‘Of a kind. It’s called the Hollow. It’s outside of our world. Outside our senses. Just like Heaven or Hell. Think of it as Purgatory, only no one’s waiting for judgement in there. In fact no one’s waiting for anything at all.’
Once again Winter felt his head lurch. Karina said these things in such an infuriatingly matter-of-fact manner, as if she was explaining sunsets or gravity to a child. So now he had to accept that Heaven and Hell were real, did he? The remains of his rational mind – the part that had let him kill men in the name of his country – flinched at the thought. The rest of him surrendered to it. He had seen so much already. The sane world was smashed anyway. There was plenty of room for God and the Devil in its ruins.
‘Why did we lock her away?’
Malykh pressed his black knife against Winter’s ribs. ‘Stop talking.’
Father Katsworth had his eyes open now. His skin was slick with sweat. It pooled in his pores, giving him the look of a pale dead fish in a dog collar. He was snatching icy lungfuls of air, desperate for breath. The Bible had almost been crushed in his hands. The leather binding was split, ripping through the gold-leaf cross on the cover. The priest gripped it as he watched the woman approach, and there was something uncomfortably close to fear in his eyes.
‘Christ the Redeemer preserve us,’ he muttered, forcing the words through his teeth even as he struggled to breathe.
The woman joined them. She had a distinctive scent, powerfully sweet, like marzipan or decay. Her skin was waxy, the colour of milk, seeming all the more bloodless against her black clothes. Winter peered through the veil that obscured her features, searching for her eyes. There was no flash of white behind the lace, only a suggestion of something impenetrably dark.
She smiled, and her teeth were tiny and sharp, like a kitten’s. ‘Hello, Tobias,’ she said.
It took Winter a moment to realise that the demon was speaking to him.
17
Winter frowned at the woman. ‘Tobias?’ he repeated, blankly. ‘That’s not my name.’
The Widow of Kursk extended a hand wrapped in a kidskin glove, studded with a pearl at the wrist. She swirled a lean finger on Winter’s lapel, stroking the weave of the tweed. It was a strangely playful gesture. Familiar, even.
‘Are you pretending not to know me, Tobias? How hurtful.’
Her eyes were like black marbles behind the lace. They reminded Winter of the dead gaze of porcelain dolls in Victorian nurseries. Even up close he found it impossible to estimate how old the woman was. Twenty? Forty? Sixty? She could have been any age. There was something unnervingly timeless about her.
‘I don’t know you,’ he insisted. ‘We’ve never met. And my name is not Tobias.’
The name felt curious on his lips, though. Tobias. As he said it aloud for the second time it seemed to prick a memory. It was the faintest shimmer of recognition but it was there, and it disturbed him. It felt like a half-remembered snatch of melody, something he’d once known.
He could hear Malcolm’s fingers on the broken piano in that bombed-out ballroom in Knightsbridge. A nightingale sang… That handful of discordant notes played in his mind.
The woman smiled at Winter. ‘Tobias! Always such mischief with you! Such games!’
She took her hand from Winter’s jacket. And then she lifted her veil, just a fraction, exposing wire-thin lips that were almost as pale as her skin. She extended her tongue and let it curl, tasting the night air.
‘So much grief in this little world,’ she declared, letting the lace fall again. ‘Grief and loss and hurting. Everywhere! Such a tang. I’d almost forgotten.’
Winter glanced at Karina, wanting to share a look. But Karina had her gaze fixed on the Widow. It was like she was keeping watch on a cornered scorpion.
Malykh stepped forward. He gave a terse, military bow. ‘I am Colonel Pavel Timurovich Malykh of the First Chief Directorate of the Committee for State Security. The motherland welcomes you home.’
Winter thought he caught a trace of discomfort in Malykh’s voice. He certainly seemed to be wary of the demon’s presence.
The Widow regarded the Soviet officer, unimpressed. ‘Oh, are you tedious Stalinists still ruling Russia? Pity. I had so much more fun under the tsars. Tell me, Colonel, are we at war again? Will there be mourning? I am thirsty for mourning.’
‘We are not openly at war,’ said Malykh. ‘But we have ideological enemies. We’re trading with the British tonight.’
The demon regarded Winter again, a slit of a smile playing behind her veil. ‘So, you have earned me my freedom, Tobias. Your country must want you very much indeed. I’d be flattered, if I were you. My deliverance is a considerable price for any nation to pay.’
Winter frowned at her, nonplussed. ‘Why do you keep calling me Tobias?’
‘Why do you keep denying it’s your name?’
‘This is Christopher Winter,’ interjected Malykh, with a flash of irritation. ‘He is a British intelligence operative. A crude gunman. A man of no true consequence.’
The Widow hissed through her teeth. ‘Be careful you do not insult me, Colonel. I would not be traded for a man of no consequence.’
‘Of course not,’ stated Malykh, flatly.
The demon returned her attention to Winter. ‘Oh, Tobias,’ she smiled, her black eyes gleaming behind the lace. ‘You always did confound them, didn’t you? Never one to be documented and filed away. It’s why I always found you so very appealing. The brightest butterflies can never be pinned.’
Winter shook his head in exasperation. ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about, whoever the hell you are. Let’s just get this over with, shall we?’
‘We should conclude the exchange,’ said Malykh, briskly. ‘We have an agreement.’
Winter felt the Russian withdraw the knife at his ribs. And then the officer took a small key from his trenchcoat pocket and unlocked the cuffs. Winter kneaded his wrists, keen to stimulate the blood flow. His hands felt colder than ever in the raw Hungarian air.
‘One moment,’ said the Widow, imperiously. She turned her veiled gaze to Father Katsworth, still standing there with the crumpled Bible in his hand. ‘I remember you, dear priest.’
The elderly clergyman shifted as she approached him, rising on his heels. He did his best to set his face into a fearless expression. A sheen of sweat still clung to him, his pores reflecting the moonlight.
The demon’s voice had a coquettish lilt to it now. ‘But then how could I ever forget my jailer?’
She carried the aroma of rotting flowers, rich and sickly. The priest’s face wrinkled, betraying his revulsion.
‘I’m surprised you remember,’ said Katsworth, as calmly as he could. ‘It’s been nearly fifteen years.’
There was a black flash behind the veil. ‘Time is not as you know it in the Hollow, Father. I have only known thirst. A thirst that did not require the passage of years to grow more profound. It was a thirst I imagined I would never sate. Even if I was free, would there ever be enough grief in this little world to sate it?’
‘You’re a bloody monster,’ said Katsworth, spitting his words. ‘You belong in Hell.’
‘But surely God will forgive me? Doesn’t he forgive everyone? Isn’t that the way it works? I’m sure that’s what the carpenter said…’
‘I want to believe there are no limits to God’s love,’ replied the priest, fighting to keep his tone measured. ‘But creatures like you make me doubt the reach of his mercy.’
‘You make me feel very special,’ said the Widow. She gave a smile like ashes in a grate. ‘Now tell me. Who is there to mourn you?’
Katsworth fell silent. He kept his eyes on the woman but his jaw tremored, faintly.
‘Surely there’s someone in the world? Someone who would cry for you? It can’t be only God who loves you, surely?’
‘The Lord is my shepherd,’ said Katsworth. ‘I’ll not want. He makes me down to lie.’ The words sounded like a protective incantation.
‘We don’t have time for this. We need to exchange.’
‘Please, Colonel. Indulge me. It won’t take a moment. I can’t imagine he’ll put up much of a fight. And we won’t harm the dear man.’
Malykh walked forward with an air of reluctance. Sighing, he took the priest’s head in his hands, sliding his fingers through the snowy hair to clasp the old man’s skull. For a moment Katsworth continued his recitation. ‘In pastures green, he leadeth me, the quiet waters by…’
And then he stumbled on the words of the prayer. They became broken, guttural, a random collection of sounds in the clergyman’s throat. The milky whorl of Malykh’s iris started to swirl. The priest stared back, his eyes widening as the Russian’s grip tightened. Malykh sunk his nails into the mottled scalp.
‘For Thou art with me,’ intoned Malykh, ‘and Thy rod and staff my comfort still…’
Katsworth’s mouth hung wide, saliva running from his tongue. His pupils matched the movements of Malykh’s own, darting in parallel.
Winter looked on, remembering Malykh’s assault on his own mind. He moved to intervene but a soldier pressed a gun muzzle against the small of his back.
‘Toasted bread,’ said Malykh, as if peeling the words from the man’s skin. ‘Toasted bread and a kind of sweetness… you call it jam. A fruit… damson. From the tree in the garden. It is your favourite. The clock in the kitchen is old, and slow, but these evenings it barely matters, for she is with you, and you don’t notice the hours when she is with you. She’s always made you forget them.’
‘A wife?’ asked the Widow, eagerly. ‘Let me know her name.’
The tips of Malykh’s fingers dug even harder into the priest’s temples. Katsworth stared back at him, emptily.
‘Harriet,’ said the two men, in unison, one voice firm, the other broken.
Malykh finally released the clergyman’s head. It lolled backwards, the eyes fighting to regain focus.
‘Harriet,’ said the demon. ‘Not the prettiest name. But she will stand by your grave and grieve like a good Christian wife. Her sorrow will fill me.’
Katsworth glared at her. Breathless, his bloodshot eyes fierce behind his glasses, he found words. ‘Goodness and mercy all my life shall surely follow me. And in God’s house…’
With a quick, curiously eel-like motion the Widow of Kursk rammed a hand into the man’s mouth. Her knuckles shattered his teeth on impact. She twisted her wrist, the pearl stud of the glove twinkling as she tore the tongue from his throat. She held it like a prize, the severed lingual artery spouting a futile gush of blood. Katsworth collapsed to his knees in front of her, catatonic with shock.
‘I did ask him not to bore me,’ the creature declared, casually.
Winter felt an overwhelming rush of disgust. He pushed towards the woman before the troopers could restrain him.
‘What the hell did you do that for?’ he yelled. ‘There was no need!’
The demon raised her other hand, demanding silence. The moment was held. A second later the clergyman’s head burst apart in a volley of blood and bone.
The Widow gave a jagged little smile behind her lace. ‘Sweet Tobias. Do you really have no stomach for this anymore?’ She tossed the tongue to the ground.
Malykh placed himself between Winter and the demon. ‘Enough!’ he said, addressing the Widow. ‘This is not why we are here! We have an agreement with the British! You have violated it!’
‘I have no agreement, Colonel,’ the Widow spat. ‘I never agreed to be held in that empty, hungry place. And why, I wonder, did it take you so long to deliver me from my exile? One might almost imagine that such an arrangement suited Mother Russia.’
She cast a black glance at the sentry tower. A young guard flung himself over the edge of the turret and smashed into the wet earth below. He lay there, face down, limbs splayed, a final exhalation of breath bubbling in the mud. The Widow ran her tongue over her taut lips. It was a repellently sensual motion.
‘Perhaps my country cannot forgive me for the acts I committed in her name? Perhaps she now considers them cruelties? Time changes perspective for you animals, I’m told. Mine’s quite the same, I assure you.’
She turned her gaze to a military jeep parked at the edge of the great fence. The demon tilted her jaw and the vehicle rose into the air, wheels spinning and a door flapping open. There were two soldiers inside. They had no chance to escape before it was hurled into the thick wire mesh, triggering a fusillade of sparks that lit up the dark with a bright violence of electricity. The ozone spice of voltage filled the air.
‘I helped you to level Berlin,’ declared the woman, proudly. ‘I drank that city’s grief and it was sweet.’
‘Stop this!’ insisted Malykh. His fingers were tight around the hilt of his obsidian knife.
‘No, Colonel,’ said the creature. ‘I demand my sustenance.’
A bullet ripped through the earth at Winter’s feet. He stumbled backwards as a second bullet followed it, slicing through the soil. Glancing up he saw that one of the tower guards had levelled a rifle. Another had drawn a revolver. Further shots came, studding the mud, clearly aimed with anger rather than precision. The sentries were shooting blindly, wildly.
Winter knew how vulnerable he was on the empty plain. The only available cover lay in the shadows under the watchtower’s turrets – and chancing that direction would take him even closer to the guns.
He looked towards the British contingent. Faulkner was running, his coat gusting behind him as he was hustled to the Jaguar by the protective bulk of a secret service man. The car’s headlights flared, its engine snarling impatiently in anticipation of escape. The other agent held his position, his gun anchored in a precise two-handed grip. The man took a pre-emptive shot at the watchtower, winging a guard in the shoulder. He was met with a rapid return of gunfire that forced him to fall back to the car.
Only then, as the agent was illuminated by the headlights, did Winter recognise the man. He had fought with him on the stairs in Belgravia, the night that he had found Malcolm’s body.
It had to be him: the weight, the height, the surly confidence in the face, they all matched. Winter had never encountered the man in all his years in SIS. And yet here he was tonight, working security detail for the head of the service. Who was he? Did he really answer to Faulkner? Or did he have another agenda, another master?
Two more British agents leapt from the idling van. They squatted by the doors, angling them into makeshift shields as the Jag roared a retreat behind them. Their handguns thumped. The man positioned by the left-side door took out one of Malykh’s men with a brisk, efficient shot. The trooper fell close to Winter, pitching into the sludge. Malykh sheathed his knife, snatched his semi-automatic from his holster and blasted back. He abandoned Winter and ran to the shelter of the tower, evading a chain of shots.
It was a chaos of bullets now, all sides trading fire as the Widow of Kursk stood untouched and delighted in the centre of it all. Winter had planned to scramble through the crossfire towards his countrymen. Now he froze. Perhaps he’d be safer taking his chances with the Russians.
He needed a gun. He half slid towards the fallen trooper and – cursing the lack of holster on the man’s belt – tore the tunic open. The soldier was still alive, staring up at him with young eyes. It was the boy who had given him cigarettes. He wore a white cotton singlet beneath the khaki. It was clammy and dark. Chest wound. Winter located a gun strapped to his shoulder. A small, snub-nosed revolver, a weaker gun than he wanted. It would have to do. He plucked it out, his fingers wet with the boy’s blood. The soldier’s eyes continued to track him even as his breathing cracked and faded.
The gun was booted from his hand. A fist followed, smashing into Winter’s cheekbone and sending him sprawling to the ground. It was another of Malykh’s troops, a thickset man with ove
rsized hands. Winter struggled to rise, the mud sucking at his elbows. He saw his opponent unbutton his jacket and take out his own gun. The trooper trained the weapon on Winter and coiled a broad finger around the trigger.
A reed-thin blade skewered the man’s windpipe.
The soldier crumpled, rasping, his hands clawing at his punctured throat. Behind him stood Karina. She withdrew the blade with a swift, surgical motion.
‘I make that the third time,’ she said. ‘Don’t you?’
Winter glowered at her. ‘Christ, who’s counting?’
He pulled himself to his feet and retrieved the gun that had been kicked from his grip.
‘You know you just killed one of your own?’
Karina shrugged. ‘He’s not exactly one of my own.’
‘What do you mean he’s not one of your own? He’s in your bloody army, isn’t he?’
‘We need to go, Christopher. We need to go now.’ There was an unexpected urgency in her voice.
‘We? We need to go? Since when is this we?’
Karina glanced behind her. ‘Since the moment I killed that man.’
Winter knew there was no time to debate this. He turned and began to walk at speed, heading for the motorcycles waiting behind them, their engines idling. ‘Come on, then,’ he hissed to her.
He spun the gun in his hand and used its slab of a handle to cold-cock one of the riders. The man tumbled from the bike’s seat, eyes rolling into unconsciousness behind his goggles. Winter caught the bike before it fell and hauled himself onto it, wrapping his thighs around its wide, brawny chassis. He felt the engine quiver like a constrained animal, its vibrations filling his bones.
The other rider simply stared at him, lifting his hands from his handlebars in a clear gesture of compliance. Winter knew without looking that Karina had her blade pointed in his general direction.
‘Get on!’ he told her.
She straddled the bike to ride pillion. As her arms encircled his chest Winter pulled the clutch in and slammed his left foot down, knocking the bike into first gear. The engine responded with an eager growl.
The War in the Dark Page 13