21

RIVERS IN THE SNOW

Blood tumbled in rivers over the snow, freezing before the bodies at their source could die. One man blinked away a stray snowflake, its crystal form catching in his eyelashes. His fingers twitched against the ground, leather rasping against the snow and then went still. The black cliffs hung behind him, a demonic curtain of rock and ice framing the horror with a stark blue sky beyond.

Ashley pushed herself off the snow, groaning as pain ebbed from her bloodied arm. She inspected the trio of claw marks torn through her hiking gear, the force of which had sent her flying down into the soft snow behind some stray boulders. Her blood was still smeared on the nearest one where she'd clipped it with her head.

Staggering through a knee-deep drift, Ashley surveyed the remains of her rescue team. Even from this distance she could tell that all sixteen were dead, strewn over the area in various states of dismemberment with smears of carnage between them. Bullet casing littered the ground, gleaming like a bed of stars under the harsh sun.

The vampire had appeared from nowhere in a crack of purple light, electricity spewing forth in angry shrieks of thunder triggering micro avalanches. The rest was a haze but Ashley remembered seeing him feed from several of the team, stooping over their dying bodies with claws and fangs dripping red. The bloodshed was confirmed as she reached the top of the glacier and the bodies of her friends.

"Oh god... Williams," Ashley whispered, kneeling beside a middle-aged man. She'd been on many missions with him, including her first through the swamps of Eastern Europe when she was still a child. "You were right – I'm sorry. Mum's gonna be so mad but I couldn't let her go into the mountains with two vampires and a cop as cover, no chance in hell..." Her gloved hand brushed his eyes closed.

She peeled open one of the first aid kits, wrapping the cuts on her arm. Frostbite could start fast and she was no good to anyone if she let it cripple her. Ashley sighed, holding her bandaged arm for a moment then picked up one of the radios and tapped it. Nothing. A gargle of static. She swore and delved deeper into the bag. There was a locator beacon inside which she slipped into her jacket. There was already enough weaponry concealed in her combat clothes to take on a small army to which she added a flare and stun grenade.

"Right, vampires – here we go," she whispered, boots crunching against the snow. "Just like old times."

Her dead friend seemed to smile at her as she trekked toward the cliffs.

As the minutes passed, Nikola could feel his body healing. Bones were knitting together, blood welling up and drying on his skin – torn muscles numbing. The ancient vampire sneered, taking care to shove Nikola roughly against the rock wall every now and then, breaking something new.

Tesla groaned softly as a fresh stream of blood ran down the side of his head. He was a scientist, not a warrior. Though it pained his ego to admit, he knew very well that he didn't stand a chance against Apries.

"No-" he protested weakly, covering his face just before he was thrust into the rock again. It cut through his hands and arms, shredding what was left of his sleeve and adding a bloody tear along his forearm.

There was water under their feet. Nikola could feel it biting at his ankles. There was something else too – snow – it was wafting through the air, gently colliding with his cheeks. How could it be snowing?

He didn't know how long they walked for but eventually the General came to a stop. Nikola opened his eyes. The first thing he saw were two beacons of fire erupting from the floor, burning in spirals of flame and wind. The base of its jets electric blue where it was feeding off natural gas locked in the rock. The heat from the enormous pillars of fire banished any hint of ice from the rock around them, scorched off the moss and left a sooty residue over the enormous door looming beyond as though it were the passage to hell itself.

Between the two flames lay the famous granite door built to a monstrous scale. Houses could have skimmed through its breadth with room to spare. Deep grooves and a large flat landing suggested that it was designed to open towards them but nothing had shifted its weight in tens of thousands of years.

It was not ornate. Instead, simple inscriptions were scored into the gleaming black surface read, 'Immortal Lands' in a language few could still read.

The door.

"I don't understand," Nikola whispered, when Apries held him close, pressing one of his sharp claws to Nikola's fragile neck. He reached up, weakly gripping the General's arm. "I know nothing of this – I swear." Nikola was still taking in the shocking find. It was beyond anything he'd ever imagined finding buried under the earth. Its gleaming symbols meant nothing to him.

"I believe you," Apries hissed. His army of sand creatures shivered against the walls and ceiling, waiting, hungry. "The woman you're with -"

"Helen?"

"Yes... She knows how to open the door and if she wants you back in one piece, she's going to open it for me. Isn't that right?" He lifted his voice, addressing the tunnel.

Helen's response was another bullet, sheering off a nearby rock making the vampire laugh. The vampire curled the edge of his lip. "Immortals – always so testy."

Nikola tried to pick her out against the rock. He could feel her – that rapid patter of her heart and the sound of her breath catching. She was there. "Don't listen to him," he managed. If this vampire desperately wanted what was behind this door then opening it was a very bad idea. "You hear me? Guh..." He gasped for air as the vampire thrust three of his claws through Nikola's back and out his chest. There was a gurgle from Nikola's mouth as blood welled up his throat and dripped from his lips.

"Stop it!" A very angry, British voice bellowed from the cave. Helen Magnus strolled out of the shadows, gun in hand. Her eyes were like steel, fixed on Apries. "Leave him alone."

"Do you know what happens when you bleed a vampire dry?" Apries dragged his claws a few inches through Nikola drawing out a gargled screech from him. Helen could hear his blood dripping down onto the rock – his heart starting to fail. "It's a very slow death," he continued. "Losing your mind, drip by drip until insatiable hunger takes hold."

Helen watched as Nikola's head lulled back into unconsciousness.

"I know that you have to kill a vampire today – all of that, 'restoring the balance' shit that you Immortals have been peddling since the sun first rose but it doesn't have to be me." Apries withdrew his claws and let Nikola fall to the ground in a damaged heap against one of the boulders. "Or him, as I see you are quite fond of the mongrel."

"Then who – Amasis?" she sneered. "He is long gone," Helen did not lower her gun but she was running out of shots. She doubted the silver tipped rounds were enough to kill him.

"I can bring you my brother," Apries walked past Nikola's body without so much as a glance. "I'll even do it for you, for old time's sake. I had a age to think things over in my tomb. Genetic memory is a powerful thing, Immortal," he reached out to brush his claws over the stone door. "I searched mine, for hundreds of years until it started to unlock... The things I saw – glimpses of what lays beyond this door."

Helen frowned, risking a cautious step closer. She resisted the urge to look at the sea of sand creatures churning around the walls and ceiling. They made their presence known by a constant rain of dust. "You weren't coming for my Sanctuary?"

The vampire laughed, turning. He lounged back against the cold, rock of the door. "Did you really think that my first port of call after thousands of years imprisonment would be revenge?"

Helen was silent.

He shook his head. "Disappointing... There are much grander prizes than retribution." Apries tapped his claws against the granite. "Can you read it?"

Helen lifted her gaze to the symbols cut into the door. She'd never seen the language before but her mind instantly translated. The flicker or recognition in her eyes was enough for Apries.

"Good. Now, if you'd be so kind – how do I open it?"

Helen shook her head. "I have no idea."

Slowly, the vampire stalked over to Nikola's body, stepping on his neck – pressing down with his sandle until another moan escaped Nikola. "Answer carefully, Magnus."

"Werewolves in a hole – what happened to you?" Ashley sat down beside Detective Joe Kavanaugh. "You look like you got bit by a vampire."

Joe, deathly pale, rested against the tunnel wall, gulping down half a bottle of water before he replied. "I did. Your mother forgot to mention I was a walking snack."

Ashley flinched. "Sorry. Mum does things like that."

"Clearly," he pointed at the angry fang marks on his neck.

She rested her hand on his shoulder. Ashley didn't know Joe particularly well but he seemed like a nice enough guy and so far he'd handled the onslaught of the Abnormal world much better than any of the other institutional forces she'd come across. Maybe he might consider working for them one day. "When was the last time you saw them?"

"Half a day ago?" he guessed. "That bloody ancient pain in the neck looks a lot younger now he's freshly fed."

"Yeah," she agreed. "He tore through our guys up top no trouble. No wonder mum won't let Tesla feed."

"Something's gone wrong. Amasis was on our side far as I could tell." Joe had a terrible feeling that they'd find Magnus and Tesla's bodies deeper in the caves.

A veil of dust fell over Helen, the sand creatures above shifting restlessly.

"Stop it... or I won't tell you shit, Apries," she scowled. "Thank you," Helen watched Apries back away from Tesla. There was just one gaping problem in Helen's plan – she didn't have the faintest clue how to open the door. She surveyed the enormous slab of rock, shining her torch up its facade. The surface of the stone was unnaturally smooth, certainly polished by hand and then set into place. The slab beneath Apries and Tesla was equally worked, almost like parts of a machine. Hell – what she really needed was Nikola. He was the engineer.

Apries narrowed his blue eyes at her. "What?"

"The secret of the door was lost long ago," she lied casually. "Yes, I can read the language but I need Tesla," her hand waved at the vampire, "to help open it."

Those blue eyes went black. "The mongrel?" he spat. She nodded. Apries snarled something untoward.

Helen nodded, her eyes betraying nothing this time. "Didn't you wonder why an Immortal would allow a vampire to live?" she let the revelation hang in the air until it stuck. "Now you know. You're not the only one trying to open this door, vampire."

Apries picked Tesla up by the back of his jacket like a kitten. He glowered at the barely conscious half-breed. "That true?"

Nikola had just enough presence of mind to nod weakly.

"Still nothing," Joe slipped the radio back into his pocket. "We're not officially missing for another two days."

"I'm not missing for three – I was supposed to be your backup."

"Well, thanks, I guess."

Ashley lofted her eyebrow at him. "I heard about your dad, by the way. Now I know why you were always hanging around the gates while I was growing up." They were nearly the same age – Joe three years her senior.

"It's why I became a detective in the first place. There is some seriously weird shit going down in Old City but most of the Force keeps their eyes closed. They don't want to know what's really going on. Or they've been told not to look. I'm not sure which."

The corner of her lip curled up in a smile. "You know, if we both manage to live through this perhaps we could help each other out a bit. You drop me a few hints – I reel in the abnormals. Lower body count all round."

"Let's live through this first," he managed a proper smile, a bit of colour returning to his skin now. "Now, if you really are my back up, you better give me a hand."

Nikola was sitting against one of the polished rocks in front of the door indulging his obsessive compulsive behaviour. He was using a shred torn from his jacket to wipe away as much dried blood from his face as possible but the rag was filthy, merely spreading charcoal across his flesh. Most of his bones were mended even if the pain hadn't subsided. Still, he was in a black mood, scowling at the other vampire.

It was still snowing, tiny crystals wafting through the Throat of Thoth. He realised now that it was the constant stream of snow which caused the water to collected in the tunnel's floor.

"All right Nikola, enough now," Helen whispered, standing a few feet from him. Her gun was back in its holster and Apries paced around the door, lost in thought with his army of sand creatures hissing in the cave behind.

"This is not going well," Tesla pointed out, tossing the rag away.

"Like all of your evil plans go smoothly," she automatically snapped back.

"Usually they do – until you drop by and start unravelling them."

"Really Nikola, can we focus on the task at hand?"

He surveyed the door, polished stones and breadth of the tunnel behind. Despite his reservations, Nikola couldn't stop his mind from attempting the puzzle at hand. "I'm not sure it's something I should be setting my mind to."

"It's that or he kills us," Helen whispered.

"He's going to do that anyway. Come on Helen, you know how this goes. We help the bad guys get what they want – they return their gratitude with a few well placed bullets, or in this case fang marks. Ow!"

She'd swatted him over the head, messing up his hair. "Focus!"

"Focussing..." he sighed, using the rock to help him to his feet. Several of his bones cracked back into place. He dusted off his tattered clothes and strutted up to the door. Apries narrowed his eyes at the mongrel. Such half-bred creatures were forbidden under his father's rule.

Nikola had spent his whole adult life trying to meet a full blood vampire but the reality was rather underwhelming. "It's not vampire in origin," Nikola started, touching the cold stone. There was a faint current of electricity almost like a pulse coursing through the veins of imperfection. "Nor is it from Hollow Earth."

Nikola looked over his shoulder at Helen. For the first time he saw her for the creature that she was. An Immortal. A different race entirely. A race with a past lost beneath the world – all but erased from it.

Helen shifted uncomfortably under his gaze. "What?"

He smirked. "Nothing, Ms Magnus..." His smile was stolen when he saw some of the sand creatures' eyes peering out from the darkness at him. Nikola cleared his throat. Focus, he reminded himself before Helen could hit him again.

Whatever the answer was, it wasn't on the door itself, so Nikola walked away – right away, down the steps and back into the tunnel of river stones.

"Where the hell is it going?" Apries growled.

"Patience," Helen insisted. "Let him go. This is what he does."