Under a Ghostly Moon (Jerry Moon Supernatural Thrillers Book 1) (33 page)

Rurik's lurid words spurred Ellie to struggle more ferociously against her bonds.  She screamed furiously against the gag in her mouth. The sound that she was making transformed into something close to an angry roar as she fought desperately to break free.  Moon realised with a kind of pride that she was more furious than afraid.

"
You don't expect me to stand by and let you destroy someone in my care, do you, you overgrown arsehole?" shouted Uri. The vampiric power began to flow into him from wherever it normally lay hidden.  As it unfolded through him he appeared to grow in size and his face contorted into a snarling mask.  The girls moved in on either side of him so they could present a combined front to the ancient vampire lord, their own sleek bodies rippling with barely contained power.

"
Shit!" commented Avril, her face a picture of unveiled astonishment.  "Is that what they really look like?

"
No," Rurik replied to Uri's rhetorical question, a sly smile passing over his face.  "I expect you to help me!" Then his massive brows knit together in concentration as he summoned up the full force of his evil will.

Uri groaned and half turned towards Moon, hands grasping the air as he fought to restrain himself
.  "Sorry, my friend," he gasped through gritted teeth.  "I should not have come here…  I forgot..."

"
Yes!" laughed Rurik.  "You forgot that you belong to me body and soul.  Forgot the liege-hold I had over you even before we became what we are now.  You have grown stronger since we parted, Uri, I will give you that.  The old Uri could never have dreamed to resist me as you do now, but you'll never break the rightful hold I have over you and your bloodkin."

Moon risked a quick look around.  Charlie and Roanne
also struggled desperately to prevent themselves from attacking their friends.

"
Seize them, my people!" Rurik roared to his cultists. "Their blood and bodies will be yours tonight, I promise you.  Fear not the vampires for they are entangled in my will like flies caught in a web."

There was a moment
's hesitation then Rurik’s fledgling brood swarmed around them like a pack of wolves.  Obeying their master’s command, they ignored the vampires and went straight for the humans.

There was an agonised groan from Moon
's right and one of their attackers, a short, flabby man, crumpled to the ground clutching his knee.  The foreleg beneath was twisted at an unnatural angle, which made Moon wince involuntarily.  That had to hurt!

"
Yes, and there's more of the same for any of you bastards that try to come near me!" yelled Avril menacingly.

In the short pause that
followed Moon aimed a regretful look at Sonia, who shrugged.  "I think we're fucked," she said, her eyes searching desperately for a way of escape.  She turned quickly and kissed him hard on the lips.  "It was nice knowing you, Jerry Moon!" Then the enemy rushed them again and they were fighting for their lives.  Four men surrounded Avril and managed to wrestle her to the floor, although one was unconscious and another was missing an ear by the time they had her pinned.

While he and Sonia tried to fight their way to help their fallen friend,
Moon knocked one assailant aside with a roundhouse punch to the jaw and found himself face to face with the loony evangelist from Gloucester Road.  She still looked crazy but now she had fangs.  The surprise of seeing her free from custody must have shown clearly on Moon's face.  "Oh, we has very good lawyers," she explained with a mocking grim.  "Now the Master say I can 'ave you body an' blood," she hissed.  "I not sure which I wants first!" she laughed and slashed at him with her knife.  "Blood, I guess."

"
Sorry, bitch, all mine!" shouted Sonia as she lunged past Moon and pierced the crazy woman's chest with the sharp point of a broken chair leg.  Their assailant screamed furiously as she burst into flames.  In a last act of madness, her knife snaked forward out of the engulfing flames and raked down Sonia's right arm, leaving a long dark gash from wrist to elbow.  "Shit!" yelled Sonia as she tried to stem the flow of blood with her hand.  Another vampire took the opportunity her confusion to blind-side her, felling her with a wildly placed blow behind her right ear.

Within moments
it was all over.  Partly stunned and bleeding, Moon, Sonia and Avril were held firmly by beefy disciples as Rurik paced smugly back and forth in front of them.  "Well, Seer, your ragamuffin army seems to have failed you…  So sad!" He forced his twisted lips into a mocking moue.  "All that remains now is for you to die.  But you have brought two most tasty morsels for tonight's repast.  He gestured at Sonia and Avril.  "So I think I will deal with them first." He gestured lewdly at his freshly aroused penis and Moon felt hatred rise in him like a cold tide.  The intensity of the emotion astonished him and brought with it the stark realisation of how much he truly loved Sonia.  "...After I've finished with our gallant Gregory's lovely gift of course," Rurik rasped hungrily as he turned back to where Ellie struggled on the makeshift altar.  "Hold her," he ordered Charli and Roanne and, although tears of anger and desperation fell from their eyes, they were powerless to disobey.

Rurik

Ellie was far from content to play the placid victim, however.  As the vampire moved to position himself between her legs, her struggles freed her left ankle, which allowed her to draw her leg back as far as it would go and drive her heel hard into Rurik's groin with a force that made Moon gasp.  The monster howled and doubled over clutching his bruised balls.  The resulting pain broke Rurik's concentration and freed Uri and the girls from his control.  Snarling like enraged tigers, they turned on the surrounding cultists with angry vigour.  Uri swooped down on Rurik before he had a chance to regain his composure and began kicking his former master repeatedly in the nuts.  "That's the problem with returning to the flesh isn't it, Rurik? It hurts!"

"
It will only add greater pleasure to what I intend to do to you," hissed Rurik painfully, raising himself from the ground with the tips of his huge wings.  "A vampire can be tortured for a long, long time and never die." His mouth split into a jagged, fang-filled grin as he reasserted his will on the vampires, despite the obvious pain caused by Uri's efforts to keep him distracted.  "I will hear you beg me for death ten thousand times before I tire of it."

Moon saw Uri and his ladies stiffen as Rurik
's dominance robbed them of any hope they might have had for victory. 
"If you intend to call for aid, now would be a good time,"
a dark, earthy voice rumbled through Moon's mind.

"
Yes, of course I need help!"
Moon vibed impatiently.
"Isn't it obvious?"

"
Nevertheless, you must still ask,"
replied the voice. 
"It is the rules."

Moon realised that, whoever this potential saviour was, he wasn
't very bright. 
"Alright,"
he replied, ducking a cultist's hurtling fist. 
"Help... Please!"

At Moon's silent bidding dark, blocky figures flowed lava- like out of the concrete floor.  The ancient lino floor tiles cracked and burst aside as they rose like living statues into the flickering light of the candles and launched themselves violently at the cultists.

"
What the hell are those?" Sonia's eyes were wild with anticipation of more trouble.

"
Gnomes, I guess," replied Moon, realizing Sonia hadn't heard his silent conversation.  "I think they're the cavalry..."

"
Bit on the large side for gnomes, aren't they? And where're their pointy red hats?" asked Avril, who had broken free of her captors, leaving one unconscious and the other wishing he was.

She has some issues to work out, that girl
, thought Moon, shaking his head.

"
Racial stereotypin'!" rumbled a nearby gnome out loud as he bashed two cultists' heads together.  "'Gnomes', as in 'spirits of Earth', yes? 'Sides we only wears the red hats fer weddin's an' foonerals.  'S a sign o' respec', see?"

"
Okay," Avril nodded incredulously.

It was hard to tell how many gnomes were in the room because they seemed to blend in and out of each other as they passed, like soft clay, but Moon estimated about ten
.  They made quick work of Rurik's troops and two of them had taken on the vampire prince himself, wrapping themselves around him like a cage of living rock.  As increasing numbers of their enemies were subdued, more of the gnomes left the fray to help contain Rurik, who was putting up a strong fight, snapping limbs off his captors and casting them away to prevent them from reforming.  The gnomes were quickly running out of substance as they manifested replacement arms and legs.  It wouldn't be long before they satisfied Avril's earlier expectations of size.  "Hurry, seer," cried one, whose granite skin was shot through with veins of silvery metal.  "We cannot hold him long!"

Moon cast a glance towards Uri.  "If only we had the sword you used last time..."

"
It would not work, my friend." Uri shook his head.  "It would only kill the body he possesses.  His foul spirit would live on as powerful as ever."

"
Why don't you try ghost zapping him?" suggested Sonia, her eyes bright with desperate hope.

"
Zap something as powerful as that monster?" asked Moon incredulously.  He shrugged, "Well, I suppose can give it a try."

"
Perhaps we all should," suggested Uri. A blue flame of ghost light snapped out from his forehead and pierced Rurik's chest.

Rurik laughed
.  "You will have to do better than that, you weakling!" he roared, snapping off random bits of gnome as he fought hard against his captors.

"
Now! All at once!" shouted Moon, concentrating and sending a tendril of ghost energy lashing out against Rurik.  Sonia, Uri and the girls followed in suit.  Rurik growled in agony but he still wore the same triumphant grin.

"
It's no use," yelled Charli in frustration.  "There's too much of him!"

Roanne nodded in agreement, turning wearily to look to Moon for any other suggestions
.  Then her eyes widened with amazement.  "What's happening with those?" she asked, pointing to the ghost globes, which were whirling and closing in around Moon's body.  The vampire gasped as a pale nimbus grew between the tiny lights and Moon.  "They're doing something to his aura!"

Rurik
's laughter tailed off as he regarded Moon incredulously.  "What kind of trick is this, Seer?  Do you try to scare me with those tiny ghosts?" he laughed.  "But... I eat ghosts!"

Moon could feel the individual energies of his small companions entwining with his spirit
.  He sensed their cold anger and determination as it engulfed him and stifled the wave of panic that was welling up from inside him.  A feeling of clarity overwhelmed him, bringing with it a sudden realisation... "You know what, Rurik?" he smiled sardonically.  "I think they're about to return the favour!"

Moon lashed out once more, a filament of pure, white flame extending
from his body towards the vampire lord, who countered instinctively with his own red fire.  The two threads of energy collided and entangled.  Then, to Rurik's horror and astonishment, Moon's thread began to pull back, drawing pulsing red streamers of the vampire lord's stolen power along with it.  Around Moon ghostly forms began to take shape: Connor O'Flynn, the navvy; Gordy, the hospital spook; Dominic and several others whom Moon did not recognise.  Then Rurik roared in pain as other tiny pinpoints of light began to flow out of his body towards Moon, punching glowing scarlet holes through the vampire's distorted flesh.  "You cannot do this! It is impossible!" he cried, as he fought to pull the little balls of energy back into himself with his massive claws.

"
Well, I guess I can," replied Moon.  "With a little help from my friends, that is.  That's the trouble with being a bully, Rurik.  It only works while your victims are afraid of you.  Once you've hurt enough people badly enough they get together and fight back." The new ghost balls took their places beside Moon and began to return to human shape.  He realized that these must be the victims of Rurik's cult, who had been taken before they could pass over.  Their sheer numbers amazed him; there must be at least forty people here - forty people whose lives had been sacrificed to this false 'god'.