His Vampyrrhic Bride (31 page)

The woman with the baby stood up. ‘My God, she must be the one that’s making it smash down the door.’

Her point got thunderous emphasis when Helsvir slammed into the other side.

‘If you control that thing, make it go away,’ demanded Phil.

‘I can’t . . . I don’t know how.’

‘You better,’ screeched Bolter. ‘Otherwise, we’ll open the door and chuck you right out there. You better be able to control it then, or it’s gonna rip you—’

‘Shut up.’ Tom had heard enough. He put his arm round Nicola’s shoulders. ‘Nicola doesn’t know when she’s controlling it. Until tonight she didn’t even believe it was real.’

‘Liar!’ snapped Bolter.

Mrs Bekk rose to her feet. ‘It’s true. Ever since Nicola was twelve she’s had a kind of rapport . . . a bond of some sort with Helsvir. But it’s like she’s sleepwalking when she controls it. Nicola doesn’t know she’s giving it orders.’

The door crashed again.

Phil grunted. ‘Another couple of those, and it’s going to blow the door wide open.’

Tom couldn’t disagree. One of the iron hinges had snapped clean through.

A deathly silence followed. The air of tension tightened everyone’s nerves to the point Tom felt sure they’d soon start screaming in panic.

‘Here he comes,’ sang Bolter. ‘Here he comes . . .’

Another crash tore through the building. The massive door buckled. The force of that blow knocked the key from the lock, sending it clattering across the stone floor.

Everyone stared at the door; they expected it to give way at any moment. Of course, that’s when Helsvir would storm into the church. People clamped their hands over their ears as the furious thunder of what appeared to be fists beating at the timber grew louder and louder . . .

Nicola ran to the door; she pressed both palms against its woodwork. In a loud, clear voice she called out: ‘Go away. Stop that. Stop attacking the door. My name’s Nicola Bekk. I order you to stop.’

The abrupt silence that followed seemed like a physical presence. Everyone rubbed their ears, wondering if the sheer cacophony of clattering had damaged their hearing.

‘See,’ said the woman with the baby. ‘Nicola Bekk can make it stop. She only had to tell it.’ Her eyes narrowed as she stared at Nicola. ‘But you never really wanted it to stop, did you? You want to watch us being torn apart by your pet!’

‘You’ve always treated my family like vermin!’ Nicola’s blue eyes flashed with anger. ‘You turned us into outcasts. For years, people have done their utmost to hurt our family.’

Chester shook his head in astonishment. ‘Nicola Bekk can actually speak. I’m sorry I doubted you, Tom.’

However, before Tom could utter a heartfelt
I told you so
, Phil turned on Nicola. ‘Even as a child you were insane. You were always running out of school in the middle of lessons. Yes, we heard what you were like. Your damn mother was just the same.’

Nicola glared at the man. ‘Is it any wonder I seemed strange as a child? Every day I went to school I was bullied. Even the teachers treated me as if I wasn’t human. They decided I was the peculiar little creature from the backwoods; something to be tolerated, not educated. So is it really surprising that I was too frightened to speak to other children? Or that every day I’d run home with my head down?’ She raked her finger at the people there. ‘Because your children threw stones at me. They chased me out of your precious village and back into the forest. Sometimes they caught me, then they pulled my hair, punched me – they made me feel that I didn’t deserve to breathe the same air as them.’

In the silence that followed, the men and women stared down at the floor, too ashamed to meet her gaze. Tom realized that Nicola had made them see an important truth that they’d hidden from themselves: that the population of Danby-Mask had bullied the Bekk family for generations. The bullying and the violence had been so routine, and so deeply entrenched, that the villagers didn’t even seem to realize that this habitual abuse was wrong.

Joshua spoke up: ‘Nicola Bekk speaks the truth, doesn’t she? You mistreated this woman and her family.’

Nobody could look the priest in the eye; they kept their gaze downward.

‘If you examine your conscience, and you recognize that it would be right to ask forgiveness from this woman, then I invite you to do just that.’

Before anyone could speak, Nicola hissed, ‘Don’t bother. I’ve got better things to do than listen to their self-pity. I’m going to stop Helsvir doing what he was created to do. And that is ripping you sorry bastards apart.’

Nicola suddenly ran. At first Tom was afraid that she’d open the door, which would, of course, allow the creature to storm the building and rip its occupants to bloody pieces. However, she dashed through an archway at the end of the church. He grabbed a flashlight from the table and followed.

What was she planning to do? After witnessing her in action today, he couldn’t begin to guess.

Other than it would be unexpected, dramatic, and undoubtedly dangerous.

N
icola must have realized that access to the church tower lay behind the archway. Tom quickly found himself following her up the spiral staircase towards the roof.
What’s she going to do?
he asked himself with a growing sense of alarm.
She’s not going to throw herself off the tower, is she?
An icy blast of fear ran down his spine.
Because anything seems possible tonight . . . absolutely anything. The village lies underwater. A monster has trapped us in the church . . .

Thoughts of what might happen to those children downstairs made his blood run cold. If Helsvir attacked them? If they became part of its grotesque body? A young child’s head, and a baby’s head, among those heads of men and women that budded from its grey flesh? He shuddered.

Nicola paused as she climbed the steps. ‘I was harsh with those people down there, wasn’t I? When I told them that they’d made my life hell.’

‘They needed to know the truth. You were the victim, not them.’ He stretched out his hand.

She reached back and gently squeezed Tom’s fingers. He could tell she was pleased to have him here.

‘You’re not thinking of doing anything too extreme up there, are you?’

She gave a grim smile. ‘When I told Helsvir to back off from the door, it obeyed. I’m going to put my powers of command to the ultimate test.’

‘Whatever you do, don’t put yourself in danger.’

She shook her head. ‘That’s why I’m going to do my commanding from the top of the tower.’

‘What are you going to do?’

‘Tell it to disappear for good.’

‘That might not work. When you’ve given it orders before, you’ve always been in a trance.’

‘You’ve seen me do that before, Tom?’

Quickly, he told her about the night he was attacked by Bolter and his pals at Mull-Rigg Hall. He described how Helsvir had rushed out of the wood to protect her. He also told her that he believed the first time he encountered Helsvir was the night he first met Nicola. Helsvir had flung him away into the trees as easily as if he was a child’s doll.

‘All of which means,’ he told her, ‘is that you’ve got an extremely loyal bodyguard. Helsvir has been trying his hardest to protect you and your family.’

‘You’re not trying to protect
him
, are you?’

‘No. But that ugly ball of hate and dead people genuinely cares for you.’

He could tell from her expression that she was thinking about what he’d said as she turned away to continue climbing the spiral staircase. He followed, shining the light for her, although neither of them could see for more than five or six feet ahead at any one time. The spiral was incredibly tight. Anyone coming down in the other direction would have a hell of a job passing.

Just pray we don’t meet Helsvir
, was Tom’s ominous thought.
Nicola might be safe, but he doesn’t like me one little bit. He? Why am I thinking of that monster as He? I need to focus on the thing being an ‘it’ – an ‘it’ that should be destroyed.

They climbed past the workings of the church clock. No ‘tick’ or ‘tock’ came from the mechanism. The clock’s motor was dead now the power supply had failed. He could see the silhouette of the hands through the opaque glass. They’d stopped at three thirty. He checked his own watch. The time fast approached midnight. Thoughts of midnight – the witching hour – made him uneasy. Danger floated on the air. He could almost reach out and touch that sense of dread. And DANGER was getting closer by the moment.

Moments later, they passed the church bells that hung inside the tower. They were ancient pieces of cast bronze as large as a domestic fridge. The bells hung silently in the void. There was something uncanny about them – as if they wanted to shout that evil had been released into the world. For the moment, however, they were stifled. Silent. They weren’t permitted to peal out their warning.

Tom shook his head. ‘Damn it, this place starts to work on your imagination, doesn’t it?’

‘It used to work on mine,’ she said. ‘When I was a girl, I was convinced this church would be the place where I’d die.’ With that, she pushed open the hatchway to the roof.

Tom moved quickly. He didn’t want her outside by herself. What he saw made him catch his breath. The landscape had been transformed into an extraordinary realm. He stared at his surroundings in wonder.

Tom and Nicola stood on top of the tower, a full seventy feet above the ground. The lake formed by the flood stretched out for miles along the valley. A layer of thick, white mist floated above the water; the low-lying vapour was decidedly eerie as it gleamed in the moonlight. There was even less of the village to see now that the mist had joined forces with the water to engulf the buildings. Just here and there, chimneys poked up above the phantom blanket of white.

‘It’s beautiful,’ she breathed. ‘Beautiful and frightening at the same time.’

He put his arm around her delicate shoulders as she trembled. ‘Helsvir’s gone,’ he told her.

‘You think so?’

‘I don’t see him, do you?’

‘You’re calling Helsvir “him” again.’

‘Force of habit.’

Her eyes were serious. ‘When we refer to Helsvir by name, or call it “him”, or talk about what
he’s
done . . . don’t you think that helps
it
embed itself in our world? I mean, the more we treat the thing as being real, the more
real
it becomes.’

‘Do you think if we ignore him – it – it’ll stop being real?’

‘I don’t know, Tom. Maybe I’m just trying to find a way – any kind of way – to make him disappear for good.’ She clicked her tongue. ‘There I go, calling a knotted up bunch of dead people “him”.’

Embracing her, he kissed her forehead. ‘Despite all this
madness
, kissing you makes me feel so warm . . . and so great inside. I want to be able to kiss you every day.’

‘I want you to kiss me every day.’ She gave a sad, sweet smile. ‘Only, there’s so much out there trying to stop that from happening.’

‘We’ll find a way.’

‘You really want to?’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ He spoke softly, but her:
You really want to?
hurt as much as sharp teeth ripping away at some sensitive part of him inside.

‘What I mean,’ she whispered, ‘is if you left here, and went to Greece to start your diving school, then everything would be like it was before you came to Mull-Rigg Hall. You’d be safe. I’d go back to living my life with my mother.’

‘Is that what you want?’

She didn’t answer. Tom thought she was going to tell him it was over: that they were finished. No more kisses. No wedding. He could picture her saying: ‘
So goodbye and get lost.
’

Then, as he stood there with his arms round her, he felt her head go suddenly heavy. ‘Helsvir . . .’ she breathed. ‘Helsvir. He burnt our house down . . .’

‘Nicola?’ Gently, he raised her head. Straight away, he knew she was slipping into that trance again. Her eyes were only part open.

‘
Helsvir. Come.
’

Tom looked out across the mist-covered waters.

Oh . . . he’s coming alright.
Tom saw a shadowy object moving just beneath the mist. Like a torpedo, it sped along the flooded street. Even from up here he heard the swirl of water.

Nearer . . . nearer . . .

Nicola had summoned this supernatural bodyguard of the Bekk family. She’d told it in her own way that Bolter had destroyed her home.
There’s unfinished business at the church. A crime that must be avenged . . .

Tom knew the church door couldn’t take any more punishment. Two or three full-blooded hits from the thing would smash it down. Then that ugly body of dead flesh would squeeze through the doorway in order to rip everyone apart. Chester. The adults. The children.

Gently, he shook her. ‘Nicola. Wake up.’

No response. Her eyes possessed a strange dullness.

‘Nicola, Helsvir’s on its way!’

The monster swam closer. Tom caught glimpses of dreadful faces that bulged from its body. The eyes were wide and staring at the church.

‘
Nicola?
’

The trance gripped her. ‘Helsvir . . . Helsvir . . .’

‘Nicola, don’t let it attack the door – it won’t hold out this time!’

Helsvir continued to speed beneath the white mist. The churchyard wall lay just a few inches below the surface of the water. This forced the creature to haul itself over the stonework into the graveyard. Briefly, he glimpsed the truck-sized body that was studded with dozens of human heads. A moment later, Helsvir flopped down into the deeper water that covered the path.

A second after that it hammered through the water towards the door.

‘Hey! Up here! It’s me you want, you ugly bastard!’ Tom yelled at the creature. He waved his free hand as he supported Nicola with the other. ‘Come and get me. Come on!’

He gambled on the height of the church tower saving him.

He gambled wrong.

The creature plunged towards the base of the tower. Soon it hauled itself from the water. Then it began to climb. Its dozens of human arms still possessed dexterous fingers – they dug into holes that had been weathered in the stone blocks.