SCROLLS OF THE DEAD-3 Complete Vampire Novels-A Trilogy (64 page)

And then he ravaged her, ripping the jugular vein from her throat and closing his wide mouth over the wound in order to catch the flow.

She was old and frail and skinny. She tasted of dust and resin, of bone marrow gone dry and musty. She was hardly an appetizer. She hadn't lasted seconds past the opened wound in her throat, her terrified gaze falling dead and her eyes turning back in her head.

Before the night was over, Charles had stalked and taken six victims in the little African town. On his way back to the caves on Lanzarote Island, he glanced at the yellow moon in the sky, and inside his mind he howled like a victorious beast on the first night of a ravenous rampage.

Soon, he told himself, soon I will have my victims brought to me bound and shivering. Soon I will make both vampire and human tremble when I pass by. Soon I will control the world and every living thing in it.

5

Days passed without incident for Malachi in the little cabin behind the country store. He took his meals with Howard and the twins, careful not to complain about the old man's cooking, despite the fact it was frequently inedible. The dinners ran to beans and franks, beef stew filled with more potatoes and peas than beef, and tomato soup served alongside bologna sandwiches. Breakfast was better, since there wasn't much Howard could do to eggs that could ruin them. The days he cooked oatmeal, however, was another story. Oatmeal Howard's way turned out thick as tar and so salty Malachi could hardly eat it.

Dottie and Jeremy took to hanging out with Malachi during the day. He tinkered with his old motorcycle, and Jeremy liked handing him tools. Dottie enjoyed fetching cans of cola for him to drink. As he got to know the twins, he came to admire their genuine sweetness. Though their grandfather doted on them, they were as unspoiled as a peaceful summer day.

"What will you do if something happens to your granddad?" Malachi asked one afternoon. He hadn't meant to get involved, but he really liked the old man and his grandchildren.

"I'll take all the money from the register, call my great-aunt in Plainview, Texas, and have her come get us," Dottie said.

"So you've already thought it all out. That's good.”

“Grandpa helped us," Jeremy said. "He gave us his sister's phone number."

"I keep it in my purse," Dottie said. She lifted the glamorous little silver purse from her side and shook it a hale. Every morning Dottie put on a new dress, some of them much too large for her so that the skirts dragged on the ground. Malachi suspected these dresses came from her mother's closet, left there when her mother had died so many years ago. After putting on a dress Dottie carefully applied makeup. But shoes weren't in the picture. "I hate wearing shoes," she confided. "I have lots of shoes cause Grandpa keeps buying them for me in case I change my mind and wear them, but I won't."

"I don't like shoes either. I don't even like underwear," Jeremy said, not to be outdone.

Malachi laughed. "Why don't you like shoes?" he asked Dottie.

"They pinch my feet. When they're new, they rub blisters on my heels. I'd rather go barefoot. I really like it when it rains and I can squish my toes in mud. But it don't rain much here." Dottie gave him a wistful smile.

"They pinch my feet, too," Jeremy echoed.

Malachi glanced at the boy before looking at Dottie again. They sure were twins, all right. "Why do you wear makeup, Dottie?"

"I just like it," she said. "Like going barefoot."

"Don't you want to wait until you're all grown up to wear lipstick and stuff? Little girls don't usually wear makeup because their faces are so pretty anyway. You have a pretty face."

"Thank you," she said, preening, "but I just like it." She reached up and patted her rouged cheeks.

"You don't wear it to school, do you?"

"Makeup? Oh, no. When school starts, I only wear real light pink lipstick. They'd send me to the principal's office if I wore mascara and rouge."

Malachi forced himself not to smile this time. "Hand me the wrench," he said to Jeremy, turning to work on the bike's chain.

It was the eleventh day Malachi had been staying at the cabin when the vampires came. He thought he'd escaped them. He thought they'd lost him and after a couple of months they would give up the search.

Due to his naïveté they caught him unaware, bent over his bike as he worked. Dottie was inside getting him a soda and Howard was busy concocting another inedible stewed or boiled supper. Jeremy stood faithfully at Malachi's side, a dedicated assistant.

The first Malachi knew the vampires were there, they had him by the scruff of the neck, hauling him backward to the ground. He saw them then, surrounding him, and there were more than he'd ever seen before. His heart quadrupled in its beating and he found it hard to breathe. He thought of home, the ranch. He thought of how his mother had so often known before he did when the assassins came for him. She'd been like an early warning system.

"Go inside," Malachi told Jeremy. The boy, rooted to the spot, began to back away slowly and the vampires let him go.

"Where's your mama, half-breed?" one of them asked as if reading Malachi's mind.

"Don't talk to him. Let's get him out to the desert and get it over with," another said.

Malachi began to struggle, throwing off the hands that grasped him. He stood quickly, his heart still beating furiously. He backed away just as Jeremy had done. He needed a weapon, some kind of weapon. Oh, God, he thought, looking at them as they advanced, their fangs showing as they snarled. There are eight of them. How will I . . . ?

At that moment Dottie came from the back door of the store with his cold drink. She stood riveted to the steps, her eyes going wide in terror. Jeremy reached the steps and ran up them to his sister.

"Run, Dottie, go inside and lock the doors!" he said.

She dropped the can, cola spewing across the dry ground. She turned, opening the screen door and rushing inside with Jeremy. Within a minute the children emerged again, this time trailing their grandfather.

Malachi saw the old man had a shotgun. He pointed it at the group and said, "What the hell do you think you're doing? Leave that boy alone and get off my property."

"Go back inside, Howard," Malachi pleaded. "Take the kids, lock the doors."

"Yeah, go away, old man," one of the vampires said, turning his head to show the intruder his fangs.

Howard stared hard at the vampire, taking in the fangs, and now his eyes widened as Dottie's had earlier. "What are you?" he whispered. The shotgun trembled in his hands, the barrel wavering. Both children slipped behind his legs, holding onto the denim of his overalls.

"I can show you." The vampire began to approach the steps.

"Jeremy! Get me the shovel, hurry!" Malachi danced away from the Predators, speeding so fast only the vampires were able to see his movement. He had moved closer to the store.

"You go to hell, whatever you are," Howard said, and pulled the trigger on the double-barreled shotgun. The vampire had nearly reached him at that point. The blast took off the vampire's head, knocking him backward and to the ground. He didn't move. Two more vampires changed direction from where they stalked Malachi and came toward the old man, hissing.

Howard fumbled with shells he withdrew from a jacket pocket. He got them socked into the chambers and snapped the gun shut, raised it, and said, "I wouldn't if I were you."

Dottie had hurried back into the house with her brother. Jeremy ran through the building to the front door. He slammed it open and flew across the porch, racing around the house away from the killers in the back. He hit the door of the shed, knocking it open and went straight for the shovel leaning against empty snake cages. He hurried out with it again, going around the store in the opposite direction now, hoping to get close enough to Malachi to hand the shovel over. He'd heard the shotgun blast, and tears sprang to his eyes, but it didn't slow him down.

Howard shot one of the vampires coming for him, turned the barrel and shot the other. Both of the creatures fell back to the ground, but even as Howard chambered two more shells he saw the two vampires he'd shot rise up again. Miraculously the middle of their bodies were as untouched as if they'd never been shot. Shirts hung in shreds from their bodies around their middles, revealing unblemished skin.

"My God," Howard said, talking to himself. He was sweating now and fumbling in his pocket for more shells. "What do I need? I need a stake, I need a silver bullet, I need a crucifix . . ."

Malachi was in a fight for his life, unable to give his attention to the old man. He threw off three vampires who were attacking, all of them biting at him on arms and chest and face. He screamed, the pain shooting through him like fire. He, too, would heal quickly, but not nearly as quickly as a true immortal.

He saw Jeremy coming, running as fast as his feet would carry him, the shovel held across the front of his body. He had to get the Predators off him so he could take the shovel. He could use the shovel's blade to slow down his attackers and when he got the chance, he could use it to lop off their heads, thereby rendering them dead forever.

He turned, beginning to spin so that the vampires couldn't latch onto him. His mind fell away, and he was simply flesh intent on survival. His movement was so swift that he looked like a blur. The vampires fell back a step or two, taken off guard. They never expected a dhampir to employ such ability. Balthazar had told them Malachi was unusual, that he was formidable, but they hadn't believed him. A half-breed as fast and deadly as they were? It had to be a lie.

Malachi leaped toward Jeremy just as he neared the melee. He took the shovel from his trembling hands. He stood still now, feet apart, the shovel held before him. He said, "Hide, Jeremy. Run and hide. Now!"

The two vampires Howard had wounded reached him on the store's back steps before the old man could chamber the next shells. The shotgun was ripped from his hands, causing him to wobble on his feet. He cried out in surprise and fear, but his cry was cut off by a roundhouse knock to the head with the butt end of the shotgun. He fell where he stood, crumpling to the ground unconscious and bleeding.

The vampire who had struck him dropped the shotgun, leaned down, and pierced the side of the old man's throat with one long fingernail. Blood welled and the vampire went to his knees, his face closing on the puncture. The other vampire turned back to Malachi.

Malachi began to fight in earnest. He knew one of the Predators was feeding on Howard and if he didn't get to him soon, he would be dead. The vampires surrounding Malachi backed off, wary of the sharp spade end of the shovel, their gazes following the rhythmic swinging motions as it sliced back and forth through the air.

Malachi advanced with such speed his attackers couldn't retreat. One by one Malachi took them down, slicing off the head of one, shoving the blade into another's midsection to slow him, striking another against the shoulder to knock him off his feet. All around Malachi the frenzy rose, the death-dealing so fast a mortal couldn't have followed it.

Malachi knew he was only able to outwit and outfight the vampires because he drew on the inner reserves that belonged to his own vampire heritage. He did not know how he had been so blessed with strength and agility, and he had no time to question it now, but it was obvious to his enemies he was no ordinary dhampir. He was no weak half-breed. In fact, he was as awesome in warfare as a monster killing machine. Despite the Predators' fearsome abilities, Malachi was superior to them.

With five of the eight mortally wounded or dead, Malachi went after the vampire kneeling over the old man, taking his life from the jugular in great draughts. He knocked him aside and buried the shovel blade into the vampire's stomach, withdrew it and used the spade as a hammer, swinging it high above his head and bringing it down with tremendous force on the enemy's neck, severing it from the convulsing body.

Six down, two more to take care of, Malachi thought frantically, swinging around to attack the remaining vampires. He saw he was alone, and panic filled him. He glanced down at Howard and realized the old man's eyes were open and fully dilated. He was gone. He'd been too late to save him.

What about Dottie and Jeremy? Was he too late for them, too? Jesus.

He sped across the yard, looked in the shed, found it empty. He scanned the rows of rattlesnakes and saw many of the cages had been knocked from their stands, the latches holding the cages closed having come undone. All around him on the desert ground swarmed the rattlesnakes, some fleeing into the nearby desert land, some curling, ready to strike. He backed away from them and turned. He rushed around the house and saw no one in front of the place. Up and down the long straight highway the lanes were empty.

Inside. They must have gone inside.

He flung open the door and entered the dark store, his vision adjusting immediately from his adrenaline rush. He saw nothing moving, no hint of the vampires. But he could feel them. He could sense their cold presence.

He ran into the back rooms where there was a kitchen and bedrooms. He heard voices and followed them, the shovel raised. He couldn't let them hurt the twins. He'd fight to the death for them.

He pushed open a bedroom door and thought he was hallucinating. Could he be dreaming?

It was the twins' bedroom, obviously, decorated with cartoon wallpaper. On one of the twin beds lay Jeremy Stretched out on his back. On the floor two vampires lay dead, decapitated, blood from their mortal wounds spreading in wide puddles across the hardwood. Between their bodies lay Dottie, her dress soaking in blood, her throat torn open. Calm, dead eyes stared unseeing at the ceiling. And over the bed stood Mentor and Ross looking down at the male child, their backs to him.

Malachi dropped the shovel. His whole body went weak, and he caught the doorjamb to keep from crumpling. He couldn't stand this. Couldn't. It couldn't be true. He had fought so hard, he had taken down the enemies with as much speed as he could command. How could they have killed the children? Even monsters should hesitate to take the life from a child. "Mentor," he whispered.