Cold Warriors

by Rebecca Levene

  "It's not my place to tell you," the other man said with infuriating patience.

  Morgan jerked back the curtains, spilling more light into the room. Tomas instantly looked his age again, the fine lines around his eyes and mouth placing him somewhere in his late thirties. "What's the Hermetic Division, Tomas? I'm working for them - I've got a right to know."

  Tomas shrugged and rose to join Morgan at the window. For a minute they both stared out over the waters of the Danube, five storeys below. Morgan's breath fogged the glass, but in front of Tomas it stayed entirely transparent.

  "Hermes was a Greek god," Tomas said eventually.

  Morgan frowned at Tomas's faint reflection in the window.

  "Hermes - Hermetic. That's the origin of the word. He's regarded as the father of magic in some traditions. Nineteenth-century occultists were particularly keen on him."

  "So the Hermetic Division is... what?"

  Tomas turned to look at Morgan directly. "Listen to me - you don't need to know this. And you definitely don't want to. Don't ask me to tell you things I'd have been happier never knowing."

  "Stop patronising me!" Morgan shouted. In a blur of action he didn't fully remember, he had Tomas pressed up against the glass of the window, Morgan's arm crushing his windpipe. "Who are you, Tomas? Who are you? Tell me what the fuck you are!"

  Tomas narrowed his eyes but didn't fight back. Morgan knew he should let go -without air Tomas would pass out - but the other man's passivity infuriated him. He pressed harder, then harder still. No blood should have been getting through, no oxygen. Thirty seconds passed, a minute, more - and Tomas just stared back at him gravely.

  Finally Morgan released Tomas and stepped back with a gasp that was almost a sob. Tomas put a finger to his throat, as if to check for any damage. "Finished yet?" he asked quietly.

  Morgan jerked his head in a gesture that might have been a nod. He wasn't sure himself. "Why doesn't that hurt you? Why didn't my bullet kill you?"

  Tomas's smiled bitterly. "It did hurt, so did the bullet. I can feel things - they just can't harm me any more."

  "But that's..." Morgan wanted to say impossible, but he wasn't stupid. He'd seen enough to know it wasn't.

  Tomas shook his head, as if Morgan had voiced the unspoken word. "No, just very difficult."

  "How?" Morgan whispered.

  "Rituals, old knowledge, forgotten secrets."

  "Magic, you mean?"

  "World is crazier and more of it than we think," Tomas said, a sing-song quotation.

  "Don't quote fucking poetry at me!"

  "I'm sorry. Then how's this for an answer? When our bosses realised the occult contained grains of truth in the mythical chaff, they set up the Hermetic Division to research it. And to use it."

  "Why?"

  Tomas eyes looked blank and distant. "Because we were in a war, and if something was out there to be found, however odd or improbable, we had to find it before the other side did. The Hermetic Division is part of the secret service, Morgan, and I'm just another weapon."

  "What kind of weapon, exactly?"

  "One who returned from the other side. They buried me twenty years ago, before you were even born. And two days ago, they brought me back from the dead."

  Morgan realised he was gasping for breath, as if he was the one who'd been choked, not Tomas. "Back at the briefing, Giles said those artefacts can cause Armageddon. I thought he was just talking that way because he's a twat."

  Tomas smiled and looked down.

  "But he wasn't, was he?"

  "No." Tomas looked up again, green eyes piercing. "Have you read the Book of Revelation?"

  "That's part of the Bible, right?"

  Tomas nodded. "The last book, also known as the Apocalypse of John. It describes God's final judgement on humanity, when Jesus breaks the seven seals and the four horsemen are unleashed: a rider on a white horse, who brings pestilence; a red rider who ushers in a time of war; the black rider of famine; and a pale rider on a pale horse, who is death himself. One hundred and forty-four thousand people alone are saved, and the rest are left to endure a time of terrible tribulation, fire and earthquakes, a beast with seven heads, and all the green grass of the earth burned."

  Morgan slumped back down on the bed. "And that's actually true, is it?"

  Tomas shrugged. "Christian evangelicals believe so. They devote their life to ensuring they're among the limited number of the elect, those who'll be saved, and they wait for the Rapture, when they'll be taken up to Heaven to sit at God's side. Others disagree. Historians see John's words as relating to the time in which he lived, when Rome was the greatest threat to Christianity. They claim the seven-headed beast is a metaphor for the Roman Empire. There had been seven Caesars up till then, you see, and Rome itself is built on seven hills. Then there's the number of the beast -"

  "I've heard of that - 666, right?"

  "Yes. The ancient Jews were very keen on numerology. Every letter in the Hebrew alphabet had a numeric equivalent, and they used it to construct puzzles. The Bible's full of them. If you translate three sixes into letters, you get Nero - the name of the Emperor who'd most persecuted the Christians. Historians believe Revelation is polemic, not prophecy."

  "I don't fucking care what they believe. What do you think? Is it real, or not?"

  "In its details... Probably not. But the Revelation of John isn't the only apocalyptic story in biblical literature. At the First Council of Nicea, held in the year 325 by the Emperor Constantine, the early church leaders gathered to decide which books should be included in the Christian Bible, and which rejected. Some of the decisions were based on sound reasoning, others were arbitrary, political. And all the other apocalyptic books were banished to the Apocrypha - where they've remained, mostly unread, ever since.

  "Other religions also have legends of an ultimate end. The Norse Ragnarok, which the artefacts are named after, foretells the death of the gods and the destruction of the world of man. Jewish and Greek legends of the flood are just another apocalypse, imagined into the past rather than the future."

  "It's all just the same bullshit, though, isn't it?" Morgan said. "Yeah the earth can be destroyed - someone can press the red button. But this..."

  "As above, so below," Tomas told him. "The world of magic is a mirror to the mundane world. If that world includes the power to end itself, it's almost certain the magical realm does too."

  He reached out a hand to Morgan, as if in comfort, but Morgan slapped it away. "No. No. Enough. You can't seriously be telling me my latest mission is to stop the end of the world!"

  Tomas dropped his hand. "It is. If we can."

  Morgan backed away, then stormed out of the room before Tomas could tell him anything else he didn't want to believe.

  Morgan wasn't heading anywhere in particular, just away. An image of Tomas, face impassive as Morgan squeezed the breath out of him, hovered behind his eyelids. And there was the sense memory of other things he hadn't registered at the time: the clammy coldness of Tomas's skin; his statue-like stillness; the lack of any pulse in his throat. The way he hadn't been breathing even before Morgan had attacked him.

  Morgan heard a hollow hubbub, voices in a vaulted space, and realised he'd made his way to the spa in the hotel's basement. The main room was vast and ornate, but peeling, a little faded in its grandeur. A large pool, floral tilework high above it, led through to a series of smaller chambers with thermal baths inside them. Morgan looked at the water longingly and realised that he wanted to wash the feeling of Tomas's cold skin from his body.

  There were only a few people in the changing rooms, the early-morning risers. Morgan stripped hurriedly to his boxers, then headed back to the first of the side chambers and immersed himself in the left-hand pool, hissing at the heat. The water had a strangely oily texture to it - the minerals, he guessed. They were supposed to be good for you, but he wasn't sure he liked the feel of them, as if the water wasn't entirely clean. Still, Morgan lay and drifted in it f
or as long as he could bear, trying to lose himself in a haze of sensation.

  It was no good. He stood up, tossing his head to send droplets of water flying from his tightly curled brown hair. Then he walked out of that pool and into the one opposite.

  Morgan gasped at the icy-cold water, but the shock of it seemed to pound some sense back into him. He floated on his back, eyes closed, and thought. The mission shouldn't take long. He would get through it, he would spend as little time with Tomas as possible, and then he would go home, resign and forget that Tomas or the Hermetic Division had ever existed. He would go back to living in the normal world, not the crazy one Tomas wanted to drag him into.

  Morgan's body rocked suddenly as several others fell into the water beside him. There was loud talk in a foreign language, men and women, even though there were supposed to be no women in this section of the baths.

  One of the men shouted something that probably translated as "fuck me, that's cold!" and the others all laughed.

  Morgan slid his eyes open, annoyed to have his solitude interrupted. The women around him were barely that - teenagers with soft, unlived-in faces that were harder around the mouths than they should have been. Hookers, Morgan guessed. The men were all at least ten years older, solid and aggressively muscular. In fact, they looked like somebody's muscle, with their square, not-too-bright faces and watchful eyes. Their hands were all over the hookers.

  "Natasha," one of the men said to a small dark-haired women.

  She shook her head and said, in accented English, "My name is Dita."

  The man's hand tightened on her arm until Morgan could see her wince. He half rose out of the water, but Dita smiled the smile of a woman who's been paid to look happy.

  "If I want it, you are Natasha," the man said.

  The water swirled against Morgan's legs as the thug sculled himself and the girl to the side and he suddenly had a clear view of the man in the centre of it all.

  He was huge, a beached white whale in this shallow pool, roll after roll of fat leaving the greying head on top of it looking too small, like a deformity. "You're Natasha," he said, pointing at one of the girls, and then to another, "And you're Natasha. You're all Natasha - saves us the trouble of telling you apart."

  Then he turned his face towards Morgan, and as soon as their eyes met Morgan knew him. This was their target - Karamov.

  Karamov's bodyguards actually made it easier to follow him. Tomas could hardly miss the great white lumpy body with the tight knot of men around it, glaring untrustingly at everyone they passed.

  Tomas ghosted after, far enough behind to give them no reason to notice him. The crowds allowed him anonymity. It was midday now, nearly lunchtime, and the winding, cobbled street they were following into the old quarter of Buda was crammed with tourists. Up ahead, Tomas could see them parting like a wave in front of Karamov, pushed aside or moving voluntarily when they saw the cold expression in the bodyguards' eyes.

  They walked very slowly a few hundred yards up a steep incline, Karamov panting like a dog in the heat, then they turned right. Tomas hurried to the turning himself, pulling out the small portable phone Morgan had given him. "Alagut Road," he said, ringing off before Morgan could answer. His partner was another hundred or so yards behind. Karamov and all his men had seen Morgan close-up in the thermal baths and they couldn't risk him being recognised.

  A couple more turnings, and the men seemed to have reached their destination, a basement restaurant in a narrow green-plastered house. Eight of Karamov's guards trooped in after him, leaving only two to scowl at the street outside. It seemed their handlers had been right - whatever business Karamov had here, it was important.

  Tomas slipped round the corner, out of sight, and called Morgan to join him.

  "I'll follow Karamov," Tomas told him, "see what he's up to."

  Morgan grimaced, sweat standing out on his smooth brown skin in the muggy air. "Eating," he suggested. "I'm guessing he does that a lot."

  Tomas smiled, but Morgan didn't see it because his eyes were very carefully avoiding him.

  "I may need to leave in a hurry," Tomas said. "Be ready."

  "Yeah," Morgan said dryly. "You never know what might happen."

  Tomas turned away without responding. When he walked down the steps into the restaurant he found a space that seemed pitch dark after the sunshine outside. The whole place smelled of roast pork and boiled cabbage. There was a small, crowded bar at one end, the optics catching stray splinters of light from the open door, and only ten tables. Karamov's party had taken five of them. Tomas kept them in the periphery of his vision as he went to the bar and ordered a Budwar.

  "Staying for food?" the barman asked.

  Tomas shook his head. "It's crowded already." He used the excuse to look round at Karamov. He was seated by himself, his bodyguards squashed onto the surrounding tables. A waiter approached the big Russian but he waved him away impatiently. He must be waiting for someone else to join him, probably the buyer for whatever he was selling. Tomas hadn't imagined the transaction would be taking place so soon, but if Karamov really did have one of the artefacts, he might be glad to offload it.

  Would he hand it over now, or arrange a price and a drop-off? Tomas slid to his knees by the bar, as if he was tying a shoelace, and snapped a quick glance under the tables. It looked like Karamov had a small suitcase on his lap. That might be it but Tomas couldn't be sure. In all his years of searching, he'd never found out exactly what the Ragnarok artefacts were.

  One of the bodyguards said something to Karamov, leaning back on two legs of his chair. As Karamov twisted round to reply, Tomas caught a glint of silver at his wrist, snaking down to the handle of the suitcase. It must be chained to him, which meant whatever was in there was definitely the thing Karamov planned to trade.

  Tomas drained his beer in a couple of gulps. He intended to get out and report back to Morgan, but there was another flash of sunlight as the door opened, and someone new walked in. The newcomer paused a moment for his eyes to adjust to the gloom, then crossed to Karamov's table. He was a slight young man with a round, thick-lipped, wheedling face.

  The bodyguards slid their chairs away to make room. Almost too fast. Were they afraid of this man? Tomas turned back to the bar and ordered another beer, though he could feel the first swirling unpleasantly in his stomach, indigestible. While he was waiting for the drink to arrive he sidled between the tables towards the toilet, giving himself another chance to study Karamov's party without being obvious.

  The bodyguards were all ordering food, none watching their boss and his dinner companion. Either they trusted him, or they'd been told not to pay too much attention. The newcomer had a briefcase with him too, exactly the same size as Karamov's, though this one wasn't chained to his wrist. Tomas heard a faint chink over the clatter of cutlery as the young man put it down at his feet. Payment, probably, diamonds by the sound of it.

  That was a lot of money for such a small thing. Tomas felt the first stirrings of excitement. The best thing to do would be leave now and send Morgan to report back to headquarters while Tomas waited outside to trail Karamov's contact when he left.

  But there were too many variables in the equation, the solution dangerously in doubt. What if someone on the restaurant staff was in on it? The package could stay here and Tomas would never know. Or what if the deal went sour and the exchange never took place? Better to stay and watch the whole thing play out.

  He spent as short a time as he could get away with in the dingy toilet, glad there was no one else in there so he didn't have to make some awkward pretence of pissing. When he came back to the bar, Karamov and the young man were still at their table, an open bottle of red wine between them. Only Karamov was drinking it. As Tomas flicked a glance at him, he drained a full glass in one swallow and hurriedly refilled it, wine slopping over the edge to stain the tablecloth. Tomas wondered if his hand was trembling, and what exactly he had to be so nervous about, surrounded by all his men.
>
  He looked at the young man sitting opposite Karamov, but he seemed as nervous as the Russian, his foot tapping the floor, fingers drumming. His eyes refused to settle anywhere, dark and greedy, like flies hovering over spoiled meat. It was unlikely he was the end buyer - probably just a go-between who was scared of screwing up.

  As Tomas watched, the young man leaned forward and said something urgent to Karamov. The words were too faint to hear, but Tomas picked up the high, anxious tone of them. Karamov shrugged. The tempo of the young man's fingers increased, and the pitch of his voice went up. Karamov seemed to be only half-listening, waving a waiter over, maybe after more food, probably more wine. As soon as he'd caught the waiter's eye, Karamov reached inside his jacket pocket, then fiddled at his other wrist.

  He was unchaining the briefcase. That meant the handover was going to take place right now.

  The young man seemed to be alone. He'd come here with no protection, holding a case full of diamonds, and he was going to walk out of here on his own, carrying whatever they were worth in exchange.

  That just couldn't be the plan. The young man must have some guaranteed way of getting the prize to safety. But Tomas didn't know what it was - he had a severe information deficit. If he let the young man walk out of here, the chances were he'd lose both him and the briefcase.

  Behind Tomas, the waiter Karamov had summoned flipped open the hatch of the bar to squeeze out into the main restaurant. Tomas didn't pause to think as he snatched the towel from the waiter's shoulder and tossed it over his own. The waiter looked almost comically shocked, his mouth open in a round, cartoon "O". It made it easier to pry the notepad out of his slack fingers.

  He was still staring at Tomas's back as Tomas wove through the crowded tables to reach Karamov. In a moment the waiter would start making a fuss, but not quite yet. Tomas knew that if you did anything - however outrageous - with enough confidence, people usually let you get away with it.

  The bodyguards glanced at him and away as he walked between their tables, pulling their chairs in tight to their meaty thighs to let him through. That was something else Tomas's career had taught him. Wear a uniform of any kind, even one as simple as a towel and a notebook, and that was all most people saw.