“I don’t want to. You’re a murderer and a certifiable coward, Mr. Morne.”
“I am no coward! I came after you!”
“On the sly. Sneaking up like a snake when you thought you had the drop on me, but not once after that first time and look at the size of you. You could have overpowered me anytime, but you pulled back because you are a coward. Your prey always has to be weaker, smaller, and surprised. You have to make sure they don’t anticipate you being their enemy. You need their surprise. If they face you, you lose heart.”
“I could finish you while you’re sleeping. I’m patient.”
“Well, I’m not. Maybe I should just go ahead and use my knife to destroy that monster you carry inside you. Of course, seeing what it did to your hand, it would kill you in the process. Is that what you want?”
Morne hesitated.
“Is that what you want?” Saida asked. She watched his eyes for the answer.
“I want that second chance.” He held his hands toward her to have the bonds cut.
“I think we’ll be keeping those on for the time being.” Saida retrieved her hat, her cloak, and the rabbit, then kicked the fire into the stream. Morne’s pistol belt and knife already hung safely from her saddle.
As she mounted her horse, he scratched his face with the rough ropes on his wrists, puzzling some questions in his head. “Why did you follow that thing out here? Somebody must’ve been offering a fat reward.”
“I didn’t do it for money,” said Saida, and maybe that was why she succeeded. “That is so. I didn’t do it for money.”
“How come then?”
Her knuckles turned white around the reins. “La Llorona has stolen many, many children over the years. Two of them were mine. They were young, very young, and they were playing alone by the River of Tears, and La Llorona took them. I could have helped the others who lost sons and daughters. I could have stopped her when she tore holes in the other families. But I didn’t. I waited until she tore a hole in mine.”
Morne nodded appreciatively. “So that’s the reason. Vengeance.”
Saida shook her head. “Penance.”
Iron Bells
Joshua Reynolds
It was 1922 and the Minister of Transport for the London Underground was at a loss. Sitting in the parlor of a particular house on the Embankment, surrounded by curios from strange shores and books that smelled of unguents and oriental oils, he tried several times to begin. Finally, he simply came out with it.
“Fifteen dead,” the Viscount Peel, the Minister, said as he dabbed his lips with a napkin. He folded the napkin carefully, placed it on his saucer and looked at his host. “We’ve called it a crash and roped off the area, of course.”
“Of course,” Charles St. Cyprian said, sipping his tea. In contrast to Peel’s long, quintessentially English face and aristocratic style, St. Cyprian possessed hard olive features and a Mediterranean exoticism to his dress despite its Savile Row origins.
“It wasn’t. A crash, I mean,” Peel added unnecessarily.
“Of course,” St. Cyprian repeated. He put his cup down. “What does the Tunnel Authority say?”
“They assure me that the-ah-the seals are undisturbed,” Peel said, looking distinctly uncomfortable. “Is that the correct word? Seals?”
“Seals, sigils, symbols, if you will. Runes, even, if you prefer,” St. Cyprian said. He spoke with a certainty that one would expect of a man occupying the post of Royal Occultist. Formed during the reign of Elizabeth the First, the office of Royal Occultist (or the Queen’s Conjurer, as it had been known) had started with the diligent amateur Dr. John Dee, and passed through a succession of hands since. The list was a long one, weaving in and out of the margins of British history, and culminating, for the moment, in one Charles St. Cyprian. “Care for more tea, Viscount?” he continued, making an offhand gesture with the teapot.
“No. Thank you, Mr. St. Cyprian. The-ah-the Authority recommended that I contact you. A Mr. Morris, in the Ministry, spoke quite highly of you and you’re particular…talents.”
“Is that what Morris called them?” St. Cyprian said. “Talents?”
“Highly? Us?” said the third person sitting in the study. Ebe Gallowglass was, for lack of a better description, St. Cyprian’s assistant. Cinnamon-skinned and wielding a startlingly white smile, she would have been referred to as an apprentice in earlier centuries. In 1922, she was simply an annoyance of the most vocal kind where men like Peel were concerned, dressed flamboyantly in men’s clothes and bearing a revolver with the smug self-assurance of a merchant seaman. “That’s a laugh and half,” she continued, scrubbing a thumb across the spatter of freckles that occupied the bridge of her nose.
Peel frowned. “Unfortunately, he was slightly more vulgar. Still, I have high hopes you can deal with our little matter.”
“Fifteen people are a little matter?” Gallowglass broke a biscuit between two fingers and nibbled it insouciantly as she met the Viscount’s glare with a bland gaze. “Bloody hate to see a big one.”
“I apologize,” St. Cyprian said, smiling slightly. “Ms. Gallowglass is afflicted with terminal impudence.”
“Impudence is fatal now?” she interjected.
St. Cyprian glanced at her. “For you? Quite possibly.” He turned back to Peel. “Do go on Viscount.”
“Hmp. Yes, well.” Peel looked at St. Cyprian. “Morris said that you would need the area left as is. The Tunnel Authority have seen to sealing it off for you. One of them—Stanhook, I believe his name is—will be waiting on you. Solid fellow. Bit queer, but then all those Tunnel fellows are a bit, you know, eh?” Peel made a shaky gesture and shook his head.
“Considering what they have to deal with, I do believe they’re allowed a bit of oddity.” St. Cyprian snapped a biscuit in half and swallowed the larger piece almost without chewing. “Worm that gnaws, wot?”
“Er, yes, rather,” Peel said hesitantly. From the unhealthy sheen of his face, St. Cyprian figured that the Viscount had only recently been filled in on certain pertinent details regarding London’s Underground. It was a strange world down there, in many ways a funhouse mirror version of the city above. Right down to the inhabitants.
“Have a biscuit, Viscount,” St. Cyprian said kindly, pushing the plate towards Peel in order to hide his shudder. “We’ll have it sorted, never fear. The Office of the Royal Occultist has long had a working relationship with the honorable gentlemen of the London Tunnel Authority.”
After the biscuits were gone and the tea had been reduced to dregs, St. Cyprian and Gallowglass found themselves trooping down the stairs into the maw of the Embankment Underground Station. Two uniformed police constables had been stationed above to turn back the hoi-polloi, but they stepped aside for the duo, nodding respectfully. One tapped the brim of his helmet.
“So,” Gallowglass said as they stepped onto the platform. Colorful posters lined the curving brick walls, boasting the merits of the zoo or Hampton Court.
“So?” St. Cyprian said, stepping to the edge of the platform and peering into the tunnel, his hands in his pockets.
“What’s so scary about the Underground then?” Gallowglass said, joining him. She lit a cigarette and handed him the lighter. St. Cyprian popped open his silver cigarette case, selected one and lit it. The brand was unique; hand-rolled by a Moro woman in Limehouse and delivered to her customers by armed courier.
“Depends who you ask,” he said, blowing smoke through his nostrils. The platform was empty, thanks to the Metropolitan’s finest above, and eerily quiet. Their voices echoed strangely, fleeing into the tunnels and cascading away into unseen depths.
“Funny. I thought I was asking you,” Gallowglass said, snatching the lighter back and bouncing it on her palm. “I’ve never heard of the London Tunnel Authority.”
“Really? Old firm, that lot.”
“How old?”
“Their charter goes back before the Great Fire, I should think.” St. Cyprian glanced at her.
“Before you ask, it was the first Great Fire, when our fair city was Londinium.”
Gallowglass whistled. “Old firm too right. So who are they?”
“Canaries in a coal-mine,” St. Cyprian said, smiling bitterly. “Only slightly more expendable.”
“That clears everything up, thank you,” she said sourly.
“Glad to be of service, assistant mine.” St. Cyprian tossed his cigarette onto the platform and crushed it under his heel. “Speaking of assistance…I do believe our ride is here.”
The low little shape scooted up the line towards the platform with a loud clackety-clack, the large spotlights mounted on the front, sides and back railing blazing away despite the relatively well-lit condition of the platform. It paused in a shower of sparks and a metal gangplank extended, connecting the platform with what was revealed as a heavy-duty hand-car with a chugging, chuffling gasoline engine mounted on the rear. Three men rode the car, dressed all alike in boiler suits and hard-hats with lamps mounted on the brims. Two had Thompson sub-machine guns clutched in their gloved hands, with extra ammo drums clipped to the harnesses they wore. The third man had a Mauser pistol holstered on his hip and a Webley revolver in his hand.
It was the latter who opened the side gate on the hand-car railing and beckoned St. Cyprian and Gallowglass forward. “Mr. St. Cyprian? Ian Stanhook, night-manager for the Thames Section. Glad to see you sir. Damn glad. Care to come aboard?”
“After you, Ms. Gallowglass,” St. Cyprian said. They boarded quickly and the hand-car set off with a squeal even before Stanhook had gotten the gate shut.
“Glad you could come out sir!” Stanhook shouted over the growl of the engine as they whipped through the tunnels.
“How bad is it?” St. Cyprian shouted back.
“Not as bad as Tunnel 18, but worse than Charing Cross!” Stanhook said, holstering his Webley. “Don’t know what it’s all about really though!”
“How are the seals holding?”
“Bit of leakage sir, but that’s natural!” Stanhook said grinning. “We can handle the odd vagrant, no worries!”
“You don’t think this is one of their lot then?” St. Cyprian said, ignoring Gallowglass’ inquiring look. “You’re sure?”
“Sure as we can be where they’re concerned!” Stanhook said. He gestured to the rail. “Hold tight, we’re heading to the sub-platform now!” Abruptly the hand-car took a sharp turn and then it was hurtling down a slope. Gallowglass repressed a squeal of fright. A moment later she glared at St. Cyprian who was grinning openly at her.
The hand-car slowed in a burst of sparks and the engine’s roar died to a grumble. Ahead of them, a solitary underground carriage sat on the track. More boiler-suit men occupied the platform, most carrying weapons. Once the plank was extended, Stanhook led St. Cyprian and Gallowglass up onto the platform. Another man took his place on the hand-car and it reversed course with a shriek, hurtling back up the tunnel.
“We’ve still got a few checks to run this evening,” Stanhook said by way of explanation. “We can’t let anything deter us from our appointed rounds, can we?” He took off his helmet and ran a hand through his sweaty mop of hair. He was a short man and built spare, with a wilting grin and a long face.
“So what exactly is it that you do down here?” Gallowglass said.
Stanhook looked at St. Cyprian, who shrugged. “Well, we see to the integrity of the Underground,” Stanhook said. “Keep the tunnels free of vermin and such.” He lit a foul-smelling cheroot with a match and sucked in a lungful of smoke. “We also see to certain sewer lines and cellars and such.”
“Vermin,” Gallowglass said.
“Mostly vermin,” Stanhook said, nodding.
“Not rats,” Gallowglass said, looking at St. Cyprian.
“Sometimes rats,” he replied.
“Of unusual size,” Stanhook said, spreading his hands. He dropped his hands and nodded to the carriage. “This wasn’t rats of any description though, I’m afraid.”
“No, it wouldn’t be,” St. Cyprian said, striding towards the carriage with his hands in his pockets. Gallowglass and Stanhook hurried to catch up. The doors were open and the smell of carnage was heavy on the recycled air. The guards on the doors steadfastly kept their eyes turned away. St. Cyprian gingerly stepped inside. “Mind the blood,” he said tersely.
Gallowglass cursed as she caught sight of the pitiful, mangled scraps of once-human meat that occupied the length and breadth of the carriage. Instinctively, her fingers found the butt of the Bulldog revolver holstered beneath her frock coat and she stroked the Seal of Solomon carved there on the ivory grips. “What the devil happened in here?”
“The devil indeed,” St. Cyprian said, hiking up his trouser cuffs and sinking to his haunches near one of the more intact bodies. His face had gone gray and assumed a pinched look. Memories of Ypres, never buried too deeply, surged to the surface of his mind like hungry sharks. He closed his eyes for a minute, trying to push back against the flashes of blood and wire. He’d taken two bullets, but there were other wounds than just the physical.
When he opened his eyes, he took a breath and began to examine the corpse. “Parallel slashes. No, more like rips than slashes. This wasn’t done by claws so much as brute strength.” He glanced over his shoulder at Stanhook. “You’re certain there was no leakage around the tunnel seals?”
“Yes,” Stanhook said, nodding jerkily. “They’ve-ah-they’ve been quiet lately.”
“They?” Gallowglass said.
“Good.” St. Cyprian ignored her and looked around, his dark eyes narrowing thoughtfully. “All of the blood is on the inside, did you notice that?” He stood and sniffed the air. “And the smell…”
“It smells like blood,” Gallowglass said, tapping her fingers against her pistol. “Who’s ‘they’?”
“And only blood. No odour of the unnatural. No musk or must or mildew. The doors weren’t forced, the windows are unbroken and the roof hasn’t been breached.” St. Cyprian gestured as he spoke. He blithely ignored the glares his assistant tossed his way and turned to Stanhook.
“What are you saying?” Stanhook said.
“Inside job,” Gallowglass said, shaking her head. “Someone-something was on here with them.” She looked around, her olive features strained. “Christ.”
“Not even close,” St. Cyprian said. He looked at the floor. “Footprints, Stanhook, from bare feet. I assume you followed them?”
“We tracked them to the stairs going to the street. Then they just…stopped.” Stanhook frowned. “They were human enough looking, if a bit big.”
“So where did he—did it—go then?” Gallowglass said.
“Home, I assume,” St. Cyprian said. “He put his shoes on and went home.” He turned in place, patting the air with his hands. “There’s something here. Something we’re not seeing.”
“Shoes?” Stanhook said, blinking.
“Yes. That’s why the tracks vanished, you see. He put his shoes back on.” St. Cyprian waved a hand. “That’s not important. What is important is that we find this individual.”
“You think we’re dealing with a man, then?” Stanhook said. “And not one of them?”
“Them, they, those,” Gallowglass said. “Who are they?”
“They are not our concern,” St. Cyprian said. He cast a look at Gallowglass and her mouth shut with an audible snap. “Double your patrols, Mr. Stanhook. Watch the joins and set up some unscheduled line work in the deeper sections until we get this sorted.”
“And him?” Stanhook said. “What do you think—”
“It’s not one of them. That’s all that matters.”
“What about this?” Stanhook said, indicating the carriage.
“A terrible accident. No survivors.” St. Cyprian paused, and then said, “Destroy the carriage. No sense in riling them up with something that smells, however faintly, of food.”
Stanhook gave another jerky nod. “Right. You’ll call us in if there’s any p
roblem?”
“Indubitably,” St. Cyprian said. “Until then…”
“Double the patrols. As you say, sir. No fears, we’ll see to it,” Stanhook said, pulling his Webley and checking the cylinder. He spun it shut with a slap of his palm. “We always see to it, in the end.”
There seemed to be little else to say. Before they left the carriage, St. Cyprian borrowed a pair of pliers from one of the boiler-men and extracted a handful of teeth from the mess. Borrowing a canteen next, he washed the teeth clean and dried them with his handkerchief. Wrapping them up tightly, he bounced the package on his palm and led Gallowglass up the stairs and away from the platform. More bobbies met them at the exit, looking pale-faced and full of questions. They said nothing however, merely nodding in recognition.
“Good old Metropolitan Section 13,” St. Cyprian said, returning the nods. “They can be counted on to see nothing, hear nothing, and do what’s required.”
“Because if they don’t, Morris from the Ministry and his lot will have them out of uniform and on the dole or in the dock faster than they can spit,” Gallowglass said. “And speaking of hearing nothing…”
St. Cyprian sighed. “I’m sorry. I was hoping not to have to give you this particular low-down until farther along in our association. And in better circumstances.” They stepped out onto the street and St. Cyprian took a deep breath, as if seeking to expel the stink of dark places from his lungs.
“Just give it to me straight, if you would,” she said, her dark eyes boring into his own.
“Straight eh? Fine. Here’s straight…there are things in the deep that walk that ought to crawl. Straight enough?”
“Crooked as a corkscrew,” Gallowglass said, lighting a cigarette. She cast a nervous glance at the station they had just left. “Things?”
“You grew up in Cairo. Surely you heard stories about ghuls?” he said.
“I was too busy scrounging to listen to stories,” she said tersely.
“Ever read any HG Wells then?”
Both Barrels of Monster Hunter Legends (Legends of the Monster Hunter Book 1) Page 41