by Steve McHugh
“Is that your blood on your hands?”
I’d forgotten about the blood, but there was no use lying. “Yes, but it’s not mine.”
“So, did someone really escape from Tartarus? Are we in danger?”
“Did someone escape? We can’t be certain, but maybe. Are you in danger? No, not even slightly. If someone did escape, they’re not going to do something stupid with an army of armed people nearby. They’ll try to get out of the compound and as far from here as quickly as possible. It’s why Hades checked the buses; it would be a logical place for someone to try to hitch a ride back to town.”
“Did you use to work for Merlin?”
“Who told you that?” I asked.
“My mum. She said you were his personal dog or something.”
“Lapdog?” I asked.
She nodded. “That’s it.”
“I did work for Merlin, yes. But I wasn’t much of a lapdog. It was my job to try to make sure the world was safer for everyone.”
Chloe was quiet for a moment while her mother’s shouts echoed across the compound once more. “I’d better go,” she said, standing and brushing down her jeans.
“If you ever need a break, talk to Kasey. I’m sure she’d be happy to have you stay over at her place.”
“I will.” She walked off and began climbing down the cliff, stopping halfway to glance back up at me. “Thanks.”
“No problem.” I paused for a moment. “Hey, can I ask you something?”
Chloe smiled and nodded.
“Have you ever heard of Sarah Hamilton? She’s a witch.”
“I know Sarah,” Chloe said with a smile. “I’ve seen her a few times when she’s visited the coven my mum belongs to. She’s really nice. Why?”
“I met her in town yesterday. She said she knew your mum.”
“Yeah, she likes my mum about as much as everyone else.”
“Who does she work for?”
Chloe shrugged. “No idea; she works in London for some big company. She said she was in equations.”
I had to think about it for a second. “Acquisitions?”
“That’s it. She acquires stuff for her boss.”
“Sounds important.”
“Oh, Sarah is very cool. She taught me some new runes. Just little things, but it was nice to have someone talk to me like I had an opinion.”
Mara Range screamed for her daughter.
“I’d better go. Nice talking to you.”
“You too,” I said as she ran off around the corner. A few seconds later, Mara appeared. Her expression did not lead me to believe that she was happy to have discovered her daughter had been talking to me.
She turned and stormed off as I climbed down from my perch, their bus driving up to the compound gates before I’d made it back to the rest of the group.
“Well, that’s probably for the best,” Tommy said after walking over to me, Kasey beside him.
“I hope Chloe is okay,” Kasey said.
“I’m sure she’s fine,” I said. “And I think you guys will be going back soon too.”
“From that, I take it you won’t be joining us,” Tommy said.
“I’m going to speak to Hades and try to figure out what’s going on.”
“This isn’t your fight, Nate,” Tommy said. “You don’t have to get involved.”
“It wasn’t my fight until last night when a witch and her thugs tried to kill me in a car park.”
“Is that your only reason for wanting to be involved?”
I explained about the sorcerer who had recognized me in the control room.
“I’m staying too then,” he said. “Don’t argue.”
“I’ll stay too,” Kasey said. “It’s safer here with you two than it is anywhere else.”
“Neither of you are staying,” I said. “I’m going to talk to Hades and find out what’s happening, and then, if they don’t need me, I’ll leave. In the meantime, there’s a krampus about. So no one leaves that hotel alone.”
“Don’t worry about that; I’ll make sure everyone knows,” Tommy said. “You sure you’re not coming?”
“I need to know who escaped.”
“Because of last time?” Tommy asked.
Kasey immediately latched onto her father’s words. “What happened last time?”
“No one had ever escaped Tartarus until Pandora. And now, less than a century later, someone else has managed it. I need to check that the two events aren’t linked.”
“Why?” Kasey insisted.
“Because Pandora’s last escape caused a lot of pain and suffering. And if I get a say in it, nothing like that will happen again.”
CHAPTER 13
Berlin, Germany. 1936.
It had been only a short time since I’d left Pandora with Hades and his people, but it felt like much longer. Selene’s obvious shock and anger at having her brother, Helios, be part of whatever Pandora’s plan was meant she wasn’t in the talking mood, and I wasn’t convinced she’d have allowed Pandora to leave in one piece had Hades and I not been there.
I was pretty certain that Pandora was immortal and indestructible. Back when she’d escaped and managed to slot herself into the Napoleonic Wars, there’d been an occasion when she’d been hit by a cannonball while walking along a battlefield. I had no doubt about the pain it had caused, but whatever damage had been done was short lived.
Even so, Selene would have more than likely put Pandora’s ability to heal to the test if given the chance. Hades had wisely escorted Pandora onto his plane, while I took an enraged Selene outside to the car, where she’d punched a hole in the side of the hangar as the plane taxied for takeoff.
She’d remained quiet since we’d gotten back into the Bugatti. A quiet Selene was never good. Just before we reached the outskirts of Berlin, I pulled the car over onto what appeared to be the start of a dirt road and switched off the engine. “Right, Selene, what do you need to say?”
Selene glanced over at me. “She’s enthralled my brother into helping her. Either we stop him, or he kills a lot of people. Are you sure we can’t force Pandora to release him?”
“No. She either will or won’t. You can’t force the situation. People have tried torturing her in the past, and she just endures it. She’s been hurt enough in her life; I won’t add to that pain.”
“It’s just, I know what stopping him is going to entail.”
“We don’t have to kill him, Selene.”
“He won’t go down without a fight. The only way to stop him will be to do it permanently.”
“We’ll make sure it doesn’t come to that.”
Selene closed her eyes and nodded once. “Pandora’s right about one thing: he’s more powerful than either of us. At least during the daytime. We need to get him during the night, when he’s weaker. Even that’s going to be hard work. We need to find those people who helped Pandora.”
“Jean and Magali Martin. Although we have no idea where they are.”
I’d asked Pandora where they could be found, but she didn’t know. Apparently, she hadn’t been to their house. All we had to go on were that they were French nationals living in Dresden. “When Pandora escaped, I wasn’t the only person sent to track her down. Petra and Kurt were sent along too.”
“Why only you three?”
“Fewer people for Pandora to use. I’m immune to her, as are Petra and Kurt. It made sense for us to be the ones sent to track her down. They stayed in Dresden, searching for whatever Pandora was up to, while I moved on to Berlin.”
“You knew she’d gone to Dresden? You never mentioned it at the airfield.”
“We’d tracked her from Mittenwald to Dresden. She’d been in Dresden for a week before she left for Berlin. We had no idea what she was doing while in Dresden, though. Now I’m guessing she was working with the Martins and Helios on her plan.”
“Except Pandora doesn’t know the plan. Isn’t that the whole point? She can just claim it’s all down to my brother.”<
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“We can release him from Pandora’s grasp. It’s been done before.”
“With whom?”
“Petra and Kurt were both under her power, although it was done in strict circumstances with Hades watching. Once she releases someone voluntarily, she can’t then re-enthrall them. Petra and Kurt worked in Tartarus a lot, so it was necessary to ensure that they wouldn’t be taken control of.”
“So, how are you immune to her?”
I paused for a second. “Like I said, Pandora has to let someone go.”
“She enthralled you?”
I nodded. “Many centuries ago.”
“Why did she let you go?”
“Lots of reasons,” I said quickly. “They’re not important right now.”
Selene stared at me for a moment before nodding and turning away. “You don’t trust me.” It wasn’t a question.
I turned to look out of the windscreen. “No, Selene, I don’t. And I think there are some pretty big reasons why that is. I’m okay with you helping me track down your brother, but we need to stop him from hurting people. I don’t care what Hera’s agenda was in sending you, but if whatever your orders are puts people’s lives at risk, I’ll stop both you and your brother myself.” My voice was hard, and I spoke slowly enough to ensure that no emotion would creep in, betraying how hard it was to sit so close to her and talk to her as if nothing mattered.
I felt her staring at me for what seemed like a lifetime. “You’ve made your feelings perfectly clear there, Nathan.” Her tone was sharp, a slither of anger leaking through. “I’ll try not to let Hera’s master plan interfere with saving people’s lives.”
I opened my mouth to argue and quickly thought better of it. I didn’t want another fight.
“I never said our working together would be easy,” Selene almost whispered. “But I am on your side.”
“And what side are your husband and Hera on? What’s their plan?”
“Why do they even need to have a plan?”
“I find it hard to believe that once Hera had discovered Pandora’s escape and arranged for you to become involved, she didn’t have a plan.”
I turned to look at Selene, who was absentmindedly rubbing her wedding ring finger, which was bare.
“She wants to remonstrate my husband for what she considers to be him overstepping his boundaries.”
“What does that mean?”
“He pissed her off when he tried to have one of her staff killed after the woman spurned him.”
“He cheats on you?”
Selene held my gaze. “We’re not discussing this.”
“Fine, but do you really think all she wants is to send you here in order to piss off your husband?”
“Well, I guess she’d like to find a way to get control of Tartarus, but she’s wanted that for several thousand years, and it’s about as likely to happen now as it was when Zeus was alive. So she settles for playing silly games and trying to constantly one-up her own grandchildren and make them feel small.”
“Sounds like a fun place to live.”
“No, Nathan, it’s not. But like I said, we’re not here to discuss my personal life; we’re here to stop Helios from killing untold numbers of people. I know this is difficult—it is for me too. If I didn’t have to be here, I wouldn’t have darkened your doorstep with my presence. Now, can we put any future discussions aside until we reach Dresden and talk to people who might be able to help us?”
I started the engine. “Not a fucking problem,” I snapped.
For the briefest of moments, I thought I saw Selene deflate slightly as a softness passed over her face, but then she turned away to look out of the window, and I knew there was no point in talking further. I hoped we could find Helios quickly. Not only to stop him from hurting people, but because I wasn’t sure how long it would be before Selene or I said something to the other that would cause whatever we’d never said to spill out. We’d never really spoken after she’d left; there had been a lot left unsaid—a lot of anger and resentment that had been left to fester deep down inside of me, where I’d been able to ignore it right up until I’d seen her again.
Damn. It was going to be a hard few days. I was going to be grateful when something came along I could punch. Repeatedly.
We stopped the car outside a four-story town house that sat opposite the river Elbe, which runs through Dresden.
The city itself was beautiful, with stunning architecture, and when you got high enough, views that would stun. I’d always considered it a jewel in Germany’s crown, and despite the military presence it was still a hub for artists and scientists to mix and flourish.
It had begun to drizzle as we walked over to the house. The soft, occasional splashes of rainfall and grayness of the sky, a fitting backdrop to the task ahead of Selene and me. Trying to hunt down Pandora was hard enough, even without her talents working on me, but hunting Helios? That was a whole different league of trouble. I wondered how much it would take to subdue him. How many people we wouldn’t be able to save before we did.
I forced the thoughts aside as I ascended the steps to the red front door and knocked. It didn’t take long for the occupants to open the door, and even less time for Petra to envelop Selene in a tight hug. Petra smiled at me as she held her friend, a knowing smile that bespoke the conversation I was sure we’d have. Again. She appeared determined for Selene and I to resolve our differences, as if Selene’s being married was just a phase or passing fancy.
Petra ushered the pair of us inside, glancing around the street before closing the door. A woman wearing an ankle length light green dress ran down the nearby staircase, past me, and stopped at the door. She was at most five-two, and her dark brown hair was tied up in a bun. A pair of spectacles sat on her small nose, making her appear much older than her twenty-six years. Bandages covered the back of her hands. They started at her wrists and stopped halfway up her forearms. She pressed her hand against the door, the runes that had been painted on the back shimmering slightly as power was poured into them.
Anything can be used to create runes so long as you have enough power to activate them. But whereas sorcerers and the like need to learn how to use already existing runes, enchanters, such as Lucie Moser, could create and manipulate runes to do a vast amount of things. These ranged from removing the power of everyone in a building, to exploding if tampered with.
“Worried?” Selene asked.
“A natural concern, considering everything that’s been happening in this country,” Kurt said as he entered the hallway and hugged Selene, then shook my hand.
“Good to see you still have Lucie to help you,” I said.
Lucie finished activating the runes and then turned toward me. She was not happy to see me. “You’ve returned,” she said in a tone that suggested she’d rather I hadn’t. “I’ll prepare some drinks.”
I smiled.
Lucie shook her head and walked off, brushing past me with slightly more force than necessary as she did.
“I see you made a friend,” Selene said.
“Yes, apparently I’m quite the charmer,” I said flippantly before she walked off with Petra into a nearby room. Kurt and I followed a few seconds later.
The room itself turned out to be a library that I hadn’t seen on my previous time here before I’d tracked Pandora to Berlin. It was stacked floor to ceiling with hundred of books, and in the center sat two comfortable red leather couches with a small table between them.
We all sat down and waited for Lucie to reappear. The tray in her hands held several cups and saucers, along with a teapot and small jar of sugar. All of the china matched in color—blue and white—and style; steam billowed out the top of the teapot, reminding me that it had been far too long since my last cup.
Lucie poured and distributed the drinks, glaring as if she’d have preferred to throw mine at me, and when we were all settled, Kurt asked what had happened with Pandora.
I explained about Berlin, the Gestapo
headquarters, and the murder of the two men in the alley, telling too what Pandora had told me at the airfield.
“So those people, the Martins, that Pandora was staying with,” Petra said. “Any idea where we can find them?”
I shook my head. “She says they’re still in Dresden. Thus ends my knowledge. I assume they’re helping Helios somehow, maybe by looking around the stadium for a plan of attack.”
“They could be working there,” Kurt suggested. “I’ve got a few friends in the police force here, ones I trust. I’ll ask around and find out if they recognize the names.”
“And if they’ve changed their names?” Selene asked.
Kurt shrugged. “One problem at a time. It’s unlikely they have, though, unless they’re wanted criminals, and Pandora wouldn’t have used people who couldn’t have helped her plan succeed. Besides, if what she told Nate was true—”
“It was,” I interrupted.
“Then Magali and Jean have help. Probably a group of people to work with them.”
“Has anyone realized that Nathan said these people are opposed to the Nazi regime?” Selene said. “These are the good guys.”
I shook my head. “If they’re planning on helping your brother kill innocent people just to make a point for Pandora, they’re not any good guys I want to work with.”
“And killing brothers, you know all about that, yes?”
“Let it go,” Kurt said, his tone hard.
“It’s fine,” I explained and turned to Lucie. “What’s done is done. I can’t change what happened.”
“Do you even care?” Lucie snapped.
I stayed silent.
Lucie flung her teacup at me, which I managed to catch, using a cushion of air magic to stop the contents from covering me. She stormed out of the room, sobbing, Petra in close pursuit.
“You killed her brother, I assume?” Selene asked.
“It’s a long story,” I said without wish to elaborate further.
Selene never was any good at allowing me to get away without explaining. “What happened?”
I quickly came to the conclusion that hearing it from me might be better than getting it from Lucie. “Her father, stepmother, and younger brother and sister were murdered one night twelve years ago while they slept. Lucie wasn’t home at the time. She was sixteen. The police arrived and arrested Lucie’s brother, Robin, but he escaped and found his sister. He convinced her it wasn’t him, that someone was trying to frame him.”
