The Pilgrims of the Damned: A Vampire Thriller, page 41
Church barked.
“And you?” Miles asked Lauren and Amelia.
Lauren nodded, her expression stern. “Let’s go.”
“No time like the present,” Amelia said.
“Lauren, the second you can start taking control of these desolate, let me know,” Miles said.
“They’re too far away now,” Lauren said. “I can feel them, though.”
Miles drove the vehicle through the town at high speed, hitting whichever desolate were stupid enough to stay in the way. They made it through the pockets of fighting and over the bridge, where dozens of desolate waited to climb up from the sides of the bridge and leap onto the car.
“I can’t reach them,” Lauren said. “I can’t get into their minds. Ulfrik has taken complete control.”
“I guess we’re doing this the hard way then,” Amelia replied.
“Little help,” Miles said as he grabbed the arm of one desolate who tried to reach him through the window, snapping the bone and hitting the desolate hard enough to dislodge, sending it back into the desolates behind with a noise that implied it wasn’t a fun trip.
They cleared the bridge and found themselves narrowly avoiding open warfare between the desolate and citizens of Brunswick.
Miles continued on, following the directions that Clint had given him, until they were past the built-up part of the town and were hurtling along a dirt road that led to the bay, and hopefully Commander Bailey.
As they rounded a corner next to a sign that pointed toward the bay, Miles lost traction for a second, and their wheel hit a large chunk of rock. The car appeared to be okay, but it quickly lost power in the steering. Miles slammed on the brakes, forcing the car to a skidding stop. He got out of the Toyota as the second car arrived.
“I guess they were in the workshop for a reason,” Lauren said as Miles popped the bonnet of the car and looked inside. “You know what you’re looking for?”
“Nope,” Miles said. He’d always meant to learn more about automobiles, but it had always seemed like the thing to do later. Apparently, now was much too late.
“You got room?” Amelia asked the second vehicle.
Everyone piled into the second Toyota, which made a bit of a squeeze, as Church had to sit in what had once been the boot of the car before its refurbishment. Once everyone was in, the driver set off at high speed, driving across the bumpy dirt road with Miles hoping the suspension didn’t snap from the continuous assault it was under.
As they drove by a patch of dense woodland, the facility in the bay came into view. It was a sprawling mass of fifty-foot-high concrete walls, which encircled a long building that, to Miles, looked a bit like a hangar for an airplane. Although it was big enough that it would have easily housed a 747.
“The fencing is electric,” Lauren said. “There’s a sign there.”
“Stop here,” Miles said. “Just by those trees.”
“Yes, sir,” the driver said.
The car pulled off the road and stopped where Miles had indicated. Miles got out, letting Church out of the boot. “We’re going to head to the side,” Miles told everyone.
“There’s a lot of desolate in there,” Lauren told him as she exited the Toyota, too. “I can feel them, but I can’t break through into their minds. Maybe if we’re really close I could.”
“Do you want to get really close to them?” Amelia asked.
“I’d rather not,” Lauren admitted.
Everyone else exited the car and started to check their gear as Miles checked out the facility from a distance. “What do they do here?” Miles asked no one in particular.
“From what we heard, the Commander was putting in defensive capabilities in the bay,” one of the soldiers said.
“Capabilities for what?” Lauren asked.
“No one knows,” the soldier said. “Or it’s way above my pay grade. One of those two.”
They set off toward the facility, with Church in front until they reached the edge of the entrance, and Church dropped to the ground, her ears flat against her head. Miles crouched beside her, a hand on the back of Church’s neck for reassurance. He looked back at the others and motioned for them to stay, before heading alone into the facility.
There were multiple dead desolate lying on the ground between the entrance and the hangar-like building, and several military vehicles sat up against the interior of the wall, with dead soldiers lying around them. They’d tried to get out, or get to weapons, and had been caught too quickly.
Miles motioned for everyone to enter the facility, which they did wordlessly.
At the far end of the facility were several more buildings, all of which looked like the kind of red-brick houses and offices that had populated Brunswick. Miles pointed to the soldier in charge, and over to the buildings. The soldier nodded, motioned for his people to follow, and they set off along the side of the hangar.
“You ready to go inside?” Miles asked.
Church made a huffing noise and both Amelia and Lauren nodded.
Miles made it to the door first, which was slightly ajar, and pushed it all the way open, revealing a large helicopter inside. “What the fuck?” he said as he stepped into what really was a hangar. There were dead soldiers and desolate all over the floor, with blood splashed across the white-and-blue helicopter.
“They built a hangar for a plane that can’t take off,” Lauren said. “What’s the point?”
Miles looked around. “Yeah, bit odd, isn’t it?”
“How did they even get it here?” Amelia asked.
“That’s a Bell Huey UH, something or other,” Miles said. “I know because I was on one that crashed in the seventies. Long story for a different time. This thing must have been here for nearly fifty years.”
Amelia walked under the helicopter. “You think it will fly?”
“I think they can’t get a plane or helicopter here from outside,” Miles said. “So they kept an old one ready to go. Although I wouldn’t get in that damn thing if you paid me.”
“Because of the crash?” Lauren asked.
“No, because in helicopter terms, it has to be ancient by this point.” Miles walked to the end of the hangar and opened the door there, revealing a dirt runway at the end that went to the far end of the wall next to where the buildings he’d seen earlier were. There was a red helicopter tug just outside the hangar, which explained how they planned to get the Huey outside. To the far side of the grounds outside of the hangar were fuel stations. A huge amount of it to fuel one helicopter that wasn’t going anywhere.
He was about to go back inside when the top floor of the building farthest to the left exploded. Miles set off at a sprint across the facility toward the buildings, when more explosions were triggered throughout the buildings there.
Two soldiers threw themselves out of windows onto the dirt ground and started rolling around in an effort to put out the flames which had caught their clothes.
Amelia used her magic to summon roots out of the ground, creating large holes which threw a lot of dirt over the soldiers, smothering the flames. Both soldiers lay on their backs, their faces singed, but otherwise looking okay.
“The rest of you?” Miles asked.
“Inside,” one of the soldiers said through gritted teeth. “Stairs went down into a basement. Smaller building. Booby-trapped.”
Lauren joined them and set about helping the second soldier, who appeared to be in more shock than anything.
Miles moved toward the buildings, the largest of which was now an inferno, and used his telekinesis to blast away the debris from the doorway of a less damaged building. He quickly found the stairs that led down, and crouched by the hole in the floor. He spotted the remaining explosives and incendiary device that were on the walls of the basement next to the stairs. The booby trap hadn’t gone off properly, as this part of the building was meant to be just as much of a fireball as the rest of it.
He dropped down into the basement, the metal staircase warped from the explosion that did actually set off. He found one soldier on the ground, next to a large hole in the floor.
“You okay?” Miles asked, touching the young vampire on the shoulder. His face was a mass of melted skin and burns. The booby traps hadn’t gone off properly, but they had still worked enough.
The soldier let out a strained reply.
Miles looked down the hole and spotted two soldiers lying on the ground. “You two okay?” he shouted.
“We’ll be fine,” one said.
“There are stone steps here,” one of the soldiers said. “They lead down toward some kind of large black stone door.”
“Do not go through the doorway,” Miles said, making sure there was no ambiguity to his tone. “Can you get back up here?”
“Yeah, it’s fine,” a soldier said. “We’ll meet you back up top.”
Miles picked up the young soldier and leapt up through the hole in the ceiling, back up to the ruined building above. He carried the seriously injured vampire outside and laid him down next to the soldiers. “He’ll be fine,” Miles said. “He needs blood, though, so when you’re both able to, move him into that hangar and see if you can find any. There’s a lot of places in there we didn’t have time to search. I’m going back for your…”
The floor beneath their feet shook, and dirt exploded up from the ground close to the hangar, as dozens of desolate poured out, all hungry for flesh and blood.
Lauren walked toward them and shouted, “Stop!”
They stopped.
Miles blinked as Church, who had been growling and ready to fight a second ago, sat back, a look of bemusement on the dog’s face.
“Me too,” Miles told her.
The thirty-eight desolates, some of which were huge in size, all stood around as if they weren’t entirely sure what they were meant to do next.
“You got them?” Miles asked Lauren.
Lauren shook her head. “They’re a lot bigger than the ones I’m used to. I can control the smaller ones no problem, but the larger, they’re outside of my power.”
Miles removed the talisman out of his pocket. “How about if you wear this?”
Lauren stared at the talisman for a moment. “It can be used to control me.”
“Not if you’re wearing it,” Miles told her.
Lauren tentatively reached out and took the talisman, dropping the chain over her neck. Her mouth opened wordlessly, her eyes turning to pools of darkness.
Miles watched her for the short period of time that she reacted to the talisman, before she looked back at him. “I can feel Ulfrik watching what I do.”
Miles stuck two fingers up at Lauren, who laughed. “Want to try those desolates again?” he asked.
Lauren nodded, and reached out with her power. The desolates all turned toward her as one. “It’s done,” she said. “I have them. But Ulfrik knows.”
“Good,” Miles said. “He can be aware of how close we are to finding him.”
“I would not want to meet one of the Desolate Royalty who aren’t on our side,” Amelia said.
“I don’t advise it,” Miles told her before calling to Lauren, “Any chance they know where Ulfrik, the Priest, or Commander Bailey are? Or Thomas?”
Lauren pointed a long finger at one of the desolate. A large creature that reminded Miles of the Viking he’d met. Maybe not a first-generation desolate, but only one removed from them. There was an intelligence in the creature’s eyes that Miles found unnerving.
“Where is Ulfrik?” Lauren commanded.
No one spoke, but the desolate turned toward the hole.
“He’s down there,” Lauren said, pointing to the same hole.
Miles walked over to the hole and looked down the hundred-foot shaft, beyond the drill that sat halfway up. Part of the drill had snapped off and was lodged in the side of the hole, giving a large gap with which to get down to the bottom. “That’s the vampire city,” he said, recognising the black stone that almost shimmered at the bottom. “Is Thomas down there?”
“Answer him,” Lauren commanded.
The desolate opened its thin, ruined mouth, and no words came out. It looked to the desolate beside it, but it was in considerably worse shape.
“Ulfrik down there?” Miles asked, pointing down.
The desolate nodded.
“Okay, I’m going after Thomas,” Miles said. “Church you want to join me?”
Church barked.
“I’m coming, too,” Amelia said.
“The desolates will climb down okay,” Lauren said. “They’ll follow us. I’ll stay back from Ulfrik, though. I can’t risk it.”
Miles looked over at the soldiers, who were all still seriously injured. The two soldiers he’d spotted earlier made their way out of the ruined building, with one dropping a bag next to the soldier that Miles had rescued and removing a blood pouch.
“Let’s go hunt,” Lauren said, and stepped into the hole.
Miles waited for the desolates to scramble back down the hole, before picking up Church in his arms. “You ready?” he asked.
Church barked.
“You want to go down the same way as that hole at the fort?” Miles asked.
Amelia wrapped her arms around Miles and whispered, “This is a lot less fun than vampire romance books had me believe.”
Miles chucked and stepped out into the hole, turned into his vampire self, and used the talons on one hand to ensure his descent was slow enough to give Church the easiest time possible. He landed beside Lauren, and Amelia let go of him, moving away so that Church had more room to jump to the floor.
They were all soon running through the tunnels, the desolates in the front, leading the way as Lauren’s control over them was absolute. Eventually, they arrived at a set of stairs that led to a large black stone door, much like the ones Miles had seen several times since arriving in Maine.
“This the door you told them not to go through?” Amelia asked.
Miles nodded.
“I assume we’re going to break that rule.”
“Unfortunately, yes,” Miles said, as the desolate pushed open the door with the sound of stone scraping on stone.
They continued on through the archway into a large empty chamber with three exits. Miles checked them quickly and found two pools, like the ones he’d found himself in under Falmouth, although thankfully these weren’t full of blood and body parts, just dust and cobwebs. Someone used this place to feed desolate, and by someone Miles was pretty sure it was Ulfrik and his followers from back when he first roamed these lands.
They all continued through the third and final exit, eventually reaching a massive door like the one Miles had seen earlier. The desolates pushed the door open, revealing more of the city. More towers, more walkways connecting them.
In the centre of the room was a kneeling Commander Bailey. Blood drenched his arm, dripping steadily into an ever-growing puddle beside his knees.
Lauren stopped the desolates and Miles continued on, smelling the fresh blood on the Commander. His face was a mass of bruises and blood. He was missing one ear, and his nose had been badly broken, leaving him with a whistling noise as he tried to breathe. His arm was pointing in a direction a human arm wasn’t meant to point, and his uniform, which had been so tidy last time, was badly torn, showing lacerations beneath.
“Guess that Ulfrik found you,” Miles said.
The Commander looked up at Miles with his only working eye. He opened his torn lips to speak, but no words came out.
“I did,” Ulfrik said, as he dropped from the walkway above, landing next to the Commander.
“Where is Thomas?” Miles asked, as Lauren and the desolates moved back, toward the stone door.
“Show him,” Ulfrik commended.
Miles looked up as Thomas was kicked from the highest walkway. He tumbled over and over on the way to the ground next to Miles, a drop of several hundred feet onto hard stone floor. Miles leapt up, catching Thomas, and landing back on the ground a short distance away. The First Authority was hurt, but would live.
“Broken ribs, collarbone,” Ulfrik said conversationally. “I think I collapsed his lung. He’s a vampire, he’ll live. He will be kept alive until William Fuller is brought before me. All who betrayed me will be punished.”
“I think the First Priest has been feeding you spoonfuls of bullshit to suit his own agenda,” Miles said. “Fuller wasn’t even in America when your own people attacked you.”
“Commander Bailey, the werewolf, and the witch were working together,” Ulfrik said. “My talisman let me see everything the witch saw. They believe they can use my blood to destroy vampires, as if I would ever be easily subjugated so they could retrieve it. My library was not meant for humans. It was for our kind. The kind who should rule this world. This one here desecrated my library with his human filth.” Ulfrik shouted the last part, the word echoing all around them.
“Torture is the last plan of the weak,” Lauren said.
Ulfrik’s gaze snapped toward Lauren. “You could have had it all.”
“I don’t want anything from you,” Lauren said.
“Enough people have died here,” Amelia said. “This has to stop.”
Ulfrik laughed. “This will only stop when only the strong remain.”
Miles laughed. “I think you might be pissing up the wrong tree with that idea.”
“Aid me,” Ulfrik said, ignoring Miles. “You will have a place at my side as we subjugate these pathetic creatures. You have my word that I will give you power and riches the likes of which you’ve never seen.”
“Fuck you, and fuck your word,” Lauren snapped.
“How dare you,” Ulfrik said with a snarl.
Commander Bailey took that exact terrible moment to try to get away. Ulfrik caught him by the back of his head, with one swipe of his claw, removing a large part of the Commander’s skull. “Your turn then,” the Dusk said menacingly.
Miles rolled his shoulders. “Get ta fuck, ya wee bawbag.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Miles didn’t have the chance to attack first as the desolate slammed into Ulfrik like a wave of death, dragging him back toward one of the towers. Lauren stayed back, her eyes pools of darkness as she controlled the throng of desolate at her command, while simultaneously fighting Ulfrik to keep him out of her head. The talisman around her neck blazed red, and Miles hoped that she could keep up her control for long enough to give them the edge.
