“You speak English, yes?” asked Vanessa suddenly, as we crossed the river on the new bridge.
“English, French and Czech,” I said.
“How the devil did you end up with Czech?” asked Vanessa.
“I took it at police college,” I said. “It’s rare so I thought it would support my application to the BKA. How about you?”
“French and English,” she said. “But my point is that everyone I know speaks a bit of English.”
“How else are we going to talk to the Swedes?” I said.
“Everyone, that is, except for whoever it was with Uwe and Jason the night he died,” said Vanessa, and I felt suddenly cold.
“Everyone speaks English except for Jonas Diekmeier,” I said.
I’d sat less than half a metre from him this morning and felt nothing. But that’s what revenants did—they hid inside people’s minds.
“Gabriel Beck kills Christian Stracker in a duel and is buried alive on top of the Markusberg by Kelly,” I said. “Who then thinks ‘job done’ and, still grief-stricken, gives up her child to the Stracker family to raise. Did she say whether it was a boy or a girl?”
“Boy,” said Vanessa.
“A century later the good people of Trier build the Mariensäule, which has the effect of channelling any ambient magic into poor Gabriel Beck.”
“You think he was still alive underground?”
“Alive, no,” I said. “Conscious, yes.”
“That’s horrific.”
“Fast forward to New Year’s Day 1945 and Heinrich Brandt, aged two weeks, is found in the ruins of his family’s house. He was buried for five days and his survival is considered miraculous,” I said. “What if that miracle was the spirit of Gabriel Beck?”
“How?” asked Vanessa.
“All living things are intrinsically magical,” I said. “The magic gets released at the point of death.” Such as happens when the RAF drops a couple of thousand tonnes of high explosive on a town—evacuated or not. “And there was a natural connection between Beck and the child, because of what they both had in common.”
“Being buried alive,” said Vanessa.
We turned off the main road and headed into Ehrang, which certainly didn’t look any less dull from this angle than it had when I’d first seen it from the other side of the railway tracks.
“So was that guy Heinrich, or was he really Gabriel Beck pretending to be Heinrich?”
“I’m not sure, but if I had to guess I’d say he was Heinrich pretty much up to that day when he attacked Jacky Stracker.”
He called me “my love”, “my beauty”, “my precious one”. Like a friendly dog who suddenly bares his teeth.
“Then Jacky shoots him and he runs off,” I said.
And then what?
“Perhaps he dies up there by the Mariensäule,” I said. “If his body went over the cliff and into the forest he will never be found.”
“And then what?” said Vanessa. “He jumps into another person.”
“Maybe,” I said. “These things are rare and there’s a lot we don’t know.”
“Or perhaps he licks his wounds, bides his time and comes back with a different identity,” said Vanessa. “Perhaps Heinrich Brandt and Jonas Diekmeier are the same person.” Vanessa slowed looking for the turn-off.
“Diekmeier is twenty-nine,” I said. “Assuming Brandt is still alive, he’d be in his seventies.”
“Not if the revenant kept him young,” said Vanessa.
I was about to say that was far-fetched but really, if the evil spirit of Gabriel Beck could cause Brandt to survive a 9mm round to the chest why couldn’t it keep him young?
Heinrich Brandt’s old home was half a double house on a side road off Quinter Straße. Vanessa parked ten metres short so that we could approach quietly on foot.
“Assuming either that they’re the same or Beck sequestrated Diekmeier,” she said, “why does nothing happen for over thirty years?”
“I think Frau Stracker might be the trigger,” I said as we approached the front door.
Judging by the freshly varnished wood trim on the door frame and the clean windows, somebody was definitely living in the house. Still, K11’s inability to track down the current owner made us cautious—for all we knew, Heinrich Brandt was still in there nursing his bullet wounds. Which is why Vanessa automatically stepped to one side out of the immediate line of fire when I rang the doorbell.
Such precautions can save your life.
“So what are you saying?” said Vanessa, as we waited for an answer. “That the spirit of Gabriel Beck rose up because Jason Agnelli took a fancy to Jacqueline Stracker?”
“Pretty much,” I said, and rang the doorbell again.
“That’s way out,” said Vanessa.
There was a driveway to the side of the house and access to the back garden.
“Check round the back?” I asked.
“There’s somebody moving around inside,” said Vanessa.
I banged on the door with the flat of my hand.
“Hello,” I called. “Police. Open the door please.”
Magic is tricky and difficult to do. You assemble a spell out of components and that initial assembly creates a “sound” that you sense in the same manner you sense vestigia. Ordinary people wouldn’t notice it, but if you’re trained it’s as distinctive as the sound of someone working the slide on a pump-action shotgun.
“Down,” I shouted, and threw myself to the left.
There was a noise like ball bearings hitting a metal sheet—and the front door, most of the frame and chunks of the surrounding wall, exploded outwards.
Well, that answers that question, I thought. Dead or not, Gabriel Beck had retained his skills.
I rolled over and drew my pistol and covered the door as I scrambled to my feet. Checking right, I saw Vanessa take cover against the wall on the other side. Her face was calm but her eyes were a little wild. Police don’t get shot at very often, so I doubted she’d had much direct combat experience. Still, training counts for something because she had her pistol out and was checking around to ensure we weren’t flanked.
“Follow me in,” I said. “And stay behind me.”
She nodded and I braced myself to go through the door.
Too late.
We heard the sound of an engine revving. But before we could react, a blue VW Golf flew down the drive, fishtailed on to the road and accelerated away. I caught a glimpse of the driver—it was Jonas Diekmeier.
Vanessa was already running for the Duster and I followed, cursing under my breath.
As we established it later, Jonas Diekmeier had been using Heinrich Brandt’s old house as a second home. It was later speculated that the revenant Gabriel Beck had periodically seized control of Jonas’s mind so he could maintain control of the house and the finances and have the occasional night out on the town. No wonder Jonas didn’t think he had a social life. Gabriel was having it for him.
I arrived at the Duster in time to see the VW turn left on Quinter Straße and then had to hang on for dear life as Vanessa did a reverse into a J-turn and accelerated after it before I’d even got my door closed.
She slowed down as soon as we had the VW in sight. It’s bad policing to pressure a suspect vehicle when you’re pursuing it through a densely inhabited area. Most people will slow to a safe speed if they don’t think you’re going to catch up. Instead, your job is to keep eyes on the target while your control room sets up an intercept or a stinger team.
Only my phone was kaput. When I shook it, it made the faint rattling sound that indicated overexposure to magic. When I got Vanessa to hand me hers, I found it too was sanded. I hoped she didn’t have any sentimental selfies on it. This is why I keep a spare phone, but that was back in my own car.
“What about your police radio?” I asked as Vanessa accelerated after the VW.
“Inoperable,” said Vanessa. “I was planning to get it fixed today.”
We fo
llowed Jonas and the VW under the railway bridge onto Niederstraße. Ahead was the jagged red-brown tower of St Peter’s Church, and just before that the unfortunate Restaurant Eifel.
“Do you have a spare phone?” I asked.
“Back in the office,” she said. “What’s he doing?”
To our amazement the VW came to a complete halt outside the restaurant. Vanessa sped up to close the distance, but before we were twenty metres away Jonas accelerated off again. The Duster had been out of sight of the house and there was a chance he hadn’t associated it with the police. So we kept the separation at twenty metres and tried to look inconspicuous.
The road curved to the right into the Kyll valley proper and Vanessa asked where I thought he was going.
“I think he’s looking for Frau Stracker,” I said. “My guess is he’ll go for the winery next.”
“Then he’ll have to go up the Karrenbachtal,” she said.
“If you can get next to him in the clear,” I said, “I can stop his car.”
“Safely?” asked Vanessa.
“Just make sure it’s in the clear,” I said, and didn’t mention the high probability that the spell I used would wreck the electronic engine management of her own car. People get very sensitive about their personal vehicles.
Unsurprisingly, the Karrenbachtal runs up the valley of the Karrenbach—a tributary of the Kyll. Once you’re past the built-up area at the mouth you’re plunged into a shaded slot in the landscape. It sloped and was relatively clear of traffic, but Vanessa couldn’t get the Duster close enough for me to cast the spell. I might have risked a fireball, but we don’t cast them from moving vehicles for the same reason you never open fire from a moving vehicle. Not if you want to keep your job.
At the top of the valley, Jonas pulled a hard right on to an unmetalled lane that I recognised as leading to the winery. Vanessa closed the distance again—if he stopped, we wanted to be on top of him before he had a chance to react.
“I can protect both of us if you stay behind me,” I said. “If he gets a shield up there’s no point shooting at him. You’ll just be putting us at risk from ricochet.”
The VW bumped into the farmyard. I saw some of Frau Stracker’s workers staring as Jonas and then Vanessa and I actually skidded to a halt. Vanessa winced as she scraped the side of the Duster against the derelict farm wagon. I had my door open and was out before we stopped moving.
Jonas ran for the door down to the cellar and I followed. I’d have loved to let him enter and then barricade him inside, but there was too great a risk that Frau Stracker would be down there with him.
Momentum is critical when dealing with practitioners. Magic takes concentration, even for the malevolent spirits of the dead. For a successful capture you have to pile the pressure on, and never let them catch their balance.
So I went down the wooden stairs much faster than I would normally, with my pistol straight out in front of me.
“Gabriel Beck,” I shouted at the top of my voice. “You’re under arrest!”
I heard Vanessa following me down the stairs.
Gabriel Beck—or possibly Jonas Diekmeier, or most likely a combination of both—stopped halfway down the length of the cellar, next to the ranks of fermentation tanks, and turned to face us.
There was no sign of Frau Stracker, who I learnt later was a couple of fields away at the time. Jonas’s face was twisted into a frustrated snarl while I continued to shout at him to surrender as I closed the distance. Then he went suddenly expressionless and I sensed him putting together a spell.
In a classical wizards’ duel you’re supposed to respond by guessing what the spell is and casting a counter-spell or riposte. The Director has made it clear that while she regards me as a promising pupil, I am not to engage in such romantic frivolity.
“We’re not paying you to spar,” she said.
So when I saw Jonas’s fingers twitch and sensed the weird twist that signals a casting, I aimed my pistol at his centre mass and shot him three times in the chest.
A Sig Sauer P229 is lighter than a P38, but any firearm discharged in an enclosed space like a cellar is painful and, literally, deafening. Even so I distinctly heard the buzz of one of my own bullets as it ricocheted off Jonas’s shield and flew past my ear.
I lowered my pistol and flung up my own shield.
Just in time, because a fist-sized ball of lightning struck it at chest height and exploded—half blinding me. Gabriel Beck had been a master of the White Library and I’d been training for less than three years.
“Back up,” I yelled to Vanessa, and stepped back myself.
Jonas snarled and drew back his arm as if casting a javelin. I could see the air shimmer like a heat haze around his fist.
I backed up some more, but Vanessa stopped me with her hand on my left shoulder and her outstretched gun arm on my other shoulder.
I tried to shout Wait! But it was too late.
She fired once, twice.
A jet of water shot from the ruptured pipe above and behind Jonas, and hit him in the back of the head. It was, I explained, at length, later, a ridiculous thing to do. Apart from anything else, that jet of water could have missed, and occasionally I scare myself awake by dreaming about what might have happened if it had.
Still, it didn’t. And the cold water had the intended effect of breaking Jonas’s concentration. The spell in his hand fell apart and his shield started to collapse. I surged forward with mine still up and knocked him flat.
The water struck me in the back as I followed him down, but I wasn’t relying on my magic by then. I slapped him hard in the face to keep him distracted until Vanessa got to us. Together we rolled him, cuffed him, hauled him upright so that he got another face full of water and frogmarched him up the stairs out of the cellar.
There were blue lights flashing beyond the gate to the farmyard and somewhere behind the painful ringing in my ears, the rise and fall of sirens. Someone, probably one of Frau Stracker’s workers, had called the cavalry.
“Good work,” I told Vanessa.
“What?” asked Vanessa, mouthing the word so I could read her lips.
“Good work!” I shouted and she shrugged.
I waited for our hearing to return before giving her the lecture.
Chapter 13:
Recruitment
Drive
Special Circumstances have a special prisoner transport van which mostly gathers dust in their garage outside Wiesbaden. It consists of an iron box with a complex pattern of enchanted metal welded into the outside. It used to be padded on the inside but they ripped what was left of that out after a practitioner set it on fire in the 1960s. The iron box is known as “the bottle”, as in Djinn in a bottle, and is currently retrofitted on to a militarised Unimog truck and painted black because some bright spark thought that would make it less conspicuous. It took four hours to arrive after we called it in.
Four hours of Vanessa and me watching over Jonas Diekmeier while he demanded to know by what right we were holding him. He was very convincing, and it’s possible that the revenant spirit of Gabriel Beck had left his mind. Or, more likely, had submerged itself in the hope that we’d be foolish enough to let Jonas go—thinking him an innocent victim.
“But isn’t he an innocent victim?” asked Vanessa, once Jonas was safely in the bottle with Elton himself as a minder. My hearing was coming back by then, although anything above normal conversation was painful.
“There are proper procedures. All legal and tested in the courts,” I said. “Once he goes into the bottle it’s not our problem any more.” I sighed. “As long as we do the paperwork properly.”
“There’s paperwork for magic?” asked Vanessa.
“Not so glamorous now, eh?” I said.
Because there’s paperwork for everything, except perhaps spontaneous river goddess creation.
“She wants to go to kindergarten,” said Kelly.
I’d gone back to my hotel to find her waiting to
ambush me in my room. I didn’t ask how she’d got in—no doubt she just asked one of the staff to lend her a master key card.
“It was the revenant spirit of Gabriel Beck,” I said.
“Really?” Kelly shrugged. “Is he dead?”
“Taken care of,” I said.
“Fine,” said Kelly. “Now about kindergarten—”
“That’s it?” I asked, because her attitude seemed a bit too forgiving to be true.
“I settled that matter two hundred and fifty years ago, and since then my mother has become my daughter, and the German state has tried to kill me twice. But now it wants to be my friend. The world is turned upside down and Morgane wants to go to school.”
“Why not let her, then?” I asked.
“Oh yes, because that wouldn’t be a disaster,” said Kelly. “And when she puts the glamour on her teacher? Or has her new friends come round for a sleepover in the river?”
“You’ll have to teach her to fit in,” I said.
“But how?” asked Kelly.
“I am but a fleeting mortal,” I said. “You’re a goddess with the wisdom of the ages.”
“Not helpful,” she said.
“How do your precious London rivers do it?” I asked, which for some reason caused Kelly to laugh so hard she had to put out a hand to steady herself. I waited patiently for her to stop.
“What’s so funny?” I asked.
“You’re not my type,” she said, and refused to explain further.
Do you think she’ll listen to you?” asked the Director.
The Director looks taller than she is because of her long face and narrow shoulders and her habit of wearing ten centimetre heels in all environments that aren’t active combat zones. She’s very pale, dresses in red, and was currently wearing her hair in a bob that fitted her head like a helmet. She’d arrived that morning to debrief the upper echelons of the Trier Police so that they wouldn’t do anything foolish—like hold a press conference.
The October Man Page 14