Necroscope - The Lost Years, Vol II Part 30

They must know it won't be long now,' she nodde d, biting her lip with anxiety. 'And yet -1 don't know - they seem to be acting far in advance of anything I had expected. And John, they also know where you are now. They know for sure!'

'Aye,' John's voice was stronger than she'd ever heard it 'And they know somethin" of what they're up against! Ma ybe they were - Ah dinnae ken - testin' the water, as it were? Well if so, they would'nae find it much to their likin'. A wee bit too hot if ye take mah meanin'.'

'Ferenczys,' she s.h.i.+vered. 'And we don't know how many of them. In fact we don't know a d.a.m.n thing about them!' BJ. sensed panic setting in again. Auld John was a brave old lad, but he was a brave old fool, too.290.

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'Ah, but we do know somethin' about them!' He cut into her thoughts, actually seeming to relish this entire mess. 'For Ah turned out this bleddy foreigner's pockets, and there were one or two verra interestin' items in them, be sure."

'Well, then - go on!' BJ. snapped. And immediately softened a little. 'John, I'm sure you don't really understand the danger here.'

'Oh, but Ah do, Bonnie Jean, Ah do. Verra well, now listen. There were cards in his wallet, credit cards and such. And even money. Mainly American dollars, but some small change, too - in lira!'

'Lira?'

'Aye. And the plastic is Italian, or rather Sicilian. Also, there's a wee personal card wi' names, an address, and a telephone number. The card's in Italian, but even an auld fool like me can read it easy enough. It says "V.

Ragusa: Personal a.s.sistant to A. and E Francezci, Le Manse Madonie."'

'Le Manse Madonie!' BJ. gasped out loud as her mind began to whirl. A long time ago she had tracked the ancient Ferenczy bloodline to Sicily, where the trail had appeared to peter out. And now... now it seemed that they'd been there all the time!

Harry Keogh was at the window of their small room, looking out disinterestedly into the darkness of evening at the rear of their country inn hideaway. At least, BJ. hadn't suspected his interest In fact with every pa.s.sing moment, Harry seemed to be sinking deeper and deeper inside himself. Just what was happening in his head - if anything at all was happening in there - she wouldn't even hazard a g uess. But now, startling her: 'Ferenczys,' he said (simply re peating her?) And: 'Le Manse Madonie. The Madonie is a range of mountains in Sicily. Is that Auld John on the phone? Some kind of problem?'And, continuing to stare blankly out of the window: 'Margaret MacdowelTs here. A taxi just dropped her off.'

Margaret Macdowell: the police had finished with her now, and rightly so. For after all, she was the victim - or she had been the intended victim - of a rapist and murderer, and she'd told the police 'all she knew' weeks ago. Weeks: was that all? But time had seemed to slow down. It felt like years to Bonnie J ean! Since the attack, BJ. had bided her time, keepi ng Margaret pretty much out of things in case the police should want to talk to her again. But that was then and this was now, and B J. needed every ounce of help she could get Auld John was still on the phone. 'Bonnie Jean?'

'Listen, John? I'm cutting this short I think if s time you were out of that cottage. And I do mean tonight!

Find yourself lodgings, but well away from Inverdruie and Aviemore. Then give me a call to let me know where you are. Do you understand? You're my mainstay, John. I can't let anything happen to you.'

'Get out o' here?' He seemed bemused. 'But if s mah home. Where would Ah go?'

'Anywhere that you'll be safe!' she snapped at him again, and meant it this time. 'So do it! Now then, tell me you understand.'

And in a moment 'Aye, Ah understand. But Radu...'

When it's time, you'll hear his call. Until then ... good luck, John.'

She sensed his nod. You, too, Bonnie Jean. Take care, mah bonnie wee la.s.s.' And the click as his handset went down. Then: 'BJ.' Harry's voice again, a little more animated than it had been of late. She glanced at him; he continued to stare ou t of the window, but he was frowning now, blinking rapidly.

'H.

arry?' She made to go to him.

That car,' he said, without looking at her. Its lights have gone out now, but it's there, where the hedgerow finishes at this end of the service lane. It drove in after Margaret's taxi, and now ... if s just sitting there.'

She stood beside him, staring hard through the gauze curtains and reaching to switch the lights out From the corridor muted greetings sounded as the rest of the girls met Margaret But BJ. wasn't interested in that her attention was centred elsewhere. 'A car?' she whispered, peering harder still.

Where the hedgerow finishes,' the Necroscope said again, in that not-quite-there voice that B J. hated but was getting used to. And Harry could sense, could almost feel her concentration as he wondered however vaguely: The people in that car: are they our enemies? But his guard was down; his metaphysical thoughts went out... and a certain member of the Great Majority was out there waiting for them.

As for B J.: she was no telepath, not yet but she was on the verge of true ascension ... Wamphyri! Scarcely knowing she was doing it she found and probed the car, and the Necroscope heard her low, rumbling snarl, a growl that came and went deep inside her. She staggered a little in her pa.s.sion, and grabbed his arm to steady herself. And: 'Drakulsf The word, the name, left her lips like a poisonous sigh. Then, with a hiss - and a savage grin as her eyes glowed yellow in the dark - 'Drakuls! Aye, as if I had wished it and my wish had come true for Zahanine. For Zahanine!'

Without another word to Harry, BJ. made for the door. As she went, she called ahead - low-, husky, dangerous-voiced to one of the girls: 'Keys! Sandra, I want your car keys!'

The girls were in the corri dor talking to Margaret Bonnie Jean swept upon them... there was a brief, astonished, shocked exchange, then small, fierce, raven-haired Sandra Mohrag seemed whirled along in B J.'s wake, and went almost at a run with her down Brian Lutnley 292.

the stairs to the rear exit from the inn.

And Harry still at the window, looking out at the car in the shadows, and the dark silhouettes inside it; left abruptly to his own devices, and not knowing what to do or if he should do anything. So that when the voice came - in his head - it came almost as an electric shock: Enemies, Harry! said that dead voice, urgently. You was right first time, Necroscope - dead right! It was R.L Stevenson Jamieson, and the Necroscope's instinctive response was to erect his neglected mental barriers...

Which he would do, except there was something he must know first 'How many enemies, R.L.? And what kind of enemies?'

What? You knows what kind, man! R.L answered. Same ones you has had all along. Only there's five of'em now, not six.

Drakuls, Red-robes, Tibetans, but by no means priests. Not of any clean, healthy religion, anyway. But was something wrong here? Five of them? Not four?

/ recognize four of 'em, (R.L said). Or at least, my obi does. But number five's a newcomer. Their new boss, maybe? Anyways, there be five of'em for sure. Yeah!

And Harry thought: What do numbers matter anyhow? The only thing that mattered was that they were enemies. That, and maybe some thing B.J. had said... something about Zahanine? And something else, about a dark spot on the floorboards in his study?

But Bonnie jean had been in such a hurry, she hadn't left any instructions for Harry! BJ., in one h.e.l.l of a hurry, yes. And that look on her face- -The Necroscope knew what that look meant And suddenly he felt himself galvanized to action.

Out there in the wintry evening darkness, there were five monstrous enemies. And h.e.l.l-bent on revenge, Bonnie Jean Mirlu had gone rus.h.i.+ng to meet them head on...

PART FOUR.

FRIENDS IN LOW PLACES.

I.

B J.: STILL INNOCENT? -REALITY'S ENDING! - A GRAVE SOLUTION.

Still at the window, alone in his room, the Necroscope felt dizzy, nauseous, and clung to the windowsill. His knees felt like water, as if they were trying to liquefy and topple him. He wanted to do something - anything - but he had no orders, didn't know what to do.

But he did, and he must! And the last thing he wanted was for B.J. 's girls to come into his room - not if he was going to have to move! He went to the door of the room - seeming to drift there, scarcely of his own will - locked and latched the door, then drifted back to the window. Bonnie Jean and Sandra Mohrag were out there, making for Sandra's car. So BJ. wasn't alone. Sandra would go with her. But go where? And the Drakuls were out there, too...

those silhouettes in that sinister car.

Suddenly there was strength in Harry's legs, in his body, even in his mind. It was the strength of desperation.

Even if what he was doing was making no sense (and what was sense anyway, in his senseless world, where even now his various levels were trying to interface, yet afraid of doing so?) at least he would be doing something, depending on what BJ. was doing.

Right now she and Sandra were walking, very nearly running, across the cold black surface of the service road to the inn's small car park, and Sandra seemed to be - what, laughing? - as she fumbled keys from her purse. They were dressed for indoors but the temperature outside was well below zero. And Harry saw that at all times B J. kept her back to the avenue of leafless trees back there, where hedgerows cast long shadows. The suspect car was some forty or fifty yards away, as yet motionless, but the furtive, barely visible figures inside appeared to be leaning forward, intent on what was happening...

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As to what was happening: 'Laugh!' B J. told Sandra, grinding the words out as the smaller girl got her driver's door open. 'Keep right on laughing, and make it look good. I don't want those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds thinking I know they're there. I want them to follow us!'

Laughing, doing a twirl, and dancing even - and while she danced daring to scan the area around, but fleetingly - Sandra said, "What b.a.s.t.a.r.ds, B J.? I don't see anyone!' Then she slid into her seat, and reached across to release the far catch for B J.

'Don't look for them,' BJ. growled. 'Don't even think about them. One of them's a telepath.

I can feel his slimy fingers groping at the edge of my mind. And don't put your seat-belt on! We may want to be out of here fast Now listen: start up and drive slowly and carefully out onto the main road in the direction of Edinburgh.'

'For the open country? There's a lot of open s.p.a.ce between here and Edinburgh, B J.'

'Yes!' (The bite of BJ.'s words - and the hundred per cent guarantee of her intentions).

'You're... what luring them?' Sandra had seen the headlights in her rearview now, where a black saloon car turned on to the road less than a hundred yards behind.

'Yes!' BJ. snarled. 'For Zahanine. And for me. I'm tired of being a target. Now tell me - that shotgun, and the cartridges Auld John sent me: still in the boot?'

'Yes. Your crossbow , too.'

'And is it loaded? And are there spare bolts?'

'One spare bolt, yes. But BJ., who are they? I mean, are they Drakuls? And will they have guns, too?"

'Oh, yes - but they'll be loath to use them. Open country, but plenty of farms, buildings, pubs, along the way.

And well have the element of surprise.'

'Where will they think we're going?' Sand ra's fear was beginning to show. But she was a moon-child and when push came to shove there'd be no fear. She would be like Zahanine, fearless. But she wouldn't be Zahanine, dead - not if B J. could help it They won't know where we're going, because we don't know,' B J. answered. 'But they're surely interested. If we've been under observation at the inn - if they've been following our every move -it's so they can know everything about us. Maybe they learned a lesson that time up north, or maybe their rules have changed. But mine haven't! I think perhaps they wanted to take Zahanine alive, and if so they may want us that way, too.

That gives us a double advantage: surprise on the one hand... and I couldn't give a f.u.c.k on the other! So slow down a little. We're going too fast, and I don't want them to think we're running.'

They seem to be keeping an even distance,' Sandra's breath was coming more easily now. BJ.'s, too, as she continued to do her thinking out loud: 'But suppose they've only just found us? Margaret Macdowell was the one who led them to us, because she was the one who got left out when we moved. When they found Margaret they only had to watch her movements until she joined up with us. But how did they find her, mainly locked away in Sma"

Auchterbecky?'

'But haven't you often said that the watcher has known most of our movements for years?' Sandra wasn't thinking straight... Or maybe she was.

The little man, the watcher, is a Ferenczy!' BJ. snapped ... and paused. 'But according to Radu the Drakuls were always the most furtive of their kind. So maybe you're right and they have been watching the watcher!'

'So why are they following us now?' (Sandra's logic at work again). 'I mean, since they now know where we're hiding... ?'

'But they don't know for sure that we're all there,' BJ. answered. And to herself: And then there's Harry Do they know about Harry? About his involvement up in the Spey Valley, when we took out their two colleagues?

'BJ. - where are we going?' The fear was back in Sandra's voice. The roads are treacherous and it's starting to snow. We can't just drive forever!'

B J. glanced out of her window. There was a farm with outbuildings coming up on the left. 'Slow down a little more,' she said... then sighed her relief as the car behind them likewise slowed down. Another quarter- mile and they pa.s.sed a long, open-ended, barn-like structure behind the high hedge that lined the road.

Further yet a four-barred gate stood open. And: There,' B J. said. 'Drive in there, turn left go back to the barn.'

'But they'll see us,' Sandra gasped. They're only a hundred yards behind us, and we're the only ones on the road.' She slowed the car to a crawl, and the snow came down harder yet 'I know,' BJ. snapped. 'I want them to see us! Do it'

And Sandra did it. Inside the field, a potholed metalled track led to the barn, in fact a large animal shelter and feeding station. Dipping the car's lights, Sandra drove inside and stopped, switched off the motor and lights, handed the keys to B J.

BJ. was out of the car in a moment Her night-vision served her well; she had taken the weapons from the boot returned to Sandra's window, handed her the shotgun and the keys before the headlights of the saloon had cut their first swathe across the empty field. But as the headlights dimmed and scythed jerkily in BJ.'s direction: 'Stay there,' she told Sandra. 'Anyone comes to the window, don't298.

Necroscope: The Lost Yean - Vol. II 299.

hesitate but shoot the b.a.s.t.a.r.d! Move your body inside the car... pretend you're talking, laughing. My headrest will fool them into thinking we're both still in there. And Sandra, don't worry. Ill be right here.'

Then, as the dipped beams from the black saloon reached for the feeding station, found it and blinked out, B J. disappeared into the shadows- -But she didn't go far.

The station was simply a large, open-ended, timber-built shelter. On both sides, bales of fodder were stacked almost to the low ceiling behind fencing so gapped mat animals would be able to get their heads through.

There was also a water trough, and stout wooden ladders that climbed to a loft so loaded with hay it sagged in the middle.

Then, as the sound of the Drakul saloon's engine died away, B J. slipped between the bars of the fence into the musty-smelling darkness between aisles of stacked hay...

The saloon was a s.p.a.cious five-seater. And the dead man, R.L. Stevenson Jamieson, had been right all five seats were in use. Within the vehicle, as the hot engine cooled and slowly ticked into silence, and the wipers scratched a little as they arced to and fro, clearing wet snow from the cold, curved windscreen, four Drakul thralls waited for orders. The fifth member of the party - the new leader of the group - sat in the fron t pa.s.senger seat, staring forward through his arc of blurred gla.s.s.

One of the three in the back smoked a perfumed cigarette, a rare luxury. In the Drakesh Monastery, such was not allowed: inhuman vices took precedence over the merely human. But smoking was only one of this man's vices. His face bore testimony to that sterile dressings, taped in place over hollow, badly scarred cheeks.

'So, they are waiting for someone.' The leader - the lieutenant seconded by Drakesh from India and recently arrived in Scotland -turned to the thrall with the scars and said, "You ... have some experience of Radu's people, yes? Did you recognize these women?'

'As his thralls?' the man answ ered. "Yes. One of them is called Sandra Mohrag. I didn't see the other's face. But what does it matter what they're called? They're his thralls, certainly. And all of them shapely, good-looking women. Or b.i.t.c.hes!' His grin, twisted by the dressings, was sallow, shallow, and ugly.

Their shapes and looks do not concern me,' the leader's answer was cold, emotionless. 'Only their knowledge. And this time we want at least one of them... alive?' His meaning was obvious. But the scarred man protested: That was an accident! We were waiting for the man, this Harry Keogh. It wasn't planned that the black girl- '.

'-But,' the leader cut him short, 'this time there can be no accidents. And better still if there is no gunfire.

Do try to remember that. And do not disappoint me, for if you do you also disappoint the last true Drakul.

The "accident" with the black girl was - what? - an opportunity wasted? Try not to waste this one. Now go, and hurry. For if they are waiting for someone, we do not want to be here when that someone arrives. Or, if it should be this Harry, then we will want to be here, most certainly. But until we may - question? - we may not know.'

The thrall with the scarred face, and his companion from the Zahanine killing, left the car, melted into the shadows of the hedge, moved silently towards the animal shelter. As they went the scarfaced man took out his automatic and screwed its silencer in place on the muzzle. No gunfire? Oh, really? That was all very well, but he had seen how these b.i.t.c.hes fought'

The shelter loomed close, a dark blot behind the diagonally slicing snow. Closer still, and there was movement, animation in the car. At the wheel a female figure moved, nodded her head, leaned this way and that, and laughed! Not for much longer, however.

Scarface took the pa.s.senger side. The other crouched low, crossed behind the car, inched his way to the driver's window. And as laughter sounded again from within, he wrenched at the handle, yanked the door open, and came to his feet all in one movement In the next moment he was reaching inside with both arms, reaching for the girl where she sat at the wheel.

Sandra felt his hands touch her neck, shoved the shotgun cradled on her knees into his lower belly, pulled on one trigger. It was almost a repeat performance of the scene at Inverdruie, whe n Auld John killed Vincent Ragusa. The Drakul didn't know what had hit him. With rags of clothing flapping, and his lower intestines uncoiling from his blackened flesh, he lifted from his feet, sailed backwards, broke his spine on the fence as he crashed through it. The sound of the blast was deadened by walls of fodder all around, all but lost in the moaning of the wind and the hissing of the snow. While on the other side of the car: Acting in perfect co-ordination with his number two, the thrall with the facial dressings had first tested, then likewise s.n.a.t.c.hed his door open - in time to see the flash of the detonation, and hear its m.u.f.fled boom! - as the figure of his comrade was hurled back out of sight Then, moving with frenzied speed, he got his right arm and gun hand inside the car; but his target was already slipping out of the driver's door.

He instinctively reached after her, at the same time wondering: But where is her pa.s.senger?