Inkarna

by Nerine Dorman

  Jonathan smiles at me and it takes all my willpower to not make some attempt to lash out at him. Paul steps forward, reaching into a back pocket for a small leather wallet, from which he retrieves an ampoule of clear liquid. There’s a look of grim determination to him as he closes the distance between us.

  Ashton makes an attempt to get me to my feet and, for a moment, we war with each other—Ashton obviously wanting to make a run for the door and me trying to keep the Kha in one place.

  Paul fits the ampoule into a cartridge that looks like a pen, his hands cold and clinical as he pushes aside my hair to hold the pen to my neck. Cynthia’s fingers dig even deeper, the pain excruciating for the split second before the drug kicks in and my world tumbles into a comfortable oblivion.

  Chapter 13

  Striking Back

  Most people, I’m sure, would also have a sixth sense, an awareness of when they’re not alone in a room. I wake groggily, disorientated, but completely sure someone’s standing at the foot of my bed.

  For a moment I thrash about on the narrow cot, uncertain as to where I am before the past night’s occurrences flood me and I strain doubly as hard against my bonds. My hands have been cuffed behind my back, chained to my feet so I’m effectively hog-tied. Ashton stands by my feet, more solid than ever before, his arms crossed over his broad chest so the muscles bulge.

  “What the fuck are we going to do?”

  I groan, my head thumping in time with my pulse.

  “Feels like the mother of all hangovers,” Ashton says. “Now you know why I’ve stepped out.” He gives a low chuckle. “I guess there are advantages to this arrangement.”

  “First off, I’m going to get out of this.” I strain back to get a good look at an intricate assortment of padlocks and chains. They obviously think I’m a fire starter, but they’ve done me a favour. Now rope may have presented a problem. Closing my eyes, I concentrate, shrugging aside the foggy after-effects of whatever drug they’ve given me.

  The mechanism is easy to spring, run by a combination of interlocking parts, and it’s almost like a puzzle, the small wheels spinning until, with a snick, the thing comes loose. It’s easy enough grappling at each padlock in turn in order to unhook it.

  Ashton stands there, watching, and I glare at him. “What?”

  “You’re giving me ideas.”

  “What, you going to open doors now, too?”

  He shrugs. “Hurry up, hey.”

  “How is Marlise? I assume you’ve checked up on her.”

  His expression becomes pained for an instant, and he evaporates in a burst of snowlike static.

  “Bloody hell,” I mutter. The chains unravel and fall to a clinking pile on the bed. Gingerly I rise, massaging some life into my wrists and legs, which are cramping something awful after being tied in this position the whole night.

  What is the time, anyway? I rise and hobble to the window. The light spilling through the heavy maroon drapes is buttery, but heavy bars put paid to any thought of escaping via the window. At least the sky is blue. Beyond the glass is a rolling expanse of lawn running down to a thick stand of oak and, after that, the first rolling vineyards of Constantia, the vines bared this time of year to expose the red-orange soil. I must be near one of the original historical homesteads.

  “She’s awake,” Ash says as he envelopes me in a cool mist, seeping into my Kha. “But you must hurry. I think they’ve got a camera or some sort of motion sensor in your room, or you’ve just had the rotten luck of waking as they were about to fetch you.”

  I nod, shoving at the dullness of my mind, just damn glad my daimonic abilities are working better, and sans the nosebleeds. Placing a trembling hand on the door handle, I breathe deeply, trying to see inside, to figure out how this one works because it’s not the usual run-of-the-mill mechanism one would purchase at a shop.

  It’s then that I realise the chains I’d been bound with earlier were just a tool to make me feel helpless. I encounter circuit boards, like one would find inside Marlise’s computer, and some sort of recognition software linked to… Something—something that is almost sentient. I pull back with a gasp.

  “That’s pretty close to AI,” Ashton says. “Like in the movies.”

  “Shut up. I need to concentrate.”

  As I put my hand down, something beeps and the door is flung inward. I jump back just in time to come face to face with Cynthia, who looks rather too curvy in a black, tight-fitting tracksuit and running shoes. Her defensive stance is decidedly unsexy, however.

  For a moment her expression is that of surprise but then she relaxes, looking me up and down. “White boy thinks he’s being clever getting out of the chains. We’ll just use rope next time.”

  Trying not to show my dismay, I smile. “Good morning to you, too.” I bunch my muscles, trying to weigh up which would be the better course of action: to try shove past her or to yield. Paul appears behind her. The gun he’s pointing at my midriff has me raise my hands immediately.

  “Okay, okay.” I step back. I may be Inkarna, but I can’t dodge bullets and I’m not sure I can sabotage the weapon before he pulls the trigger.

  “Don’t make any holes in this body,” Ashton says.

  I bite my tongue, in case I answer him out loud.

  “Bind his hands behind his back,” Cynthia says to Paul. She takes the gun from him and motions for him to enter. Then she looks at me, holding up a plastic object, some sort of remote control. “See this? If I press the red button, it sends a signal, and one of the staff will know they have the instruction to terminate your pretty girlfriend. Paul has one, too. One false move… And I’m not totally dense. I can feel when you’re drawing in power.”

  I swallow hard, yet turn my back from Paul as he advances so I’m pressed against the window. “You don’t need to bind me, okay?”

  “Don’t take me for a fool.”

  Paul advances on me, the tranquiliser pen clutched in his right hand. A thin film of moisture beads his brow, small runlets trickling down his temple in slick dribbles. The man is close to shitting himself because of me.

  “You aren’t just going to let them tie you up?” Ashton asks.

  “I don’t have a choice, do I?”

  Cynthia, her eyes never leaving mine, laughs, shaking her head. “Aikona.”

  “Look, I’m going to need shoes where we’re headed.” I glance pointedly at my bare feet.

  Paul turns to Cynthia. “Binneman didn’t say anythi—”

  “Don’t be such a wimp, Paul. Go get him a pair of your old running shoes. Looks like you two are of a size.”

  Paul scowls at her something fierce but obeys, turning his back on me. For a moment I consider drawing my powers, lashing out, but Cynthia’s finger is twitchy, the ball of her thumb caressing that fateful red button.

  How many other staff members patrol this estate? Do I want to take the chance to find out? Cynthia and Paul I may be able to take on once we’re away from the property, though this in itself may prove tricky.

  Cynthia walks behind me, the gun jammed into the small of my back. One false move and Marlise will be dead, this Kha with its spine blown out. Now’s not the right moment.

  My stomach growls ominously. “Can I at least have something to eat?” I ask.

  Cynthia hisses. “You don’t deserve food.”

  “It’s quite a way up the mountain. You don’t want me fainting before I can undo that compulsion.”

  “Very well.” She walks me down several long passages where I recognise a few Claerhouts and even a Siopis adorning the walls. Jonathan is rich beyond my wildest imaginings.

  Once in the kitchen—a typical modernistic affair clad in vast quantities of black and red granite—Cynthia unties my hands long enough for me to wolf down a bowl of corn flakes and a banana. This is hardly enough to fuel the body but right now I can’t expect any better.

  By the time I’m done, Paul returns, holding the oldest, scruffiest pair of running shoes as though they wer
e covered in excrement. I try not to cringe as I slip my feet into them. They smell none too fresh as well, and I elect not to ask when he last wore them. The shoes are too small for my feet, my toes horribly scrunched up at the front, but it’s still better than having to attempt a climb barefoot, and in winter.

  All the while they watch me, fingers conspicuously on the remote buttons as I do up the laces, gritting my teeth against the fusty smell.

  “You could have brought me a pair of socks, you know,” I say to Paul.

  He offers me a silent snarl in response.

  “I’m so going to get him for this,” Ashton says. “I would never be caught dead wearing crappy Adidas takkies that look like they’ve been used to run one half-marathon too many. If you get a weird fucked-up fungal infection or something after this…”

  “What you grinning about, shithead?” Cynthia asks.

  Carefully I school my face. “Nothing.” I watch them warily, waiting for the cues that suggest I can rise to my feet.

  Paul jingles keys in his pockets. “No point in waiting; he’s done.”

  Cynthia gestures with the gun and I get up slowly, watching both of them watch me.

  We file out into the driveway and I get my first real glimpse of the house—a rambling faux-Tuscan edifice that sprawls, no doubt with a number of hidden courtyards. Palms shiver in the stiff breeze, eliciting a tremor in my Kha. It’s bloody cold and I’m wearing only a thin t-shirt and a pair of jeans with shoes in which not even a dead man would want to be buried. After a brief discussion, Cynthia has Paul restrain my hands behind my back with one of those plastic ties the cops use. The bindings quickly cut off circulation to my hands.

  I don’t need eyes in the back of my head to know we’re being watched, from one or more of the dark-tinted windows in the house. My imagination suggests it could be Catherine, staring at me with her little hate-filled heart pumping very hard.

  An old Egyptian saying warned against one eating one’s own heart, lest one’s hatred becomes all-consuming, like Apep trying to eat the sun-disc. I can only begin to imagine the centuries of feuding that are culminating in my present situation. A pawn, that’s what I am. A pawn. Nothing more.

  Ashton’s angry ghost is my only advantage right now, also that I’m fully Inkarna. Give Cynthia another month or two and she’d be more dangerous. I can sense her daimonic powers fizzling just beneath the surface. She can call some of them forth, that much I’ve seen, but our kind can sense those who are lower in the scale. Both Paul and Cynthia would, no doubt, have had some experience with combat training and weapons. That goes without saying.

  Ashton was, or rather is, a brawler. Him going up against these two? I’ll have to catch them unawares, which may prove tricky. I don’t doubt they’d go through with the threat of killing Marlise. Potential or no, she’s a risk to them. What’s it going to be, our lives relegated to a newspaper report about two decayed unidentifiable bodies discovered in some remote area?

  I shudder. Not only at the thought of having to pass through the Black Gate again so soon, but also facing the ire awaiting me in Per Ankh should I fail. That’s if House Adamastor is still recognisably a collective of Inkarna. I don’t know.

  My head pressed against the glass, I watch the world go by. Cynthia sits next to me in the back, her eyes never once leaving me as she watches every small gesture, every tiniest twitch of muscles. Paul handles the driving—a big black Mercedes Kompressor with tinted windows like our government officials sometimes drive when they leave their SUVs at home.

  The car’s engine is so quiet I don’t feel the slightest vibration through the floor, though I sense the power of the engine as the vehicle slips between the early morning traffic. Pushing my senses further may just alert Cynthia to my curiosity. Outside it’s a beautiful day, the trees’ stark branches catching the sunlight, the sky that special winter aquamarine I’d find especially beautiful if it weren’t for the certainty that today may well be my last on the material plane, for a very long time.

  Even Paul’s taste in music has a funerary tone, or at least I’ve always had the opinion that the music of Thomas Tallis verges on the maudlin. A motet has been arranged for a string quartet and, while the music is pretty, it only serves to increase the lump of sorrow I carry within.

  I’m not ready to die again. I’ve had so little time. Today hangs on such a slender thread. My stomach lurches and I wonder idly if I’ll get sick. Let me not think of the stele—a stone accusation. How the hell am I going to keep The Book of Ammit out of House Montu’s hands?

  We arrive in Kalk Bay sooner than I want, the risen sun glinting off the calm blue-green waters in the small harbour where colourful fishing boats bob. Cynthia motions for me to get out of the car and I obey, standing very still. Here on this road above Kalk Bay the cars passing below seem almost like toys, and I look anywhere but at her in an attempt to feign nonchalance.

  Cynthia zips up her leather jacket, and I turn to see her eye me speculatively as Paul fiddles inside the car. She waits for him to climb out then speaks. “We’re going to have to untie his hands. Can’t have people getting suspicious. I want you to have the house on speed dial.” She glares at me. “One false move from you and Paul calls to let them know that your girlfriend bites it. If I so much as even feel you tapping into the reserves around us, I will get him to make that call. Do you understand?”

  I incline my head, not deigning to answer because I don’t trust myself to prevent a snappy retort.

  “Fucking bitch, I’m going to stick that gun so far up her pussy she’ll have to get it surgically removed,” Ashton says.

  Paul unties my hands and for that I’m grateful. I rub the feeling back into fingers gone numb. There’s nothing left but to start climbing, with the two of them walking behind me. I don’t have to turn to know that pistol’s trained on my back. All the small hairs on my nape prickle—Cynthia keeps some of her daimonic powers cocked as well, like the gun. I can expect a physical backlash and more if I’m not careful.

  The path up the mountain is ridiculously easy during the day. The stairs that tripped me and Marlise the last time are now only a pleasure, but my pair of goons doesn’t give me a chance to admire the view. Paul gets out of breath easily and so do I. This Kha doesn’t want to stumble up the mountain at such a pace, but Cynthia is impatient. Every time I stop to catch my breath, her lips thin and her eyes glint dangerously.

  With each step we are closer to the goal. While we walk I envision the scramble near the top. This would be an ideal spot. They will have to let me go on up ahead. Cynthia may have her pugnacious attitude as an advantage, but her limbs are much shorter than mine and, combat training or not, she’s still going to have to put a lot more effort into clambering up that vertical spot.

  I think long and hard—pointedly at Ashton—of how loose rocks can make someone slip, how he or she can fall at that particular spot where I’d been doubtful of getting Marlise to succeed at the last section.

  “I’m gone.” His awareness leaves me with a sigh.

  “What was that?” Cynthia asks.

  Damn. I stop and turn slowly, hands held up. “What?”

  “I felt that. What did you do?”

  Paul blinks at us then mops his brow, but that cell phone remains clutched in white-knuckled hands, thumb on the call button.

  Summoning what I hope to be a puzzled expression, I look her square in the eye. “There’s some daimonic activity here. I should have warned you. Someone or several someones died in a cave here a few years ago, or so I’ve heard. I felt that too when I came here the other day.”

  “If you’re bullshitting me…”

  I bite the inside of my cheek, maintaining a façade of calm. Bloody hell. She felt Ashton leave me. That means she could feel the build-up of daimonic energy if he were to try anything. If I attempt projecting, to tell him to back down, she’ll probably detect that too.

  The woman stares at me long enough for me to shift from foot to foot. My he
els and toes burn with the icy fire of skin rubbed raw. My stomach is rumbling and I’m desperate to take a piss.

  Our path forks from the main track to cut through the veld to the low peak bulbing above us to our right. Pale lichen-encrusted sandstone folds grimace down on us, the cone bushes and fynbos verdant after so much winter rain. All so pretty and impassive compared to the small drama playing itself out here on the mountain’s slope. Tomorrow I may lie here decomposing and the bushes will still nod in the slight breeze. Only flies will be buzzing about my unmoving flesh. A deep shudder runs through me. I can’t let any of this happen.

  Soon we’re climbing in the shade and I can’t help the way my teeth chatter. Ahead the scramble looms, two vertical bits where it’s damn tricky to climb, especially if one is concentrating hard not to put a foot wrong with twitchy, combat-ready almost-Inkarna.

  They argue briefly between them at the foot of the first ridge, and it is decided that Paul will go first, the icy barrel of Cynthia’s gun pressed under my chin. Her hand clamps down hard on my shoulder as we watch Paul ascend. The man may look awkward, but he moves with surprising grace over the rocks, seeking hand- and footholds with great efficiency.

  It’s my turn thereafter and I don’t have to look back to know that damned pistol is trained on me, on some point targeting my spine to rip a bullet into my flesh at the slightest error in judgment. A whining starts in my head, like some sort of electric current, just as I pull myself over the lip of rock. Cynthia is already at my heels, her hand nudging my shoes when, with a sharp crack, soil loosens a stone above us.

  In slow motion the trickle of soil starts running like a miniature river, the rock—about the size of a football—surfs down the small avalanche, bouncing off boulders. With a grunt I pull myself out of the way as the thing launches into the air. I’m almost certain Ashton was aiming for Cynthia, but the stone offers Paul a glancing blow to his thigh that sets him dancing on the edge.