Vampire Hunter D Omnibus: Book Nine

Book 0: Vampire Hunter D Omnibus

by Hideyuki Kikuchi

Genres: Horror; Fantasy action & adventure; Dystopian

Synopsis

A new omnibus collecting volumes twenty-five, twenty-six, and twenty-seven of the Vampire Hunter D horror novel series!

The hunt continues in the bizarre far future of 12,090 A.D, where the immortal vampire lords who were the only winners of mankind’s nuclear war still oppress the human survivors who have pushed the blood-drinking fiends back to the lawless Frontier. Yet humanity too remains as quick as ever to prey upon itself, and where the law can’t bring safety or justice, the crescent blade of D will—assuming you meet the half-vampire wanderer’s price!

Vampire Hunter D Omnibus Book Nine collects three different complete novels. Everyone knows vampires fear running water—so how did the immortal Nobility come to reside on Undead Island, and what is the secret of the fog they create that lures in human fisherfolk to be their slaves? Then, D crosses the route of the Bedeviled Stagecoach, transporting a valuable prisoner—Dorleac, mortal page of the mighty Duke Sinistre. The prisoner is to be transported to the Capital to learn his vampire lord’s secrets, but Sinistre has no intention of letting the stagecoach finish its journey! Nightmare Village is the unwilling destination of a band of travelers from an inn, spared by seeming chance from a bizarre landslide to find shelter in an ancient town said to once be the site of genetic experiments by the Sacred Ancestor. Can D save them—or will his very presence trigger their doom…?

The Vampire Hunter D Omnibus Book Eight collects volumes 25, 26, and 27 in author Hideyuki Kikuchi’s adventure horror series: Undead Island, Bedeviled Stagecoach, and Nightmare Village. Illustrated by Final Fantasy artist Yoshitaka Amano, the legend of D endures!

Release date: September 23, 2025

Publisher: Dark Horse Books

Print pages: 552

Sample

chapter 1

I

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Meg was taking a break on top of a cliff that overlooked the sea and the entire village. The thought of the chicken pot pie she’d bought in the town of Piercenun along with the heavy-duty hooks and lines made her stomach rumble. If Toma could’ve heard it, he’d have asked her to break up for sure. Just below the sixty-foot-high cliff lay the “god wood,” and beyond that was the village. The houses on the beach she’d been looking down at for seventeen years were, to this girl with her heart full of the springtime of youth, almost frustratingly unchanged. Still, the cramped bay and tiny boats in the distance set against this backdrop of sea and sky couldn’t help but make Meg’s heart quiver with emotion—even if she felt like a sucker all the while.

It was a clear, cloudless day, the sunlight-studded sea truly losing its borders until it too seemed a part of the heavens. However, there was just one thing. One black point that seemed to be a sarcastic god’s way of saying, Nothing in this world is perfect. The scene touched her heart so deeply as she sat on the cliff not because of the panoramic view but in spite of it, Meg thought, occasionally frightened by the workings of her own mind.

Boldly taking a seat on the edge of the cliff, Meg looked down on the sea and the sky, where a kitten-like cloud had formed, as she pulled the chicken pot pie from its tin wrapping. Clearing her throat, she turned her eyes back to the sea and sky. They were changing.

“Huh. What’s that?” she said somewhat fearfully, yet she still managed to bite into her lunch, as she was still a growing girl. As she chewed in mute amazement, something from the distant horizon came swiftly creeping toward the beach. The azure and ultramarine that filled Meg’s field of view were becoming a different hue. The white of fog.

Meg wrapped her arms around herself. A trembling was rising from the very marrow of her bones. And she believed it wouldn’t stop until the fog had cleared again. She knew the reason.

“It’s coming from the island.”

Meg didn’t say anything more. It was too dreadful to put into words. But in her head, like the applause that followed the climax of a play by the regional thespians, a number of words were already running around. It’s from Undead Island.

“In the old days, we got the fog a lot,” a pale-faced man said in a tone so strained the words seemed to have been extracted by torture. He was very old, with white hair and a hoary beard. Though he was stooped over and needed a metal cane to walk, his eyes had a gleam that said he burned with a vitality all his years couldn’t hide. Perhaps it was fueled by fear.

The old man was at the west end of a stone embankment that enclosed the narrow bay, and behind him close to ten more people stood in the light of the sun. From the badges on their chests it was clear that three of them were the sheriff and his deputies, and of the others behind them, one was a girl who from the looks of her garb was either from this village or another nearby. The rest were men who, even as they beheld this scene like a paean to the life-giving powers of sun and water, had a lingering and ill-suited air of blood and murderous thoughts about them. Any Frontier resident over the age of three could immediately tell what they were. Bounty hunters.

“The men of this village were called ‘wave braves.’ It means they’re people of courage who don’t fear the sea.” The pale old man’s faltering voice had a mysterious power that couldn’t be attributed to failing memory as it flowed through the group. “The seas might be rough, whirlpools churning or lightning splitting the sky, but these are men who’d think nothing about heading out in a battered old boat if need be. But that fog—the fog from the island—made men like that bolt the doors to their houses, put out the lights, and hold their breath. The fog from Undead Island—even now, nobody rightly knows what it is.”

“Okay, that’s enough of the ‘nobody knows’ foreplay,” said a tough and determined man that anyone would’ve taken at a glance as the leader of the badge-wearing contingent. Once the old man’s story broke off, the lawman left some breathing room before he said to him, “We’ve put up with that all the way here from your house. Now spill it. Back in the day, what happened when the fog came rolling in? You said it wasn’t like the situation we’ve got now. So how was it then?”

A sort of tension sprang up around the old man. Invisible to the eye, it was the concentrated attention of the girl and the quartet of bounty hunters.

“Every time the fog showed up, everyone turned into Nobles.”

The girl alone gasped, while the battle-hardened men showed no change at all. Rumors about Undead Island had spread quite far across the Frontier. Turned into Nobles—the horrifying import of those words was clear to the old-timer as he said that. Fog pressed in from the sea one night to turn everything milky white, a few villagers got pairs of raw, swollen teeth marks on the nape of their necks, and then they in turn sought the blood of their family and neighbors.

“In the seventy-two years I spent in the village,” the old man continued, “the fog hit us three times. And every time, a couple of people would go after

 their families for blood, and they and all those they bit got stakes through their hearts. And the only reason we managed to slay the predators in fog so thick we could barely see our hands in front of our own faces is because, aside from the first few people turned into Nobles, those drained of blood only became Nobility the night after they joined the dead, and the fog’s incursion ended quickly enough. When we got the second wave of it, five folks total turned into Nobles first. Four of them were put down soon as the fog cleared, but the last one escaped into the sea.”

On hearing that, the sheriff was just about to shout, “Hold it right there!” However, it was actually one of the bounty hunters who spoke up, a giant of a man even more powerfully built than the sheriff and as hirsute as the old man—only in his case the whiskers were jet black. His name was Garigon.

“Hold it right there, Mister Former Mayor. Freshwater or salt, I thought Nobles and those they’ve turned weren’t supposed to be able to cross running water.”

“Me and the four villagers I was with all saw the man swimming out to sea by the light of the moon. Ever since, we haven’t put any stock in the legends about running water.”

“So, did that fella head off to Undead Island?”

“I don’t know. No one was about to follow him.”

“And did the fog really come from the island?”

The old man nodded. “Back before I was even born, and I’m talking more than a hundred years ago, there was a bunch of villagers who went out to the island to see if maybe folks could live there. Their report was pretty surprising. When they came back, they said that setting aside the facilities left by the Nobility, Undead Island could be called a paradise on earth, filled with plants and animals, the sea around it a treasure trove of fish and shellfish, and with all the fowl you’d care to shoot. But what whipped the village up more than anything was the way they said soil out on the island was real well suited to farming. As you can see, mountains border the village on three sides, so they’ve only fishing to rely on for their daily bread. Now the men might’ve been too proud, but the women they left tending the homes wanted a life of working the unshaking soil instead of an existence on a sea that’ll turn wild at the drop of a hat. Less than two weeks after the survey party came back, seven families from the village—thirty people, all told—decided to cross the sea and take up permanent residence on the island.”

“On Undead Island?” one of the sheriff’s deputies murmured. Although the head lawman and his two underlings wore standard-issue gun belts, the hands poised to reach for their weapons all trembled faintly.

 youngest of them—a boy who still looked to be in his late teens—was twanging the short bow he had under his left arm as he said, “I never heard this story before. Now things are getting interesting. You know, I’ve heard a lot of talk about Undead Island, but it’s always kinda fuzzy on the details. Is there really one of the Nobility’s spaceports out there on the island?”

“There’s something like that. Only it seems not a single soul from the survey party or the settlers who came later ever set foot inside it. All there ever was on that facility were reports about the outward appearances. Based on those, it seems it wasn’t a spaceport. But then with the Nobility, you never can tell.”

“Hmm. Back then the fog didn’t roll in, I take it.”

If it had, and the results had been similar to the present situation, there probably wouldn’t have been any talk of establishing a settlement.

The old person confirmed this with a nod, saying, “Not that I’ve heard.”

“What happened to all those settlers, then? Did they pull up stakes and come back?”

It took a while for the old man to respond.

“They’re still out on the island.”

“Meaning what—they got wiped out?” asked the third bounty hunter. In his right hand he gripped an eighteen-inch short spear.

The old man shook his head. Two expressions occupied the deeply wrinkled face weathered by wave and wind and sun. Fear and a smile.

“Seems they’re not dead,” he said.

“What do you mean by that?” This question came from Garigon’s lips.

“You see, the first time the fog hit, one of the Nobles who attacked the village had been part of that group of settlers.”

__

II

__

When the old man said “Noble,” he wasn’t talking about their station. This was a term of derision cast on all their ilk—including humans who’d been turned into bloodsuckers. What the old man was telling them was that the Noble who attacked the desolate little fishing village under cover of fog that first time was a former villager.

“That place’s been called Undead Island since long, long before the village was built. But we didn’t really feel it in our hearts until that second down on the beach when the fog cleared and flames from our torches showed us the face of one of our own. See, that first fog had come exactly a day after we lost regular communication with the settlers.”

“Had the Nobility risen again?” the fourth bounty hunter inquired, his lips seeming to curl in amusement. White teeth gleamed in a suntanned face. A repeating rifle was slung over his shoulder.

“That’s all we could think of. The day after that first fog, the village banned all passage over to the island. Just the same, a number of folks with blood ties to the settlers broke the ban and sailed out, but not one of them ever came back.”

Only those unfamiliar with the Frontier and the Nobility would be foolish enough to label that travel ban cruel. Even now, with the Nobility in extreme decline, the fear of them remained a deep black stain on the brains of the populace.

“But why did the Nobility come back all of a sudden?”

Garigon’s query might’ve been directed at himself, yet the rest of them unconsciously focused their gaze on the old man once more.

“No way to know that without crossing over to the island,” the former mayor said, his reply carrying a terrible resignation and weariness.

Even these rough men who’d left mountains of corpses and spilled rivers of blood were momentarily left speechless.

After that brutal silence, the sheriff finally said, “That’s why we’re here. Could we trouble you to set us up with a boat?”

The old man shook his head from side to side.

“Boats are a fisherman’s life. I can’t let somebody else just take one out. Not even if the owner’s gone now.”

The lawman was at a loss.

“Supposing you were to take one out,” the old man continued, “the area around Undead Island’s still notorious for all the accidents where you get these three different currents colliding. I’ve been putting out to sea since I was all of three, and my father and his father both warned me about getting anywhere near there. Truth is, I nearly died out there twice. No way on earth you can do it without somebody from the village along.”

“We were hoping you could help us out there. Yesterday, as soon as Meg here notified me and we had confirmation of the situation in the village, I

 immediately got in touch with anyone in the nearby towns or villages who hails from this village. No one but you would even hear me out. Now, I realize coming out here wasn’t easy for you. Chalk it up to shit luck if you must, but give us a little help here.”

“You’re talking to a man who turned his back on this village. After forty years serving as mayor, all of sudden I couldn’t take any of it anymore. Not living in poverty, not the raging sea, not a miserable little village that only survived by the grace of God. Sheriff, you think anybody’d be happy with a man who ran off and abandoned his own family dragging his sorry ass back here and letting other folks use their boats? For starters, I won’t allow myself to do it!”

Though the old man’s tone was one of complete exhaustion, it was underpinned with a will of iron.

“Damn, but this is the strangest thing,” Garigon said, twisting his body around so he could look back at the village behind them. “More than a hundred villagers, from little babies up to grannies and grandpappies, all disappearing in a single night.”

Everyone had already turned in the same direction. Before them, houses of wood and plastic sat in unsettling stillness in the midday sun. Two days earlier, fog had crossed the sea in the afternoon, and apparently someone within it had taken everyone away. When the sheriff and others raced there the next morning, they found not a single soul—a village so dead, in fact, there was no sign of so much as a dog or cat.

“Meg,” the sheriff called out, and the girl turned to face him. “I know we’ve been over this time and again, but is that really what you saw—every last person from the village walking out to sea on top of the water, headed out to Undead Island?”

The lawman had a stern look in his eye that told her he wouldn’t hear any lies, and the girl nodded to him, but just then a dazed look surfaced on her face. Ever since witnessing the coming of the fog she’d done her level best not to let fear get the better of her, but the threads of willpower steadying her had suddenly been snipped, throwing them into disarray. The change was so great the sheriff himself twisted around for a look to the left—staring off at the cliffs towering over the other end of the bay some fifty yards distant. What Meg saw should’ve been there. But there was no one. And none of the others seemed to have seen it. However, when Meg took another look, all she could think was that some sort of incredible being had been there. Something that could raise her fear-fraught psyche in rapture.

“I saw,” Meg said, nodding absent-mindedly. The reply seemed to come from a husk robbed not only of its mind but of its very soul. “I saw a really

 gorgeous man.”

Meg had left the town of Piercenun about noon and run into the sheriff’s office all pale-faced that same evening. A one-way trip between Meg’s village and the town of Piercenun would take a girl like her an hour and a half on foot. Apparently the girl had run the whole way, and according to her wheezing, breathless tale—

Tearing down the stone steps from the cliff toward the fog-shrouded village, Meg headed toward her house without the slightest hesitation. Though she was well acquainted with the strange and terrible occurrences connected to the fog, that only helped her concern for her family and the desire to save them claw their way to the surface.

The village was already choked with thick white fog, but Meg managed to discern the shadowy forms of houses a few yards ahead of her. Relying seventy percent on her eyesight and the other thirty on instinct, she headed for the center of the village—a grocery store called Gass’s Place that was fifty or sixty feet from the bay. But when the girl got there, the door was open.

“Huh?” she said, the word escaping her in surprise.

The ironclad rule was that when fog came in from the sea, you shut your doors and didn’t open them even if it were your own family outside.

Standing in front of the shop was the proprietor, Gass Kemp. And it wasn’t just him. His wife, son, both daughters, and even his bedridden grandmother all appeared, one after another, lining up right beside him. Meg got the feeling there was some invisible drill instructor right by them.

The grocer and his family quickly set out on foot toward the bay. Following them with her eyes, Meg was rooted in place. Something black took hazy shape in the depths of the fog, and by the time she realized it was made up of people they’d closed to within a few yards. Meg was so scared she was ready to shut her eyes, but they passed right in front of her as they walked toward the bay, just as Gass and his family had done.

“Auntie Mabel . . .” the girl murmured.

Passing by was an old woman who lived alone now that all her kin were dead, and the community looked after her.

“The Kapsch family . . .”

The father, Nodd, was at the fore, leading a quintet of the village’s most accomplished fishermen.

“Mr. Ulmer . . .”

He was the most important person in the village—their shipwright, who would be ninety this year. 

 month ago the young blonde had been widowed when she lost her husband in a storm, but they said she’d be married again inside of a month. Every bachelor in town had his sights set on her.

All of them were walking toward the bay. Meg stood stock-still, unable to do anything, but not one of them turned so much as a vacant eye in her direction.

“What’s going on? Is something waiting for them there? Is this what happened to the people long ago?”

Meg took a deep breath. She’d finally remembered her family.

“Dad? Mom? Ida?!”

She ran like a woman possessed. It was a minor miracle that she didn’t get lost or trip even once. There was no saying how many people she passed. The only thing that was clear was that everyone in the village was headed in the same direction.

The village was built on stony terraces like the rice fields of mountainous Asia, with the bottommost tier reaching down to the beach. The houses were connected to one another by stone steps. Meg’s house was on the third tier. She crept into the place, but quickly realized nobody was there. Still, she couldn’t help running through each and every room.

When Meg left the house, she was crying in spite of herself. All she had to rely on was the spear gun she carried—one belonging to her father. Though it was the spring-powered type, it was quite powerful, with just as much force as the gas-propelled ones rich people used. Come what may, the girl was going to bring her family back—that determination burned like a fire in her, though she felt like someone was whispering to her that it was no use.

Three minutes of running down cobblestone streets brought the girl to the bay. She pushed her way through the fog, which was still clinging to her when she arrived, at which point she murmured, “I’m too late.”

There was no sign of anyone.

Meg climbed up on the breakwater and ran. Going all the way down to the end, she peered out to sea. Shadowy figures melted into view. Beyond the bay was no shallow shoal. It was more than thirty feet deep out there. Yet the figures were walking across the surface. Meg could only watch in astonishment as they went, and in less than two seconds’ time they’d vanished. 

down to the marrow of her bones, Meg forgot herself, dashing down the road that led from the village to the highway.

On receiving notification, the sheriff immediately had two of his three deputies speed to the village, and as the messenger pigeon they dispatched reported that the place remained shrouded in fog, they were ordered not to enter the village. The lawman had then fallen into serious meditation. For he was not without considerable knowledge about the fog that struck from the sea. Though he possessed the skepticism that came with his line of work, the sheriff believed everything Meg had told him. He was certain the villagers had walked off across the sea. And he was equally certain of their destination. Based on that conviction, it probably took him less than a minute to decide his next course of action, because he’d known that someday this would come to pass and had given the response to the situation consideration on more than one occasion. They were thoughts that’d soon faded from his mind, but now that speculation had become reality, the sheriff was quite proud of himself for not being taken by surprise.

His plans were predicated on first crossing over to the island. To do that, they’d need a good number of people. And since something weird was going on with the island, amateurs like the townsfolk and fishermen were excluded from the fight. Because the Nobility were undoubtedly involved.

The sheriff ordered his remaining deputy to go around town and talk to all the roughest customers, he had signs put up guaranteeing a flat wage of ten thousand dalas, and he ran the emergency siren before sending out messenger pigeons with the same information to be disseminated to every town and village within a day’s ride. That night nearly a hundred confident souls had called on his office, but on hearing the details they turned right around, one after another, until only four remained the following morning. Now they stood shoulder to shoulder with the sheriff on the breakwater.

As far as the sheriff was concerned, the one saving grace was that the former mayor of Meg’s village had left there, and for the past year he’d been living with a daughter who’d married into a family in Piercenun. At the sheriff’s request the old man had straightened up his troubled back and clambered onto a cyborg horse.

“Well, this is a fine hole in our plans. We got nobody to take the helm!”

Garigon’s complaint was greeted by silence. So long as the former mayor objected, these warriors couldn’t cross over to the field of battle.

It was the youngest of the bounty hunters who shattered the oppressive air, saying, “Leave it to me. I was born in a fishing town. My rowing ain’t half bad!”

“How old are you?” asked the former mayor.

“Huh? How old do I look?”

“And how old were you when you left your hometown?”

“Let’s see—seven.”

“You been across the brine since?”

The young man shrugged his shoulders.

“I can’t give the helm to a seven-year-old. Just accept it.”

“So, what the hell are we supposed to do, then?”

The sound of waves was the only answer to the agitated boy’s query.

The solution came from a most unexpected source.

“I’ll do it,” said the girl.

__

†

__

III

__

“Hey! No freaking way!”

“You should’ve said that before we left.”

While Meg was at the stern expertly working the rudder, the young deputy had a strange look in his eye as he stared at her arms, to say nothing of the waist and legs that supported her and seemed several times stronger than they’d appeared on dry land.

At any rate, with the half-dozen men also aboard, the small craft was nimbly cutting across the waves, at times with the current and at others against it. If it were a person, you’d say it had a nice, steady gait.

Stunned by the girl’s ridiculous proposal, the sheriff had asked if she could even row, to which Meg replied she’d been putting to sea and helping her father with his fishing since the age of seven. Even now she was confident she was better than boys her age. The sheriff had shaken his head and said no to taking a woman along, but Garigon had suggested they could send her back as soon as they reached the island. Meg was the very first to support him. Just to be clear on the matter, the lawman asked her if she swore to do it,

and naturally the girl replied in the affirmative. In truth, she had no intention whatsoever of going back. Her parents and her little sister had gone off to an island where the Nobility roamed, after all.

In addition to the men, the boat was packed with food and water enough for two days and medicine, and two hours later the small craft headed out into the bay with the water almost up to its gunwales. The elderly deputy who’d been left behind to carry word back to Piercenun soon faded from view.

When the mainland vanished an hour out, even the sheriff thought anxiously that these currents were incredible. The boat was borne on a current reaching speeds of twenty knots. And a girl of seventeen was not only challenging that current, she was mastering it. It was small wonder that the young deputy couldn’t help but let his honest impression slip out.

“We’ll be there in another thirty minutes,” said the girl. “Your weapons and head good to go?”

“More or less,” a youthful face replied with a sigh, giving Meg a long look and a smile.

The reason she’d asked was because she was thinking to herself, Will this kid be able to hold his own on an island with Nobles?

“I’m Meg. And you are?”

No sooner had she asked that than the sheriff, standing at the prow, called out, “Wesley! We’re within sight of the island. Don’t forget to prep for our landing, now.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Wesley.”

Once again his name had been called. This time it was Meg.

“You look a lot like the sheriff,” she continued. “Is he by any chance—”

“My father,” he said, nearly spitting the words.

“Oh, really. So, you’re following in your dad’s footsteps? Aren’t you the dutiful son.”

“I’m not a deputy by choice. See, he was shorthanded.” There was no hostility in Wesley’s answer because Meg’s tone had been entirely sincere. Getting up, he turned his gaze forward to find a little hump of an island on the horizon. “Undead Island?”

The fear and horror the boy’s voice carried made Meg tense up. Soon they’d be dealing with the Nobility, those who’d once been their victims, or their descendants.

Just then, the youngest bounty hunter deftly made his way across the rocking boat to the pair. Making no attempt to hide his vulgar smirk he said, “My, aren’t the two of you chummy. Can I be your friend, too?” He couldn’t have been any older than Wesley.

“Not a chance,” Meg said flatly. 

cause ever since you got to the village you haven’t taken your eyes off my boobs and butt. You’re such a pig.”

As Meg had reprimanded him loudly and without a hint of restraint, the bounty hunters in the middle of the craft let out delighted whoops. The young man’s face flushed crimson and murderous intent filled him from head to toe. For those who lived on the field of battle, a public tongue-lashing could be considered the greatest insult. If they couldn’t reassert their honor right there and then, they’d have no leg to stand on the next day. Meg was well aware of that but had been merciless with him nonetheless because he’d had such a lecherous look in his eye. However, the instant Meg saw the young bounty hunter’s hand go for the machete on his hip her expression froze. It was no exaggeration to say a killing lust radiated from the young man.

“Knock it off!” Wesley said, standing between the two of them.

“You wanna try stopping me, lover boy?” said the young bounty hunter. “Don’t kid yourself. You act like you’ve never heard of Bo the Bowman before.”

That knocked the wind out of Meg. She’d had her suspicions since she first saw his bow, but never would’ve imagined he was really that young.

They said he could fire an arrow that would punch through a demon bird soaring a thousand yards off the ground, and he was so quick that in a second he’d taken down ten bandits, putting an arrow through the right eye of each. At a range of a hundred yards he’d taken on a hundred charging outlaws mad for blood, slaying the last with just three feet to go and ensuring that his consummate skill was already the stuff of legend. Meg got the impression Wesley and the badge on his chest were swiftly fading away like mist.

But then the girl heard someone say, “Never heard of you.” That was Wesley’s reply. The young deputy’s right hand was going for the pistol on his hip.

“Nice. Fight! Fight!” the bounty hunter nearest the three of them chanted, pounding the butt of his short spear against the bottom of the boat and getting to his feet. “A bounty hunter and a lawman fighting over a gal? This won’t be done till we’ve seen some blood.”

“Neither of you better pull out,” Garigon added. He was licking his chops.

From the look in their eyes, Wesley didn’t have a prayer of winning. Knowing that, he still held his ground due to the inherent hatred of wrongdoers shared by those on the side of the law.

“Shut your trap!” the bowman snarled. The naked malice in his tone showed he’d played right into his compatriots’ hands.

“Wesley! Bo! Settle down, both of you,” the sheriff commanded from the prow. “This seem like any time to be fighting among ourselves? Bo, anything happens to my deputy and you won’t see a lousy dala!”

There was no reply. The young man called Bo was so lathered up for a fight there’d be no stopping him now.

The sheriff’s right hand went for his gun—and at the same time, the two bounty hunters gripped their weapons as well. A fight between the young bucks was turning into a proxy war splitting them along job and character lines. It could no longer be averted. Both the sheriff and Meg felt it.

“Huh?!”

A cry of surprise had escaped the sheriff. It was a heartbeat later that not only his form but the entire boat was engulfed by something white billowing up from behind them.

“It’s fog!” Garigon exclaimed, his voice quavering violently.

The sea had suddenly gone mad. Waves bared white fangs and slammed the boat broadside.

“This is some serious shit! Hey! Do something, helmsman!”

“This can’t be,” Meg said, squeezing the words out in what was nearly a scream. “The tides don’t just go nuts like this. No way! It’s been rough, but we’ve managed to get this far because they were running the same as always.”

“Hold on tight, everyone! Fall in the sea and you’re a goner!” the sheriff shouted, his voice, too, shaking badly.

“What the hell is this? The wind ain’t even blowing!”

“And the sun’s shining away like nobody’s business. This ain’t normal stormy weather!”

The seas had erupted madly despite sunny skies and a lack of wind. Swells were reaching ten feet now, and if the fifteen-foot-long craft couldn’t adjust to the changed conditions, it was only a matter of time before it’d be reduced to so much flotsam.

Though she’d experienced rough seas more times than she could count, now waves rose on all sides of the boat, falling on it with the force of some bizarre beast and leaving Meg slumped over the rudder and barely conscious.

The sheriff and the roughnecks could no longer even find voice enough to shout at her. But it didn’t take long for all that to give way to cries of astonishment and delight.

“The fog’s gone!”

“The waves have settled down, too. It’s

calm!”

As she felt the pitching and rolling quickly fade, Meg turned her face forward from where she clung to the rudder. Already calmed, the surface glittered in the sunlight, while far off across the water the shape of a tiny boat became visible.

“What’s that?”

As proof that Meg hadn’t been the only one to spot it, someone to the fore called out, “It’s a boat! One a lot smaller than ours. So how’s it going so fast?”

“Manning the helm is—just one person. Some guy in black.”

Meg strained her eyes for all she was worth. It’s him, she thought. It has to be that gorgeous fella I saw up on the cliffs. However, when her eyes finally focused on the point in question, the little boat and the figure were rapidly pulling away, and they swiftly melted into the vast expanse of sea.

“I don’t believe it. When I spotted him, it was that small. To get that far in less than five minutes . . .”

The sheriff’s words sounded like delirium, and in her heart of hearts Meg was shaking her head vehemently. You say you don’t believe it, but that’s a lie, she thought. He of all people could do it. I mean, just look at how beautiful he is.

But a voice cut into the girl’s rapturous thoughts like the teeth of a beast.

“In that boat just now—was that another bounty hunter?”

“If it is, he’s a hell of a good one! Hey, hurry it up, baby. Don’t want him getting the jump on us.”

“But to be able to work a rudder like that . . . Who the hell is he?”

Seemingly unconcerned with the voices that rose like bubbles to the surface, the sheriff was concentrating on a different question. Those sudden killer waves just now—had they been calmed by the master of the now-vanished boat?

He had no reason to think that. No, actually there was one. Though it was at a great distance and only for a second, the sheriff had seen the face of the man helming the little boat. Not only were his features indistinct, but his very outline had been a blur. Still, the lawman’s retinas had been emblazoned with it. That one God-granted instant had been like an eternity. And in it, he had been witness to beauty itself. 

 

chapter 2

I

__

It was thirty minutes later that the boat entered a bay much larger than the one back at the village. The air grew milky white and hazy, and the way they drifted along in an almost imperceptible breeze called to mind the stillness of a tomb.

On seeing the orderly rows of bizarre midsized ships on the other side of the bay, Garigon asked Meg, “Would those happen to be the Nobility’s boats?”

“Yup. Seems they’ve been anchored there for more than a thousand years.”

Since it wasn’t the sheriff who’d posed the question, Meg’s reply wasn’t overly polite.

“They’re clean as a whistle. I heard they never ever rust, but the way they look like they just pulled up gives me the creeps.”

Meg wanted to say, “Good!” and stick her tongue out at him. As the daughter of a hardworking fisherman, she viewed bounty hunters as right at the top of the list of people to be spit upon.

“But with all their science, the Nobility would’ve been able to use aircraft to come and go to the island,” the bounty hunter continued. “I’d heard stories about them using boats, and now it looks like they were right.”

The Nobility had an intrinsic fear of water—running water in particular. In light of that, the fact that they’d built a facility out at sea on an isolated island and used ships to cross the waves to it was more than just strange; it bordered on the miraculous.

Catching glimpses of enormous docks and cranes off in the distance, as well as fantastic machinery for purposes they could hardly imagine, the group reached land. The faint fog that hung there hid the true nature of this world from their eyes.

When he saw what their final addition, Meg, was doing, the sheriff said with a stern expression, “You remember that promise you made, right? I won’t have you going ashore. Take the boat back to the village.”

“My folks and my little sister are here. Just let me be. I won’t be any trouble.”

“I hate to have to say this, but if something were to happen to the three of them, you’d be all that’s left of your family. I can’t let you do anything dangerous. You’re going back.”

“No way. I can’t face the coming night worrying about if the three of ’em are safe or not. Take me with you, Sheriff.”

“Can’t do it.”

“Then I’ll go anyway. Isn’t it safer for you if the boat’s still here?”

“Damn straight,” Bo concurred. “What say we bring her along, Sheriff? Only no one’s gonna be looking out for her. If she dies, it’ll be all on her.”

“Yeah. Out in a desolate place like this, having a girl along will make us wanna get it done a lot more than if it were just a bunch of guys.”

That remark came from Garigon as he looked all around him.

But the sheriff was only looking out for Meg. “No dice,” he said. “Meg, a promise is a promise. Head back to the village right away.”

“No way.”

“Then you leave me no choice. Wesley, bring Meg back. And then—”

The sheriff’s words were sucked into the air, vanishing.

A buzz—and tension—shot through the group. The faint fog clinging to them had suddenly increased in density.

“This is bad. Everyone, stay close,” the sheriff ordered. “Meg, hurry up and get in the boat.”

“No,” the girl said, having already squatted down, drawn a female-sized harpoon from the case she’d been wearing diagonally across her back since she got out of the boat, and poised to hurl the weapon.

“No sign of anything,” Garigon said. They could still make out the outlines of everyone.

Bo replied, “I know. I’ll try firing off an arrow. If anything weird’s creeping up on us, that’s sure to get a response.”

Not waiting for a reply, he raised the short bow that already had an arrow nocked. The bowstring twanged. However, his bow was aimed up at the sky. How was that supposed to deal with a threat that might lurk on the ground?

The answer came as a red rain. At a height of about thirty feet the arrow had split in four directions. And that’d released the liquid sealed inside. There was a breeze, though it was faint. The crimson liquid was caught in the breeze, misting the group before moving on to the far end of the bay—and gusting into the expanse of trees that stood behind the buildings.

“It’s blood!” the spear-wielding bounty hunter cried after seeing what clung to his fingers.

“What the hell are you doing? Are you trying to bring 

every damn Noble down on us?!”

Wesley’s roar got only a laugh in return from Bo. “Sheesh. That way’d save us a lot of trouble, after all. Let ’em all come at once.” He already had three arrows clutched between his fingers and a fresh one nocked in the bow he had aimed at the ground, ready for offensive or defensive action.

“What the hell are you doing, asshole?!” Wesley continued to shout, but the sheriff’s hand clamped down on his shoulder.

“Pipe down.”

“Huh?”

The young deputy fell silent, realizing that he was the only one that’d still been talking. His ears rang with an odd sound. At first he took it for the snarling of a small animal. No, that wasn’t right. It was human. Human groans. Or humans groaning like animals.

Garigon’s lips twisted into a sneer. “Pretty crazy, right? The forest is full of ’em!”

No one answered him. They were too focused on the voices issuing from the forest. Now groans rose from the entire forest, enveloping the landing party like a miasma.

“They’re hungry,” the spear-wielding bounty hunter remarked, licking his lips. There was something vulgar about his tone that made it seem like he might as well be talking about himself, but no one corrected him.

“What the—?”

It wasn’t clear who’d made that remark. Most likely it’d come from someone who’d spotted something shooting up from the treetops in that milky-white world. Much whiter than the fog, they were threads so fine that the more someone tried to focus on them, the more difficult they became to see. And hundreds if not thousands of them fell like a white rain.

It was the sheriff who shouted, “Run for it!”

The bounty hunters had scattered before he’d even given the word. Garigon and Bo dove into the water. In an unbelievable display of speed, the spear-wielder and rifleman dashed into a nearby building.

It was Wesley who grabbed Meg—frozen in her tracks—and got her back into the little boat that’d brought them there. No sooner had they pulled one of the thermal blankets on board over their heads than a white thread zipped right past them and a cry of surprise rang out.

“Pa?!” Wesley shouted, about to leap out from under the blanket.

“Stay right where you are!” he heard the sheriff cry. He was out in the white rain—or rather, wriggling in a net. White threads clung to his face, his

shoulders, his hands and feet, and more stuck to him with every move he made until he was encased in a white cocoon.

“Pa?!”

Wesley was about to dash over to the lawman, but Meg clung to his waist for all she was worth.

“Let me go!”

“No. You’ll just end up like your father! You think that’s what he wants?!”

Wesley became flustered. “But—Pa?!”

No sooner had the deputy put his strength into his arms to throw off the blanket than a weird sound traveled through the air. The net of threads wound about the sheriff’s body had suddenly drawn tight. It was the sound of his bones breaking.

As the two of them stared speechless, the white cocoon was squeezed down to half its former size before their very eyes, rose into the air like a fish on a line, and was yanked off into the stand of trees where the threads had originated.

Meg could feel the young lawman trying to move in her arms, but she fought him desperately. The enemy was waiting for more prey to present itself. What’s more, just look. Weren’t there more white threads again drifting lightly up from the stand of trees, sketching white lines against the blue of the heavens as they drifted back down?

We can’t get out of here. We’ll just end up getting wrapped up like the sheriff sooner or later!

Fear froze Meg’s heart solid.

“At this rate, we won’t be able to move forward at all; we’ll just be left here to—”

The instant the girl put her despair into words, the rain of threads grew chaotic. The arcs they should’ve followed became weaker in midflight, and they fell, drooping from leaves and branches. The master of those threads had met with some sudden emergency.

Once the rain of threads had ended completely, the pair came out from under the blanket. Some threads clung to the blanket or the deck of the boat, so it took considerable time and effort to get through them, but on the other hand, picking a path across the open spaces on the now-white ground seemed impossible.

“As long as those threads stay sticky, we ain’t going nowhere,” someone shouted over from the building where the bounty hunters with the spear and the rifle had taken cover. “No way of knowing how long that’ll take. What’s our play?”

Wesley fell silent.

Though whatever was discharging the threads had

settled down, if they weren’t careful how they moved they’d still find themselves snared. If the master of the threads or some other monster were to then come along, that would be the end of them.

“I’ve got a great way!”

The proposed solution had come from the water’s surface. As the group watched, Garigon crawled out of the sea and touched the rockface. Mixing with the water that dripped from the man’s body, the threads dropped off it.

“You follow? These damn threads lose their stickiness when they come in contact with water. So, what do you say to spreading some water on them? Better yet, it’d be a lot faster for the lot of you to dunk yourselves like we did.”

They all elected to do the latter. Wesley was the first to jump in.

On emerging dripping wet, he announced, “I’m going into the forest to see whether the sheriff is okay or not. The rest of you, wait here.”

No one voiced any objection to that. With the sheriff gone, who’d bother going with the likes of a young deputy? In fact, the entire group seemed wholly inclined to follow his directive. They kept their silence because Wesley was free to leap into the jaws of death for all they cared.

“Sure, we’ll just wait here patiently. Be sure to watch yourself out there, now,” Bo said to him with mock sincerity. ...