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Black City Demon

Page 20

by Richard A. Knaak


  “What’re you doing?” Claryce whispered.

  “Trying to choose between bad choices.”

  At that moment, the choice was taken from us. From within the room with the open door there came a crash of glass.

  “Fetch!” I shouted both to Claryce and to Fetch himself. I don’t know what’d caused him to enter the room, but it couldn’t have been good.

  Weapon ready, I barged through the door.

  There was no Fetch. There was Barnaby, though. Barnaby on the floor in the middle of the shadowy room. Someone had shoved aside a bed and dresser to the wall next to his outstretched hand. A broken lamp lay by the dresser, the probable source of what I’d assumed had been Fetch leaping through one of the two covered windows.

  I looked up, looked down, and at every wall, including the one with the closet. I could see nothing.

  Eye will show you. . . .

  I let his gaze take over, but even in the emerald world all seemed safe . . . thus far.

  Barnaby groaned. I had no choice but to head toward him. The fact that he was still alive startled me. I’d expected to find something at least as bloody as what’d happened to the Nilssons.

  “Stay in the hall,” I ordered Claryce. I took a step farther inside, then another. The closet was my main concern. Children often thought there were monsters in their closets, and they were occasionally right. It was one of the places where Wyld liked to lurk as they built their power. They enjoyed toying with the open minds of children. I’d seen the results of some of their worst efforts . . . and that was enough to make me slip past Barnaby and fling open the closet door. If there was a Wyld within, it was going to discover how frightened it could become.

  But other than a few suits that told me Barnaby had very consistent taste, there was nothing. No Wyld could’ve escaped the dragon’s gaze this close.

  Then, I heard a sliding sound . . . and knew I’d been thinking in all-too-human terms.

  “Nick!” Claryce’s warning was followed by two shots, shots that I knew wouldn’t do any good.

  I spun around just in time to see darkness spilling out of one of the dresser drawers, darkness swelling in size so quickly as it flew at me that a moment later I saw nothing else.

  CHAPTER 18

  I didn’t need anyone to tell me that this was the same Wyld that’d been lurking around a few other times, apparently in service to Holmes. As it spread out, I caught glimpses of dark green eyes without pupils scattered throughout the shadow.

  I brought Her Lady’s gift to confront the creature.

  The Wyld split in two.

  The action only took me by surprise for a moment, but it was a moment too many. Each half of the Wyld sprouted more than a dozen limbs, all ending in three sharp nails. The thing was versatile, I’ll give it that.

  I’d long ago given up trying to understand the macabre diversity of the creatures of Feirie. I could only assume that since they were in part inherently magic, it made for very fluid forms. Not one seemed the same as the last, the elves included.

  I slashed at the nearest limb and watched with satisfaction as it fell cleanly away. Unfortunately, I’d not been able to make a deep cut with the point or else I’d have rid myself of at least one-half of my adversary. As it was, I continued to be assailed on both sides.

  There was another shot. I didn’t want Claryce wasting any more effort. “See to Barnaby! Go!”

  “I can’t leave you, Nick!”

  “Go!” As I shouted, I lunged at the right half. Even though the blade didn’t touch, the partial Wyld split into two smaller parts. Now I was confronted by three foes.

  A set of nails rushed past my face. If I’d not jumped aside, I’d have lost a good portion of my face.

  Eye can help you! Let me out! Let me breathe!

  I wasn’t yet desperate enough to do that. In silent reply, I used a feint to distract the largest piece and to run one of the smaller parts through. Her Lady’s gift drank up the partial Wyld with gusto, the dwindling shadow’s shriveling accompanied by a horrible, shrill tone.

  That wasn’t enough to deter the others, though. Sharp nails came at me from every direction, some scoring hits. I bit back a cry as one managed a jagged cut across my chest.

  Beyond the Wyld, I heard the thumps of feet.

  Its remaining parts fusing together again, the Wyld abruptly shifted aside as a new threat closed.

  I stared into a familiar—and ugly—face. The deathly pale hood who’d materialized in the car and attacked me before vanishing again stood right before me . . . so close, in fact, that Her Lady’s gift was all but useless.

  This near, I could see the dead eyes all too well. If I hadn’t known better, I’d swear he was a corpse. I still wasn’t sure.

  I caught his hand as it came up with the same arcane dagger with which I’d been stuck in the neck during the car chase.

  “Not this time,” I growled at him.

  But before I could bring my other hand—and the sword—toward him, his twin materialized from nowhere and seized my wrist. The pair pinned me against the wall next to the closet.

  A shot rang out. Twin One grunted and dropped the dagger, but stayed on his feet.

  “Damn it!” Claryce shouted angrily. “I got him square in the back, Nick!”

  I had no doubt as to her accuracy. I also had no doubt as to needing something a lot stronger to put an end to either of my new adversaries.

  Eye will help you! Let me out!

  I didn’t have much of a choice now. I opened the way.

  Nothing happened.

  It came as much of a shock to him as it did to me. I could feel him pressing as hard as he could, trying to seize control and growing more and more furious that he could not. His anger spilled over on me with such intensity that I couldn’t resist it. I roared at the twins, who stared back at me with their dead eyes and emotionless faces. Strong as I was even without the dragon’s aid, I couldn’t break their grips.

  Then, another crash of glass echoed through the room. This time, I had no doubt that Fetch’d arrived.

  He snarled at something. A shadow covered the area, the Wyld returning to the fray.

  “Get Claryce out of here!” I managed. “Get—”

  A squeal of pain that could only have come from the Wyld all but deafened me. That finally made the twins turn their heads in mirror image of one another to see what’d happened. Their reaction gave me a chance to see as well.

  The shadowy Wyld writhed. In its center I could see the hilt of the blessed dagger I’d given Claryce. Teeth bared, she watched as if trying to make certain that the creature didn’t shake the blade free. While not Her Lady’s gift, it had strong abilities of its own just because of the blessing. Whatever the true reason, creatures of Feirie could not stand that power. The shadow literally dropped to the floor, where it continued to flail.

  Fetch leapt upon it, tearing into the black mass with teeth and claw. Although shadow, the Wyld fell victim to his Feirie power.

  From below, shouts and rapid footsteps warned that we had more company. I doubted they’d come to rescue us.

  The dragon continued to rail against whatever unseen barrier kept him from dominating us. I became caught up between my own emotions and his to an extent I’d rarely suffered. It became impossible to focus, which didn’t help when the twins returned their attention to me.

  Gunshots rang out. A man cursed. Claryce’d taken the initiative and stepped out to the stairs to hold them off. Still, I hoped Fetch would listen to me and get her out of here somehow.

  I screamed as, without warning, the dragon made some headway in his struggle. The world changed to emerald, and smells I could’ve never noticed as a human tried to overwhelm me. I could detect Claryce’s nervous sweat and Fetch’s odd, Feirie odor. I smelled the essence of the Wyld, including those scents indicating its near death. I could even smell the grave scent of the twins.

  But what I could not smell in the least was the presence of H. H. Holmes eve
n though he abruptly stood in the shadows just to the side of the twin on my right. Holmes tipped his bowler hat at me and smiled darkly through his mustache.

  “Hold him still, lads. We’re at the edge here now, but this should still work just fine!”

  He drew out a small dagger akin to the one the twin’d carried, except this one had a black edge I didn’t care for in the least. I struggled, but the Schrecks kept their grips. Inside me, the dragon continued his attempts.

  “I can feel him now,” Holmes murmured as he stepped up. His eyes grew intense with anticipation. “I can feel both of you. It’s so close. So close. Yes, it was worth the risk—”

  Fetch growled. I couldn’t make him out, but he’d clearly lunged at Holmes.

  “Damned mutt!” the Beast of Chicago snapped. He raised his free palm toward where I assumed Fetch had to be.

  An unsettling thing happened. Suddenly, Holmes and I were surrounded by a throng of translucent figures. Ghosts.

  Fetch whined in pain as he stumbled into view. He twisted around twice, then collapsed.

  The ghosts faded away. His smile back—albeit with a touch of grimness to it—Holmes returned his attention to me.

  “Keep fighting,” he whispered to me. “Keep fighting. That’ll make it all the better. Yes . . . fight hard . . .”

  As he thrust the dagger, I realized it wasn’t me he was talking to, but the dragon. I didn’t know why he wanted the dragon to continue straining to take over, but I fought anew to keep control, at the same time mentally warning my constant companion to return to the recesses of my mind.

  Naturally, he didn’t listen.

  In desperation, I threw my weight toward the twin on the opposite side. For the first time, I managed to put my captors off-balance. The twin to whom I leaned grunted as he fought to retain his footing.

  My attempt still wasn’t good enough. Although Holmes managed only a glancing blow with the blade, my entire body shuddered. It felt as if something slimy crawled into my veins and burrowed its way toward my heart.

  Someone fired a shot. Through bleary eyes, I watched Holmes’s head explode.

  Then, just as quickly, I watched it reform.

  Despite that miracle, Holmes looked more than a little disturbed. He shoved past Claryce—the source of the devastating shot—and leaned deeper into the shadows.

  There, he melted away.

  The twins released me. Groggy as I still was, I did notice that one second they were in front of me and the next they were gone.

  The dragon seized control. I felt myself dwindling into that place of darkness within him.

  “Nick! No! Don’t lose yourself!”

  I had to battle both the dragon and whatever poison Holmes’s dagger had injected in me. Claryce’s sudden interjection into the situation somehow gave the dragon pause. I fixed on Claryce, trying to use her to bring me back to the mortal world.

  To my surprise, the dragon growled, then gave in. I stood on my two weakening legs, startled by my victory and wondering if he’d let me take over again just so the poison could do me in.

  “I go, you go,” I muttered. “You like to burn things, burn it away! You’ve done it before!”

  There is nothing to burn. . . .

  I didn’t understand. It felt like poison. I’d been poisoned a hundred times and knew how poison felt.

  “Nick! Hurry! They’re still on the stairs!”

  It took me a second to realize she was talking about Holmes’s human thugs. “How . . . how many?”

  “I wounded one before I came back in here. There are three others.”

  “Give . . . give me your hand.”

  I wanted it only for balance, but to my bewilderment, as we touched, I felt my focus return. I was able to look past Claryce to where the Wyld still flailed slightly. Moving over to it, I seized the dagger’s hilt, then twisted the blade so it sank deeper.

  A faint squeal rose from the melting darkness that was the Wyld. As I pulled the blessed weapon free, the Wyld began to melt. The other pieces followed suit.

  “A nearly perfect strike,” I complimented Claryce. “Did you know where to hit or just made a good guess?”

  “I don’t really know. It was the only spot that didn’t have eyes everywhere. I thought that might mean something.”

  I nodded. “You thought right.”

  I handed her the dagger, then rushed to Barnaby’s side. He’d been struck hard in the back of the head and had a knot nearly the size of my palm. He needed a doctor, but he’d live.

  The fact that he’d been treated so softly compared to the Nilssons meant something. He hadn’t been left alive just to draw me in. Holmes didn’t strike me as the kind to plan that way. I hoped that maybe when he woke up he could fill us in.

  But first we had to escape Holmes’s human pawns. I didn’t know who they thought he was, but clearly they had some knowledge of his arcane ways, if only because of the twins. I still had no idea what the twins were, but they had traces of Feirie on them.

  I suddenly noticed that it’d grown awful quiet in the hall. With a growing suspicion, I cautiously went to the door and listened. Sure enough, it was deathly silent.

  I swung the door open.

  The hall and the stairs were empty. Traces of blood marked where Claryce’d hit the one man.

  “They’ve gone?” Claryce asked as she joined me.

  “Yes.” That bothered me more than I let on to her. Sure, Holmes had grabbed Joseph, but he’d also set up a trap for me in particular. As far as I could tell, it hadn’t quite succeeded. Whatever the dagger’d done to me had faded away. I still felt tired, but that was it.

  “What do we do, Nick? Do you think they’re waiting outside for us?”

  “Not likely. I can’t say why, but when Holmes faded into the shadows, the twins and the rest ran off.” I glanced at the shadows into which the Beast vanished. For some reason, not only did they look paler, but the entire room seemed brighter to me. I asked Claryce if she noticed such a difference.

  “I think the shadows are lighter, but I can’t say about the room.”

  “Fetch, what about you?”

  “The same as the mistress.”

  There was something to what we’d noticed, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. Maybe the shadows had been darker only because Holmes had been using them, but I thought the reason something beyond his control. There’d been a sense of haste, of concern that if he’d remained much longer, he risked something of value to him.

  I quickly returned to Barnaby. He moaned as I carefully turned him over just enough to better check his condition. There was no choice. I needed to get him to a hospital.

  Eye could help him. . . .

  It was true, the dragon could in limited ways heal others, but not only did I not trust him to succeed with Barnaby’s injuries, but I just didn’t trust him period. Not after the way he’d fought so eagerly to seize control even when I’d warned him against it.

  “Fetch, check the way out.” I hefted Barnaby as gingerly as I could. Fortunately, he wasn’t that heavy. “Claryce, stick with me. I may need you to help shift him.”

  Nodding, she put away her revolver and joined me. Fetch trotted out of the room and to the stairs. He sniffed the air and the steps as we started down.

  “Much blood here, Master Nicholas,” Fetch remarked halfway down. “We could use a bit to follow this hood to his boss.”

  “If he’s that bad off, he’s already on his way to the river.” Holmes didn’t strike me as the kind to take care of the wounded. I had no sympathy for any gunsel. Throughout the centuries, I constantly had to face those like these men who’d long ago sold their souls for gold, power, and more. Galerius’d gathered himself quite a nasty bunch under his dragon banner, some of whom had taken personal parts in my beheading.

  Fetch poked his head out the front door, which’d been left ajar. “All quiet.”

  “To the car.”

  He darted on. With a little assistance from Claryce, w
e made it to the Packard without anyone seeing us. I didn’t know how well the neighbors knew Barnaby, but I doubted they’d be pleased if they saw us dragging his beaten body out of his house.

  I understood enough about Barnaby’s condition to risk driving him to Provident Hospital on East Fifty-First Street. It was by far neither the nearest nor largest hospital in Chicago, but I needed a place I could trust. Barnaby was no ordinary patient, and in his state he might murmur something he shouldn’t.

  Claryce said nothing as we pulled up at the nondescript three-plus-story building on the South Side. While I’d driven, she’d kept a constant check on Barnaby’s injuries.

  I drove around to the side of the hospital, parked, then ordered her and Fetch to stay inside. Now that I was here, I wasn’t certain I’d made the right choice. It wasn’t that I didn’t trust the staff; it was I didn’t know if they deserved to be involved in any way.

  I knocked on the door there. A strong-looking Negro nurse opened it up and eyed me.

  “You . . . Don’t I know you, sir?”

  “I’m a friend of Dr. Williams.”

  “Dr. Williams? As in Dr. Daniel Hale Williams, may God bless him?”

  I tried to peer past her, but she insisted on filling the doorway. “Yes. How is Daniel?”

  “Not here in a long time, sir. You know his Alice died last year?”

  “I’d heard.” I actually hadn’t seen Williams in more than twenty years, but she wouldn’t have known that. I’d actually met him shortly after he’d founded this hospital some forty years ago. It’d been a stunning thing, a Negro—well, Negro and Scots-Irish—surgeon opening a hospital willing to take those of any race. That’d caused no end of trouble for him.

  He’d accidentally confronted a Wyld in the process, which was how I’d come to know him. He’d been a man of courage and conviction, always striving to save a life. Where Holmes liked to play doctor while he gutted victims, Daniel Hale Williams had sliced open a man’s chest in order to save his heart.

  Three times, I’d needed the services of his hospital, with Barnaby the least conspicuous of those patients. I’d known that Williams had retired—he’d be in his seventies by now—but there was another rather unorthodox doctor I’d hoped was still here—

 

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