by Max Turner
“That woman bears the Changeling’s mark,” Vlad said. “In moments she could awaken. Her screams will bring others. We cannot allow that.”
“Wait a minute,” Charlie said, inspecting her more closely. “She’s the one from the church. Her friend is the bounty hunter. How did she even get here? She should be sleeping with the fishes.”
“She’s a shadow-jumper,” I said.
“Wonderful. Those freaks are like portable telepods.” He put two hands on the grip of his sword and lined her up for a clean overhead.
I stepped in the way. “That’s not going to happen.”
“It is not for you to decide,” Vlad said.
“What if we can remove the mark? She might throw her lot in with us. Wouldn’t that be better?”
Vlad didn’t answer. He and Ophelia were talking silently with one another. Her face was grave.
“Let me try something,” I said.
Charlie grudgingly stepped back as I crouched beside her. I put my palm over the mark on her hand, then closed my eyes and imagined the woman’s skin as it should have appeared, smooth and unblemished. Nothing happened. I concentrated harder, willing the mark to disappear. Nothing. Next, I used the edge of my sword to cut a shallow groove across the top of my palm, then I pressed my hand against her mark again, wincing with discomfort. I figured that if I was the real Messiah, maybe something in my blood would make this work. But it seemed that every time life presented me with a valid test—like seeing through the Changeling’s disguises, or resisting his venom—something that would prove that I was the one the prophecies were really about, I came up short.
“There has to be a way to do this.”
“We won’t discover it here,” Vlad said.
Something in his tone unnerved me. Our eyes met. An understanding passed between us. He wasn’t going to leave her alive.
I stood. Killing Tamerlane was one thing. He’d known exactly what he was doing when he murdered Suki and Uncle Jake, and he had shown no remorse. Killing this woman was different—like executing an insane person, someone who had no grasp of what they were doing. I’d spent enough time around the mentally ill to know how wrong this was.
I held Vlad’s gaze, set my feet at shoulder width, put two hands on my katana, raised the tip and pointed it at his chest. And another understanding passed between us.
CHAPTER 46
SIGNS AND SIGNALS
VLAD’S MOUTH SPLIT into a wide grin. “So, it seems you are capable of killing on principle. All I need to do is threaten to take the lives of your enemies.”
I didn’t let my guard down. There was no way to know if his levity might suddenly vanish beneath a torrent of rage.
“Perhaps there is some way to restore her mind, but we are out of time. There is a parking lot above us. If we are lucky, the way will be clear and we can join Vincent in Pest. We must leave, immediately.”
Vlad didn’t strike me as the kind of man who deferred to others. I waited for him to make his exit first. He seemed to be waiting for me to do the same.
At Ophelia’s prompting, Charlie turned to leave. Then footsteps echoed down from the tunnel ahead. A man emerged. He was tall and handsome, with a moustache like two half moons and a streak of white in his tawny hair. If he was surprised to see us, he gave no sign.
Vlad rubbed his chin. “Istvan, this is unexpected.”
“Truly? You know I never stray far from where the action is.” He stroked his moustache. “It is hard to maintain my status as a triple agent, playing you and the Changeling off against one another, if I remain too far behind the scenes.”
Vlad chuckled at this. “Well met, cousin,” he said.
“And you. You seem remarkably well intact, despite the Changeling’s attempts to kill you.”
“The Horseman’s attempts. The Changeling remains aloof, regrettably.”
Istvan waved a hand in front of his face to move the dust away, then made a fist, pressed it against his lips and coughed gently. “The puppet master is always closer than you think. This was an important meeting, you and the Baptist.”
“You knew of it?” Vlad asked, scratching at his throat.
“Not until now, or I would have been here to witness it. Tell me, are the rumours true? Is Tamerlane dead?”
“Quite,” said Vlad. “But I cannot take credit. Most of the work was Vincent’s. Charlie dealt the final blow, as was his right.”
“So now there are but three. The balance of power is shifting.”
“Not far enough.”
Istvan turned to Charlie. “Did you know, it was rumoured that inside Timur’s casket it was written, ‘Whoever opens my tomb shall release an invader more terrible than I’? His body was exhumed by the Russians for examination in 1941. Two days later, Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa. An interesting bit of history.”
“There is more to that story, is there not, cousin?” Vlad said, adjusting his belt.
“There is,” Istvan said. He pushed a long lock of hair away from his eyes and tucked it behind his ear. “Before the assault on Iron Spike Enterprises, the Changeling opened Tamerlane’s tomb yet again so that, as War, he could lead the horde. And not a week later, I resurrected Vladislav so we could secure Ophelia’s release. And so a more terrible invader was released. Fascinating how history repeats itself, don’t you think, Charles?”
Charlie did not have time to respond before Vlad attacked. He shifted forward and rammed his sword through Istvan’s chest. He aimed for the heart, but Istvan twisted so that it pierced his other side. I took a step back in surprise.
A raspy moan escaped Istvan’s lips. “Were my gestures not faithful?”
“They were, all of them,” Vlad said, twisting the sword. Judging by the look on Istvan’s face, it was excruciating. “My chin, your moustache, your mouth, my throat, my stomach, your ear,” Vlad said. “A pointless exercise, it would seem. Thankfully, Istvan only calls me Vladislav when he is upset with me. A small mistake, but a revealing one.” Vlad pushed the sword deeper. “Where is my good cousin? Did you kill him?”
Istvan’s face went flat and his pupils turned a chalky white. I’d seen those eyes before. It was the Changeling.
“Why would I kill such a useful man?” he said. “Did you not think he could be valuable to me, despite his loyalties to you?” All evidence of the Changeling’s pain vanished. He put a foot on Vlad’s thigh and jumped back. Vlad’s blade slid from his torso. The wound it left behind sealed instantly.
Before he could say more, Ophelia closed in and struck. The Changeling brushed her sword aside with his open palm, then pushed her into the tunnel wall. Charlie and I moved in and swung at the same time but from different sides—me high, Charlie low. The Changeling’s body turned to mist. Our swords passed right through him and he flowed back against the cave wall, then reassumed the form of Istvan.
“The signalling was a clever idea, Vladislav, but I was able to pluck the details from Istvan’s mind. Your cousin foolishly believes that he can shield his thoughts from me, but there is no defence that I cannot penetrate with time and patience.”
Ophelia nudged me sideways. The four of us fanned out, blades up.
“Have you learned nothing? Put your weapons away and accept the hand that fate has dealt you. Take the mark or be destroyed.”
Vlad hesitated as if in doubt, then shifted so that he was right in the Changeling’s face, his sword thrust forward. It would have taken the Changeling through the heart, but that part of him had turned to mist again. His arms remained solid, however. One hand closed around Vlad’s throat. The other pushed his sword to the side. Once the blade was no longer sticking through his misty torso, he solidified, and that same hand passed into shadow. It reappeared an instant later with the fingers fused together. They were encased in a scorpion’s shell, the end tipped with an envenomed stinger.
Vlad dropped his sword and grabbed the Changeling’s forearm in his hands. At the same time, Ophelia lunged forward and swung. Her tim
ing seemed perfect, but the Changeling’s stinger turned to mist just as she would have severed it. Then he pushed Vlad at her. She managed to step out of the way, but Vlad wasn’t so lucky. His heel hit a stone and he stumbled backwards. The Changeling shifted so he was right beside him as he fell. He swung with his stinger. I was close enough to parry. My blade bit into the surrounding shell. He grimaced, tore it loose and swung for Vlad again. This time, Ophelia stepped in the way. She swung her rapier at his neck with one hand and pulled Vlad sideways with the other.
I missed what happened next. Charlie had taken hold of my collar and pulled me back. I heard him shout, “Fire in the hole!”
The air around me detonated. Red, orange and yellow sparks lit up the cave, peppering every bit of my exposed skin with burning metal. The effect was identical to the canister shot his father had used against Tamerlane. I raised an arm to shield my eyes, but the damage was done. A thousand sparks had burned golden trails across my field of view, so when I opened them the cave looked like a glowing electric spiderweb. I couldn’t see a thing.
“After him!” Charlie shouted. I heard footsteps disappear down the tunnel.
Vlad’s voice exploded in my head. “WAIT!”
My eyes began to clear and I could see from his expression that something was terribly wrong. Ophelia was lying on the ground at his feet. She was clutching her neck. Her face was contorted with pain and the skin under her chin was turning grey.
CHAPTER 47
ULTIMATUM
VLAD KNELT ON the ground beside Ophelia. “Oh no …
Oh no … This cannot be.” He put a hand under her head, cradling it from the rock as he spoke to her. “Why would you do such a thing? That stroke was intended for me …”
Grey death washed over Ophelia’s face. Her breathing grew shallow. Then it stopped.
Vlad scooped her up in his arms. “Go after Charlie,” he said to me.
I stared at Ophelia’s face, too stunned to move. Her skin had turned the colour of ash. Her eyes were vacant and lifeless.
“We cannot lose them both,” Vlad shouted. “Go … Go, or your friend will suffer the same fate as this! GO!”
I stumbled down the tunnel. My vision collapsed into something so narrow I barely saw the walls around me. A surreal feeling followed, as though my senses were muted and what I smelled and heard and saw was filtered through air too thick to breathe. Ophelia was dead. She wasn’t coming back. And there was nothing I could do about it. Nothing but run. It was just like that day in Libya when my father died. I could barely see. Tears poured from my eyes. I sped blindly down the tunnel, but I was really back in Libya, in that ancient city, my feet tirelessly pounding down streets of sand. The rock walls were ruins. My body was hollow, my mind numb.
I ran in circles. Tunnels looped and doubled back. I had no sense of where I was. I didn’t care. All I remember thinking was that if I ran far enough I would come to a place where things were right. My father would be there. And Ophelia. I would be a kid again and everything would be as it was supposed to be.
But that place did not exist. And nothing I did could change it.
Eventually the tunnel grew so steep I had to climb to continue. Ahead was a faint light. The sun was up outside. I could smell the open air. Then the ground flattened out. I heard voices and stopped.
“… dead?” said a woman. It was Famine. She was just around the corner.
John Tiptoft spoke next. “And you are certain that the boy is alone?”
There was no answer.
“Can you find out where he is?”
A few seconds later, Pestilence stepped out of the shadows below me. The steep part of the tunnel was at his back, so I was out of sight. He slunk away from me, bent over like a thief in the night.
I heard a noise behind me. Before I could turn, the keen edge of a longsword was pulled up against my throat.
“What was the first thing you ever killed?” Charlie asked me. “Whisper. And if I feel you digging in my head for the answer, it will be the last thing you ever do.”
Charlie’s other arm was wrapped around my chest. In that hand was an incendiary grenade. He had taken the pin out and was holding the lever closed with his fingers.
“It was a red squirrel,” I answered quietly, mouthing the words more than saying them. Then I pushed his blade away, turned and swung. The edge of my katana stopped against the side of his neck. “Where did it happen?”
“My cottage on Stoney Lake,” he answered, a bit too loudly. There was a look of shock on his face.
I put my finger over my mouth as a warning to be quiet. “It’s me,” I whispered.
“Yeah, I hope so.”
I lowered my sword.
“I forgot you could move so quickly,” he said.
I smiled.
“Yeah, it’s you. Who else would blush from a compliment?” He glanced down the tunnel. “Bathory and Tiptoft are up there.”
“I heard them.”
“Where’re Vlad and Ophelia?”
I looked at him. Words failed me. My eyes began to water and I felt the muscles in my neck tighten. He glanced down, then handed me his sword. I took it and watched, bleary-eyed, while he put the pin back in his grenade. He slipped it into his belt beside a gas canister, then took his sword back. “The Changeling … He got her, didn’t he, with his stinger?”
“Yeah.”
“They were both moving so quickly. I hoped …”
He didn’t finish.
“Vlad’s very close to an antidote, you know. Very close. He’ll get her back. He will. I know it.”
I was having trouble seeing and had to look away. I had no idea what to do. Pestilence was behind us. It wouldn’t take him long to reach the cave-in. He’d probably double back and would find us unless we got out, but Tiptoft and Famine were ahead, blocking the only obvious exit. Without Vlad and Ophelia, we had no chance of escaping. Even if Vlad had an antidote, it wouldn’t do us any good. Dead or alive, I’d probably never see Ophelia again. Or Luna. I didn’t even know where she was. I should never have let Vincent take off with her. All that blood … I started pulling at my collar. It was getting hard to breathe.
Charlie grabbed me roughly by the shoulders. “Keep it together. If you fall apart now we’re both dead.”
He was right, and I had no right to lash out at him, but I did just the same. It seemed getting angry was the only thing that would keep my sadness from taking over. That would have shut me down completely.
“If you don’t get out of my face, Charlie, I’m going to kill you myself.”
He took a step back and smiled. “That’s more like it!”
I stared at him for a few seconds, then wiped my eyes clear and shook my head. He was still grinning. I couldn’t help myself. Despite all that we’d suffered, I had to smile back. “How do we get into these messes?”
“I’ve been asking myself that since preschool,” he said. “I guess it’s a talent.”
“Yeah,” I said, and wiped my eyes clear. A small measure of calm was returning. “I wish I had some good news. Pestilence is looking for us. We’ve got to get out of here.”
Charlie nervously picked at the grip of his longsword. “If we go ahead, we face Tiptoft. Do you think we can take him?”
“Didn’t you just chase after the Changeling all by yourself?”
“My grenade did a number on him. He was hurt, and I wasn’t thinking. Tiptoft is fresh. And he’s lethal.”
“If you can deal with Bathory,” I said, “I can deal with John.”
“You sure?”
“No.But what choice do we have?”
We started forward at a crouch. The cave continued to grow brighter as we rose closer to the surface, forcing us to squint. We came to a dead end. Above us was a concrete ceiling about three feet thick with a car-sized hole in it. Fingers of rusted rebar stuck out along the inside of the opening so that it looked like the gaping mouth of a grey-skinned monster.
“Hold this,” Cha
rlie said, handing me his sword again. He jumped to the lip of the hole and pulled himself up. Once he was clear, I leapt straight through.
“Show-off,” he whispered.
We were in an underground parking lot. A cement mixer sat against one wall, along with an assortment of equipment: hoses, shovels, picks, orange pylons and a pile of large I-beams. Otherwise, the place was deserted.
Charlie reached for his sword. I kept it. “I have an idea,” I said.
“So far I don’t like it.”
“Trust me. Just keep going.”
We didn’t get far. John Tiptoft stepped from behind a concrete column. Vlad’s Dragon Blade was in his hands. His cowl was pulled back so we could see his weathered face and salt-and-pepper whiskers. Famine was behind him. Beyond that, a ramp spiralled up to the level outside. The light filtering down was strong. The sun must have been well above the horizon.
“That’s far enough,” Tiptoft said. “Drop the swords.”
I shook my head. “That’s not going to happen. But if you put down the Dragon Blade and kick it over to me, you might just leave with your head attached.”
CHAPTER 48
DUELLING WITH DEATH
FAMINE TOOK A step back.
“What do you think is going to happen, youngblood?” Tiptoft asked. “Do you think Vlad is going to save you? His safe houses have been torched. The last of his tombs has been razed. And now Ophelia is dead. He and all who align themselves with him are finished.”
“So is Tamerlane,” Charlie said. “He’s a good head shorter now.” He reached out to take his sword back.
I held it away. “You’d better get going,” I said to him. “Make sure the others are okay. I’ll deal with these two.” I handed him my sword. I mean no offence to Japanese swordsmiths, but a katana is basically just a long razor blade. When a man is in armour, you might just as well be whacking him with a willow wand. Tiptoft wore platinum and Kevlar, just as we did. I needed Charlie’s sword to beat him down. It was heavier.
