Edge of Dawn (40 page)

*   *   *

The road spiraled around the massive hill as if a giant with a paring knife had peeled a green apple. It was early, so there was little traffic, which made Richard's pursuers very obvious. The Old One clearly wasn't with them, since they were in cars. Richard had Kenntnis in the backseat and his Mosi stand-in buckled into the front seat. On their left, towers built from blocks of red-tinged stone defended the summit. It was an odd design. All the towers were connected with only limited distance between them, and instead of offering the flat side to the enemy, the towers were offset so enemies would approach the point of a corner. The placement made the towers seem like teeth ready to grind invaders to pulp.

They drove past a little restaurant tucked into the side of the hill, where men were unloading supplies from the back of a small truck. Another curve, and now the battlements were draped with rugs either drying or airing in the sun. It was an incongruous sight from stone jaws to stone laundry line.

The silence was adding to Richard's nerves. “So here we are, sir. End of the line. I guess. We did some good stuff together, didn't we?” Richard gave his head a sharp shake. “This is probably really stupid, huh? It's not like you're going to answer. Maybe you don't even understand any longer. Doesn't matter, and if you don't mind I'd like to keep talking. Kind of helps. So, are there any of your kind left? Somewhere … out in the universe? If there are, I wish we could tell them what happened to you. Or better yet, one of them turns up to help. But I guess that only happens in stories, huh?”

The road ended at a car park, and a sign in numerous languages stated that only residents' vehicles were permitted from this point. Richard parked, grabbed the shotgun, and opened the back door.

“Come on, sir.” He handed the fake Mosi bundle to Kenntnis. Richard saw no point in alerting Titchen and Grenier to the fact the little girl wasn't with him until it was absolutely necessary. They started up the narrow road. Farther down the hill, Richard heard the engines of the approaching cars. “And while we still have the chance … I just want to say … thank you. For trusting me with your company and for opening my eyes. About the world … and about me.”

They passed a few gift shops, closed at this early hour, and then hit an archway that had once held the city gates. Beyond were ancient stone, plaster, and wattle houses two and three stories high and lopsided with age. Overhanging balconies yearned toward each other. Power lines and wires snaked above the narrow cobbled street, and wooden signs adorned with the Coca-Cola label swung gently in the breeze.

“We could almost be in the eleventh century, couldn't we?” Richard asked. Kenntnis remained silent.

Five children, three boys and two girls, raced past, flanked by a pair of fat-bellied puppies yapping with excitement. Richard and Kenntnis walked on, and Richard felt the muscles in the back of his thighs and calves starting to pull from the steep climb. They reached a small courtyard with a battered stone fountain in the center. A few men were gathered, smoking cigarettes. They reacted when they saw the shotgun, but no one approached or said a word. Either it wasn't that uncommon or there was something in the smoky air that gave warning that things were amiss. Richard took the next turn to the right, and they climbed higher.

Past shops with enormous white sacks filled with carded wool. Others displayed wooden barrels filled with dried fruit of every description, dried beans and peas, potatoes and dried lemons. Others were heaped with spices. The smell of different kinds of chili and every other imaginable spice was strong enough to overpower even the reek of smoke. It reminded Richard he was hungry. He thought that was maybe a good sign. That his fear wouldn't immobilize him when the time came.

He picked smaller and smaller streets, searching for a place to make a stand. A place where, he hoped, no bystanders would be hurt.

*   *   *

Titchen's cell phone rang. He answered, listened, then drove his fist into the back of the front seat. The guard seated next to the driver jerked but kept his eyes strictly on the curving road ahead.

“Fucker tricked us! He doesn't have the girl. She was with the scientists.”

“But the second team got her, yes?” Grenier asked.

“No. She got away.” Titchen rolled a choleric eye toward Grenier.

Grenier didn't misinterpret the look. “I misjudged my influence. I'm sorry.”

“Sounds like you also misjudged his smarts and his courage.”

“So shall we return to the hotel and let your teams search for her? Or I could go back and coordinate the search. Men such as ourselves really have no business trying to be action heroes. Let your experts handle this.”

“No. This guy's made a monkey of me one too many times, and we may need our … ally. These numbnuts can't handle that.” Grenier watched the back of the driver's neck redden. “And you're really useless.”

“Then why am I here? Why didn't you leave me behind?”

“Because I want you to be there when we kill Oort.”

“Why? Do you think that's going to bother me?”

“Yeah, actually, I do.”

Grenier looked out the side window so Titchen wouldn't see the truth.

*   *   *

The stitch in her side hurt enough that Mosi had to stop running. She forced herself to keep walking, but the road seemed to stretch on endlessly, and she kept having to duck off to the side and hide when cars went past. She looked up at the rugs hanging on the stone walls and was startled that one of them looked so much like the rugs her grandmother had made for sale at the Crown Point rug auctions. She wondered why that was. Realizing she was just standing and staring, Mosi pushed herself back into motion. Then she heard the clop of a horse's hooves. Startled, she looked back, and around a curve came a man driving a wagon pulled by a skinny gray horse. The back of the wagon was filled with milk bottles. The man had a nice face, round and jolly. She decided to take a chance. Stepping out into the road, Mosi waved. He pulled up and looked at her.

“Are you going up there?” she asked, and pointed toward the top of the hill. The man nodded. “Can I…” Richard's voice filled her memory. “
The word ‘can' implies ability. ‘May' implies permission.
” She corrected herself. “May I have a ride?” Again the nod. Mosi scrambled up into the seat next to the man, and the horse resumed its patient plod.

“We had horses. Me and my family. My daddy taught me how to ride. I like horses.”

The man finally spoke. “So do I. The wind of heaven is that which blows between a horse's ears.”

*   *   *

Every part of him hurt. Knees, feet, back. Most worrisome was the ache in his chest as Grenier labored after Titchen and the eight guards deeper into the Old City. They had ignored the sign at the car park and driven three cars into the old quarter. Men had approached, prepared to remonstrate with them. Titchen had raised his arms, called, and the Old One had left the burning shantytown where it had been feeding and flung itself across the sky, trailing shadows and terror. Its arrival filled the area with the stink of burned rubber, rust, and blood. The cars had died and the men had fled, wailing in fear.

Once the Old One joined them, they were forced to proceed on foot, and Grenier was beginning to think the walk alone was going to kill him. The creature made no effort to form a body. It oozed through the streets, wormlike and with multiple tentacles. Within the darkness, there was the sense of eyes, hundreds, thousands of them. As they passed, people abandoned their houses, screaming, weeping, turning on each other. Occasionally a tendril would stretch out and enfold a human, and that human would die.

And each time it killed, Titchen laughed. With each death the laugh became more manic, and even his guards, loyal though they might be, were starting to look at him askance.

How on earth did he get this rich when he is clearly barking mad?
Grenier wondered with some resentment. He also wondered what power the creature possessed that its touch could kill. And if it could kill a paladin.

*   *   *

They were almost at the crown of the hill. Judging from the screams, something terrible was going on behind them. Richard stopped, looked back, and tried to decide what to do. Go back? Could he actually help? Didn't matter. He had to try. Whatever was happening below was a direct result of his presence.

He started back down the hill. His leather-soled loafers slipped a bit on the cobbles, so steep was the incline. He was startled when Kenntnis caught him by the arm and kept him from falling. He looked up into the man's face, but the distant expression never changed.

An enormous wall loomed up on their right. Richard had noticed it when they'd first passed, heading up the hill. Mixed in among the cut stones were blocks of marble. Many of them bore carvings of Greek and Roman design, and one block in particular sported a bas-relief face, the mouth open as if echoing the screams from the buildings below.

Richard glanced up at it and froze as a viscous black tentacle oozed from the mouth of the carving. Smaller tendrils emerged from the eyes, and the three merged and braided, trailing down the wall and reaching out toward him. The stink of Old One nearly drove him to his knees. Richard dropped the shotgun, pulled loose a knife, and snapped it open.

Powerful arms closed around his waist, and he was flung unceremoniously over Kenntnis's shoulder. The big man whirled and began running up the hill away from the creeping oily shadows. The jolting run slammed Kenntnis's shoulder into Richard's diaphragm, driving the air from his lungs and sending pain lancing through the stitches in his side. The Mosi bundle had been tossed aside, the pillow with the taped-on hair rolling away to come to rest against the side of a building. The sight of that tumbled hair focused all his hopes and fears. If the Old One was here, then the ruse had succeeded and Damon would have gotten Mosi clear.

Richard was sure of it. He had to be.

*   *   *

Screaming people were racing down the road toward Mosi and her companion. The horse gave a snort of alarm at the approaching crowd. The driver called out in his own language. Some of the men answered him. The man looked terrified and began to turn the horse and wagon.

“No! What are you doing? I have to go up there!”

The man ignored her, but the crush of people made the turn almost impossible, and a back wheel lodged on the stone lip at the road's edge. Mosi couldn't understand the words, but it sounded like the man was cursing as he jumped down from the wagon. He reached up to try and lift her down, but Mosi slapped his hands away. He shouted at her in his own language and joined the people running down the hill. Mosi, panting, frightened, and near tears, sat frozen for a few moments in the wagon. The horse was starting to plunge, trying to pull free. Mosi grabbed the knife Damon had given her, jumped down, and sawed at the leather traces, all the while keeping up a gentle conversation with the horse.

“You're a good boy, aren't you? You and I are going to ride to battle together. Much better than pulling a cart. If you do this, my
na sha dii
will take you home and you'll be my horse.”

One by one, the traces parted. The gelding's ears flicked back and forth between her, and then up toward the city. Its nostrils were flaring and Mosi could see why. There was a bad stink in the air. Once the horse was free, Mosi led him over to the stone wall that outlined a parking lot, climbed up, and swung onto the horse bareback. Its back dropped as if he resented the sudden weight, but the horse didn't try to buck. Gathering up the cut reins, she nudged with her heel and sent the gelding up the hill.

 

Chapter

TWENTY-THREE

K
ENNTNIS
continued to pound up a series of stone steps. Richard, hanging over the big man's shoulder, had an excellent view of the rugs that lay on those steps. They were covered with evil eye wards, some incorporated into jewelry, key chains, and various other trinkets. All abandoned now. Grabbing a breath, he yelled, “Mr. Kenntnis! Sir! Please, put me down.”

They passed between thick walls of red stone and marble blocks. Kenntnis slowed and stumbled to a stop. He lifted Richard off his shoulder and set him gently on his feet. Rubbing his abused diaphragm, Richard turned slowly and surveyed their surroundings. They stood in the center of the high fortress. Flagged paving stones were underfoot, and all around were arched entryways, small rooms and narrow courtyards, and staircases leading to higher and higher walls. At some points, they loomed at least a hundred feet over the central circular courtyard. Richard saw a discarded camera and a scarf clinging to the rough stones. A breeze caught the scarf and sent it billowing high over the walls. This early there obviously hadn't been many tourists, and the few that had been present had fled.

Richard ran up one of the sets of stairs and onto two-foot-wide battlements that offered him a view into the Old City. The black tendrils wriggled along the streets and oozed from windows of the wood-and-plaster houses. Walking in the center of the tentacles was Alexander Titchen. Grenier plodded in his wake, mopping at his face with a handkerchief clutched in his real hand. There were eight armed men with them, not that their guns would do them any good. The only sound was an uncanny humming that lifted the hair on the nape of Richard's neck. Then a new sound intruded. Hoofbeats.

Frowning, Richard moved to a vantage point just above another gate into the fortress. A skinny gray horse, lather on its neck and a rider clinging to its mane, came scrambling up the steps. The rider's hair was a pennant of waving black. Richard didn't need to see the outfit to recognize Mosi. He gave a moan of despair.

Racing down the stairs, he arrived in the courtyard simultaneously with Mosi and her steed. She gave a sob and flung herself off the horse and into his arms. He hugged her close, her tears dampening his shirt.