It was in front of a tiny little shop that Wu-Lin dismounted. The sign bore the words “Cyrus’s Curio Shop” painted in letters that were now almost completely blurred. Tethering her horse’s reins to a pole outside, Wu-Lin went into the shop.
The dusty odor of old furniture reached her nose. Old-fashioned tables and chairs, paintings, sculptures, antique mirrors—the merchandise that rested in the murky light differed little from what would be found in any such shop, but that wasn’t why Wu-Lin was there. When she struck the call bell that sat on the counter in the back, a door that looked to be something of an antique itself opened, and a middle-aged man who was little more than skin and bones appeared.
“Welcome,” the man said as he ran his eyes over Wu-Lin.
“There’s something I’d like you to have a look at,” Wu-Lin said, covering her pouch with one hand.
“Well, that’s the line of work I’m in, so I guess I’ll take a gander,” the man replied in a less-than-amiable tone. “But unless it’s something really spectacular, you won’t get much for it from me. Especially not for curios—”
“It’s not old.”
“No?” the man remarked. “So you want an appraisal, then?”
“Yes.”
Dubiously eyeing the package Wu-Lin opened in her hand, the man picked up the sphere. “What is it?” he asked.
“I don’t know. That’s why I’m here.”
Shrugging his shoulders, the man then held the sphere up to his eye. “Where did you come by it?”
“Near my house. On the beach there.”
The man’s eyes shifted for a second to Wu-Lin. “From the sea?” he muttered. “You know, I can’t tell much without really looking into it. Would it be okay if I kept it?”
“How long?”
“Let me see—till noon tomorrow.”
“Could you write me up a receipt for it?” asked the girl.
“Sure.”
Taking a form imprinted with the proper information from behind the counter, the man hastily signed it and handed it to Wu-Lin.
“Whereabouts are you staying?”
“I haven’t decided yet,” the girl replied. “I’ll be back again at noon.”
Pointing down the street, the man said, “Take a right down at the corner and you’ll find a hotel. Quarters are cramped, but it’s cheap and the service is good.”
“Thank you,” Wu-Lin said with a smile as she turned to leave.
Making sure she’d gone, the man went into the back room and set the sphere on the desk he used for appraising antiques. Taking a seat, he didn’t use any of the electronic lenses or microscopes around him, but rather rolled the sphere around in his hand. Suddenly seeming to recall something, he looked up and smacked his fist to his forehead. Several minutes passed before the following words spilled from his lips: “So that’s it . . . I remember now! I’m sure it was in that book . . . This is a Noble’s . . .”
As the blood drained from his already corpse-like countenance, the man grabbed his jacket from the back of another chair, stashed the sphere in his pocket, and headed for the door with lengthy strides. What the man didn’t notice as he reached for the doorknob was that his body had turned in entirely the opposite direction. With the same tense expression as ever on his face, he walked toward the window on the far side of the room with a much gentler gait.
The door opened behind him. And who should step in but Toto, cautiously surveying the room as he entered. Judging from the way he quickly walked over to the man and fished the sphere out of his pocket, he must’ve seen everything the shopkeeper had done since entering the back room. Giving a light tap on the shoulder of the man who thought he was still facing the door, the mysterious young gentleman bounced the bead from his right hand and the pair of rings from his left in the palm of his hand. “Sorry,” he told the shopkeeper, “but I’ll be taking this. Kindly give my regards to the little lady. See you!”
With these words, Toto took off like a gust of wind. But even after he was gone, the owner of the curio shop just kept plodding slowly toward the window—although in his own mind, he was hurrying toward the door.
—
About an hour later, several men went into a saloon with the gaudiest neon sign of all the drinking establishments that lined the bustling thoroughfare. Their fierce eyes, expressions, and powerful bodies made it quite evident they were in a dangerous line of work. Heading straight to the counter in the back, one of them said something to the bartender, who then used the hand that’d been wiping out glasses to indicate a door far to the right.
“That little bastard—you’ve gotta be joking me,” spat the man who’d spoken to the bartender, curses rolling from his lips like an incantation. When he tossed his jaw in the direction of the door, the other men started across the room with a brutal wind in their wake. A pair of muscular brutes who looked like bodyguards stood by the door, one on either side, but they let the group pass without saying a word.
Just beyond the door lay a hallway with a row of garish pink doors on the green wall. Though no voices or other sounds could be heard, the men knew what was going on behind the bright-pink planks, and it seemed like they could almost see the hot, dense fog rising from each and every door. Out on the Frontier, it wasn’t at all rare for saloons to double as whorehouses.
Stopping for a second, they checked the number plate above one of the doors, and then the whole group headed down the hall to the right. The door down by the first corner was their destination.
When they were a few steps shy of their goal, they all heard a woman’s voice shout, “What are you doing?! I told you I’m not going for that, you lousy pervert!” At the same time, the door swung open from the inside. Along with the sweet smell of spices, something pale flew from the room: a half-naked woman. She clutched her clothes to the front of her body.
“You bastard!” the woman shouted. Her sensuous face twisted into a demonic visage, and she swung her right hand. Something shot back into the room; there was a dull thud and then a cry of pain.
“Take that, you fucking deviant!” the woman roared before she growled to the group, “Out of my way!”
While watching the woman stalk away indignantly, the men grinned at each other and then heard someone say, “Damn, that hurt! Where’d you run off to, bitch?!”
Spewing curses and groans all the while, a powerful form clad only in a pair of briefs appeared. His right hand was pressed against his forehead, and he had a high-heeled shoe dangling loosely from his left. A pendant of two interlocked rings swayed against his hairy, muscular chest.
“I paid you a good chunk of change. The least you could do is indulge me a little! I’ll grab your sorry ass and—” At that point, he noticed the men and said, “What the hell do you want?”
“Been a long time, hasn’t it, Toto?” the man who’d spoken with the bartender said with nostalgia . . . only his eyes weren’t smiling.
Staring intently at his face, Toto broke into a nostalgic grin, too. “Well, spank my ass if it ain’t Peres! This is some coincidence. You still doing the roving bodyguard routine?”
“Looks like neither of us has changed,” Peres replied. “When I heard about what happened at the antique store, I knew it was you. Seems you’re as good as ever with that trick of yours.”
Toto was playing down his abilities as he reached for his chest, but his pendant jolted away right before his hand.
Staring thoughtfully at the rings he’d torn free, Peres forcefully suggested, “Let’s talk inside.”
Still rubbing the back of his neck, Toto replied, “First, I have to get that bitch and—”
But as he attempted to go out into the hall, there was a dull thud against his solar plexus. Doubling over with a groan, he was roughly shoved back inside by the man who’d just punched him.
As he fell in the center of the medium-sized room, Toto groaned, “What the hell . . . was that about?” His Adam’s apple bobbed madly as he tried to take a breath.
“Check his clothes,” Peres ordered one of his compatriots as he bent over Toto.
The room had no decorations, save a bed and an end table—Toto’s clothes had been strewn on top of the table. Above the wall that the bed was attached to, a glass window reflected the neon lights outside.
“You stuck your nose in a hell of a place this time,” Peres said in a sinister tone. His eyes were laughing. “Though I don’t figure you ever dreamed things would go like this. Without me around, Mr. Gilligan wouldn’t have ever known about you, or the fact that you like this place more than three hots and a cot. Too bad, eh?”
“Who the hell is that?” Toto asked in a tone that was somehow calm. Apparently his pain had subsided.
“Why, he’s the big boss who runs everything here in town. That was a serious mistake, making a move on a curio shop he’s connected to. I hear there’s something unbelievable all tied into this. The boss went completely nuts and had us grab not just you, but the girl who brought it here to have it looked at. Hey, now,” Peres cautioned Toto, “don’t try and slip away. I know all your tricks. I know how tough you are, too, but these guys do this for a living. You don’t want them taking you apart alive, I bet.”
Having said his piece, Peres then turned toward the end table.
“It’s not here,” said the man searching through Toto’s clothes. “Where’d you stash it? Your hotel?”
“Yeah,” Toto replied with a pained nod.
“All right, then. We’ll all go get it. But I’m warning you—if I find out you’re jerking us off to buy some time . . .” Peres said, lifting the corner of his coat. A sheath with a broadsword hung against his leg. They were convenient items, and depending on what your needs were, they could be used for anything from butchering a fire dragon to skinning a man alive.
“Do whatever you like,” Toto said as he stood up.
“Give him back his clothes,” Peres told his compatriot, adding, “But only after you’ve torn all the pockets out.”
A few seconds later Toto’s garments were thrown back to him, and he quickly put them on. “What happened to the girl?” he asked.
“You worried about her?”
“Yeah. I know what a scumbag you are and how you like to get your kicks. You don’t exactly take it easy on women or children, do you?”
“You’ll just have to wait till we’re in Mr. Gilligan’s basement to see about that, I guess.”
“Fine with me,” Toto said, his body sinking.
Catching a vicious shoulder attack in the stomach, Peres flew toward the table.
“You little bastard!” the other men snarled, although the reason they all charged Toto immediately must’ve been because they knew he was unarmed. Perhaps that was all they had in mind as they attacked.
A metallic clink! rang out.
Peres watched in a daze as his compatriots completely ignored their forward momentum and sharply turned around a mere foot shy of Toto.
“Where the hell did you have ’em?!” he shouted as his right hand raced to his broadsword, but his eyes then went wide with a second surprise.
“Right here!”
The flash of silver that shot forth with Toto’s words answered both of Peres’s questions simultaneously.
Hacking half-way through the man’s neck with his own blade, Toto spit something out of his mouth for the other man to see just as his old acquaintance fell to the floor gushing blood: a pair of metal rings.
“Never showed you that before, did I? Don’t go thinking things never change,” Toto lectured Peres, whose head flopped to one side. He then dashed over to the window, threw it open, and leapt out.
He landed on the street along the left side of the saloon—the moon was now out. Crouching down, he ran. To the rear there was a cluster of eateries. Avoiding them, he quickly turned right instead. The alley was murky. If he kept going straight, he’d come out at the grain storehouses.
As he put his strength into his legs, a crisp sound reverberated behind him. Whistling. Toto became a statue—it had that sort of ring to it. Nevertheless, Toto managed to slowly turn around.
At the entrance to the alley he’d just gone into, a figure in blue stood illuminated by the moonlight. He was tall and wore a cape. A sword hung from his left hip, and the handle and sheath were both covered with exquisitely intricate carvings. Both hands wore leather gloves, and they hung naturally by his sides. And yet, it was perfectly clear that they would flash into action in response to any slight movement. Occasionally you encountered people like this. Perhaps he was one of the men after Toto, waiting outside as a precaution?
“What do you want with me?” Toto called out, his tone surprisingly calm. Surely he hadn’t exactly led a normal, peaceful existence, either. “Are you with them?”
“Come with me,” a gorgeous voice said. It was as clear and fresh as the moonlight.
“What for?”
“Because you’re the suspicious character I saw break open a window and run away. I’m taking you to the sheriff’s office.”
“Spare me. C’mon, pal. From the look of you, you’re not more than a step or two out of my world yourself. As a favor to another guy, just let me go, okay?”
His reply: a whistle.
A certain feeling suddenly filled Toto’s heart. It was that sort of melody. And the instant it completely filled his ears, a flash of white mowed through Toto’s abdomen, and his body was blasted by a lust for killing.
Toto somehow managed to jump. However, as he hung in the air, blood spread from him like smoke. When he landed fifteen feet away, a grotesque mass of intestines spilled from his belly with a gush of blackish blood.
Toto couldn’t believe it. The distance between him and the man with the drawn blade in his right hand had to have been fifteen feet at the very least. Now, there was less than six feet between them. How had his opponent closed the other nine feet?
Something hot welled up within him, and no longer able to bear it, he coughed. More than just gore splashed out in the alley. Even covered with dark blood, the sphere retained its dull shine as it bounced once on the ground and then gingerly rolled across the alley.
Just behind the bead, Toto finally noticed the other alley to his right that lay wide open. However, that new path wasn’t to be his escape route. Pinning him to the ground with the sheer ferocity of his will to kill, the gorgeous man calmly drew closer with his naked blade. There was no doubt in Toto’s mind that any movement now would only invite a deadly blow. With desperate eyes, he gazed down at the puddle of blood at his feet—the pair of interlocked rings was in there somewhere. He heard whistling. When it stopped, the moment of fate would come. The melody flowed on—then faded away. The blood seemed to drain from every inch of Toto. And then . . . nothing.
Toto looked up at his foe, but his opponent wasn’t looking at him. His gaze was concentrated on another alley.
Following the other man’s eyes, Toto found it was now his turn to be astonished. There before him was a man’s face so gorgeous it could make even someone caught in hellish agony lose himself. He saw something darker than any ordinary darkness—a darkness given human form that hovered at the entrance to the alley. A vision of beauty. That was the only way he could describe it. The face beneath the traveler’s hat melded with the darkness, but had he been able to actually see it, the sight might’ve left him breathless with sheer envy. Perhaps it was some spell that the night put on him that caused these two gorgeous men to appear before him in that narrow alleyway.
The second figure bent over and picked up the bead. He left himself so wide open to attack that it looked like a mere child could cut him down. Gazing at the bead, he asked, “Is this yours?”
“Yes, I’m sorry to say,” Toto replied. And as he spoke, he took the intestines lying in the road and began stuffing them back into his abdominal cavity. “See, someone gave it to me. You know, I hate to do this, but I have a favor to ask of you. I have to be running along now, but I was hoping you could help out the bead�
�s owner. And I’ll let you keep that as payment. Seems it’s really worth a hell of a lot. Although I do have to warn you, I’ll be along later to take it back. You’ll find her in the basement of a scumbag by the name of Gilligan. I’m counting on you, pal.”
With these words, Toto leapt away to the rear. While it wasn’t clear exactly what the secret of his physiology was, his strength was unbelievable. The whistling figure didn’t follow him.
“What will you do?” he said. It sounded as if the moon had asked the question.
There was no reply.
“You plan on going?”
“We’ll see,” the new arrival said, responding for the first time.
The whistling figure continued, “You’re even better looking than I am—never met a man like that before. What’s more, I believe I know your name. Vampire Hunter D. I may as well introduce myself. The name is Glen. I’m a seeker of knowledge.”
He received no reply.
“Once again, I’d like to know if you intend to go or not.”
D’s outline melted into the darkness.
Glen looked up at the sky. Dark clouds were blindfolding the moon. They then cleared, but there was no sign of D.
“I guess you went,” Glen muttered in a low voice.
After a while, the melancholy whistling faded off in the moonlit distance.
MESSAGE FROM THE DEPARTED
CHAPTER 2
—
I
—
Wu-Lin slowly realized what was happening to her—staying at the hotel the curio dealer had told her about had proved to be her undoing. Ordinarily, she’d have made a conscious effort to avoid such a place. But she was exhausted at the time, and also greatly relieved to have entrusted the bead to someone else. Checking into the cheapest room they had, she’d quickly taken a bath, and then stood before the mirror.
No one had ever told her she was pretty before. Personally, she thought her face and body were quite plain. She didn’t ordinarily wear makeup, either. Life on the northern coast really didn’t allow for such things. Her fingers grazed her own face. It’s so rough, she thought. The wind off the sea was cold, and it carried grains of salt that bit into her skin like tiny shards of glass. And though she might try to fend it off, the wind always kept lashing away at her with those frosty particles whenever it blew. Somewhere along the line she’d forgotten all about wiping the salt off. She opened both hands, and with the fingers of her left she brushed the palm of her right. So tough. It felt like the whole thing was made up of nothing but calluses. Even the tips of the fingers she touched to it were hardened.
Mysterious Journey to the North Sea, Part 1 Page 3
