The Witch Who Came In From The Cold: The Complete Season 2: The Complete Season 2 (The Witch Who Came In From The Cold Season 2)

by Lindsay Smith

  Oh, dear. She truly was feeling the snare. Too soon, too soon. Zerena donned a more maternal mantle before little Tanushka flailed to death trying to break free.

  The KGB officer flinched at her touch, the tendons in her neck standing out like steel cables and the muscles across her shoulders hard as staves when Zerena snaked an arm across them. But she persisted. Gently, she guided Tanya to a promontory just past the shadow of the basilica.

  “Did you know,” she said, “that local legend holds this to be the very spot where the pagan witch Libuše envisioned what would become the city of Prague?”

  “Hmmm. Smoke and all?”

  “We can only speculate. But now the site of her successful vision is a basilica, built by a religion that would have denounced her as a heretic and burned her at the stake. I sometimes wonder if that was part of her vision, and if so, if it discouraged her. Did she cleave to the future she’d glimpsed, knowing that such irony was only fleeting? Or, deterred, did she leave it to others to fulfill her legacy?”

  Flatly, Tanya said, “I’m sure I don’t know.”

  “Neither do I. All I know is that if we do the best we can with the information on hand, history will absolve us of honest mistakes.”

  Now it was Tanya’s turn to sigh. “I assume this a convoluted way of asking me for another favor. What now?”

  Very well. Enough beating around the bush.

  “Your friend, the bartender. Jordan. How well do you know her?”

  A twitch rippled across Tanya’s shoulders in the instant before she pulled away. She leaned against the railing, her back to the river. “I’ve already helped you as much as I can. I betrayed Sasha for you. I won’t do the same to Jordan.”

  “Comrade Komyetski nearly had you killed, as I recall.”

  “Jordan hasn’t.”

  “Do you know that? Do you know what dark charms she keeps in her cellar, what works she makes impossible by restricting access to the locus beneath her tavern? We ask for the chance to shake the heavens and she refuses us to pour beer for peasants.”

  Tanya went very still. “Are you planning to harm Jordan?”

  “Oh, Tanushka. Is that really what you think of me?” To fill the damning silence, she added, “No. I give you my word. In fact,” she said, “what you tell me today might save Jordan a great deal of trouble.”

  Zerena watched the river while Tanya chewed this over. She could read the girl so easily. Zerena knew the very instant Tanya made her decision. Of course, it had been inevitable. But Tanya’s expression was something new, something Zerena had never seen.

  “Very well. Ask me your questions. I’ll answer them if I can.”

  Zerena sighed and smiled as if relieved. As if there had been any doubt.

  “What do you know of Jordan’s background? Why does she value her tiresome neutrality so highly?”

  Tanya chewed her lip, as though sifting through memories of a dozen conversations. Eventually, she said, “From what I’ve been able to piece together, Jordan’s father was Irish, maybe Protestant, and her mother was a Syriac Orthodox Christian. I do know that she’s named after the river where she was baptized. Both parents were Ice adepts, but they disappeared when she was fourteen…”

  3.

  At first blush, the smartly dressed figure who emerged from the early morning fog couldn’t possibly have been the same wild-eyed and disheveled man who, just days ago, had physically pushed Josh out of his flat, slammed the door, and then audibly collapsed against it. He wasn’t haggard, he wasn’t swaying. But while a specter of unsteadiness haunted his gait, the steady clicking of an umbrella ferrule against the cobbles of the Charles Bridge was like a fingerprint. Josh knew it well. Only Alestair walked like that.

  So he hadn’t died, then. And he’d received Josh’s message. That was a good start.

  Alestair walked like a man with a purpose, or at least a destination. Nobody would ever suspect he had taken two rounds in the chest at close range just a few nights ago. Josh abandoned his contemplation of the river and fell into step when Alestair passed. Though it was early, with few people about, they acknowledged each other with but the slightest of nods.

  Look at me, Josh wanted to yell. Now that you’re not at death’s door, or whatever the hell that was, look me in the eye and tell me what the hell is going on.

  But putting Alestair on the defensive wouldn’t accomplish anything. Josh tamped down his anger—it wasn’t easy—and took the high road. Give him the space he needs. We can still fix this.

  “Good morning, Mr. Winthrop.” Sounding normal took Herculean effort. But somehow he imbued his voice with a cheerful lilt, or what he hoped sounded like one.

  Al flinched, as if surprised by the sound of a human voice. He kept the fingers of one hand tucked in the pocket of his suit coat, Josh noticed. It was too small to conceal a firearm.

  “Good morning, Mr.…” The other man trailed off. For the second time in a few days—the second time ever—Josh watched Alestair’s composure fracture.

  What is it about me? he wondered. You didn’t react half as much to the bullets that tried to perforate your heart as you do to my simple attempts at communication. Should I be touched or infuriated?

  “… Joshua. Josh.” Alestair sighed.

  Touched. For the Brit to be so informal right out of the gate, that could only be an overture.

  “I owe you an apology.” Alestair stopped midway across the bridge. They had it almost to themselves, or so it seemed in the fog. There he turned to face Josh directly, then repeated himself. “Truly, I do.”

  Infuriated. Alestair couldn’t shove the stuffiness completely aside even when he was being sincere, or trying to. Josh wondered if maybe Nadia had the right way of things; at that moment, he wanted nothing more than to knock the stuffing out of Alestair. But how would a man who shrugged off bullets react to the punch of a man who’d never thrown one?

  Very well, then. Cards on the table. “Yes. You really do.”

  The dissipating fog echoed with a steady creaking. A young woman approached from behind them, pushing a wooden cart full of flowers toward the castle. Probably hoping to stake out a good spot for the day. Neither man spoke until she passed. A stiff wind came off the river, pulling the fragrance of lilacs and a trail of petals from the cart. The men resumed their walk more slowly, waiting to speak until the flowermonger was out of earshot.

  “Please understand there are certain things I simply cannot share with you.”

  “I’m not asking for state secrets, Alestair. I just want to understand what’s going on. What I saw down at the docks and, my God, in your apartment. I mean, those rounds should have gone right through you. Instead, it looked like they’d hit I don’t even know what.”

  “Naturally, given our respective employers and our respective responsibilities to same, there are certain—”

  “Don’t, Alestair. Just don’t, okay?”

  The MI6 man closed his eyes, briefly pinching the bridge of his nose. Then he met the edge in Josh’s voice with one of his own. “What am I to do or say, then?”

  “Just tell me the truth, Al. Please.”

  Josh hated the way he sounded. But he hated this unresolved situation, this Gordian knot, even more. Most of all, he hated the other man’s hesitation. He tried again.

  “Okay. Let’s back up and start with something simple. What was in the package you had me deliver to Kazimir? What was it truly for?”

  Alestair took a long breath, as if searching for the right words. But when he exhaled, he seemed to deflate a bit, as if a puzzle had defeated him. “The truth, Josh, is there are things you cannot and should not know. Things you cannot understand.”

  “Can’t understand? What does that mean? I don’t have the proper background, I didn’t go to Eton, I don’t have the right family, I don’t pronounce my vowels properly?”

  “Oh, do desist.” Alestair turned away.

  Josh grabbed his arm, spun him around. “Sometimes you act as if you
enjoy my company. You seek it. But then when I’m scared for your life, you turn around and push me away. You act as if I’m, I’m, I’m just some kid whose presence must be tolerated.”

  The arm beneath Josh’s hand turned hard as stone.

  “Because you are a child, Joshua. You stumbled across a single conch on the beach, and now you claim inheritance of the sea.”

  “Jesus, Alestair. I’m making an overture here, but all I’m getting in return is bullshit.”

  Through clenched jaw, Alestair managed, “I appreciate and welcome the overture.” It seemed a wonder his teeth didn’t shatter in that moment. “I am trying, as well. That I’m here should tell you so. But every human relationship must navigate a morass of compromises. You’re demanding things to which you have no claim.”

  Other pedestrians became visible as the fog burned off and the rest of the city slowly materialized around them. Other folks out for a stroll, or walking to work. Their island of solitude would vanish in moments. Reluctantly, Josh dropped the other man’s arm, lest the prolonged contact draw notice. For a moment, the ghost of intimacy lingered, but it evaporated with the last of the fog.

  “Is that how you see our relationship? As a ‘morass of compromises’?” Josh crossed his arms. “That may be the most bloodless thing I’ve ever heard. I suppose that means I’m finally seeing your true colors.”

  Alestair went very still. A tightness came over his face, a subtle tensing in the muscles stretched across his jaw and fine cheekbones. With it came a look so hard it might have crushed him. Josh retreated as though the air between them had become poisonous.

  In one fluid motion Alestair bent low, scooped up a handful of flower petals, stood, and clenched them in his fist. Josh flinched, recoiling from a punch that never landed. Instead, Alestair crushed the petals, working his gloved fingers like a mortar and pestle.

  He hissed, “Pray that you never see my ‘true colors,’ Mr. Toms.”

  Then Alestair opened his fist, blew the petals at Josh’s face, and spoke an unintelligible word that landed in his brain like a railroad spike driven between the eyes. Josh staggered, recoiling from a man whose eyes no longer had pupils or whites. But he had no time to ponder this, for then a tremor shook the bridge, and a crack knocked chips from the statues, and he and several others collapsed on the hard stones, writhing.

  Minutes later, after the fit had passed and Josh had cleared the flecks of dried blood from his eyes, Alestair was gone.

  • • •

  Moonlight streamed through the warehouse’s high windows, rendering Terzian a silver-plated gargoyle. Zerena imagined him crouched on a flying buttress, licking stony lips, watching unsuspecting passersby. Ready to leap upon some poor soul and rend him limb from limb.

  An unsuspecting soul like Sasha. This would be his last day as a favored acolyte of the Flame. It was probably too much to hope that Terzian would literally rip him apart, which he could certainly do. Either way, Zerena would no longer have to waste her time and energy on their frankly tiresome personal Cold War. Resecuring Terzian’s favor and patronage would lift her to new heights; freedom from Sasha’s amateur machinations would enable her to climb higher still.

  The old man leaned upon a dusty desk. The disused warehouse had fallen into disrepair after the state had consolidated textile production and reassigned the overseers elsewhere. It made for broken windows that let in spring rains on the windiest days. But it also meant a useful meeting place, so long as one could disregard the occasional ghostly whiff of wet wool.

  Edvard finished his circuit of the warehouse. “We’re secure.”

  Terzian opened a drawer and produced an oaken box little larger than an infant’s skull. A few tufts of excelsior had been caught under the lid, and now the packing material wafted free to flutter across the desk. A spell woven into the iron bands and hinges (so elegant, so efficient, undoubtedly the work of Terzian himself) thwarted Zerena’s attempt to divine the contents. A momentary crease in the hollow between Sasha’s eyebrows suggested he, too, was forced to wrestle with his curiosity.

  The unspoken implication was clear. The box contained a powerful artifact, something that would be central to the upcoming ritual, and Terzian would bestow it upon the person who won his favor today. Like schoolchildren vying for the teacher’s favor, she and Sasha would be graded on their reports. It was demeaning. Supplicating herself like this left a sour taste in her mouth. But if this was the price of recovering Terzian’s favor, so be it.

  Zerena abandoned her attempt to scry the contents. I’ll know soon enough.

  Terzian leaned on the desk again, arms crossed, cane propped against his leg. “Komyetski, what can you tell me about Jordan Rhemes?”

  Sasha licked his lips. He glanced sidewise at Zerena for a split second, then cast a covetous gaze at the oaken box. “A great deal, sir. She was, of course, already known to us in the KGB, owing to her sustained and regular contact with officers of several western intelligence agencies, including the United States, United Kingdom, and, recently, Norway. Though she professes neutrality, in recent months she has allied herself with the West, politically, and with Ice, metaphysically.”

  Empty words and nothing more. Sasha knew only what everybody knew. Zerena yawned behind her hand.

  He continued, “Her real name is Farideh Sabeti. Her family were Zoroastrians who had to flee Iran when the CIA and Secret Intelligence Service engineered Mosaddegh’s removal from office. They landed in Israel, and there changed their name to hide their heritage.” Zerena’s yawn faltered. “As recent events have demonstrated, she is not easily swayed by offers of money nor threats of violence. Prior to her arrival in Prague, she was the proprietor of a shop in Cairo”—a frisson of doubt rattled through Zerena—“where her family had for generations stored sundry items, one of which you’re already familiar with.”

  Zerena kept her hand over her mouth, but the yawn had turned into a frown. Not only did Tanya’s information flatly contradict Sasha’s, she’d given no hint whatsoever that Jordan had any connection, no matter how slight, to the Cairo fiasco.

  Sasha did have the Soviet intelligence apparatus at his disposal. Certainly they could divine something as basic as where a person of interest had spent a significant portion of her life. Zerena, on the other hand, had but a single Soviet officer at her disposal. An officer whose pliability, she came to realize with dawning dread, she had miscalculated.

  “That shop is just one of several such stashes owned or controlled by her family, who claim the heritage of the great Byzantine adepts of Thrace.”

  Zerena frowned again. Terzian leaned back, as if reevaluating.

  “Is that true?” he demanded.

  “Who can say? But they believe it. And their collections are vast. As for her vulnerabilities,” Sasha continued, growing more animated as he reached the meat of his troubling report, “she has several. There is family in Jerusalem, Aleppo, and Alexandria, plus a cousin Hakim who took over the Cairo shop after she abruptly departed for Prague. Then there is her ex-husband, from whom she took her surname. He now lives on a commune in Switzerland, though the legal status of their marriage is murky.”

  This couldn’t be true. Tanya wouldn’t lead her so far astray. Would she?

  The shop in Cairo was a nice touch, Zerena decided. It squared with Jordan’s well-known and very visible role in the local magical community. It had to be nothing but the confabulation of an expert liar spinning whole cloth.

  “The timing of that departure is intriguing, as it coincides with the failed ritual there. It is likely she departed the region fearing our reprisal.”

  Terzian scowled. For a moment it seemed to grow uncomfortably warm in the warehouse. “Show me a photograph of this woman.”

  Now Zerena’s unease became true alarm.

  Having somehow anticipated the demand, Sasha had a photo at the ready, which Zerena glimpsed as he passed it to their superior. A grainy black-and-white of Jordan hauling a rubbish bin into the alley
behind Bar Vodnář.

  The old witch glared at the image for a long moment, a gargoyle stalking its victim. His face twisted with almost geological slowness until it arrived at naked rage. A flash consumed the photo, and a burst of heat washed over Zerena’s face. A handful of ash sifted through Terzian’s fingers to dust his shoes.

  Quietly, dangerously, he said, “Redouble your surveillance.” That he reached for his cane, almost subconsciously, unnerved Zerena. And at that moment he turned his attention to her. “And you, Pulnoc? What can you tell me about this woman who calls herself Jordan Rhemes?”

  She licked her lips. What had Sasha done? What trickery was this? And what treachery had Tanya committed?

  “I don’t know where our venerable colleague obtained his information, but it is highly suspect. My own investigation paints a rather different picture of the woman,” she said truthfully. But how honest had Tanya been with her? “Her reluctance to allow us to access the confluence beneath her bar springs from her early teenage years, when her parents, both pawns of the Ice, disappeared while working for the Consortium. Unsurprisingly, the Consortium told her they’d been ambushed and murdered by our faction. Years later she learned that was a lie. Since then—”

  Terzian raised a hand. “This is nonsense. You have nothing. Nothing.”

  “Sasha would have us believe that this barmaid is the architect of one of our greatest setbacks. It’s absurd!”

  Terzian shook his head. “I know that face. That woman was in Cairo, and she was there when things went wrong.”

  Zerena couldn’t breathe. He might as well have jammed his cane into her stomach. This wasn’t happening. It wasn’t. It couldn’t.

  “This is extremely disappointing.” Terzian pointed toward the door, where Edvard slouched. He opened the door as Terzian lowered the boom on her. “Leave us.”