––––––––
It happened so fast that at first there was no pain. I’d had objects thrust through my chest before, too many times for my liking. It had always hurt more when the objects were removed. But this time the blade didn’t just go in and stay in. This time my chest was hacked open inch by painful inch.
Blood, thick, dark and disturbingly sluggish, ran from the wound and soaked into my ruined clothes. I screamed, long and loud but it did nothing to diminish the agony. When Alexander deemed the cut was long enough, he raised the knife to shoulder height then slammed it down into my rib cage. Bones cracked and splintered. Shards were driven into my heart and lungs. Now the pain was exquisite, beyond description. My screams changed, becoming deeper, almost guttural. My fangs descended, shredding my bottom lip. The minion holding my right wrist down slackened his grip momentarily. The instant the pressure left my arm, I jerked it up, snapping the chain like it was made of dental floss.
“Hold her!” Alexander screamed and the pressure came back twofold. Excitement shone from the insane leader of the London sewer vampires. He was encountering something new and his experiment had barely begun. If he hadn’t been out of his mind, he might have thought twice before continuing on with it. What sort of scientist didn’t think their way carefully through their experiments? Um, crazy ones? Instead of taking care and feeling his way with caution, he reached into my chest and yanked my ribs apart.
Shrieking in agony, I bolted upright despite the pair of vamps holding my upper body down. The chain around my left wrist snapped, sounding like a gunshot. The two lackeys hung off me like leeches. I wasn’t the only one screaming. Panic spread through them and the other two backup henchmen jumped into the fray. The sheer weight of numbers drove me back down.
“This time it will work!” Delirious with joy, Alexander pushed back the left sleeve of his robe and cut deeply into his own wrist. Squeezing the rent flesh, he forced a rivulet of dead blood into the bowl.
If Alexander managed to finish his ritual and pour his blood onto my heart, I was no longer positive that I would die. I was scared that if he poured his diseased ooze into me, I wouldn’t die at all. I might become something even worse than I already was. Wasn’t being Mortis, death of the vampire race, already enough to contend with?
Lifting the bowl, Alexander elbowed his minions out of the way and raised the clay vessel above my chest. “Dark Father, I offer you this sacrifice made of blood taken from my own body.” I heaved, lifting off the table a few inches before being slammed back down again. “Take her and show me what we can become!” The bowl tipped and foul, black crud splashed into the open cavity that had been carved into my chest.
Hydrochloric acid would have hurt less than Alexander’s noxious blood did when it splashed onto my heart. I jerked left and right, trying to escape from the altar, thrashing in torment. My body lifted off the table again and this time it couldn’t be forced back down. Only my head and heels still touched the smooth black stone. A blood curdling shriek burst from my fanged mouth and rebounded off the rock walls.
After an eternity of agony, my brain tried to shut down but couldn’t quite manage it. I went limp and my head lolled to the side. It was as close to fainting as I could get. My heart sizzled and lurched, pumped a few times then expired once more. For a moment there, I had almost been...well, not alive but slightly less undead.
“Is that it?” Ty whispered. “Is it over?” He sounded shaken and he wasn’t the only one. Feet shuffled and disturbed murmurs swept through the small group. Some were on the edge of fleeing.
Alexander brushed his minions aside and thumbed open my half closed eyelids one after the other. Whatever it was he was looking for, he didn’t see it. “No. No! There has to be more!” The insane leader of the sewer vamps was truly distressed that his experiment had failed once again. Truthfully, I’d also expected something a bit more dramatic than a near fainting spell after the torment I’d just suffered through.
“Uh, Alexander?” One of the lackeys was brave enough to tug on his sleeve to gain his attention. “Should she be able to heal like that?”
Staring down at my chest, Alexander prodded the now unbroken flesh with a finger. I’d felt the wound rapidly knitting back together. Bones, veins and flesh had realigned back to their original positions. It had happened in seconds and hadn’t hurt at all. It was a bit like having ants crawling all over my rent flesh, ticklish and unpleasant.
“I think we should get out of here,” someone muttered nervously, “before something bad happens.”
Alexander’s shadow seemed to agree. It was hunched down and shielding itself from me while timidly peering over the vamp’s shoulder. It sensed my dazed gaze and flinched away. Now that the pain was gone I was beginning to focus again. The thought uppermost in my mind was that the chains on my wrists had broken. I’m free! This was very good news for me but not so good for Alexander and his band of frightened men. It was time for them to reap the brunt of my wrath. And I was feeling very wrathful indeed.
Seven startled vampires gaped at me when I sat up. My fangs were still out and my grin had to stretch around them. Thankfully, my lower lip had healed along with my ribs. “You know,” I said into the silence, “I feel pretty good, considering I just had my chest hacked open.” Turning my head, I met and caught Alexander’s eyes. “Now, why don’t I chain you down, cut you open and pour some of my blood into you?”
“What are you?” whispered one of the minions who had backed away from the slab.
“Who, me?” I said with feigned innocence around the forest of teeth that had sprouted in my mouth. “I guess I haven’t formally introduced myself.” Holding both hands up, I showed them the twin holy marks that were branded on both palms. “My friends call me Natalie but you gents can call me Mortis.”
For the count of three seconds, all was still. Then I was swamped by vampires. Alexander stabbed at me with the knife again. I lifted my arm and the blade clanged against the metal cuff around my wrist. Sparks flew as the blade snapped off. A minion jumped on my back and I peeled him off like a scab. Just like the ginger psycho, I wrenched the vamp’s head around until it was staring backwards. Unlike the ginger psycho, the undead henchman didn’t die. He tumbled off the table to the ground with his head flopping on his broken neck. Screaming, he scrabbled through the dirt on his hands and knees.
Distracted by the injured lackey, I failed to block the blade of the knife that Alexander had scooped up. It punctured my poor, ill-used heart and lodged there. I’d lost count of how many times I’d been stabbed in the heart now. Based on past experiences, it wouldn’t harm me but they didn’t know that. In fact, I now had the perfect opportunity to free myself completely from the altar.
Howling and clutching at the snapped off blade, I rolled off the table. With two loud pops, the chains on my ankles snapped. I crouched down out of sight, side by side with the vamp whose head I had rearranged for him. His back was to me but our eyes met anyway. It was one of the creepiest things I’d ever seen. Before he could give me away, I yanked the knife out of my chest and rammed it into his back. My fingers were sliced to the bone by the blade but the flesh knitted back together almost instantly. It was eerie how fast I was able to heal now.
“Check to make sure she’s really dead.” Alexander gave the order in an unsteady voice. His plans had gone badly awry so far and they were about to get a whole lot worse. An evil grin sprouted on my face and I stifled the urge to cackle in triumph. Having open heart surgery performed on me against my will had made me very cranky.
Ty was the one who was pushed forward to be the sacrifice. Creeping around the altar, the first thing he saw was the empty clothes the vamp I’d just stabbed had left behind. His remains were just starting to seep out in a wide circle. Then he spotted me hiding in the shadow of the black stone slab. Since I wasn’t a damp patch on the ground, he correctly deduced that I wasn’t dead.
Scuttling around him, keeping out of sight of the others, I was on my feet before he could issue a warning. The knife I’d rescued from the dead minion found his heart and he jittered on his feet, mouth opening and closing in silent screams. He dropped to his knees, revealing me to the five remaining vampires. If they’d had any brains, the whole lot of them would have fled for their lives. They’d all heard of Mortis but none seemed to grasp what that meant. I was their nemesis, the long awaited doom of their kind. Did that stop them from attacking me again? Nope.
The four remaining lackeys rushed me. They’d managed to overwhelm me with sheer numbers before but I wasn’t chained to the altar this time. I clamped my hands on the head of the first vamp to reach me. It imploded with a wet popping sound. Frenzied with terror, the other three kicked his already melting body out of the way and began attacking me with their bare hands. My flesh was torn by their long nails but I barely felt it and the wounds healed in an instant anyway. Using both hands, I palmed a pair of faces away and shrieks of agony pealed out. Their deaths would be slow but I was beyond caring. Swiping out a hand, I batted at the head of the last minion. His face showed horrified surprise when his head detached from his neck and went spiralling off into a nearby tunnel. His body turned into liquid almost as soon as it hit the ground. Beheading a vampire seemed to be the quickest way by far to kill them. I filed the knowledge away for future use.
Alexander backed away from me when I turned to confront him. His face was ashen even for a long dead vampire. Any blood he had consumed lately had been drawn deep within his cold body. His shadow gibbered silently, pawing at his shoulder and pointing at me in terror.
“You shouldn’t have tried to be a scientist, Alex,” I advised him, advancing slowly. I didn’t bother to cover my bare chest, my hands would shortly be required for another job. “You have no idea what you’ve unleashed.” Neither did I but my warning sounded suitably ominous.
“But, I did this for the Dark Father,” Alexander stammered. “If you are Mortis then surely you should be on my side.” He was speaking in a language that had been lost long ago. It wasn’t Latin but something even older. I believed it was the spoken version of what had been written in the book.
“If there are sides,” I informed him coldly, “I wouldn’t stand with a madman who worships an evil alien.”
Wailing at the knowledge that it was about to die, his silhouette suddenly rushed forward to engulf Alexander. I was momentarily disconcerted to hear the shadow’s screeches clearly in my head. Alexander was almost jerked off his feet as his shadow possessed him. “You know nothing of our kind, pitiful creature!” it spat, using Alexander’s mouth to speak to me. “We were once more powerful than you can even conceive of.” Hatred poured from it in icy waves. “Our time will come again. Even now we work to return to our rightful place. There is nothing you can do to stop us.”
Using Alexander’s body, it laughed. The laughter turned into howls, primordial and savage. No human could hear a sound like that and remain sane. Lucky for me, I was no longer human. I was far more than that. Not even just a simple vampire, I was Mortis, death of the damned. It’s time to end this shadow, I thought with grim satisfaction.
Leaping forward, I caught the dark silhouette off guard. It lifted both hands to ward me off but I was already too close for it to stop me. I crashed into Alexander’s body and he tumbled backwards. Falling with him, I reached through the shadow’s head to the flesh and blood of the body beneath. The shadow wrapped its arms around me but I was ready for the attack this time. Shudders wracked me as my already low body temperature plummeted. Once Alexander was dead, I knew that the shadow had to follow him into oblivion, even if this silhouette seemed to be more powerful than any I’d encountered before.
Feeling silver hair beneath my fingers, I struggled to get a decent grip. The shadow was forcing me backwards, pushing against me with all of its will. I slipped and lost my hold. Frustrated, I slapped at the shadow and my hand passed through its head. It shrieked in pain and loosened its grip a touch. Apparently, the holy marks could also hurt the dark shades. Seizing the moment, I leaned forward with all of my weight and ignored the cold that had seeped into my bones. My fingers found and closed around Alexander’s ears.
Piercing shrieks drilled into my head as the holy marks began melting the vampire leader’s ears off. When they were just warm rivers of melted flesh, my palms met the side of his head without resistance. I turned my face away just as his head imploded in my hands. Goo splattered my chest and shredded clothes but missed my eyes.
Squirming in pain and torment, the shadow released its hold on me and began to shrink. Tearing at its hair, it wailed as its master began to melt. It finally dissipated when there was no solid flesh left.
Straddling the spreading stain that had been Alexander, I shook with the cold that would have drained me completely if it had gone on for much longer. It wasn’t safe to remain in the cavern. Someone could come looking for Alexander or his minions at any moment. It felt like it had been hours since I’d woken up chained to the altar but my watch said it had been less than one. Pushing myself to my feet, I stripped off my torn jumper and shirt and used them to clean off as much of the goo from my skin as possible. I then searched the discarded clothing for replacements. I found a jumper and long black coat that weren’t too badly stained and pulled them on. The arms were too long and I had to fold them back several times. I looked like a kid wearing her father’s clothes.
Before leaving, I picked up Alexander’s book from the table. It was far too big to hide down my jeans so I stuck it beneath the jacket, holding it close to my body. It was easy enough to locate the correct exit. It was the tunnel with the most footprints scuffing the dirt. Following the tracks upwards, I soon found myself back in the populated areas. I received curious glances but no one ran screaming from me. The dark experiments Alexander had performed in the cavern below had been a secret. Not a very well-kept secret, going by the terrified stares the vamps had once given their now departed leader.
When Alexander and Ty didn’t come back soon, the shit was sure to hit the fan. I wanted to be long gone by then. Heading straight for the sleeping quarters, I retrieved my cross and journal. The cross went into a pocket of the jacket for easy access. One of the blankets served as a carry bag for the books after knotting it securely. The torn page was back in my pocket. If anyone managed to wrest the books away from me, at least they wouldn’t be able to see my final demise.
I roughly remembered the path we’d taken when I’d first been invited to join the group and headed back to the main tunnel with the intention or retracing my steps. With the package slung nonchalantly over my shoulder, I strode into the hall and into confusion. Minions milled in small groups, worriedly searching the tunnels for signs of Alexander or Ty. They were used to being led but I couldn’t dredge up any concern for what would happen to them now. I’d worry about that in the future. Right now I just wanted to get the hell out of there alive and intact.
Roxie took in my change of wardrobe and glared at me with suspicion. She started in my direction as I made my way through the throng toward the tunnel I recognized as being the entry point. Someone grabbed her arm and whispered something urgent. She scowled at me then turned and ran off back towards the sleeping area. I forced a sigh of relief. If she’d questioned me and found my answers lacking, I would have been in deep trouble. I had no illusions that I’d be able to fight my way to freedom through fifty or so vampires.
Mostly ignored by everyone else, I slipped into the tunnel and began to jog. I’d never had a great memory or sense of direction as a human but I found my way back to the lair that had so briefly been my home. There was nothing of any value to salvage there so I oriented myself, chose a direction and began to run.
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