Death Blows

by D. D. Barant

  Great. Now I have to deal with Lugosis…

  FOURTEEN

  Let me tell you a little about Bela Lugosi.

  Lugosi was a Hungarian actor born near the end of the nineteenth century. He came to America in the 1920s and worked in both films and theater, starring in a Broadway play called Dracula that became a big hit; the movie that followed made him a star. That much is true in my world and this one, but that’s about it.

  See, in this world Dracula was a very different thing. It was still a work of fiction, but in a world of vampires and werewolves, it was more of a murder mystery than a horror novel. Dracula himself comes across more like a criminal mastermind out for world conquest than a bogeyman—still a monster, but one easier to identify with. For the pire readers, anyway.

  The book wasn’t nearly as successful, either—not until Bram Stoker stalked and murdered several pire hookers in London’s Whitechapel district. Being a writer, he couldn’t resist bragging about his deeds in print, sending letters to the local press—unfortunately for him, someone recognized his prose style and he was arrested. And hanged.

  The fact that the murders had been committed by a human set off riots, with over two hundred human deaths before it was over. The novel catapulted to instant fame, and the serial-killer thriller genre was born.

  The Bela of this world’s portrayal of the old neckbiter was memorable for two reasons: first, the sheer physicality he brought to the role—he played him as a combination of Errol Flynn and Jimmy Cagney, with a little Bogart thrown in.

  Second, Bela himself started off human. He became a pire in order to get the part.

  I shouldn’t be shocked at that. The list of things a hungry actor will do for even a small part, let alone a starring role, is long and humiliating. And all the obvious jokes about Hollywood bloodsuckers, immortality and the lack of anything like a soul are there, too. But I still find it horrifying—to give up your humanity, to change the basic nature of what you are, in return for success? I can’t imagine doing that, despite the joke I made to Cassius.

  But Bela could, and did. And though his career had its ups and downs—particularly during the 1940s and 1950s when musicals were big—he never acquired the painkiller habit that sidelined him in my world. Vampires don’t get sciatica.

  Still, his star had faded by the time the 1960s rolled around, and he spent most of the next two decades playing forgettable mob bosses in crime pictures. Until 1981, and a little film called Raiders of the Lost Ark.

  I won’t go into the differences between that film and the one I know—the important thing is that it relaunched Bela’s career, and made him the go-to guy for cynical, flawed heroes who preferred to solve their problems with a slug to the jaw and a fast getaway vehicle. Over the years he’s played parts that in my reality went to Clint Eastwood, Arnold Schwarzenegger, or Bruce Willis—he’s terrific in the first few Die Hard movies. There’s even a series of updated Dracula films where he plays the count as a kind of superpowered antihero, and it’s these films that his most hardcore fans adore. They dress like him, wear the same kind of fang extensions he does, even try to talk like him; Bela never did lose that Hungarian accent.

  And now I’m staring down a group of these wannabes.

  This is a lot more dangerous than it sounds. Lugosis tend to be Eastern Europeans who have survived genocidal wars, and their attitude toward anyone who isn’t one of them ranges from contemptuous to predatory. They’ve been known to kill people as the punch line to a joke—the same sort of deadpan one-liners that Lugosi utters after setting someone on fire and throwing them off a building.

  “Vell, vell, vell,” the leader says. He’s virtually indistinguishable from the rest of them, other than the fact that the medal hanging off the red ribbon around his neck is a little bigger than the others. “Vere’s your friend, little thrope?”

  “You tell me,” I say. “All those little TVs in the room you just came out of? That’s not cable.”

  He chuckles in a raspy kind of way. “Your friend seems somevhat camera-shy. But you know vhere she’s going, don’t you?”

  “I’m guessing to get help. Sure you want to be here when she comes back?”

  “She’ll find dere’s no one to get,” the Lugosi says. “Ve have neutralized any possible resistance. But perhaps she vill come back if you scream loudly enough…”

  That’s the second time somebody’s tried to use me as bait, and I’m starting to feel a little insulted. “You first,” I say.

  He lunges. He thinks I’m a thrope, so he’s hoping to nail me before I transform and get bigger, faster, and stronger. I use a trick I learned from a biker with a pit bull: block with your forearm, giving the dog a handy target to sink his teeth into instead of your neck. It might seem like a somewhat drastic solution—especially when you consider how strong a pit bull’s jaws are—but as the biker pointed out, it’s a lot easier to sew a hollow section of metal pipe into the lining of your sleeve than a scarf. And I have a pipe with a coating of silver paint.

  Both of Mr. Bitey’s fangs snap with a noise like breaking chalk. I ram the silver spike of my baton into his forehead hard enough to dent his skull, and his eyes roll up in his head before he slides off my arm and drops to the ground.

  “Now serving customer number two,” I say.

  For film fans, they’re not that appreciative of my wit. In fact, rather than following the time-honored movie cliché of attacking one at a time, they decide to swarm me instead.

  Which means I’m dead. Or lunch.

  Pires are fast. I’ve been forced to compensate in a number of ways, one of which is my gun. I wish I’d drawn it now; there’s no way I can take these guys down all at once with the scythes. I barely have time to snap the blades out before they’re on me—

  And arrows start sprouting from their eyes.

  A wooden arrow through the brain won’t always kill a pire, but wood penetrating any major organ can potentially be lethal. Two of them clatter to the ground in a pile of bones, and another screams and sinks to his knees while clawing at his face. I nail the one leaping at me with a backhand swipe; his head spins past me while the body crumples into a pile of rotting meat.

  I face off against the last two. Neither of them is paying attention to me; they’re looking around wildly for wherever the arrows are coming from.

  “Get down on the ground and put your hands behind your head,” I snap. “You don’t have to—”

  Two more arrows. Both heart shots. “—die,” I say softly. Nobody seems to be listening, anyway. The African Queen steps out of the undergrowth. She’s in half-were form, her fur dyed in a striking black-and-white-striped tribal pattern. She’s got a compound bow in her hands, a quiver of black arrows clipped to it. She already has another shaft notched and the bowstring pulled taut. “Hi,” I say. “Can we talk now, or are you not done killing all my suspects?” She tenses her legs and leaps, landing in the open door of the security outpost. She ducks inside.

  I wait. She reappears a few seconds later, her bow lowered. “Kind of hard to talk with your hands full,” I point out. She hesitates, clearly uncomfortable with the idea of letting her guard down, so I hold up the scythes and say, “I’ve got your back, all right?”

  She nods. A few moments later I’m looking at Catharine Shaka once more. “You have interesting enemies,” she says.

  “Not me. These guys were here looking for you.” She frowns. “I don’t know them. They must be foot soldiers—assassins rarely travel in packs. But why send such ill-prepared thugs against—”

  Her eyes open wide. “No!” She sprints past me, back into the bush, and this time I do my best to follow. I manage not to lose her, but only because she doesn’t go far and makes no attempt to be quiet. I find her in a clearing, at the base of a massive banyan tree, on her knees. There’s a large hole in the ground, as if something had erupted from the earth.

  “Gone,” she says, her voice as hard as flint. “It was a feint, meant to occupy me whi
le their master stole the sky-shield.”

  “Or to draw you into the open so that he could take it from your body.”

  “That would not have happened—the shield protects the wielder from any harm. I thought it was safe here; it was hidden not only from sight but by powerful magicks.”

  “Same thing happened to the Centurion. Whoever this guy is, he knows how to find you.”

  “Whoever he is, he has made a mistake,” she says calmly. “The isihlangu was given to my father’s father’s father, by the Sky God Umvelinqangi. It is a sacred artifact, meant to protect all of my countrymen, and I will not suffer it to fall into the hands of another.” Anger sparks in her eyes, but her voice is cold and steady. “I will find this thief, and I will end him.” I believe her. “Let’s go update Cassius and Charlie. We’ll get your shield back.”

  She nods sharply, gets to her feet and strides back the way we came.

  We get back to the security hut, and I notice our body count is a little low—in fact, we’re short one Count. I remember the one Shaka shot in the eye—looks like he was in better shape than I thought.

  But not quite good enough to manage an effective escape. Cassius and Charlie come strolling down the path, Charlie frog-marching the Lugosi with one arm twisted up behind his back. The arrow still juts from the pire’s left eye.

  “Lose something?” Charlie says. “We found the pincushion staggering past the bar, spouting gibberish and blood.”

  The Lugosi doesn’t seem to be all there. His other eye won’t focus, and he’s muttering what sounds like nonsense under his breath. Pires aren’t normally affected by mental illness—or weren’t, until recently—but brain damage by wood or silver is another matter. Ordinary humans have survived having all kinds of things rammed in or through their brains—a railway spike in one famous case—so why shouldn’t a pire? He may be not be firing on all cylinders, but at least he’s alive.

  “We have to get him to a hospital,” I say. “Cassius, you drive. Charlie and I—”

  “No,” Shaka says coldly. “He will not die. Not until he has answered my questions.” She steps forward and grabs the arrow in one hand.

  I expect her to yank it out, but she doesn’t. She uses it like a handle to turn his face toward hers, slowly but firmly. He gapes at her, his remaining eye twitching and his mouth hanging open. “Calibration,” he blurts. “Calipers. Contiguous. Contiguous.”

  “Charlie, don’t move,” I say. “Let him go, Shaka. You can’t torture the man.”

  “I am merely questioning him,” she says, her eyes locked on the pire’s face. “It will not become torture unless he tries to nod. Who sent you?”

  “Apricot flambé. Fling the warbled soup, for jewelry is not penultimate. Gazpacho!”

  “Interesting. How about now?” She twists the arrow slightly to the left—I expect him to scream, but he reacts by shuddering and then beginning to sing: “On top of old Smokey, all covered with snow, I lost my poor—”

  “No…”

  She twists the other way, and this time he shrieks. “The smell! Shoe polish! Make it stop, make it stop!”

  “For God’s sake,” I say and grab her arm. She ignores me.

  “Tell me who sent you, and the smell will go away.”

  “I can’t stand it! I can’t stand it!”

  “Let him go,” I say, “Or you’ll be the one with something sticking out of your eye.”

  “You should really let go of my arm. I might accidentally drive the arrow deeper.” About the only alternative I have is to draw my gun and shoot her, or chop her damn hand off. The only reason I don’t is because I know she can kill the Lugosi quicker than I can move. “All right, all right,” the Lugosi sobs. “The Shadows sent us. The Crooked Shadows.”

  “Why?” she demands. “Revenge. For killing one of them. That’s all I know, I swear.” She releases the arrow, and he sags in Charlie’s grip. I let go of her arm. Cassius hasn’t said a word during this entire exchange, but now he speaks up. “You must have good medical facilities here. If you wouldn’t mind showing Charlie the way?”

  She studies him for a second, then says, “Of course. Follow me.” She marches off, Charlie carrying the now unconscious pire in his arms. I’m about to follow them, but Cassius puts out a hand and stops me.

  “Are you kidding?” I say. “I’m not going to leave a prisoner alone with her—he’ll wind up a pile of dust with a few bones sticking out.”

  “No, he won’t. Shaka’s methods might seem brutal, but she won’t just execute a prisoner. She’s learned what she needs to know. Besides, I think Charlie would have his own opinion if she tried.”

  “Well, how about what the Lugosi said? The Shadows think she killed the Sword of Midnight.”

  “If she had, do you think she’d interrogate a suspect in front of us to reveal that information?” He had a point. “So the Lugosis are being played, too.”

  “They were meant as a distraction to steal the shield, that much is true. They believe the Crooked Shadows hired them, which also fits the facts. But as to who actually took the shield—”

  “—That we don’t know.” I’m already taking out my phone. “We need to get Eisfanger here to process the scene.” He nods. “Maybe we can get something else out of the Lugosi. And pay attention to Shaka—she’s the best tracker on the planet. If the thief left any kind of trail at all, she’ll find it.” By the time I get to the infirmary, Shaka’s gone.

  “Said she needed to pick up the trail before it got cold,” Charlie tells me. “Thought I should stay with the prisoner.”

  “Yeah, stay here,” I tell him, and sprint back the way I came. There’s nobody at the banyan tree. Either Shaka’s already stalking the thief, or she’s just taken off. Either way, I have no idea where she’s going—

  I almost smack myself in the head over my own stupidity. I run back to the security hut, where Cassius—as usual—is one step ahead. “The Lugosis disabled the system,” he says, indicating a bank of dead monitors. “That’s why they hit here first, to cover their tracks. Shaka’s probably still in the park, but we can’t tell where.”

  “Damn it. How about the security logs?”

  “Those are archived; they should be fine.”

  “That’s good—because other than a brain-damaged fanpire, that’s about all we have left.” I spend the next couple of hours downloading footage onto my laptop and reviewing it. Cassius organizes whatever details need to be handled between the staff of the park and the cleanup squad that arrives to deal with the aftermath of the attack. Charlie helps me check the security recordings—he’s got sharp eyes, and there’s a lot of material. We’re looking for Shaka’s movements before, during, and after any of the murders, especially times when she’s not accounted for.

  By the time Cassius shows up with Eisfanger, my eyes are starting to blur, my head is beginning to ache, and I could cheerfully go without seeing another zebra for the rest of my life. “Wow, this place is cool,” Eisfanger says. He’s wearing an honest-to-God pith helmet, even though it’s the middle of the night. “I’ve always wanted to go on a safari but never got around to it.”

  “Well, here’s your chance to play Great White Hunter,” I say. “Come with me.”

  I take him to the excavation by the banyan tree. “Here’s where it was buried. Shaka took off in a hurry, so she either picked up a trail or knew where the thief was going.” Eisfanger sets his case down on the ground. “I can do this better if I get hairy,” he says, sounding almost apologetic. “Call of the Wild on line two. Go ahead, pick up.” He shifts. I do my best not to laugh—a werewolf in a pith helmet is just hard to take seriously. He starts to sniff around the site. I leave him to it—if he finds anything urgent, the security hut isn’t far away.

  Cassius is still there when I get back. “I’ve been talking to the people Shaka worked with. She had many friends, but none of them knew her well. I’ve already had the second best tracker take a look at where the shield was buried—he says
that whoever took it got there the same way we did, walking from the path. He couldn’t find a trail leading away.”

  “So the thief either vanished or figured out how to fly the damn thing.”

  “It looks that way. I’ve also tried talking to the Lugosi, but he’s no longer coherent. It’ll take a while for his brain to heal.” Charlie steps out of the hut and joins us. “Just finished up with the security recordings.”

  “And?” Cassius asks. “Hard to say. She spends a lot of time in the bush and out of sight. My professional opinion—if she’s as good as I’ve heard, she could’ve slipped away on any of the nights. Especially if she had air transport.”

  “I have to agree,” I say. “There’s nothing proving she was gone, but there’s nothing conclusive to give her an alibi, either.”

  Cassius nods. “Let’s hope Eisfanger comes up with something we can use.”

  “There are no tracks leading out of here,” Eisfanger says. “We already knew that,” I say. “The thief must have taken the aerial route.”

  “Let me finish. Just because there’s no tracks doesn’t mean there’s no trail—there’s just no trail on the ground.” I frown. “You can track someone through the air?”

  “Well, no. But apparently Shaka can.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because she took to the trees.” Cassius and Charlie are back at the security hut—it’s just me and Eisfanger out in the bush. “How do you know? The other tracker didn’t find anything like that.”

  “The other tracker didn’t have my equipment. It’s one thing to follow a herd of wild buffalo, and another to locate the spoor of the African Queen.”

  “Spoor?”

  “Okay, not spoor, exactly. More like very tiny amounts of spiritual trace.” He holds up a feather in a plastic bag. “I used this—it’s highly sensitive to etheric vibration. I was able to harmonize it to the fletching on one of her arrows. According to the feather, she went up this tree.”