The Blood Gospel

“They have to. They’re strigoi. When the sun rises, they’ll all die. They will need to go to ground.”

Nadia dug a slug out of Rhun’s chest with his karambit’s tip. The bullet had deformed into a grotesque five-petal flower.

“Silver hollow point,” Jordan said, immediately understanding.

The attackers had known what to expect.

Nadia dug out the other slugs, none too gently, hurrying. Six total. A human could not live with that much damage. Maybe not even a Sanguinist.

Blood pumped out and ran across the floor.

Erin put her palm on Rhun’s chest, plainly concerned. “I thought he would stop bleeding on his own.”

Jordan remembered Korza’s demonstration back in Jerusalem with his sliced palm.

Nadia pushed Erin’s hand away. “His blood is purging the silver. If it doesn’t, he’ll die.”

“But then won’t he bleed to death?” Erin asked.

Nadia’s face tightened. “He might,” she admitted, and glanced back at the door.

The strigoi had ceased pounding. Jordan didn’t trust the silence and apparently neither did Nadia.

She stood, hauling Rhun over one shoulder.

Erin joined her. “What do we do? Try to use the water exit?”

“It’s our only chance,” Nadia said, and pointed her free arm. “We must reach sunlight.”

They took off at a dead run. Jordan hauled Piers along in a fireman’s carry, but Nadia outpaced him. They reached the intersection of passageways—when a thunderous explosion erupted behind them.

Jordan jolted, ducking from the noise. The enemy had set charges against the door.

Without breaking stride, he turned to check on Erin. She was behind him, too far behind. Snarls echoed down the tunnel from the blasted doorway.

The monsters were inside—and they were pissed.

39

October 27, time unknown

Undisclosed location

Tommy shifted in his new bed, trying to find a more comfortable position. He had no idea where he was, when he was, but he didn’t think it was another hospital. He studied his new home, which he suspected was what this prison was supposed to be.

He filed that disturbing thought away for now.

But he had to admit that the box in his head was growing more and more crammed.

Something eventually had to give.

He stared around. The walls were painted silver, with no windows, but the room came equipped with three different kinds of video-game consoles and a flat-screen TV, fed by satellite and carrying American channels.

Across from the foot of his bed, a door led to a bathroom stocked with familiar brands of soap and shampoo. Another door led to a corridor, but he’d been unconscious when he was brought in, so he didn’t know where that went.

Some faceless doctor must have set his bones, patched his wounds, and cranked him up on pain relievers. His mouth still felt full of cotton that no amount of water could soothe. But his neck had already healed, and his bones were knitting fast, too. Whatever had happened at Masada, it had sped up his healing, curing him from far more than just cancer.

Since he’d woken up, they brought him food, whatever he asked for: burgers, fries, pizza, ice cream, and Apple Jacks cereal. And he was surprisingly hungry. He could not get enough to eat; likely his body needed the fuel to help heal itself.

Nobody told him where he was or why he was here.

He spent one entire hour crying, but no one seemed to care, and he finally realized the futility of tears and turned to more practical thoughts: thoughts of escape.

So far, he had no good plan. The walls were made of concrete, and he imagined that something in the room was a camera. The guards shoved his food through a slot in the door that led out to the corridor.

Suddenly that door opened.

Tommy sat up. He couldn’t stand very well yet.

A familiar figure strode inside, sending a chill through Tommy. It was the boy who had kidnapped him from the hospital. The strange kid walked in and flung himself into bed, sprawling next to Tommy, as if they were best chums.

This time he wore a gray silk shirt and a pair of expensive-looking gray pants.

He sure didn’t dress like a normal kid.

“Hello.” Tommy twisted to face him and held out his hand, not knowing what else to do. “I’m Tommy.”

“I know who you are.” The boy’s accent was strange and stiff.

Still, he shook Tommy’s hand, pumping it firmly, formally. He had the coldest hands that Tommy had ever felt. Had he been shipped to some country above the Arctic Circle?

The boy let go of his hand. “We are friends now, no? So you can call me Alyosha.”

Friends don’t try to kill friends.

But Tommy kept silent about that and asked a more important question. “Why am I here?”

“Is there somewhere else you would rather be?”

“Anywhere else,” he admitted. “This feels like a prison.”

The boy turned a thick gold ring around on his white finger. “As cages go, it is a gilded one, no?”

Tommy didn’t bother pointing out that he didn’t want to be in any cage—gilded or not—but he didn’t want to offend the kid, nor did he want to chase him off by being rude. To be honest, Tommy didn’t want to be alone again. He’d even take this weird kid’s company at the moment—especially if he could learn anything.

“When I was your age, I lived in one of the most gilded cages in the world.” The boy’s soft gray eyes traveled around the room. “But then I was set free, as you are.”

“I don’t call this free.” Tommy gestured around the room.

“I meant free of the prison of your flesh.” The boy sat up, crossed his legs, and reached for a game controller. “Many aspire to that.”

“Are you free?” Tommy reached over and picked up the other controller, as if this were the most natural thing to do.

The boy shrugged and started an Xbox game on the screen. “After a fashion.”

“What does that mean?”

Alyosha faced him as the game bloomed to life on the screen. “You are immortal, no?”

Tommy lowered his controller. “What?”

Alyosha prompted the game—Gods of War—to start. “You know this now, no? It was what I tried to teach you. Out in the desert. So you would understand.”

Tommy struggled to understand, seeking some frame of reference as the game’s theme music began, full of drumbeats and brass chords. “Are you immortal, Alyosha?”

“There are ways that my life can end. But if I avoid them, yes, I will live forever. So we will be friends for a very long time.”

Tommy heard a hint of the loneliness in that voice.

He spoke softly, despairing. “So I’m like you, then?”

Alyosha shifted as if this part of the conversation bothered him. “No, you are not. In all the long history of time, there has only ever been one other like you. You, my friend, are very special.”