Burning Ashes

by James Bennett

  Thanking his stars that he’d arrived in time, Ben still didn’t fancy his chances against a ravenous nest of three-hundred-odd vampyri. Fangs might not be able to pierce his scales, but given time, the creatures would probably wear him down, find the softer parts of him … it wasn’t was a risk he was willing to take. In any case, such a mob could easily overwhelm him and he couldn’t employ fire here either, for fear of setting the old, closely packed buildings alight, consuming the humans along with the leeches in an inferno of his own making. Likewise, the streets of the Gothic Quarter were too narrow to accommodate his full draconic bulk, not unless he wanted to smash through a hundred shops, scattering shoes, postcards, food, pottery, bikes and selfie sticks, reducing the historic district to rubble.

  Maybe not. He was going to have to face this in human shape, with added scales for armour. Time was running out, he could feel it in his bones. Dawn could only be an hour or so away at most. Was that why House Artigas had chosen this moment for its little parade? Leading the procession, Ben picked out a tall figure in a tattered cloak, his hair and beard black and lustrous with the signs of a recent feed, his lips and cheeks red and full, his skin otherwise ashen. Was this Bernat, the man that Ben had heard in his head under Paris? The woman beside him, all brunette curls and fangs, was she the one called Lucia? And the brawny-looking man marching alongside them, a hunched and drooling beast of the dark, must surely be Ignasi, no doubt the muscle in this scenario. Their eyes shone with triumph, but filth and decay clung to them, a pall like an open sewer that crept into Ben’s nostrils, stinging his eyes. For all the grace of their movements, the grave hadn’t done them any favours.

  Bernat, the don of House Artigas, led the procession across the square. Ben watched them go, many in the throng hissing and spitting as they passed the cathedral, cursing the arched façade and the statues of the saints, the glory of a god who had long since turned his face from them. In swirls of mist, with an echoing requiem, Bernat strode back into the labyrinthine streets, swallowed by the night.

  Clutching the sword, Ben dropped down from the wall and followed, a man, to all intents and purposes, covered in thick red scales.

  As he crossed Via Laietana and entered the alleyways again, passing a Starbucks on the corner and an old Roman well, Ben noticed the symbol on the wall, a territorial stamp scrawled in blood. The image, dripping as it was, resembled a hooked crescent, the emblem of the House that he currently pursued. Over this, someone had spray-painted DIABLES CREMATS in Day-Glo green, but Ben knew that it would take more than graffiti to incinerate the devils ahead of him. Keeping close to the wall, Caliburn thrumming, he slipped down the street, heading roughly northeast. For all his size, his feet barely brushed the paving stones. When he turned the corner, however, emerging onto Carrer de la Princesa, it was clear that some in the procession had noticed him. A few feet above him, horizontal to the street—an impossible angle—the woman called Lucia stood with her feet planted against the brickwork, her copper curls and tattered dress hanging down in disorientating shreds. She glared at him with wine-dark eyes, indignation wrestling with her hunger.

  “Buenas noches,” she said. “But this one is your last, I think.”

  “I came for the Vicomte,” Ben replied, raising the sword. “I don’t mind toasting the lot of you fuckers in order to do so.”

  “You are one man against …” Her smile slipped, uncertain, and she paused to sniff the air. He watched her eyebrows spring into arches. “My. You are no man at all. Well, I didn’t think it too late for a midnight snack, but instead you bring us a feast.”

  Ben cricked his neck, crooking a finger up at her.

  “Come and get it.”

  Lucia came, dropping to all fours on the wall and loping towards him, her lips parting in a wolfish grin. Before she leapt, he realised she’d wrong-footed him, distracting him with a direct attack. Too late, he heard the snarl at his back and a cold slab of brawn smacked into him. The impact sent him sprawling into the road.

  “Bugger,” Caliburn said, the sword flying from Ben’s grip, clanging away from him.

  Ben’s chin struck the ground. Bright spots swirled in his skull and a couple of his teeth went skittering across the tarmac. When he looked up, clutching his jaw and groaning, he had a second to register the woman crouching in the road, her limbs at an angle that no human’s should be. Without taking her eyes off him, she lowered her lips to lap at the blood on the ground. Wincing, he stuck his tongue in the hole in his gums, already tingling with warmth, his flesh healing, a new tooth forming. He had no time to savour the sensation. A coldness clamped the back of his neck, dragging him upright and slamming him face first into the wall. Above him, a bar sign swung around its pole with the blow. Glass in a nearby storefront cracked along with the bones in his cheek.

  Dazed, he managed to swing out an arm as his attacker wrenched him around, Ignasi’s dead, oafish face before him, leering through the fog. It was like being drunk, apart from the fun bit. His fist skimmed off ossified flesh, the bloodsucker dodging the blow, then straightening, his lips peeling back from his fangs. The creature wasn’t going to win any beauty contests.

  “A Remnant,” Ignasi said, sounding vaguely impressed. “But what kind of—?”

  Ben showed him. His jaw hung loose, partly shattered, but he managed a grin all the same. Fangs. Two can play at that game. His neck grew longer, a snake weaving up to the first-floor window. Wings blossomed at his shoulders. The leathery membranes rippled over the walls, covering roll shutters, snapping cables and shattering light bulbs. Even as his chest bulged, his expanding scales shoving Ignasi away from him, fire came blasting from his throat. Ignasi screamed, stumbling back into the road, his head going up like a Roman candle.

  Lucia climbed to her feet. Wiping her mouth, a smear of red on snow-white flesh, she watched her cohort twist and burn, the flames dancing in her eyes. Ignasi fell to his knees, his limbs smoking, and then he slumped and crumbled against the wall, reduced to ash. Lucia squealed, but Ben couldn’t decide if it was dread or delight. When she looked at him, her intoxication was plain, her eyes threatening to burst from her head like overripe tomatoes. Veins slithered and pulsed through her flesh, jumping like cables at her breast and neck, her cheeks flushed and filling out, her skin darkening …

  It’s the blood. Dragon blood. She’s jacked on the stuff.

  Throwing back her head, Lucia gave a screech, and then she was coming at him again, her hands stretching out, extending into claws. As she drew near, he watched her transform, her pale, human shape giving way to something larger and fouler. Bestial. Her rags fell away, her face turning black, bristles of hair covering her skin. Ears sprouted on either side of her head, ridiculously large and cupped. Coals took the place of her eyes, reflecting Ben’s alarm. He’d barely recovered his wits as two tons of bat barrelled into him, the impact wrenching him into the air.

  In a tangle of tails and claws, Ben and Lucia rose from the alleyway, bashing into the bordering walls. A section of guttering raked across the brickwork, showering sparks. A balcony, all elegant scrollwork and roses, twisted into jags of black metal. Flowers and glass rained down.

  Ben roared, smoke pouring from his throat. Even swollen to twice the size of a human, the she-bat was tiny in comparison to him, a hairy little beast squeaking and thrashing against his chest, drunk on the stuff in his veins. Lucia meant to drag him into the sky, but what she intended to do with him there was anyone’s guess. Nibble on his wings? She was no manticore, that was for sure. As though pecking at fruit, her head darted back and forth, unable to make a dent in his scales. Still, he was flameless at present, the gases in his belly expelled, and he could do little more than endure her frenzy with gritted teeth.

  Tiles scattered as she tried to pull him over the rooftops. Finally, his patience ran out. With a grunt, he simply relaxed, his half-formed bulk sagging under her. He heard Lucia screech again, his weight tugging at her, carrying the both of them down. With a crash, dragon a
nd bat smashed into the road, the tarmac cracking, dust billowing out.

  For a stunned second, Ben lay wedged in the alley, his wings trapped by the brickwork. Then Lucia was on him, squeaking and scratching, her bloodlust lending her strength. He found that he couldn’t move, couldn’t lower his snout enough to blast her off his chest or reach her with his claws. If he remained in dragon form, she’d dig her way through his scales sooner or later, scrabbling for his heart. This presented him with a problem. If he changed back into human shape, then he’d hand the she-bat the battle on a plate, her prey shrinking under her.

  Damn it. The thought pricked his ego. After a dragon, a giant and a manticore, you’re going to get your arse kicked by a flying mouse?

  He shook his head, mustering rage, and caught a twinkle in the corner of his eye. Caliburn, lying flat and discarded in the road. Its pommel stared up the sky, the gems hard and bright, yet somehow long-suffering.

  “Don’t mind me,” the sword said. “I could lie here all day.”

  Seeing his chance, Ben reached out, his straining arm shrinking in size along with his body. Lucia screeched, flapping her wings, thrown off balance by her diminishing prey. With a grunt, his human-shaped fist closed around the hilt of the sword. The she-bat redoubled her efforts, pressing upon him with claws splayed, but the vampyr had run out of time. With a cry, Ben swung the sword up, thrusting the blade at her belly.

  There was a flash of light, silver and bright. A whine accompanied the sweep of the sword, distorted like a song heard underwater, but Ben couldn’t mistake the tinkle of bells, reminding him of the mnemonic harp. With the thought, lunewrought bit into flesh and the air around him shuddered with power.

  In his skull, a series of images went whipping by. A sword flying into a lake, flashing in the moonlight. A hand reaching from the surface to catch it, graceful, sure and brown. The Lady! Then he saw the weapon—Caliburn—thrust into stone, sparks showering. The blade penetrated some rock face or other, twisting like a key, a door opening. Snowdon. The slopes of Snowdon. Light, silver, exploded in his mind, dancing over the imagined precipice, igniting a band of indecipherable symbols that arched down into the valley below …

  It was only a moment, only a glimpse into the past, the blade awakened by battle. He had seen a Fay circle of protection emanating out from the sword, the great glyphs and the border that edged them aglow with argent health. And he had seen this light before, hadn’t he? It was the light of the harp, lunewrought shining in the darkness, shining with the last dregs of enchantment. The magic—it struck him with a surge of nausea in his guts—it was all connected, all one. Light. Souring. Turning blue. He didn’t know what that meant right now, but he could sense that he was onto something. Another unpleasant truth, knowing his luck.

  As the sword slipped under Lucia’s ribcage, Ben caught an afterimage on the walls around him, a silvery riddle of glyphs, fading like the echoes of the she-bat’s scream. The next thing he knew, he was sitting up in the road, his ears ringing. Bells. Bloody bells. Flakes of ash drifted through the air, settling on his cheeks and hair.

  Lucia was nowhere to be seen.

  In his hand, Caliburn throbbed, a cold, steady rhythm, unmistakably triumphant.

  Or smug.

  “What the …” Ben searched for the words. “Why didn’t you say—?”

  “Pray, do not venture there,” Caliburn told him.

  Ben was on his feet in a second, the sword held out before him.

  “Come on.”

  By the time he stumbled into the Parc de la Ciutadella, the broad gardens on the edge of the Gothic Quarter, the vampiric procession was swarming at the foot of its destination. In the western corner of the park, the Castell del Tres Dragons rose from a fringe of palm trees. Ceramic shields hung in a row around the top of the building, following the faux line of battlements. Built for the 1888 Universal Exposition, the square structure of apricot-coloured brick overlooked the park from four grand towers. The north tower rose above the others in a crenellated decagon, a baroque turret of small peaked roofs, each one facing a compass point. Above that, the turret grew slimmer still, a belfry of sapphire glass sporting a crown of elaborate ironwork, the spire culminating in a decorative weathervane.

  The Castle was Ben’s favourite building in the city. Admittedly, a difficult choice with such an embarrassment of riches. He vaguely recalled courting some widow or other here back in the war, swanning through the leafy surrounds, past the duck ponds and the golden cascade, arm in arm under the Mediterranean sun. A dull ache spread across his chest at the sight of the vampyri climbing the building, and as he drew closer, ducking behind bushes and statues, he did so with a feeling that bordered on offended. Any reverie evaporated as the pallid creatures scuttled up the sheer walls with all the ease of scaling a ladder, a busying line of ants against the brickwork. Looking up, Ben could see Bernat on the battlements directing his underlings, urging them to caution as, hand over hand, the creatures hauled du Sang on his broken cross up to the heights.

  From a distance, the Vicomte resembled a porcupine with the array of stakes bristling from his body. Bernat, on the other hand, appeared to be enjoying himself. Clearly, the don of House Artigas had dispatched his cronies to finish off a presumably human pursuit, judging by his arrogant stance and gestures, his cloak fluttering in the wind. Such theatrics. Ben gave a sour grin in the dark, knowing that the don was in for a dragon-sized surprise. He watched, counting the moments, as the nest of vampyri gathered on the battlements, a handful climbing up to the belfry to rest du Sang’s cross gently against it.

  “Any famous last words?” Bernat asked, calling up to his prisoner. And when du Sang looked down, the garlic bulb stuffed in his mouth, Ben could picture his expression. “I thought not,” the don said with a chuckle. “And so you pay the price for your betrayal.”

  With that, the creatures were retreating, converging along the top of the wall in a dishevelled line, each moon of a face turned to the belfry. A minute passed, maybe two, and then a silent signal passed between them. The vampyri turned and began descending the walls, leaving Bernat alone on the battlements.

  As the eastern sky blushed a lighter shade of blue, the fate awaiting the Vicomte became clear. Old as he was, cold and hardened by time, Ben doubted that du Sang could withstand the full blast of the Spanish sun for longer than an hour, particularly when pressed against glass, magnifying its intensity. You wait for the dawn and the sun gives you blisters, soon healing in the dark … That’s what he’d said last winter, a confession that betrayed his vulnerability despite his age. Add garlic and wooden stakes to the sunlight and well … things didn’t look good. House Artigas seemed to think this a fitting execution, anyway, and that convinced Ben of the danger. Folklore must play a part, after all; he guessed that du Sang would eventually burn, his dry, dead flesh going up like a tinderstick. And with it, Ben’s last hope.

  The time had come to act. The treetops hissed and creaked as Ben bounded into the sky, the rest of his hominid form unravelling in the sky, lengthening and reddening from snout to tail, the Castle of the Three Dragons joined by a fourth.

  Looking up at the disturbance, Bernat swallowed his smile, the shadow of wings falling over him. Cloak flying in the wind, he choked back a cry, the throng of vampyri arrested by the noise, glancing back from where they clung ragged on the wall. As one, the creatures released a piercing shriek as Ben came swooping down from the darkness, closing a claw around the broken cross and plucking du Sang from the belfry.

  Ben circled the battlements, his tail lashing back and forth. He narrowed his gaze on the tall, handsome and utterly deceased figure that stood under the north turret. For a moment, rage appeared to consume the don of House Artigas and he flung a string of profanity up at the sky, his fists shaking. Then light bloomed across his face, thrown by a radiance behind locked and airborne fangs, descending towards him.

  Lights go up. Crowd roars. No time for an encore …

  Closing his eyes
, Ben vented a rush of fire. Below, he heard curses turn into screams, lost in the thundering flames. The battlements rippled in the heat, the turret and the belfry a charred spindle of cracked glass and bursting brick. The ornate crown shrivelled and sagged, a rain of melting iron. Atop the spire, the weathervane spun in the blast, each arrow of the compass pointing at hell.

  The inferno spurred the throng to flee. The vampyri scattered, skittering down the castle walls, heading for the shelter of the bordering trees, the cool safety of darkness.

  Ben didn’t give them the chance. Despite his appreciation of the building below, the park was out in the open, far enough away from the district greater, and he wouldn’t miss his opportunity to burn. Filling his lungs, his inner gases flaring, he ushered in the dawn. A pink line broke the horizon, the first rays of the sun touching the sea, but the Castell del Tres Dragons was already aglow. Round and round Ben wheeled, a swift, roaring blur of red, strafing the walls with his fury. A great billow of flame engulfed the building, devouring all in its path. The creatures below danced and shrieked, and when at last he dared to look down, he shivered in satisfaction at the sight of the incinerated nest. Ancient rags went up like paper, not to mention flesh and bone that should’ve rotted centuries ago, all exploding in cinders and sparks. He watched the creatures cringe against the building, their sheltering arms dwindling to matchsticks, their eyeballs popping from scorched skulls, muck hissing on the ground. On his final circle, he could only see rivers of smoke and fire. The shrieks and screams were echoing into silence. All was ash, scattered by the wind.