Blood-caked eyelids fluttered. Stale air issued from between dry lips, and, with a groan, Michael Morbius sat up. Or tried to, at any rate. Velcro restraints and two pair of handcuffs prevented him from moving very far. Weak, he flopped back down, breathing heavily. An IV drip was connected to one arm, and the steady beep-beep of a heart monitor and respirator echoed in to sterile little room he found himself in.
“I see you’re awake.”
Morbius turned, bloodshot eyes widening slightly.
“Stroud,” he hissed.
“I’m glad to see you remember me, old pal,” Simon Stroud said, running blunt fingers through his blonde hair. He sat in a chair beside Morbius’ bed, legs crossed, a look of contempt marring his features.
“Cause I sure as hell remember you.”
Morbius tugged at his restraints. “It looks as if you finally have what you always wanted, Stroud. I’m far too weak to escape…”
“Even if you did, it’s a bright, beautiful, sunny day outside, Morbius. And I made sure we’re on a floor with a lot of windows.” Stroud leaned forward, steepling his fingers and resting his chin on them. “So. Who were they?”
“They?” Morbius laid back and stared at the ceiling. He could smell the blood pulsing in Stroud’s veins. Pumping and thumping-
“The guys who finally brought you down. The CIA, Interpol, half a dozen other organizations want to give them a medal.”
“Ha!” Morbius licked his lips. He grinned, baring his teeth. Stroud leaned back. Morbius laughed and Stroud felt his flesh crawl. “Before this is over, Stroud, you’ll wish they had been the ones in this bed. I guarantee that!”
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#1
MAY 09 |
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“Wages of Sin”
Venice
Vlad Tepesh, Dracula, Lord of All Vampires, made his entrance through a swirling mist of crimson, his cape snapping wide as he shrugged it off of his shoulders. All noise in the ballroom ceased as Dracula let his gaze rest on one face, then the next. Asserting his dominance, marking his territory, whatever one would call it, Dracula did it with brisk abandon.
Dead faces watched him, minnows in the blood pool. Vampires of every nationality, unliving snapshots to the whole of human history. And all of them owed their loyalty, their very lives-such as they were-to Dracula. He preened, ever so slightly, beneath their gazes. His cloak flared behind him, a dark cloud that encompassed everything in its shadow. The thin shapes of his courtesans padded silently behind him, red eyes unblinking.
“My lord,” the Prince of Venice said, striding forward to meet the man who was ostensibly his lord and master. The Prince was tall and spindly, his face hidden behind a golden mask, his body swathed in silk robes the color of the sunset. Dracula examined his reflection in the surface of the mask and smiled, displaying his fangs.
“Fealty suits you, Doge,” Dracula purred, head cocked. The Prince stiffened slightly, then inclined his head.
“Forgive me. I-”
“No matter,” Dracula said, waving a long-nailed hand. “You have done well.” A young woman, stripped to the waist and bearing a tray of crystal goblets swept past. Dracula snagged one and sniffed it. “How many have chosen to attend?”
“All, my lord.”
“All?” Dracula raised an eyebrow. The Prince shrugged, his robes rustling.
“Varney isn’t here, of course.”
“Ruthven? Orlok?”
“Orlok is ashes,” the Prince said, slowly. Dracula smiled.
“Blade?”
“No.”
“Hh.” Dracula sipped from the goblet, frowning. “Then who?”
“Monks.”
“Monks?” Dracula spit the word out. “Monks?”
“Yes. They-ah-they destroyed his lair. Annihilated it.”
“Monks.” He shook his head. “What of Ruthven?”
“Greece. He said you were no lord of his. He sent my envoys back in a bag.”
Dracula grunted. Then, he laughed. It was a horrible sound, devoid of all humor and light. Heads turned, eyes narrowed, looking for the source, the reason for his humor. The laughter of Dracula was often a harbinger of unpleasant things for those it was aimed at.
“As I expected,” Dracula said, after a moment. “Still, he will have to be dealt with.” He wiped a droplet of blood from his lips. “Has there been any sign of Deacon Frost?”
“None. Not in Europe, at least.” The Prince spread his hands. “I am sorry.”
“Again, no matter.” Dracula turned. Couples danced on the polished floor, powdered wigs on their heads. Human musicians played antique instruments, but it was more for form’s sake than anything else. Where others heard music, the undead heard only noise. Those dancing did so from memory and instinct. It lent an artificial, somewhat stilted air to the proceedings. Dracula’s lip curled in derision.
“Fools,” he said.
“My lord?” the Prince said. Dracula glanced at him, his sneer fading. Here was a man who was anything but a fool. Many said that the Prince of Venice was second in cunning only to Dracula himself. The golden-masked creature had survived the centuries, hidden in his palace, subtly weaving a web of influence across most of Europe. No hunters came to his door. No rivals challenged him. He hid, and waited and plotted.
Dracula could almost respect him, if not for his lack of courage. And, of course, the illness he carried in his flesh. The Prince, as in life, had never felt the kiss of blade or fire upon his flesh. The leprosy that had provoked him into hunting down a vampire to grant him unlife still riddled his flesh in immortality, and like all men of his era, Dracula abhored the leper even more than the Turk.
“Nothing,” Dracula said, sweeping past the Prince and into the crowd. They moved aside for him, as was his right, and for a brief moment, Dracula gloried in it.
After so many years, he was king again. So many setbacks, so many battles that ended inconclusively, Dracula was at last the undisputed Lord of the Vampires once more-
The pain struck him suddenly. He doubled over, a grunt of pain spilling from his lips. He looked around, confused. What-
More pain. Fire, surging through his veins. He sank to his knees, arms wrapped around his chest. Voices rose, a mutter of concern. The Prince hurried towards him, pushing through the crowd.
“My lord-”
Dracula screamed. Head thrown back, arms raised, Dracula screamed. A red mist spewed from his pores, curling and rising into the air. The vampires fell back, tumbling over each other in their haste to get away.
Dracula’s scream faded and he collapsed onto his face, his limbs splayed out at odd angles, eyes closed. Lost in his own head, in his own pain, Dracula passed into oblivion, listening to something he had not heard in years.
The sound of his own heart beating.
Transia
Light flared from the windows of an ancient and seemingly crumbling monastery.
The monastery had been abandoned in 1510, after an orgy of violence and suicide that some held was the result of the clay and stone of the not-distant Mount Wundagore, which had been used in the construction.
Now, a different order held forth ceremonies within the round, unassuming tower that squatted in the deepest of Transia’s forests. An order far darker than any other.
The Cult of the Book. The Swallowers of Sins. The Darkholders.
The order had been through much in the past decade. Two entire branches of the cult had been eradicated-one, more recently, by a demonic entity known as Diabolique and the other by Dracula.
The Lord Mask of the Council of Masks, the reigning body of the Darkholders, Randolph DeGuzman, had been personally victimized by the former. But it was the latter that he was focused on now.
DeGuzman stepped back from the gargoyle shaped altar, his arms dropping, sweat rolling down his face beneath his mask. Heart thundering, he turned.
“It’s done.”
“Successfully?” one of the dozen masked individuals gathered in the room said. DeGuzman waved a hand.
“Time will tell. But as for the spell itself-” He removed his demonic mask and ran fingers through his short, curly, silver hair. He was thin faced, with a pointed beard the same hue as his hair. “That has done its task.”
“You’re sure?” another said.
“As sure as one can be.” DeGuzman snatched the page of the Darkhold, retrieved in Budapest by agents of the cult earlier in the week, off of the altar and rolled it tight. “Surely you don’t think those first Darkholders in long sunken Atlantis would create a creature they had no means of dealing with, do you?”
“Like all of us, my brother-mask simply assumed that the so-called Montesi Formula was the only method of dealing with the pestiforous vermin-”
DeGuzman held up a hand to forestall any further argument. Mutters filled the room. The animals were restless. DeGuzman smiled.
“The only method you knew of,” he corrected.
“I assumed we all knew much the same thing,” a third said. “Despite your grandiose title, DeGuzman, we are equals, are we not?”
“Of course, Marla my dear. I shared with you what this page could do, did I not?”
“Yes. But why was it something which needed to be done?” Marla removed her mask, revealing a wide face. She could have been any Transian hausefrau, unless you caught her eyes in the right light. Horrid gems, those eyes.
“Dracula crossed us, my dear,” DeGuzman said. “And now he will pay for his error by reclaiming that which is ours by right-the Darkhold!”
Marla opened her mouth. Then, in one hideously bright moment, she was gone, wiped aside by the explosion that rocked the monastery. Flames bellowed where there had once been stone. DeGuzman fell to floor, ears ringing, blood streaming from the cuts on his face and hands.
“What-”
“The Darkhold. Where is it?” The voice was as cold and as brittle and sharp as ice. DeGuzman looked up, eyes bleary.
“Who-”
“Is your memory as short as the span of your years, puling worm?” A green cloaked form walked through the dust and the flame, long strands of silver hair spilling from within the hood. A pale hand wrenched back the hood, revealing a satanically grinning face.
“Do you not remember Modred the Mystic?”
London
The man called Blade ran across the rooftops, his breath hissing in and out of his lungs. With a growl worthy of his prey, he leapt, clearing the space between the two council flats. While he hung suspended, his hand found the sword sheathed on his back.
He was drawing it even as his thick soled boots touched the edge of the roof. A glitter of reflected light, and the sword was out and slashing across the spine of the vampire that Blade had been chasing.
“Auhuhk-” the vampire stumbled, archaic cloak swirling. He was wearing ragged, moldy 19th Century garb. Long hair swept over his face as he whirled, clawed fingers digging for Blade. “Damn darkie!”
“Watch the language, Varney.” Blade swung aside, avoiding the blow, dancing on the edge of the roof. He twirled, driving the edge of his blade into Varney’s stomach and sending the vampire sprawling. “I know you’re old, but you need to keep up with the times.”
“I’m immortal, Blade. Time is the problem of other people,” Varney spat, climbing to his feet. He was thin and long-faced, the very picture of a dissolute aristocrat. Which, of course, he had been. At least before Cromwell’s men had driven him into hiding and the arms of the witch who had made him what he was today.
“You’re not immortal, you just haven’t died yet,” Blade said. Varney cackled.
“And I don’t intend to do so tonight,” he said, lunging for the vampire-hunter. Blade fell into a crouch, and his opponent sailed over his head. Varney hit the wall of the opposite building, splaying out like a tree frog. He turned, hissing.
“You-”
“What? Finding it hard to pounce on someone who can see you coming?” Blade gestured with his sword. “Come on, Varney. You’re getting soft. I expected better of the oldest vampire in England.”
Varney didn’t reply, instead bounding towards Blade, limbs extended like those of a hunting spider. Blade stepped back despite himself and Varney crashed into him, whirling him around, fangs digging hungrily for the hunter’s neck, Blade’s sword pressed flat between them. Pale fingers wrapped around Blade’s skull and he found himself bent backwards, the weight of the vampire fully on him.
“Bleed for me,” Varney hissed, then screeched. The first crossbow bolt took him in the back. He fell away from Blade, who threw himself aside instinctively. A second bolt found Varney’s chest. Soon he was bristling, porcupine like, with bolts. His scream echoed for moments after his withered form tumbled down into the garbage strewn alleyway between the buildings. Blade spun.
“What the hell-”
Something struck him. He stumbled, the sword slipping from suddenly nervous fingers. Blade staggered forward. Through blurring vision, he saw robed, masked figures watching him. One raised a crossbow.
“You-” Blade muttered. The crossbow twanged.
Everything went dark.
To Be Continued...
Next Issue: Morbius is in custody of an old enemy…but for how long? Dracula finds himself in an unlikely position…the human guest of a fortress full of the undead! Modred the Mystic has come calling…will the Council of Masks survive the visit? And Blade finds himself the captive of…who? Be here in thirty for ‘CAGES FOR TIGERS’!
Previous Issue | Next Issue
Vlad Tepesh, Dracula, Lord of All Vampires, made his entrance through a swirling mist of crimson, his cape snapping wide as he shrugged it off of his shoulders. All noise in the ballroom ceased as Dracula let his gaze rest on one face, then the next. Asserting his dominance, marking his territory, whatever one would call it, Dracula did it with brisk abandon.
Dead faces watched him, minnows in the blood pool. Vampires of every nationality, unliving snapshots to the whole of human history. And all of them owed their loyalty, their very lives-such as they were-to Dracula. He preened, ever so slightly, beneath their gazes. His cloak flared behind him, a dark cloud that encompassed everything in its shadow. The thin shapes of his courtesans padded silently behind him, red eyes unblinking.
“My lord,” the Prince of Venice said, striding forward to meet the man who was ostensibly his lord and master. The Prince was tall and spindly, his face hidden behind a golden mask, his body swathed in silk robes the color of the sunset. Dracula examined his reflection in the surface of the mask and smiled, displaying his fangs.
“Fealty suits you, Doge,” Dracula purred, head cocked. The Prince stiffened slightly, then inclined his head.
“Forgive me. I-”
“No matter,” Dracula said, waving a long-nailed hand. “You have done well.” A young woman, stripped to the waist and bearing a tray of crystal goblets swept past. Dracula snagged one and sniffed it. “How many have chosen to attend?”
“All, my lord.”
“All?” Dracula raised an eyebrow. The Prince shrugged, his robes rustling.
“Varney isn’t here, of course.”
“Ruthven? Orlok?”
“Orlok is ashes,” the Prince said, slowly. Dracula smiled.
“Blade?”
“No.”
“Hh.” Dracula sipped from the goblet, frowning. “Then who?”
“Monks.”
“Monks?” Dracula spit the word out. “Monks?”
“Yes. They-ah-they destroyed his lair. Annihilated it.”
“Monks.” He shook his head. “What of Ruthven?”
“Greece. He said you were no lord of his. He sent my envoys back in a bag.”
Dracula grunted. Then, he laughed. It was a horrible sound, devoid of all humor and light. Heads turned, eyes narrowed, looking for the source, the reason for his humor. The laughter of Dracula was often a harbinger of unpleasant things for those it was aimed at.
“As I expected,” Dracula said, after a moment. “Still, he will have to be dealt with.” He wiped a droplet of blood from his lips. “Has there been any sign of Deacon Frost?”
“None. Not in Europe, at least.” The Prince spread his hands. “I am sorry.”
“Again, no matter.” Dracula turned. Couples danced on the polished floor, powdered wigs on their heads. Human musicians played antique instruments, but it was more for form’s sake than anything else. Where others heard music, the undead heard only noise. Those dancing did so from memory and instinct. It lent an artificial, somewhat stilted air to the proceedings. Dracula’s lip curled in derision.
“Fools,” he said.
“My lord?” the Prince said. Dracula glanced at him, his sneer fading. Here was a man who was anything but a fool. Many said that the Prince of Venice was second in cunning only to Dracula himself. The golden-masked creature had survived the centuries, hidden in his palace, subtly weaving a web of influence across most of Europe. No hunters came to his door. No rivals challenged him. He hid, and waited and plotted.
Dracula could almost respect him, if not for his lack of courage. And, of course, the illness he carried in his flesh. The Prince, as in life, had never felt the kiss of blade or fire upon his flesh. The leprosy that had provoked him into hunting down a vampire to grant him unlife still riddled his flesh in immortality, and like all men of his era, Dracula abhored the leper even more than the Turk.
“Nothing,” Dracula said, sweeping past the Prince and into the crowd. They moved aside for him, as was his right, and for a brief moment, Dracula gloried in it.
After so many years, he was king again. So many setbacks, so many battles that ended inconclusively, Dracula was at last the undisputed Lord of the Vampires once more-
The pain struck him suddenly. He doubled over, a grunt of pain spilling from his lips. He looked around, confused. What-
More pain. Fire, surging through his veins. He sank to his knees, arms wrapped around his chest. Voices rose, a mutter of concern. The Prince hurried towards him, pushing through the crowd.
“My lord-”
Dracula screamed. Head thrown back, arms raised, Dracula screamed. A red mist spewed from his pores, curling and rising into the air. The vampires fell back, tumbling over each other in their haste to get away.
Dracula’s scream faded and he collapsed onto his face, his limbs splayed out at odd angles, eyes closed. Lost in his own head, in his own pain, Dracula passed into oblivion, listening to something he had not heard in years.
The sound of his own heart beating.
Transia
Light flared from the windows of an ancient and seemingly crumbling monastery.
The monastery had been abandoned in 1510, after an orgy of violence and suicide that some held was the result of the clay and stone of the not-distant Mount Wundagore, which had been used in the construction.
Now, a different order held forth ceremonies within the round, unassuming tower that squatted in the deepest of Transia’s forests. An order far darker than any other.
The Cult of the Book. The Swallowers of Sins. The Darkholders.
The order had been through much in the past decade. Two entire branches of the cult had been eradicated-one, more recently, by a demonic entity known as Diabolique and the other by Dracula.
The Lord Mask of the Council of Masks, the reigning body of the Darkholders, Randolph DeGuzman, had been personally victimized by the former. But it was the latter that he was focused on now.
DeGuzman stepped back from the gargoyle shaped altar, his arms dropping, sweat rolling down his face beneath his mask. Heart thundering, he turned.
“It’s done.”
“Successfully?” one of the dozen masked individuals gathered in the room said. DeGuzman waved a hand.
“Time will tell. But as for the spell itself-” He removed his demonic mask and ran fingers through his short, curly, silver hair. He was thin faced, with a pointed beard the same hue as his hair. “That has done its task.”
“You’re sure?” another said.
“As sure as one can be.” DeGuzman snatched the page of the Darkhold, retrieved in Budapest by agents of the cult earlier in the week, off of the altar and rolled it tight. “Surely you don’t think those first Darkholders in long sunken Atlantis would create a creature they had no means of dealing with, do you?”
“Like all of us, my brother-mask simply assumed that the so-called Montesi Formula was the only method of dealing with the pestiforous vermin-”
DeGuzman held up a hand to forestall any further argument. Mutters filled the room. The animals were restless. DeGuzman smiled.
“The only method you knew of,” he corrected.
“I assumed we all knew much the same thing,” a third said. “Despite your grandiose title, DeGuzman, we are equals, are we not?”
“Of course, Marla my dear. I shared with you what this page could do, did I not?”
“Yes. But why was it something which needed to be done?” Marla removed her mask, revealing a wide face. She could have been any Transian hausefrau, unless you caught her eyes in the right light. Horrid gems, those eyes.
“Dracula crossed us, my dear,” DeGuzman said. “And now he will pay for his error by reclaiming that which is ours by right-the Darkhold!”
Marla opened her mouth. Then, in one hideously bright moment, she was gone, wiped aside by the explosion that rocked the monastery. Flames bellowed where there had once been stone. DeGuzman fell to floor, ears ringing, blood streaming from the cuts on his face and hands.
“What-”
“The Darkhold. Where is it?” The voice was as cold and as brittle and sharp as ice. DeGuzman looked up, eyes bleary.
“Who-”
“Is your memory as short as the span of your years, puling worm?” A green cloaked form walked through the dust and the flame, long strands of silver hair spilling from within the hood. A pale hand wrenched back the hood, revealing a satanically grinning face.
“Do you not remember Modred the Mystic?”
London
The man called Blade ran across the rooftops, his breath hissing in and out of his lungs. With a growl worthy of his prey, he leapt, clearing the space between the two council flats. While he hung suspended, his hand found the sword sheathed on his back.
He was drawing it even as his thick soled boots touched the edge of the roof. A glitter of reflected light, and the sword was out and slashing across the spine of the vampire that Blade had been chasing.
“Auhuhk-” the vampire stumbled, archaic cloak swirling. He was wearing ragged, moldy 19th Century garb. Long hair swept over his face as he whirled, clawed fingers digging for Blade. “Damn darkie!”
“Watch the language, Varney.” Blade swung aside, avoiding the blow, dancing on the edge of the roof. He twirled, driving the edge of his blade into Varney’s stomach and sending the vampire sprawling. “I know you’re old, but you need to keep up with the times.”
“I’m immortal, Blade. Time is the problem of other people,” Varney spat, climbing to his feet. He was thin and long-faced, the very picture of a dissolute aristocrat. Which, of course, he had been. At least before Cromwell’s men had driven him into hiding and the arms of the witch who had made him what he was today.
“You’re not immortal, you just haven’t died yet,” Blade said. Varney cackled.
“And I don’t intend to do so tonight,” he said, lunging for the vampire-hunter. Blade fell into a crouch, and his opponent sailed over his head. Varney hit the wall of the opposite building, splaying out like a tree frog. He turned, hissing.
“You-”
“What? Finding it hard to pounce on someone who can see you coming?” Blade gestured with his sword. “Come on, Varney. You’re getting soft. I expected better of the oldest vampire in England.”
Varney didn’t reply, instead bounding towards Blade, limbs extended like those of a hunting spider. Blade stepped back despite himself and Varney crashed into him, whirling him around, fangs digging hungrily for the hunter’s neck, Blade’s sword pressed flat between them. Pale fingers wrapped around Blade’s skull and he found himself bent backwards, the weight of the vampire fully on him.
“Bleed for me,” Varney hissed, then screeched. The first crossbow bolt took him in the back. He fell away from Blade, who threw himself aside instinctively. A second bolt found Varney’s chest. Soon he was bristling, porcupine like, with bolts. His scream echoed for moments after his withered form tumbled down into the garbage strewn alleyway between the buildings. Blade spun.
“What the hell-”
Something struck him. He stumbled, the sword slipping from suddenly nervous fingers. Blade staggered forward. Through blurring vision, he saw robed, masked figures watching him. One raised a crossbow.
“You-” Blade muttered. The crossbow twanged.
Everything went dark.
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To Be Continued...
Next Issue: Morbius is in custody of an old enemy…but for how long? Dracula finds himself in an unlikely position…the human guest of a fortress full of the undead! Modred the Mystic has come calling…will the Council of Masks survive the visit? And Blade finds himself the captive of…who? Be here in thirty for ‘CAGES FOR TIGERS’!
Previous Issue | Next Issue