The Seeker

by Martyn Taylor

  The words that anyone who was not scared of the unknown was too stupid to be followed crept up towards Call’s lips, but he managed to swallow them. Their words of the past few hours notwithstanding, this was not the time or place to risk antagonising a centuries old creature with the strength to break him like a dry stick. Best to stick to practicalities.

  “What will happen if we get separated?”

  “You will revert to the appearance you had before my glamour changed you, to the appearance you have now. So, we don’t get separated. Simple.”

  He decided that there was nothing else he could so, so he finished his drink, got to his feet and pulled on his jacket. A glance in the mirror revealed him to be a slightly scruffy man approaching a hard earned middle age who did not so much ignore fashion as trample it under the soles of his unpolished shoes bought from a cheap website. The man in the mirror had no more chance of being allowed into The Russia House than he did of being ushered into The Garrick Club.

  Roxane followed him out of the room and along the silent carpeted corridor towards the elevators. Once inside that confined metal cage Call found himself yawning so hugely he was positive he was going to dislocate his jaw. The pain was sharp enough to make him close his eyes.

  The doors were sliding open when he opened his eyes and looked into the mirror to discover a very sharp dressed man looking back at him. He was a little taller, slimmer and younger than the real Robert Call was, a little darker of hair - that was much more expensively barbered than his own - a little firmer and plumper of face and a very much better clotheshorse for the slim cut three piece suit he wore with a dazzling, starched white shirt and black shoes so shiny he would be able to see his face reflected in them.

  There was a gold half hunter pocket watch in one waistcoat pocket and a heavy gold chain crossing his firm stomach to the other pocket. He held a solid black stick in his right hand with a silver skull shaped pommel which he knew without thinking was actually a sword stick. He wanted to make a few passes with it, but restrained himself.

  Roxane was equally up to the minute, fashion-wise, in a blood red rose patterned dove grey silk dress that appeared to have been sprayed onto her, with enough diamonds at her throat and on her fingers to make any passing jewel thief come there and then in his boxer shorts. Her dark glasses were, simply, impenetrable.

  He watched as she walked towards the front door and was reminded of the scene in ‘Some Like It Hot’, where Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis watch Marilyn Monroe pneumatically undulating away from them, and came up with the phrase ‘jello on springs’. He hurried after her and they became a wealthy couple out on the town for some dangerous fun, and where in London were they more likely to find such fun than The Russia House?

  The doorman raised his top hat to them as the left. Call felt his gaze boring smoking holes between his shoulders as the doorman imagined what it must be like to fuck a creature like that. How did he know the man was thinking that? He shook his head and snorted as they crossed the road. He would just have to get used to lascivious glances coming in his direction if he was out on the town with Roxane.

  At the top of the steps he found a credit card in his hand to pay their admittance, not the one he had used the last time. He had never seen it before, even though it was in his name. He tapped in the first four digits of his birthday when the green screen demanded his post code, and was rewarded by a green light on the electronic reader and the Cossack holding open the velvet rope for them to enter.

  They entered The Russia House as though it was something they did every day.

  Chapter Twenty

  Rasputin had spent a long time that day in the lowest depths of the cellars, observing his prize, trying to understand his obsession with the vampire and coming no closer to that understanding than he had been when Gabriel and the others had delivered him.

  It was the unknowability that fuelled the obsession, he knew that much. Who could understand a nearly five centuries old vampire, except an even older vampire, and there were none older than Cyrano and Roxane, of that he was certain.

  He had spent a lot of time and money on researching that particular topic over the last six months and there was no evidence these were not the oldest. The rumours about Peter the Roman were just that, baseless rumours. He possessed one and would soon possess the other. Possession was not nine-tenths of the law. In this case, it was the whole of the law.

  What he would do with them he did not know. All that mattered was the opportunity to do whatever he chose. He might not know now, but he would think of something, and it would be entertaining, for him if not them.

  He went through into Cyrano’s cell. The vampire was only just alert, and weak from having had nothing to eat since he arrived, and only tepid water to drink. He had been such a beautiful creature, quite the best looking man Rasputin had ever seen, more handsome even than Paul Newman, in a less masculine, more symmetrical, almost perfect way.

  Even his mother would not describe him as handsome now, his face little more than parchment thin, chalk white skin stretched over his skull, bruised here and there, filth streaked with tears. It was the tears that astonished the wizard.

  Who could imagine a vampire weeping? Not him. The self-pity had to be strong in this one. Why else should he weep? Did he imagine his tears would melt away his captor’s resolve?

  His lips were thin, cracked and caked with detritus he lacked the strength to lick away. He was entirely abject, pathetic. He did not even strain against his restraints now to get at Rasputin when he entered. Six months of pain had eventually instilled their lesson. Only the eyes retained a little of the fire that had blazed there when first he was taken prisoner, the last, distant glowing coals of a conflagration that had seemed hot enough to consume the whole world and everything in it.

  Time, the force against which everything and everyone contended in vain, be he human or wizard or vampire. Time. There was a subject worthwhile a man studying, the endlessness of it, the relentlessness of it.

  How old did the scientists say the universe was, 14.6 billion years? Something like that. Who could have any concept of time in such quantities? He had seen the sea – nothing more than salty water he could cup in his hands and let dribble out with no effect on him whatsoever, other than a momentary dampness of his flesh – he had seen the sea eat away at a mighty stone needle in the sea just outside the fishing village in which he had been born, eat away lick by lick by lick until the needle, which the villagers believed had been there since before God was born, never mind a mere man, toppled down into the depths of the ocean where the movement of sea floor rocks on the tides had probably reduced it to powdery sand by now. Time. Human beings never had enough of it, were so terrified of wasting it that they entirely neglected to make full use of it. Time. The vampire knew even more about time than he did, and he knew more than any other man because he had lived longer than Methuselah.

  But not for much longer. That he knew. Which made the vampire even more important to him; why he had to break him and scoop the understanding from his brain like ice cream on a spoon before his time ran out, before his hour glass was empty. If he could not break Cyrano then he would break Roxane. She was a woman. She was certain to be weaker than her brother.

  “Your sister is coming to rescue you,” he told Cyrano, smiling as he stood at the bottom of the cot, well out of the vampire’s range. “She brings her lover with her, her human lover, the Seeker.” Cyrano’s eyes blazed momentarily in reaction to this knowledge. He contorted himself against the restraints so violently that Rasputin was momentarily afraid that he might move the cot towards him, only relaxing when he remembered the cot was bolted to the concrete floor. An explosion would not dislodge it. “How do I know she is coming?” he wondered before removing a mobile phone from his pocket. “The Twenty-First Century is how I know. They might not be able to come out in the daylight, but daylight makes no difference to electronic communication.”

  He put away the phone and turn
ed to leave. “Just make yourself comfortable, and don’t make any plans to leave. I just won’t hear of it.” He laughed as he closed the door. Even he did not find it an attractive sound. He decided to go up to his office and close his eyes for a while, make himself ready for what was going to be a gloriously interesting night.

  Chapter Twenty One

  Roxane and Call mingled for a while, ignoring the deafening music of the dance floors and losing some small change in the casino before taking a seat in a supposedly quiet bar on the first floor before turning about and going directly to the real object of their interest.

  They came to the basement door, and found it locked. Roxane stamped her foot and cursed under her breath.

  “Didn’t think of that, did you,” sighed Call as he removed his wallet of lock picks that had, somehow, transferred itself from the jacket he was wearing in the Belmont to the jacket he wore now. She wore a quizzical expression as he stepped past her. “Mt dad used to be a copper, didn’t he. He learned how to pick any lock on the second day at college, after they taught how to shit properly and salute. Learned a lot from my dad, I did. Nothing about his night job, of course. Nothing that might be useful.” He was surprised to hear the bitterness in his voice so long after his father’s death. He believed he had loved his father.

  The door looked heavy, and the lock looked solid, but it presented no challenge to him. Neither did the lock on the door to Cyrano’s cell. He stepped inside, looking down at the vampire, only to be barged out of the way by Roxane, who was as easy to resist as a rhino in heat. She took one step past him and then stopped still, staring down at her brother, both hands raised to cover her mouth. Call was convinced he saw tears in her eyes. A vampire that could weep. Now there was something he had never expected to see.

  She sank to her knees by Cyrano’s head, taking hold of him with a profound, palpable tenderness, as though she feared he might break. “Oh my poor darling brother, what have they done to you? What have they done?”

  At the sound of her voice he opened his eyes, which had been tightly closed, and stared at her, terrified. Only then did she remember she was still wearing Rasputin’s appearance and so changed back to herself quicker than Call could blink. Cyrano relaxed for a moment, then turned around and lunged towards her, so their faces were almost touching.

  “Save the loving sister crap for another time, Roxane. Get me out of her before the wizard comes back. He told me you were coming, by the way.” His voice was a barely audible rasp, barely strong enough to make it out of his constricted throat, but his tone of habitual command and scorn was clear enough. Call heard him well enough to know that he did not like this vampire one little bit.

  “Loathe as I am to disturb this tender family reunion, Mam’selle, I really would move away from him if I were you. Goodness only knows what diseases he harbours.”

  Rasputin stood in the doorway, having arrived there silently, standing behind his two henchmen –

  who looked much more comfortable with themselves now they had automatic weapons in their hands. The cell, small enough at the best of times, felt so confined to Call, so claustrophobic, that he would not be surprised if the walls and ceiling began to move in on them.

  Without thinking, he drew his blades from beneath his jacket and lashed out at the minions. More by luck than any judgement of his, he did enough damage to both thugs that they dropped their weapons and caught hold of their injured hands with their other hands, desperate to staunch the flow of their blood.

  Their howls and the sudden smell of hot, coppery blood that filled the cell had both Roxane and her brother turn in the direction of the doorway. Roxane took half a step towards the thugs, eyes a burning, livid red behind her glasses that added illumination to the room. Both vampires exposed their fangs and drew their tongues across them.

  Then Cyrano wrenched his head to the side so he could not see the blood. “Don’t bother with the animals, you stupid bitch. Get me loose from these!” He shouted and writhed against his restraints. Roxane turned to look at him and the red gleam went out of her eyes.

  She returned to her brother, sawing at the ropes around his wrists with her finger nails. It proved more resistant than had the spines of the vampires in the Green Dolphin. She turned her face so she was looking into the corner of the cell, away from the puncture wounds on his wrists, wounds he had suffered since last she saw him.

  Call wiped his blades on the jacket of the closest thug and kicked them both in the side of the head, rendering them unconscious. The blows felt so sweetly timed, so perfect to him that he believed he might well have killed them - the first people he had killed that were not vampires. Not that he was overly concerned. They would have killed him with far less thought. At least they were silent now.

  Rasputin loomed before him, somehow haloed in the doorway by light coming in from the other cell, even though Call knew there was just a single, weak light bulb in there. The snakes on the wizard’s skull writhed and twisted, spitting at him. He flinched away from the gobbets of venom he saw shooting from their fangs, although he managed to keep his blades levelled and pointing towards Rasputin, promising pain and blood.

  The wizard vanished. In less time than it took Call to blink, Meghan stood there, her face contorted and barely recognisable because of the terror she felt, holding out her hands to her father, wordlessly pleading with him not to hurt her. Call staggered backwards, allowing his blades to drop, only to feel a very solid hand between his shoulder blades and to hear Roxane hissing at him.

  “She’s an illusion, that is all - an illusion, not your daughter. Everything about him is an illusion. Everything”

  He was shoved forward, staggered again and felt himself lose his balance. His arms wind-milled to keep him upright and the cell was filled with a harsh, almost metallic howl. He saw Meghan with her hand clamped to her right cheek with blood bubbling between her fingers.

  Once again he took a backward step, almost falling over the prone, bleeding figure of one of Rasputin’s minions. Did the fact he was still bleeding mean that he was not dead?

  “She’s not real,” Roxane shouted, still sawing at her brother’s ropes. “That is Rasputin, not Meghan!” Call turned to see her lift her brother from his cot, his hands free and flopping by his side. He was plainly incapable of standing by himself, of moving unaided, but he would not be an exactly dead weight to be carried out once they got past Rasputin.

  “Out of my way!” he roared at the figure, which glared at him with the purest hatred in her eyes and then morphed from Meghan to Marion even as he watched. He shook his head and raised his blades. “You’re not fooling me, not now,” he said, taking one step forward and then another.

  The figure changed again, become Roxane, so there were two of her in that tiny room where there had been two Rasputins before. There was no doubt in Call’s mind which was which, however. The false Roxane had a trail of blood on her cheek.

  He swept at that figure with the blade in his right hand, an obvious blow which she evaded easily enough, but not so the blade in his left hand, which sliced across her belly and drew a spray of scalding blood to go with that hideous scream. The illusion dissipated and Rasputin stood there, a faded, shabby old man, holding his steaming entrails within his belly, thick, rich red blood oozing between his fingers.

  Call raised his blade to deliver the beheading coup de grace, only to see the light die in the wizard’s eyes just before his body toppled nervelessly to the floor, his head bouncing once, twice before he lay there, lifeless in the spreading pool of blood. There was no need for his killing blow.

  He gazed at him for what felt like a long while, wondering whether he had done what he seemed to have done, and why it seemed so easy. Then he helped Roxane move Cyrano to the door. The vampire glared at him over his sister’s shoulder, malevolence in his eyes, challenging him.

  “Take his head!” Cyrano hissed, but Call ignored him.

  “There’s no need. He’s dead.” He looked towards
Roxane.

  “Get him upstairs, he gasped, wiping Rasputin’s blood away from his face with his jacket sleeve and then looking back into the cell. So far as he could tell, all three figures on the floor were lifeless. He was surprised Rasputin had died so easily, but then he was just a long lived human being who could do tricks with peoples’ brains, nothing else. Even though they looked dead he closed the door and – using his picks – locked it. He repeated the procedure with the second door. It was better to be safe than sorry.

  He followed the real Roxane up the narrow staircase as she carried Cyrano draped over her shoulder. He saw Cyrano staring at him, his eyes still glistening with a hatred that went to the marrow of his bones. The vampire would kill him at the first opportunity. As they stepped out into the corridor of the upper basement level Roxane’s appearance become Rasputin’s again.

  “Give a hand,” Rasputin yelled to the two men in their Cossack uniforms standing at the far end of the corridor, who needed just a single glance in their boss’s direction to set off towards him at a dead run.

  Doors opened along the length of the corridor at the sudden noise. Faces appeared in the doorways, eager to see what was happening. The Cossacks slammed the doors shut as the ran past, ignoring the angry, frustrated, even pained shouts coming from behind the closed doors, but not a one reopened.

  “Take him to the stairs,” Roxane ordered, using her frightening imitation of the wizard’s ‘Do this immediately or die’ voice, allowing Cyrano to slip from his shoulder only to be caught up by the Cossacks before he could hit the floor. They did their best not to look into their master’s face and Call wondered whether they were really afraid that the snakes tattooed into his head might turn them into stone.