The Pilgrims of the Damned: A Vampire Thriller, page 25
The giant was twelve feet tall, at least, and tore the remains of a tree from out of the ground, launching it at Miles, who easily avoided it as he ran into the woodland, hoping there weren’t more desolate waiting inside.
Miles wondered just how many of these giant desolate there were in Maine as he scaled one of the larger trees, hiding out amid the dense foliage higher up as the desolate stomped and crashed around the area, smashing its fists into trees and tearing them apart.
The desolate let out a roar which vibrated through Miles’s body, making part of him want to run and keep running. He watched the desolate slope around some more and tried to come up with a plan of attack. Miles had used his bloodline gift on the desolate giant in the tunnels, and it had worked, but with a werewolf to worry about too, he wasn’t sure it would be a great idea to do the same again.
Miles leapt from branch to branch, moving around to the side of the desolate in an effort to get behind it. The werewolf was roaring in rage at having half of its body covered by dirt and mud, even more so that it was face down and couldn’t get purchase to cut its way free. And if it turned back to its human form, the weight of the debris would almost certainly crush it.
Miles dropped down to the ground and stepped out toward the werewolf, who roared at him, trying to swipe him with its claws. He was about to use his bloodline gift to turn it human when the Blood Guard dropped down from the road above, burying his broadsword into the skull of the werewolf. The blade went down through the top of the werewolf’s mouth and came out the bottom, pinning the creature’s maw to the soft ground.
“I told you to leave,” Miles said.
“My First Lord would disapprove,” the Blood Guard said, twisting the blade, and making a crunching sound, before he pulled it free, bringing it down again in one smooth motion to decapitate the werewolf a second later.
The desolate charged toward Miles and the Blood Guard, smashing its fist down where the Blood Guard had stood, and meeting nothing but the remains of the werewolf, which was turned to a bloody smear on the wet ground.
The Blood Guard darted forward, trying to get a good hit with the blade, but the desolate was faster than it looked, and hit the Blood Guard with the back of its hand, sending the vampire flying back fifty feet. The Blood Guard used his bloodline power, wrapping himself in a crimson shield of energy, which exploded in a burst of light as he slammed into a large tree, a huge branch punching through the back of his armour and out the front. The branch cracked from the added weight, and the Blood Guard slid down along it, until he fell from the branch, letting out a gasp before hitting the ground hard, where he remained unmoving.
Miles picked up the discarded sword and tested it in his hands as the desolate giant stood to its full height and bellowed at him. “Let’s do this,” he said.
The giant moved quickly, but Miles was faster, easily avoiding the swipe of the creature’s hands. Miles drove the sword through the back of the desolate’s hand, out through its palm, and using all of his strength to force the hand back, drove the tip of the blade into the desolate’s opposite knee as the creature tried in vain to stop Miles’s brute strength.
Miles blasted the leg nearest him with telekinesis, which momentarily wobbled the desolate, allowing him to thrust the sword into the leg as planned. The desolate bellowed in pain, and Miles used a second telekinesis blast on the now injured leg of the giant, sending it toppling over onto the remains of the werewolf. Miles grabbed the sword hilt, pulling it free, stepping around to the side of the giant, and driving it into the neck of the desolate, wrenching it up and out, before bringing the blade back down onto the wound, decapitating the creature.
With both threats dead, Miles ran back over to the Blood Guard, who was on his knees, his mask cracked down the middle, his armour dented badly enough that blood streamed out of the new hole in the breastplate.
Miles used his telekinesis to pull the breastplate back, causing the Blood Guard to gasp in pain. Eventually he managed to make the breastplate look like something approximating its original shape, and he helped the Blood Guard to remove it, along with his mask. The Blood Guard gritted his teeth as it was removed, and fell back to the ground when it was done.
Blood covered the torso and face of the vampire, who looked exhausted. Miles examined the gaping wound in the guard’s chest and back; there was nothing good about how large the wound was. Even as a vampire possibly capable of healing such wounds, the Blood Guard wasn’t going anywhere for a while, and would need blood to feed on as soon as possible. Vampires were hardy, but even a vampire would need time to heal from a fist-sized hole in its chest.
“You’re going nowhere until that heals,” Miles said, folding the tunic back across the chest, after making sure the large wound had started to close.
“It is dead?” the Blood Guard asked.
Miles looked back to the desolate and werewolf, the former of which was beginning to dissolve. “Aye, they’re not getting up from that.”
“Killed a werewolf,” the Blood Guard said, before coughing up more blood.
“You did, I’m very proud,” Miles said. “If you like, when we get back to Thomas, I can have them write a sonnet about you.”
“I’d like that,” the Blood Guard said with a smile. “Never had a sonnet.”
“It can start something like, There once was a dickhead from House Idolator,” Miles told him.
The Blood Guard laughed, started to cough up more blood, and made an awful wheezing noise. “This really fucking hurts,” he said.
“Good,” Miles told him. “Next time don’t get hit.”
“Next time?”
“No matter how stupid or bad you think something is, there’s always something more stupid, or more horrible just waiting down the road for you to stumble across.”
“Don’t get hit,” the Blood Guard said. “Good advice.”
“Glad you think so,” Miles said, getting back to his feet. “It’s a good job it was just those two shites, or we’d be fucked, what with you having a wee lie down.”
“My sword came in handy,” the Blood Guard said.
Miles wiped the sword with the back of his jacket sleeve and placed it back in its scabbard. “Don’t go getting a big head now.”
“I can safely say that I have no intention of getting a big head. I can barely breathe without it hurting.”
“Once saw a vampire get hit with a cannonball,” Miles said. “He just walked right into it. At least you didn’t have that happen.”
“It’s the little things that make life worth living,” the Blood Guard said with a smile.
“Hello,” a voice said from back toward where the giant was now all but done and the werewolf’s corpse remained.
Miles turned to see the newcomer as he walked along the muddy ground, using a walking stick for aid. He wore a black raincoat, with a large rimmed matching hat.
“And who the fucking hell are you?” Miles asked, getting the feeling that he and the Blood Guard might well be a lot more fucked than he’d previously considered.
The man looked up, and Miles recognised him from his photos in Amelia’s notes.
“You know me,” the man said, having stopped walking with fifty feet between him and Miles. A silver pendant hung from a chain around his neck. He touched the pendant and let out a little sigh.
“Stuart Murphy,” Miles spat. “Priest killer and neighbour cooker.”
Stuart laughed. “I did do that. Both deserved it.”
“And the people just going to church?” Miles asked, putting himself between the witch and the still seriously injured Blood Guard.
“Collateral damage,” Stuart said. “You killed two werewolves.”
“Technically, I only killed one,” Miles said. “My friend here killed the other.”
“They were very keen to kill you,” Stuart said. “You were meant to be brought without harm, but you saw an end to that when you killed the werewolf and desolate giant in the tunnels. These two wanted vengeance.”
“How’d you get here so fast?” Miles asked. “It’s those little mine cart things, isn’t it? You take one here, hide in some hole for the day, wait for us, and pop out.”
Stuart smiled. “Something like that.”
“It’s funny, you say the desolate wanted revenge, but desolate don’t want anything except food,” Miles said. “I also don’t recognise that desolate. It looks more scarred than the two I met in the tunnels.”
“The larger desolates have a… bond,” Stuart said. “Almost a hive mind. Some of the smaller, too. I think you’ll find a lot of them know what you did. They’re not happy about it.”
“Can I assume you’ve given up on taking me to meet your boss?”
“Oh no, these two went against orders,” Stuart said. “I’m your last chance. You won’t get another. If it helps, I would have killed these two had they completed their need for vengeance. It’ll be a shame if I have to kill you now, my… boss so badly wanted you to come see the person who has made all of this possible.”
“All of what?” Miles asked.
Stuart waved his arms around. “This.”
“Maine?” Miles asked. “The person responsible for what happened to Maine is your boss? He cured your cancer yet?”
Stuart’s expression darkened.
“Yeah, I read about that,” Miles said. “Your wife and kids did a runner to the other side of the country, too. Turns out you’re not a barrel of laughs to live with.”
“You are quite irritating,” Stuart said.
“And you, Stuart Murphy, are a murderous gobshite.”
“You’re going to come with me quietly, or I’m going to have to hurt you.”
Miles stared at the witch for a moment. “And you can fuck yourself, ya little shitehawk.”
“I want you to remember that I gave you a chance,” Stuart said.
“I’m going to rip your head off now,” Miles said, and took a step toward Stuart as the witch’s pendant started to glow. A second later, a rock the size of Miles’s torso that had been sitting on the ground smashed into his ribs, spinning him around to face a second similarly sized rock, which hit him in the chest.
Miles had tried to use his telekinesis as a way to slow down the speed of the rock, but it had moved through his ability as though he hadn’t even tried. He landed on the ground, the rock atop his chest, pushing down on him, forcing his body to sink into the mud.
Miles roared in anger as he tried to lift the rock off his body, while more and more rocks piled up onto his chest. Each one pushed him down further into the mud, as if they weighed dozens of times more than their size suggested.
“This is what happens when you don’t behave,” Stuart said, as he stood over a helpless Miles. “I’ll come and find you shortly.”
Stuart, the pendant still glowing blood red, brought his walking stick back across his body as if he were about to hit a baseball, and quickly snapped it back the other way, toward the woods. Miles flew back into the woods, colliding with a large tree and bouncing off onto the ground as flames encircled him.
Miles looked around him and saw that more and more of the trees were dying, the remaining grass withering away to nothing as it powered Stuart’s chaos magic.
“Don’t you fucking dare!” Miles shouted at Stuart, who stopped walking as he reached the Blood Guard and slammed the bottom tip of his walking stick into the Blood Guard’s head, right between his eyes. The Blood Guard reacted as if he’d been shot, his body quickly going prone and unmoving as blood poured out of his open eyes.
The fire intensified, burning Miles’s arm as he attempted to walk through it. Miles yelled out in pain as the burn felt more like a UV light than normal fire.
“I’ll come with you!” Miles shouted.
Stuart placed the tip of his walking stick against the Blood Guard’s head and turned to Miles. “Like you ever had a choice.” He pressed down with the tip of his cane, drawing life energy from the trees around him and forcing it through the front of the Blood Guard’s skull, burning away the man’s head until it was nothing but ash.
“No,” Miles said, screaming in rage as he turned into his beast form. He launched himself forward, through the fire, beat his wings once, and flew at Stuart, whose face was a picture of shock for just a second until Miles’s taloned hands grabbed hold of where the witch’s skull should have been.
Miles landed and flexed his talons as he looked over at Stuart, who had vanished and was now back where he’d started, fifty feet away.
Fear was now etched across the witch’s face. “How did you get through the fire?”
“You didn’t need to kill him,” Miles said, stalking toward his prey, ready to rend flesh from bone.
“How?” Stuart shouted.
Miles beat his wings again and launched himself forward at incredible speed, only just missing Stuart as he opened a portal and stepped inside. The portal snapped shut behind him, leaving nothing but the smell of burning flesh and hair in the air, mixed with the scent of decaying and dead vegetation.
Pain racked through Miles’s body, and he looked at the burns that covered his upper torso and wings. He’d flown through that fire at speed, but it hadn’t stopped the unnatural flames from doing their job. He beat his wings, taking to the sky, feeling the pouring rain soothe his skin, his wings. The cool air blew across his body as he tried to figure out where Stuart had gone. He looked back along the road the convoy had travelled down, but he saw only darkness and dirt. He’d never heard of any witch, no matter their designation, being able to teleport. And that staff appeared to give him greater control over his magic, another thing he hadn’t known existed.
Miles landed close to the quickly dissipating pile of ash that used to be the Blood Guard. He moved the breastplate aside and picked up the necklace that lay in the mud. A steel chain with a smooth grey stone attached to it. The stone was flat and about two inches in diameter. It had the badge of House Idolator on one side, and a bloody slash across the back. A Blood Guard mark. Miles, still in his beast form, pocketed the necklace and picked up the still-sheathed broadsword, holding it in one hand as he looked down where the Blood Guard had lain.
“I’m sorry,” Miles said softly, the words catching in his throat. “I’ll make sure everyone knows what you did here today. I promise.”
Miles looked up at the rain as it continued to pelt down. He looked back at where Stuart had been and sniffed the air. No scent apart from the blood of the Blood Guard and the dead body of the werewolf. He walked over to the werewolf, grabbed it by the arms, and with a blast of telekinesis, and a lot of strength, pulled the remains out from under the rubble that covered it.
Miles had hoped the werewolf might have worn something that gave away any clue as to what was going on, but it wore no clothing, no jewellery. Miles let the body drop back to the dirt, beat his wings once, and took to the sky. He needed to catch up to the convoy; he needed to tell Thomas what had happened. He gripped the broadsword tightly in his hand and set off as fast as he could toward Bangor.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Miles spotted the pilgrim convoy when they were about halfway between where he’d fought the werewolf, desolate, and witch and their destination of Bangor. He’d only been flying for about ten minutes, but with his injuries, his body was beginning to scream at him to stop, to land and rest.
After another thirty seconds, his body made it clear that he either rested or he fell. He chose to land, and returned to his human form, grateful for clothing that had been large enough to accommodate his beast form. They were ripped, and he was basically topless, but at least he wasn’t running through the state of Maine naked.
The weather had intensified since the fight, and Miles was soaked to the bone, although he welcomed the cold wind, and hadn’t been concerned about catching a chill for about four centuries. He was, however, exhausted. The fight, the elongated time he’d spent in his beast form, the fact that his skin was still scarred from where he’d flown through the witch’s magical fire circle—everything combined to make sure that he just wanted to feed and sleep, not necessarily in that order.
The taillights of the vehicles were easy to keep in his vision as he trundled along the broken road. They were probably only moving at about fifteen to twenty miles per hour; any more than that and even a vampire’s enhanced reaction speed probably wouldn’t save you from an accident should the road no longer be where it was meant to be.
Miles looked down at his bare feet. He wished he could figure out a way to save the shoes. The hard, jagged rocks on the road cut open the soles of his feet, which immediately healed the tiny wound, but the constant irritation of it happening over and over again was beginning to grate.
As Miles continued on, his thoughts went back to the desolate. To what Stuart had said about how they’d changed in Maine. The desolate giant had wanted vengeance. That some of the desolate had a bond. He’d never heard of anything like that, but then he’d never known any desolate to want or feel anything. Except the need to feed. The idea that it had wanted vengeance, even over its own self-preservation, was a new one. He wondered if those people in Maine who had been experimenting on the desolate for all those decades before the state fell had managed to do something to their brains.
Miles wasn’t entirely sure he was comfortable with the idea of giving desolate thoughts and feelings. Would they know who they were before they became desolate? Would they be able to deal with such information? Would they even understand it? He didn’t have answers, but he let his brain ponder the questions as he walked, anything to drown out the need to rest.
Finally catching up to the paused convey at the gates of Bangor, he reached the Winnebago at the back of the trail and walked by the side of the vehicle, running his hand along it to the door. The interior was dark, and the engine stopped, so he continued on to the bus, which like the Winnebago was empty and dark. Thomas’s vehicle was similarly empty and dark, so Miles continued on for the fifty feet toward the towering walls of the city of Bangor. It was at that exact moment that he reached the first floodlight, which bathed him in light so bright he had to blink.
