He was lost in his own rhetoric, drunk on what he was saying. “And we will triumph, my brothers in arms. By our will. We
will
succeed.” His voice was rising in a crescendo. “We shall see further than our predecessors. We will travel a greater distance down the path than anyone before us.”
Ava’s concentration was interrupted by a small movement in the corner of her eye.
She snapped her head towards the far end of the vehicle where it had come from.
It took her a moment to recognize what it was, before she was filled with a sudden sense of dread.
Christ
—
not now.
She fought to stay calm.
But there was no mistaking the two-tone black and golden-brown nose of an Alsatian dog, sniffing along the ground by the four-by-four.
She held her breath, hoping that if she did not move, it would not notice her. But she knew Alsatians did not sense by movement alone. They also relied heavily on smell. And there was nothing she could do about that.
It already knew she was there.
Malchus was still in full flow. “To harness the greatest powers of the universe, we need only look within ourselves, and cultivate what we find there. For we are a microcosm of the universe. The ancients summed it up in their mantra: as above, so below.”
The powerful dog was drawing level with her. She could see it was on a thick black leather leash. A pair of boots was walking a few feet behind it.
“We all have whatever power we may ever need within us. All we must do is recognize and develop what we have. It can be a journey of many long steps. But the legends of old are there to guide and inspire us—especially in the Norse and heathen tales, which contain a universe of hidden teachings.”
Ava was no longer listening. She was focused exclusively on the dog approaching her hiding place.
What happened next was brutally swift.
The dog suddenly began to snarl and bark—in loud staccato bursts, throwing its head back and baring its large teeth.
No sooner had it started than Ava realized with horror it was coming for her—scrambling under the vehicle and hurling itself towards her, the noise of its snarls filling the entire space under the vehicle’s chassis.
Her body released a massive surge of adrenaline, filling her muscles with blood and hormones, launching her away from the animal’s powerful square head and open jaws as fast as she could.
But in the cramped space under the four-by-four, she was not fast enough, and had barely moved half a foot before she knew what was going to happen.
Her body instinctively braced itself for the impact.
The large dog crashed onto her, its heavy paws cutting into her side and shoulder—its saliva-covered teeth only an inch from her face.
She felt its hot angry breath on her skin as her ears filled with the throaty sound of its attacking snarl. Before she had time to think, another massive dose of adrenaline prepared her body for the imminent crushing bite to her neck or face.
But it never came.
With a series of guttural strangled noises, the dog was yanked out from under the vehicle.
As Ava stared after its retreating form, her heart hammering hard enough to burst her ribcage, the dog was replaced by the dull grey metal of an old Colt handgun pointing directly at her, followed by a man’s livid face.
Still in full fight-or-flight mode, her eyes darted about as she tried to assess escape options. At the same time, the man motioned with the handgun for her to come out from under the vehicle.
Without pausing, she lunged for the other side of the four-by-four, propelling herself as fast as she could away from the threat.
As she rolled out from under the vehicle and into the sunlight, she realized her mistake too late.
A group of men was gathered there. They were looking down at her, grim faced—angered by the unwelcome intrusion and interruption.
Before she had time to react, something cold and heavy connected hard with the back of her head, and the world went dark.
——————— ◆ ———————
Stockbridge House
Nr Newton Tony
Wiltshire SP4
England
The United Kingdom
Ava awoke to the sound of tyres crunching on gravel.
Opening her eyes slowly, she gradually became aware of being in a moving car.
She winced as the engine slowed to manoeuvre over a speed-bump, feeling a bolt of pain flash across the back of her skull. As the rear wheels rolled down off the hump, she heard a sharp cracking noise inside her head, accompanied by a flash of bright white light.
It felt as if her brain was being sheared in two.
Swivelling her eyes to look through the heavily tinted black windows, she saw the car was turning off an isolated country road and nosing its way gently between a set of monumental ivy-clad grey stone pillars set into a tall dark green hedge.
She blinked, trying to focus on what was happening. But the throbbing pain coming from the back of her head was interrupting her ability to think.
The car was now purring along a private ornamental driveway that snaked down the side of a gently rolling hill and opened onto a breathtaking view of sheep and a village in the lush green valley below. As the narrow road bent away to the other side of the hill and rounded a corner, she caught sight of an imposing country house at the end of the driveway.
It was an idyllic scene of English rural gentility.
The house was built of the same grey stone as the gate pillars on the road. Its small windows were criss-crossed with strips of leading, turning each one into dozens of small glass diamonds. A long range made up the main body of the building, off which three smaller wings protruded at right angles. The resulting E-shape and period windows instantly gave the house away as a classic Elizabethan manor.
Struggling to remember what she was doing tightly strapped into the seat, she turned to look around the car’s plush walnut and beige-leather cabin.
With a jolt of horror, she instantly recognized the hairless head of the thickset man squeezed into the front passenger seat.
It was Malchus.
What on earth … ?
Her pulse suddenly accelerated as she tried to remember what she was doing in a car with him.
She winced as she remembered the bungled conversation with him by the Thelema stall.
Looking around for an answer, she quickly recognized the other two men. They were his brawny bodyguards from the upper field.
One of the bodyguards was driving, but the larger of the two, the one who had threatened her, was sitting beside her in the back. He still wore the same unpleasant expression, but this time it was backed by a matt black Glock handgun pointing directly at her.
“Glad you could join us,” he rasped. The sarcasm dripped from his voice, and the expression of menace in his eyes was anything but welcoming.
South African, she thought, from the accent. Probably Johannesburg. If he shared Malchus’s racist politics, then he had probably come up through the extremist neo-Nazi scene there.
Nasty.
As she felt her focus returning, memories of the morning’s events came crashing back—shaking off Ferguson, hiding under the car, eavesdropping on Malchus’s impassioned speech, and evading the guard dog only to be clubbed into unconsciousness by Malchus’s followers.
At least that explained the sickening pain at the back of her skull.
As her head cleared further, she began to register the seriousness of the situation.
After the fiasco by the Thelema stall, she had meant to ensure her next meeting with Malchus was on her terms, so she could begin getting to the bottom of the questions to which she was increasingly sure he held the answers.
But once again she had been caught unaware.
Looking at the ugly muzzle of the semiautomatic gun pointing at her, it was painfully clear the odds were now heavily stacked against her.
She would have a lot of explaining to do, and it would need to be convincing.
Her chances did not look good. She was Malchus’s prisoner, in his car, in the middle of nowhere, and no one knew she was there.
As they slowly drew up outside the house’s grand frontage, the bodyguard gestured with the pistol for her to open the door.
She thought for a moment of tackling him as he got out of the car after her. He would be unstable for a second or two, and she was pretty sure she could separate him from his gun in that time. But she instinctively knew it would be suicide—Malchus and the driver would both be armed.
She clicked open the car’s heavy door and stepped out onto the crunchy gravel, scanning the surrounding area, taking in the house’s grand doorway, the open expanse of well-manicured lawn, the carefully tended flowerbeds to its right, and the densely wooded area behind and to the left.
She weighed up the options, but none of them were good. If she tried making a run for it in any direction she would be dead on the driveway with half a dozen rounds in her back before she got ten yards.
There was no realistic choice except to go along with whatever Malchus had planned. Her only hope was that he kept her alive long enough for her to devise a way out.
Looking round, she caught a glimpse of Malchus, who was scowling as he got out of the car. Their eyes met briefly, but she could read nothing from their cold hard expression.
The bodyguard grabbed her arm roughly, bent it at the elbow, and twisted it up behind her back. A flash of pain tore up to her shoulder blade, but she suppressed the urge to make any sound.
She was watching all her captors keenly. She needed to stay alert, to be ready for any opportunity that presented itself.
With her arm pinned firmly behind her and the gun rammed into the small of her back, the bodyguard propelled her towards the house.
As they approached the brass-ornamented door, the driver stepped forward, turned a key in its lock, and pushed it open, ushering her into the old building.
The hallway was high, and thick shafts of sunshine streamed in from the diamond-leaded windows, piercing flared tunnels of light deep into the building.
The entrance space was painted a gentle off-white, and bright geometric op art paintings hung on the walls, framing a hallway sparsely filled with simple yet elegant furniture.
Whoever owned the house, Ava noted, was someone with a degree of sensitivity—which ruled out Malchus, who she suspected would have installed stags’ heads and suits of armour holding chunky weaponry.
The driver had meanwhile opened a small cupboard just to the right of the doorway, and was entering a security code.
So they were alone.
They passed through the hall into a reception room. It was comfortably furnished with three deep brown leather sofas at one end and a large shiny mahogany desk at the other. Halfway down the far wall was a set of French windows leading onto a patio with an attractive bubbling fountain. Along the remainder of the room’s walls were a series of carved dark wooden bookcases holding antique leather-bound volumes and modern hardbacks. Between them, she could see delicately lit oil paintings—mostly landscapes.
It was a tasteful room, without pretentions—further proof it was not Malchus’s house.
Malchus nodded towards the middle of the room. The bodyguard marched her over to a carpet in the centre, and pushed her down onto her knees, roughly placing her hands behind her head.
Interlacing her fingers, she glared up at him defiantly.
He was not going to have this all his own way.
She knew her prospects looked bleak, but for the time being was reassured by the knowledge he was not going to kill her just yet. He of all people knew what a messy business executions were, and she doubted very much he would have brought her into the main room to shoot her.
But the danger was still very real. The bodyguard had not moved. He remained beside her, pressing the cool nylon polymer muzzle of the handgun against her head.
Malchus sat down in the leather sofa facing her. He looked over at her, withdrawing an object from his pocket.
She was surprised to see it was a set of black rosary beads, like those used by traditional Christians the world over. She did a double take, unable to reconcile the devotional object with what she knew of Malchus.
But as she focused on it more closely, she noticed the beads were made of matt black metal. And where the rope of beads usually ended in a crucifix, the one he was holding had a sleek and sharp-pointed black steel star about the size of a dollar coin.
At first glance she thought the pendant was a pentagram. But as it turned in the light she saw it had six points not five—although it looked nothing like the usual six-pointed star on Christmas trees and the flag of Israel.
There was something infinitely more malevolent about it.
He settled himself into the sofa, and began to run the metal beads between his fingers, as if in some silent meditative prayer.
Ava slowed her breathing, telling herself to take longer deeper breaths. Dropping her shoulders, she willed her muscles to untense. She knew she had to relax if she was going to pull this off.
Looking across at Malchus, she could see he was still eyeing her coldly. When at last he spoke, his voice had changed from when she had heard it at the rally.
He was no longer the passionate bold-gestured orator. Now he was angry—speaking slowly and deliberately, every inch the ruthless and mechanical operator she knew he really was.
“Let’s get this over with.” He looked expectantly at her, as if challenging her to defy him. “Who are you?”
The question was cold. Clinical.
She breathed an inner sigh of relief.
Good.
If he wanted her to answer questions, then it gave her a chance to talk her way out of it.
But she would need a cover story. Quickly. And it would have to be good. One thing she knew for sure—there would not be another opportunity.
An idea had begun forming while she had been kneeling, and she was still running through the angles in her head as he began talking. More than anything now, she needed to stall, to give herself the time to put the final pieces of the story together—to get it right in her mind.
Trying to sound as unfazed as possible, she glowered back at him. “Tell your monkey to put his gun away.”
Malchus did not rise to the bait. “I’ll ask you again—who are you?”
Ava glared at him. She was still thinking through the details of her cover story and needed to play for time. “Call him off.”
Malchus kept his eyes fixed on her. There was no flicker of reaction. She stared back at him, refusing to be intimidated. “Go on. Call him off.” She nodded in the direction of the bodyguard holding the gun to her head. “Call him off, and I’ll talk to you.”
Despite the danger, a part of her was enjoying the defiance. If he was going to kill her, she had no intention of begging.
Malchus eyed her carefully, giving her valuable seconds before at length answering. “You’re in no position to negotiate anything.”
She nodded. “If you kill me, you’ll never know why I’m here.” She was pleased to hear that her voice sounded strong. Combative.
She waited keenly for his answer. There was a serious point to her demands. The way he responded would tell her how she needed to handle him. If he acquiesced even slightly, then she knew she had the ability, however small, to influence him. But if he did not, then she had her work cut out if she was going to talk her way free.
Without warning, he stood up and strode over to her. The blow came so fast she had no time to protect herself.
The intensity of the pain surprised her, but she stifled the urge to shout out.
It had been an open-handed slap, but hard enough to knock her sideways. As she righted herself, she felt him grab a handful of her hair. He yanked it hard, and bent low over her so their faces were only inches apart.
“Believe me when I tell you I’m in no mood for your games.” He tightened his grip on her hair. The pain was excruciating. Her heart was hammering, and there was a rushing noise in her ears. “In a very short time you have become a considerable nuisance to me.”
With his free hand he put something cold on her face. It felt sharp, and he was pressing it into the flesh at the bottom of her eye socket. As she tried to work out what it was, she could see the black metal beads of his rosary flowing out of his clenched hand. With a wave of revulsion, she realized he was pushing one of the sharpened tapering points of the hexagram pendant into the flesh just under her eye.
His voice was menacingly quiet. “You need to start thinking about cooperating with me. Because I’m fast losing patience with you, and I’m very close to ending your ability to bother me.” He pushed the lethal point of the evil-looking star a little harder into the soft skin, all the while staring into her eyes.
What she saw in his expression was not reassuring. There was nothing living—just an icy determination.
He let go of her hair and took the vicious star from beneath her eye. Returning to his seat, he stared at her again. “Now, one more time. Who are you?”
She did not have to feign anger or indignation any longer. The blood was coursing through her veins, and she wanted nothing more than to let herself loose on him. But she restrained herself—she had to think of the longer game.
When the time came, he was going to pay for that
, she promised herself.
Well?” Malchus prompted.
Ava was thinking rapidly. The incident had given her the answer she wanted—Malchus was not open for negotiation.
It had also bought her more time. She had initially wanted to say she was a journalist—it used to be one of the best covers around. But the internet had ruined that. With a few clicks of a mouse anyone could discover she had never been anywhere near a newspaper or written any magazine articles.
But she was now out of time. Ready or not, she had to give him an explanation.
She breathed deeply, forcing back the intense hatred she was feeling towards him, pushing it out of her voice. “There’s no need for all this,” she began. “I have a proposition for you.”