A Kingdom Falls (The Mancer Trilogy Book 1) (23 page)

Queen Amanda Rothgal–Ackroyd knelt naked before her bed, deep in prayer, as a cold breeze from the open window brushed against her.  “My Lord, I will rule this land in Your name and for Your greater glorification.  I will banish the abominations, the unclean, the impure, the mutant, and the deviant from Your lands.  I only humbly ask that You give me the strength and determination to do this, for I am merely an instrument of Your divine will.”

***

The guest apartments within the Royal Palace

Tania Stone ran her hand slowly along the guardrail on the balcony.  Raising her full wine glass in a toast, she said softly, “Soon, all of this will be mine, and it will be a shrine to debauchery and all the base desires that dwell within the human heart.  The
Midnight Man cometh and the world shall tremble
.”  Tania drained her glass and smiled.

However, before that could happen, there was the small matter of the wedding, which would take place within ten days’ time - the wedding between Lady Joanna Harris and Aaron Power, and from this unholy joining, the Midnight Man would return.  

She would have to return to the Brethren’s island for the wedding, of course, but she could afford to be away for a few days. Everything was going according to plan.

A cool breeze from the lake brushed over her and caused her nipples to harden, goose bumps to appear, and a shudder to run through her.  Placing a hand to her breast, she exclaimed, “Fuck, my nipples are hard.  Shame to waste it.”  Turning to face the room, she called out, “Plaything, come here!  I need your cock now.”

One week later

Aaron Power lay on his back watching the narcotic smoke he released from his mouth as it danced and weaved its way into the darkness.  The visions dancing before his eyes were at once horrific and nightmarish, whilst at the same time deeply fascinating.  He lazily reached out with his left hand, which was feeling unnaturally heavy, to try and touch one of the rotting zombies that was raping a dog.

“He is lost to the dream moss,” stated Gideon Sandhu as he stood ten feet away from the pile of naked bodies in which Aaron lay.

“I wonder what visions he is seeing?” asked Miriam Gregorious as she watched him wave his hand slowly left and right.

“I don’t know...” began Gideon, before screaming interrupted him.

Both vampyres turned to see two naked bodies - a man and a woman - disentangle themselves from the group of bodies around Aaron and run screaming around the room.  The man tripped and fell to the ground, and began rolling on the mat-covered floor.  He finally ended up on his back, where he started to pull his eyeballs out of their sockets with his fingers as his heels drummed a manic tattoo on the floor.  His screams continued unabated.  The woman was crouched in a corner and was pulling her long hair out by the roots whilst continuing to scream loudly.

“Ah,” said Miriam, “our drinks are ready.”

Gideon smiled and made his way to the woman, where he grabbed her by the hair and pulled her back to where he had been watching the gruesome spectacle.  Meanwhile, Miriam strode over to the man and hauled him back to Gideon.  Both Night Stalkers ignored their struggling victims as they stood behind them, holding them upright and close.  They looked over the shoulders of their prey into each other eyes.

“Let’s see what sort of cocktail we are going to have tonight,” said Gideon as he bit into the woman’s throat and drank deeply of the drug-infused blood.

“Yes, indeed,” replied Miriam as her fangs pierced her prey’s neck and entered his jugular.

Gideon’s eyes widened as the drug-tainted blood entered his system.  The mixture of drugs the woman had taken must have been extremely potent, as he could feel himself starting to lose control of his body.  Placing his hand on her back, he pushed the woman away and staggered backwards.  Back and back he went until he finally crashed into the far wall, where he slid down and sat watching the beautiful kaleidoscope of colours and patterns dance before his eyes.

Miriam Gregorious felt the rush from the cocktail of blood and narcotics wash through her body, and she began to laugh.  The laughter turned into hysterical laughter, then to crying, before finally heart-breaking sobs.  “What... what have you done to me?” she managed to say to the bloody and moaning man lying before her.  Dropping to her knees, Miriam whispered through the tears, “
Thank you, oh thank you for this wonderful gift
,” before plunging her hand through his chest and ripping out his heart.  As she began to eat it, Miriam started to rock back and forth, tears flowing freely down her cheeks.

From the shadow-cloaked alcove, Joanna Harris watched everything.  “Enjoy your earthly delight, my love, for soon we shall become one, and our Lord, the Midnight Man, shall once again enter this world.”  She gave a feral grin as she watched a man and a large-breasted woman begin to kiss and fondle Aaron.

Turning her attention back to Miriam and Gideon, she watched as both of them enjoyed their new and heightened states.  “Enjoy your poor delights, you fools,” she murmured, “for I will soon enjoy the sweetest of passions; for soon, I will be with the Midnight Man and I shall knee before His will and experience the extremes of emotion that only He can produce.”  Joanna’s eyes went wide with the thought.  “
The Midnight Man cometh
!” she declared with passion.  A chuckle escaped her lips a moment later as she watched the man start to deep throat Aaron’s mouth whilst the big-breasted woman moaned in sexual arousal as she rode Aaron’s hard manhood.  “Total corruption, my dear, total corruption is required.”

***

“Well, ladies - to us, the chosen ones!”  Alicia Saunt raised her glass of special chilled wine.

“To us!” said Tania Stone and Maria Clough as they raised their glasses.  The women drank deep of the wine, whilst their three bodyguards stood watch at the door to the room.

“Who would have thought,” began Tania as she plucked a grape from the bowl of fruit on the table and popped it into her mouth, “that the Midnight Man would return in our time and in only two days?”

“I know,” smiled Maria as she took another drink from her glass, “and we three are specially invited to the ceremony.”

“Well, we are now important women,” added Alicia.

“True,” grinned Tania.  “Maria is going to be a Dark Herald for none other than Joanna Harris.”

Maria Clough grinned from ear to ear and raised her glass.

“Alicia,” continued Tania, “is going to take control of the day-to-day running of the Red Bank.”

Alicia Saunt raised her glass.

“And I,” shouted out Tania, “will be the ruler of Deep Lake!  Oh, yes!”  Tania laughed happily, as she, too, raised her glass.

All three drained their glasses.

“Plaything!” called out Tania, “we need more wine!”

The man known as Plaything nodded and moved to carry out his mistress’ wishes.

“I have to commend you,” said Maria, as she blatantly watched the man walk away to get more wine.  “Your bodyguard has a great arse.”

“He has a great
everything,
Maria,” replied Tania.  Tania then cast a glance at Maria’s bodyguard.  “Yours has seen better days.”

“Do you mean the scars?”

“Yes.  They rather spoil his beauty.”

“Oh, I would disagree with you, Tania.  I think they rather add to it.  He even had some of those scars from his time in the Night Guard,” Maria laughed.

“Though mine is better than both of yours,” Alicia purred as she popped a grape into her mouth.  She smiled as the other two women glared at her with barely disguised hate.  “Yours may be Night Guards, but mine is a Midnight Guard.”  At that moment, Plaything returned with the wine and sat it down on the table before Tania.

“And he is still riding a horse,” muttered Maria.

“Sorry, what was that, Maria?” asked Alicia.

“I said - does he still get to mount a horse?  You know - him being in the Calvary and all.”

“Dracko, come here,” said Alicia.

All eyes in the room watched as the towering Dracko walked to his mistress’s side.  The man radiated power and darkness. “Now then, Maria, would you like to ask that question of Dracko himself?”

Maria gave a nervous smile as she gazed upon the massive killer.  “Well, do you still manage to mount a horse, Dracko?”

“No,” replied Dracko.

“Oh, that’s a pity.”

“More wine, everyone!” called Tania as she lifted the wine bottle that Plaything had brought.

“Yes,” quickly replied Maria as she reached out with her empty glass.

“Maria,” called Alicia.

“Yes.”

“Never forget that the Brethren of the Night saw fit to grant me a Midnight Guard - that is my standing with them.”  Alicia popped another grape into her mouth.

“I will not forget, Alicia.”

“Good.”  Alicia turned to Tania.  “I also will have some of that wine.”

Maria smiled as she looked upon Alicia.  “
What you don’t know, Alicia, darling
,” she thought, “
is that the Lady Joanna Harris has said that, if I do my job well, I will become one of the Brethren, and when that happens, we shall have this conversation again, and it will have a different outcome.
”  Maria lifted her now full glass.  “To us and the future.”

“To us and the future,” the other women repeated.

***

The next day

Aaron Power sat on his bed and rubbed his eyes as he tried to ease the pain sitting right behind them.  Even though he had slept, his entire body ached, especially his throat, and he felt slightly sick.  “What the hell happened last night?” he murmured.

Looking around the room, he spotted a jug and glass on a sideboard.  Taking a deep breath, he shakily stood and made his way across the floor.  He placed a steadying hand on the top and looked inside the jug.  “Water - excellent,” he said, as he poured himself a glass.  He drained it in one and refilled the drinking vessel.

Taking his beverage, he made his way to the shuttered window and opened the bolts holding the shutters closed.  Knocking back the water, he placed the glass on the floor, closed his eyes, and opened the shutters.

The cold instantly caused goose bumps to appear all over his naked body.  Opening his eyes, Aaron looked out on the grey sky, across the smallish courtyard to the barren wall of rock that surrounded the complex.  Beyond the wall, he could hear the waves smashing violently against the natural barrier.  Aaron scratched his chest just where his heart was.  There was a minor burning sensation, which was just on the wrong side of annoying.  Looking down, he saw what was left of the cross, which had been branded onto his chest.

Heavy scars cut through the outline of the cross - some very old, some very new.  Aaron ran his hand over the scars.  The first scar had been caused by a bandit - of all people - many, many years ago.  He had missed a parry, allowing the man’s sword to cut across his chest and, in doing so, cut through the branded cross.

It was five days later, when he was lying on his bedroll under the stars, that he first dreamed of a man in a monk’s habit, his hood pulled up and shadows hiding his face - a man he would later come to know as the Midnight Man - a man who also knew the beauty that lay in death.

The desolate cry of a seagull caused him to look up into the sky.  Seeing nothing, Aaron made his way back to the sideboard for more water.

***

“Are you sure he is ready, Lady Joanna?” asked Gideon Sandhu.

“Positive,” replied Joanna Harris as she powered down the corridor with Gideon and Miriam Gregorious striding hard to keep up with her.  “His mind is already corrupted enough by the horrors he witnessed as a young boy,” Joanna slowed her pace, “- the same horrors that created me...  Is not fate a strange creature?” she mused.

“She is,” replied Miriam.

Ignoring Miriam, Joanna continued, “Yes, a strange creature.  Anyway, to answer your question, Sandhu - his mind is suitably corrupted.  Over these last few weeks, his body and soul have endured and tasted every deprived act that we have performed on it, or do you disagree?”

“I agree that the drugs, alcohol, and the most base and deprived sexual acts in which he has participated will have driven out what little goodness and innocence was left within him.  However, I would suggest another week...”

“NOOOOOOOOOO!” screamed Joanna as she turned upon Gideon.  Grabbing him by the throat, she lifted him off the ground and rammed him against the cold stone wall.  “I will not be denied having my husband by my side any longer!”

Although not needing to breathe, Gideon grabbed Joanna’s wrist with both hands, trying to stop her razor-sharp nails from digging into his neck and slowly but surely slicing his head from his shoulders.  “
The Midnight Man cometh
,” he managed to say.

“
The Midnight Man cometh
-” repeated Miriam.

“My son comes,” whispered Joanna as she closed her eyes and tilted her head to one side.  Her grasp lessened around Gideon’s throat.  “My son comes.”

“- a
nd the faithful shall rejoice, and the land shall burn
,” said Miriam as she gently applied pressure on the arm which was pinning Gideon to the wall.

“-
for He is saviour and the leader
,” continued Gideon.

“- f
or He lives within us all
,” finished Joanna as she slowly lowered Gideon to stand on his feet.  Removing her nails from Gideon’s neck, Joanna patted him on the head.  “Do you think Aaron is ready?”

“Yes, Lady Joanna,” came Gideon’s quick reply.

Still looking at Gideon, Joanna asked, “Gregorious?”

“Yes, my lady.”

“Good.  Then we are all in agreement, are we not?”

“Yes, Lady Joanna,” was the joint reply.

“Then we must go.”  With that, Joanna Harris continued making her way down the corridor.  Miriam and Gideon followed quickly in her wake.