by David McAfee
That was it. The beginning of the end. The first day of Theron’s long fall from the Council’s grace. Had it really been only twenty-seven years? It felt much longer. Nearly three decades of hiding and hunting, chasing Taras while running from Ramah.
“There will be time for daydreaming later,” Baella’s voice cut through his reverie. “We need to leave. Now.”
Wonderful. More running. More hiding. More skulking in filthy alleys trying to stay one step ahead of Ramah. And it wasn’t likely to end anytime soon.
Or was it?
Theron looked at Baella again, careful to keep his sudden thoughts hidden. The Council had been hunting her since the earliest days of his race. She’d made Ramah, and even Herris, look like fools many times. She was dangerous and cunning, and he’d best not forget it. But if he could somehow bring her in, would it be enough to restore his lost honor?
Maybe. Maybe not. But if anything in the world had a chance of getting him back into the Hall where he belonged, it would be this.
Theron fell into step behind her. He couldn’t take her. Not yet. He wasn’t strong enough to defeat her, and she had too many tricks for him to attack her openly. He would have to be subtle. Bide his time. Wait for the perfect opportunity. Then, when the moment came, he would strike.
If everything went as planned, he would bring Herris the ultimate present: Baella’s head in a sack.
***
Baella felt Theron’s eyes on her back and smiled, knowing his thoughts had gone exactly as she thought they would. So predictable, she thought.
19
Ramah ran through the dust and cobblestone streets of Londinium, staring into every crack and crevice as he passed. Every shadow was suspect. Every doorway a possible hiding place for Baella and her minions. He kept his claws out and his teeth ready, unwilling to let his guard down for a moment just in case he spotted his prey. The few people he encountered ran from the sight of him. Those that didn’t died fast and bloody as Ramah’s claws tore into them. He tore one woman nearly in half, spilling her entrails onto the street and silencing her screams with a twist of her neck. Ramah never even slowed down.
He couldn’t believe it. She was here. Somewhere in this wretched city walked the most powerful renegade vampire ever. Baella. Ever since he joined the Bachiyr, he had heard about her. The myths and rumors were plentiful, and ran the gamut from the unlikely to the impossible. Some said she was the direct daughter of The Father, while others believed she was a human wizardess. Still others doubted she existed at all. The woman had attained near mythical status among his people, in part because no one had ever seen her, with the singular exception of Theron. Even Ramah had never laid eyes on the Bachiyr who was such a bane to the Council. But that was about to change. After four thousand years, he finally had a chance to claim the kill he’d always wanted. He’d never been this close. He could almost smell her.
He now understood the significance of the freshly turned Bachiyr who’d attacked him earlier. Baella must have converted them in order to keep him occupied while she freed Theron. It had worked. Ramah had been forced to fight the new vampires while en route to his hiding place. At the time he’d enjoyed the bloodlust, but now he shook with frustration. He’d just missed her! Worse, he knew she’d left Taras alive to taunt him. She knew he would speak her name, and that Ramah would stop whatever he was doing to pursue her. That meant she wanted him to chase her. But why?
And why Theron? Ramah would chase her regardless of the company she kept. Doubtless she knew that, so taking the former Enforcer wasn’t necessary. That meant she wanted him for something, too. But what?
Damn it all, there were too many questions. He needed to focus his energies on finding her, not speculating about her motives. He’d force her to answer his questions when he caught her. Then he’d kill her, and bring her shriveled, blackened heart to Herris as a gift, along with Taras and Theron, if he could be captured alive.
He turned a corner and saw two figures huddled in the shadow of a tavern doorway, a man and a woman. The man’s back was to him, but his height and build were about the same as Theron’s. Could it be that easy? He didn’t recognize the woman, but he’d never seen Baella before, so that didn’t surprise him.
As he approached, he heard their voices.
“How much?” the man asked.
“Five silver,” the woman replied.
“Robbery. I’ll not pay more than two silver.”
The woman spat. “It’s a bargain at five. Four is my final price.”
A prostitute. Not Baella. Damn.
Ramah swept by the pair, plunging his claws into the man’s back as he passed. The man gurgled and slumped to the ground, while the prostitute screamed and fled. Ramah ignored her and stepped over the body of his kill, peering into the next alley.
The man grabbed Ramah’s boot, his weak grip leaving red prints on the leather. Ramah shook him loose and kept walking.
Baella had to be nearby. She had to be.
***
Boudica spotted the torches atop Londinium’s Eastern wall. The city’s lights flared into the sky, illuminating the place in a dull orange glow that could be seen for miles. Under cover of darkness, her army had moved, covered from head to toe in black clothing, and managed to sneak, undetected, to within three hundred yards of the city gate. Well within range of her ballista.
Beside her, Heanua nodded, and Cyric motioned to the Captain of the Ballista Regiment. The big, heavy machines stood in dark silhouette, looking skeletal and deadly in the weak light. They moved forward on well-oiled wheels that her troops had padded with animal hides earlier in the day. The hides had dampened the sound of the wheels on the ground, but they also made rolling the machines a great deal harder. The last few hours had been long and tedious, but as she watched the first of her crews load a stone the size of a sheep, Boudica felt it was all worth the wait.
Behind her, crews carried large balls of tightly packed rope soaked with black pitch. The buildings in Londinium were mostly made of wood, and the balls would be set alight prior to launch. They should create havoc inside the city walls, and hundreds would feel the sting of their burn and breathe their acrid smoke just before they died. Once the city was reduced to a pile of burning rubble, her people would storm the walls and put any survivors to the sword.
“Sleep well, Romans,” she whispered. “Those of you who are lucky will never wake up.” Tonight she meant to wipe Londinium off the face of the world.
20
Taras lay in a pool of his own blood, watching it spread out around him in an ever increasing arc across the stone floor. The smell of it wafted up from underneath him, making it hard to think. The metal pole through his chest had ceased to hurt, and now he felt only a slight pressure as the skin and flesh tried to mend itself around the foreign object in his torso.
Maybe he’d lost too much blood to feel pain. That seemed likely, given the amount on the floor and the fact that he hadn’t fed recently. What had that witch gotten him into? Baella. He remembered the name. She’d been using him to get to Theron, and he’d fallen for it.
Clemency from the Council of Thirteen. What was he thinking? He’d never met any of the Councilors, but from what he understood, they never made deals such as the one she offered. He’d been a fool to think he could gain acceptance into their race. And now he would pay the price by dying like a stuck pig on a dirty floor.
Taras had spent nearly thirty years learning everything he could about the Bachiyr. He’d studied everything from folklore to reported firsthand accounts, even traveling to the East to speak with a man who claimed to have killed one. Almost all his leads turned out to be a waste of time, but he had managed to acquire a rudimentary knowledge of the Council and its minions.
Ramah was the one who hunted him. Ramah and Theron. Of course, Theron did so for personal reasons. Ramah was another matter. Bloodthirsty and violent, he made Theron look like a Jewish rabbi.
But this Baella woman…he’d never heard of her before.
Whoever she was, the mention of her name had sent Ramah running after her like a dog chasing a rabbit.
Taras felt weak. His vision dimmed. This is it, he thought. The end of my days. He knew what it was like to die, he’d done it once already, and now it seemed he was about to do it again. Did he have the strength to fight it? Did he want to? He didn’t think so. Maybe it would be easier to lay down and die, as he should have done all those years ago.
But something about the comparison of Ramah to Theron brought back a fuzzy memory.
A Jewish rabbi.
Another time he contemplated death…
***
“You were wrong, Abraham,” he said. “Some of us want to die. Some would find it preferable.”
“It’s not beyond you, you know,” a voice said from behind him.
Taras spun, yanking his sword from its sheath. It was too early in the evening; too soon after such a painful goodbye to kill again, but he would if he had to. When he saw the speaker, his mouth fell open and he dropped his sword.
“You remember me,” Jesus said.
There stood the Nazarene, just as Taras remembered from the night he’d tailed Theron to the Gardens. That night, Jesus had not yet been arrested, and thus he didn’t have the cuts and bruises Taras saw later as he was led to Golgotha. On the cross, his face was bruised and swollen, and numerous cuts and scrapes pocked his body. Now, however, the man’s smooth, unblemished skin showed no evidence of abuse. The crown of thorns was gone, and Jesus's dark hair spilled over his thin shoulders and down his back. But the biggest change in the Nazarene, Taras noted, was the light.
Jesus glowed, similar to the people of Jerusalem but far more intense. Taras felt weak just looking at him. It radiated from Jesus like the light of the sun, and he had to squint his eyes nearly shut against the glare.
Taras blinked, thinking his own situation had driven him insane, but when he opened his eyes again, Jesus remained in front of him. “It’s not possible,” Taras said. “You are dead.”
“As are you, if I’m not mistaken.”
Taras looked down at his hands, so cold and lifeless, and realized he didn’t have a reply. “I suppose you’re right.”
“Of course I’m right.”
Taras remembered his part in the man’s death, and shame filled him. He raised his eyes and looked at Jesus, so calm and serene in the moonlight. “Why are you here?” he asked. “Have you come to take your revenge on me, Nazarene? If so, please get on with it. I’m late; I should have been sitting with Pluto in Tertius four days ago.”
Jesus smiled, and the light around him intensified so much Taras had to turn his head. “That is not why I came,” Jesus said. “Your mistakes are not entirely your own, though you must still take responsibility for them. I hold no anger for you.”
“Then why are you here?”
“To tell you it’s not beyond you.”
“What isn’t?”
“You know the answer to that already, Taras.” Jesus folded his arms and fixed him with a stern look, as though lecturing a dense child. “Your wish; it’s not impossible. The sun can do it. So can fire. If I’m not mistaken, the Bachiyr can also die by having their heads removed, and there are other ways, too. In other words, you have options.”
“Options?”
“Yes, options. Allow death to find you, or spend eternity running from the other Bachiyr, killing and devouring innocent people. They will hunt you, you know. Ramah, in particular, will not rest until you have been destroyed.”
Taras pondered that for a moment. He’d known about the Sun’s ability to kill him; his burned fingers told him that much. But he hadn’t been ready. Of course, at the time he didn’t know the extent of what he would become, either. Was he ready now? Could he step into the sunlight, if it came to that? Could he willingly walk into his death?
***
Jesus had delivered his words and walked away, taking his strange glow with him as he headed toward Bethany. He probably thought he’d left Taras better off than he’d found him, but instead Taras was more confused than ever. He’d stood by the entrance to Mary’s tomb and wondered if he was strong and brave enough to die. In the end, the answer was no. And he still wasn’t. He willed his hands to move, and placed them on the floor, palms down underneath his chest. With a grunt of pain, he began to push his body off the floor and up the length of the steel rod. The pain flared in his chest like a white hot poker, and he had to stop for fear of losing consciousness.
But as soon as it faded a bit, he shoved again.
Not yet, he thought.
When the pain flared through his chest again, he clenched his jaw shut and pushed still harder against the floor, rising off it in a haze of blood and pain. His vision blurred, and more than once his mind threatened to shut down, but he forced himself to focus on the task at hand, working his way up the metal pole one slick, red, painful inch at a time.
I will not die yet.
21
Ramah stood in the empty street, looking one way and then the other. Both showed him nothing. The dusty streets of Londinium showed no sign of his quarry’s passing. Theron and Baella could be in any direction, at any distance. He’d never locate them with his eyes alone, he would have to use a web psalm, though he dreaded the subsequent loss of blood. He would simply have to take some from Theron before he killed him.
Ramah stood in the middle of the street and closed his eyes, focusing his mind on the task at hand. He cast a mental web around his current position, and slowly expanded it to include the outlying area. The web kept growing, until it eventually covered an area one quarter the size of the city with him at its center. Once it was set, he poked along the filaments with mental fingers and willed his quarry to touch one of them. The strands were limited in their ability to gather information. He could only search for one person. Other individuals would merely register as a slight tickle of the web, but when the object of his search crossed a thread, he would know immediately.
He’d never seen Baella, but he’d known Theron for nearly a thousand years. It was easy enough to conjure an image in his mind of the former Enforcer. Since they were traveling together, he only needed to locate the one to find them both. Or so he hoped.
He pushed the strands out further, slowly feeling his way across the city streets. Dozens of small tingles registered on the web, but none more than a slight twinge. They were the normal humans who had remained behind. He forced himself to remain calm and still, letting the web expand at a slow, steady pace. Patience, he counseled himself. It would not do to drop his web and run randomly through the streets, he would never find them that way, and he knew it. It should not take much longer before There! A bright flash touched his web about half a mile to the east, back toward the gate. It could only be Theron. Ramah turned toward the flash and concentrated only on the strands of the web in its immediate vicinity. The rest of the web withered, lacking the mental energy to keep itself open.
The web psalm was a strong tool in the Bachiyr’s arsenal, and very useful, but it also drained a great deal of mental energy. Ramah could feel his body burning blood to keep the web active, but he couldn’t drop it yet. He needed Theron to cross another strand. The relation of the new strand to Theron’s previous position would tell Ramah exactly which direction the renegade was moving, making it a simple matter to cut him off.
There it was again! Still headed toward the city gate, and moving fast. They must know I am coming for them. Ramah dropped the web and ran. Theron and Baella were trying to leave the city. Ramah could probably catch them before they made the city gate, but it suited his purpose to let them leave. Once outside the city walls, there would be fewer humans, and fewer witnesses. Witnesses were messy. Easy enough to kill one, but not so easy to dispose of several dozen. Far better to have none at all.
Ramah slowed his pace, wanting to let Theron and Baella get far enough away from the city gate that there would be no one around once he caught up to them. Up ahead, a lone woman stood
in the flickering light of a single lamp. A prostitute, judging by her garish attire. The sight reminded him of the energy he’d burned creating and maintaining the web. He would probably have to make another one once he left the city to locate the pair of renegades again, which meant he would need more blood.
The woman’s appearance proved most fortunate for the hungry vampire.
***
Taras clenched his teeth, fighting the nausea and blackness that threatened to overwhelm him. His entire world had been reduced to blinding pain as his body slid up, inch by agonizing inch, toward the end of the pole. His hands slipped in the gore beneath him, so he tried grasping the metal rod instead, with much the same result. Every time he gained a few inches, he would lose his grip and slide back down several more. It didn’t help matters that his hands shook with pain, making it difficult to grasp anything.
He slid back down to the floor, looking up at the two-foot shaft of metal through his chest, red and slick with his own blood. His vision grew more hazy with every passing second, and a sense of dread settled into his mind. How long had Ramah been gone? How soon before he came back? If he didn’t get off this damn pole soon, he would find himself at the mercy of that black devil, and from what he knew of Ramah, mercy was not one of his failings.
I will not die here, he told himself, and tried again. He grasped the end of the pole and pulled himself upward off the floor. After several attempts, he found himself at the tip of the pole. No longer able to pull himself forward, he reached behind him, trying to grasp the pole from his back and push forward. This was the tricky part, the angle was all wrong, and he invariably lost his grip and slid back down to the floor.
When he felt the metal in his hand, he tightened his grip, straining his muscles as he focused all his remaining strength on holding the pole. Then he reached behind with his other hand and grasped the pole just beneath his back. Almost there. With his hands on the metal, he closed his eyes and pushed. Up, up, and up, he slowly rose, feeling the rod slide painfully through his body. He almost blacked out, but fought it off, knowing that to faint now would only find him back on the floor again. When he reached the limit of his arms, he inched his hands upward and started again. He was close, he had to be. How thick was his chest? How much of the pole remained? How much longer could he hold off the gathering darkness?