On a Darkling Plain (41 page)

Smiling down at him, the naked man said, “That’s enough refreshment for now.”

But it wasn’t. Dan’s system was still depleted. He tried to make a grab for the woman, to drag her bleeding body back to his lips. But something not unlike the coils of a python tightened around his form with crushing force, holding him in place. He peered down the length of his body, but couldn’t see what was holding him; his restraints were invisible.

He didn’t think he could break the bonds, at least not instantly; yet, half-berserk with blood lust, he almost kept struggling against them anyway. But he didn’t want to humiliate himself in front of the golden man; he wanted to appear rational and self-possessed, not like a mindless animal. And so he held himself in check.

“Very good,” said his captor, as if commending him on his willpower.

Though he realized that he was in no position to express resentment, Dan bristled at the condescension in the other man’s tone. “Who are you?” the prisoner asked. Sharpening his hearing, he discovered that the naked figure had no heartbeat. Evidently, despite his atypical coloring, he was one of the Kindred.

Dumping the unconscious woman casually on the muddy floor, the other vampire smiled. “Durrell knows me as Timothy Baxter, but perhaps you’re familiar with my original name. In Hellas, when your mistress” — the matter-of-fact manner in which he alluded to Melpomene convinced Dan that it would be useless to deny he was her agent — “and I were fledglings together, I went by Tithonys.”

Dan felt a jolt of fear. Since the beginning of his mission, he’d dreaded the thought of coming face to face with

Melpomene’s opposite number. Now it had happened: he was bound and helpless, and the enemy Methuselah had turned out to be the adversary that his faithless patron feared most of all.

Except that he couldn’t really be, could he? Eager to discount the other vampire’s claim, Dan said, “Bullshit. Tithonys is dead. Melpomene killed him in France, hundreds of years ago.”

The golden Kindred’s beautiful smile grew wider. Beholding it, Dan was convinced that this godlike creature was telling the truth, that he could have no
reason
to deceive someone as insignificant as his prisoner. The younger Kindred belatedly grasped that he was responding to an unnatural charisma like Melpomene’s, but recognition did little to free him from the effect. “You’re half right,” Tithonys said. “1
was
dead. But after my demise I entered the service of a, well, a god or a fallen angel according to your point of view, known as the Count of the Wasteland. Ultimately, after many achievements on its behalf, it saw fit to restore my earthly existence. Someday, perhaps, I’ll tell you the whole story. I can assure you that you’ve never heard anything like it.”

Struggling to mask his fear, trembling slightly anyway, Dan said, “What do you want with me?”

“Relax,” Tithonys said. He clasped Dan’s shoulder, and the prisoner’s fear gave way to a sense of profound relief. Knowing the feeling was artificial, that the ancient vampire was still manipulating his emotions, Dan struggled not to succumb to it. “If I’d wanted you harmed, I could have left you in Durrell’s clutches instead of persuading him to turn you over to me. But I’m hoping that we can be friends. You are, after all, quite special.”

Puzzled, Dan frowned. “What do you mean?”

Tithonys grinned impishly. “Aha! 1 didn’t think you realized, and yet you might have guessed, if you’d pondered the clues. You never knew your sire, did you?”

Dan instinctively felt leery of giving the Methuselah any information about himself, but he couldn’t see the harm in disclosing such a simple fact. “No.”

“And how long have you been a vampire?”

“About thirty years.”

“And you’ve discovered you’re quite powerful, haven’t you?”

Dan grimaced. “I don’t feel very powerful strapped down like this.”

“Possibly not. But I rummaged through your memories while you were unconscious” —- the idea of such a thing made Dan feel sick to his stomach — “and I saw that, even before Melpomene enhanced your abilities with a measure of her blood, you sometimes held your own against vampires far older than you were: undead against whom no one would have predicted you had a chance.”

Dan shrugged, causing his bonds to tighten slightly. He still had no idea what Tithonys was driving at. “All right, I guess I’m reasonably tough. So what?”

“So this.” Somewhere in the tunnels something thumped four times, a dull sound like a colossal heart beating. For a moment a foul, fecal stench suffused the air. Startled, Dan twitched, but the Methuselah didn’t react. “Do you understand that our race has two sources of power: generation, the number of ancestors that separate one from Caine, and sheer longevity?”

“I’ve heard it said.”

“Then you should be able to see,” Tithonys replied, “that, lacking the latter, you must be gifted with regard to the former. The creator who embraced and abandoned you was a Methuselah. Specifically, she was Melpomene.”

Dan goggled at his captor, so astonished that for a moment he forgot to be afraid. “That’s crazy! And even if it were true, how could
you
know it?”

“Various means, some of which you simply wouldn’t understand. Suffice it to say, I took the liberty of obtaining a sample of your vitae. It smells and tastes much like hers. And, as I mentioned, I looked into your head. Your conscious mind doesn’t recall your transformation, but your unconscious does, albeit murkily. Someday, when time doesn’t press, perhaps I can help you recover the memory... if you’re interested.”

Dan scowled. “I don’t understand why you’re telling me this —”

Tithonys smiled. “We’ll get to that.”

“—7 but I do see that you aren’t giving me any proof. I’m just supposed to take your word for it.”

“Not so. Be patient, I’m building a case. We’ve already discussed your unusual strength. Now consider the weakness you’ve developed since drinking Melpomene’s vitae. The tendency to stand helplessly transfixed before beauty. The Achilles’ heel of your treacherous mistress’ bloodline.” “Like you said, I caught it from drinking her blood.” Tithonys grinned boyishly. Despite himself, Dan felt a pang of affection for his captor. “Take it from an old diabolist. You can’t ‘catch’ other vampires’ handicaps that way. Otherwise I’d be as ugly as a Nosferatu, as hairy as a Gangrel, as short-tempered as a Brujah — well, you get the idea. That second drink from your sire’s veins merely activated a trait which, like certain of your abilities, has lain dormant inside you since the draft that made you.”

Belatedly Dan remembered something Melpomene had told him, a fact that seemed to contradict what Tithonys was saying. “Wait a minute. Melpomene told me that she had spent most of the last hundred years hibernating.”

“If so, and I think you’ve discovered just how far you should trust her word, then she roused herself long enough to create you. Although she evidently had no notion that I’d already returned from the afterlife, perhaps she, psychic that she is, had a premonition that she might need you, a powerful agent with no perceptible ties to her, a seasoned combat veteran who’d grown up in Sarasota and was thus well prepared to act in its defense. An ace in the hole. Or perhaps it was merely a precaution. We ancients concoct safeguards to defend ourselves against the unlikeliest contingencies. It’s what keeps us alive.”

“Why didn’t she tell me this herself?”

Tithonys arched an eyebrow. “Would you have pledged her your allegiance if she had? Haven’t you always hated the sire who Embraced and then abandoned you?”

Dan’s muscles tightened in rage. He couldn’t tell to what extent Tithonys’ charismatic powers had evoked the surge of emotion and to what extent it simply flowed from his heart. “Yes,” he admitted.

“And you don’t even know the full extent of her abuse.” Dan stared at him. “What do you mean by that?” Tithonys squeezed the prisoner’s shoulder as if to comfort him. “She didn’t want to teach and nurture you herself. That might have compromised your usefulness. But she couldn’t allow you to find affection or a master who would accept your fealty elsewhere, either, for fear that she wouldn’t be able to lure you into her service when the time was right. And so she laid two curses on you.

“First, she deprived you of the ability to feel affection for kine. Many Kindred pursue friendships with mortals for centuries after their transformations. A few never lose their fondness and their empathy for humankind. But you felt alienated from your prey immediately, didn’t you?"

Dan swallowed. “Yes.”

“Second, she put an invisible mark on your brow, a stain that would make you repellent to other vampires. And thus you’ve always been scorned, and desperately lonely. She removed the symbol the night she met you on the beach. Had she not, Wyatt Vandercar and his anarch tools might not have welcomed you even after you saved them from the Brujah.”

Dan remembered how, as he was sucking blood from her, Melpomene’s fingertip had traced a symbol on his forehead.

Her touch had left a tingling trail. He decided that everything Tithonys had told him was true: the female Methuselah was responsible for every bit of the misery he’d endured over the past thirty years. The realization made his fangs ache in their sockets. “God damn her,” he growled.

Tithonys smiled. “Why should we let the Deity have all the fun? If you’ll help me find Melpomene, we can punish her ourselves.”

Puzzled, Dan peered up at him. “I don’t know how to find her. I’m surprised you didn’t get
that
from my memory.”

“I did,” Tithonys said. “But you’re her childe. Her blood. The two of you are linked on the astral plane. If you’ll open your mind and soul to me willingly, completely, I believe I can attack her through you.”

For a moment, still seething with hate for Melpomene, Dan was tempted to go along with the plan. Then another reflexive flash of repugnance at the notion of having his innermost being invaded cut through the haze of fury.

He had to remember that Tithonys was a Methuselah too, and, beneath his preternatural charm, no doubt as icily intent on controlling him as Melpomene had ever been. If Dan were fool enough to take part in whatever piece of black magic his captor was proposing, there was no telling what terrible harm it might do him.

No, damn it, he was through being anybody’s flunky. He just wanted out of this nightmare. But maybe if he pretended to go along with the program, Tithonys would set him free. Trying to control his emotions — a painful tangle of fear, anger and, still, the irrational affection that the goldenskinned vampire had instilled in him — he said, “I’m with you. Let’s kill the bitch.”

Tithonys studied him for a moment, then sighed and shook his head. “Dan, Dan, Dan. You can’t deceive me. I’m too old and wise. I can see your aura too clearly. But
why
won’t you help me? Melpomene betrayed and abandoned you

twice:
once when she Embraced you, and once when she left you to perish last night. And my cause is just. She murdered the only person I ever loved. Hell, she’s been committing similar atrocities since the dawn of time. Are you concerned about doing something that might endanger her other pawrns in this game she and I are playing? If so, I can’t imagine why. Roger Phillips and his people certainly never did anything for you. And they’re doomed in any case.”

Dan’s eyes narrowed. “How’s that?”

“As I told you, a wary old general like me is prepared for every contingency. Even as one scheme fails, it empowers a
new
strategy. Long ago, I laid plans to curse Prince Roger into madness. Since 1 needed some of the prince’s personal items for the spell — they’re buried in this chamber — I enslaved one of his progeny to steal them and to serve as my spy thereafter. I arranged the murder of Mary Sinclair, the wife of Phillips’ chief lieutenant, to cripple the grieving husband psychologically. And I recruited Durrell to organize a multifaceted campaign against the Kindred of Sarasota. The goal of it all, of course, was to destroy Melpomene’s descendants and the artistic treasures they’d created, gradually and painfully. I knew that such a calamity would devastate her even if it didn’t draw her out into the open.

“Alas, the strategy isn’t panning out. With the Toreador’s beloved Phillips unable to command, Elliott Sinclair was supposed to prove inadequate as a leader; but somehow he’s pulled himself together and is holding the line rather well. And now you, unbeknownst to poor Durrell, have provided crucial information about him and his efforts to Melpomene. She in turn has passed it along to her soldiers, who intend to launch a surprise counteroffensive after the park closes, in the final hours before dawn.”

Tithonys smiled. “But it doesn’t matter a bit. Because, having met you, I have a new plan.

“When Sinclair and his friends invade the fortress above our heads, they’ll find to their dismay that the resident

ofT!ffiSKUNG
^,
?W!N

Kindred have had a
little
advance warning of their arrival. The resultant fighting will be chaotic and bloody in the extreme, and because the gore in question will be of supernatural origin, it will generate an energy I can use for occult purposes. Specifically, to strike down every living or undead being — except for you and me, of course — for miles around.”

Dan gaped at the ancient vampire. “We’re just outside Orlando. You’re talking about thousands, probably tens of thousands, of innocent people. Why the hell would you want to do that?”

“As a sacrifice to
my
patron, the Count of the Wasteland,” Tithonys said. “In return, he’ll grant me the power I need to reach through you and smite your mistress. I’d
like
to believe that I have enough power to destroy her unassisted, but she
is
my peer, and she did kill
me
once, so it would be foolish to take chances.” Sighing, he shook his head. “Please believe me, ordinarily I wouldn’t be so profligate with the lives of the masses, or betray and squander my servants either. But I’m on the brink of a final victory.” As he spoke, his somber expression gradually warped into a savage grin.
“Now,
not in five hundred or a thousand years. You can’t imagine the joy I’m feeling!”