The vampire army advanced. The mutant dogs' teeth glinted.

"David!" Nia screamed.

David broke his paralysis. He slammed the rear door and hurried to the driver's side.

The engine was already purring.

"What was wrong with you back there?" Jahlil said from the backseat. "Let's get the h.e.l.l out of here!"

"Everyone hang tight," David said. He resisted the compulsion to check the rearview mirror, fearing that he would once again be transfixed by the vampire. He switched on the headlamps to the highest setting and shifted into drive. He mashed the accelerator.

The tires bit into the dirt, and the vehicle exploded forward. They mowed across the gra.s.s.

"The trail, where's the trail?" David said. He had been in Pearl's backyard before, but that was during daylight hours. At night, the landscape was different and unfamiliar. That he was ready to p.i.s.s his pants didn't help his sense of direction, either.

"Over there, by the shed!" Nia pointed frantically.

David saw it: near the tool shed, amidst the shrubbery, a path that looked barely wide enough to admit a compact car beckoned. He cut the wheel to the right. The SUV clipped a rosebush, crimson petals fluttering over the windows. A series of b.u.mps throughout the yard jostled David and the others in their seats.

"Man, those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds are on our a.s.s," Jahlil said.

David risked a glance in the rearview mirror. Revealed in the red taillights, the vampiric hounds raced across the yard. Behind them, the valduwe gave chase. Diallo and Kyle were not among them.

Where were they?

Pearl, he thought, with a pang of anxiety. She had been right about the vampire's intent to confront her.

But he could not expend any energy worrying about something beyond his ability to control. Driving this narrow route without smashing into a tree was going to demand all of his attention.

He bulleted through the gap between the bushes. Branches screeched like claws across the truck's body. The leafy boughs of the trees formed a low-hanging tunnel. The path was twisty, the dirt surface moist and orange-red. It was better suited to accomodating a four-by-four recreational vehicle than a truck designed for city driving.

He grasped the steering wheel in both hands, something he did only when driving in hazardous conditions. Still worried that he would spin off the trail, he cut his speed, too. He was traveling only twenty miles an hour.

"They're gaining on us," Nia said. She turned to stare out the rear window. A vein throbbed in her slender neck.

David took her word for it. The dense woods were alive with the dogs' thunderous barking. In the rear pa.s.senger seat, King whined.

They aren't ordinary dogs, either, he reminded himself. The beasts were supernaturally gifted and could run much faster than normal canines.

"We've got to slow them down," he said. "I don't know how, but we've got to do something."

"I'll take care of them," Jahlil said. "One of you, roll back the sunroof."

"What're you doing?" Nia said.

"Just do it, will you?" Jahlil shouted.

"I'm not taking my hands off the steering wheel," David said. Gritting his teeth, he navigated the relentlessly curving path. "Nia, please. Let him do whatever he has in mind."

"Fine" Nia punched the b.u.t.ton to open the sunroof David did not dare to look away from the trail, but from the corner of his eye, he glimpsed Jahlil holding his shotgun, and he knew what the boy was going to do.

That kid is something else, he thought. His dad would be proud.

Pearl waited in the bedroom, sitting in the rocking chair beside the bed where Chief Jackson's body rested. Her eyes were closed, and her hands rested on her lap, palms turned up. She was praying.

Dear G.o.d, do with me what you will. But please, keep my friends from harm and give them the strength and courage to fulfill the mission you have decreed for them ...

She was in such deep prayer that she did not hear the snarling pack of monster canines that rushed past her house. Neither did she hear the front door crack open as though split with an axe. And she did not hear the deliberate foot steps that clocked across the wooden floorboards of the living room, thudded across the hallway, and entered the bedroom.

Open your eyes, Pearl. I am here.

The voice slipped into her mind with unsettling ease, interrupting her prayer. Her eyes snapped open.

Diallo loomed in front of her.

She drew in a startled breath. She knew his mind, but not his body. He was a fearsome, yet majestic creature, intimidating, yet beautiful, terrifying, yet awe-inspiring.

"You are brave," he said. His voice was as deep as a summer night. His gaze touched Jackson's covered corpse on the bed. "And n.o.ble."

Her heart hammered. "I am only fulfilling my responsibility."

Slowly, he nodded. His eyes were so compelling that she found it impossible to look away from him.

"You fear me," he said. "But not how others fear me ""

"Yes," she said thickly. He did not need to elaborate; they had a mutual understanding. This creature had the power to pierce her mind like a hypodermic needle and suck it dry of all her sanity. She found the prospect of being driven insane far more frightening than anything he could do to her physical body.

"You understand me," he said.

"I understand only what you have allowed me to learn about you, Diallo. You were conscious all the while of my presence. Some doors you kept closed to me"

He smiled, mysteriously. "Some doors must remain closed."

"That may be. But I have never understood why you are causing so much pain to innocent people."

Perhaps it was his unexpected candor and casual manner that made it possible, but Pearl captured a thought from him. It was trapped in her quick mind like a fly caught in a spider's web, and before she checked herself, she spoke her discovery aloud.

"It's her, isn't it?" Pearl said. "A woman whom you loved when you were a man, a woman whom you lost."

Diallo's smile vanished.

Quickly, Pearl said, "But you will see her again, Diallo. Have hope. She is not lost to you forever."

Diallo shook his head, almost sadly. "You are talented, Pearl. Your talent is dangerous, to you, and to me ""

"But "

A cold, invisible hand closed over her throat, cutting off her words. With a grip as powerful as a machine, it began to squeeze.

Her hands instinctively scrabbled at her neck, but there was no physical choke hold for her to tear away. She gagged.

Diallo watched her silently.

Choking, she rocked in the chair. Her feet kicked in the air.

Then, she gave up the struggle. She allowed peace to flow through her. Although her lungs ached as they thirsted for oxygen, and gasps came from her mouth, peace cradled her spirit, and as the life drifted out of her body at last, she felt herself soaring, into a vast s.p.a.ce, enveloped in a warm tranquillity, completely at peace, for she had fulfilled her life's mission, and because of her, others might live and go on to touch and change lives, and so it would go on, forever ...

What I'm about to do is crazy, Jahlil thought.

But he didn't see any alternative. Crazy situations called for crazy solutions.

"Holler at me when I need to duck," he said to Nia. "I don't wanna get my head taken off by a tree or something."

"Okay," she said. He could tell by her tone that she didn't like what he was going to do. Well, that was too bad. Someone had to do something.

The German shepherd watched him. Maybe it was his imagination projecting human feelings onto an animal, but the dog looked worried.

Jahlil patted the dog's head. Then, he braced his legs against the back of the front seats. Gripping his shotgun in his clammy hands, he squeezed through the open sunroof.

He'd gotten the idea to do this from a thriller novel he'd read a few months ago. The book was called thunder something and had been loaned to him by a girl he liked. He'd only read the book to impress her, but it turned out to be a decent read, with lots of action and some cool, scary stuff. Not half as scary as what was going on in this town, though. If the guy who had written that book were in Mason's Corner tonight he'd probably s.h.i.t in his pants. Just like Jahlil was ready to do.

Sharp wind sliced at his face, drawing tears from his eyes. He blinked a couple of times to clear his vision.

The pack of monster hounds gained on them. Their sleek, muscled bodies filled the dirt trail, and in the backsplash of the truck's taillights, the faces of the closest beasts appeared to be drenched in blood.

Behind the canines, about a dozen vampires gave chase, too. He did not see Kyle, or Diallo, the tough ones, but they could not be far behind.

Jahlil steadied the gun on the cold roof.

It's like target practice on a shooting range, he thought. Think of it that way.

The dogs' frenzied barking drove a chill deep into his marrow.

No, scratch that. This is war. This Pathfinder is our a.s.sault vehicle. I'm the gunner popping out to knock down the enemy soldiers.

He took aim at the closest vampire mutt, which looked like it had been a pit bull in its former life. Straining to keep the gun steady as the vehicle roared across the b.u.mpy trail, he squeezed the trigger.

The kick of the rifle, combined with the wind and the rough ride, almost slapped the gun out of his grip, but he held tight. He hit his mark, too. Struck in the breast, the creature yelped and tumbled to the ground.

The beast's vicious companions trampled it thoughtlessly, not slowing their pursuit at all.

He frowned. He'd hoped to discourage them by cutting down one of their pack mates. But that wasn't going to work. He would have to shoot all of them.

"Get down!" Nia warned.

Jahlil dipped into the truck. He looked up. A thick branch zipped past, where his head had been only two seconds ago.

"Oh, man," he said. His mouth was dry. "Thanks"

"I wish you would stay in here," Nia said. "These woods are too thick and dark for us to see anything coming until it's right up on us"

"Hey, I knocked down one of the bloodsucker mutts," he said. "I can get 'em all, just watch."

"Throw a bottle bomb back there at them," she said. "The fire will slow them down, and that's all we need. Like I said, it's not safe for you to stay up there too long, exposed like that"

"She's right, Jahlil," David said, his voice taut. "You're a crack shot, I admit, but this road is twisting like crazy. I don't want you to get hurt"

"You guys aren't my parents," Jahlil said. His chest was tight. "You don't even know me. So why do you care?"

He had to almost choke out the last words. He couldn't cry, not now. He had work to do.

Nia placed her hand on his shoulder. Something about the way she looked at him reminded him, startlingly, of his mother, and he felt a loosening of tension in his chest.

"Please," she said softly.

"Well ... okay." He placed the shotgun on the seat. Curious, King sniffed the gun's wooden stock.

"Use this." Nia offered him one of those Molotov c.o.c.ktails. "Need a lighter?"

"I have one" He fished a cigarette lighter out of his pocket.

Positioning his legs against the back of the seats again, he popped through the sunroof.

The h.e.l.lhounds were close. Less than twenty feet away.

"I'm gonna knock you a.s.sholes back," he said. He flicked the lighter.

"Hold on!" Nia said. "We're gonna turn!"

Jahlil lodged himself in the corner of the sunroof, to keep his balance. The truck veered around a curve, dark trees floating past.

The lighter flame winked out. He struck it again.

Something thudded against the back of the SUV.

Jahlil raised his head ... and saw the grimy hands of a vampire grasping the edge of the roof.

He froze.

The bloodsucker had leapt onto the rear b.u.mper. It began to hoist itself up, like a man doing a pull-up. The vampire was someone he knew. It was Mr. Laymon, the dean at the high school.

Mr. Laymon's face was smeared with dirt and dried blood. His white shirt looked as if it had been washed in a mud puddle.

"Gonna take care of you, boy," Mr. Laymon said in a guttural voice. He pulled himself onto the roof. He crouched like a panther ready to pounce.

Jahlil remembered the Molotov c.o.c.ktail in his hand. In a swift motion, he lit the cloth fuse, then hurled the bomb at the vampire.

The bottle smacked against the vampire's chest. It blew up with a whoompf.7 Jahlil raised his arm across his face to protect against the flying gla.s.s shards and the flames. A sudden push of heat drove him back inside the truck.