Part VII

The castle of the Lord of the Black Wing, Gransurg Blackmore, didn't fail to impress Kirei; a black behemoth towering over a ravine at the bottom of which ran a wild stream, it instilled a sense of awe and terror into everyone who saw it.
Well, almost everyone; Narbareck didn't seem to pay much attention to the gargantuan castle. She barely even spared a glance at the countless towers and turrets that rose menacingly towards the dark skies above.
Kirei couldn't afford to gaze at the castle for long, either, for he had to watch his step as the two made their way along the ravine.

A narrow goat path led up and down along the length of the canyon and towards the great castle. In the pitch black darkness of the night one could all too easily miss their step, which would momentarily send them tumbling down the rocky slopes and towards the river.
Such a fall was something only a lucky few could hope to survive, and Kirei preferred not to test his fortune there.

The two pressed on at a fast pace, and the massive black walls and towers of the fortress grew ever taller with each passing step.
The goat path eventually brought them to one of the doors that opened right over the ravine and the river, and which led into the castle's sprawling underground dungeons and cellars, dug throughout the hill and the cliff on which the castle stood.

Much to Kirei's surprise, the door at the end of the path was open.

"What is this?"

"What is what?"

"The door. From what I understood from your instructions, we were supposed to break in here."

"You understood wrong."

"So this is normal?"

"Yes. The fact that these doors are open means things are still going according to plan. I thought that the whole operation had been discovered when those ghouls intercepted us in the forest, but apparently not."

"Or this could be a trap."

"Yeah, that's a possibility, too."

"And you still think we should just enter and go on as planned?"

"Sure. We won't know if it's a trap if we don't enter; and in case that it's not a trap, there's no problem, right?"

"Right... but, how come this door is open?"

"We have an accomplice on the inside."

"You're cooperating with someone from Blackmore's coven?"

"Yeah. He's been providing us with valuable info for over a year."

Kirei decided not to comment on the fact that the Church was cooperating with heretical monsters such as vampires. Besides – seeing as how the Burial Agency had already openly admitted a Dead Apostle Ancestor into its ranks, this sort of covert cooperation seemed rather insignificant. So he decided to say nothing.

"Alright, let's go," said Narbareck, lighting a torch that hung on the wall, and stepped into the castle. Kirei followed her with a torch of his own.
"Be prepared, priest."

"Huh?"

"We may have dispelled Blackmore's bounded field over the forest, but this castle is another matter. There's no doubt that they've detected our presence when we entered just now. Keep your Black Keys close at hand."

"Of course."

"And try not to get separated. I still need that relic in your briefcase, you know?"

"I am touched by your concern for me."

Narbareck stopped in her tracks and turned around at Kirei's last remark. He expected her to be angry, but to his surprise she didn't seem to be at all insulted. On the contrary; a faint grin was on her face again, and that probably disturbed him way more than her anger would.

"My... losing your inhibition already?"

"...What?"

"That sarcastic little comment of yours. It's the first time you said something like that."

"I just... it suddenly came to my mind."

"Of course it did. It's only natural,"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Oh, nothing, nothing," she said, feigning a serious expression, "come – we've got to hurry, priest."

Narbareck had memorised the map of the building perfectly, and they navigated the underground maze of corridors without ever hitting a dead end. However, the closer they got to the upper levels, the higher was the likelihood of someone seeing them.

(...)

Two floors up from their starting point they came across first of the guards.

It was the first time either of them had come into contact with Blackmore's minions, and their appearance left Kirei and Narbareck a little shocked and confused, even though they had heard of them.
Members of Blackmore's coven were very unlike normal vampires, just like their master was unlike the other Ancestors. They all strived to model their bodies after those of the birds, and each one of them was unique in their own way; their jaws were shaped like bird beaks, they had feathery wings on their backs, and their feet were shaped similarly to those of birds.

'Freaks', Narbareck thought to herself.

Unable to go around them, and not knowing when the guards might move, they had no choice but to confront them.

"How many Black Keys do you have?" Narbareck whispered, peeking around the corner of the hall in which the two guards stood, blocking their way.

"Twelve."

"Alright, you do the honours."

She backed away and let Kirei come forward. He inspected the situation, measuring his distance, waiting for the guards to move into a favourable position.
Once they were shoulder to shoulder, he took out two Black Keys from his jacket. There was a small glow as he materialised the holy blades, and it did not go unnoticed; one of the guards took a step towards them, observing the wall behind which the two hid with a suspicious eye.
Kirei knew that there was no time for hesitation.

He sprang out of his cover and threw the Black Keys in the direction of the vampires, praying for the weapons to hit their targets. They did.

The first vampire got hit in the neck; as his throat started to bleed, his skin quickly became dry like sand, and his eyes turned from red to black. He fell onto the floor and turned to dust the moment his body hit the cold cobbles.
The second vampire was killed even more quickly; a hit right in the middle of his chest turned his heart to ashes, and he died on the spot.

Once the guards had been taken care of, Narbareck emerged from around the corner to join Kirei.
Just then a third guard appeared at the far end of the corridor.

He looked at the dead bodies of his two comrades, then at the two agents of the Church standing next to them.
Kirei and Narbareck were, naturally, a little astonished when he appeared, but their shock paled in comparison to the terror that possessed the vampire once he saw Narbareck – the black Peter Cross on her chest became well known among the Dead Apostles after her first, and successful, Ancestor hunt over a year ago.

As soon as she took a step forward the bird-vampire ran back as fast as he could, screaming and screeching in terror:

"Alarm, alarm! Intruders!"

"Oh, dammit, he's gonna alert the whole damn castle now," Narbareck said with a sigh.

"I think we should hurry."

"Yeah. This is gonna get messy, priest. You sure you're up to it?" she teased, drawing one of her cutlasses from her back.

"Let us hope so, " Kirei replied, and drew another three Black Keys.

They exchanged a small nod of trust, clutching their weapons tightly, and then hurried down the corridor and up the stairs behind it, their nerves tense and ready to react at the slightest sign of danger.

(...)

It didn't take long for those signs of danger to appear.

After climbing four flights of stairs and running down a corridor at the top of them, they found themselves in the entrance hall of the castle.
It was an enormous room, shaped like the letter 'U', spanning the height of two floors, and was almost a hundred feet wide.
Two staircases led from the ground floor to a pair of galleries, each supported by a series of ornate marble columns, which converged like a horseshoe at the far end of the hall. From these galleries numerous corridors led to other parts of the castle.
But, most important of all, the gallery opened into the great hall, or the throne room, through a large, ancient wooden gate located at the point where the curves of the galleries converged.

And Narbareck was willing to bet that that was where Lord Blackmore was. After a long and arduous hunt, her pray was finally within her reach.

There was only one problem.

The entire entrance hall was filled to the brim with Blackmore's winged minions.

The way to the gates of the great hall was guarded by well over a hundred vampires.
Kirei was left in a slight shock after witnessing the sight – the winged vampires screeched and shouted like harpies, and there was an unmistakable killer look in their burning, red eyes. He looked at Narbareck to see her reaction; just as he had expected, she wasn't at all perturbed by the situation, assessing it with an emotionless, steel gaze.

However, her look did not remain blank for long – wheels turned quickly inside her head as she calculated the odds, weighing her strength against the awaiting battalion of enemies.
Kirei could see fire of excitement starting to rise in her emerald eyes as thirst for blood started to take over her mind again. However, Kirei was worried.

Yes, Narbareck had managed to kill some two hundred Dead on her own in the forest without even breaking a sweat, but each of these vampires was worth a dozen ghouls, at least. While the Dead had their numbers and their sheer stubbornness on their side, they were still little more than dumb, walking corpses.

These vampires, on the other hand, possessed intelligence, cunning, monstrous strength, and weapons, even if it was only in the form of razor-sharp claws.
Taking even up to a dozen of them wouldn't be that hard of a task for an Executor as skilled and experienced as Kirei, and Narbareck was a monster far above his league, but he still had doubts. There were two of them against a hundred of those winged beasts.
He looked a little indecisive, and Narbareck noticed that.

"Are you scared?"

"Not really. I just doubt that we can win."

"You're not scared?"

"No."

"Then you are a fool."

"Why is that foolish?"

"Because only a fool would not be afraid of these monsters."

"And you? Are you afraid?"

She snickered at his question, and then replied, her eyes burning with hellfire:

"No. I'm the bigger monster."

With those words, she dropped her suitcase from her left hand, drew out her other cutlass, and charged into the mass of vampires.
Kirei dropped his own case, made a sign of cross on his chest, and followed after her, clutching six Black Keys between his fingers.

The vampires were being mown down before Narbareck like wheat.

One of them swung his right arm at her, intending to rip her head off with his long, steel-hard claws, but she blocked his arm with her left cutlass, and pierced his neck with her right. The winged monster didn't even have the time to be stunned by how a mere human had managed to match him in strength and stop his blow. It turned to ashes after being smitten by a blade coated in holy water, and its remains fell to the ground.

Narbareck wasted no time, and swung her right cutlass in a wide arch to the right, cutting the throat of another vampire. A third monster came at her from the front, trying to ram through her chest with his claws, but she dodged the blow, cut off his arm, and then stabbed him in the face.

While the pile of ashes beneath Narbareck's feet started to grow larger and larger, and she penetrated deeper into the mass of bird-vampires, Kirei wasn't slacking off, either.

Though the Black Keys really weren't the best weapon to use in close quarters combat, he was too short on them to be able to afford to use them as missiles. So instead of just nailing him with a single Black Key, he cut off an attacking vampire's arm and then decapitated him.

Two more vampires came from the front, one attacking him from above and one from his right. He crouched and then threw himself to the left to avoid both blows. He rolled on the floor a few times to get to a safe distance, then rose back to his feet and took a defensive posture; his arms crossed in front of his chest and the Black Keys pointing over his shoulders.

His enemies weren't going to give him any respite, and charged at him with full force.
Kirei didn't remain idle, but stepped forth towards the vampires. One of them aimed straight at his head, and the other swung from the left and below, up towards his spleen.
Kirei followed the trajectories of their claws closely, waiting for the right moment to spring into a counterattack.
When the vampires were just one step away from him, he finally retaliated; he spread his arms apart in one tremendous swoop, moving his right horizontally to the right in order to intercept the claws which were aiming for his head, and his left diagonally down to protect his side.
It all happened in a blink of an eye.

The vampire who was aiming for his head had his right arm sliced into four pieces, and the other one lost his hand and whole forearm.
Kirei breezed between them, his arms stretched behind his back, then turned on his heel, and, bringing his arms together again, chopped both their heads off.

He had no time for celebration, though, as five more vampires headed his way to replace the fallen ones.
He was being driven towards the stairs, where even more vampires awaited. Kirei realized that he would be overwhelmed and killed off in less then a minute if he tried to fight them all at once at close quarters, and so immediately made a decision.

Before the two decapitated vampires even fell to the ground, the deadly Executor launched a volley of Black Keys towards the incoming wave of enemies. All blades managed to hit their targets.
Blessed steel pierced their chests, stomachs, and heads, and they all stumbled and then fell to the ground at Kirei's feet, turning to ashes.

He turned towards the stairs, creasing his brows and weighing his chances. All he had left were four Black Keys and a pistol with a single clip, and considering the number of enemies he was facing, those supplies were sure to dry up within seconds, a minute at most if he opts for more hand-to-hand combat.
Still pondering what to do next, he looked down from the stairs to see how Narbareck was doing.

He immediately noticed that the ranks of Blackmore's minions had grown much thinner since the time they entered the hall.

It was difficult to judge how many had fallen since they all turned into ashes, but he was certain that she had already taken some twenty or thirty vampires out, and was showing no signs of stopping or even slowing down. Even though her current enemies were much tougher than the Dead that she annihilated back in the woods, she dispatched them with about the same amount of effort, but much more vigour.

Five vampires encircled her, but she just stepped over one of them to break out of of the circle and then proceeded to cut each one of them into pieces, tearing their limbs from their bodies, chopping their heads off, cutting their hearts out.

Another vampire managed to grab her from behind, and threw her a dozen yards across the hall. She didn't rise back to her feet at first, and just crouched on all fours, fixing her eyes on the winged monster.
Her eyes were burning with an uncontrollable passion, and she looked like a beast ready to leap forward after its prey. Even the vampire who threw her, a tall beast with giant gray wings, wavered a little after she looked at him like that.
He hesitated for a moment, and it cost him his life.

Narbareck immediately jumped at the opportunity, rising back on her feet and charging forward like a runaway train.
She crossed the distance in a split second, her superhuman speed taking the vampire completely by surprise. She shoved her left cutlass into his abdomen, and her right into his neck. She then violently pulled both and simultaneously spilled his guts and chopped his head off.

In one moment the vampire was standing, ready to take Narbareck on, and in the next his lifeless body fell to the floor like a puppet with its strings cut, and crumbled into dust.

But Narbareck didn't stop to gloat over her vanquished enemy; more attackers came into her sight, more prey she was dying to kill.

She lunged forward to dodge a blow, rolling two times before standing up and turning around to face her enemies who were now just mindlessly screaming and swinging at her, without order but also without fear.
However, their bravery did them no good.

Narbareck parried their blows to the side, then turned on her heel as the two assailants stumbled forward, having been thrown out of trajectory and out of balance. She quickly lowered her cutlasses into their backs, right between their shoulder blades.
She held her blades inside them for a few seconds, took them out, and kicked the vampires with her right leg. More dust fell onto the ground, and more blood stained Narbareck's swords and her clothes. Her black leather coat was now almost completely drenched in the sticky vermillion.

Most of these feats went unnoticed by Kirei, as he had his own foes do face.

He was halfway up the stairs, and on top of them stood three winged monsters, screeching and shouting at him. They had the advantage of the higher ground, and trying to just push through them might turn out to be a mistake.

Of course, he could probably easily eliminate them with a volley of Black Keys, but then he'd be down to only one. While he was pondering what to do, the fact decided for him; the three vampires started to advance towards him, and spreading out in order to encircle him.

He was in a very unfavourable situation, and so decided to resolve it in the quickest and simplest manner possible; he took out three Black Keys and threw them in the direction of his attackers. Two of them hit the bulls-eye, piercing the vampires' hearts. However, the third blade failed to deal a lethal blow, and only hit the vampire in his leg. It was still effective, for the wounded monster fell down the stairs and broke its neck, removing the need for Kirei to finish it off himself.

His triumph was short-lived, however, as a whole new group of vampires blocked the top of the stairs.

There were even more of them now, and Kirei was quickly running out of weapons. He drew out his pistol and sprayed the beasts with lead. His efforts were useless, though, as even those bullets that managed to find their targets failed to deal any significant damage; the vampires quickly regenerated such superficial wounds.

Left with only a single Black Key and his own fists, Kirei took a step back, ready to launch his last missile. The vampires wasted no time, having realized that he was almost completely out of ammo, and charged down the stairs.

Just as Kirei was about to throw the last Black Key between the leading vampire's eyes, their charge stopped and the five monsters collapsed into ashes before Kirei. It all played out in a split second, and it took him a moment to realise what had happened.

"Don't use that, priest, not yet." Narbareck shouted.

Kirei nervously glanced over the railing of the staircase at the hall below.

Narbareck was standing in the middle of it, surrounded by piles of dust and ashes.

She had stopped the charge of the vampires with a volley of her knives and bayonets, and Kirei was amazed that she had managed to hit all of her marks considering the circumstances. Still, there was no time for idle chat.

"Thanks."

"You're welcome. Now move on, I'll meet you at the gates."

With that, she returned to slashing and hacking, while Kirei dashed his way to the top of the stairs.

There were only three more vampires left in his way; the others deemed Narbareck to be the bigger threat, and focused their attention on stopping her. It suited Kirei just fine.

He took a stance some seven or eight yards away from the vampires, facing them sideways, one arm in front of him, the other behind his head. He stared at his opponents with steel eyes, inviting them to come to him.

Kirei completely cleared his mind, now no longer a human being, but merely a machine whose only purpose was to kill. The vampires shuddered a little when they saw the abyss in the eyes of the priest. Nevertheless, they couldn't wait forever – they gathered their courage and charged at him.

Taking the first vampire out was easy enough – it came straight at Kirei, trying to strike before he could even react, putting its faith in its superior speed and power. Kirei was quick to punish this overconfidence.

He dodged the blow by moving his torso out of the line of attack, and then, as the vampire came just inches away from him, struck him in the stomach with his knee.
The blow was monstrous – organs were crushed inside of the soft belly, blood vessels ruptured, and blood started gushing out of the winged creature's mouth. Its fate had already been decided, but Kirei still managed to find space to deal a finishing blow, and broke the vampire's neck.

Then came the second vampire's turn. He was coming right behind the first one, but he lost his vigour when he saw the young Executor defeating his comrade with a single blow.

Kirei took advantage of his moment of hesitation, and delivered a skull-smashing blow to the vampire's head with his right leg. It failed to kill the monster, so he grabbed it by the neck and threw it over the edge of the gallery and down to the hall below. A sound of its neck breaking was drowned in the noise of the other vampires below as they kept attacking Narbareck.

Kirei took guard again, locking his eyes with those of the last remaining vampire; this one seemed braver than the second, for he didn't waver even after seeing the Executor dispatch the first two with his own bare hands. Kirei expected some trouble from his third opponent, but was still confident enough in his own skills that he opted not to use his last Black Key yet.

The two were locked in a stand-off for a while, and then they both broke out of it at once, leaping forward towards their opponent.
The vampire swung from Kirei's left, aiming for his neck. He couldn't dodge to his right because the enemy already started taking a swing with his left leg, so Kirei had to dodge that, too. He managed to slow down with his last step, and changed his course a little to the left at the last moment.

He parried the arm to stop its deadly claws from tearing his head off, and got behind the vampire's back.
He grabbed him by the neck with his left hand, pulled him back and out of balance, and as the vampire started falling back and towards the ground, Kirei swung his hips and delivered a tremendous elbow-punch to his chest.
The vampire died on the spot as its ribcage got completely crushed.

Kirei threw the dead body aside where it promptly turned to ashes, and leaned on the railing of the gallery to see the battle below as it rapidly approached its end.

Narbareck was fighting bare-fisted now, too, her cutlasses tucked into the leather sheathes on her back. Kirei couldn't help but feel hopelessly outclassed as he watched her wreck havoc among the remaining vampires.
She, too, utilised some sort of martial art, but considering her strength, no special techniques were needed, at least in Kirei's opinion.

She knocked one vampire's head off with a single punch. She ripped the other's arm off with a tremendous jerk, and broke the third one's back just with the force of her arms, not needing to use her knee and hips to help her snap the monster's spine.
Another vampire got its jaw ripped out. The fifth one she hit in the stomach with such a force that her arm ripped all the way through his abdominal wall, intestines, blood vessels, and finally tore through his back to the other side.

The vampires' numbers were dwindling fast as the goddess of death continued to slaughter them one at a time, in the most savage and gruesome manner imaginable, to the point of strangling one vampire with his own intestines.

Finally, some two minutes after Kirei had beaten his final enemy, Narbareck extinguished the life of the last remaining vampire in the hall.

Breathing heavily, she looked up towards Kirei. She looked positively ecstatic.

Her leather coat was now soaked in blood and entrails, her boots, gloves and trousers were in a similar condition, and her sleeveless white shirt had turned crimson. Even her silvery hair got spattered with some red. The only clean and white things on her now were her fangs, which she was showing with small, distorted smirk.

"You done?" Kirei asked in a flat voice.

"Yes," she said shortly, her breathing now almost back to normal.

She went to collect the two briefcases which they had left by the side entrance to the hall, and then climbed up the stairs to the gallery and joined Kirei.

"Say, what was that martial art you used?" she aked him, looking genuinely curious.

"Baijiquan, " he replied, "I learned it from my father."

"Heh, is that so? Well, in any case, it's a rather impressive fighting style. I'm thinking of taking some classes once I'm back to Rome. It seems rather... efficient."

"Thanks."

"Oh, and before I forget: please give me that last Black Key of yours."

"What?"

"I'll be needing it. I'm thinking of performing a special trick for the lord of this castle, and I'm afraid I can't do it with my cutlasses."

"Alright... Here you go," Kirei said and gave his last remaining blade to Narbareck.

"Thanks. Well. Ready for the grand finale?" she said to him as she handed him his briefcase.

He replied with a small nod.

"Alright then, let's go."