey,” Nick was about to protest, but then he realized the creature was right.

A small wind blew Vance’s dark hair in his eyes, but he didn’t so much as blink. “You have no authority here anymore.”

“Saving pilots,” the vampire groused half to himself. “That’s the kind of stupidity that’s going to get you killed.”

All three vampires laughed hysterically as if this was high humor. Without warning they abruptly made a break for the humans, rapidly propelling themselves through the air. Their advance was instantly repelled by a flight of arrows.

The small group on the ground staged a fighting retreat through the front gate. They backed towards the open door of the building, Nick moving with them. Rags woven into a heavy, intricate net had been strung between the gate and the building, making it more difficult for the vampires to get through, but only slightly impeding the trajectory of the arrows.

As soon as the little band stumbled into the front hall, two boys stationed on sentry duty inside the building instantly slammed the massive front door shut. They shot several metal bolts into place and then secured the whole thing with a metal crossbar that emitted a shriek like an old jail cell door being dragged closed. Safe inside, Rick unceremoniously released Scott. He would have smacked the stone floor hard, if Kelly hadn’t used his body to cushion his fall. “Dude, are you okay? I thought you were totally dead,” Kelly said as he roughly propped Scott’s head on his knee.

“For a minute, there, I thought I was dead, too,” Scott croaked.

Vance interrupted the quiet tête-à-tête by commanding, “Kelly, stick to procedure. Dave, check Scott for bites.”

Dave was already stepping forward with Rick right behind him. “It's okay. I'm not bit,” Scott said, struggling to get to his feet.

“You know the rules,” Dave closed in. “Let's go.”

Dave and Rick started roughly stripping Scott of his leathers. “Easy guys. I'm not bit.” Scott squawked in protest.

With the beating of his heart finally slowing in his chest, Nick became more aware of his surroundings. His eyes adjusted and he was able to look around the dimly lit front hall. It was cavernous with tall, narrow peaked windows that faced the front of the building, but were now heavily shuttered with reinforced wood. The remnants of a few torn curtains hung askew on broken curtain rods.
 An oil painting of a man on a Napoleon style rearing horse hung over the blocked fireplace, it’s canvas only slightly torn. There were rows upon rows of framed photographs, almost all of which were missing their glass, showing boys and young men lined up in military fashion, wearing matching gray uniforms. Crowded around him in the hall was a large group of lean and disheveled looking boys, most of whom were watching Scott get worked over. “What in the hell is all this?” the pilot murmured.

“I'm not bit,” Scott insisted, indignant. His protests echoed off the tall ceiling but doing little to dissuade the others from relieving him of all his clothes.

“He’s clean,” Dave announced, letting Scott drop to the ground with a dull thunk.

“Told you,” Scott said, sullenly, as he hiked up the pants of his leather suit.

“What happened to you guys out there?” Vance demanded. “Why were you so far back?”

“We...” Kelly couldn’t think of a plausible excuse. “We screwed up.” He confessed, hanging his head in shame.

Whirling around, Vance confronted Nick. “Saving you almost cost us a man.”

“I'm sorry,” the pilot stammered. “I had no idea. I mean, vampires, right? How was I supposed to know? It just,” Nick floundered for words. “It just doesn’t make any sense.”

“Next time you delay us, we'll leave you,” Vance snarled.

Martin crept up next to Vance and whispered in his ear, causing the older boy’s eyes to shift back in Nick’s direction. “You're right,” he said. Then, to Nick, “I'm afraid we're going to have to check you for bites.”

Nick stiffened. “Forget it, kid. No one's checking me for anything.”

Vance was not dissuaded. “Listen, we have procedures to follow. No one gets inside unless we're sure they're not going to vamp.”

“What? Don't be ridiculous.”

Vance signaled to Dave with a thrust of his chin. “Would you please check our guest?”

Dave, Kelly, and Rick stepped towards Nick. “You have three choices," Dave said in a matter-of-fact tone. “You can strip. We can strip you. Or you can go outside.”

Nick scanned the faces surrounding him. They were deadly serious. “Okay, fine," he capitulated setting his satchel gently on the stone floor.
  "If it'll make you guys feel better." He quickly shrugged out of his bomber jacket, yanked off his button down and t-shirt, then unbuckled his jeans and dropped them around his ankles, not bothering to remove his laced up boots. “Satisfied?” he asked, unwilling to be embarrassed.

Dave gestured towards his boxer shorts. “Drop 'em.”

Nick thought about protesting, but he knew it would do no good. He had the vague recollection of some of his old buddies talking about pledge week at various fraternity houses. The pilot shed his boxer shorts down to his ankles.

Vance barely looked in Nick’s direction. Instead, he half turned to question Dave. “Who's first watch tonight?”

“Owen’s squad.”

“Tell him to be on high alert. Something tells me we're not done for the night.”

Dave jerked his head towards Nick, who had figured he’d been on display long enough and was hastily yanking up his boxers. “What do we do with him?”

Vance shrugged “Let him get dressed.”

Copyright © 2013 Adrianne Ambrose

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and publisher of this book.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and everything else are a product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously.

Visit the author at:

http://gaylatwist.blogspot
.com

@gaylatwist

And on Facebook under Gayla Twist ;)