'Thank G.o.d you've come.' Trajan spoke the words even as he was waking up on the couch. The rest had recharged his vitality because he added sharply, 'Why didn't you come when I telephoned earlier?'

Elmo Kigoma entered the lounge with an air of quiet dignity. 'Ben Ashton also thanked G.o.d for my appearance, but whether you'll still be thanking G.o.d in the next few minutes is another matter. Also the ritual I conducted took, by necessity, several hours. You've both slept?'

'Some.' Ben raised the blind to admit the afternoon light.

'Good, because you'll have a long night ahead of you.'

Trajan was on his feet. 'Have you seen April?'

'Ben showed her to me. The stranger, too.'

'What's happened to them?'

'They've been taken.'

'Taken?' Ben shook his head.

'Taken,' Elmo repeated. 'I was born in a village in the Congo where the fields ended the jungle began. Edshu would take people into the jungle for a while. When they came back it would always be at night, and they'd be stricken by a hysterical hunger for human blood.'

'They'd become vampires?'

'Vampire is a term used by your culture, but, broadly, that is what they are.' Elmo gazed out of the window. 'London has a population of millions. This isn't only a feeding ground for Edshu's vampires, it's a breeding ground. Those they kill are also taken away to a secret, hidden place, where the transformation has time to occur.'

'When you were asleep, Trajan, the stranger became conscious. He talked about an island in the river. He wanted to take April back there.'

'Over my dead body,' Trajan said with feeling.

Elmo shook his head. 'You might have to think the unthinkable, gentlemen.'

Trajan paced the room. 'But you're telling us that April has become a vampire?'

'For want of a better term,' Elmo said. 'Vampire is apt. They feed on blood. They shun the daylight.'

Ben frowned. 'And you're saying this trickster G.o.d, Edshu, has transformed people in order to attack the living?'

'Edshu is more sophisticated than that. His desire is for mischief. He doesn't want to destroy human beings, no, he'd rather human beings destroy one another. So in my country he would trick tribes into waging war on one another. Edshu could breathe on this city and turn it to dust and its population with it, but that isn't Edshu's way. He would rather plant in your mind the compulsion to destroy the city.'

'Then he's equal to the devil, this Edshu. He despises humanity.'

'Wrong again. The creator G.o.ds gave Edshu the task of testing human beings. If they're strong enough to survive the ordeals he inflicts then the G.o.ds will continue to protect humanity against the destruction of the species.' Elmo gave a grim smile. 'After all, what G.o.d would continue to prop up a failing species? Better to wipe them out and start again from scratch.'

Ben saw Trajan's troubled expression. 'Is Trajan's doubt one of Edshu's weapons, too?'

'Absolutely. For Edshu fear or pride or cowardice or recklessness can be a weapon that he turns against you.' His gaze appeared to casually brush against Ben. 'Jealousy, too. Jealousy is one of the most powerfully destructive emotions.'

Trajan hadn't noticed who that final comment was intended for but Ben felt its sting. Had his emotions been that transparent to the hermit?

'Imagine,' Elmo continued. 'If you go into battle with your brother at your side in the full knowledge that your brother will inherit your father's wealth. How hard would you fight to save your brother's life?'

Ben felt a stir of unease that Elmo might ask him there and then to reveal his secret feelings for April so he quickly asked, 'You've completed the ritual?'

'Yes.'

'Did it work?'

'Who knows? Only time will tell.' Elmo regarded the pair of them as they watched him with a desperate trust on their faces. 'My ritual doesn't involve the examination of chicken entrails to foretell the future. I didn't sacrifice goats. I invoke a far greater power. The power of visualization, or if you prefer, imagination. Today I lay on my bed and I imagined a scenario. I pictured my ancestors around a campfire with the G.o.ds of my village. There, my father, grandfather and all my uncles argued with the G.o.ds to persuade them to undo what Edshu has done because it's unnecessary. I pictured my grandfather, who was a huge lion of a man with copper bands around his neck and a spear that was as tall as a tree, who once drove away demons by tearing a thunderbolt from heaven and hurling it into their faces. I lay on my bed and I pictured my grandfather saying to the G.o.ds: "These people in the city are good. They work hard to build lives and protect their families. Life itself is a test for them; they don't need Edshu's mischief. So do away with these vampires. Banish them, send them away, turn them to dust, make them shadows that vanish before the sun." For hour after hour I imagined my ancestors debating with the G.o.ds. I pictured them explaining why Edshu should be sent on away, that his test of humanity is not required here.'

'But you can imagine anything you want,' Trajan protested. 'In my mind I can picture April growing wings and flying over the city. You can manipulate those images inside your head to do whatever you want.'

Elmo smiled. 'If you are honest with yourself does that really happen? You might picture the woman flying on golden wings but before you can stop yourself don't you imagine her shedding those wings and falling? Or even flying away into the arms of another man?'

Ben said, 'Okay, but did this scenario you imagined end with the G.o.ds agreeing to put an end to Edshu's tricks?'

Elmo spoke carefully. 'At the close of the debate that I visualized in my mind it seemed to me that the G.o.ds reacted favorably to my ancestors' argument, and yeta' He paused. 'And yet they observed there would be an obstruction to what we desire.'

'An obstruction?'

'A man-made obstruction,' Elmo replied. 'My feeling is that the G.o.ds wish to send Edshu on his way, and to rid the city of these vampires. Only there is a human that prevents it.'

'This visualization, as you call it, you're confident it can bring results?' Ben asked.

Elmo smacked his hand against his forehead. 'I'm at fault for not expressing my beliefs clearly enough. I'm to blame that you doubt me. Nowa sometimes a person will come to me with a problem that dogs their life. What advice can I give them when the answer is inside of them all along? So I suggest that when they retire at night they lie there and imagine they are able to converse with one of their ancestors. Perhaps a grandmother who died twenty years ago. Lie there, I tell my patient; relax, breathe slowly, then picture you are speaking with your dead ancestor. Explain your problem to them. Politely ask how it might be solved. Then allow your imagination to visualize their reply.' He walked to the door. 'Alas, we don't have time for that technique. We must resort to one that is more immediate. You'll need your courage for this, gentlemen. Quickly! Come with me.'

Elmo Kigoma led them into the bedroom. There, the stranger with gold-tipped teeth sat unconscious with his back to the wall. April still slumbered under the bed.

Elmo spoke. 'There are only a few hours of daylight left. We must act quickly.'

'What exactly?' Trajan was troubled.

'It won't be pleasant,' said the man. 'But to have even the smallest chance of saving these people you must put aside feelings of disgust.'

'We're not going to harm April?'

'She'll know nothing but you must undertake the ritual.' Elmo crouched down to regard the woman. 'I'm going to put April on the bed. As I move her don't touch me, and don't touch her. Then you must do exactly as I say.'

Ben's stomach gave a queasy roll. 'Do you need more light?'

'No, the gloom is perfect.'

Trajan's doubt manifested itself again. 'Is this really necessary?'

'Yes. Trust me.'

'I have a friend who's a doctor. He could-'

'Trajan. My beliefs and rituals are perplexing.' Elmo reached under the bed, took hold of April's arms and drew her out to the centre of the bedroom floor. 'All religions are full of perplexing self-contradictions. To many the Bible is a book of peace, yet in the Book of Exodus Jehovah gives this command: "Put every man his sword by his side, and go in and out from gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay every man his brother and every man his companion, and every man his neighbor." '

With hardly any exertion the old African lifted the unconscious woman on to the bed. As he arranged her limbs, as if to lie in state, he spoke in that gentle, sing-song voice: 'In my faith we expect our G.o.ds to test usa often they test us to destruction. To the G.o.ds everything in creation is beautiful and right, even deatha it's only human beings who judge whether events, objects and people are good or bad.' The man positioned April so she lay flat on her back in the centre of the mattress with her legs straight and her arms by her side.

He smoothed down the black dress; there was a rip in the side that revealed raw teeth marks. Her feet were bare. Even with so little light Ben saw she was still breathtakingly beautiful. Her eyes were lightly closed, and the skin around her lips had an eerie colouration as if lightly dusted with a blue powder.

Elmo touched her hair. 'Stickya Dead-bone Womana Edshu, what are your plans for her? You have your strategy, don't you? She's a sticky hair, she's your weapon against mana' When he'd placed her in position he took a deep breath. 'Gentlemen. We conduct the ritual now. As I've told you this will not be pleasant. You are going to experience disgust. Revulsion. What I ask you to do won't seem right, but for your sakes, and hers, you must do it.'

Trajan was uneasy. 'This ritual? Wouldn't it be better to perform it on the man?'

Elmo tilted his head to one side. 'You really think this ritual would be better performed with a stranger?'

'Mr Kigoma, you haven't even explained what we have to do to her.'

'I thought that would be obvious.' He beckoned them. 'Come to the bed. Therea don't touch her yet until I give the command. Nowa both of you have emotional ties to this woman.'

'I'm going to marry her,' Trajan said.

Ben clenched his fist behind his back. 'I know her very well. For yearsa' The words came out awkwardly.

Elmo smiled. 'You both care about her, I know that. Now, do not touch her, but you, Trajan, sit on the bed to her right. Ben Ashton, sit on the left.' He went to the foot of the bed where he faced them. 'Moments ago, I talked about the power of your mind to imagine. If you are to win her back to this life you must rid your minds of doubt. You must know that she is a vampire of Edshu. Just as that man there is a vampire. And that the vampires now threaten London. If you are in no doubt that you face a real enemy only then can you begin to fight back. Are you with me, gentlemen?' Elmo spoke with a fiery purpose now. 'In a moment I will count to three. On "three" you will each take April by the hand. You will only release when I command it. You are entering a whole world of danger now. You must do as I say, because I know Edshu, and Edshu loves to bring strife to humanity. Gentlemen, imagination is aided by stimulus from outside of yourself. If you smell beef roasting how easy is it to picture yourself eating it? This woman is your stimulus. When you touch her hand I want you to feel her skin, feel the contours and the texture, whether it's warm or cold. When you touch her flesh imagine what kind of life she's led over the last three days. Has she been sad? Has she known pleasure? What appet.i.te does she own? What must she do to satisfy it? Do you understand?'

Ben nodded; Trajan murmured his agreement.

'Don't be distracted,' Elmo instructed. 'Allow the feel of that skin to suggest what she has become. On the count of three, gentlemen: one, two, three.'

Ben reached out and curled his fingers about her hand the same moment as Trajan took the other. The hand he now grasped was so small and delicate. Unlike the state of her dress the skin was clean; her fingernails were perfectly shaped with no chips or marks. Whether it was his state of mind, or whether the impulses that ran along his nerves from his fingertips to his brain were blocked in a moment of self-preservation he didn't know. Yet for an entire procession of seconds he felt nothing. He could have been touching an empty glove.

'Gentlemen.' Elmo Kigoma spoke gently. 'Close your eyes. What do you see?'

Nothinga just blanka wait! Then the images came. Not a sequence that his mind generated by dint of effort, but nothing less than a lightning strike. And what dark and baleful lightning at that. Ben clenched his jaw as the images blazed.

TWENTY-SIX.

Darka darka darka Ben Ashton sat there in the room and held April's hand. His eyes were closed. He did as Elmo Kigoma told him. When he touched her cold skin he imagined what kind of life she'd lived for the last three days. No images were forced. They roared through his mind. First came darkness. Only this darkness wasn't an absence of light. This darkness was a force to be felt. In his mind's eye he saw the darkness as a power that seized April Connor to hurl her through utter blackness. She fell end over end, as if in slow motion, her arms flung out; these fingers he now touched buffeted by an elemental force.

Watera Rivera Then he saw: images of April underwater. Being swept from the islanda from willows, a derelict house. In the house lifeless figures wait for eternity. Then she's swept upstream by the tide. The depths of the Thames are black; that blackness flows through the core of her being. It gathers where her heart once beat. Darkness has the power to drive her free of the water. April finds more of her kind there on the sh.o.r.e beneath the concrete overhang. Traffic rumbles, men and women are walking. Above is normality, below on the sh.o.r.e could be the matter of h.e.l.l itself leaking out to pollute the earth. April slithers up the mud. Alongside her more of Edshu's vampires crawl from the river into the city.

And why are they venturing into the city, these creatures - sticky-hair, dead-bone creatures? These Vampire Sharkz? It is hunger that pushes them. An insane appet.i.te for what is contained in human veinsa Ben visualizes April and sees her as she walks along an urban street with her companion; the man with the gold-tipped teeth. Their eyes blaze with eerie lights. The hunger is a force that rages inside not only their bellies but in every atom of their flesh. Every part of their bodies hurt because of that craving for nourishment. When they see the drunk stumbling along beneath the street lights they race to him. In seconds they have ripped away his shirt so they can sink their teeth into bare flesh. Once they have opened the flesh they suck at b.l.o.o.d.y wounds with such bliss on their faces. The salty taste eases the pain in April's body. And as she gulps it down by the mouthful it becomes nothing less than an explosion of sheer pleasure in her stomach that sends out wave after wave of warming satisfaction through her body to her fingertips and her toes. Between downing those huge draughts of crimson she sighs. They are like the heartfelt sighs of love making. Then more of that violent gorging on blood until their victim is dry; nothing more than a cloth wrung of every last drop of moisture.

Elsewhere in London, Ben sees the vampires feeding, too. From the Serpentine in Hyde Park grey figures emerge from its waters to seize people taking a midnight stroll. They drag their shocked victims back into the water to feed; within minutes the moonlight reveals a scarlet film on the lake. More of Edshu's vampires crawl out of the sewers to claim their prize - a man who'd been stalking his ex-girlfriend didn't notice the open manhole cover in the alley way. Even before he has time to cry out a pair of cold jaws grind their teeth against his face until they break through to the hot goodness beneath. Then the vampires give something in return. They vomit contaminated blood back from their own stomachs into the victim's wound. This brings New-Life. Within hours the victims develop a craving for human blood. So the epidemic spreads. More vampiresa more victimsa more deatha more New-Lifea demon creatures with an appet.i.te that burns with all the fury of h.e.l.la A return to shadows. Although hot air crept into the room Ben held a hand carved from ice. At least that's what the chill that numbed his fingers suggested. Then he heard traffic sounds from the street outside. A horn sounded. For a moment it was all muted as Ben felt those images of vampires, gore and violence run through him; they weren't so much imagined pictures as a deadly radiation that had the power to burn the visions of the undead into his brain.

The voice of Elmo Kigoma appeared to reach out to him from faraway. 'Gentlemen. Take your hands away from April. Don't touch her again unless I tell you to.'

Ben's neck was stiff, while his shoulder ached so much he grimaced when he withdrew his hand from those icy fingers. April still lay on the bed. She hadn't moved. Her expression hadn't altered. Her eyelids were still closed.

'You saw what her eyes saw.' Elmo didn't ask a question; it was a statement of fact.

'You knew what would happen, didn't you?' Ben grimaced again as he rotated his shoulder to ease the tight muscle. 'You made us feel what it was like to be one of those things.'

'And I warned you it wouldn't be pleasant.'

'Trajan, did you experience the same thing? Trajan?'

Trajan had withdrawn his hand from April's. Yet his expression was vacant.

'Trajan.' Ben got up off the bed and walked round to him. 'Hey, Trajan. It's time to snap out of it now.'

The man's eyes were open but they were strangely dull.

'Elmo. There's something wrong with Trajan. Do you think-'

In a burst of movement Trajan leapt from the bed, grabbed hold of Ben by the shoulders and smashed him back against the wall.

'Let go of him!' Elmo tried to drag Trajan away but the man's strength was phenomenal. 'This was the risk,' Elmo panted. 'Trajan sank too deep.'

'Trajan!' Ben struggled to break free. 'Snap out of it.'

Trajan's eyes widened as they locked on to Ben's throat. He opened his mouth, then lunged his face toward the bare skin. Ben whipped his head down, so the open mouth struck his scalp; he felt the sting of the teeth as the crazed man tried to bite.

Elmo spoke calmly. 'Trajan. You're not a vampire. You're a human being. Remember who you are. This isn't your nature.'

With a grunt Ben managed to catch Trajan off balance; he toppled the guy to floor where his head whipped back against the boards. Trajan's face spasmed as the pain tore through him. Ben s.n.a.t.c.hed up a wooden chair by the leg. It felt like a club in his hand, and had all the destructive promise that went with it. In a second he'd raised it above the man's head as he groggily tried to rise to his knees. Trajan reached out a hand to steady his balance and touched the bed where he had made love to April.

Ben realized Elmo was telling him to stand back; not to strike Trajan with the chair.

Trajan touched the back of his head and grimaced as he knelt there on the floor. 'What the h.e.l.l am I doing down here?'

The image of the chair crashing down on Trajan's blond scalp was an enticing one. Ben even framed a justification for the act. Trajan's one of the vampires now. Hit him before he can attack usa When the man groaned in pain, however, that expression of human suffering dissolved the temptation to strike him. Ben set the chair down then helped Trajan to his feet.

'I'm afraid that fall opened the cut on your head,' Ben told him.

'Uha I just remember waking up on the floora Oh, my G.o.d. There was a nightmare. April was in the river. I wanted to save her but she climbed out of the water and then she just ripped into this guy with her teeth.'

'I know,' Ben said with feeling. 'I saw something like it.'

Elmo helped balance Trajan as the man swayed. 'What you both saw wasn't identical - but it's a powerful rendition of when your imagination works together with empathy, and that other element some call sixth sense.'

Trajan gave a low whistle. 'It was so vivida the vampires? For a moment I believeda' His words tailed off as he touched his head. 'd.a.m.n, that stings.'

Ben said, 'Elmo, that's a powerful mental technique you've got there. It's lucky we were only under for a few minutes.'

Elmo's brown eyes turned to him. 'Why? How long do you think you were seeing those images inside your head?'

'Five minutesa maybe ten at the most.'

The African shook his head. 'Both of you were lost in here.' He touched his own temple. 'You were gone for more than two hours.'