The blood came into her like living fire, like a flower opening in her gut. Then came the bittersweet flavor that followed the blood, that meant that the organs had also given up their fluids.

She got off him, sat on the bedside and lit one of his cigarettes. Taking a long drag, she enjoyed the sensation of absorbing his life. The males and females felt quite different. After consuming a woman, you had a ferocious sort of an energy in you. You felt as if you could tear the world in half. A man left the flavor of his strength. You got a heady, hard-edged high from testosterone.

She got up and strode to the window. The healthier they were, the more you got from them, and this creature had been very healthy. Her face got hot, her body flushed warm and pink.

She went over to the mirror and touched the reflection of her face. She had been a woman before; now she was a girl, fresh as dew, her eyes sparkling and innocent.

Still enjoying the taste of blood that lingered in her mouth, she rifled through the man's clothing. She'd get his money, then dispose of the remnant and go straight to the airport. She could still make her Paris flight. The European clan was not as big as the Asian, but it was wise and ancient, not like the adventurous Americans. Europe had fixed the Transylvania situation by transforming true vampire lore into myths and stories. Europe would know what to do.

She drew a fat brown wallet out of his hip pocket and tossed it open. Poor wife, smiling so desperately, will you miss this man or feel relief that he has gone? And here were children - d.a.m.n!

She was furious with herself for looking at the pictures. She never looked at the d.a.m.n pictures! She held the weathered print of the kids, wondering how old they were, poor little things. She stuffed it back into the wallet, pressing it deep into one of the pockets.

It was then that she noticed a rather strange card. At first, she thought that it might be a Thai driving permit, but when she looked more closely, she found that it was very far from that.

Lying in her hand was an identification card. She stared at it, reading it carefully. It was in French, English, and Chinese, not Thai at all.

The sunken husk lying on that bed over there, now nothing but forty pounds of bones and drum-tight skin lost in a pile of sheets, was no innocent Thai businessman. Lying there were the remains of Kiew Narawat, police inspector with Interpol.

Her breath came short, her skin grew hot and dry. She felt dizzy, her bowels threatened to let go. She threw on her clothes, settled her wig on her head, and applied a smear of lipstick to reduce the glow of her fire-red lips. Going deep into her purse, she pulled out three yellow-and-black bennies and threw them down her gullet. Sleep would drag at her now, but she must not let it come, not until she was in her plane in her seat and covered with a blanket.

Forgetting the remnant lying on the bed in full view, forgetting everything except escape at any and all cost, Miriam Blaylock made a mistake of spectacular proportions, one that she had not made in three thousand years upon the earth. Indeed, it was a mistake so rare that it could bring a Keeper the penalty of confiscation of property.

So distressed was she by the events of the past few hours - the discovery of the disaster in Chiang Mai, and now this horrible discovery, so loaded with dreadful implications - that she left the remnant where it lay.

There was only one thought in her mind: Get out of here. She hurried into her clothes, barely even stopping to see if she had left any of her possessions behind, and took a taxi straight to the airport.

THREE.

Hunter of Hunters.

When Paul Ward had first realized what the confused Interpol e-mail was about, he'd felt as if the entire Petronas Towers complex were about to topple into the streets of Kuala Lumpur. But the towers were fine. Only his program had collapsed.

Jesus G.o.d, he screamed silently, they were like roaches. He had cleared them out of the whole continent, sanitized it. And now, instead of cleaning out his office in Kuala, preparing for departure to the States and the start of the endgame against them, he was racing through the streets of Bangkok in this clanking old emba.s.sy Caddy.

Paul Ward was dealing with one smart breed of animal. How smart, he had just plain not understood, not until now.

He pressed himself against the seat of the limo, instinctively keeping his face in shadow. It was always possible that they knew him, he thought, that they would recognize him. He watched the people thronging the streets and wondered if Bangkok, or any city, would look the same if its inhabitants knew that predators a thousand times more dangerous than the tiger or the shark might be walking just behind them.

The d.a.m.ned thing of it was, he'd even run his traditional victory celebration, with all the traditional goodies, stolen in all the innovative ways that his crew could come up with. There had been a couple of cases of Veuve Clicquot borrowed from the Surete outpost in Ho Chi Minh City, a couple of cases of beluga borrowed from the KGB in New Delhi, and a whole bunch of dancing girls who came to the crinkle of the dollar - counterfeits made in Myanmar and borrowed from Pakistani intelligence by the redoubtable Joe P. Lo, who could steal venom from a cobra.

They'd been saying good-bye to the General East Asia Pest Control Company. Good-bye and good riddance to their ironically named front organization. This had been a miserable, exacting, a.s.signment, and an extremely dangerous one. Will Kennert, Addie St. John, Lee Hong Quo, Al Sanchez - these were just a few who'd died fighting the vampires.

If he hadn't needed to be totally and completely centered for the task ahead, he would have told the driver to stop at a bar. He'd go in and suck sacred Stolichnaya like a Russki at the nipple of his still. He'd get a ma.s.sage that lasted all night. Ma.s.seuses in relays. Every sin he could think of and - thanks to being in good old Bang-yer-c.o.c.k - some he probably couldn't.

"G.o.dd.a.m.nit!" he suddenly said aloud.

"Sir!"

The driver didn't know that he talked to himself. Why would he? People didn't know Paul Ward, not even emba.s.sy people. They weren't supposed to. "Sorry, son."

The flight from Kuala had exhausted him - just sitting in that d.a.m.n seat, waiting through what seemed an eternity. He'd tried the phone, but it hadn't worked. The Gulf of Thailand was still an empty corner of the world. He hated empty places, dark places. He hated small places even more. Recurring nightmare: he comes awake, starts to sit up in bed, and wham, wham, his forehead hits something with such force that he sees stars. Then he realizes that the air is heavy with his own breath and he can't sit up without braining himself. He knows, then, that he is in a coffin. his forehead hits something with such force that he sees stars. Then he realizes that the air is heavy with his own breath and he can't sit up without braining himself. He knows, then, that he is in a coffin.

He knew a CIA guy called Richie Jones, who'd run afoul of the Khmer Rouge and been buried alive. Somebody who'd been in that prison compound had reported that you could hear him screaming for about half an hour. From Ohio State to a lonely hole in the jungles of Cambo. Had Mr. President ever been told about Richie? Had Mr. Director of Central Intelligence known or cared? Weep a tear for the Buckeye state, for it has lost a son.

To die the way covert ops died in the field, d.a.m.n hard and d.a.m.n alone - Jesus G.o.d, pa.s.s the bottle. And to do what he and his crew were doing, to live the way they were living, chasing these monsters in the sewage and the filth of some of the world's most terrible cities, getting yourself eaten if you weren't careful - Jesus G.o.d, pa.s.s the bottle again.

He was tired. They were all tired. It had been a hard operation, soaked in the blood of fine men and women. And what a death. It'd be better to be buried alive by a bunch of twelve-year-old Khmers with AK-47s and dead eyes, than to be stung in the neck by one of those filthy things.

Long before he'd been forced to come back, Asia had been a place he wanted to put behind him. Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, 1971 to 1973. In those days, life had less value than dirt out here, especially American life, and most especially the life of a clean-cut CIA virgin with a buzz haircut and wire-framed gla.s.ses. He had made it through the Parrot's Beak ma.s.sacre when Danny Moore had been pulled apart between two backfiring tractors. He had lived through six weeks in a bamboo cell with nothing but roaches and rats for food, while Betty Chang was methodically raped to death and George Moorhouse starved. He had survived because he was too ugly to rape and so cussed that he could crack rats and drink 'em, blood, guts, and all.

He fumbled in the little cabinet that was supposed to be stocked with booze. "Got any vodka in this thing?"

"No, sir."

Of course not. A CIA officer didn't rate booze in his car. This was the U.S. Government. The foreign service kid driving this thing outranked him by a d.a.m.n country mile. The kid and the limo had appeared at the airport only because there hadn't been time to find a conveyance s.h.i.tty enough for a CIA field officer. Had he been from State, there would have been booze and ice both.

"The G.o.dd.a.m.n b.a.s.t.a.r.ds."

"Sir?"

"Nothing."

Paul wished they'd sent a girl driver. He wanted the scent of a woman in this car. He wanted, he thought, what all men want. He wanted deliverance.

He closed his eyes. Instantly, he saw an old and hated vision, the prairie gra.s.s dancing in the moonlight. He opened them again. He could not go there, no. Better to stay with the wartime memories or the memories of sterilizing those filthy dens with acid. How in h.e.l.l was it that these things looked so much like people? How had they evolved? Had G.o.d gone nuts?

The prairie gra.s.s dancing in the moonlight, his curtains billowing with moon wind, and in the distance, the most beautiful voice singing: that was the beginning of a life woven from nightmares.

Paul slapped his breast pocket. Pillbox in position. He'd take two tonight, maybe three. Black sleep, please.

"s.h.i.t," he said softly, and then, "s.h.i.t!" louder.

"Sir?"

This kid would chatter that he'd had to drive a muttering old crazy man to the Royal Orchid Hotel, and then he'd try to find out just who this VIP third cla.s.s was.

He would not find out.

The State Department could not tell anyone about Paul Ward because they could not tell anyone about the vampire project. If they did that, they would also have to explain that humans are not at the top of the food chain, that we are prey, legitimate prey, just as nature intended. What is worse, they'd have to explain that the predator is d.a.m.n clever and has evolved some very remarkable camouflage. The predator, you see, looks just like you. Except that his skin is as pale the light of an October moon, and he will sing to you and dance for you, and comfort you in his arms while he kills you. As far as looks are concerned, you can't tell the difference between a vampire and your postman or your doctor, or your own d.a.m.n brother.

No involved division of any involved government had questioned the secrecy of this operation.

He stared balefully at the back of a stopped truck. Was it parked, or what?

"Can't you hurry?"

"Sir, this is Bangkok."

"Mind if I drive?"

"You want to drive, sir?"

"I need to get there before dark, for Chrissakes."

"Look at the street!"

"Son, excuse me, but get me there now!"

The car shot forward, slamming up onto the sidewalk. An enraged pedestrian hammered the window as they smashed through a food cart.

"You d.a.m.n fool! That was that guy's rice bowl!"

"You told me to!"

"I didn't tell you to hurt people." Above all things in the world, Paul hated to hurt. He would put a fly out the window rather than swat it. He would watch quietly as a mosquito gorged on his blood, then brush it off when he thought it was getting greedy.

Ironic, in a man who had killed so much. When he slept at night, his legions of dead would steal near: the kids who'd died in the dark corners of Vietnam, the victims of the vampires, the crew members who had not returned. They would call to him; they would stroke him with their cool hands; they would beg him to return them their lives.

He would wake up awash in sweat and choking with terror and regret. He would go to the brutal light of the bathroom as to an altar afire with candles, and gulp the pills of oblivion. Black sleep.

Asia had made him love certain very bad things, chief among them opium. Better than hash, better than gra.s.s, better than c.o.ke or any of the new designer drugs, far better than the brute high you got off horse. Opium was a deep pleasure, something wonderful that connected earth and soul. It made you feel at peace with the eternal world. He loved the mechanisms of an opium high: the long pipes, the sweet vapor, even the tickly lice in the greasy old sheets of today's few real opium dens.

Paul Ward had sunk deep and sinned hard. Why not, my friends? Tomorrow we die.

Well, that was what they'd thought back in the seventies, listening to Kissinger on Armed Forces Radio. It had seemed hard then, before he knew about vampires, but it had really been easy.

The Jungle Jamboree. No way could you do opium then. He who tripped died.

Still true now, at least for him and his crew. Killing vampires was horribly dangerous. They were quick, so quick that they could throw a knife at nearly the speed of a bullet.

They could not be killed with normal gunfire. You could empty the biggest, most evil weapon in your a.r.s.enal right into one of the d.a.m.n things and it would just stare at you with its deceptively calm eyes, waiting for your bullets to run out. You had to destroy the head.

If you cut them open after they'd fed, they would gush blood like exploded ticks.

The Book of Names had identified twenty-six vampires in Asia. He and his crew had burned out or poisoned or dismembered twenty-four vampires in Asia, and found the remains of two ruined lairs, creatures that had lost their lives on their own.

Accidents happened even to vampires. They weren't perfect. Statistically, if you live long enough, you will meet with some sort of accident. That was their disease - statistics.

That's why vampires did not travel. They were highly territorial and obsessed with accidents. So the trick was to kill them all in a given area as quickly as you could, then move on before the others realized that they were gone.

Paul's next target was going to be Europe. There were many references to Paris in the Book of Names. He'd been looking forward to working out of Paris. Not that he disliked Kuala, but he could use a little less humidity and a little more familiar beauty around him. The Musee Marmottan with its magnificent collection of Monet water lilies was a favorite. He considered Monet to be one of the most evolved of all human beings, on a par with the D. T. Suzukis and Foucaults of the world. From those paintings, a man could obtain the true balm of peace. The light that shone in from the garden at the Marmottan, that light was holy.

"G.o.d help me!" he cried out loud.

"Yessir!"

"Please, son, be quiet. And stop running people down."

"I didn't run anybody down. I just got around that truck."

"You need to go back there later. Give that guy some dough for his cart."

"Sir?"

"Without the cart, he and his wife will starve. Their children become prost.i.tutes. Do you understand that?"

"Sir, I hardly think -"

"Do you understand that?"

"Sir, yes, sir!"

Could this be a marine out of uniform? No, look at the hair. Foreign service all the way. He was just yanking Paul's chain with his military lip. He'd be sneering later with his State Department buddies about the old CIA a.s.shole he'd driven around.

With his cart wrecked, that fruit vendor might as well open his veins, and Paul knew this kid would not not go back, he would not give the guy the twenty bucks it would take to put his life back together again. go back, he would not give the guy the twenty bucks it would take to put his life back together again.

Funnily enough, Paul was in his work because he liked people. He'd seen the CIA take such incredible s.h.i.t over the years and save so many d.a.m.n lives. The Company could not defend herself, not without giving away secrets she was bound to keep. So she just took it. He'd seen the effects of all the Company bashing in his own life. There'd been a time when the merest hint of a Company connection brought women swarming like darling honeybees. Not anymore.

The car swung around another corner, and the Royal Orchid Hotel finally appeared down the smog-hazed street.

What the h.e.l.l was he about to find? This would be the first actual victim they had ever had a chance to study. The vampires were obsessive about destroying remains. Except, apparently, this time.

Still, there was something very bad about all this. He could smell it, but he couldn't quite see it. A place is wrapped up, finished. Then, suddenly, it ain't finished.

Okay, think. Think it out, Paul: All of a sudden, they leave evidence in a hotel. The hotel is on a continent that has just been sterilized of their presence.

It was not like them to taunt you. They were too shy, too careful for that. Their lives were incredibly precious to them, because this life was all they had, at least in Paul's opinion. In his opinion, nature had given them immortal lives - potentially, if they were very d.a.m.n careful - but they had not been given souls. They were d.a.m.n animals and they knew it.

So if this wasn't a declaration or a taunt, then it must be something else. The thing was, when the National Security Administration had cracked the language in the Book of Names, the whole vampire world had been opened up to Paul and his crew. He returned to the States to become head of a whole new division that would be devoted to eradicating the menace. There were to be units operating on every continent, using the methods that Paul and his group had evolved.

One of the reasons that he was racing back to the States so soon after completing his work in Asia was to deal with a stupid but potentially serious problem: The director of the CIA had been asking legal questions. Specifically, were these creatures to be regarded as animal or human? If they were human, then they were committing crimes, not killing prey.

Declaring that the creatures were human meant that a whole different approach would be necessary. There would have to be due process and trials and prison sentences, and the vampire would like nothing better than this type of leverage. The vampire was powerful and quick and so d.a.m.n smart. It could get away from prison.

They were almost unkillable. Something about their blood gave them extraordinary powers of recovery. You had to blow that head apart, then burn the creatures to ash, to be absolutely certain they were dead. Then the lair had to be washed in acid.

How could you ever call anything that lived in a filthy hole like a vampire lair human?

But he couldn't stop the wheels of the bureaucracy from turning as they turned. "What is this bunch of agents doing out in Asia killing people?" "Who are these 'vampires,' a terrorist group? A secret society? What in h.e.l.l is going on here?"

Some Thai were pa.s.sing the car, banging gongs and chanting. Funerals made Paul physically ill. He had to drown out that sound, and not not with a Thai radio station because the Asians, G.o.d love 'em, had not figured music out yet, not in any way whatsoever. "Are there any CDs in this car?" with a Thai radio station because the Asians, G.o.d love 'em, had not figured music out yet, not in any way whatsoever. "Are there any CDs in this car?"