She wandered to the bolted doors, but saw no way through them except by key. The locks were gleaming and large. She imagined a guard carrying it around his neck. When two initiates came over and gently guided her away she knew they were all subject to a vigilant eye. She did take a few moments to examine them though, and saw gloves on their hands, under which the impression of bandages could be seen. Did they walk awkwardly too? Did one of them wince every time he touched his own chest? She didn’t want to delve too deeply—the monstrous imaginings that slithered through her mind would last forever.
A gong sounded, deep and ominous. The initiates all clapped, grabbing attention but grinning now with just a little more venom. It was time for the real party to begin.
I’m a prisoner. They wanna take my body and leave my mind intact to remember every last minute of it.
“We will make our way to the feasting hall,” one of the women said.
Hayden saw Fay blanch, saw the indecision, and held out a hand to the girl. “Stick together,” she said. “We can get through this.”
If Fay was eighteen she was lucky, but she looked on Hayden with eyes that had suffered too much. “I’m scared.”
Hayden wanted to say, me too, but held it back. They joined the line and waited. Dantanion’s underlings walked up and down the line, ensuring all stayed together and answering questions with nothing but knowing smirks. Presently, they moved and Hayden shuffled forward. The line filed through the door and then up a narrow corridor, lit by artificial sconces. The going was slow, hesitant, but seemed to suit the assistants. As Hayden neared the end of the corridor she saw those ahead turn to their left and disappear. Soon, the loud noise of chatting, laughing and quiet conversation filled her ears.
Roll of the dice.
What to do?
No actual guards were in evidence, but Hayden was totally alone and she knew what the spider creatures were capable of. She saw them now as she entered the feasting hall, capering around the outsides to the beat of an unknown song. Clad in black, they cavorted like jesters, some partially climbing walls, others flitting between the crowd and encouraging shrieks. Hayden took a long look at all the recruits.
Young and pretty. All alone. And this was the work of the Devil.
Torches flickered all along the walls. An enormous table dominated the center of the room, already laid with cloths, cutlery, napkins and warming dishes. Servants flitted here and there, barely noticed. Bottles of wine stood open, breathing, everywhere. Plates of nibbles were distributed through the gathering which, to Hayden’s relief, looked to be bread in all its forms.
The throng quietened on seeing the recruits, staring with mixed gazes dripping with appraisal, judgment and expectation. Hayden saw a man standing on a dais—clad in a sheer black bodysuit—and striking a pose on one leg with one arm around his back. How he stood so still for so long she didn’t know, but was forced to wonder about the symbolism.
She saw banners unfurled along a far wall, floor to ceiling, black with a red logo that she had to assume was Dantanion’s personal crest. In a far corner musicians strummed quietly, faces red probably from liquor or drugs. Pedestals rose among the people, surfaces taken up by silver plates full of plastic cups that held a clear liquid. Dozens were ingested every minute, invoking some darker pall that fell over the crowd. The table itself was so brightly illuminated it caused after-images to blur Hayden’s vision.
“I . . . I don’t want to do this,” Fay echoed her own thoughts.
An underling heard her and leaned in. “You signed up for it.” He hooted. “You’re being paid for it. So it’s eat, or take the long fall.”
“The what?”
The underling mimed taking a dive. “From the cliffs.” He shrugged. “Whatever. It’s fun either way. The boss—he knows. He knows when you’re faking it. When you’re pretending to be part of the family. But once he roots them out,” he rubbed his belly, “they make a fine feast.”
Hayden pulled Fay away as the line started to move. One by one the recruits were seated around the table, filling one half of it. Hayden sat staring at an empty plate, a heated dish and some shiny cutlery. Hundreds of hungry, half-rabid eyes stared at her, gauging her response. At that moment a flash of black caught her eye and Dantanion appeared, without ceremony, from behind one of the banners. Quickly, the man walked to the head of the table.
He eyed the recruits.
“It is a good day for a feast,” he said.
Cheers erupted around the room, startling Hayden. Cups were raised. Servants appeared from a door, each one carrying something that made Fay—and Hayden, truth be told—cringe. Skulls. Empty skulls. Oh fuck, they’re not replicas.
Dantanion spoke again: “With this feast we gain the strength to overcome our enemies, replenish and renew our knowledge, expand our skills and accept new successes. We give thanks to the offering for giving their essence and all that they were, to nourish and sustain us.”
Hayden felt her cheeks flush red and fought down the sudden fear. In this room, among so many enemies, she was about to die.
“Tonight you give a piece of yourself,” Dantanion said. “And then you will enter our family. This is our sacred ritual. This is our proof to you. And the proof . . . is in the tasting.”
He took his seat now, the black robe about his body drawn tight. Hayden studied his face, his eyes, wondering how such a striking figure might perpetuate such a mysterious and macabre past. The slight smile he afforded her sent butterflies through her stomach. Whatever it is I don’t want to do it but still, I’d like to make him proud of me.
Empty skulls clunked down on the table before them as a select few took seats opposite. Hundreds of others crowded around, some leaning on the back of the new recruits’ seats. Soon, even the whispering stopped.
“Take up the knife,” Dantanion said.
Hungry eyes fixed on Hayden, on Fay, on all the newcomers.
“See its edge? Feel it. Test its weight. Grip the handle. Study the fine blade. Are you ready?”
Hayden picked up the knife with reluctance, seeing no way out for any of them. The hall was full, the table surrounded; Dantanion’s family expectant and fueled with a cocktail of drugs. Someone then quietly slipped a plastic cup in front of every new recruit. Hayden looked ahead and saw eyes gleaming at her, shining at the prospect of what was to come. She knew immediately that if she took that sip she wouldn’t be able to stop any of it.
And what are your chances if you don’t?
Worse than zilch.
Already, some eager recruits had slammed down the shot as if it was golden tequila. Hayden turned to Fay, ignoring the glistening eyes and mouths that watched.
“Together?”
The tear-filled stare wrenched at her soul. “I can’t do it.”
Fay pushed at the table, sending her chair away and into those that were gathered behind. They pushed back, trapping her. Hayden reached out quickly, trying to calm the girl with a gesture.
“It’s the lesser of two evils.”
“No it isn’t. I’d rather die.”
She was right. It wasn’t. Hayden didn’t feel exactly the same, but understood. “If you die, everything ends. No more chances. No future.”
“As if my life has been a carnival so far.”
But there is always a chance, no matter how small. “Keep trying. Stay alive. Never lose sight of your dream. Be doubtless. Be tough. Be fierce. You will win.”
Fay hung back, reluctant. Hayden saw half a dozen men and women licking their lips only four feet away. Incisors, sharpened, slid free. An insatiable hunger burned in those faces—hotter than furnace fire.
A recruit further down the table tried to bolt. The pack fell on him, tearing, shrieking, enjoying every minute. Hayden saw him dragged off cut and bleeding, flesh hanging in strips, stomach bleeding.
She turned the knife in her hands. “Live,” she told Fay and positioned the blade at the tip of her little finger, above the nail.
D
antanion’s voice was soft, impersonal. “Fill their skulls.”
Hayden swigged the clear liquid as a servant filled the empty skull with red wine. She repeated herself one more time.
“Live,” she said.
A fever started in her brain, infecting every nerve receptor and cell. It traveled quickly down the length of her body. It calmed her fears, making her wonder what Fay was being so frigging fussy about.
Fay hesitated with the cup to her lips. Hayden reached out and tipped it, sending the liquid into the girl’s throat.
Dantanion raised his own wine-filled skull. “Eat,” he said.
Hayden pressed down on the knife. The pain was short, the fire that shot through her finger brief. The slither of flesh came away, and rolled onto the table. Blood followed it and she reached out with the napkin, mopping it up. A bandage was swiftly offered by a servant who appeared from nowhere. Hayden applied it to the tip of her finger, wincing at the raw pain even through the rapture. Then, with a pristine set of tweezers she took hold of the snippet of flesh and placed it upon the hot dish. Every other recruit did the same, even Fay, who somehow managed to look sick and ecstatic at the same time.
“Eat,” Dantanion intoned. He bent slightly as an aide appeared to whisper into his ear. Hayden was good at reading lips, but this message made so little sense she wondered if she’d misread. The wolves are loose.
Hayden turned the flesh over with the tweezers, trying to give it an even roasting on both sides, then brought the piece of herself up to her own lips.
Hesitated.
Every base instinct, every human impulse, fought hard to resist. The vilest of sins lay before her, sizzling, and whatever vile feelings rose inside had to be quashed. To live, she must first be abominable.
Fay chewed first, head down. Hayden then ingested the morsel of her own flesh and chewed until she could swallow. They could not take wine with it, but when the piece was gone they were allowed to wash it down.
“Now,” Dantanion said. “You have become family. Go below and rejoice. You are free in your new home.” To the servants he said, “Bring out tonight’s offering.”
CHAPTER THIRTY NINE
Drake bent as the first slavering beast came into sight, running hard around a bend ahead. It was large and lean, jaws bared, fur matted to its body. Within seconds its brethren could be seen rushing behind it, the pack incensed by something their handlers had done and clearly set on the intruders.
Gun up, he dropped the first, scattering it in front of its fellow runners, upsetting their balance. Dahl was at his side, also crouched because on this narrow path nobody else could come alongside. Behind and above them stood Alicia and Smyth, also firing.
Bullets ripped into the pack. The wolves screamed and howled, their cries echoing between canyon walls and surging across the mountain. Other, far away, plaintive cries took up the call. Drake doubled down—two shots for each wolf. He had more compassion for these creatures than any mercenary, but they were still trying to kill him. The speed of the beasts rapidly closed the gap between them.
A wolf slowed and then leaped, sleek and graceful, legs straight, jaws endlessly snapping. It landed to the right of Dahl, rebounding off the mountain wall. Smyth managed to wing it as its paws hit the ground and then again as it recovered and snapped at Dahl. The Swede never lost concentration on the oncoming pack, ignoring the wolf and trusting Smyth to have his back.
Drake whistled softly at Dahl’s trust. “Not even a twitch?”
“Balls,” Dahl replied, “of steel.”
“More like brains of mush.”
“Seeing is believing,” Alicia piped up from behind.
“Hey.” Kenzie was crouching frustrated to the side, fingers nervously flexing mostly because they were empty and feet inching forward at every snarl and howl and animal grunt. “I got first dibs on those.”
Alicia grinned, dropping a wolf. “All right, I’ll ride shotgun.”
“How would that work?”
“Y’know, top and bottom. One—”
“Hey!” Dahl cried. “I’m right here, for fuck’s sake.”
“And me,” Drake added.
He counted eight wolves left alive with eight more dead or dying. The ones at the rear of the pack struggled to make ground, hampered by bodies, but the more creative of them—or the hungriest—soon began to use their fellows’ bodies to leap from. A wolf landed at Drake’s feet, snapping, dropped by Smyth. Its fangs brushed his sleeves, leaving a string of drool.
“See. I got dem balls too.”
“That’s just stupidity.” Dahl eyed the drool. “Stop trying to be me. Never gonna work.”
Drake rose fast then as a wolf leaped desperately high and cleared its fallen. The gun was useless. Its body slammed down, heavy as a man, smashing hard against his shoulders. He caught it, wrestled with the balance of weight, then dashed it onto its back hard against the rock floor. It squirmed hard, jaws snapping around. Alicia leaned around and shot it. Dahl stepped forward to meet the last three oncoming wolves.
Drake stared. “Really?”
One used its incredible speed to partially mount the right wall of the canyon, claws tapping, and came at Dahl at an angle. He caught its leap, grabbed its haunches and threw it straight into the next running wolf. The two collided hard, tumbling together in a mass of legs. The third would have latched onto his shoulder, again using forward momentum to perform an incredible leap, but Kenzie rushed forward with perfect timing, drew down with her katana and ended its assault with one smooth stroke.
Dahl winced, splashed by blood. “Jesus, Kenzie. Have a care. They’re wolves, not bloody mercenaries.”
“Yeah, just mindless animals,” Drake said.
Mai crouched watching. “A good description of every mercenary I’ve met.”
Kenzie wiped her sword. “Who ended their poor suffering quicker? You with your bullets or me with my blade?”
Drake knew several animals were wounded and moved quickly to end their pain. Mai joined him and then Kinimaka. The villagers congregated further down the canyon, keeping an eye out for any further ambush. Drake walked beyond the dead wolves and peeked around the furthest corner, Dahl at his side.
“You think that goes all the way above the house?”
The pass twisted to the left and ran upward at a sharp angle, still traversable but only just. Drake could just make out twists and turns as it progressed, and thought he saw the briefest sign of it continuing beyond the house, edges picked out by silvery skies.
Brynn was at their backs. “Nobody from Kimbiri has been even this far,” she said. “There could be other traps.”
Drake broke out the pencil flashlights, their beams tiny but powerful, and waited until everyone switched to theirs. The procession began to pick their way upward, exposed to the elements, scoured by winds and cold, shocked at turns by the sudden drops that almost seemed to jump out to left and right. It was at these hazards that the team moved closer to each other, holding onto jackets at times to make sure their closest neighbors didn’t stray to their deaths.
The path wound hard, up and up, and they lost sight of the house to their right. Drake saw it only twice, the high, brick walls rising like pillars of darkness toward some distant, high altar where blood sacrifice was performed.
They climbed together, but fought separate battles. Drake worried for the team—how Smyth might overcome his fears for Lauren, how Mai and Alicia might end up, how Dahl struggled with his wife and she with him, how Kenzie might turn out, how Kinimaka and Hayden would end. Unable and unwilling to affect any of it, he nevertheless was good-hearted enough to worry. The team was in flux—but wasn’t change a good thing? With Webb’s statement still largely unaddressed what did that bode for the future?
And where the hell is Karin Blake?
They fought the slope, a step at a time. They used rocky handholds to pull themselves up. They rested on outcroppings as the trail wound to both sides. Once again they saw the chateau, this
time unexpectedly and abruptly. A sheer brick wall greeted them at the end of another passage. Drake stopped and looked up, now able to see the top of the roof and the continuing mountain above.
“Almost there,” he breathed. “Pass it along.”
Mai, Smyth and Kinimaka dropped back to help the villagers, though all were fit and hardy and wouldn’t accept assistance to walk up a mountain. Nevertheless, they let the soldiers walk with them, primarily as guards. They paused momentarily at the edge of a mountain plateau, the deep valley running away from the chateau spread out before them. Drake caught his breath for a few minutes.
“I’ve rarely seen anything more stunning,” he said. “Remember Iceland? During the Odin thing? That was pretty good.”
Dahl was so close Drake could hear him breathe. “Been a long road, matey. So many adventures. I wonder where it’ll all end.”
“Our finest hours,” Drake said with certainty. “That’s where it always ends.”
The group looked ahead, and moved out. Drake hated being fatalistic, but adventure couldn’t go on forever. The pass continued at a sharp angle for two more minutes, views open and deadly to their left, away from the house, until the route leveled off and an opening appeared up ahead and to the right. Dahl arrived first, nodding into the darkness. Drake came up alongside him.
“Risky,” he said.
“Strap on your big panties.” Dahl nodded in agreement.
Alicia made a sound of protest. “Don’t tell me I have to climb all the way back down to go get them.”
Smyth walked along the chest-high promontory, looking out over the edge. “We can attach the hooks here,” he said. “It’s pretty solid.”
“Yeah, Lancelot,” Alicia said. “That’s why it’s called rock.”
Kinimaka came up. “Make it a firm fix, guys. I don’t wanna end up crashing through that roof and ending up on a dinner table.”
Inca Kings (Matt Drake Book 15) Page 23
