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  Shim crumbled against one of the corpses, pulling it down on the floor, and got up more or less unscathed, knowing far too well that this wouldn't last long. He started milling around the table leg, without any real purpose, just trying to keep the undead at bay. Unfortunately, the limited room he had was not an advantage. Some zombies retreated under his attacks, just to start advancing again after a second or two, and soon he was almost submerged by those rotting bodies.

  In that very moment, a weird red light crossed Vivienne's eyes. With exceptional speed, impossible for a normal human, she jumped into the middle of the undead, attacking them barehanded. What followed was too fast for the dwarf to really understand what was happening. He saw flesh being slashed, limbs ripped apart and thrown away, as the room around him increased and the number of the zombies decreased visibly.

  He didn't waste time looking for an explanation. Doing his best to survive so that he could ask for it later seemed the best choice. As soon as he could, he run forward and recovered his wand from Krey's hands, pointed it at the men, still standing in the doorway, and shoot, without bothering to take aim.

  The projectile went through the shoulder of its target, leaving a burned hole in its clothes and an exit hole as large as a fist, which should have been enough to separate his arm from the rest of the body. But, under the unbelieving gaze of the detective, the hole disappeared almost immediately, leaving the holed and smoldering jacket and shirt as the only evidence that it had existed.

  «What... what's that...?» he asked himself more than Vivienne. It was her to answer anyway, «I am afraid I do not have the slightest idea, detective. But there are more coming.»

  «How do you know?»

  «Do you really think this has any importance?»

  Shim had to admit that, at the moment, it was quite irrelevant.

  «It seems he only wants to prevent us from passing by», he remarked. Indeed, the man had stood still even after his attack, and didn't seem about to change his tactics.

  Shim risked a quick glance behind him. The zombies were remarkably less than before, and the room had started looking like a slaughterhouse. There were chunks of corpses scattered everywhere, heads ripped away from their bodies, severed hands which still crawled blindly searching for something to grab. The zombies that where still healthy enough stood still in front of Vivienne, making guttural noises and grunting softly. If they had had any feeling at all, Shim would have thought they were afraid of the woman. As per Vivienne, nothing seemed to have changed in her. If she really had fought against those creatures, she had been able to do so without even tussling her hair or staining her clothes. The dwarf turned again.

  «I believe this might be a further reason to try to go into the adjacent room», the woman said, replying to his previous statement. «It is likely that the one who has planned all this is there.»

  «Doing what?»

  «Waiting for us to die, I assume.»

  «Nice.»

  «I am afraid you will have to try to handle the situation alone here, detective. I will try to reach the necromancer.»

  «What?»

  Shim received no answer. He didn't see Vivienne move, or pass him by, still a second later she was on the other side of the door, behind the brute. She must have passed aside him, but he couldn't see how, the distance was anything but enough. The man seemed surprised as much as him, because he wasn't able to do anything to stop her. He turned when he realized she was behind him, tried to grab her and found himself holding only her cloak as she walked by.

  Shim tried to seize the moment to pass in turn, lowered his head and charged toward the now free space between the legs of his opponent and the frame of the door. The men turned suddenly and hit him with the back of one hand, throwing him against the table, which didn't stand the crash and broke in two, in a shower of splinters.

  Beyond the door, Vivienne went through a short corridor, ignoring the three doors opening on its walls, and going directly to a fourth at the end. She opened it with a single gesture and moved a step inside, then stopped as if she had hit a solid wall, although there was nothing visible in front of her. She tried to touch the air around her and found out she was enclosed into some kind of circular barrier. A lightning of awareness crossed her features as she looked down, seeing the symbols traced on the floor all around her and the double circle they where inscribed into.

  CHAPTER 10

  They advanced along the city streets, toward a single destination. Only the empty gaze in their eyes gave them an unusual look, beside that they seemed no different from what they had always been. Homeless. Prostitutes. Tramps. People few noticed and even less missed.

  They advanced along the empty streets, disregarding anything and anyone, all with a single goal. Only if anyone went closer, hindered them, disturbed them, only then they reacted, and their reaction was always fast and deadly.

  Rupert walked without a true purpose in the police headquarters, leaving behind a trail of blood which didn't belong to him. He could no longer bleed. None of the one who had crossed his path after his awakening could bleed any longer.

  He had killed four agents before his presence got noticed.

  He had killed eight afterwards.

  Many had tried to stop him, to no avail. Stunning wands had no effect on him whatsoever. Heavy weapons damaged him only for the short time needed by the wound to heal and disappear as if it had never been there at all. And that time was very short.

  Only the cuts made by the scalpel during the autopsy were still open, at least as much as the stitches allowed them to, maybe because they had been already there before he awoke.

  Vivienne cursed quietly against her own stupidity. She had let herself being trapped like a novice, and now she was paying the consequences of her rashness. The power of the circle held her, preventing her from leaving that simple symbol painted on the floor under her. As much as she tried to use her power to break the bond, all of her attempts were vain.

  The man who was in the room was looking at her as if she were a guinea pig.

  He wore a black, elegant suit on a white buttoned shirt and was sitting on an office armchair, one leg raised, with the ankle standing on the knee of the other, his arms in front of him, fingertips joined together. He looked like the prototype of a businessman who had just reached the end of a fruitful agreement. She knew too well that he was something else entirely.

  «You can quit trying», he finally decided to say. «You're not going to leave. You should have understood by now that your power is nothing compared to mine.»

  She reacted instinctively to that voice, even though she didn't mean to. Her eyes took a red tinge, her lips seemed to recede, revealing her teeth, while her canines grew into sharp fangs. The delicate features of her face had been replaced in an instant by a fiery grace. He didn't seem to worry.

  Vivienne tried to get a grip on herself. She forced the change to stop. Her face returned to the usual one, just a spiteful grimace was left to remind that not all was as usual.

  «You do have a lot of power, this I admit. Not anyone would have been able to entrap me in this manner. Or to create undead similar to the one at the entrance. However I wonder where this power comes from?»

  «From the heart», he answered, laughing at a joke he seemed to be the only one to understand.

  «Ripping hearts away from mortals does not give any more power than killing them by other means, it is just more fatiguing», she replied.

  «I don't just take their hearts. I feed on them. I feed on their greater weakness to make them strong, of their strength to gain power.»

  A disgusted expression appeared on her face. The man laughed again.

  «You are disgusted by the thought of eating a human heart? A being like you?»

  «Eating a heart is an extreme display of bad taste. And it is terribly gross.»

  He stopped laughing. He looked at her, curious.

  «Are you serious?!» his tone was halfway between question and st
atement. «You are a vampire, a necromancer, and you complain because eating hearts is... is... not chic enough?»

  «Being a necromancer does not mean forgetting good manners, or behaving like ignorant beasts.»

  «I might be an ignorant beast, but I'm not the caged one», he provoked her.

  «That is a situation that can be remedied. I will not stay here forever, be sure of this.»

  «I have no doubt. Just a few hours. Then dawn will come, and this room is very well exposed to sunlight.»

  «It is very vile to let the sun do your job.»

  He laughed again.

  «I don't think you have understood. See, to create my heartless it is not enough to take their heart and eat it. There's another ingredient I need, not easy at all to find. But once the sunlight has turned you to ashes, I will have enough of it to complete the ranks of my army.»

  «And once you will have done that, what would such army serve you for?»

  «I don't think this is a problem of yours. Anyway you won't be here to see it.»

  «Ridiculous. Do you believe you will be able to have your corpses without heart march on the city to conquer it? To do what with it?»

  «Conquer the city? Ha! That's not my goal at all. Let's say I will... sell my help to the best bidder. Don't you think there is people who would give anything to have some indestructible creatures at their command?»

  «Indestructible as long as you live.»

  «Ah, I see you understood. Indestructible as long as I live, sure, but who do you think could kill me with them defending me?»

  «You. You will kill yourself. Now». Vivienne's gaze became sharper, something seemed to stir behind her eyes, something that was able to catch the attention of Wilton Grange, binding his gaze to hers. The man flinched for a second, then stood up abruptly. Vivienne felt his power surround him, protect him, then burst toward her like a lightning bolt. She added her necromancer power to that of her hypnotic gaze, trying to repel the counterattack of the man. The air in the room seemed to become denser, as if a weird tension was gathering in it. The power radiated from her, pressing against his. Their energies clashed, merged, as if in an invisible embrace, repelled each other, then clashed again, none able to prevail on the other. Then he laughed again, and Vivienne felt a wave of power like no other she had ever met in her whole, long life. She felt her defenses being destroyed, her body lose control. Again she changed, leaving her human facade behind. Her teeth became fangs, her well-cared nails became curved claws, her eyes fired like torches, then she bent on herself, curling on the floor, and groaned.

  «I hope you enjoyed it», he mocked her.

  Shim was between a rock and a hard place. He couldn't advance without facing the zombies. He couldn't leave the room due to the creature blocking the only available door. He couldn't stand still because the zombies, now that Vivienne was gone, had started advancing again.

  His back hurt. Hitting the table hadn't been pleasant at all, but that wasn't going to kill him. Which didn't change the bitter truth: he wasn't going to leave that place alive.

  He had kept using the wand as long as he could, with scarce results. He had kept the last shot knowing that, if the zombies reached and grabbed him, turning the weapon against himself would at least give him a less painful death.

  There was only another chance left, something that in a different situation he wouldn't even think about using under such conditions.

  Without taking his eyes off the corpses, who had by now almost reached the half table he was standing behind, he opened one of the pockets in his belt. His fingers brushed two little round items and closed on one of them, which he brought up to his face. He whispered a single word and in the heart of the little dark-red sphere a feeble light seem to appear. He quickly threw the sphere in front of him, in the midst of the creatures, and bent down as much as he could behind his only shelter, covering his head with his free arm. There was a flash of light and heat as a huge flame burst filled almost the whole room. There was almost no actual explosion, but still the table was pushed, toppled over him and caught fire. As did the zombies.

  The stench of burning flesh soon reached his nostrils, even before he could push away the burning table and risked looking behind it. The undead were on fire, clothes and hair burned like lit torches. And they kept advancing. The most worn out, already damaged by the projectiles of his wand, had slowed down their pace even more; the others just kept going, and if they reached him they were going to burn him alive, as well as dismembering him. Things had become worse.

  He decided that it was time to try a last ditch move. He went to the half table that still was between him and the creatures, placed his hands against it, in spite of the fact that it was now scalding hot, and started running forward using all the speed and power he could muster, crushing the zombies and making them fall backwards in a tangle of limbs, knowing that this might have given him some more time, as well as a serious burn to both hands, but nothing more. He only had a chance to seize, after which he was going to join his ancestors in some place he had never really thought about so far.

  He launched himself to the door blocked by the other undead – which was still standing motionless in spite of all that had happened – and right before it could try to grab him he aimed the wand for his stomach and shot from up close, tearing a gash into its waist. It started to heal immediately, but before it could close itself completely, Shim whispered something and pushed one hand in the entrails of the monster.

  CHAPTER 11

  Wilton Grange's eyes went wide as if he had just seen a ghost – which by the way shouldn't have been too unusual in his line of work – when he saw the figure advancing trough the corridor in his direction, and recognized the dwarf who had entered his trap along with Vivienne.

  He was holding his left hand, which seemed burned down to a stump, against his chest, his forehead was bleeding, his clothes were torn to shreds, but he was alive, and that shouldn't have been possible. No one should have been able to pass by the heartless at the door. No one except the vampire, obviously, because he wanted her to, believing she had succeeded thanks to her abilities and not because the guard had been properly instructed.

  He expanded his mind to look for his creature and immediately perceived it, or better perceived the parts it had been made of, now scattered around the room and the corridor, already trying as much as possible to gather in the same place in order to join and start rebuilding the body they had belonged to till a few seconds before. He relaxed, turning again his attention to the place he was standing in. A temporary defeat was tolerable, after all. Also because its author wasn't going to live long anyway.

  Shim looked at the scene around him. Vivienne was at a few meters, curled on the floor, with her knees pressed against her chest and her face deep between her arms. He didn't know exactly the purpose of the symbols traced around her, but he knew just enough to understand that she was unable to pass them.

  At the end of the room there was the man who had to be responsible for all that.

  «You are...» he started to mumble, struggling to say the words so that they could be heard and understood «... under arrest...»

  Vivienne slightly lifted her head at the sound of his voice, just enough to let an eye out and look at the detective, who had been able to get there in spite of her thoughts.

  Grange too looked at him. Pathetic. He raised one hand and said some words in a language unknown to the most. Immediately the body of the dwarf was shaken by convulsions. A whitish foam raised to his lips, while his chest started burning as if someone had just poked it with a scalding ember. His legs started to tremble.

  He forced himself to go on, even though each step required a huge effort, even though he was losing control over his own body. He tried to say something, but only managed to let go an agonizing rattle.

  Grange watched him stumble forward. It was remarkable for him to try fighting the effects of his spell. As remarkable as useless. It was a pity that he w
as too worn to be used as raw matter to create another of his masterworks. Nonetheless, he would have been a worthy sacrifice to further consolidate his already enormous power. As soon as he would let go and lose consciousness for the pain he was causing him, he would put him on the altar consecrated to Death and finish him the right way. It was just a matter of seconds.

  Indeed Shim fell soon enough.

  He fell on his knees, his body shaken by uncontrollable spasms, only his gaze was lit and alive, his eyes fixed on a single spot on the floor. A spot that seemed to be very far. A spot that was closer and closer.

  He made another shuffled step, crawling on his knees with the help of the only functioning arm he still had. Then, with his last strength, he pushed himself as far as he could, and lied flat on the floor, his right hand stretched towards Vivienne. His palm was the last thing to touch the ground, just on the edge of the circle that was trapping the vampire.

  The look of triumph on Grange's face was quickly replaced by a mixed expression of surprise and terror as he found himself looking into the depths of Vivienne's eyes.

  He hadn't seen the vampire moving, he hadn't even seen her standing up, still she was there, in front of him, with her right hand pushed into his chest up to the wrist.

  He realized he should be feeling pain, but all he felt was an unreal sensation. Then nothing more, everything disappeared as his body slid to the floor and his gaze became empty. His hearth, clenched in the hand Vivienne had extracted a second before, beat weakly for a few seconds more, then joined him in the silence of oblivion. She threw it away, disgusted.