The Dark Messenger

by Milo Spires

  Jenny wondered if she too would have done something similar, if somebody close to her had been murdered.

  ‘My darling Jenny, please do not think that way. Raffious is on an evil path for revenge and has become much like Lucifer, lost in his ways. He is now in our eyes and by his actions against humanity, known to us as The Dark Messenger.’

  Suddenly the floor began to vibrate again, but this time it was much louder. The angel held his hand up and the noise stopped.

  Chapter 26 – Viatis Onertiunes

  ‘No turning back now,’ Longinus said to himself as he heard the mechanism inside the secret door on the Tower of London beginning to turn. He desperately hoped that those inside would have a means to killing Raffious.

  They must have, he told himself. Covens are always practicing dark evil rituals. They had to know what to do with that old fool.

  As he stepped inside, he hoped that they would be forgiving of his own crimes against them, but doubted they would. With relief, he quickly remembered the code, Viatis Onertiunes. He didn’t know what it meant, but since Rex had told it to him, it must have meant something very important.

  As the door swung back, standing there in front of him and bathed in moonlight were two guards. Both of them stepped one pace forwards, holding long spears pointed out towards him. Longinus noted that the weapons stood about five feet off the ground and had thick wooden shafts. Nothing’s changed here, he thought to himself.

  They gaped at him for a moment.

  ‘Longinus, how are you back here? Did you not go with Vius to kill the woman?’ one of them asked inquisitively before shooting him a scornful look.

  ‘I did, but…well, it’s a story for your leader. Who is in charge now, by the way?’ he inquired, wondering which one of the elder vampires had assumed the role since Rex had vanished.

  ‘Hoidrious has looked after the decisions since we lost Rex. He has assumed command on a temporary basis. One hundred years, and if Rex has not returned by then, another vote will be taken,’ one of them said.

  Then the guard to his left reached past him, grabbing hold of the main door and slammed it shut. As he did, the strange feeling that Longinus had been having ended abruptly; a feeling as if something in his wake had been following him, and watching his every move.

  ‘What is that all round your mouth? It looks like sick,’ the other guard said, pointing at his face.

  Embarrassed, Longinus quickly wiped it away. ‘I have been ill,’ he replied.

  The guards exchanged puzzled looks, knowing vampires almost never got ill, and if they did something must be terribly wrong.

  ‘Can you take me to Hoidrious immediately?’ Longinus asked. ‘It concerns Rex.”

  From their disbelieving looks, Longinus knew that he had to tell them the rest or end up dead. ‘I have just been with him, and he told me to tell you Viatis Onertiunes.’

  As soon as they heard those two words, there was an instant change in them. It was as if suddenly nothing was more important than his speaking with Hoidrious. Turning round immediately, one of them said, ‘Follow me,” and stormed off down the corridor into the darkness beyond. Longinus followed, remembering that he had to be quick or Raffious might become suspicious and possibly leave.

  Longinus knew that if Raffious disappeared because he took too long inside, Hoidrious would kill him slowly, probably the slowest a vampire had ever died. Once he had told Hoidrious that he only joined their coven as a spy, he was in great danger until Raffious was caught, so every second counted.

  Finally after descending 80 floors beneath the main entrance, they stepped out and

  exited the stairwell and turned left, entering into a short corridor some forty feet long.

  Ahead of Longinus stood a massive stone door that he recognized as being the entrance to the main hall. The door had markings carved all over it that were faded from hundreds of years but were still just about visible. They were drawings of vampires doing battle with demon’s, with humans being dragged kicking and screaming behind them.

  ‘Wait here,’ he was told, as the guard in front vanished through the door.

  -----------

  Outside, Raffious was starting to have second thoughts about waiting. He knew it was seriously dangerous, even for a man of his powers. Maybe he should abandon the vase and just save himself, he thought.

  If he did, he felt sure that a holy war would start between the vampires and the Church, as soon as Jenny was destroyed. He thought that maybe he should jump back there to Kaine’s and kill her himself. A holy war might actually be the answer; he could relax and watch the vampires be taken out by the religious crusaders. He felt sure that the Church would win, killing them all.

  But what if they didn’t?

  Then he told himself, ‘No!’ Stop being paranoid. Everything will work out fine. Longinus wouldn’t have come this far if he wasn’t going to get the last piece of the vase.

  When they had arrived together outside the Tower of London, he had tried some of his dark magic as he watched Longinus walking up to the main door. He had created a third eye, and the darkness was following Longinus. Raffious could see and hear everything all around him as he had approached the secret entrance. But as soon as the door had been slammed shut, apart from the spell had mysteriously stopped working, he had also suffered from a searing pain in his head, one so bad he felt sure it would leave him with a massive headache.

  He couldn’t understand it though; he knew the spell extremely well and it had never failed him before. Often he had used it to listen in on Kaine and Regina in their house, and there had never been any problems then.

  At least none like this, he thought.

  Looking over to the doorway where he had last seen Longinus, he started to get quite concerned that too much time had passed, and as he watched he began to seriously think about his own self-preservation.

  ‘What’s keeping that cretin?’ Raffious said to himself. He figured that if hoards of vampires came out charging at him, he would have no choice but to vanish into another time to escape them.

  ‘Damn!’ he muttered, suddenly thinking how stupid he had been to chance everything on Longinus getting the last piece of the vase for him. If they did come out in force and he had to leave, he felt sure they would move it and then as a result, he might never get another chance to get the thing.

  -----------

  Inside the coven, Hoidrious had just walked up to Longinus.

  ‘How are you here?’ he demanded as he signaled to his guards to surround Longinus. They left no spaces; their long swords were in hand, dangling loosely by their sides, and the tips were gently scratching the dirt beneath them.

  Longinus explained the whole story, stressing Raffious’ powerful dark magic and his time-shifting skills. He also warned Hoidrious that the magician was waiting outside for the last piece of the vase. He told the coven leader he had only really joined their coven as a spy and that he had been working for Raffious who had made him do it. He then explained he had left the Scots, because he had been offered the gift of time travel, into the future by him.

  As he finished, Longinus swallowed deeply as he looked up into Hoidrious’s eyes, hoping he would have mercy on him.

  Hoidrious was furious though and lunged forwards, grabbing him by the throat before lifting him off his feet and then running him back into the rock wall.

  ‘Wait! Wait, listen!’ he gasped. ‘I saw Rex in a prison earlier, and the time shifter outside is the one who has him. Raffious is waiting for me outside. Rex told me to tell you Viatis Onertiunes! And he said tell Vius not to get Jenny anymore, else the church might start a holy war.’

  Hoidrious paused for a second, looking shocked. The two words Longinus had just uttered was from an ancient vampire dialect which was not spoken anymore. Only very old coven members actually knew its meaning. The guards at the entrance had only recognized it as being ancient. The reason they had reacted the way they had was simply because of the dialect. They had ass
umed that, since it was of the old language, it had to be of the utmost importance.

  ‘Viatis Onertiunes,’ meant ‘I am alive, but not for long,’ and it was clear to Rex’s replacement that Longinus might actually be telling the truth.

  After releasing his grip on Longinus’ throat, and dropping him to the ground, Hoidrious suddenly closed his eyes and held his hands high above his head as he chanted some strange words, ‘omniatis viotieros gladiousternous daintes.’

  Then when he had finished repeating them, he dropped to his knees and remained this way, silent, for a few seconds.

  Suddenly, a strange-looking vampire ran into the room. He was dressed in old dark-brown leather and was holding a long wooden bow in one hand and in the other, apart from his archery glove was a ominous looking, luminescent green arrow. It appeared to have strange gases emanating from it. The end of it was featherless too, but because of the speed it travelled at, where the feathers should have been, instead the shaft was knuckled to prevent it going through its victim, upon impact.

  Nervous and not particularly wanting to, but having had the guards witness Longinus’ previous treacherous statement, he knew had no choice, Hoidrious said, ‘Dracus, we must be quick! We have only one chance; outside a time-shifter waits, and we must capture him. The swine has Rex alive in a prison somewhere.’

  As he heard Rex’s name, not even an ounce of shock passed the bowman’s face, instead he simply nodded.

  ‘Yes, my master, it will be a pleasure. Consider it done,’ he said but not in the vampire language Longinus understood. He spoke in the old archaic language his peers knew.

  Dracus was their best bowman, and his skills were immense. He could somehow even bend his cursed arrows so that they flew around corners. Each would fly so fast that most spells couldn’t stop them as they flew through the air. The arrows he used were made from the skin of snakes that were over a thousand years old. The fangs of the slithery creature were bound tightly together to form their tips. The covens most powerful dark magic had cursed these arrows. Whoever they hit would lose their powers and become paralysed regardless of their knowledge in the darkest of evil.

  Another guard appeared, holding the other half of Christ’s Trucale vase in his hands. Hoidrious passed it to Longinus as Dracus suddenly vanished in front of him. Longinus could only stare; he had never seen a vampire do that before. Despite the seriousness of the present situation, he couldn’t stop himself from wondering what skill that was.

  Time-shifting like Raffious, or something else? he thought.

  Hoidrious stood a foot from Longinus and stared deeply into his eyes. ‘Take the piece of vase out to the time shifter. If this plan fails and he escapes, you had better hope that you can fly fast, because if he does get away, there will be another arrow headed for your brain.’

  -----------

  Outside, Raffious was sure that the plan had failed.

  How long should I wait? he thought. If Longinus had told them about him, then the longer he waited, the more time it would give them to summon spells. They might have something he didn’t know about, and then if so he might be killed or even worse, he might end up rotting in their cells.

  As the nervous thoughts passed through his mind he knew he wasn’t prepared to risk himself any longer. Stepping forwards, he summoned a spell. Then he turned around to look at what he had just created and smiled at its perfectly sculptured beauty.

  In the place where he had just been standing was a clone of himself, an exact copy in every way. His new idea was to go and hide somewhere, letting the clone risk itself. If Longinus came out, he could watch from safety and allow the clone to jump him and the piece of vase back to Rex. Then he would follow them. When he got there he would take the piece of vase and afterwards, kill Longinus slowly for telling him to ‘shut up’ earlier.

  As he started to walk away from the clone but still in clear sight of the tower, the secret door he had seen Longinus disappear through earlier, suddenly opened.

  Stepping out with a mischievous grin across his face, and holding the other piece of the vase tightly against his chest. Longinus double-checked it was clear before he started running across the road towards him. Raffious suddenly felt almost giddy with extreme happiness, and laughed as he thought about just how furious they were going to be when they realized they had just been burgled and lost Rex’s piece of the vase too.

  Watching Longinus as he was approaching, Raffious reconsidered the idea of killing him. Why should I, if Longinus is this loyal? he thought. No, maybe he would just demonstrate his powers to him back in front of Rex and tell him he was going to be his slave forever. Yes, a vampire slave. How perfect, he thought.

  At that exact moment he suddenly felt a massive pain in his left leg. Looking down, he was horrified to see that there was something sticking out of his kneecap. It looked like a luminous green bolt or shaft of some kind.

  How? his mind screeched. He had spells protecting him--powerful spells that he had cast upon himself to make sure that he couldn’t be stabbed by anything. He knew they worked too, because earlier when he had tricked Voitek on the hillsides in Devil’s Dyke by shape-shifting into Rex, he hadn’t died when the sword had been thrust deep into his chest.

  Looking across, Longinus had stopped running now and was walking slowly towards him.

  ‘You fool!’ Longinus shouted as he drew even closer. When he was about ten feet from him, he laughed mockingly. ‘You thought you were going to get the vase to make us vampires extinct. Well, your mistake was when you told Rex. He then told me everything telepathically, and I told his coven. You honestly didn’t know that we could communicate by thought alone? You are an idiot, and now you will probably pay with your life.’

  Raffious was absolutely furious. He had only one thing on his mind, and that was to kill him for this, then afterwards he would continue on his mission to rid the vampire species from the earth forever.

  How dare this vampire do this to me? he thought. He knows what I am capable of doing.

  Thrusting his arms back high either side of his head so that his long white sleeves slid down his pale forearms, he tried to summon his nastiest of spells. But as he spoke the words, absolutely nothing happened. Full of rage, he tried another, then another, but none of them did anything. As he desperately tried his last one, he felt his body beginning to twitch violently, as if he had trapped nerves everywhere. Then numbness began to settle in, replacing his sense of touch with nothingness. It scared him to the core of his being, especially when seconds later, he couldn’t even feel anything below his neck.

  He was paralysed.

  Longinus had reached him by now and said, ‘I have something to remind you that a vampire outsmarted you. Consider it a gift,’ he said coldly as he drew his sword out and held it up so Raffious could inspect the shiny archaic blade.

  Then as he could see Raffious’ eyes flickering backwards and forwards and turning blood shot from fear, he said to him as he leant right in to his face. ‘For all the lies and the disgusting way you treated me, I'm going to scar you forever.’

  Pushing the tip of the sword deep into his cheek, Longinus slowly began to twist, and in doing so, he allowed the razor-sharp tip, just beneath his eye, to rip open the old boy’s cheek. Raffious’ deeply mumbled words suggested nothing more than he was in deep. Then as the blood began to trickle down the sword, Longinus grinned at him. He stared into his eyes as he pushed the blade in even deeper till it grated against the bone. Then he slid the blade downwards and with it sliced open the whole cheek.

  ‘I hope that hurts, you bastard!’ Longinus sniggered just before something heavy hit him across the back of the head and he passed out.

  Dragged by their feet with their head’s crashing against the ground. Warriors from the coven took both of them back inside and then they closed the secret door behind them.