Moonspawn (9 page)

to her rear.

It was a frustration that had her furious, but also delighted. Cassandra was a cruel mistress, someone with a grudge against her, someone who would abuse her without relent, make her commit the most heinous acts of degradation. With the promise of being made to relish such distress, Kira was intently happy. Life with the queen would have been wonderful, but to be the property of such a diabolic mistress as the seneschal, to be her property and treated with disdain and constant punishment, was a fate she was besotted with. The paddling, the threats, and now her bondage, it had shown her her true lot. Was it part of the training? Had it brought this trait out in her already as Cassandra had intended?

Or had she already been well attuned to such vices, and Cassandra had merely awakened what had always been there? In such a case, what would her eventual fate be?

If training to turn a normal person into a grovelling sex slave were applied to one who was already well inclined to it, what sort of beast would it create?

The belt started its work once more, and Kira sighed and resigned herself to being frustrated again. Images of Cassandra clad in latex, her slender body pale and full of power, her cruel smile as she stood with a cane, a crop, a paddle, any weapon Kira could conjure in her mind. As the belt continued, Kira dreamt that she was being punished again, the searing flash of pain through her rear as the weapon was applied. But as the pleasure began to mount, another sensation started to creep into her. There was a cramp in her chest, eating at her insides and occasionally tightening her limbs. Her throat ached as though dry and requiring water, and there was a tickling in the front of her jaws.

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A faint rustle of movement snatched Corin’s attention, causing her to hold her reactions in check and pretend she had failed to notice the near inaudible clue to the proximity of another.

They were intending to defend themselves instead of flee. Excellent. She wanted to face them head on instead of chasing them down like the vermin they were, and besides, a direct confrontation might give her access to their leaders, a capture that could let her question as to the whereabouts of her brother.

The elders had still not decided what course of action to take and were still discussing it, calling in representatives from the other tribes to make the choice.

It was taking a long time. Some sort of epoch was dawning. The tribes of the Wyrm were growing, mounting some sort of plot. Prophecy and omen spoke of something dark brooding on the horizon, the dawning of an age of darkness only hinted at in their oldest and most venerated texts. With such matters occupying them, the running of internal matters of the tribes was all but forgotten and low on any agenda.

But while her fellows prepared for an apocalyptic war, Corin had remained to exact her blood vengeance on the Nosferatu. She was going to slay as many as she could in the hope of uncovering her lost sibling, or by forcing the vampire kind to cut their loses and give him back lest the genocidal female butcher them all.

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Throughout the days since Thanos had vanished, she had tracked them down and entered their lairs, hacking down their ghouls and protectors before entering their precious sanctums and rending the occupants as they slept the sleep of death itself. But she could not find the major powers, the ones who were more likely to be responsible for the kidnapping than the small pockets of fledglings she unearthed. The oldest monsters were well hidden and protected and she would need the help of her tribe to find them and mete out their well-earned and long deserved fate.

But as she hunted, so too had others, and not all of them were without success. Occasionally she ran into human vampire hunters, and when she could she communicated with the less zealous – trading information.

There had been an uprising amongst the vampire ranks.

A beast was loose, butchering those of the great vampire houses, the ones who had carved up the city and who ruled it from the darkness.

The lowly groups and individuals were going untouched, these vampire citizens of the city being forsaken as some sort of demon assassin was shattering the great vampire lords. There were numerous rationales to support what was doing it – a hater of vampires, someone betrayed by them, or a blundering sorcerer who had conjured a Wyrm demon that had got lose and which now wreaked such havoc. Or perhaps it was a renegade follower of Gaia, a shaman taking the fight to the darkest of enemies. Also there was the possibility of a dark lupine or tribe of such aberrations allied to the Wyrm, seeking to overthrow the vampire kind and take the city as their own.

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Until she knew what was going on she would continue to exorcise her choler through murder, though it was not really a crime to give the breed the death they had cheated for so long. The shells she faced had died many years ago when first fed the blood of their sires, and to slay a walking corpse who flaunted the laws of nature to extend its cancerous existence was no felony, it was richly exacted justice.

The shadows began to seethe with movement, the occupants keeping out of sight, the vaguest minutiae being enough to warn her of their presence.

Subduing a smile of glee she tensed her body, regulating her breathing as she anticipated the rigors and joys of close quarter combat.

With a hiss of displaced air the enemy emerged and charged, seeking to catch her by surprise with an attack to the rear, sweeping in from behind, fangs bared, weapons drawn and readied to kill.

Keeping exact track of their whereabouts through sound alone, at the last moment she whirled, unleashing the unstoppable raw power of her full form. Her flesh rippled and rode out, unfolding its secret stores of muscles and skin, making the seams of her clothing shriek as it was pushed beyond tolerance to explode into rags and sundered strips. Bones bucked and solidified into struts as dense as hardened steel. Razor-edged claws ripped free of her fingertips as flesh-rending fangs sprung from an elongating snout. A deep crimson glow lit up from within her eyes, the wells of light flashing with rancour.

The leading vampire was wrenched aside as her talons ripped into his throat, tearing open the meat and gouging open the entire area. After a brief moment of flight 78

through the air he struck the street, bounced, and rolled into the gutter, clawing at the massive crater as a deluge of blood drooled through his fingers, the white glistening bone of his vertebrae clearly visible.

The two behind him did not waver in their fanatic assault. Their ragged attire gave the rough appearance of vagrants, a disguise to let them move and feed unopposed and unnoticed amongst this most uncared for social caste. Their resources were frugal, and thus could not gather a decent arsenal of silver weapons, therefore knives were their armaments, the weapons crafted from the metal so inherently caustic to her body.

They looked ferocious with wicked incisors and snarling faces, but she could see fear in their eyes. Their ranks were under attack, and they perhaps thought her to be the assassin that had felled so many noble houses.

Were these really a lowly group, or were they lofty vampire elite, in hiding, trying to evade the fate so many of their fellows had already been given by this anonymous arch-nemesis of the undead?

A vicious stab lanced at her ribs from the left. A deft weave had the gleaming tip dancing through nought but air. Clapping a fist to the outstretched wrist she locked the other to his throat and ripped him into the air and into an overhead arc that smashed him face first into the ground. His body jolted with a violent throe as he crumbled, the violent signal of his features into the hard rock eclipsing the growl of the second opponent as he slashed at her in a wide arc.

‘I’ll drain your carcass dry, wolf bitch!’ he roared.

Dropping into a crouch she let the thin knife speed overhead, caught upon its own momentum to sail far past its target.

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‘You want blood? Try your own!’ she hissed, and a truculent upward kick from her retained position drove her heel into his ribs, the ferocity casting him up and into the air as the bones parted with a moist pop, her clawed toes marking his chest with deep scratches.

The vampire touched down and sought to recover his balance with a few staggered steps backward, fighting off the pain as his ancient flesh started to heal the trauma.

‘Bitch whore,’ he rasped with venom, a punctured lung bringing thick lines of meagre red drool over his lips.

With the immediate threat negated for a brief moment, Corin raised an elbow and dropped back into a retreating roll, smashing the poised joint to the neck of the fallen undead, shattering the discs and wringing a violent paroxysm from the stirring creature, vastly delaying his rise to regenerated normality.

The tumble brought her to her feet on the opposite side of the felled beast. The other vampire was still recovering his balance, so she opted to end the beast at her clawed feet. An underhand thrust slipped her talons into the soft viscera of his belly before sliding upward upon a savage slash, eviscerating the carcass.

Immediately, it started to putrefy at an incredible rate as its undead life faded.

The second vampire charged with an ascending growl of fury upon seeing the wash of glistening offal pour free of the opened abdomen, the entrails slipping around the feet of the lupine.

Behind this creature she could spy the first attacker rising to his feet, the torn hole of his throat already congealed and starting to heal, his animated frame able to function fully even with this horrendous damage to a vital area.

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Focusing upon the two creatures she almost failed to hear the twin hums of spinning blades as they cavorted through the air. Instinct kicked in as soon as her ears detected it, flicking her aside and turning the lethal assault into a nick from one pointed ear. The arctic pang from the silver made her wince and she turned her attention back to the fray.

Two dull thumps sounded a second after she had dodged, the silver tipped shuriken having sunk into the chest of the vampire before her. The creature choked, blood slipping over his lips as he started to pull the barbed teeth of the star from his ribs.

‘Charltos, you fucking idiot!’ he cursed, scowling as the metal fangs tore at his flesh, the process of removing the deeply embedded weapons little more than picking a splinter from his flesh.

Corin ran forward into their midst, to make their comrade pause lest he hit his fellows again.

‘A feeble attempt, night soil, and it’ll cost you!’ she growled, and as the vampire stabbed at her again she swatted her forearm to his wrist, knocking the stab aside before her other arm jolted forward with a pile-driving punch. With clawed fingers leading the way she gouged through his torso, the talons erupting from his back amidst a plume of crimson.

An almost unheard whisper of motion arose behind her and she whirled to exchange places with the cavorting body. Another shuriken thudded into the skull of the vampire, and Corin wrenched her limb free and ran for the other creature.

The beast lost all willingness to fight and ran, having already been grievously wounded by the battle. Corin sprung, her powerful muscles kicking into the road and 81

sending her high through the air.

Lost to a killing frenzy her claws raked down his back, shattering ribs and causing him to arch with a shriek, throwing his neck into her poised jaws. Snapping them shut and twisting, the sound of rending flesh poured out, and his cry became a gurgling high-pitched mewl before being abruptly cut off.

The headless cadaver ran on a few steps and collapsed, his head bouncing into the gutter, depositing a trail of red to mark its route.

Another hiss of motion came and Corin whirled, her hand slapping out, catching the side of the twirling death star and altering its trajectory in mid-flight. The star struck a wall and spat sparks from the bricks with a bright chime before bouncing across the pavement.

Corin dropped a claw behind her, pulling a dagger from a scabbard, her belt and tools for murder designed to accommodate her full form, allowing her to remain armed for her crusade of genocide. Peering into the night she saw the sniper hanging in a second-storey window.

‘Fool undead!’ she muttered irritably as the creature fumbled for another star. ‘If you’re going to throw a weapon, throw it right!’

Potent muscles, enhanced and fuelled by the power of the earth instantly flashed with inhuman force. The dagger moved at a speed beyond mortal vision, the sound of is passage reaching out only once it had already reached its target. The slender stiletto bored through skin, muscle and bone, sheathing deep, the point puncturing the beast’s heart. Only the wide cross-guard stopped the weapon drilling all the way through and escaping from the other side, but the imbued velocity tore the beast from its feet and sent it hurtling back through the air.

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Smashed violently into the opposite wall its body crashed through the plaster and timbers, dropping through and onto the stairs beyond.

It bounced down, arms and legs flailing, its body starting to crumble. With its heart pierced, the creature joined the other vampires in true demise, and their decay was swift and merciless.

The head in the gutter, the decapitated body, the transfixed corpse, all started to wither and crack, the stolen years finally taking their revenge and pouring back in. In moments the bodies were restored to their true age, the onslaught of decades turning them to desiccated shells, and as these years became centuries, their blackened skeletons began to shatter and crumble into dust.

The sniper started her fall as a woman, was a mummified ruin a third of the way down, and amidst dust clouds of dry flakes of flesh, she crumbled to a skeleton near the base. When she struck the landing her form burst out into a pool of fine motes, a few bone shards fossilised within.

Corin stood alone in the street as the stink of fetid particles curled around her, the remains of her opponents drifting away on the wind. Again she had failed to find answers, her impetuous wrath having cost her possible informants. But she was warrior by nature; she killed, she hunted, she fought. Subterfuge and strategy were for these foul beasts, and until she found Thanos she would be glad to simply hack their numbers to final depletion.