“Understand what?” Viktor said. “How insane you are?”
His words broke the spell. Natalie took a deep breath
as the car pulled through a wrought-iron gate and slowed to a stop. In
front of them stood a pale but imposing Gothic mansion with a three-story tower
at its center. The Russian flag flew to the right of the entrance and two
armed sentries stood between the car and the mansion’s front porch.
Natalie wiped beads of sweat from her brow. She could feel Belial,
nervous and restless, as he prowled the space beneath her skull. She
ground her teeth and concentrated on containing him.
“Let’s go,” Starinov said. He and his bodyguard got
out of the car and Viktor pulled Natalie out after them. The prime
minister led them straight through a red-carpeted ballroom with staircases
ascending on either side. Natalie looked up in awe at the light streaming
in from the third-story window, falling brightly over golden urns, paintings,
and detailed fretwork.
Viktor pulled her to the back of the house, to a golden
ballroom with a parquet floor and crystal chandeliers. It was furnished
with beige salon chairs and a large marble bar. At the far end of the
room, Natalie thought she saw a bank of windows and then realized they were
mirrors, framed and draped in curtains. She glanced around again and
confirmed her suspicion—there were no windows, no view of the outside.
Starinov pulled the double doors closed behind them.
“A good place for parties, yes?” he said, turning to Natalie. “I
announced my candidacy for prime minister here. I have many happy
memories of this room. Today, you are going to give me another.”
“Where are Beth and Constantine?”
“Gregor and Arkady are bringing them now.”
“Please let them go. They can’t help you.”
“Don’t ask for the impossible.”
“You are,” she snapped. “Why do you think I can do
what decades of your Soviet flunkies couldn’t do?”
Belial shifted his weight, raising his head to stare at the
door.
They are closing in on us. I don’t like this.
A scuffling sound from beyond the threshold grew louder as
two more guards marched Constantine and Beth in at gunpoint. They pushed
the two captives into the ballroom, locked the doors from the inside, and took
up positions on either side of Starinov, guns drawn.
Beth rushed over and grasped her hands. “Nat, you look
ill. It’s Belial, isn’t it?”
Natalie nodded. “He’s trying to get out.”
Beth turned on Starinov. “She needs alcohol.
She’s no good to you without it.”
The prime minister raised one pale eyebrow. “Aren’t
you the noble nurse. I’ve never heard of anyone prescribing alcohol for
insanity.”
“I’ve been taking care of her my whole life! I know
what she needs.”
Constantine came up to her and touched her face
softly. She saw how tired he looked. The lines around his eyes had
grown deeper, like canyons cut into a child’s relief map. “Will it happen
like before? In the motel?”
“I don’t know,” she whispered. “Maybe.”
“You need to help us,” Beth said to Starinov.
“Why? If she can’t give me the password, you will.”
“Both of those letters are ruined and Nat’s the only one
who’s at least read one of them! If she were able to tell me what the
first letter said, I might have a shot. But if she goes under, you’ll
never get that goddamn password.”
It was quiet for a moment. Starinov’s face, devoid of
all expression, studied each of them in turn. One of his guards grasped
his gun tightly, caressing the trigger. “All right,” Starinov said
softly. “I’ll give you five minutes. But if you don’t have that
password when I return, I will begin shooting people one by one until you tell
me what it is. Have I made myself clear?”
Natalie felt her heart stop.
Belial
, she
thought.
Stop reading
.
“Go,” Starinov said to his guards. They marched to the
door, opened it, and waited for him to exit. “Four minutes and fifty-nine
seconds,” he said over his shoulder. The last guard pulled the door shut
and locked it behind him.
July 2012
London, England
Constantine jumped up and ran to check the bay of
mirrors. He peeled back the panels of curtains, looking for a hidden
exit. “Nothing,” he called. He patrolled the room, looking for
anything they could use as a weapon.
“Nat, he’s going to kill us. What the hell are we
going to do?”
Natalie looked into her sister’s face. Beth’s lower
lip had begun to tremble and the fire in her eyes was considerably
dimmed. Stray hairs, wrinkles, smeared makeup—everything Beth usually had
under control had gone awry.
It’s all because of me
, she
thought. She forced a smile and touched her sister’s arm gently.
“We’re going to give him the password.”
Beth’s blue eyes widened. “You know what it is?”
“Of course not. But I know who does.”
It took Beth a moment to follow. “Nat, you can’t be
serious.”
“What are you two talking about?” Constantine asked.
He finished his circuit of the room, finding nothing more dangerous than a
half-empty bottle of vodka behind the bar. He brought it back and held it
out to her. “Drink this. It might help.”
“I don’t want it any more.”
Just like Beth, it took him a moment to understand.
“You can’t be serious.”
“Do either of you have a better idea?”
“Hell, yes,” Constantine said. “We convince Starinov
to get those letters to a spectroscopy expert. Maybe there are traces of
the ink deep down in the paper that we can’t see.”
“He won’t give us that much time.”
Beth sniffed and rubbed her nose with the back of her
hand. “Nat, we’ve spent twenty years fighting this. How can you
just give in?”
“Because I want you to see your son again.” She turned
to Constantine. “And I want you to see your sister. Belial will
tell me what I need to know.”
“No!” Beth cried. “What if he doesn’t let you
go? What if you don’t come back?”
“I’ll come back. I always have.”
“There has to be another way.” Beth grabbed Natalie’s
wrists and held on as tightly as she could. “Every time you go under, my
first thought is that I don’t know what I’ll do without you. I need you,
Nat. You’re my baby sister. Fighting for you is what I do…I don’t
want you to go somewhere I can’t come with you.”
Natalie looked down at their clasped hands. Grigori
said he’d seen an angel behind her, standing ready to defend them.
Maybe
,
she thought,
that angel was me.
“I’m not a baby, Beth. Maybe
this time I’m the one who has to protect you.”
Belial’s lips curled—Natalie felt the movement as surely as
if she could see it.
This is a very interesting conversation, little
one.
“Of course it is,” she said, closing her eyes and
surrendering. “It’s all about you. Belial, I need your help.”
“No!” Constantine yelled. She felt herself lifted into
his arms. He carried her across the room and laid her down gently, away
from the door, with a folded sweater beneath her head. “No,” he said,
shaking her shoulders. “Open your eyes.”
Natalie kept them shut. She felt his fingers sweep her
face, caressing her cheeks. Still she kept her heart closed. She
focused on Belial’s movements—his lips, his wings, his fingertips. She
shut out everything else, locking the pain and the hope away in her
heart. When she spoke, it was only to him. “Belial, I need you to
ask them what the password is.”
They aren’t going to tell us. It’s their secret.
“It will save my family. They’ll understand. I
know they will.”
It might take me awhile to find them.
“Go. I don’t want anything to happen to Beth and
Constantine.”
I need to give them something, a token that proves my
intentions.
“Why would they doubt you? You’re an angel.”
My brother put his hand upon them and someone must atone.
“Here,” she said, pulling all the Romanov jewelry from her
body. “Take it all with you.”
I will, little one. I’m going to release you while
I look for them.
“I don’t care.”
You should care. I’ve always wanted you to care.
“Just go! Don’t come back without that password!”
All right, little one. As you wish.
Belial bent his head and lifted his wings. They carried him up past the
corporeal limits of her skull. She felt a rush, as if a gust of wind
passed straight through her. The pain in her head vanished so suddenly
that the absence of it hurt as much as the pain itself. A heavy silence
hung over her brain, as thick and opaque as a coating of mud.
“He’s gone,” she muttered. She twisted her body and
her clothes stuck to her, as if she’d been dunked in hot, sticky water.
“Nat?” Beth whispered.
Natalie opened her eyes. She was on the floor, propped
up in Constantine’s lap. Beth knelt beside her, holding her hands.
There were red marks on each of her wrists. “What happened?”
Over her head, Beth met Constantine’s glance. “Should
I?” she said.
Constantine sighed. “They’ll tell her if we don’t.”
Beth opened her hand and revealed one of the earrings
Natalie had been wearing. The wire loop that went through the ear was
coated in blood.
Natalie raised her hand to her left ear and felt the
earring’s mate. Then she tried her right ear and her hand came away
red.
“You ripped it out,” Constantine said. “I don’t think
you even realized what you were doing.”
“You pulled this one from your hair,” Beth said, holding out
the diamond hair clip with a clump of matted hair still attached. “Once
we figured out what you were doing, I told Constantine to hold you down.”
“I’m so sorry,
lastochka
,” he said, brushing his
fingers over the red welts on her wrists. “You were struggling, and I was
afraid of what you’d do to yourself if I let you up.”
“Belial needs these,” she said. “He was supposed to
take them.”
“He’ll be fine,” Beth said quickly. “But I think we
should hide them.”
“Are we alone?” Natalie asked, glancing over Constantine’s
shoulder.
“Yes and no,” Beth said. “I screamed for help when
your ear started bleeding and they all ran inside. Viktor wanted to stay
and watch, but Starinov dragged him back out. He said they were going to
call the Bank of England and make sure everything is ready. They left a
guard by the door.”
Beth and Constantine locked gazes once more over her
head. “They’ll return in a few minutes,” he said. “What are we
going to do?”
“Belial needs more time,” Natalie said.
“Is that really our best option?” Beth said gently. “If
you tell me what the first letter said, we can try to do this together.
I’ll help you.”
“We wait,” Natalie insisted.
“Natalie, they’re going to start shooting people if we—”
“Then stall them! I can’t do it without Belial!”
She looked up at Constantine, needing the warmth and solidity of his
body. “You’ll tell them to wait, won’t you?”
“Natalia,” he said, brushing the hair back from her face and
kissing her lips gently. Her heart clenched at the sweetness in his
voice. “It’s not Belial. It’s you. There’s no one else who
can do what you do.”
“But I don’t do anything! I black out and Belial does
the rest. It’s not
me
!”
He took her hands in his, holding them against his
chest. “I think it is you. It’s always been you.”
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “You’re
wrong.” Panic rose up in her like a tsunami. It was Belial who told
her the answers, Belial who warned her when danger was near. Without his
voice, she was lost. She was simply herself, and the world had already
told her that she wasn’t good enough.
“I believe in you,” Constantine said.
The ballroom doors burst open as Starinov, Viktor, and three
guards returned. Natalie felt her throat run dry with fear.
Belial,
where the hell are you?
Constantine lifted her to her feet, keeping an arm around
her waist. One of the guards came to stand beside him, watching every
movement of his hands.
Starinov’s cold blue eyes swept her from head to toe,
blinking rapidly as they passed over her torn earlobe. “You will give me
the password now.”
“I need more time. Please.”
He curled his upper lip, giving her another glimpse of his
small, child-like teeth. “When I give an order, I expect it to be
followed. Perhaps this will convince you of the gravity of our
situation.” He drew a Makarov pistol and pointed it at Constantine’s
forehead.
“No!” she screamed.
Starinov aimed, smiled, and pulled the trigger.
July 2012
London, England
The guard standing next to Constantine fell backward, legs
crumpling awkwardly beneath him. A small, dark hole pierced his forehead.
Beth screamed and Natalie felt her heart vault up into her
throat.
This wasn’t supposed to happen
, she thought, clasping
Constantine’s hand tightly.
Belial, where are you?
“Are you convinced now?” Starinov said. “Because there
is one minor detail I have not yet shared with you. We have only one
chance to unlock this account. The Bank of England will seal it forever
if you give me the wrong password.”
“What?” Viktor cried. His face had blossomed with deep
purple bruises that stretched from his orbital sockets to his upper lip.
“But who would get the money?”
“No one. The bank will destroy everything associated
with the account.” Starinov stepped over to Natalie and tapped her
forehead with the muzzle of the gun. “So you see, my dear, you have quite
an important task. I am prepared to give you all the time you need to
think so long as you know that I will kill one person in this room every three
minutes until you’re done thinking.”