The Nightfold: Blood, Sweaty Sex, And Tears...

By Percy Crow

For 200 years, Zoe's strategy of feeding on the ghosts of society has kept her off the radar of Set, the psychotic overlord of the underworld—until the night she makes a fatal mistake. Fate entangles her with Luc, a damaged and intriguing guitar virtuoso, and the couple fall for each other. Madly, deeply. But when Zoe's superhuman powers begin to wane with no explanation, thee couple is left defenceless as Set's noose secretly tightens around them.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Sep 9, 2018
• ISBN: 9780648339618

Book preview

Acknowledgements

Overture

o

In the good old days she would have stormed the beach and killed the loud, motley clique of surfers for sport, before glutting on their sumptuous nectar. The huddle of hapless mortals was the only obstacle between Zoe and her next meal, but to her bitter frustration, exercising such freedom tonight would cock the hammer on her doom.

Enraged at having to skulk in the shadows of the jagged limestone cliff, Zoe ogled her prey on the darkened yellow sand.

Seemingly unaware of the imminent storm threatening just off the coast, the wizened hobo tossed a loose faggot onto his tiny fire. Out to his right the obsidian ocean rippled in the moonlight, as if giant, powerful muscles flexed beneath its detestable skin.

Zoe hated the sea: every last undrinkable drop of the sullen, arrogant bitch.

By the time the surfers had finally picked up their belongings and shuffled off to who knew – or cared – where, she was frenzied with hunger.

After polishing off whatever drink was in his brown paper-wrapped bottle, the hobo surprised Zoe by pulling a black snub-nosed pistol from his coat pocket. Wobbling on his sandstone seat he pressed the barrel to his temple. If he shot himself his blood would be useless. She would have to hurry.

With ruthless efficiency Zoe swooped down on her unsuspecting meal, tearing the weapon from his effete grasp. Relishing the familiar power of her body, she casually snatched up another one of society’s forgotten souls, soaring out over the sullen sea, draining him before a scream could escape his dry, cracked lips.

As always, the sweet nectar refreshed her, restoring sanity, enabling her to think straight.

At least until the hunger returned…

Consumed by rabid thirst, she thought nothing of the strange piquancy of the bony, grey-haired man’s blood, though in the months to come she would remember this night, this feed, with regret. It would be the biggest mistake she had made since enraging Set, the leader of the Nightfold – incurring a huge bounty on her head from the Nocturnal Council in the process – a little over two centuries ago.

To avoid seeing the light, Zoe had fled to what was then the new English penal colony, Australia. Her strategy to avoid detection by her peers and prey alike was to keep moving, and to feed as infrequently as possible to keep the body count down, while restricting her diet to the ghosts of human society: fugitives, poor loners, the homeless, and illegal immigrants.

Disposal of corpses was a no-brainer: drop them into the deep sea, and what the sharks did not devour, the eternal depths would swallow up forever.

Zoe was ever-aware of how thorough the Nightfold’s searches were. Set’s sick, obsessive nature meant that her elusion would have become a worsening irritation as the decades stretched into centuries. A wicked smile curled her sensuous purple lips at the thought of Set’s fury, that she was still free, un-living happily ever after…

Chapter

1

When Tobias and Claudio entered Set’s chamber he hurled the pallid, exsanguinated corpse of the red-haired woman he was feeding upon into the shadows at the far end of the room. Both men froze at the sound of the victim’s bones snapping on impact against the wall. The King was furious. They knew his fury was directed at them.

Tobias tried swallowing, but his mouth had dried up. If it got ugly, he would be the one who suffered. Being Set’s younger brother would grant his friend Claudio immunity from the worst of the insane tyrant’s wrath. Tobias’s dry tongue rasped against his fangs, vocal chords conjuring no more than a timid croak.

‘You summoned us, My Lord.’

Normally brusque, the Immortal shakily genuflected, gazing at the worn granite floor, hoping it would not be the last thing he ever saw.

A blur of angry muscle, Set suddenly materialized beside him. Cool droplets sprayed across Tobias’s face. By its rich, aortal aroma, he knew Set had just beheaded Prince Claudio, his last living brother.

As a rule Nocturnal blood would normally send any member of the Fold into a feeding frenzy. Tobias was not the least bit peckish. His stomach cramped with fear as all of the rumours about Set’s madness played through his head.

For as long as Tobias could remember Set had been a haughty, emotionless madman. Except where his search for this mysterious Zoe was concerned. Her elusion peeled away his paper-thin veneer of civility, showing the insidious evil rankling within. Now he had just slain his only remaining brother without the slightest hesitation nor hint of remorse.

Tobias’s mind raced through the previous month since they had given their last report.

What could we have possibly done wrong? He wondered fearfully.

‘What have you done?’ Set echoed the assassin’s mental question sharply.

Rage now possessed his normally cold, blank visage. He was boiling on the ugly edge of control. Tobias stared intently at the floor, wishing for the storm to pass.

‘It is more what you have not done, you pathetic little insect!’

Struggling to comprehend, Tobias shied away from thinking that Set had finally gone stark raving mad, lest he hear it.

‘I am very sorry Lord Set. I do not understand.’

Feared by most of his peers, Tobias was now a meek lamb that had caught the terrifying scent of a wolf circling nearby. He and Claudio were at the end of a long chain of scouts and assassins futilely employed to track down this elusive ghost, Zoe. Whispers were rife among the younger members of the Fold that she was just that: a phantom born of Set’s insanity.

Normally, a stray Nocturnal left clues to their whereabouts, making them easy to pin down. After which, the psychotic king would make a horrid example of them, for the benefit of any other potentially seditious members of the Fold.

This mysterious woman however – if she did indeed exist – had not left the slightest trace of her existence in a little over two hundred years. Such secrecy was impossible in the year 2009, with cameras in every pocket, worldwide media available at every twitching fingertip. Yet this spectre remained nothing more than a mere shadow? She could not be real.

Real or not, Set’s obsession with her was all-consuming, as the growing list of dead assassins attributed.

‘Tell me Tobias, did you not hear news of the missing millionaire in Terra Australis nearly three weeks ago?’

‘The retired mining tycoon?’ Tobias carefully kept his voice neutral. ‘Certainly My Lord.’

‘Aaand!’ Set’s imperious voice, pregnant with impending doom, echoed off the millennia-old cavern walls.

‘Nothing, Sire,’ Tobias whispered. ‘Probably suicide. We didn’t find any–’

One of Set’s claws was suddenly crushing his throat, cutting him off. His black, eternal eyes turned Tobias to water.

‘Poverty-stricken wretches commit suicide to end their misery. This man was a successful businessman. He–’

‘But Lord Set, he had aye–’

Set exploded at the interruption. Though he had intended to make Tobias pay with exquisite torture for disappointing him, he instead gulped down the sweet silky fluid spurting from the ragged column where his head had been avulsed.

When sated, Set threw Tobias’s withered corpse aside.

‘Rafael,’ he roared at his sentry outside.

‘Yes My Lord,’ Rafael’s voice quavered when he rounded the corner to see the two beheaded corpses of his seniors, one of them Prince Claudio, whom he was very fond of.

Tobias needn’t have knelt obediently. Set did not look his way when he spoke at him with undisguised contempt.

‘Tell Daemon to find Kane and bring him to me, immediately. Then clean up this garbage for me.’

‘Certainly, Highness.’ Rafael hurried to obey, eager to be away from his toxic presence.

Chapter

2

Zoe’s eyes snapped open earlier than usual. She sensed the Sun would not set for at least thirty minutes. Fighting an uncharacteristic twinge of claustrophobia, she recalled fragments of a dream and immediately knew something was wrong.

It wasn’t anything in the dream that perturbed her. In it she was back at home in her peaceful little village years before the sea destroyed it, murdering everyone she loved.

What unsettled Zoe was the fact that it was her first dream in countless centuries. Usually, her diurnal rest was as motionless and dark as the remotest regions of space between galaxies.

Keen instincts honed during her long existence told her the visions held meaning. She could not shake the feeling that something momentous was going to happen, and her after-life would never be the same again.

By the time night had fallen Zoe’s frustration was unbearable. Wedged tightly in the hot, dusty space between the coffin and sarcophagus’s marble lid, she had been forced to relive her past ad nauseam. With an anxious heave she raised the slab, emerging from the dusty crypt, elated to be freed from her thoughts in the open night air.

Outside, the mid-winter night was blossoming; bats arced under the emerging stars, a cool zephyr caressed her skin, and crickets were singing soothing drones in the long grass.

Despite her restless sleep, Zoe felt strong. Not unusual for a night or two after she had fed, but judging by the thin sliver of moon in the sky, it had been three weeks since she had snatched the wasted hobo from the beach. And he had looked so lean and un-vital.

How could that sad zombie’s blood have been so potent?

During the hedonistic days of the Graeco-Roman Empire she and Set had glutted on healthy, overfed aristocrats. More recently, during the early twentieth century elite athletes had become a treat for her. Their sweet blood – Zoe moaned in pleasure at the thought – infused the feeder with a euphoric boost for up to a week. Nowadays, in her precarious exile, with the advent of modern media, they were strictly off the menu: the mysterious disappearances of prominent or successful people attracted attention that Zoe and her kind could ill afford.

This long after feeding, hunger pangs should be wracking her body, yet she felt strong, more sated than ever, excitedly anticipating tonight’s performance of Beethoven’s Moonlight at the Sydney Opera House.

*            *

In the majestic Concert Hall’s acoustics, though individual voices were hushed, their combined volume coalesced into a loud drone. Zoe bit back a cynical chuckle at the idea, if the com-poseur John Cage was here, he’d have another masterpiece: Prelude of Miasmic Mindless Murmurs…

Thankfully the din died away abruptly as the sylph-like pianist strode to her seat, and mournfully fingered the dolorous classic. The woman was amazing. Her soulful rendition allowed Zoe for the first time in centuries, to abandon herself to the sensuous sorrow of Moonlight Sonata. The cascade of solemn arpeggios underpinning the sparse melody left her feeling like the bleakness at the masterpiece’s core.

As the last notes faded and applause erupted, Zoe’s ears prickled with the knowledge that she was being watched.

Fuck!

Zoe had remained off the radar for so long that she often entertained thoughts that the vainglorious demon might have given up his pursuit. Now she had allowed herself to be found at a recital, after more than two hundred years of careful evasion.

The fury at herself for dropping her guard increased tenfold when she scanned the room to find her enemy staring directly at her, only ten seats to her right. His lips twitched a mysterious smile at her, yet his eyes remained empty. Like something was missing.

How the hell did I miss him!

Though concert attire had become decidedly casual in the last century, the young longhaired blonde man was starkly incongruous in his trench coat and heavy metal tee shirt. He did not belong to this crowd, and could only be one of Set’s scouts; a brazen, incredibly stupid one.

As people were leaving he surprised Zoe by approaching. She didn’t want to attract any attention by destroying him here in front of thousands of witnesses. However, if this fool made a move her face would be the last thing he ever saw.

Zoe braced herself, scanning his trench coat for weapon-bulges, watching intently for any hint of bodily threat.

‘Excuse me for the intrusion. I was fascinated by how deeply Moonlight affected you.’

His softly spoken middle-class accent was underpinned by an Australian working class drawl that had been all but polished away by elocution lessons which had started a few years too late.

An Australian scout? VERY unusual…

One who had been crying during the recital: Zoe smelled dried salt on his cheeks. His blue, bloodshot eyes were warm and sensitive, with an unmistakable sadness swimming in their lonely depths. When they met hers, a fragment broke away inside, lost forever.

Perhaps perceiving Zoe’s defensive assessment of him as a rejection, the man apologized.

‘Sorry to have troubled you.’

He shuffled away with resignation. Something in his gait resonated with Ludwig’s famous piece, as though its haunting architecture still echoed within the young man’s frame.

Despite such a short encounter Zoe doubted that he was one of Set’s bounty hunters. In the past His Infernal Majesty had sent out human scouts because they were less obvious than Immortals. Defenceless against a Nocturnal, it was usually their job to merely locate a target and inform the lunatic liege of their whereabouts. Then the nightlife would arrive to execute his orders.

If this man were a scout – even if he could somehow disobey a Nocturnal’s glamour – he would never have dared to make contact. Instead he would have left quietly, sending a message to whomever had commissioned his services. Still, Zoe could not afford to leave anything to chance. Despite the fact that his sudden death or disappearance would be a warning to Set, in no time plaguing Sydney with his henchmen, the young man would have to die. Even though it meant that she would have to flee yet again, to who knew where?

Zoe would have to wait patiently until he was alone. Hanging back a little, she followed him out into the foyer where he retrieved a guitar case from the cloakroom. Any doubts about what lay inside it were soon dispelled. No sooner than the chubby brunette attending the cloakroom had laid it on the counter, the mystery man snapped open the locks, stroking the unmistakable orange wood of a Spanish guitar top with reverence. Curiously, he leaned down, inhaling deeply from the sound hole. When he opened his eyes they were glazed over with memories.

In that touching moment Zoe saw a beauty in his smile, realizing that he was attractive – sexy even – in his own beguiling way.

What a shame you have to die…

He carried himself with an understated confidence, spoke gently and had been crying at a Beethoven recital, which was at odds with his rugged looks, facial piercings and Slayer tee shirt. The dichotomy intrigued her. Zoe wanted to know more, but she had not eluded the clutches of Set for two hundred years by making friends numerously, nor carelessly.

She shadowed him through the busy quay, taking a train west, then walking back to his unremarkable unit, in a less remarkable street, by a seedy canal known as the Parramatta River, where during the next two weeks she felt herself being drawn into his tiny universe.

Luc was an intriguing bundle of contradictions. For a person of his ultra-modern generation he used very little digital media and rarely watched TV, with the exception of the nightly news, or documentaries about an eclectic array of subjects. For reasons unbeknown to her Luc always watched with a pen and notepad, taking spurious notes throughout.

Though his bookshelf was brimming with horror novels, he was a strict vegan with strong, uniquely egalitarian ideals. Luc loved heavy, aggressive music yet wore a gold cross around his neck, poring through a leather-bound bible every other night, occasionally taking notes. Despite his rugged handsomeness and lean physique, he was a shy, withdrawn loner with only two friends and no lovers. From snippets of phone conversations Zoe had deduced that Vince and Dave were band mates, due back next week from a holiday in Queensland’s Sunshine Coast.

She had managed to glean nothing of Luc’s diurnal life, but the first time she heard him play his Spanish guitar she knew that though unworldly, he was no pleb. True, his preferences were modern and noisy, yet his crystal clear articulation and nuanced touch brought to life any piece he played.

Most reassuringly, he was definitely not a bounty hunter or assassin. A heartless murderer could never move her with music the way Luc did. Nor would they have the time to practise that assiduously. Luc paid extraordinary attention to his rehearsals, painstakingly running through advanced exercises that would make most musicians cry in frustration.

She was overwhelmed with desire to play with him. It would have to wait for another time though. The Sun was due to rise in another hour. Zoe stifled a yawn, deciding to make her way back to a limestone cave she had recently found in the Blue Mountains.

Icy dread chilled her innards. She could not recall the last time she had yawned, or felt this tired. She should be at the height of her powers: the New Moon was due in only two days.

What the hell?

Something was very wrong.

And WHAT is all this carry-on over some nobody guitarist? I’m losing it. I’d be the laughing stock of the entire Fold, falling for this young punk.

Leaving Luc to his speed picking drills, she flew back to safety at the sandstone cavern.

Back at the grotto Zoe’s brain circled all day with possibilities. Fevered dreams frothed in her mind, making her shallow sleep unbearable. When at long last the late winter sun drew close to the horizon, she burst free of her prison, returning to the intriguing young man’s balcony to watch and listen.

Chapter

3

It was a Saturday night, and Luc had lugged his guitar to the Church Street Mall in Parramatta where Zoe guessed he was setting up to busk. The paved stretch heading north-west was sparsely populated with passersby. About a hundred metres farther up, near a slate-roof sandstone church was a small group of vocal born-again Christians, trying their best to convert anybody who would stop long enough for a chat.

Zoe hid herself in the branches of a nearby ghost gum, melting into the shadows, listening intently as with no warm up Luc broke into arpeggios that Zoe recognized were in the key of B flat Minor.

Though the old worn guitar was a Spanish beauty with a beautiful timbre, what really struck her was Luc’s dexterity. The quick triplets of the intro were crisply articulated with feeling, matching the lively spirit of the lyrics that followed. As the song moved into the verse, the feel shifted to a flamenco dynamic. Luc’s unrefined yet passionate voice made Zoe’s heart sing.

Here we are unfathomable miracles of existence

Killing each other in a military offence

Squabbling over territory like all the dumb beasts

Our weapons cooking up a storm for The Reaper’s feast

The beauty of life is forgotten for greed

To have it all is such an ill need

If we shared everything then nobody would fight

We’d work together and share our insights

For the greater good of all it’s time to

Lay down the instruments of war

Erect a collective initiative

Even peace is not worth fighting for

For millennia fighting kept tribal people strong

But times have changed so much today it’s only wrong

The age of reason must come now and prevail

It’s time to free each other from our violent gaols

Swinging into the jazzy second chorus, some drunk metalheads staggered passed, splashing handfuls of loose change into his case.

‘Thanks guys!’

‘No worries, duuude. You’re ripping it up,’ one of them with a shaven head yelled back in a drunken slur.

‘Cause we are dying slowly of a spiritual disease

It’s time to work together to set this darkness free

Our Mother’s also dying so let us not forget

Or our kids will be the ones who live to regret

The beauty of life forgotten for greed

To have it all is such an ill need

If we shared everything then nobody would fight

Work together and share our insights

For the greater good of all it’s time to

Lay down the instruments of war

Erect a collective initiative

Even peace is not worth fighting for

At the end of the third chorus a plump woman in an azure dress strode up to Luc. Her rosy face was beaming as she threw a blue note into his case. Luc graciously thanked her for the ten dollars. He looked primed to break into another tune when she interrupted with a friendly voice.

‘Hi, what’s your name?’

‘Luc.’

‘God has given you a great talent, Luc. Have–’

Luc shook his head ‘No. God’s done nothing good for me. I had an awesome teacher and applied countless hours of dedicated practice.’

‘Son, you do believe in God though?’ asked the woman.

‘Not your version: I worship great musicians.’ Luc flashed her a smile, trying to keep the mood light.

Zoe sensed however that he was eager to continue playing, and understood just how frustrating this interlude would be for him. She had always hated any distractions from her playing or practise in the time before Set had ruined music for her.

Although the lady smiled at Luc’s joke, she was not satisfied to leave it at that. ‘I never used to believe in God either, until one night Jesus appeared to me.’

Luc loudly rolled his eyes, yet the lady’s denial made her oblivious. She raved on.

‘He came to me two years ago when I was a heroin addict and told me that only with his love I could be saved.’

‘So now you’re on the opiate of the masses, but at least it doesn’t rot your teeth…’

Zoe laughed, impressed by his paraphrasing of Karl Marx. Luc was a bundle of surprises.

To the guitarist’s obvious astonishment the lady was nodding agreement, with the empty eyes of someone who has lost the plot of the conversation.

‘…Instead it rots your mind.’

Zoe smiled at the added quip. She loved Luc’s sass.

Rather than leave, the woman seemed to take it as a sign to up the ante. Zoe admitted the lady had temerity, if not any practical intelligence.

‘Wouldn’t you love to worship someone that loves you back?’

‘Of course I would!’ Luc agreed in earnest. ‘That’s why I don’t waste my love on a figment of human imagination.’

‘Well why do you wear the cross of Christ if you don’t believe in our lord, Jesus?’

Luc shook his necklace explaining to the lady, ‘This is not a Christian symbol.’

The woman snorted at him. ‘Oh I think it is. Look in any church.’

Luc grunted impatiently. ‘This symbol is much older than the story of The Anointed.’

‘Anointed?’

‘That’s what The Christus means. Before the church appropriated it, this cro–’

‘What!’

‘Before they stole it, this cross was a pagan astrological symbol representing the four directions, four seasons, and–’

‘Jesus died on that cross. How dare you?’ Her body language arched toward him, aggressive.

‘The story of the cruci-fiction,’ angry now, Luc flared his eyes at the lady, ‘was also stolen from other, older parables. Numerous ancient cultures – thousands of years before the alleged Immaculate Conception – used that paradigm to represent–’

‘Alleged? How dare you mock the Virgin Mary!?’

‘The Virgin is not real. Just a–’

‘Shut up!’ Her voice had climbed a few semi-tones.

‘The virgin in that myth is merely a personification of the constellation Virgo,’ Luc shouted over the top of her, impressing Zoe with his knowledge of ancient astronomical myths.

Before she was turned Zoe had always loved the night. Its mystery, stillness and the beauty of the radiant heavens arcing overhead had seduced her, even as a mortal. Zoe knew the stars intimately: her father taught her all of the astrological parables when she was a small child, being groomed for training as an apothecary.

A new respect toward Luc dawned in her right then.

Unsurprisingly the pudgy woman was incredulous.

‘What’s that satanic zodiac mumbo-jumbo got to do with the bible?’

‘It’s not satanic. It predates Christianity and therefore Satan, who is also just a make-believe character. The twelve constellations of the zodiac have been anthropomorphised into the Twelve Apostles, and Jesus is merely a personification of the Sun.’

‘What?’

By this time the woman’s angry tone had attracted two fellow worshippers from the nearby church. Both hulky men. Zoe was worried by how strong they looked. Lost in his passionate argument Luc didn’t seem to be aware of the danger closing in.

Exasperated, Luc told the pudgy woman, ‘Look, I just want to play my guitar. If you want to believe in fairy tales–’

‘Fairy tales! I hope you rot in HELL!!’ Her voice broke. Zoe could hear the rabid bitch was frothing at the mouth.

‘Have you taken a look at the world lately? We’re already a long way south of heaven.’

‘And you deserve it! You’ll burn for eternity, you evil piece of shit!’

‘Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary because she was having an affair behind Joseph’s back. He just never cottoned on ‘cause the naïve softcock was too stupid to know he was being cuckolded,’ Luc barked with angry humour. ‘Now fuck off and leave me alone!’

Zoe’s laughter caught in her throat as Luc’s blasphemous tirade set all three prayer group members into a frenzy. The woman leapt at Luc in a fury, slashing at his face with her bright pink claws. Luc dodged her, managing to safely drop his guitar into its case, while ducking a deadly punch from the first, barrel-chested man. Unfortunately he could not avoid the next lusty left. Dazed on the pavers, Luc was completely at their mercy. Zoe knew they would show him none.

She didn’t want to get involved with Luc. It would put his life at risk, causing too many complications that neither of them needed. But Zoe’s sense of justice overrode her caution: he had not started anything here, and now who knew how badly they were going to hurt the likably unique person.

‘Smash his guitar!’ cawed the Christian woman, her peaceful parables of kindness forgotten in a toxic sea of rage. Though Zoe couldn’t see the woman’s face she heard by the sound of her voice that an ugly smile was spread across it.

‘No!’ Luc protested weakly, mustering what little energy he had left.

‘Make toothpicks out of it Steve!’ Her voice was ragged with evil humour.

‘Then I’ll smash this filthy pervert’s face in,’ Steve announced.

‘Ah fuck,’ Zoe sighed.

She had no choice now. Against every rational part of her mind that asked –

What would it matter if another insignificant human disappeared?

– she felt strangely compelled to save him, by a strong connection that she could not explain.

Zoe scanned the street. Satisfied that no one was looking her way, she soared to Luc’s aid just in time to save him from serious harm, but not the Spanish beauty. The burly red-haired thug called Steve stomped Luc’s guitar with a heavy work boot, two seconds before Zoe dove into their midst. With fierce precision her lightning fists laid all three assailants out cold