DARREN SHAN - Shan, Darren - Cirque Du Freak 08 - Allies Of The Night

As I stared at the cross, pink and tender-looking, the years evaporated and I was back in a cemetery on my first night as a vampire's assistant, facing a boy whose life I'd saved, a boy who was jealous of me, who thought I'd conspired with Mr Crepsley and betrayed him.

"Steve!" I gasped, staring from the cross to his cold, hard eyes. "Steve Leopard!"

"Yes," he nodded grimly.

Steve Leopard, my one-time best friend. The angry, mixed-up boy who'd sworn to become a vampire hunter when he grew up, so that he could track me down � and kill me!

CHAPTER ELEVEN

HE WASclose enough for me to lunge at the gun barrel and maybe redirect it. But I couldn't move. I was stunned beyond anything but passive observation. Debbie Hemlock walking into my English class had left me gobsmacked � but Steve Leopard (his real name was Leonard) turning up out of the blue like this was ten times as shocking.

After a handful of anxious seconds, Steve lowered the arrow gun, then jammed it through a belt behind his back. He extended his hands, took my left arm above the elbow, and hauled me to my feet. I rose obediently, a puppet in his hands.

"Had you going for a minute, didn't I?" he said � and smiled.

"You're not going to kill me?" I wheezed.

"Hardly!" He took my right hand and shook it awkwardly. "Hello, Darren. Good to see you again, old friend."

I stared at our clasped hands, then at his face. Then I threw my arms around him and hugged him for dear life. "Steve!" I sobbed into his shoulder.

"Stop that," he muttered and I could hear the sound of his own voice breaking. "You'll haveme in tears if you keep it up." Pushing me away, he wiped around his eyes and grinned.

I dried my cheeks and beamed. "It's really you!"

"Ofcourse. You don't think two people could be born this handsome, do you?"

"Modest as ever," I noted wryly.

"Nothing to be modest about," he sniffed, then laughed. "You able to walk?"

"I think a hobble's the best I can manage," I said.

"Then lean on me. I don't want to hang around. Hooky might come back with his friends."

"Hooky? Oh, you mean the vampa�" I stopped, wondering how much Steve knew about the creatures of the night.

"The vampaneze," he finished, nodding soberly.

"You know about them?"

"Obviously."

"Is the hook-handed guy the one who's been killing people?"

"Yes. But he isn't alone. We'll discuss it later. Let's get you out of here and cleaned up first." Letting me lean on him, Steve led me back the way I'd come, and as we walked I couldn't help wondering if I'd been knocked unconscious in the alley. If not for the pain in my leg � which was all too real � I'd have been seriously tempted to think this was nothing but a wishful dream.

�

Steve took me to the fifth floor of a run-down apartment block. Many of the doors we passed along the landing were boarded-over or broken down. "Nice neighbourhood," I commented sarcastically.

"It's a condemned building," he said. "A few apartments are occupied � mostly by old folk with nowhere else to go � but the majority are empty. I prefer places like this to boarding houses and hotels. The space and quiet suit my purposes."

Steve stopped at a battered brown door kept shut by an extra thick padlock and chain. Rooting through his pockets, he found a key, unlocked the padlock, removed the chain and pushed the door open. The air inside was stale, but he took no notice as he bundled me inside and closed the door. The darkness within held until he lit a candle. "No electricity," he said. "The lower apartments are still connected, but it went off up here last week."

He helped me into a cluttered living room and laid me down on a couch that had seen better days � it was threadbare, and wiry springs stuck out through several holes. "Try not to impale yourself," Steve laughed.

"Is your interior decorator on strike?" I asked.

"Don't complain," Steve scolded me. "It's a good base to work from. If we had to report back to some swanky hotel, we'd have to explain your leg and why we're covered in filth. As for accounting forthese �" He shrugged off the pair of arrow guns and laid them down.

"Care to tell me what's going on, Steve?" I asked quietly. "How you were in that alley and why you're carrying those?"

"Later," he said, "after we've tended to your wounds. And after you've�" he produced a mobile phone and tossed it to me "�made a call."

"Who am I supposed to ring?" I asked, staring at the phone suspiciously.

"Hooky followed you from your friend's house � the dark-skinned lady."

My face whitened. "He knows where Debbie lives?" I gasped.

"If that's her name � yes. I doubt he'll go after her, but if you don't want to run the risk, my advice is to call and tell her to�"

I was hitting buttons before he finished. Debbie's phone rang four times. Five. Six. Seven. I was about to dash to her rescue, regardless of my bad leg, when she picked up and said, "Hello?"

"It's me."

"Darren? What are�"

"Debbie � do you trust me?"

There was a startled pause. "Is this a joke?"

"Do you trust me?" I growled.

"Of course," she answered, sensing my seriousness.

"Then get out now. Throw some gear into a bag and scram. Find a hotel for the weekend. Stay there."

"Darren, what's going on? Have you lost your�"

"Do you want to die?" I interrupted.

A silent beat. Then, quietly, "No."

"Then get out." I hit the disconnect button and prayed she'd heed my warning. "Does the vampaneze know where I'm staying?" I asked, thinking of Harkat.

"I doubt it," Steve said. "If he did, he'd have attacked you there. From what I saw, he stumbled upon you earlier tonight by chance. He was casing a crowd, selecting his next victim, when he saw you and picked up your trail. He followed you to your friend's house, waited, trailed after you when you left, and �"

I knew the rest.

Steve fetched a first-aid kit from a shelf behind the couch. He told me to lean forward, then examined the back of my head. "Is it cut?" I asked.

"Yes, but not badly. It doesn't need stitches. I'll clean it up and apply a dressing." With my head seen to, he focused on my leg. It was deeply gashed and the material of my trousers was soaked through with blood. Steve snipped it away with a sharp pair of scissors, exposing the flesh beneath, then swabbed at the wound with cotton wool. When it was clean, he studied it momentarily, then left and came back with a reel of catgut and a needle. "This'll hurt," he said.

"It won't be the first time I've been stitched back together," I grinned. He went to work on the cut, and did a neat job on it. I'd only have a small scar when it was fully healed. "You've done this before," I noted as he tucked the catgut away.

"I took first-aid classes," he said. "Figured they'd come in handy. Never guessed who my first patient would be." He asked if I wanted something to drink.

"Just some water."

He pulled a bottle of mineral water out of a bag by the sink and filled a couple of glasses. "Sorry it's not cold. The fridge won't work without electricity."

"No problem," I said, taking a long drink. Then I nodded at the sink. "Has the water been cut off too?"

"No, but you wouldn't want to drink any � fine for washing, but you'd be on a toilet for days if you swallowed."

We smiled at each other over the rims of our glasses.

"So," I said, "mind telling me what you've been up to these last fifteen years?"

"You first," Steve said.

"Nuh-uh. You're the host. It's your place to start."

"Toss you for it?" he suggested.

"OK."

He produced a coin and told me to call. "Heads."

He flipped the coin, caught it and slapped it over. When he took his hand away he grimaced. "I never did have much luck," he sighed, then started to talk. It was a long story, and we were down to the bottom of the bottle of water and on to a second candle before he finished.