The Eye of the Moon (53 page)

‘HEY, SHITHEAD!’ a voice growled loudly above the noise of the wind and rain.

Kacy felt Swann jerk against her and his grip on her slacken, his body no longer pressed so tightly up against her back. Then she felt the toe end of a boot kicking her in the butt. It was evident that the meat of the boot, and the full force of the kick had caught Swann between the legs from behind. Right in the plums. Right where she had recently wounded him with the broken light bulb. She heard him groan in pain and then fall to his knees behind her as his grip on her fell away. Whatever the cause of Swann’s discomfiture, Kacy needed no second invitation, and she instantly took the opportunity to jump away out of his reach.

Standing behind Swann and readying himself for a second kick to his nuts was a fearsome-looking vampire. Fearsome to most people, perhaps, but to Kacy he had a certain lovable vulnerability, too. It was Dante, still recognizable even though he now appeared to be a fully fledged creature of the night. As Swann tried to steady himself against the taxi cab, Dante once more swung his right boot into the unfortunate agent’s already sliced and swollen balls. Swann was wearing jeans with boxer shorts underneath, but they weren’t made of iron, and as a consequence he suffered as if he had been wearing nothing at all. Instinctively he placed both hands down to his groin to cup the rapidly swelling and bleeding area between his legs, doing his best not to throw up. Then he watched in horror as a hand reached through a small gap under his right shoulder between his arm and his chest. The hand pulled Swann’s pistol
from its holster.

‘Shit!’
was the last word he managed to utter, but it was lost amid the rain and wind. The same was not true of the gunshot that followed a second later, which was loud enough to be heard by anyone within a mile of the hotel.

Kacy looked away just a little too late. As a consequence, she saw Swann’s brains fly out through the front of his head and splatter all over the back door of the cab. Then his body slumped forward and hit the door before slowly sliding down into the gutter. The rain washed the blood from his head away as quickly as it poured out from the gaping wound.

The dark-eyed figure of the vampire that Dante had become looked down at the body, unable to hide his disgust at what he realized the agent had been planning to do to the woman he loved.

For Kacy, the sight of her lover standing over the sodden corpse of the man who had planned to rape and kill her was overwhelming. She found herself unable to conceal the elation she felt. All the horror of last few minutes was suddenly washing away faster than Special Agent Swann’s blood.

‘Baby, I love you!’ she squealed, reaching over to grab hold of her returning hero. To her dismay, Dante jumped back.

‘Stay away,’ he hissed in a horrid voice. ‘I ain’t human any more. Don’t come near me. I’ll fuckin’ kill ya, I know it.’

‘What?’ Kacy cried, reaching out an arm in a desperate attempt at least to touch him. He backed away again.

‘I’m serious. Stay back. I’ve got an incredible urge to bite you. Not kiddin’, I’m thirsty for blood. Just stay here. Peto has that Eye of the Moon thing. I’ll get that from him an’ I think it’ll turn me back to normal. Then you can hug me all you like. Till then, just hold it in.’

‘Is Peto
here?
’ asked Kacy.

‘Yeah. In the hotel. He took the lift, while I ran up the stairs to find ya.’

‘Was he wearing a cop outfit like yours?’

‘Yeah. You seen him?’

Kacy nodded sadly. ‘Everything apart from his head.’

‘Say again?’

‘He was in the lobby, but his head was … was missing. There was blood everywhere. People are freakin’ out.’

‘Shit!’ Dante turned and ran up the steps, through the doors and on into the hotel lobby. Immediately he saw for himself what Kacy had described. Peto’s lifeless body was bleeding all over the carpet from the ghastly stump where his head had once joined his neck. The blue stone and its silver chain were gone, too, and so was the Holy Grail. The only person still in sight was the girl behind the reception desk, who seemed to have gone into shock and was just sitting, staring vacantly at the dead body on the carpet. Dante, forgetting that he was now a full-blown vampire, turned towards her and hissed, ‘
Where’s the blue stone gone?
’

The woman woke from her hypnotized state and turned her head slightly to look at Dante, who was staring right back at her across the lobby with a pair of large razor-sharp fangs on show and a bucket load of blood over him. It wasn’t really what she needed to see at that particular moment and she promptly fainted, smacking her head hard on the wall behind her as she fell.

The tired, dishevelled and haggard figure of Kacy arrived in the lobby behind Dante.

‘C’mon, baby, let’s get outta here!’ she pleaded.

Dante turned to face her. In spite of the fangs, the pale veiny face and dark-ringed eyes, and the soaked-through shirt covered in blood, he somehow managed to look completely helpless. The realization had dawned on him that whoever had killed Peto had made off with the Eye of the Moon, and would by now be long gone.
He was fucked.
A vampire for all eternity, most likely. And right now Kacy was looking like his first meal. There’s nothing a vampire craves more for a feast than an attractive member of the opposite sex, so to Dante, Kacy was pretty much Christmas dinner.

‘Honey, get away from me,’ he hissed at her urgently. ‘Get as far away from me as you can. I’m gettin’ urges to kill you. Drink your blood. Don’t make me do it. Get the fuck outta here!’

Kacy’s face fell and she looked ready to cry again. ‘What?’ she gulped. Never in all their time together had Dante not wanted her. This wasn’t a feeling she was used to, or wanted to get used to.

‘I fuckin’ mean it,’ Dante scowled. ‘Get as far away from me as you can.’ He stopped, then added, ‘I’m sorry.’ With that he began to choke up himself, realizing what he was asking of her. He didn’t want to be apart from her any more than she from him, but he had to send her away. It was the only thing he could do. Her best interests were more important than his own desire to drink her blood. And at the moment, while he still had a little control over that urge, which was growing fast, he had to get rid of her. ‘I love you Kacy, an’ I always will, but get the fuck out. Get away from me. We can’t be together. I’ll kill you, or worse still, turn you into a fuckin’ vampire like me. And trust me, this ain’t a nice feeling.’

Kacy stepped towards him. He could see the tears now streaming down her cheeks, brought on by the pain of hearing him rebuke her. It only made him feel worse.

‘Dante, baby, haven’t you learnt anything?’ she asked with pleading eyes.

‘Whadda ya mean?’ he replied, his voice beginning to crack, revealing the pain he was trying to hide.

‘I mean,’ said Kacy, forcing a smile,
‘bite me,
you moron.’

Dante froze. Was she really asking him to make her a member of the undead like him? Did she really love him enough to let him kill her and commit her to an eternal hell?

‘You … you sure, Kace? I mean …’

‘Shut up,’ Kacy sniffed, her tears flowing faster than ever. ‘Just shut up, will ya? You had me at “
Hey, shithead!
”.’

As soon as she said it she knew she had broken through to him. His eyes betrayed him, and Kacy was sure she saw a tear appear for just a second. It disappeared with one blink, but she’d seen it. He still wanted her, and he couldn’t hide it no matter how hard he tried.

‘I love you Kace,’ he said.

‘I know. Now come on and get me before I change my mind.’

Dante walked over and put his arms around her, looking down into her eyes.

‘Mind if I kiss you first?’

‘You’d better.’

A few minutes later they were both creatures of the night, destined to spend their eternal undead lives hunting for the precious blue stone known as the Eye of the Moon.

Rameses Gaius sat contentedly at the desk in his oval office. Everything seemed to have gone according to plan. All he needed to do now was wait for his two new High Priests to return with the merchandise he longed for.

At just after midnight the first one arrived. There was a knock at his door. Not an overly loud knock, in fact, a fairly gentle one by most standards, but perfectly audible. ‘Come in,’ he called out.

The door swung inwards, opened by a hired mercenary who had been standing guard outside. He was one of the many uniformed police officers, members of the Filthy Pigs clan, who had deserted De La Cruz and Co. in their hour of need. Gaius was a far greater leader, and all the undead were honoured to be allowed to serve him.

The guard held back the door into Gaius’s office and the slender figure of his new High Priestess and only daughter, Jessica, dressed in her traditional black outfit, marched past him and into the room. She was holding a package wrapped in thick brown cloth under her right arm. The door was closed behind her by the guard, who remained outside, and once she heard it click shut she lowered her head in acknowledgement of Gaius.

‘Father, I have the Eye of the Moon and the Holy Grail,’ she said, raising her head back up to look him in the face. ‘And the head of the monk who possessed them.’

She pulled the brown cloth package out from under her arm and, no longer able to hide her huge vampire grin, threw it over to Gaius. He caught it with both hands as he was getting
up from his seat and placed it down on the desk in front of him. He picked at one of the corners of the cloth and then slowly and carefully unwrapped it. Inside was the deformed and already somewhat shrivelled head of Peto, the last of the Hubal Monks. Gaius ran his hand through the bloodied dreadlocks on Peto’s head.

‘So, he was hiding in with the Dreads. They should be punished for not sniffing him out. If there’s any of them still alive after all of today’s killing, make sure they die before I have to see any of them again.’

‘It’ll be my pleasure,’ Jessica smiled. She reached both arms up and behind her head and unclasped a silver necklace she was wearing around her neck. Hanging from its finely worked chain was the Eye of the Moon. She saw her father’s face light up as she placed it on the desk in front of him. Then she reached her right hand down into her cleavage (of which plenty was on show in the V of her low-cut black karate top) and pulled out a gleaming golden cup.
The Holy Grail.
She waved it under his nose, grinning at him as she did so. ‘Now, what have you got for me?’ she asked. ‘Any news of the two bastards who shot me up during the eclipse?’

‘Both will be dead, my dear. I am just waiting for the final confirmation now.’

‘Really? How did the Bourbon Kid die?’

‘Your new partner, Bull, took him down.’ He pointed at the door. ‘That will be him now.’ Two knocks on the door followed. ‘Enter,’ Gaius called out.

The door opened once again and Bull walked in, followed by his three Shadow Company comrades. He was carrying a brown cloth-wrapped package under his arm, much as Jessica had done. Without a word he tossed it over to Gaius. The newly reinstated Dark Lord caught it, set it down and began to unwrap with much greater haste than he had the package Jessica had brought. This was the one he wanted most, unable to hide his eagerness to set eyes upon it.

The blood-stiffened brown cloth fell to the floor and Gaius kicked it aside. Another severed head had been wrapped inside
the cloth, but now it was resting in the large hands of Rameses Gaius. He held it up in front of him as Jessica, Bull and his three henchmen looked on, waiting for his reaction.

‘So,’ he said, taking a deep, contented breath. ‘The head of the Bourbon Kid, the son of Taos. Doesn’t look so
bad
now, does he?’

The others laughed politely as Gaius stared into the one remaining eye in the bloodied mess of the head in his hands. The thick dark hair, matted with drying, thickly spattered blood, covered much of the upper part of the face, sticking to the forehead. Gaius brushed the hair aside and smiled a contented smile as he looked at the dead face of the Kid. After a few seconds he looked back up at Bull and his henchmen, barely able to contain his delight.