Walpurgis Night

By Patrick Whittaker

He has no choice but to die. How he dies is up to him.

Verlaine is a vampire, the last of his kind. He knows that the people who killed his brethren are coming for him. Alienated and alone, he decides to bow out in a manner of his own choosing.

It is Walpurgis Night. Before it is over, Verlaine will have left a trail of death that will never be forgotten.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Patrick Whittaker
• Release date: Feb 2, 2010
• ISBN: 9781452301372

Patrick Whittaker

Patrick Whittaker is winner of the British Fantasy Society's Short Story Competition 2009. He has directed a number of short films, several of which have garnered awards for him. He currently resides in Blackpool, England where he works as a government phone monkey.

Book preview

Walpurgis Night

by

Patrick Whittaker

Smashwords Edition

© Patrick Whittaker 2010

www.coldfusion.freewebtools.com

[e-mail]

Discover other titles by Patrick Whittaker at Smashwords.com

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Published by SILENT THUNDER at Smashwords

CHAPTER ONE

Halifax Bay on the eastern seaboard of Canada. An insipid patch of scrubland on which Nature had applied the palest colours in her palette.

To Father Andrew Beck it was a Godforsaken place, a corner of creation where evil had sought refuge. The grey cast of the sky, the relentless wind that stung his cheeks, even the incessant pounding of giant waves as they sought to tear the coastline into the Atlantic – all these seemed to suggest he was on the edge of Damnation. If he needed a picture of Hell, it would be him standing as he was now, in an abandoned churchyard, holding a crucifix before him, cold and tired, for ever and ever.

‘Amen.’ Brother William turned the page of the ancient book he was holding and began a fresh litany. ‘Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus, omnis satanica potestas, omnis incursio infernalis adversarii, omnis legio, omnis congregatio et secta diabolica…’

Father Andrew tuned the kneeling Dominican from his mind. He hated being here. Hated, in fact, being anywhere but the stuffy unchanging halls and chapels of the Vatican.

Digestive acid blazed a trail along his oesophagus. His stomach churned. It was all he could do not to belch.

My last cleansing, he reminded himself. After today, no more. Not unless Father Rydzyk fucks up. And Father Rydzyk never fucks up which is all that keeps him safe from his enemies. Those enemies who know Rydzyk’s mission is coming to an end. You poor, poor bastard, Rydzyk. Soon no longer a necessary evil. The knives are out. Always have been. But now they’re being sharpened…

Father Andrew tasted bile at the back of his throat and cursed himself for not having anticipated what had of late become a daily occurrence. Back in the car that had brought him here, he had an abundance of antacids and stomach pills. If only he’d thought to raid the glove compartment before commencing the exorcism. Just one Rennie. One Alka-Seltzer. Dear Lord, what wouldn’t I give for a sip of Milk of Magnesia?

The only medicine within reach was prayer, and prayer had so far proved ineffective against his recurring heartburn.

Too many long-haul flights. Too much time spent in airport lounges and strange cities with nothing to do but drink liquor and gorge on junk food.

Soon be over though. Soon be back in the Vatican waiting for Rydzyk to phone and confirm our work is done. Then we can dissolve the Congregation and I can spend my retirement living a simple life knowing that I’ve served the Lord well. Maybe I’ll finally find time to write my book.

His stomach spasmed.

This fucking ulcer will be the death of me, he thought with unfortunate prescience. Twenty four hours later, as the plane he was on prepared to land in Rome, the ulcer he had refused for months to have properly treated would perforate and kill him.

He took a deep breath. Two burly men emerged from a ruined mausoleum. Between them they carried a coffin which they lay beside two other coffins at the foot of a stone angel.

o~O~o

It’s the smell as much as anything that excites me. The hydrocarbons and industrial effluence that gives this dirty little canal a bouquet as heady as any Burgundy. The decaying vegetable matter left stranded by a recent downpour. And the girl. Barely a woman. No more than seventeen. She reeks of cheap perfume and sexual frustration. I saw her coming out of St. Jude’s church so I know what kind of girl she is. I’d know anyway from the fussy way she dresses with every button done up and not one millimetre of flesh unnecessarily exposed. Her bra is plain. Her blouse is slightly too large and loosely tucked in. She doesn’t want her curves to show. Doesn’t want men to know she’s a woman. She wears flat shoes that match her slate grey stockings and pleated skirt.

Seventeen. Or thereabouts. And filled with fear of hellfire, with guilt and want and longing. Never had a boy’s lips on hers. Probably not even been groped. Too afraid. Afraid of her own body and nature. Afraid Jesus knows the thoughts that plague her mind and the dreams that make her feel good and bad at the same time.

What did she tell the priest? Father Thaddeus Bell, that upright Man of the Cloth with the unhealthy interest in fallen women and rent boys. Did she tell him she spends too long washing certain parts of herself in the bath? Did she tell him of her fantasies? Of the way she can’t get certain men out of her head? Of how she touches herself where she shouldn’t? And did she have any inkling that when she was confessing her sins, Father Bell was committing one of his own? There is sacrament in the confessional at St. Judes, but it is neither holy nor blessed.

I’ve been stalking this girl for two hours. I saw her coming out of the church, walking to the park, sitting on the bench by the duck pond, reading Little Women and trying hard not to think about men or anything that might make her moist, might make her desire to be penetrated, defiled, debased. She wanted to be clean. Not because she was a good person. Not because she thought the world would be a better place if everybody stopped fornicating or thinking about it. But because she was afraid. Afraid of God. Of Jesus. Of the Devil. And of burning for all eternity in the flames of Hell.

What I’m about to do to her is as nothing compared to what her Church has already done.

I could have taken her any number of times. But I wait. Because I am what she is not. I glory in my lusts, my drives, my desires. I let my appetite build, my juices flow. All that disgusts her, delights me. Because I will not deny who I am, what I am. I hunt, I kill, I fuck, I rape, I tear people apart and I drink their blood.

And soon, Little Miss Prim and Proper, you will be my dinner.

o~O~o

Susan Matthews had taken the long way home. The ugly, lonely way beside the old canal that cut through wasteland and industrial estates. Beneath the underpass. On through what had once been a goods yard. Past the skeletal remains of an abandoned shoe factory. This was the old Sheffield: the city her father talked about like it was some lost utopia. The grey, grim citadel that occasionally showed up in grainy black and white clips on the television.

She shouldn’t have come this way. Not now it was dark. There were no street lamps here. No policemen. No passing strangers she could call out to if trouble reared its head.

Automatically, her hand went to the chain around her neck. It was still there, which meant her crucifix was tucked inside her blouse. Jesus was with her. Jesus would see her safely home.

If she felt reassured, it was because she was unaware of the stranger who had been tailing her since just after sunset.

He was a tall man, dressed in black. Handsome and athletic. There was more than a hint of gypsy in his features. Jet-black hair. Olive skin. In a landscape of shadows, he was just another shadow, virtually invisible except to the keenest of eyes.

Until he wished to be a shadow no more.

And now she sensed his presence. Her heart beat that little bit faster. The hairs on her neck stood on end. Adrenalin flooded her system; which was what the stranger wanted. It would add spice to her blood.

Don’t look back, she told herself. Don’t make it real. Jesus will protect me because I have prayed to him and accepted him into my heart. And I’m a good girl, though I sin, though I have thoughts that are impure and wicked. He knows the devil puts them in my head and he knows I try to fight Satan and he understands and he forgives and he’ll forgive me a thousand times so long as I am sorry - which I truly am.

And it’s all right. There’s nobody there. It’s just my imagination. My overcharged imagination which I can’t seem to control.

There is nobody there.

She looked over her shoulder. He was on the other side of the canal, some twenty yards behind her, matching her step for step.

Mary, Mother of God, protect me!

The canal, she knew, was no barrier against someone determined to do her harm. The water wasn’t deep and it teemed with shopping trolleys, furniture, prams – each one a potential stepping-stone.

Up ahead, a bridge crossed the canal. It was a wide bridge, almost a tunnel. Once there, she could hide in the thick shadow where he wouldn’t be able to see what she was doing. Reaching into her coat pocket, she wrapped a hand round her mobile phone. Around salvation.

The bridge loomed before her. Mustn’t run. Mustn’t do anything to alarm the dark stranger. Or excite him. Or force his hand. Mustn’t let him know I know he’s there.

Under the bridge. The Victorian stonework coated in soot and slime. The smell of urine. Into the shadows; into the dark.

The phone almost slipped from her hand as she pulled it out. And now what? Who to ring? Father Bell? Her parents? The police?

What did it matter who she called? They’d never get here in time to save her.

She scrolled through her contact list and selected Father Bell. She prayed she’d have enough time to tell him her location, then at least her body would be found while it was still fresh. And she could confess one last time and Jesus would hear her and guide her soul to Heaven.

Susan put the phone to her ear. There was a ring tone. Come on, she prayed. Please, please, please…

‘Hello. This is Father Thaddeus Bell. I’m not able to answer the phone right now, but if you’d like to leave a message – ‘

She cut the connection and dared to look behind. The man was gone. Probably on his way