Colm & the Ghost's Revenge (8 page)

I
nside the coffin that sat upon the muddied earth of the wet and windy Transylvanian graveyard, lay what was once Vlad the Third, Prince of Wallachia. In his heyday he had been known by many as Vlad the Impaler, by others as Dragul, and by those who believed in the supernatural as Dracula. Yes, that Dracula. He had been in the coffin for five hundred and thirty-five years now, yet he was still alive. Barely. There was only a tiny drop of existence left in him. The part of the brain that had once been home to emotions and feelings, no matter how cruel, had long since died and what was left was a creature that wanted nothing more than to feed, even if it didn't know why. Vlad would have smiled if he had lips or anything resembling a mouth. His organs had long since turned to jelly and the blood that flowed from his heart pulsed slowly now, a mere trickle from a chest that had once beat with a fierce passion. What lay in the jewel-encrusted box had long since ceased to resemble any form of human. Despite the aura of magic in his resting place, Vlad had still faded over the centuries.

His forefinger, almost desiccated now, twitched slightly. Life was all around him. He could sense the men. He could be reborn. Vlad had spent far longer in this coffin than he had above the ground and for the first three hundred years, when he still had his faculties, he had been heartily sick of it. Being dead probably wasn't much fun, but it certainly would have been more pleasant than being buried alive. He was supposed to be immortal. That is how it should have been. But he had been tricked by his enemy Basarab Laiotă and now he was stuck here dying ever so slowly.

Over the centuries, while he could still think and feel and remember, he had heard the people in the nearby cemetery – the solemn, thoughtful ones visiting and tending to the graves of their relatives, the idle youth drinking cheap alcohol and telling ghost stories, the lonely, the bored, the rich and poor. So many people. So many different people. Every footstep, every cry of pain or peal of laughter pierced his slowly dying heart. How he had longed to be up there among all that life. Just so he could kill anything that moved.

But he had never been able to escape, and over the centuries, as he had slowly decayed, he had fallen into a trance, kept alive only by the possession of that horrible thing that lay alongside him in his prison. The Lazarus Key. Wretched thing. It had been nothing but a curse to him. Once he had been a cold and callous ruler, a killer, the most feared man within a thousand miles. Now he was nothing. It was at that moment that Vlad the Impaler became aware that he was thinking again. And that his body was growing stronger. His senses were becoming heightened. Was it the men above him? The fresh, living men? They didn't know how good it was to be alive, to taste the fresh air, to eat and laugh. Taking it all for granted.

The key began to glow.

But it wasn't just the presence of the men that was causing the transformation, although it was certainly part of the reason. There had been visitors before and the creature that had been Vlad hadn't returned to life then. He was doing so now because unbeknownst to everyone except his boss – The Ghost – Camus held the second Lazarus Key. It was wrapped in a purple velvet cloth, tucked away in his jacket.

Camus took a few steps backwards until he was beside the spotlight. He unzipped his jacket pocket and took out the key and, being extra careful to ensure it remained safely wrapped in its cloth, enclosed it in his fist. The fingers of his free hand twitched nervously as they hovered over the ON switch. He tried to order his thoughts. He had to be steady and in control. His life depended on it. The other men's lives depended on it too, but he wasn't worried about them. ‘Open it,' he shouted.

The men shoved each other, fighting like school-children, eager to be the one to open the coffin. They slid the tempered steel of their shovel blades into the spot where they imagined the seal between the lid and the main body of the coffin should be. They poked and prodded, cleaning out centuries of dirt and stone and dead worms, but they couldn't force the coffin open.

Igor the Poisoner stepped forward.

‘Back,' he commanded in his strong, thick accent.

Nobody moved until he produced a small brown bottle of foul-smelling liquid. They gave him a wide berth then. A single drop of one of Igor's potions was reputed to be enough to bring down an angry bear. He uncorked the bottle and emptied a little along the brass edge.

A wisp of smoke escaped as the pungent liquid took seconds to eat through what had taken centuries to build up.

‘Is good stuff,' said Igor, grinning toothlessly.

The men took a further step backwards. Even if Igor didn't have evil intentions, none of them wanted to be splashed by something that potent. They allowed him to continue his work in silence until all that kept the coffin closed was a series of padlocks of ancient design.

Alexander watched, still captive. He noticed that the coffin was in remarkably good shape for something that had been buried for so many years. His keen senses were also aware of something else. Something that disturbed him. He knew that he had to get away from there.

Igor slipped a crowbar into one of the brass latches and levered it until it began to bend. The lock popped open suddenly. The men's eyes widened. Some of them licked their lips in anticipation, even though they had no idea or expectation of what opening the coffin would reveal. Only five locks to go. Igor's grin grew wider as he moved on to the next one. And the next one.

Alexander realised that the grip of the men who were holding him had slackened. They were distracted by the show. He began to cough and splutter. It was enough to attract their attention. Sweenz glanced at him, his headlamp illuminating the prisoner's face which had turned an unhealthy shade of crimson.

‘He can't breathe,' he said.

‘So what?' said Gillespie, who wasn't a particularly sensitive type. Sensitivity isn't usually a trait associated with ruthless mercenaries.

‘He's annoying me. Take the tape off his mouth.'

Gillespie sighed. This was interrupting the show. He'd take it off all right, then he'd give Alexander a couple of swift kicks for daring to have respiratory problems while he was in charge of him. He ripped off the tape as quickly as he could, hoping it would hurt like hell. He forgot to resume his grip on the prisoner.

Alexander coughed one last time, then, still on his knees on the wet grass, he looked up at the man and whispered something inaudible. He had a devilish plan. One that would set him free. A plan so cunning that it would be the model used for every escaping hostage for a thousand years. Gillespie was about to lean over to hear what Alexander was whispering when the scream distracted them.

It wasn't a pleasant girlish scream. It was one of sheer terror. Of someone who had just seen something his mind couldn't comprehend. Of someone who had just experienced the most horrific moment of his life. And this was someone who'd been involved in some supremely nasty events. Sweenz released his grip on Alexander and stepped forward to get a better look at what was happening.

Alexander knew when to take his opportunity. No time to hesitate. No time to look and see why the man was screaming even though every curious bone in his body wanted nothing more than to have a gawp. The devilish plan would have to wait for another time. He took off, his hands still tied behind his back. He stumbled as he reached the crumbling stone wall dividing the cemetery from a darkened forest. He pushed off his left leg and leaped into the air, catching his right foot on the top of the wall. He fell to the ground, rolled over, clambered to his feet.

As he thundered through the thick grass and sticky mud, Alexander promised himself that if Camus survived this night, he would find him and make him pay for his disrespect. He would make him beg for forgiveness and then he would kill him. No one had ever treated him like this before. No one. He had made him feel like a common citizen. Him! The great Alexander. He would track Camus down even if he had to travel to the ends of the earth. He would track him down and destroy him. He swore on the graves of both his wives and three of his dogs. The mercenary reached the edge of the forest and was swallowed up by the darkness.

What he left behind was a scene of devastation.

When Igor had broken the last lock, he'd grunted with delight. All these tough men and he'd been the one to do it. He'd pressed his fingers against the lid and prised it open. A cloud of mist had emerged, hanging in the air above the coffin. Igor had reached in, his hand disappearing from view. His fingers brushed against something. It felt like … a diamond. He knew what they felt like. He'd stolen enough of them in his time. He closed his fist around it and slipped his hand into his pocket.

The cloud dissipated. And then a dark shape had moved towards Igor in a fury, almost swifter than the eye could comprehend.

The creature moved more on instinct than thought. It had enveloped Igor and suddenly he was hidden from view. Before he had a chance to move, to cry out, to even become aware of what was happening to him, he was dead. The scream that Alexander had heard had come from the man standing beside him. And moments later he was dead too.

The thing that had once been Vlad the Impaler fed quickly, drawing the life force from the men in seconds, growing stronger with every moment as panic set in around it. Its dried-up body began to reform. Veins and arteries re-grew. Its heart began to pound. And a voice in its head cried out in exultation:

I am alive.

One of the mercenaries swung his shovel in the direction of the Impaler. It cut through the air, finding space where the creature had been a millisecond before. He heard the hiss in his ear as Vlad the Impaler wrapped its spindly, newly grown flesh around his body. He felt the blood in his veins turn ice cold as the creature dug its long, pointed nails deep into his neck. His lips began to turn blue, his face almost transparent, as the life began to flow from him and into the creature.

‘How do we kill it?' one of the men roared. ‘Camus? What have you done to us?'

Jean-Paul Camus snapped out of it. He'd been transfixed by the spectacle, watching as Dragul, Dracula, the first vampire went about its work. He'd been idly wondering why the Impaler was using its fingers to feed, not the sharp teeth like he'd seen in films. As the cry of the mercenary snapped him back to reality he berated himself for standing there thinking such a useless thought. Had the creature hypnotised him somehow, to prevent him from doing his job? He'd heard that it had such talents. He realised he was quickly running out of time and needed to press the button. The UV light would destroy the creature and save him from becoming its next victim.

He slammed the palm of his hand on the button and closed his eyes as he waited for the blinding light.

Nothing happened.

No cries or screams other than those of the men falling to the ground all around him. He pressed the button again and again. Still nothing. He opened his eyes. What had gone wrong? The generator was still running, still bouncing around … that was it. Its movement had caused the cable that connected it to the lamp to fall out. It lay there on the ground. Once he plugged it back in, he'd be OK. He picked it up. The end was wet. He dried it on his shirt, checked it once, twice and thrust it into the socket. When he looked up, the creature was right in front of him, its red, watery eyes filled with animal cunning.

Looks like I've just made the biggest mistake of my life, Camus thought.

The creature hissed and lunged for him.

Camus dodged to his left. Quicker than he'd ever moved in his life. It was still a hundred times slower than was necessary. Vlad the Impaler was upon him. It had been drawing the life from Camus for a full two seconds before Camus was even aware of what was happening. He felt the creature's cruel joy as it began to feed.

Camus's life flashed before his eyes. It was full of regrets.

His fist opened and the Lazarus Key rolled clear of its velvet cloth. The creature stopped gorging. Even though it didn't want to. Some force was drawing it to the key. Something that had a hold on him. It dropped Camus's weakened body to the ground and knelt before the key. The only sounds were the wailing of the wind and, just beneath it, the constant spluttering of the generator.

Camus knew what to do. He felt weaker than he had at any time in his life. If he survived he wasn't sure if he'd recover, but he couldn't let this thing free in the world. He didn't hate life that much. He dragged himself up and crawled on his hands and knees until he reached the lamp. He swivelled it until it was pointing in the direction of Vlad the Impaler.

‘Say goodbye, Dracula,' he whispered.

The creature spun around. It didn't know what was happening, but sensed it wasn't good. The man was still alive. Why? It had become distracted somehow. As Camus pressed the button the creature flew at him, ready to cause him pain. The bulb flashed brightly enough to light up a city. And to tear Vlad the Impaler into a thousand pieces. Five hundred and thirty-five years lying in a coffin for two minutes of killing, the creature thought as it exploded. It wasn't worth the wait.