“Have you got nobody faster?” Martin asked.
Over the next two hours they sent fourteen more against him, and they all were sent to the final death, although the thirteenth nearly managed to reach Martin’s neck. The crowd roared and stomped their feet, sending the torches trembling, but Martin managed to punch the Other hard in the face and gain himself a second. It was time enough to put the snare to use once more. He tossed the head towards the platform, but he was weakening and it fell short.
“It is nearly time, my cub,” the Boy-King said. “It would be best if you joined us of your own free will.”
“Never,” Martin said, and spat in the dust at his feet. There was blood in his spittle and he feared that something was broken inside him.
The fourteenth managed to knock him over. It raised a foot to stave in Martin’s ribs...and the wolf in him rose up, faster than thought and completely unbidden. He grabbed the foot and pulled the Other to the ground where he tore its throat out with his teeth. He howled his fury to the sky...and the Boy-King clapped his hands in glee.
Martin threw himself forward. He could smell them. Even above the stench rising from the gathered throng he could pick out their individual scent ...the betrayer, the daughter of Campbell, and the leader of the Others. He leapt onto the pedestal, intent on tearing and gouging...and his legs gave way beneath him as a grip took hold of his mind.
“Quiet, my pup,” the Boy-King said in his mind. Martin felt the thick hairs rise on his arms once more, and talons seemed to grow from his fingers. The Boy-King’s grip on his thoughts loosened slightly, but he was too weary.
“Come and sit at the feet of my lady,” the voice said. “She is in need of a new guard...after tomorrow, if the stars go right, she will carry a prince of the blood.”
Martin screamed inside, but his body betrayed him. He crept, on all fours, to Mary Campbell’s feet and lay there, quiet.
“Behold,” the Boy-King said. “My lady has a new pet.”
The gathered horde roared in laughter.
“Lie still, my cub,” the voice said in Martin’s head.
Hot tears ran unbidden down his cheeks, but he was unable to move to wipe them away.
Chapter 5
NOVEMBER 20, 1745, STIRLING
Sean could have wept at the sight of Martin’s humiliation...but Others did not weep.
He had almost given himself away when tossing the snare to Martin. Any indication now that he was not what he seemed could prove disastrous. He forced himself to watch as the Boy-King addressed the crowd.
“My friends,” the Other began. “You can see how I have tamed the cub. In the same manner we will tame the Protector. But first, we must ensure the bloodline.”
He held a chalice above his head. Sean was dismayed to see that it was the same one he had thought destroyed back in Edinburgh.
“Agents of the Protector tried to stop us,” the Boy-King called out. “And they thought to destroy Baphomet.” He put his hand in the chalice and drew out a small, bloody mass. As he raised it above his head the blood ran thickly down his wrist, and the Other smiled as he licked himself clean, like a cat after a kill. “The King of Kings will not be sent to the final death that easily,” he said, his mouth red.
The crowd cheered loudly. The Other next to Sean looked at him strangely until he joined in with the cheers.
The Boy-King shouted above the noise.
“And later, when the moon is up, and if the stars are in the rightful place, we will see the turning of a new prince.” The crowd howled again.
“And maybe we will give my son a new pet,” the Boy-King said, and ruffled the hair on the top of Martin’s head.
The crowd of Others around Sean laughed loudly, and they were still laughing when the Boy- King took his entourage out of the arena. The crowd began to disperse, and Sean went with them, trying to give the impression that he was on an errand of some import, adopting a haughty look and hoping that no one would examine him too closely.
Martin’s mind was in turmoil. He remembered fighting the Others’ on the esplanade, but only as a memory of blood and meat left uneaten. Somewhere out in the darkness his gray brothers waited, ready to howl at his release, ready to join him as he led the wolf pack in a hunt.
But when he raised his head to howl all that he could produce was a strangled moan.
“Look, my Lord,” a tall Other said. It was a voice Martin knew from another time, another place. “Your new pet has something to say.”
The Other knelt beside where Martin lay, curled at the feet of a tall dark throne. It put out a hand, as if to stroke the top of Martin’s head. Martin sniffed. It was meat. It might smell as if it had been dead for some time, but it was meat, and Martin hungered. He growled, and snapped his teeth forward, just missing the outstretched fingers.
“It seems my cub needs to be house-trained,” it said. Martin remembered that voice. There was hurt there, and pain. But most of all, there was hatred. Martin wanted to rip, to tear, to bite, but the Other put a hand on his head, and it was like being in a strong cage, one with no exit.
“Be calm, my cub,” the Other said. It stroked the hair on the top of Martin’s head and began to speak, almost distractedly.
I had another cub once.
He was my birthing gift from my father…a huge gray timber wolf from the forests of the frozen north. We used to run together, my wolf and I, through the streets of Rome and Paris, Prague and Warsaw. My father was ruler of the strongest countries in the world, and soon he would take Europe. I was on the Grand Tour, sampling the tastes of the old countries while there were delights yet to be had.
I was young, having only five years in the night, but my wolf taught me the ways of the hunt, and the joys of blood that has been pursed until it is filled with sweet terror.
We were in Bucharest…an old city, but with older things still prowling through it. There are brothers of the blood there who knew the King of Kings when he was a mere youth, and a great dark one who may even be speaking true when he says he can remember when all men lived in caves, in fear, and quaking in terror at the coming of the night.
My wolf and I coursed through the city, and the blood was so sweet. But there came a day that I shall never forget. We were asleep, cuddled together like twin brothers, when my cub woke in frenzy. He was tearing and gouging…most uncontrollable in his rage. I grabbed him tight, there in the dark place away from the sun.
And that’s when I felt it…the hammer-strike to my heart.
I knew even then that my father had gone to his final death. And I vowed that I would have my revenge, and that I would reign in his place…a reign of terror such that the world would never forget.
We bided our time, my wolf and I, while I sought allies in my quest. But allies are hard to come by for a King without a throne, and I was in need of a grand gesture that would prove my intent.
And so it was, in the year 1666 of the false god, I took my wolf and myself to London, for there was a new Protector in the land, and I wished to pay my respects.
The voice stopped, but the hand kept petting Martin’s head. Somewhere deep inside himself Martin cried out in disgust, but he was paralyzed…locked inside the wolf and held by his Master’s will.
“It is an old story,” an Other said, a tall Highlander on the Boy-King’s left. “It will end differently this time.”
“Aye,” the Boy-King said, “for I am older, and wiser, and the cattle have grown weak in my absence.”
He started to stroke Martin’s head again.
The last time we crept into London under cover of night, just my wolf and me. It was no different to us than Vienna or Berlin, the only difference being the squalor and sickness that pervaded everything.
We ran through the streets like moonlight shadows, unseen by the populace, unlooked for by the meager guard posted on the river. But we did not feed, although my wolf was hungry. I was saving him, you see, stoking his need, in order that the protector’s blood migh
t be all the sweeter.
We ran the length of the city, from Dockland to Westminster, and wherever we passed the cattle quaked in fear, although they knew not the cause. And finally we came to what passes for a palace under the regime of the Protectorate…a poor, squalid, tawdry effigy of the gothic magnificence of the continent.
He was there…the one who called himself Protector…the son of the one whom had staked my sire at the Bloody Tower. The wolf’s blood was raging by now, so I let him have his head…a mistake I will not make again.
Before he had gone a yard a cross-bolt took him in the shoulder, and another in the flank. From being hunters we had become hunted, in the blink of the eye. My wolf was sore wounded, and we fled, my wolf and I, pursed by many horsemen.
The city was in uproar, and on another occasion we might have reveled in the chaos and bathed ourselves in the cattle’s blood. But my wolf was greatly pained, and the horsemen were gaining on us. I took my cub in my arms, feeling the heat as his blood spilled over me, and I ran, ran like the wind, with the protector’s guard screaming at my back and crossbow quarrels hissing past my ears.
I could have made it back to the boat waiting at the docks, but I could not leave my cub, no matter that he was slowing me down or that I was growing weaker by the stride. He licked his own blood from my hands as I raced back to the east of the city.
I was barely thirty yards ahead of my pursuers as we ran into the warren of hovels and shacks to the north of London Bridge. The wolf was like a dead weight in my arms, and I could go little further. I used up what little charm my exhausted state would allow and persuaded my pursuers that I had taken a left turn, while I darted right into a dark alleyway, and right again into a quiet and empty shop that smelled of yeast and flour.
I laid my wolf on the floor. The swift companion was nearly spent. His haunches shuddered and trembled as if a terrible ague had taken him, and his tongue was hot and dry as it rasped against my hand. I bent beside him to give him a final peace, when the first flaming firebrand came through the window, followed by three more in quick succession.
The air itself seemed to explode, and in less than five seconds the place was a roaring inferno. My cub thrashed in distress, and when a burning ember alighted on its nose it could stand no more. It burst out of the bake room and was immediately surrounded by jeering guardsmen. I had to watch as they kicked and stamped my cub to a bloody mess. They then pissed on its body, and flung the bloody pelt onto the fire.
I stood there, the fire raging around me, and for the only time in my life in the dark, I wept bitter tears.
“It is near time,” the tall Highlander Other said.
“We are nearly done,” the Boy-King replied. “My cub should know why he has been chosen.”
And finally the flames and the heat got too much, even for me. My cloak began to burn and I flung myself out into the night, a ball of smoke and fire.
The guards, the cowards who had been so keen to stamp on a wounded and dying animal, fled before me as I fled through the city. And behind me, London burned.
It was near dawn when William of Rennes found me. I was little more than a charred, blackened mass of meat and bone. But Baphomet’s blood runs strong in me, and although it would take long months of pain. I would be myself again.
Even as the boat turned away from the red sky over London, I was taking a vow, that I would return, and that I would take one of the protector’s guards to be my pet, and I would show him the same courtesy my cub was shown.
“So here I am,” the Boy-King said. “And look, the serpent has sent me a cub…a Protector’s guard…and one who so wants to be a wolf.”
“It is time. She is ready,” the tall highland Other said.
The Boy-King took Martin’s head in his hands and dug his fingers deep into the head wound until the pain caused Martin to thrash and scream.
The Boy-King stood, and licked bloody fingers. “So sweet,” he said. “And it will be sweeter still when you are turned. I will have a new cub…and together we will hunt the Protector down.”
The Other lifted a foot and kicked Martin, hard, on the side of the head, sending him into unconsciousness in a sea of red pain.
Sean had left Linthithgow just after dawn without having gotten close to catching the bloated keeper of that blood-soaked castle. Many times he had thought of setting the place alight and sending its occupants to the hell they deserved. But that would have drawn more attention to himself, and he had done enough of that already.
Instead, he had called on the new part inside him, the part he had inherited from the woodsman. With the newfound skills he was able to track the progress of the one who had taken Mary Campbell north. The trail had led him steadily north and east and, earlier that evening, he had entered the castle.
Mary Campbell was inside…part of him could sense her presence, even through the four-foot thick walls. He knew that by entering the castle he was bargaining on the dark one inside him to fool the Others, but that was a risk he had to take. He had to get to her before the Boy-King performed his ceremony of king making.
All evening he had managed to mingle with the Others. Being so close to them turned his stomach, and on several occasions he was near to exploding in rage and violence. But he kept repeating the phrase old Seton had given him.
“I am the Balance,” he told himself. It didn’t stop the rage inside him, but it was enough to give him some sort of control.
He had almost given himself away when Martin was brought out into the quadrangle, and it was all he could do to stop himself from jumping in and joining the fight once it began. The Others around him were in a frenzy, and he had managed to get the snare to Martin without being noticed, but any more help was impossible.
Now he had to get both Mary Campbell, and his Thane, out of this nightmare, or let the Boy- King perpetuate his hellish bloody bloodline.
“I am the Balance,” he said to himself, and gave the Other inside more freedom, using the scent of blood in his nostrils to pinpoint his goal. He caught Martin’s spoor straight away. His friend was near, somewhere within fifty yards. The smell of blood almost over-whelmed him, and Sean swayed slightly, nearly colliding with a tall, tartan-clad Other.
He snarled and showed his bloody fangs, and the Other bellowed a huge laugh.
“The arena is a bit too strong for you young ones,” it said. “You’ll have to learn to control yourself better if you wish to see your second century.”
It clapped Sean on the shoulder and, still laughing, went on its way. Sean could still smell it long after it had passed out of sight.
And there was another smell in the air...far away yet, but coming ever closer, the slightly acrid stench of garlic.
He was not the only one who had noticed it. The activity around him became frenzied as the Others and their mind-slaves sealed the castle against attack.
Somewhere in the night he caught the spoor of Mary Campbell but it was blown away in the wind.
Out beyond the castle walls the stench of garlic filled the air. A single bugle blew a long, fading note, and a drum took up a martial beat. Cumberland had brought his army to Stirling.
Martin woke in darkness. At first he was disoriented, thinking he was back in his own room in Milecastle. Then the smell hit him, the stench of fresh blood, and he knew he was a very long way from home.
The last thing he remembered was fighting in the arena. His head throbbed, as if he had drank too much ale, and there was a heavy feeling deep in the pit of his stomach. Panic began to grow in him, and it took all his training to fight it down and check his body for bites. He let out an audible sigh when he discovered his skin was unbroken.
“Not yet, dearie,” a voice whispered in the darkness to his left. “I thought we might have some fun first.”
Martin’s eyes were beginning to adjust to the gloom and he could just make out a figure heading towards him. He scuttled away backwards, but came up hard against a rough stone wall.
“Now
is that any way to treat a lady?” the voice said, and it laughed, a deep throaty chuckle. “And one who was so polite to you earlier.”
And now Martin recognized the voice. His eyes finally began to see through the darkness, but he didn’t need them to tell them that Jean Munro was the source...or rather, the Other who had once been a woman of Orkney of that name.
“Did you get what you were looking for?” Martin asked. His hands frantically searched for a weapon, but there was nothing within reach as the Other stepped in close and put its face nose to nose to his.
The creature was still recognizable as the woman he had spoken to earlier, but her hair was now blood red, and that was matched by her eyes. Where once they had been green they now shone like hot coals.
“Oh, I got what I wanted,” it said. “What I’ve always wanted...power over puny little men like you.”
“Come closer, my lady, I’ll show you that I’m not what I seem,” Martin said.
“Oh, I intend to see everything you have to offer,” the Other said, and stretched out a hand to stroke at the front of Martin’s breeches. “The King wants you turned, but he wants you whole,” it said. “Otherwise I could have had more sport. But at least you will be my first feeding.”
“They say a maiden always remembers her first,” Martin said.
The Other was about to reply, but Martin gave it no chance to speak. He drove his right hand forward, heel first, straight at the point of the Other’s nose, forcing bone backwards towards the brain. Blood gushed, hot and heavy, against his face as the Other fell away from him.
The blow would have killed a man-and-only-man, but the Others did not die so easily.
The thing that had been Jean Munro smiled and smeared blood across its lips.
“Yours will taste sweeter, my pretty,” it said, and came forward with the speed of a striking snake. Martin only had time to get his hands up near his neck before he was pinned hard against the wall, rough stone grating on his back.
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