Black City Saint

by Richard A. Knaak

  Eye can help! Let me out!

  It was tempting to let him take over, but the transformation would take too long and force me to release what remained of my footing. Yet, I couldn’t see a target, couldn’t find something to bury the point into.

  Probably just what William Delke or whoever might be controlling him had planned.

  I gritted my teeth as the agony grew. As one foot began to slip, I grew very tempted to throw away the weapon so that both hands would be free to make one last desperate grab for the mantle. It was the only sensible course left to me—

  And then I realized that doing so was just what my true enemy intended.

  I gripped the blade with both hands and pointed it at the center of the darkness . . . then leaned forward.

  The powerful suction tore the last of my footing away. Instead of my feet going in, though, I dove headfirst, or rather point first.

  Her Lady’s gift sank into the darkness.

  A deep moan thundered in my head. Something shook me so hard I almost lost the sword. I knew that doing so would be my end.

  The suction magnified. I was certain I’d miscalculated for the last time.

  Before I knew what was happening, I dropped hard on the fireplace’s stone base. The drop knocked the air out of my lungs. All I understood was that I couldn’t let go of the sword.

  But then it finally dawned on me that there was no more suction. To that was added Fetch’s cold nose prodding my cheek.

  I looked up to see the gray black interior of a perfectly normal fireplace. Peering up only revealed the long, dark interior of the chimney.

  A quick glance at the sword enabled me to just barely catch the last bit of black fading into the bright blade. My exhalation of relief echoed in the fireplace.

  “Master Nicholas? Be you all right?”

  “Yeah.” I pushed myself out. The trap had lasted only a few moments—not even as long as my fight with the shadow dweller—but I felt as if I hadn’t slept in weeks. My heart pounded wildly, and even my unseen companion appeared shaken.

  But none of that compared with what awaited me when I turned around.

  Fetched whined and with good reason. He should have noticed her first.

  Her mouth agape, Claryce stared, not at me but at the sword in my hand. She shook but didn’t faint, a credit to her, but a problem to me. Had she fainted, I could’ve convinced her that she’d been mistaken about anything she thought she had seen.

  “I saw—there was something in that fireplace! I saw—no, I sensed it!” She looked at me. “Your eyes! And that sword! And Fetch! I heard him talk—”

  “Woof,” Fetch said unhelpfully.

  I thrust the sword back inside my coat, at the same time forcing my own eyes to return. Claryce shook even more upon seeing the latter normal again.

  “You shouldn’t be in here!” I abruptly shouted, rushing toward her. “The gas leak’s already getting to you! We’ve got to get downstairs fast—”

  She shook off my hand as I tried to lead her to the door. “I know what I saw! I—”

  A sharp pain struck me in the chest. I stumbled back, reaching inside the coat. Claryce went from anger back to confusion.

  Her Lady’s gift dropped to the floor, falling out of that magical place it hid when I didn’t need it.

  The blade was as black as the fireplace interior had been.

  Fetch whined.

  I tried to grab the hilt, but the point swung toward me. I barely backed away in time to avoid being cut by it.

  “Nick! What’s happening?”

  That was a question I wanted an answer to. “Get out of here, Claryce!”

  Pain again jolted me. I opened the coat and saw more of the blackness spreading over my side and waist. At the same time, a horrifying chill began to spread through me.

  I stumbled back, which inadvertently saved me from another slash by the animated sword. I had been tricked. I had been made to believe that I’d vanquished the Wyld as I had so many other creatures of Feirie before. Never had I had one that could not only resist the gift’s sinister power but seize it.

  Someone had searched long and hard for this particular fiend.

  Eye can help! my companion roared as loud as he could in my head. Eye can help!

  The cold crept over me at a faster and faster rate. I felt as if I were falling and falling and falling.

  With no other choice, I allowed him to help me. He briefly railed at not being given more freedom but then struck at our common foe.

  My left hand twisted, changed. I’d long ago gotten used to the pain that came with any change, but the added burden of the growing chill made me groan hard. I felt as if my fingers were being torn out one by one.

  Through tearing eyes, I watched the scaled hand rake the sword with long, sharp claws. With each strike of the claws, the gleam of Her Lady’s gift returned to those areas. The blade’s animation slowed.

  With the threat lessened there, he brought the hand to my side and slashed once more. I groaned louder, but although the claws dug deep, no blood or bits of flesh spilled from the spot. Instead, shreds of darkness fell away, leaving in their wake my whole flesh. As that happened, the chill started to recede.

  He slashed a final time, inside taking some satisfaction at the physical discomfort he caused me in the process. More of the darkness dropped like silken ribbons to the floor. Once there, it melted away as if it had never existed.

  Weak but cleansed of the taint, I let him return to the sword. With two quick slices, he rent the Wyld from the blade as if wiping grime off the unique metal.

  I watched with relief as the last lingering foulness faded away. Someone had planned well for me but hadn’t taken my companion into account.

  The scaled hand suddenly grabbed the hilt. That had not been my choice but rather his. I tried to regain control. Unfortunately, my exhaustion was still too great.

  I realized only then that he had expected just that.

  From somewhere behind me, Fetch growled. I knew that he was growling at me—or rather, at the dragon.

  “Nick?” Claryce couldn’t know exactly what was wrong with me, only that something really bad was. She took hold of my left arm.

  I—the dragon—turned to glare at her. Claryce gasped and took a step back but then steadied herself. She reached forward again.

  My treacherous companion eyed her with suspicion. Knowing who she was, he could not immediately decide what best to do with her.

  Before he could decide some possibly monstrous fate for her, I fought for mastery again. This time, I found the strength. He roared silently as he receded within me. My hand returned to normal, and I knew that my eyes had done the same.

  But, meeting Claryce’s gaze, I understood that everything else would be different.

  “What are you?” she asked in a remarkably calm voice. “What happened here . . . and don’t tell me I’ve inhaled gas!”

  Inside, the dragon chuckled at my dismay. I let my anger at him be known with a number of silent expletives that would’ve shocked someone who had known me as long as Diocles.

  Eye do not fear you, he retorted. Eye am beyond your threats . . . beyond any of your weapons . . . even the accursed spear which slew me . . .

  It frustrated me to admit that in many ways he was right. I chose to do as I often did in such arguments and focused again on Claryce.

  “It’d be best if you forgot all about this. Actually, it’d be best if you left Chicago forever.”

  She gave me a look that ended any further discussion about departures. That was a trait I knew too well from every incarnation of her. Again, the dragon snickered.

  “I’ll ask you one more time.” Claryce glanced at Fetch. “Tell me everything . . . including why I heard him speaking.”

  This time, Fetch managed a more natural bark, but it was too little too late. He looked apologetically at me, but I shook my head. This wasn’t his fault. It was mine. I’d been tricked. Yes, I might’ve died, but it was al
so clear to me that, failing that happening, someone had set forth a challenge. They were being blatant in their disregard for secrecy. Secrecy was a strong trait in the Wyld, in all creatures of Feirie. Even more than among man, the struggle for power over another was constant not only in Her Lady’s court but throughout the realm.

  Once again, I thought of William Delke.

  I hid the sword. Claryce’s eyes widened briefly, but she remained stolid otherwise. I admired that. “Obviously, you weren’t imagining that something was watching you.”

  “But what was it? How did you know where it was?”

  “Fetch noted it first. Collectively, they’re called the Wyld.”

  “‘Wild’?”

  I spelled it for her. “All the legends, all the stories of fairies—the old ones, not the cute, fanciful ones in children’s books—have a basis of truth. This thing was from that realm. Feirie. A place ruled by Her Lady.”

  She frowned. “Their queen? Is that what they call her?”

  Exhaling, I tried to give her the short answer. “We call her Her Lady because to call her by her name is to gain her attention.”

  Fetch whined his agreement. A mistake. She looked at him again. “And is he one of the—the Wyld?”

  “Yes and no.”

  “You speak,” Claryce insisted to the shapeshifter. “Don’t deny it.”

  She continued to display the steel with which I remembered ­Cleo­linda and the more than half a dozen other incarnations. Fetch sought my approval, which I gave with a grudging nod.

  “I do speak, mistress, when near enough to Master Nicholas. But I’m all Jake, all white. You can trust me . . .”

  Claryce’s brow deepened, and she looked at me.

  “Yes,” I answered her unspoken question. “He does talk like that.”

  “I’m eggs in the coffee,” Fetch added eagerly, apparently trying to win her over with every expression he thought might work.

  Evidently, it did the trick. This time, Claryce didn’t even bat an eye. Instead, she smiled. That earned her a strong tail wag. Thankfully, for the moment she didn’t ask more about his background.

  Unfortunately, now that she was done with Fetch, that left her with one subject. “And who are you, Nick? Are you also from Feirie?”

  She asked in a tone that indicated she doubted that. A number of stories—all false—rushed through my thoughts. Yet, somehow, I couldn’t lie to her. I could omit some things, but I couldn’t lie to her.

  “I guard the Gate. The path between our world and Feirie.”

  Claryce wouldn’t let it stop there. I’d hoped she would but had doubted I’d be that lucky. “You guard the way. What about that—what about that other part of you? Who are you really? How long have you been doing this?”

  Tell her not! my companion insisted. I told him to stay quiet. His insistence only spurred my desire to open up more, even though this was exactly what I hadn’t wanted earlier.

  “I’m a soldier. I’ve been a soldier for well over sixteen hundred years. I served as a tribune in the Roman Empire, though my family was Christian. During that time, I encountered a beast. A dragon.”

  “A dragon? They exist, too?”

  “They have always been few and they serve neither man nor Feirie. They are said to be older than both, though even they don’t know.”

  We were first . . . and first to be enslaved! snarled the dragon.

  I kept to the story. “I slew the dragon, not realizing that he’d been set to guard the gate. There needs to be a balance between the worlds. Without a guardian, without a way of keeping both sides from flowing too much into the other, everything risked destruction.”

  Claryce glanced at Fetch, who nodded at the truthfulness of my answers. Who exactly I was, I still didn’t want her to know. That might be too much and might eventually lead to the truth about herself.

  “The blood of the dragon had mixed with my own. It brought us together, so to speak. It enabled me to take up the mantle, which I’ve willingly done since then.”

  The dragon raged more, furious at so much detail given, even if so much remained hidden from her. With all the magic surrounding me, there was no way I could avoid telling her something. Whichever of Oberon’s followers was behind this had discovered her first and had intended from the beginning to toss her into the situation. My best hope was to convince her of the partial truth and pray that it would serve to scare her away. I had no choice but to face my foe, but I still believed there might be a small chance of keeping this incarnation of the princess alive.

  “I don’t know why . . . but I believe you.” Claryce took a step back to the door. As she did, she looked up at the border. “You mentioned something about cards. What was—”

  I was saved from having to explain the Clothos Deck by a tapping at the window. The three of us looked there to see a large black bird pecking intently at the window.

  “We need to leave,” I quietly but firmly commanded. Fetch had already passed her to take point at the entranceway. I moved to take her hand—a necessity to make certain we didn’t become separated, I told myself.

  “What is that?” she demanded as we moved. “Is that bird after us? Is it something like what was in the fireplace?”

  “No, it’s another associate.” Fetch was not the only exile who helped me on occasion. The bird—for lack of a better word to describe what it really was—had come through, along with several other refugees, during the chaos just before the Great Fire. Even after so many decades, I knew little about it, just as I knew little about most of the other exiles and escapees. Fetch was one of the few with a past I shared.

  The black bird helped me when it was so inclined. I’d contacted it just before heading here and hinted that this might be the work of one of Oberon’s followers. That had been enough.

  We darted down the stairs, but not before I hesitated at the oldest of the Delke portraits. Something drew me to the painting, despite the black bird’s warning. I peered at the tiny book held by the founder of the Delke dynasty.

  But it wasn’t a book. It was the back of a playing card.

  I pushed us on to the next painting below, then hesitated once more. Sure enough, the son of the first Delke held a card of the same design.

  “I hear someone,” Claryce whispered.

  Below us, Fetch let out a very low, almost inaudible growl. He needn’t have bothered. I could hear the intruders as well. A moment later, the shadows of a trio of hoods moved toward the bottom of the staircase. I couldn’t see the shadows’ owners, but they had to be close. Fortunately, at this point that meant that neither could they see us.

  Someone spoke. I couldn’t make out the words, but what was even more important was the accents. Not the hint of Italian I’d thought would come from thugs hailing from the South Side, but the Irish brogue from the North.

  It was too coincidental that a trio of North Siders—probably tied to Weiss and his partners—would risk entering so deep into Outfit territory—those sections of Chicago controlled until recently by Papa Johnny—to sneak into Delke’s house just at this moment. Neither Wyld nor their human counterparts were above hiring muscle. Sometimes, there were things that magic could not do that simple force could.

  One shadow halted, but the other two continued on toward where we hid. The silhouettes grew more distinct, if not also more distorted. I could see that the pair were armed, at least one with a barreled weapon I suspected was a tommy. As a former soldier, I could appreciate its power but not the fact that it gave beasts on two legs the ability to deal death indiscriminately.

  “Keep back!” I whispered to Claryce. Fetch, now near the bottom of the steps, suddenly backed up. His ears flattened, and I could see his distress, though I was certain it had nothing to do with a pair of hoods.

  But then the shadows moved even nearer to the steps and I saw why Fetch was so distressed.

  The shadows were not attached to bodies.

  CHAPTER 5

  The shadows stretc
hed along the far wall as they moved, their shapes further distorting. The second had what was probably a revolver, but the weapons didn’t bother me as much as what the shadows themselves were capable of. I’d not seen this magic before, but I knew that it had to be bad.

  “Is there another way out from the upper floors?”

  “There’s a fire escape.”

  I signaled Fetch to come up. I wasn’t the type to sacrifice an ally of any sort. He rushed past us, doing so not out of fright but because again he took the point ahead. The fire escape might be a safe way out, but, then again, it might be exactly where our visitors wanted us to go.

  As blatant as this trap was, it in no way risked whoever was behind it to public scrutiny. They knew that I didn’t dare do anything to draw attention to myself from outsiders. I did eye a phone in the hall as we reached the third floor, but although it was one of the newer, pricier carriage types, quickly snatching up the combination handset and listening verified that the line was dead.

  “Was this working before?”

  “Yes.”

  I replaced the handset and rushed with Claryce toward where she’d indicated the fire escape. As we passed through her suite, I eyed the border there again. Everything about this situation struck me as a taunt. My foe knew me well, which meant that he had to have been part of Oberon’s inner circle. I could count the possible number of survivors on one hand with fingers left, but none of them struck me as having this sort of mocking mentality. The Wyld preferred torture over taunting, the more monstrous the better. Yes, many of them enjoyed teasing their victims, just not in such a manner. This was more human . . . which brought me again to William Delke, who might be better able to deal with North Side gangsters like Weiss or his partners—“Schemer” Drucci and, more volatile and the only Irishman of the trio, “Bugs” Moran.

  Fetch had already made it to the fire escape. However, he did not leap out onto it, which boded ill. I tried to surreptitiously peek below, only to have a single shot nearly give me a second part in my hair. Whether by magic or mundane means, our pursuers intended to take us.

  “What do we do now?” Claryce asked.

  Let me free! was my invisible companion’s incessant suggestion. Doing so would only add fire to the fuel, so to speak, as he would likely try to bathe the entire area in flames. I didn’t need that any more than this situation.