One With the Night (41 page)

Elyta frowned.

Callan put his arm around her shoulders. His energy spoke to hers, reverberating between them as he tucked her in against his side. “I wish ta God there
was
a cure.”

Silence stretched as all six vampires stared at them and tried to decide. This was the moment that would settle their fate.

“I tend to believe her,” Khalenberg said finally, in a voice that was used to command. “Which aligns all our interests, Zaroff, and leaves one final action. They must be killed.”

“You aren’t lying, are you?” Elyta asked Callan and Jane with something like wonder in her voice. Then she exploded. “Zeus and Hera!” She advanced, her fingers curling into claws, her lips drawn back. “I’ll rip you apart myself.”

“Why?” Jane shouted. “Why must we be killed?”

Callan pulled Jane behind him. His body was tense, ready to defend their lives as long as he could. Jane had no illusions that just because he was male he could win out against Elyta. She was a very old vampire. “What would it cost ye ta let us go?” he reasoned, as though Elyta was not past reasoning.

“Leaving aside your traitor state, since I myself might be called that by many these days, you must be killed because you are made.” Khalenberg’s clipped tone sounded like a sentencing judge. “Russo?” The doughy vampire nodded and strode forward to join Elyta.

“Which side are you on, Flavio?” Callan shouted. “The choice is yours.”

Would Flavio help them? Callan seemed to think so. But Flavio just stood, immobile, as Elyta advanced on them.

Jane looked around wildly. The water of the loch was frothing about a hundred yards away, but she didn’t care about a water monster when the land was filled with monsters all trying to kill her and Callan. She glanced up at the tower. If they just transported …

“Callan! Let’s get out of here,” she hissed.

“Do you think I’d let you escape?” Elyta sneered.

“You said we could join our power…” Jane whispered to Callan. She felt his vibrations ramp up.
Companion!
she called, and felt its answering buzz in her veins. She dared not break her concentration by looking down, but she could feel the tingling pool of blackness gathering at their feet. The power sang in her veins.

Elyta’s eyes went red even as she lunged for Callan. Jane’s power cycled down as though a blanket was thrown over the flame. The blackness dissipated. Elyta grabbed for Callan’s head. Jane felt his power ebb, too. He managed to push Elyta’s chin up. Jane couldn’t get enough power to transport, let alone to take Callan with her. And he seemed totally occupied with trying to keep his head. Panic clawed at her throat. What to do?

A hand grabbed her arm. Russo! The doughy vampire jerked her away from Callan. With a grunt, she struggled away from him and scrambled, stumbling, over the pebbles of the beach. What could she
do
? Her eyes lighted on the crumbling crenellations above them. She couldn’t raise enough power for translocation, but what about transporting stones? Maybe they didn’t know she could move rocks. Maybe she could surprise them and distract Elyta.

Callan grunted behind her. She glanced back. Elyta had him by the head, twisting as Callan pushed her chin up. Callan was calling his power, but Elyta’s eyes were carmine-red. She was stronger. It was only a matter of time. The doughy vampire was trying to pin Callan’s arms. But they didn’t have him yet.

Give me just a little power, Companion
. The world went red. Blackness pooled about her feet, then washed away. The red film faded.
Focus!
she commanded herself. She stared at the stones above. She daren’t try to hit those attacking Callan. She might hurt Callan himself. But by hitting others maybe she could distract Elyta, and Callan could escape. A stone wobbled loose from mortar powdery with age. She thought about the ferret-faced vampire. “Go!” she yelled.

The great stone flew from the battlements, followed by another and another. She watched them arc down and hit the ferret-faced one in the head, the chest. They knocked him to the ground and pinned him there. He wouldn’t be down long. Khalenberg glanced at his compatriot and then stared at Jane. “How did you do that?”

“Would you like to see?” Jane whirled. Elyta lost focus, distracted by the hailing stones. Callan struggled away from her and Russo. Callan and Elyta circled each other until her back was toward the loch. Jane stared up at the tower and willed a shower of the great stones. They rained on Khalenberg and the other one, Treadwell, who had pushed his way out of the pile of rubble. But the two vampires still stumbled through the hail of stones toward her, grunting and staggering as they were hit. It wasn’t enough!

Waves splashed over her feet. Some great stones plopped into the water with a spray.

Flavio lunged toward them. Not Flavio, too! But he pulled Elyta away from Callan. She turned with a growl and back-handed him. He sprawled across the stones.

“Still,” Elyta commanded to Callan, her eyes deepening to burgundy. And Callan did go still. Now she would kill him with ease.

“No!” Jane cried. The stones stopped showering as she lost concentration.

But Callan was staring at the loch. His eyes too had gone deep red. His power ramped up. Focus on Elyta, not the loch, she wanted to shout.

Khalenberg pushed past Callan and lunged for Jane. She stumbled backward and sprawled on the stony verge. Khalenberg loomed over her, a look of grim determination on his face. “I’m sorry,” he said and reached for her.

Then they felt it.

The air was filled with a great gasping intake of breath and a shushing spray of water. Waves sloshed up the gravel strand. Jane turned to see a gargantuan head with tiny eyes rise from the water on a thick and supple neck, limned by moonlight and pouring water. The snout had a wide mouth that flapped open now. A roar issued from the creature’s throat high above them. It must be twenty feet out of the water. Behind the undulating neck was a great body with limbs like oars beached in the shallows of the loch. The creature seemed maddened, its head casting about for the source of its misery.

And there! Behind it was another, and another, all rising from the cold black depths of the loch. Water sluiced off their gleaming, slate-gray hides. Someone was shrieking. Jane could not take her eyes from those great beasts to see who it was. Clara perhaps, for Elyta was turning toward the creatures, her eyes going wide as she released Callan. Even Khalenberg backed away.

Only Callan stood calmly, dwarfed by the monsters. Their necks swayed, their heads, however big, absurdly small for their massive bodies. The very quality of the air was changed by their immensity. Callan held out a hand to Jane without taking his eyes from the monsters that writhed above him. Elyta stood, frozen, between him and the creatures. Jane hurried to take his hand. He drew her into his side even as he called the power. The darkness whirled up in a flash. Jane felt the popping pain and the world shivered back into view around them.

She and Callan were standing on the parapet of Urquhart Castle.

Below them the scene dissolved in chaos. Elyta drew her power, apparently in an attempt to use compulsion on the beasts. That seemed only to enrage them. One heaved itself onto the beach using its stubby, flipperlike appendages. Treadwell of the ferret face was crushed beneath it. His scream floated into the night.

Another was bearing down on Flavio.

“Callan,” Jane whispered. A flipper caught Flavio and smacked his head against one of the great stones Jane had showered on the beach. He seemed stunned. Russo turned to run from the onslaught, his pudgy limbs pumping with effort. One of the monsters opened its mouth wide. The huge head was propelled with surprising speed by the great neck. One moment Russo was there and the next all you could see were his legs, kicking frantically from the great mouth. His screams were horrible. Callan held Jane tightly. The creature raised its head to the sky, opened its gullet, and gulped the rest of Russo down. Jane wanted to cover her eyes, but she couldn’t look away. Flavio! Where was Flavio?

Clara was running toward the beasts. No! She was running for Flavio. The monster heaved its bulk up and forward. Flavio’s body was lost in the darkness beneath it even as Clara bent and snatched at him. The bulk came down. The earth shuddered. But Flavio was clear. Clara heaved him up and half dragged him up the shingle.

Elyta shouted at the creatures. From this angle Jane could see that her eyes were red. “Go from here!” The words echoed up to them. She was trying to compel them.

“It will no’ work,” Callan muttered. “The power is what attracts them.”

Jane looked out across the loch. Callan must be right, for the surface of the water was choppy with rising humps. “My God,” she murmured. “How many are there?”

By the time she turned back to the narrow beach, Elyta must have realized her mistake. Her eyes faded. There were five of the great creatures struggling up the beach, their heads undulating above their bodies. Clara and Flavio had reached higher ground. Khalenberg transported to a point high on the little cliff Jane had once stood upon, overlooking the scene. Only Elyta now remained in range of the monsters. Her eyes lifted to the parapet where Jane and Callan stood.

“You won’t escape me,” she yelled.

“Come away, Elyta,” Flavio called. “It isn’t worth it. There is no cure.”

Elyta was forced to scramble back as another monster heaved itself forward. She blinked out of view in a whirl of blackness and reappeared next to where Flavio and Clara huddled together on a grassy knoll. She turned back to Callan and Jane. “I’ll find you,” she shouted.

From the village, a group of men brandishing torches and whatever weapons they possessed swarmed up the road.

“No you won’t,” Flavio said, rising. Jane could hear him clearly, because of what she was. “You’re going back to Mirso where you belong, Elyta. There is nothing more to be done here.” He took one of Elyta’s arms and Clara took the other. Their eyes were red.

“You’ll pay for this,” she shrieked at Flavio and Clara.

“I don’t care,” Flavio said as he reached for Clara’s hand. Darkness swirled up around them and engulfed Elyta, too. Just before he blinked from view, Flavio looked up at Jane and Callan. “Thank you,” he called, “for the reminder.”

And they were gone.

The mob from the village lunged off the road and onto the knoll where the three vampires had just stood. Jane looked around for Khalenberg, but he was nowhere to be found. The waters of the loch quieted. Humps of flesh slid beneath the surface into the darkness below, now that the vibrations of the vampires had quieted. The villagers waved their torches at the creatures on the shingle. They seemed to take no notice. But they too heaved themselves back toward the water as if listening to some unheard call. In a matter of minutes, only the villagers were left on the shore of the loch shouting and brandishing their weapons. The choppy waters smoothed themselves. It was if the whole thing had never happened, except that the body of Treadwell, or more accurately, the crushed pulp of Treadwell, was still smeared across the beach.

“Come, Jane,” Callan whispered, and pulled her in closer to the tower. “We dinnae want th’ villagers ta see us.”

They peered around the edge of the tower and watched the crowd mill disconsolately about. Finally the men broke away in ones and twos.

When Callan and Jane turned from the dispersing mob, they almost bumped into Khalenberg. Jane gasped.

“Was this your plan, to kill all in your path?” he asked Callan in his clipped accent.

Jane felt Callan draw himself up. He examined Khalenberg’s face for a moment before he spoke. “Nae. I knew Miss Blundell and I would ha’ ta fight Elyta. I hoped Brother Flavio would help us, since he regretted no’ helpin’ someone before. And I thought Clara might support Flavio, whatever he decided. With four ta one, I thought we could prevail against her.”

“But you called the monsters.”

“I dinnae count on ye and yers comin’ in on her side,” Callan said calmly. “I realized th’ monster was attracted ta our power. It maddened them. Sa I used compulsion ta bring it in, as a distraction. When Elyta tried ta use compulsion on them, she only made them angrier.”

“Got a little out of hand,” Khalenberg observed.

“Aye,” Callan answered. He was so brave. He looked Khalenberg straight in the eye, regardless of the fact that the man was so much more powerful than they were. “I did no’ know there was sa many.”

“And you!” Khalenberg turned on Jane. “How did you move those stones?”

Jane lifted her chin. “Well, if we can direct our own bodies in translocation, I thought we might be able to use the power to direct other objects, as well. I conducted experiments until I mastered the technique.” She glanced to Callan. He looked proud.

“I guess Jane showed ye somethin’ about being vampire ye did no’ know. Maybe she’s a better vampire than ye are.” The two men stood there, glaring at one another. “Sa d’ye still want ta kill us?” Callan asked at last.

“We’ll join our power against you,” Jane threatened, though the threat was surely empty.

Khalenberg’s brows drew together over his hawk nose. His face looked like it had been cut with a blunt chisel. He frowned. “Are you going to make an army, Kilkenny?”

“There were twelve,” Callan said, exasperated. “How does that make an army?”

“Whole religions have been started with twelve.”

“They’re all dead, and some deserved ta be. Nae. I’ll no’ be makin’ any more.”

Khalenberg’s eyes flicked from Jane’s face to Callan’s, examining them. Callan moved to stand in front of Jane. She couldn’t have that. She took his arm and stood beside him. Khalenberg looked disgusted. “I hardly credit the fact that I am going to do this yet again. What is one more pair when there have already been three to my personal knowledge? And I’ll wager Flavio and Elyta’s servant are well on their way. My God, what is the world coming to?” His eyes went red. Jane braced herself to call on her Companion and add its power to Callan’s.

But the red eyes did not shower them with compulsion. “You must show me how to move objects sometime, young lady.” The words echoed and blackness whirled up around his lean form in an instant, and he was … gone.