Some vanished.
That’s how it was.
Unbroken screaming, like fifteen thousand drunks on the town, right up to the final moments, when it was the ballad from the last clip, Age of Innocence.
And then the music softening. The drums rolling out, and the guitar dying, and the synthesizer throwing up the lovely translucent notes of an electric harpsichord, notes so light yet profuse that it was as if the air were showered with gold.
One mellow spot hit the place where I stood, my clothes streaked with blood sweat, my hair wet with it and tangled, the cape dangling from one shoulder.
Into a great yawning mouth of rapt and drunken attention I raised my voice slowly, letting each phrase become clear:
This is the Age of Innocence
True Innocence
All your Demons are visible
All your Demons are material
Call them Pain
Call them Hunger
Call them War
Mythic evil you don’t need anymore.
Drive out the vampires and the devils
With the gods you no longer adore
Remember:
The Man with the fangs wears a cloak.
What passes for charm
Is a charm.
Understand what you see
When you see me!
Kill us, my brothers and sisters
The war is on
Understand what you see
When you see me.
I closed my eyes on the rising walls of applause. What were they really clapping for? What were they celebrating?
Electric daylight in this giant auditorium. The real ones were vanishing in the shifting throng. The uniformed police had jumped up onto the platform to make a solid row in front of us. Alex was tugging at me as we went through the curtain:
“Man, we have to run for it. They’ve got the damned limo surrounded. And you’ll never make it to your own car.”
I said no, they had to go on, to take the limo, to get going now.
And to my left I saw the hard white face of one of the real ones as he shoved his way through the press. He wore the black leather skins of the motorcycle riders, his silken preternatural hair a gleaming black mop.
The curtains were ripping from their overhead rods, letting the house flow into the backstage area. Louis was beside me. I saw another immortal on my right, a thin grinning male with tiny dark eyes.
Blast of cold air as we pushed into the parking lot, and pandemonium of squirming, struggling mortals, the police yelling for order, the limo rocking like a boat as Tough Cookie and Alex and Larry were shoved into it. One of the bodyguards had the engine of the Porsche running for me, but the youngsters were beating on the hood and the roof as if it were a drum.
Behind the black-haired vampire male there appeared another demon, a woman, and the pair were pushing inexorably closer. What the hell did they think they were going to do?
The giant motor of the limousine was growling like a lion at the children who wouldn’t make way for it, and the motorcycle guards gunned their little engines, spewing fumes and noise into the throng.
The vampire trio was suddenly surrounding the Porsche, the tall male’s face ugly with fury, and one thrust of his powerful arm lifted the low-slung car in spite of the youngsters who held to it. It was going to capsize. I felt an arm around my throat suddenly. And I felt Louis’s body pivot, and I heard the sound of his fist strike the preternatural skin and bone behind me, heard the whispered curse.
Mortals everywhere were suddenly screaming. A policeman exhorted the crowd over a loudspeaker to clear out.
I rushed forward, knocking down several of the youngsters, and steadied the Porsche just before it went over like a scarab on its back. As I struggled to open the door, I felt the crowd crushing against me. Any moment this would become a riot. There would be a stampede.
Whistles, screams, sirens. Bodies shoving Louis and me together, and then the leather-clad vampire male rising on the other side of the Porsche, a great silver scythe flashing in the floodlights as he swung it over his head. I heard Louis’s shout of warning. I saw another scythe gleaming in the corner of my eye.
But a preternatural screech cut through the cacophony as in a blinding flash the vampire male burst into flames. Another blaze exploded beside me. The scythe clattered to the concrete. And yards away yet another vampiric figure suddenly went up in a crackling gust.
The crowd was in utter panic, rushing back into the auditorium, streaming out into the parking lot, running anyplace it could to escape the whirling figures as