Forever and Ever Amen

Chapter 12: Castles in the Snow

"How much farther?"

"Ten minutes maybe. I think."

"You do know where we're going, right?"

"Yes, of course, I do." Mike consulted the map again. "No name castle. Vicki and I did a homicide investigation there about three years ago."

"Is it on the map?"

"Of course, not. Why do you think they call it 'no name' castle?"

Mick set his jaw and pushed the accelerator down a little harder. He would have dearly liked to floor it, but the last thing he needed was a patrol car pulling him over. Not having Henry's powers of persuasion in his bag of tricks, that delay would have lasted far longer than they had time for. Seconds were precious now. Off to the right, the sun had broken over the horizon several minutes ago, washing the white winter landscape in a torrent of fresh, clean light with increasing intensity. Squinting, he pulled the sunglasses from an inside pocket and pressed them into service. With one hand he tried gamely to block from his face the light that eluded the glasses. "It's winter, for crying out loud. You'd think it'd be overcast up here this time of year."

"Usually it is," Mike agreed, trying to keep the glare out of his own eyes as well. "Just your rotten luck, I guess. What does that do to you anyway?"

"Hurts like hot needles. And it drains my energy."

"Well, better than what it would do to Fitzroy."

Small miracles, Mick thought. He couldn't imagine having to seek shelter right now with Beth and Vicki so near and in mortal danger. Henry's finals words to him burned brightly in his mind. Her blood would be on his hands if anything happened to her. It was implied that the price would be his life. A fair bargain, all in all. If anything happened to Vicki, it would also happen to Beth, and if that was the case, Mick had no reason to go on. This he knew now beyond the shadow of a doubt; Beth was his reason for existing. Without her, Henry Fitzroy was at liberty to dispose of him as he saw fit.

"Tell me about this castle," he prompted to keep his mind from circling that particular drain.

"Turn-of-the-previous-century construction. It was fashionable then for the wealthy around here to live like European royalty. Several castles were built. One is now a tourist attraction. The rest are abandoned. They tend to attract fringe elements—cults, drug parties, homeless, that sort of thing."

"Vampires."

"Apparently. Turn off at the next exit."

Mick did. The streets they turned onto became increasingly narrow and convoluted, and Mick was beginning to doubt his navigator's skills, but he held his tongue and maintained what remained of his patience. Mike was working hard enough on pulling the information out of his frazzled and exhausted brain without the undead impatiently tapping a virtual foot. He wanted to find Vicki as desperately as Mick wanted to find Beth, and that would just have to be good enough.

Eventually neither map nor memory was necessary. On a rutted forest road, a fresh set of tracks was visible in the snow. They followed it.

"No name castle, I presume?" Mick ventured as they pulled up.

"Yep."

It was like nothing he had ever seen before. Wedged deep into the side of a mountain, the castle was a collection of towers and turrets punched through with black, empty windows. Snow piled at the base of massive granite walls and swirled into yawning doorways. Bare winter trees moaning in the wind embraced the stones possessively. The overall impression was one of an enormous skull jammed in the dirt eons ago and long forgotten.

Mick reached into the backseat for Henry's sword. By his reckoning they were facing at least four vampires, one of them Cynthia, provided that one of those their captive had named was the one Henry had dispatched when he came to Mick's aid. Mick hated to think that any more of that caliber might be sheltering here. Cynthia would be challenge enough. Though not an ancient, she was old enough to be quick and dangerous. And she had learned at the feet of the most cunning of all. "I don't like these odds Mike. I may not be able to protect you."

Mike pulled the gun out of its holster and checked the magazine with the silver bullets. "I'm somewhat dangerous myself, remember?"

"Right," he murmured. Being human, Mike would only mange to hit a vampire if he caught it by surprise or was graced with an inordinate amount of luck, such as he clearly had back at the park. He reached into the back of his jacket and produced one of the stakes he always carried. "Take this. Straight through the heart will paralyze them. Then you can shoot them at leisure. Directly to the head if you want to make sure."

"Gee. Thanks for the vote of confidence."

"It's a big one considering the circumstances. Trust me."

They approached as quietly as they could manage given the crunching snow. The cold morning air glittered around them. Tree shadows rippled across the snow. Mick and the sword went first, his nose drinking in the rich scents of ice, wood, decay and blood. Mike followed at a small distance, gun at the ready, eyes scanning all the openings in the castle and the surrounding woods. Nothing interfered with their progress, and Mick breathed a tentative sigh of relief upon entering the drafty, shadowy interior.

They stood just inside a doorway with no doors, snow drifting about their ankles, and looked around at the pitiful remnants of a once stately residence. Except for the shattered skeleton of a piano, no furniture remained, and most of the wood that was left was splintered and rotted. Half a stairway hung from the second floor landing. A thick electrical wire twisted out of a wall, the remnants of a light socket tethered to the end. Mick could smell all the creatures that had made a home here in recent times—rabbits, rats, foxes, boars. Vampires. Closing his eyes, he scented carefully and moved into the direction of the strongest markers, Mike close behind.

At the end of a narrow hallway in which torn spider webs drifted and groped for their faces, lay the kitchen. Rusting hulks of metal, what remained of the stoves, and sagging cabinets lined the walls. Through a back entrance, a light blue van was visible outside. On the far end of the room, another doorway led into total darkness. It was from there that emanated the strongest smells and sounds of life in this desolate place. Mick indicated the passage with his eyes and Mike nodded. Like a well-practiced team they moved forward.

A stairway lay just beyond the edge of the slender archway. Mick saw it easily and all but flowed down the incline. A moment later there was a gasp, slip, scuff and thump. Mick whirled around, sword raised, expecting an attack, only to find Mike on his backside, clumsily trying to regain his feet. "You could have told me there were stairs!" he cursed under his breath.

"Shut up!" Mick hissed.

From somewhere below, a howling ruckus rose.

Mick hurried down the winding stairway, only to be greeted by a weathered wrought iron gate secured by a shiny new chain and lock.

"Mick?" Vicki squinted, trying to spot him in the shadows. "God, I hope that's you."

"It's us, Vicki," Mike called, clattering down the stairs.

She hurried over. With the exception of an ugly bruise on her left cheekbone, she looked to be in good shape. But Mick's eye quickly landed on the figure beyond her, towards the far end of the room, folded small upon herself near the terminus of a dusty sunbeam. Her long, golden hair was stringy and snarled but unmistakable. "Beth."

"You better hurry and get us out of here. Your buddy Cynthia can't be far."

With a sharp snap of his wrist, Mick broke the lock from the chain and pushed open the door. Mike burst through behind him and scooped Vicki up in a massive hug. "Thank God you're all right!"

A curtain of steel bars divided the room, which looked like it had once been used as a kitchen pantry the contents of which included live animals. On the other side, three naked male vampires growled and snarled their feral hunger. But Mick gave them only a cursory glance; his entire world collapsed into a single point—the cowering woman on the floor. The blade clanged to the ground as he slid to a stop on his knees before her, taking her shoulders into his hands, lifting her. "Beth. I'm here." She was a limp and fragile rag doll in his embrace. "I'm here now. You're going to be OK. Everything is going to be OK."

She stirred feebly, weary and dazed. He held her closer, pressing her head against his shoulder, drowning in her familiar scent. "It's going to be OK." Behind him the vampires gathered and shook the bars, their blood greed a wet, chilling sound in the cold air.

Beth pushed at him suddenly, panicked. "It's all right. They can't hurt you." She pushed harder, her hands balling into fists. Her breathing grew ragged and her heart tripped in her chest.

And then she screamed.

The sound was so unexpected, so overwhelming, it felt like a stake to his heart, paralyzing him on the spot. She was halfway out of his arms when he caught her and tenderly tightened his grip to reassure her that she was safe. Instead of calming down, however, she only grew more frantic. She fought him like a wild thing with nails and teeth, eyes glazed and crazed, screaming and screaming. The ferals echoed her lustily until the stones reverberated with the clamor.

"Mick! Let her go!" Vicki shouted.

"No!"

"Let her go! Can't you see she's terrified of you?"

No! He felt cold and unreal suddenly, disembodied even, lost in a bizarre new reality he could not imagine but which was real nevertheless. Reluctantly he relented his hold on her. Sobbing, she all but flew away from him, slamming into the corner behind her, and made herself as small as possible. Her eyes were on him, though, peering behind a curtain of tangled hair. What he saw there chilled him to the core. She was terrified of him. Terrified to death.

"No," he whispered. "No. Beth. It's me. I..."

Her voice shook with vehemence. "Get away from me you monster!"

He couldn't breathe. He couldn't think. A maelstrom of emotion opened up in his soul, drowned him whole, and brought forth the creature that forever lived just beneath his skin. He felt it rising and was powerless to stop it. Still he could not avert his gaze from her—or the growing horror in her face.

"She's been through a lot, Mick," Vicki said. "This will take time."

"She will always hate you now," said a new voice now. "How does that feel, Mick?"

He turned slowly to the petite blond that had entered the dungeon. Mike pointed his gun at her, but she didn't so much as glance at him or Vicki. Her chin rose a little higher in triumph. "How does it feel, Mick?" she said again.

"I had nothing to do with what happened to Coraline." His voice was thick with menace.

Cynthia's amiable expression vanished in an instant. "You had everything to do with it! You're the one she couldn't stop hunting. You're the one that drove her to steal the compound from Lance! You're the one, therefore, who caused her to be taken away and killed."

Mick rose to his feet. "What you have done is far worse. How many lives has this sick revenge cost? Five? Ten? Fifteen?"

"Does it matter? They're only human."

"Hey, watch it," said Vicki.

Cynthia indicated Beth with a nod. "I was going to turn her for you, you know. What a beautiful monster she would make."

"You were going to let her become feral."

Cynthia smiled. "Ah well. The devil is in the details, as they say."

Without warning she broke into a blinding blur of speed, turned to the door to the cage, released it and threw it open. The ferals were out of it in a flash. Mike's gun fired twice before one of the creatures was on him, knocking it out of his hand. But the human was prepared with his backup weapon. When the vampire fell on him for a lethal feed, he ran right into the sharpened stake Mike held at the ready with his other hand and instantly became a limp weight.

Vicki lunged for Beth as the other two ferals came for both of them. Mick stooped for the sword and spun on his heel, the blade humming in his grip. His intended target saw him coming, however, and ducked out of the way, then came in for a low attack that sent them both flying across the cobblestone floor. Mick growled up into the other's distorted face. Nothing human remained there. Reason had fled. Sharpened by deprivation interspersed with violent feedings, only the hunger ruled, and it was that hunger that made him strong. The long, sharp fangs came for Mick's throat like missiles. Bucking violently, he managed to shake the leach loose just enough to get a hold on him and throw him into the nearest wall. By the time the feral bounced off and flew at him again, Mick had the sword back in his hand. Leaping high into the air, he surprised his foe with the blade singing around in a mighty arch—and straight through his neck.

At almost the exact same instant, Mike's gun fired again.

Mick looked to see Mike drag the body of the vampire who had gone after Vicki off of her crumpled form. Beth sat beside her, mouth open, dazed. Blood and gore covered them both. It had been a head shot—lethal even without the silver bullets.

Before he could fathom what he was seeing, a sharp gasp threw his attention. The third vampire fought to rise to his feet. Cynthia stood over him, stake in hand, encouraging him with sharp kicks to his ribs. Her shoulder was wet and bright red, and she swayed unsteadily, victim of one of Mike's lucky shots. Mick didn't wait for the feral to recover. There was no point in it. His destiny was certain and written on the blade of King Henry VIII.

The body collapsed between them. Cynthia looked up at him, eyes bright. Her breath coming in the low, quick cadence of a mortally wounded vampire. Loathing carved her beautiful face into a fearsome mask. "I hate you, Mick St. John." It was the second time in as many days that someone had declared this to him. Except this time he believed it.

He lifted the bloodied sword high. She straightened, ready. "She will hate you forever!"

The spike of rage that guided his hand knew no more reason than the ferals had. He gave in to the sheer joy of killing as he had not done since his earliest days as a child of night. The blade struck downward with such power it cleaved clean through her shoulder and torso, slicing her heart in two as it went. The body tumbled, exploding blood.

Mick stood and stared at it for a long time, the small grip he still had on his humanity screaming to be heard. He saw nothing else. Heard nothing. Was aware of nothing. Only the blood. Only the death. And, somewhere beneath it all, the unfathomable pain of having lost...her.

Something called his name. Over and over. A man's voice. Very slowly he turned, very slowly becoming aware again of the room and why he was there and who he was there with. His eyes, still crazed with the blood lust, found Beth. He watched her tremble and pull away, crawl along the wall like a trapped animal until she could go no father. He heard her heart. He heard her whimper. He closed his eyes and lowered his head. Beth. His Beth. She who had fed him and loved him and defended him and laughed with him. She remembered none of this. The only thing that remained for her was the inhuman thing he truly was.

"Mick!"

He looked up at the other humans in the room. Mike knelt on the floor and cradled a limp body. Another cold fist closed around his heart, nearly stopping it completely. Only now did he register the desperation in Mike's face and voice...and all the blood on the floor...