Darren Shan - Lord Of The Shadows

"Neither, my Prince," she smiled. "I serve merely as a witness."

"Hurm!" he grunted.

I stared up at the building. It was tall and dark, with jagged grey stones and broken windows. There were nine steps leading up to the oversized front door. The steps were cracked and covered with moss. Apart from some more moss and broken windows, it hadn't changed much since my last visit.

"I know this place," I told Vancha, trying to forget about my conversation with Evanna and focus on the business at hand. "It's an old cinema theatre. This is where the Cirque Du Freak performed when Steve and I were kids. I should have guessed this was where he'd come. It brings everything full circle. Stuff like that is important to a maniac like Steve."

"You shut up about my dad!" Darius growled.

"You think Leonard's inside?" Vancha asked, cuffing Darius around the ear.

"I'm sure of it," I said, wiping streaks of Morgan James's blood from my forehead there'd been no time to mop myself clean.

"What about Shancus?" Evra hissed. He was trembling with anxiety. "Will he harm my son?"

"Not as long as we holdhis son captive," I said.

Evra stared at Darius, confused he knew nothing about the boy but my old friend trusted me, so he accepted my guarantee.

"How should we play this?" Debbie asked.

"Just march straight in," I said.

"Is that wise?" Vancha asked. "Perhaps we should try to sneak up on them from the back, or via the roof."

"Steve's prepared this for us," I said. "Anything we can think of, you can bet he's already considered. We can't outguess him. We'd be fools to try. I say we go in, face him directly, and pray that the luck of the vampires is with us."

"The luck of the damned," Darius sneered. "You won't beat my father or any vampaneze. We're more than a match for the likes of you."

Vancha studied Darius curiously. He leant up close, sniffing like a dog. Then he made a small cut on the boy's right arm Darius didn't even wince dabbed a finger in the blood that oozed out, and tasted it. He pulled a face. "He's been blooded."

"By my father," Darius said proudly.

"He's a half-vampaneze?" I frowned, glancing at his fingertips they were unmarked.

"The blood's weak within him," Vancha said. "But he's one of them. There's just enough blood in his system to ensure he can never regain his humanity."

"Did you volunteer for this, or did Steve force you?" I asked Darius.

"My father wouldn't force me to do anything!" Darius snorted. "Like every vampaneze, he believes in free choice not like you lot."

Vancha looked at me questioningly. "Steve's fed him a load of rubbish about us," I explained. "He thinks we're evil, and his father's a noble crusader."

"He is!" Darius shouted. "He'll stop you from taking over the world! He won't let you kill freely! He'll keep the night safe from you vampire scum!"

Vancha cocked an amused eyebrow at me. "If we had time, I'd take great delight in setting this boy straight. But we haven't. Debbie phone Alice and tell her to come here. We'll go in together all for one and all that guff."

While Debbie was on the phone, Vancha pulled me aside and nodded at Evra, who was standing a few metres ahead of us, gazing at the entrance to the cinema, fingers twisted into desperate fists. "He's in a bad way," Vancha said.

"Of course," I muttered. "How would you expect him to react?"

"Are you clear on what we must do?" Vancha responded. I stared at him coldly. He grabbed my arms and squeezed tight. "Leonardmust be killed. You and I are expendable. So are Debbie, Alice, Harkat, Evra and Shancus."

"I want to save him," I said miserably.

"So do I," Vancha sighed. "And we will, if we can. But the Lord of the Vampaneze comes first. Remember what happens if we fail the vampires will be destroyed. Would you trade the snake-boy's life for all those of our clan?"

"Of course not," I said, shaking myself free. "But I won't abandon him cheaply. If Steve's prepared to deal, I'll deal. We can fight him some other night."

"And if he won't deal?" Vancha pressed. "If he forces a showdown?"

"Then we'll fight, and we'll kill or we'll die whatever the cost." I locked gazes with him so he could see I was telling the truth.

Vancha checked his shurikens and drew a few. Then we turned, gathered our allies around us Debbie dragged Darius along and advanced up the steps and into the old abandoned cinema theatre where, for me, all those years ago, the nightmares had begun.

It was like stepping back into the past. The building was cooler and damper than before, and fresh graffiti had been scrawled across the walls, but otherwise it was no different. I led the way down the long corridor where Mr Tall had sneaked up on Steve and me, appearing out of the darkness with that incredible speed and silence which had been his trademark. A left turn at the end. I noted the spot where Mr Tall had taken and eaten our tickets. Back then, blue curtains had been draped across the entrance to the auditorium. There were no curtains tonight the only change.

We entered the auditorium, two abreast, Vancha and Alice in front, Debbie and Evra next (Debbie pushing Darius in front of her), then Harkat and I. Evanna drifted along further back, detached from us by distance and attitude.

It was completely black inside the auditorium. I couldn't see anything. But I could hear deep, muffled breathing, coming from somewhere far ahead of us. "Vancha," I whispered.

"I know," he whispered back.

"Should we move towards it?" I asked.

"No," he replied. "It's too dark. Wait."

A minute passed. Two. Three. I could feel the tension rising, both in myself and those around me. But nobody broke rank or spoke. We stood in the darkness, waiting, leaving the first move to our foes.

Several minutes later, without warning, spotlights were switched on overhead. Everyone gasped and I cried out loud, hunching over, covering my extra-sensitive eyes with my hands. We were defenceless for a few vital seconds. That would have been the ideal time for an attack. I expected vampaneze and vampets to fall upon us, weapons flashing but nothing happened.

"Are your eyes OK?" Debbie asked, crouching beside me.

"Not really," I groaned, slowly raising my eyelids a fraction, just enough to see out of. Even that was agony.

Holding a hand over my eyes, I squinted ahead and caught my breath. It was a good job we hadn't advanced. The entire floor of the auditorium had been torn out. In its place, spreading from one wall to the other, running from a few metres ahead of us all the way to the foot of the stage, was a giant pit, filled with sharpened stakes.

"Impressive, isn't it?" someone called from the stage. My eyes lifted. It was hard to see, because the lights were being trained on us from above the stage, but I gradually brought the scene into focus. Dozens of tall, thick logs clotted the stage, placed vertically, ideal cover. Sticking out from behind one log near the front was the grinning face of Steve Leopard.

When Vancha saw Steve, he drew a shuriken and threw it at him. But Steve had picked his spot carefully and the throwing star ended up buried in the wood of the log behind which he was standing.

"Bad luck, Sire," Steve laughed. "Care to make it the best throw out of three?"

"Maybe I can get him," Alice muttered, stepping up past Vancha. She raised her pistol and fired, but the bullet penetrated no deeper than the shuriken.

"Is that the preliminaries out of the way, or do you want to take a few more pot shots?" Steve called.

"I could possibly leap the pit," Vancha said dubiously, studying the rows of stakes between him and the stage.

"Don't be ridiculous," I grunted. Even vampires had their limits.

"I don't see anybody else," Debbie whispered, casting her eyes around the auditorium. The balcony above us from where I'd spied on Steve and Mr Crepsley could have been swarming with vampaneze and vampets, but I didn't think so I could hear nothing overhead, not even a single heartbeat.