Carpathian 03 - Dark Gold

wall. The air reverberated with gunfire, then with Stefan shouting to his wife.

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    "Call an ambulance, Marie, and get out here now! I need some help!" Stefan knelt beside Vinnie and tried to clamp the worst of the wounds pumping out the man's life onto the ground.
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    "Joshua! Where is Joshua?" Marie cried when she joined him.
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    "He's gone," Stefan reported grimly. "He was taken." Marie's sobs faded behind him as Aidan followed the human and child. Joshua was thrown into the trunk of a car, and the puppet walked with the characteristic jerky motions of a vampire-induced trance to the driver's seat. Aidan streamed in through the open window and hovered, but the puppet could not detect his presence.
    The vampire could not direct this assault while he lay beneath earth in the daylight hours, but he had implanted his orders into his minions' minds before he had sought the safety of his lair.
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    The car swerved along the winding road, the driver drooling and staring vacantly ahead with the gaze of the possessed.
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    Aidan moved away from the abomination and into the trunk. Joshua lay in a stupor, the left side of his face swelling, his eye already turning black. Tears rolled down to his chin, but his sobs were silent.
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    Aidan concentrated, calling on all of his strength to communicate silently with the boy. Joshua, I am here with you. I will have you sleep. You will stay asleep until I come for you. When I say to you, "Alexandria needs to see your blue eyes," you will know it is safe to awaken.
    Only then will you do so . The mind meld was draining, and he had so little energy during this terrible time of the day. He also needed to cast spells, the most intricate, dangerous ones Gregori had taught him. If the vampire was somehow able to rise before Aidan could return to the boy, it would take a time to unravel the spells, and Joshua would be safe from harm and further trauma in his sleep.
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    Aidan wove his spells as the car moved northward, toward the mountains. Toward Gregori's new home, came the unbidden thought.
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    It couldn't be Gregori. Aidan wouldn't believe it. The vampire simply had no idea Gregori was anywhere in the vicinity. It wasn't Gregori. Gregori was so powerful, he would not need the deceitful tricks, the beasts, the mindless puppet doing his bidding, or even the child. Gregori would need no help. This was not Gregori. Aidan held on to that certainty while he wove the spells. Ancient, binding, dangerous to any who tried to harm the boy.
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    When he was finished, he rested, exhausted. He had done all he could. Once he knew the child's exact destination, he would have to make his way home. He dreaded the journey in the bright sun; there was no pain quite like it, nothing more sickening to one of his kind.
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    The puppet stopped the car at the entrance to an old, rundown hunting lodge with rotting timbers and overgrown with vines and bushes. Aidan knew at once that the vampire was close, most likely beneath the decaying planks of the floor. Rats scurried visibly, the sentinels for the undead.
    The walking marionette, the minion of the undead, already drained of his mind and free will, opened the trunk and reached in to pull the child out by his shirtfront.
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    The protective spell instantly sent fire racing up the puppet's arm to his shoulders and enveloped his head. The thing, no longer really alive, programmed to do one thing only, continued to try to clutch the boy even as his flesh burned.

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    Aidan was thankful Joshua was asleep. The putrefying stench was incredible, even to one without a nose. The blackened carcass fell to the ground, bits of charred flesh dropping away.
    The puppet issued a low, keening vibration, his death slow and difficult, the macabre caricature still trying over and over to drag the boy to the vampire. Aidan hated the torment resulting from the vampire's twisted schemes. But then, the undead liked his minions to suffer as much as possible.
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    When the thing was finally still, the last breath dragged from its lungs, Aidan inspected the remains to ensure it was truly dead and to leave no smoldering ember that might accidentally ignite any vegetation. Satisfied that he had done as much as he was able, Aidan had to leave, to travel through that terrible sunlight, back to his home.
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    His