Vampirates 5: Empire of Night

by Justin Somper

  "You saw what he was like, Connor, when he came to us and asked for our help. He was tormented. Every day, every night of his life --for want of a better term--is torture now. If he was dead, he'd be at peace. He was a

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  good and honorable man. He deserved the right, true end to a noble life. That... monster Sidorio denied him that."

  Connor shivered at the word monster , for if it applied to Sidorio, then it certainly applied to Connor himself. Bart didn't yet know that Sidorio was Connor's true father. Nor did he know that Connor was a dhampir and therefore half-vampire. But Bart's impassioned words left Connor in no doubt. If he had known, he'd have turned those same heartbroken eyes on Connor and pitied him for a fate worse than death. Connor felt queasy at the thought, and queasier still at the fact that he was keeping such a big a secret from so close a friend.

  Jacoby pressed on, oblivious to Connor's meltdown. "Suppose it had been you, Bart? You, instead of Jez, killed in that duel. Would you really prefer to be dead and buried than brought back from the edge--to walk and talk and sail the oceans again?"

  "Absolutely!" Bart said, smashing his fist down into the palm of his other hand. "I told you before. A short life but a merry one. That's what I signed up for." His eyes blazed with fire as he gazed at his comrades. "When I die, bury me deep as hell where no vampire can dig me up and have me join his crew. Deal?"

  No one answered.

  Bart's eyes scanned the group. "I asked you all a question. Do we have a deal?"

  "Yes," Connor said, his voice overlapping with those of

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  his comrades. He felt really sick now, and intensely claustrophobic. He had to get out of the tavern, away from this conversation. He couldn't stand it a moment longer.

  As Cate reached out a soothing hand to Bart, Connor was quick to seize his opportunity. "I'm not feeling so good," he mumbled to Bo Yin. "I need some air."

  "I'll come with you, Connor Tempest," Bo Yin said, her face etched with concern. But Connor shook his head and held up a hand to deter her.

  He strode away from the group and made his way toward the back of the saloon. The back door was ajar, and Connor slipped outside.

  He found himself on a small beach, strewn with litter from the tavern. Waves lapped, like whispers, against the sand.

  Connor breathed in the night air. He kicked off his shoes and socks and rolled up the bottom of his pants. Weaving his way through the debris, he walked out into the water. The first caress of the cool liquid around his ankles was instantly soothing. He closed his eyes and willed the toxic thoughts raging in his brain to drain out into the waves and be carried away on the tide.

  When he opened his eyes again, he felt momentarily dizzy. The sea below and the stars above seemed to be sliding toward each other. He had lost his footing and prepared himself for an imminent dunk in the cold, oily water. But somehow he remained upright, suspended in midair. It took him a moment or two to come to his senses.

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  Glancing down, he saw that a pair of pale hands had reached out to steady him.

  "All right now?" asked a familiar voice, presumably belonging to the slowly retracting hands.

  Connor nodded. "Yes," he said. "Yes, thank you." He twisted around to face his rescuer.

  As he did so, his heart missed a beat and he felt dizzy again. Even though he had suspected it, the reality was nevertheless a body shock.

  There, standing beside him in the ocean, was his old friend and former comrade Jez Stukeley.

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  8 THE SHARING

  Grace waited for a bowl of cherry pie to be cleared from her place. She had barely touched her food at tonight's Feast. It had looked and smelled as delicious as usual, but she had taken only a mouthful or two of first the scallops, then the lamb, and maybe half a spoonful of dessert. The rest of the food had ended up being pushed around her plate or lingering uneaten in the bowl, under her cutlery. None of this escaped eagle-eyed Oskar's notice.

  "Still not hungry, I see," he said, a dark eyebrow raised interrogatively.

  Grace shook her head. "Not for food, anyhow."

  Oskar looked her directly in the eye and nodded, slowly, thoughtfully. He understood. Leaning closer, he spoke in confidential tones. "Remember what we talked about before? You should join us--Lorcan and me--

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  tonight. I have more than enough blood for both of you." His brown-black eyes seared into Grace's. "Share me."

  Since he had first made this proposition at the previous week's Feast, Grace had turned the idea over constantly in her head. It was unthinkable, wasn't it, to take blood? If she did, there would be no turning back. She was accepting that she was a dhampir--half-vampire, half-mortal--and that this was the way she lived now.

  On many levels, she did accept it. What was the point in even trying to deny it? She was not, as she had thought for the first fourteen years of her life, the daughter of a lighthouse keeper from a dead-end coastal town. No, she was the daughter of a Vampirate, Sidorio--the result, like her brother, of a spell cast by Sidorio on their poor mother, Sally.

  Grace looked down to find that the long banquet table had been cleared. The servers had disappeared back to the kitchens. She had been so lost in her own thoughts, she hadn't noticed any of this. At once, the musicians took up their instruments again, playing more and more loudly. Glancing along the table at the faces reflected in the warm glow of the candlelight, she saw that the men and women on both sides of the table were waiting silently. The Feast--at least this phase of the Feast--was over.

  At the far end of the table, nearest to the door, Darcy and her donor, James, rose together from their seats and began walking away from the table, their footsteps beating time with the percussive music. Their neighbors

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  followed, moving in unison. The exodus continued like a wave as each Vampirate and his or her donor left the banquet hall--no one hurrying, no one missing a beat. Though Grace had seen it many times before, it still fascinated her--now perhaps more than ever.

  The wave reached them, and now it was Lorcan and Oskar who rose; and each began walking along his side of the table toward the exit. Then, Mosh Zu and Grace stood. Though they were not Vampirate and donor, they would exit the cabin together, so as not to break the symmetry.

  As Grace followed in Oskar's path alongside the table, she couldn't help smiling at the irony that she still sat on the donor side of the table. She was so deep in her own thoughts that she didn't even register leaving the banquet hall, and was surprised to find herself out in the corridor. Was this what it was like for the Vampirates? She had seen the distant, empty look in Lorcan's eyes when his hunger was most urgent. Like now.

  Glancing over at him, Grace saw that his normally blue eyes had changed. They now looked like deep pits of fire. It didn't scare her or freak her out. She had seen him in this condition before. All he needed was the gift of Oskar's blood to satisfy his hunger. Grace found her gaze turning to the tanned skin on Oskar's neck. Suddenly, it was as if his skin was transparent and she could see the blood flowing within the veins beneath it. She could see it. Smell it. Taste it...

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  They climbed the stairs to the next deck--the donors' deck. Along the corridor, doors opened and quickly closed, like the beating wings of moths, as the Vampirates and donors disappeared inside. Grace felt her heart racing. Her head was pounding with the strange, driving music of the Feast, now intercut with Oskar's words. You should join us.... Share me. Share me. Share me. Share me.

  Oskar reached for the door. He opened it, and Lorcan walked purposefully inside. Oskar followed. The door began to close.

  Grace faltered. Share me , he had said. What was she supposed to do? She should talk to Mosh Zu about this but, as she turned, she saw that he had continued on along the corridor. Now she was separated from him by other vampire and donor pairs making their way to their cabins.

  Oskar's door was still ajar. Grace felt a powerful heat coursing
through her, followed by as sudden and penetrating a chill right along her spine.

  Share me . Inside her skull, Oskar's voice grew stronger. Her head would surely explode if the music didn't end; if this feeling didn't subside. This feeling that she now understood to be her hunger. There was only one way for such a hunger to be quelled, wasn't there? Grace saw the sliver of candlelight spilling out into the corridor. She stretched out her hand and pushed the door. Taking a deep breath, she entered the room.

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  The cabin was covered with a red glow. Grace couldn't be sure if this was the lighting within or if it was a further effect of her hunger. Each of her senses seemed heightened. Time seemed to lurch from running at increased speed to suddenly spooling very slowly. Through all of this, she felt the alternating heat and chill, and the relentless throbbing in her head. Share me.

  It took all Grace's strength to gather her focus. At last, she began to make sense of what was happening around her. There was Oskar, leaning against the wall, Lorcan to his side. So this was how it happened. This was how they shared. Grace had glimpsed Lorcan sharing with Shanti from outside in the corridor once before, but then she had been quick to turn away. Now, she opened her hungry eyes to the scene before her, fascinated to see how it worked. Once again, it seemed to her that Oskar's skin had become completely transparent, and she could see the blood coursing from his heart and through his veins toward the punctured skin of his thorax. Looking up, she was surprised to find him smiling at her and beckoning her closer.

  "Come," he was saying. "Share me."

  Grace stepped closer. She moved forward until she was standing only a breath away from Oskar. He smiled at her again as she looked into his eyes. There was fire there, as in Lorcan's eyes, but more distant somehow. It confused her, distracting her from her hunger for a moment. She stared deeper into the black slicks of Oskar's pupils, seek

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  ing out the fire. Then she recoiled, understanding. There was no fire in Oskar's eyes; they were simply a mirror, reflecting back to her her own deep hunger.

  The realization made her gasp and step backward, stumbling toward the door. The room suddenly felt utterly airless. She needed to escape. "I'm sorry," she said, unsure whether there was any volume to her words. Oskar was turning toward Lorcan now, as the Vampirate prepared to take his blood.

  She had to get out. Now. She wasn't ready for this.

  Grace wasn't sure of the sequence of events that followed. Somehow, she managed to locate the doorknob and twist it open. She made it into the corridor and found herself pushing open another door--though she had no recollection of having climbed up any flights of stairs--onto the main deck. It was only as she stepped out into the air that she began to breathe with any semblance of normality and to start to pull together her thoughts into some kind of shape.

  She knew she had done the right thing, removing herself from Oskar's cabin. She was not yet ready for this. Her hunger had fallen away as steeply as her appetite at dinner. Now, as she reached out to the deck rail, the thought of what she had been on the verge of doing shocked her to her very core. She took in a deep lungful

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  of air, then exhaled just as slowly. Her body felt released from the thrall of her hunger. She felt normal again, though this seemed a relative state and quite possibly a temporary one. She stood at the guardrail, the breeze caressing her hair and skin, growing calmer with each passing moment.

  She wasn't sure how long she stood there before she heard footsteps and became aware of someone joining her. She smiled, preparing herself for the sight of Lorcan. He must have broken off the sharing to come after her. How typically selfless of him, even in the moment of his most urgent hunger, to come and check on her. Truly, he was the perfect gentleman.

  But when she turned, it wasn't Lorcan's face she found gazing back at her, though it was still familiar, still handsome. Instead it was a face she hadn't expected to see again--or not for a good while, at least, and not here, of all places.

  Johnny tipped his hat and grinned at Grace appreciatively. "Well, look at you, little lady! Heaven must be missing an angel tonight!"

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  9 THE INVITATION

  Connor stood in the icy water, outside the Full Moon Saloon, staring at Jez--or rather, he corrected himself, at Stukeley. His former comrade was wearing a red shirt, sleeves rolled up to the elbows, and beaten-up black leather breeches. Since the last time Connor had seen him, at Sidorio's wedding, Stukeley's hair had been closely shaved. From his left ear dangled a tiny skull. On the back of his neck was a fresh tattoo--of a wave, in the style of a Japanese woodcut. Lower down, on the inside of his forearm, was the tattoo of three cutlasses that identically matched the tattoo on Connor's own arm. Connor, Bart, and Jez had each woken up to find them there after their "lost weekend" in Calle del Marinero. It remained a complete mystery to them as to how the tattoos had gotten there.

  "How do," said Stukeley with a nod.

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  "We were just talking about you," said Connor.

  "Well, you know what they say," Stukeley grinned. "Speak of the devil and the devil appears."

  Connor shook his head. "You're not the devil. You've got some wacky new habits and strange new people to hang around with, but you're not the devil."

  Stukeley shrugged. "Thanks... I think." He smiled. "Shall we go ashore?" He put his arm on Connor's shoulder and led him out of the cold water onto the sand.

  Amongst the rubbish on the beach were a couple of rusting oil drums. Stukeley leaned back against one, and Connor sat down on the other. "What are you doing here?" he asked.

  "I came to find you," Stukeley said. "To give you this." He reached inside his shirt pocket and produced an envelope. In the starlight, the vellum shone like a sliver of white gold.

  Connor took the envelope and saw his own name written on it in ink, in wild, curling letters. He had a deep sense of foreboding about what lay inside. He let it rest in his hands for a time.

  "Open it," Stukeley said.

  His heart beginning to race, Connor tore open the envelope and pulled out the folded parchment. He unfolded it and scanned the brief letter....

  Dear Connor,

  I hope this finds you well. My son, you have been much in my thoughts of late. Our reunion was interrupted. We 91 should get to know each other. My wife and I would very much like you to come and stay with us aboard our ships. Come as soon as you can and stay as long as you wish.

  Your blood father,

  Sidorio

  Having read it, Connor instantly folded up the letter and reinserted it into the envelope. He set it down on the rusting oil drum and began walking away.

  "You can't ignore this," Stukeley said, coming to walk alongside him.

  "I can try." Connor's eyes were fixed ahead.

  "It won't change anything," Stukeley said. "Sidorio is your blood father. You're one of us now."

  Connor said nothing, just kept walking. He was in imminent danger of running away from the beach.

  "Wait!" Stukeley said, jumping in front of him. "Look at me, Connor!"

  Reluctantly, Connor lifted his eyes to face Stukeley once more.

  "We were friends once," Stukeley said. "We said that our friendship transcended life and death, remember? When I came back to find you, you helped me. You took me to the Blood Tavern and then to The Nocturne so I could get help from the captain."

  Connor nodded. "I remember." He shivered at the thought of the Blood Tavern.

  "You helped me," Stukeley repeated. "Now it's my turn

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  to help you." He reached out his hand to Connor's shoulder. "I know you must be reeling from all this--discovering that Sidorio is your father, that you are a dhampir. It changes everything."

  "Only if I let it," Connor said defiantly.

  Stukeley shook his head. "No, Connor. You're not in control of this. It's bigger than you. Trust me, I know what I'm talking about."

  Connor thought about Stukeley's
words. He thought of how he had watched Jez die and of the lavish funeral they had staged for him on the deck of The Diablo . He thought of how Jez's journey had ended there, but Stukeley's had just begun as they had tossed his coffin into the ocean and unwittingly sent it traveling on the tide into the grateful arms of Sidorio.

  "I didn't ask to be on this side of the fence either," Stukeley said, as if reading his thoughts. "But Connor, I've learned that the only way through this is to accept what you are."

  Connor hung his head, letting his eyes close. A fresh thought occurred to him. He opened his eyes again, frowning.

  "What's the matter?" Stukeley inquired.

  "I don't understand," Connor said. "I thought I destroyed Lola Lockwood at the wedding. But, in the letter, Sidorio says, 'my wife and I,' as if she's still around."

  Stukeley's nod confirmed it. "Lady Lola is very much still around," he said. "In spite of your best efforts to the contrary."

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  Connor shook his head in disbelief.

  Stukeley leaned in closer. "You saw how she managed to recover from your first attack, didn't you? You stabbed her, but she removed the sword from her own chest."

  "Yes." Connor thought back to the events of that night. "But then I decapitated her and we separated her head from her body. That should have proved fatal."

  Stukeley shrugged. There was a look in his eyes Connor couldn't decipher. "You'd certainly have thought it was enough, but Sidorio brought Lola's head and body back together and before you could say, 'Congrats!' they were bound for their happy honeymoon."