The Lucifer Messiah (28 page)

Charybdis was nervous. She knew Argus's plan was nothing more than a last-ditch gamble, and one that required her to expose herself to their enemies.

To that end, she had come to the appointed meeting place. It was a West Side rail yard, deserted at night, but near enough to the river that the clanking from the docks made it anything but quiet. Wrapped in a tattered blanket, she would have looked like any other homeless woman, were it not for her stark white skin and jet-black crew cut.

She smelled the Morrigan's messenger coming before she saw him, or even heard him. The stench of canine feces and dog-breath assaulted her.

Finally, Lycaon sprang into view. A litter of stray cats hissed and scampered away when he landed.

“I have bad news,” the wolf-man began, wasting no time. “Scylla is dead.”

Charybdis breathed heavily, several times. She wasn't sure how to respond. She wasn't sure how much Lycaon
knew, or how truthful he was apt to be under the circumstances. The grip on her dagger tightened beneath her makeshift cloak.

“I'm sorry. I know how much she meant to you,” the wolf-beast continued.

“We were close once, for many years. As close as two of our kind can possibly ever be. Had we been human we might have grown old together by now,” she replied.

“She was killed by Arachne. We caught the spider-girl in the very act of it. We believe your friend Argus tracked her down and ordered her to kill Scylla while still in the cocoon.

“She did so, and by my hand she lost her own life in the process,” Lycaon concluded.

“Argus is not my friend,” she said, explained the details that the ancient one had fabricated for her. She hoped her tone was convincing. The news about Scylla had shaken her.

“Did Scylla manage to tell you how Arachne had subdued her in the first place? She was one of the most resourceful killers I've ever known, anyone has ever known,” Charybdis questioned.

She cursed under her breath. Was it a ruse? Had their plan somehow been betrayed? Or had their gamble failed, and her lover truly was dead? Ever in control of her emotions, her face betrayed none of her feelings.

“She did not live long enough to tell,” Lycaon reported. “But we do know this: before she was lost to us, Scylla had tracked and captured Vince Sicario, the human friend of Lucifer.”

“Did you find him as well?” Charybdis already knew that they hadn't.

“No, but we think we know why. The Morrigan's agents are in the process of correcting that as we speak.”

“I don't understand,” Charybdis replied, the first honest thing she'd said since their conversation had begun.

“He likely escaped while Arachne and Scylla fought. A source among Sam Calabrese's associates has informed the Morrigan that Mr. Sicario is now in hiding with his estranged wife, Margaret. Together they are planning to flee from the area.”

Now Charybdis was puzzled. She knew Vince was safe and secure in Argus's lair. How could the man be in two places at once?

Almost as soon as the question occurred to her, it practically answered itself.

“And you believe that if you apprehend Sicario, you will soon find Lucifer?” Charybdis answered, the absolute truth of that statement now utterly clear to her, if not to Lycaon.

“The Morrigan is convinced of it.”

“What does she ask of me? My blade is at her service.”

“She expected that you might wish to have a hand at avenging the death of Scylla,” Lycaon answered. “The Keeper is assembling her death guard, to hunt down and seize both Sicario and his wife. We could use one more reliable warrior. If you wish, of course.”

Charybdis paused. Was it a set-up? She still had no idea how much the Morrigan knew, or whether Lycaon's
report of Scylla's demise was true.

“I would consider it an honor, and I would extend my humble thanks to the Keeper for the opportunity,” she finally replied.

“I will pass your sentiment along,” Lycaon said. “Though I believe you will soon have the chance to do so in person.”

T
HE WAREHOUSE HAD FALLEN STILL.
I
T WAS DARK; A
moody, sullen dim of spent pipe-smoke and ashes. Only the Keeper's throne dais felt the warm touch of candlelight, from flickering tapers arrayed upon its steps and near to the Phantom Queen's great seat.

An interlude had been called amid the debauchery, a brief repose for the revelers to consider the solemnity of their occasion. So had the orgies and the sex games settled out into casually entangled clumps of celebrants, three or four or sometimes more, still intertwined in licentious jigsaws of flesh, lulled for a time from their carnal pursuits.

And so too had the glassy-eyed, stumbling, inebriated denizens halted their binges to allow their senses to return to them in some small measure.

None dared disobey the command of the Morrigan to call a pause in their indulgence, contrary though such a suggestion was to everything that they had gathered to celebrate.

All eyes in the vast expanse focused their attention on her platform, though the pleasure seeking had not fully
ceased. Some among the deviant throng continued to puff gently on their opium pipes. Others stroked one another sensuously as they huddled.

The occasional squeal from some shadowy corner passed largely unnoticed.

The Morrigan stepped down from her gilded chair when six figures in white shrouds stepped into the circle of candles. She had again assumed a guise that was much more the innocent girl than fearsome goddess of battle. Her delicate face beamed golden, as though reflecting the light from an invisible sun.

“Children of Nestor,” she began, her voice high-pitched and melodic, but echoing clearly. “This is a special night. You have come here from every land of the world, across oceans and seas, to be with others of your kind.”

Prompted by the drums and the lyres of the Keeper's orchestra, the gathered recited a phrase. It was in a language that had not been spoken by humans for centuries.

As the tide of chanting ebbed, the Morrigan slipped through the shadow of her own chair. She emerged from the brief, dark interlude once more a wrinkled crone.

The withered old lady she now was raised her hands to the crowd. Her voice was unchanged.

“The time has come for us to join. We must unite, become one. One people. One Haven. Beyond these walls, there are those who would destroy us, the humans who refuse to acknowledge us as their ancestors did. We must continue to be vigilant against them. But now there is a new threat.”

Again they chanted in their hidden tongue. Again she
passed through light and into shadow.

“Some among our own seek to scatter us, to betray their own kind. It is my pledge to you, as Keeper and Protector, that I will not allow that to happen.”

In the center of the circle, the six lowered their hoods, and dropped their shrouds.

The gathered chanted once more.

“Here stand your guardians. Those who have sworn to fight to the death against the enemy, those who have offered their own lives to protect yours,” the Morrigan continued.

Standing before the Keeper were the fiercest of all the changelings, their faces lit by the candles. Horus stood farthest to the left, bearing the regal head of a falcon upon a body that was split between bird and man. He rested in a menacing perch beneath scarlet wings. His talon-arms both clutched swords.

Beside him hovered Tisiphone. Her reptilian features and wild eyes fumed beneath a tangled mane. Claws extended from the scales along her arms. She held them before her like a pair of scythes.

To their right stood the eternal pair, Icarus and Anubis. The first was a slender, beautiful youth. Snow-white wings grew out of his shoulders. The elegant, strange feature both suggested his ancient namesake, and marked the only malformation to his near-humanity. He wore nothing but a tunic and chain belt, a long sword slung at his side.

The second of the two was a canine with heavy jowls. Recalling his Egyptian predecessor, he yet bore a largely human form, though jackal-headed and carrying elongated,
fur-lined forelimbs.

Standing a step apart, but together within the circle, were Lycaon and Charybdis.

The Morrigan stepped out a second time from the shade, her aspect yet again altered. War goddess once more, her visage a storm cloud of blood and shadows and anger, she stepped forth in a threatening stride. She lifted her arms, and her waving cloak twisted into the wings of a black raven. They spread wide as her face grew to crown them with the terrible glower of the death-bird.

“I hereby dispatch you six slayers,” she announced. “Avenge your sister Scylla! Hunt down and bring forth the traitors!”

It was a clear night, chilly but not too cold. Typical for late fall in New York. Flanagan was at the wheel, and no one had said a word since they'd left the city. That silence, combined with the endless rolling of the tires and the whistling of the autumn wind, made it seem like they'd been on the road for hours.

When they saw the sign for a hamlet ahead, Pat suggested a brief rest stop. Vince and Maggie agreed without discussion.

The town was small, just a main street along a ridge overlooking the Hudson. The grocery store was already closed for the night, as were most of the other places, the barbershop, the post office and the church. There was a
bar, though, with a couple of flickering signs outside and some cars parked in the vacant lot next to it.

That was where they pulled in.

“I'm gonna get a cup o' coffee,” Pat said. “We still got about a forty-five-minute drive to the place. Anyone else?”

Maggie shook her head. She hated bars, even ones that served coffee. And she didn't much like Vince going near one either. Under the present circumstances, however, that seemed like the least of their problems.

Vince tapped her on the shoulder, asked her if she'd be okay,
if she was okay.
Then he disappeared inside with his ex-partner.

Maggie spent a moment peering upward then. You really couldn't see the stars very well in the city, too much light pollution from the buildings, the cars, and the street lamps. It was only when she made it out into the country, upstate some, that she ever got a chance to see the real night sky.

Her father had often taken her up near West Point as a child, to where her aunt and uncle lived in Highland Falls.
They were near there now,
she thought,
farther up the river than she had figured Flanagan was going to take them.
Close to where she had first learned the names of some of those constellations many years ago.

With all the strange things she'd seen lately, she relished the chance to take a breath, and stop for a moment with something so familiar, so reliable.

When the others exited the bar a few minutes later, she heard them behind her, Vince's coat rustling, and the
small talk between him and Flanagan. The wind snapped the branches in the bare trees, occasionally drowning out their talk of old times and old faces. But she didn't take her eyes off the sky.

Not until she heard a series of footsteps, fast-moving and heavy. They snared her attention, and that of the others. Maggie spun her head, to the left, away from Vince and the car. Then she saw them.

There were six. All dressed the same, beige raincoats, belted at the waist, collars lifted above the neck. Black hats, broad-brimmed and flat, sat low over their heads, hiding their faces in the evening shadows.

“Maggie … !” She heard Vince's voice, but she couldn't move in time.

The half-dozen strangers were on her in a heartbeat. One had a blade. Maggie felt the steel cut through her jacket. It pierced the soft skin of her belly with a hard, stinging slice. She gasped, and staggered. A clammy grip braced her on the back of her neck.

Vince grabbed Pat Flanagan by the shoulder.

“You son of a bitch! You sold us out!” he shouted.

Flanagan stumbled backward, looking for cover behind the car. He reached for his gun under his coat, suddenly unsure if Vince was going to shoot him for trying.

“Vince, I swear. I didn't!” he shouted back.

The calls drew four of the intruders, who peeled off from the circle around Maggie. Three aimed their focus at Vince, while the fourth dashed toward the sedan, and Flanagan.

“Vince, you gotta believe me! I don't know what's goin' on!” he continued to shout.

His cries stopped abruptly a moment later, when a figure lunged at him from the darkness. He fired, several times, but the bullets clanged against the side of the car.

Vince's gun was drawn as well. Three men rushed toward him. He fired, emptied the revolver's six shots in a hot blast of smoke and fire and sound. He hit all of them, or so he thought.

But they kept on coming, faces hidden. There wasn't even a hint of blood from under their coats.

Maggie screamed. The blade of the one in front of her rose up for a second cut. A splash of her own blood already trickled along the edge. The grip of the one behind her tightened on her neck.