The Isis Covenant (19 page)

He built up the speed of his movements, circling and dancing, first in, then out, the knife weaving glistening patterns in the artificial light. Inside the circle, Jurgen turned, always facing his opponent, but Jamie saw a faint hint of concern in the close-set eyes, because he was only barely moving fast enough, and he knew it. Jamie’s bare feet allowed him to dance over the plastic sheeting, where Jurgen’s trainers, with their notched soles, moved it with them. Jurgen glanced at his feet and Jamie struck. He darted inside, at the same time bringing the blade round in a slashing arc designed to sever the German’s carotid artery. Jurgen, and every man in the room, thought he had reacted too late. He swayed away from the blade, but it pursued him like a hawk diving on a sparrow. A splash of bright scarlet signalled the hit and Jurgen screamed in fright. Jamie heard Danny’s cry of triumph and felt the volcanic surge of victory deep in his loins. But it was only momentary. A man with his throat cut doesn’t keep moving. A man with his throat cut sways and bleeds and falls and dies. Jurgen raised a hand to his left ear, which had been sliced diagonally, with the lower piece flapping against
his
neck held by a thin strip of skin. A line of blood appeared where the knife point had traced the flesh of his cheek.

Jurgen was hurt, but like a wounded big cat it made him more cautious, but no less dangerous. Jamie was unaware of the savage delight that etched his face and sent a shudder of concern through his enemy. He had tasted blood and he wanted more. He darted in a second time, hoping to take advantage of Jurgen’s shock, but the big man knew how close he had come and retreated into a defensive crouch. They fell into a rhythm of move and counter-move, thrust and counter-thrust. The minutes passed and Jamie felt his arm beginning to tire. Once more, he created what he thought was the killer opening, but this time Jurgen was ready and as Jamie swerved away his hand flicked out like a striking viper. The knife point scored Jamie’s left cheekbone and his vision disintegrated into a fiery cauldron. He knew Jurgen would be coming for him and he slashed blindly with his blade. But when his sight cleared Jurgen was standing back with the grin restored to his face. He reached up to touch the scar on his own cheek.

‘
Schlager
,’ he laughed.

Jamie knew a
schlager
was the heavy sword used in years past by German students to inflict scars of honour during fencing contests. But those were tests of skill, not fights to the death. That was when he understood this was a battle he could never win.

Frederick barked an order to continue, and Jurgen
moved
in for the kill. They resumed their circling, Jamie reduced to trying to stay alive and seeking an opening that seemed increasingly less likely to come, and Jurgen, his confidence restored, now doing the probing and dancing. Another near miss opened Jamie’s left breast just above the nipple and that galvanized him into a new attack, but he could feel the fatigue eating at him. He had to finish it now. Or die.

Feigning a slip, he allowed his feet to go out from under him at the same time praying that Jurgen would see his opening and go for the kill. It was a risk, but a calculated one, because if he was quick, the way he had fallen would carry him under the knife and into the killing zone. The downside was that if Jurgen was quicker, Jamie would be at his mercy for the vital split second it would take to plunge the blade into his body. As he hit the plastic he heard a crash as the door slammed back and a shrill voice that shouted, ‘
Hande hoch
.’ Inexplicably, Jurgen froze and his knife arm dropped. Jamie was already rolling beneath his opponent’s guard and he came up in a fluid movement that brought the skinning knife in below Jurgen’s breastbone. He sensed the moment it broke the skin and entered the sucking embrace of the flesh, and the instant it pierced the frantically beating heart. Jurgen screamed and screamed again, but Jamie kept forcing the blade up and up, deeper and deeper. He felt an elemental, visceral joy that men in battle must have shared through the ages. Death-bringer. Survivor. Victor. More alive than
he’d
ever felt before. Until the next war, the next battle or the next fight. The German’s mouth opened and closed and his eyes bulged. Blood sprayed from his nostrils into Jamie’s face and a flood of warmth covered his knife arm. As he twisted the knife and pulled it free he heard the sharp chatter of a machine gun and the thud of a body falling. Jurgen’s shuddering body crumpled into the widening pool of blood at his feet. When Jamie looked up, the men who had made up the circle behind Jurgen stood with their mouths open and their hands above their shoulders. He turned with the knife still in a death grip ready to kill and kill again. It was puzzling that the audience had been increased by four figures dressed in ski masks and black overalls who now stood inside the doorway covering the room with cocked Heckler & Koch machine pistols. Against one wall, eyes wide open and a string of ragged holes stitching his chest, lay the pony-tailed stormtrooper with the sub-machine gun. Frederick stood beside him, his face a mask of fury.

Jamie advanced on the Vril’s paramilitary leader until a soft hand touched his shoulder.

‘It’s all right, Jamie, we’re safe now.’

XXII

DANNY FISHER HAD
never witnessed anything more magnificent and she had a sense of the feral, animalistic delight experienced by a spectator in a Roman amphitheatre.

She knew the memory of the knife fight and the knowledge that its end meant her certain death would return to haunt her, but it was the look of savage certainty on Jamie Saintclair’s face she would remember for ever. He couldn’t win. He had known that. Even if he had somehow managed to disable the giant German, Frederick would have had him killed. Yet he had fought, and the spirit that had sustained him had helped to sustain her. She knew that if Jamie had died and they had come for her, she would have fought them with her feet and her teeth until they killed her. When Jamie fell she had believed it was the end for him, and for her.

Then the miracle had happened.

The door had burst back and two slim figures in
black
jump suits and ski masks had appeared with the barrels of their machine pistols threatening every man in the room and shouting at them to raise their hands up. After the initial shock most of the Germans had dropped their guns and raised their hands, but the fool with the machine gun had made one move too many. The figure on the left had switched aim a fraction and fired a short burst that threw him back against the wall.

Within seconds, the two gun-toting figures at the door were joined by two more and one of them cut Danny free with nimble, delicate fingers that surprised her when she felt them against her skin.

‘We’re safe now,’ she repeated, leading Jamie back to the chair.

The words penetrated, but they didn’t have any meaning. He seemed to be caught somewhere between two worlds. A moment earlier he had been at the centre of a blaze of light and anything had seemed possible. Now the light was fading and he suddenly felt very tired. Slowly, he began to dress, his hands automatically doing the right things, even though his mind was still in another place. He was aware of putting on his shirt over skin tacky with Jurgen’s still-damp blood. Danny helped him with his socks and shoes, then draped his jacket over his shoulders.

‘
Hände auf den Kopf. Legen Sie Ihre Waffen auf den Boden und Rücken gegen die Wand. Irgendwelche Tricks und du bist tot wie dein Freund
.’

A woman’s voice, but a woman who had proved she
was
prepared to back up her words with bullets. The surviving Nazis, including Frederick, did as they were ordered and retreated until their backs were against the wall where a gesture from the machine pistol forced them to their knees. Another of the masked saviours kicked the abandoned weapons into a heap near the door. She started to put them in a rucksack, but, before she’d completed the job, Danny Fisher selected one and cocked it.

‘We must go now,’ the leader said.

Jamie stared at her. He had no idea what was going on, only that he and Danny had been about to die and these people had saved them. He heard Frederick’s voice as he moved towards the door. Despite his defeat it was thick with menace.

‘This is not the end, Saintclair. We do not forget. You will be looking over your shoulder for the rest of your short life.’

Danny didn’t move. ‘Just one more thing. You, up!’

She pointed the pistol at Frederick, who rose to his feet with a sneer of contempt on his face.

‘Whore,’ he spat.

Jamie winced as he saw Danny smile. She had positioned herself perfectly. Her foot swung in an arc to land directly between Frederick’s legs. The Vril’s leader doubled over with a choked groan and before he could recover she smashed her knee into his face and brought the butt of the pistol down on the back of his neck so he collapsed to the floor as if he’d been shot.

‘For the record,’ she held the gun carelessly against her thigh as she surveyed the rest of the men, ‘I am a detective with the New York Police Department. If anyone else wants to call me a whore, now’s your chance.’

They drove from the warehouse in a Mercedes van with blacked-out windows. Two more of the Vril lay by the doorway, left unconscious when the assault team – that’s how Jamie now thought of it, he’d only seen a more professional infiltration in an SAS demonstration – had broken in with Taser shock devices and gas grenades.

They were well away from the warehouse when the front passenger, the woman who had led the assault, removed her ski mask and shook her dark hair free. She was older than the speed of her actions had led Jamie to expect. Startling green eyes shone from a face that had known suffering and disappointment, but still retained a fine-boned beauty that reminded him of a Modigliani portrait and hinted at an origin in southern Germany or the Alps. Jamie expected the others, there were five of them altogether, to follow suit, but they made no effort to imitate their leader.

She saw his puzzlement. ‘It would be preferable if you remained unaware of the identity of my sisters. Also that you keep any questions you may have until we reach our destination.’

He looked at Danny and she nodded. ‘Of course.’

Suddenly Jamie felt very sleepy and his eyelids began to droop. Danny dabbed at his brow with something damp. He reflected muzzily that it seemed to be the role of the women in his life to wash other people’s blood from his face. Maybe there was a message there?

By the time he woke they were parked in front of some kind of remote country house; three substantial floors of white stucco with a red tile roof and a garden screened off from the surrounding farmland by bushes and trees. They got out and the van drove off without a backward glance from the other passengers. Inside the house, their hostess showed them upstairs to a large bedroom, with a window that looked out over trees and fields.

‘You will find your personal effects from the hotel here. I thought it sensible that you did not return there, Germany is not safe for you now. It will also give you a chance to change your clothes, Herr Saintclair.’ She said it politely, but the words contained steel. He realized for the first time that he stank of sweat and fear and was still stained with another man’s blood. ‘The washroom is through the second door on the left.’ He opened his mouth to thank her, but she wasn’t finished. ‘Of course, you will have many questions. When you are rested, perhaps you will join me downstairs in, shall we say, one hour?’

Jamie nodded, reflecting that this was one formidable lady, but Danny hadn’t been brought up to be quite that polite.

‘We’d just like to express our gratitude for rescuing us. I believe you saved our lives back there.’ The other woman nodded graciously. ‘May we be allowed to know your name?’

She smiled, and, in that instant, looked ageless. ‘I have many names, Detective Fisher,’ she said enigmatically, ‘but you may call me Athena.’

Exactly an hour later a maid ushered them into the main room where Athena waited for them by a drinks cabinet.

‘May I offer you wine, or perhaps you would prefer something a little stronger after your … adventures?’

Danny accepted a glass of wine, but Jamie opted for whisky, which came large, over ice and, unless his nose mistook him, was some sort of well-aged single malt. Athena took a seat by the window. She had switched her black jumpsuit for jeans and a designer sweater that set off her trim figure to good advantage. She waited until they were comfortable.

‘Where do I begin?’

Jamie took a sip of his whisky and exchanged glances with Danny Fisher. She nodded.

‘All right,’ he said. ‘Perhaps you’d care to tell us how you managed to be at the warehouse at just the right time to save our necks. I’m assuming that the two young ladies who followed us on our arrival in Berlin were your people, but the fact that you were able to do what you did, when you did, speaks of not just good
intelligence
, but first-class resources and exceptional organization.’

Athena nodded thoughtfully. ‘You speak like a soldier, Mr Saintclair, but I suppose that is not surprising given your background.’ Jamie raised his eyebrows at that. ‘Oh yes, we know a great deal about you, but not about you, Detective.’ Fisher acknowledged the smile. ‘Our influence in the New World is not yet so extensive. We had information about your investigation, which was of interest to us, and we were able to gain access to your travel plans. You were followed, and we were happy that you knew you were followed, because we wished you to be aware that we were no threat. But when a genuine threat appeared in the guise of our Neanderthal Nazi friends, the decision was taken to make the surveillance more covert. That was how we were able to follow you after your abduction and how we had the time to draw together the necessary resources and to make our timely intervention.’

Jamie saw the hook being dangled, but for the moment he decided to ignore it. Danny was about to ask a question. She picked up his warning glance and relaxed back into her chair.