THE BRIDGE OVER THE RIVER wasn’t guarded, and the ville seemed deserted.
“Seems like most of the men have gone marching up the hill,” J.B. said, glancing at his chron. “Wonder how long before they figure we’re not up there and they come running back down the hill again?”
Ryan looked up into the darkness. “No sign of any lights coming back again. And no sign of Melmoth, either.”
Mildred stooped to retie the laces on her boots. “Have to say that Melmoth looked much the sickest of them all. Despite his strength and special powers, he still looked like a single puff of wind could’ve blown him from this world into the next.” She straightened. “Probably sounds stupe, but in some ways I feel kind of sorry for the Family. Made by scientists and forced to carry on such an endless, painful, pointless existence, depending on the DNA samples of others to keep them half-alive.”
Doc nodded. “I can see that, Mildred, my dear. Living and partly living. Bleak, bleak. Oh, the horror of dragging out your days and years like that.”
“Mebbe shock of others being dead’ll freak out Melmoth and he’ll drop off the log, as well,” Dean said.
“Could be,” his father agreed. “Yeah, could be.”
THE MOON HAD VANISHED behind a thick bank of cloud, and the rising wind tasted of rain. The seven friends picked their way along toward the redoubt, passing through a section of the bayou where the villagers had been logging.
The path grew narrow, twisting between patches of muddy swamp. The overhanging trees were draped with the white fronds of Spanish moss that brushed damply at the faces of the companions.
Ryan was still leading the way, into a small clearing, when J.B. shouted a warning.
“Lookout, left!”
The SIG-Sauer was already drawn and it swung around, almost of its own accord. Ryan glimpsed someone coming in at him on his blind side, carrying a weapon that glinted silver. It was a tall, skinny figure, wearing black, with a shock of white hair.
“Melmoth,” he breathed, and squeezed the trigger on the blaster.
The bullet smashed into the dark shape, sending it skidding sideways and backward, with a muffled cry of pain. Ryan leveled the SIG-Sauer again, ready to put several more rounds into the skull of the vampire and pulp it beyond redemption, when Krysty grabbed at his arm.
“No, lover!”
“Why?” He saw the answer to his own question, lying still in a brief pool of moonlight, like a crumpled toy.
It was a young woman, thin, wearing a long black skirt and a white cotton head scarf. A short-hafted kindling ax lay on the ground a couple of yards away from her. The 9 mm round had been fired with extreme accuracy, hitting her just above the breastbone, tearing through lungs and heart.
A classic killing shot.
“Shit! Never saw her properly.” Ryan walked over to look down at the dead girl, seeing that she was barely into her teens. “Came at me with the ax. I couldn’t have”
A violent gust of wind blew through the trees around them, almost as if some vast night-flying creature had soared overhead.
“Couldn’t help it, lover,” Krysty said. “She gave you no chance not to chill her.”
“Even so” He shook his head, remaining behind a few moments as the others filed out of the clearing. “I’m really sorry,” he said. To himself.
THE REST OF THE WALK through the swamp was more or less uneventful, though a big bull alligator lumbered along the path toward them, tail swinging like an armored pendulum. But he made so much noise that there was plenty of time for everyone to get safely out of his way.
It was still dark when they reached the entrance to the redoubt.
Ryan paused, holding up his hand. “I’ll go ahead. Make sure there’s no sign of Melmoth. Soon as I think it’s safe, I’ll call you.”
It took him only a couple of minutes to reassure himself that the outer sec door was still firmly locked. Unless someone knew the code, it hadn’t been touched.
“Let’s go! “he shouted.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
All of them felt uncomfortable, knowing that the oldest of the vampires might still be swooping around, somewhere behind them. They moved at a brisk walking pace along the corridors, past the numberless locked doors, until they reached the part of the redoubt that was familiar to them. Once they were close to the gateway entrance they all began to feel that they could finally relax.
“Nearly there,” Ryan said.
Doc bolstered the gold-plated commemorative Le Mat, rapping on the floor with the ferrule of his swordstick. “Well, my dear companions, we have once again fronted the forces of evil and come through successfully. And I do not believe that the dark powers have been so dark or so powerful, ever before. Certainly I can recall no precedent for such wickedness.”
“Then again, Doc,” Mildred teased, “most times you have trouble remembering what you had for breakfast.”
“Door’s still open, Dad.”
The heavy vanadium-steel sec door had jammed three-quarters of the way up and it still hung there.
Ryan ducked under it, pushing away a momentary vision of the faulty catch giving way and the entire weight tumbling on himself and the others, crushing them to smears of blood and pulped bone on the concrete.
But they all passed through safely and crossed the control room, where the faint smell of damp still lingered, through the anteroom, with the armaglass sec door of the gateway directly ahead of them.
Everyone bustled through, all of them following Doc’s lead and bolstering their blasters. Dean had recovered all his sharpness and was back to his old self.
“Can I close the door, Dad?”
“No, I’ll do it. You sit down with the others and get ready for the jump.”
Krysty looked around, turning to stare behind them, across the deserted comp-control area, with its monitor screens showing endless, ever-changing fields of data.
“Anything, lover?” Ryan asked.
“No. Don’t think so. Just got that odd feeling of there being something. And nothing.”
“Well, if it’s Melmoth, then he’s too late. Another few seconds we’re out of here.”
Doc went in first, laying his swordstick at his side, stretching his long legs in front of him, knees cracking. Mildred sat next to him, her beads fluttering against the dark brown wall of the chamber.
J.B. stepped in third, avoiding a dried-up mess on the floor. “Could’ve cleaned up your puke, Ryan,” he admonished. “Sloppy housekeeping.”
Ryan grinned. “Remind you of that next time you throw up during a jump.”
“That’ll be the day, pilgrim.” He settled himself beside Mildred, laying his weapons at his side, taking off his spectacles and carefully folding them, placing them in a top pocket of his coat. He took Mildred’s hand in his.
Jak went in silently, sitting with the grace of a cat in front of a hearth.
Dean looked at his father. “Are you sure I can’t do the door, Dad?”
“No. Sit down, quickly.” Despite the security of being snug in the heart of the redoubt, Ryan still felt a little uneasy. The Trader used to say that an enemy alive meant always checking the shadows. It was true.
Krysty patted him on the cheek. “Let’s hope we find a nicer, kinder place next time,” she said, sitting beside Dean and waiting for Ryan to join them.
He took a last look behind him.
The air was still, though he thought for a moment he heard a whispering of wind.
He set that thought away and walked into the chamber. “Everyone ready?” A chorus of “yes” greeted him. “Then here we go.” He closed the door and sat cross-legged beside Krysty, reaching out to hold her hand.
“To a good jump,” she whispered.
“I’ll drink to that, too, lover, when we got something to drink.”
The disks in floor and ceiling of the armaglass chamber were beginning to glow, and a faint mist was gathering at the top of the hexagonal room.
“You see that the notice is gone off the wall of the little room, Dad?” Dean asked, his voice already echoing from far away.
“Notice?”
“Boy’s correct, you know,” Doc said, his voice booming like a bittern at sunset across a salt marsh. “About a show they were putting on here. Before skydark. It’s vanished.”
Ryan felt his brain beginning to scramble. Dean mentioning the note was somehow important. But how and why? Perhaps it didn’t matter at all. Though it had to mean someone had been down in the gateway section since they jumped to the bayous.
“Who could?” he said slowly, his voice distorted.
Krysty’s fingers squeezed his hand very hard, painfully. She was telling him something, shouting. But the jump was almost under way.
Almost.
A silhouetted figure appeared outside the heavy door, someone tall and skinny.
Wearing black.
Ryan’s grip on the present had almost gone, and he was clinging to consciousness by a ragged fingernail.