At Sword's Point (25 page)

"I suppose you've got a gun?" Eberle said.

"Yeah, back at the castle."

"I figured as much," Eberle muttered. He leaned behind the seat of the car and rummaged in his luggage for a few seconds, emerging with a 9mm Walther automatic, which he handed to Drummond.

"Here," he said, when he had sat back down. "Take this. I thought it might be a good idea to bring along a spare."

Drummond took the pistol and tucked it into the waistband of his trousers as he pointed the car between two large trees.

"It sounded like the shots came from somewhere near the trail we followed to the castle, so I'm going to swing wide and then come in from the side," he said.

As he spoke, Drummond sawed away at the wheel, slaloming the Range Rover between the trees. Suddenly, the headlights revealed the dark blue Saab parked in the woods ahead of them. As Drummond slowed down, the body of the Mossad agent slammed onto the hood of the car, his chalk-white face lolling against the windshield.

"Jesus!" Eberle shouted, as Drummond slammed on the brakes and the body shifted but did not fall off. "What the fuck was that?"

"I'd guess that's what the shooting was all about," Drummond said, noting the smear of blood on the windshield.

"You mean someone shot the vampire?" Eberle's voice was pitched with nerves.

"No," Drummond said, "that's not the vampire. But we're close." He put the car into reverse and eased it back between two trees. Cutting the wheel hard to the right, he edged forward toward the Saab.

"Markus, can you put down your window and pull this guy off the car, so I can see where we're going?" he asked.

"Yeah, sure," Eberle replied, as if scraping dead men off the hood of a car was an everyday experience. "If you're sure that the wipers won't clean him off."

Drummond chuckled nervously. "No, I'm all out of washer fluid."

Eberle put down the window and reached out for the dead man. Catching him by the collar, he dragged him across the hood of the car and pushed him headfirst off to the side. Once the head and shoulders were clear of the vehicle, gravity took over and the body slid from sight. Settling back in his seat, Eberle put the window back up, still looking around nervously.

"Did you notice anything about the body, Markus?" Drummond asked.

"Only that its throat had been cut," Eberle said.

"Didn't bleed much, did he?" Drummond looked at Eberle.

"You weren't kidding about vampires, were you?" Eberle said.

"Nope. They're real. And fortunately, most of them are on our side." Drummond turned past the Saab. "All except for—holy shit!"

He slammed on the brakes, and the Range Rover's tires bit into the leafy forest floor. Standing in the glare of Drummond's headlights was Baron von Liebenfalz, cape draped across his shoulders, his arm extended in the classic pose of a marksman, a gold-rimmed monocle clamped in his right eye. Not twenty-five feet in front of him stood the vampire, sword held at the ready in a semi-crouch. The vampire was mouthing something that could not be heard, glaring malevolently at von Liebenfalz, who stood his ground as if cast from bronze.

Suddenly the vampire lunged forward. As he did, Drummond and Eberle heard the distinctive pop of a .25-caliber automatic. The vampire's left leg buckled under him and he sagged toward the ground, only catching his balance on the point of his sword.

The vampire struggled to stand up, and Drummond realized that he had been shot through the knee. As he regained his feet, von Liebenfalz retreated by one carefully measured step.

"Drop the sword, knight, and I'll show you mercy," he said in the carefully structured language of Renaissance German.

"I'll have your blood first!" the vampire shouted back, red-foamed saliva drooling from his lips.

"Then you'll die," von Liebenfalz retorted. "Drop the sword."

The vampire screamed, and for a moment von Liebenfalz flinched. In that moment, the vampire launched himself at the baron, attempting to run him through with his sword.

Von Liebenfalz' pistol fired again. The vampire was momentarily knocked off balance then recovered, but not before von Liebenfalz had retreated another step. To Drummond and Eberle, watching in fascinated horror from their car, it looked as if the vampire's left eye had been replaced by a hard-boiled egg oozing watery ketchup.

"Drop the sword!" von Liebenfalz commanded.

"Die!" the vampire screamed in defiance, as he rushed toward von Liebenfalz.

The pistol cracked again and the vampire's other eye exploded.

Totally blind, the vampire swung his sword madly at von Liebenfalz, who only barely managed to avoid the blade that flashed in the harsh light of the Range Rover's headlamps.

Stepping back, von Liebenfalz leveled his pistol again.

"Drop the sword and accept mercy, Sir Knight," he said in an even tone. "Drop the sword."

"Never!" the vampire screamed. "I am supposed to live forever! You can't kill me! Nothing can kill—"

Von Liebenfalz fired again.

For a moment the vampire stood still, a look of utter amazement trying to express itself on his eyeless face. Then, dropping the sword, both hands went to his forehead and began clawing at the neat little blue hole centered just above his eyebrows.

Von Liebenfalz slowly lowered his arm and dropped the gold-plated Browning automatic into his pocket. With measured steps, he walked forward and carefully bent down, picking up the vampire's sword. Then, throwing his loden cape back over his shoulder, he raised the sword and held it poised above his head.

The vampire screamed in blind rage as he staggered about, clawing at the bullet hole in his skull. As he passed by von Liebenfalz, he stumbled on the root of a tree and fell to his knees. Von Liebenfalz brought the blade scything down on the vampire's neck with all of the strength he possessed, severing the head in a torrential fountain of blood.

Eberle barely managed to open the car door before he was sick.

Stepping back from the twitching body of the vampire, von Liebenfalz rolled it over with his foot. Then, raising the sword above his head once again, he plunged it downward with both hands, driving it into the heart of the vampire. He started trembling as he stepped back from the now motionless form on the ground, and crossed himself shakily as he sagged against a tree.

Drummond jumped from his car and ran over to the baron, helping to prop him up.

"Are you all right?" he asked.

Von Liebenfalz nodded weakly, fumbling for one of his pockets.

"Yes, yes," he whispered. "Just help me with my flask."

Drummond took the silver flask from the baron's shaking hands and undid the stopper.

"Here," he said, passing the flask back to von Liebenfalz.

The baron took a long swig, then handed the flask back to Drummond.

"Do help yourself," he said after a moment, apparently refortified. "And when you've finished, I really wouldn't mind a lift back to the castle."

"Where," Eberle asked von Liebenfalz, "did you learn to shoot like that?"

"In the basement of my apartment," the baron replied. "Every day since 1934, I have shot a minimum of ten rounds at a target in my coal bunker, exactly eight paces away."

"Is that why you kept backing up?" Drummond asked.

"No, it was to keep the headlights of your Range Rover out of my eyes." He nodded toward Drummond. "Frankly, if you hadn't arrived when you did, I'm not sure I could have survived."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Well, I shot him in the knee, just before you got there, but he didn't go down. That convinced me to try for a head shot—always a tricky thing in the dark. When your headlights hit us, I knew there was still a chance that he might just yield to me after all. Sadly, for him," he gave an eloquent shrug, "he chose otherwise."

The baron drew his cape around his shoulders and moved closer to the fire, just as Father Freise came up to the table carrying four steaming mugs of coffee.

"There you are, old-timer," he said, setting a mug in front of von Liebenfalz.

"I beg your pardon, young man," the baron replied, giving the priest a frosty look.

"Sorry," Freise said. "Nothing personal, just a figure of speech."

A little awkwardly, Freise distributed mugs of coffee to Drummond and Eberle, keeping one for himself. The slightly strained silence that descended among them lasted only a moment before de Beq and his men came in from recovering the bodies of the Mossad agent and Alfredo de Cuneo. Beyond them, through the open door that led to the castle's courtyard, Drummond could see the knights putting down two blanket-wrapped bundles, one of them considerably shorter than the other.

De Beq scanned the hall as he came in, looking for them, then left William of Etton standing by the door with a sack containing something about the size and shape of a large melon as he strode across the hall to the fire.

"So," he said, glancing at Drummond, "this is the man who will lead us to Kluge." He nodded toward Eberle. "And this old man—" He jerked a thumb toward von Liebenfalz. "Who is he?"

Von Liebenfalz shot to his feet. "I am Baron Anton von Liebenfalz, Knight of the Swan. And who, might I ask, are you?"

"Baron Henri de Beq, seigneur of Marbourg, Knight of the Order of the Sword." De Beq looked von Liebenfalz straight in the eye. "And this," he said with a sweeping gesture, "is my castle."

The two men glowered at each other across the table, each taking the measure of the other, until Drummond decided it was time to intervene.

"The Baron von Liebenfalz is the one who killed the rogue vampire," he said.

De Beq's steel-eyed gaze softened to iron but did not shift from the baron.

"Really?" he said. "By himself?"

"Yes, Sir Henri," Drummond replied. "By his own hand. Eberle and I can swear to it."

"Was there trickery in their combat?" de Beq asked, looking for some reason to continue disliking von Liebenfalz.

"No, sire. It was fair combat." Drummond wondered privately if matching a sword against a pistol really was fair combat, but then again, any man in his seventies facing a vampire needed a slight edge to balance the scales. "Also, the Knight of the Swan did offer quarter to his adversary three times before killing him."

"Humph," de Beq said. "Then you are welcome, Sire von Liebenfalz."

"I am most honored, Sire de Beq," von Liebenfalz said with a courtly bow.

"Now," de Beq said, turning to Eberle, "where is this Nazi, Kluge?"

* * * *

A cold, dry wind blew through the woods surrounding Marienkampf Castle, making the sparks from the torches fly high into the ink-black sky like a thousand tiny red stars twinkling through the clouds. It stirred the sacred banners flanking Kluge—the black and silver labrium of the SS and the tattered scarlet of the
Blutfahne
, the most sacred relic of the old Third Reich.

Standing before Kluge in two perfectly aligned ranks were his six most senior knights save himself and Baumann, each standing next to a candidate ready to be received into full membership in the Order of the Knights of the Blood. The new knights' formal training was now complete, but recruiting would continue in order to draw in Germany's finest. Kluge could feel the pride welling up inside him at their accomplishments. Meanwhile, under the new moon, twelve immortal knights would share in the blood of their ancient enemy tonight.

A faint smile of satisfaction crossed Kluge's face as he thought of the young Russian soldiers that Baumann had swept off the streets in Berlin the week before. It had been so easy. The
Scharführer
had told him of it over a bottle of good Rhine wine, the night he returned with their quarry. He had begun the operation in a sleazy
Ratskeller
in one of the less salubrious quarters of Berlin.

"Do you want to earn a few dollars, Ivan?" the
Scharführer
had said to the two, fingering a thick wad of currency. "Come back to my studio with me. Let me take your picture."

In the shabby surroundings of the photo parlor, the Ivans had proven quite willing to strip naked and pose for the camera in exchange for the promise of a few American dollars. By promising more dollars, backed up with a liberal supply of Western whiskey, Baumann had cajoled them into performing increasingly intimate acts. Finally, when the last of the film had. been exposed, he had reached behind an old-fashioned portrait camera and brought out a Luger.

The taller of the two Ivans didn't seem to comprehend what was happening, even when Baumann shot him in the forehead. He crumpled to the floor with a look of utter surprise on his face, like a marionette with its strings cut. His partner simply froze, unable to believe. Ignoring him, Baumann set down the Luger and went casually over to where the Russians had dumped their uniforms when they had undressed, pretending great interest as he bent to go through the pockets.

Seizing his chance, the smaller soldier darted past Baumann and grabbed the Luger from the table near the cameras. Pointing the gun at Baumann, he pulled the trigger. The hollow metallic click of the firing pin striking an empty chamber filled the room. Smiling, Baumann had turned slowly around and pointed a Mauser HSc at the Ivan, gesturing for him to drop the Luger. The man offered no further resistance.

All according to plan, Baumann had ordered the naked Ivan to sit cross-legged facing into the corner of the room, his hands on top of his head and a strip of silver duct tape over his mouth. He took both men's wallets but left their uniforms in a heap on the floor, casually kicking the Luger closer to the body.

Looking around, he was satisfied that he had left enough clues to give the police all they needed to piece together what had happened: a camera with the sexually explicit photos, a dead Russian soldier, and a murder weapon with his comrade's fingerprints all over it. It was so obvious that even the Berlin police should have no trouble figuring it out for themselves.

Grabbing the Ivan's fingers and a handful of his hair, he had pulled him to his feet, jabbing the Mauser pistol into the small of his back to march him, still naked, down the back stairs of the photo studio, where he locked him in the trunk of the Mercedes-Benz. On the way back to the castle, Baumann stopped at a train station and tossed the dead Russian's wallet into a trash can in the men's room. By this time tomorrow, the police would be looking for a Soviet deserter who had murdered his gay comrade and then fled to the West—an open and shut case.

They had kept the Ivan in a cage for the last week. Tonight, he would serve a useful purpose at last: to feed the knights of Kluge's new order, his hand-picked successors to the inner order of the SS—the first of many who, in the years to come, would truly establish a race of Aryan supermen.

"
Achtung
!" Baumann's voice rang out, and twelve pairs of steel-shod heels clicked together.

"
Sieg Heil
!" he cried, and thirteen arms shot forward in a stiff-armed salute.

Slowly, imperiously, Kluge stepped up onto a stone heavily carved with runic inscriptions, his black cape billowing in the night wind with the banners. Later, the stone would serve as an altar for the holy communion that bound them in blood. Just now, it was Kluge's pulpit, and he the high priest of a new and glorious resurgence of their holy cause.

"
Heil
!" he returned, not loudly but in a voice that reached to every corner of the clearing where they stood before him. His pale eyes swept them as he set gloved hands on the polished black belt circling his waist. He wore the black full dress uniform of his rank as
Sturmbannführer
, replete with silver braid and
Sigrunen
and the high, peaked cap with the SS pattern eagle and swastika cap badge. Just visible through the parting of his cape, circling his left arm above the elbow, was the blood-red armband that echoed the motif of the
Blutfahne
, with its white roundel bearing the black swastika.

"Brothers of the new Reich," he said quietly. "Tonight, as you receive the final symbol of full membership in our immortal order, you will join again in the mystical bonding that brings all Aryans together: the bonding of our blood and our soil.

"For centuries we have struggled against the evils of the East and against those degenerate swine who would sell out our own race, our own heritage, to those who have always been our mortal enemy.

"Our fight against the enemy transcends the defeat of our order by the hordes of Bolshevism in 1945, and goes back to the time of the crusades in the holy lands and the holy wars against the pagans in Eastern Europe. Our struggle reaches back through the eons to a time before the advent of the weakening influences of the Christian Church, back to the time when giants ruled the earth and the Aryan man was supreme.

"Now I call upon each of you to swear again the sacred oath of our order."

Proudly Kluge looked down at the twelve ardent faces gazing up at him from beneath the brims of a dozen gleaming black coal-scuttle helmets. Right hands raised, the young knights chanted the blood oath of their order, swearing loyalty and bravery unto the blood and soil of their race and vowing absolute obedience to their Führer. When they had completed the oath they were led by their sponsors, one at a time, to stand to attention before Kluge and again give him the stiff-armed salute.

"
Im Namen von unser Orden
," Kluge said to each one, when he had returned the salute, "
vorwärts, Ritter
." In the name of our order, advance as a knight…

Then, clutching in his left hand the tattered edge of the
Blutfahne
, Kluge received a sheathed SS dagger from Baumann for each man, presenting each weapon with an admonition never to draw it without reason or to sheathe it without honor. On receiving his dagger, each newly professed knight exchanged salutes with Kluge again before returning to his place with his escort, to be replaced by the next pair.

When the last knights had returned to their places, two gigantic braziers erupted into flames behind Kluge. At that same moment, the senior knights extinguished all of the torches, leaving the entire scene bathed in an eerie red glow.

"Brothers in blood, as knights of our new order, I call you forth to join in the communion of our fallen brethren," Kluge said, still standing upon the low stone altar.

From out of the darkness Baumann came, dragging the naked Russian soldier between the two ranks of SS knights. When he reached the foot of the altar, he shoved the Ivan to the ground, planting a boot in the back of his neck. The soldier gabbled out something quickly in Russian, but Baumann ground his boot harder into his neck, silencing him.

As Kluge stepped down from the altar, Baumann reached down and grabbed the Ivan in a wrist-lock, forcing him up and onto the carved gray stone on his stomach, naked legs and his free arm splayed out across the surface in futile attempt to escape the pain that Baumann was inflicting. Planting one knee in the small of the Russian's back, Baumann used his free hand to grab a handful of the Ivan's hair and yank his head back, exposing the neck. Stepping up to the altar again, Kluge drew his SS dagger and reached across to slit the Russian's throat.

The Ivan managed a garbled scream at the explosion of pain searing across his neck and sobbed out a weaker cry at the realization that he was dying. Blood spurted from severed vessels, drenching the altar and running in rivulets between the runes carved into the cold gray stone. At Kluge's beckoning gesture, an expressionless Ritter von Tupilow came forward with a great, golden chalice carved with runes and eagles and swastikas and set with precious stones, holding it by its twin handles to catch the dying man's blood. When it was full to the brim, he gave it reverently to Kluge, who held it up in offering to the ancient gods he now served.

One by one, first the senior knights and then the ones new-made, the knights came forward and drank from the golden cup in silent communion with the fallen heroes of another age.

* * * *

The telephone in Berringer's room purred softly several times before he was sufficiently awake to fumble for it at the side of his bed.

"Baron von Holtzhauser?" the night porter asked.

"
Hier
," came the half-awake reply.

"Please hold for a call from Dr. LeBlanc." The line went dead for a second, then LeBlanc came on the line.

"Baron, I am sorry to wake you, but I have just received instructions from—"

"Never mind from where you received them," Berringer interrupted. "Just repeat them to me."

"Very well," LeBlanc said. "The instructions were in English, but I'm not sure I understood them."

Berringer was growing impatient. "You don't have to understand them, just repeat them, okay?"

"All right. The message was this: Tell him to stick to Drummond and the priest like shit on a blanket. If there is any trouble, send the priest home and take Drummond to heaven." LeBlanc paused just slightly. "That was all." He sounded vaguely irritated with Berringer's treatment of him over the phone.