Kardinal (33 page)

Wembley Stadium, London – 10.11pm (GMT), 20 May, 2011

DAVID and his mum curled up and waited for the vampires to devour them. The creatures circled.

George Fuad said, “Go on, feed on the fuckers, feed on them.”

The creatures hesitated. They looked at Fuad. He was bleeding badly. Blood on his chest, where David had stabbed him, and blood coming from his mouth.

And the vampires were drawn to it.

They sniffed it.

They wanted to drink it.

But Fuad was protected – the red mark in the form of a band around his wrist.

He growled at the vampires:

“Kill ’em, go on, kill ’em – fucking rip their throats out – tear the cunts to shreds – ”

One or two of the vampires looked back at David and his mum. They were trying to make a decision – which was the easiest kill.

But the fact that blood was flowing made it difficult. All their instincts told them to go for the wounded prey. But they couldn’t. The bleeder was protected.

“Go on, don’t look at me, you bastards,” said Fuad, spitting blood. It sprayed on the ground. The vampires hissed and licked their lips. He showed them the mark. “I’m a fucking Neb, you disgusting filth. You can’t touch me. But you can fucking do those two.”

David thought quickly.

He saw the knife.

He went on all fours.

His mum tried to stop him.

But he was away.

Scuttling across the ground.

Eyes on the knife.

Vampires all around him.

Fuad screaming at them to kill David.

He grabbed the knife, dived at Fuad, clutched his wrist, sliced off the mark.

Fuad screamed.

David, without looking, scuttled back towards his mother.

He showed the vampires the mark:

“We’re protected, we’re protected.”

Fuad screamed again.

The vampires growled.

His blood made them frenzied.

He was unprotected.

Not a Neb to them anymore.

Just food to them.

They went at him.

He screamed:

“You can’t touch me, you can’t fucking touch me!”

But they did. They piled on him. They tore at him. He shrieked. Only his twitching feet could be seen under a press of vampires, all of them trying to get at his wounds to drink his blood and make new wounds to empty his veins.

“Let’s go,” said David.

He started to drag his mum away.

But more vampires poured up the steps into the walkway. And now some of those who’d been feeding on Fuad rose to their feet, looking for more nourishment. Finding it right there in David and his mum.

The vampires prowled.

David had the mark.

“We’re protected,” he shouted, holding his mum close.

“Only one of you,” hissed a vampire. The creature charged in and lunged at David’s mum’s leg. Grabbed it and tried to pull her away. She cried out. David yelled, “Mum”! He rammed the red mark into the vampire’s face. It reeled, hissing, desperately rubbing its mouth and cheeks.

Another rushed forward, trying the same thing. David leapt up and stood in its
way, brandishing the mark.

But behind his back, two more bolted towards his mum, making a grab at her.

She screamed, and David fended them off.

“We’re protected,” he said, crying.

“Just you, kiddo,” said a vampire.

He pinned the mark on his mum.

“No, David,” she said.

“Now her,” he said.

“No, David.”

The vampires snarled.

Gunfire erupted. Shouts came from nearby. A gang of people, some dressed in army fatigues, others in civilian clothing, rushed up the steps.

And David saw who was leading them.

“Mei!” he called out.

She was leading another a
rmy – just like she’d done months ago. And this time it was made up of soldiers. Real ones. They ploughed into the vampires. They pinned them down. They staked them. Mei was lethal. She wielded her wakizashi swords. The blades were bloody.

She embraced him.

Her army swept into the stadium.

“How did you do this?” asked David.

“Ediz found your friend Old Bill. He made internet message. Just a few soldiers heard it. Only a few, but enough to help us here. But more come. More come from all over England and Scotland and Wales.”

David and Mei helped his mum to her feet.

“Still many vampires,” she said. She looked at the body of George Fuad. It was covered in blood. There were bite marks on it – neck, face, arms, legs. He had a look of horror on his face. He had died in agony.

Good
, thought David.

“Human leader dead,” said Mei. “But they don’t care. Vampires just feed. Vampires will kill anyway.”

“Can I borrow one of your swords, Mei?” he said.

She handed him the blade. David drove it into Fuad’s chest until steel hit concrete. He watched every second of Fuad’s decay and didn’t move until the last speck of dust had swirled away on the breeze.

As David stood up and handed Mei her sword, a voice on a loudspeaker said, “This is General Howard Vince. I am recently back from Iraq. I urge citizens to fight against this insurgent army that is invading the stadium. These are the friends of the traitor Jake Lawton. They are here to ruin Britain. The vampires will join you. Fight for England. In Iraq, we have discovered a great power that will make this country great again. A god for us to worship. A mighty warrior to lead us to victory. Fight back against the rebels. Fight back against the terrorists.”

The noise inside the stadium grew.

Everyone was fighting everyone else.

And vampires were in the mix, killing anyone they could.

“What are we going to do?” said David’s mum.

“Too many vampires,” said Mei.

“Jake must have failed,” said David. He couldn’t believe what he was saying. “The Iraqis got him. He didn’t get away. If this Nimrod thing is awake, and he survives, we’re done. We’ve got no chance. We’re lost.”

A sea of people burst down the stairs from the Royal Box. The hurtled into the tunnel. Some fell and were crushed by the stampede. The mob roared towards David, his mum, and Mei.

“Run,” he said. “RUN!”

Hillah, Iraq – 10.15pm (GMT + 3 hours), 20/21 May, 2011

AALIYAH was crying. She was in pain. But that wasn’t the worst of it. The worst of it was that her heart had been broken.

Her dream of being with Jake was over. The dream that had brought her to Irkalla. The dream that had taken her away from him in the first place.

But no, they didn’t have a future.

It was going to die in this underworld.

Die with her.

Nimrod had dragged her down the flight of steps, and every yard hurt.

It felt like a long time before they finally came to a halt.

Aaliyah wiped tears from her eyes to take a look. They were in a clearing.

Behind them, the steps that led up to the coliseum.

Before them, a rock face that climbed as far as the eye could see. There was a cave in the rocks, and its entrance was framed by a gateway of red clay. It appeared to be the doorway to a temple. The gateway was warped and broken, but once, thousands of years ago, it must have been spectacular. Evidence of carved figures could be seen, although the surface of the artefact was now cracked and shattered completely in places. Ages ago, it must have given the impression of great wealth, of a bright future. Of something that would live forever.

But everything died.

Everything
, thought Aaliyah.

She spluttered, tears relentlessly streaming down her face. Her body hurt. She’d broken her arm, for sure, and her leg throbbed painfully. She was bleeding a lot, particularly from the injury to the side of her neck where the monster had bitten her. He’d sucked some blood out of her. Not enough to make her dead, then alive again. But enough to weaken her.

Nimrod began dragging her towards the cave.

“Where are you taking me, you bastard?” she said.

He was silent.

Inside, the cave’s floor slanted upwards. Nimrod dragged Aaliyah up the slope. It was dark, but she could make out skeletal arms poking out of the walls. Clamped into the bony hands were torches.

The floor levelled, and they went down a corridor, the walls decorated with murals depicting some kind of battle. A horned monster –
Nimrod
, thought Aaliyah – was at the head of an army that had savaged what appeared to be hundreds, maybe thousands, of people – men, women, and children. Torn bodies lay strewn across fields, in towns, floating in lakes. Blood was plentiful. The mural could well have been painted in it.

At last they entered a chapel-sized room. It triggered flashbacks to her childhood – going to church with her mother, singing hymns, praising God.

But later, she’d turned her back on all that. She wanted adventure. She had been drawn to flashy men – drug dealers and gangsters.

Nimrod flung her across the tiled floor. She came to a stop and sat up, dizzy, facing the altar. It was made of clay and stained with something. A dark liquid dried up.

Blood
, she thought.

Next to the altar was a pool. The stagnant water smelled. Nimrod knelt at the water’s edge. He reached into the pool and drew water, splashing it over his face and his scalp.

Aaliyah stared around the room. Portraits had been painted on the walls. The figures of women dressed in white. They were pale-skinned and dark-haired, their eyes red. They encircled the room, twenty-five on each wall. One hundred of them. The hundred brides of Nimrod. Just as Goga had said. She remembered the one with Nimrod in the arena. She had said something about Jake. About being lovers.

Her stomach felt gripey.

Nimrod groaned quietly to himself as he stared into the pool. Aaliyah took her chance. She started to crawl towards the door. Blood seeped from a gouge on her thigh, and her arm felt as if it were on fire. She could put no pressure on it. Her neck pulsed, and she felt faint.

But she had to try.

For Jake
, she thought. Who’d let her fall – but it wasn’t his fault. Who’d let Nimrod assault her – but Jake couldn’t have done anything. Who’d abandoned her to death – but he would save her if he could.

Or maybe he was the white witch’s lover?

She let out a cry.

Crawling, leaving a trail of blood behind her, she was nearly at the door.

She broke into a smile. She could survive this. She could make it out. She had to have hope. She had to –

Nimrod grabbed her leg.

She screamed as he pulled her back into the altar-room. She clawed at the tiles, but her hands slithered through the blood she’d left behind.

She screamed for Jake.

Her eyes were fixed on the door as she waited for him to surely burst through it any second and rescue her.

But he didn’t.

And when Nimrod lifted her and slammed her on the altar, and then loomed over her, she knew she’d been deserted.

Because there was no one else to do it, she cried for her unfulfilled life just as the monster mounted the altar and pinned her down.

IT was a terrible sight. One Alfred had hoped he’d never see again. But it was here. He’d come back from the dead. And he looked even more terrifying than Nimrod.

He was covered in blood and dust from head to toe.

In his right hand, he wielded the conjoined Spear of Abraham, and in the other, an ebony cane with a blade on the end. There was a pistol tucked into his belt, and Alfred was momentarily relieved that he wasn’t going to get shot. But that relief soon faded when Lawton came closer.

One side of his face was bruised, and his eyeball seemed to be completely red, as if filled with blood.

Alfred wanted to scream. He nearly pissed himself for a second time. He pointed the submachine gun at the spectre.

“Can’t you just fucking die?” he said.

“Not very easily, it seems,” said Jake Lawton.

He strode towards Alfred, whose knees buckled. Lawton was a tough guy. He’d always been a tough guy. He was menacing and carried an air of
“don’t mess with me” about him. But now, he was a hundred times scarier than he’d ever been before. He’d become a monster. An angel of death.

And Alfred knew he was in trouble.

“You think you’re passing?” he said, the gun trained on Lawton.

“I know I’m passing, Alfred.”

He kept coming.

“I’ll shoot.”

“I’ve been shot before. Six bullets in me already. Few more won’t make a difference. Do your worst.”

“You might not be afraid of bullets, Lawton, but you come any closer and I’ll have Nimrod rip your bitch to pieces, you hear me? He’s in there now with her. I can tell him to stop. He listens to me. I’m a Nebuchadnezzar. I’m his… his master and his servant, Lawton. You hear?”

Lawton was hesitating. He’d stopped. Alfred felt strong all of a sudden. His grip on the gun tightened.

“See?” he said. “See who’s boss around here?”

Lawton appeared to be thinking. He looked back over his shoulder. His eyes – or at least his one good eye – narrowed.

And then he curled his lip and charged.

Alfred panicked.

He fired, but the bullets went astray because his aim was affected by nerves and the fact he was shitting himself.

Lawton wasn’t stopping. He was coming straight for him. Alfred’s head screamed at him to run. But terror had frozen him to the spot.

He fired again. The shot grazed Lawton’s shoulder, tearing a groove in the flesh. But it didn’t stop him.

Alfred screamed and threw the gun at Lawton, who just batted the weapon aside.

“Bye, Alfred,” Lawton said, and Alfred saw the cane jabbing at his chest and felt it break his skin and sink into him, and it was still in him long after Lawton had walked by. And then Alfred saw everything swim before him, his hearing dulled, he grew cold, and he thought, “Is this how I’m going to die?”

And darkness enveloped him.