Angel Souls and Devil Hearts

by Christopher Golden

  “My ‘kind,’” Hannibal said and stopped him. “I don’t believe I like the sound of that.”

  Roberto’s eyes narrowed.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “Your people are needed everywhere, to best assist with this operation. And I need both of you with me because our job is, quite simply, to take out the sorcerer himself, to kill Mulkerrin.”

  Rolf’s voice-pad was still on the table, and now he picked up his pen again.

  “Easier said than done,” he wrote.

  Munich, Germany, European Union.

  Wednesday, June 7, 2000, 12:59 A.M.:

  “I’m telling you, ’Berto, he’s got something going, and whatever it is, it’s going to be a danger to this operation!”

  Roberto looked up from his desk, where he’d been keying in a coded message to UN Secretary General Nieto, and gave his second, Gloria Rodriquez, the once over. She was not angry, or afraid, only frustrated that she couldn’t figure out what it was Hannibal had in mind. He could tell it was making her nuts by the way she was pacing, and the manner in which her eyes moved, never stopping to rest on anything long enough to focus, as if she were literally, visually, looking for the answer in that very room.

  “He’s dangerous,” Roberto Jimenez agreed, “and he’s certainly been scheming something, but we have no way of knowing it will interfere with this operation. Certainly it’s in his best interests just as it is in ours to get rid of Mulkerrin once and for all.”

  Roberto could almost hear Gloria’s mind racing. She was not a beautiful woman. Tough, yes, and in perfect shape. Those qualities, and her intelligence and personality, made her attractive. Her face was pretty enough, dark hair and eyes, but she would never be beautiful. Eye of the beholder, Roberto thought.

  “You didn’t see Sechs,” Gloria said. She had already told him about the gesture Rolf Sechs, the deputy marshal of the Shadow Justice System, had made when she had made brief eye contact with him. Rolf had caught her attention, lifted a finger to his eye and bowed his head, almost imperceptibly, toward Hannibal. It was a clear message, an intentional warning: watch him.

  “Look, Glory, I want you to understand something.” Roberto keyed off his hand-held PC scrambler and slipped it inside his jacket pocket. “Whether our friend Rolf was signaling you or had an itch, we would still watch Hannibal more closely than we have ever watched anyone, even the enemy. I despise the creature, and would feel much safer, much more confident about the potential success of this op, if he were not around.”

  “But we have our orders,” she said, finishing for him.

  “Yes, we have our orders. But nobody said we shouldn’t be careful.”

  Gloria looked at him, and Roberto felt her attention, like a physical thing, return to the reality of the room, to him. Her mind focused for the moment on him, and he liked that. He knew he shouldn’t, but he did. Glory smiled at him, and Roberto couldn’t help but return that smile.

  “Don’t worry, bonita,” he said, “we’ll keep him reined in.”

  She went to him, then, and he held her in his arms, giving her small kisses on her head and cheek and neck and rubbing her back. There was nothing sexual in it, for the moment, but Roberto knew that would come later. Their relationship had been building up to it for more than a year, and each day, as his feelings for her grew, so did his longing.

  Gloria broke their embrace and looked up at Roberto, touching his face with her hand. She loved his eyes, the gray stripes in his cropped, silky hair. Part of her so wanted to just let go and rely on his plans for controlling Hannibal, but she couldn’t. She was just as able as he, just as canny and intuitive, his equal in all but raw force and combat skill, and even with that she was catching up every day—thanks most especially to his personal training. No, she couldn’t just leave the question of Hannibal to her superior officer. One mind might miss something that two would not, and they could not afford such an error.

  “What do you have in mind?” she asked in a low voice, understanding his reluctance to discuss the matter. Still, when he looked at her, she knew he realized everything she’d just thought, and agreed with her.

  “Well,” he began, and his tone brought them both back to business, “in a sense we’ve already started. Hannibal will be with us during this op, and Rolf will be there. If anything happens, I’ll dismiss Hannibal and hand Rolf his command. Beyond that, I’ve got a number of operatives on both of them at all times.”

  Gloria nodded slowly, but her mind was off again, a mile a minute, searching for extra precautions.

  “His kind disgust me,” Roberto said suddenly, the ferocity of the statement distracting Gloria from her thoughts. “I don’t want to be anywhere near their kind, but we need them now, their abilities. And as long as we need them, I’m going to be as near to them as is necessary to see this operation through. You’ve read the file on this Mulkerrin.”

  Gloria nodded, then patted the holster at her hip, inside of which her H-K auto nestled snugly, heavier than usual, pregnant with the weight of sixty silver rounds. According to the file, the silver worked wonders on Mulkerrin’s “creatures,” the real shadows. But it also hurt, at least temporarily, the pseudo-shadows, the vampires. They couldn’t supply that ammunition to their entire force—only she and Roberto carried it—but they’d see that the silver went to good use.

  “I’ve read it,” she said. “It seems we know more about Mulkerrin than we do about Hannibal. I would hate to think we’re better prepared to take on this mad sorcerer than a soldier on our own side.”

  “He’s no soldier!” Roberto snapped. “And you’d be hard-pressed to convince me that he’s on our side, or that any of the shadows are for that matter. The SJS is looking more and more like a smoke screen, like a survival tactic, every day. I can’t believe we’re letting them become even more organized, more dangerous, than before, and we only have personal histories on a couple of dozen out of thousands. Hell, there could be thousands we don’t even know about.

  “Aw, shit,” he said and shook his head. “I can’t be worrying about this now. We’ve got to get rid of Mulkerrin first, before his blackness taints everything. Then we’ll worry about Hannibal and his clan.”

  “Better the devil you know . . .” Gloria shook her head, sighing. “Takes on a whole new meaning, doesn’t it?”

  Munich, Germany, European Union.

  Wednesday, June 7, 2000, 1:01 A.M.:

  Rolf knew he’d taken a chance in gesturing to Rodriguez. If Hannibal had seen him . . . but he hadn’t, and that was important. Hannibal had to continue thinking Rolf was no more than an inconvenience. It wouldn’t do to tip his hand too early. Rolf had guaranteed Meaghan and Alexandra that he would be ready when Hannibal made his move, and that he would take the elder shadow down.

  This way, the humans were also on the alert. Not that he’d needed to warn them. From what he could tell, they’d been plenty suspicious of Hannibal already, but he’d wanted to be certain. And there was no way Rodriguez had misunderstood his meaning; in fact, she had nodded in return and almost given him away. But Hannibal was too distracted by the smug game he was playing to notice anything.

  Several shadows had been added to each platoon since Rolf had drawn up their duty rosters, yet each time he walked through the barracks, he did not sec a single face he did not recognize. He knew that these extra bodies were the outlaws that Hannibal had enlisted rather than killed, rebellious shadows who wanted nothing more than to kill humans. He knew that they would make their move at some point during this operation, and to that end he had taken into his confidence a number of his own soldiers, those he could trust, to neutralize Hannibal’s plans as soon as something unusual took place. If they tried anything, Rolf himself would kill Hannibal. It was the only way. And despite the elder’s much greater age, Rolf felt that his own evolution had become so rapid that he was at least a match for the old hunter.

  And yet, he hoped that Hannibal had enough sense to wait until Mulkerrin was dead, to assist in the
extermination of one threat before presenting another. Unfortunately, Rolf didn’t have much faith in that scenario. More likely, Hannibal intended to use Mulkerrin’s atrocities as a springboard for his own, and come back to take the sorcerer on later. Rolf knew such a strategy would not work in the long run, and he wondered how Hannibal could believe in it. For one brief moment, Rolf had believed that shadows could live in peace among humans, could become a society of their own and merge with the world, in the light of day.

  His faith had been fleeting.

  Now he steeled himself for battle again, fighting the poisons that threatened to destroy his kind from outside, and in.

  And what if I’m alone now? he asked himself, then shook it off, not daring to address such questions. He had not felt his brother Will Cody, die, but he did know what it was he had felt: pain; extraordinary pain for one of their kind, and then nothing at all. Cody’s mind had been shut to him before, a trick few of the shadows could perform, but Rolf didn’t think this was a trick. Whatever had happened to sever Cody’s psychic bonds with his family, it had not been by the old showman’s own choice. Rolf had once shared his family’s hatred of Cody for reasons he had never been too clear on, though he knew his brothers and sisters had been completely certain of their motives. But in Venice, he and Cody had stood side by side, fought together for their people, for their lives, and Rolf had been proud to stand with him.

  Heaven help Mulkerrin if Will Cody were dead. Meaghan and Alex were closer to him as friends, but Rolf shared a warrior’s bond with Cody, a thing of pride and honor.

  And what of Alexandra and Meaghan, his sister and her lover, both his friends? What had become of them? They had been planning to reach Munich today, and yet George Marcopoulos and Julie Graham had sent a joint communiqué saying that they had disappeared from their home just before they were to leave for the airport, apparently intercepted by another shadow. Rolf could not begin to guess who this shadow was, or what business could take Alexandra and Meaghan away from something as dire as Mulkerrin’s return.

  But of course, that’s not what had happened. Rolf knew that they had not simply gone off on some other adventure because when he reached out with his mind, to attempt to locate Alexandra, she too was gone. Not dead, for he would have felt such a tragedy, but simply gone.

  All of this confusion wore away at his confidence, at his resolution, but he pushed it back. There was Mulkerrin to deal with, more powerful now than when Peter Octavian had been victorious over him in Venice, and this time they didn’t have Peter to rely on. And Hannibal . . .

  Rolf rose from where he’d been sitting, staring out the window at the gray dusk falling over Munich. Very shortly it would be time to muster the forces of Operation: Jericho. Before then, he would see if he couldn’t learn a bit more of what Hannibal had in mind.

  Before he was halfway to the door, someone knocked. He opened it to find the American commander, Elissa Thomas, alone in the hall.

  He stood for a moment, unsure how to respond to her visit.

  “May I come in?” she finally said, and he gestured for her to enter.

  “I think we need to talk,” she said as she passed him, and the lilt in her voice, the pride in her step and the sweet, sweet smell of her convinced Rolf that Hannibal could wait a few minutes. He didn’t bother to remind her that he was unable, really, to talk. She knew that, of course. And there were, after all, other forms of communication.

  Rolf closed the door and turned to find Commander Thomas leaning against the bare desk. His eyes flitted involuntarily to the single bed in the corner of the Spartan quarters he’d been given, then back to her. The commander had not missed the glance, and her lips turned up at the edges. Without the power of speech, Rolf had learned early how to interpret facial expressions, and there could be no mistaking the woman’s intent.

  He was surprised, even a little suspicious, but he was also excited. He had been attracted to Elissa Thomas the moment he laid eyes on her, and he respected her strength of will, her boldness and the courage in evidence within the personal records the SJS had on all UNSF commanders. He wondered if there were an ulterior motive, hoped there were not, and walked to her across the room.

  Rolf motioned with his large hands, shrugging his shoulders, asking why she had come. Commander Thomas tossed her hair to one side like a schoolgirl, and Rolf felt his erection growing. An intelligent woman confident enough to allow her sexuality through. Yes, he wanted this woman.

  “Rolf,” she began, and he liked to hear her say his name, “let me lay it on the line here. I have no reason to trust you, but I do. I see in you a courage and cunning that I can respect and admire. And, of course, other things.”

  She reached up and put a hand on his neck, and the warmth of it made him even harder.

  “Later, I’d like to talk to you about, shall we say, a strategic alliance. But for now . . .”

  And her other hand moved forward and rested on the enormous bulge that had grown under his pants. Rolf closed his eyes a moment, a light breath escaping his mouth, warm on her cheek as she went to kiss him. Their lips met, and now Rolf’s hands came up and held her face, enveloped it, and he pulled her to him and kissed her deep. Their tongues intertwined and then he broke off, leaving her breathless. His tongue flicked out and traced her lips, engraving a promise there of what he would do when he reached lower.

  Rolf picked her up and carried her to the small bed, where he undressed her slowly, kissing, nibbling and licking at each newly bared region of her body. He caressed her so softly, gently, that she could hardly believe it was this great, powerful man who touched her. He rolled her nipples between his fingers as he lay her back and spread her legs with one strong hand. She didn’t feel the urge to speak, because he, simply, could not. It wasn’t just his tongue, but his lips and teeth, the stubble of his chin—he took control of her in a way no one had before.

  As she approached her orgasm, building to something she knew would wrack her body with convulsions, just as she took that final breath . . . he stopped. He looked up at her in that moment that she thought she would suffocate, that she would never be released from the frozen muscles of her body, and he grinned at her, a naughty child, knowing what he’d done.

  He had barely entered her when Elissa bucked up against him, pulling him deep into her. Then her legs were around his back, her fingernails raking his shoulders as she urged him on, her orgasm rocking her entire body with convulsions. She bit her lip and it bled, and somewhere in the back of her brain she wondered why he had not bitten her, but she couldn’t hold any thought for long.

  After he shuddered into an orgasm of his own, she wondered again why he hadn’t taken her blood, but found she didn’t care. She became suddenly aware of the muscles in her face, as he lay his head on her breast and snuggled close to her, and realized that she shared that grin of his.

  And they slept.

  7

  Somewhere Between.

  Thirty-Seven Seconds After Departure:

  Lazarus had said that passing through the portal would hurt them less than it had Peter. As the three of them emerged on hands and knees, all retching and shivering, or perhaps convulsing, Meaghan and Alexandra were unaware that they shared a thought. If it had been this bad for them, exactly how bad had it been for Peter?

  “Lions and tigers and bears, oh my,” Alexandra said, weakly, and Meaghan attempted a soft chuckle to reward the effort, but couldn’t manage it.

  Lazarus didn’t even try; he only moaned as he slowly worked himself, trial and error, to his feet. Meaghan was standing first, if only because her muscles ached more lying down. She thought that they might have experienced a weird sort of birth, and she wondered if babies experienced that kind of trauma. She reached out and pulled Alex to her feet, letting Lazarus take care of himself. He was, after all, supposedly older and stronger than either of them.

  They had emerged in a dark alleyway, which was nothing like what they had expected, though if they had discus
sed it aloud they would both have realized that they had not really expected anything. Alex and Meaghan walked in silence to where the alley opened onto the main street, and Lazarus was right behind them.

  “Lazarus,” Meaghan said. “Where are we?”

  It was, of course, Hell. But not the Hell they had expected. The street upon which they now stood was lined with old stone buildings, a crumbling inner city that resembled so many they had known, and yet was none of them. There was something about the architecture that was at once familiar, and yet accented with so many unfamiliar details and almost nonsensical geometry as to make them completely certain they were no longer “home.” And it seemed that everything—buildings, street and sky—was gray.

  Indeed, they had passed through to somewhere else, but not necessarily to the elsewhere they’d intended. And as Lazarus took his time responding to Meaghan’s question, she realized what his answer would be before he could voice it.

  “You don’t know, do you? You don’t know. Oh, well, that’s just fucking wonderful.”

  “What now?” Alexandra asked.

  Meaghan thought her lover sounded quite courageous, but she herself was nearing a panic. If Lazarus didn’t know . . . Uh-uh. She wasn’t going to let that happen.

  “Lazarus,” she said, back in command, “look through the book and try to find out where we went wrong, and how to get us out of here and on our way again. Alex and I will head opposite ways up the street, only a block, to get our bearings and perhaps a clue as to what this place is.”

  There was no discussion. Alexandra began to drift off down the street in one direction, and Meaghan in the other. The one thing that struck Meaghan as most chilling, the fact that threatened to undermine her new resolve, was the complete and unrelenting silence. This was a city, though not one they were familiar with, and yet it had no loud vehicles, no construction, no people. It was deserted. Up ahead in the distance, above the row of buildings that were like brownstones but not, the city’s skyline shot up into towering glass-and-metal structures. Meaghan thought, not for the first time, that the word “skyscrapers” was incredibly appropriate.