by Darren Shan
“Scared?” I asked softly.
“Young Murlough’s scared of nothing!” he snapped immediately.
“Then what are you waiting for?”
“You seem very eager to lead me to your girl-friend,” he said suspiciously.
I shrugged as best I could beneath the ropes. “The longer I have to wait, the worse I’m going to feel,” I said. “I know what has to be done. I don’t like it, and I’ll feel awful afterward, but all I want right now is to have it over and done with, so I can take Evra and find someplace warm to lie down and relax. My feet are like blocks of ice.”
“Poor little half-vampire.” Murlough giggled, then used one of his sharp vampaneze nails to cut a circle in the glass of the back-door window. Reaching in, he opened the door and shoved me through.
He listened quietly to the noises of the house.
“How many people live here?” he asked.
“Three,” I said. “Debbie and her parents.”
“No brothers or sisters?” I shook my head. “No guests?”
“Just the three of them,” I repeated.
“I might nibble one of the parents when I’m finished with the girl,” he muttered.
“That wasn’t part of the deal!” I hissed.
“So what? I never said I’d spare them. I doubt if I’ll be hungry after, but maybe I’ll come back another night, pick them off one by one. They’ll think it’s a family curse.” He giggled.
“You’re disgusting.” I growled.
“You’re only saying that because you like me.” He chuckled. “Go on,” he said, focusing back on serious business. “Up the stairs. The parents’ bedroom first. I want to make sure they’re asleep.”
“Of course they’re asleep,” I said. “It’s the middle of the night. You’d hear them if they were awake.”
“I don’t want them walking in on me,” he said.
“Look,” I sighed. “If you want to check on Jesse and Donna, fine, I’ll take you to them. But you’re wasting time. Wouldn’t it be better if we got in and out as quickly as possible?”
The vampaneze thought it over. “Very well,” he said. “But if they wake up unexpectedly, young Murlough will kill them, yes he will, and it’ll be your fault.”
“Fair enough,” I said, and started up the stairs.
It was a long, tense walk. Being bound by ropes, I wasn’t able to move as quietly as usual. Every time a step creaked, I winced and paused. Murlough was tense, too: his hands were twitching and he drew in a sharp breath whenever I made a noise and stopped.
When I got to Debbie’s door, I leaned my head against it and sighed sadly. “This is it,” I said.
“Out of the way,” Murlough snapped, and shoved me to one side. He stood there, sniffing, then smiled. “Yes,” he said. “I can smell her blood. You can smell it, too, I bet, hmmm?”
“Yes,” I said.
He turned the handle and eased the door open. It was dark inside, but our eyes were used to the greater darkness of the tunnels, so they adjusted quickly.
Murlough glanced around the room, noting the closets and chests of drawers, the few posters and pieces of furniture, the bare Christmas tree near the window.
Debbie’s outline could just be seen beneath the covers of her bed, moving around slightly, like a person does when she’s having a bad dream. The smell of her blood was thick in the air.
Murlough moved forward, then remembered me. He tied me to the door handle, tugged at it hard to make sure the knot was secure, then jammed his face up to mine and sneered.
“Have you ever seen death before, Darren Shan?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said.
“It’s wonderful, isn’t it?”
“No,” I said bluntly. “It’s horrible.”
The vampaneze sighed. “You cannot see the beauty. Never mind. You are young. You will learn as you grow.” He pinched my chin between a couple of purple fingers and a thumb. “I want you to watch,” he said. “Watch as I rip her throat open. Watch as I suck her blood out. Watch as I steal her soul and make it mine.”
I tried turning my eyes away, but he pinched harder and forced them back. “If you don’t watch,” he said, “I go straight to the parents’ room after this and kill the two of them, too. Understand?”
“You’re a monster,” I said, gasping.
“Understand?” he repeated menacingly.
“Yes,” I said, jerking my chin free. “I’ll watch.”
“Good boy.” He chuckled. “Clever boy. You never know — you might like it. This could be the making of you. Maybe you’ll come with me when I leave. How about it, Darren Shan? Fancy abandoning that boring old vampire and becoming young Murlough’s assistant, hmmm?”
“Just get on with it,” I said, not bothering to hide my disgust.
Murlough crossed the room slowly, making no sound. He drew his two knives as he walked and twirled them around like a pair of batons. He began whistling, but softly, too softly for any but the most advanced ears to hear.
The slight movements continued beneath the covers.
I watched, stomach churning, as he closed in on his prey. Even if I hadn’t been under orders to watch, I couldn’t have torn my eyes away. It was a dreadful sight, but fascinating. Like watching a spider zoom in on a fly. Only this spider carried knives, ate humans, and had an entire city for a web.
He approached the bed from the side nearest the door, stopping half a foot away. Then he pulled something from one of his pockets. Straining my eyes, I realized it was a bag. Opening it, he took out some kind of saltlike substance and sprinkled it on the floor. I wanted to ask what it was for, but didn’t dare speak. I guessed it was some ritual that vampaneze performed when they killed somebody at home. Mr. Crepsley had told me they were big on rituals.
Murlough walked around the bed, sprinkling the “salt,” muttering words I couldn’t make sense of. When he was finished, he walked back to the foot of the bed, glanced over to make sure I was watching, and then, in one swift move — almost too quick for me to follow — leaped on the bed, landed with a foot on either side of the sleeping form, jerked back the covers, and lashed out with both knives, killer cuts that would slash open Debbie’s throat and end her life in an instant.
Chapter Twenty-five
MURLOUGH’S KNIVES SWISHED THROUGH THE AIR, through the space where Debbie’s neck should have been, and through the soft fabric of the pillows and the mattress.
But not through Debbie.
Because she wasn’t there.
Murlough stared down at the creature tied to the bed, its hooves and snout bound as tightly as I was.
“It’s ...a...” His jaws quivered. He couldn’t bring himself to say the word.
“It’s a goat,” I finished for him, smiling grimly.
Murlough turned slowly, his face a mask of confusion. “But...but ...but ...”
While he was spluttering, trying to figure out what was happening, the door of one of the closets opened and Mr. Crepsley sprung out.
The vampire looked even more sinister than the vampaneze, with his blood-red clothes and cape, his orange crop of hair and ugly scar.
Murlough froze when he saw Mr. Crepsley. His red eyes bulged out of his head and his purple skin lightened a couple of shades as blood rushed from his face.
From the movies I’d seen, I was expecting a long, exciting fight. I thought the two would trade insults first, then Mr. Crepsley would draw a knife or a sword and they’d lunge at and evade one another, battling their way around the room, nicking each other in the early stages, gradually working up to the more serious wounds.
But it wasn’t like that. This was a fight between superfast predators of the night who were only interested in killing, not impressing action-hungry audiences. There were just four moves in the conflict, and it was over in the space of two blurred and furious seconds.
Mr. Crepsley made the first move. His right hand zipped out and sent a short knife flying through the air. It struck Murlo
ugh in the upper left of his chest, a few inches higher than its target — his heart. The vampaneze recoiled and drew in air to scream.
While Murlough’s mouth was opening, Mr. Crepsley sprang forward. One huge leap was all it took, then he was at the side of the bed, in position to go hand-to-hand with the vampaneze.
That was the second move of the fight.
The third move was Murlough’s — his only one. In a panic, he lashed out at Mr. Crepsley with his left-handed knife. The blade glittered through the air at a frightening speed and would have been the end of the vampire had it been on target. But it wasn’t. It soared a good three inches above the vampire’s head.
As Murlough’s left arm followed through on the swing, it left a gap that Mr. Crepsley exploited. Using only his bare right hand, he delivered the killer blow. Keeping the hand flat, rough nails jutting out like five sharp blades, he drove it into Murlough’s stomach.
And when I say into, I mean into!
Murlough gasped and went deathly still. The knife dropped from his hand and he gazed down. Mr. Crepsley’s hand had disappeared into the flesh of the vampaneze’s belly, all the way up to his forearm.
He left the hand there a second, then yanked back sharply, bringing guts and a torrent of dark blood with it.
Murlough groaned and collapsed to his knees, almost squashing the goat in the process, then toppled to the floor, where he rolled over onto his back and tried closing the hole in his stomach with spit he’d quickly licked onto the palms of his hands.
But the hole was too wide. The vampaneze’s healing spit was useless. There was nothing he could do to seal the flesh or stop his precious blood from pumping out. He was finished.
Mr. Crepsley stepped back from the dying vampaneze, picked up one of the bedsheets, and wiped his hand on it. His face was expressionless. He appeared neither pleased nor saddened by what he had done.
After a couple of seconds, Murlough realized his situation was hopeless. Flopping over onto his belly, his eyes settled on me, and he began crawling toward me, gritting his teeth against the pain.
“Mr. Crepsley?” I said shakily.
Mr. Crepsley studied the crawling vampaneze, then shook his head. “Do not worry. He can do you no harm.” But, taking no chances, he walked over, freed me, and stood by my side, ready to strike again if needed.
It was a long, agonized crawl for the vampaneze. I almost felt sorry for him, but had only to think of Evra strung up and what he’d planned to do to Debbie to remind myself that he deserved everything he’d gotten.
He paused more than once, and I thought he was going to die midway, but he was determined to have his final say. He fought on, even though he must have known he was accelerating the moment of his death.
He collapsed on his face at my feet and breathed heavily into the carpet. Blood was gushing out of his mouth, and I knew the end was almost upon him. He raised a trembling finger and crooked it, beckoning me to lean down.
I glanced questioningly at Mr. Crepsley.
The vampire shrugged. “He is harmless now. It is up to you.”
I decided to see what the dying vampaneze had to say. I bent down and leaned close to his mouth. He had only seconds left.
His red eyes rolled directionlessly in their sockets. Then, with a huge effort, they fixed on me, and his lips split into one last leer. He raised his head as high as he could and whispered something that I couldn’t hear.
“I didn’t catch that,” I told him. “You’ll have to speak up.” I jammed my ear closer to his mouth.
Murlough licked his lips, clearing some blood and making space for air. Then, with his final breath, he got out the words that seemed so important to him.
“Cluh-cluh-clever buh-buh-buh-boy, hmmm?” He gurgled, then smiled blankly and fell forward.
He was dead.
Chapter Twenty-six
WE BUNDLED MURLOUGH’S BODY into a large black plastic bag. We’d drop him off later in the tunnels of blood he’d loved so much. As fitting a burial place as any for him.
We stuck the goat in a bag, too, but made a couple of air holes in it. We’d expected Murlough to kill the goat, which I’d stolen earlier from the children’s section of the city zoo. Mr. Crepsley wanted to take it back to the Cirque Du Freak — it would make a nice snack for Evra’s snake or the Little People — but I persuaded him to set it free.
Next we cleaned up the mess. Murlough had shed a lot of blood, all of which had to be mopped up. We didn’t want the Hemlocks to find it and start asking questions. We worked quickly, but it took a couple of hours.
With the cleaning finished, we climbed up to the attic and brought down the sleeping bodies of Jessie, Donna, and Debbie and laid them in their respective beds.
The entire night had been planned. The wine I brought for dinner? I drugged it when I was in the kitchen. I added one of Mr. Crepsley’s potions to the wine, a tasteless little concoction that knocked everybody out within ten minutes. They’d be asleep for several more hours yet, and wake with sore heads, but otherwise no ill effects.
I smiled as I wondered what they’d think when they woke in bed, fully dressed, with no memories of the previous night. It would be a mystery, one they’d never solve.
It hadn’t been a perfect plan. Lots of things could have gone wrong. For starters, there was no guarantee that Murlough would find me when I had my “fight” with Mr. Crepsley and stormed off on my own, and no guarantee that he wouldn’t kill me instantly if he did.
He could have gagged me when he caught me, in which case I would have been unable to convince him that he ought to let me live. Or he might have disregarded my warning about the Vampire Generals — what I said was true, but the trouble was, Murlough was crazy. There was no telling how a crazy vampaneze would act. He might have laughed at the threat of the Generals and sliced me up anyway.
Convincing him to swap Evra for Debbie was always going to be the trickiest part. For it to work, I’d had to deliver a perfect performance. If I’d come straight out and made the offer, Murlough might have been suspicious and not walked into the trap. If he’d been in full control of his senses, I don’t think he would have fallen for it, regardless of my performance, so on that score his insanity worked in our favor.
And, of course, there was the killing of him to account for. Murlough could have beaten Mr. Crepsley. If he had, all six of us would have died: Mr. Crepsley, me and Evra, Debbie, Donna, and Jesse.
It had been a dangerous gamble — and unfair to the Hemlocks, who knew nothing of their role in the deadly game — but sometimes you have to take chances. Was it wise to risk five lives for the sake of one? Probably not. But it was human. If I’d learned one thing from my encounter with the crazy vampaneze, it was that even the undead could be human. We had to be — without a touch of humanity, we’d be like Murlough, nothing more than bloodthirsty monsters of the night.
I tucked Debbie in under the fresh covers. There was a tiny scar near her left ankle, where Mr. Crepsley had drawn blood earlier. He’d needed the blood to smear on the goat, in order to mislead Murlough’s sense of smell.
I looked up at the vampire. “You did well tonight,” I said quietly. “Thanks.”
He smiled. “I did what had to be done. It was your plan. I should be the one offering the thanks, were it not for the fact that you got in the way when I first had him in my sights. In my eyes, that makes us even, so neither need thank the other.”
“What will happen when the vampaneze find out we killed him?” I asked. “Will they come after us?”
Mr. Crepsley sighed. “With luck, they will not find the body. If they do, I hope they will be unable to trace him to us.”
“But if they do?” I pressed him for an answer.
“Then they will hunt us to the ends of the Earth,” he said. “And they will kill us. We would not stand a chance. They would come in their dozens and the Generals would not assist us.”
“Oh,” I said. “I wish I hadn’t asked.”
“Would you rather I’d lied?”
I shook my head. “No. No more lies.” I smiled. “But I think it’ll be for the best if we don’t tell Evra.
What he doesn’t know can’t worry him. Besides, he’s mad enough at me as it is. He thought I was really going to trade Debbie’s life for his. He’s furious.”
“He will calm down when the facts are explained,” Mr. Crepsley said confidently. “Now — shall we go and get him?”
I hesitated and looked down at Debbie. “Can I have a couple of minutes to myself?” I asked.
“Of course,” Mr. Crepsley said. “But do not delay: dawn approaches and I do not wish to spend tomorrow trapped in those godforsaken tunnels. I will be downstairs.” He departed.
I checked my watch. Nearly four in the morning. That meant this was the twenty-fifth of December. Christmas Day.
I worked quickly. I placed the bare Christmas tree to one side of Debbie’s bed, opened the box of decorations, and covered the tree with glittering balls, tiny figures, streams of tinsel, and twinkling lights. When I finished, I turned Debbie so that she was facing toward the tree. It would be the first thing she’d see when she opened her eyes in the morning.
I felt bad about leaving without saying good-bye. This way, I hoped to make it up to her. When she woke and saw the tree, she’d know I hadn’t slipped away thoughtlessly. She’d know I’d been thinking of her, and hopefully wouldn’t hold my sudden disappearance against me.
I stood over her a few seconds, studying her face. This would almost certainly be the last time I’d ever see her. She looked so sweet, lying there asleep. I was tempted to find a camera and take a photo, but I didn’t need to — this was one picture I’d always be able to remember in perfect detail. It would join those of my parents, my sister, Sam — cherished faces that would never fade in the mental galleries of my memory.
Leaning forward, I kissed her forehead and brushed a stray lock of hair out of her eyes. “Merry Christmas, Debbie,” I said quietly, then turned and left — and went to rescue Evra.