Eph did not run or raise his sword. The wolf slowed near him, paws kicking up dirt. Palmer’s blood stained its snowy mouth fur.
Eph recognized the wolf’s eyes. They belonged to Abraham Setrakian, as did its voice.
Eph shook his head with incomprehension, and then a great hand seized him. He felt the beating of the archangel’s wings as he was lifted away from the red land, the ground below shrinking and changing. They neared a large body of water, then banked right, flying over a dense archipelago. The archangel dipped lower, diving straight for one of the thousand islands.
They landed on a basin-shaped wasteland of twisted iron and smoking steel. Torn clothes and burned paper were strewn across the charred ruins; the small island was the ground zero of some catastrophe. Eph turned to the archangel, but it was gone—and in its place was a door. A simple door, standing alone in its frame. A sign affixed to it, written in black Magic Marker, illustrated with gravestones and skeletons and crosses, drawn in a young hand, read:
YOU MAY NOT LIVE BEYOND THIS POINT.
Eph knew this door. And the handwriting. He reached for the knob and opened it, stepping through.
Zack’s bed. Eph’s diary was set upon it, but instead of a tattered cover, the diary was faced in silver, front and back.
Eph sat down upon the bed, feeling the mattress’s familiar give, hearing it creak. He opened his diary, and its parchment pages were those of the
More extraordinary than that was the fact that Eph could read and comprehend the Latin words. He perceived the subtle watermarking that revealed a second layer of text behind the first.
He understood it. In that moment he understood all.
As though summoned by the utterance of this very word, the Master stepped through the wall-less door. He threw back the hood shadowing his face, and his clothes fell away; the light of the sun charred his skin, turning it crispy black. Worms wriggled beneath the flesh covering his face.
The Master wanted the book. Eph stood, the feather in his hand a fine sword of silver once again. But instead of attacking, he reversed his grip on the sword’s handle, holding it pointing down—as the
As the Master rushed at him, Eph drove the silver blade into the black ground.
The initial shockwave rode out over the earth in a watery ripple. The eruption that followed was of divine strength, a fireball of bright light that obliterated the Master and everything around it—leaving only Eph, staring at his hands, the hands that had done this. Young hands—not his own.
He reached up and felt his face. He was no longer Eph.
He was Zack.
AWAKENING TO FIRE
Columbia University
The Born’s voice called Eph back to consciousness. He opened his eyes. He was lying on the floor, the Born standing over him.
Leaving the vision for reality was a shock. Moving from sensory overload to sensory deprivation. Being in the dream had felt like being inside one of the
He sat up, now aware of the headache. The side of his face, sore. Above him, Mr. Quinlan’s face was its usual starkly pale self.
Eph blinked a few times, trying to shake off the lingering hypnotic effect of the vision, clinging to him like sticky afterbirth. “I saw it,” he said.
Eph heard a percussive beating sound then, growing louder, passing overhead, shaking the building. A helicopter.
Mr. Quinlan helped him to his feet. “Creem,” said Eph. “He told the Master where we are.” Eph held his head. “The Master knows we have the
Mr. Quinlan turned and faced the door. He stood still, as though listening.
Eph heard footsteps, soft and distant. Bare feet. Vampires.
Mr. Quinlan grabbed Eph’s arm and lifted him to his feet. Eph looked into Mr. Quinlan’s red eyes, remembering the dream’s end—then quickly put it out of his mind, focusing on the threat at hand.
Eph did, and after collecting his diary and throwing on his pack, he followed Mr. Quinlan into the corridor. They turned right, finding stairs leading down to the basement, where they entered the underground corridors. Vampires were already in the passages. Noises carried as though conducted on a current. Human yells and sword slashing.
Eph pulled out his sword, turning on his flashlight. Mr. Quinlan moved with great speed, Eph trying to keep up. In a flash, Mr. Quinlan zoomed ahead, and when Eph rounded the corner his beam of light found two decapitated vampires.
Another came out of a side room, Eph spinning and running it through the chest with his blade. The silver weakened it, and Eph withdrew the blade and quickly sliced through its neck.
Mr. Quinlan moved ahead, rushing into battles, slaying vampires before the creatures had a chance to attack. In this way they proceeded through the passageways of the subterranean asylum. A stairway marked with Gus’s fluorescent paint brought them to a passage that led to another stairway, back up into the basement of a campus building.
They exited the mathematics building near the center of the campus, behind the library. Their presence immediately attracted the attention of the invading vampires, who came running at them from all sides without regard for the silver weapons they faced. Mr. Quinlan, with his blazing speed and natural immunity to the infectious worms contained in their caustic white blood, cut down three times as many
An army helicopter approached from the water, swooping overhead, curling hard over the campus buildings. Eph saw the gun mount, though his mind rejected the image at first. He saw the bald vampire head behind the long barrel, then heard the reports, yet still could not process it until he saw the rounds impact the stone walk near his feet—strafing gunfire heading for him and Mr. Quinlan. Eph turned with Mr. Quinlan and ran for cover, getting in under the overhang of the nearest building as the helicopter swung out to come around again.
They ran to the doorway, ducking out of sight for the moment but not entering the building—too easy to become trapped. Eph fumbled out his night scope and held it to his eye just long enough to see dozens of glowing green vampires entering the amphitheater-style quad, like undead gladiators called into battle.
Mr. Quinlan was still next to him, more still than usual. He stared straight ahead as though seeing something somewhere else.
