by Dmitry Bilik
My day ended late. By then, even my apparently deaf neighbor had already turned off his blazing TV and the motion sensor lamp under my window had gone out. The courtyard was quiet now: this kind of weather wasn’t clement for outdoor entertainment. Finally, the snow came bucketing down. I lay in the dark, just thinking about everything and nothing. I didn’t even notice myself dozing off. That’s why I believed everything that happened afterward to be reality.
I was standing on one side of a busy wide street packed with traffic. People were walking past without even noticing me: all of them commoners hurrying about their own apparently important business. Still, it wasn’t them who attracted my attention.
Three men stood on the opposite side of the road: three Seekers, their faces concealed by hoods.
Instinctively — either through Intuition or just some gut feeling — I knew I had to join them. But how was I supposed to do that? The road was so busy that there was no way I could cross it. There were no traffic lights or pedestrian crossings anywhere in sight. And the three Seekers didn’t look as if they were going to wait forever for me to get my act together.
I stepped forward, only to be rammed by a yellow cab. It hit my leg, threw me onto the hood and then down onto the road.
As I lay on the tarmac, I realized that I could actually wind back time. Still, my ability didn’t work.
“Are you all right?”
I felt somebody’s hands help me to my feet. Apparently, it was the cab driver.
“I’m okay,” I tried to focus my blurred vision on his face. Everything was swimming in front of me, all I could see was a big white spot hovering before me.
A white spot?
The realization struck me too late. My vision came back into focus a mere second before he hit me. It was Morbian standing in front of me: slightly worse for wear but happy in a bloodthirsty way. His grin turned into a grimace, his face becoming a black waxen mask. The Dark Avatar.
Then I realized that the cab wasn’t a cab at all: it was an enormous snapdrake carrying a large bundle on its back. All this had taken me a split second to take in.
“It won’t take long,” the masked Morbian said, burying his fist in my chest.
I woke up gasping for breath like a winded boxer. It felt as if I’d actually been punched in the solar plexus. I ran my hand over my sweat-drenched hair, wiped the perspiration from my temples and peered out the window where a scarlet dawn was breaking, cold and uncaring. It knew that today two Seekers would be locked in mortal combat — but it didn’t seem to give a damn.
Once I’d regained my breath, I calmed down, picked up my phone and dialed Arts.
“Yes?” her sleepy unhappy voice demanded. “What’s up?”
“It’s today.”
“What’s today?”
“It’s gonna happen today. Morbian is already quite close. I know now where he’s gonna come from. I want you to listen carefully. This is what you need to do.”
“I’m listening,” she replied, immediately wide awake.
I took the next five minutes to unhurriedly explain to her everything she had to do — without actually revealing all of my plan to her.
Chapter 31
THE MORNING IS HARDLY a prerequisite of a good mood. Especially in winter, when you have to get ready for work in the dark, fry a few eggs and drink a boiling-hot, sickly-sweet cup of tea or instant coffee, moving on autopilot because your mind just refuses point blank to wake up. You turn the TV on, only to see the same old grim news anchors forcing a semblance of a smile as they wish you a “good morning”.
My day began anxiously with this half-prophetic dream. Still, by the time I sat in my kitchen just in my boxers, I was already in a relatively good mood. The yolks in my eggs were nice and sloshy and the whites themselves well done. Together with a few slices of ham, it all went down great. I wasn’t at all scared or panicky about meeting the Horseman; just a bit jittery like a substitute player coming on in a football match. It wasn’t that hard to overcome.
I made myself look presentable, brushed my unkempt hair — it was high time I did something about it, — and got dressed. Then I checked my entire inventory, weighing up the most important weapons I intended to use in the upcoming battle.
Just as I walked out the door, I remembered Hunter and our regular morning sessions. I pulled out my phone and typed in a quick message, telling him I wouldn’t be able to come.
The answer arrived almost straight away:
Very well. Good luck.
I chuckled. Talk about keeping a secret that every barber knows! On the other hand, I would have been surprised if Hunter hadn’t known about it.
I dropped a quick “Bye” to Bumpkin and left. I’d already decided not to upset him or make him anxious about the day’s events.
The morning was remarkably sunny and warm. The city was gradually coming back to life after last night’s snowstorm. Street cleaners were scrubbing pavements with their shovels, snow-cleaning machines moved slowly along; schoolkids were throwing snowballs. Recently, I’d been constantly in a hurry, rushing around in cabs, too impatient to resolve all sorts of problems and find all sorts of answers; but today I wanted to take a leisurely stroll to the bus stop. I still had loads of time before seeing Arts.
I pulled a bundle of earbuds out of my pocket and unwound them, then pressed the Play button, setting it to Random, and clicked on the next song. It turned out to be The World Ain't Slowin' Down by Ellis Paul. Good choice. I even smiled, repeating after the singer: “You gotta get gone, you gotta get going”...
Professor walked past, his tipsy arm draped around a plumber I knew. The two must have been heading for yet another “symposium”. Uncle Zaur waved to me from his little kebab joint by the crossroads, standing in the doorway cigarette in hand. Even the saleswoman from the corner shop gave me a long angry look, apparently trying to figure out where she’d seen my face before.
At which point I broke into a run seeing the bus I needed approaching the stop. I made it just in time; I paid and took a seat.
By then, my earbuds were buzzing with the sweet strains of Patti Page singing about the raindrops falling on her head as the snowed-in sunlit city flashed past the window. The bus was half-empty, the streets deserted. It was a weekend, wasn’t it? Everybody was sleeping in before embarking on the mandatory shopping trip, followed by strolls in the park and trips to the skating rink.
It felt so nice and peaceful here. They could say what they wanted about Cesspit being the asshole of the universe but it was one hell of a good place. I really didn’t want to die.
I noticed Arts through the bus window. Clever girl. She’d taken a place by the door even though it meant that she had to stretch her neck just to see out of the high café windows.
The café — or restaurant as it proudly announced itself — had been chosen for a reason. It was situated on Heroes Avenue, just next to Moscow Highway and only a stone’s throw away from Burnakov Drive which we might have to use as an escape route.
From last night’s conversation with Arts I’d found out that both the Order of Drivers and their flyback stables were situated on the airport’s grounds. Which was quite handy really because commoners perceived any mounts taking off as airplanes. That’s where Morbian was supposed to arrive from (first by flyback and then by snapdrake). And that’s exactly where Arts must have been today, judging by her beautiful proud mount which was lying by the roadside only a few yards away from the café entrance.
“You’re a beauty,” I said, stroking the animal’s neck. “Still, you’d better stealth up. You do understand me, don’t you?”
The creature snorted, shook his head and began to vanish before my very eyes.
I took out the true mirror just to check out what exactly the commoners could see: an empty roadside or some kind of creature instead. A bog-standard Skoda was parked up in his place. Did that mean that invisibility was something only Seekers could use? How interesting.
The café — or
restaurant — had only one room. Its columns were inlaid with decorative stones, heavy burgundy drapes lined with lacy undercurtains, and two fake crystal chandeliers were hanging from the ceiling.
Arts was sitting on a leather-covered bench with her elbows up on a little square table. Unsurprisingly, we seemed to be the only customers: it was too early for lunch and indecently early for the happy hour, so Arts was nursing a cup of espresso.
“A glass of your best unfiltered draught beer,” I said to a waiter who materialized next to me.
Arts gave me a disdainful look. The waiter, however, didn’t show any reaction, probably thinking I was just yet another hungover patron on the mend. Then again, if you remembered how commoners viewed me, a bottle of vodka could easily kill someone of my seemingly puny appearance, and a few beers could do me some serious damage.
“I always dreamed of starting the day with a beer,” I said.
“As long as you don’t end it in the gutter.”
“That entirely depends on a certain horseman we both know. Have you brought what I asked you to?”
“Sure. A powerful stun spell like you want requires an Eh’rgh rune. Here, take a look.”
She produced an elongated flat rock with sharp edges. I could make out some writings — or maybe pictograms — covering its surface but I couldn’t quite figure out what it was. I didn’t dare take it from her — you never know with these things, it just might explode or something. It’s better to ask first.
“How does it work?”
“You show me the right place, and I’ll install it there myself. It works on any Player whatsoever. The moment he steps on it, it’s gonna blow sky high. It’s perfectly safe for commoners. The only problem is, I’m not sure whether it can kill Morbian, or even do him any serious damage.”
“That’s not what we want. We just need it to go off, that’s all. I’d like you to set it up right by the entrance to this ‘respectable’ joint.”
She nodded and walked out of the café. The waiter followed her with some suspicion, to which I replied as nonchalantly as I could,
“She’s just gone for a smoke.”
I peered out the window, watching what she was doing. Admittedly, I was curious. I couldn’t see much from where I was: I had to really crane my neck in order to catch anything.
Arts passed her hand over the rock, resembling an experienced UFOlogist trying to divine the information encrypted in an alien artifact. She crouched and did the same to the café’s front door step. Then she discarded the rock and came back inside.
“So how can a Stun rune help us defeat Morbian?” she asked.
“It won’t help us defeat him, no. But what it’ll do, it’ll make him really pissed. We could have gone directly to the place we’d chosen, but that way he’d know straight away that it was a setup. And there’s no knowing what he might do then. What I really want is for him to follow us wherever we take him, without any hesitation or doubt. And the only way I see to make him do that is by making him really angry.”
“Okay. But why here, of all places?” Arts swept her hand around the café as if doubting my choice.
“Easy. Morbian is going to arrive on a flyback. Then he’ll hire a snapdrake and rush headlong to meet me, using the information he’s gleaned from the Grand Master.”
“Can’t he just use the Gates?”
“He could. But he won’t. Not because the Gatekeepers would mind so much. They don’t give a damn. But community guards might want to have a word with him. I don’t really know which side packs a better punch — but he won’t want to risk it, that’s for sure. The first time we met him he was riding a flyback, remember? That’s why I’m pretty sure he’s gonna do the same now. Although I can’t really tell which route he’s gonna take, I’d probably bet on him taking Lenin Avenue first, from where he’ll turn off into Komsomol Highway. But that’s really not important.”
“What is, then?”
“Just that he gets here. This place is far enough away from Players’ usual routes. Which is exactly why the rune trap won’t spring prematurely. And secondly, here we have a perfect escape route, following Burnakov Drive to Sormovo Route. And then it’s all down to us.”
“You still haven’t told me quite how you’re gonna kill him. Making a lion angry is a great idea, provided you’ve got a gun in your hand. Have we got one?”
I smiled. “Not a gun, no. A grenade.”
She didn’t get the chance to ask me anything else, just opened her eyes wide and pointed out the window. I turned to take a look, belatedly regretting not having finished my beer. Trust the Horseman to ruin our pleasant morning in the café.
My earlier dream had proven to be almost perfectly correct. Morbian was sitting proudly astride a panting snapdrake. Behind him, the unconscious body of a Seer dangled from the saddle, bound hand and foot. A stupid and highly inappropriate thought flashed through my head: I wondered what the victim looked like through commoners’ eyes and whether they could see him at all.
The Horseman looked regally impressive, reminding me of Thranduil from the books of the great Tolkien. His cold regular features betrayed no emotion; his watchful prickly gaze filled every onlooker with dread. His lean sinewy body was so precise in its movements as if he were a coiled spring about to unwind.
He dismounted unhurriedly, walked over to check on the Grand Master lying listlessly across the saddle, then returned to his snapdrake and looked him in the eye without saying a word. The snapdrake shook his head as if nodding his agreement.
“He’s a Tamer,” Arts whispered.
I might have asked her what it was supposed to mean but my tongue felt frozen, refusing to cooperate. Because at that very moment, Morbian was looking directly at me, right into my eyes.
I didn’t like his smile.
Arts pulled my hand down. “He’s gonna enter now.”
“It’s time, then,” I took some money out of my wallet.
By now, the waiter couldn’t take his eyes off us. I waved the bill in the air, then put it down on the table and placed my beer mug on it. I then forced myself to my feet even though everything within me screamed out for me to duck and promptly waddle over to the back door while I still could. Arts too looked as if she would love to part company with Morbian as quickly and safely as possible.
No such luck.
I cast two Mantles on myself, knowing they would be highly inadequate. Then I took a deep breath and walked over to the front door. By then, the Horseman was already a few mere paces away. All that stood between us was a flimsy white-plastic shop door. I could make out his grinning face through the double glazing as he reached for the door handle and took yet another step.
Strangely enough, there was no explosion. Morbian was just thrown up into the air like a rag doll. As he flew, I watched his protection sphere crumble into a shower of yellow flashes. This must have been some magic analog of my Mantle. And once he crashed down onto the road, I saw blue sparks flying off him.
“Arts — now!”
We must have looked like a bobsleigh team once they’d fully accelerated and were now hurrying to take their places in the sleigh. The only difference being, we had our snapdrake instead. The poor creature was so scared he’d even unstealthed, becoming perfectly visible. I leapt into the saddle, winding the reins around my hand, while Arts clung to my back lacing her arms around the place where my waist should have been.
I turned around one last time to check on Morbian. Cars were stopping all around him as helpful motorists rushed to administer first aid. Morbian was slowly coming round. He heaved himself up onto his elbow, looking around blurrily. I paused, waiting for him to catch sight of us, then dug my heels into my snapdrake’s shiny black flanks.
The race had begun.
I moved in an energetic trot past all the cars, catching the drivers’ surprised stares. Of course. Even in this warmup mode, my snapdrake could beat any SUV hands down. It must have felt really embarrassing to be overtaken by a battered o
ld Skoda as if you didn’t move at all. And that was with me trying to rein the beast in. We didn’t want Morbian to lose us before we wanted him to.
After a brief while, he finally caught up with us. His face was distorted with fury even though he didn’t look as if he’d come to any serious harm. The only thing that had suffered when the rune had gone off was his ego — but that was well enough to make him want to flatten us into the tarmac.
As soon as I saw him, I spurred my snapdrake on. The cars around us had now turned into blurred lines, as did the traffic lights in our way. The road in front of us was reduced to a series of white markings which my mount expertly navigated to undertake any slower cars only to return to the fast lane.
The chase filled me with adrenaline even though I realized that Morbian would never be able to catch up with me, provided he didn’t cheat. His own snapdrake had already traveled all the way from the airport. It might not sound like a great distance but he’d already broken into a sweat while our own mount was just warming up.