by Pavel Kornev
"Leo, catch up!" He shouted, running down the stairs.
"Stop!" I roared in pursuit, but my partner was already nowhere to be seen.
Curses! Malk was our target! Malk, not the werewolf!
I cursed, pulled my Roth-Steyr from the holster and leaned out the window, pistol in hand. The werewolf was lying on the earth as before. He was clearly visible from the second floor, and I managed to shoot almost an entire magazine at him before I heard an incomprehensible shuffling behind me. I turned around. Aaron Malk had woken up and was getting on all fours. He then darted out the door with unexpected agility. Having forgotten about the wounded werewolf all at once, I caught the escapee by the stairs. Without particularly restraining myself, I grabbed him by the scruff of his neck and handcuffed his right wrist to the thick balustrade of the strong-looking banister.
There, I also found my Cerberus, but the cartridge of rounds had flown out of it, and I didn't have time to find it. I snapped the top from my cane and rolled down the stairs to the first floor.
The men had all left, and no one was stopping me from jumping out the flung-wide back door with a cane in one hand and a Roth-Steyr in the other. By that time, the werewolf's trail had gone cold, and Ramon was prowling the alley, looking at the viscous drops of the werewolf's blood in the dirt.
"Ramon!" I called out to my partner and, at that very moment, a shadow that looked too dark stood up on the carriage-house roof. "Ramon, behind you!"
The shadow shot up into the air. Ramon turned in place, putting up his gun.
A shot thundered out. A long flame from the dual barrels lacerated the shadow and illuminated the spread-eagled werewolf mid-jump.
Miss! Both shots missed him!
Another bullet went flying, and the werewolf collapsed weightily on the earth a few steps from Ramon.
The lever on his Winchester gave a clank. A smoking shell flew onto the mud, but the animal had already managed to get up to Ramon and push the barrels skyward before another shot could ring out. The strike from his left paw, in comparison with previous ones, was markedly less powerful, and could even be called weak, but even so, Ramon was knocked off his feet. With a crack, he tore into the carriage-house, fell and froze motionless on the ground; streaks of blood were dripping down the walls.
Curses!
I jumped up from my place and lunged deep with my cane; the werewolf, with an unbelievably graceful pirouette for his body, started to dodge the strike, but a shot from my Roth-Steyr forced him to break step and the points of the electrodes caught his back and made him start chattering in electric convulsions.
The werewolf, howled, spun in place and then I, in a pitiful attempt to copy the dancing motion of a banderillero getting away from a wounded bull, dove under his splayed paw.
"If you let your opponent get to within slashing distance, you've wasted the last moments of your life for nothing," my father's admonition flashed in my mind, and at the last moment, the claws sped over my head; the werewolf lost balance and fell down on one knee.
The crackling of electric shocks went silent. I jumped back hurriedly and only there realized that I was unarmed. The cane's electric jar was out of power. I'd lost the cartridge for the Cerberus, and the slide stop on my unloaded Roth-Steyr was jammed.
So I unfolded my knife with a nervous smirk.
The titanium blade sparkled in the murk of the bleak night as an elegant strip of silver, but the werewolf had already started reeling, then fell snout-first in the mud.
And it wasn't just the effects of the electric shock: his wiry fur started falling out, denuding his skin to reveal that it was covered in boils and a web of deep cracks. His ribs started to shake, and a sharp cough tore itself from his lungs. His maw filled with a crimson foam, and when the animal fell onto his side, I could see his blood-shot eyes and a large number of bullet holes that hadn't fully covered themselves over.
"The Convent," the beast wheezed out, "will never leave it like this!..."
Then the werewolf lost consciousness, and his once-powerful body began to decay and fall apart before my very eyes.
The uranium bullets and his accelerated metabolism had brought this invulnerable creature to an end after all.
The animal now out of my mind, I tore off for Ramon. He had already come to and was even pressing a wound on his right shoulder, but based on the streams of blood whipping out between his fingers, his subclavian artery had been severed. He had just minutes left to live.
"How is he?" Ramon gasped hoarsely when I came near.
"Dead," I assured my partner, getting down on my haunches.
"I hope I can catch him on the way to hell and give him a kick in the ass..." the hulking man tried to laugh, but just clenched his teeth in pain.
"You'll live, don't even doubt it," I objected.
"Drop it, Leo..."
"It's true that they won't be able to save your arm," I continued, "it's hanging by a few shreds. They'll have to amputate. But it's better to live as a one-armed cripple than to be struck down in the prime of your life. You can keep working as a guard and..."
"No!" Ramon snapped as much as he had strength to.
His lurking fear of becoming a lame cripple burst out, and I grabbed onto the horror, set it alight with my illustrious talent, and stuck it back. The squat man gave a wail, arched his back and lost consciousness; the blood that had been shooting out between his jerkily clenched fingers stopped as if the wound closed up on its own. And that's actually what happened. Fears were my domain, after all...
I stood to my feet, blinked several times and shook my head, but it didn't get any better. My eyes were burning. Then I clipped my dark glasses onto my nose and returned to the werewolf. The animal was truly dead, and his partially decayed body made for a pitiable spectacle.
It won't be easy to prove that this is the beast that murdered Isaac Levinson.
And also, what the devil did he mean by "the Convent?"
I heard a cough behind me. I turned and it was Ramon, on his feet and limping toward me.
"You put in a lot of effort for me," he complained.
"Malk!" I suddenly remembered. "Ramon, after me!"
I grabbed the Winchester from the ground and ran up to the opium den. On my way, I pulled down on the lever and swung it back up, putting another bullet in the barrel. I was afraid the Red Dragons might be upset about the firefight in their establishment.
But no, the bandits still had yet to return to the smoke-spot. At the entrance, though, I found some agitated smokers who were still – or already? – able to walk.
I saw my Cerberus cartridge on the lowest stair and stuck it in my pocket. I then ran up to the second floor, and, on seeing the broken balustrade, fell into a moment of complete stupor.
Aaron Malk was gone.
But how? How had he done it?!
"Devil!" I cursed out.
"What are you talking about?" Ramon came up after me. His former weakness had already left him and his face had reacquired its normal reddish hue. He was also moving confidently as if he hadn't been just about to die a few minutes earlier.
And I started to feel ill. So much effort, and for what?
"Look!" Ramon suddenly pointed to a drop of blood. And another on the step above it. "He's in the attic!"
I held the Winchester at the ready and began walking up the stairs. Ramon pulled his Webley-Fosbery from his holster and set off behind me.
Aaron Malk really was hiding in the attic. He was sitting in the far corner, leaning on the slanted trusses. Just sitting and not moving.
He was finally and irreversibly dead.
"Opium does not lead to good things," Ramon sighed, lighting the way for me with a lighter.
I didn't answer and touched the dead man's cheek. It was very cold, as if he had died several hours ago. And under the collar of his shirt, on his pale skin, there were clear blue finger marks.
"He was murdered," I told my friend. "He was dragged here, interrogated and strangled.
And it was no human that did it."
Ramon touched Malk’s neck, rubbed his fingers on the cloak and took a step back.
"Dark matters," he decided.
"Dark as they come," I replied.
We walked down from the attic and I grabbed my torn up briefcase from the hutch, a scratched-up Mauser inside, and suggested:
"But what if we hadn't found him?"
"You mean at all?" Ramon clarified.
"We went into the room and found the werewolf. They definitely won't give us anything for the werewolf."
"Except money."
"Except money," I nodded. "I think the jaw impressions will confirm my theory."
"That would be nice," he sighed and headed down.
I followed after him, took a stool from under the dice-game table and sat on it, giving my weary legs a rest.
"We should call the police," Ramon decided, "before the owners come back and throw us out."
"Let's send one of the neighbors," I suggested, reloading my Roth-Steyr. "Five francs per eye ought to do it. We'd better both stay here. I don't know what kind of beast killed the man, but whatever it is, it could still be nearby."
I placed the stool in such a way that I could see the stairs and both doors easily.
Ramon took the Winchester I'd set on the table and walked away to the exit.
"No matter who paid for your box, they have serious problems in store," he reassured me. "Before dying, he probably blurted out the name of his patron."
I just winced, not reproaching Ramon for running out to fight the werewolf.
What was the point now? Just to have a falling out?
And also, Aaron's body was giving off a whiff of something so horribly ghoulish that I didn't even have the slightest desire to meet face-to-face with his killer. Perhaps, Ramon had saved our lives with his poor judgement.
With a heavy sigh, I took Malk's wallet from my briefcase, opened it, and studied both bank notes in the light, then checked all the coins, one after the other.
"What are you doing?" Ramon asked in surprise after I stuck my knife into the wallet and started hacking it to shreds in my search for a hidden compartment.
"He said he had ten thousand francs on him."
"Opiated nonsense."
"Maybe yes, maybe no. I'll be back soon."
Pistol in hand, I walked up into the room on the second floor, took Malk’s jacket and walked back down. I felt it, but didn't find anything suspicious, so I started ripping apart the seams.
"Leo, if you’re feeling bored, we could play Mah Jong," Ramon joked.
"Very funny," I muttered and suddenly felt the rustling of a thin piece of paper under my fingers. Carefully, making sure not to tear it, I pulled it through a slit, took a look and froze, not believing my eyes.
Ramon came up close and whistled:
"A check for ten thousand francs! That's a hell of a stack of money!" But his joy didn't last long. He saw that it had been bounced and drew out his words in disappointment: "They paid him in phony money! And what trickster did that?"
I silently folded the check in half and put it in my own wallet.
"My uncle, the Count Kósice," I said, sweeping the dice onto the floor with an abrupt arm motion. "My very own uncle. Just think! Oh, I'll strangle him with my bare hands!"
"I'm afraid," Ramon shook his head, "someone else will get to him before you." He pointed up at the ceiling, reminding me of the strangled corpse.
"Nonsense!" I waved it off and got to my feet. "We just need to hurry, that's all!"
Outside, a piercing police siren rang out and Ramon sighed:
"This isn't gonna be easy."
I cursed and turned to the window. On its clouded glass, I could see the leprechaun drawing something that amused him from the other side. Tiny droplets of drizzle were constantly flowing down the glass, ruining his drawing, and he even stuck out his tongue in zeal.
"Hangman!" I suddenly realized. The small man was drawing a gallows with a rope and a person in the noose!
What a great omen!
The leprechaun noticed my confused gaze, threw his head into the noose, leaned it to the side, and started imitating pre-death convulsions.
I took the stool and threw it out the window with all my might.
My mood was bad enough as it was, and I could be sure it would only get worse from here.
But a noose? Oh no, I've still got some kicking to do...
End of Book One
NEW!
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G. ZOTOV,
Russia’s leading science fiction author,
and the English version of his latest bestseller:
MOSKAU (an alternative history thriller)
The 21-century SS Sturmbannführer Loktev embarks on a crazy and impossible mission. Whole areas of planet Earth have begun to disappear, leaving behind portals to other realities and filling the world with the identities of long-dead people. A “trigger agent” of the disaster is on the loose in a world ruled by the victorious allies Germany and Japan. If Loktev doesn’t stop the looming catastrophe, the Nazis might regret they won the war back in 1941.
From Russia’s bestselling science fiction author G. Zotov comes a book which is equal parts alternative history, dystopia and satire. Lovers of Philip K. Dick’s The Man in the High Castle will appreciate the author’s dry black humor and psychedelic imagination which rule the streets of a post-apocalyptic Nazi-controlled Moscow.
Preorder Moskau (an alternative history thriller) now!
About the Author
Pavel Kornev is a popular Russian author whose writing crosses the boundaries of the sci fi thriller, fantasy adventure and steampunk. Genre mashing has long become his signature style.
“His books are a page-turning mix of non-stop action and hard-boiled detective stories in the edgy atmosphere of steampunk noir. Far from being a knight on a white charger, Kornev’s typical protagonist is an everyday man with his fair share of flaws who puts his talents to good use. His heroes struggle to survive and win their places in the sun; but most importantly, they manage to preserve their humanity even in the direst of circumstances.”
Pavel is a professional economist who spent years working for a large bank – until his first novel, The Ice, became an overnight bestseller, allowing him to quit his day job. In his spare time Pavel jogs, swims and is an avid beer brewer.
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