by Stephen Cole
‘It’s possible Tom’s had a bad reaction to an anaesthetic,’ agreed Stacy. ‘The symptoms are—’
‘No ordinary anaesthetic,’ snapped Jicaque. ‘This is the work of the codechanters.’
Blood pulled a face. ‘The who?’
‘I sense the nature of the rituals, the energy that lingers about him.’ The old Native American nodded grimly. ‘I should have expected as much.’
‘Here we go with the mystical wise man act,’ muttered Stacy.
‘These codechanters … they’re old men? Blind?’ Sunday looked at Kate. ‘German, maybe?’
He looked at her. ‘You’ve encountered them?’
‘One of them controlled my body just by speaking. He seemed to be training others, using me as some kind of guinea pig.’
‘And two of his friends turned ’wolf and tried to kill us,’ Kate said.
Jicaque nodded gravely. ‘The codechanters are among the oldest of the European necromantic cults. They may be blind now, but those men have seen the threads that bind the body together. The strongest codechanters can undo those threads, or retie them in any way they choose.’
‘Just by speaking?’ Stacy looked sceptical, and Kate had to agree it sounded fantastic.
‘If it would help, think of those threads as protein chains, as strands of DNA,’ said Jicaque, pronouncing the letters as if they were distasteful to him. ‘And think of the words the codechanters speak as a kind of hypnosis, an autosuggestion that affects all the ancient, untapped regions of the human mind. It releases certain chemicals in the brain, blocks the impulses of certain nerve endings, depending on the code spoken.’
‘It’s true,’ said Sunday. ‘I’ve felt it.’
‘And so have I,’ croaked Tom, struggling to rise from the bed. Stacy carefully propped up his head with a pillow. ‘This old blind guy – Liebermann, they called him – he paralysed me. But I think he was going to do a lot more than that to the security guard Araminta Black took there,’ he murmured.
Kate nodded grimly. ‘He did.’
‘Karl Liebermann,’ breathed Jicaque. He looked troubled. ‘It is as I thought. He is the most powerful of these men. Only he could control the nervous system with such skill.’
Blood raised a finger like a bewildered pupil seeking the teacher’s help. ‘Karl Liebermann?’
Jicaque glanced at him. ‘He took control of the codechanters in the mid-nineteenth century.’
‘He’s over one hundred and fifty years old?’ spluttered Stacy.
‘He looks it,’ Tom said, closing his eyes again.
‘Those Jedi types in Tibet – yogis,’ said Blood, thoughtfully. ‘They’re meant to live to great ages, aren’t they? Lower their heart rates, control wear and tear on the body …’
Jicaque nodded. ‘It is a similar discipline. But as Tom and Sunday have experienced, the codechanters can turn this power on others.’ He paused. ‘Liebermann’s mistake was to ally his cult with the Nazis in the 1930s. He used his powers in terrible experiments on humans and lupines alike, trying to breed werewolf supersoldiers to bolster the German forces.’
‘I can see why Takapa would want to know these guys,’ Kate said, uneasily.
‘I had assumed they would be dead by now,’ said Jicaque. ‘When the Nazis fell from power, the new lupine regime turned on the codechanters. Liebermann and his followers were blinded as punishment for their experiments on the lupine race. Sympathisers helped them flee to South America.’
‘But Takapa’s found them,’ Tom said weakly. ‘And he’s brought them out of retirement.’
Sunday stared at Kate. ‘And to show he values them, he puts them in the penthouse at Brook Mansion,’ she breathed. ‘That heat, the fake foliage on the walls …’
‘That South American touch,’ Kate nodded. ‘A regular home from home.’
‘So, to summarise,’ said Blood dryly, ‘we have a new twist on the three blind mice – this lot can talk the farmer’s wife to death.’
Stacy looked sharply at Blood as if hoping for an ally. ‘Do you believe this stuff? Old men altering a body’s biochemistry with words?’
‘Well …’ Blood looked at her apologetically. ‘It would explain that old myth of magic spells, wouldn’t it? I mean, witches turning men into frogs – that would mean altering DNA, wouldn’t it?’
She frowned. ‘So, what, you believe in witches too?’
‘No choice, love,’ he grinned. ‘I’ve dated enough of them!’
‘The thing is,’ Tom said, gingerly raising himself up on his elbows, ‘what are they doing here?’ He looked at Kate with bloodshot eyes. ‘I saw Liebermann with your mom and dad, and Dr Walker. They were talking about regenerating the flesh of that König Man thing, the body from the peat bog.’
Kate shuddered. ‘But its skin is mummified … like leather or something.’
Jicaque rose from the bed and stared hard at her. ‘You’ve seen the body?’
‘We both have,’ said Blood. ‘It’s at the gallery ready for the purebloods to view it tomorrow.’
‘Regenerating the ancient skin and bone,’ breathed the untidy old man, sinking back down on to the bed. ‘That corpse has lain dormant for more than three hundred and seventy years, and now there’s so little time.’
‘What are you saying?’ asked Sunday.
Jicaque looked at each of them in turn. ‘Takapa is a revolutionary, yes? A ’wolf idealist, tired of his kind being forced to skulk in the shadows for fear of incurring the open wrath of humanity.’
Kate nodded. ‘Sure. So he uses genetics to help the ’wolves evolve to a higher level – and to hit back at humans.’
Jicaque sighed and nodded. ‘And he seeks to convince the purebloods that, if the ’wolf race is to flourish, it must unite under one strong leader.’
Blood snorted. ‘What, and he really thinks he’s a suitable candidate?’
‘That is the crux of his work here in Chicago,’ said Jicaque. ‘He has shown himself to be fallible. In New Orleans, he was frustrated, and again in New York. He has lost face, and he knows it. So what he needs is a figurehead. An indisputable champion for whom the lupine race will rally together without question.’
‘Who?’ chimed in Tom. ‘Surely that’s the whole problem – there’s no such person.’
‘No living person, perhaps,’ said Jicaque darkly. ‘And so with his modern science, and with the necromantic arts of the codechanters, he has widened his scope.’ His amber eyes were clouded with concern. ‘He seeks to wrest life from the dead.’
Kate felt a long, creeping tingle down her spine. ‘The body from the peat bog?’
‘König Man,’ breathed Blood.
‘Yes, König.’ Jicaque scowled. ‘It means the king, the crowned man. And I believe the body to be that of a man of great evil. A man tortured to death in 1632 after a show trial, his evil, broken body dumped in wasteland without blessing or burial, for scavengers to devour. But I’ve heard tell that his followers retrieved the corpse in secret. Bound its shattered bones in healing ritual and dark prayer. Gave it up at last to the thick, squalid waters of the Gottenheim marshes, where it lay, preserved in blackness and silence.’
‘How about you cut to the chase,’ said Stacy dryly, though Kate noticed everyone else seemed spellbound.
‘Centuries later, some expert – a scientist, a palaeontologist, I don’t know – stumbled upon this extraordinary find in the ancient, boggy ground. They lovingly unearthed him, imagined a past for him, scoured him and studied him, and when they had learned all they could, they put him on display.’ Jicaque sighed. ‘How could they know the dangers? To them he was just a man. But to the ’wolves … to the secret historians …’
‘Who was this guy?’ asked Tom.
‘His name was Peter Stubbe,’ said Jicaque slowly, as if he could barely bring himself to say the words out loud. ‘Also known as the Great Wolf. Alleged to be the first werewolf in all Europe. His followers, the men and the women he turned against their own kind, took up
his cause – went on to spread the plague of the ’wolf throughout the rest of Europe and on to America.’
‘Stubbe,’ Kate echoed, suddenly chilled to the bone. She knew about him in the same way normal families knew about Abraham Lincoln or JFK; Stubbe was the founding father of modern lupine society. Werewolf lore was peppered with his name. ‘Of course … he was sentenced to death in the seventeenth century on charges of murder and witchcraft.’ She looked at Blood. ‘That weird presence I felt at the gallery. It was him, Blood, I know it!’
Jicaque gave a grim smile. ‘Clearly some remnant of Stubbe’s evil soul has survived within his shrivelled remains … Perhaps he sensed the wolf that waits within you.’
‘So this is Project Resurrection,’ breathed Tom.
Blood slapped a palm against his forehead. ‘That must be why he’s showing it off on Christmas Day. A sick kind of publicity stunt, if this is a kind of lupine second coming.’
‘Shouldn’t he have waited till Easter?’ enquired Stacy dourly. ‘That’s the traditional time for a resurrection.’
‘Lacks the same impact,’ Blood pointed out. ‘And can you see Takapa twiddling his thumbs for four months until April rolls around?’
‘But why take the white wolves?’ Kate asked.
Tom’s eyes flickered back open. ‘Dr Walker said something about combining wolf and human genes … it was stuff he took from the wolves that was fixing up the corpse’s skin.’
‘Right,’ said Sunday. ‘As well as the decay of the skin and bone, with DNA that old, there’d surely be gaps in his genome – faulty genes affecting both human and ’wolf. And those white wolves are rare, right? Good-quality stock, breeding in isolated pockets …’
Blood smiled faintly. ‘Like darning his old socks with purest silk.’
‘And Takapa will make this resurrection happen tomorrow,’ Kate realised, horrified. ‘That’s what this pureblood gathering is here to see.’
‘Like any other politician,’ conceded Stacy. ‘Get a celebrity endorsement to sex up your campaign.’
Tom nodded. ‘That’s what’s going to get Takapa the support he needs.’
Jicaque inclined his head. ‘So it would seem. Tomorrow, Peter Stubbe shall be given new life.’
‘Das Zeitalter des Werwolfs,’ Kate said, ‘that old legend …’
‘The Time of the Werewolf,’ Tom translated.
Kate bit her lip. ‘Looks like it’s starting.’
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CHAPTER TWELVE
Jicaque took Tom into the other bedroom and spent what seemed like an age just chanting ancient texts and applying pressure to different points on his face and neck. In the rooms beyond, Tom could hear the sound of hasty packing. Blood wanted them to move out as soon as possible; it might not be safe for them here any longer.
‘Your nervous system still holds the scars of the codechanters’ assault,’ Jicaque explained. ‘I hope I can heal the damage.’
‘Not as much as I do,’ sighed Tom. ‘How’d you learn this stuff? Is it Shipapi knowledge?’ Tom knew that Jicaque was descended from an ancient order of missionaries, pledged to defend humanity from werewolf predators. They took their weird name from an old Pueblo word, meaning womb of the earth, the place from which the first humans entered the world.
‘The incantations are obscure, even for one of the Shipapi,’ said Jicaque, smiling faintly. ‘Lucky for you I’ve been cramming, absorbing all the ancient knowledge I can, in anticipation of my final battle.’
Tom frowned. ‘Final battle?’
Jicaque took his old, leathery fingers from Tom’s temples and looked at him, thoughtfully. ‘The Shipapi knew of Stubbe, Tom. When the first Dutch colonies were founded in America in 1624, they brought with them word of ’wolves at work in Europe. Shipapi missionaries were dispatched there to bring those ’wolves to heel.’
‘So what went wrong?’ Tom murmured.
‘The missionaries failed.’ He laughed mirthlessly. ‘They saw Stubbe executed, but his followers eluded them. If, indeed, they ever seriously tried to fulfil their sacred duty, for it would seem they were not strong men.’
Tom looked at the old medicine man. ‘How’d you know so much about this?’
‘I am descended directly from one of those missionaries,’ said Jicaque. ‘And I too have been guilty of neglecting my sacred trust, of letting lupine evil fester and grow.’
‘You’ve made up for it since I’ve known you,’ Tom assured him. ‘You stopped Takapa in New York, you cured those poor people he turned ’wolf …’
‘Yes, I cured them,’ agreed the old Native American. ‘But I could have prevented their nightmare becoming a reality. I resolve to do so now, or to die trying.’ A slow smile stretched his leathery skin. ‘Though in truth, I am not a brave man, and would rather live forever if at all possible.’
Tom grinned. ‘I’m with you on that one.’
‘Then dress yourself, get packed, and we shall move on to safer quarters,’ said Jicaque.
g
Kate was relieved to see Tom looking, if not the picture of health, then at least a rough cartoon of it. Even Stacy seemed impressed with the change in him, though of course she would never give Jicaque the credit.
‘Good thing I brought the car here,’ said Sunday as they bundled into the elevator together. ‘Be a bit of a squeeze, six of us in Blood’s car.’
‘Nothing wrong with the odd bit of squeezing,’ Blood observed, glancing slyly down at Stacy.
Sunday noticed, and smiled. She was looking a little better for a half-hour spent lying down with a cold cloth over her eyes.
The elevator didn’t stop on the way down to the hotel reception. While Blood checked out, Kate caught herself wondering what Tom made of Sunday – full of curves, whereas Kate was just plain straight. Nice going, she told herself wryly. The end of the world might start tomorrow and you’re worrying if Tom’s a breast man. Who could blame him for going after Sunday? Wouldn’t that be simpler, cleaner, better for everyone?
Tom glanced over, saw her watching him and smiled.
No, she decided, smiling back. It damn well wouldn’t.
‘So do we have any plan at all as to what to do next?’ Tom asked.
Stacy shrugged. ‘I heard some pretty fantastic stuff up in that room. But I work better with evidence.’
Kate was struck by a sudden realisation. ‘Maybe I can help you out.’ She reached into her pants pocket and produced the phial she’d taken from the operating room at the warehouse.
‘What’s this?’ asked Stacy, peering at the grey detritus gathered at the bottom of the glass.
‘I think they’re skin samples. They might be from Stubbe’s body,’ Kate said, and explained how she’d come by them.
‘Weird sciencey stuff, huh? Well, I guess that’s why I’m here,’ said Stacy wryly. ‘An old colleague of mine works in a lab near Grand Avenue. Immunologist, so our interests kind of overlap. I’ll look her up, see if she’ll let me borrow a test-tube or two …’
As Stacy went to call her friend, Sunday sighed. ‘Guess we should’ve taken some of that stuff in the wheelchair for study too. Before my dad ate it all.’
‘I was trying to forget about that,’ Kate shuddered. ‘What the hell did they do to that security guard?’
‘Whatever it was, Liebermann was responsible,’ Tom said. ‘That’s what was in store for Sunday. They drugged the guard so they could experiment on him instead of her. It seemed important to get it right.’
‘Describe the remains that you saw,’ said Jicaque urgently.
‘It was just … a kind of mush,’ Kate told him. ‘Like every bit of the guy had decomposed to next to nothing.’
‘The guy looked OK when they wheeled him in last night,’ Tom said.
Jicaque nodded, still fixing Kate with his amber eyes. ‘As if the binding force of his body, the soul … had been removed?’
‘If that would leave him looking like security-guard puree,’ Kate said uncertainl
y, ‘then maybe.’
‘I think you’re right, Jicaque.’ Sunday looked spooked. ‘That ceremony Liebermann was performing on me, before Tom came crashing in … I felt like I was coming undone from the inside.’
‘Good thing Stacy’s not hearing this,’ Kate observed, watching her talking animatedly on the phone. ‘You’re saying these codechanters can separate a soul from a living body – like a dentist pulls a tooth?’
Jicaque nodded. ‘The soul is just one name for the psychic energy held within our minds and bodies.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘They have Stubbe’s body back from that peat bog – and can restore his withered flesh with certainty. But the mind and soul …’ He glanced at Stacy, just finishing her call. ‘That requires more than mere science – it requires art. It seems they are planning to use a donor’s psychic energy to refresh the remnants left in Stubbe’s body. If they succeed, they will have achieved the ultimate resurrection.’
‘I think I’ve just achieved the ultimate hotel bill, if anyone’s interested,’ said Blood, tucking his wallet back into his jacket pocket. ‘Come on, let’s go. I’m feeling slightly faint.’
‘I’m going to that lab,’ said Stacy proudly, pocketing the phone and shaking the phial. ‘It closes at twelve for the holidays, but my friend says I can stay on as long as I need.’
‘We don’t have long,’ muttered Sunday.
‘If the body’s at the gallery,’ Tom said, ‘why don’t we just … I don’t know – torch it or something? Turn Stubbe into toast?’
Jicaque smiled sadly. ‘How would we be certain of his destruction? Do you not think the ’wolves would sacrifice anything to preserve such a prize?’
Tom wasn’t ready to give up. ‘Well, couldn’t we phone 911, say there’s a bomb in there or something, just as the whole thing’s about to start?’
Blood looked sceptical. ‘That might delay them for a few hours … then what?’
‘So, what do we do?’ asked Sunday.
‘I must finish what my ancestor started,’ said Jicaque, ‘all those centuries ago. I must confront Stubbe and try to end this madness.’
