To Dream of Dreamers Lost: Book 3 of The Grails Covenant Trilogy

by David Niall Wilson

  Without a word Abraham slid through the small entrance and she followed. Once they were inside, he carefully pulled the stone slab back across to hide the fact of their entrance as long as possible. There were those among the Order who would remember Abraham, even those he’d thought he could call friend. Now he was less certain, and it made sense not to rock the boat until one knew how deep the water was.

  He slipped along the nearest wall, Fleurette moving easily behind him, and found that they were at the end of a long, narrow passage. It curved around to the left, then evened out and opened into a larger passage. Along this larger way he could feel air moving. He turned into that slight breeze, still staying as close to one wall as possible, and moved carefully inward. It was only moments later that he caught sight of the stairway ahead. There were torches flickering along the walls, illuminating the passageway dimly. Abraham knew they would be on the lowest level of their stronghold that was feasible.

  The core of the Order had been Embraced by Gustav’s original band of Nosferatu. Abraham had heard the story over and over again, though it was endlessly fascinating. Upon their being Embraced, the old one, Kli Kodesh, who seemed little more than a legend to Abraham, had shared with them of his own blood, and it had altered them somehow, binding them to him, and changing their makeup. Gustav had been Nosferatu, and old, at the time of his transformation, and his features still bore the scars of that odd, decayed group.

  The others were more fortunate. Their skin fairly glowed. While other Damned were pale, even white at times, these were opaque and milky. Even Gustav had lost much of the harshness of his features, his deformities somehow becoming less obvious. There were other changes.

  During his stay with the Order, Abraham had not once seen one of them feed. It was possible that their rituals forbade public blood-taking, but Abraham was certain it was more than that. They did not feed because they needed much less blood than other Damned. They felt the hunger, but it was more of a nagging itch than a consuming fire.

  There was also an uncanny ability to be remain awake in the morning, before dawn, and to rise before it seemed possible. Never had Abraham seen one of them retire for the evening, and every time he’d risen, they had been there, alert and busy, moving about their business as though they’d been there all along.

  They spent their nights, when not moving about on business that had never included Abraham, in study. In the mountain where they’d abandoned him the libraries and laboratories had been extensive, even astonishing. The wisdom of many ages had been contained within those walls, and Abraham was willing to wager it had come along with them as well, or been moved slowly, a bit at a time, the entire time they’d been under that mountain.

  Now he was pitting himself against this group of powerful Cainites, with a newly Embraced companion at his side, and to remain behind with a monster like Noirceuil about was an even more certain destruction than that which they faced. Not for the first time Abraham wondered why, when Santorini had given him the letters and the gold and sent him on his way, he had not turned toward some faraway land and never looked back.

  Abraham cared nothing for the Church. He’d given up on that form of salvation when his life was taken, then handed back to him warped and darkened. When he’d walked about as a man it had seemed well and good to offer his life to God and his trust to salvation. Damned as he now knew himself, it mattered little and seemed nothing short of frivolous to worry over it at all.

  But the Order promised something more. Their existence, their odd powers, their secrets and knowledge, these were goals worth latching onto and following. These were things worth believing in.

  Moving more slowly, he came to the bottom of the stone stairs that led up into the shadows above. There was still no sound, no sign that any save himself and Fleurette inhabited the huge building. For the first time since coming up the trail he wondered if he’d been wrong. Was this where they’d come, or was it an elaborate hoax? It was not beyond the Order to raise this huge stronghold, fill it with nothing for years, then slip in and back out of it, escaping down the far side of the mountain and into oblivion.

  These thoughts brought a hint of desperation to his movements, and he began to climb the stairs, moving more rapidly. Fleurette reached out, placing a hand on his shoulder, slowing him. He turned to bat her arm away, but her eyes stayed his hand. She was right. He could not go barreling up those stairs without regard to what might be waiting. Not that he had a plan in any case. So close to his goal, and yet still so far from any resolution.

  They made the top of the stairs, and here the passageway branched in both directions, with another stair leading further up directly opposite where they stood. Abraham glanced down the passage in either direction. There were doors lining this passage, and by the spacing he determined that they were probably the private chambers. It was a lower level still, completely cut off from the sun during the day.

  “We have to go higher,” he said softly. “They won’t be here by night.”

  Fleurette nodded, and as he moved across the passage, taking the second set of stairs upward, she followed closely. He had not bothered to explain to her exactly what they were doing, or what sort of danger they now faced. It would have taken far too long to make her understand, and her silence had begun to wear on his nerves. He was half convinced she’d lost her faculties during her Embrace.

  He moved even more slowly than before. There was no way to know how far down into the mountain the structure reached, or how far they would have to climb to be near the top. He climbed steadily, pressing to the shadows along the wall, watching and listening for even the tiniest breath of motion, the softest passage of air.

  Ahead, he saw that the stairs ended in another wide passage, and he stepped up to the frame of the doorway, glancing to the right, then turning left, and stopping. Gustav stood not ten feet from him, watching him intently. The old Nosferatu did not move to attack him, nor did he seem particularly disturbed or surprised to see his young would-be follower.

  “Hello, Abraham,” Gustav said softly. “It has been a long time.”

  Abraham froze in place, and Fleurette, who had moved up beside him at the sound of a voice, watched Gustav in silence.

  “Not so long,” Abraham said at last. “Not long enough to forget my name at least. Why did you leave me, Gustav? Why abandon me after so many months of my company? Am I that contemptible?”

  “You are not of the Order,” Gustav replied simply. “I did not form the Order, and it is not my place, though I oversee the actions of those here, to add to that number. I did as I had to do, as do you. It is good to see you again.”

  “Who are you?” Fleurette spoke, and Abraham turned as if he’d been bitten.

  Gustav watched the childe in amusement. “If you have a few hundred years, girl, I would be happy to sit back and tell you. Unfortunately, however, none of us can afford too much time for idle banter at this juncture.”

  “What do you mean?” Abraham asked.

  “Montrovant, of course,” Gustav replied, turning away and heading down the passage slowly, leaving them to stand or to follow, as they chose. “He is right on your heels, you know. He and another. It would not do for us to underestimate the dark one when he takes the time to make his way to our very doorstep.”

  “It is all a trap then,” Abraham called after him, following the old vampire down the hall, his fear of moments before replaced by curiosity, tinged with anger. “It is all to draw the dark one here, and myself in the bargain, if I survived, that is. Tell me, Gustav, why you couldn’t have just stayed in the mountain, guarded the treasures, and waited? Why go? Why now? Surely you know the church is aware of your leaving? Rome is filled with those who want to hunt you down, not all of whom are powerless to do so.”

  Gustav did not look back, but he replied softly.

  “It was not my choice, Abraham. It is seldom my choice. Come, in moments you will understand more fully.”

  It was then that they rounded a
corner and came to a massive open doorway, leading into a large chamber. In the center of the room sat a long, oblong table of dark, solid wood. Around that table many chairs were ranged. In each of these chairs one of the Order sat, watching the doorway as though they’d been waiting for Abraham to arrive all evening. At the head of the table, a figure Abraham had never seen lounged indolently.

  The vampire was old and brittle, thin to the point of emaciation, his long, wispy white hair sweeping back from his drawn face like a dandelion blossom past its prime, looking as though it might be blown away by a strong gust of wind.

  Even from that distance, the vampire’s eyes stood out. In a room where every feature appeared a bit off kilter, warped, or rotted, where nothing should have amazed, where the norm was far more bizarre than any other gathering Abraham could imagine, those eyes stood out. They smiled without humor, latching onto Abraham’s gaze and drawing him to a silent halt. If Fleurette had not noticed the sudden lack of motion and kicked his leg softly, Abraham might have stood in that one spot and stared for hours.

  “Kli Kodesh,” he breathed. It was not a question. There was no other it could be, and with all that was happening in and around the keep, there was no other place one might expect the ancient one to be found.

  “And you are Abraham,” Kodesh replied, grinning back. “I hear you have led my friend Montrovant right to my doorstep.”

  Abraham watched the old one for a long moment of silence before replying, trying to reconcile the sight of him with the words and stories he’d used to build his own image. It was difficult.

  “I did not lead him anywhere,” Abraham said at last. “I followed him here.”

  “I see that,” Kodesh replied, eyes dancing, “and yet you have arrived first. An interesting method of tracking, one we shall have to discuss at a later date. It is enough that he has come, as I knew he would.”

  Abraham found the old one’s humor at the situation less than amusing, and would have said more if given the chance, but Kodesh went on.

  “It seems, according to our scouts, that Montrovant and his men have departed the village below and are making their way up the mountain. It is nearly time to make ready for their arrival, not to mention a fitting welcome for Noirceuil, whom I haven’t seen in years. It should be an interesting diversion if I can arrange for a meeting between those two on the mountain.”

  “Noirceuil is a hunter,” Abraham cut in. “He kills his own kind.”

  “I believe that he would argue that one with you, my young, impetuous friend,” Kodesh replied quickly. “Noirceuil is fighting in God’s army, and to hear him tell the tale he is the only qualified warrior in that group. He will do his best to send our dark one to his final rest, you can be assured of that. It is in the interest of the salvation of souls that Noirceuil kills, and while a bit overzealous in his methods, he has proven very effective over the years. I would hate to have to sit down and count the number of Damned he has put to rest since his Embrace. What a delicious irony his existence has been!”

  “Why bring him here?” Abraham insisted. “If your goal was to lure Montrovant here, a final confrontation, why invite more trouble? The hunter is not here on his own, he was sent by the Church, the Inquisition. If he does not return, he or his partner, Lacroix, this area will soon be swarming with agents of Rome, poking under every rock and tree, searching for what they only vaguely comprehend. Why ask for that so blatantly?”

  Kodesh threw his head back and began to cackle madly, leaning over the arm of his chair and nearly falling to the floor in the sudden, out-of-control burst of amusement.

  “If you have heard anything at all of me, boy,” Kodesh turned to grin at Gustav, who sat to his right, “and in this company I am assured that you have, then you know that I do things for one reason, and one reason alone. They relieve my endless, tedious boredom. They give me a reason to continue on, though everything has been done that there is to do, and everything seen that can be seen. The only thing left is the mind, the subtle nuance of one will, one heart placed against the resistance of another. It keeps me moving, makes me whole…and it amuses me to no end.”

  Then the laughter returned once more and the old one lay back in his chair, surrendering himself to it.

  “Let me help then,” Abraham called out boldly. “I have as much reason to hate Montrovant as any who walk the earth by day or by night. I have seen the hunger take the existence of another just because it suited him. I want to be a part of their end, if such is your plan. I want to be a part of the Order.”

  Kodesh leaped suddenly from his chair, landing on his feet on the table in an incredible display of speed and agility, made all the more ludicrous by his fragile, aged aspect. His eyes were burning, and his lips were curled back in a sneer.

  “You would be one of them?” Kodesh’s eyes swept first over Abraham’s features, then over the gathered throng of his own followers. “You would walk with Gustav, study and control the secrets of the ages? You would stand against Montrovant, and those who think to take these treasures and make them their own?”

  Abraham tried to speak, but Kodesh caught him easily in that magnetic gaze, advancing on him with the grace of a large, predatory cat. Abraham wanted to flee, but at the same time would not have moved granted the strength. It was the moment he’d waited for since he’d come from Lori’s caverns to the doorstep of the Order so many years before. He would die now a second time, or he would rise to be something more.

  “It will work,” Kodesh grinned, nodding. “I will give you what I have given them, on the condition that you will then become the bait. You will go to them both, Montrovant, Noirceuil, and you will let them see what you have become, what has been offered you and denied them. Then you will lead them to their destruction, or be destroyed yourself in the attempt. At least, for that moment, you will have what you have sought for so long, what you have dreamed of late into the night and during your rest by the light of day. You will be one of the Order of the Bitter Ashes, guardian of secrets.”

  Fleurette had drawn close behind Abraham, and she clutched him suddenly. “Do not do it,” she said fiercely. “He is making it sound like a good thing, a special thing. He will send you to your death.”

  “And what if he does?” Abraham replied, tearing his gaze from Kodesh’s dark, deep-set eyes to meet hers. “If I die, I will die accomplishing what I set out to do.”

  “Not if you die at Montrovant’s hand, you won’t,” she said, shaking him by his arm. “You will do as that one,” she turned to Gustav, pointing a slender finger at the ancient, eyes blazing, words snapping free of her lips as if spat. “You will turn your back on what you have created, on the one you now lead. You will do as they all did to you, abandoning me as soon as you took my life and hope of salvation. You will take this new Damnation, and you will leave me here…to do what? To serve? To make my own way in the world, feeding off those I once called friend? Alone?”

  She screeched then, diving at Abraham with such sudden fury that he was driven back several steps and took a deep gash below his eye before he managed to grab her wrists and hold her. Still she struggled to get at him, eyes awash in cold fury. His mind whirled. What she said was true.

  “Stop,” he commanded, and though the fire barely dimmed in her eyes, she did as he commanded. She had no choice, bonded by the blood, or she would have continued to fight until he was forced to do something more permanent to stop her.

  “She is full of fire,” Kodesh cackled. “You will be better off without her.”

  “No,” Abraham turned back. “I will do as you ask, and I will lead them here, but you must make your offer to us both. I swore long ago that I’d not bring another to this hellish existence, but now I have done so. I will not become what I have loathed. I will not leave her to suffer as I have.”

  Kodesh hesitated. It was not his plan, but it was clear that Fleurette’s actions had caught his eye. Diversion. Entertainment.

  He nodded. “So be it. I will double t
he stakes. If you lose her on the mountain, that will be on your own conscience. Come to me now, both of you.”

  Leaping from the table, Kodesh stood before them, holding out one withered hand, and they both started forward instantly, compelled. Fleurette tried to fight at first, but it was futile. Abraham moved in a trance, mesmerized by the moment, the odd twists of events that had led him to where he stood.

  They moved steadily and as they came near, Kodesh wrapped each in one ancient arm, his face alight with—madness. It was the only way to describe it. As his arms wrapped them, he brought a wrist to each of their lips, not waiting for them to bite, but impaling himself on their fangs, lifting them from the floor with the violence and suddenness of his action. They both struggled then, for just an instant, then their expressions shifted subtly…completely.

  Their eyes stared, glazed, and their jaws clamped hard, as if in unison. Kodesh stiffened for a long moment, feeling the blood flow, the twin bites piercing his wrists in an odd mockery of the nails biting in the crucifixion, symbol of the very Church that now hunted them. Then he shook himself, and they fell away as if thrown, tumbling to the floor. Neither moved at first, and Kodesh drew his arms in toward his body, closed his eyes and lowered his head for a moment, then raised it again, the dark grin having spread to a maniacal expression of something much wilder.

  “It has begun,” he said softly, as first Abraham, then Fleurette rose to their knees, and then to their feet.

  Abraham stared at his hands, then turned, his gaze rising to meet Kodesh’s. He tried to speak, but words failed him. “I…”