White Devil Mountain (33 page)

Lourié ran over to Crey, then looked down to the far end of the corridor. The flames were still burning. Reflecting that firelight, the new membranes that appeared had a reddish glow.

“What are these things?” Lourié murmured.

“A kind of monster . . . Gilzen made . . . modeled on alien DNA-mixing technology,” Crey said, his voice painfully hoarse. “The DNA I got from him tells me that. These things were offshoots produced while Gilzen was trying to accomplish his aims . . . He intended to use ’em as guards or something . . . but they were too vicious to serve any purpose . . . So they all got locked up in a room underground . . . for ten thousand years . . . No, not even a year’s passed since the first one was put in there. These things are immortal freaking monsters. Who’s to say how many of ’em died and how many survived . . .”

“How many were there?”

“. . . A lot . . . Five thousand . . . Probably all that survived were the ones that could get by without drawing energy from outside . . . Maybe ten, give or take a couple . . .”

“Ten of those flap-of-skin thingies?”

“Yep . . . Run for it.”

“How did they get out?”

“How should I know? Get a move on!”

“Can you stand, mister?”

“You needn’t worry . . . about little ol’ me. What’s more important . . . those placards I gave you . . . They’re grave markers . . . I’m counting on you with those!”

Lourié gazed at the outlaw’s face. It was an earnest look. Crey had probably loved those two women as well as someone like him could.

Getting up, Lourié grabbed one of Crey’s arms and pulled on it.

“Don’t . . . I can’t move . . . So make a break for it.”

A thin membrane was drawing nearer to Crey’s feet.

“Go!”

Giving a violent swing of the arm the boy was holding, Crey sent Lourié reeling backward. Somehow the boy managed to keep from falling over, straightening himself up and looking over at Crey. The membrane that’d drifted over had grown rigid without warning, and it was just flowing past Crey’s chest. Crey’s head dropped back behind his torso.

Speechless, Lourié was rooted to the spot. Down by his feet, a white cloth-like strip drifted along. Up it floated, its edge aiming straight for the boy’s neck.

“Wha—”

A stark flash of light joined the boy’s backward-reeling body and the deadly membrane. Nailed to the floor by a rough wooden needle, the membrane twitched as only a living creature could, but it quickly grew still.

“D?”

From the far end of the hall a figure in black raced closer with a sword in his right hand, and the warrior woman following him also carried glittering steel. Hacking off the flapping membranes near Lourié in no time, D scooped up the boy without saying a word.

“Wait,” the boy said, looking down at Crey’s remains.

Normally, that was the sort of sight people shut their eyes to, but out on the Frontier you got used to seeing things like that while still in your infancy. Looking at Crey’s head, Lourié thought,
He’s smiling
.

His fallen torso had its right arm extended in the boy’s direction. Lourié’s tears overflowed. A split second before D’s needle had pierced the membrane, that arm had knocked Lourié out of the way.

We’re definitely going to plant these up top for you!
the boy thought, his grip tightening on the little placards in his pocket.

“There’s just no end to this!” Lilia cried out. At her feet was a pile of membranes she’d sliced. Now it looked like ten times as many were flying down the corridor. “What are these things?”

The boy replied to Lilia’s question, “They’re monsters Gilzen had locked up.”

“I see. I’ll get the story from you later. D—retreat!”

By the time she called out to the young man in black, he’d already advanced about fifteen feet.

“What an ego!”

She was about to go after D, and then he halted.

Up ahead, a black form flecked with shades that were difficult to describe had appeared. Without a single corner to it, it called to mind a beetle, but since it lacked limbs it apparently relied on the tank treads on its bottom half to move. Surprisingly enough, those treads weren’t mechanical; they were clearly organic in nature. Perhaps it was equipped with some sort of sensory apparatus, because although no eyes were visible on it, it slowly moved what appeared to be its head from side to side, then turned toward D.

Lilia turned around and said, “It’s no good. There’s a ton of them coming!”

The other end of the corridor was choked with the membrane creatures. Death was closing on them from both sides.

Fear tightened its grip on Lourié’s heart. He clung to D’s shoulder for all he was worth. Beneath his fingers, the Hunter felt like iron. Relief and trust warmed the boy’s heart. Here was a man who’d fought the Nobility and always triumphed.

D stepped forward. A sword in his right hand—that had been enough for him to carve his way through any danger.

Lourié was no longer afraid.

At that moment there was the sound of scraping stone to their left. From the depths of the stone doorway a woman poked her head out, saying, “Hurry! This way!”

“
Miss Vera?
”

Leaving Lourié’s words hanging like a trail behind them, D ran toward the doorway, along with Lilia.

It was a room choked with dust. There were small windows to either side of the door. Lilia pressed her face against one.

The limbless beetle still seemed fixated on D and the rest of them. Staring at the stone wall with eyes that weren’t eyes, it unexpectedly dashed forward. Compared to its earlier movements, its speed was unbelievable.

“
What
in the—” Lilia exclaimed, backing away in spite of herself, and then the door shuddered violently.

There was an unnerving sound as cracks raced through the wall.

“That’s some horsepower,” Lilia said with a smile. “Here it comes again.”

The beetle backed up. Then the white membranes assailed it. One after another they became unholy razors, dealing white cuts to the beetle’s head and body. The beetle groaned. Turning its head, it tried to drive the membranes away. The depth and numbers of the cuts only increased. After suffering countless hits in the same spot, the beetle disgorged what could only be described as grayish “blood” from its wounds, and then every inch of it turned boiling hot.

Once again Lilia pulled her face back from the window, and an intense heat spread through the room.

“Into the next room!” Vera shouted.

D pushed Lourié and Vera into the room, then shut the door. He probably didn’t throw Lilia in with them because she was a Huntress.

“It’s incredible!” Lilia remarked with excitement.

Every last one of the advancing membranes was enveloped by flames, reduced to ash before they fell to the floor. Every inch of the beetle was still burning hot, and the melting walls and ceiling around it began to collapse.

D and Lilia moved into the other room, too. Vera and Lourié were already lying limply on the floor. That was on account of the heat that filled the room.

“If this keeps up, those two are goners. Not that it’s a big deal or anything,” Lilia asserted unpleasantly. She’d been a callous woman from the start, and after being bitten by Gilzen that trait only seemed to have been amplified.

Another wall collapsed. They were less than eighteen inches from the feverish hell.

“What do you intend to do, D?”

As Lilia made that mocking query, D stepped forward. Lilia could see how his eyes gleamed wildly.

“You—you don’t mean to . . . ?”

For a few seconds astonishment prevented the Huntress from making any movement at all. D pulled the paralyzed Lilia close. She planted one hand against the black fabric of his chest to push him away, but there she was stopped. Both physically and mentally. Oh, the look on D’s face as he sank his fangs into her carotid artery! He had chosen to transform into a vampire. A second passed, and then another—and as D quietly pulled away, Lilia simultaneously collapsed on the spot. There was something both disturbing and sensual in the way D wiped his lips with the back of his hand.

“Was that enough?” he asked.

“More or less,” the hoarse voice replied. A small face was rising in the palm of D’s left hand.

Another wall collapsed. The heat assailed them like a wild beast.

“So hot,” Lourié muttered fuzzily.

As if in response to that, D raised his left hand. From the little lips protruding from it something spurted. Fresh blood.

The stream of blood eddied, forming layer upon layer, turning into crimson steam where it came in contact with the heat. It became a wall of red liquid that stood against temperatures high enough to melt away even stone. It was obviously Lilia’s blood. However, there was no way the small amount of blood taken from her should be able to counter the waves of heat that were ravaging this floor of the castle. Perhaps it was something in the nature of the blood, or maybe there was some magical power behind the way it’d been spit out, but when the blood turned to steam it seemed to multiply without end, becoming a bloody vortex that mesmerized the room, the world, the very heat—until at last the heat was gone.

An ineffable stench of blood hung in the room, and D didn’t so much as glance back at the boy or the doctor by the wall as he asked them, “Are you okay?”

With unexpected speed the exhausted Vera responded, “I’m fine. The child’s fine, too.”

As Lourié lay there, the doctor had taken his pulse and checked his pupils.

D had already stepped out into the corridor. The rooms along either side of it were all burnt out. There was no sign of the beetle or the living membranes. Had the battle ended with the beetle victorious? No, on the floor were about a dozen whitish lines, long and trailing like loose threads. They were marks left where the beetle had bled. The membrane creatures had made manifest their terrible cutting ability.

“So, they took each other out?”

No one replied to the left hand’s question.

“My thoughts on the matter are that those were some of the creatures locked in that underground vault and putting out that supernatural aura. Their prison must’ve selectively taken part of the shock from that blast in the laboratory, breaking it open. Which would mean the rest of ’em have escaped, too. Sheesh! We’ve got Gilzen’s servants and the aliens—plus monsters? This castle’s turning into all sorts of hell! You’d better get those two out of here fast. Even though they know your true nature now.”

At that point the left hand made a garbled cry. D had balled it into a tight fist. He squeezed it harder and more cruelly than ever.

III

The first thing D did was tell Vera and Lourié to hide. At that point there was an unexpected development. Vera—the brave doctor—started crying in fear.

“No, I don’t want to be left here with the child!” she cried. “What are we supposed to do if the monsters come? Can you take responsibility for that?”

“Wow,” the Hunter’s left hand groaned. “That’s how the cookie crumbled? A physical and mental shift brought on by external pressure—just perfect!”

Even Lourié couldn’t help but ask, “Dr. Vera, what’s wrong?”