“Too . . . late.”

Jamie looked round, and saw Alexandru’s remaining eye looking at him. The vampire’s mouth was twisted into a ghoulish approximation of a smile, and he was trying to speak again. Jamie leaned down next to the swollen, broken mouth and listened.

“Too . . . late,” Alexandru said again and laughed, a tiny grunt that was full of pain. “He rises. And everyone you love . . . will die.”

Jamie looked down at the old vampire, then yawned, extravagantly, throwing his head back and squeezing his eyes shut. When he had finished, he smiled down at Alexandru, who was looking at Jamie with dying outrage on his face.

Then Jamie raised the stake above his head, held it for a long moment, and hammered it into the vampire’s beating heart.

A column of blue fire shot out of the organ as Jamie’s stake pierced it. The chapel hall shook as a tremor thudded through it, then what was left of Alexandru exploded in a series of deafening thunderclaps, blood thudding into the air in great bursts that splashed across Jamie and onto the stone floor around him.

Jamie stared for a long moment, then closed his eyes and slumped to his knees. Frankenstein, Larissa, and the rest of the Blacklight team ran toward him, but before they were even halfway there, Marie Carpenter leapt down from the platform, slid to the blood-soaked floor, and wrapped her arms around her son.

47

THE HUMAN HEART IS A FRAGILE THING

Six figures made their way slowly out of the Lindisfarne monastery, as the first glow of the imminent dawn began to creep over the horizon to the east. Jamie and Frankenstein had each placed an arm under Marie Carpenter’s shoulders and were helping her across the thick grass that covered the cliff tops. Kate and Larissa walked side by side, a comfortable silence between them. The Blacklight operator brought up the rear, his weapon still set against his shoulder, his visor sweeping slowly from left to right.

On the headland above the monastery stood a Blacklight helicopter, its angular shape a dark silhouette against the coming dawn. The pilot who had delivered Frankenstein and the two operators to Lindisfarne was standing at the cockpit door, his MP5 drawn. He lowered it as they approached, and a smile broke across his face.

Frankenstein went to the man, and they embraced, laughter echoing in the predawn air, the simple laughter of men who are glad to be alive. Jamie let go of his mother, reluctantly, and shrugged his weapons and body armor to the grass. He stood up and stretched his arms above his head; he felt lighter than he had at any point since his father had died. Then Larissa pressed herself against him and kissed him. He hesitated for a moment, knowing his mother and his friends were watching, but then he gave in, and kissed her back. They broke the embrace, and Jamie flushed a deep red, looking around at the grinning faces of the survivors.

The operator lifted his helmet and rotated his head, his neck creaking as the muscles relaxed. His face was pale, but his eyes were alive with adrenaline, and he smiled at Jamie. The teenager’s heart leapt as he found himself looking into a familiar face.

“Terry?” he said, a smile creeping over his face.

The Blacklight instructor grinned, then stepped forward and wrapped Jamie up in a crushing hug. “You did it,” he whispered into the teenager’s ear. “You really did it.”

He released his grip, and Jamie stared at him, overcome. “What are you doing here?” he asked. “I don’t understand.”

“Frankenstein told me you were in trouble,” Terry replied. “And I don’t get many chances to put on the old uniform.”

He smiled warmly at Jamie, but the teenager’s mind was already elsewhere.

Frankenstein.

Jamie looked over at the monster and was about to ask him for a word in private when a voice shouted his name. It was Kate who called out, and when he turned toward her, panic spilled through him like ice. She was kneeling on the ground beside his mother, who was convulsing.

He ran to her, sliding to the ground next to Kate. He grabbed his mother’s shoulders and tried to slow her thrashing. Her head was whipping from side to side, her long hair fanning out around her, her arms and legs drumming the grass.

“What happened?” yelled Jamie.

Kate looked at him, a frightened expression on her face.

“I don’t know,” she replied. “She just fell down. I was holding her arm, and she just fell down.”

Frankenstein, Larissa, Terry, and the pilot were suddenly next to him, helping him hold his mother, demanding to know what had happened. Then Marie’s head suddenly jerked up, and she looked round at them with crimson eyes.

Jamie’s heart stopped, as Kate screamed and Larissa gasped in shock.

Oh, no. Oh, please no. Not this. Not after I’ve got her back. Please, not this.

“I’m sorry!” screamed Marie. “I’m so sorry, Jamie! I’m sorry!”

There was movement as the pilot fumbled the stake from his belt. Without thinking, Jamie pulled his Glock pistol from its holster and leveled it at the man’s head. For a second, no one moved, until Jamie found his voice.

“Get some blood from the medical pack in the helicopter,” he said. “Do it now.”

The pilot backed away, his eyes locked on the barrel of Jamie’s gun, and then turned and ran to the helicopter. He returned less than a minute later, holding a plastic pouch of O-negative blood.

Jamie snatched it out of his hands, tore it open, and pressed the opening to his mother’s mouth, as if he was feeding a baby. Her head was twisting slowly from side to side, her eyes were closed, and she was moaning gently, but her mouth latched on to the plastic nozzle.

He turned away as his mother drank the blood.

He couldn’t watch her do it, couldn’t bear to see her reduced to this. When the pouch was empty, he cast it aside and looked down at her. She was staring up at him with the pale green eyes he recognized, a look of terrible, painful shame on her face. He reached toward her, but she scrambled away from him, pushing the restraining hands from her body, and jumped to her feet. He tried to go to her again, his arms outstretched, ready to hug her, ready to let her know that he didn’t care what had happened to her, she was still his mother and he still loved her. But she turned her back on him.

“I don’t want you to see me like this,” she whispered. “I’m revolting.”

“You’re my mom,” said Jamie.

He saw her shoulders heave as she began to cry, and he stood there helplessly, without the slightest idea of what to do. He looked around at Frankenstein, who was watching Marie with a solemn expression on his face. The monster caught his eyes, but he said nothing. Larissa stood with her hand over her mouth, her eyes wide and wet. In the end, it was Kate who moved.

The teenage girl stepped slowly over to Jamie’s mother and placed an arm carefully around her waist. She crouched and leaned around so she could see her tear-stained face and spoke to her in a low voice.

“Mrs. Carpenter?” she said. “My name’s Kate. I lived here on Lindisfarne until Alexandru and the others came. I’d probably be dead if your son hadn’t rescued me.”

Jamie felt his heart swell with gratitude as he heard a small laugh of pride escape from his mother’s mouth.

“He’s a good boy,” Marie said, softly. “And you’re a kind girl.”

“Do you want to go and wait in the helicopter?” asked Kate.

She nodded, and let herself be led slowly to the chopper. She kept herself turned away from Jamie and the other survivors as she moved, then stepped carefully into the black vehicle. Larissa watched them go, a flicker of jealousy pulling at her heart, and she chastised herself for it.

Jamie stared after his mother, his exhausted mind unable to comprehend what he had seen.