Hello anyone who is good enough to take time to read my story. Another chapter already. It seems once i get going with this i cant stop, which you will see in this chapter. This part was originally about 500 words shorter than the others, so i thought it a good oppotunity to stick in a bit of action to tide you over till the next chapter. However i got a bit carried away and it ended up about 500 words longer than the other chapters. So apologies for the length. Sincere thanks again for the kind reviews. And special thanks to Squeekie for the good sugestions. Enjoy.
Carl stepped quietly downstairs, peering over the banister.
Pádraig, Roan and Van Helsing were sat around the long wooden table at the back of the main room eating what appeared to be breakfast. Glancing at the dusty clock on the wall, he realised it was probably lunch. He sheepishly slunk over and joined them.
Roan spotted him, and smiled weakly. "Dia duit ar maidin, sir. We were getting worried, we thought we'd have to come and drag you up."
"Late night Carl?" Van Helsing teased.
"Erm. I'm not sure.." He groaned, rubbing his head.
"You don't really have a head for strong drink, do you Brother?" Pádraig smiled.
"I don't suppose you remember falling asleep down here and being practically carried to bed by Roan?"
Carl looked up in disbelief, his face burning red with embarrassment. He turned to Roan, looking at her with awkwardly apologetic eyes.
To Carl's relief, Van Helsing broke the uncomfortable silence.
"So, what's the plan?"
"What do you need to know? If you're wanting to go look for clues, what mystery is it we're trying to solve?"
"You're sure that these disappearances, these murders, are to do with Dorchadas?"
"It's happening exactly how it did ten years ago. His followers are killing to provide for their chief, to grant him power for his return."
"Well I suppose it would be a good idea to prevent him from gaining anymore strength than he already possesses." Carl put in.
Van Helsing nodded, thinking. "How many are there? How many 'minions'?"
"It's difficult to be certain. Most never show themselves openly. We do know that there are at least two demons gathering the offerings, that we know of. They are Dorchadas' second in command, if you will. They are the vessels."
"Who are they, and more importantly, how do we kill them?"
Roan dropped a thick, dusty book on the table in front of him and opened it.
"Ìobairt and Gortaìm?" Van Helsing said, reading the page aloud.
"Sacrifice and Pain." Roan translated. "They themselves are a lot older than Dorchadas, but not nearly as powerful. Which is probably why the followed him. Back from hell."
"They are in a demonic body, but they can transform into a more human figure, so as not to be noticed when they hunt."
"Well, demons can be exorcised. We can expel them in the name of God." Carl suggested.
"God?" Roan looked up. "God will not help us now." She said quietly.
"Their demon bodies are much stronger than their human bodies. We have a better chance of destroying them while they are in human form. The difficulty will be finding them."
"How long is it since they last took an offering?" Van Helsing asked.
"Two weeks. I'd say they will be on the hunt again very soon."
"They come at night, all the victims have been taken from the west of the village so far, over in Linehan road, close to their lair." Roan said.
"Is there any way we can predict the next victim? Has their been any uniformity in the victims they've chosen?"
"Not that we know of." Pádraig shook his head. "Men, Women and children. More young teenagers than I'd guess was chance. All being about Roan's age. Though knowing his nature in life I'd not be much surprised at that twisted favouritism." Pádraig looked slowly across at Roan. "Perhaps they've got more of an idea about their required 'blood' than we'd hoped. They've got smarts enough to know, if there had been a Murphy child, they would be about that age."
"All from roughly the same area too." Roan added. "But for that reason, many of the people close by have fled, so it may be that they will have to look further a-field for their prey."
"Well we'd better start tonight." Van Helsing said firmly. "We'll go down into the town, and keep an eye out for anyone suspicious, anyone you don't recognise as a villager. Until then, I would like to see the bodies of the victims, see if we can decipher anything more from that. Are there any left unburied?" He asked, turning to Pádraig.
"Aye, a couple. Some of families already fled. Some were left where they lay, the villagers to afraid move them."
"Where are the corpses now?"
"They were moved to an old barn near by a derelict farm. They're waitin' to be burned."
Van Helsing stood up and turned from the table.
"Carl, arrange some artillery for our friends."
†
Van Helsing rattled the splintering barn gates, but they had been bolted shut. To prevent the demons from disturbing the dead? Van Helsing thought, or to prevent the dead disturbing the village? Unfazed, he whipped out a small weapon with fierce saw-like edges from his belt, and it began to spin violently. With a flick of his wrist the circular blade ripped through the gate's catch in a burst of sparks and the high pitched roar of shredding metal.
Kicking the doors open, he stepped inside. That balmy, festering stench he knew all to well lurched toward him in a thick heavy wave, making him retch at the putrid smell. Pulling his bandana over his face from his throat, he glanced around the bare store and gestured for the others to enter. Despite the warm, rotting tang that hung the air it was cold inside. Shreds of chilled light from the grey afternoon sky stretched across the hay covered floor through the gaps in the barn's slatted walls, highlighting the many specks of dust that floated about them.
Roan pulled her over-sized cast-off jumper tighter about her and folded her arms around her chest.
She strained to see in the gloom and spotted Van Helsing stood by a hay stack in the corner. She took a glowing torch from her godfather and jogged over to see what he had found, although she already knew, and part of her wasn't so sure she wanted to see the mangled corpses again.
Little over a month ago she had been returning from school to the farm she shared with her father. Passing through the town square, a cry came from a young man running down the hill that overlooked the west of the village. Amongst his panting hysterics they managed to make out the basics of what the boy had found. A while later, a group of men returned to the square, the body of what looked like a young girl in the arms of the largest man. Onlookers hurried their children back into their houses as the men lay the limp figure down on the ground and gathered around it. Even the toughest men were shaking in horror at the sight.
The girl's throat had been slit wide open, so much so that the inner workings of her throat were plainly visible. The front of her dress was slashed, and although she was now wrapped in one of the men's jackets, the exposed part of her pale bare chest was cut with deep gashes, carved with precision to form symbols and letters. Her face, or what was left of it, was ashen, her lips cold blue. Her cheeks were adorned with similar lettering to those sliced into her chest. Perhaps the most gruesome sight was where her eyes had been brutally crossed out, leaving ugly, bloody welts that ran from her cheeks up to her forehead, the splintered bone of her sockets crumpled around the hollow where her pretty young eyes had been.
The men muttered uneasily, some uttering blessings for the dead, some tossing locals names between the group. There had been more than one young girl vanish of late, and it was difficult to identify which one this unfortunate child was.
The gathering of villagers debated what the core of her horrific death was, desperately seeking some explanation other than the one they all held in their minds, but they all knew what this meant. It was happening again.
†
Roan knelt down next to Van Helsing, who sat staring silently at the row of human shaped lumps laid out under a long sheet on the ground. He straightened up, and taking a deep breath he pulled the sheet back.
"Oh my God…" Carl gasped quietly behind them.
What he revealed was a heap of decaying bodies, some almost a month old. He leant over to take a closer look one of the fresher looking corpses.
Suddenly the barn doors swung open, and Van Helsing turned sharply.
"What're yer doin' in here?" The stout old man in the doorway scowled at the group, before his mistrustful stare fell upon Van Helsing. "You've no right comin' in here!"
"Mr. Henry-" Pádraig started, trying to appease the notoriously cantankerous farmer.
He turned and glared at the young man, his jowls quivering ferociously.
"You," He said, pointing his stubby finger. "Yer bringin' strange folk to our village. Up to no good. Yer trouble, you Heany. Yer as bad as them. Yer not right. An' that girl o'yers!" He turned to Roan, glowering. "She's just the same. S'no wonder yer associatin' with these strange folk!" He spotted the freshly uncovered pile they were currently inspecting, and his face flushed with anger. "And here yer are, disturbin' our dead! Have y'no respect lad?!"
"They're trying to help us." Said Pádraig through gritted teeth, clearly losing patience.
"I bet! I think you'd better leave son. All of you."
Van Helsing stood up. "According to Pádraig here, this is no one's lawful property. We'll be staying as long as we feel necessary, sir."
"Aye." Roan said quietly, glancing warily about the eerie barn. "And no longer."
"You're not welcome here. You wanna watch your back. You'll leave sharp if you know what's good for yer." With that he stormed out of the barn.
"Thank you for the advice, not the first time I've heard that since I've been here." Van Helsing sighed.
He leant over to continue examining the bodies when a shot flew past his head and crashed through the wooden wall behind him, a streak of light from the bullet hole falling on his long black coat.
He began to turn to face his attacker, his hands sliding into his coat to pull out a weapon, when a second bullet soared towards him, and he rolled across the straw covered floor behind a barrel.
Pádraig grabbed Roan and Carl and yanked them back into a nearby stall.
"I warned you!" Cried Henry, striding into the barn with a smoking rifle propped up in his arms. "You folks don't listen." He cocked the rifle and took aim at the barrel.
Van Helsing leapt up, dodging another bullet as it hit a haystack in an explosion of straw.
"Why doesn't he just shoot him?" Roan cried, exasperated.
"He's a monster hunter. Not a murderer." Carl said.
Van Helsing darted behind a thick wooden post and took out his blades. It was too dangerous to throw them, after all, he didn't want to kill him, just disarm him. He leapt out from behind the pole, waiting for the right second to spin his blades at the gun. The farmer lowered his gun to reload, and Van Helsing threw his blades toward it. But Henry moved, and cocking his gun he moved into the barn.
Van Helsing cursed. His blades were stuck in the floor on the other side of the barn. He certainly couldn't use his crossbow, he was stood directly in front of the others. It was too risky, even for as good a shot as himself.
Henry aimed at him, and he quickly rolled out of the way. The shot was fired, but it hit the roof, shattering the lead tiles and bringing wooden slats falling to the floor. Van Helsing looked up. Henry was sprawled on the floor, his lying gun feet away from him. Van Helsing's confusion vanished when he saw Roan stood over Henry, a thick wooden plank in her shaking hands.
Van Helsing half-smiled and nodded his thanks. He picked up the fallen gun and nudged the unconscious man with his foot.
"Good job. He won't be going anywhere for a while."
"True. But when he wakes up he'll be even more livid." Pádraig said, who despite the serious truth in his words, couldn't help but smile at the whole situation.
"Well we'll worry about that when the time comes. We've more important…and far more dangerous things than Mr. Henry to worry about."
Carl crept out of the stall. "What was his problem? Sometimes I just don't know why you bother with this job, it certainly doesn't earn you any gratitude!"
"I'm sorry, about him." Roan apologised. "There are some of us who appreciate your help."
Van Helsing nodded. "Don't worry. It's not the first time people have been less than thrilled at my presence. Pádraig." He called.
The slight man came to his side and nodded in response.
"Do you recognise these markings?" He said, pointing to some unusual scratches on the flesh of the cadaver.
"Aye. These ones are used in the transferring ritual, where the vessel gives the life it has taken over to the receiver."
"And what about these?" Van Helsing enquired, running a gloved finger over a set of different but similarly styled scars on another body next to him.
"Those are the markings that've been found on the younger victims."
"And what are they for?"
"The resurrection. I think the demons have been performing the blood letting ritual on youngsters that would be about the Murphy child's age, had there been one, trying to find the blood they need."
"But if Murphy's wife had had a child with someone else, as the villagers say, the child wouldn't be of the same bloodline." Protested Carl.
"Aye." Said Pádraig. "But the window is approaching and they're getting desperate. They'll tear the whole village apart looking for a descendant of Seamus Murphy."