by Rod Rees
A sour-faced Crowley was seated waiting for them. He used the revolver he was holding to wave them into the seat opposite his. “Have they been searched?” he asked.
“Yes, Your Holiness, we frisked both of them. They’re clean.”
And you enjoyed every second you were doing it, you pervert, added Ella silently. But fortunately you weren’t perverted enough.
Crowley relaxed. “So I finally manage to track down the elusive Vanka Maykov and his mysterious PsyChick, Mademoiselle Laveau. I cannot tell you how happy I am to have found you. At last we have an opportunity to resume the acquaintanceship that was so abruptly interrupted by your disappearance from Dashwood Manor. You should know, Maykov, that your abduction of the Daemon has caused me some considerable embarrassment; I was heavily criticized by the Leader for not recognizing you for the villain you are.” He took a long suck on his cheroot and then blew smoke into Vanka’s face. “Yes, capturing you and Mademoiselle Laveau will be quite a feather in my cap. The Leader is very anxious to meet her again.”
“How did you find me?” asked Vanka.
“A little bird whispered in my ear, a little bird who is very anxious that Mademoiselle Laveau stop dabbling in the Dark Arts. But really, Maykov, I’m not here to answer your questions, you’re here to answer mine. Firstly: what were you doing conniving with that black wretch Louverture? And please don’t dissemble; Karl, the doorman of the Resi, is a loyal Party member.”
“I was trying to buy blood.”
“I suspected as much. I have had you investigated, Maykov, so I know you are a reprobate with a history of blood trafficking.” Crowley flicked ash from his cigarette over Vanka’s knees. “Unfortunately for you this is one deal which will remain unconsummated. By tonight Louverture and the rest of the black trash performing at the Resi will have been declared personae non gratae and thrown out of the ForthRight. But a question arises: what were you doing in the Bank?”
Now this, Ella realized, was a bloody difficult question to answer. That the money to pay for the blood had come from the coffers of the Ordo Templi Aryanis was not, she guessed, an answer that would be popular with His Holiness. Vanka seemed to be stumped for an alternative and believable answer and therefore opted to stay silent. It was a silence that provoked Crowley; he slashed the barrel of his revolver across Vanka’s face.
“Answer me!” he snarled as he raised his hand for a second strike.
“No . . . !” Ella blurted out.
With a thin smile of triumph dressing his mouth, Crowley turned his attention to Ella. “My, my, a cross-racial show of affection. My cup really does runneth over. This will make my work at Wewelsburg all the more delicious. The Leader has evinced a great deal of enthusiasm to meet you again, Mademoiselle Laveau, but what condition you are in when he meets you . . .” Crowley glanced back to Vanka and gave a sardonic laugh. “I presume you are aware of the punishment for the Race Crime of Miscegenation, Maykov? It’s gelding.” He shook his head in mock dismay. “I am disappointed in you, Maykov, it’s never advisable to mix business with pleasure, though I admit your slattern of a PsyChick has a certain appeal.”
“I’m no slattern—” began Ella, but her protest was stymied by a slap across the face.
The pain was worth it. Despite the difficulty she had in reading Crowley, in that instant she knew what he had planned for her and Vanka and it was an insight that made her blood run cold. But she had learned other things too . . . important things.
All she had to do now was get away from this monster.
“Be quiet! I will not be interrupted by a primitive such as you. Remember I have seen you perform! No woman other than a trollop would disport herself in such a lascivious manner. Your kind should know their place, and in your case that is on your back.”
It was the gleam in the man’s eye that gave Ella an idea. “Dat’s right, sir,” she said, mumming her NoirVillian accent. “Ah would sure like to perform on mah back for such a fine man like yous.”
“Disgusting,” muttered Crowley, but his interest in Ella seemed to ratchet up a little.
“An’ then maybe you’d get to feel mah fine, long legs around yous.” And to the astonishment of the three men crammed in the steamer’s cabin she began to slowly draw the hem of her long skirt up over her legs. “Dey says ah’s got the prettiest ankles in all ob de JAD.” As though to emphasize the point, she wriggled her foot around. “But ah tinks dat it’s mah calves dat are de nicest.” She pulled the skirt up over her knee and hooked her leg around so that Crowley could get a view of her silk-stocking-encased calf. “Den dere am some gentlemen who am ob de opinion dat it is mah thighs dat am de fings dat makes paying for me to service dem worthwhile.”
Ella artfully drew the skirt over her thighs. Three sets of eyes were locked in stunned appreciation of the succulent flesh she was displaying. Then she started giggling. “Ob course it might be de ting hidden between mah legs dat dey find most exciting.” With an evil little wiggle she delved her hand under her skirt. When it reappeared it was holding the small but very businesslike revolver Rivets had procured for her just the day before, a revolver that she was pointing straight between Crowley’s eyes.
“I would be obliged, Your Holiness, if you would lower your weapon . . . the one you’re holding in your hand, that is.” All trace of the NoirVille accent had vanished; now her tone was much more threatening. “I shall count to three and if you haven’t surrendered your weapon by then I will shoot you through the eye.”
“My dear young lady, don’t you realize that my colleague here has a pistol jammed in the ribs of your friend Vanka Maykov?”
“One!”
Crowley swallowed hard. “This is ridiculous. Shoot me and you won’t get ten yards.”
“Two!” Ella decided not to count to three.
Screw playing fair.
Instead she shot Crowley in the shoulder, the impact of the bullet causing him to pull the trigger of his own weapon. The gun exploded, the bullet smacking with a wet thud into the SS sergeant’s leg. Vanka didn’t need a second invitation; he smashed his elbow back into the thug’s face.
“Out!” he shouted as he pushed open the steamer’s door and jumped into the road, kicking the second SS trooper standing guard there squarely between the legs as he did so.
All Hel broke loose. A steamer that had been trundling along Blumenstrasse swerved to avoid the door that Vanka had thrown open, crashed into a dray cart hauling a shipment of potatoes coming in the opposite direction and demolished two stalls standing by the side of the road. In seconds the street was reduced to a shouting, cursing, fighting chaos and it was a chaos that Vanka, dragging Ella behind him, used to escape Crowley’s goons.
THEY REACHED VANKA’S ROOMS A BREATHLESS TEN MINUTES LATER. Once he was sure they hadn’t been followed, Vanka sent Rivets off to reconnoiter the Resi and to see what was happening there.
The boy was back in less than an hour. “By the Spirits, Vanka, you’ve really gorn an’ done it now. The streets is swarming wiv Checkya. They say there’s bin an assassination attempt on His Holiness Comrade Crowley by some Shade bint who’s a WhoDlum crypto. From wot I’ve bin told they’re puttin’ guards outside every Blood Bank in the ForthRight and at every mooring point along the Rhine and the Volga, and they’re searching every cart and steamer leaving the ForthRight.” He shook his head. “Yous an’ Miss Ella ’ere are a couple of really ’ot potatoes.”
“Fuck.”
“I fink there’s more bad news as well, Vanka. I sees that black item Louverture bin led away for questioning by the SS.”
“There goes our chance of smuggling you out of the ForthRight, Ella. Our best bet is to stay hidden until the SS get tired of looking for us.”
“I can’t do that, Vanka, I’ve got to save Norma Williams,” said Ella quietly. “When Crowley slapped me”—and here she brought her fingers up to the four red welts that decorated her cheek—“I read him . . . not clearly, his mind is too well shielded for that, but
well enough. Norma Williams is alive and Crowley has her held in a place called Wewelsburg Castle.”
“Then the cow might as well be dead,” snorted Vanka. “Lots of people go into Wewelsburg Castle but I’ve never heard of any of them coming out. It’s the headquarters of the SS. We’ll never be able to rescue her from there.”
“I know,” admitted Ella. “But the other thing I learned from Crowley is that he’s having her moved soon. They’re taking her somewhere to use her in the Rite of Transference. I couldn’t read where—Crowley had blocked that piece of information—but I know she’ll be moved on the last day of Winter. That’ll be our chance to rescue her.”
“First you’ve got to find where Crowley’s taking her.”
“To do that I need to get into a Blood Bank again. Once I’m there I’ll be able to find out about Norma and I’ll be able to help the people of Warsaw. Working the IM Manual has given me an idea as to how I can have the Varsovians escape Heydrich.”
“What? Have you gone crackers? You won’t be able to get within half a mile of a Blood Bank without the Checkya spotting you.”
“Which is the last Bank that Beria and his crew would think I would use?”
Vanka thought for a moment. “Oh fuck . . . the one in the Ghetto.”
Chapter 31
The Demi-Monde: 82nd Day of Winter, 1004
I regret to inform you, Comrade Leader, that my Ministry has received a communication from Venice, endorsed by Doge Catherine-Sophia, stating that until ForthRight troops have been removed from the Warsaw Ghetto all trades handled by the Rialto Bourse with respect to the ForthRight will be suspended. It should be recognized that a full 90 percent of intra-Demi-Mondian trades are conducted through the Bourse and that almost 70 percent of the ForthRight’s blood bonds and promissory notes are held by Venetian financial institutions. Without the loans raised on the Bourse it will be difficult for my Ministry to finance the longer-term ambitions of Operation Barbarossa. The ForthRight Guinea will also, effectively, be off the Blood Standard, which will have major—negative—repercussions in terms of its rate of exchange vis-à-vis other Demi-Mondian currencies.
—LETTER WRITTEN BY COMRADE COMMISSAR HORATIO BOTTOMLEY, FORTHRIGHT CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER, TO COMRADE LEADER HEYDRICH, DATED 82ND DAY OF WINTER, 1004
When, six hours later, the three of them—Rivets had insisted on coming along to protect Vanka and the ten thousand guineas he’d been promised—finally emerged, foul and stinking, through the manhole in Zapiecek Square in the center of Warsaw’s Old Town, Ella made the silent pledge that that was the very last time she would ever travel by sewer.
This was reinforced by the experience, when she first poked her head out through the manhole, of having a rifle shoved in her face by a ragged boy who looked barely old enough to shave. That the boy had a piece of tattered cloth with the words “Lieutenant: WFA” scrawled on it pinned rather crudely on the sleeve of his filthy jacket only confirmed to Ella just how desperate the plight of the Varsovians was.
“Who goes there?” the boy squeaked.
“My name is Ella Thomas, and I am the girl who, if you prod me with that rifle one more time, is going to jam it up your ass and pull the trigger.” The cold fury in Ella’s eyes persuaded the boy to back away.
“Gor . . . I’m sorry, Miss Ella. I didn’t recognize you, wot wiv yous bin covered in all that shit.” He paused as though waiting for some reaction from Ella. “Don’t cha know me, Miss Ella? It’s me, Lieutenant Michalski.” He stepped as close to Ella as the smell coming off her would allow. “You ain’t bin down in those sewers for four days, ’ave you? No wonder you smell so ripe.”
Ignoring him, Ella eased herself out through the manhole and spent a few minutes trying to massage some warmth back into her hands and her ass. Finally, feeling vaguely human again, she gave Lieutenant Michalski her best effort at a smile. “It’s good to see you again, Lieutenant, and congratulations on your promotion. I would appreciate it if you would have someone take us to the headquarters of Colonel Dabrowski. It’s vital that we meet with him right away.”
DABROWSKI LOOKED UP WHEN THE THREE OF THEM ENTERED AND gave a tired smile. In the few days since she’d last seen him he seemed to have deteriorated terribly: his face was gaunt and his skin the color of old parchment. His voice trembled when he spoke. “Now, here are some bad pennies. I never thought to see either you, Colonel Maykov, or your friend Miss Thomas again.” He peered into the gloom toward Rivets. “And who’s he . . . reinforcements?” He laughed at his own weak joke. “So you made it, eh? I thought when I heard that you’d been ambushed in the sewers that that was the end of you. Pull up a seat.” He nodded to three oil drums. “Aren’t you going to welcome our visitors, Captain Dashwood?”
Trixie stared at Ella with a look of real dislike on her face. “Did you organize the delivery of the blood?”
There was no point in sugarcoating the pill. “We organized it and I paid for it,” explained Ella, “but our contact has been arrested by Beria. As we understand it, there’s no chance of the blood being delivered.”
Trixie gave the door a savage kick. A mist of brick dust drifted down from the ceiling. “I knew we should never have trusted a fucking Shade.”
Ella felt Vanka move closer to her; he was obviously as nervous of Trixie as she was. The girl seemed borderline out of control.
“Please . . . Captain . . .” the colonel pleaded. “You must forgive the captain. These have been difficult days.” He looked at Ella and gave a wan smile. “You tried, and for that I am grateful. But now it is over. We lost control of the Warsaw Blood Bank to the SS this morning.”
“How bad is the situation?”
“We have two weeks . . . possibly less. There are close to three million civilians crowded in the Industrial Zone and without blood we are finished.”
“I might have another idea,” began Ella. “Another idea about how we can save the people of Warsaw.”
“My, my, Miss Thomas, you Daemons are very devils for ideas, aren’t you?” The sarcasm in Trixie’s voice was palpable. “What will it be this time? Will you use your Daemon’s knowledge of the Demi-Monde to fly all of us out of the Ghetto on winged horses?”
No one spoke, but the silence was almost audible. So far as Ella could judge, Trixie seemed to be on the brink of a nervous breakdown. The savage fighting had finally taken its toll.
“You’re quite right to be doubtful, Captain Dashwood,” Ella began, “and you’re equally correct in believing that, as a Daemon, I know things about the way the Demi-Monde works that you don’t.” She took a deep breath. “It may be possible to alter the Demi-Monde so that your people can escape the Ghetto.”
“How?” said Trixie quietly.
“Actually it isn’t my idea; it’s Colonel Dabrowski’s. I think I might be able to open the Boundary Layer.”
“Oh, stuff and nonsense,” said Trixie scornfully. “No one can do that.”
“I think I can,” said Ella simply. “Not permanently, but long enough for your people to escape.”
There was a stunned silence. Even Vanka seemed shocked by what she had said.
Dabrowski broke it. “How long will you be able to keep the Boundary open?”
“I don’t know,” admitted Ella, “but certainly for no more than an hour. The Demi-Monde is governed by people—by Spirits, if you prefer—who have granted me the power to make changes to your world, but these changes will only last one hour. That might be long enough to move your people out of Warsaw.”
“Move them where?” asked Trixie.
“Into the Great Beyond.”
“Absolutely ridiculous,” she sneered. “We don’t know what the Beyond is like. We might not be able to live there.”
“I think you will,” answered Ella carefully; she didn’t want to complicate matters by mentioning PINC. “My understanding of the Demi-Monde is that its geography and climate are uniform; this means that in the Beyond the air will be breathable, the wood worka
ble, the soil farmable and the water drinkable. You can see for yourself that trees grow happily there and that the Beyond is home for a great many animals: buffalo, ibex, wild pig . . .”
“But what about blood?” said Trixie scornfully. “No Demi-Mondian can live without blood.”
“There are Blood Banks in the Beyond,” interjected Vanka. “When Speke made his balloon ascent he reported seeing them.”
“Look, Captain Dashwood,” added Ella, “I’m not saying this is a perfect solution to your problems. In the Beyond your people will have no access to the goods and commodities provided by the Industrial Zone. It’ll be a pretty primitive life.”
“But it will be life,” said Delegate Trotsky quietly. “All my people have here is the certainty of death.” The old nuJu shifted his backside on the oil drum he was using as a seat. “It has long been the dream of my people that one day we would journey to the Promised Land, a place where nuJus would have a home and be free of persecution. We nuJus made a Covenant with ABBA that in exchange for our obedience to His laws He would lead us to the Promised Land. It is this Covenant that has sustained us through all our trials and tribulations. Perhaps the Promised Land referred to by the prophets is the Beyond? Many nuJu theologians have speculated that it might be.”
Trixie gave the door another kick. “With all due respect, Delegate Trotsky, this isn’t the time for religious revelations or mystic prognostications. We need hardheaded RaTionalism. There are almost three million people trapped here in the Ghetto; we must be sure that they are not escaping certain death here in the Demi-Monde for certain death in the Great Beyond.”
Ella nodded sympathetically. “I appreciate your frustration, Captain Dashwood, but it’s no use me promising something I can’t deliver. I’m not even certain I’ll be able to open the Boundary at all. But it is a possibility and anything must be better than sitting here watching your people being pounded to death by SS artillery. And, as your colonel has said, you have only two weeks’ supply of blood left.”
