The Third Section (Danilov Quintet 3) by Kent Jasper

Author:Kent, Jasper [Kent, Jasper]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
ISBN: 9781446434413
Publisher: Transworld Digital
Published: 2011-08-17T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER XV

INSIDE THE CHURCH all was quiet, but for the sound of three pairs of lungs breathing – each reflecting a different state of mind in its owner.

The drunk from the tavern was drifting between consciousness and unconsciousness, breaths rasping and interrupted. When Yudin had entered the church, the voordalak who had brought the man had already put him to one side, to deal with later. Both the man’s legs were broken just below the knee and were splaying out as though he were a frog freshly jumped from a pond. Yudin had not seen how it had been done, but it would not have been difficult with a voordalak’s strength. It was easier than tying him up, and ensured he would not escape. Occasionally, when the man’s desire for life overcame the pain, he dragged himself across the mosaic floor using only his hands, but like a fool he headed not for the door and possible freedom but towards the iconostasis and the Beautiful Gate, in the hope of unlikely salvation. It didn’t matter. Even if he had made it halfway to the door, his captor could easily have strode across the nave and dragged him back to begin his journey again.

At least his captor might have been able to do that, until Yudin had arrived.

Yudin’s breathing was slow and calm, belying the excitement he felt. He needed to be lucid, and to keep a steady hand, so that what he was doing could be achieved swiftly. He did not know when Prometheus – perhaps others too – would return, but it would most certainly be before dawn. Even so, Yudin knew that the anticipation he had felt when setting out earlier that evening would not go unfulfilled, though his victim was utterly different from what he had expected.

It was the breath of the voordalak that came in the loudest, shortest, most unsteady bursts. It was the breath of the terrified, the breath that prepares the body for action and yet which the body chokes off before it is complete. Yudin pondered why a vampire should breathe like that. A vampire could be terrified, he had verified that many times, but it had so little need for air that a change in breathing was quite unnecessary. Perhaps it was merely a memory of being human, the body reacting to events in a way that would once have been helpful but was now merely for show – like a dog half-heartedly kicking the earth over its faeces as a memory of the wolf that it once was.

‘So, you’re Mihailov,’ said Yudin. ‘I’ll have to take your word for it. I don’t remember the name, but I never forget a face.’

‘I’ll never forget yours,’ Mihailov replied. Yudin glanced up and saw the hatred in his eyes. He had been easy to capture, and easy to persuade to talk, at least to reveal his name, but the rest would come. Mihailov’s goal was vengeance, and vengeance was a meagre feast if its victim was not fully aware of the reasons for it.

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