04 - Rise of the Lycans

by Greg Cox

  It will take more than one arrow to keep me from your throats!

  Stubbornly, he tried to climb to his feet, only to feel a second bolt pierce his side. An agonized wail tore itself from his lungs, even as he realized that the Death Dealer was deliberately avoiding any vital organs. He was shooting to subdue the prisoner, not kill him.

  Viktor’s not done with me yet, Lucian guessed. He has something worse in mind.

  Unable to throw off the shock and pain, Lucian collapsed onto the floor of his cage. A third bolt struck his back, narrowly missing his spine. He writhed in agony as the caustic silver poisoned his body. The flesh around the wounds grew hot and inflamed. Pulsing veins throbbed with every heartbeat. Blood streaked the whites of his eyes. He whimpered and gnashed his fangs. The accursed silver kept him from assuming wolfen form….

  The door to his cell swung open, but Lucian lacked the strength to lunge at his visitors. He could only thrash helplessly upon the dirty straw while a Death Dealer crouched over him and painfully snapped off the wooden shafts protruding from his body, leaving the barbed silver points lodged in his tortured flesh, where they burned like acid. Rough hands grabbed him beneath the shoulders and dragged him from his cell. Every bump sent an excruciating spasm through his entire body. A steel gauntlet cuffed him for good measure.

  “Time to pay for your crimes, you murdering mongrel,” Sandor cursed at him. “Hell is waiting for you.”

  Lucian could have sworn he was already there.

  Sonja faced her accusers in the crypt.

  Her father gazed down on her from his throne, while the rest of the Council also sat in attendance. As ever, Tanis stood at the Elder’s right hand; apparently he had not yet dared to ask for her seat on the Council. Sonja thought she detected a certain unease in his manner, as though he feared that she might expose his own complicity in Lucian’s escape.

  He need not worry on that score. The scheming scribe had upheld his end of their bargain; she had no intention of betraying him. Enough blood had been spilt already. Why should her own fall bring down anyone else?

  Let Tanis escape with his miserable life.

  She stood alone in the center of the mausoleum, above the buried tombs of Marcus and Amelia. The bronze circular plaques felt cold beneath her feet. Iron manacles chafed her wrists. Death Dealers were posted along the walls of the vaulted chamber to discourage any thought of escape. Silence rained over the somber proceedings, broken only by the crackling of the torches and braziers. An ornate chandelier hung above her head. Wooden shutters covered the stained-glass windows, keeping out the sunlight. Expectant eyes turned to her father, waiting for him to declare the trial under way.

  Sonja wondered what he was waiting for.

  The mystery was answered when, moments later, Sandor and his elite guards dragged Lucian into the crypt. Shackles bound his wrists and ankles. An involuntary gasp betrayed her dismay as she spied fresh bloodstains blossoming across his ragged brown tunic. His face looked gray and clammy. Purple shadows sagged beneath his bloodshot eyes. Distended blue veins throbbed across his brow. He seemed dazed and sick, almost in a stupor. Sonja recognized the telltale signs of silver poisoning.

  Lucian, my love! What have those bastards done to you?

  She glared accusingly at her father, who showed no sign of remorse. He merely nodded in satisfaction as the soldiers tossed him facedown onto the floor. They held on tightly to the ends of his chains. Fettered like a dog, Lucian wearily lifted his eyes to meet hers. Aching to comfort him, she started to step toward him, but the Death Dealers drew their swords, warning her away. It seemed this was as close together as they would be allowed to come. Clearly, Viktor intended Lucian to bear witness to her trial.

  Or was he to be tortured before her eyes?

  Coloman stepped forward to present the case against her. A creature of Marcus’ creation, he no doubt relished the opportunity to embarrass Viktor before the Council.

  “The accused has broken the laws of the coven,” he proclaimed. The severity of his tone made clear the enormity of her offense. “She has consorted with animals. She has abetted in their escape. She—”

  Sonja spoke out in her defense. “And I have saved this coven many times over!”

  This was no idle boast. On more than one occasion, her quick wits and ready sword had spared her fellow vampires from disaster. It was she who had once rescued the Lady Amelia when the female Elder had been ambushed by a pack of werewolves. And had she not once ridden through enemy lines to secure reinforcements when the castle was under siege? And personally captured a mortal vampire hunter who had crept into the castle by daylight with mayhem on his mind? Truly, she had never shirked from her duty to protect her people….

  “You have killed your own kind!” Coloman asserted. But that, his darkening expression seemed to imply, was the least of her offenses. “And you have commingled bloodlines, resulting in the thing germinating within you.”

  The other council members looked appropriately appalled and horrified by this reminder of Sonja’s gravid condition. They recoiled from her as though she were a leper. Orsova, of all women, sniffed in disgust. Only her father’s face remained unmoved. His gaunt features were as fixed as carved granite. No one spoke up on her behalf.

  “Your past glory does not excuse your present guilt,” Coloman continued. “Nor does your lofty station as a member of this Council.” He turned to face his peers. “The punishment for these crimes is death. How vote you?”

  A chorus of “aye”s sealed her fate. A muscle twitched beneath Tanis’ cheek, but he held his tongue. All eyes turned to Viktor. As the reigning Elder, he alone had the authority to pardon Sonja or reduce her sentence, perhaps to life imprisonment or banishment. Sonja had little expectation that he would do so; his scathing words upon the ramparts had made his feelings clear. Still, she looked hopefully into her father’s eyes, praying for just a trace of understanding, if not mercy. He was still her father; she did not want their last moments together to be as complete strangers to each other. Let us not part as enemies….

  Lucian’s appeal was less restrained. Lifting his head, he shouted frantically at Viktor. “She is your own daughter!”

  But her father’s eyes were as hard as sapphires.

  “Aye,” he said coldly.

  Sonja felt like an orphan, condemned to death by a man she no longer knew.

  “Take her to the chamber,” Coloman commanded the guards.

  “Nooo!” Lucian howled. He tugged helplessly at his chains like a dog on a leash, the fervor of his exertions reopening the wounds beneath his tunic. Fresh blood soaked through the threadbare fabric. “You cannot do this!”

  Coloman raised an eyebrow at the lycan’s protests. He glanced at Viktor for guidance. The Elder nodded gravely.

  “And bring him,” the boyar added.

  The guards hauled Lucian to his feet, even as their comrades escorted Sonja toward the door. He thrashed helplessly in the Death Dealers’ grip. The chains between his ankles scraped loudly against the floor. He called out desperately to the seated Elder.

  “NO! VIKTOR!”

  The execution chamber was hidden away in the turret of a tower overlooking the courtyard below. Cobwebs hung from the domed ceiling. Shuttered windows kept out the sunlight, at least for the time being. A large wooden post, reinforced with riveted iron supports, occupied the center of the doleful chamber. Sonja averted her eyes from the stake. She did not want to think about what the post was for.

  The guards shoved the condemned prisoners into the turret. Forcing Lucian to his knees, they chained him to a pair of iron rings embedded in the floor. Exhausted by his struggles in the crypt, he was easily subdued by the armored soldiers who clubbed him into submission before turning their attention to Sonja.

  Very well, she thought. Do your duty.

  Outnumbered and unarmed, she did not fight back as they shackled her to the stout oaken column, binding her arms uncomfortably above her head. Their grim faces betraye
d neither anger nor regret as they secured her bonds, then stepped away from the post. Sonja held her chin high, determined to face the end of her immortality with dignity. Her composure faltered, though, as she felt her baby stir within her. The realization that she would never look upon her child’s face, and that its innocent life would be snuffed out even before it began, tore at her heart. The life inside her had been conceived in love; it was no abomination, no matter what the Covenant said. If anything, it was living proof that lycans and vampires were meant to live together in harmony.

  My father is destroying more than just his own flesh and blood, she thought. He is slaughtering the future.

  The doors opened to admit Viktor and the rest of the Council. Their velvet robes rustled like cobwebs as they entered the chamber. They spread out along the circumference of the turret, so that they surrounded both Lucian and Sonja. Viktor faced his daughter but did not address her. Instead he nodded at a burly Death Dealer by the name of Soren. Palace gossip had it that the bearded Irishman, who had been recruited into the coven generations ago, was first in line to take Kosta’s place as the new overseer of the lycans.

  Soren uncoiled a fearsome whip composed of forged silver vertebrae. “No!” Sonja cried out as he cracked the lash against Lucian’s shoulders. The barbed vertebrae tore through his ragged tunic and made ribbons of his hide, burning his skin even as they sliced through his defenseless flesh, paring it to the bone. Hot blood streamed down his back. The scalding silver cauterized the gaping wounds before each new blow opened them anew. Steam rose from overlapping layers of throbbing scar tissue. Sonja saw Lucian brace himself for the blows, but not even his heroic heart could steel itself against the searing agony as the whip viciously lashed his back again and again, shredding meat and muscle, until he was left gasping on the bloodslick floor. Crimson welts showed through the back of his rent tunic.

  Tears leaked from Sonja’s eyes at the sight of her lover brought low once more. She suddenly recalled the first time she had ever laid eyes on him, when, as a mere child, she had breathlessly watched him prevail over her father’s many grueling tests and trials. How young and handsome he had been then! She had been drawn to him at once, even before she was old enough to truly know what love was, as though they had always been destined to be together. The future had seemed bright and full of possibility.

  How then had they come to this dismal pass?

  Viktor raised his hand at last, signaling an end to the flogging. Soren lowered the whip and stepped away from the defeated lycan. Crimson globules dripped from the silver vertebrae onto the cold stone floor.

  Sonja realized that her own penalty was drawing nigh.

  Taking care not to step in the pooling blood, the council members filed out of the mausoleum one by one. Viktor was the last to leave; Sonja held onto the hope that he might turn and look back at her one last time. Now that the trial was over, and the other council members departed, perhaps he could spare her a kindly word or two before they were parted forever? This was their last chance to say good-bye….

  At first, she feared he would not even look at her. But, at the last moment, he hesitated upon the threshold and glanced back over his shoulder. Their eyes met briefly. Viktor’s thin lips parted as though to bestow some final message of forgiveness, but then his jaws clenched tightly shut. Unable to speak, he left the crypt without a word.

  The guards stepped forward to carry out the sentence.

  The soldiers exited the crypt, leaving only Soren and one other guard to play executioner. A heavy oaken door slammed shut. The Death Dealers retreated to a shadowy alcove at the far end of the mausoleum, where a large iron wheel awaited them. Squealing metal reverberated through the cavernous vault as the ancient wheel initially refused to turn. Grunting, the vampires put their backs to it and gradually managed to crank the wheel in a clockwise direction. Every turn, Sonja knew, brought her closer to oblivion.

  Timeworn gears began to squeak and grind overhead. Sonja swallowed hard as she braced herself for what was to come. Panic flooded Lucian’s face as he grasped what was happening. His bloodshot eyes widened in horror.

  Be brave, my love, she thought. I wish I could spare you this.

  The relentless grinding drew her gaze upward. Directly above her, at the very apex of the domed ceiling, a circular iron hatch slowly dilated. Many yards away, the Death Dealers backed deeper into the shelter of the secluded alcove. A tiny crack of sunshine hurt Sonja’s eyes, proving that, just as she had feared, it was still daylight outside.

  A frightened whimper escaped her lips. Her heart pounded in fear.

  “No, Sonja,” Lucian called out to her. “Look at me. Keep your eyes on me!”

  Averting her eyes from the blinding glare, she stared across the crypt at Lucian. Now that the fatal moment was upon her, she felt her courage evaporating. She looked to him for strength and found a measure of comfort in his caring eyes.

  “I love you,” he declared.

  I know, she thought. His eternal devotion was the one thing she could always rely on, even in the hour of her death. “I love you.” Her voice cracked as their last few seconds slipped away with heart-breaking speed. “Your face will not be there when this is over, will it?”

  He tried to answer her but could not find the words. There was no way to deny the dreadful enormity of the moment. She cursed her father for forcing Lucian to witness her death; that would surely be an even more harrowing ordeal than the one she now faced. Remembering the helpless anguish and frustration she had felt when Kosta had flogged Lucian before her eyes, she suspected that she was the lucky one.

  “Good-bye, my love.”

  Two hundred years seemed like hardly enough.

  Sonja’s blood still stained her bed linens. Viktor stood alone in his daughter’s chambers, having dismissed Tanis and the other vampires from his sight. He wanted no eyes upon him as he endured the final moments of his daughter’s life. He held onto a carved wooden bedpost for support. Unbearable sorrow weighed down his shoulders; he had not experienced pain like this since his beloved wife had perished in childbirth two centuries ago.

  Thank the dark gods that she had not lived to see this day!

  He knew that he should leave, that he was only torturing himself by lingering here, surrounded by reminders of Sonja, yet he could not tear himself away from his daughter’s room. Despite her grievous sins, he had been impressed and moved by Sonja’s grace and courage at the end. She had neither denied her crimes nor groveled for mercy like a sniveling mortal. What a magnificent Elder she might have become, had not that vile lycan seduced her!

  He will beg me to put him out of his misery!

  Many floors shielded him from the sight of Sonja’s impending cremation, but he could hear the rusty gears carrying out the lethal purpose for which they had been engineered. Never before had this fearsome penalty been imposed on another vampire, let alone one of royal blood, but Viktor himself had commissioned the mechanism as the ultimate deterrent for any vampire who might dare to violate the sacred Covenant that governed them all. A clever mortal locksmith, whom Viktor had previously employed to craft William’s hidden oubliette, had installed the deathtrap according to the Elder’s specifications.

  Little did I know its first victim would be my own daughter!

  It was not too late, he knew. He could rush in and call a halt to the execution. The Council would be scandalized, and he would face strident opposition from Coloman and the rest, but Sonja would be spared. In time she might even come to see the error of her ways and renounce her foolish passion for that lycan scum. She could still make him proud and become his loving daughter once more.

  He moved to the door. His hand fell upon the handle. White knuckles tightened around the knob.

  Then he remembered the unspeakable monstrosity gestating in her womb. Her unnatural offspring was more than just a scandalous embarrassment; it was a dire threat to their very kind. It could not be allowed to exist for one more day. No matter the c
ost.

  He took his hand away from the door.

  The metal hatch opened entirely. Daylight poured through the circular gap. The golden radiance fell directly upon Sonja, who let out a blood-curdling scream.

  No! Lucian thought, Not the sun! Not on her!

  He lunged forward, desperate to shield her with his own body but the heavy chains snapped taut, holding him back. Iron shackles cut into his wrists, but he barely noticed the pain. Silver barbs, buried deep in his flesh, trapped him in human form. He strained with all his might, working himself into a lather of blood and sweat, yet there wasn’t a damned thing he could do to save the woman he loved.

  Sonja’s pale face blackened and flaked away beneath the sun’s pitiless rays. Smoking lesions popped and snapped across her delicate skin. Shrieking, she tossed her head from side to side but could not escape the unsparing sunlight as it turned her vulnerable flesh to charcoal. Smoke rose from her dark hair moments before she burst into flame, the thrashing noblewoman turning into a living torch. Her charred face contorted in agony, exposing her fangs, while her blistering arms twisted above her head. Chains rattled as she fought in vain against the manacles binding her to the post. Her ragged shift was set ablaze. The smell of burnt meat befouled the air. Her golden pendant glowed red as blood within the hellish inferno.

  The scorching heat beat against Lucian’s face. The devouring flames were reflected in his wild cobalt eyes. Only yards away from the blazing pyre, yet too far away to do anything but watch the corrosive sunlight consume his beloved, he bellowed like a madman. His raspy voice joined her dying screams in one final, excruciating moment of communion.

  “SONJA!”

  Viktor listened to his daughter die. Her agonized shrieks echoed through the castle, and ripped his ancient heart to shreds. He pressed his furrowed brow against the bedroom door, while ice-cold tears streamed down his face. Sobs shook his ageless form.