Judas and the Vampires (56 page)

Run, now, Mommy!!

From there it was a blur. Yet at the same time, I felt as if I was moving in slow motion. I couldn’t save the children, but then again, this thing wasn’t after them anyway. I ran as fast as I could, praying the God-given athleticism that made me a high-school star and earned me the athletic scholarship to UT was enough to save me right then.

I threw open the back door to the palace, wondering ever so briefly why there were no day-time guards protecting the main building in the complex. I didn’t wait to close the door, and I sprinted down the corridor toward the front of the building. I had no intention of stopping or looking over my shoulder until I reached my room.

Meanwhile, the door exploded behind me, and I heard the screams of more terrified children. The clicks and scrapes of sharp talons against the marble floor were all I needed to know this monster intended to pursue me until it held my trembling body within its mouth or claws.

I scrambled up the stairs to the second floor just as my pursuer crashed through the reception area. It sounded as if I might have gained a few seconds on it, since I heard the snap of a table being broken and chairs launched into a wall. But before I made it to the stairs to the third floor, the fiend was racing across the second floor to catch me. It let out an even angrier screech, no doubt irritated that I hadn’t even bothered to turn around. Do that, and I might as well have said goodbye to life as I’ve known it.

I had less than a twenty-foot lead when I made it to the third floor. If I’d bothered to lock my bedchamber’s door, I would’ve never made it to safety. Just before I reached the door, I felt the thing lunge itself at me, and part of my snowsuit was torn away as I slipped into my room. The angry vampire-turned-dragon fell to the ground, and before it could right itself to pursue me inside my bedchamber, I managed to get the door shut and locked using the bar bolt provided by our Chinese hosts. At least I knew then why it was needed.

The creature on the door’s other side slammed its body repeatedly against the door, and it started to give. I had no idea what to do next, and dire panic rose rapidly within me. I sought to rouse my protectors from their deep, daily slumber, knocking loudly on every single casket. But they remained comatose as to what was going on.

The door began to splinter. I cowered next to the last coffin in the row of five next to my bed to await my impending doom. It was the smallest one and belonged to Raquel. Just as the heavy wooden door fell into the room, and I saw the creature’s angry maw and open talons, the lid to her casket suddenly flew open and she sat up facing the doorway…screaming. Screaming a litany of chopped words and guttural sounds.

She scared the holy shit out of me, and I was almost as frightened by her sudden appearance as I was the menace in our doorway. Her eyes were glowing blood red—unlike their usual lavender beauty—and her teeth looked a hell of a lot sharper than I remembered ever seeing—even from the side. Not to mention, her fangs looked especially elongated…so dangerous.

I scurried under the table nearby, terribly frightened and unsure what to do next.

But apparently whatever Raquel had uttered had some effect on the dragon. It was somehow prevented from crossing the threshold into our room. It howled angrily, but after being repulsed again and again, it slammed loudly against the wall facing the hall one last time and then I heard an immense crash from breaking glass.

Having abruptly exited the palace via the immense window that faced the highest reaches of the Himalayas, the monster’s angry cries grew softer and softer as it ran away. When the cries finally grew faint and difficult to hear, my diminutive protector closed her mouth and eyes and laid back down inside her casket. I tentatively stood up and stole a peek into her daytime resting place. She looked so calm and peaceful, like an angel at rest.

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Reign of Coins

The Judas Chronicles, Book Two

(Please read on for a sample)

As I’m sure that most of you can imagine, I enjoyed a restless night, with almost no sleep. Not that the lack of sleep is normally an issue for me, as often I can go days on end without an extended rest period. But, whenever alcohol is involved, I actually do get tired enough to close my eyes for a ‘power nap’. Often, I get some great inspiration that way.

Not that night. At least not right away….

Instead, all of the possible mishaps related to my blown cover flitted before my mind’s eye as I lay in my bed, listening to Alistair’s light snores from his bedroom in our suite. It may sound strange, but I have always drawn comfort from his snoring, as I also did long ago from Beatrice. It’s as if a part of me is ever fearful that they could die at any moment, and a terror far greater than a violent death in my presence would be to find either one cold and lifeless in their beds the next morning.

I tried to think about positive things, like the fact Alistair and I could now spend more leisure time together. Not long after he left his post at Georgetown, I decided to leave the Smithsonian. Granted, my coin research efforts would be impacted by the lack of field notes and artifacts to which only an archivist (or someone higher in the Institute) would have access. But, knowing my days of prowling in the bowels of the famed museum were numbered, this past February I began diligently transferring files from the archives to a small zip drive I carried with me. Once I figured out how to skirt around the Institute’s security clearances, I carefully focused my efforts on gathering all pertinent information regarding the last thirteen potential hot spots for where my final eight coins likely lay hidden.

Of course, since we were presently in one of these places, my mood quickly spiraled down into despair. Looking for the coin that I was certain had traveled down through time and into the Cheung family’s possession was like searching for a needle in a haystack. I was clueless as to where to look next, now that the famed Cheung coin collection carried only untainted shekels.

Making matters worse was the intrusion into my personal mental space of Kaslow’s smug grin. My mind had drifted back to Caracas again…. I pictured him clearly as he watched me from less than fifty feet away. I had just finished replacing duplicate documents for the ones I lifted from a Belarus diplomat’s apartment in the city’s outskirts, and had stepped outside the building. While it isn’t unusual for those working covertly for their governments to sometimes catch a glimpse of one another in the field, it is very unusual to engage someone directly. Not unless it is with the intent to capture, interrogate, and dispose of such a person.

Even from a safe distance, I could see a contemptuous leer upon his face—like he not only was letting me know that he knew what I had been up to inside the apartment, but that he intended to obliterate my efforts with glee. That recognition saved my existence as William Barrow, since I didn’t immediately see the rocket launcher Kaslow carried. But I sensed it. Sensed it lucidly in my mind’s eye, and quickly determined where I needed to dive for cover.

In my Royal Garden bed, I now watched myself turning my head in horror toward the explosion behind me, as all five units in the 1920s building were destroyed. Several innocent people died, and I heard the screams of a woman and her child…and could do nothing for them. But innocent people always die when Viktor Kaslow is around. When I looked again to where he had stood, he’d already left the area, and the sound of a sedan speeding away was the only evidence he left behind.

Unfortunately for me, my mind will forever carry the image of the late morning sunshine and raindrops from an earlier downpour dripping from the leaves of cecropia trees and a large palm near the building’s burning remains. That image, and of course, Kaslow’s youthful mug leering at me.

Kaslow’s presence in my world had changed everything, as I’ve mentioned before. While staring into the darkness above my bed, I considered how easy life could be if Beatrice, Alistair, and I lived someplace else—maybe on a deserted island in the South Pacific. Of course, the reality that my beloved wife and son couldn’t manage without modern comforts nixed that fantasy in its infancy.

What about someplace that came with modern comforts and utilities? A place that was far, far away from America and hopefully out of reach from Kaslow’s homicidal radar.

Australia? The Philippines, maybe? Or…New Zealand?

New Zealand sounded intriguing, and I had visited both islands on a regular basis back in the early 1900s. This wonderful country offered nearly every climate and terrain I loved, and the people were strong and kind to strangers. I started making the arrangements to relocate my family to this wonderful country in my mind. I even added special accommodations in my fantasy world for Larissa Jones to come along as Beatrice’s private nurse and companion.

But, what about Alistair and his girl, Amy Golden Eagle—who would probably not go anywhere without her brother, Jeremy? That made five people and counting….

It was while thinking about this shit that I somehow drifted off to sleep. Normally, when I do rest in this manner, my consciousness moves through a narrow corridor where I am completely surrounded by thick darkness. The corridor seems endless, and along both sides of the corridor I sense souls of the dead…watching me, and speaking in whispers too faint to decipher.

Of course, none of this is likely real—I don’t see dead people. But…it does mark the place where my dreams start. Like everyone else on the planet, I nearly always dream when I sleep. That night was no exception. Most of the time my dreams are peaceful—despite the heavy burden of guilt I have carried since my ultimate betrayal of Jesus Christ in Jerusalem two millennia ago.

I am, however, occasionally visited by nightmares. That night, I thought such an event was happening. Loud explosions erupted all around me, and clouds of falling soil fell upon my head. I soon determined that I was crouching inside some sort of cave room that was approximately fifty feet wide, but less than five feet in height. It was quite dim, with the only illumination coming from a hole in the center of the room. Through this entrance, an assembly line of Chinese men dressed in silk changpaos moved up and down a pair of thatched wooden ladders while carrying small steamer chests into the cave from above. The jingle of metal on metal and small stones when each chest was stacked along a rear wall in the room made it obvious to me that items of incredible value were being transported there.

The explosions would come and go, with the men ducking in panic and peering anxiously up toward the lighted opening. One of the men suddenly called anxiously to the others from above the entrance, and then machine gun fire sprayed into the hole, sending the bullet-riddled body of the man tumbling down upon his terrified companions. They all scurried away into the cavern’s shadows, carrying what they could.

Roughly a dozen more men descended into the cave, and these were attired differently than the first group. I recognized the black boots and dark blue pants from what the Japanese infantry wore during World War II. But, I had never been this close to them—even when I enlisted with the U.S. armed forces in the Pacific. These soldiers were no more than eight feet away from where I was crouched.

As the soldiers crept into the cave, they fired shots in every direction. Death screams from direct hits accompanied the flashes of bright light from each expended round. Even so, I heard the sound of survivors moving deeper into the cave, as if the
subterranean
shadows would save them. Perhaps such a tactic worked for some, since the soldiers seemed reluctant to venture after them, and instead fired multiple rounds from their automatic weapons in every direction again. Of course, none of the shots hit me, since I was a mere voyeur in spirit.

A lantern that had been turned down exploded when a bullet hit it, in one corner of the cave room,
roughly thirty feet away to my right. Suddenly, that entire section of the room was brightly illuminated from fire as the lantern’s fuel landed on several larger chests that immediately ignited. Nearly a dozen similar chests were stacked against a wall behind these other chests. One of the Chinese men moved over to them, where the nearest chest was propped open
slightly. I caught a glimpse of a metal armor vest in the firelight, along with something faint…but glowing blue.

Holy shit, it’s my coin!

I tried to get closer to it, as the Japanese infantrymen opened fire on the defenseless man. Like so many nocturnal travels, I couldn’t move quickly. Meanwhile, the man tried desperately to close the lid to the chest, as if it were direly important to do so. He did manage to pull it mostly shut, and then he slid down the side of the chest, slumping dead from a bullet that pierced his heart from behind.

I tried to get close enough to verify that the coin bore the eagle and Caesar’s profile. But, it was as if an invisible force prevented me from drawing any nearer to the chest. All at once, the world around me grew dark and I was pulled back into my hotel room. I cursed silently at the lost opportunity to mentally take notes on the cave’s physical details and the chest’s other glowing contents. Contents that were apparently important enough for the Chinese man to sacrifice his life to protect.