Authors: Tony Richards
She stared in my direction, her predatory green gaze seeming to devour me.
“You?”
I felt as surprised as anyone by this new development, but I nodded.
What else was I going to do? Ever since I’d first met Saruak, I had been waiting for a chance like this.
Only Kurt came back outside with me. I wondered what the rest were going to do. He tossed me a set of keys and nodded to the black Porsche 911, which was sitting on the gravel with its roof down, looking like a cross between a bullfrog and a fighter plane.
“You drive,” he told me. Then, by way of explanation, “I’ll need both my hands.”
For what? But he seemed eager to get on with it, whatever it might be.
Above us, the sky had grown slightly lighter than it had been when I’d gone inside. The sun had not come up as yet, but it was due. The whole eastern horizon was tinged with paler shades of dimness and then, along the world’s edge, a soft band of platinum appeared, growing as I watched.
Another crow, or perhaps a grackle, just a tiny cut-out shape, flapped out of a little copse of trees and wheeled toward the growing light. The town lay motionless below us, its roads empty and its windows black. The streetlamps crisscrossing it shone like distant candles, the whole place slumbering and unaware.
I wondered what kind of dreams the people down were there having. Ugly ones, I would imagine, centered round the same events.
The wind up here was stronger, cooler, than below. I shivered slightly as I approached the car. Or maybe that was the adrenaline. This might be the morning that we finally gave Saruak the unpleasant reception he’d been asking for since he’d arrived.
I climbed into the driver’s seat. Turned the key and put my foot lightly on the gas. Felt my pulse race a little as the engine’s vibrations ran through me. I never got
that
sensation from my Caddy.
Thankfully, there was a manual shift – I’ve never much liked automatics. I went up swiftly through the gears as we headed back out past the gate.
Van Friesling set the black stone disc down carefully on the dashboard. Its needle was still pointing where it first had done, toward the east.
“I follow it?” I asked.
“What else? It’s precisely like a compass, but is drawn to supernatural forces rather than magnetic north.”
My own excitement didn’t seem to be affecting him a great deal. Kurt had always been the languid type, that translating to an air of coolness when he’d been a teenager. He settled back into his leather seat, his whole expression calm, relaxed.
We were just starting down the hill, when a low thudding noise behind us made me glance up in the rearview mirror. And I’m pretty sure my jaw dropped open at that point.
I could see the Vernon mansion back there, of course. It was just as dim and still as every other building in my field of view. Except that three of the windows in the topmost story had, all at once, come blasting open. And the objects that came surging out …
I craned around to get a better look at them.
They seemed to be three rolling, churning clouds. Or three dark palls of smoke, perhaps. But smoke had never moved like this. It didn’t come apart.
They all came hurtling across the mansion’s grounds, in the same direction we were headed. Then began to climb as they reached Plymouth Drive, getting harder to see the further they rose, until the murk above had almost swallowed them.
All that you could make out, before too much longer, was a faint motion against the dormant sky. A bolt of lightning flashed across it briefly, but no thunder came.
“Were those …?” I asked, my head still back.
“Yes. Just watch the road,” van Friesling told me.
We were coming up on the first of the bends.
By the time I had a chance to look up again, a fourth cloud had come soaring along to join the others. Judging from its direction,
my best guess was that Cynthia McGinley’s sister, Dido, was counting herself in as well, minor stroke or not.
Another chill ran through me. And it definitely wasn’t from the cold this time. In all the years I’d lived here, I had never seen the adepts change themselves in quite this fashion.
Saruak and his Dralleg had better watch their step, from this point. Salem’s most gifted descendants were now on the move.
Coming down a steep part of the hill, we went round another hairpin bend. The golden needle swung with the motion, still pointing directly at the center of town. Union Square itself. Did Saruak have the gall to still be loitering around down there? It was where we’d first met, after all.
But then we passed a line of trees, and the square came properly into view. We were close enough to make out detail. And a quick glance through the windshield confirmed that, not only did he have the nerve, but he had it in spades.
The broad, rectangular buildings of Union Square still looked pretty small, from this distance. But I could make out a paler dot, directly on the Town Hall roof. As I watched, it detached itself from the chimney it was standing by, and began to pace across the broad expanse of grayish-green tiles.
I glanced across at van Friesling, who had lost a little of his detachment and looked rather stunned as well.
Son of a bitch, how long had Saruak
been up
there?
The road straightened for the last time. We’d reached the lower stretches, where the normal houses stood. There was no need to watch our speed, no traffic in the way. And so I powered down the last half mile as quickly as I was able.
Kurt van Friesling sat up in his bucket seat when we skidded off the Drive. And then, as I raced through the narrower streets, he reached into his pocket. His casual air had slipped away. He produced a jangling metal object, which he fastened round his neck. It was an intricately-wrought, large pendant, made of strands of black-enameled metal. The shapes were slim sinuous dragons, like the golden one on top of the disc. But writhing ones, all wrapped around each other. Their talons were extended and their jaws gaped. There were red stones for the eyes.
And it must have been the car, creating the effect. But for an instant, I thought I saw one of them shift position very slightly. I tried to pay that no attention.
“It’s called Black Morgan’s Talisman,” Kurt told me with a tight, wry smile. “Not all my family is Dutch. My many-times great-grandmother brought it to Salem with her, all the way from Swansea.”
“And what does it do?” I asked.
We were having to shout above the wind and the roar of the engine.
“Wrong question. It’s what it helps
me
do. It magnifies the power that an adept has. In this case, a Spell of Binding.”
And he settled back again and closed his eyes, preparing his mind for the task in hand.
When I got another look at the Town Hall roof, the dot on it had resolved into a vaguely human shape. And had stopped between the two flagpoles directly at the center, Old Glory and the crest of Massachusetts fluttering above it. We were still too far away to tell, but I felt sure that Saruak was watching us.
He could disappear at will, I knew. So the fact that he was waiting for us didn’t seem to bode too well. I tried to tell myself he was simply being overconfident, or didn’t understand what he was really up against this time.
Van Friesling opened his eyes again, spread his hands apart, the palms facing each other. And an electric bolt danced between them, so bright that it dazzled me. What the hell was that?
The streets had grown even narrower, too many flat rooftops obscuring our view. Which made me uneasy. What might Saruak be doing, while we couldn’t see what he was up to?
Van Friesling had begun muttering under his breath, although not in any language that I recognized. Starting up his spell, I didn’t doubt.
We finally burst into the square. I braked, and we swerved to a halt.
It was dead to the world, its windows vacant. Shadows were layered heavily across it, the same way as they had been the last time I was here at night. The wind, trapped by the buildings, made a heavy moaning sound.
And there he still was, in between the banners. I could see his outline clearly. He was waiting for us, his left eye still glinting faintly. A bulge against his shoulder and a twin green glow told me he was cradling his dog.
The sky had turned a little brighter. Saruak was black against it, and I could not see his face. Had no idea what his expression was.
He was staring at us, though. He didn’t seem to move a muscle.
Van Friesling held out both his palms. A huge web, like flaringly bright electricity, came shooting from them, reaching up across the square.
At the exact same moment, there was another flash of lightning from above. Those four dense, boiling clouds had gathered high above us, I could see. And they were circling. One of them detached itself, came hurtling down at the roof.
It made a thrumming noise, parting the air as it approached. The flags crackled more fiercely. Saruak looked up.
Gaspar Vernon’s face appeared at the center of it, strangely disembodied, as if somebody had lopped his head off. Enormous though, as big as a house, and rather two-dimensional.
His eyes blazed and his mouth was gaping. I had never seen the man look so angry and determined. The humming noise turned to a shriek.
The web that van Friesling had cast tried to wrap itself round Saruak. But he just flailed with his free arm and brushed it off. The strands came apart, then vanished. And before Vernon could get to him, he disappeared, along with his dog.
The other three clouds wheeled around a little faster. Shining bolts flashed in between them once again. Gaspar Vernon hovered above the rooftop, staring down at us with plain frustration.
“
Kurt?
” his voice boomed out, so loud it made my head ring.
Van Friesling could only look apologetic.
“I’m sorry. It’s been a long time since I did anything like this.”
But had that been our only chance? I glanced down at the black stone disc. The needle had swung around a
gain and was pointing southward.
“He’s still here,” I said.
But how far away, exactly?
I backed the Porsche up a little, swung it round, bumping the front tire on the curb. Then put my foot down hard. The howling motor started eating up the distance. And it wasn’t very long before the taller buildings started giving way to a low, suburban sprawl.
The needle flickered slightly to the right, halfway down May Avenue. I swerved at the next intersection, went across a block. There was a cold, hard feeling growing in my chest. Could we be heading …?
Greenwood Terrace lay ahead of us. The scene of one of his crimes last night. He seemed to be fond of revisiting places. He had gone back there.
Van Friesling had leaned back again, his blond hair fluttering in the draft. His lips weren’t moving anymore. But the look on his face was so intense, I felt sure that he was concentrating hard. Focusing on, and trying to strengthen, the next spell that he was going to cast.
His palms lifted again. Dozens of electric sparks danced in between them, like a tiny firework display.
I spotted a narrow silhouette ahead of us, at the next intersection. And tensed for a moment, thinking that it might be Saruak again. But it wasn’t. It was just an ordinary man, the first that I had seen so far on this particular morning. The dimness robbed him of all his normal hue. And his back was bent, as though to take the weight of the approaching day. He was climbing onto a pushbike, heading into work presumably. His head came up at the sound of our approach. And he gawped at us astonishedly as we went hurtling by.
He was lost into the background a few seconds later. Just a regular Joe with a regular life, completely unaware of what was going on around him.
I’d been like that, once upon a time.
When I got the chance, I glanced up again. There was still movement in the sky above us. The adepts’ first attempt might have failed, but they were not anywhere near to giving up.
We crossed another junction, and a spire became apparent up ahead of us. The needle shifted again, pointing directly at it.
My teeth clenched, and I almost spat enamel. My God, he’d gone back to St. Nevitt’s!
We swung around the corner. Saruak came clearly into view a second time.
As did other things, high up in the air, to either side of him.
Vernon was hanging back, this time. It seemed to be the turn of the others. Two of them swung round to the left of the church, and one more to the right. And then they started to descend.
There was no humming noise accompanying them, this time. And no faces I could see. As they grew closer, they changed shape, lengthening and spreading out.
A sound did reach my ears at last. But it was a steady, heavy flapping. As the shapes resolved, it finally became clear what they were. The adepts had transformed themselves to massive birds.
To Saruak’s left were a pair of buzzards, but far larger than normal ones. Their wingspans had to be at least eight feet. And what was the betting, if you got up closer to them, they had nasty emerald eyes? It was impossible to tell from this far away.
To his right there was a truly gigantic eagle. A bald eagle, I guessed, since Levin had always been a patriot. I couldn’t tell for sure, because there was no visible detail or color. All the birds looked the same shades as the original clouds had been.