“Please take your seat, sir. We’re about to make our approach to San Francisco International.”
Pangloss’s chauffeur was waiting for them at the exit gate, holding a neatly printed placard that read S. Blue. They were shown to a stretch limo with tinted glass and a fully stocked bar in the back.
Before climbing into the back seat, Palmer’s gaze fell upon a gaunt woman dragging her luggage into the terminal. Although the woman was very frail, a smoke-monkey the size of a gorilla straddled her narrow shoulders. He bit back a laugh he knew would sound too high-pitched and brittle to be mistaken for sane.
Sonja stuck her head out of the limo and motioned for him to get in. “Come on, damn it! It’s just a tobacco demon!”
The moment the door slammed shut behind them Palmer popped one of his foul smelling cigarettes into his mouth and opened the liquor cabinet. His hands were shaking.
“What’s wrong?”
Palmer snorted, expelling a cloud of smoke. “What’s right about any of this? That bastard Pangloss tried to have my brains turned into guacamole dip, and here we are riding in the back of his fuckin’ limo! We’re walking into a trap, for Christ’s sake! It might as well have T-R-A-P spelled out in flashing neon letters!”
Sonja sighed and looked out the window. “Don’t worry about Pangloss. I can handle him. He’s not going to bother you. He got what he wanted. Adding you to his stable was merely a little lagniappe, not the main event.”
“You sound real sure of yourself.”
“I know Pangloss is crafty. I don’t doubt he’s got his own reasons for bringing me into this, but I don’t care what they might be. The only thing I’m interested in is Morgan.”
“So who is this Morgan, and why do you want his head on a spike?” Palmer frowned.
“Ever hear of Thorne Industries?”
“Of course,” he replied. “Old Jake Thorne is one of the last ‘bootstrap’ billionaires. He started off with nothing and ended up owning two dozen companies. ”
“Do you remember what happened to his daughter, Denise?” she asked, the corner of her mouth lifting into a bitter smile.
“Wasn’t she kidnapped or something back in the late Sixties, early Seventies?”
“That’s what everyone assumed. No ransom demands were ever made and she was never found,” she replied, her voice suddenly wistful.
“What does that have to do with you?”
“Because a long, long time ago, Denise met a man called Sir Morgan. Turns out he was a Noble alright, but not the kind Denise expected. He coerced her into ditching her friends and taking a moonlight drive in his chauffeured limousine. But once they were alone, he raped her, drank her blood, and, when he was finished with her, tossed her into the gutter from a moving car. She was found and taken to the hospital, where she remained in a coma for nine months. Then I woke up.”
“You’re Denise Thorne?” Palmer stared at her, open-mouthed.
Sonja shrugged. “That is open to debate. But something in me used to be Denise Thorne; perhaps it still is.” She returned her gaze to the window, staring at the dim outline of Candlestick Park in the pre-dawn fog. “There are a lot of things I do not know. But I do know one thing: I will send Morgan to hell, even if I have to escort him there myself.”
Pangloss’s lair was in one of the older downtown skyscrapers, dwelling in the perpetual shadow cast by megaliths like the Transamerica Pyramid building. The limo slid into the underground parking garage, depositing its riders before an old-fashioned elevator shaft secured by sliding metal gates and manned by an operator.
As Sonja and Palmer stepped out of the limo, the elevator operator, an old man in an ill-fitting uniform, folded back the accordion gate and gestured for them to enter. The interior of the car smelled of old leather, older money and cigars. Upon reaching the penthouse, the elevator doors opened to reveal Kief. The hulking ogre jutted his massive jaw forward as he flared his apelike nostrils.
“I told you this was a bad idea,” whispered to Sonja behind his hand.
The ogre’s lips peeled back in a rictus grin, revealing teeth better suited for a shark’s mouth, as he took a step forward.
“Kief! Heel!”
The ogre grunted and moved aside, allowing a narrow-shouldered man in a nondescript suit and tortoiseshell spectacles to step forward.
“I’m Doctor Pangloss’s assistant. He’s in the gymnasium right now. I’ll escort you to the waiting room…”
“I’ll see him now,” Sonja said flatly.
The assistant scowled at the clipboard he held in his hand. “I’m afraid that’s not possible.”
She stepped forward and snatched the clipboard from his hands, snapping it in two like it was a graham cracker.
The assistant’s pale face grew even pastier. “Follow me, Ms. Blue.”
The gymnasium was larger than any apartment Palmer had ever lived in, with parallel bars and other athletic equipment scattered about, and a state-of-the- art Nautilus machine crouching in one corner like a chromium spider. In the middle of the room were two men, dressed in the mesh faceguards and starched white tunics of professional fencers, dueling with naked cavalry sabers.
As Sonja and Palmer entered the gymnasium, one of the duelists drove his weapon through his opponent’s chest, neatly skewering the tunic’s red heart. The wounded fencer, still clutching his weapon, staggered backward, staring at the length of cold steel jutting from his breastbone. The victor gave a dry chuckle and turned to leave, only to have the wounded swordsman leap forward and, with a single swing of his blade, neatly decapitate him in midstride. The head, still encased in the protective face guard, bounced a couple of times before rolling to a stop near Sonja’s foot.
Pangloss removed his own visor and tossed it aside, revealing eyes the color of garnets, bisected by a narrow, reptilian pupil. “I’m glad that’s over and done with!” he exclaimed as he motioned for his assistant to pull the saber free of his chest. “What a bore! Always going on about those scars he got at Heidelberg. Why, I remember when it was called Bergheim.” The vampire winced slightly as the sword was removed, and blood the color of transmission fluid trickled from the wound. “Ah! That’s much better-it was starting to itch.”
“Is there anything else I can do for you, Doctor?” the pinch-faced assistant asked.
“That will be all for now, Renfield. I will see to Ms. Blue and her friend myself.”
“Very good, sir. I’ll have Kief dispose of Herr Grunewald.”
“That’s not the same Renfield,” Palmer scowled as the assistant left the room.
“What of it?” Pangloss replied as he unfastened the buckles of his tunic.
“Because Renfield’s dead. I saw him die!”
“My dear Mr. Palmer, the world is full of Renfields!” Pangloss sighed. “Just like it’s full of paper clips. You don’t christen each and every one you use with its own name, do you? The operative our charming Ms. Blue terminated in New Orleans was, indeed, one of my Renfields, but far from the only one. But you will soon find how interchangeable such creatures are, now that you’ve replaced the late, unlamented Chaz.”
Sonja raised her hand for silence. “Stop baiting him, Pangloss. Mr. Palmer is under my protection, but he’s not a Renfield. I’m here because you have something to tell me about Morgan. Now what is it, Herr doktor?
Pangloss clucked his tongue in disapproval. “The years have not improved your etiquette, my dear. You’re just as blunt as ever. But I suspect that’s what comes from being American.” He shrugged free of the bloodstained tunic, revealing a hairless chest as pale as milk and covered with the faint traces of hundreds of crisscrossing scars. The newest wound, the one piercing his heart, was already puckering into pink scar tissue.
Without realizing it, Palmer reached up and touched his own chest, tracing his near-fatal flaw. He wondered for a moment if Sonja’s flesh was equally scarred, then hastily pushed the thought aside.
Pangloss strode across the room and removed a green silk dressing
gown from a peg near the door. “You still cling to certain human conceits, such as the ludicrous idea that time is valuable. You’re far too impatient, my dear! When will you realize that time is the one thing you have plenty of? Then again, I forget how young you truly are. While you are indeed a prodigy, my dear, in many ways you much like a backward child. Come; let us retire to more amenable surroundings.”
As they left the gymnasium, Palmer glanced over his shoulder and saw the ogre, Kief, pick up the severed head of the ill-fated Herr Grunewald from its resting place on the floor. The ogre peeled off the fencing mask and grinned as it lifted the dead man’s head to its slavering mouth. Palmer looked away, but he could still hear. It sounded just like someone biting into a big, crisp apple.
Marble art deco nymphs flanked the hearth while a panther carved from a single piece of obsidian crouched on the mantelpiece. There was a fire burning behind the ornate iron screen, but Palmer couldn’t feel it. Perhaps it was just the notorious San Francisco Bay damp getting to him, but he doubted it.
Pangloss stood at the picture window, his back to his guests. The fog was heavy, obscuring what little view was available at four in the morning. The swirling gray mist reminded Palmer a little too much of the tobacco demons he’d seen earlier, so he returned his gaze to the fireplace.
“You said you know something important about Morgan,” Sonja prodded. “Is that true?”
Pangloss glanced back over his shoulder at her. “Oh, it’s true alright. But I would rather speak to you in private. Shall we retire to the patio?” he suggested, gesturing to the sliding glass door that opened onto a rooftop garden.
Sonja glanced at Palmer, and then followed the elder vampire onto the fog-enshrouded terrace. The sea air was sharp in her nostrils, reminding her of blood. The Other’s voice stirred inside her head, admonishing her for having subsisted for so long on nothing but bottled plasma. She tried her best to tune it out: this was neither the time nor the place for the Other’s yammering to put her off guard. Despite his effete manner, Pangloss was dangerous; something she had learned the hard way years ago.
“You’ve changed, my dear,” Pangloss said, hands clasped behind his back as he stared into the fog bank. “You’ve matured. I noticed it the moment I laid eyes on you. You’re not as angry as you used to be.”
“Let’s just say I’ve discovered how to work within the system since the last time we met. I’ve learned to... focus myself. Now, about Morgan..?”
Pangloss turned to face her, and for a brief moment she was looking at an unwrapped mummy with red coals banked deep in its empty orbits. The vampire reached into the voluminous pockets of his dressing gown and retrieved an ivory cigarette holder with dry, twig-like fingers. The first time she’d glimpsed Pangloss’s true self she’d come close to screaming. But now, decades later, his desiccated appearance seemed almost normal.
“Ah, yes... Morgan. It always comes back to him, doesn’t it?” he said in a melancholy voice. “He was my greatest mistake, just as you are his. But at least I knew I created him.” Pangloss frowned and suddenly his features were once more those of a handsome middle-aged man. “It can be lonely for beings such as you and I, as you’ve no doubt discovered by now. Alliances with humans are, by their very nature, destined to be brief.
“Speaking of which, I congratulate you on claiming Palmer as your new Renfield. He’s much better spoken than that piece of trash you picked up in London. Tell me, does he still imagine himself the captain of his own will?”
“I told you he’s not aRenfield!”
Pangloss held up a hand in supplication. “You’re quite right, my dear! That was rude of me! Now, where was I? When I was younger—at least younger than I am now, anyway—I longed for companionship. At the time, I fancied myself quite ancient. I was what? Seven or eight hundred years old at the time, which means it must have been either the Eleventh or Twelfth century.
“I yearned to have an equal as a companion. But since I was forced to recruit my brood from serfs and peasants, with the occasional yeoman thrown in, most were unsuited for any intellectual pursuits beyond hunting down their next meal. Then I met Morgan.
“I was working for the Church as a barber surgeon at the time, gelding their most promising sopranos in order to create castrati. I was famous for having a low mortality rate, at least by the standards of the day. It was a good cover, as it allowed me to feed off the jealousies and infighting created whenever human sexuality is subverted. I fed well at the Vatican’s expense for the better part of two decades in that capacity. But Morgan’s arrival in my life changed all that.
“He was fourteen when I first saw him, but I instantly knew I had found what I had been searching for. He was the fifth son of a minor Frankish nobleman, who had donated the boy to the Church with the intention of him becoming a priest, but his excellent singing voice had drawn the attention of the choirmaster. Instead of gelding the boy, I chose to abandon my identity and leave Rome, taking him with me.
“We traveled Europe in the guise of uncle and nephew for several years as I schooled him in the ways of our kind. Morgan’s intellect was astounding, and he proved himself an apt pupil. He begged me many times over to be transfigured, but I withheld my benediction until he was thirty years old.
“My faith in his innate superiority was justified. For two centuries he was my constant companion. I was his Maker, but I never abused my status. I allowed him far more liberty than I’ve granted any of my brood, before or since. In the end it cost me dearly. On the two-hundred and twenty-fifth year after I re-made him in my image, Morgan turned against me. I’d underestimated the strength of his will—and his guile. He came close to killing me, just as you did.” Pangloss opened his robe and pointed to a long, ragged scar in the middle of his chest. “I nearly died from that silver blade of yours. It still hurts, even now.”
“If you’re expecting me to feel guilty, forget it.”
“I know better than to expect pity from you, or from any of our ilk.”
“So why are you telling me this?”
Pangloss’s smile was bitter. “When you love someone as much as I loved Morgan, and find that emotion betrayed...it becomes hate. You see, my dear, I loath him as much as you do. Also, it is in my interest that Morgan’s plan be foiled.”
“Plan?” Sonja’s ears pricked up, recalling Malfeis’ account of Morgan dabbling in something that had the Dukes of Hell gossiping.
The elder vampire chuckled. “His ambition is boundless, if nothing else. I’ve heard rumors his trying to create a brood of silver-immune vampires. If he succeeds, then he will change the Real World forever.”
“Do you know anything else?”
Pangloss shook his head. “He’s managed to screen his activities quite well. It took me five years to trace him to this city.”
“You mean he’s here? In San Francisco?” Sonja felt her stomach knot. She’d been hunting for so long, traveling the world in search of him, that to be told that she was in the same city with him was enough to make her head swim.
“I have no idea what name he’s going by, but I know he has dealings with a human realtor named Russell Howard. I suggest you start your inquiry with him.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
Pangloss grimaced as if he’d sipped tainted blood. “The Ruling Class is too preoccupied with their own blood feuds and atrocity exhibitions, and refuses to take action against him. They think he’s gone mad and his plans will come to nothing. But they don’t know Morgan the way I do, what he’s capable of. The situation requires a wild card. And what better weapon to turn against Morgan than one of his own making?”
“Flattery will get you nowhere, Herr Doktor. What makes you think I can stop Morgan?”
“Because you scare me, my dear,” the vampire replied. “You have from the moment I first saw you.”
“Why is that, Pangloss?” Sonja asked as she removed her mirrored glasses. “What is it you see when you look at me?”
Ther
e was fear and loathing in the old vampire’s wine-red eyes, but he did not avert his gaze from her own. “I don’t know. And that’s what frightens me.”
Chapter Seven
Their hotel was a few blocks from the famed dragon gates of Chinatown and catered largely to tourists and Asian businessmen. As they approached the revolving door that lead to the lobby, a homeless person shuffled forward, gesturing and muttering unintelligibly. He—at least Palmer assumed it was male—was dressed in several layers of cast-off clothing, his feet wrapped in old newspaper like dead fish, and smelled of piss and cheap wine. For some reason Palmer found himself reminded of his Uncle Willy. Upon seeing the homeless man, Sonja appeared startled and quickly pushed past him. Perplexed by this uncharacteristic display of fear, Palmer glanced back at the ragged figure as it returned to the fog-shrouded doorway it had shambled from. In the diffused light from the street lamp, the old man’s eyes glowed like burnished gold.
By the time Palmer reached the front desk, Sonja seemed once more in control of herself. The night auditor, an elderly Chinese gentleman who moved with the grace of a tai chi master, did not seem terribly surprised by their unconventional physical appearances. After all, it was San Francisco.
They received connecting single rooms, although Palmer would have been more comfortable with separate floors. After he’d stowed his meager luggage in the shallow closet behind the door, there came a light rapping on the door that connected his room to Sonja’s. He opened it halfway and found himself staring into twin reflections of his own weary face.
“What do you want?” he asked, stifling a yawn.
“We need to talk.”
Palmer glanced at his wristwatch. It was just after five in the morning. “What about? That Morgan asshole?”
“Yes, and what Pangloss told me.”
Palmer grunted. “Okay. Just let me get a quick shower first, okay? I feel like a pile of dirty laundry.”
“You got a point there.”
“I know; that’s why my mama made me wear a hat.”
Sonja laughed, and Palmer was both surprised and disturbed to find he liked how it sounded.
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