The Cross

a muffled cry from Dec and a staggering impact knocked the world sideways. For a dazed moment or two as she rolled across the platform, she thought that it was the gun’s recoil that had sent her flying.

Then she saw the demonic-looking hooded goblin creature coming in for another cut with the chopping blade in its fist. It was Dec who’d knocked her over as he leaped in between them. His face twisted in fear, he managed to parry the blow with his sword and knock the chopper out of the thing’s clawed, muscular hand. It came on. He backed away, shielding Chloe with his body.

‘Get away from her, you wee skitter!’

The goblin gazed at them for a second or two, making a strange twittering sound. Then, with terrifying speed, it pounced.

The force of the impact knocked the sword out of Dec’s hand and cannoned him into Chloe. She staggered backwards towards the edge of the platform. Her arms flailed for something to grab—

And then she was falling into empty space, nothing but the black sky above her and the valley far, far below.

Chapter Sixty-Six

There was wild chaos as the remaining vampires crowded through the chalet, desperate to put as much distance between themselves and the fearful cross as they could. Gabriel, Kali, Lillith and Zachary pounded down the stairs towards the back exit on the ground floor. Alex and Joel were running down the passage towards the top of the stairs when Sonia, Albrecht and Yuri came crowding past in a panic.

‘I’m not sticking around here to be cooked by that thing,’ Albrecht brayed, suddenly breaking off from the rest of the group and turning towards a little window that overlooked the back yard. In his panic, he crashed into Alex, knocking the wind out of her and inadvertently dragging her along with him as he launched himself out of the window.

Alex landed heavily in the snow, hitting her head hard against a boulder. Dazed, she struggled up onto her hands and knees. She could hear Joel calling her name from somewhere inside the house.

Albrecht was sprinting madly away up the craggy slope. As she watched, an arrow flew towards him from behind a rock. Still running like crazy, he dodged it, and covered a few more paces before another pierced his throat. He’d barely hit the snow before a horde of little dark figures swarmed out from their hiding places among the rocks and descended on him. Knives and hackers rose and fell. Body parts were tossed up in the air.

Alex’s legs were unsteady under her as she staggered to her feet. Even vampires could get mild concussion from a severe blow to the head. She inched away in the shadow of the house, terrified of being spotted by the goblins.

But in her dazed state she didn’t notice the chopping block behind her, next to a stack of firewood logs and a precarious pile of old varnish cans. She bumped into the handle of the axe that was propped against the block and it fell and hit the varnish cans, which clattered noisily to the ground.

The nearest of the goblins started at the sound, whipped round and saw her standing there not twenty yards away. Suddenly they were all jumping up from what was left of Albrecht and charging towards her.

Alex broke into a run, heading for the cliff edge. One time, she’d jumped off the London Eye — and she was still around to tell the tale.

Shit, she thought as she neared the edge. It was a long way down. She didn’t much fancy spending eternity as a smear of mincemeat spread across the rocks below, although even that was preferable to being paralysed and chopped into dog food by these things.

But then she realised that three of the goblins, darting around her flank with awful speed, were heading her off. One took out a slingshot as it bounded along, and fired something at her that smacked off a rock. It splintered into pieces and Alex saw what the missile was: a hollow glass ball filled with the black paralysing fluid.

Terrified, she veered away from the cliff edge, willing herself to run faster. She headed in the only direction she could — up the mountainside. Something whizzed past her ear and another poison ball shattered just a yard away. She felt the splash of poison hit her sleeve, tore it away in repulsion and kept running up the steepening slope, the goblins — maybe a dozen of them, maybe more — converging behind her in pursuit. The white peak of the mountain loomed high up above, as if threatening to topple over on top of her. She hauled herself over a ledge and found herself in a dip in the rocks. A glance back over her shoulder told her that the chalet was out of sight now.

She thought of Joel. Run, Joel, run.

Half a second’s distraction was too long. Alex barely had time to react as the goblin launched itself from a hidden crevice up ahead and came lunging at her with a crooked black knife. She threw herself out of the path of the slicing blow and the blade struck sparks off the rock next to her. She grabbed the goblin’s wrist and yanked it hard towards her, straight into the knee that she drove into its ribs. The foul-smelling breath burst out of its lungs and it doubled up in pain. She smashed its head against the rocks, once, twice, three times, grappling with its little muscular body with all her strength until the writhing death struggles had stopped and it lay still, oozing blood onto the trampled snow.

Then Alex heard a twittering sound behind her and turned.

Fifteen more of the creatures were gathering round her in a circle, and now there was nowhere to run at all.

Chapter Sixty-Seven

‘Chloe!’

Dec’s scream filled the boarding station as he saw her topple over the edge of the platform. The goblin’s powerful little claws were around his throat. Its hood fell away; the hideous jaws opened wide and came snapping towards him. Before it could rip his face off, he headbutted it so hard that he saw stars. The thing chittered angrily and fell back. Dec twisted away towards the fallen sword. The goblin was back on its feet, muscles coiling for another pounce.

‘Come on then, you fucker,’ he said as he grasped the katana with both hands. The creature hurled itself at him, jaws distended …

And hit the floor in two pieces.

Dec spat goblin blood. ‘Chloe!’ he yelled, rushing to the edge of the platform and staring down in anguish at the sheer drop down the cliff. His heart almost burst with relief when he saw her just a few feet below him, crouching dazedly on a little rocky lip that protruded from the cliff face.

The crash of the pistol shot was still ringing in Chloe’s ears. Her mind clearing suddenly, she looked up at the cable car and saw Ash. The shot she’d aimed at his chest had gone wide when Dec had knocked her clear of the goblin’s attack — though not too wide.

Ash’s left hand was still clutching the cross. But it was no longer attached to his arm. Blown away by the expanding hollowpoint bullet, the severed hand had bounced away over the cable car roof and entangled itself in the wire. Fingers curled around the cross’s shaft like the legs of a dying spider, it slid down the cable tracks a distance, then stopped and hung precariously over the valley.

As Chloe watched, Ash crawled across the roof and tried desperately to work his way down the cable tracks to retrieve the cross — but the vibrations through the wire were only making it slide further away; too much movement risked shaking it free altogether.

The gun. Chloe scrabbled about the rocky ledge and for a terrible moment she thought it must have fallen off the cliff. No! There it was, half-covered in snow and dirt.