Authors: Elizabeth Einspanier
Mr. Cavanaugh entered in a state of puzzled good spirits, and I stood at once.
“Mr. Cavanaugh,” I said, “I understand you’re a very busy man, and I’m grateful that you agreed to see us, so I’ll get right to the point. Are you aware that Alexandre Russeau plans to purchase Salvation?”
He looked at me for several seconds before answering.
“Of course I’m aware of it, Doc—he can hardly do so without my knowledge, after all.” His tone was light and casual, and he seemed to be unaware of Russeau’s true nature.
“The sale can’t be allowed to go through,” I said, my heart pounding. “It will kill Salvation.”
Cavanaugh frowned. “Kill it how?” he asked.
“Russeau isn’t human,” I said, endeavoring to sound as sane as I could. “He’s a creature called a vampire—a blood-sucking monster. He’s already feeding on the people of Salvation, and if the sale goes through there will be no way to stop him. He’ll leave this place a withered husk.”
I opened my mouth to warn him of the lair that we suspected was somewhere on his property and the danger that he, personally, was in, but he spoke over me.
“Calm yourself, Doc,” he said, and his voice was so calm that it chilled me. “I don’t think you know quite what you’re saying.”
“I know exactly what I’m saying,” I insisted. “I’ve seen these creatures. They’re dangerous—Russeau most of all. Please—you have to listen to me.”
“Look,” Cavanaugh said, in the tones of a doting father comforting his child after a nightmare. “I know that you’re afraid of change, but Russeau has big plans for this town. The money we get from the sale can be used to expand Salvation and improve it. Just think—instead of being a little flyspeck town between here and there, Salvation could be a major waypoint for folks headed west…”
It was at this point that I stopped listening, because Mrs. Cavanaugh had entered the parlor behind him, looking as pale as death. Her eyes, though! They blazed like coals, reminding me sharply of one of Russeau’s brides.
Cavanaugh stopped talking suddenly, noticing the direction of my gaze. He looked to his wife and smiled lovingly, taking up her hand to kiss its delicate knuckles. It put me in mind of an Indian snake-charmer kissing a rearing cobra on the head.
“I see you’ve noticed how much more beautiful my darling wife is since Mr. Russeau’s arrival,” Cavanaugh said, and then leaned in confidentially. I heard Wolf growl behind me, but I held very still, terrified sweat prickling on my brow and down my spine. “He says he knows the secret to eternal life,” Cavanaugh said, his voice like ice. “It’s worked so well on my wife, and I mean to find out what it is.”
My throat closed. I didn’t need to see the evidence of bite marks to know that Cavanaugh was utterly ensnared, either through Russeau’s hexing gaze or simple fear of old age and death.
“I know you dealt with the sick and dying all the time back East,” Cavanaugh continued. “So I expect you’ll understand where I’m coming from. If he knows how to stave off aging and death, I’d be a fool not to take him up on his offer. You understand, I’m sure.”
I understood perfectly. Russeau had his hooks in Cavanaugh—and probably had since arriving. He’d told Cavanaugh sweet lies about eternal life without telling him of the terrible consequences that went with it.
I hadn’t known the man to be vain or to fear aging, but a man of his years tended to turn his mind to such things, as inevitably as a sunset. With horrifying certainty, I understood that Cavanaugh would be no help in ousting Russeau, and that Wolf and I would have to do this ourselves.
***
“Now what?” I asked Wolf once we were outside again. “I’d gather a posse, but at least a third of the town is bitten, probably hexed, and certainly in no shape to help.”
“Best ya don’t, in any case,” Wolf replied. “They’d just get theirselves killed on account of they don’t know what they’re doing, and we don’t have time to get them up to speed.”
“So it’s just us, then?”
Wolf nodded. “Us and the local preacher man.”
I thought about Pastor Wood. “But he’s not a fighter.”
“Nope,” Wolf affirmed, “But he’s a man of God, and he can give us an edge when we’re out hunting. Ya never had yar weapons blessed?”
I opened my mouth, and then shut it.
“I’ll take that as a no,” he said. “We need every advantage we can get over Russeau.”
I couldn’t exactly argue with that. Between us we gathered my rifle and woodcutting axe, and Wolf’s revolvers and crossbow, and took the whole lot to the church.
I inclined my head to Pastor Wood as he glanced up.
“Pastor,” I said, “I apologize for coming by on such short notice.”
“Nonsense,” he said, adding with a glance at Wolf, “All are welcome here. What brings
ya here today?”
“Vampire hunting,” Wolf said flatly. “We need ya t’bless our weapons so we can take down the son of a b—” He swallowed the last word in a hurry, but it still hung silently in the incense-tinged air. “Sir,” he concluded.
Pastor Wood raised his bushy eyebrows at Wolf’s near-profanity, but made no comment. “I can help ya with that,” he said instead. “Right this way.”
Watching Pastor Wood bless our weapons was, in truth, a unique experience for me. I knew that the native Salvationers would frequently have him bless the various tools of their trade—hunting rifles and farming tools alike—but I had never felt any strong need to do so because I felt they would function regardless of the amount of prayers said over them. However, these were dire circumstances, and I was willing to accept as much help as was available to me, regardless of the source.
I watched as he took each implement in turn, passing fragrant smoke over each while muttering something in Latin, and finally making the sign of the cross over them. I didn’t know what effect this would have on them, but the locals seemed to believe that such a ritual would make one’s aim truer and one’s blade sharper.
“Now,” Pastor Wood said quietly, “the quest
ya are undertaking will be dangerous, no matter yar tools or who ya believe in. I will pray for yar success, though.” He offered us a small smile. “I would go with ya, but I don’t think these old bones would fare well in a straight-up fight with the forces of darkness.”
I put my hand on his shoulder. “Hopefully, you won’t have to.” I looked at Wolf and took a deep breath. “Let’s go.”
***
“How are we going to find him?” I asked that evening over dinner. I’d prepared a hearty meal, in light of the impending hunt—filling without making one sluggish. I was so nervous I had to force myself to eat.
“That’s the hard part,” Wolf said. “We’re gonna have to wait ‘til he makes his move, and then strike.”
“But we don’t even know where he’ll attack next,” I protested. “And we can’t exactly break into the Cavanaughs’ house searching for his coffin.”
He was nodding even before I finished speaking. “That won’t be a problem,” he said. “I think I have a fair idea where he’s going to strike next.”
I sat up straighter. “Where?”
He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. A few seconds later I realized that he was pointing to the Cook residence next door. My heart lurched in my chest.
“How can you be sure?” I whispered.
“It just makes sense, Doc,” he replied soberly. “We’ve killed off both of his brides. He’s gonna want another one. And he’s as much as said he’s going to go after Miss Sarah next, right?”
I saw red. “Do you mean to tell me,” I said quietly, “that you intend to use her as bait?”
“I don’t have to,” he said. “That’s where he’s going to go whether I want him to or not.”
“We have to warn her, Wolf!” I blurted, surging to my feet.
He grabbed my wrist in an iron grip. “Ya gave her a rosary, right?” he returned. “Ya told her about Russeau, right?”
“I did, but—”
“If she’s wearing the rosary, it’ll protect her. If she’s not, then the only thing we can do is make sure to act fast, ya understand?”
“But—”
“I
said
, do ya understand? We can’t go camping in their yard or it’ll tip him off, and then we’ll never find him. It’s a risk, but it’s one we need to take.”
I took a few deep breaths, trying to get hold of myself. “I don’t like it,” I said finally.
“I know ya don’t. We don’t have any choice. He’s killed off our only other lead—probably for this exact reason. Now sit down and finish yar dinner. We’ll need to get some rest before everything happens. I’ll wake ya up when he comes by.”
I sank back into my chair, feeling wretched. Suddenly I wasn’t sure if I could finish my dinner, let alone get any sleep—my nerves were stretched like bowstrings and my stomach was in knots. Wolf finished shoveling food in his mouth as though unaffected by the terror that gripped me, washing the last few morsels down with a glass of milk. I did my best to follow suit.
Afterwards I set my rifle under my bed and stripped down to my shirtsleeves in preparation for a catnap. As I was getting myself ready, I glanced up at the crucifix hanging on the wall above my bed.
“Whatever else happens,” I whispered to whoever might be inclined to listen, “Watch over her.” It wasn’t much of a prayer, but it was the best I could manage. I lay in bed atop the covers and closed my eyes.
It was a long time before I slept.
***
I was awakened from a restless sleep later that night by Wolf’s hand on my arm.
“Get yar gun,” he whispered harshly in my ear, “He’s on the move.”
“How do you know?” I asked, pulling my rifle from under the bed.
“I can smell him. He’s close.” Wolf’s lip curled in loathing, a feeling I shared regarding Russeau. I had little time to enquire further, for no sooner had my feet met the floor than I heard a shrill scream close by. Next door, in fact—and upon making that realization, my blood ran cold.
Sarah!
Galvanized by this conclusion, I wasted no time in pulling on my boots, and I was out the door on Wolf’s heels in a moment.
The night was cool and overcast, the wind like icy, inquisitive fingers around us. I heard a man’s shout from the Cook residence—brave Kyle, I supposed, defending his sister from danger—followed by an unearthly screech that chilled me more thoroughly than the night wind. I could not hope to describe the cry, only to say that it certainly came from some huge predator that this Earth was not meant to know.
I heard a shotgun blast next door, and Wolf and I hurried to investigate. The front door of the Cook house was open, and through it I saw Kyle taking aim with his shotgun. His target, half-revealed in the red light of the fireplace’s smoldering coals, was a monstrous, vaguely manlike beast, as tall as a man, but covered all over in black fur like a bear. Its head was shaped like that of an ape, but with large, flared ears, beady eyes that shone red in the firelight, and a mouth full of jagged fangs, which it presently licked with a long, pointed tongue. Its slavering jaws were red with blood. It raised its forepaws, tipped with hooked claws like those of a bear, and I saw folds of loose skin stretching between its wrists and its heels.
The thing advanced on Kyle and he fired, the cluster of buckshot tearing half its face away in a spray of gore—but still it kept coming. I was frozen to the ground in terror, and so could do nothing as the monster grabbed Kyle and tore his head from his shoulders in a spray of crimson. Then it turned towards me, and my bowels fairly turned to water. The shotgun blast had exposed the entire orb of one eye, the bones of its skull, and the fangs on one side of its face.
It shrieked and dropped onto all fours, bunching its muscles to leap at me. It sprang—
“Out of the way, ya damn fool!”
—and I felt Wolf hit me broadside, knocking me out of the thing’s path. The beast leaped over us both—and for a frantic second I saw the folds of skin under its forepaws unfurl into leathery wings—and vanished into the gloom. It took me a few moments to catch my breath, but when I thought of what the thing might have done to Sarah I scrambled to my feet and was inside like a shot.
She was lying on the floor by the fireplace. Her nightgown was torn in several places, as though she had been beset by a wildcat, and the side of her throat was lacerated and bleeding profusely. I did not see the rosary I’d given her. I had no time to look for it. I had no time to be afraid.