The Chaos Curse (16 page)

“Oo oi!” Pikel heartily agreed.

Cadderly’s answer blew away any logic that Ivan could muster against going back into the library, against facing Rufo, whether or not the night had fallen.

“Danica is in there!”

Their legs were shorter, but their love for Danica was no less, and as Cadderly straightened and slowed, trying to figure out how to get through the barrier, trying to discern if the portal had been dangerously warded or trapped, Ivan and Pikel flew past him, heads down, calling out a united “Oooo!”

Rufo had bolstered the doors with both enchantments and heavy furniture and had placed half a dozen zombies behind the barrier, with orders to stand very still and simply hold the doors closed.

He shouldn’t have bothered. By the time Ivan and Pikel had played out their momentum, they were facedown in the foyer, with splintered wood and furniture and zombies raining down all about them.

Cadderly came in on the heels of the dwarves, his holy symbol held out strong and chanting the melodies of Deneirian music. He felt his power diminish as soon as he crossed the threshold into the desecrated place, but had enough of his momentum with him, and enough sheer anger and determination, to complete his call to his god.

The six zombies rose stubbornly and advanced on the dwarves and Cadderly. Then they froze in place, expressionless, and a golden light limned them all, head to toe. The edge where that light met either ragged clothing or skin blurred, and the glow intensified.

A moment later, the zombies were piles of dust on the floor.

Back by the entrance, Cadderly slumped against the jamb and nearly swooned, amazed at the effort it had taken him to bring Deneir into this place-amazed yet again that the Edificant Library, his library, his home, had become a place so foreign and uninviting.

She did not scream when Rufo leaned over her, because she did not think that anyone could hear. Neither did she struggle, for her bindings were too tight, her weakness too complete.

“Danica,” she heard Rufo say softly, and the sound of her own name disgusted her, coming from that one.

The monk fell deeper into herself, tried to fall away from her corporeal body, for she knew what was to come. And for all that Danica had endured in her short life, the loss of her parents, the years of brutal and unforgiving training, the battles on the trail, she did not think she could survive this.

Rufo leaned closer; she smelled the stench of his breath. Instinctively, she opened her eyes and saw his fangs. She struggled hard against the unyielding bonds. She closed her eyes tightly, trying to deny the reality of this hellish scene, trying to will it away.

Danica felt the sting as Kierkan Rufo’s fangs punctured her neck.

The vampire groaned in ecstacy, and Danica was filled with disgust. All she wanted was to get away, to flee her own battered body. She thought she would die, and she wanted to die.

To die.

The idea hung in her swirling thoughts, a flicker of salvation, the one route of escape from this horrid monster and the state of undeath that he desired for her.

Danica felt the sickness in her leg, felt the pain through all her beaten body, and she let go her defenses, accepted that sickness and pain, basked in it, called to it.

To die…

Kierkan Rufo knew true ecstacy for the first time in his life, a greater pleasure than even imbibing the chaos curse, when he felt the pulse of Danica’s blood coming to his taste. Danica! This was far better than any vampiric meal he had tasted thus far. Danica! Rufo had desired her, craved her, since the moment he had first seen her, and now she would be his!

So lost was the vampire in the realization of his own fantasy, that it took Rufo a long moment to understand that the woman’s blood was no longer pumping, that any sweetness he extracted from the wound on Danica’s neck had to be taken forcefully. He kicked back to a kneeling position, staring down, perplexed, at this woman who would be his queen.

Danica lay perfectly still. Her breast did not rise and fall with the rhythms of breath; the dots of blood on her neck did not increase from the continuing flow of blood. Rufo could see that he had hit her artery perfectly. With other victims, the blood spurted wildly from such wounds.

But not now. Just little red dots. No force; no pulse.

“Danica?” the vampire asked, fighting hard to keep his voice steady. He knew, though. Beyond any rational doubts, the vampire knew, for Danica’s face was too serene, too pale. And she was too, too perfectly still.

Rufo had wanted to bring Danica from life into undeath, into his realm to be his queen. She was tied and weak and could not escape, or so he thought.

Rufo’s body trembled as he realized what had happened, what Danica had done. He fell back farther from her, to the bottom of the huge four-poster bed, brushed an arm across his bloody face, dark eyes wide with horror, and wider still with outrage. Danica had found an escape; Danica had found the one way out of Rufo’s designs and desires.

Danica had died.

Cadderly, when his wits returned, instinctively believed they should follow that sound, that it would lead to Rufo, and he, in turn, would lead to Danica. The young priest had a difficult time telling his dwarven companions that, though, and had a difficult time in his own mind in rationalizing any decision that would put him closer to the one who had loosed that wail! He looked behind him, out the door, and into the empty night. One step back, he knew, and the song of his god would sound more clearly in his thoughts. One step back… but Danica was ahead.

“Deneir is not with me,” Cadderly whispered, to himself and not the others, “not close.”

“Where are we off to?” Ivan prompted impatiently, his gnarly, hairy brow showing droplets of sweat, more from nerves than exhaustion.

“Up,” Cadderly answered. “It came from the second floor, the private quarters.”

They crossed the foyer and several smaller chambers, past the kitchen where Ivan and Pikel had worked as cooks for many years. They met no enemies, but the library was awakening around them. They knew that, could feel the sensation, a sudden chill in air that was not moving.

“Cadderly.” The voice, the lewd, feminine voice, froze the three in their tracks, barely a dozen steps up the winding stair that led to the second floor. Cadderly, at the head of the line, his light tube in hand, turned about slowly, putting the beam over the low heads of Ivan and Pikel to shine directly on the scarred face of Histra.

The vampiress, baring her fangs, curled and hissed at the intruding light.

Pikel squeaked and launched himself, and his swinging club, smack into her, sending both of them tumbling down the stairs.

Cadderly swung about instinctively, facing up the stairs again, and threw up a defensive arm just in time to catch the charge of a ragged zombie. Back stumbled the priest, and Ivan, not really turning enough to comprehend what was happening up front, ducked and braced. Over the low and immovable dwarf went Cadderly and the zombie, rolling in a clinch to join Pikel and Histra in the hallway below.

Pikel did a series of short hops, trying to flank the crouching vampiress. He waggled his club threateningly, then came forward in a rush, angling the club out and turning a complete spin, once and then again. He swirled out of the ineffective routine, and, dizzy, stumbled a single step.

“Eh?” the confused dwarf asked, for Histra was not in front of him, not where she had been.

Her fist connected on his shoulder, and Pikel spun again. Fortunately for the dwarf, he rotated the other way this time, and somehow the counterspin took all the dizziness from him, so that when he stopped (and luck again was with him), he found himself facing the advancing vampiress squarely.

“Hee hee hee,” Pikel snickered, and he came forth in a tremendous burst, stepping somewhat to the side of his foe. Histra veered quickly to keep square, but Pikel, solid on his big dwarven feet, shifted one foot ahead of the other and threw himself at her in a purely straightforward attack. Hardened muscles corded and snapped, and the dwarf’s tree-trunk club sneaked past Histra’s upraised arm to smack her squarely in the face. She flew back as though launched from a crossbow, to slam the wall, but before Pikel could utter another “hee hee hee,” he realized he had not, in any way, hurt her.

Pikel looked down at his club, then to the confident vampiress, then back to the club again, as though the weapon had deceived him.

“Uh-oh,” the green-bearded dwarf muttered an instant before Histra’s powerful slap sent him spinning. He did a perfect two-and-a-half somersault, ending up standing on his head against the wall.

Cadderly had better success against the zombie. He came up much faster than the awkward thing, and his finger was already set in the loop of the cord to his spindle-disks, two small disks joined by a short metal rod. He sent the adamantine disks spinning down to the end of their cord and recalled them to his hand, once and then again to tighten the string. As the zombie finally pulled itself to its feet, Cadderly snapped them out viciously at the thing’s face.

The young priest winced at the sound of crunching bone. The zombie staggered backward several steps, but, compelled by commands it had not the intelligence to question, it came right back in, arms stupidly out wide.

The spindle-disks slammed home again, right under the chin, and when the thing began its next advance, its head lolled weirdly, with all of the supporting neck bones shattered.

It didn’t rise again after the third hit, but as it fell to the floor, a tumbling dwarven missile, Pikel Bouldershoulder, went right over it, leaving the ground between Cadderly and Histra wide open.

Cadderly heard Ivan up on the stairs, engaged with some enemy. He glanced that way momentarily, then looked back to find that Histra had closed the ground, standing just a couple of feet before him, smiling that terrible, fanged smile.

Cadderly hit her solidly in the chest with the spindle-disks as she brazenly walked in, but the weapon only knocked her back a step, and she smiled again, even more widely, showing that it had not hurt her.

“Dear Cadderly,” she purred. “You have no defense against me.” Cadderly, like Pikel before him, looked down to the disks as if he had been deceived.

“Would you not prefer the fate I offer you?” Histra said teasingly. She seemed such a grotesque caricature to Cadderly, a mocking insult to the alluring, sensual woman she had once been. As a priestess of Sune, the Goddess of Love, Histra had primped and perfumed, had kept her curvy body in perfect physical condition, and had kept a light in her eyes that promised the purest of pleasure to any man she deemed worthy.

But now the skin of her face sagged, as did her cleavage, showing between the tatters of what had once been a beautiful crimson gown. And no perfume could overcome the burned stench that surrounded the maimed vampiress. Even worse, by Cadderly’s estimation, was the look in her eyes, once a promise of pleasure, now the diabolical fires of unholiness, of evil incarnate.

“I offer you life,” the ugly vampiress purred. “A better deal, for Rufo will offer only death.”

Cadderly bolstered himself in the face of that awful image, and in the mere mention of Kierkan Rufo, using both to reinforce his faith, using both as a symbol, a clear reminder, of the fall to temptation. Up came his holy symbol, the light tube behind it, and never had the young priest presented the light of Deneir with so much of his heart in it.

Rufo had resisted Cadderly’s symbol earlier, but Histra was not the master here, was still far from the full powers of vampirism. She stopped her advance immediately and began trembling.

“By the power of Deneir!” Cadderly cried, advancing a step, holding the symbol high and angling it down so that its flaring weight drove Histra to her knees.

“Well, we ain’t going out that way!” A bruised and bloody Ivan cried as he half ran, half tumbled out of the stairway.

Cadderly growled and pushed the light lower, and Histra groveled and whimpered. Then the young priest looked to the stairs, to the host of zombies that were shuffling down behind Ivan. He looked across the hall, to Pikel, who was thankfully up again and running in circles -no, dancing, Cadderly realized. For some reason that Cadderly could not understand, Pikel was dancing around his club, gesturing with his stubby hands, his mouth moving more than Cadderly had ever seen it move.

Ivan took up the fight again at the entrance to the stairs, his mighty, wickedly sharp axe taking limbs off reaching, stubborn zombies with every swing. “There’s a hunnerd o’ the damned things!” the dwarf bellowed.

Something faster and more sinister than the zombies stepped through their ranks to stand before the dwarf. Ivan’s axe met it head-on, and right in the chest, but as the blade connected, the vampire, not flinching, caught it by the handle and pushed it harmlessly aside.

“Hunnerd and one,” the dwarf corrected dryly.

Cadderly growled and forced the symbol of his god right down on Histra’s forehead, acrid smoke belching from the wound. The vampiress tried to reach up and fight off the attack, but there was no strength in her trembling arms.

“I deny you, and I damn you!” Cadderly growled, pressing with all his strength. Again, Histra was caught by the fact that she had not yet mastered her new state of undeath, that she could not quickly and easily transform into a bat or some other creature of the night, or melt into vapors and flow away.

“Hold him back!” Cadderly, knowing he had Histra defenseless, cried to Ivan. He started to call to Pikel, but just grunted, seeing that the dwarf was still weirdly dancing, worried that the dwarfs sensibilities had been knocked clear of his green-bearded head.

Ivan growled and launched a furious attack on the vampire, hitting the thing several times. But the monster, and its horde of zombies behind it, inevitably advanced. If it had been a loyal thing, a true comrade, the vampire would have rushed past the dwarf to save Histra, but as one of Rufo’s two remaining vampiric minions, Baccio of Carradoon looked upon the powerful young priest and his flaring holy symbol and knew fear. Besides, Baccio realized, the demise of Histra would only strengthen his position as Rufo’s second.

And so the vampire allowed this frantic and ineffective dwarf to hold him at bay.

Soon Cadderly was engulfed with black smoke. He kept up his call to Deneir, kept pressing the eye-above-candle on Histra’s forehead, though he could no longer even see her through the acrid cloud. Finally, the vampiress collapsed, and Cadderly heard the thump as Histra fell hard to the floor. As the smoke wafted away, Cadderly saw that it was finished. He could only imagine-and he shuddered when he did!-the reward that awaited Histra. He thought of black, huddled shadows pouncing on her damned soul, dragging her down to hellish eternity. Still, the vampiress seemed much more peaceful in real death than she had a moment before. Her eyes reverted to their natural color, and she seemed almost at rest. Perhaps even great sins could be forgiven.

Cadderly had no more time to think about Histra. A single glance over his shoulder told him that he and his friends were being beaten back once more, that they could not, despite their fears for Danica and their determination to rescue the monk, defeat the library, Rufo’s library, in the dark of night.

Baccio, too, had seen enough. With a single swipe of his hand, he sent Ivan flying away, skidding across the floor right beside Pikel. Pikel picked up his club with one hand and his battered brother with the other.

Cadderly cried out and faced the vampire squarely, presenting his symbol as he had against Histra. Baccio, an older and wiser man, and one who had more willingly gone into Rufo’s service, flinched, but did not back down.

Cadderly thrust his arm forward, and Baccio winced again. Cadderly called out to Deneir and advanced a step, and Baccio found that he had to fall back. It lasted only a second, and Cadderly knew he had the upper hand, knew that if he pressed on with all his faith, he could destroy this one as he had destroyed Histra.

Baccio knew it, too, but the vampire smiled wickedly, unexpectedly, and mentally commanded his legion of zombies to swarm about him, to block him from the light of Cadderly’s faith.

The first of those unthinking monsters was limned with light, as were the zombies Cadderly had met and defeated when first he and the dwarves had come back into the library. That one dissolved to dust, as did the next, but there were simply too many of the things.

Another shriek, a most terrifying wail, resounded off the walls, echoed down the stairway.

“The master is coming,” Baccio mused from the back of the horde.

“To the door!” Ivan cried, and Cadderly, though his heart ached to think of Danica in this ungodly place, knew the dwarf was correct.

They rambled down the hall, easily outdistancing the slow-moving zombies. Pikel spun around the first door, slammed it closed behind them, and threw its latch.

“We will take another way up,” Cadderly remarked, and he began scouring his memories, searching for the fastest route to the back stairs.

Baccio’s hand smashed through the door, and the vampire’s fingers casually began searching for the latch.

The three friends were running again, through the small rooms, past the kitchen, closing every door behind them. They came into the foyer, the dwarves angling for the open door, and Cadderly tried to push them straight across, toward the south wing and main chapel, where there was a balcony that led up to the second floor.

“Not out!” the young priest insisted.

“Not in!” Ivan promptly countered.

Kierkan Rufo was before them suddenly, halfway between the door to the open night and the door to the hall that would take them to the main chapel.

“Not anywhere,” Ivan, skidding to a stop, remarked.

Up came Cadderly’s holy symbol, the light tube shining behind it, casting its image on Rufo’s face.

The vampire, trembling with rage at Danica’s death, didn’t shy away in the least, but began a steady approach that promised nothing short of a terrible death to the young priest