Chapter 25

Arthur came awake with a shudder. The throbbing of his head and the malaise that gripped his body brought back dim recollections of the hangovers he had suffered as a mortal. He had nearly made a grievous error the previous night. The emotional feedback from his bond to hundreds of ferals had very nearly overwhelmed him. In fact, he almost certainly would have succumbed to the rage, hate and, above all else, hunger that had beat relentlessly at his mind, if the ferals had not started to die off rapidly. Such a complete loss of control, the extinction of intellect and reason, could have been more than simply dangerous. Even now he could feel that rage, that hunger, begin to pulse anew as his remaining ferals rose to hunt again. They were mercifully few now, certainly well less than a hundred. This he could endure.

Throwing back the tarp that now served as his final protection against the sun, he pushed himself shakily from the dingy basement floor. He decided that he would soon need to replace the caskets that had been lost in the aftermath of his first battle with the authorities; his current sleeping arrangements were ... undignified.

With something akin to guilt, Arthur examined his bond to Alicia which revealed that she, much like himself, was experiencing some pain and that she was desperately struggling to resist the primal emotions which were even now assailing her rational mind. Last night, his fledgling had not been strong enough to resist the seductive call of the ferals and had reverted to a primitive beast-like state. Keeping her under control while fighting tenaciously to hold on to his own sanity had proven to be most difficult.

He pulled the tarp back from her body, but she continued to lie motionless, her eyes squeezed tightly shut. He stood gazing at her for a long moment. She had again pleasantly surprised him during the carnage of the night before. It seemed that she enjoyed causing pain even more than receiving it. Even he had been impressed with the imaginative ways in which she had inflicted suffering upon their victims in the exceedingly short time that they could spare on any single individual.

Finally, he bent to brush the hair back from her face with a gentle finger, "Alicia?"

With a whimper, she whined, "I can still feel them, Master. I don't want to lose myself again."

Unexpectedly, pity welled up from some long forgotten corner of Arthur's soul. "Sit up, child," he told her softly as he lowered himself to sit on the floor next to her. "I want you to focus on a single knot of emotions to the exclusion of all else and then repeat after me."

Over the next hour, he guided her repeatedly through the cantrip with which Lei had gifted him until Alicia had passed the bonds of forty ferals to him. Gritting his teeth against the added strain to his psyche, he cursed Lei under his breath for not passing him the knowledge to simply release a fledgling from the bond.

Refocusing his thoughts on Alicia, he asked, "Is that better?"

"Yes, Master. Thank you," she replied. The rush of gratitude and devotion that coursed through the bond between them threatened to overwhelm him as all of the rage and hate of the ferals could not.

"Good," he answered cooly as he rose rapidly to his feet, "lets go upstairs and find out how our efforts have paid off."

The mercenaries had thoughtfully recorded various portions of the day's news that they thought he would find interesting. Arthur delighted at the helicopter views of the traffic snarls caused by thousands of people trying to flee the city only to be turned back to their homes or, in the case of the unfortunate commuters, the temporary shelters being provided by churches, hotels, universities and hospitals. He rejoiced at the video clips of his ferals wreaking havoc at the hotel. He noted with glee that, despite the official assurances that a disease was the root of the problem, every clip he watched had variations of the words, "Vampires in Pittsburgh?" prominently displayed at the bottom of the screen.

After he had watched the recorded excerpts several times over, he decided that it was time to add to the terror that gripped the city. As he stood to leave, he gave Alicia's shoulder a light squeeze, "I think it would be best for you to stay here tonight, Alicia. You have more than earned a night of respite."

After she nodded her acceptance, he exited the house. The moment he set foot outside, he was able to feel the change that he had wrought: the entire city reeked of fear, the heady aroma penetrated every building, every street, and every alleyway. He could almost see the miasma of terror that hung over the city like a black cloud.

Scanning quickly through the bonds to the ferals, he chose one that seemed relatively close by. He moved quickly in its direction, avoiding the occasional masses of policemen, federal agents and soldiers with contemptuous ease. Within minutes, he located his target. Using the skills he had perfected several nights before, he brought the beast under control and led it into a dark alley. There he foisted the bonds of its kindred onto it until he could bear those that remained without strain. He then released the creature, its fury and hunger now magnified many times over, with a simple command to kill.

Hearing a fresh burst of gunfire erupt in the distance, Arthur decided that it would only be right to even the playing field a bit. Pushing himself to the limit of his supernatural speed, he ran to the bank of the Allegheny river and then turned to follow the waterway to the point. All along his route the moisture in the air and on the surface of the river coalesced into a dense fog which rolled into the city in waves. Rounding the point where the three rivers met, he journeyed up the Mon and repeated the process. By the time he had finished, screams had joined the gunfire in a mad cacophony. Arthur sprinted toward the towering skyscrapers to join the ferals in the hunt.

After night had fallen across the city, Agent Frederick Roper had begun to doubt his own sanity. First, shortly after he had stopped to inspect the mix of National Guard soldiers and city police officers that manned a checkpoint by the PPG towers, eight people emerged from a manhole leading to the sewers half a block from the checkpoint. The moment that they were free of the sewers, they had sniffed at the air for a minute before charging directly at Roper's little force. They refused to respond to shouts demanding that they stand their ground and identify themselves. Roper sent two of the guardsmen forward to block their path. The eight fell upon the two like a pack of hungry wolves.

Roper and his team immediately brought their M-16's to bear and mowed down the eight in a blaze of gunfire. Before any of his men could get close enough to the bodies to check them for identification or life signs, all eight rose to their feet and resumed their charge. Again, Roper and his men cut them down. And again they rose. And again. And again. Agent Roper ordered his men to switch their rifles from burst mode to single shot. While four clips each had seemed an unnecessary extravagance in the light of day, it was obviously not going to be enough.