The Dark Messenger (3 page)

Flight after flight he descended, still going
further and further down underground to where the main chamber was
located. On every floor he passed, there were more and more guards
dressed in black leather, huge in size and almost nearly as tall as
himself. They had black shoes, black leather trousers, black shirts
with high collars fastened tight around their necks and black silk
capes that flowed down their backs to within an inch of the floor.
On their hands they wore black leather gloves, and they each had a
huge sword slung by their left sides. This weapon had a white
leather handle and a simple gold band that weaved from end to end,
as if it was a gold serpent crawling along the handle. The sword’s
sheath, however, was made from hardened black leather. The guards’
pale white faces were expressionless, and their eyes were blacker
than the darkness itself, as was their hair. Kaine didn’t even
glance once at them as he passed. Not one of them dared to stand in
his way for a second either.

Finally he reached the level he wanted,
eighty floors below street level, deep underground. He always
counted the floors every time he came for meetings here, as if
maybe one time they might strangely change. As he exited the
stairwell he turned left, entering into a short corridor some forty
feet long.

Ahead of him at the end stood a massive stone
door. The door had markings carved all over it that were faded from
hundreds of years but were still just about visible. They were
drawings of vampires doing battle with demons, who were dragging
humans kicking and screaming behind them. It always made him smile
as he approached it, because he had fond memories of being in some
of the battles depicted on it too. As he reached the door he
grinned broadly, his shiny white teeth glistening in the flickering
light that came off a wall candle in the far distance.

He knocked on the door with his huge fist,
and wondered if Lucius, the guard who was petrified of him and he
liked to tease, would be there to open it.

A brief second later, the door swung open and
Kaine smiled, because standing there was Lucius.

‘WHAT KEPT YOU?’ Kaine demanded in a booming,
powerful voice.

Lucius was shaking; he looked like he was
just about to turn and run.

‘Er, sorry, I um…’ he managed. Then he lapsed
into frightened silence. Those four words seemed to be the only
words the guard could manage to say because he was shaking so
badly. Walking past Lucius into the main hall, Kaine kept his face
stern but inside he was laughing.

The main hall was the size of a large ice
rink, not massive but still big enough for a large vampire meeting.
The walls were made from solid rock that reached up a hundred feet
into the darkness above. There were twenty large flaming torches
that were again made of thick branches tied fast together, with
rags wrapped around their ends. They were jammed into the walls and
burning intensely, just a little higher up than the vampires who
were already there, waiting for him. The light from the torches
illuminated the floor area beneath the gathering, and was bright
enough to seem as day. In the center of the room there was a spike
that went deep into the ground, with a huge chain coming off it
that was about ten feet in length. Each of the rusty links were
about an inch thick, and seventy millimeters in diameter. It looked
like it had been robbed from a shipyard.

The chain was made from solid steel, and
shackled to it by their ankles were two humans. The first of them
was a woman with long dark hair. She was almost naked, dressed only
in a ripped beige blanket that was strewn over her left shoulder,
and hardly covered any of her body beneath it. The second was a
young girl who gripped the older woman’s hand tightly. She was in a
similar costume. The younger girl seemed to be very scared, and by
the lacerations around both of their ankles, it appeared that they
had been trying for hours to free themselves.

The woman saw Kaine glance across at her; she
spat at him and launched herself in his direction, but the ankle
chain tore deep into her already raw flesh and stopped her.
Dropping to the floor, she screamed in agony. Kaine felt sorry for
her; like all humans, she had misjudged his intentions.

About twenty feet up the walls were small
caves full of vampires. The caverns were ten meters deep and
scattered all around the entire room. For a second as his peers
stared down at him, he almost felt as if he was on trial here.
However, he knew he wasn’t; he was a guest here too. Some of them
he recognized, but of the two hundred there must have been, he
thought he only knew a handful.

‘Saw you scaring Lucius, my guard, Kaine.
Can’t you ever leave him alone?’ came a loud screeching voice from
high above. The speaker laughed. ‘I nearly tore his head off myself
when I came in. Just for fun that is, my dear Lucius. Maybe though
your head is better off on your shoulders for the time being
though,’ he croaked.

Kaine unfortunately knew the voice too well,
and recognized it as Rex’s. The sound of it was bone chilling, pure
evil; it was fucking horrible and hadn’t changed in years. Rex was
a small, twisted, rotting vampire who was two thousand years old if
a day, and about five foot tall, hiding as always behind a dark
brown hood. His robe was like that of a monk’s and full in length,
coming down to just past his toes.

Looking up, Kaine could see
that Rex was in his normal place,
sitting near his second in command, a
vampire called Hoidrious
. Rex was huddled
on a rock that was jutting out only a few feet from the wall, next
to Hoidrious on his rock. The leaders were positioned about ten
feet higher up than the other vampires below them. Kaine remembered
not to look at Rex directly though, not because he might be
punished for it (hardly!), but simply because he was so hideously
ugly. If he had been tempted to look up at the old creature, the
mere memory of the last time he’d done so would most definitely be
a deterrent; the thought made him feel quite sick.

Rex had warts and pustules all over his face
and his skin seemed to be flaking and rotting off the bone. His
face was also badly burned down the left side, and the rumor was
that it was caused by holy water. No one really knew exactly
though, and anyone who felt like they were bored with life had only
to ask him about it, and their existence wouldn’t be lasting much
longer.

He was also known for
practicing strong dark rituals and took great pleasure out of
watching someone die an agonizing death. It didn’t matter who they
were either, even his own soldiers stood in as substitute on
occasions too. Anyone would do. He
was a master in all forms of torture, and
if his victims
died slowly and screamed
for hours, he preferred
that
.

Hoidrious regularly wore similar attire to Rex, and today
was no exception. They were both in hooded all-in-ones. It was
questioned, generally in whispered conversations, as to whether
they were twins. Because of their similar height and grotesque
facial features, it seemed highly probable. If that were the case
though, then naturally there would be great pity for the
p
oor mother.
Imagine the despair when these two had been humans, their looks
alone would have suggested she must have had something deeply and
terribly wrong with her womb.

Kaine despised the fact that he had come
here. Being in Rex’s presence was already starting to annoy him,
and he couldn’t understand why they were all so evil. He himself
was a vampire, under the same curse, but wasn’t viciously nasty and
nefarious like them. He got his enjoyment from nicer things, such
as hunting deer, classical music, fine wines, art and nature. He
would never kill a human himself unless they were clearly guilty
like that robber had been outside, of the most heinous of crimes.
In truth, the robber could consider himself extremely lucky to have
experienced a much shorter death than usual. If Kaine hadn’t been
late for the meeting, and with his views about robbers, his demise
would have gone on much longer.

Kaine lived in Devils Dyke, a place near
Brighton in the countryside, and felt he was so different from
normal vampires that he couldn’t compare himself to them in the
slightest.

He had deeply chiseled looks and his jaw line
was in perfect symmetry. His skin was pale, with just the slightest
shade of color--as if the human inside was somehow still playing a
role in his existence. His eyes were sunken, but only slightly, and
his black orbs shone as if they were liquid. The reflection coming
off them was almost fourth dimensional. He was extraordinarily
handsome, and with his blonde hair slicked back to within a hairs’
breadth past his ears, he was easily recognizable amongst his own
kind.

‘Kaine, fellow brothers and sisters, I have
called you here today to discuss our extinction,’ Rex began. ‘Are
you ready to let it happen, or did you want to live a few thousand
years longer? Those nasty humans have been breeding too much and
Mother Nature is dying. In short, they are killing the Earth. We
need to wipe out a massive number of them, cull them a little--well
a lot really--leaving ten percent for us to feed from.’ Rex
laughed, a horrible sound, and all the vampires started cheering
and shouting. The noise was deafening, and the frenzy built up
until their actions somehow turned into a massive argument.

‘SHUT UP, you miserable bastards!’ Rex
shouted as he turned and stared down at them. When he didn’t get
the immediate response he wanted, he added, ‘I will lock you all in
here and burn the whole room after I leave if you don't shut
up!’

That got their attention, and there was
immediate order. Rex went on to say he had a plan, which involved
the two humans who were chained in their midst, and that they were
the key to fixing the planet for them.

The silence was deafening as the vampires
stared at each other in disbelief.

Finally someone shouted out, ‘What, that
woman and young girl? Really?’ There was a sound of laughter, then
he said, ‘Have you have gone mad, Rex? Not that you weren’t anyway.
But really, how can they fix the planet, you old fool?’

‘You have wasted our time, making us come
here to listen to this rubbish,’ someone else said loudly. Then
others shouted out, ‘We are leaving!’

Suddenly there was another
uproar from the coven members, and
this time Hoidrious,
who had been glaring at them in
fury, looked down at his guards and
ordered the
m
to set fire to their caves. The
guards below
responded instantly; they thrust their bows out in front of
themselves and pulled back on their drawstrings before touching
their arrow’s tip into a flame by their side. They paused, pointing
the lethal archaic instruments of death up towards the caves, as
they waited for Rex to confirm the order of death.

‘Check your doors,’ Rex thundered, ‘and you
will find that you have all been locked in. Believe me when I tell
you that you are on the last chance with me.’

Then, suddenly, against his own beliefs and
to the surprise of all, he ordered the guards to stand down. They
obeyed immediately; their arrows were extinguished again and the
archers’ bowstrings fell limp.

Hoidrious furrowed his brow and cursed inwardly at Rex’s
obvious clear weaknesses. He reasoned that the old buzzard should
have killed at least some of them. After all, they would be so
easily replaced by a couple of nights’ gluttony.
No
matter
, he
thought, and laughed. Stage One of his plans to overthrow the
leader’s reign was about to be set into motion.

Rex hearing him
laugh and having no idea why he had, he simply turned and gave
Hoidrious a stern look.

Then he spoke and his voice thundered through
the room. ‘Now, before we move on, let us not forget that one of
you just told me I was an old fool…” He looked around at the
gathering, knowing full well who it had been.

‘Lance. You just dared to say I had gone mad,
didn't you?’ he yelled. Everyone turned to look at Lance, who said
nothing in response but looked extremely guilty.

Lance was 5ft 10 in height and about 1500
hundred years old. He looked quite athletic for his age, and his
body shape was still very much strong and muscular. He had long
blonde hair that flowed down past his shoulders before being tied
back into a low ponytail, centered between his shoulder blades. He
was dressed all in black like the guards that Kaine had passed on
his way down the stairs, but his cape had a red lining to it, and
he wore pure white silk gloves.

Unusual
attire
, Kaine thought, as most vampires
wore all black to these meetings out of respect for Rex.
There’s always one though that likes to bend the
rules, so it’s not surprisingly that he too was the one who had
just opened his big mouth.
Kaine glanced
up at Rex to see if he was giving off any clues yet to the
punishment Lance was obviously just about to receive. No one came
to Rex’s coven without the utmost respect for him, and everyone
knew there were severe punishments for stepping out of line. The
way Lance was dressed was sure to make Rex angry enough, let alone
calling him mad and an old fool.