By Anne Fraser and Barbara Zuchegna
With assistance from Sharon Pickrel and Jean Lamb
Copyright 1999

Chapter Twenty-Two

Things happen at sunset. Flowers close up shop for the night, birds roost, bees return to their hives, many animals seek shelter while others, the predators, stir and rise. Tawny muscles stretch, wide, sharp-toothed mouths yawn insolently, heads lift as nostrils sniff the darkening wind for spoor.

Alone in his tiny, ursine-free cave, Adrian woke. He stretched and yawned even though he had no real need to do either. His head came up as he sniffed the wind suspiciously. No bears. He relaxed for a microsecond then came on the alert again as he realized that Something Had Gone Wrong.

He was alone in the cave.

They hadn't come back.

Damn.

His mind reached out for Jake's, but the fortress was just a little too far from the cave. He felt a tentative flutter; that was all. Damn, damn, damn ... the distance factor meant that Jake and presumably the others were still in the fortress. Which meant they'd been captured.

Which meant that he, Adrian Talbot, certified self-preservationist, was going to have to go and rescue their sorry butts. All by himself. Against at least a dozen human guards and Allah knew how many vampires.

He only did heroes on the stage.

Even as the thought that this was suicide (vampicide?) screamed at him from the back of his brain, he was slinging the rifle onto his back. He ditched the idea of putting on the guard's uniform. It hadn't worked for the others. He'd have to bluff his way in, hoping that the guards would take him for one of Bahram's Exalted Ones. He was a little light-skinned, but so were many of the local people. The English accent might be hard to explain, but Adrian was an actor and could do a fair approximation of a Middle Eastern accent. That and his vampiric mind powers should fool any mortal guards; and as for the vampires ... he checked the cartridge supply on the automatic.

"Eat hot silver, fang-face!" he shouted. It lacked something, possibly a red-eyed vampiric bad guy coming at him full tilt.

Right, then, no more Mr. Nice Vampire. Adrian smeared mud on his face and tied back his long black wavy hair away from his eyes with the only thing resembling a head band he could find; a filmy black scarf that had somehow found its way into his pocket and that smelled like Hanan. He didn't think she'd mind, and it felt right.

He headed towards the fortress, occasionally pausing to check if Jake was within range yet. When he could clearly hear Jake's reply to his probes, he stopped again.

Adrian, like Richard had earlier, didn't waste time asking what had happened. No need to belabor the obvious.

'Where are you being held?' he asked, aware of a continuing interference factor.

'They have underground cells,' came Jake's reply. 'T'beth is down here, too; they've got her behind a silver chain and silver bars. She can't break out. I was too busy fighting to really notice the layout. Sorry.'

Ah, that explained the interference. Underground. Why couldn't things ever be easy?

"How many vampires?" was Adrian's next question. He could feel them, but they didn't seem excited by his presence -- what, after all, was one more vampire in the area? It was that attitude that he was counting on. He would have to carefully guard his thoughts so that it wasn't obvious he was here on a rescue mission.

'Lots,' came Jake's grim reply. 'They know what I am, and they're making it tough on me. Shit, they're coming back to the cell. Hurry up, dammit.' Jake's mental voice was abruptly cut off.

Lots. Nice, informative answer, that. But Adrian couldn't wait any longer. He was going to have to go and get brave. His eyes scanned the desert night, seeing far more than a mortal could have, but even vampiric vision failed to reveal a hidden army waiting to help him out. It was up to him, Vambo.

He calmly walked right up to the guard on duty at this side of the only entrance and looked him in the eyes.

"I'm just another vampire," he said, never releasing his mesmeric hold on the man's attention. "You don't need to see my papers. These aren't the droids you're looking for. I can go about my business."

"You can go about your business," repeated the guard.

"Move along," Adrian said.

"Move along," the guard intoned, waving him past. The other guards, seeing this, assumed that Adrian had proven his credentials.

Adrian walked into the fortress and leaned against the nearest wall, fighting a laugh. 'Always wanted to do that,' he thought, then sobered up. Things had deteriorated. He now had to save not only T'beth, but Jake, Richard, Will and even damned Ed Perry. Not to mention Sa'idi and Saravan and maybe the whole damned Middle East before they got out of here. He felt a wave of longing to be back in front of a classroom of bored and cynical undergrads, teaching them how Shakespeare's words set the soul on fire. He felt a larger wave of longing to be safely treading the boards of a stage, setting the audience on fire with Willem's words. You got to walk off the stage after saving everybody.

Two more human guards ahead. He didn't fool around with these. One of them he sent to slumberland at once; the other one he grilled about the whereabouts of the prisoners, and where the weapons taken from said prisoners had been stored. He knew he didn't have much time if the vampires were tormenting Jake. One of the bastards might take it into his head to finish what Adrian had started.

Jake Fowler, finding himself locked in a cell with Will Scrope, Ed Perry, and Richard Plantagenet, has just had his peculiar half-vampire status revealed to Richard by an unsavory group of local vampires who happen to be their captors. Jake had been worrying about the vampires. Now, he's worrying about Richard.

The local vampires have gone away, temporarily, with promises to return. Richard hasn't gone anywhere. Jake isn't entirely sure he wouldn't have been further ahead if the situation were reversed.

In his most patiently courteous voice, but keyed so low that only Jake could hear, Richard said, "This is why Adrian can speak into your mind?"

"Uh ... that's one thing." Jake tried to keep his voice as soft as Richard's.

"And why the Lady T'beth cannot take your blood?"

Jake swallowed rather noisily. "That's another."

He had never seen Richard look so weary. Whether that was because of the amount of his blood T'beth had been only too eager to take, or because he was thinking that the Wars of the Roses, in hindsight, weren't all that bad after all, Jake didn't know. He said, "Is there perhaps something else of significance you couldn't find a good time to tell me?"

What was it about the man that always made Jake feel like he was twelve years old and had just been caught looking at the pictures of bare-breasted native women in the National Geographic? Jake tried to explain about the territoriality of vampires in general ... how Jake's presence here would very likely been seen as an invasion by an alien vampire. They would want to know who Jake's "sire" was ... and where he was. And they might very well decide to ... well, steal him from Adrian by making him one of their own.

Richard gave this a moment's careful thought, studying Jake's contrite face. "That," he said finally, "could work to our advantage."

It could? Jake was damned if he could see how it could work to his advantage. Before he could say so, he felt an odd, fluttering sensation inside his head. His eyes widened; his mouth closed. Richard was watching him with frowning concentration, but Jake's attention was suddenly directed inside. And there it was again, a moment later, a little stronger. Oh, Jesus.

"What is it?" Richard prompted.

Jake looked at him, stunned. "Adrian's coming," he whispered.

Richard waited. He had a "so what else is new?" look on his face. But Richard had already said that Adrian would do something. Jake just hadn't been entirely sure he was right. Adrian would be the very first to admit that he was no damned hero. When Jake said nothing more, Richard said, "How far away is he?"

"I don't know. Too far for me to hear him. But getting closer."

"Jake." Richard reached up to take his arm. It was one of the few times that Jake had been aware of just how much bigger he was than Richard. But there was nothing diffident in Richard's eyes or in the voice he kept carefully low. "We must give Adrian all the time we can. If our captors return before Adrian arrives, do nothing to force them to action. Do you understand? And give no sign that you are hearing anything Adrian sends to you."

Richard started to turn away, and Jake reached out to stop him. Richard looked down at Jake's hand on his arm with genuine surprise, but didn't try to pull away. "Richard," Jake whispered, "just what in the hell do you think Adrian can do, all by himself?"

"I have no idea what he will do," Richard spoke so softly now that even Jake could hardly hear him. "But he is not by himself entirely. While the guards were occupied with subduing you and Will, your lady friend had the presence of mind to push Will's pack under her pallet. T'beth, Jake, has her crossbow."

As Richard pulled free, Jake turned to stare out through the bars and into T'beth's cell, across the corridor. Will had broken the cell's lock, so the guards had fastened the door with a silver chain. So far as Jake could see, T'beth hadn't moved at all since she had whispered his name and closed her eyes. And he hadn't even noticed her left arm, hanging over the edge of the cot. That wasn't where it had been when he and Will had finally succeeded in pulling her off of Richard. He could remember clearly holding her wrists while he shouted her name and tried to get through to her. Will's big backpack was nowhere to be seen.

I'll be damned, Jake thought in wonder. There was another, much stronger flutter in his head, and he reached out with his mind. 'Adrian?'

Adrian's mind whispered into his. 'Where are you being held?'

He tried to give Adrian what information he could, but it really wasn't much. He'd been too busy running and dodging to really know much about how they'd ended up at T'beth's cell. He could feel Adrian's irritated sigh inside his head. Dammit ... was there some kind of fucking conspiracy to make him feel inadequate every time he turned around on this trip?

Richard had bent down to check on Will's condition, where Will sat, his back to the wall at the rear of the cell. Will looked like hell. Jake was just about to ask Richard if he had any more worthwhile directions to give to Adrian ... he would bet money that Richard could have drawn him a goddamned map ... when activity out in the corridor drew his attention.

Richard heard it, too, and straightened up, listening. Jake felt his nerves twitching; they were coming back ... the Khelat vampires. And there were more of them. He was already talking to Adrian in his mind, and now he added an urgent, 'Shit. They're coming back to the cell. Hurry up, dammit.'

Adrian didn't ask anything else. And Jake shut down his own mind, cutting the connection as much as he could. The locals would be able to sense it if he was communicating with Adrian when they were too close. Hell, if they concentrated on him very hard, they would feel his heightened psychic senses anyway.

Richard was watching him again, saying nothing aloud, but his eyes were speaking volumes. Stall. Give Adrian time. Don't do anything stupid.

Richard didn't understand. Jake had tried to explain, but before he had seen it for himself, he wouldn't have understood the way a dominant vampire felt about invasions of his territory. The picture of Adrian and Safelli, talons and fangs dripping with each other's blood as they ripped at each other, swarmed back into Jake's mind ... their slim bodies thrashing, raking at each other, blood everywhere, nothing remotely human about the savagery with which they had torn into each other.

A dominant vampire would not allow an intruder ... or an intruder's get, in his territory.

The same three vampires appeared now, at the cell door, with the same two frightened-looking mortal guards. But now even the vampires looked both terrified and subservient. They backed away, their heads lowered, eyes downcast, careful to avoid touching the silver bars of T'beth's cell on the opposite side of the corridor, making room for the robed figure that now strode into their midst. They had carried the news of Jake's half-blood to their sire, and he had come to attend to this annoyance himself.

Bahram Bakhtiar.

Hundreds of years old, absolute master of all the vampires in this place ... of all the vampires in this end of Iran except for those who lay comatose in the hidden cave near Sa'idi ... those he thought he had destroyed by exposing them to the sun, Bahram Bakhtiar moved through his servants with all the radiant power of an emperor accepting homage in his own court to come to a halt at the bars of the cell door.

And he had eyes ... fiercely glowing eyes ... for only one of the cell's occupants.

Jake was in trouble.

Bahram Bakhtiar.

As dreaded vampiric names went, Jake reflected, it lacked a certain piquancy. No aristocratic title, though undoubtedly the human guards would call him "Vaje" to his face. It didn't roll off the tongue like Count Dracula, Carmilla, or even Lord Carrock did. And when he arrived, his court clustered around him, dust in the wake of this Iranian comet, his appearance was...

Okay, pretty damn frightening.

Tall and dark and handsome. Shit. But he was, in a way. Really dark, as in African ... he was, after all, one of the original vampires turned by Bizaya. And although he actually was no taller than Jake, he towered over his less splendid sycophants. He was dressed in opulent robes that could have served in a Broadway production of "Aladdin." Surrounded by his adoring children, Bahram seemed like a minor prophet. A prophet with fangs, which he wasn't bothering to hide. The prisoners knew what he was.

Jake heard Ed Perry stir and moan. He couldn't spare any pity. He'd told Ed the truth. Or maybe Ed was stirring and moaning over his impressive list of injuries; he didn't have Jake's advantage of speeded-up healing. Jake couldn't spare him any pity for that, either, since Bahram was here to speed up the process even further by seeing to it that Jake would be nearly impossible to hurt in the first place.

There wasn't much doubt why the debased Exalted One had come to their cell. He ignored everyone else, even Richard, and concentrated on Jake.

"Perversion," Bahram said in excellent English. "I did not believe it when my children told me of you. Never before have I seen a half-blood, something not fit for food nor yet of the true blood."

Jake kept his eyes cast down and his mind carefully on anything but Adrian's approach. He could feel the actor, moving around above them in the fortress proper, but dared not contact him.

"Look me in the eyes when I speak to you, boy," Bahram snarled.

Anger flashed in Jake's eyes as he raised them to meet the African vampire's. "Don't call me that," he said, very quietly.

Bahram laughed. "Little boy, little half-blood," he taunted. "Who is your master?"

"I have no master. I serve no one."

Bahram made an impatient gesture. "Open the cell door," he commanded his lackeys. "This one must learn some manners." While they hunted for the keys, which seemed to be with the human guards, the vampire master turned back to Jake. "Whose blood is in your veins, boy?" he demanded. "Why are here?"

Jake made no answer, which infuriated the vampire. As soon as the cell was opened, the robed master was striding in, confident in his ability to subdue the other three prisoners with his mere presence. He went straight to Jake and grabbed the young anthropologist's chin. His grip wasn't gentle, but Jake refused to flinch.

"Where is your master?" Bahram repeated, eyes boring into Jake's. "Perhaps I should finish the job for him, since he seems rather careless. I can smell the taint in your blood, boy; it moves too slowly. I shall quicken the process, and you shall be mine."

Jake wanted desperately to tell Bahram to fuck off, but his tongue didn't seem to be working. Bahram's fingers tightened their hold, turning Jake's head to one side, clearing his neck for the bite.

If Richard was going to do something, now would be a really good time...

In order to get to the detention cells, Adrian learned, he had to find the outside entrance. More exposure to the guards and the possibility of being seen by the other vampires. He moved quickly through the inner courtyard, toward the opposite wall of the fort, hoping like hell that no vampires were on guard duty. But at least now he knew where the weapons were -- sublevel, in a storeroom. The guards didn't want the Exalted to know that they had silver weapons. That was interesting, but there wasn't any time to explore the option of firing up incipient human rebellion against the Exalted. Adrian questioned the guard about what had been done to the prisoners. He didn't like the answer.

He kept his mind away from contacting Jake. If Jake was being threatened by another vampire, then Adrian's mind contact would only cause trouble. He had to effect a physical rescue. He hurried through the ruined buildings, playing "You don't see me" with the guards, searching for the entrance to the stairs.

It would make a bad stage set, this business of a hidden sublevel ... though the upper part of the fortress had possibilities for staging some of the more military plays ... stop it, Talbot, stop thinking like a goddamn actor/director...

Yet he couldn't help thinking, as he ran down the stairs, rifle slung at the ready, face smeared with camouflage and the scarf wrapped around his forehead, that he made one hell of a funny-looking Puck. He should scrap the idea of doing "Dream" and do "Richard III" in modern dress, set in Iran ... the War of the Roses as Operation Desert Storm...

Half a dozen or so human guards tried to stop him as he ran into the first corridor. They might as well have tried to stop a freight train or a hurricane. Adrian mowed them down impersonally with a rapid burst of fire from the semiautomatic, thinking that Ed would be proud of him. The ones who didn't fall under a rain of silver bullets turned and fled before this insane Exalted One with mud on his face and hellfire in his eyes.

The time for subtlety was over.

He kicked open the door to the recreation room, wrinkling his nose at the smell of stale beer, some of it recycled through the human bladder. But the room itself was empty of breathing or nonbreathing bodies. There was blood on the floor, silent testimony to the slaughter Richard had wrought, but the blood told Adrian only that people had died in this room. Now, where was that damned storage locker? Everything down here was corridors, with tiled floors and finished walls, but still corridors. He could sense that some of the rooms belonged to vampires, but those were empty. A concentration of the undead seemed to be further in this maze.

He found the storage locker, wrenched it open, and discovered the cache of silver weapons. Adrian snatched the ones that wouldn't slow him down, knives and handguns, careful to pick up the knives only by their hilts. Sofi would have had a field day in here with so many silver weapons, he thought; and for the first time in a year the thought of her didn't make him feel like he'd been punched in the stomach.

No time to dwell on that. No time for anything. The other vampires would know he was here, now ... unless they ignored the sound of gunfire. Which they might, as being something for the human guards to handle.

Adrian, rifle at the ready, made his way to the detention cell area. And there quite the little tableau met his eyes...

(Poor Jake. All this time he's kept Adrian from turning him into a Canadian vampire. Now, it looks like he's gonna find himself turned into an Iranian vampire. Some guys just never seem to have any luck at all.)

Richard said, "Yes, take him. The sire of your sire has so many reasons to chastise you, why not add one more?"

Oh, super. Jake's frantically racing mind chalked up one more against Richard. "Take him?" Bastard.

But then Jake realized that Bahram's hold on him had weakened, his eyes lost their intensity. And Bahram's hand dropped away from his chin.

Bahram Bakhtiar turned, slowly, away from Jake. To Richard, he said softly, "The sire of my sire?"

Jake was aware that Bahram had suddenly lost interest in him altogether. His attention was riveted on Richard, who faced him with a nonchalance Jake found hard to believe. Was that something they taught kings when they were growing up?

"He who exalted Bizaya, the first of the Exalted in this place ... Bizaya, who made the error of exalting your own unworthy self," Richard said calmly. "The ancient one has come to correct his child's errors." He actually smiled into Bahram's fiercely glowing eyes. "Old when the pyramids were young, powerful beyond all knowing, our master came out of Egypt and took your people under his wing in the shadow of the snowy mountain ... and all, until you, revered and obeyed him. Cherish each moment, debased creature. Your destruction is upon you."

What in the hell was Richard talking about? And why was he talking so much? Jake had never heard Richard put so many words together at one time before. Jake stared at Bahram, who had forgotten Jake's existence, and then saw the three vampires outside the cell gaping at Richard with unmistakable awe, the guards with evident terror. Son of a gun.

Bahram took a step toward Richard. "You're lying," he said.

He had turned his back on Jake. Behind Richard, both Will and Ed Perry struggled to their feet. Everyone was staring at Richard.

And Richard laughed out loud. "Yes," he said. "I'm lying. Believe it, diseased dog. You who would place your head beneath the heel of a pathetic mortal molester of children." His smile was insufferably scornful, in that way that Richard could bring off better than anyone Jake had ever seen. "Believe it, perverted offal," he sneered. "You who have brought shame on all our master's line, who have allowed yourself to be the cringing lackey of a mortal degenerate. Comfort your last moments with the thought that our master and his true children have not come out of Africa to this place, to put an end to the stench you have raised in the nostrils of all the Kindred of his get ... to cleanse the very earth of your vile existence, and that of all the filth you have created here ... these skulking vermin of alien blood, who would obey you rather than bow down to the true blood of our master's ancient line."

Incredibly, Jake heard the three vampires outside the cell begin to hiss in agitation. Vampires, Jake knew only too well, hissed like that in only two situations ... when they were about to attack, and when they were scared shitless. This bunch wasn't in attack mode at the moment.

Bahram was made of sterner stuff. He had taken another step toward Richard ... and away from Jake, and he raised his voice now, threateningly, as he leaned toward Richard. "Silence! This is all lies! Who are you, human, to speak of the Old One? How can you know of him ... of any of this?"

Richard's smile never wavered. He faced Bahram with perfect composure, and the sheer guts, Jake thought, of a cornered lion. "I?" he said serenely. "I am he who does the will of the ancient one while the sun is high. I am he who brought him and his get across the sea, at his behest, to restore order to this place you have so vilely corrupted, and to protect those in this land who have provided for the true Exalted since Bizaya first brought them into these mountains."

Jake was beginning to understand. Adrian had told him a bit about what he and Richard had learned from the elders in Sa'idi ... not enough, but Jake realized that Richard was using that knowledge now to tie Bahram in knots. Adrian was close; Jake could feel his presence, moving quickly toward them.

Adrian had to know what was going on here. Jake was pretty sure that Bahram and his fledglings, who were clustering just outside the cell with absolute terror on their hissing faces, were concentrating too hard on Richard to be paying any attention to Jake's mental activity. Carefully, tentatively, Jake reached out toward Adrian with his mind.

'Adrian,' he sent, 'I think you just landed the role of a lifetime in here.'

Adrian was too busy to answer. Jake got impressions only ... and they weren't pretty. Adrian was cutting a swath through the mortal guards in this joint that was just about as wide as Richard's had been. And he was getting closer.

Bahram continued to close the distance between him and Richard, and Richard wasn't giving ground. On his face was the same confident smile. Behind him, Will's eyes had gone to Jake, and there was a message in them Jake wasn't sure he understood ... until he realized that he was the only one in the cell that no one at all was paying any attention to, or could even see without actually turning to look at him. And they were much too caught up in what Richard was saying to do that.

"If this is true," Bahram said to Richard, and Jake could hear the unwilling soft hiss in the words, "where is your master?"

"He comes," Richard said. "He and his, who are your executioners, Bahram Bakhtiar."

Will's eyes bored into Jake fiercely. He was damned near screaming silently, and it abruptly dawned on Jake what he was trying to say. Jake turned toward the cell door, focussing his eyes on the corridor beyond the hissing vampires there, beyond the white-faced mortal guards and, raising his voice reverently, bellowed, "Master!"

The bunch outside the cell jumped and turned their heads to look down the corridor, in the direction Jake's eyes indicated. Bahram spun on his heel away from Richard, and in one incredibly quick, smooth motion, Richard bent, his right hand going into the top of his boot, and launched himself at Bahram. Light glinted on the silver-plated knife in his hand, and Bahram screamed as the blade touched the bare flesh of his throat.

"Gently," Richard said, his voice silk in the sudden, awful silence. The vampires in the corridor, the human guards, and Bahram, had all frozen in place. "Gently," Richard repeated, turned the knife slightly, the edge ready to sink through skin and muscle, "or you will not live to greet the ancient one, Bahram." His left hand was sunk into the flesh of Bahram's upper arm in a grip with which Jake was only too familiar, that bone-crushing grip of a swordsman's fingers that was very nearly as strong as any vampire's.

Bahram swallowed, his Adam's apple sliding over the edge of the knife carefully. He said, hissing, "Who are you?"

Richard's laugh was soft now. "But I've told you," he said. He raised his voice, his eyes shifting to the frozen group in the corridor. "Move back away from the door, and toss your weapons into the cell." When no one moved, his voice sharpened. "Now!" And he was obeyed. People always seemed to obey Richard when he used that tone, Jake thought, and obeyed just as quickly when Richard said to him, "Jake, get the weapons and get over here, behind me."

Now what? Jake wondered. He passed handguns to Ed and Will ... but they wouldn't be loaded with silver bullets and would be useless against the vampires they would have to get through to get the hell out of here.

So just what in the hell was Richard planning to do about that?

Adrian Talbot, probably no real threat to keep Schwartzeneggar and Stallone awake nights, has nonetheless been doing a credible impression of one of them as he makes his way through the criss-crossing corridors beneath the crumbling fort of Khelat.

Vambo.

But as he nears the detention area, he feels Jake's mind reaching out to his, and he 'hears', 'Adrian, I think you just landed the role of a lifetime in here.'

Too busy at the moment to answer, Adrian jumped over the two vampires he had just mowed down with his silver bullets, while Jake poured into his mind all his impressions of what was happening in the cell he shared with Richard, Will, Ed Perry ... and, it seemed, the vampire named Bahram Bakhtiar, the renegade Exalted One who had turned on his own kind and created the "enforcers" of the Ayatollah Zanjani. And Richard, unless Jake was crazy, had a silver knife at Bahram's throat and was pouring into his ears enough bullshit to fertilize half of Iran.

The Ancient One? An Egyptian? Adrian's mind cast about frantically through a stored encyclopedia of roles. He'd never done opera; he ruled that out as he ran. Nothing of Willem's, either ... maybe Shaw? There was Apollodorus ... no, too servile. Damn! There was really only one good Egyptian role ... and he was damned if he was going in there as Cleopatra.

Adrian skidded to a stop at the head of the short, rock-walled corridor the mesmerized guard above had said led to the detention cells. He could feel T'beth's presence strongly now; she was right here, down the corridor on the right. Jake was on the left. And in between was a frozen tableau of three vampires and two human guards ... not one of whom was paying any attention to Adrian.

The vampires were staring into the cell on the left, hissing through their fangs, their faces twisted in fear and indecision. These had been local people before their turning ... fair-skinned Iranians, and not the mixed-blood folk of Sa'idi. So these were Bahram's get. The guards should have chosen their profession more wisely. Without hesitation, Adrian opened up with the semi-automatic rifle and sprayed silver-coated bullets into the whole bunch of them ... about four bullets, before he ran out of ammunition.

Damn!

How did you reload these damned rifles? And where in the hell had he crammed the extra clips?

One of the vampires was down and one of the guards. The two remaining vampires, a man and a woman, turned toward Adrian with hellish fires glowing in their eyes and a really spectacular amount of saliva spitting out through their bared fangs. The guard looked as if he would really, really, like to have some place to run to.

Adrian fumbled for one of the handguns stuffed into one of his myriad pockets, but while you had to hand it to Banana Republic for the number of things you could carry on you in one of these outfits, you would have to deduct points for speedy accessibility. Oh, shit. He still had his own handgun in its holster on his belt ... its nice, secure, holster with the covering snap-on flap. The two vampires were already moving ... moving very fast, by the time he remembered it.

There was a sudden, piercing whistling sound and one of the vampires, the woman, turned toward it, toward the cell on the right ... and sprouted a narrow wooden accessory to her ensemble, protruding from the heart area. She dropped like a stone. The man hadn't taken his concentration off of Adrian, who gave up on the damned gun. The knife was easier to get at. Screw Cleopatra; more direct methods were called for. It wasn't that easy to switch from one role to another for a truly dedicated actor anyway, and Adrian was really into Vambo at the moment. He almost scared himself with the roar he let out as he closed with the Iranian vampire.

Actually, this one was quite a bit bigger than Adrian, and he was on a high that was as much fear as anger. He managed to get a hand on Adrian's wrist, holding the deadly silver away from his body as he tried, with talons and fangs, to detach Adrian pieces from their accustomed places. He was also doing a fair job of turning the knife toward Adrian himself.

In the corridor behind him, Jake, Will and Ed Perry spilled out of their cell. Ed almost casually brought the gun in his hand down on the forehead of the frightened guard, who was probably happy to drop into unconsciousness. Will broke the silver chain holding T'beth's cell door closed with one massive wrench of his arm ... and T'beth staggered into the corridor as Will slid the silver-plated bars aside. As busy as he was at the moment, Adrian could see that she was naked, mad as all hell, and struggling to cock her crossbow with far less than her normal strength.

Adrian wished her luck ... with some enthusiasm. The knife in his hand was twisted entirely around now, and being slowly forced down toward his throat. The Iranian vampire was too tall, and too strong, and Adrian couldn't get leverage enough to turn the knife away. If somebody didn't do something fairly quickly, Adrian was going to be seriously re-thinking the wisdom of carrying silver-plated weapons.

But then he heard the familiar, soft twang-thud of the bow ... and the Iranian lost all interest in Adrian, his knife, or anything else. His eyes were still open, the red glow fading swiftly, as he slid down against Adrian's body to the floor and lay still. The wooden quarrel was sticking out of his back, slightly to left of center, and had pierced his heart. Never let it be said that there was anything wrong with T'beth's aim.

He raised his eyes from the fallen vampire and stepped over him, so glad to see T'beth he could almost have run to her and hugged her. Mother naked, so gray from hunger she could have been a character in a black and white film, her hair streaked with gray and her eyes sunk in dark blue circles, she was the most wonderful sight Adrian had seen in weeks. He couldn't seem to swallow; his vision was swimming with red, and he knew now that, up until this moment, he had never really been sure he would see her again.

She was leaning against the rock wall, her bow hanging down in limp hands, staring at him with fathomless dark eyes. "Talbot," she said wearily, "what in the hell took you so damned long?"