Sebastian spun, looking for her in every corner, expecting her to leap from the shadows, but she was simply not there. Rising to his feet unsteadily and moving with concern to his father's side, Klaus said, "She is gone. I would know if she was still here, and she is not."
"Is she dead?" Sebastian asked, confused.
"No," Klaus said, "but she is hurt. She will run now and she will hunt. She will fill her veins with blood, and she will come for us. For now, she is gone."
Sebastian's heart turned to ice. Had they launched their pitiful little rescue attempt only to prolong the agony of certain defeat? If they'd failed with the element of surprise on their side, what chance could they possibly have when she returned?
There was an odd light in Klaus eyes, and Sebastian suddenly realized that his parents both had their eyes turned on the group – in hunger. He shuddered and backed away as realization of what they were filled my mind.
"Klaus," He began, "I . . ."
"Go," he said simply. "There is nothing else you can do here. I will help them as best I can. I will hunt and bring them blood. Rabbits' blood" he said, seeing the horror in his friend's eyes, "the blood of rabbits, Sebastian. I will come to you tomorrow night, but do not try to find me sooner. Do not search for us during the day, because you will not find us. I have a lot to learn, a lot to discuss with them, and a lot to answer for. I will come tomorrow, but for now, go. Go for your own safety."
Sebastian didn't relish the thought of going back into the darkness with Rosa running around loose, but the other option seemed to be to remain and become a meal for Klaus and his parents, and that was even less acceptable.
"Come on," he said to the others, turning his back on the scene of horror and gore in the room and heading back into the street. Father Adolph looked a bit uncertain about leaving them there like that, but in the end he followed as well. Klaus might prove as evil and dangerous as Rosa herself had, but Sebastian was not ready to attack him with crosses and Holy Water to drive him to his grave. There was too much to be settled, too much to think about before any final decisions could be made.
They ran down the street, entered the old Inn, and pulled the door closed tight behind them. With what resources were left to them sealed off every window and door in the place with rings of Holy Water and hanging crosses. Sebastian didn't think anyone really thought they would get to sleep, but they wanted to wait out the hour or so of darkness that was left in what relative safety they could find.
"What next?" Damon asked, once the room was as well sealed as it was within their power to make it. "Do we just talk to him, or do we come back with crosses and a wooden stake and put our friend to rest? Is he dead? Jesus, what do we do?"
"That may well be where we have to go for an answer to this," Father Adolph said quietly. "Everything I've been taught tells me he must be destroyed, along with his parents. They are alive by the power of evil, wherever that evil might have been generated originally, and there is no place for them in the Church's world."
"But this isn't some Bela Lugosi reject running around tearing people's throats out," Peyton cut in. "It's Klaus, for God's sake. We can't just run him through with a stake; he's our friend!"
"If you were my friend," Claudia cut in, taking his hands in her own and looking deeply into his eyes," and I was faced with life like those…things…back there, I would want you to put me to rest. I wouldn't want to live like that, at least not if I were still myself. If not, then you wouldn't be killing me, or that's the way it seems."
"She's right," Sebastian said, shaking his head. "We have to consider the greater good here, Klaus' as well as our own and that of the villagers and anyone else he might hurt if he goes off to wander the world. He may be our friend, but he is something more as well, something we don't understand at all."
"We have to return to the village as soon as it's light," Father Adolph said at last. "We have to warn the villagers about Rosa, since we have failed to put an end to her. We have to do what we can to protect them. Whatever the answers may be for your friend Klaus and his family, they do not represent the depth of evil that she does, and she will be very, very angry."
The room fell silent then, each of them lost in his or her thoughts as they waited for the end of the darkness and the birth of another day.
~*~
Rosa crawled for what seemed an eternity through the brush, her ruined eyes unable to focus on the trail before her. Her body screamed for release from the pain, and from the intense hunger brought about by the energy she'd expended in her escape. She was driven by fury and blind, sullen rage that smoldered and blazed in the depths of the burnt and empty sockets that had been her eyes.
The sudden scent of fresh blood brought her up cold, and she quested with her remaining senses, scent and sound, until the furious beating of a tiny, terrified heart pinpointed itself less than a dozen feet to her right. She concentrated, brought all the horrible strength of her will, all her years of lonely pain and suffering to bear, and reached out to the animal's mind. Her control was unsteady, weakening by the second, but it was enough.
With agonizing slowness, she crawled across the intervening space, dragging herself one painful inch at a time. Her mind locked onto that of the animal. She had to reach it, to reach the fresh blood that could return some of her strength, and her sight.
Somewhere in the trail behind her was the cross, which she had finally managed to pry free from her ravaged face, though it had burned her hands horribly to touch it. If she could only feed, could only wash fresh blood through her veins, she would make it. She would survive, and she would be avenged.
Foot after tortured foot she moved forward. She sensed the animal, stiff as stone; it's every nerve quivering with the need to bolt and run. At last her questing fingers found its body, dragged it to her with a frenzied jerk and she drove her fangs into its throat.
The relief was instantaneous – euphoric. She knew, even as she drained the animal's carcass completely dry and cast it aside, rising to her feet in a fluid, graceful swirl of long limbs and flame-red hair, that it would take more than one small rabbit's blood to bring her back to her full strength.
The advantage was hers now. Shifting instantly to wolf form, she loped down the mountain, and then began to run. She crossed the terrain in swift, sure strides. She moved so quickly that she almost seemed to glide.
She could have gone to the castle, but she knew that Klaus would go there, and if he released his pig of a father and bitch of a mother, the three of them would be more than a match for her in her weakened state. That left the village and the cellar beneath the Inn, if she made it. It was a long run, even for her, and she lengthened her strides yet again in a desperate burst of speed.
There was no way that the priest or the others could reach the village before the following evening, and by then it would be far too late. The villagers, even if they saw her return, would not dare to come into the cellar after her, and if they did, well, she'd kill one and regain her strength that much faster.
The thought of fresh human blood made her throat itch in anticipation, and she focused herself on urging every ounce of speed possible from her ravaged body.
They will pay, she thought as she ran. They will all pay, and dearly. If it takes an eternity, I will ensure that it is so.
The miles melted beneath her, and she reached the lower line of trees with moments to spare. Already she felt the slow burn along the length of her body that presaged the rising of the sun, but she knew that she was close enough, and she put her remaining strength into a final sprint, a mad burst of speed that drove her from the trees and around the side of the Flagon and Barrel just as the questing fingers of dawn inched their way across the tips of the trees.
She saw that the garage door was closed, but that was no obstacle, and she made the transformation instinctively, sliding toward the crack at the side.
Her screams awakened the entire village. Those who were not already up and moving about started from
their beds in terror. Those who were outside, or in the Inn, ran to find the source of the screams, dreading even as they came what they would find.
Father Adolph's prayers and the sprinkling of Holy Water had been more effective even than he could have imagined. As Rosa tried to insinuate herself past the door in the form of her purest essence, she brought that essence in direct contact with his spiritual barrier. What might have been only a minor annoyance in physical form was torturous agony, and in her mindless terror at that moment, she made a final, fatal mistake. Instead of bearing that pain and fighting her way through, instead of battling with the last of her strength to reach the cool darkness beyond, she backed off, and the sun was waiting.
Villagers gathered in a large circle, watching in morbid fascination as she lurched about, her hair steaming and her skin flaying from the bones. She moved first one way, then another, lost to her senses and incoherent with pain and fury. She staggered a final step, and then fell to her knees. With inhuman determination, she began to claw her way across the sun-dappled ground toward the line of trees, fighting to reach some sort of shelter, fighting to survive.
A lone figure cut loose from the surrounding crowd. The Innkeeper hurried off around the corner of the building, a resolute fire burning in his eyes. He had seen the priest the previous day, and he knew, after all these years, that the thing writhing about in back of his Inn could die. He entered the Inn and moved to his workroom as quickly as possible.
He grabbed an old broom that leaned by the door and, pressing one end at an angle against the floor, he snapped it. He took the stake he now held to his workbench, grabbed a small plank from his supply of wood, and quickly reached for his hammer. He fixed the plank onto the stake to form a crude cross, and, hammer in hand, he ran back out of the front door and into the growing crowd.
The thing that had been the flame-haired demon was barely more than a skeleton now, but it had reached the bordering trees at the bottom of the mountain by the time he got back, clawing its way almost pathetically toward the shade. The other villagers watched, but none would approach the creature crawling away from them. Their fear was still too great.
With a great cry, his heart hammering with the thought of what might already have happened to his daughter on the mountain; the Innkeeper rushed forward, raised the stake high above his head and brought it unerringly to earth, piercing Rosa's heart with one clean blow.
She let out a horrifying screech. She tried to reach around and free the stake, but she was trapped. He pounded it into the ground, working quickly with furious strokes.
"Go for wood," he cried. "We must burn it! I have seen the priest kill one of the others, and it can be done, but you must hurry; bring me wood!"
They all moved then, wanting to be a part of it and fearing that, in the end, it would not work. There was a huge mound of wood surrounding Rosa's scrabbling, dying form within moments, and without hesitation, the Inn keeper struck a match, lit a small ball of tinder and straw he'd gathered, and tossed it onto the pyre.
The wood caught instantly, almost as if it were hungry for her, and in moments the fire was a blazing furnace of heat and purification. Rosa stopped moving long before the flames had eaten the last of her bones, but they all watched until there was nothing remaining but ash, until nothing was left but a gray heap of dust and cinders. Then they came forward, one by one, and they kicked at those remains, spreading them as far as they could. Some even took small shovels and picked up bits of dirt and soot, walking off in different directions to separate the remains by as much distance as possible.
It is over, the Innkeeper thought, his mind filled with wonder. It is over, and we have won.
His wife came up beside him then, and put her arm around his back. Together they stared up the mountainside. The only thing that remained was to find their daughter, and to thank her, and to thank her friends, and the priest; if they lived.
There would be a celebration, he decided, a feast. He whispered some words to his wife, who was glad of any work that might distract her from the waiting, and the two hurried off, spreading the word among the villagers and beginning the preparations that would be necessary. If anyone alive came down that mountain, they would receive a welcome worthy of heroes.
Chapter Twenty-one
It was a surprisingly disconsolate group that made the journey back down the mountain the next morning. They had basically completed only one small part of what they'd set out to do, and the fear of coming reprisal was strong. Though they knew they'd hurt the evil creature they'd set out to destroy, they also knew they'd fallen short. Who knew how many holes she might have to hide in, how many ways she might have of recovering to fall upon them at the next nightfall in dark, soul-stealing vengeance?
And there was Klaus. They'd saved him from one fate, but had lost him at the same time. How could they reconcile their decisions if he turned on them? Would they be able to stop him? Would they do it if they were able? Too many difficult questions to answer, and coming far too close on the tail of the terror of the previous night's harrowing events.
They walked in silence. Peyton held Claudia as close as was possible and still allow the two of them to walk, and Damon was similarly attached to Melissa, who seemed stronger, despite the danger they'd faced. Most of them had not been in the forefront of the night's horror, but they had all seen enough to know what was happening.
"My father will say we have done a horrible thing," Claudia commented at one point in the journey. "He will say that we have only angered her, and that we should have left things alone."
"Your father is a good man," Father Adolph answered after a few minutes, "but he is living in fear. Sooner or later a man must face his fear, or it will begin to rule his life. What we have done is a beginning. If there is more to this war than one battle, than that is fine. The important thing is that, in the one battle we have fought, we have won."
"Have we?" Damon asked. "Then where is she, Father? Where did she go? How do you know she won't fall on us the minute it grows dark?"
"If she lives, and I believe that she does," the priest answered, "then we will fight. She can be killed. You have all seen what can be done. We must stick together. One alone would fall, surely, but the group of us, that is a different story."
As they approached the line of trees that bordered the village, they heard strange sounds somehow completely out of place and inappropriate. There was music. The scent of roasting meat and the sound of laughter floated up through the trees, and Sebastian halted, holding out his arms for the others to follow suit.
"What the hell?" Peyton said.
They exiting the trees and stepping into the main street leading down to the village. There were people everywhere. If Rathburg had seemed dead and silent since they'd arrived, it was now vibrant with life.
Groups of men danced about drunkenly, wine bottles held high and laughter on their lips. The women were dressed in the brightest, most colorful finery Sebastian had seen in years, and they moved about with trays of food and more bottles of wine, giggling and dodging away from the groping hands and suggestive cat-calls of the men.
Sebastian stopped in his tracks, unable to assimilate the scene stretched out before him. It was so unexpected, so inappropriate to the moment, that he was in a sort of shock. Peyton and Claudia came up to stand at his side, and Claudia was the first to find her voice.
"Papa!" she cried, breaking free of Peyton's protective arm and running down the center of the street with her arms outstretched. "Papa, what is happening? Have you all lost your minds?"
"Claudia!" The man's eyes misted instantly, and he dropped the wine bottle in his hand to grab her in a huge, bear-like hug. "We were so afraid that we'd lost you – that she'd gotten you before she died."
"Died?" Claudia said, pulling away, "She has not died, Papa! We only injured her; I am certain!"
"Ah," he smiled down at her, taking her arm in his and escorting her back toward our little group with a wide grin splitting
his face, "but she has died. I have seen her burn with my own eyes, driven the stake through her evil heart with these very hands."
He held his hands up, and they stared at him in incredulity.
"What do you mean?" Father Adolph asked him. "What happened here?"
"The demon is dead," the man replied simply. "She came back to the village just before the dawn. She must have thought to slink into her pit beneath the Inn and rest through the daylight hours. It was not to be."
"The wards," the old priest cried, eyes filling with tears. "Praise God, the wards I put on the door! She couldn't enter."
"The sunlight caught her there," Claudia's father told him solemnly. "She could not enter, and she had nowhere else to run. How could she have known about the others, the one you killed and the ones that escaped?"
Sebastian turned to Father Adolph and clapped him on the shoulder in disbelieving glee. "We've done it, then!" He cried.
The group began to dance about insanely, then, hugged one another and laughed, and several of the villagers, the same as the ones who'd shunned them since our arrival, joined in their revelry, clapping them on the back and congratulating them. It was a good time, a time of togetherness and strength, and it was well into the evening before Sebastian's good spirits began once more to wane.
The villagers were happy, and their age-old problem was solved, or so they believed. He knew the full truth of the matter, though, and his own dilemma had only just begun. Klaus was on that mountain, somewhere, and through some perverse whim of the gods, his parents were there too. They didn't have the evil in their hearts that had possessed Rosa, but would they learn it?
It was not the sort of illness one could take to a specialist back in Hamburg and receive a healing immunization. It was a curse of immortality and hunger, and even the purest spirit would surely crack under such strain, in time.
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