Kardinal (13 page)

MOTHERHOOD, marriage, journalism, and now politics – fate had decided that Christine Murray would fail at them all.

Is there nothing I can do right? she thought.

Murray, Elizabeth Wilson, and a few supporters were watching the end of Britain play out on television at party’s Millbank HQ.

It was 10.00pm. The ballot had just closed. The first exit poll predicted a landslide. Fuad was going to romp to victory, according to the survey.

Commentators sounded the death knell of democracy. Analysts suggested cautious optimism in any dealings with the vampires.

“Fuad’s Union Party has won sixty-two per cent of the vote,” said a BBC reporter on the portable television.

Murray’s heart felt heavy. She thought of what she’d sacrificed over the past few years. She thought of what others had sacrificed. And for what?

She looked around the office. Most of the furnishings had been removed during the day. Soon the place would be abandoned. Murray wondered if it would become a relic of democracy.

In a thousand years’ time, would children be shown round the building and told that this was where human Britain died, and where the handing over of power to the undead took place?

Would there be humans left in a thousand years?

There will have to be
, she thought. Humans were necessary for vampires to survive. No predator lived long without its prey – even an immortal predator. Three nights without blood meant death to a vampire. Murray glanced around the office.
Maybe that’s what we should do
, she thought. Maybe it was the only way to defeat the vampires.

Deny them food.

Kill ourselves
, she thought.

Mass suicide.

What was there left to live for?

She felt dizzy and sick, thoughts of her family filling her mind. David was out there somewhere. Her young son lost to her, desperately trying to survive. She looked towards the windows. It was dark outside. She hoped David was safe, wherever he was.

She wondered where she would go after that night. They had to stay in the building for now. The streets were probably crawling with vampires. When dawn came, it would be safe to leave. But what was there for them in New Britain?

Families gone. Homes gone. Jobs gone. Country gone.

Tomorrow was the beginning of a long night for the British people.

George Fuad and the Nebuchadnezzars would be in charge. Other humans, non-Nebuchadnezzars who refused to collaborate, would be second class citizens. Slaves. Criminals. Food.

But maybe we deserve it
, she thought.

Humans had thought for so long that they were masters of the world. But that was a false belief. It was a myth. Now the species was in danger of becoming extinct, just like millions of other life forms.

We are nothing
, Murray thought to herself.
Nothing
.

Nothing without him.

Without Jake Lawton
.

She closed her eyes and prayed to any god listening to protect Jake and help him destroy Nimrod.

The phone in Wilson’s office rang. It made Murray jump.

Wilson looked around nervously, as if she were surprised that anyone would call. Journalists had been contacting her all day on her mobile, but she’d had advisors and members of her party answer their questions. Wilson didn’t look in any state. She headed for her office saying, “Only my family has that number.”

Something cold went through Murray’s veins.

“Put it on speaker,” she said.

Murray and some of the others gathered around Wilson’s office door as the politician pressed the speaker button on the phone and answered the call.

“Hello?”

“On speaker phone, darling?” said George Fuad’s greasy voice.

“How did you get this number?” said Wilson.

“Your very nice husband gave it to me.”

Wilson paled.
Some of the other party members gawped in horror.

“We had a nice chat,” said Fuad, “about your affair with Graeme Strand all those years ago. He was very hurt, your husband. You should talk to him about it. See, Liz, you lack a caring side, which is why you have failed as a politician and a wife.”

Now Wilson was turning red.

“Get out of my house, Fuad,” she said.

“I am not at your house, Liz. We are all at my headquarters in Soho. A lovely old building with a deep dark cellar. Murray there with you? Hello Christine. You remember the cellar, don’t you?”

The basement at Religion, the nightclub owned by the Fuad brothers. The place where the vampires were first born in Britain. Beneath the club lay the
basement where three years previously Murray nearly lost her life. Others had died there as the Nebuchadnezzars tried to resurrect the vampire god, Kea.

“I shouldn’t imagine that place holds good memories for you, George, since Jake Lawton killed that ugly red monster of yours,” said Murray, trying not to let her voice shake.

Fuad hissed out a breath. She’d landed a blow. But he recovered quickly.

“You won the battle,” he said, “but you’ve lost the war.”

“Not yet,” said Murray.

“Where’s my family?” said Wilson. “This is outrageous. I will have you – ”

“Have me what, Liz?” said Fuad, and he laughed.

The laugh chilled Murray. She’d heard it so often. She had gone undercover at the Fuads’ villa in Spain the previous year. They’d found her out and kidnapped her. She’d been tied up in the back of a truck with the remains of the Nebuchadnezzars’ other monsters. And while the truck travelled to the UK, Murray had to witness young runaways and immigrants being murdered to feed the creature.

“Are you going to concede defeat, Liz?” said Fuad.

“Let my family go.”

“You can see them soon enough, but concede defeat.”

“I concede, of course I do. Don’t lay a finger on my family, Fuad.”

“They’ll be treated fairly,” he said.

The look on Wilson’s face said she didn’t believe him. And Murray didn’t believe him, either.

Fuad said, “And all your staff and party members will also get a fair hearing.”

“A fair hearing? They’ve done nothing wrong.”

“I’m sure we can think of something,” said Fuad. “My team will be over to Millbank in the next hour and we’ll sort the transition. Since there’s no Queen here anymore, we don’t need to go through all that palaver. I’ll just take the reins, and get to work sorting out the mess you’ve made.”

“It’s not necessary that your people come here, Fuad,” said Wilson. “We’re packed up and we’ll be heading home, soon. We are all returning to private life, so we’ll be – ”

“No, no, no,” he said. “You’re being taken into custody.”

A gasp of dread went through the office. The men and women looked at each other, fear in their eyes. Some of them started to leave. Wilson urged them to go. Murray wanted to stop them. There would be vampires outside. The streets were dangerous. But so was everywhere else, it seemed. The Nebuchadnezzars were coming for their enemies.

“And one more thing,” Fuad said, “I’m going to – ”

Murray lifted the receiver and slammed it down on its cradle, cutting off the call.

“We need to get out of here,” she said.

“What does he mean ‘custody’?” said Wilson.

“Elizabeth,” said Murray. “Wake up. This is not a democracy now. Your rights are gone. We are not citizens. We are fugitives. Enemies of the state.”

“He can’t do this.”

The doors suddenly burst open. Black-shirted Neb militia men swarmed in. Screams erupted around the office.

Murray felt a cold sweat break on her back. She touched her red mark, the protection all Nebs wore. It had kept her safe, too. Safe from vampires. But not anymore. She knew they’d rip it off her shirt. They’d throw her to the beasts.

“Oh, my God,” said Wilson.

Murray thought she was reacting to the Nebuchadnezzar thugs. But she wasn’t. She was looking at the windows. Murray turned slowly. Seven vampires appeared glued to the window pane, just like giant insects. They snarled and hissed. Their hands and feet seemed to grip the glass. As Murray watched in horror, more of them crawled up the side of the building, hundreds of feet above the streets.

Hillah, Iraq – 10.27pm (GMT + 3 hours), 19 May, 2011

AALIYAH turned and saw that Goga had stopped in the shadows. For the first time since she’d known him, there was fear in his eyes. They glittered in the moonlight, and his face was pale.

She said, “What’s the matter with you?”

He shook his head. He put on the aviators to hide his eyes, to hide his fear.

Aaliyah had initially persuaded Goga not to launch a one-man attack on Fuad’s compound. The Romanian had been reluctant. He wanted to go ahead. They couldn’t wait for help, he’d said. They couldn’t depend on Lawton to turn up. He would not put off the raid on Fuad’s compound.

“You look scared, Goga,” said Aaliyah.

“Fear is good.”

“Not for me it’s not. I don’t want to fight alongside someone who’s bricking himself.”

“I will not,” he said, shoving past her, “brick myself. This has been my life, the hunt for this creature. I shall not waver.”

“I saw wavering.”

He wheeled to face her. He was gripping his stick, the gold ferrule catching the moonlight.

“I do not waver,” said Goga. “I remember. I remember my grandfather and my father, that is what I do. I remember. And that makes me shudder.”

He looked around quickly, checking to see if they were safe. They were a hundred yards from the compound.

Goga and Aaliyah were in the shadows between a row of trucks. She didn’t know what his plan was, other than to sneak into the site and do whatever needed to be done. It wasn’t a new way of working. That’s how she’d always done things with Jake. You clock the enemy. You hit them fast. You hit them hard. You make sure they stay down. Not too much planning. But at least with Jake she felt safe. He made you feel confident that if the shit hit the fan, he’d be able to clean it up quick and get you to safety.

She didn’t feel that way about Goga.

“You’re scared of facing that creature?” she said.

“It is not a human thing.”

“Neither are the vampires, but they’ve never scared you.”

“This is different.”

“You’ve been looking for Nimrod all your life, and now you get cold feet?”

“Cold feet?” he said, not getting the idiom.

“You get scared,” she clarified.

He slumped against the truck and looked deflated.

Christ, she thought. This is the last thing I need.

For a second she wanted to be back in Britain. Yes, it was dangerous, but it was a danger she could cope with. Here, she also had to cope with Goga. You just didn’t want to be looking after your buddy in a dangerous situation. You’d get them out if you had to, and you always had their back. But you hoped that they had your back, too. It didn’t seem to be the case with Goga.

“I know why you’re scared,” she said. “Once you kill this thing, it’s over – everything is finished.”

He shrugged. The moonlight glittered on the lenses of his Aviators.

“You’re scared of seeing him, sure,” she said. “He’s supposed to be some terrifying god, and you don’t really know how to kill him. Is that right?”

Goga nodded.

“But once you do kill him,” said Aaliyah, “you’re just scared of what happens next.”

“What happens to my life?” he asked.

“You get it back.”

“But this is all I know. Ever since I was a child, seven or eight, I remember my grandfather telling me of my family, my ancestor, Vlad Dracul, vampire killer. He told me of the impaled vampires and the Nebuchadnezzars. He told me of the wars fought as they terrorized Europe. They came to unleash the Trinity, and Vlad stopped them. It made him mad. It made him a murderer of men, too. The evil he fought made him evil. My grandfather told me about the legend of Nimrod’s wife, hidden somewhere in Romania after she’d killed Vlad. And he told me about Nimrod himself, creator of vampires. Kill him, you kill them all. All my life I have wished for this moment. But look at me. I am full of dread.”

“That’s a shame,” said Aaliyah. “But I’m telling you, Goga, you’d better find your guts and tuck them back in your belly. You dragged me halfway across the world and promised me that if we killed this creature, I could be with Jake in a place without vampires. That’s what you said. I’ve turned my back on my friends, and maybe lost Jake, too, just because I listened to you. So don’t even think you’re getting any sympathy from me. Now stand up straight and show some fucking backbone. We’re going to this Irkalla place, if it exists, and we’re going to kill this monster, if that exists.”