by Tal Bauer
“Damn you,” Lycidas growled. “Damn you, Asmodeus.”
Asmodeus’s voice fell flat. “We are already damned.”
His spell roared. The vampires shrieked, wailing and howling as their bones broke and their skin fractured and the blood within them—stolen blood, thirteen corpses worth—flowed free, bathing the bones of their cathedral, pooling on the ground. The taste of copper filled the air, the tang strong and sweet.
Lycidas lived, barely. He struggled against the flaming bonds as Asmodeus moved to him, circling the alpha. “I needed you for something beyond your search for the hunter, Lycidas. I needed you, and your nest, for this blood. To gather it here so that I could spill it as one.”
Madness flared from Lycidas’s eyes. “Burn, demon. Burn in the depths.”
“No more depths for us.” He pushed Lycidas down, the fires pulling him until he was flat on his back, lying in the pool of spilled blood from his nest. It rose around him, over his ears, his cheeks. Poured down his throat. Lycidas thrashed as smoke rose from his mouth, as his body started to burn from the inside. “We’re bringing Lucifer back. Today.”
Lycidas bellowed, his fangs snapping as he burned from the inside out.
Asmodeus’s Demon Fire bonds cracked.
Lycidas’s screams died with a wet snap.
* * *
Silence, thick like death, hovered in the air as Alain and Lotario crept toward the vampires’ bone cathedral.
They took the long way, snaking along the banks of the Tiber that broke off into a tributary underground. When they crept into the darkness, Alain passed over a set of night vision goggles he’d pilfered from the Swiss Guard armory.
Deep underground they pushed, communicating with silent gestures.
Alain motioned for Lotario to follow him carefully toward a pebble shore in the black depths.
He froze, the Tiber lapping at his shins as he crept up the vampires’ rocky beach.
Something dripped from the bone walls, from the skulls and their guttered dark flames. Something wet.
He waited, listening. There were no sounds. No movement. Nothing at all in the darkness.
Alain folded up his NVGs and fished out his flashlight. Lotario held his own with his wrists crossed under the grip of his pistol, covering Alain. Alain hefted the knight’s blade he carried. Lotario had raised both eyebrows when he brought it, but Alain hadn’t said a word. This one wasn’t his own. He’d left his as a gift for Cristoph back at his apartment.
No, the blade he held wasn’t his.
He held it before him as he crept up the softly sloping pebble shore. The glow of their flashlights landed on the blood-drenched nest.
Blood was everywhere. The entire space was coated in it—running down the bone walls, lying in a lake in the center of the nest. Bodies lay in the shadows, unmoving. He stopped short at the sheer amount of gore. His throat closed against the smell of it, copper and iron on the back of his tongue, the taste of rot and grave dirt. But no ozone, no electricity arcing down his throat.
The vampires were dead.
Slaughtered would be a better word.
Lotario whistled. He coughed, choking on the death in the air. The beam of his flashlight moved to the center of the cavern and froze. “Alain.”
A vampire, or what was left of him, lay in the center of the lake of blood. A ragged slice ripped down the center of his chest. His ribs flared out, peeled back at odd angles.
They moved closer, flashlights trained on the vampire’s corpse.
“Jesus Christ, it’s the alpha.” Alain coughed and turned his nose away, trying to escape the stench. Death and putrefaction, and a sharper, deeper scent. Burning.
The alpha’s eyes were open, staring at nothing. His fangs were out, lips pulled back, his face frozen in a last, desperate scream.
Blood swirled against their boots, almost up to their ankles.
Alain peered into the hollow, open cavity of the alpha’s chest. Darkness stared back at him, a hole that ran straight through the corpse and opened into an endless void.
“What the hell?” Lotario squatted next to the body.
A shiver crawled up Alain’s spine, slow taps like fingernails plucking his bones. “I know what this is,” he breathed. “I’ve seen it before. In the secrets of the Order.” There was a danger in the air, a stain, a brand of evil. Something that screamed in his mind, tore at his soul, shredded him apart. Run! Run!
A slithering voice, deep within, urged him to stay. To reach into the alpha’s corpse, to fall headfirst into the black void cut through the vampire’s lifeless body.
“It’s a spell.” He closed his eyes. The slippery voice buried under his soul was getting louder. “A portal through the Veil. It’s the same kind of portal the first knights found in the Well of Souls.”
Lotario was silent, save for the wet inhale of his ragged breaths. “Who could do this?”
Inhaling, Alain’s nostrils flared. That burn, that acrid stench, slotted into his brain. “Demons.”
Lotario’s lips pressed together, thinning to a hard line.
“Can’t you smell it? The burning? The sulfur?”
“I can’t smell shit over all this blood.” He peered at Alain, shining his flashlight into Alain’s face. “You sure? You sure it’s demons?”
Jump. Jump down. Cross the Veil, Alain. It was a whisper tugging on his soul, deep enough to rattle his bones.
“I’m sure of it.” He pulled himself away from the alpha’s corpse. “What else could destroy a nest of vampires and leave them soaked in gore?”
“I thought they were working together.”
Panic bloomed, so suddenly, so fiercely, he stumbled, nearly fell into the lake of blood. “This is it, Lotario. Whatever they’re planning, it’s happening now. The demons, they must have double crossed the vamps. For this! This is a portal, like before. Like what the knights found. It’s an opening, it’s the opening. The Veil, it’s—” Groaning, Alain dropped down, squatting as his mind screamed and the whisper inside him chuckled, dry leaves and old nails scraping across chalkboard.
He had to get back. He had to get to Cristoph. Why wasn’t he right next to Cristoph, right now? Why had he thought, why had he believed, Cristoph would be safe away from his side?
“What’s happening? What the fuck is going on with you?”
“I don’t know! I don’t fucking know!” He grasped his hair, almost pulling out strands as he groaned. His head throbbed, as if his skull was splitting in two. “We have to get back. Something’s happening, Lotario. Something terrible. I can feel it.”
* * *
Commandant Best made the sign of the cross over his chest and kissed his rosary before tucking the wooden crucifix back under his shirt. His gaze rolled up, eyes fixing to the painting he’d insisted on hanging in his office. A portrait of the Knights Templar, two knights bedecked in white tunics, emblazoned with red crosses, kneeling with their swords dug into the earth. Eyes turned up, the knights’ faces held a look of rapture as they prayed, listening to God’s word.
Where was divine guidance when he asked? Where was his rapture, his answered prayer?
He closed his eyes, his eyelashes brushing over his weathered cheeks. The years had grown long, perhaps too long, and it was getting time to consider stepping down and letting Luca take over the reins.
And yet, Luca…
Sighing, Best rubbed the beads of his rosary again.
His cell phone ringing jarred him out of his pensive thoughts. He didn’t recognize the number. Still, he swiped to answer. “Commandant Best speaking.”
“Commandant!”
It was Alain, but not Alain as he’d ever sounded. This Alain was panicked. Petrified.
“Alain? What is wrong? What’s happened?”
“We found a portal, Commandant. Through the Veil. Just like the legends say. A bloody gate and a black hole to the abyss. We found one down in the vampires’ nest. It’s the demons, Commandant, they’re—”
“Alain, slow down. What are you saying?” As Alain spoke, Best slowly rose from his desk chair. The blood drained from his face. “I have to warn the Holy Father. His Holiness will want to pray.”
“Be careful, Gaëtan!” Alain’s panicked voice was almost drowned out by the wail of a car horn. “The girl searched you out, and the vamps killed Cardinal Nuzzi. They might have the same information she did. If the vampires knew about you, then the demons must too! They could be coming for you.”
“I will be cautious, Alain. You must do so as well.”
“No, my file wasn’t there. The only way they’ll find me is if they get to you.”
“I will be cautious. But I must inform His Holiness.”
“We’re on our way back. I’ll find you when we get there. I need help, Commandant.” Alain exhaled, a long, sorrow-filled sigh. “I’m sorry, Gaëtan. I’m sorry I failed. I let this happen—”
“Alain, there hasn’t been a true demonic rising in centuries. And the last vampire rising, you stopped. You’ve been dealing with revenants and wraiths and hungry ghosts for over a decade, and you’ve been great.”
“Commandant—”
“Speak no more of this, Alain. We’ll talk when you get here. We will fight this rising. Together.”
He heard Alain’s swallow over the phone line. “Yes, Commandant. I’ll… I’ll see you soon.”
Closing his eyes, Best sent a prayer to the heavens as he hung up. Lord, deliver us now, as we place our faith and our future into your hands. He pulled open the bottom drawer of his desk and took out a long box from the filing cabinet. The narrow, navy box had a simple clasp. He slipped the brass clip back and tilted the lid.
A silver-coated blade nestled against black velvet, laid in place twelve years ago, the last time he’d ever touched it. He hefted the blade, the grip still fitting his hand like it had for the decade he had been the knight on guard against the darkness.
Beneath the black velvet, a leather scabbard rested, fitted for his suit. The Swiss Guard wore rapiers and swords on their belts every day, for ceremony and for purpose, and it had been easy to carry this blade back then, hidden in plain sight, a holy weapon amid a sea of ordinary.
Alain had never carried his blade, not since that night twelve years prior.
Sliding the blade into the scabbard, Best slipped it into his suit jacket’s inner pocket. He left his office and strode through the garrison. Luca was scowling at his computer monitor. Captain Ewe joked with one of the sergeants, tossing back his head and laughing out loud. Halberdiers milled, on their way to or from a posting, and tipped their heads in a salute as he passed by.
The walk to the Apostolic Palace was a short one. He smiled at the young halberdier guarding the elevator for the Holy Father’s private apartment.
As the elevator doors opened, the heavy brass bell ringing, another man joined him, sliding to his side. “May I ride up with you, Commandant?” Cardinal Santino Acossio, the new secretary of state, smiled.
“Of course, Cardinal.” Best gestured to the opening doors. “Please, after you.”
“No, I insist. As a warrior for God, please do me the honor.” Cardinal Acossio held out his hand.
Tipping his head, Best stepped in the elevator and pressed the button for the Holy Father’s floor. The doors started to close.
“Such a trying time,” Cardinal Acossio said, clucking his tongue. “Cardinal Nuzzi’s death. So violent.”
“We’re working on finding the murderer, Cardinal. We will keep you safe. You and the Holy Father.”
The brass doors slotted together. The elevator began to rise.
“But Commandant,” Cardinal Acossio said, turning to face him.
Black smoke appeared in a vortex. Swirling, the smoke formed into the shape of a man, cracking and thundering. As quick as it appeared, the smoke vanished, revealing a being cut from darkness, long limbs stretched to grotesque proportions, lean muscles pushing out from midnight skin, and an angular jaw narrowed to a tip beneath a pointed skull. The creature grinned, all sharp teeth and fangs.
It was a demon in full form, summoned bodily through a portal ripped through the Veil.
Best reached for his blade.
Cardinal Acossio smirked. “Who will keep you safe?”
Acossio stepped back. The demon struck before Best could draw his blade, pinning him against the elevator. Smoke poured from its skin, sliding over Best’s body, up his arms, around his throat, and into his mouth, open in a silent scream.
Best’s eyes rolled back in his skull, shifting to black as the demon possessed his soul.
* * *
It had taken hours to crawl their way to the vampires’ nest deep under Rome, but they didn’t have that kind of time heading back.
Filthy, soaking wet, and drenched in spilled vampire blood, Alain and Lotario burst from Lotario’s Bug half a mile from the Vatican and ran for St. Anne’s Gate. A roadblock had stopped all traffic heading into the Eternal City. Two Swiss Guards waved people away, directing them to turn back.
“What happened?” Alain grabbed one of the guards, nearly running over the man. He was a corporal, three years in, but not someone Alain knew well. “What’s happening?”
Eyes wide, the guard stared askance at Alain. His gaze tracked the blood and gore, the rot and the putrescence clinging to Alain’s suit. He tried to jerk away, but Alain held him fast.
“Tell me!” Alain roared, shaking the young guard.
“Alain—” Lotario tried.
“It’s the Commandant!” Petrified eyes darted between Alain and Lotario. He jerked again but wasn’t able to break Alain’s hold. “It’s the Commandant.” His voice wavered, warbled. “He’s dead.”
No. God, you bastard. No, damn you! Alain gripped the guard’s arms until the younger man winced. “How?” he breathed as Lotario cursed.
The guard shook his head. “They found him in His Holiness’s elevator. His—” His voice cracked. The guard looked down.
Alain shook him again. “Tell me everything!”
“He was decapitated!” the guard snapped. “He had some kind of blade with him, and it sliced his head off. But he was alone! How—”
Pushing away, Alain doubled over, his hands on his knees, trying to fight back the wave of nausea. Gaëtan was dead. His one anchor in the world, his friend, and he was gone. Ripped from his life.
Ripped from his life by demons, working with vampires.
If the demons had gotten to Best, then they knew everything Best knew. Which meant—
Whirling, Alain grabbed the guard again. “Where is Major Bader?”
The guard tried to pull free from Alain’s ironclad grasp. “He’s in the garrison. He’s trying to keep a lid on this, but you’re acting like a lunatic, Sergeant.” The guard finally twisted free and stepped back, one hand on his service weapon at his hip. “Get a hold of yourself. You’re making a scene.”
Fuck him. Alain took off, ignoring the guard’s demands to stop. He ran, Lotario beside him, and tore straight for the garrison offices.
A blur of color appeared, striped red, yellow, and blue. His soul wept as he recognized Cristoph, and he reached over and grabbed his uniform, hauling him close.
“I just heard.” Cristoph ripped his beret off. “The major put me on post at the Door of Death for nine hours. I left.”
He couldn’t be mad about Cristoph ditching his post, not now. “Stay close to me.”
They slowed as they reached the garrison, Lotario hacking through a wet cough as he doubled over while Alain ripped open the door. Cristoph’s hand landed on his back as they crowded through, and even through his suit, the touch burned.
Chaos had descended on the Swiss Guard inside the garrison. Phones rang off the hook. Stricken halberdiers rushed to and fro as Captain Ewe barked orders in German into a radio in one hand and shouted into a phone in Italian in the other. Chaplain Weimers sat at a desk, staring at his folded hands, his eyes vacant and lost.
Luca stood
in the center of it all, listening to his own radio and furiously scratching something down on a notepad.
“Luca!” Alain bellowed.
Luca’s gaze rose and met Alain’s.
Light and fury exploded through the garrison.
An eruption bloomed, bursting apart the brick wall of the office. Shrapnel flew, shards of red brick sliced through the air. Molten heat washed the world in orange flames. Desks and computers blew apart, rocketing across the office, cords whiptailing behind the machines. Glass shattered, raining a stinging, razor-sharp grit. Shouts cut off mid-scream as the ceiling groaned and buckled, collapsing. Smoke and haze choked the air, lodging in Alain’s throat and obscuring everything from sight.
Alain coughed as he peered through the wreckage, knocked to his belly and trying to see something, anything. Shattered glass sliced his palms. Brick dust hung on his tongue, mixing with acrid black smoke. His eyes watered, stinging. He twisted and found Cristoph’s soot-covered face. A gash bled from his temple to his chin, but his eyes were clear, and he reached for Alain, squeezing his shoulder. “I’m all right,” Cristoph shouted over the roar of devastation and the chaos of destruction. “You?”
He nodded as the fire sprinklers jetted on, red lights spinning as the two-note siren wailed.
A being made of darkness, of midnight skin and angular features, stepped through the blown hole in the garrison’s brick wall.
Demon! Alain’s soul shouted. A demon from beyond the Veil! It crossed over!
Next to the demon, a second being entered, also made of darkness, but covered head to toe in curling flames writhing over his skin.
Temeluchus, deep whispers breathed beneath Alain’s soul. My old friend. So good to see you again.
Dread filled Alain, spreading to all the corners of his being. He scrambled up, slipping as he came to his knees. “Luca!” he shouted. “Luca, Goddammit, where are you?”
“Here.” A voice he didn’t know spoke. Alain turned—