Sergey screamed out his fury, raking at Luther’s eyes and neck as he pulled back, closing down his chest with razor-like blades in an effort to chop off his lieutenant’s arm before it could grasp the heart and extract it. The lesser vampires threw themselves on the ground right under the feet of the two combatants, licking at the blood pool, heedless of the danger to them from the reaching tentacles.
The poisonous spider’s web went crazy. It was stretched across several trees, a very effective guardian to the entrance to the underground lair beneath the forest. The long threads swayed and rocked, reaching in every direction, looking for anything unwary enough to get close so they could attach themselves to it and pull it into the center of the web where it could feast.
The tentacles had to be sticky or have suction cups on them because two of the crawling vampires licking frantically at the black blood were gripped, rolled fast and dragged up and into the web where hundreds of threads locked them in place. The feeder tubes jammed into their still-intact flesh and blood spurted, drawing the attention not only of the newly made vampires but of the master vampires as well. The scent of blood permeated the air.
Sergey and Luther narrowly escaped the thrashing threads. Ferro caught sight of Edward Varga backing far away from the fray, answering the puzzle as to how he had survived for so long. He was the same coward, looking after himself and disappearing when he thought he could get away with it. Sergey’s four guards circled cautiously, trying to find a way to get to him without putting themselves in danger of being eaten by the protector of the lair.
Sedrick Overtower hooked one of the hapless newly made vampires, still with red blood in his veins, and pulled him away from the others, dragging him across the ground, heedless of the rocks and debris. He skirted around the combatants, continuing to tow the doomed vampire across the uneven ground and into the trees, away from the opening that led to the lair.
He crouched down, tore into the neck of the starving vampire and began to consume him. Immediately, crows made their way down from the higher branches to hop across the ground, pecking at the kicking, screaming vampire, tearing strips of flesh from the bones. Sedrick didn’t seem to mind sharing the flesh, as long as he was able to drain the last of the blood from the veins.
“You will be still, Luther,” Sergey commanded. “Remove your fist from my chest.”
Ferro heard the gift in the Malinov voice. One of his older Malinov brothers was reputed to be able to command others to do whatever he ordered, not just human but Carpathians and humans alike. Ferro hadn’t believed it. Now, hearing that beguiling note in Sergey’s voice, he could almost believe it was true. Luther didn’t obey, but he hesitated. That was enough to tip the battle in Sergey’s favor and warn all the brethren that Sergey had a few tricks of his own up his sleeve.
Sergey struck hard, ripping Luther’s heart from his chest and tossing it into the air. One of his guards called lightning down and incinerated it. Sergey stepped back and indicated Luther’s falling body. The lightning forked and jumped to the body, burning it as well. Just like that, Sergey seemed in good spirits again, although, watching him, Ferro could see he was tense and not in the least bit at ease the way he wanted the others to think he was.
The moment lightning lit up the night sky, Sedrick was on his feet, abandoning the vampire in the forest to the crows. Varga made his way back quickly to press close, as if he’d been there all along. Sergey kicked at the remaining newly made vampires.
“Get up before I feed you to the puppets, or our guardian.” The web seemed satisfied with the two men it was devouring. Their piercing cries seemed to make Sergey even happier. He did nothing to silence them, although the sound carried across the lake, far into the night.
He kicked viciously at the vampires on the ground and they crawled hastily out of his way before stumbling to their feet. Sergey stood in front of the web, his guards by his side, and waved aside the dangling strands of the web. One master vampire moved up in front of him and another dropped behind him. The other two flanked him on either side.
Ferro could see why the entrance was so large. It had been deliberately made that way so it was safer for the vampires to pass through when their guardian was in a feeding frenzy. He drifted closer, Sandu, Petru and Benedek closing ranks so they were in tight formation, almost on the very heels of the master vampires. They had to time their entry so the vampires wouldn’t feel them, yet be close enough that the guardian wouldn’t, either. They couldn’t stir so much as a drop of air and had to move in perfect sync with the vampires as they entered the lair.
Nothing smelled as bad as a vampire’s lair. When many vampires shared the same lair, the stench was overwhelming, even to the most hardened of Carpathian hunters. They might not feel emotion, but they had a heightened sense of smell. They were predators, and like any predator, their senses were acute, no matter what form they took.
The passage may have started out narrow, but over time it had been widened, and now three grown men could easily walk side by side down the steps hewn out of the dirt and root systems to the floor below. Someone knowledgeable in engineering had designed and fortified the underground fortress. There was a series of smaller rooms to the front that presumably housed victims the vampires kept alive to feed off of for long periods of time.
As they floated past the rooms with the open doors, the brethren could see evidence of captivity, the chains and smears of old blood left behind with echoes of screams still encased in the dirt of the walls and flooring. There were no prisoners, and hadn’t been for some time. Either Sergey hadn’t been using this lair for very long, or he had abandoned the practice of keeping his food alive and close while he worked at retrieving Elisabeta.
The hallway ended abruptly, spilling into a large circular room cut out beneath the forest. The vampires had made an effort to make it comfortable, even somewhat livable, with chairs for the master vampires on a raised dais and more scattered around for the lesser vampires following them. The pawns sat on the floor, not yet worthy of a chair.
Ferro and the others exchanged notes on the master vampires entering the room with Sergey. Two of them were cousins of the Malinov brothers. Cornel and Dorin were often seen with their five cousins when they were young, preferring to stay in the background. They were quiet but skilled hunters, a force to be reckoned with from early on when they hunted vampires. Still, it shouldn’t have been a surprise when they followed their cousins and made the decision to turn. The members of the Malinov family were close and they believed themselves superior to the Dubrinsky family—those who ruled the Carpathian people.
The Astor family had always followed the Malinovs. As children, Georg, Fridrick and Addler had hung around them, and when they were first learning to hunt, they followed the direction of one of the older Malinov brothers. They had all been good hunters, although unlike Cornel and Dorin, the Astors were on the flamboyant side. At times they had gone so far as to act in theaters in various countries, choosing small stages where they could perform, be stars, and then when they had gotten enough accolades to pander to their vanity, they would stalk any critics and drain them of their blood, sometimes killing their families slowly in front of them first. They needed attention constantly, and following someone like Sergey had to be difficult for them. Georg and Fridrick had been killed recently by Tariq and the others in their fight against the vampires, but Addler had survived.
Addler was a smart, colorful vampire, very reminiscent of the man he had once been. Unlike the others, he kept himself looking fairly decent, even though there were no humans to fool. He wore a suit with a purple shirt and black stripes. Ferro could see that his once handsome face would appeal to modern women. He had always been a good hunter, even as a young man, a careful student of the Malinovs, and apparently, he still was.
The fourth master vampire was one who, again, didn’t surprise Ferro all that much. He hadn’t been related to the Astors or
the Malinovs but he had grown up with them and, as children, it was reputed that where they were, he was. He was called Ambrus Balog. In Carpathian culture they took names suited to the times and whatever region they lived in. Often they kept their childhood name, given by a parent, for sentimental reasons, but even that could change if it wasn’t suited for the country where they were residing. Ambrus liked his name and continued to use it.
He was a big man and liked intimidating his prey. He’d used his size against other children when he was a boy and still did so as a vampire. It was said he crushed children’s heads in his hands in front of their parents just to hear the elevated heartbeat, the rush of blood in their veins, hoping the heart would explode in their chests. He played with his prey for a long time before finally giving them death. He was a vicious fighter and one to respect in battle.
Ferro, Sandu, Benedek, Petru and Gary exchanged everything they knew of the four men as far as every battle they’d ever heard of or observed them in. They did so without words, simply calling up memories to share in their merged minds. They weren’t taking any chances that a flare of energy would give their presence away before they had the information they needed.
“Vadim’s infection was not effective at all,” Sergey greeted, his voice shaking with fury once again. He glared at Cornel. “Unless you set us up to be killed. They were waiting. An ambush. We were lucky to get away. As it was, we lost all of the idiot fawning pawns.”
Cornel frowned and glanced at his brother. “That doesn’t make any sense, Sergey. The infection had to have spread by now.”
“Well, it didn’t, so you tell me, Cornel, how is it that the infection didn’t spread when you assured me that it would? When you told me the ancients would turn on one another and that the gates would be opened from the inside? How is it that none of that happened?” Sergey demanded and threw himself into a chair.
The few remaining newly made vampires crawled into the room, covered in black shiny blood, and prostrated themselves on the floor. They whined in high-pitched voices, although the sound was more of a whimpering, grating on Ferro’s nerves with his acute hearing. He knew it grated on the other ancients as well. He didn’t see how the master vampires could tolerate such a din in spite of how low the actual sound was. It felt like nails scratching over a chalkboard.
“I have no idea.” Cornel sighed in frustration. “I can’t work from here. I need to be in a location where we have access to the internet. Eventually we’ll be able to trace the hunters. We’ll know their locations when they choose to move around. They have energy fields, and we’ve been working to perfect an algorithm for that.”
Ferro had no idea what that meant, and he doubted if Sergey did, either, although the master vampire cocked his head to one side and nodded as if he did know.
“Who do we have developing that?” Sergey asked, frowning as if he were very interested.
“It was Fridrick, Addler’s older brother, but he was killed when Vadim insisted he try to get those women pregnant,” Dorin answered, his tone slightly disparaging. “He brought the hunters right to us before we were ready.”
“Had you taken over sooner, Sergey,” Addler added, “we would be in a much stronger position.” He casually kicked one of the newly made vampires who had crawled too close. It was a hard kick, delivered with the strength of a master vampire. “Know your place, worm. You don’t ever get near Sergey unless he chooses to acknowledge you.”
The man fell back, shuddering and whining, crawling back to the other newly made vampires. Once human, they had been young college-aged males who had gone to the Morrison Center for psychic testing. The Malinov brothers had conceived a plan to use them as pawns, dangling immortality and the promise of power in front of them. They converted them and then sent them into battle with the experienced Carpathians, using the new vampires as diversions or to wear the hunters down before launching the main attack.
Ferro and the others felt no emotion as they watched them fawning, trying to win favors with the master vampires. The high-pitched whining increased in volume to the point Ferro found it strange he couldn’t turn the sound down. Carpathians could always lower the volume when noises were too loud, yet that screech was persistent and growing louder until he thought he might go mad.
The large room seemed to shudder, the ground rippling as if something alive moved beneath the vampires’ feet. For one moment, the walls in the circular room appeared to do the same, the dirt walls undulating in a slow, uneasy wave, alerting Ferro that there could be things hidden that could be equally as dangerous as the master vampires and the poisonous web they had guarding the front entrance.
Cornel impatiently waved his hand toward the newly made vampires to silence them, annoyed by their continuing noise. The whining broke off abruptly. When it did, the uneasy rippling in the floor and walls ceased as well.
Ferro experienced an unfamiliar sense of relief. A flutter of awareness touched his mind. The merest hint of fragrance pushing out the scent of decay and rot. Bergamot, orange, vetiver, camellias and sandalwood. It was there and then gone as if it had never been, but strangely, it was an alarm, triggering an unease over the rising sound of the newly made vampires. If they didn’t always sound off like that to their masters, why had they continued to do so and increased their volume? There was no answer. He had to be watchful. There were secrets here, and the brethren had risked everything to learn them.
Cornel paced across the floor, his movements so smooth he appeared to glide. “If we had that kid Josef, we would have exactly what we need by now. That idiot prince, Mikhail, has no idea what he has in that kid. They’ll never catch up with you, Sergey. Never. They don’t have your foresight. You’re working without their tools and yet you’re still ahead of them.”
Ferro had to admire Cornel. He didn’t fawn on Sergey. He didn’t apologize or back down even with the implied threat that Cornel might be trying to get Sergey killed. He simply spoke matter-of-factly, stating what he needed and then ending with praise, knowing that was really what Sergey would focus on the most. After centuries of being abused by his brothers, always looking like the buffoon, Sergey craved and demanded respect. He needed those around him to stroke his ego.
The conversation told Ferro a lot about Cornel. He might be content to stay in the background, but he had the streak of brilliance that ran in the Malinov family. He could be a huge threat to the Carpathians. Cornel hadn’t mentioned Elisabeta. Ferro wondered if he was aware she was the real brains behind Sergey’s genius and now that she was gone, Sergey was incapable of leadership without her. Perhaps it was too soon for any of them to have figured that out yet.
Ferro knew Josef was considered very special by Gary, and that was huge praise. At one time Gary had been in the human world and he was a genius with a quick, decisive mind. He knew the ways of modern technology. When he had been converted by Gregori Daratrazanoff, second-in-command to the prince and from a powerful family in the Carpathian lineage, Gary had been presented before the long-dead ancients to be judged worthy of becoming a Carpathian warrior. If accepted, he would be wholly of the Daratrazanoff lineage and all past warriors would pour their battle and healing experience into him, as well as all other knowledge. He would wake a Daratrazanoff but already ancient, without emotion or the ability to see in color.
It would take a man of great strength to handle the terrible burden of such a sudden difference in one’s life. Carpathians lost color and emotion over time. Those things faded, allowing them to get used to it and giving them time to reinforce their desire to uphold honor at all costs. Gary was forced to deal with it almost immediately.
If he said Josef was needed by the Carpathian people, it didn’t matter that the kid had blue spiked hair and piercings, which didn’t offend Ferro in the least. The kid had to be protected. Knowing the vampires had their eyes on him made that even more imperative. Ancients were used to sharing knowledge by acquiring
it and simply sending that information to the others. The internet and the use of it seemed useful but not imperative until just that moment when Cornel acted as if Josef was the most important person to focus on acquiring. The implication Ferro was getting was that he was more important even than Elisabeta.
“This Josef you speak of is the boy Traian and his lifemate brought with them to the fortress where they are holding Elisabeta,” Sergey said. There was speculation in his voice. Too much interest.
Cornel nodded. “Yes. It would be good if we could lure them both out from under Tariq’s nose. Or if we can give the infection more time to spread, place our spies so that the command works and the gates are open, we can go in and retrieve both. That way, we can kill as many as possible.” Before Sergey could reply, Cornel turned toward his brother. “Dorin, what of the plan to use our pawns in Tariq’s club? Are they in place? That could be just the thing to bring the hunters out into the open.”
Sergey looked pleased. “A bloodbath in Tariq’s precious nightclub. Feasting on his well-dressed patrons. A great idea.”
“Beneath the main club is the underground club,” Dorin said. “That one is for those who like to play at being creatures of the night. We fit in perfectly there. To test for safety, I have entered numerous times, picked up a lovely woman, left with her and dined deliciously in the lair beneath the city, feasting for days before she succumbed. I had others do the same. It will not be difficult to deal with the cameras and feast right there in the underground club and then go floor by floor. Fear is such a wonderful addiction.”
Sergey sat up much straighter, definitely pleased with the direction of the conversation. He clearly wanted to get back at Tariq for stealing Elisabeta out from under him. “Perhaps this Josef could be lured to the underground club. He’s young. Is there a female we can use? One who would want to sacrifice to save her family? Dorin, if you’ve been to the club, did you meet anyone this Josef might be intrigued with?”
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