In the Blood (32 page)

Howell clucked his tongue in disapproval. "I wouldn't bother trying to get a better
grip on your senses if I were you. It won't do you any good. This room- my 'secret
laboratory' if you will-is located in Ghost Trap's attic, at an intersection of several
architectural impossibilities. The barriers separating the space-time continuum are
very thin here, weighting the probability factors for my experiments in my favor.

Morgan and his loathsome renfields shun this place. I like it. It helps me think. Here
I'm free to plot my vengeance against Morgan."

"Vengeance?"

Howell smiled a junkie's smile. "I mean to see the bastard stew in his own juices! I
want to see him broken like Dresden china in a trash dump! I want to see the look
on his face when he realizes his dreams of godhood have been ground to paste! Just
as he destroyed my hopes and dreams so many years ago. The monster sorely
misjudged me, and now he's paying for it. He and his loathsome little skull-peepers
find my thoughts opaque. I confuse them by thinking in terms of formulae. And
thanks to the interference generated by certain... inhibiting factors in my
bloodstream, my thought processes are hard to decipher. Surrounded by a nest of
telepaths, I've kept my thoughts to myself for over five years!"

"But you're working for this guy, aren't you? You helped him create Anise and
Fell."

Howell frowned. "I am Dr. Brainard Howell. Does the name mean anything to
you?"

"Uh, well, I..."

"Well, does it?"

"No"

"And why should it?! For years I've been under Morgan's thrall, locked away from
my fellow scientists. Unable to communicate my discoveries. Kept incommunicado
while slaving to find a way to restructure human DNA into that of a vampire's
without the use of actual venom. In the time I've succeeded in stealing for myself,
I've worked miracles! "

He pointed to a shelf lined with glass jars similar to the one that housed the
changeling. Palmer could dimly make out the forms of a tiny triceratops,
tyrannosaur and stegosaur curled inside the jars like chicken embryos.

"And there is no one to see! No one to nominate me for a Nobel prize! No one to
make sure my name goes down in the history books along with Pasteur! Einstein!

Salk!"

"You left out Frankenstein, Mengele and Benway."

Howell jabbed a finger at him. "Don't get smart, Palmer! I could stick you with a
hypo full of miracle juice that would make your amino acids square dance. 'Swing

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your partner! Do-si-do! He's got three eyes and no more nose!' How'd you like that,
Mr. 'I'm My Own Man'?!" The scientist's pupils contracted into pinpricks.

"Calm down, Doc! I didn't mean anything by it! Honest!" Palmer lifted his hands in
deference. "But if you hate Morgan so much, how come you're working for him?"

"Human weakness-something creatures of Morgan's ilk are adept at exploiting. I
was working at a minor research facility in Colorado when I first made Morgan's
acquaintance. I had acquired a fondness for certain... chemicals... during my post-graduate studies. I found that heroin and other opiates helped to stimulate and
focus my thought processes. They enhanced my powers of concentration, much like
Sherlock Holmes and his infamous seven percent solution. Genius, Mr. Palmer, has
its price.

"Somehow, Morgan learned of my foible. He came to me and threatened to expose
my secret vice to my superiors if I didn't agree to work for him. I still had no idea of
who-or what-he truly was. Even though he'd essentially blackmailed me into his
employ, I did not find much to dislike about my situation. I was paid three times my
previous salary and given access to the most technologically advanced-and
expensive-equipment available in the field. Plus, my new employer provided a
steady supply of narcotics for my personal use. What was there not to like?

"It wasn't until I was relocated to this place that I learned what he really was! That
was five years ago. I have been a virtual prisoner in this house ever since. During
that time I have been an unwilling participant in his plan to create a race of living
vampires. It took five hundred experimental subjects before I perfected the serum
used on the test group that produced Anise and Fell. Five hundred. Even then, the
mortality rate was still eighty percent."

"You sound real calm about that."

"Do I?" Howell sighed, rolling up the sleeve of his coat, exposing a pale, surprisingly
hairy arm. The inside of his left elbow looked like a pincushion. He took a small
plastic bag of white powder from his breast pocket and mixed it with distilled water
into a beaker suspended over a flickering Bunsen burner. "Appearances can be
deceiving, Mr. Palmer," he murmured, wrapping a length of rubber tubing above
his elbow. "Very deceiving."

Sonja scanned the downstairs, finding no traces of renfield activity. Not that she
expected any. For some reason, Morgan had effectively slaughtered his few
remaining servants by commanding them into the outer house. That still left the
Asian she'd seen back at the Shadow Box, the one Fell claimed was Morgan's heavy
gun. High-caliber renfields weren't exactly easy to come by, and Morgan sure as hell
wouldn't waste one by marching it into a meat grinder like the Ghost Trap.

Fell drifted after her, gazing in fascination at the sections of the house he'd never
been permitted to enter. Besides the three rooms that had served as Anise and Fell's
suite, the downstairs consisted of a retrofitted country kitchen, several large, disused
parlors full of dusty Victorian love seats and moth-eaten mounted fox heads and
what had once been a conservatory before the panes had been bricked in.

They paused at the foot of the staircase that led to the second and third floors, Sonja
leaning on the banister. "What's upstairs?"

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"Dr. Howell's laboratory and Morgan's library study. I'm not sure what else. The
renfields' quarters are on the third floor. I-" He frowned and fell silent, as if
listening to distant music. "Did you hear that?"

"What?"

"Someone called my name. It sounded like- There it goes again!"

Sonja scowled. "Kid, I don't hear a damned thing."

Fell trembled like a foal trying out its legs for the first time. "Oh my God, it's her!

It's Anise!"

Sonja grabbed Fell's elbow, shaking him in time to her words. "Fell! Listen me to
me! It's a trick! Anise is dead! This is Morgan's doing!"

Fell's face twisted into a grimace as he jerked his arm free of her grip. "How do you
know she's dead? Were you there? Did you see her die?"

"No, but-"

"Then how can you be so sure she's dead?" He peered into the darkness at the top
of the stairs. "Anise? Is that you, darling?" He smiled and turned to his companion,
pointing toward the second-story landing. "You heard her that time, didn't you?

She's alive, Sonja! Alive!" He began sprinting up the stairs three at a time.

"Fell, no! Don't!" Sonja grabbed his wrist, trying her best to hold him back without
resorting to force. "It's not Anise! It can't be!"

Fell spun about, his fangs bared and eyes glinting red, and punched her squarely on
the jaw. Sonja hadn't been expecting it and there was nothing to do but roll with the
blow. She counted ten risers before the back of her head made contact with the
flagstones at the foot of the stairs, then things went black.

"Anise? Anise, where are you, sweetheart?"

I'm upstairs, dearest. Waiting for you.

"Are you all right? Sonja said you were dead. So did Morgan."

I'm fine, sweet one. I've missed you so! I'm sorry about all those nasty things I said
the last time we were together! I just wasn't myself. That evil woman filled my head
with all kinds of horrid nonsense. I was such a naughty girl to believe her!

"Where are you, darling?" Fell stood at the top of the second-floor stairs, trying to
catch a glimpse of her.

In the library, silly. Where else?

As he heard the words inside his head, the door to Morgan's study swung open.

"But what about Morgan?"

He's gone, Fell. Gone for good. We'll never have to worry about him again.

Fell didn't bother to question his luck. It was enough that his lover had returned to
him and his enemy had fled. He hurried into the darkened library.

"Anise?"

She was standing in front of the marble mantelpiece that adorned the library's huge
fireplace, watching him with a coy, teasing smile on her lips. Her figure had
returned to the trim proportions it had possessed before the pregnancy. She was
beautiful and sexy and, best of all, she was alive. Anise held out her arms to him and
Fell threw himself into her embrace.

"Anise! Oh thank God, it wasn't true! You're alive! You're
alive!"

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"Fell, you're squeezing me."

He stepped back to feast his eyes on her precious face, only to see Wretched Fly, the
right half of his head swaddled in fresh bandages, returning his gaze. Fell backed
away from the renfield, shaking his head in denial.

"No! She's alive! I heard her.' I heard her call my name!"

"You heard what you wanted to hear, my dear boy. You are still human in that
regard!"

Fell stared at the figure dressed in immaculate eveningwear seated behind the
massive marble top desk. Morgan leaned forward and rested his chin on his steepled
fingers, smiling affably at his erstwhile patient.

"Ah, the prodigal son returns!"

"Fuck you, Morgan!"

The vampire lifted an elegantly arched eyebrow. "It seems you've been exposed to
the same corrosive influence as your poor sister. One night away from home and
you're already falling in with a bad crowd."

Fell's anger was quickly eating away at his caution. "You used me, Morgan! Or is it
Caron? I came to you for help and you fuckin' used me as a guinea pig!" He jabbed
an accusatory finger at Morgan. "You looked inside me and took out things that
had no right being outside my head and twisted them around so I'd be happy
playing out your
Dracula über alles
ego trip!"

Morgan tilted back in his chair, studying Fell with a detached interest Fell
recognized from Tim Sorrell's therapy sessions. Sonja had warned him about going
up alone against the vampire lord, but who was this leech that he should be afraid of
him?

Fell's hate swelled inside him like a storm, invigorating as an amphetamine cocktail
with a speedball chaser. He felt like he could kick Morgan's butt to the moon and
back. He was immortal and invulnerable, a child of the night to be feared by all that
dared cross his path.

Fell planted his palms on Morgan's desk top and leaned forward, thrusting out his
lower jaw in defiance. "You fucked with me! And worse, you fucked with someone I
loved, asshole! I mean to get satisfaction. I'm going to flay you alive and grill your
nuts on a hibachi!"

"Indeed." The vampire smiled. "Then why don't you take your best shot?" Morgan
stood and stepped out from behind the desk in one smooth, seamless motion, his
arms held away from his sides. "Go ahead. Be my guest."

Fell snatched up an obsidian letter opener from the desk's blotter and moved
forward, ready to plunge the knife into one of the vampire's eyes. As he lifted the
blade, his eyes met Morgan's and the room began to spin around as if it had
suddenly been transformed into a centrifuge. He cried out in pain as an unseen
hand forced his fingers back from the letter opener's hilt. The obsidian knife
dropped to the carpet at Fell's feet.

Morgan watched his protege's agony with undisguised amusement. "What's the
matter, Fell? Got a cramp?"

Fell growled and looked away from Morgan's taunting smirk.

"Look at me when I speak to you, boy!" the vampire lord snapped.

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Fell continued to glower at the floor.

"I said look at me,
boy!"
Morgan's words echoed in Fell's skull like thunder.

The youth cried out as invisible fingers yanked at the muscles in his neck, forcing
him to meet Morgan's wine-dark gaze.

"Good. Now show me who's boss."

Fell collapsed to the floor, groveling at Morgan's feet like a dog desperate to
ingratiate itself. He lay on his back, belly exposed, like a cub submitting to the
dominant male in a wolf pack. A thin, nasal whine escaped his constricted throat,
increasing in intensity as he pissed himself.