Chapter Twenty
"Home again, home again, jiggety-jig," Sonja muttered as she stepped from the secret passage into the suite of rooms Fell had once called home.
"I never knew this corridor existed. I don't think Morgan or the renfields did, either," Fell marveled.
"I suspect it was left over from when the carpenters were working on the house. It's only natural for a place like this to have secret passages. The building's probably lousy with them."
Fell picked up a paperback from its resting place on the table next to Anise's old easy chair. He fanned the pages and put it back down.
"It's hard for me to believe that she's really gone. I can still smell her . . "
"Fell, don't."
"Don't what?"
"Torture yourself."
He didn't seem to hear her. Leaning his forearms against the mantelpiece, he studied the room's reflection in the mirror that hung over the fireplace, as if trying to catch a glimpse of the past in its depths.
"Do you know what the last thing she said to me was?" he asked, nodding at the room in the looking glass. "She told me this was a cage. A prison. She was right, of course. I can see the bars now. But for a short while, this was the happiest place on earth. I..." He shook his head, refusing to look his companion in the face. "Damn you, Sonja! Why did you have to come into our lives? Why did you force this knowledge on us?"
"I wish I could say I did it because truth is freedom, and living in ignorance is the same as living in slavery. But that would be a lie. I did it because I wanted to ruin Morgan's plans. I wanted to hurt him where he'd feel it. And I wanted you for myself."
Fell frowned. "Me?"
"And Anise. And the baby. I - I've been alone for a long, long time. I was hungry for the company of my own kind. Sometimes loneliness makes you do things that are selfish. Forgive me."
"What's there to forgive? Besides, even if your reasons weren't altruistic, what you said about ignorance and slavery is still the truth."
"I hate to bring this up, but we can't waste any more time talking about our feelings. I know coming back here is painful for you, but we've got to dispatch Morgan as soon as possible. He's here, somewhere in the house. I can feel him."
"I can feel him, too." Fell's mouth pulled into a grimace. "I'm gonna fix that bastard but good."
Sonja placed a firm hand on his shoulder. "Kid, it's good that you hate Morgan. But be careful with your anger. Don't let it get out of control. Vampires feed on powerful emotions like hate and rage. It makes them stronger. Remember what happened at the bar? You've got to shield yourself from Morgan. I can't do it for you. It will be your will against his. You have to be strong, Fell. As strong as Morgan - if not stronger."
"I know. I may be inexperienced, but I'm not stupid."
She was here. He sensed her presence in the house the way a spider monitors the strands of its web. How could he have slept, unaware, when first she walked these halls? How could he have been insensate to anything so exquisitely lethal?
At first he'd refused to believe she could be one of his by-blows. But now he knew it to be true. His hand had sown this dragon's tooth. In a perverse way, he was proud of her. Even from a distance there was no mistaking her potential strength. She was a thing of fatal beauty, to be feared and admired, like an unsheathed samurai sword. To know that he had played a role in creating such a fearsome and deadly creature was flattering. Such a pity she must be destroyed.
The breeder, Fell, was with her, his presence nearly overshadowed by the female's. Interesting. There seemed to be something added to the youth's psychic echo - a trace of will, similar to that in the rogue. But it was only a hint, nothing more. Most interesting. If the breeders and their gets harbored potential similar to the rogue's, then Howell's sabotage had, in the end, been in Morgan's favor. What was the advantage to siring a new race of vampires, only to have them destroy him along with his enemies?
Morgan rose from the ornately carved rosewood chair in his study and opened the antique chifforobe with the blacked-out mirror. If this was to be a formal confrontation, the least he could do was dress for the occasion.
"Who are you? I don't recognize you as being one of Morgan's lickspittle servitors. Answer me! I didn't hit you with the golf club that hard!"
Palmer opened his right eye. He tried to open the left, but it was swollen shut. His left cheek rested on rough wooden floorboards. He moaned as he struggled to sit up.
"Wh - where?"
"Never mind where you are! Who are you?" A wan, balding man dressed in a grimy lab technician's coat, a stethoscope looped around his neck like a pet boa constrictor, thrust his unsmiling face into Palmer's field of vision. The stranger's forehead bulged slightly, as if his forebrain was slightly too large for his skull. His eyes, amplified by coke-bottle glasses, regarded Palmer with a detached, insectile interest. There was something familiar about the stranger Palmer could not quite place.
"I'm not one of Morgan's renfields, if that's what you're thinking."
The moon-faced stranger grunted in distaste and swiftly shoved his hand inside Palmer's trench coat, removing his wallet and scanning the identification inside. His eyebrows lifted slightly at the sight of Palmer's private investigator's license.
"Hey! Whattaya think you're doing?" Palmer reached for his gun, only to find the holster empty.
"Looking for this?" The stranger extracted Palmer's Luger from one of the oversized pockets of his lab coat. "I might not be a private detective, Mr. William Calumet Palmer, but I know enough to disarm a potential enemy." He snorted and tossed the wallet into Palmer's lap.
"I'd rather you not mention the 'Calumet' part, whoever you are," Palmer sighed, cradling his bleeding head. He peered up at the smirking man leaning against the metal table littered with glass beakers and Bunsen burners. "I told you who I am, now who the fuck are you? And why did you smack me in the head with a golf club?"
"I am Dr. Howell, late of his diabolical majesty Lord Morgan's service." He bowed at the waist with the heel-clicking propriety of a Prussian nobleman. "Forgive me for introducing myself in such a fashion, but I had no way of knowing you weren't one of Morgan's minions."
Suddenly Palmer realized where he'd seen Howell's face before. "I saw you looking out of one of the windows the other day while I was surveying the house!"
"Interesting. And not impossible. But why are you here, Mr. Palmer? This is hardly a place for sightseeing."
"I'm trying to find someone."
"Indeed. Who might that be?"
"A friend. A woman."
Howell's smile widened as his eyes narrowed. "The same woman who entered the house earlier? Don't look so surprised - there's little that goes on in Ghost Trap I don't know about. So, you are a renfield!"
"Stop calling me that!" Palmer snapped. "I'm my own man, damn it! Unlike some!" He groaned as he got to his feet. Howell watched him cautiously but did not threaten him with the gun. "Now, will you help me or - Jesus Christ!"
Resting next to Howell's elbow was a ten-gallon jar full of a clear liquid, in which was suspended the monster-fetus Palmer had seen Anise give birth to - and kill - earlier that same evening, its umbilical cord attached to a pulpy yolk sac. The sight of the little bastard made Palmer's leg ache.
"Ah! You've noticed my friend, have you? How do you like him, hmmm?" Howell leaned forward, eyeing the monstrosity in the glass jar with something resembling affection. "He was the prototype for a parasite I succeeded in sneaking into sweet Anise's unhallowed womb." He removed a syringe from one of his pockets and tapped the side of the jar with it. To Palmer's amazement, the fetus opened its eyes, revealing the cold, needful stare of an insect.
The sight of Howell's face, distorted by the glass and the synthetic amniotic fluids that sustained it, caused the fetus to pucker and extend its hideous tube-like mouth. Howell chuckled indulgently. "How cute! It thinks it's feeding time!"
"You're responsible for that... that thing Anise gave birth to?"
Howell gave Palmer a sharp glance. "You saw it?"
"We met." Palmer grimaced, rubbing his wounded calf.
"Hideous as it may be, it was my attempt to make amends for betraying my race. I bioengineered the creature from the breeders' own sperm and ovum, so there would be little chance of rejection, then implanted it in Anise during a prenatal exam. I performed the operation under Morgan's very nose!" Howell's face twisted into a rueful grimace. "He may be wise in the ways of the supernatural world, but when it comes to science and the technologies, he's no more than a potato-munching peasant, fearful of the shaman's magic!
"The parasite was supposed to devour the original and take its place. However, at my last prenatal checkup, there were still two heartbeats. If necessary, I was prepared to take care of the little Antichrist myself during its delivery." He leaned forward, eyeing Palmer intently. "You were there, weren't you? At the birth? The child is dead, is it not?"
"Yes. It's dead," Palmer lied.
Howell smiled grimly. "Good! Good! Should the breeders' child have thrived, mankind's future would have been seriously endangered!"
"How so?"
"The breeders can only reproduce with others of their kind, which are - mercifully - rare. But their child would have the ability to mate with normal humans and still breed true. Morgan - the preening fool - had no idea of what he was unleashing!"
"And your changeling was an improvement?"
Howell shrugged. "The creatures are designed in such a way that they have no means of eliminating wastes, once severed from the umbilical cord. The pathetic little monsters are destined to die of uremia within a day or so of their birth."
Palmer shook his head in an attempt to clear the ringing from it. He groaned as his vision swam.
Howell clucked his tongue in disapproval. "I wouldn't bother trying to get a better grip on your senses if I were you. It won't do you any good. This room - my 'secret laboratory' if you will - is located in Ghost Trap's attic, at an intersection of several architectural impossibilities. The barriers separating the space-time continuum are very thin here, weighting the probability factors for my experiments in my favor. Morgan and his loathsome renfields shun this place. I like it. It helps me think. Here I'm free to plot my vengeance against Morgan."
"Vengeance?"
Howell smiled a junkie's smile. "I mean to see the bastard stew in his own juices! I want to see him broken like Dresden china in a trash dump! I want to see the look on his face when he realizes his dreams of godhood have been ground to paste! Just as he destroyed my hopes and dreams so many years ago. The monster sorely misjudged me, and now he's paying for it. He and his loathsome little skull-peepers find my thoughts opaque. I confuse them by thinking in terms of formulae. And thanks to the interference generated by certain... inhibiting factors in my bloodstream, my thought processes are hard to decipher. Surrounded by a nest of telepaths, I've kept my thoughts to myself for over five years!"
"But you're working for this guy, aren't you? You helped him create Anise and Fell."
Howell frowned. "I am Dr. Brainard Howell. Does the name mean anything to you?"
"Uh, well, I..."
"Well, does it?"
"No"
"And why should it?! For years I've been under Morgan's thrall, locked away from my fellow scientists. Unable to communicate my discoveries. Kept incommunicado while slaving to find a way to restructure human DNA into that of a vampire's without the use of actual venom. In the time I've succeeded in stealing for myself, I've worked miracles! "
He pointed to a shelf lined with glass jars similar to the one that housed the changeling. Palmer could dimly make out the forms of a tiny triceratops, tyrannosaur and stegosaur curled inside the jars like chicken embryos.
"And there is no one to see! No one to nominate me for a Nobel prize! No one to make sure my name goes down in the history books along with Pasteur! Einstein! Salk!"
"You left out Frankenstein, Mengele and Benway."
Howell jabbed a finger at him. "Don't get smart, Palmer! I could stick you with a hypo full of miracle juice that would make your amino acids square dance. 'Swing your partner! Do-si-do! He's got three eyes and no more nose!' How'd you like that, Mr. 'I'm My Own Man'?!" The scientist's pupils contracted into pinpricks.
"Calm down, Doc! I didn't mean anything by it! Honest!" Palmer lifted his hands in deference. "But if you hate Morgan so much, how come you're working for him?"
"Human weakness - something creatures of Morgan's ilk are adept at exploiting. I was working at a minor research facility in Colorado when I first made Morgan's acquaintance. I had acquired a fondness for certain... chemicals... during my post-graduate studies. I found that heroin and other opiates helped to stimulate and focus my thought processes. They enhanced my powers of concentration, much like Sherlock Holmes and his infamous seven percent solution. Genius, Mr. Palmer, has its price.
"Somehow, Morgan learned of my foible. He came to me and threatened to expose my secret vice to my superiors if I didn't agree to work for him. I still had no idea of who - or what - he truly was. Even though he'd essentially blackmailed me into his employ, I did not find much to dislike about my situation. I was paid three times my previous salary and given access to the most technologically advanced - and expensive - equipment available in the field. Plus, my new employer provided a steady supply of narcotics for my personal use. What was there not to like?
"It wasn't until I was relocated to this place that I learned what he really was! That was five years ago. I have been a virtual prisoner in this house ever since. During that time I have been an unwilling participant in his plan to create a race of living vampires. It took five hundred experimental subjects before I perfected the serum used on the test group that produced Anise and Fell. Five hundred. Even then, the mortality rate was still eighty percent."
"You sound real calm about that."
"Do I?" Howell sighed, rolling up the sleeve of his coat, exposing a pale, surprisingly hairy arm. The inside of his left elbow looked like a pincushion. He took a small plastic bag of white powder from his breast pocket and mixed it with distilled water into a beaker suspended over a flickering Bunsen burner. "Appearances can be deceiving, Mr. Palmer," he murmured, wrapping a length of rubber tubing above his elbow. "Very deceiving."
Sonja scanned the downstairs, finding no traces of renfield activity. Not that she expected any. For some reason, Morgan had effectively slaughtered his few remaining servants by commanding them into the outer house. That still left the Asian she'd seen back at the Shadow Box, the one Fell claimed was Morgan's heavy gun. High-caliber renfields weren't exactly easy to come by, and Morgan sure as hell wouldn't waste one by marching it into a meat grinder like the Ghost Trap.
Fell drifted after her, gazing in fascination at the sections of the house he'd never been permitted to enter. Besides the three rooms that had served as Anise and Fell's suite, the downstairs consisted of a retrofitted country kitchen, several large, disused parlors full of dusty Victorian love seats and moth-eaten mounted fox heads and what had once been a conservatory before the panes had been bricked in.
They paused at the foot of the staircase that led to the second and third floors, Sonja leaning on the banister. "What's upstairs?"
"Dr. Howell's laboratory and Morgan's library study. I'm not sure what else. The renfields' quarters are on the third floor. I - " He frowned and fell silent, as if listening to distant music. "Did you hear that?"
"What?"
"Someone called my name. It sounded like - There it goes again!"
Sonja scowled. "Kid, I don't hear a damned thing."
Fell trembled like a foal trying out its legs for the first time. "Oh my God, it's her! It's Anise!"
Sonja grabbed Fell's elbow, shaking him in time to her words. "Fell! Listen me to me! It's a trick! Anise is dead! This is Morgan's doing!"
Fell's face twisted into a grimace as he jerked his arm free of her grip. "How do you know she's dead? Were you there? Did you see her die?"
"No, but - "
"Then how can you be so sure she's dead?" He peered into the darkness at the top of the stairs. "Anise? Is that you, darling?" He smiled and turned to his companion, pointing toward the second-story landing. "You heard her that time, didn't you? She's alive, Sonja! Alive!" He began sprinting up the stairs three at a time.
"Fell, no! Don't!" Sonja grabbed his wrist, trying her best to hold him back without resorting to force. "It's not Anise! It can't be!"
Fell spun about, his fangs bared and eyes glinting red, and punched her squarely on the jaw. Sonja hadn't been expecting it and there was nothing to do but roll with the blow. She counted ten risers before the back of her head made contact with the flagstones at the foot of the stairs, then things went black.
"Anise? Anise, where are you, sweetheart?"
I'm upstairs, dearest. Waiting for you.
"Are you all right? Sonja said you were dead. So did Morgan."
I'm fine, sweet one. I've missed you so! I'm sorry about all those nasty things I said the last time we were together! I just wasn't myself. That evil woman filled my head with all kinds of horrid nonsense. I was such a naughty girl to believe her!
"Where are you, darling?" Fell stood at the top of the second-floor stairs, trying to catch a glimpse of her.
In the library, silly. Where else?
As he heard the words inside his head, the door to Morgan's study swung open.
"But what about Morgan?"
He's gone, Fell. Gone for good. We'll never have to worry about him again.
Fell didn't bother to question his luck. It was enough that his lover had returned to him and his enemy had fled. He hurried into the darkened library.
"Anise?"
She was standing in front of the marble mantelpiece that adorned the library's huge fireplace, watching him with a coy, teasing smile on her lips. Her figure had returned to the trim proportions it had possessed before the pregnancy. She was beautiful and sexy and, best of all, she was alive. Anise held out her arms to him and Fell threw himself into her embrace.
"Anise! Oh thank God, it wasn't true! You're alive! You're alive!"
"Fell, you're squeezing me."
He stepped back to feast his eyes on her precious face, only to see Wretched Fly, the right half of his head swaddled in fresh bandages, returning his gaze. Fell backed away from the renfield, shaking his head in denial.
"No! She's alive! I heard her.' I heard her call my name!"
"You heard what you wanted to hear, my dear boy. You are still human in that regard!"
Fell stared at the figure dressed in immaculate eveningwear seated behind the massive marble top desk. Morgan leaned forward and rested his chin on his steepled fingers, smiling affably at his erstwhile patient.
"Ah, the prodigal son returns!"
"Fuck you, Morgan!"
The vampire lifted an elegantly arched eyebrow. "It seems you've been exposed to the same corrosive influence as your poor sister. One night away from home and you're already falling in with a bad crowd."
Fell's anger was quickly eating away at his caution. "You used me, Morgan! Or is it Caron? I came to you for help and you fuckin' used me as a guinea pig!" He jabbed an accusatory finger at Morgan. "You looked inside me and took out things that had no right being outside my head and twisted them around so I'd be happy playing out your Dracula über alles ego trip!"
Morgan tilted back in his chair, studying Fell with a detached interest Fell recognized from Tim Sorrell's therapy sessions. Sonja had warned him about going up alone against the vampire lord, but who was this leech that he should be afraid of him?
Fell's hate swelled inside him like a storm, invigorating as an amphetamine cocktail with a speedball chaser. He felt like he could kick Morgan's butt to the moon and back. He was immortal and invulnerable, a child of the night to be feared by all that dared cross his path.
Fell planted his palms on Morgan's desk top and leaned forward, thrusting out his lower jaw in defiance. "You fucked with me! And worse, you fucked with someone I loved, asshole! I mean to get satisfaction. I'm going to flay you alive and grill your nuts on a hibachi!"
"Indeed." The vampire smiled. "Then why don't you take your best shot?" Morgan stood and stepped out from behind the desk in one smooth, seamless motion, his arms held away from his sides. "Go ahead. Be my guest."
Fell snatched up an obsidian letter opener from the desk's blotter and moved forward, ready to plunge the knife into one of the vampire's eyes. As he lifted the blade, his eyes met Morgan's and the room began to spin around as if it had suddenly been transformed into a centrifuge. He cried out in pain as an unseen hand forced his fingers back from the letter opener's hilt. The obsidian knife dropped to the carpet at Fell's feet.
Morgan watched his protege's agony with undisguised amusement. "What's the matter, Fell? Got a cramp?"
Fell growled and looked away from Morgan's taunting smirk.
"Look at me when I speak to you, boy!" the vampire lord snapped.
Fell continued to glower at the floor.
"I said look at me, boy!" Morgan's words echoed in Fell's skull like thunder.
The youth cried out as invisible fingers yanked at the muscles in his neck, forcing him to meet Morgan's wine-dark gaze.
"Good. Now show me who's boss."
Fell collapsed to the floor, groveling at Morgan's feet like a dog desperate to ingratiate itself. He lay on his back, belly exposed, like a cub submitting to the dominant male in a wolf pack. A thin, nasal whine escaped his constricted throat, increasing in intensity as he pissed himself.
Morgan gazed down at Fell with cold disdain. "Ah, the recklessness of youth!" He knelt beside the writhing young man and caressed Fell's cheek with the ball of his thumb as he spoke. "Ready to snap the leash and bound, unhindered, into the world, as spry and eager as a pup at play! Is that what you want, child? Freedom?"
Fell tried to speak, but all that came from his mouth was a bubble of bloody froth.
You don't have to answer me - I can see it in your eyes. You're still human enough to believe in such garbage, I fear. And it's contaminated you beyond redemption." Morgan shook his head sadly. "What is freedom but a chance to starve to death? To die at the hands of those who fear you? If you went to the zoo and threw open the doors of the tiger's cage, would it leap free of its prison and run wild in the streets, snacking on infants snatched from their perambulators before catching a policeman's bullet between its eyes? Or would it simply yawn and go back to sleep, the concept of freedom - indeed, of life beyond the confines of its cage - completely without meaning?"
Morgan kissed Fell's sweaty brow gently, like a father bidding his young son good night. "You should have stayed in the cage, Fell," he murmured. "You are no longer of use to me. Pity. You showed such promise in therapy."
Morgan picked up the letter opener Fell had dropped, turning it about between his agile fingers. He ran his thumb down the length of the obsidian blade, watching his blood boil forth like brackish water. His thumb sealed itself before the thick, foul-smelling liquid had time to stain the carpet.
"Give me your hand."
The command was quiet, almost gentle. Fell gritted his teeth and tried to keep his right arm from unfolding. Although his muscles groaned like rotten mooring ropes, there was no escaping the vampire lord's will.
Morgan placed the letter opener in Fell's rigid, trembling hand, wrapping the youth's fingers around the hilt.
"You know what to do," whispered Morgan as he stood, his eyes fixed on the boy stretched out at his feet.
Fell ground his teeth together even harder, heedless of the blood filling his mouth as his fangs shredded what was left of his lower lip. He tried to twist his head away from the slowly approaching knifepoint, but it was no use. His body was no longer his to control. He ordered his left hand to claw at his right hand, to try and knock the letter opener from its grasp, but it remained paralyzed. He screamed, but all that escaped his constricted larynx was a tight, doglike whine.
When the point of the blade punctured his right eye like an overripe grape, he managed a short, muffled shout of pain. Then, to his horror, his left hand rose of its own volition and took the obsidian letter opener from his bloodstained right hand. The left hand was faster than the right, piercing his remaining eye within a few seconds.
The darkness was total, the pain beyond anything Fell had ever known in any life. Then he felt the sharp edge of the blade as his left hand began rhythmically sawing away at his neck. He continued trying to scream long after he'd severed his own larynx.
Anise, I failed you. I failed Sonja. I failed Lethe. Forgive me, please. Forgive -
"What is this! There is a child?"
In his agony, Fell had forgotten that Morgan was in his mind as well as his body.
Morgan straddled the dying man's body, slapping the letter opener from Fell's grip. Morgan grabbed Fell by his bloodied shirt front, making sure not to shake him so hard his head would fall off.
"It was a trick, wasn't it? The child didn't die! It's still alive somewhere! Tell me where, breeder! Tell me!"
Fell opened his mouth, but all that came out was a large, black bubble of blood. His head tilted to the right at a sharp angle, the spinal cord nearly severed. He could feel Morgan rooting inside his dying brain, searching for the memories concerning Lethe's whereabouts. Blind and partially paralyzed, it was like being alone in a dark house with a rabid, hungry animal.
"Tell me where it is, breeder, and I'll kill you fast!"
Fell raised his right hand, the fingers closing on his long, blonde hair. He'd fucked up big time, and now he was paying for being a stupid jerk. He'd waltzed into Morgan's trap like the world's biggest fool. He'd gotten a taste of being superhuman and it had made him foolhardy. He was dying, but he'd be doubly damned if he'd betray his own daughter to this monster. But Morgan was stronger, both physically and mentally, and accustomed to getting what he wanted.
"Tell me, breeder!"
Fell wanted to say "fuck you," but since his larynx was severed, the best he could do was grab a fistful of his own hair and give it one good, final yank.
Morgan yowled in rage as Fell's head dropped to the floor, coming to rest on the stained Persian carpet. He let go of the body, kicking it a few times in frustration. The sound of ribs snapping did little to assuage his anger. Wretched Fly watched his master nervously.
"Send the pyrotic after Howell. Unplug its television and tell it there will be no more Gilligan's Island or S.W.A. T. until it brings the good doctor back to me! When I'm through, it can use his corpse for a host."
"Very well, milord. And the rogue?"
"She's mine."
Sonja sat up, rubbing the back of her head. Her fingers came away sticky with blood. She grunted and wiped her hand on her jacket. The kid was stronger than she'd suspected.
She got to her feet, leaning heavily on the banister. Blue-black fireworks bouquets exploded behind her eyelids. Had she been human, the fall she'd taken would have killed her. As it was, she'd suffered an insult to the brain that was far from problematic. But that could wait. She had to find Fell. Make sure he was all right. What did the young fool think he was doing, running off like that?
"Fell!" Her voice sounded weak in her ears, like that of an old woman. "Fell, where are you?"
Her answer came in the form of a footfall at the top of the landing.
"Fell? Kid, are you okay?"
Fell lurched into sight, his tread heavy and unsteady.
Sonja shook her head, as if somehow denying what stood before her would change it.
Fell's clothes were so black with blood they looked like someone had doused him with a five-gallon can of paint at point-blank range. The corpse lifted its stiffening right arm to display Fell's head, dangling by its long, yellow hair. The eyes had been gouged out and the nose sliced off.
Dead fingers spasmed as the body went limp, collapsing on the landing. The head bounced and rolled its way to the foot of the stairs, staring up at Sonja with its ruined sockets.
Sonja's grief was so deep, so painful, it numbed her. Alone again. After so many years of loneliness, she'd finally found others to share her life, her knowledge with, only to have them snatched away from her within the span of a day. It wasn't fair.
From the darkness on the second floor came the sound of laughter.
She knew that laugh. She'd last heard it in London, over twenty years ago.
"I'm coming for you, bastard!" she whispered under her breath, her fingers closing on the folded switchblade in her pocket. "And I'm gonna make you pay!"
She comes. And my hands shake in anticipation. Her aura precedes her, lighting her way like foxfire. Did I create this magnificent creature? That I could have succeeded by accident where my carefully laid plans failed so horribly is both fascinating and humbling.
I must destroy her. Her very existence is a threat to my continuance. Yet I cannot help but stand in awe of her - worship her.
She comes. And my hands burn when I think of her blood.
Palmer pressed his hand to his forehead, shielding his eyes from the things eeling in and out of his field of vision. They looked something like centipedes, except that they were transparent and swam about in midair. If Howell saw them, he didn't seem to mind; he was too busy checking his syringe for air bubbles to worry about extra-dimensional creatures in the rafters.
"Uh, look, Doc - If you're worried about getting away from Morgan, I'm sure Sonja will be more than happy to help you in that area..."
"My dear Mr. Palmer," Howell sighed, slapping the inside of his elbow with his index and middle fingers as he tried to raise a vein. "I have spent over five years in the grip of one vampire. What makes you think I'd want to hand myself over to yet another one?"
"Sonja's not like Morgan."
"And rattlesnakes are nothing like Gila monsters." Howell deftly jabbed the loaded hypo into his arm.
Watching Howell shoot up made Palmer want a cigarette. He winced and averted his gaze.
Howell smiled wryly. "Go ahead and look away. I don't mind. Mainlining . isn't a pretty sight, not even to junkies. You could jump me right now. Why don't you?"
Palmer shrugged. "I don't know." It was the truth.
Howell quickly untied the rubber tubing and flexed his elbow a few times. He turned to face Palmer, his eyes dilating as the heroin rushed through his bloodstream. It suddenly occurred to Palmer that, despite his appearance, Howell was only a couple of years older than himself.
Howell removed the Luger from his pocket. Palmer tensed. The guy was a loon and, as if that wasn't enough, a junkie to boot. There was no telling what he might decide to do.
"I'm not proud of the things I have done in Morgan's service. But it's too late to pretend they didn't happen or that I had no choice in the matter. I must admit that the work challenged me, unlike anything else I've ever done in the private sector." Howell handed the Luger back to Palmer, butt first. The detective muttered his thanks and quickly returned it to his shoulder holster.
"I dug my grave years ago, Mr. Palmer. I am a dead man. The only question is when my heart will stop beating. I do not expect to live terribly much longer. In fact, I'd be surprised if I survive to see the dawn. But I warn you, do not trust your champion simply because she is a woman. The females are even worse than the males."
"Sonja's different - she's not like the others." He frowned as he listened to himself. What he was saying sounded stupid, even deluded, but it was the truth. How could he explain it to someone like Howell?
"You love her." The scientist's voice was flat, almost dead sounding, reminding Palmer of Chaz's equally lifeless pronouncement.
"Yes. Yes, I do." He was surprised to hear himself admitting it out loud.
"They always love their masters. That's what makes them so loyal." Howell paused, sniffing the air. "Is it my imagination, or do I smell barbecue?"