Brass Neck: Book 3 of the Saddleworth Vampire Series Read online

  BRASS NECK

  BOOK THREE OF THE SADDLEWORTH

  VAMPIRE SERIES

  Brass Neck by Angela Blythe

  Book 3 of the Saddleworth Vampire Series.

  First Edition.

  Copyright 2018 Angela Blythe. All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher, except as permitted by U.K. copyright law.

  Please contact me for details of future books at http://www.angelablythe.com

  Published by Willow Publishers.

  Cover Illustration and Design Copyright 2018 by Dark Grail https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/DarkGrail

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Other books in the Saddleworth Vampire Series

  Sticky Valves

  Silver Banned

  Table of Contents

  1 – Church

  2 – Tripe

  3 - Little Michael

  4 - Parents

  5 - Doomed

  6 - Barricade

  7 - Unconsecrated

  8 - Smashed

  9 - Nuts

  10 - Hardware

  11 - Vigilante

  12 - Training Band

  13 - Parade

  14 - Bell

  15 - Bite

  16 - Cellar

  17 - Rescind

  18 - Familiar

  19 - Ernie

  20 - Changes

  21 - Run

  22 - Slug

  23 - Bad Ass

  24 - Refuge

  25 - Match Girl

  26 - Mill

  27 - Marmalade

  28 - Enriched

  29 - Big Willies

  30 - Upside Down

  31 - Brass Neck

  32 - Tunnel

  Brass Neck

  1 – Church

  It was mid-morning – this was now the time that they went to bed. It had been a long night, and they stunk of petrol, and fire and death. Joe added another couple of marks on the wall in marker pen, another seven lines to the five bar gates he was making. Now there were six groups of five exactly. It was Craig’s house. He had told him it was okay. Exhausted but content, they drifted off, either going over the previous night's triumphs or planning tonight’s escapades.

  Rick was pleased with how it had gone down. About 8 pm the previous night, he had spied the two vampires entering the cold and lonely home. They suspected that it was vampire footprints that they had spotted, not human. Fresh footsteps made at night after a snowfall. The four of them had listed the houses, and now it was time to check this one out. The two creatures dragged a dead old man behind them. An actual old man. This was their nest, they weren’t up for sharing with the others. It was too late to save him. That was clear. In fact, they could be saving him from a fate worse than death. Maybe they would be turning him. Making some kind of unholy trio.

  Rick trained his binoculars on the creatures. They needed no light as they entered the house. He wondered if it had been one of their homes. It was clear they had been using it for a while.

  He put down his binoculars and rubbed his eyes. This was normality. Life was a day to day slaughter of the undead. Until they were gone, Rick would carry on.

  ‘Right Joe, we’re up. There’s two of them, just gone in. With a victim.’

  ‘Whole?’

  ‘Yeah, so we need to check him out. I think there’s a possibility we could have to slay three of them.’

  Joe moved Darren’s foot with his boot.

  ‘Lazy arse, get up and bring your lighter,’ Joe said. Craig was already awake. He watched the street below, whilst Rick had been on his binoculars. It wouldn’t do for them to be spotted up here.

  They put their coats on and picked up the weapons. Opening the door, Joe looked both ways before coming out and beckoning the others. This was always the most dangerous part. There could be any number of them walking about. This was the time they were the most active – after their long sleep. The men couldn’t wait for them to get sleepy just before dawn, however. That would mean they could only sort one nest at a time. At the rate they multiplied, that would never work.

  The road was clear – they quickly crossed it and went over to the shelter of the garden opposite. The house they needed to get to was the other side of this, and there was no way through the gardens. The four of them would have to be out in the open for between five and ten minutes. Walk down the street, on the pavement, round the corner and back up the other street. Vulnerable but it had to be done.

  As quickly as possible, they moved along the road, single file, against the hedges, on full alert. Before they knew it, they were there. Success.

  Banging and moaning could be heard inside. These days, the suckers didn’t have to hide. Being silent wasn’t as much fun. They weren’t checking the windows, they never did. Why should they when they were the top of the food chain?

  The four men moved up the path. Joe used a series of hand movements now that they had devised. He told Darren to stay by the front door outside. They would try to run, these creatures always did. They weren’t set up for battle. Usually caught unawares they had done their fighting for the night, got their meal and were now absorbed in their work.

  These creatures were in the back of the house. Rick had seen them. Joe hoped to pick at least one off before they got to the front and the prospect of the human roadblock that was Darren.

  Joe held his axe ready, Craig had a pickaxe. Rick opened the door, and they rushed inside. He followed with two knives. The two creatures were in the kitchen above their prey. One knelt and fed from one arm of their victim, the limb lifted for easy eating. The other knelt too, but he was leaning forward, his head buried in the old man’s stomach. He was chewing on something gristly in there, and it made a squeaking noise. His head was facing away from the door as he had turned it to use his back teeth on the tough old man. The burrowing vampire didn’t see them, but the limb eater did.

  He gave an almighty scream and leapt up. The other vampire, in a feeding frenzy of orgasmic proportions, didn’t move. Joe buried his axe in the limb eater’s chest, and he ran forward. Craig caught him in the skull with the pickaxe, his eyes rolled towards the strange object that now stuck out of his head at the side. Craig’s pickaxe was stuck. It was far better to swing than Joe’s axe, but it nearly always got wedged in somewhere. Rick stepped forward with the two huge knives. He crossed his arms, then drew the blades sharply across the vampire’s throat, the soft flesh yielding effortlessly. The monster was now three-quarters decapitated. Craig pulled his pickaxe back and twisted, swinging it out. This successfully ripped off the head and removed it from the pickaxe. The vampires head flew in the corner, the teeth gnashing for the briefest moment.

  Now the burrowing, gnawing vampire finally noticed and jumped up to a squatting position. There seemed to be an area in the corner where the vampires had been urinating, and this is where the limb eaters head had landed. In a massive pile of black vampire piss. The burrower scuttled across to the corner, with its friend’s head, it screamed and clicked its tongue. It was calling for help.

  In two strides Joe was upon him, the axe coming down once, expertly and finally. The squatting body relaxed. The legs languidly sliding forward on the pool of black filth. Darren ran into the back. He could tell by the noises that two of them had been slaughtered.

  ‘How are we doing?’ He asked.

  ‘Two down. They
weren’t turning this one. Poor bastard.’ Craig said.

  Darren looked down. Entrails were pulled up over the man's face where the burrower had discarded them. It looked like he was ashamed to be found in this state of disarray. Hiding his eyes behind his intestines.

  ‘Torch it, Darren. The whole lot. Before they come,’ Joe said solemnly. Darren was in charge of that part, he knew the best places to put the petrol. The curtains, the bed, the sofa. That was all he had to do. He set them off one by one, joining the other three outside.

  ‘Where’s the next one?’ Craig asked.

  ‘There’s one near the bottom of Springmeadow Lane. That’s an obvious one. We’ll do that next. I’ve got a spy hole,’ Rick said.

  ‘Eyes peeled on the way,’ Joe said.

  Lisa wished she had a dog. Yes, it might draw their attention to her, if it barked, but it would also bark if their attention had already been attracted to her. As it was, she had a whole tank of tropical fish and cat, who was always out. Not much good.

  She was holding out. Help would come. It had to. What other options did she have? She hadn’t seen anyone living for a couple of weeks. There had to be other people. She just knew there were. Living exactly like her. Dividing their food up. Keeping their lights off at night. She had braved a local delicatessen twice. Gone out through the back garden, jumped over a couple of low fences, pushed through someone else’s hedge, then out on another street. Hopefully, that was enough to put them off her scent or not track her footprints in the snow. And they hadn’t. She had brought back as much as she could. The cold meats were all off now, but there were copious amounts of olives, which luckily, she liked. There was chocolate and luscious ground coffee in bags.

  Tonight, it looked like her luck had run out. Either they had tracked her back to here, or just by chance, they had found her. In the dark, she had been watching through the upstairs window. What else was there to do? She never made noise. The television or radio would never go on at night, she didn’t to attract them by sound. She didn’t even flush the toilet at night.

  Lisa didn’t really know what attracted them, was it noise, or smell? Or both. Could they even smell or hear? Maybe they just hunted by sight or heat from a house. Every day was a blessing. A day nearer to a rescue.

  The lone vampire came up her path and sniffed the air. So, they could smell. He purposely moved forward. His head raised ever so slowly. He pointed upwards at her, then removed his backpack. It wriggled. Opening it quickly so she could see, he shut it again and smiled a humourless smile and shook the backpack. Lisa’s cat howled inside it. He beckoned with one finger. She came.

  When she woke up, she was in a dark room. Lisa was quite sure that she wasn’t a vampire. She was breathing and was desperate to use the loo. She moved her hands, to raise herself. They were tied to a bed. Her wrists and her feet. A needle and clear pipe came from her inside elbow. There was no-else in the room. Lisa relieved her bladder. She had no choice.

  As Wee Renee’s group, the remainder of Friarmere Band, walked up to the church, they squinted against the sun that had risen behind the building and was now blinding them. The trees twinkled, ice-kissed. The sun shone through the crystals, a rainbow of tiny lights across the virgin snow. The footprints still undoubtedly led to this place.

  After the silence of Friarmere, they could now hear the distant sound of children’s voices. The friends were tired and would be glad to be inside. Terry was the first to see faces looking out of the stained-glass windows. Adult faces, that he did not recognise. They continued for a few more steps towards the building before they observed some movement and heard noise from inside the church. The large iron hasps began to turn, and the massive church doors swung open. Standing in the entrance, champing at the bit to get out were their old friends. Sue, Liz and Laura ran out to the group to help them with their luggage. Andy and Danny stood at the door grinning.

  ‘What are you doing here so soon?’ Sue asked as she hugged them all.

  ‘That’s for telling over a pot of tea,’ Pat said. ‘Let me get in and rest my trotters.’ The whole party went inside, dragging the sledges with their contents up the icy stone steps. Andy and Danny came behind them, shutting the cold and danger outside.

  ‘We’re so pleased to see everyone’s safe,’ Wee Renee said breathily. The warmth of the church immediately flushed her cheeks. All of a sudden, they felt hot and began to disrobe. None of the new group had noticed that Carl and Gary were missing. The church smelled slightly of furniture polish, wood and strongly of wet children and old hymn books.

  As well as everyone they knew, there were the children, twenty-four to be exact, and four other people inside. One of these was St. Dominic’s Vicar, Father Philip. Terry asked where he should put the sledges and Our Doris said she needed somewhere she could put Haggis’s bed, food bowl and water. Father Philip told her to lay it all underneath the font, which was currently adorned with an evergreen arrangement for the festive season. Our Doris got to work instantly and began to take Haggis’s coat off. Bob came to help her as he had missed Haggis. Haggis for his part was quite confused but immediately recognised Bob, so became excited and very licky. The new group looked weary. Laura could tell something terrible had happened to her friends after leaving them in Melden.

  ‘Not to be rude, but I could murder a cup of tea,’ Pat said.

  ‘Oh, and me,’ Kathy added.

  ‘I’m sorry, we can’t offer you tea. We’ve run out. But we have coffee,’ Tina said.

  ‘I’ll have a mug of that then, please.’ Pat said sniffing.

  ‘Coffee for everyone?’ Tina asked cheerfully. They all nodded to her saying, yes, please. ‘And a biscuit?’

  ‘Have you got anything a bit more hearty?’ Wee Renee asked. Tina looked down.

  ‘We have run out of everything but biscuits, just this morning. I was going to try and go on a shop run in a bit,’ Liz said. Then in a lower voice, she said, ‘kids can’t half get through some stuff.’

  ‘We’ve bought some food from the shop. We couldn’t fit loads on though because the sledges were pretty full already,’ Kathy advised Liz.

  Tina put the kettle on, and the new guests sat down. Our Doris instantly had to tell some children not to start chasing Haggis round the church, which upset them.

  ‘He’ll widdle everywhere if you do that!’ Our Doris shouted. Pat laughed, but Tina flared her nostrils over the coffee cups as she filled them. Her lips were very tight, and she had angry spots on her face. Laura noticed this and gave a wry grin. It didn’t look like Tina was impressed with Our Doris at all. She seemed to have taken offence to the word widdle, although there were worse words for it.

  The other ladies from the church and Father Philip decided to try and occupy the children again after the excitement of the new arrivals and the dog. They got crayons, paper and glitter out of some drawers and began to tell the story of the journey to Bethlehem.

  All the travellers sat as comfortably as they could on church pews and were given their drink and a rich tea biscuit. It was quite warm inside the church, and after taking off their coats, they now had to take off their cardigans and sweaters.

  Kathy and Sally were happy to see each other and wouldn’t leave each other’s side. Kathy had wound herself up all the way about something happening to her sister, so there was a general outpouring of tears and emotion from her. Sally was fussing around Terry, asking how he felt, if he was tired and how the antibiotics were working.

  ‘Oh, we’ve had a horrible time,’ Kathy told her sister. ‘But I will let you hear the whole story. Looking back, I don’t know how we got through it,’ Kathy said, her eyes full of tears.

  Sally had been worried about her sister and father in Melden. She thought now, they had experienced even worse than she had imagined. Wee Renee congratulated Sue on her choice of sanctuary, which she felt was safe, warm and well away from the road. An excellent decision! Sue felt unexpectedly touched to have been praised by Wee Renee.

 
‘I always knew Bob, got his brains from your side, Sue,’ Wee Renee said. Excitedly and without being asked, Bob began to tell the new additions about the confrontation with Adam and how he was no longer human.

  ‘We are surprised that he is even that. We were told by a certain person after you left, that Adam and all the other children had been eaten up by the old band!’ Wee Renee informed them.

  ‘You were told that he was dead? By Anne? No, he’s definitely a bloodsucker. Either she was lying, or Norman had lied to her,’ Andy said.

  ‘Aye, she said they were all pushing up the daisies,’ Wee Renee said.

  ‘Where was the bugger?’ Pat asked.

  ‘Sitting on the stage in the school, in the dark. Adam was so white he was nearly luminous,’ Bob replied. ‘He’s become quite cocky.’

  ‘I bet he has!’ Our Doris said. ‘Cocky seems to be one of the personality traits of these suckers!’ She was currently putting her cowboy boots upside down on the radiator to dry out.

  ‘I’ll knock that out of him!’ Pat commented.

  ‘I think it’s all talk though,’ Bob said, who continued to tell them how he had asked the children if Adam had bitten them or any of the others. From what the school children in their care had told him, Adam was strictly forbidden to bite them. He had to look after them in fact, and keep them away from the blood-drinking vampires. Bob admitted he was quite proud of Adam for that, no matter what else he was up to.

  ‘In the whole scheme of things then, he’s a good egg,’ Wee Renee concluded.

  ‘Tell us then, why have you come back so soon? What happened?’ Sue asked.

  ‘I’ll have a swig of my coffee first then you’ll hear the whole tale,’ Wee Renee said. She took a sip, stopped, raised her eyebrows and quickly took the cup away from her lips, placing it back down beside her.

  ‘Have you got any squash?’ She asked. Our Doris frowned and took a sip.

  ‘It’s bloody Camp Coffee!’ Our Doris exclaimed.

  ‘Of all the dirty tricks!’ Pat said.