The thinking of the Unseelie was that if silver bullets killed werewolves, giving humanity a phobia of silver was a werewolves’ best weapon.
This is why terrorism was such a delicious concept to them.
Usher slung his weapon across his chest and opened up the laser sights. He peered through as the active dot was cast across the floor of the helicopter. He and his team were the perpetual spanner in the works of Unseelie plans. If that was their role in life they now accepted it. He trusted his team, trusted scientists like Ariel, and he trusted the steel that could be fired from his gun. Let the Unseelie deal with that using their schemes and machinations.
Everyone has a plan until they get shot.
The rest of Usher’s team were as serious and determined as he was, except for the newest addition to their motely band. The scientist Dr Ariel Speedman was shivering and feverish and his eyes were becoming a cloudy white like a man slowly becoming blind. Usher reached out and placed a reassuring hand on his arm.
“Ariel? Thank you for agreeing to come back aboard with us. You’re the only person who has been on that ship and you are invaluable as an advisor. But you’re not looking too good and we need to get that thing to take whatever power he put inside you back. We’ll make sure that happens.”
The scientist looked up at Usher and attempted a smile.
“I know you will Major Usher. I just don’t want to slow you down.”
Usher was impressed by the grit the small man had shown during this mission. Usher had been isolated and stranded before in a number of theatres of war and it was always a horrible feeling. He knew the young scientist would not last much longer with that power inside him and wanted to help him get his life back.
He had to admit though, whatever that trick was he had pulled back at the hunting lodge may also come in handy if they encountered the three remaining Feral Berserkers.
The helicopter set down on the deck of the Proteus. No mean feat in the snowy conditions with the ship lilting at a slight angle. The pilot turned and gave Usher a curt salute then Usher drew open the door and he and his team jumped out onto the ship.
They all sat on their haunches with heads bowed against the blizzard and the rush of the stealthy rotors, then the helicopter pilot gave them a wave and took off again into the night. It’s dark and technologically silenced shape faded off into the white sky like a ghost.
They were alone on a ship that now seemed utterly deserted. Ariel pointed upwards.
“That whole section of the tower is Argent’s private quarters. That’s where the tree is, and Arrik too I bet. I can see it, something surrounding the metal on that tower. Like the borealis.”
Usher looked up and saw that high on the tower of the huge ship there was a wide window and from it some light from the room inside shone out, but he saw nothing strange surrounding that area of the ship itself.
“I think your eyes are seeing things we can’t Ariel. It must be the power you were given.”
The team moved tactically across the deck, two at a time flitting from one area of hard cover to another, while the others kept cover-on with their firearms. They alternated this until they had traversed the wide deck.
They met no resistance and soon they stood at the doors to the lift that led up to Argent’s private quarters.
Brock and Charlie levered the doors open and Isaac scanned his firearm inside the cabin. It was empty.
Usher addressed his team before they got inside.
“Now Argent thinks we probably died in London at the hands of the Russians and that Kruger and those Ferals took care of Ariel. The only people he will be expecting back here is them, with Ariel in their care. So we might have the element of a few seconds surprise, but that’s all the time it will be so make the most of it.”
The team nodded and they entered the cabin of the elevator and pushed the only button on the console. The one that led to Argent’s quarters.
As the lift slowly ascended Usher controlled his breathing, took the adrenalin down to a level where he could use it. Maintenance lights shone through the window every ten metres, illuminating the team’s faces and showing the fear and determination in their eyes.
If Argent had already opened the gateway, then there was no telling what creatures they could encounter as the lift doors opened. It could mean certain death for all of them.
Then the lift was at the top and it came to an abrupt stop with a mechanical jolt.
The team braced themselves and aimed their weapons as the doors opened in front of them.
There was no hail of bullets, no rake of bestial claws and no bolt of sorcerous energy. Usher looked down and saw that the long mosaic floor of the room was slick with dark blood. A thick yellowish haze hung in the air up in the high vaulted ceiling and the smell of sulphur permeated the air.
A large brazier burned next to Argent’s oak desk at the far end and on the wall behind that was what Usher knew could only be the world tree. He glanced down at Ariel and saw that the scientist was equally slack jawed. Ariel looked up at Usher.
“It didn’t look like that before, Major.”
Usher signalled his team to move in and they crouched low and traversed the floor to points of cover behind the numerous thick marble and steel plinths that lined either side of the hall.
Usher took a moment to take in the view.
Seemingly growing from the back wall of the room was a tree. It was far larger and more developed than the fledgling tree they had destroyed in London. Its black branches snaked out covering almost every inch of the back wall, the ceiling and the floor like some kind of climbing plant. Thick vine-like tendrils did seem to hang from many of the branches and dark purple flowers bloomed on its skin.
A fragrant humid mist rose from the tree and filled the room as if it stemmed from the heart of an ancient jungle. Its cracked and ancient bark was covered in a mould of some kind that gave off a sickly luminescence. At the centre of this thousand-tentacled monster was a swollen and bulbous trunk that seemed to breathe in an out with the groan of expanding wood and in the centre was a huge black fissure.
Within this hollow chasm there seemed to be a film of thick tarry sap like the glutinous black blood of the tree that bubbled and steamed. From the other side of this, as if it were a sheet of black rubber stretched out, hands and faces seemed to push and try to break through. None of them looked human.
Above this fissure hung a huge pale figure that was nailed to the tree through its wrists and ankles. Vines that were blood red had wrapped themselves around its limbs and were puncturing the skin. A loud and sickly noise could be heard like sucking a thick milkshake through a straw. The figure’s blood was being slowly drained.
It was Arrik the bear-god.
Argent had given him as the blood sacrifice to the tree and now the barrier between worlds was becoming thinner. Usher looked to Ariel.
“Argent wants to kill him? Why?”
Ariel took a moment to take in the scene. He put a sweating palm on the wall to steady himself. He did not look healthy.
“Like all magic of the Unseelie, the more powerful the symbol the stronger the spell, and what could be a more powerful sacrifice than the blood of a god? It must take a huge amount of magical energy to open that doorway and Argent wants to make sure it works. The portals can lead anywhere, so he’s conducting some ritual to make sure that it opens a door to the Unseelie realm. Soon whatever is on the other side will burst through. It looks like it’s almost there already.”
Usher noticed that Argent was kneeling in front of the tree as if in supplication. He was casting some form of holy water at the base of the tree and chanting to himself in prayer.
Usher realized that time was running out and gave the hand signal to attack.
They had barely moved three paces when the bullets began to rain down upon them.
As a unit Empire One ducked for cover beneath the solid marble and steel plinths. Chips of stone and slivers of torn metal flew off in a
ll directions and the team curled up and held cover as best they could.
The three remaining Feral Berserkers stepped out from the shadows and continued delivering suppressing fire down the hallway. Usher felt chips of splintered marble fall down on his back and knew that their cover would not hold long.
Usher felt Ariel grab his wrist. The young scientist looked frail and weak. The power of the bear was destroying his body and Usher did not know if they would have time to save him.
“Major, if you can keep them busy I think I can reach the tree and give Arrik back his strength. If we get him down from there the tree will not have any more of his blood to complete this ritual.”
Usher raised his eyebrows again at the pluckiness of this desperately ill young man but nodded.
At Usher’s signal the team darted up from the plinths and returned fire. The Berserkers were so confidant in their healing abilities now that they had not even bothered to find suitable cover. The rounds battered into them, sending blood and bone splinters across the room.
As soon as they fell, Usher saw Ariel sprint out from behind the plinth and skirt around the room, hugging the walls and staying in the shadows.
Then in a matter of seconds the Berserkers were up and snarling as they reached for their fallen weapons and began to return fire with renewed ferocity.
Usher and his team were in a bad position and he knew it. This narrow hall with its limited cover was the funnel of death and a nightmare position to assault. Usher peered across the room to where Ariel was skulking through the shadows towards the god on the tree. He looked extremely weak and shaky on his feet. The shade was offering him some concealment but perhaps not from the red nocturnal eyes of the Berserkers. Usher glanced from the shadows to those crimson eyes that shone in the gloom and had a sudden idea.
He signalled to Isaac who was closest to him and they both unclipped something from their tactical vests. Usher gestured for the rest of his team to shield their eyes then he and Isaac threw the flash bang grenades towards the enemy.
The effect was instant and better than he could have hoped.
The red nocturnal eyes of the Berserkers were painfully seared by the explosions of bright light. They cried out and staggered, firing their guns off wildly in all directions.
Usher glanced across the room and saw Ariel staggering out into the light in the middle of the room, trying to get the crucified Arrik’s attention.
Then in one horribly slowed down moment, he saw a stray round from one of the berserkers guns ricochet up off the floor and graze Ariel in the side of his head, tearing off half his ear in a splutter of blood. The already weakened man dropped to his knees then fell crumpled onto the cold marble floor with blood oozing from his head.
No!
Usher roared in anger and shouted for his team to attack.
They wasted no time in drawing their machetes and bounding out from behind the plinths. With a war cry they charged like soldiers of old at the enemy, knives held high and thirsty for blood.
As a single unit they reached the stunned and blinded berserkers and began to hack and slash with animal ferocity. They had learned from previous fights and this time focussed all their attacks on the necks and spines, attempting to decapitate or damage the nervous system as quickly as possible. At the same time they drew their pistols and filled the berserkers with as many debilitating shots as possible to distract them while the foot long knives did their job.
Usher was suddenly struck by a wild flailing fist from one of the berserkers and found himself stunned and sprawled out on the floor.
He lay there for a moment with his head buzzing. When he looked up he saw that at the back of the room the crucified bear-god was awake and staring down at Ariel’s stricken body. The limp frame of the scientist was beginning to rise from the floor and an arc of thick white mist was issuing forth from his mouth. The mist glowed and pulsed with some inner storm of magic as it returned to its owner. Usher watched in amazement as the defeated and drained body of Arrik seemed to increase in size. His skin turned from sickly and anaemic to ruddy with the glow of power. The cloud gathered around him and flashes of electricity crackled and forked into his body.
The huge man’s eyes were tight shut and he was grinning as if caught in the ecstasy of lust, then he drank in all the power at once.
Usher had been way too close to a number of explosions in his military career and the effect he then felt reminded him of the moment before a bomb explodes, when it seems to draw all the air around it inwards like a deep intake of breath. Usher and his team felt the air pressure in the room change and the hairs on their arms prickled with static electricity.
Arrik open his eyes and they were a blue brighter than the sky on a pale winter morning.
He scanned his eyes across the three berserkers. They staggered back from the fighting soldiers with a moment’s confusion in their eyes, and then the writhing branches of the World Tree had wrapped around their limbs like pythons and lifted them from the ground. The giant warriors were held suspended there for only a struggling moment before Arrik blinked at them and in a sudden movement the branches tore them limb from limb. Their torsos were sundered, the heads flew across the room, and then a shower of blood and innards descended onto the cold white marble floor with a wet slap, coating Empire One in a fine sheen.
Usher looked up as the droplets fell.
The iron nails pinning Arrik to the tree suddenly shot out and flew across the room, impaling themselves in the opposite wall. The huge man fell with the agility of a panther onto the floor, landing in a crouch and surveying the room.
Hunched over next to his huge desk, Isaiah Argent suddenly looked like the pale frail corpse that he was. He took several steps back, his milky eyes wide in fear. In his bony arms he cradled the carved box that held the seeds of the remaining World Trees. He held it close to his chest like a child afraid that his favourite toy will be stolen. In his southern preacher’s drawl he spoke.
“Now just hold on there, we need to parley. You’ve been away a long time and things have changed between the worlds. There are agreements, treaties and such. If you do me ill it will cause considerable political ripples. I suggest if we just wait a few minutes for my friends to arrive via that doorway, we can all sit down and talk.”
Arrik stood up and glanced back at the World Tree, then smiled grimly at Argent.
“Your friends won’t be coming.”
Arrik nodded his head and the blood vines of the world tree shot out and wrapped around Argent, lifting him up and dragging him back onto one of its thick boughs holding him fast. He recalled that Ursula had described Arrik as a tree wizard of sorts and now he understood.
Usher then realized with sudden clarity that only now at this moment were any of them seeing the true face of Arrik.
The demi god had been tired in a way only centuries of life could bring, despondent and world weary. All he had wanted to do was sleep and when he was rudely awoken by power hungry men, he did not yet have the fire in him to fight back. He had prayed for death for so many centuries and thought that these men may finally give him its release.
Now finally he was fully awake and restored of his power and bearing, and he was ill pleased.
Arrik stood tall, rolled out his shoulders and flicked the blood from his punctured wrists, which healed even as the blood spattered the floor. He looked around as if seeing the room for the first time. Then he strode over to the small prone body of Ariel. The scientist lay prostrate on the floor, dark blood trickling from his torn ear.
Arrik knelt down beside him and frowned. His huge hand rested on Ariel’s head. Then the god looked up at Usher. In a voice deeper than thunder he spoke.
“He is your friend?”
Usher took a moment to evaluate the situation, then nodded curtly and lowered his weapon then took a step towards Arrik.
“He is. He’s one of us now. We can’t leave him behind, but he’s very sick. What you gave him for safekeeping, peopl
e aren’t built to handle. We need to get him out of here, to where our doctors can help him.”
Arrik looked down at the stricken scientist, and then nodded.
“Take him to your people. Save him. If he lives he will be different, in his soul. He has held power in his heart, it will open doors for him.”
Isaac and Stromberg moved in and lifted Ariel as carefully as they could then took him back behind the cover of the marble plinths. Charlie opened his first aid kit and started checking for vitals, while Brock got on the radio to request immediate evac.
Usher looked behind Arrik to the pulsing writhing World Tree. In its hollow centre monstrous faces and claws still tested the tarry membrane between worlds, which morphed further with each attempt, like a thin sheet of rubber stretched to bursting.
“Arrik, there are enough doors open already. We can’t fight what’s coming through there. Not just us and there isn’t anyone else to help us. You can’t stay here. What you have in your blood is too strong, and they will never stop hunting you for it. You won’t find peace here, not under the ice, not by hiding your strength in the unlikeliest men, and not by fighting the world. You can’t stay here. If that tree is a door that can take you home then you need to use it, no matter how long you’ve been away.”
Arrik looked to the Tree.
“I’m afraid to go home.”
Usher nodded. “So am I. Every day. Too many ghosts. But we both need to go home anyway. And we need to just deal with it.”
The Last Line Series One Page 32