Stake Read online

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Recent Titles by Kevin J. Anderson

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Chapter Fifty

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  Acknowledgments

  Recent titles by Kevin J. Anderson

  Novels

  SPINE OF THE DRAGON

  KILL ZONE (with Doug Beason)

  Saga of Shadows series

  THE DARK BETWEEN THE STARS

  BLOOD OF THE COSMOS

  ETERNITY’S MIND

  Great Schools of Dune series (with Brian Herbert)

  SISTERHOOD OF DUNE

  MENTATS OF DUNE

  NAVIGATORS OF DUNE

  Dan Shamble, Zombie PI series

  DEATH WARMED OVER

  UNNATURAL ACTS

  HAIR RAISING

  SLIMY UNDERBELLY

  WORKING STIFF

  TASTES LIKE CHICKEN

  SERVICES RENDERED

  STAKE

  Kevin J. Anderson

  This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  This first world edition published 2020

  in Great Britain and the USA by

  SEVERN HOUSE PUBLISHERS LTD of

  Eardley House, 4 Uxbridge Street, London W8 7SY.

  Trade paperback edition first published

  in Great Britain and the USA 2021 by

  SEVERN HOUSE PUBLISHERS LTD.

  eBook edition first published in 2020 by Severn House Digital

  an imprint of Severn House Publishers Limited

  Copyright © 2020 by Wordfire, Inc.

  The right of Kevin J. Anderson to be

  identified as the author of this work has been

  asserted in accordance with the Copyright,

  Patents Act 1988.

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

  A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

  ISBN-13: 978-0-7278-9053-5 (cased)

  ISBN-13: 978-1-78029-704-0 (trade paper)

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4483-0425-7 (e-book)

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents

  are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Except where actual historical events and characters are being described

  for the storyline of this novel, all situations in this publication are

  fictitious and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead,

  business establishments, events or locales is purely coincidental.

  This ebook produced by

  Palimpsest Book Production Limited, Falkirk,

  Stirlingshire, Scotland.

  This one, like so many others, is for Rebecca, who got me straight through the heart …

  ONE

  A dusting of early-season snow covered the gray shoulders of Pikes Peak, and aspens splashed gold along the Front Range to the west of Colorado Springs. The clear blue sky was bursting with sunlight.

  Perfect conditions for killing a vampire.

  Just after noon, the Serenity Hedge apartments felt subdued, with most people off at their day jobs. Preschoolers played on the courtyard swing set or rode plastic Big Wheels along the sidewalk, while their mothers chatted.

  No one noticed him as he approached with practiced nonchalance.

  Simon Helsing knew how to stay invisible. For centuries, vampires had used similar techniques to move unseen through everyday society. At this time of day, a vampire’s powers would be at their lowest point, but nosy observers could also pose a great threat.

  Helsing wore a gray plumber’s shirt and a Colorado Avalanche cap over his long brown hair. His battered metal toolkit held weapons rather than plumbing tools. Carrying fake work orders he had produced on a public printer down at the library, he walked with a casual confidence that told the world he was supposed to be there.

  Helsing climbed the concrete exterior steps to the second floor of the apartments, glanced again at the paperwork as if to double-check the address, though he knew full well that the creature’s lair was in #220. A hand-lettered index card permanently taped to the door said Quiet! Do Not Disturb.

  He pantomimed a polite knock, but made no noise. At the height of day the vampire would be in a deep sleep, likely having fed well the night before, and a simple knock wouldn’t wake him, but Helsing didn’t like to take chances. The job was risky enough as it was.

  After waiting an appropriate time for an answer, he got out his picks and smoothly unlocked the door, as if the building manager had given him access. He slipped into a dark, sinister apartment that reminded him of shadows and blood. After closing the door behind him, he no longer worried about being seen, but was in danger nevertheless. He froze for a moment, assessing the threat inside. His skin tingled as he sensed the brooding evil here. Yes, this was the place.

  He had adopted the name ‘Simon Helsing’ when he embraced his new mission, and it fit him like a calfskin glove. He lived entirely off the radar in Colorado Springs; it was important to maintain a quiet profile so he could do his work. Even though the members of the Bastion offered him support, and their leader Lucius shared the same mission of saving the human race, Helsing did his bloody work alone.

  After hunting the lampir – the Bosnian word for vampire – in secret for years, he had decided to change tactics. No longer did it serve his purpose, or humanity’s, to hide his crusade. People needed to know that real monsters lived unnoticed among them …

  He waited for his eye
s to adjust to the apartment’s dark interior. The curtains were made of a heavy opaque fabric, a significant upgrade from the flimsy dishrags usually found in cheap dwellings. The inhabitant had added light-blocking window shades to prevent any purifying sunlight from seeping through.

  The front room held minimal furniture – sofa, chair, coffee table, end table, lamp – austere basics that had probably come with the apartment. No pictures on the walls, little of the clutter he would have found in any normal human home.

  The place was silent as a tomb except for the faint ticking of the stove clock in the small kitchen. Helsing remained still as he peered through the gloom, discerning the door to a hall bathroom and a second mostly closed door – the room where the vampire slept during daylight.

  Before moving forward, he rested his toolkit on the sofa and opened the latch with only a muffled click. He raised the metal lid and withdrew a mallet and the wooden stake he had sharpened.

  Helsing had surveilled the target, studied his background. Mark Stallings worked as a night-time clerk in a convenience store on North Academy Drive. He had filled the night shift for three years straight and never once, as far as Helsing could tell, worked during daylight hours. More telling, according to public records, ‘Stallings’ had not existed before he moved to Colorado Springs. No previous addresses, no tax returns, not even a driver’s license in any other state. No siblings, no parents, no wives, ex or otherwise. He was alone, a cipher who drew no attention to himself so he could feed without being caught.

  Over the past three years, four separate tenants in the Serenity Hedge apartments had mysteriously vanished without giving notice or leaving a forwarding address. Helsing was convinced that Stallings had killed them and discreetly disposed of their bodies. Or maybe the victims were among the unidentified corpses burned by members of the Bastion to prevent them from turning into lampir.

  Drawing a deep breath, Helsing strengthened his resolve to move forward with his terrible work. From the kit he removed a plastic bottle of holy water filled in St Mary’s Cathedral downtown. As if it were sacred cologne, he dabbed the moisture on his face and neck, then slipped the cross on its chain over his head and adjusted it. He wasn’t sure how effective such religious trappings were, and he was not religious himself, but centuries of folklore had to have some basis in fact. The peasants near Sarajevo knew what worked, and he would accept any protection the cross might provide.

  He pulled on a pair of latex gloves and crept to the vampire’s lair with the mallet and stake in hand.

  As soon as he pushed open the bedroom door, he could smell the creature’s animal odor, possibly even rank blood from a recent victim. Stallings lay flat on his back, sound asleep in the darkened room, an indistinct silhouette under a rumpled sheet. The convenience store uniform shirt hung on a chair in front of a cheap build-it-yourself desk. Clothes lay strewn around a hamper in the corner, most of them on the floor rather than inside it.

  Stallings was utterly quiet, not snoring, sleeping as if dead. Vampires needed to breathe less than normal humans. The creature had a beard and reddish-brown hair matted with sleep. He wore dark flannel pajamas with the shirt unbuttoned, conveniently exposing his chest. His head was turned on the pillow, eyes closed.

  Three silent steps took Helsing to the side of the bed, where he loomed over the lampir. Stallings didn’t stir.

  Helsing positioned the tip of the stake directly above the sternum, and gripped the mallet like a carpenter about to pound a nail into the two-by-four. He let the sharpened point just touch the vampire’s skin. ‘You’ll never hurt anyone else,’ he whispered.

  When the wooden point touched his chest, Stallings started, blinked his eyes. ‘What—?’

  Helsing raised the mallet high and brought it down using all his strength. The point punched through the breastbone and pierced the vampire’s heart with a spurt of hot blood.

  Even before the monster began to twist and jitter, as they always did, Helsing pounded a second time with a loud crack, driving the wood all the way through the back. The stake pinned the body to the bed so that it could never again rise from the dead.

  TWO

  Alexis Tarada stared at the headline for a long moment before posting it to her website.

  BIGFOOT RAPES WOMAN IN PIKE NATIONAL FOREST

  It was by no means the most unlikely story she had run on HideTruth.com. Some would ridicule her for it, but there was a kernel of veracity, so she opted to include it for the possibility, however small, that it might be true.

  One of these days, I’m sure to be right, she thought. By now it was practically a mantra. She tucked a lock of brown hair behind her left ear in a fidgety habit and kept researching the details.

  The assault in the woods was undeniable, even if the Forest Service downplayed the sensational aspect of the story. The hiker had been attacked in the Front Range just west of Colorado Springs. Since the mystery was right in Lexi’s backyard, it caught her attention.

  The details of the incident were sketchy, which left room for interpretation. A single young woman, Holly Smith, age twenty-four, had been backpacking alone on the Ring the Peak Trail deep in the national forest. Several days after she was expected home, her sister had reported her missing. Word of the vanished hiker had sparked a flurry of stories on the local news.

  Lexi had seen the reports, but assumed the hiker had gotten lost or injured out in the forest. When three hikers accidentally came upon Smith on an isolated part of the trail, she was bloodied and bruised, hungry, terrified. She insisted that Bigfoot had kidnapped her, held her prisoner in his lair, and raped her repeatedly. The hikers brought her to safety and shared her wild story, although the victim herself had refrained from comment.

  The Bigfoot claim had piqued Lexi’s interest, though, and she dug more deeply into the case. According to police records and the appended medical report, Smith had suffered numerous scrapes, scratches, and contusions, all of which signified rough treatment. Her wrists showed ligature marks where she had been bound by a rope. Her fingernails and clothing were torn from clawing her way free. A rape kit showed evidence of recent sexual intercourse, while vaginal tearing and pubic bruising strongly suggested rape, which corroborated the woman’s story. Long, brown hairs from her assailant had been found on her; the strands would be tested for DNA evidence with the hope of searching for possible matches in the sexual predator database.

  A Forest Service spokesman downplayed the idea of Bigfoot and deflected further questions. Journalists were reluctant to ridicule or shame a victim of sexual assault. Smith had given no public statement about the sighting or the attack. In fact, the young woman’s identity would have been kept quiet, except that her name and photograph had been spread all over the news after she went missing and volunteer search parties were organized.

  Lexi herself had hiked in the nearby Pike National Forest, but only on day outings. Since she worked at home from her rental house, she could go on a weekday hike whenever she liked. The scenery of the Rockies was a far cry from her native Dubuque, Iowa.

  With all the information she could find, she posted the story to her site with a satisfying click and sat back in the chair in her home office, leaving the comments field open, knowing she would soon have a host of theories, supporting evidence, debates, skeptics, and with the vibrant traffic, a few more donations would appear in the tip jar.

  At twenty-six, Lexi was driven and independent with a small frame and straight, shoulder-length hair, currently strawberry blond. Blair, her housemate, kept suggesting she switch the color to auburn, but he thought about her hair color more often than she did.

  Before long, comments about her post began to roll in, and she tried to maintain a sense of decorum, which was sometimes difficult with the passionate HideTruth audience. Her followers claimed to be open-minded, yet often demonstrated extreme defensiveness when anyone expressed skepticism.

  As background for the Bigfoot discussion, she called up old threads about Sasquatch,
a perennial favorite, especially here in Colorado. With countless outdoor enthusiasts, hikers, hunters, and backpackers out in the wilderness, anecdotes and sightings were legion, particularly in the mountain communities around Pikes Peak. Many locals believed that something lived in the forest, but they put up with it, just as they had a live-and-let-live attitude toward it, just as they did with bears or mountain lions.

  She had found persistent reports of abandoned fire circles, remnants of large camps deep in the wilderness, stories about feral homeless groups hiding from society. Were these rumors a way to explain Bigfoot sightings without invoking any fantastical elements? One of these days, I’m sure to be right.

  As she watched, someone posted a blurry photo of what looked like a low, dark tree that had a vaguely humanoid shape. ‘Proof that Bigfoot was in my backyard!’ said SkyWatchr1. Many of the commenters in the HideTruth forum preferred avatars and screen names; few used their real identities.

  Though she was dubious, Lexi allowed the blurry photo to remain on the site. No harm done. SkyWatchr1 was a prolific poster, endlessly hopeful, even gullible. He or she had also posted pictures of odd oil stains on the driveway, speculating that the patterns meant something. PencilNeck posted an audio clip of what sounded like rushing leaves and some kind of gruff animal undertone deep in the background, claiming it, too, was proof of Bigfoot.