when he got home. But for the time being, he didn't give a damn. Both he and Lara were giggling as his car skidded away in a cloud of dust and gravel.
'Why do I get the feeling we're playing truant?' Lara asked.
'Sometimes, I want a bit of privacy, that's all,' Noah answered. 'The trouble with these events is that people want it to carry on till all hours. Sometimes, that's fine, but tonight' He glanced at her and she smiled.
He took her to a Thai restaurant he'd never visited before, secure in the knowledge that none of the group would track him there. The food was rather lacklustre, but it didn't matter, because Lara was sitting opposite him and her smile seemed to enfold him in a hazy golden mist. They were both high on the sense of being secret conspirators. They were high on the potential of what might happen later.
Lara seemed content to listen to Noah talk about his new book, and it wasn't until the coffee arrived that she broached the subject she'd brought up after the meeting last Tuesday. 'Why did you react so badly to my question?'
'I don't think I did. Some things I just steer clear of.'
'So what's the story behind it?' She took a sip of coffee, smiled disarmingly. 'Or is it a secret?'
Noah leaned back in his chair. 'It's no secret. If you become part of the core group — and I'm sure you will — anyone would tell you about it. Basically, while I was writing Nosferatu I was involved in more than the obvious method of research. The problem came from that.'
Lara put her head to one side. 'What do you mean?'
'You saw what we did today. People are keen on the psychic stuff. On one level, it's harmless, and most people never go beyond that. But on another, it isn't. Sitting outside an old church and trying to visualise images of the past can't hurt anyone, because it's dead and gone. It's nothing more than a psychic photograph. But other things, well, they're more alive, still around, so to speak.'
Lara laughed, lit a cigarette. 'Are you trying to tell me that you contacted a vampire psychically?'
Noah hesitated for a moment. Part of him didn't want to say more, but Lara's wide eyes were fixed upon him with a bright, intelligent gaze. He felt safe with her. 'I worked with a girl called Sarah. People don't realize it, but a lot of the information in my books comes from what I call 'inspired' sources, from psychics. Most of what I find out can't be used in a serious book, because it can't be checked out and verified as fact, but it gives me a feel for and understanding of the subject. Sarah was my assistant and also my partner. She was very psychic.'
' Was,' Lara said, her chin resting on her hands. Smoke curled around her in slow tendrils. 'That sounds ominous.'
'Let's just say that I was interested in the origin of the vampire myth, like you are. I'd investigated all the legends of blood-drinking demons, from medieval Europe right back to Sumerian times. Somewhere along the way, the flavour of the subject changed.' He gestured with both hands. 'It's difficult to describe, but the idea of the vampire as unfortunate undead — perhaps a victim of their circumstances — mutated into the idea that the original vampires were very much alive and that their vampirism was by choice, a necessary facet of their belief system.'
Lara nodded enthusiastically. 'That's my thought also.'
'It all seemed very academic to us. We called them the vulture people, a shamanic tribe who indulged in blood drinking and sacrifice. Sarah picked up some interesting stuff that pointed us in the direction of certain ancient sites in Turkey. The imagery she saw could be verified. These places existed and there was archaeological evidence that a shamanic culture existed there, who had worshipped vultures. They believed that drinking blood gave them superhuman abilities. Whether that was true or not, we thought that other tribes would probably have regarded them as supernatural, as demons, even, because of their bloodthirsty habits. We believed that there was a diaspora and that factions of this tribe might have moved gradually into Europe, eventually giving rise to the vampire legend.
'Every evening, I'd have Sarah go into a kind of trance, guiding her further and further back into the past, seeking the true story. It seemed we were meant to discover all this, to make the link. The vulture people became more real for us: powerful shamans, who used the rites of blood to change their world. As time went on, Sarah started to get jumpy about it. She said she sensed little dark things that scuttled in the folds of these creatures' vulture wing robes, that they had begun to touch her. She wanted to stop, but I persuaded her otherwise. I thought we were getting close to something that would prove my theory incontrovertibly. We had to continue. But then, one night, Sarah brought something back with her.'
There was a silence, while Lara took a long, meditative draw on her cigarette. Then she said, 'And Sarah couldn't cope?'
Noah pressed the fingers of one hand briefly against his eyes. He could hear her screams even now. 'It was too overwhelming, too alien . We always did these sessions by the light of one candle, so we couldn't see much, but it was as if the night just surged into the room. We were surrounded by a presence, not evil exactly, but beyond good and evil. It was amoral, and we were nothing to it. Even I could sense it, and I'm no great psychic. In moments, I realized how we'd been playing with something inconceivably huge and beyond us, something immeasurably powerful. We'd pulled at its skirts too insistently and now it had noticed us.'
'What happened?'
'Well, once Sarah started screaming, I just leaped up and put the lights on. If something really had been there, it disappeared.' He finished off the warm lager left in his glass and shook his head. 'Sarah was writhing on the floor. I didn't know what to do. The noises were hideous. In the end, I slapped her. It's what you're supposed to do, isn't it? And she kind of came out of it. But even if the thing had gone, it left a taint behind.'
'Did it kill her?' Lara asked bluntly.
Noah detected a faint note of scorn in her voice. 'No, no. Of course not. Sarah was an experienced psychic, but she was damaged by what she'd felt and seen. It changed her and there was nothing I could do about it. Nothing. She became paranoid, jealous and afraid. It destroyed us.'
'It wasn't your fault,' Lara said, reaching out to touch one of Noah's hands.
He laughed cynically. 'They all said that, but it's not true. I was so eager to discover the truth, I didn't think about the dangers. I just kept pushing and pushing. After we split up, Sarah lost her job. She just lost it, big-time. The last I heard she'd admitted herself to hospital. She dropped all her old friends.'
'It wasn't your fault,' Lara insisted. 'Sarah just wasn't strong enough.'
