“What’s your sergeant’s name?” asked Kate.

A brief hesitation. “Parker.”

“And your station?”

“Lincoln.”

“Lincoln what? There must be more than one police station in—”

There was a click as the door opened behind Kate. She turned to see the nurse standing in the doorway, her eyes wide as she stared at the Glock.

“Get in here and shut the door,” said Kate. She turned back to the men, suddenly aware that she had taken her eyes off them, but Sudbury was already halfway across the room, his face twisted into a smile, his fist hurtling towards her. She raised her arm to protect herself, but was far too slow; Sudbury’s punch knocked it aside and slammed into her mouth, driving her back across the room as stars exploded across her vision and a single thought filled her mind.

Failed.

Kate was sitting on the floor when she came, to her back against the wall.

Her head was pounding, her mouth felt like someone had filled it with razor wire, and her throat was thick with liquid. She raised the back of her hand to her face, fought back a scream of pain, and felt her head swim as it came away soaked with red.

Bleeding, she thought, her mind thick and slow. Why am I bleeding?

Then she looked up, and adrenaline roared through her as she remembered where she was.

Woodford was standing beside her dad’s bed. Sudbury – if that’s even his name, she wondered – was standing over her, pointing her own gun at her chest. Behind him, in the corner, the nurse sat trembling on a chair.

“What’s the plan?” asked Woodford.

“No witnesses,” said Sudbury.

“All three of them? Randall was the order. These other two don’t have anything to do with it.”

Sudbury shrugged. “You know what an evolving situation is,” he said. “Remember Helmand?”

“This isn’t Afghan,” said Woodford.

“It’s a war,” said Sudbury. “Different enemy, that’s all.”

“I don’t like it,” said Woodford. “This one’s a nurse and we have no idea who the other one is. Why attract more heat by killing civilians?”

Sudbury sighed. “How many civilians have you met that pointed a Glock 17 at you?” he asked. “Anyway, don’t you read the papers? Pete Randall’s daughter is Blacklight. That’s why he founded SSL in the first place. This must be her.”

Woodford looked at her. “That right?” he asked. “You’re Blacklight?”

Kate stared up at him, her mind blank.

“She’s a soldier,” said Sudbury. “I know one when I see one. So I’ll make it quick. I’ll do that much for her.”

He raised the Glock until its barrel was pointing between her eyes. Kate saw not a flicker of doubt in the man’s eyes; he had killed before, and she knew he wasn’t afraid to do it again.

I’m going to die, she thought, her heart freezing in her chest. I’m going to die, and that nurse is going to die, and then my dad is going to die.

Sudbury’s finger tightened on the trigger. “Say goodbye, Miss Randall,” he said. “It’s time to—”

The door crashed open, and Kate’s heart thundered back to life as she spun round.

Two Operators in full uniform, purple visors over their faces, silenced MP7s at their shoulders, burst into the room. The Night Stalkers were fast – Sudbury’s Glock rose in a blur as Woodford drew a Beretta from his belt with well-practised speed – but the Operators were used to facing vampires. The MP7s fired, the suppressors reducing the shots to low thuds, and the two men hit the ground, expressions of surprise on their faces and neat holes in their foreheads.

Kate got unsteadily to her feet and looked at the nurse. The woman was staring at the two bodies, her eyes and mouth comically wide, but she wasn’t screaming, and Kate was grateful for that; screams would have attracted more attention, which this situation absolutely did not need.

“Are you all right?” asked one of the Operators, their voice cold and metallic through their helmet filters, and all of a sudden she understood how terrifying an encounter with Blacklight must be to a member of the public: the calm precision of the violence, the voices and faces hidden by technology.

“I’m OK,” she said. “Did you have to kill them?”

“Better them than you,” said the Operator.

Kate stared at the impenetrable purple visor; she could think of no response to such a blunt assessment.

The Operator took a step towards her. “Are you sure you’re all right?”

“I think so,” she said. “Yeah. I’m all right.”

The Operator nodded. “OK. Medical team, the room is clear. Extraction is a go.”

Two Blacklight medical staff, wearing full NBC suits and hoods, strode into the room, followed by two more Operators. Kate stepped aside as the doctors went to her father’s bed and the Operators led the nurse towards the door. She went without protest, her face a mask of shock: Kate knew she would be given a copy of the Official Secrets Act to sign, then left with nothing but a memory that would give her nightmares for years to come.

Kate shut the door as the medical staff leant over her father and began removing the needles and monitoring patches from his body. When he was fully unhooked from the machines, which let out a horrible droning beep as his vital signs disappeared, they unfolded a plastic isolation tent and threw it over his bed, clipping it tightly to the frame.

“Ready,” said one of the doctors.

The Operator nearest the door nodded, pulled it open, and followed the medical staff as they wheeled her father’s bed through it. The other looked over at her.

“Coming?”

Kate stared. “Thank you,” she said, her voice trembling with relief. “Thank you so much.”

The Operator flipped up their visor and Dominique Saint-Jacques smiled at her.

“You’re very welcome, Kate,” he said. “Tell me one more time that you’re OK.”

“I’m OK,” she said, a tiny smile rising on to her face.

“I believe you,” said Dominique. “Now come on. I want your dad safely at the Loop before Dracula’s deadline.”

Kate frowned; she had thought about nothing else since Paul Turner had given her the news about her dad, and had completely lost track of time.

“How long have we got?”

“Just over an hour,” said Dominique. “Then we’ll see what we’re dealing with.”

“Yeah,” said Kate. “I suppose we will.”

Every clock in Carcassonne ticked over to 10.06pm as every resident of the city held their breath.

Silence.

In the displaced persons camp, at the Loop and Dreamland, in Washington and London, and in homes around the world, people waited, hearts in their mouths, for Dracula to make good on his promise.

Silence.

Watching through a pair of binoculars from his command centre, General Allen momentarily allowed himself to consider the prospect that the ancient vampire had been bluffing.

Perhaps he already has what he wanted. Perhaps he just wanted the city cleared. Perhaps—

The night sky burst a bright, blinding orange, illuminating the city with a vast, silent flash. A millisecond later the sound hit; a roaring explosion that rumbled the ground beneath Allen’s feet and hammered into his skull. He staggered backwards, bellowing in pain, and turned to the monitor tuned permanently to a French news channel. It was showing helicopter footage of Carcassonne on a five-second delay; as he watched, enormous fireballs erupted into the sky as every petrol station within a five-mile radius of the medieval city exploded at the same moment.

Dracula smiled as shock waves thundered across the empty city, blowing his long hair back from his face. The sound that followed them was agony to his supernatural ears, but his smile didn’t waver.

The first vampire was floating above the highest section of the ancient walls, as his army flooded down the hill below him to carry out the task they had been given. Blowing up the petrol stations had not been strictly necessary, but Dracula had always instinctively understood the need for theatre when it came to warfare, to consider not only the damage you could do to your enemies’ body but also the effect you could have on their minds. Fear, as he had told the Rusmanov brothers on a great many occasions, was the greatest weapon any commander wielded; it was the one thing that could defeat an enemy before the fighting even began.