by David Mack
No matter how hard Anja pressed against the wound in her gut, it wouldn’t stop bleeding. Syrupy warmth pushed between her fingers and pulsed under her palm. Parched and dizzy, all she wanted was to stop moving and quench her thirst, but Adair and Cade dragged her down one dark street after another. “Water,” Anja mumbled. Cade shushed her.
Adair halted them at a corner. They pressed their backs to a wall. From the street ahead came running steps. The master raised a shadow to hide them from the squad of Nazi soldiers who charged past. As weak as she was, Anja held her breath and made herself believe, if only for a few seconds, that she was one with the wall: cold, impervious, oblivious.
The soldiers’ footfalls melted away. Then Adair and Cade were in motion, pulling Anja with them, to a destination unknown. Her memory, like the streets, was thick with fog.
Harsh floodlights snapped on far away down a tree-lined avenue. Cade and Adair whisked Anja across a deserted street toward a great pillared edifice of granite. “Hurry,” Adair whispered, his voice taut from the effort of carrying Anja.
Overwhelmed by the size of the building ahead, Anja was surprised to find herself in front of an unassuming door at one of its side entrances. Cade opened the door with magick; then he and Adair sidestepped through it, supporting Anja between them.
The master told Cade, “Lock it behind us.”
“Done.”
“This way.” Adair led them through pitch-black corridors, down steps Anja couldn’t see, into the bowels of a building so voluminous that even its silences echoed.
A fever surged through Anja’s body. Delirium followed. Next she was flat on her back, atop something cold and hard. She blinked to sharpen her blurred vision. Rising up on either side of her were endless rows of books on shelves.
Her voice sounded remote to her. “Where are we?”
“The Strasbourg University national library,” Adair said. “Well, beneath it, to be precise.” He snapped at Cade, “She’s still bleeding!”
“It’s a magick wound. I don’t know how to make it stop.”
“Find a way.” Adair leaned over Anja, his affect once again paternal. “Hang in there, lass.”
It hurt her throat to speak. “What happened?”
“Ambush. The dabblers saw us coming.” The master shook his head. “It’s my fault. ’Twas only a matter of time before Kein got wise to us. I should’ve been more careful.”
Cade dug through Anja’s shoulder bag for clean gauze, which he stuffed into the puddle of blood seeping from her abdomen. “Keep her awake,” he said, dusting the wound with white powder that numbed all it touched.
The master took Anja’s hand. She blinked again, and now she saw that Adair and Cade were bloody, bruised, and scorched from head to toe. “Are you hurt?”
“We’re fine, thanks to you.”
“What did I do?”
“You don’t remember?” Anja shook her head; Adair smiled. “You took a shot meant for me.” The master used his shirtsleeve to sop blood from Anja’s face and forehead. “If not for you, it would’ve ripped out my heart.” His eyes misted, and his voice broke. “That’s the second time I owe you my life.” Tears fell from his eyes as he glared at Cade. “Why’s she still fucking bleeding?”
“Because I don’t know what demon stabbed her!”
“Dammit! Reason it out! The coven’s sworn to SATHANAS! A barbed sword—?”
“HADRAGOR,” Cade said, suddenly realizing. “Keep her talking.”
Adair cupped his palm to Anja’s cheek. “Still with me, lass?”
A faltering smile. “Still here, Master.”
Stabbing pain overpowered the morphine powder caked into her gut. She looked down and saw Cade sew her ragged wound shut while he mumbled in broken Latin, making a hash of a healing charm. She wanted to slap him but couldn’t move her arms.
Cade finished his closing stitch. His shoulders slumped. “I’ve stopped the bleeding. I can fix the rest later, but she needs to rest. And so do I.”
The master dismissed Cade with a nod, then stood by Anja’s side. “The worst is over. But now you need to leave us for a while.”
“I understand.”
Adair brushed his leathery fingers over Anja’s eyelids, coaxing them shut and ushering her into a dreamless sleep.
* * *
It took hours for Cade to finish the healing charms Anja needed to recover from her wounds, and the effort left him feeling more drained than he had ever thought possible. Sitting on the floor, he cast his eyes about the subterranean library and noted arcane symbols engraved into the stone pillars that surrounded them. “This isn’t a normal part of the library, is it?”
Adair drank in the nostalgia. “Sixty years ago, this was a secret Freemason temple. Its members are gone now. Most dead, the rest in hiding. But this place is still a sanctuary, hidden from the enemy.” A rueful chortle. “If only it had a mirror.”
The master paced between the stacks and let his fingertips brush the spines of books that were almost as old as he was. “Magick wasn’t always like it is now. Great brotherhoods of White magicians once sought wisdom from the Celestial powers, and they used that knowledge to give rise to Science.” A deep sigh. “Answering questions beyond human ken—that’s why man took up ceremonial magick in the first place. Not for this. Not for murder. War. Genocide. Not to pave a road to the Apocalypse, but to light the way to objective truth.”
The next question seemed obvious to Cade.
“What happened?”
“What always happens. Greed. Hubris. Lust for power.” A melancholy settled over Adair. “Kein and I were taught by the same master, many moons ago. I thought we learned the same lessons, but time proved me wrong on that count. The first time Kein threatened to meddle in human affairs, he helped Napoleon run roughshod over Europe. I begged him to stay out of it, but he didn’t listen—not until our master intervened. A few years after Waterloo, our old master vanished. Kein swore he had nothing to do with that … but I knew then that the next time Kein decided to take sides in a war, it would be up to me to stop him.”
Listening to Adair talk left Cade awash in doubts and questions—a state of unrest the master clearly recognized. He ceased his wanderings and planted himself in front of Cade. “Something on your mind?”
After months of stifling his curiosity for the sake of mastering the Art, Cade realized this was the first time he was being invited to ask the master anything he wanted. “You make it sound like Kein is some kind of villain. But what are we? If we all use demons for magick, is there any difference between us and him? Or are we just monsters of a different stripe?”
The master nodded. “Church propaganda aside, demons are like any other tool. Using them doesn’t make us evil—it’s what we use them for that matters.”
“So what’s the difference between us and Kein?”
The question drove Adair to a soul-searching pause. “We have conflicting visions for the future of man. Kein resents science and technology. Calls them ‘blights on our collective soul.’ He doesn’t just want them destroyed—he wants them disgraced. Shamed into oblivion so that he and his ilk can use magick to lord over the broken remains of ‘a simpler society.’”
“And what do you want?”
A wistful smile. “My hope? One day, after science defines the rules of the physical universe, the Art’ll be ready to ask the one question science can’t answer: Why? And when that day comes, I pray magick will still be there, ready to dispel the old superstitions and bridge the last gap in humanity’s understanding of itself—and the universe.” He lit two cigarettes and handed one to Cade. Exhaling smoke, he turned toward Anja, who still lay sleeping on the table, and cupped her head in one hand. “Those are the true stakes in this fight, lad: a future of light—or an eternity of darkness.”
* * *
It was a crude fence, but an effective one: thick posts sunk deep into the ground, sharp pickets bound closely together, all topped with barbed wire. The only breaks
in the perimeter were gates manned day and night by Vichy gendarmes who seemed to revel in doing the Nazis’ bidding.
Beyond the fence rose an oddity in the French landscape: a five-story modernist residential complex in the shape of a zigzag. Its designers had erected it in the center of Drancy, a northeastern suburb of Paris, as a model of peaceful urban dwelling; to wit, they had taken to calling it “the Silent City.” Now that the complex had become an internment camp for Jews, members of the Resistance, and anyone else who ran afoul of Vichy or Berlin, its old nickname had taken on sinister overtones.
Niko strolled on the opposite side of Avenue Jean Juarès, his hands stuffed inside his pockets as he passed the main gate. It was dusk but still hours shy of the city’s curfew, so the guards ignored him. At the next corner he turned and strolled to his borrowed car, which was parked on the narrow street where he’d left it.
He slumped into the driver’s seat and twisted around to make sure he was alone. Then he pulled his enchanted mirror from inside his jacket. “Fenestra, Stefan and Adair.”
Several seconds elapsed while he awaited a response. The master was the first to appear. “Niko, lad. Still in one piece?”
“So far.”
Stefan rippled into view and split the frame with Adair. “Niko! You are well, I hope.”
“As well as can be. Master, how is Anja?”
“Almost healed. Another week and we’ll be back in the fight. Stefan, any word?”
“No. But I have found a clue I am following to Kiev.”
Adair shifted his eyes to Niko. “And you, lad? What word?”
“My lost comrades were sent to the Drancy internment camp, along with seven thousand Jews rounded up from Paris and beyond.”
His revelation darkened Stefan’s dejected mood. “This is happening all over Europe. The Nazis have made ghettos for the Jews in Warsaw, Kraków, Łodz … everywhere they go.”
“The good news,” Niko added, “is I can think of at least three ways in and out of the Drancy camp. I can smuggle in food and medicine, then find ways to bring our people out.”
The master shook his head. “No. That’s not the mission.”
“Pardonnez-moi?”
“No mercy missions. We can’t risk it. Not with active Thule covens still at large.”
That was an answer Niko couldn’t accept. “People are starving in there.”
“People are dying all over. You need to see the bigger picture.”
“They have no heat. Some of them are without blankets or coats. What happens when winter comes? Should I just let them freeze?”
“Aye, if necessary.” Adair massaged his bloodshot eyes. “I respect your sense of charity, lad, but that’s not why I sent you there.”
Niko rolled his eyes in disgust. “Every time I get close to finding the Paris coven, they slip away. Their spy sabotages me at every turn.”
“Then set a trap and flush the bastard out.”
“I’d no idea it was so simple. I will just ask the spy to raise his hand and expose himself, mais oui?” He met Adair’s keen gaze. “If I find him, then can we help the Drancy prisoners?”
Stefan added his own plea: “And the Jews in the ghettos?”
The master frowned. “There’s fuck all we can do for them until we stop the Thule covens and get back the Iron Codex. Once that’s done … maybe then.”
His answer stoked Stefan’s desperation. “Then might be too late!”
Adair sighed. “Lad, if Kein finds the Codex before we do, it’ll be too late for all of us.”
* * *
They came by the thousands, carrying all they owned and cherished. Bundled in layers of clothing, toting suitcases and duffels, the Jews of Kiev queued up for kilometers, with the head of the line somewhere in the city’s Syrets district, out of sight around a bend in the road.
Plastered all over Kiev were printed notices—in Ukrainian, German, and Russian—posted only the day before by the city’s German occupiers. Their directions were clear:
All Yids of the city of Kiev and its vicinity must appear on Monday, September 29, by 8 o’clock in the morning, at the corner of Melnykova and Dorogozhitskaya streets (near the cemetery). Bring documents, money and valuables, and also warm clothing, linen, etc. Any Yids who do not follow this order and are found elsewhere will be shot. Any civilians who enter the dwellings left by Yids and appropriate the things in them will be shot.
A damp chill suffused the early-morning air. Stefan shivered inside his wool overcoat, unseen by the crowd because he had been rendered invisible by the talent of FORAS. He had traveled light that morning by entrusting his tools of the Art and other gear to his demonic porter. It meant he would need to fumigate and exorcise his tools before he could use them again for magick, but it was the price he had to pay to keep his hands free, just in case he found the Codex.
Beside him was an old Jewish man whose beard reached nearly to his belt. He mumbled as he walked, praying under his breath the way Stefan’s father once had done. Ahead of Stefan, a mother carted two small children—an infant in one arm, a toddler in the other—while a third youngster plodded beside her, restless and crying like his siblings.
The great mass of humanity shuffled forward. As the gate to the Jewish cemetery came into view, Stefan felt sick with suspicion. Standing on either side of the gates were not just Ukrainian police but also Waffen-SS troops with machine guns, and hundreds of SS-Sonderkommandos. How do these people not realize what they are walking into? Or do they know, but are too scared to resist or retreat? He had seen this happen throughout Poland, but still it baffled him to watch thousands march to their doom.
As he passed through the cemetery’s gate, he couldn’t help but recall Hell’s motto from The Divine Comedy: “Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.”
Inside the gate, a fat German officer sat behind a table. He wore the uniform of the Einsatzgruppen and was flanked by armed Waffen-SS troopers. More Nazi soldiers and Ukrainian police stood nearby. Most of them brandished submachine guns, but a few held snarling, barking attack dogs on taut leashes. They took turns corralling the new arrivals.
Stefan slipped away from the line and took as wide a path as possible to get behind the Germans. Self-preservation was his chief prerogative. No matter how much he wanted to let loose with every magickal assault in his limited arsenal, he knew his strength and reserve of yoked talents would expire long before the Germans ran out of soldiers. Magick was a powerful tool, but not an omnipotent one. A single karcist couldn’t last long against an army when all it would take was one lucky shot to break the magician’s concentration.
And then there were the dogs. Bred for aggression, trained for alertness, they were the most troubling enemy of all. Like many animals, dogs possessed keener senses than humans. As such, they were not easily fooled by charms of invisibility. Escaping the Nazis was hard enough, but their damned dogs were a nightmare. Stealing along the edge of the woods, Stefan did his best to avoid dried leaves and twigs, or anything that might betray his presence.
Just as the Germans had done at other roundups he had witnessed in the ghettos, they separated arriving Jews from their possessions with bureaucratic coldness. Portable valuables were seized first, up front. Luggage and larger possessions would no doubt be confiscated farther down the line. And so it would go, until the Jews were left with nothing.
It is possible the Codex was taken with the valuables, he reasoned. He needed to search the stacks of stolen goods without moving anything, or else the Germans would become suspicious. Using the sight of SŌZAY he peered inside closed crates and sealed boxes, past one layer after another of jewelry, watches, cash, and precious knickknacks. After several minutes of scrying the Nazis’ first cache, he was certain the Codex was not there.
He waited for the next large group of Jews to be moved down the line. He followed them, hoping the Germans’ attention would be on the group and not on him passing behind them, skirting the tree line on his way to their next checkpo
int.
Several meters ahead, he saw other Jews being relieved of their luggage. Bags large and small, from the most stylish suitcases to the cheapest canvas duffels, all were hurled into a heap behind the Nazis while their owners were forced onward empty-handed.
Once more he ducked behind the line and used SŌZAY’s talent to look inside locked suitcases. In one case near the bottom of the pile he glimpsed a large book. Could that be the Codex? He peered closer only to find it had no sigil on its cover, no warding glyphs on its pages. It was an old book, an antique, but not the Iron Codex. If it is here, it could take hours—
A wild snarl preceded the white pain of fangs piercing Stefan’s calf. Taken by surprise, he cried out in pain, his charm of invisibility broken.
A trio of Einsatzgruppen converged on him. He wanted to run for the trees, but the dog’s jaws were locked on his lower leg, leaving him hopelessly anchored.
The muzzle of a rifle was thrust into Stefan’s face. He raised his hands in surrender.
“What are you doing out of line?”
Stefan stammered, “I—I don’t—” A rifle’s stock slammed into the side of his head.
One of the Germans whistled, and the dog let go of Stefan’s leg. The other two Nazis dragged Stefan away from the luggage pile and threw him on the trail with the Kiev Jews. An SS officer stepped in front of him. “Where are your papers?”
“I don’t have any.”
The officer pointed at Stefan and told his men, “Search him.”
In seconds they relieved Stefan of his eyeglasses, billfold, and a tarnished old pocket watch—the first gift Evert had ever given him. “Please,” Stefan begged, “that’s all I have.”
“Keep moving, Jew!” Stefan was hounded down a gauntlet of German soldiers, who shouted obscenities and slurs at him every step of the way. More barking dogs, their fangs glistening with saliva, threatened to slip their leashes.
At the next clearing, Stefan blanched. Prisoners were being forced to strip naked. Outer garments in one pile. A stack of shoes. Women’s dresses in a heap. Men’s trousers. Children’s clothing, separated by gender. Shirts in a ragged mound. Undergarments of all kinds, tossed together without regard.