War Within (Death's Contract Book 2)

by KJ Harlow

  I shuffled off the bed and started walking towards the door. I stopped and looked back at my friend. “Come on, Trace. Let’s go.” Tracy still had the scared look from before. I looked back and Walter. “We’ll meet you up there,” I said, waving him off. Walter nodded and disappeared, closing the door behind him.

  “What’s wrong?” I said, putting my face directly into Tracy’s line of vision. “What did Agatha say to you?” Tracy’s eyes were full of fear as her eyes focused on mine.

  “Did you think she was sad before when she told us about Mortimer proposing to her?” Tracy whispered.

  “I mean yeah. She cried, right? Agatha is the iron maiden. She never cries.” Tracy shook her head.

  “That wasn’t sad compared to what I saw on her face before Walter came in.”

  “Deliverers, welcome. I have called this Regroup to discuss the events of the Overworld in the city of London in the United Kingdom,” Walter’s arms were crossed as he leaned with his back against the wall. His eyes casually slid from one person to the next. “After six months of relative inactivity, the Tormented have made themselves known to us again… and then some.”

  He uncrossed his arms and pushed himself off from the wall, walking towards the table. As he took his seat, I cast furtive glances at Agatha. She was back to her usual cold self. She caught one of my glances and paralyzed me with her gaze. I couldn’t take my eyes off her as she tried to pry into my mind. I stared back defiantly at her; I didn’t have anything to hide. She was the one who had skeletons in her closet.

  “As Agatha rightly said, the Tormented are now occupying London. Not only is their location known, we also know that they have managed to secure firearms for the Conflicted. A lot of firearms.” Out of the corner of my eye, Tor caught my attention. He was slowly rotating and exercising his shoulder. As usual, his face gave away nothing. I wondered if he was still in pain.

  My hand crept up unconsciously to rub my own shoulder. I had forgotten the pain a long time ago, such was the power of Death’s healing ability. A twinge of guilt embedded itself in my heart. I had completely forgotten about Tor. I owed him for taking the shots meant for me back at St James’ Park.

  “Do we know why they’re arming the Conflicted with guns?” Silas asked. He was hunched over in his seat, elbows on the table, cupping his chin with his left hand.

  “Probably to try and make it that much harder for us to stop the Tormented, but I thought that was obvious enough,” Agatha snapped. There was a pregnant pause in the room. Everyone shifted uncomfortably and didn’t know where to look. Even by her standards, Agatha was positively bitchy after our session with her in the resting chambers.

  “What isn’t obvious enough is where the Tormented have procured the guns from,” Walter said slowly, eyes flicking between Silas and Agatha. Silas hadn’t so much as flinched while Agatha was trying to hide the regret that had hit her moments after her spiky response. Walter looked over at Tracy and me, his eyes twinkling as he knew how good his save was just then. I suppressed a smile; Walter was too smooth for his own good sometimes.

  “I had a look at one of the weapons,” Tor said. He had stopped exercising his shoulder and now addressed Walter directly. Everyone in the room looked at him expectantly.

  “The weapon looks… familiar,” Tor said, hesitating as he tried to find the right word. Walter raised an eyebrow.

  “Familiar?”

  “Yes. I feel like I’ve seen them somewhere before. There were some scratchings on the finger guard,” Tor’s jaw was working as he tried to remember.

  “Did you use that gun when you were in the Norwegian army?” I asked. Tor’s jaw stopped moving as he looked at me. If I wanted to let him know things were good between us again, I might as well start now.

  “No,” Tor said, not taking his eyes away from me. “No,” he repeated, looking back at Walter.

  “If you do remember anything, let us know,” Walter said, nodding at Tor. “Tracy, would you like to take us through the events of the day leading up to when you saw the Tormented?” Tracy jumped slightly, looking at Walter. If Agatha had looked at me instead of Tracy, I wondered if I would have been as disturbed by what I saw on her face.

  “We landed in…” Tracy struggled as she tried to remember.

  “Hyde Park,” Agatha said irritably.

  “Yes, Hyde Park,” Tracy said quickly. “We spent time in central London, trying to identify potential places the Tormented could have set up their base at.

  “We ended up going shopping,” she immediately brightened up at the memory, “trying on some new season stuff in a store in Oxford Street,” She looked down at me and smiled as she said this.

  “As I was getting Rose a bigger size for a top,” I kicked her in the shins surreptitiously, “I noticed someone in the store acting strangely. This person looked short enough to be a child. I immediately thought it was Matylda. She was wearing dark sunglasses and an oversized sun hat. Before I could see her face, she had left the store.

  “I chased after her but had lost her. She had ditched the sun hat. Agatha and Rose caught up and together, we continued searching for her.” Walter thanked her then nodded at me. I acquiesced and stood up.

  “We continued moving south, scouting out the area and familiarizing ourselves with the landmarks. Eventually, we arrived at Westminster Cathedral.” My eyes flicked over to Agatha to see if she had any reaction. She stared stonily at the table.

  “We had arrived just in time to witness a wedding procession coming out. We stood about 35, maybe 40 yards away and watched. Just as the bride and groom made it to the cars, Matylda revealed herself. She was one of flower girls holding the bride’s train. She pulled out her gun then all hell broke loose.”

  Everyone was watching me now except Agatha. As foul a mood as she was in, she didn’t deserve to be embarrassed in front of the group. No one had to know what happened to her when the Tormented started shooting innocent people.

  “Mortimer started pulling guns out of the cars and throwing them over to the Conflicted. He gave them orders to go into the streets of London and start massacring. We would have stopped them, but we didn’t know anything about the guns. For all we knew, the Tormented might have found ways to replicate their Ombre Guns. We had to retreat for the time being.

  “We went to the west side of the Cathedral. Parents were rushing in to collect their children from school, not giving a damn about road rules or where they parked. It was chaos. I don’t know if the Tormented had planned for it to be like that, but that would have become their undoing. No cars could leave. Then the Conflicted came.”

  “Walter,” Agatha said abruptly, standing up. “May I pick up the retelling from here?” Walter gestured towards me, indicating that I was the person that she should be asking permission from.

  “Yes, please, that’s fine,” I said, flustered. I didn’t like being put on the spot like that. Agatha watched me sit down. Before she started, she gave me the smallest of smiles. Was she thanking me for not outing her breakdown when the Tormented appeared?

  “Rose rushed the advancing Conflicted, putting herself in harm’s way. Thankfully, her skills as a Deliverer have markedly increased since her first mission; she only sustained a minor shoulder injury during the skirmish, Ridding five Conflicted armed with guns.”

  “Close your mouth,” Tracy whispered under her breath. My top and bottom teeth clattered into each other as I quickly shut my mouth. Agatha had rarely acknowledged a job well done from me, let alone given me a compliment.

  “The other important fact that we were able to ascertain was that the weapons the Tormented were arming the Conflicted with were not Ombre Guns. They could wound and kill us, sending us back to the Underworld, but they couldn’t Cease us.

  “By this time, the rest of the Deliverers had come up from the Underworld. We had secured the west end of the cathedral. Liaising with the others, we realized that there were more armed Conflicted than we initially thought. We dispersed to differe
nt parts of London to provide back up: Rose to St James’ Park to join Tor, Tracy to Tate Britain to join Silas and myself to the London Eye to join Walter.

  “Before you continue Agatha, did anybody see the Tormented after they made their appearance and supplied weapons to the Conflicted?” Walter said, looking around at each of us. Everyone either looked back at him without any expression or shook their heads. He furrowed his brow, rubbing his chin thoughtfully.

  “Why would they do that? Why would they gain the upper hand and not take advantage of it? We weren’t ready. They completely caught us by surprise. Surely they would have seen us defending the citizens of London. They could have Ceased us right then and there,” he mused, frowning.

  “The Tormented are arrogant. They knew that we hit them hard by Ceasing Stan. To their credit, they bided their time and counter-attacked. It all started when Mortimer fed me the information in the chapel at the hospital. He was sprinkling bread crumbs for us to follow. He knew that we would follow the trail and end up in London eventually. He knew that we couldn’t resist,” Agatha said introspectively.

  “Are you saying that it’s not in their best interests to finish us off?” Walter scoffed.

  “I’m saying that whoever was behind that attack did it as a show of power. The scale that it was performed at was something Mortimer would have done.” Walter suddenly stood up. He seemed irritated as he started pacing the room.

  “Something doesn’t make sense. We are the mortal enemy of the Tormented. If we’re not the target, then who is? We’re missing something.”

  “Yes we are sworn enemies, but who are we to pretend that we understand their motives? We don’t know why Dante is building his army. Maybe for him, power is just a means to an end,” Agatha said. Walter stopped pacing. He stood with his feet together and looked at the wall, his back towards us. I guess if I didn’t understand what my enemy would do next, I would feel pretty antsy too.

  “That bastard,” Dante growled. “If all the Conflicted have guns from now on, it’s going to be that much harder to Cease the Tormented.”

  “That’s true, but it’s not impossible,” I interjected. Walter looked at me, his face twisted into a scowl. If I didn’t know better, I’d say he was angry at me. “The guns will hurt, but they can’t Cease us. We just have to be more careful when we’re engaging with them.” Walter scowled at me a moment longer before his face relaxed.

  “I suppose you're right. Things could be worse. They could have found a way to turn their normal guns into Ombre Guns. Then we’d be toast,” he said darkly.

  “I guess that would make things a lot harder, but there’s always hope. There’s always a possibility. There’s always something worth fighting for.” I was standing up, my chair pushed back. I didn’t know why I was so fired up. What had triggered it? I laughed sheepishly then sat back down. Walter looked at me with amusement before he too took his seat.

  The glass door to the meeting room suddenly disappeared. Death stood in the doorway, his expression grim.

  “I know where the Tormented got their guns from.” He turned around and went back to the control room. I exchanged looks with Tracy as we stood up and hurriedly left the meeting room. The other Deliverers weren’t far behind. We convened at the front of the control room where the monitors on the wall were all showing one image.

  “That’s…” I started.

  “Yes. It’s a map of London,” Death said, his hazel eyes flashing as he regarded me. They flicked over to Walter, who had come to stand next to me as he too stared up at the big screen. “I’ve been trying to figure out where the weapons came from since you guys got back down here. As unpredictable as the Tormented can be, I think I found something. It was actually Silas’ idea. He told me to bring up a map of London and plot the locations where the Conflicted appeared. Silas?” Death stepped aside, beckoning Silas to come forward.

  Silas pushed his steel-rimmed oval glasses up his nose and moved towards the central display. Nodding at the worker he turned around and faced everyone. “Westminster Cathedral,” a big, red spot appeared on the cathedral on the screen, “St James’ Park, Tate Britain and the London Eye.” Three more spots appeared. I still couldn’t see it. He nodded again at the worker, who proudly tapped a button on his keyboard. Lines appeared between each of the dots.

  “An arrow!” I exclaimed, looking at Walter. “That can’t be a coincidence, right?” His arms were crossed as he frowned at the revelation.

  “Where’s it pointing to?” He rumbled.

  “No…” Agatha whispered, eyes filling with fear again. “Anywhere but there.”

  Seven

  The room was quiet; all eyes were on Agatha.

  “Where’s ‘there’?” Walter said, looking back up at the map. The arrow was pointing in a south-westerly direction. I looked at the map too, trying to find an important landmark. The trajectory of the arrow was missing Buckingham Palace and the House of Commons. What could be more important than those two places?

  “I see now,” Tor said quietly from the back of the group. I swiveled my neck up to look at him. He was staring at a spot in the bottom left corner of the screen. There wasn’t anything there. I spied Heathrow Airport, which was west than south west. Finally, I caved.

  “What is it, Tor? Where is the arrow pointing to?” Tor was silent for a while.

  I could see the gears behind his eyes cranking as he dredged up a memory. “In my second year at the Norwegian Army, we had a placement in the British Army headquarters. They marked their weapons on the inside of the guard.” I stared at him, nonplussed. “The guns that we looked at, they were military grade hand guns, built for short- to medium-range shooting.”

  “Andover.” Agatha whispered.

  I looked at her again. Her eyes were rooted to the bottom left of the screen. Squinting through my glasses, I finally found an area marked ‘Andover’.

  “Andover is where I did my placement. It’s the headquarters of the British Armed Forces. That’s where their arsenal is as well,” Tor said.

  “Are you saying the Tormented have infiltrated the British Armed Forces?” Walter asked slowly. Agatha turned to look at him.

  “If they haven’t, they’re going to very soon.”

  “We should wait and see what happens–”

  “If we wait, and they get all the weapons–”

  “What if it’s a trap?”

  Death, Walter, and Agatha were all standing up and arguing in the meeting room as the rest of us watched on helplessly. Despite being the ones who should have been at a disadvantage, it seemed like the Tormented now had the upper hand. Not only had they sprung an attack on us, they gave us a clue as to their next move. Problem was, was it a bluff or the real deal?

  “Why don’t we–” I said meekly as my futile attempt at breaking into the argument fell flat on its face.

  “Let me handle this,” Tracy said, winking at me. She took a deep breath in, stuck two fingers in her mouth and blew hard. Her whistle pierced the ruckus in the room as everyone stared at her.

  “Rose has something she would like to say,” Tracy said sweetly. Agatha, Walter, and Death looked at me, waiting impatiently. I exhaled quietly. I had to hand it to Tracy; she knew how to get a group’s attention.

  “Why don’t we look at the worst case scenario?” All I got were blank looks so I started taking apart the main causes of concern. “Right now, we don’t know whether the Tormented are bluffing or not. They may be pillaging the arsenal as we speak. If they are doing this, they could destroy London. If they’re bluffing, it could be a trap. We could walk straight into it and be Ceased right then and there. Am I missing anything?” It was quiet as everyone looked at me.

  “They could be doing both. They could have already raided the arsenal and have set a trap for us. Now that would be the worst-case scenario.” Walter said, his face twitching into a snarl.

  “They could also be turning the armed forces into Conflicted. That would be the smarter thing to do. That
way, they wouldn’t have to take their guns. They just shoot them then they have a literal army of highly trained killers,” Death said.

  “Yes that’s possible too, but if that was the case, why would they just get guns earlier? They could have just infiltrated the Armed Forces to begin with and turned them into Conflicted. My money’s on them stealing military guns. They’re over-confident.”

  “And Walter,” I said turning my attention to the senior Deliverer. “Yes, it’s possible that they could pull off both at the same time, but it’s unlikely. They have had several opportunities to crush us in the past but they haven’t done so. They’re toying with us, or so they would like to think so.” I stood up and addressed everyone.

  “Do you know what I think? I think Dante wanted to try and prove two things. Firstly, that by us Ceasing Stan, he wasn’t weakened. What he could do was use his skills of persuasion to get Andover to surrender all their weapons to him. Secondly, upon achieving that, he would want a captive audience to appreciate him masterful acts of terrorism.

  “That’s where we come in. Mortimer and Matylda already know that he can do that. He doesn’t derive any pleasure out of showing off to them. He needs us to validate his existence as a powerful enemy. Let me say that in a different way: he needs us to feel powerful. If he defeated us, there would be no opposition to his madness. Then he would just be bored. He’s probably waiting for us at Andover, hoping that we’ll show up.”

  Looking around at the group, I had a few dubious looks. Tracy was nodding. Silas and Tor looked thoughtful.

  “It doesn’t change the fact that it’s a really dangerous situation to be in,” Agatha said. “Trying to justify reasons for the actions of the Tormented is like trying to understand the hallucinations of the clinically insane.” I whirled around and turned on Agatha.

  “Isn’t that what we’re here? To understand the Tormented? Their power comes from a single, unanswered question. We find the question, we find the answer to it and we win. Yes, they’re dangerous. Yes, their actions are unforgivable. But if we are to stand any chance of winning this war, we have to venture where the Tormented don’t want us to go and beyond. We have to keep searching for the truth and if that involves facing our own demons, that’s something we have to be prepared for.”