Vampire Hunter D: Dark Nocturne (18 page)

“Yeah. He's been that way for more than ten years.”

“Perhaps he can't get by without drinking. Not everyone can pick themselves up from any disappointment.”

“Yeah, but—”

“Are you sure you're the only one who thinks it's best for you to go to the Capital?”

Raya slowly turned to face the door to the next room. Her expression had grown stiff. Then she shook her head ever so slightly.

“No, that'd be a lie,” she replied, the words carved deep in the silence.

__

III

__

Three days passed. Snow fell relentlessly, reducing all the colors of the world to black and white. Some men who apparently worked for Brewer were at the house from sunrise to sunset, and since they took over the farm work, Raya was able to start doing needlepoint. As she listened to the sound of the snow piling up, she would suddenly look up and always find D in her field of view. And each and every time, the graceful black shadow was staring out at the snow-covered landscape. Raya couldn't help but wonder if the young man was going to disappear at some point into the harshness of winter.

That night, something happened. One of Brewer's young associates came back covered in blood and told them he'd been attacked by the trio on the northern part of the farm. His wounds were real enough.

After sending D out to investigate, the flesh trader had Raya loaded into a wagon.

“Where am I supposed to go?”

“The Capital, of course.”

Brewer's reply left her stunned.

“But—we're leaving without Mister D?”

“You'll be fine without him. Those three freaks won't be back again. You see, D's off chasing his own tail. I'll stay here and explain everything to him. You'd best go on ahead with these boys. See you later!”

“Wait!” she wanted to cry, but there wasn't even time for her to say it before the wagon raced away in a spray of snow.

The world of white sped by as they left the farm and got on the road through the forest. Wind and white snowflakes lashed Raya's face, but suddenly both ceased. The wagon had stopped.

The young man in the driver's seat let out a scream. Back by Raya, the two others turned in his direction and gasped aloud.

The heads of both horses were missing from the shoulder up. As it dawned on the young men that the heads had been removed without the sound of severed bone, a black form skimmed through the group for an instant. Though the headless torsos of the animals remained in the same pose they'd held in life, they toppled over to one side, spraying geysers of black blood.

On the snow to the right side of the wagon, Raya saw a black beast fling the three human heads it'd just bitten off.

“Now
that
is an example of my true ability.”

And with that remark from the opposite side of the vehicle, Sabey climbed in to join the girl.

“We couldn't get near that miserable flesh trader while he had D around, but fortunately, he was kind enough to do our work for us. Although you may not realize it yet, Miss,
he
will be coming soon. We must hurry and get you properly prepared.”

“What are you talking about? Just who the hell are you, anyway?”

“You'll find out soon enough,” Sabey said with apparent relish, baring his white teeth.

Throwing the corpses from the wagon, he settled into the driver's seat. A mass of obsidian muscle whistled into the seat beside him. As the black beast licked its chops, Raya averted her gaze.

Despite the fact that both horses lay on their sides, Sabey took the reins in one hand and made a sweeping gesture with the other. A reddish powder settled over the horses like a mist. As the decapitated bodies staggered back up, Raya thought she must be having a nightmare.

“This isn't part of my power, and it can't do much more than make the horses run, but it should do for now. Off we go,” he said with a shake of the reins.

Shrouded in a ghastly air, the hideous horses began to gallop once more.

“What's this?” Sabey said, his eyes bulging.

The stark-white scenery wasn't moving. Actually, the wagon wheels weren't even turning.

The scenery shifted. Vertically. As the wagon was incredibly hoisted into the air, Sabey and the beast alighted without a sound.

“Who the hell are you?!”

“Oh, it's one of
you guys
,” said a voice that rained down on Sabey. The words fell from the head of the titanic figure that'd lifted the wagon and left the horses' legs kicking vainly in midair.

“So, we meet at last,” he chuckled. “I just got into town, but I'm glad I came straight here instead of stopping off for a drink. See, I came out of the forest real quietly while you folks were going at it and hid myself under here. Did I surprise you a little?”

If what the giant—Dynus—said was true, then even the black beast had failed to note his presence.

Perhaps due to his surprise, Sabey stood there stock-still for a moment as if lost in his thoughts. Then his whole face flushed vermilion as he commanded, “Kill him!”

A flash of black lightning raced across the ground, halting in midair.

Moving at super-speed, the vicious beast had removed the heads of three people and a pair of horses in the blink of an eye, yet a gigantic hand had effortlessly closed around its throat to hold it at bay.

“This little pup of yours has a face only a mother could love,” Dynus said, but his words were accompanied by a harsh snap.

The beast's body twitched for a few seconds before it moved no more, at which point Dynus tossed it back lightly over his shoulder as if he were discarding a little piece of trash. Limning a smooth parabola, the corpse sailed over a stand of trees that was eighty to a hundred feet high and disappeared in a testament to the unbelievable brute strength of the giant.

“Okay, now we're getting down to the main event. Just relax and make your move. I think I'll stick with this.”

And with these words, the giant took the hand he'd used to slay the beast and put it back against the bottom of the wagon.

Sabey's expression was one of indignation for a heartbeat, and then his lips curled into a satisfied grin. At the same time, a deathly stillness radiated out around him.

“Welcome to the land of the beasts!” he said.

It was a second later that a pair of gargantuan forms pounced on Dynus from behind.

“Whoa there!” the giant said, barely managing to keep himself from tumbling forward as grizzly bears more than six feet tall mauled him mercilessly with fangs and claws.

Blue sparks flew from his chest and the base of his neck.

“What a joke,” the giant muttered shamelessly, adding a shout of, “Here you go!”

And with that, Dynus hurled the wagon at Sabey, horses and all. The impact caused snow to fall from the stand of trees, while Raya was thrown free of the wagon and struck her head hard against the ground, rendering her unconscious.

“Just watch this,” Dynus said to Sabey as he leapt away, then he wrapped one arm around the trunk of each of the massive bears.

Each weighed a good ton. But by the look of things, that was light for him. He quickly squeezed their torsos down into an hourglass shape, and then there was a hearty string of snaps as their bones shattered. The beasts were spitting up blood as the giant slammed their heads together to finish them off before he made an easy leap into the air.

Sabey didn't even have time to run. Just as the giant landed, he struck the man in the head with a fist the size of a boulder, killing him instantly. Bright blood spattered across the snow and Dynus's face.

“Well, that takes care of one of them. I guess that just leaves the one I'm here for. Ah, that should be a piece of cake.”

Dynus then turned around to face the way the wagon had come and added, “A handsome man against a snowy landscape? Talk about a freakin' work of art!”

As he stood there book-ended by pure white forest, the young man in a coat blacker than the darkness looked like nothing less than a sculpture hewn in heaven itself.

 

I

 

You've been there a while, haven't you?” Dynus said to D, but the Hunter advanced without speaking.

He didn't race forward in a hurry. As the giant suggested, he'd been following the wagon from the very start. He'd seen Brewer's scheme coming a mile off.

“Hey, there! Wait just a second,” the giant said as he stuck both hands out—although technically, he was sticking them down. “I have no intention of throwing down with you. Don't wanna use up all my strength before the main event. I'll give you back the woman safe and sound.”

“From the way you say it, the girl was what you were after.”

“Spare me. I don't wanna kill someone who doesn't even know who they are.”

“She doesn't know who she is?”

“That's right. Because I don't have that tingle running down my spine. If I were to fight her now, I'd just be tearing apart an innocent girl. Could you bring yourself to do something like that?”

“No.”

“Wow,” Dynus replied, boldly baring his gleaming white teeth in a smile. “Knock it off. If you smile at me like that, you're gonna make me all bashful. You lady-killer! Well, hurry up and take her back home so you can get her patched up. Huh?”

As he turned to where Raya had been thrown, his eyes went wide. An elliptical depression had been left in the snow, but the girl's body had vanished without warning. And without D even noticing.

“I didn't do it,” Dynus declared with a frantic wave of his hands. “And I'd say you didn't, either. You suppose it was one of that guy's cronies? Nah, I'd have noticed if it was one of them. Then it'd have to be—”

“Do you have some idea where she could've gone?”

“Let me see,” the giant said, bringing his hand to his chin as he deliberated. “I'd say she's at her castle.”

Turning toward the forest, D gave a whistle. Climbing onto the cyborg horse that came galloping out, he said, “I'll show you the way.”

“How am I supposed to get there?”

“You've got a wagon.”

“You're not exactly mister personality, are you? But I see your point. The girl's in such rough shape, she could freeze to death out here. I guess I'm still half asleep. Just give me a second.”

Dynus wasted no time in returning from the woods carrying the usual log with the cloth bundle tied to one end, quickly righted the wagon, and lashed the headless horses that even now kicked at the earth in hopes of fulfilling their role.

As they rode along side by side, D said to the giant, “I'd like to hear about this situation.”

“Yeah, sure—though to tell the truth, I don't know much about it either. At any rate, that woman and I are apparently hereditary foes. We've probably been set up as proxies in a war between Nobles. Only, I knew where she was right away, but she doesn't seem to have awakened yet. That's why the flunkies got here first.”

“Why don't you just stop the fight?”

“I can't do that. Or, to put it another way, I was made so I can't even think that way. And once she comes around, she won't be able to either.”

“And if she never comes around?” asked the Hunter.

“That's a thought. If possible, that's the way I hope it'll go. I'm made not to fight anyone I don't view as a foe. So that'd probably be best for the girl, too.”

“You're a strange warrior.”

“There's more to being a warrior than just fighting. There's a little thing called fair play,” Dynus said, his voice rising in a laugh.

Startled snow plopped down from the trees by the road.

“Sure is pretty,” the colossal warrior said as he squinted his eyes. “The world's such a beautiful place, but it's just somewhere for me to fight. Something's just not right about that. Why'd those bastards in the Nobility ever get it into their heads to make something like me? It's tragic to be good for nothing but killing. I want to be of more use to the world, you know?”

The pair came out onto a plain. At some point the snow had stopped falling, and now the moon was out with a silvery glow. By its light, the snowfields glittered like a mirror that seemed to stretch on forever.

Suddenly the scenery changed. Blue light colored the pair as a desolate, snowless plain bare of even a blade of grass exposed itself.

“This way.”

Dynus drove the wagon through a region studded with one fantastic rock formation after another—they must've continued on for the better part of a mile. From off in the distance, rows of spacious buildings that certainly seemed to be ruins crept into view. The castle walls, the domed ceilings, the stone columns, the great foundation—and a huge reactor and electronic barrier larger than most villages made it seem as if there was still life in these ruins that were the size of a great city.

Not hesitating in the least, Dynus slipped into one particularly towering structure and found Raya lying in a room where only the central foundation remained. D had already dismounted and taken the girl's pulse.

“How is she?” the giant asked.

“Fine,” was all that D said, but it put the giant at ease.

Oddly enough, the two of them seemed to be able to communicate without words. Neither mentioned how miraculous it was that even on foot, she'd managed to get there ahead of them.

Before D could lift her in his arms, the girl opened her eyes the tiniest bit.

“I—What happened to me?”

“You should get some rest.”

Looking all around with fearful eyes, she said, “These are the ruins of Castle Sinestro, aren't they? What am I doing here?”

“So you don't remember anything?” Dynus inquired.

In reply, Raya shrieked and clung tightly to D. But the reason she wasn't really terribly afraid was because she hadn't seen Dynus running amok. The wagon had been between them, with one in it and the other under it.

“Who's he?” she asked.

Silence descended.

But just as Raya was about to get suspicious, the giant said, “Heck, I'm your new employee. I heard you needed help out at your place, so here I am!”

Raya looked up at D.

“So it would seem,” the Vampire Hunter told her.

__

The next day, work began at Raya's house with a change of cast. Dynus was truly adaptable in his activities. And the amount of energy pent up in his body was far different from what a human could store. He set the tilting roof of the main house straight again, then filled the nearly empty woodshed and water tank with a store that would last a good three years.

“You take it easy and leave all the heavy work to me,” the giant told Raya as he peered down at her and grinned. It was the sort of smile one couldn't help but return, and though the girl's features were stiff at first, they quickly softened.

“That man—is he really a farmhand?”

“Yes,” was all D said in reply.

“But why would he come to my house? We can't even afford to pay him.”

“Apparently all he wants is enough to eat in the coming year.”

“But that's not very—”

“Let him do as he likes. These days, there are a lot of odd characters running around.”

“That'll be great for our farm, but what should I do? It's not like Mr. Brewer will let me stay here indefinitely.”

“Don't worry about him,” D said softly. “We've come to an agreement.”

That evening, the three of them returned to her home and Dynus set the severed heads of the men who'd tried to make off with Raya out in front of the speechless flesh trader.

As Brewer tipped over in his chair, D said to him, “You tried to pull a fast one, didn't you? Leave Raya on the farm until he's finished his business.”

Like a man possessed, the flesh trader had accepted D's declaration.

A week passed peacefully, and after finishing repairs on the farm, Dynus turned his energy toward expanding the fields. The western edge of their land was a wild stretch of heavy undergrowth. With a tiny hoe in his hands, the giant worked from early morning at reclaiming the ground, and by late that night he'd succeeded in turning it into rich farmland. Even the girl's alcoholic father couldn't help but watch him work.

“Let me show you something interesting,” the giant said after hearing Raya complain about how difficult it was to use the snowy roads.

Gathering the whole group on the porch, he then went out to stand about thirty feet away in the center of the front yard. There was about a foot and a half of snow on the ground.

A summer breeze stroked Raya's cheek. It was as if the very sun had landed in the yard as steam rose from the ground and the icicles fell from the eaves. If D hadn't intercepted the icy spears, Raya and Brewer—who was still around—probably would've been impaled by them. When Dynus presently appeared from the steaming mist in fine spirits, the whole yard was cleared of snow, leaving the black earth exposed. From this, it became clear that Dynus could control his body temperature and radiate heat at will.

D took that opportunity to escort Brewer back to town and sent off an express letter to the Capital. Naturally, it was to request data on any situations resembling Raya's from the library. He'd known from the very start that the other story about Raya's connection to the Nobility had been a fabrication . . .and he'd said as much when the severed heads were laid out.

“How did you know?” the flesh trader had asked, one eye bugging behind his monocle.

Of course, D hadn't replied.

“So you knew from the get-go? Then why'd you come out here to the girl's place? Vampire Hunter ‘D' shouldn't care at all unless the Nobility have shown their fangs. Yet you came out here anyway. Oh, I get it—you're sweet on the girl, are you?”

“Was there really a library?” D had asked him.

“Yes, that part was true.”

“Afterward, it'll be too late to tell me it was another lie.”

Though ice water coursed down his spine, Brewer replied, “It's true. By the way, you sure I'm not in the way here?”

“We don't have any real need for a flesh trader.”

“From time to time, you really sound like an old man,” Brewer commented. “I've already parted with the princely sum of six thousand dalas, you know. When the time comes, I have every right to take that girl to the Capital. But seeing the awkward incident we had earlier, I'm not saying she has to go right away.”

Of course, Brewer couldn't very well stay at Raya's house, but he showed up every day, grinning out in the garden or sitting inside enjoying the tea and cakes he brought just for that purpose. Oddly enough, neither Raya's father nor the girl herself seemed to harbor any ill will toward this buyer and seller of humanity.

“You're a strange fella, aren't you?” Dynus said to him somewhat suspiciously.

“That's my natural charm,” the flesh trader replied.

The northern sky clouded heavily, as if spring's eventual arrival were no more than a legend, and the snow continued to fall, stark and white, to freeze the hearts of humanity.

One day, as the white snow piled up on the colossal figure digging a new well, Raya walked up and held her umbrella over him.

“Did you actually come here to help out at my house?” she asked.

“I sure did,” the giant replied without hesitation.

“I find that hard to believe,” Raya said, training her probing gaze on the giant. “There must be tons of better jobs for you in the village. Any place would be glad to have someone like you through the winter. So, what are you doing out here at our spread?”

“Well, it was love at first sight!”

“What?!”

“No, I don't mean with you. I mean with the young fella.”

“Mister D?” Raya said, putting her hand up to her mouth and making a gagging sound.

“Hey, what's that all about? Whoever said there was something wrong with one man being smitten with another? I mean, look how gorgeous he is! The most beautiful woman in the Capital probably couldn't hold a candle to him.”

Raya got a new glint of light in her eye.

“Have you been to the Capital?”

“Nope. Can't say that I have,” the giant replied.

“But you just said—”

“I said ‘probably,' didn't I?”

“I wonder what kind of place it is,” Raya mused as she swung the umbrella to dislodge the snow that'd collected on it.

“It was the headquarters of the Nobility. That's no place for humans to be living.”

“Is it really that awful?”

“Yeah. You know, the Nobles weren't good for squat. They completely ignored what anyone else thought or felt and made all kinds of monsters. I wonder how those bastards would've liked being one of those freaks.” Then scratching his head bashfully, the giant added with a wry smile, “You get what I mean?”

“You . . . you were made by the Nobility . . .” Raya said, her voice carrying an unavoidable tremble. “So . . . why are you here?”

“The Nobility might've made me, but I've still gotta eat to survive.”

Dynus brought the hoe down. His timing must've been perfect, because he scooped a three-foot-square section clean out of the ground. He'd already gone down ten feet—the top of his head was at the same level as the ground. The hole was more than fifteen feet in diameter, and was more like a pond than a well.

Raya simply left everything to the silence of the falling snow. Though she wished the gorgeous young man were there, the figure in black had gone off to check the farm's perimeter. This was a problem she'd have to solve on her own. The hand she used to clutch the umbrella trembled a bit.

Raya bravely began, “That day . . . I had the strangest dream . . . On the day I met you, that is . . . I went underground somewhere and got hooked to these mysterious machines . . . and then I understood everything. That I . . . I'm not the real me. The other me is a scary, scary woman . . . one who lives to do battle with someone.”