One With the Night (3 page)

“Don’t take that mocking tone with me, young lady,” he said severely.

She willed herself to silence, thinking about the horrible things she had discovered about herself ever since she had been infected. It wasn’t only the blood. There were the … urges in her body that were almost uncontrollable, and the fact that sunlight burned her. She lived in dread of discovering some new effect.

Still, vampires could be civil.
At least I hope so,
she thought.

CHAPTER
Two

Urquhart Valley, Scotland, April 1821

Callan Kilkenny tied Faust to a tree in the copse behind the farmhouse. The smell of fir mingled with the rot of cones beneath his feet. There were lights on in the house, a large stone affair made of the local slate, and also in one of the outbuildings, the largest except for the barn. The horse snorted and blew, restless. Callan stroked his shoulder. That wasn’t like Faust.

This was Muir Farm, all right. He hadn’t even had to use compulsion on the woman outside the village. She was so frightened by her unconscious sense of his vibrations, she told him where the doctor and his daughter lived straightaway, just to get rid of him. Highlanders had no use for the English and they regarded Lowlanders like him as English once removed, so this woman had felt no compunction in passing the object of her fears along to an English visitor.

He’d been on the road for nearly three weeks, hunting down the author of an article on human vampirism. Dr. James Blundell thought there was a cure, and the article was meant to solicit help from fellow doctors and scientists to find it. It was the hope that the good doctor had discovered what he sought that had driven Callan on. If he could get rid of the thing in his blood, he might get back to who he’d been before
she
had made him a monster. And if he couldn’t … if she had destroyed his soul as well as made him vampire … well, at least if he was human, suicide would be possible. He steeled himself and blocked out memories of that time in the desert, as he did countless times each day, sometimes with more success than others. The doctor and his daughter had been forced out of first London and then Edinburgh by horror at his experiments with blood and his theories that human monsters did exist. But Callan had found them, here outside the tiny village by the shores of Loch Ness. He only hoped Blundell had found the cure.

A woman’s figure moved about in the room at the back of the house. The outbuilding had a tangle of what looked like poles and flasks silhouetted against the light. A laboratory, surely.

Wait. What was that faint smell? Cinnamon and ambergris. He stepped into the concealing branches of the fir tree, and peered around. There was another vampire here.

Callan spotted him moving around the barn to the outbuilding with the laboratory. He was a blacker splash of darkness on the night, a big man, carrying a heavy cudgel. Callan wasn’t the only one who had read Blundell’s article.

Still, he did not greet the newcomer. Callan’s vibrations, that energy about him even humans could sense, were slow. That branded him as young, and made by infection with a vampire’s blood, not born to his nature. And born vampires killed those who were made on sight, without asking for character references. Was this vampire born? The vibrations he felt were confusing. One moment he thought they were slow and new, the next they seemed old and powerful, operating just at the edge of his senses. He must be too far away.

The vampire made his way around the outbuilding to the door. He didn’t appear to be making any effort to conceal his presence. Callan didn’t care if he wasn’t first in line for the cure, as long as there
was
a cure. He’d wait to see how the old doctor greeted a potential patient.

The vampire kicked in the door to the laboratory, growling. Callan stiffened in shock. He felt the power in the air ramp up to impossible heights. The old man in the laboratory shouted something unintelligible.

“You have no right to meddle!” The vampire’s voice boomed in a vaguely Eastern European accent. He began swinging his cudgel. The crash of breaking glass shattered the night.

Callan burst from the copse at a run. The creature was mad! He crossed the short meadow in long strides. He didn’t know he could run that fast. The vampire was advancing on the old man. Callan pressed himself for more speed. The girl came out of the house from a back door at a run. He crunched across gravel spread in a path to the house and lunged through the door to the laboratory just as the vampire raised his cudgel to brain the old man.

*   *   *

Jane saw the big man tear across the yard toward the creamery, arms pumping. Was he going to join the attack on her father? She was strong these days, but she had never known how to fight. Was she a match for two men? She ran toward the laboratory. She’d soon find out.

But the tall man was ahead of her. He pulled the attacker’s shoulder round. Jane stopped in the doorway, panting. Her father shrank back against his workbench, now covered with broken glass. The creature who had been attacking the laboratory and her father had black hair and black eyes. His features were craggy, his expression callous and jaded. The air was filled with the scent of cinnamon and something sweet she didn’t recognize.

“What are ye doing, man?” the one who accosted the attacker cried, stepping back. “Dinnae ye know he’s workin’ on a cure?”

“And why would those born to the blood want a cure?” The man’s voice reverberated with power. The air was electric with it. He was a vampire just as she was. A thrill of fear made her gasp. Did the man trying to stop him not know that?

“Sa ye dinnae ha’ ta kill th’ ones ye made,” the newcomer said.

“Some don’t find that killing onerous.” A smile that turned Jane’s stomach lurked in the attacker’s eyes.

The newcomer tried again. “Even those born get tired of livin’. A cure would be a blessing.”

“Fool!” The creature’s eyes went hard. All Jane could see of the man who was trying to stop this attack was a broad back clad in a black caped cloak and black, curling hair. “You’re new,” the vampire said. What did he mean? “So I shall get the pleasure of killing one who was made while I destroy this cure.” He took a step toward the newcomer and … and his eyes glowed red. There was no other word for it. They gleamed a clear, true red that deepened into burgundy. Jane had never seen anything so chilling. The air vibrated with power. The newcomer didn’t seem to be frightened though. He stepped in to grapple with the creature. He was going to fight a vampire to protect her father? Didn’t he know how strong they were? Behind them, her father approached the two.

“Get back, Papa!” she screamed.

The newcomer glanced behind to her, startled.

His eyes were red too.

*   *   *

Damn! The creature’s power drenched Callan. He was no match for this one. The pistols in his pockets were useless. Was he strong enough to decapitate one so much older than he? But that was almost the only way to kill one of his kind.
Companion!
he called to the thing in his blood. His power ramped up and the room was veiled with red. He threw himself at his adversary. If he could get a grip …

Behind him, the girl screamed to her father. He glanced back. She stared at him in horror. Then she set her mouth decisively and ran for the house. The vampire beat at Callan with his cudgel, a fierce grin on his face. Callan stepped back, trying to draw the creature away from the old doctor. Broken glass crunched under his boots. Metal scaffolding hung at crazy angles everywhere. He shrugged off his cloak. The vampire had backed him up enough so the brute could draw a light sword. That was bad. Well, if bullets wouldn’t kill the man, they might weaken him. Callan pulled out both pistols and got off one shot from each at point-blank range. The creature jerked with the impacts. Blood blossomed in twin flowers on his waistcoat. But he only growled and lunged forward.

Companion,
Callan thought,
more power!
The vampire hefted his sword. Callan put up his forearms to protect his neck. They wouldn’t be enough. The vampire cut down ruthlessly with his sword. Callan twisted. Pain shot through his shoulder. He lunged for a piece of dangling metal pipe and wrenched it down. He felt the sword slice into his back and side. Somehow he got the metal up to keep the sword away from his neck. Sparks flew as the blade hit metal.

With a roar of frustration, the vampire began hacking at Callan’s body.

Behind him he heard the girl screaming again. The old man had fallen to his knees. A burner tipped and spilled its tiny flame onto the floor. The vampire was cutting at Callan’s hips and thighs, trying to make him protect them and leave his neck exposed. He was losing blood fast now, though the pain had dimmed. What chance was there to kill the creature when he could hardly defend himself?

“Sword! Sword!” That was what the girl was yelling.

Of course the creature had a sword. The damn thing was making the floor slippery with Callan’s blood. Wait! He chanced a glance backward. The girl clutched the hilt of a huge claymore. The weapon was longer than she was tall. The vampire’s blade cut into his shoulder dangerously close to his neck. He threw himself backward, leaving himself vulnerable as he fell to his knees. She tossed the claymore to him. How could she toss such a heavy sword? He caught it. The hilt felt good and solid in his hand.

The vampire descended with a roar, knowing Callan’s odds had just improved.

He swung upward between the vampire’s legs and felt the blade cleave bone. The vampire shrieked in pain, giving Callan the moment he needed to scramble to his feet. He swung the weapon up.
Keep it moving,
he admonished himself,
for however long you can
. The vampire blocked his blow with the lighter sword. Callan tried to break the other’s blade, but it was flexible. Behind the vampire, Callan saw the old man scuttle around the large table that held his equipment, trying to escape the flame that licked through the broken glass.

The vampire backed toward the flame. Callan swung the giant sword. Only the strongest humans could wield the claymore, but it would be nothing for Callan in normal circumstances. Now, however, he was wading in his own blood. The thing was getting heavy. He swung it again, and again the vampire parried the blow. The only sound was the clang of steel, the grunts of effort, and the crackle of flame. The end was coming soon, one way or another.

Then he had nothing to lose. Callan gritted his teeth and dropped his sword point. He put his head down and simply drove at his adversary. The vampire cut at Callan’s back and buttocks as he stumbled backward. Callan pushed his head into the creature’s midsection.

And then it happened. The vampire stumbled and fell backward. Callan straightened. He stomped on the man’s wrist, locking his sword hand to the floor. Straddling him, Callan raised the claymore high above his left shoulder. He could see the vampire accept what would happen even as he struggled to free his wrist. His arms trembling, Callan brought the sword down.

He stepped back, chest heaving, and kicked away the severed head. Unless it was separated, the vampire might still heal. Life in his adversary drained away, protesting. The room seemed to echo with shock. Callan’s gorge rose. The thing in his blood shuddered in revulsion too at the death in the air.

Coming to himself, Callan looked around. Flames were spreading through the laboratory. The creature would accomplish his goal even in death unless Callan moved quickly. He stripped off his coat.

Behind him, the old man yelled, “Careful, my dear!”

Callan turned. The girl had a bucket sloshing in each hand. She darted across the broken glass and the blood, purposely not looking at the vampire’s corpse. “Stand aside!” She tossed first one bucket and then the other into the flames. Callan swung his coat at a flame racing along the floor. The girl whirled with her buckets and dashed out the door. Fire licked at the heavy curtains, made out of some kind of sacking. Callan pulled them down and smothered the fire at their base. He used the smoldering fabric on other patches of flame. The girl came running back with two more buckets of water and sloshed them across the floor. Her father looked on helplessly as Callan stomped on several last flickers.

The fire was out. Callan looked around. The laboratory was a shambles of broken glass and twisted metal. Oily concoctions in vibrant hues swirled in the sooty water on the floor. The place reeked of smoke and blood, alcohol and pungent herbs, all combining in noxious fumes that made him cough in protest. Had the vampire succeeded in destroying the cure after all?

He turned to the girl. Her own eyes were big and frightened. He noted somewhere at a distance from himself that she was quite beautiful in an English sort of way; eyes so dark blue they looked violet, light hair a thousand colors of blonde, fair, fine skin now pinkened with her exertion. But all that paled as the slow vibrations washed over him. Even through the other odors he could detect her distinctive personal version of cinnamon and ambergris. It had been her vibrations that had confused him in the copse. The girl was vampire.

*   *   *

Jane looked up at the creature who had just defended her father and his laboratory. He might be as bad as the one who had attacked them, but she had realized immediately that she and her father had few choices. Monster or not, they must cast their lot with him. He at least wanted the laboratory and her father saved. That’s why she had run for a weapon. Now she wondered what she had done. The air was filled with the scent of cinnamon and that something else she couldn’t quite describe. His eyes weren’t red anymore. They were some light color between green and gray. But she couldn’t forget the red glow that was absolutely not human or the incredible strength he had displayed. And … there was something more
alive
about him than any other man she had known, in spite of the fact that he was covered in his own blood.

Indeed, he stood in shirtsleeves and waistcoat soaked in blood, his wild, dark hair matted with it. His expression was desperate just now. Then she saw him recognize her for what she was. His eyes became watchful. He might see her as a rival for the cure. She swallowed. She was no match for him, even injured as he was. So she held out her hand.