The Pilgrims of the Damned: A Vampire Thriller, page 11
“Aye,” Miles said. “She shouldn’t have lied. I’m meant to be keeping her safe.”
“I don’t think she lied out of malice,” Sam said.
Church snorted her agreement with Sam, let the vampire pet her for a few seconds, and walked downstairs.
“The dog agrees with me,” Sam said.
“The dog is smarter than both of us,” Miles pointed out. “You going back to New York?”
Sam nodded. “Just so you know, Miles, I’ll be talking to some people in my office about all this. We’ll have my team in Kittery should you need it. If you have to send Amelia out of Maine, we’ll be there to help. I don’t think she’s going to leave willingly. There are parts of Maine that a witch, even one as capable as Amelia, shouldn’t be walking around.”
“There are places in Maine that a vampire shouldn’t be walking around either,” Miles said. “But thanks for your help. If there’s trouble, I’ll get word to Kittery. Somehow. Drest told Amelia something about a satellite phone in Bangor. We’ll get a message to you if needs must.”
Sam walked over to Miles and offered his hand, which Miles shook after standing. The pair embraced. “Be careful, Miles,” Sam said, slapping him on the shoulder. “None of this sounds like a fun time.”
Miles said his goodbyes and walked Sam out, before closing and locking the door. He sat on the step next to the doorway for a moment, then went upstairs and knocked on the bedroom door that Amelia was using.
“Can I come in?” Miles asked.
“Sure.”
Miles opened the door to the master bedroom. The only light in the room was the bedside lamp, illuminating Amelia as she lay in bed reading. She’d changed into an oversized black T-shirt with a picture of Gonzo from the Muppets on it.
“I shouldn’t have been so harsh when we met,” Miles said. “It’s nae your fault I have issues with journalists. It’s nae your fault the First Lords of two Houses decided to involve me in something with no prior warning. I’m sorry.”
“I should have told you everything,” Amelia said, putting the book on the bed beside her. “I’m scared, Miles. I don’t get scared very often, and after tonight, I…”
“It’s difficult to see someone die,” Miles said.
“Is it still difficult for you?”
Miles considered it for a moment. “It depends on the person. Someone I care about, or like, yes, it’s hard. Someone who wants to hurt me or someone I care about, no, not really. I’ve always been this way, which is probably a damning indictment of my upbringing.”
Amelia looked down at her hands, turning them over as if expecting to see them still covered in blood. “The Detective was a good man. He wanted to help. I couldn’t stop him from being killed.”
Miles tried to think of something that might offer Amelia some comfort and came up empty. “I don’t think there’s anything I can say or do that will make what happened better,” he said eventually. “You are alive. That’s all that matters. So while, yes, what happened tonight was horrific, and Detective Hauser didn’t deserve it, it happened, and we need to concentrate on the fact that you didn’t die. I know that’s difficult. I wish it wasn’t. If you need to talk, I’m here. And if you need someone to hug, so is Church.”
Amelia laughed but quickly placed her hands over her mouth as though she’d done something awful. “Not a hugger?”
Miles smiled. “I don’t mind the occasional hug. Church is a lot better at it, though.”
“Would Church come and sleep in here?” Amelia asked.
Miles turned around. “Church,” he called and, within moments, the large dog was in front of him. “You want to keep Amelia company tonight?”
Church wagged her tail and bounded into the room and up onto the bed, giving Amelia’s face a lick.
“Good night, you two,” Miles said.
“Thank you,” Amelia called after him as he closed the door.
Miles made his way back to the front room and out onto the balcony. He mentally figured out what time it would be in Scotland, decided he didn’t much care whom he woke up, removed his mobile phone, and called Drest.
Drest answered on the second ring. “How’s America?”
Miles gave a brief rundown of everything that had happened since he’d arrived. Saying it out loud made it all feel like a lot to deal with for such a short space of time.
“Werewolves and witches,” Drest said. “I didn’t know about the first of those two being involved. A pack of werewolves is unusual, to say the least.”
“Whatever is happening here, with Stuart taking a grimoire and running off to Maine with a werewolf pack, it all feels like a precursor to something much worse.”
“Keep safe in Maine,” Drest said. “I’ll get in contact with Sam, I’ve met him before. We’ll coordinate getting people in Kittery ready to go should you need help. You’re just going to have to get word to us that you need help. So, until you get that satellite phone, you’re on your own. Be careful, Miles. Nothing about this feels good.”
“I’ll be in contact when I can,” Miles said and ended the call. He stood looking out over the darkness of the surrounding neighbourhood for a few minutes, before deciding to go get some rest. Judging by his time in America so far, tomorrow was going to be an exceptionally long day.
Chapter Ten
The journey to Kittery was done the following night, setting off at dusk with Amelia driving. There was little conversation on the hour-long journey, with Miles mostly spending the time running through everything in his head that he’d seen or dealt with in the last few days. Witches and werewolves, neither of which filled him with much joy.
Before he knew it, Amelia was driving over the Piscataqua River bridge and continuing on through what had once been a town with nearly ten thousand people. Despite the buildings still being there, the population was now closer to two or three thousand mostly US military and their families. It was better than some places along the border that were now little more than ghost towns. She stopped the car a few minutes later by what used to be a shopping centre, which had been all but demolished and replaced with a sizeable military outpost. Due to the destruction of several roads—including large parts of the Maine turnpike—it was the only way through Kittery to the rest of Maine.
The entire road, which Miles guessed was technically still called
Route 1, was blocked off with thirty-foot-high concrete walls, topped with razor wire. There were four guard towers, each one equipped with a high-
calibre weapon. An identical checkpoint sat on the opposite side of Spruce Creek—which was where the wall separating Maine and the rest of America officially started. That checkpoint faced out into the wilderness that was Maine.
Amelia stopped at the checkpoint—which was large and imposing enough that it would have given Communist Berlin envy—and spoke to the marine who walked to the car. Three more marines stood back beyond the barricade, and next to a tank. An actual tank. Miles didn’t know the make or model, but you didn’t really need to when faced with a tank. Before they’d arrived, Miles had wondered if a checkpoint would be enough to stop the desolate, and having seen the amount of firepower at their disposal, he figured that at the very least it would give the humans and vampires enough time to sound an alarm. Amelia used the controls on the arm of her door to lower both driver’s and passenger’s windows down and show her credentials to the marine.
A second marine stood by Miles. “And you, sir?” he asked.
Don’t say on vacation, Miles reminded himself, remembering that the guards in places like this tended to have very little in the way of a sense of humour. “I’m with her,” he said.
“And your ID,” the marine said.
When Miles removed his wallet, the marine caught a glimpse of the torc on his wrist. “You’re an Arbiter,” he said.
Miles mentally cursed himself, but smiled all the same. “Aye, I’m her bodyguard. She’s doing a story on the pilgrimage.”
“Just you?” the marine asked.
“And Church,” Miles said, pointing toward her.
“What’s a church?” the marine asked.
Church’s head appeared next to Miles, and the marine took a step back.
“That’s a big dog,” he said slowly.
Miles scratched Church under the chin, never taking his eyes off the marine. “Yes she is.”
“I’m still going to… to need a name,” he said, his voice trembling slightly.
“Miles Watson,” he said. “And you don’t need to worry about Church. She only hurts vampires and desolates.”
Judging from the expression on the marine’s face, that little fact did not actually help the anxiety he was currently feeling. Instead, he took another step back, and turned away and spoke into his radio. “We’ve got a Miles Watson and a really big fucking dog. Like she’s fucking huge.”
“I can hear you,” Miles told him.
The marine turned back to Miles.
“I’m a vampire,” he said, explaining. “Good hearing.”
Let them through, came the gruff-sounding voice on the other end of the radio.
“Go on through,” the marine said immediately.
Church returned to sitting on the back seat as Amelia drove through the checkpoint, going past the tank and through into a large area where there were more tanks and marines. One of the marines directed her to drive through the centre of the military base.
“Apparently we follow the yellow line,” Amelia said, nodding a thank- you and continuing on.
Miles looked around at the hundreds of personnel going about their work. There were Apache helicopters, APCs, several dozen other vehicles all ready and waiting to go. He wondered if any of them had ever been deployed in Maine proper.
“Why haven’t they ever retaken Maine?” Amelia asked as they continued along at the ten-mph speed limit.
“There was talk of it in the early nineties; it was one of the reasons I was sent here,” Miles said. “A few reasons why they didn’t, in the end. Firstly, it was deemed that it would be a massive cost of lives. And the president at the time did nae like the idea of losing a lot of people to reclaim Maine. Secondly, it would cost a fortune to rebuild everything, and to remove the wall that was still mid-construction in some places. It was already costing a lot to build it all in the first place. Thirdly, it was deemed to be an Assembly issue now, so the humans could ignore it as best they could, and the Assembly were quite happy to just let the vampires still living in Maine deal with any problems. A short-sighted way to attack the issue, but no one wanted to actually make it a priority.”
“So, they just walled it off, put troops and guards everywhere, and let everyone inside stay there?” Amelia asked.
“Pretty much,” Miles agreed. “Only a certain number of people inside Maine are allowed out. Usually the large truck convoys that collect supplies and bring them back to the towns. People make a lot of money doing that job.”
“Just driving around Maine, delivering supplies?”
Miles nodded. “Aye. And the people who stayed here have made it their home without the need to worry about the outside world. Yes, it’s dangerous in Maine, but they survived the collapse of society, and most figure they aren’t going to let the desolate win.”
“People do leave, though.”
“They do,” Miles admitted. “A lot have left. Mostly those with family. If humans want to leave, they can so long as they’re willing to sit through six months of interviews, tests, examinations, and the like. There’s still a genuine paranoia that humans are carrying some kind of desolate gene that’s just waiting to come out. It’s nonsense, they know it’s nonsense, but some in Congress are going on about it still, and the Magistrate are using it as a beating stick.”
“Are we going to see one of those convoys?”
“Maybe. Some people come along to travel through Maine to see family, usually staying with the monthly convoys. Safety in numbers. There are a hundred vehicles sometimes. Maine is a no-fly area, so you can’t get in via helicopter or plane, unless you’re Assembly or human military. And even then, you can’t actually fly into Maine itself. Whatever is happening in the sky above, it screws around with electrical signals.”
“So we couldn’t have flown in anyway?” Amelia said. “You looked annoyed when the marine knew you were Assembly.”
“I’m nae meant to be here officially, remember,” Miles said, removing the torc and placing it in his pocket. “Not everyone here will know why you’re here. I would like to keep it that way. Reporting on the pilgrimage is all we’re doing, and I’m only here to keep you safe.”
“I remember,” Amelia said as they drove toward Spruce Creek, where there were signs along the road about where to go for the pilgrimage.
It didn’t take long to arrive at what had probably been an idyllic little cul-de-sac called Cottage Way. Considering the number of vehicles and people milling around in the dark, it was pretty clearly now the staging area for pilgrimages.
Amelia parked and took a deep breath.
“You’ll be fine,” Miles said, opening the car door and letting Church out. “You’ve got ten minutes, don’t go far.”
Church bounded off into the nearby trees.
There were four vehicles in the cul-de-sac, not including Miles’s car. Two of them were repurposed military trucks, each with the badge of House Idolator—an orange Dusk-like sunset, with a bright white moon in the left corner—adorning several parts of them, as well as sewn on the sleeves of several armed guards.
The other vehicles were two matching black Winnebagos that looked geared to go off road, with metal bars around the windows and huge tyres. There was also a large orange-and-black bus that resembled something a rock star would go on tour in, although this too had metal bars around the windows. All of the vehicles had the same House Idolator badge on them somewhere and were currently being loaded with the belongings of those who would be travelling in them soon enough.
“Amelia!” one of a group of four shouted over to her.
“Jenny,” Amelia said, walking over to her and hugging the tall blonde vampire. “This is Miles. Miles, this is Jenny Lewis-Palmer.”
Miles nodded a hello to the small group.
“So, you’re a member of House Idolator?” Jenny asked. She had a posh English accent and wore designer clothing that had the approximation of ruggedness, but in reality probably wouldn’t hold up to anything that might be considered off road. Miles wondered how many people going on this pilgrimage had ever been somewhere like Maine before. Probably not many, he concluded.
“I’m her bodyguard,” Miles said with a warm smile.
“She doesn’t need a bodyguard,” Jenny said with an equally warm smile. “She has us.”
“That’s good to know,” Miles said as the other three members of Jenny’s group came over and introduced themselves. They were two men and a woman; all of them wore jeans and a sweatshirt with the badge of House Idolator on it, making them look like the kind of people who might knock on someone’s door and try to talk to them about believing.
The two men were both about six feet tall, and that was where the similarities ended. One had dark skin and a faded haircut and was cleanly shaven, while the other was white with long blond hair and a beard long enough that he’d plaited it.
“This is Jeremy,” Jenny said, motioning to the black man. “And Travis.”
Both men offered Miles their hands, which he shook in turn.
“And this is Maeve,” Jenny continued, giving the second woman a big hug that didn’t appear to have been needed or wanted. Maeve was just over five and a half feet in height, with pale skin and long red hair that went to her waist.
“Nice to meet you both,” Maeve said, her accent Irish. She looked over at the bus, and someone was waving to the group.
“You the combat medic?” Miles asked.
Maeve nodded. “Although more the medic part than combat.”
“So, are you all vampires?” Miles asked.
Jenny nodded enthusiastically. “House Idolator through and through.”
Miles noted a touch more than just pride in Jenny’s tone. She was a believer. “Your first pilgrimage?” he asked.
Jenny smiled. “The first day of a new dawn. A pilgrimage to spread the word of our House and help those in need. A great day.”
“I think we need to get on the bus,” Maeve said. “See you both later.”
“It’s lovely to see you again,” Jenny said, giving Amelia another hug.
“You too,” Amelia told her.
Jenny walked by and hugged Miles, who was a little taken aback, as he hadn’t been expecting it. “And you, too.”
Miles watched Jenny walk over to the bus and climb aboard.
“First Lord Fuller put me in contact with Jenny,” Amelia said at Miles’s confused look, “when he found out I wanted to write this article about the pilgrimage.” She gave him a wry smile. “She’s a true believer in House Idolator and its doctrines.”
“She’s very… what’s the word?” Miles asked, trying to be diplomatic.
“Exuberant?” Amelia suggested.
“Sure, let’s go with that,” Miles said. “Young.”
“She’s about fifty in human terms, but she’s been a vampire about twenty-five years,” Amelia said. “She may or may not have been brought into the House because her parents died and left her several hundred million dollars.”
“She’s filthy rich,” Miles said.
“She is,” Amelia said. “She’s lovely, but she has no clue. About anything. I hope she doesn’t get herself into trouble, because she will have no idea how to get out of it. I know she’s a vampire, but I’m pretty sure I’m more equipped to get lost in Maine than she is. I get the feeling that she thinks her faith in House Idolator will protect her.”
“She ever mention the Dusk to you?”
Amelia shook her head. “No. Until you and Sam told me, I’d never heard of it.”
“What about the others?”
“Jeremy is ex-military,” Amelia said. “All I know. Travis, I have no clue, Maeve either. I’m not even sure that any of them knew Jenny before she sort of brought them all together. There are a few more members of their little group. If Jenny has one power, it’s making friends. It’s genuinely incredible to watch her just make people like her.”
