Department 19: Battle Lines (50 page)

Harker’s cause would not fail because of him.

There was one thing he did know, however. The quality of the prose wasn’t going to matter to Colin Burton; it would be a miracle if his editor read more than an inch or two beyond the headline. If he was lucky, Burton would think it was some kind of elaborate practical joke; if he wasn’t, the reply was likely to come complete with an invitation for him to find a new job.

“It’s good,” said Harker, turning his head and smiling warmly. “It’s very, very good. It’s exactly what we need.”

“I’m glad,” he replied. “They’re not going to run it, though, Albert. You know that, right?”

“Maybe,” said Harker. “Maybe not. Let’s send it and find out.”

McKenna rolled back to the desk and brought up his email client. He opened a new message, attached the file, and wrote a short paragraph to his editor. He hit SEND and sat back in his chair, blood thumping in his veins. He wondered how slight the chances were that Colin would see his story for what it was and print it. Then an unexpected word appeared in his mind, unbidden.

Salvation
, he thought to himself.
This could be my salvation.

“Well done,” said Harker, squeezing McKenna’s shoulder. “Let’s hope that he has more sense than you give him credit for. And if he doesn’t, well, as least we’re prepared. Email our two new recruits, then try to sleep. I have a feeling it’s about to get very busy.”

The vampire withdrew his hand and headed back to the sofa. McKenna sat for a long moment, his mind racing with prospects he had not considered in years.

Respect. Acclaim. Credit. Fame.

From his desk at
The Globe
, covered in photos of celebrities in bikinis and footballers snorting drugs in nightclub bathrooms, such concepts had seemed as distant and unattainable as the moon. But now, with this story in front of him, a story so explosive that it might genuinely change the world, his mind was tormenting him with what it could mean for his career.

For his life.

McKenna drained his beer, stubbed out his cigarette, and started to write the second email that Harker had asked for.

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]; [email protected]

Sent: 23:19:02

Subject: Re: Re: Your comments on my blog post

Hello,

Great news – I’m honoured that you would let me use your words to help tell my story (I know it’s all of our story really, that’s just the journalist in me coming out…) and trust me to treat them with the dignity and respect they deserve.

As a matter of fact, I’ve been thinking about something a bit radical since I received your replies. As before, please do not even hesitate to say no if it isn’t something you’re interested in. But here it is.

I want you to consider coming down to London to help me open this huge can of worms. The time may come soon when a few brave souls are required to stand up and be counted. Let me know if I’m talking to the wrong people.

Best wishes,

Kevin

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]

Cc: [email protected]

Sent: 23:52:33

Subject: Re: Re: Re: Your comments on my blog post

Dear Kevin,

We have discussed your proposition and we accept.

We will be travelling to London tomorrow – no further details at this stage, I hope you understand.

Please let me know where we should meet.

Best wishes,

6589south

Kevin McKenna turned his laptop and showed the message to Albert Harker. The vampire smiled, red light flickering in the corners of his eyes.

“It’s all falling into place,” he said. “Just as I told you it would. Well done, my friend. Well done.”

Henry Seward spat a thick wad of blood into the sink and looked at himself in the mirror.

His nose had been broken and reset that morning, sending blood pouring down his throat and leaving a hot island of pain in the middle of his drawn, exhausted face, but he didn’t think that was what he had just spat on to the white porcelain. The blood was almost black and he felt sure it had come from somewhere deeper, from the depths of the body that was steadily beginning to fail him; his gut maybe, or his lungs. He coughed now, loud, wet barks that pounded his chest, and his lower back was a perpetual sheet of agony where the worst of Valeri’s beatings had been focused. His skin had a yellowish sheen to it, and his eyes were sunken and small.

I’m dying
, he thought, with an absence of emotion that surprised him.

He had always believed that he would die either in the heat of combat or as an old man at home in his bed. This scenario, being slowly tortured to death on the orders of Dracula himself, had never occurred to him.

Seward dressed himself carefully. His fingers and limbs were slow to respond to commands these days, as if the lines of communication between them and his brain were beginning to erode. He buttoned up his shirt, then slowly slipped his jacket over his shoulders. He had been invited to take drinks with Dracula in the vampire’s study, and he knew from painful experience that the penalties for tardiness were severe.

With his jacket in place, Seward faced himself in the mirror and smoothed down his hair. It was greyer than it had been, and there was significantly less of it; clumps had fallen out in the aftermath of one of the worst sessions of torture, when his body had still been vibrating from the current that had been passed through his wet skin. He looked as though he had aged ten years in the three months he had spent as Dracula’s guest; he was absolutely certain that he would not last another three, and probably a lot less than that.

If you’re going to come for me, Cal
,
he thought,
I hope it’s soon. Otherwise you’re going to be wasting your time.

Ten minutes later Seward knocked on a door on the top floor of the chateau.

He had been escorted up the stairs by one of his guards, a female vampire whose husband had been destroyed by a Blacklight Operator five years earlier, and who seemed to be constantly trying to restrain the urge to tear out his throat with her bare hands. She left him at the end of the corridor and he walked the last few steps alone; the vampires in the chateau were scared of Dracula and seemed to avoid being in his presence wherever possible, despite the love they all professed to have for him.

“Come in,” called the rich, smooth voice that had become so familiar. Seward took a deep breath and pushed open the door.

The room was beautiful, a wide, wood-panelled space that occupied the south-western corner of the grand old building’s top floor. It had been Valeri’s private sanctuary in the years after the destruction of his wife, but had been immediately claimed by the convalescing Dracula. Bookshelves and paintings covered the walls and a low coffee table sat between two enormous green leather sofas. In the corner of the room was a wooden door, standing open to the cool night air.

“Out here,” called the voice. “Do join me, my dear Admiral.”

Seward walked slowly across the study and stepped through the door. A wide stone balcony ran all the way round the uppermost floor of the chateau, from where it would have once been possible to see approaching Spaniards when they were still half a day’s ride away. He turned to his left and saw Dracula reclining in an elegant wooden chair, his legs stretched out before him. A delicate wrought-iron table stood beside him, on which rested an ice bucket and two glasses of pale, bubbling liquid. The vampire picked one up and held it out, smiling warmly. Seward took the glass from his captor’s long, pale fingers, trying not to let his hand shake.

“Thank you,” he said.

Dracula smiled, and nodded towards the empty chair. “You’re most welcome, Henry. Take a seat. You look as though you might fall over if you don’t.”

Seward forced down the shame that swam up from his stomach and settled himself into the chair. He sipped the champagne, which was exquisite, and looked out across the vast, dark forest that extended to the west. The air was cool and clear, and it seemed to soothe the pain that had become his constant companion.

“How are you?” asked Dracula. “I heard you had an uncomfortable night.”

On your orders, you bloody monster.

“You heard right,” said Seward. “You know it would be easier for you just to kill me.”

Dracula took a sip from his glass. “Indeed it would,” he said. “But that is what you want, yes? And I cannot give you what you want.”

“Why not?” asked Seward, realising that he was suddenly on the verge of tears. “Why not just have done with it?”

“Because you are the commanding officer of an organisation that has dedicated itself to destroying my kind,” said Dracula. “How would it look if I were to grant you mercy, or allow you the release of a quick death? What is being done to you brings me no pleasure, but even you must see that it is necessary. An example must be made, I’m sorry to say.”

Seward knew full well that his suffering gave the ancient vampire great pleasure, but he forced himself to ignore the lie and returned his gaze to the stone wall that encircled the balcony and the horizon beyond it. Somewhere, in the deepest, darkest corners at the back of his mind, an idea had begun to form.

“How does this all end?” he asked. “After all the blood and the screaming and the fighting. What happens then?”

Dracula refilled their glasses. “When I was a man,” he said, eventually, “I had no desire to rule the world, despite what the histories may claim. I was Prince of Wallachia, the country of my birth, and that was all I had ever aspired to. I fought to keep her safe, to repel those who would take my throne from me, and I did so with great vigour. But I never wished to be Alexander, with an empire that spanned the globe. My own country was enough.”

“You invaded Transylvania,” said Seward, mildly. “And Hungary.”

Dracula laughed. “Transylvania was in the pocket of the Turks and they deserved no less than they received. I took no pleasure in raiding Hungary, or Serbia for that matter. They were not moves of ambition, of invasion. They served only to keep the Turks at bay. I did nothing during any of my reign that was not solely intended to keep my country safe and free.”

Seward said nothing. He took a long sip of champagne, glanced again at the stone wall surrounding the balcony, then returned his attention to his captor.

“Once I became what I am,” continued the vampire, “after my throne was stolen for the final time, I withdrew from public life altogether. For a long time, many decades, in fact, I lived in something close to isolation, with only my Generals and their wives for company. My appetite for war and bloodshed had died with my human self, and I was content to let humanity fight and squabble among themselves.”

“So what changed?” asked Seward, draining his glass.

“Men from your country chased me to my castle and stuck their blades into my flesh. That’s what changed.”

Seward didn’t respond.

“You want to know how this ends?” asked Dracula. “It’s extremely simple. Every human being on this planet will be given the opportunity to pledge their unending loyalty to me, and their complete obedience to my everlasting rule. Those who do so will be spared. Those who do not will die.”

“And if everyone were to refuse?” asked Seward, his voice low. “What then?”

“I believe I made myself clear, Henry. What you are suggesting will never come to pass, for once the dying begins, the cowards will beg for the chance to kneel before me. But if it did? I would kill every living soul on this planet.”

Seward stared at the vampire; deep, dark red was creeping into the furthest corners of his wild, flickering eyes.

Madness
, he thought.
Nothing but madness.

“Those who do kneel,” he said, carefully. “What world will they get the privilege of continuing to live in?”

“A far better one than this,” said Dracula. “Without wars, or borders, or religions. A world where the only law is my word, and the only requirement is that they obey.”

“It sounds delightful,” said Seward, smiling widely.

He was hoping for a laugh and got one; Dracula tipped back his head and roared, a full-throated, guttural blast of amusement. For the briefest second the vampire’s eyes closed, and he made his move.

Seward launched himself up out of his chair, reached the stone wall in two faltering steps, and threw himself over it, feeling cool air billow around him as he tumbled towards the distant ground.

Henry Seward fell, watching with complete detachment as the stone wall at the top of the chateau shrank away above him. He had time to wonder whether hitting the ground was going to hurt before a dark shape burst over the wall and rocketed towards him.

Dracula thundered into him in mid-air, his face twisted in an inhuman snarl of rage, his fangs bared, his eyes boiling with red-black fire. He gripped Seward’s shoulders with both hands, his nails sinking deeply into the flesh beneath the jacket, and he cried out with new pain. The vampire grinned in triumph, although the smile began to fade as quickly as it had arrived; Seward stared into the ancient, hateful face and realised what was happening.

They had stopped moving when Dracula had taken hold of him, but now they were descending again. He twisted his head around and saw two things: they were still six or seven storeys up, and they were accelerating. He looked back at Dracula, a bitter smile rising on his face, and saw uncertainty on the old monster’s.

“Can’t hold me, can you?” spat Seward. “Not strong enough. Let me go or I’ll take you down with me and we’ll find out what the courtyard does to that new body of yours.”