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Overview
THEY FIGHT TO KEEP YOUR CHILDREN SAFE.
The Night Warriors are an ancient order set to protect us in our dreams, when we are our most defenceless – and there is nothing more vulnerable than a child.
When they learn of two monstrous apparitions that are attempting to enter the dreams of expectant mothers, sending demons to embed themselves into the minds of newborn babies, they know they must do something.
The only way to stop such a powerful force is to uncover their true motive for targeting children. They have faced evil before – but nothing as cruel and horrific as this...
Praise for Graham Masterton:
'One of the most original and frightening storytellers of our time' Peter James
'Suspenseful and tension-filled... all the finesse of a master storyteller' Guardian
'One of Britain's finest horror writers' Daily Mail
'You are in for a hell of a ride' Grimdark Magazine
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781035904075 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Bloomsbury USA |
| Publication date: | 04/16/2024 |
| Series: | The Night Warriors |
| Pages: | 416 |
| Sales rank: | 660,649 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.00(w) x 7.50(h) x 1.20(d) |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
Night Wars
By Graham Masterton
Dorchester Publishing
Copyright © 2006
Graham Masterton
All right reserved.
ISBN: 0-8439-5427-2
Chapter One
She had just stepped into the small triangular bathroom when
she heard her cellphone playing Wake Up, Little Susie,
somewhere on the couch. No, ignore it. It wasn't going to
be Jimmy Berrance, apologizing for sacking her, and it
wasn't going to be WHAS, offering her a job as a roving TV
reporter. It wasn't going to be her father, either, that
was for sure. But it kept on playing and playing, and after
the tenth play she hesitated in the middle of the bathroom
with her arms crossed and her T-shirt half-lifted over her
head. Maybe it was Joe Henry, her kind-of-boyfriend, back
from Seattle two days early.
She went back into the living-room and rummaged through the
magazines and sweaters on the couch. She found her cellphone
studded with caramel popcorn.
"Hallo? Joe Henry?"
"Is that Sasha? I tried to call you at the office but they
told me you didn't work there any longer." It wasn't Joe
Henry. It was a woman's voice, and she sounded as if she
were panicking.
"No, that's true, I don't work there any longer. Who is
this?"
"Jenny Ferraby. Do you remember me? You wrote an article
about me last year."
"Jenny Ferraby? Oh, sure, yes." It would have been
difficult to forget Jenny Ferraby. She had fought the State
of Kentucky for the right to use her latehusband's sperm to
conceive a child, even though he had been executed three
years before for a triple homicide. It had become known in
the media as the "Demon Seed" case.
"You must be due pretty soon, huh?" said Sasha. "I have a
note somewhere to call you about that."
"The baby was born two days ago, three weeks premature. He's
a little boy."
"Congratulations. Is he okay?"
"That's why I'm calling you. There's something wrong with
him. He won't stop screaming and he won't sleep. He hasn't
slept for even a second since he was born."
"You're kidding me. All babies sleep. I mean, that's what
they do, isn't it? Cry, crap, eat and sleep."
"Not this one. He opened his eyes as soon as he was born and
he hasn't closed them since."
Sasha cleared herself a space on the edge of the couch and sat
down. "So what do the doctors say?"
"They don't understand it any more than me. At first I
thought - well, you can imagine what I thought. Maybe it was
a punishment from God, for going against nature."
"Oh, come on."
"I know. It wasn't very rational, but then I wasn't feeling
very rational. It was only when another baby was born, about
seven hours later, and she wouldn't stop crying, either - and
then another, and another."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that every baby born here in the past forty-eight
hours is exactly the same. Seven babies so far. They won't
stop screaming and they won't sleep. They're having to feed
all of them on a drip."
"Well, I have to admit, that is very strange indeed. Listen
- if I remember, you were going to have your baby where? At
The Ormsby Clinic, wasn't it?"
"That's right. That's where I am now."
"And the doctors can't work out what's wrong?"
"They're going frantic. Everybody here is going frantic."
"Who else knows about this?"
"Nobody. They asked us not to tell the media, in case the
whole thing turns into a circus. But it's obvious that they
don't have the first idea what to do, and I thought that if
you published a story about it - well, some specialist might
read it. Somebody who has experience with cases like these."
"Ms Ferraby - Jenny - I don't work for the Courier-Journal any
more. They fired me. Why don't you call the editor, Jimmy
Berrance? He should be able to help you."
"But surely you can still write a story about it? When I
wanted to have George's baby, you were the only one who
understood. You were the only one who didn't treat me as if I
was some kind of ghoul."
"I'm sorry. I'm finished with the Courier-Journal. I'm
looking for a career change. Maybe TV, or movies. Maybe
I'll join a rock band."
"Sasha, I'm desperate. I wouldn't have called you if I
wasn't desperate."
"I'm sorry, Jenny. What can I say?"
"Wait up," said Jenny Ferraby. Sasha could hear voices, and
a door opening and closing, and a phone ringing. Then
another door opened, and she heard babies crying.
"Just listen," said Jenny Ferraby. "Listen to them, and my
boy is one of them. Listen, and tell me that you're not
going to help me."
Sasha listened, and the sound she heard made her feel as if
the skin around her scalp was shrinking. An appalling chorus
of naked, helpless fear. Seven babies, every one of them
way beyond hysteria, screaming and screaming as if something
so terrible was about to happen to them that they would never
be able to catch their breath.
* * *
The thunder had cleared away toward St Matthews by the time
she reached The Ormsby Clinic, and the red asphalt driveway
was wreathed in steam. As she climbed out of her
ten-year-old sky-blue Mustang, Jenny Ferraby came down the
front steps of the clinic and hurried toward her. She was a
thin, fretful-looking woman of 35 with wild gingery hair,
wearing a pale green summer dress and Birkenstock sandals.
"Thank you so much for coming. You have no idea how worried I
am. If Kieran doesn't stop crying ... I'm sure he's going to die
of exhaustion."
"You didn't tell the doctors I'm a reporter? Well - was a
reporter?"
Jenny Ferraby took hold of her arm, and clung to it tightly.
"I said that you were a very close friend of mine, that's
all."
"What about the other parents?"
"They've all agreed to keep this out of the media. None of
them really wants the publicity. It's distressing enough as
it is."
They went through the revolving door into the clinic's
reception area, which was chilly and modern, with cream
marble floors and bay trees in woven straw containers. The
words The Ormsby Obstetric Clinic were written in shiny
stainless-steel letters on the wall, and in the center of the
reception area stood a bronze sculpture of a faceless mother
and a faceless child.
The receptionist glanced across at them, and Jenny Ferraby
pointed at Sasha and said, unnecessarily, "My friend. She's
come to see my baby."
She led the way along the corridor to the Maternity Wing.
Sasha could hear the babies crying as soon as they walked
through the swing doors. A harassed-looking nurse hurried
past them, and gave Jenny Ferraby a sympathetic grimace.
Outside the intensive care ward, nine weary mothers and
fathers were sitting, drinking coffee or trying to read
magazines or simply sitting with their heads in their hands.
One or two of the mothers looked around as Sasha and Jenny
Ferraby came past, and tried to smile, but the rest of the
parents ignored her. They were too worried and too tired.
Through the large glass window, Sasha could see the babies
lying in their transparent plastic cribs, all of them
crimson-faced and all of them crying. A drip had been
attached to each of the babies to keep them hydrated and fed,
and each of them was wired up to an lcd screen to monitor
their vital signs. Two doctors and four nurses were gathered
around one of the screens, talking and shaking their heads.
"That's my Kieran," said Jenny Ferraby, pointing to the
third baby along the row. "Look at him, the poor little
darling."
"Haven't they tried sedating them?" asked Sasha. "I mean, I
know they're very little, but they can't let them go on
crying like this."
"They've tried everything. They've tried music, they've
tried dolphin noises, they've tried flashing lights and
they've tried keeping them in total darkness. They gave them
as much anti-histamine as they dared, but it didn't have any
effect at all."
"So what do they plan to do next?"
"I'm not sure. They've told us that they're going to try
hypnosis, but I don't see how you can hypnotize a premature
baby."
"Can I talk to one of the doctors?"
"Sure, I don't see why not. So long as you don't tell them
what you're really doing here."
Sasha approached the window and looked into the IC unit at all
the wriggling, screaming babies. They were so dehydrated by
their crying that they no longer had any tears. Jenny came
and stood beside her and said, "I feel so helpless. Kieran
is depending on me to protect him and take care of him, and I
can't."
She waved to one of the doctors, a short African-American
woman with glasses and hair cropped like a blacksmith's anvil.
The doctor waved back, and after a moment she came out
through the double doors.
"Hallo, Jenny. How are you holding up?"
"Dr Absalom, this is my friend Sasha. I brought her along
for some moral support."
"Right now, I think we could all use some moral support,"
said Dr Absalom.
"This is so strange, isn't it?" said Sasha. "All of these
babies crying like this, and not sleeping."
"Well, we're working on a couple of possible treatments,"
said Dr Absalom. "One theory is that they've somehow been
traumatized while they were still in the womb, but why this
condition should only have affected babies born here at The
Ormsby, we simply have no idea."
Sasha watched one of the nurses taking a blood-sample from
the baby next to Kieran. "Were the mothers given any kind of
prescription medication, prior to their giving birth?"
"Nothing stronger than vitamin supplements."
"Were they following any specific diet?"
Dr Absalom raised one eyebrow. Sasha realized that her
question might have sounded too professional, so she shrugged
quickly and said, "I'm just wondering, that's all. Like, I
heard that unborn babies can even get a taste for garlic, if
their mothers eat a whole lot of it."
Dr Absalom nodded. "We've been recommending the same diet plan
to thousands of mothers for more than sixteen years. It's not
mandatory, though, and so the mothers have all been
following different regimes. Three Hot Browns a day, in one
case."
"Hey - that's what I call a diet."
Jenny Ferraby said, "Do you think I could take Sasha in to
see Kieran?"
"Provided you both wear caps and masks, and you don't touch
him, sure."
Dr Absalom called for one of the nurses to bring them surgical
masks and caps to cover their hair. "When you go in there - well,
the noise is very upsetting. But please understand
that we're doing everything we possibly can to relieve these
babies' distress."
"I understand that you're not telling the press about it,
though," said Sasha, through her blue checkered mask.
"That's because we don't want the parents to suffer any more
than they are already."
"And you wouldn't want The Ormsby Clinic to be associated with
inexplicable infant insomnia, would you?"
Dr Absalom said, sharply, "Our priority, Ms -"
"Edison."
"Our priority, Ms Edison, is the welfare of these children.
Nothing else."
"I see," said Sasha. "I'm sorry." She didn't want to annoy
Dr Absalom before she had the chance to go in and see baby
Kieran, and take his picture, too. This story might even
get her job back for her.
"Okay?" said Dr Absalom, and opened the outer door. Sasha
and Jenny Ferraby followed her.
Even before she opened the inner door, Sasha found the
screaming was almost unbearable - the terrible, quivering
anguish, and the knowledge that she couldn't do anything to
stop it.
"You'll have to be brave, I'm afraid," said Dr Absalom.
Jenny Ferraby walked through the inner door, and then Sasha.
Every one of the seven babies was crying and gasping and
frantically waving its arms. Every one of them had its eyes
open, with its pupils darting from side to side, as if it
were desperately frightened, but powerless to escape.
"Oh God," said Sasha. "If you're a baby, this is what hell
must be like."
* * *
That evening, Sasha sat on the couch with an open can of cold
spaghetti bolognese and her laptop on her knees and started to
type up her story. Humidity was over 91 percent, and even
though she had opened her window wide, the grubby pink calico
drapes hung motionless. It was raining again, softly but
very steadily, and car tires sizzled on the wet street
outside. In another apartment, somebody was practising the
cello, starting and stopping and then starting again.
By midnight, most of her story was done, but tomorrow she
would have to call The Ormsby Clinic and give them the
opportunity to make a comment. Using her cellphone, she had
managed to take three reasonable photos of the screaming
children. In one of them, Jenny Ferraby was leaning over
Kieran's crib with tears in her eyes - tears for the tears
which little Kieran himself could no longer cry.
She looked through the photos two or three times, and she was
just about to put down her cellphone when she hesitated. She
knew that there was no point in calling her father's number.
He had never picked up before and there was no reason for her
to think that he would pick up now. He had walked out on her
mother thirteen months ago, and vanished altogether for
three-and-a-half months. No phone-calls, no letters, no
emails. Eventually, Sasha had used her contacts at the
Courier-Journal to trace him to an engineering company in
Manitoba. She must have called him a hundred times since then,
and left dozens of messages, but he had never answered.
"Dad. This is Sash. Just call me and tell me you're happy."
She pressed his number, but after it had rung twice she
pressed disconnect. Even if he did answer, she didn't really
know what she wanted to say to him, not after all this time.
When she had finished rewriting her story, she got up,
dropped the half-empty spaghetti can into the pedal bin,
tossed the fork into the sink, and then fell onto her bed,
too tired even to wash her teeth. It was nearly two in the
morning, and even though she had slept for most of yesterday,
she felt emotionally exhausted. She wound one of the sheets
around herself, punched the pillow into shape, and closed
her eyes.
She couldn't wait to finish off her story in the morning. And
she was dying to show it to Jimmy Berrance. "Not only is this
the greatest human-interest story in the history of
Louisville, it actually happens to be true. So, nyardy,
nyardy, nyah."
He would have to give her job back. He might even give her a
raise. He might even promote her to chief features editor.
* * *
She dreamed that she was standing by the cast-iron fountain in
Central Park. Although the path was sunlit, the sky was low
and very dark, and when she looked up she saw that it was
filled with thousands and thousands of ravens, all flying
north-eastward. Their wings made a horrible rustling noise,
and Sasha was sure that she could smell them, dry and fetid,
like the desiccated corpses they picked on.
As she was standing there, a small boy came pedaling toward
her on a tricycle. Although he was pedaling very hard, it
seemed to take him forever to reach her. She had time to look
around: at the diagonal pathways, along which people in
white topcoats were walking at a measured pace, some of them
ostentatiously smoking; and at the trees, which were thickly
laden with purple blossom; and at the water in the fountain,
which glittered in the sunlight like a golden horse's tail.
At last the boy arrived. He was naked except for
red-and-white Keds. He looked up at her and she recognized
him almost at once as Kieran, Jenny Ferraby's son. But how
had he grown up so quickly, and why wasn't he crying any
more?
"Kieran?" she asked him. For some reason she found it
necessary to talk into a crumpled brown-paper bag. It was
something to do with hyperventilating, which was always a
risk in dreams.
"They took the insides out of our heads," said Kieran,
although he was speaking sideways language, and Sasha found
it very difficult to translate. Sideways language was
extremely oblique, made up of hints and suggestions and
implications, rather than straightforward words. She knew
that it was usually spoken in places where space was at a
premium, like coalmines.
"I think you'll have to explain that more clearly," she said.
"I don't want to let you down by misinterpreting you."
"They took the animals and the balls and the dancing," Kieran
told her. "They took the morning and the moon and all of the
answers."
"Who did?"
"They did. The cold people."
"And is that why you cry all the time, and why you can't
sleep?"
Kieran nodded. "Find the insides of our heads, and then we
can sleep."
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Night Wars
by Graham Masterton
Copyright © 2006 by Graham Masterton .
Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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