A vampire’s head appeared, eyes full of hunger, fangs gleaming. Guérin shot it in the eye, and it slumped backwards, blood spurting into the air.

One bullet.

The stricken vampire was dragged aside, and a second figure leapt through the hole and into the room. It howled, the rising roar of a wild animal, and launched itself at Guérin. He pulled the trigger, but the bullet went wide as the vampire danced to its left. He brought the gun round, crouched down as it reached him, and sent a bullet up through the flesh beneath its jaw, tearing away part of its face and revealing a bloody patch of skull. It crashed to the ground, screaming and clawing at its ruined face. Guerin staked it, and backed up, his gun again at the ready.

Two.

Three.

A pair of vampires leapt through the hole together, their faces twisted with hatred. They raced forward through the narrow room, and Guerin forced himself to stand his ground; there was nowhere for him to go, and he had known it would come to this.

He fired the MP5, taking one of the vampires in the throat and sending it backwards, blood erupting from its butchered neck. His second bullet caught the other vampire in the shoulder; it spun round like a ballerina, but kept coming. He fired again, and took the man’s head off above his eyebrows in a shower of blood and bone.

Four.

Five.

Six.

Guérin took a deep breath, his gaze locked on the hole. Movement swirled inside it, and for the briefest of seconds, he wondered whether he had successfully made them think twice. Then vampires poured through, dozens of them, their eyes glowing in the dim light of the room as they hissed and growled, and he smiled with resignation.

He allowed himself a millisecond to say a silent goodbye to his family as the vampires thundered towards him, then raised the gun to his temple.

Seven.

Jamie watched the missile explode in a tiny ball of fire and turned to his remaining squad mates, his eyes blazing with heat.

“He did it,” he said. “I don’t believe it. Valentin did it.”

“Did what?” asked Larissa.

“I don’t know,” he said, and shook his head. “Something. It was enough, whatever it was. So let’s go.”

He led the two Operators and the American Colonel up the steep path towards the church, his T-Bone drawn and raised. They crested the hill, and emerged in front of the grand façade of the Basilica – the stained glass, the carved stone, the huge wooden doors – and the ragged line of vampires standing before them; the space between them and the survivors of the massacre in the square was no more than five metres.

Jamie stared at the vampires. He saw no fight in their flickering red eyes; all he saw was fear, and something close to despair.

“Any of you who don’t want to die, leave now,” he said.

Half instantly fled; they simply leapt into the air and disappeared over the turreted walls of the city without a backward glance. The six that remained growled as they looked at each other with obvious unease, the light in their eyes darkening.

“Last chance,” said Jamie.

The volume of the growling increased, but none of the vampires moved.

Jamie sighed. “Fine. Have it your way.”

The three remaining members of the strike team fired their T-Bones at the same time. The metal stakes screamed through the air and crunched into the chests of three of the vampires, exploding them. Three huge splashes of blood soaked the surviving vampires, who shrieked and hissed as the stakes wound back into the barrels of the weapons. They stared at each other, drenched in blood from head to toe, the fear on their faces turning into open terror.

“What about now?” he asked.

Without a single word, the three bloody vampires rocketed into the sky. Jamie breathed a sigh of relief, lowered his T-Bone, and walked across to the doors of the Basilica. He leant his head against the old wood, and heard three distant heartbeats; one was dangerously slow, one sounded like that of a regular human, while the other was the loud, steady drumbeat of a vampire.

A powerful vampire.

“Is he in there?” asked Larissa.

Jamie nodded.

“Then this is it,” said Frankenstein.

“This is it,” he said, and reached for the ornate door handles.

“Don’t you dare go in there without me,” said a voice from behind them, and Jamie smiled as he turned towards it.

Valentin was sitting casually atop the high rampart wall opposite the church; he looked like a tourist posing for a photograph.

“Oh, for God’s sake,” said Larissa, and smiled. “There really is just no getting rid of you, is there?”

Angela let her chin rest against her chest and tried not to move as Dracula walked through the nave of the church.

The man who had done this to her, the man with the empty eyes, bowed at the first vampire as he passed, then backed towards where she had been hung, and looked up at her with an expression so devoid of humanity it made her want to vomit.

“Please,” she whispered. “Please …”

The man smiled, and took a step towards her. He gently took hold of her chin, the sensation of his skin on hers so intolerable that it took all her resolve not to scream in horror, and lifted her head.

“What is it?” he whispered. “Does it hurt?”

Angela muttered something under her breath. The man took another step and tilted his ear towards her.

“It’s all right,” he said. “You can tell me. Does it hurt?”

Angela smiled as her fangs slid out of her gums and red light exploded into her eyes. The man recoiled, but before he could stagger out of range, she yanked her right hand forward with all her remaining strength; it ripped free of the cross, the nail still sticking through the palm, and she clenched it into a tight fist. She swung it up under the man’s chin, lifting him into the air as the nail pierced his flesh. His eyes flew open, and he gagged as blood gushed into his mouth and down her arm. She bore down, hauling him up and towards her, bringing his throat within range of her fangs.

“You tell me,” she growled. “Does it?”

The man stared at Angela, disbelief filling his eyes, until she tore out his throat with her fangs, and drank the blood that spurted into her mouth.

Power surged through her. She let the hateful man drop to the ground, and shattered the giant cross with a single flex of the muscles in her back. It exploded into splinters, and she floated in the air for a long moment, breathing deeply, her mind blanked by fury and the desire for revenge. Then she yanked the nails out of her hands and feet, threw them aside, and flew out into the centre of the nave as the doors of the church creaked open behind her.

The rest of the strike team walked into the Basilique Saint-Nazaire, their footsteps echoing on its tiled floor. Larissa’s skin was tingling with anticipation; after so much time, so much bloodshed and death, it was simple.

Them and Dracula, to the end.

Her eyes immediately found the far end of the church, where the first vampire was sitting in a grand chair that was almost a throne, a narrow smile on his face as he stared at them. Then a black shape darted out from one of the alcoves on the left, and she found herself looking at the pale, furious face of Angela Darcy.

Larissa’s heart leapt as relief burst through her. She sprinted forward and grabbed her friend’s shoulders, her squad mates close behind her.

“Angela!” she said. “What happened? Are you all right?”

“No,” said Angela, her voice trembling. “I’m not remotely all right. But I’ll tell you about it later.” She looked down the aisle, and growled. “Once we’re done with him.”

Dracula floated down on to the floor of the Basilica, and drew the giant broadsword that he had carried into battle more times than he could remember.