They crossed the lawns quickly, moving in a tight X-shaped formation; Carpenter in the middle, Turner and Frankenstein leading the way, the two privates bringing up the rear. Their boots crunched across the gravel as they approached the home of the Molnár family, and then Turner pushed open the towering front door, and the five men slipped silently into the house.
The smell was the first thing that hit them as they stepped onto the tiled marble floor of the atrium; a stench of rot so thick it felt as though you could have bitten into it. A dark haze of flies looped lazily in an open doorway at the rear of the room, and Carpenter led them toward it. Beyond the door was a large, spotlessly modern kitchen, big enough to have serviced a medium-sized restaurant. The smell intensified as they entered, waving the swarming flies away with their gloved hands. On a counter above one of the ovens, in a steel baking tray, was a leg of roast lamb. It was a virulent purple color and had swollen to almost double its size as the rot set in. The meat was leaking a milky fluid that was collecting in a thick pool in the tray, and maggots were swarming in wide crevices that had split open in the decaying flesh. Flies buzzed in a dense cloud above it, landing and taking off in a swirling pattern of shiny black bodies and translucent wings. Beside the tray stood bowls of black, liquidizing potatoes and vegetables, and a tray of crystal champagne flutes, their contents now long since flat.
Private Miller gagged, as quietly as he could.
“How long?” asked Turner, his voice as calm as ever.
“This time of year?” replied Carpenter. “A week, at least.”
The five men stood in silence, regarding the spoiled food. The likely implications for those who had been intending to eat it did not need vocalizing.
“Let’s keep moving,” said Carpenter.
The team moved into the lobby, a beautiful, cavernous space, with wooden walls and gleaming black-and-white marble tiles. Above them, a domed window let in the morning sun, lending the place a sense of peace and calm that couldn’t have been further from what the men were feeling.
In the dining room, they found the bodies.
It was more a hall than a room, a long oak-paneled hall, lined on one side by windows that overlooked the pale green grass of the lawns. A dark wood dining table sat in the middle of the room; stale bowls of bread sat on delicate serving plates in the middle of the surface, and gleaming water glasses and ornate silver cutlery stood expectantly in front of empty chairs.
A cavernous fireplace sat in the middle of the far wall and arranged around it were a number of comfortable-looking armchairs, no doubt the setting for thousands of after-dinner brandies over the years, and it was around these chairs that the Molnár family and their servants had been arranged.
There were six bodies in all. A man in his late fifties or early sixties sat in one of the armchairs, his head thrown back and his throat torn out. On his knee had been placed a girl, no more than seven years old, whose slender, pale neck bore two circular puncture marks. No other torment had been visited upon her, as far as Carpenter could see, and he felt a rush of relief at the quick death she had received, a privilege that had not been afforded the rest of the household.
The men approached slowly, although it was immediately obvious that nothing lived in this room. Their boots crunched softly as they tracked through a huge oval of dried blood, and even Turner winced at the sound. Two servants, a butler and a maid, had been laid end to end on the floor, their heads next to each other, their dead eyes staring up at the ceiling above them. Their throats had been slashed so violently that they almost appeared decapitated. Carpenter forced himself to focus on the last two victims, a boy and a girl in their early twenties. They had died with their arms around each other, huddled into one of the armchairs. The boy’s face wore an expression of defiance that brought a savage joy to Carpenter’s heart.
Good for you, boy, he thought. Didn’t give them the satisfaction. Good for you.
The girl, whose arms were wrapped tight around the boy’s neck, had clearly possessed no such steel; her face was a mask of terror and utter, hopeless misery. She had been beautiful, her face a perfect narrow oval, her hair the color of barley, her limbs long and slender. She was dressed in a ball gown made of a silver material that shimmered in the morning sunlight.
They had both been bled white. Below the girl’s shapely face, a second mouth had been opened on her throat, a savage grin of torn skin. The boy’s hands had been removed, the stumps of his arms ragged and chewed by the teeth of God alone knew how many vampires. There was not a drop of blood on either of the bodies, and it turned Carpenter’s stomach to think about where such a huge volume of liquid had gone.
“Sir.”
It was Private Miller’s voice, and Julian looked in his direction.
“What is it, Private?”
“Footprints, sir.” The young man gestured, and Carpenter followed the sweep of his arm. Several people had walked through the blood when it was still wet, toward a door set inconspicuously in the corner of the wood paneling, through which they had disappeared.
Carpenter nodded to Turner. The gray-eyed major stepped carefully forward and placed his ear against the wooden door. After a couple of seconds, he stepped back, drew the T-Bone from his belt, and kicked the door open. The frame shattered, and the door flew against a stone wall, cracking almost in two. There was a pregnant moment, then Turner stepped through the opening.
“Clear,” he said.
They stood in a narrow stone corridor, lit by an overhanging lightbulb. The walls were bare, and a worn staircase descended in front of them. Turner led them down it, his T-Bone pointing steadily before him. Carpenter drew his own weapon, motioned for the rest of the men to do the same, and followed.
After perhaps twenty steps, the floor leveled off and the passage widened into a large cellar. Shelves of dry goods lined one wall: sacks of rice and flour, barrels of olive oil and bottles of vinegar, sides of cured meat. The opposite wall was covered in a long row of floor-to-ceiling wooden racks, in which stood hundreds of bottles of wine, port and champagne. At the far end of the room, the final rack had been thrown over, smashing tens of bottles on the hard stone floor and filling the air with the strong scent of rotting fruit. They made their way through the cellar, and stopped in front of the downed rack. Behind it was an ancient carved stone arch, leading into utter blackness.
“Light,” said Carpenter.
Private Miller unclipped the torch from his belt and shone the beam into the hole. It illuminated the snarling face of a vampire, his teeth bared, his eyes crimson as he rushed toward them.
Julian wiped blood from his beard and flicked it disgustedly onto the floor.
“First guard,” said Turner, quietly.
“Agreed,” replied Frankenstein. “It’s possible they know we’re coming.”
“I don’t think so,” said Carpenter. “I think it was expecting police, or one of the family. I don’t think it raised an alarm.”
“Let’s hope you’re right,” said Frankenstein.
The team advanced into the darkness, the beams of their torches illuminating a round stone passage, moving as quietly as possible. The path led around a corner and began to widen, until they were standing in front of a heavy-looking wooden door. Carpenter motioned Connor forward, and the young private lowered his shoulder and slowly pushed it open. The hinges screamed as he did so, the door opening onto another stretch of passage. Connor stepped through it, and as the order to wait rose in Carpenter’s throat, a dark shadow fell from the ceiling, driving him to the ground. The torch beams converged, and the team watched in stunned horror as a vampire girl, who appeared to be no older than eleven or twelve, ripped his helmet from his head and sank her teeth into his neck. Connor screamed and thrashed in her grip. Blood flew in the enclosed space, splattering the walls and the floor, and when she clamped her teeth together and tore into his throat, the scream dissolved into a terrible gurgling sound.