Shadowlands (12 page)

He was very quiet as we made our way to Queen Street, and I waited until we were standing at the streetcar stop before I asked him what was on his mind.

“You’d like to apply for that fencing job, wouldn’t you?” I said.

“That shows you the limits of English. Anyone would think I were a carpenter.” He kept his eyes focused down the street, as if he could make the streetcar materialize by force of will. On the other hand, maybe he could.

I shook my head and smiled. “You’ve got credentials, haven’t you?” The streetcar arrived and we left the sidewalk, crossing the short section of roadway between us and the opening doors. Rush hour was over, and we were able to get two seats together close to the rear doors.

“Alejandro Martín has no such credentials.” He tapped himself on the chest. “My fencing credentials are much older, and for a man who has not existed in over a century.” He spoke quietly, even though there was no one close enough to overhear us. “The international
fencing community is smaller than you think. A psychologist like yourself, my dear, might be created out of thin air, but a fencing master must, at some point, have been seen physically.”

Over the years, Alejandro had used more identities than he could readily remember. So I wasn’t too surprised that every now and then he’d mention one I’d never heard of before.

“What will you do, then?”

“You mean, what
would
I do,
if
I were going to apply for this work?”

I rolled my eyes. “Fine, what
would
you do?”

“Offer to fence with whoever is currently the dojo champion.” His smile was a beautiful thing to see.

“And would that work?”

He shot me a look out of the side of his eyes. “You wound me, my angel, by even pretending to doubt it.”

I grinned, and hugged the backpack I had in my lap. “So why is it only what you
would
do, and not what you
will
do?”

He managed to shrug without brushing against me. His eyes were focused to the front again. I thought I was going to have to touch him to get an answer when he finally spoke.

“How can we undertake other commitments until we have discharged the one we have now before us?”

I pressed my lips together and stared out of the window. Other commitments. Alejandro was only in Toronto because of me, to help me find my family. I was a bit chagrined to find out it was only now occurring to me that I’d taken Alejandro away from his life and the place he loved.

I thought about how determined I’d felt when I’d seen that strange man on the subway, and I remembered how exhilarated I’d felt leaving the Christie Institute. I realized that was how I still felt, determined and exhilarated. Oh, yeah, and scared.

“I hope Alejandro knows what he’s doing,” Nik helped me shift my backpack to a more comfortable spot. “I don’t like using you as bait.”

“Yeah, well, we’ve been through that, and if you don’t have any better ideas now than you did last night, can we get on with it?”

Nik raised his eyebrows at me in such a way that I knew he guessed how nervous I was. I shrugged and looked away. We were standing
just inside the subway station, below street level, with the entrance to Union Station’s food court across the lane from us. According to Nik, there were a lot of sightings of the Hunt around Union Station, which had made sense to Alejandro, considering both the crossroads and the Portal were there. There were thousands of crossroads, but only nine Portals. Why they were
where
they were, was something even Alejandro didn’t know.

“We need to find out what we’re up against, so Alejandro can figure out which of the hidden People is most likely to help us. We already know the bad guys are showing interest in me,” I said. “So I’m the one they’re most likely to follow.”

“Yeah, yeah. And if they follow you, then we’ll know who and what they are. I know the plan, I just don’t like it.”

I bit my lip and eyed the station entrance. Alejandro was already inside. Nik would come in after me. Nik’s people—both people
like
him, and people
with
him—were inside as well, and though I didn’t know all of them, they’d seen photos of me.

“Got your umbrella?”

I hefted it. As if he couldn’t see perfectly well that I had.

“Don’t let anyone touch you,” Nik said. I remembered what I’d seen inside Elaine and nodded.

“What if no one follows me?” I said.

“Oh, I’m pretty sure
someone
will follow you.” I heard the smile in Nik’s voice and turned toward him in time to catch it on his face. “In fact, I’d be surprised if they didn’t.”

I rolled my eyes. It was silly, I know, but I was feeling better as I set off.

Because he was looking for it, Alejandro saw almost immediately that half a dozen men and women were not wandering randomly through the concourse, but were casting back and forth through the crowd in a subtle pattern that left no entrance or exit unwatched. These would be Nik’s friends and followers, the ones he had called and made arrangements with the night before. Now that he had noticed them, it was clear they were equally aware of him, and that they were avoiding coming near.

And here came Valory, punctual and precise, from the direction of the subway entrance. She kept her pace steady, just quick enough
not to impede the other pedestrians, but slow enough that she didn’t gain on anyone. Alejandro was pretending to look at a collection of wallets in the small luggage shop—one of which seemed to exist in every train station and airport in the world. He allowed Valory to pass him and get perhaps twenty-five paces ahead before drifting along behind her, letting his eyes wander as if he were either bored or lost in thought.

Today there was nothing noteworthy or eye-catching in Valory’s dress or appearance, no designer suit or four-inch heels—nothing, in other words that should make ordinary people notice, let alone follow her. Valory seemed a perfectly ordinary girl, her chestnut hair bouncing in a ponytail, her angular features striking rather than pretty. Khaki trousers, trainers, peach T-shirt with matching hoodie, backpack slung over one shoulder, mobile in her hand.

The roving pack of watchers changed their pattern slightly, letting her pass unmolested, but incorporating her, making her the center. If Valory noticed them, she gave no sign. She walked entirely without self-consciousness. The years she had spent with the Collector were those in which a young woman normally begins to feel her power over men—something of which, Alejandro reflected, Valory had indeed learned, though not in the usual way, nor with the usual results. She was more watchful, more skeptical than was usual in woman of her age.

Alejandro had been afraid at first that because of her years of isolation, and her singular ability, she would not be able to go out among people, especially in a crowded modern city such as Madrid or Toronto. But the press of people had been no trouble to her; she preferred crowds, in fact, and was probably feeling more comfortable here and now than Alejandro was himself. She diligently followed the route through Union Station that they had outlined for her, starting from the subway entrance, through the shopping concourse into the train station proper, angling into the embarking area, then up into the great hall, down the far stairs—

Alejandro straightened. A man was standing off to one side, leaning against the now-deserted information desk under the central clock. His eyes trailed, seemingly unfocused, over the heads of the people passing, but in reality noting each one, as if checking them off on a mental list, though none received more than glancing attention.
But when Valory walked by, the man’s head lifted, and his nostrils flared. He turned his head to keep his eyes on her as she passed.

One of the wandering watchers gave the agreed-upon signal, but Alejandro was already in motion. As Valory moved farther away, the man pushed off from the edge of the desk and began to pace behind her, maintaining his distance, but keeping her always in sight.

Rider
, Alejandro thought. It was unmistakable, now that the man was moving. Not a Hound. Alejandro did not know all of the People who had remained in the Shadowlands when the Exile began—but he knew every Rider, and this one was a stranger. One of the Basilisk’s crew, then, and therefore to be caught in their trap.

This was the part Nikos Polihronidis had not liked, the part that Valory had insisted would work. Mindful of her desire not to be smothered with protections, Alejandro had stifled his own protests. Valory had reached the staircase. Alejandro waited until he was certain the strange Rider was following her out of the Station, and when he was sure…he Moved.

In the side of the overpass that lay on the west side of the train station was an alcove, a narrow space with an access door chained and padlocked at the rear. Alejandro had scouted the place carefully, he knew every crack in the concrete, especially the one where water seeped, every ripple of paint on the old steel door, the number of links in the chain, the brand name still faintly visible on the padlock. Ah, he had forgotten the odor of urine (strong) and of vomit (faint). Just as well. He stood as far back in the shadow created by the alcove as he could. Valory walked by the opening, not revealing in any way that she sensed his presence—or perhaps, he reflected, she actually did not. He was not sure, even now, precisely how her talent functioned. Surely, though, she knew he was already there. He called upon his Guidebeast, the Hippogriff, to steady his hands, and crossed himself automatically, grinning when he realized what he’d done.

Footsteps approached and he readied himself. It was not the man who had been following Valory, but a younger, darker-haired man who evidently thought himself too cool to remove his sunglasses, even in the obscurity of the overpass. For a moment Alejandro thought he was mistaken, that this young man was the Rider he’d seen following Valory. But no, the coloring was wrong entirely.

Next came two young girls walking in the opposite direction, one on her mobile, and both giggling. The one nearest him shot him a steady look as they passed. Outsiders. Then a long-legged dog, white, wiry-haired with liver-colored markings, entered Alejandro’s field of vision.

He almost missed it, he was letting it go by him, but in the last second it turned to him and grinned, showing all its teeth and he stepped out from his shadow, twisting the handle on his walking stick as he moved, drawing the g
ra’if
blade out of the wooden shaft, slashing downward with one smooth stroke and slicing deep into the thing’s shoulder. The Hound spun on its paws, paws that were changing to clawed feet even as it turned.

It grew abruptly to five times its previous size, retaining its dog shape, though grotesquely misshapen and scarred as if by burns. This was definitely a Hound, not a Rider—where had it come from? Did the Rider Alejandro had seen somehow send it after Valory?

It leaped upon him, and Alejandro had no more time to speculate, barely meeting its lunge with the cutting edge of his sword. Just in time he remembered the advice Nighthawk had once given him and looked away from its eyes, keeping his focus on the claws, and the teeth. His hands and feet moved automatically with the precision and grace polished by centuries in fields of battle, and the sands of the bullring.

He struck, and the dog shape became a furred and armored lizard, tongue darting from its mouth. Ignore the changes, he’d been taught, and keep striking, no matter what you see. The thing morphed again, and Alejandro raised his blade high, stepping lightly to one side, arching his body as he had done so many thousands of times avoiding the bull’s horns in
corridas
. And just as he had done then, he jabbed at the shoulders, weakening the muscles there to make it lower its head. Feeling his own heart racing, and his breath coming short, striving to take air in slowly, to keep his hands steady. If only he himself could transform, if only he had
dra’aj
enough, he could take to the air and kill it from above.

Then he saw it, the dip of the shoulder, the head hanging—just for a split second—at the right angle, and in that fraction of an instant he moved, faster than he had ever done in the
Plaza de Toros
, leaping up from his toes and leaning into the thrust, the full length
of the blade passing through muscle, past bone, into the lungs and heart.

He stepped forward as it fell, unwilling to let go of the sword, though it went against every tradition. Only when he felt the sting of a claw against the meat of his calf did he step back, withdrawing the blade. The Hound changed again, and again, almost rippling as its body settled onto the ground. Finally, it took the form of a man and Faded completely, leaving not a mark on the ground, only the blood dripping from Alejandro’s blade.

And trickling down the back of his leg.

Wolf peered out through the building’s smoked glass wall, realizing that the girl out in the sun-filled square wasn’t standing on the faint trail of Rider he’d been following all morning, The trail ended where she stood. It was
her
trail. Impossible. For a moment the world seemed to shift around him, as it did when passing through a Ring. Was he losing his ability to track? Ordinarily, that idea might have pleased him, now that he was no longer a— He pushed that thought away.

Wolf examined her more closely. Trousers the color of sand. A sweater with a hood in an odd shade of orange. Canvas-topped, rubber-soled shoes. A backpack hitched on one shoulder. Not particularly tall for a human female, she was a little too thin, he thought. Her chestnut hair reminded him of the women he’d seen in Spain, where the color was popular. He stepped out into the sun. She glanced toward him, seemed about to smile, but then looked away.

The girl appeared about to take a step back in the direction from which they’d come, at the same time looking around her and lifting the mobile phone she held in her left hand to her face. Between one breath and the next Wolf was behind her, his left arm pinning her arms to her sides, his right hand covering her mouth. She smelled very faintly of vanilla.