Arnie Selmo reached out, praying not that he could push the wolf away, but that he could, at least for a moment, fasten his fingers around its throat.
And if he couldn’t get his fingers close enough, Lord Jesus, at least his teeth.
Chapter Four
Hidden Ways
White-knuckled, Ian clung to the shoulder straps for his life as the Ford Bronco swung wide onto the din road toward the Thorsen house. Beside him in the back seat, he could feel Torrie’s fear. Hell, he could almost smell it.
Thorsen drove like a madman, or maybe like somebody who thought that an extra-hard stomp on the accelerator, a more-violent-than-necessary turn of the wheel could make the car move faster.
The only one in the car who seemed calm was Hosea, who sat in the righthand front seat calmly, seemingly un-worried and unruffled.
They turned down the road toward the house.
Thorsen skidded the car to a stop amid a scene of carnage.
Under the electric lights, bodies were scattered on the grass. Blood was slick and glossy on the grass, while fragments of bone shone too brightly, and yellowy worms of intestine lay motionless.
It perhaps would have been kinder if they were dead, but two were groaning.
A thick-waisted heavy-bearded man in a puffy-looking down coat was leaning over one of the wounded; the open black bag at his side on the ground proclaimed him a doctor.
Jeff Bjerke was at the car door as they opened it. His right arm hung down by his side, as though useless, and he didn’t seem to notice that he had a revolver in his fist.
“Doc Sherve says that Arnie’ll live, but Ole Hansen’s dead, and both the Larson boys,” he said, his voice unnaturally calm, and in shocking contrast to the tears running down his cheeks and into his beard. “Davy Hansen’s tracking the wolves; they fled almost due south. I told him not to, but everybody knows you can’t tell Davy shit. He took along a roll of my yellow crime scene tape—said he’ll blaze a trail with it for you.”
His hand gripped Thorsen’s shoulder. “I’d feel damn silly telling anybody else this, but I have the feeling you know that the wolves took your wife—and your son’s girlfriend. And that bullets don’t even seem to slow them down.”
Thorsen took a step toward where the doctor was working over the old man that Ian decided had to be Arnie Selmo.
“No,” Bjerke said. “No time for it. The staties’ll be all over us within an hour. If there’s anything you need to do, you’d better do it now. Doc and I’ll cover for you, but—”
“I must talk to …”
Bjerke grabbed Thorsen’s shoulder and spun him around, bringing the pistol up until it pointed at Thorsen’s face, his knuckles white as his pale face. “Don’t you fucking dare,” he said. “Don’t you even fucking think about it. You deal with your guilt some other time, Mister Thorsen, you confess it to your minister or you dissolve it in a bottle of whiskey. Some other time. For right now, you remember that your neighbors died trying to save them. You won’t waste it, you fucker,” he said, each word curiously without heat. He let his arms fall down by his sides.
Thorsen didn’t say anything for a moment. “There’s much that you don’t know.”
“I probably know more than your own kid does—you think the only thing old John Honistead passed on was this badge?” Jeff Bjerke looked Thorian in the eye. “Get to it.” He stalked away, calling out orders to a team of stretcher-bearers.
“I will.” Thorsen turned to Hosea. “You know what they want. I need you to come with me.”
Hosea shook his head slowly. “Not this way, Thorian. There’s another route—”
“You know what they’ll do if we don’t follow,” he said, his voice flat.
“No, I do not know what they will do. I know what their actions … threaten, yes. Not all keep their promises, overt or covert.”
“No. If we don’t follow—I’ll follow them, even if you won’t.”
Hosea rubbed two fingertips against the bridge of his nose. “Then do what you must, as surely I will.”
Without a word, Thorsen turned and ran for the house.
Ian placed himself in front of Torrie. “Will you tell me what’s going on?”
Torrie shook his head. “I … don’t know.” It was hard to make out his expression in the light, what little there was streaming out through the open door to the house.
Old Hosea’s voice was thinner than usual. “Yes, you do, young Thorian. You’ve heard the stories—some of them. And some of them even were stories.”
“And some of them were true? About the wars of the Aesir and Vanir? Dvalin and Silvertop? The Vestri and the Tuatha? The Tuarin? All of it?”
“True enough, although somewhat outdated. There are few of the Aesir, and probably are no more Vanir as such; the Aesir always were ready to war on anyone when they were younger.”
“And the Tuatha?”
“What there is left of them.” The tall man nodded. “And very much the Tuatha.”
“The Brisingamen—”
“Broken and dispersed, the jewels hidden.” Hosea tapped a long finger against his temple. “Even from me.”
“About the New World and Newer?”
“Yes, and the Ways between them, bent ninety degrees out of space. Yes.” Hosea gestured off toward the south. “Your father and I came through some years ago, some miles that way, in a spot that the Lakota used to hold sacred, through an adit that does not exist here; it needs to be held open from the New World. Which it surely is, as a trap. Intended to trap him at least.” His smile was distant. “Not that that will stop your father, will it?”
“No.” Torrie closed his eyes for a moment. “Because the Sons are cold and cruel, because if the bait doesn’t draw the prey, then there’s no reason for them not to eat the bait.” He opened his eyes. “Yes,” he said. “It won’t stop either of us. ‘The blood of heroes,’ eh?”
Hosea nodded slowly. “Oh, Torrie, you’ve always had that, eh?”
“Thorian,” the elder Thorsen called to his son from the doorway. Torrie caught the first of the tossed two large leather rucksacks and threw it into the car, then the second.
“One more moment.” Thorsen disappeared back into the house.
It was only then that Ian realized that Thorsen had had a sword belt buckled around his waist. Even with jeans and plaid shirt, on him it looked natural.
Torrie’s face was pale as he turned to Ian. “I’m sorry about all this, but—” He shrugged. “No time for explanations—Dad will leave without me if I don’t keep up. I… if things work out right, and you get the chance, tell Maggie I’m sorry, if I don’t get the chance. If I’d thought—” he caught himself.
“Thorian,” Hosea said quietly, “remember everything I’ve taught you. Some of it may serve you well.” He touched two long fingers to Torrie’s forehead for just a moment, then took a shuffling step forward to gather Torrie in his arms. “As some may not. Take care of yourself.”
Thorsen appeared in the doorway, a pair of rifles tucked under one arm, and two sheathed swords in belts clutched in his hands.
“Once again, Hosea,” he said. “I ask that you accompany me. I have a sword here for you.”
Hosea shook his head as he released Torrie. “I can’t. It would be not only dangerous, Thorian, but pointless.”
Silently, Thorsen turned and walked toward the car.
Torrie quickly clasped hands with Ian for a moment before running toward the car. He managed to get the door open and himself into the front seat just as his father started the engine and gunned the car into motion.
And then they were gone.
Ian stood, stunned. None of it made sense. Not the carnage on the lawn, as bad as anything he had seen the summer he had supplemented teaching fees with work as an ER orderly. Not the talk of wolves carrying away Karin and Maggie, not—none of it.
Hosea was watching him. “Come with me into the house,” he said, long fingers plucking gently at Ian’s shin. Ian fol
lowed him inside, and then down the stairs into the basement, their footsteps too loud in the silence.
Hosea reached out and pulled a string; fluorescent light flared in the light panels above. He crossed his thin arms over his thin chest, and leaned back against a workbench. “The young one was correct; it will be a trap. They didn’t attack while I was here, because here the Sons would have no power over me. So they would lure me to where they do.”
“I don’t understand any of this.”
Hosea nodded. “True enough. And you have every right to, friend Ian, but not the time. All you need to know is this: if we’re very fortunate, we can rescue your friends, our friends, within a few hours, and then return safely. If we are less fortunate, we may yet be of service, although the way will be longer and more difficult.” Fingers worked at a knot on the paneled wall, and a square section of paneling swung out, revealing a leather knapsack and a pile of brown cloth that Ian thought was a blanket until Hosea pulled it out. It was a cloak of some sort.
Hosea set it on the floor, and worked at another spot on the panel, this time revealing a pair of recurved bows and a quiver thick with arrows. He pulled one out; its razor tip shone silver under the fluorescent light. “The Sons can’t stand silver,” he said. “Some of the others have trouble with steel.” He pursed his lips for a moment. “And that which is properly tempered in the right blood can kill anything.”
Ian cocked his head to one side. “So why no silver bullet?” It was crazy. He had no business asking questions, as though the old man was sane. What the situation called for was to head for the door and walk away from the crazy old black man and all his friends. Let the authorities handle it.
The old man gestured toward the end of the workroom, where a reloading press stood under a covering of plastic sheeting. “I trust Thorian has taken some with him. We swaged them ourselves—silver around steel. They will be useful if he catches the Sons before they make their way to the Old Way. But not in Tir Na Nog; the guns wouldn’t work, or they would work too well.”
“So you want me to go hunting wolves with you with nothing more than a bow?”
“No.” Hosea walked to the wall and pulled a sword down from the rack. “I… invite you to accompany me, and keep them off me while I hunt them. If we’re fortunate enough to locate them quickly.”
He presented it hilt first. Technically, it was a basket-hilted saber: the narrow, silvery blade was sharpened back from the needle tip on both sides, as though it was intended to cut as well as stab, but it felt stiff and light like a rapier or epée. The blade was straight, its surface uninscribed, the pommel a simple silver cap purely functional, no decoration.
It was a fighting weapon—not a practice saber, intended to score points with a quick flick: It was not a cavalry saber; it was intended to be used against somebody else with a sword, not to hew down peasants or Indians from horseback.
Ian gave it a few trial sweeps through the air. It moved with the stiffness of an epée, not the lightness of foil. The hilt was cord-wound over something that had just the right give; it almost seemed to grip Ian’s hand back.
It felt embarrassingly right in his hand.
“And if not?” he asked. “What if I don’t want to accompany you?”
“I don’t know. I will seek them, I will see what I can still do.” Hosea shook his head. “But there is one end for all, eventually: the fortunate, the unfortunate, the quick, and the slow.”
“And you want me to leave with you now? How? To go where? With what?”
There was a long pause. “There will either be plenty of time for that, or we have far too little.” Hosea kneeled at the fencing strip, and pushed one hand down on it, then set his cupped fingertips to the surface as though he was pulling on an invisible doorknob.
The whole side of the fencing strip swung up, like an absurdly long door opening in the floor, until it balanced neatly on its side.
Beneath it there was mostly dirt, except for what looked at first glance like a hole.
But it wasn’t. A hole wasn’t of the purest nonreflective black.
Straightening, Hosea took a paintbrush from the nearby table and returned to poke its tip down into the black circle.
He pulled the stick out. The end of the brush was gone, cut so cleanly that the tips of the fibers shone.
“Be careful not to touch it, unless you wish to step through,” Hosea said, tying the end of a ball of string to a hook on the underside of the fencing strip. “It is a way in, but not out.”
A small, silvery knife that Ian hadn’t seen before was in Hosea’s hands; he cut off a length of string, ran one end through an overhead eyelet, and tied the ends together. He rummaged through a box of vials on the workbench before he came up with a glass bottle, stoppered with glass. He carefully, gingerly removed the stopper and touched it to the string next to the eyelet. The string immediately began to smoke.
Hosea frowned, and touched it again, apparently satisfied when the smoke thickened. “That should do it,” he said, restoppering and replacing the bottle. “That will give you just a few moments before it swings shut,” he said. “You’ll find a spare rucksack and a belt and scabbard for that sword in the closet behind the door,” he said. “Follow me, if you choose. There’s no shame if you’re unwilling to. You’ve made no commitment, and you weren’t born to it, the way young Thorian was.” His smile broadened and he started to step off the edge.
“Best to decide quickly.” The words hung in the air.
Hosea disappeared into the blackness, and Ian was alone.
Ian knew what Benjamin Silverstein would have said, would have wanted Ian to say.
Go off to rescue somebody, a silvery sword in his hand?
Don’t be silly, boy. It’s just more of that Errol Flynn shit, and it’s about time you grew up. Get through school and into law school, and be a lawyer like your father. That’s fine; I’ll pay for that—but no more talk of this nonsense about becoming some sort of advocate for a bunch of juvenile delinquents. You find something worthwhile to do.
No, he had said, finally. No. I’ll do it my way. I don’t want to be some sort of corporate lawyer. I want to work for abused kids, I want to drag their parents into court and hold them accountable, make those bastards pay for it.
And he should have added: like I wish somebody had done with you years ago, you bastard, and I swear to God if you ever raise your hand to me again, I’ll run you through.
But he hadn’t.
Still, you didn’t say no to Benjamin Silverstein. And when Benjamin Silverstein took a step forward to slap you into submission, again, you didn’t set the point of a sword against his chest, a point you had ground from the button at the tip of a foil, turning a practice weapon into something very real.
Ian’s hand clenched on the hilt of the silvery sword the way it had on the foil, that day. Benjamin Silverstein was a bear of a man, and strong as a bull, but it was over: he was not going to beat Ian anymore.
Get out, Benjamin Silverstein had said. Fill that backpack of yours with your clothes and get out. You’ve been eighteen years old for more than a month, and I don’t have to put up with your shit anymore, boy. If you’re not out of my house in five minutes, I call the cops.
Benjamin Silverstein wouldn’t have approved. Don’t be stupid, boy, he would have said. Just more of that silly Robin Hood shit.
In the final analysis, that was enough for Ian. More than enough. He took the rucksack from the closet and slipped the straps over his shoulders. Another cloak lay folded on the shelf above it; that, too, went over a shoulder. He belted the scabbard around his waist, but didn’t slip the sword into it. It felt too right in his hand.
“Fuck you, Dad,” he said.
Smiling, Ian stepped into the darkness.
Part Two
The New World
Chapter Five
The Sons of the Wolf
The road lay flat and straight like a taut ribbon under the swollen moon as tar as the ey
e could see, but all it would take would be one deer lunging out from a windbreak, its eyes shining back the headlights, and the Bronco could be rolling in the ditch.
Still, Dad pressed down more heavily on the accelerator. “I haven’t spoken to you of strategy,” he said quietly, his eyes never leaving the road, his face, lit only by the light of the dashboard, a horrid green.
“There’s a lot you haven’t said. You taught me better than to ask.”
“I did, at that. We’re getting closer. Get me a set of the nightgoggles, and do the same for yourself.”
Torrie unhooked himself from the seat belt. Two of the leather emergency bags were in the back, behind the seat. Each was heavy, intended to be thrown in the back of a car, or carried a short distance and then some of the contents buried.
He knew their contents the way he knew the abditory where they had been hidden: two mini Maglites, along with spare batteries that were changed twice a year; two pounds of jerky, and as much of the waxy chocolate that wouldn’t melt; a physician’s kit, complete with pharmacopoeia that ran from broad-spectrum antibiotics to morphine, Vistaril, and Demerol; a long Gerber hunting knife and a Swiss Army knife and a SOG Paratool, each with blades better sharpened than they had been at the factory; a fire-starting kit; a coil of climbing rope; several dozen latex condoms, capable of carrying small amounts of water or of keeping wooden matches dry as well as for more traditional uses; copies of each of their four passports, copies that would stand the closest scrutiny; a roll of duct tape; water-purification tablets and filters; a box of Tampax; a dozen gold Krugerrands and ten thousand dollars in twenties; a fiberfill sleeping bag, squeezed into the smallest stuff sack it could fit—it used to be down, when Torrie was a kid, but fiberfill had gotten better, and the emergency bags had been updated; a food-getting kit, including fishing hooks and line, barbs for a fishing spear, and a black Ruger Mark I, along with a brick of Stingers; dry socks, and stretchy polypropylene turtlenecks and drawstring trousers, capable of fitting Dad, albeit a bit tightly, or Torrie or Mother, albeit loosely in different places; large squares of Mylar sheeting that could be used as a ground cloth or pitched as a lean-to; a Zeiss monocular; and a set of military nightgoggles.
The Fire Duke Page 7