their prison.
When they had known their end was near, Julie and Alan had come out into the night, into the garden, to make love just one last time. They hadn't reckoned on being found so quickly, that was all. Not in their own secret place, in the garden, on their prison island. Their prison, yes… indeed, their death cell.
Or perhaps not. For as the blood is the life, so there was plenty of hot blood in these two men. And without warning, suddenly Julie caught herself licking her lips in anticipation. At which she knew that it was too late for her, and that it always had been. But strangely — and as swiftly as that — she no longer cared, for she was now awake! As for what had awakened her:
Perhaps it had been the sight and salty smell of Alan Manchester's blood, or that of the soldier whom he'd shot with his speargun, or both. Which-, or whatever, it had acted on Julie as a catalyst, and now the 'good fight' was over. She was what she was and would do what she must do. She moved like a wraith towards the two men, got behind them where they crept carefully forward, making for the villa's lights.
She got closer and closer to them, her hands raised, with nails like poisonous claws — indeed, they were poisonous claws — poised and ready to strike…
… But in that same moment Julie found herself betrayed, and by three things:
One, the full moon, emerging from behind fleeting clouds, to sweep a silver swath over the sea and the land. Two, by the sharp stutter of automatic gunfire, sounding from a short distance to the west. And three, by a watchful, dragonfly spy-in-the-sky, hovering on high as it sent an urgent message to Julie's would-be victims:
'Central team. Why are there three of you? Do you have a tail?' Fading in and out, the pilot's words were hard to read.
Lardis didn't understand the message, but Jake, startled by the gunfire and the near-distant cries that accompanied it, turned and saw…
… A girl? A distraught, naked girl?
For seeing him beginning his turn, Julie had drawn back, shrunk down into herself, begun to sob and scream. 'I was in the house,' she sobbed, trying to cover herself as if ashamed of her nakedness. 'They kept me prisoner there. But when they heard your helicopter they stopped watching me, and I… and… I… oh!'
She feigned a swoon, and Jake — forgetting all that he'd seen, all that he'd been told — put up his weapon and stepped forward.
She clung to him for a moment, this beautiful girl, who was naked and frightened and so pale in the flooding light of the moon… so pale and so cold. This girl whose grip on his combat suit was like iron, and whose nose was suddenly wrinkling suspiciously as she smelled garlic, and whose eyes were a reflective yellow, sulphurous in the night!
Julie held the front of his jacket bunched in one hand, drew back the other hand until Jake saw its nails, sharpened and bevelled to gouges that would cut bloody channels in his face as easily as a routing machine! And her awful smile: the way her lips curled back from gleaming teeth.
Jake tried to bring his machine-pistol to bear, to centre its muzzle on Julie's body. But she was faster; she knocked it away, out of his grasp. And now her 'smile' was a fixed, nightmarish grimace — but whether of horror or of pleasure in her own terrible strength, Jake couldn't say. Nor could he do anything about it.
But Lardis could.
An 'old man,' Lardis Lidesci had been ignored and almost forgotten by the girl. A mistake, for he was an old man with a difference. He was the Old Lidesci, and not nearly as naive as Jake. Not in the ways of vampires.
Jake saw that slender, incredibly strong hand lift up before his face, tried to draw back from it and couldn't. He saw the fingers crook, could almost feel their rake, and knew that he was going to feel it. But then, in a moment, the look on her face changed. And she sighed.
She sighed, then smiled again, but a real smile now. And a dribble of blood spilled from the corner of her mouth. Her hand straightened out — reached out to touch his face — but just a touch, almost a caress. Then her grip relaxed, her eyes rolled up, and she toppled away from him.
Lardis Lidesci stood ten feet away, but his machete stood much closer than that; it stood up from the girl's back, where it had split her spinal column.
'Get your gun,' Lardis growled, and Jake began to breathe again after what had seemed like an hour of holding his breath. 'Get your gun and put it in her mouth… and finish it.'
Jake was numb; his hands were numb as he took up his machine-pistol. 'But…' he started to say.
'But nothing!' Lardis snarled. 'Do it, and be sure to turn your face away.'
Just before Jake did it, Julie stopped her fitful, agonized writhing, saw the weapon's muzzle approaching her face, said something that Jake couldn't hear, just a breath of air. But he was sure that her lips formed the words, 'Thank you…'
By then there was plenty of shouting and shooting, the hissing of flamethrowers, great gouts of fire and columns of smoke, all of it towards the centre of the promontory, at the villa itself. And full moon or none, it would have made no difference; bright orange and yellow flames were leaping, and all the shadows cast back in Jethro Manchester's gardens and rockeries.
Lardis and Jake were the last to get there, but two of the SAS men would never get there. Close to the house, itself burning, they came across W.O. II Joe Davis and one of his men. The NCO had a flamethrower and was watching the house. Davis was on one knee, looking at a pair of crumpled figures. His hands kept reaching, and drawing back without touching. And his hands were trembling.
'Get up from there,' said Lardis. 'Back away. Let me see.'
Davis looked up at Lardis through moist eyes; he was holding on, but only just, to would-be runaway emotions. His Adam's apple rose and fell, rose and fell, as he fought not to betray himself. 'Old man,' he said, his voice on the point of breaking. 'I trained this man, this boy. He was one of mine. But I didn't train him for this.'
Lardis pulled him away, muttering, 'What could anyone have taught him? There is no training for this kind of thing, except on the field of battle. The trouble with that is we only learn when we lose.'
He looked at the mess on the ground. Part of it, the body of a mature woman in a once-white dress, was a mound of raw red flesh. Riddled with bullets — some of which had exploded — she had been torn apart from within. Her face wasn't there, and her lower body seemed to have burst outwards. Lying under her where she'd fallen, a young soldier in combat clothing stared blindly up into the sky. His brains had been split by a bright shining cleaver that was still buried in his skull.
But even as Lardis looked, the woman's arms twitched where they clasped her victim, and one foot shuddered and vibrated in a shoe with a broken heel. Jerkily, spastically, her chest rose and fell, as bubbles formed in the liquid red mask of her face.
'Did you touch… any of this?' Lardis looked up at Davis. The other shook his head. Then Lardis stood up, stood back, and turned to the man with the flamethrower. 'Burn it,' he said.
The man looked at his leader, who in turn looked at Lardis almost pleadingly. And Lardis said, 'Their blood is mixed. Your man's corpse is contaminated. Take no chances. Burn it all…'
As they moved away from the heat and the stench, Davis got hold of his emotions and said, Tve got men on both sides, in front and at the back of the house. No one's getting out of there. As far as I know that woman was only our second kill. My kill. God help me, I did that to her!'
'No/ Lardis shook his grisly head. 'Don't ask your god for help. She needed help, and you gave it to her. Also, it was the third kill. We've done one, too. A girl, back there in the garden. So you're not the only one who's feeling sick.'
And Jake said, 'Who was the other?'
'When I killed… that one,' Davis answered, with a glance over his shoulder, 'there was a scream from the house. A man in a gable window; he ranted and raved at us, tore his hair like a madman. Can't say I blame him. I think the woman must have been his wife. One of my lads fired a grenade in there with him, and it blew the gable to hell. Whoever he was, I'm guessing he went with it. But if he didn't he'll burn anyway. Look.'
They looked back, and by then the front of the villa was an inferno. 'It'll be the same at the back,' said the Warrant Officer. 'They have orders to raze it.'
'But that still leaves three to go,' said Jake.
'Two/ a voice called out, as a man came stumbling from the shadows. He was very pale, and he was carrying his own weapons, someone else's, and a flamethrower. 'I got a young guy — I blew the fucker's head off! — but not before he got Bill Powers. My old mate's dead!… But there was a girl, too. She got away.' 'No/ Jake
