“You could have killed me before this,” Caxton said, trying not to look down the dark barrel in front of her. “You’re saving me for some reason.”
“For Simon. When he accepts the curse, when he’s one of us, you’re going to be his first victim. Daddy and I have already fed.” Raleigh lifted the weapon a few inches and fired a shot straight over Caxton’s head. The noise of the shot made them both cringe as it echoed around and around the room, amplified by the close, hard walls. Raleigh made a face, her wicked teeth protruding from her pale lips, but then she fired again, and again, aiming just shy of hitting Caxton each time. The precious bullets pranged off the rock floor and ricocheted around the room, bouncing and clattering wildly, but unfortunately none of them went so far astray as to bounce back up and hit Raleigh. One did cut through the sleeve of Caxton’s shirt. She didn’t dare look, but she thought it had just missed breaking her skin. She pulled her arms in close to her body and tried not to flinch too much.
As Raleigh fired she counted out loud, but the words were lost until she stopped and said, “Sixteen.”
Caxton’s ears were still ringing as the vampire blew on the gun’s hot barrel, then shoved it, the safety still off, into one of the straps of her vest. “Now get up, and let’s go.”
Vampire Zero
Chapter 56.
Caxton went first, prodded on occasionally by Raleigh, who kept close behind, walking forward down a corridor lined with electric lights. Jameson must have strung up those lights himself—normally coal mines were left dark except for the lights on the miners’ helmets and their equipment. Here and there side galleries led away from the main hall, and these had been left dark—silent, empty channels carved through the rock where the only sound was made by dust falling and rocks settling. Once those halls would have echoed with clamor and activity as miners pushed a giant longwall cutter down the face, grinding out coal by the ton. Now it was as silent as the tomb it had become. Or perhaps not quite silent. Caxton had little to do as she walked but look around her and strain her ears to pick up subtle sounds. It didn’t take long to notice a faint but deep roaring sound coming from deeper in the mine. Somewhere down these passages, through a series of left and right turns, the fire lay, blazing and raging as it had for so many years.
The sound was not the only evidence. She started to see wisps of smoke playing about the ceiling, braids of pale vapor that grew thicker and more agitated as she progressed. The peculiar smell of carbon monoxide came to her at first just slightly, but with increasing intensity. She’d smelled it plenty of times as a kid. She tried to think what it smelled like, but as always before she drew a blank. It wasn’t the smell of a campfire, thick with resin and wood smells. It wasn’t the smell of a candle flame, either; there was no tang of paraffin there. It was more like an un-?smell, an absence of smells. It smelled like a blanket covering her face, preventing her from breathing. It smelled like suffocation. They’d been walking maybe a quarter of a mile when she started to cough. Involuntary little spasms of her throat at first, tiny eruptions that soon graduated to full-?scale convulsions. She pressed her balled-?up fist against her mouth to try to hold them in, but that just made her chest heave all the harder. Last she noticed the heat, and in many ways that was the worst of it. It had been a crisp winter night above the surface. Down here a dry heat warmed her body, making her sweat down the collar of her winter coat. Her armpits grew moist, and then her chest. Rivulets of sweat coursed down her body. A crystal droplet formed at the end of her nose and she had to keep wiping it away. The heat pressed against her face as if she’d opened the door of a furnace to peer inside. She started to take off her coat—and then Raleigh was on her, one arm wrapped around her neck and crushing her windpipe. Caxton tried to go limp, but the vampire held her rigid and lifted her slightly until only the toes of her boots touched the floor. Then Raleigh threw her down, a discarded doll, and Caxton fell hard against her side. She couldn’t breathe; she sucked at the air, but it choked her before it got halfway down her throat. She tried to talk, to explain, but the words couldn’t form. Her hands reached up and tore at the collar of her shirt, trying desperately to loosen it. Weakness overcame her, though—her body refused to move the way she wanted it to, as every fiber of her strength was directed toward her lungs, her body’s need for air paramount.
Down on the floor the air was a little cleaner. Slowly, with painful jagged inhalations, she fed her cells the oxygen they needed. The sweat that bathed her face caught a puff of breeze and cooled her down. “I just,” she said, the words like switchblades opening in her throat, “just want—to take off my coat.”