by Alex Archer
“Thanks loads,” Annja said dryly.
“I mean, chestnut hair and those amber eyes—”
“They’re green.”
“You think they’re green,” Doug amended. “I’ll split it with you. We’ll call them hazel. Anyway, you’ve got all that professorial-speak that Kristie doesn’t have.”
“It’s called a college education.”
“Whatever.”
“She still has the breakaway bikini.”
Doug hesitated for a moment. “Do you want to try that?”
“No,” Annja said forcefully.
“I didn’t think so. Anyway, I think we’ll be okay. Maybe I can sandwich a reedited version of the zombie piece between the German werewolf and your French one.”
“La Bête was never proved to be a werewolf,” Annja said, skewing the conversation back to her field of expertise. “Between 1764 and 1767, the Beast of Gévaudan killed sixty-eight children, fifteen women and six men.”
“Good. Really.” Doug sounded excited. “That’s a great body count. Works out to an average of thirty-three people a year. People love the number thirty-three. Always something mystical about it.”
Annja ignored his comment because they were friends. She didn’t bother to correct his math, either. Counting 1764, La Bête had killed for four years. “The creature was also reputed to be intelligent. It was an ambush predator and often avoided capture by leading horsemen into bogs around here. It also outran hunting dogs.”
“This wasn’t included in your outline.”
“You said you don’t like to read.”
“Well, I don’t,” Doug admitted grudgingly. “But maybe you could put interesting details like this into your proposal.”
“There’s only so much you can do with half a page,” Annja pointed out. “Double-spaced.”
“Yeah, but you need to learn the right things to include. Body count. That’s always a biggie.”
When I get back, Annja promised herself, I’m going to finish that résumé. There has to be another cable show out there that’s interested in archaeology. She knew she’d miss Doug, though.
“At any rate,” Annja said, “no one ever found out what the creature was. It was supposed to be six feet tall at the shoulder.”
“Is that big?”
“For a wolf, yes.”
“I thought you said it wasn’t a wolf.”
“I said no one knew what it was.”
“So it’s not a wolf, not a werewolf. What the hell is it?”
“Exactly,” Annja agreed.
“A mystery,” Doug said with forced enthusiasm. “Mysteries are good. But only if you have answers for them. Do you?”
“Not yet. That’s why I’m headed into the Cévennes Mountains right now.”
“This creature was supposed to be up in those mountains?” Doug asked.
“Yes. According to some people, La Bête is still around. Every now and again a hiker goes missing and is never seen or heard from again.”
“Cool. Sounds better already. How soon are you going to have this together?”
“Soon,” Annja promised, hoping that some kind of breakthrough would take place. At the moment, she had a lot of interesting research but nothing fresh.
And she didn’t have Kristie Chatham’s breakaway top. Nor the desire to stoop so low. She said goodbye, then closed the phone and concentrated on her driving.
Glancing up at the mountains, Annja couldn’t help thinking it would be better for her ratings if she actually ran into La Bête. Probably not better for her, though.
“THE WOMAN GOT away.” Foulard sat in a small café across from the fishing shop. He held his beer against his aching jaw. The swelling made it hard to talk.
“How?” Lesauvage wasn’t happy.
“She ambushed us.” Foulard still couldn’t believe the woman had leaped from above the door and taken them down so easily. It was embarrassing.
Lesauvage cursed. “Do you know where she’s going?”
Foulard looked across the table at Avery Moreau. The young man was scowling. He sat with arms folded over his chest and blew out an angry breath now and again.
Foulard just barely resisted the impulse to reach over and slap the young man. It would have been a mistake. The police were still canvassing the neighborhood.
“The boy—” Foulard called Avery that on purpose, watching the young man tighten his jaw angrily “—says she is headed up into the mountains.”
“Why?”
“That’s where La Bête was known to roam.” Foulard didn’t believe in the great beast. But he believed in Lesauvage and the magic the man possessed. Foulard had seen it, had felt its power, and had seen men die because of it.
Lesauvage was quiet for a moment. “She knows something,” he mused quietly, “something that I do not.”
“The boy insists that she didn’t.”
“Then why go up into the mountains?”
Foulard cursed silently. He knew what was coming. “I don’t know.”
“Then,” Lesauvage replied, “I suggest that you find out. Quickly. Take Jean—”
“Jean is out of it,” Foulard said. “The police have him.”
“How?”
“The woman knocked him out. I couldn’t wake him before I had to flee. I was fortunate they didn’t get me.” Foulard rolled his beer over his aching jaw. “She fights very well. You didn’t tell us that.” He meant it almost as an accusation, suggesting that Lesauvage hadn’t known, either. But he wasn’t that brave.
“I didn’t think she could fight better than you,” Lesauvage said. “And I heard there were shots fired.”
Wisely, Foulard refrained from speaking. He’d already failed. Lesauvage appeared willing to let him live. That was good.
“Find her,” Lesauvage ordered. “Go up into the mountains and find her. I want to know what she knows.”
“All right.”
“Can you get someone to help you?”
“Yes.”
Lesauvage hung up.
Pocketing the phone, Foulard leaned back and sipped the beer. Then he reached into his jacket and took out a vial of pain pills. They were one of the benefits of working for Lesauvage.
He shook out two, chewed them up and ignored the bitter taste. His tongue numbed immediately and he knew the relief from the pounding in his head would come soon.
Turning his attention to Avery Moreau, Foulard asked, “Do you know which campsite she’ll be using?”
Arrogantly, Avery replied, “I helped her choose it.”
“Then you know.” Foulard stood. He felt as if the floor moved under him. Pain cascaded through this throbbing head. He stoked his anger at the woman. She would pay. “Come with me.”
“What about Richelieu?”
It took Foulard a moment to realize whom the boy was talking about. “The policeman?”
Avery’s blue eyes looked watery with unshed tears. “My father’s murderer,” he said.
Waving the statement away, Foulard said, “Richelieu will be dealt with.”
“When?”
“In time. When the time is right.” Foulard finished the beer and set it aside. “Now come on.”
“Lesauvage promised—”
Reaching down, Foulard cupped the boy’s soft face in his big, callused hand. “Do not trifle with me, boy. And do not say his name in public so carelessly. I’ve seen him bury men for less.”
Fear squirmed through the watery blue eyes.
“He keeps his promises,” Foulard said. “In his own time. He has promised that your father’s killer will pay for his crimes. The man will.” He paused. “In time. Now, you and I have other business to tend to. Let’s be about it.”
Avery jerked his head out of Foulard’s grip and reluctantly got to his feet.
Across the street, the Lozère police were loading Jean’s unconscious body into the back of an ambulance. The old shopkeeper waved his arms as he told his story. Foulard thought briefly that he
should have killed the man. Perhaps he might come back and do that.
For the moment, though, his attention was directed solely at the woman.
A SNAKE LAY SUNNING on the narrow ledge that Annja had spent the past hour climbing up to. She had been hoping to take a moment to relax there. Climbing freestyle was demanding. Her fingers and toes ached with effort.
The snake pushed itself back, poised to strike.
Great, Annja thought. Climbing back down was possible, but she was tired. Risking a poisonous snake bite was about the same as trying to negotiate the seventy-foot descent without taking a break.
She decided to deal with the snake.
Moving slowly, she pulled herself almost eye to eye with the snake. It drew back a little farther, almost out of room. Freezing, not wanting to startle the creature any more than she already had, she hung by her fingertips.
Easy, she told herself, breathing out softly through her mouth and inhaling through her nose.
The snake coiled tightly, its head low and its jaws distended to deliver a strike that would send poison through her system.
At a little over twenty inches long, it was full-grown. A string of black splotches from its flared head to the tip of its tail mottled the grayish-green scales and told Annja what kind of venomous adder she faced.
Ursini’s vipers were known to have an irritable nature, to be very territorial and struck quickly when approached.
Their venom was hemotoxic, designed to break down the blood of their prey. Few human deaths were attributed to Ursini’s vipers in the area, but Annja felt certain a lone climber miles from help in the mountains would be a probable candidate.
The ledge Annja clung to extended six feet to her left.
Okay, she mentally projected at the snake, not wanting to speak because the vibrations of her voice might spook the nervous viper, there’s enough room for both of us.
Moving slowly, she shuffled her left hand over a few inches. The snake tightened its coil. She stopped, clinging by her fingertips. If she’d been wearing gloves she might have felt more comfortable taking the risk of movement. But at present only a thin layer of climbing chalk covered her hands.
She stared at the snake, feeling angry as it kept her at bay. She didn’t like being afraid of anything. She was, of course, but she didn’t like it. That something so small could impede her was irritating. If she’d worn a harness and had belayed herself to a cam, getting around the snake would have been a piece of cake.
But she hadn’t.
“Bonjour,” a voice suddenly called from above.
Gazing upward briefly, Annja spotted an old man hunkered down in a squatting position thirty feet up and to the right of her position.
He was in his sixties or seventies, leathery with age. Sweat-stained khaki hiking shorts and a gray T-shirt hung from his skinny frame. His white hair hung past his thin shoulders and his beard was too long to be neat and too short to be intended. He looked as if he hadn’t taken care of himself lately. He held a long walking staff in his right hand.
“Bonjour,” Annja responded quietly.
“Not a good spot to be in,” the old man observed.
“For me or the snake?” Annja asked.
The man’s face creased as he laughed. “Clinging by your fingernails and you’ve still got wit.” He shook his head. “You seldom find that in a woman.”
“You aren’t exactly enlightened, are you?” Annja shifted her grip slightly, trying to find a degree of comfort. There wasn’t one.
“No,” the old man agreed. He paused. “You could, of course, climb back down.”
“I hate retreating.”
“So does the snake.”
“I suppose asking for help is out of the question?”
The old man spread his hands. “How? If I try to traverse the distance, should I be that skilled, I would doubtless send debris down. It might be enough to trigger a strike.”
Annja knew that was true.
“It is poisonous, you know. It’s not just the sting of a bite you’ll have to contend with.”
“I know.” Back and shoulders aching, Annja watched the snake. “I have a satellite phone. If I fall or get bitten, maybe you could call for help.”
“I’d be happy to.”
Annja held up a hand, letting go of her fear and focusing on the snake. Its wedge-shaped head followed her hand. Then, getting the reptile’s rhythm, she flicked her hand.
The viper launched itself like an arrow from a bow.
Without thinking, Annja let go the ledge with her left elbow and swung from her right, crunching her fingers up tightly to grip and hoping that it was enough to keep her from falling.
The snake missed her but its effort had caused it to hang over the ledge. Before the viper could recover, Annja swung back toward it.
Trying not to think of what would happen if she missed or her right hand slipped from the ledge, she gripped the snake just behind its head. The cool, slickly alien feel of the scales slid against her palm.
Move! she told herself as she felt the snake writhing in her grip. Skidding across the rough cliff surface, feeling her fingers give just a fraction of an inch, she whip-cracked the snake away from the mountain.
Airborne, the snake twisted and knotted itself as it plummeted toward the verdant growth of the forest far below.
Flailing with her left hand, Annja managed to secure a fresh grip just as her right hand pulled free of the ledge. She recovered quickly and let her body go limp against the cliff side. Her flesh pressed against the uneven surface and helped distribute her weight.
“Well done,” the old man called. He applauded. “That took real nerve. I’m impressed.”
“That’s me,” Annja agreed. She blew out a tense breath. “Impressive.”
She hoisted herself up with her arms, hoping the viper had been alone and hadn’t been among friends. Even with the ledge, she tucked herself into a roll and luxuriated on her back.
The old man peered down at her. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. Just resting. I’ll be up in a minute.”
Taking out a pipe, the old man lit up. The breeze pulled the smoke away. “Take your time,” he invited. “Take your time.”
Annja lay back and waited for her breathing to calm and the lactic acid buildup in her limbs to ease. You should go home, she told herself. Just pack up and go. Things are getting way too weird.
For some reason, though, she knew she couldn’t turn and go back any more than she could have retreated from the snake. As she’d begun her ascent on the mountain, she’d felt a compulsion to continue her quest.
That was dumb, she’d thought. There was no way she was going to uncover the secret of La Bête after three hundred years when no one else had been able to.
But something was drawing her up the mountain.
3
A dull roaring sounded in the distance.
Recognizing the noise, Annja sat up on the cliff’s edge and peered out into the forest that broke across the foothills of the mountains like an ocean of leaves.
Six Enduro motorcycles bobbed and slid through the forest. The riders wore brightly colored leathers and gleaming helmets.
“Are you expecting company?” the old man asked from the ledge above.
“No.”
“Perhaps they just came out here for the view,” the old man suggested. “Or maybe they brought their own entertainment.”
Meaning booze or drugs? Annja thought that was possible. But she didn’t mean to get caught standing on a ledge if that wasn’t the truth.
“Are you coming on up, then?” he asked politely.
“Yes.”
“Good.” The old man took a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his face. “It’s rather warmer up here than I’d thought it would be.”
Annja stood, balancing precariously on the narrow ledge. She reached into her pack and took out a bottle of water. After drinking as much as she could, she replaced the bottle in
her pack and started climbing again.
“There’s a rock to your left.” The old man pointed to the outcropping with his staff.
She curled her hand around the rock and heaved.
“There you go,” he congratulated.
Listening to his speech, Annja wondered at his accent. He spoke English, but she believed that was because he knew she was American. But his French accent wasn’t something she was familiar with.
Moments later, Annja gained the top of the ridgeline. The motorcycle engines had died and the silence seemed heavy.
“Thanks,” Annja said.
The old man shrugged. “It was nothing. You climb well,” he said.
“Thank you.”
“But you shouldn’t climb alone.”
Looking around innocently, Annja asked, “Where’s your partner?”
He shrugged. “I’m an old man. No one will miss me if I fall off the mountainside.” He started up the ridgeline.
Having no other destination in mind at the moment, Annja followed. The compulsion that she only halfway believed in seemed to be pulling her in that direction anyway.
“What brings you up here?” the old man asked.
“La Bête,” Annja answered.
Halting, he peered over his shoulder. “Surely you’re joking.”
“No.”
“La Bête is a myth,” the old man stated. “Probably a story made up by a serial killer.”
“You would know about serial killers?”
“I would.” He didn’t elaborate. Instead, he turned and continued up the ridgeline.
“What are you doing up here?” she asked.
“Searching for something that was lost.”
“You lost something up here?”
“No.” The old man swung around a boulder and kept going up. “It was lost a long time ago. Hundreds of years ago.”
“What was it?”
“Nothing you’d be interested in, my dear.”
“I’m an archaeologist. I like old things.” Annja instantly regretted her words when the old man turned around. If he was an old pervert, she’d just given him the perfect opportunity for an off-color remark.
“You?” he asked as if in disbelief. “An archaeologist?”
