The War in the Dark

by Nick Setchfield

  ‘How many of you bastards are there?’ asked Winter.

  ‘Communists?’

  ‘Demons. Though my side might argue they’re pretty much the same thing.’

  Immanuil closed Karina’s file. He brushed a small, smooth hand across the manila cover. ‘And you really believe that your side is above consorting with my species?’

  ‘Oh, you’re a species, are you? You make it sound like you belong in this world.’

  ‘And where, pray, should we belong?’

  ‘I imagine you belong in Hell.’

  Immanuil grinned, revealing a parade of milk teeth. ‘We make our own Hell, Mr Winter. Some of us are better architects than others.’

  Karina brought herself closer to the desk, her manner persuasive. ‘You have a nice situation here, Immanuil. You’ve found a way to coexist. And that’s good, given we usually try to kill or banish filth like you.’

  Immanuil gave a brief, boyish laugh. ‘You do try.’

  ‘But maybe the world’s going to change soon. Maybe there’s something on its way, something older and so much more powerful than you. Something that will shake up all our cosy little alliances. It’s going to come like a storm and rip through everything we have built, every nation, every empire. And when that happens I wonder what place there will be for your kind. For any of us.’

  Immanuil considered her words. ‘The Ascendance, you mean?’

  Karina nodded. ‘The Ascendance.’

  ‘I knew of Malykh’s mission. Your mission. I never imagined it was so close to completion. Have you truly found a way to summon them again, after all these centuries?’

  ‘I think we have. And I think that’s just what Malykh intends to do. God help us when he does.’

  Immanuil matched her gaze. The smile was gone. ‘I doubt God will hear you above the screams of his children.’

  The demon dismissed them. He gave a brisk order in Russian and the guards stepped forward, toting their guns. Winter and Karina stood up, scraping their chairs across the floor. They were led from the room at gunpoint.

  Winter glanced back as he reached the door. He saw Immanuil nudging the orderly line of pencils into an even neater row. He was singing, too, matching the melody on the radio with a high, surprisingly sweet voice.

  ‘We’re to be taken to the detention cells on level three,’ said Karina as they were marched down the corridor.

  Winter nodded. ‘I imagine we’re not going to see daylight for a while.’

  He looked down at his shirt. The heat had left swampy patches in the cotton. The smell of animal meat was still in his nostrils, inescapable.

  ‘God, this place. I think I’d prefer a Gulag.’

  Karina leaned in to him. ‘I know this building’s schematics.’

  ‘We can get out?’

  ‘Not easily. And not soon. I hope you have a taste for cat food.’

  She gave another of her ambiguous smiles.

  The corridor continued. Winter heard the pipes rumble and groan above them, water sluicing through the factory’s plumbing. There was a whisper of static, too, hissing from the radio grilles positioned at regular intervals along the ceiling. One of the speakers suddenly emitted a roar of white noise, as if someone had spun the volume dial while tuning into interference. The sound faded seconds later. There was an echo, almost subliminal.

  It sounded like a human voice.

  Winter realised something then. For all the heat of the building there was a distinct chill on his flesh. He could sense it on the nape of his neck, just between the collar and the hairline. It was like ice against the skin.

  Another growl of static. This time it came from the walkie-talkies pinned to the troopers’ tunics. The sound was harsh, brittle, metallic.

  They carried on walking.

  ‘The Ascendance,’ said Winter. ‘I take it these are the things that Harzner was dealing with?’

  Karina shook her head. ‘No. There are entire pantheons of demons, some more dependent on human worship than others. Whatever Dee and Kelly were summoning doubtlessly had their own agenda.’

  ‘Which is?’

  Karina quoted Kelly’s words. ‘They sought to claim our world, rule it with flame…’

  ‘Christ. Just give them the bomb and be done with it.’

  There was a thick set of fire doors ahead, the glass panels reinforced with wire mesh, just like the ones at the entrance to the building. As the escort party approached the doors Winter caught sight of their pale, blurred reflections. He saw what he assumed was his own face, distorted by the fluorescent light thrown on the glass.

  It was another face entirely.

  A shape tore itself out of the glass. It was the figure of a man, bare-chested, his almost transparent torso daubed with blood. The guards panicked, loosing bullets at the sudden apparition. The carbine cases spat and ricocheted in the narrow corridor.

  The shape moved at speed, plunging a hand into the face of the nearest soldier. Phantasmic fingers pierced the man’s skin, sinking knuckle-deep inside him, reaching beyond his eyes, into his skull. The fist tightened and the soldier screamed.

  Winter seized the opportunity. He snatched the gun from the guard and slammed the weapon’s butt into the man’s stomach. The trooper doubled up, crumpling to his knees. Karina kicked him across the jaw then spun her leg into the other Soviet soldier, her heel connecting with his crotch. As he tottered she aimed a hard, balled fist at his face, smacking him unconscious. The guards collided and fell to the floor in a heap of khaki, out cold.

  Winter stared at the translucent figure in the corridor. Even after all that he had encountered, all that he had seen, the rational part of his mind still rejected the sight in front of him. It was impossible to process.

  The spectral presence spoke.

  ‘All right, you prick?’

  Joe Griggs stood before them. His flesh shimmered, like seawater lit by luminescence.

  Winter struggled to form words. ‘How…? You’re… dead.’

  ‘I know: I’m a ghost, you daft twat. And no, I can’t explain. You don’t get a debrief. Not on this side.’

  ‘How did you find us?’

  ‘Been following you for a while. Turns out I can get around through radios and reflections. Tried to say hello in the gents, back in the village. You weren’t having it.’

  Winter continued to stare, mesmerised by the sight of his undead colleague. He saw the knife-slash at the man’s throat, viciously deep above the series of ritual shapes carved into his chest. The lacerations still looked fresh, the blood wet in the wounds, as if refusing to coagulate. They glimmered beneath the glare of the overhead lights.

  Winter extended a hand. He felt his fingertips turn cold.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said simply. ‘Christ, Griggs, I’m sorry.’

  ‘Yeah, well, you did stand by and let me die, you bastard. But that’s protocol, isn’t it? I’m not going to rattle my chains at you. Not that I’ve got chains or anything like that. God knows what I’ve got. I thought at least I wouldn’t still have these flamin’ wounds…’

  Griggs glanced at Karina, put out by the fact she was regarding him with what appeared to be professional fascination. ‘She on the level?’

  Winter nodded. ‘I trust her.’

  ‘Don’t trust no one, son. Amazing what a different perspective you get on the other side.’ He noticed Griggs’s voice had a remote, hollow quality, as if it was reaching them from somewhere deep and distant.

  Karina’s eyes flashed to Winter. ‘We need to go.’

  She knelt down and unhooked the keys from the belt of one of the troopers, then eased the man’s pistol from its holster and tossed it to Winter. She took the other guard’s gun for herself, her face full of distaste for the chunky, oily weapon. Clearly she missed her elegant blade.

  ‘She’s right,’ said Griggs. ‘Get going, mate. They’ll soon know something’s up. This place will be choked with Reds.’

  Winter hesitated, then began to follow K
arina down the corridor. He turned to look back. Griggs’s wraithlike form was beginning to fade beneath the harsh fluorescence.

  ‘What’s it like?’ he asked, softly.

  ‘What’s what like?’

  Winter gestured, uselessly. ‘This. You.’

  ‘One thing you’ve got to know,’ said Griggs. ‘You shouldn’t be afraid of it. Worse things to be than dead, I reckon. Now get going, you prick. Move yourself!’

  The figure dissolved. In seconds all that was left was a quiver of dust in the air.

  Winter and Karina ran. They moved deftly through the building’s shadows, keeping their footfalls as light as possible as they navigated a dim warren of doors, backstairs, empty service corridors and half-lit storage areas. Karina seemed to know the way. They almost encountered a pair of soldiers at one intersection but they flattened themselves against the wall and the moment passed with a mutual held breath.

  Finally they arrived at an outlying utility door. Karina spun the keys in her hand, jiggled a few in the heavy padlock, found the one that fit. The door opened into a whirl of snow that immediately turned to steam as it met the escaping heat of the building.

  There was a familiar sound in the sky. A steady beat of rotor blades, cleaving through the air. They looked up to see the helicopter climb away from the factory, its taillights winking as it banked into the night.

  ‘Malykh,’ said Karina. ‘Damn him!’

  Winter shielded his eyes from the flurry. ‘Where’s he heading? That place Kelly told us about?’

  ‘It has to be. He knows the place of summoning. He’s already on his way.’

  ‘And do you really not have a clue where it is? Come on, there must be something. What did Kelly call it? A place of water and stone and shadow, right?’

  ‘Where the stars wait,’ completed Karina. ‘I don’t know. It was said to be a sacred area. Somewhere holy, known to Dee.’

  ‘A church? A shrine? Where?’

  Karina rounded on him, all of her suppressed anger breaking now. ‘I don’t know, Christopher! I don’t know! We’ve searched for centuries!’

  Winter stared at her, startled by the emotion in her face. And then a thought occurred to him. A recent memory. He reached into his trouser pocket, dug into the cotton folds and found the coin that Kelly had thrown to him in Schattenturm. He lay it on his upturned palm. Flakes of snow blew across its surface.

  The face of a man, stamped into silver, his hands clasped together in penance or prayer.

  ‘May saints preserve us.’

  Karina peered at the coin. And then she smiled. And the smile broadened.

  A security klaxon sounded. A searchlight spun on the factory roof.

  They ran into the snow-swept dark.

  27

  The Trans Europ Express shone in the frost-bright morning.

  The sun swept its red and cream livery, playing along the sleek length of metal and glass. The train was heading south, to the edge of Germany, to her southernmost border, bounded by the Alps. It clung to the rails beneath imperious limestone peaks and lush green slopes, passing cold, wide lakes that had once been unassailable glaciers. The sky above the mountains was crystalline, the gift of Bavaria’s status as the bridge between Northern Europe and the warm Mediterranean countries.

  The train sped on, riding the electrified line, scattering a cluster of birds.

  Winter stirred in his seat, aware he had slipped into a slumber. The click of the wheels on the tracks was as regular as a heartbeat. It matched the rhythmic pounding of blood he heard in his temples, the familiar tattoo between sleep and waking. He opened his eyes and saw the craggy Alpine escarpments snap into focus, perfectly framed by the broad window of the compartment. Venetian blinds sliced the view.

  They had caught the dawn train at Augsburg, abandoning another stolen car in the early morning shadows of an alleyway. The rails, he knew, were the fastest way to reach their destination, an isolated region at the very brink of the map. Daltzenwalt. It was the only place they could go, Karina had reasoned, if the coin was truly the clue that Kelly had intended.

  ‘It’s the Basilica of Saint Cenric,’ she had told him, hours earlier, scrutinising the face on the coin. ‘It has to be. I know this representation of the saint. It’s also on a fragment of stained glass kept at the sacramental museum in Munich. I removed one of Dee’s texts from the same museum, years ago.’

  Malykh was already under way, of course, assuming he was heading to the same place they were. There was little hope of beating him there, even if that helicopter he was using would demand one – possibly two – pit-stops. An interception was the best they could hope for, and even that possibility felt increasingly fragile as the train continued to clatter past the Alps. The mountains were so huge that they barely seemed to recede in the window.

  Winter had succumbed to a shallow, unsettled sleep, turning over many thoughts. The death of Malcolm still nagged at him. The image of that ritually desecrated corpse in Belgravia was unshakable. Who was behind it? Who had sent that warning? He still suspected someone in British Intelligence rather than a foreign power or some outside interest. But who? And what was their agenda?

  Operation Magus. What was it?

  Usually he relished his status as part of the apparatus of government. It made him feel efficient. But God, he had so rarely asked questions of anyone. Not since his first kill. It had all been duty. And you didn’t question duty. Questions made cracks, and cracks grew. Cracks could grow until nations fell. Everyone in his line of work knew that.

  He moved his gaze from the window and studied Karina. She was sat across from him, leaning forward on the plush red seat, her body tight with concentration. There was a steak knife in her hand, liberated from the train’s dining carriage. He watched as she repeatedly scraped a block of flint along its serrations, attempting to sharpen it. The motion was methodical, her expression fixed. Occasionally a tiny spark would flash between the steel and the flint.

  ‘Why do you use a blade?’ he asked.

  She kept scraping. ‘Why do you use a gun?’

  ‘I was given a gun.’

  ‘I was given a blade.’

  Another spark spat from the knife.

  ‘You know what I mean,’ pressed Winter. ‘You clearly favour a blade. I can tell you’re lost without one. Why do you like them so much? I’m curious. Professionally. Indulge me.’

  Karina raised the knife, aligning it with her eyeline. She closed her left eye, inspecting the serrated edge in the clear light from the window. And then she carried on sharpening, striking the flint against the steel with even swifter strokes.

  ‘Do you feel anything when you kill someone?’ She asked the question lightly, almost casually.

  Winter considered this. ‘I try not to. But it’s inevitable, isn’t it? You take a life. You can’t ignore the size of that. You just can’t let it touch you.’

  ‘But it’s so easy with a gun. You pull the trigger. You fire the bullet. The bullet hits the body. The bullet takes the life. You disconnect. You’ve released yourself of the obligation.’

  ‘What obligation?’

  ‘The obligation to feel the truth of what you’ve just done.’

  Winter found himself bristling. ‘I know what I’ve done. Every time.’

  ‘You know what you’ve done, Christopher. But do you feel it?’

  ‘Of course I do. You feel it the moment you do it. The life that’s taken. The energy. Whatever it is behind the eyes. You feel it all right. You feel that theft. And yes, that’s a physical sensation, even with a gun, believe me. It’s like a hit of nausea. You have to absorb it. Catch it in your muscles. Move on.’

  Karina gave a half-smile. ‘I think you’re confusing it with recoil.’

  Irritated now, Winter let his breath escape between his teeth. ‘So what’s so superior about the blade?’

  Karina paused again to examine the knife. She spun the elegant rosewood handle in the air then tossed the pilfered blade from pal
m to palm, assessing its weight and efficiency. She seemed unimpressed.

  ‘It’s all about connection, Christopher. Connection and consequence. When I use a blade there’s no divide between me and my weapon. We’re all one thing. Me, my hand, the knife, the person I’m hurting, the life I might be taking. Nothing separates us. Nothing insulates me. We’re one.’

  Winter was unconvinced. ‘What is that?’ he smirked. ‘Buddhist bullshit?’

  Karina tilted her head, shook a stray lock of hair from her eyes. The light from the window struck her skin, accentuating the pale scar tissue that ran between her brow and her cheek.

  ‘Think whatever you want,’ she said and carried on sharpening. For a moment the steady rasp of the knife was the only sound in the compartment.

  ‘Who gave you that? The scar? If you don’t mind me asking.’

  She didn’t look up. ‘My family.’

  Winter stared at her, unnerved by how easily she’d given the answer. The revelation seemed so nonchalant, so matter-of-fact. She might as well have told him the name of her first pet. ‘How do you mean? Your family?’

  ‘I had many cousins in the house in Valencia. No brothers, no sisters. Just cousins. All of us were there that summer. Rafael was being taught the truth of the blade. And so was I.’

  ‘He did that to you?’

  ‘He had to know how it felt. So did I.’

  ‘How old were you?’

  ‘I was six. He was five.’

  ‘And there were adults there? Making you do this?’

  ‘Of course. We were raised by the Order.’

  Winter shook his head, repelled. ‘Jesus. That’s cruelty.’

  Karina pondered this. ‘It’s education.’

  Winter watched as she continued to file the steak knife. He tried to see a trace of that wounded child.

  ‘You know what I think,’ he began. ‘I think you don’t feel anything at all.’

  She raised an eyebrow. ‘Please. Do enlighten me further. I’m sure your insights are first rate.’