by David Wood
He was looking right at her, grinning widely. “You would never make it.”
Fury bubbled up, made Rose grit her teeth. She was tempted to try for the escape anyway. Maybe she could use her tied hands as a double fist and smash his stupid nose first, then roll from the door. The big idiot wouldn’t be expecting that.
Then another look passed over Grigor’s face, one she’d seen a million times before from a million creepy guys. Her already boosted pulse ratcheted up again.
“Don’t even think about that!” she said.
Grigor laughed, a low, guttural noise. “I can do whatever I want, you know.”
“Landvik needs me. You don’t want to piss off your boss.”
“Landvik needs your memories. Your body is a lot more disposable.” He slid one hand up her thigh.
All Rose’s frustrations bubbled over and she lifted both her hands, twisting them painfully against the zip tie to drive her right elbow as hard as she could into his ribs.
Grigor winced and grunted, folding slightly against the impact, and that gave Rose another surge of adrenaline, a more positive one this time, but Grigor straightened and grinned. “I like a little fight in my women.”
He shot one hand out, grabbed the hair at the back of Rose’s neck, and pulled her toward him. He planted a hard kiss, crushing her lips against her teeth. His breath was rank with tobacco and some kind of alcohol. Rose opened her mouth and bit hard against his lips, tasting a surge of salty, hot blood. Grigor roared, jerking back. He put one palm in the center of her chest to drive her back and backhanded her with the other. Her face whipped to one side, her cheek stinging instantly with the sharp pain of it, thankfully the opposite side to where Landvik had cut her.
He pressed the back of his hand to his mouth, the words, “You bitch!” muffled against it.
Rose knew she was in trouble, the man animalistic now with anger. Her back pressed against the door, she couldn’t twist around to open it, to dive free, so she took the fight to him. She shot forward, and threw her weight to one side, slamming an elbow across the bridge of his nose. He tried to get his arm in the way and was only partly successful. Rose was rewarded with a dull crunch and Grigor yelped, the sound as surprised as it was angry.
“You like a little fight, huh?” Rose yelled at him, clutched her fists together and crashed them into his head, once, twice, three times. Grigor snarled, covering up with one arm. As he clawed out with the other, she batted it aside and made a move for the car door. She kicked out backwards as she grabbed the door handle and pulled, planning to drive against him with her legs to exit the vehicle even if she landed on her face. She pulled the door handle, adrenaline and exhilaration pulsing through her, expecting cold wet air. Nothing happened. She yanked the handle again. Nothing.
Grigor laughed. “You think we’re stupid? Child locks, you idiot.” He grabbed her roughly above the knees and flipped her over. The back of her head hit the door as she landed and bounced against the car seat. “You should have gone for the driver’s door.” Grigor’s grin was wide again, leering, all the more terrifying for the blood over his teeth and the rapidly swelling lower lip.
Rose was pleased that she had hurt him, but it was small comfort as he dragged her down and straddled her. Thoughts of violent rape rippled through her and she tried to drive a knee into his groin, but he was ready for that and turned one thigh to block her. Her eyes went wide as Grigor’s bloodied, angry face rose over her and he closed both meaty hands around her throat.
Chapter 45
Lindisfarne Priory, Holy Island, Berwick-upon-Tweed
Landvik turned on the spot, disconsolate. Rain plastered his hair flat to his head, ran in cold rivulets down the back of his neck. He hadn’t known what he might find, but had been sure he would find something. After all, others here would never have expected to discover Mjolnir. They wouldn’t be looking for clues to its location. But he knew greater truths, and he was a man of great faith. All he needed was a little more indication, some tiny sign. But all he found was wet stone and disappointment. Perhaps he needed to change the way he looked, maybe reconsider what he expected to see. Perhaps there were clues elsewhere on the island.
A short, rotund woman in a green rain coat with Lindisfarne stenciled across the back stood in the broken down front doorway to the priory. Her back to him, she hunched against the rain and seemed to be watching out past St Mary’s Parish Church. Landvik waved his man over.
“Anything?”
Brushing rain from his eyes, the man shook his head. “Nothing.”
Landvik approached the woman in the green jacket. “Excuse me, do you work here?”
The woman laughed, rolling her eyes dramatically. “For my sins! There’s a guided tour due to start in five minutes and in this weather I honestly don’t expect anyone to show up for it. But you never know, and I have to be here just in case.”
“A guided tour?”
“Yes. I lead the group around the priory and surrounds, talk about the history of the island, its place in the development of religion and so on.”
“And the Vikings?”
The woman’s face brightened. “Oh yes, of course the Vikings. You know...”
Landvik cut her off. “You know anything about any Viking-era artifacts that have been recovered from here?”
“Well, there have been all kinds of archeological digs and programs. Any number of things from across hundreds of years have been unearthed.”
“Yes, yes, but Viking artifacts?”
The guide seemed a little put out by Landvik’s gruff questioning. He realized he was being rude, but was too wet and too annoyed to care. “Well,” she said, “if you go back down toward the town and turn right on Marygate, you’ll find The Lindisfarne Heritage Centre. There’s an exhibit inside dedicated solely to the Viking influence here and there’s a number of artifacts on display there.”
Landvik brightened, a thread of hope igniting again. “Right, okay.” He began to turn away but caught the flash of a frown pass over the woman’s face. “Thank you,” he added.
She smiled uncomfortably and nodded.
Landvik whistled once, sharply, caught the attention of his other man still roaming about between the headstones in the small cemetery. “Back to the car,” Landvik called out.
Rose fought desperately against the blackness closing in around the edges of her vision. The man’s hands clenched her throat like a vice, his eyes wild in his furious face. He had clearly completely lost control, one too many strikes from Rose hurting him enough that he no longer cared about anything except hurting her back. Permanently.
She tried to gasp for breath, tried to tell him that Landvik needed her memories and for that she had to be alive. She wanted to plead with him for her life as the terror of actually dying became an all too real possibility. After everything she had been through since this whole ridiculous drama had begun, it was surely impossible that she was about to die now at the hands of an ignorant, musclebound idiot.
Darkness closed in further, her vision narrowing to a pinpoint showing only Grigor’s grimacing, blood-stained face, and Rose’s consciousness, her very life, ebbed away.
The iron pressure of Grigor’s grip suddenly vanished. Still blinded by lack of air and panic, Rose could only gasp, her chest tight, her throat on fire. She heard a cry of surprise, a fleshy thwack, as she gasped again. Through blurred and swimming vision she watched Grigor dragged backwards through the now open car door on his side. She caught a glimpse of Crowley’s face, hair slicked to his scalp by rain, mouth twisted in a snarl of rage, but refused to believe it was real. Surely she was hallucinating from lack of oxygen to the brain. Was this some strange fantasy of rescue, her brain softening the agony of her last moments before death? But she felt the cold wind coming into the car, heard the rain more loudly, spattering against the bitumen outside.
The other back door behind her head popped open, more cold, wet air gusting in. She dragged more life-saving breaths into he
r straining lungs. A strange man with deep olive skin and black hair as wet as Crowley’s called her by name. She twisted in the seat to see him more clearly, trying to order her thoughts. Unsure who this stranger was, she scrambled forward anyway, desperate only to be out of the car, with a chance to get away from all of this.
“I’m with Crowley,” the man said. “My name is Cameron. Come on!”
Too woozy to argue, she stumbled into his waiting arms. He held her up and produced a small pocket knife that he flicked open with the hand holding it. A wash of panic slipped through her, and then he dragged the blade up through the plastic of the zip tie around her wrists. It fell away and her arms swung free. Nothing had ever felt so good. She vigorously rubbed at each wrist with the other hand, moving her elbows and shoulders as she did so.
Over the roof of the car she could see Crowley tussling with Grigor. It really was him! Where had he come from? The thug was bigger than Crowley, but not gaining much ground against Crowley’s trained skills. A number of tourists milled around, faces stunned in expressions of shock. At least two were pulling phones from their pockets, pointing them at the action.
Crowley and Grigor ducked and moved, Grigor throwing out a heavy looping punch that Crowley caught on one forearm as he ducked in and delivered a rapid double uppercut to Grigor’s liver. The big man grunted in deep pain, folding over Crowley’s fist, then a voice cut through the wind and hiss of rain.
Landvik came running from the gate of St Mary’s, water slashing up from the recently filled puddles in the gravel path. His other two heavies were right behind. One of them pulled an automatic from his jacket, raised it over Landvik’s shoulder and fired. The low popping of its report hinted at a silencer, but still the gawking crowd began screaming and running randomly left and right, all generally heading back down the road away from the ruins.
The first two shots hit the car, shattering windows.
“No wonder,” Rose thought distantly, the idiot firing a handgun at range while running. But he was getting rapidly closer.
Cameron dragged against her arm and turned her toward a large white Land Rover Discovery parked behind them, with both front doors open and the engine running. It must be the car Crowley and Cameron had arrived in.
Crowley ducked and caught Grigor across the jaw with a fast jab. As Grigor stumbled, Crowley slipped behind him and lopped one arm around the man’s neck. He dragged Grigor backwards as a human shield as he came around Landvik’s car, heading for the Discovery.
Rose dove into the big white car and scrambled into the back seat as Cameron jumped into the driver’s seat. Another bullet kicked up dirt at Crowley’s feet, then she heard two wet thuds, strangely loud, and Grigor cried out in pain and fell limp. Crowley dropped the dead weight of Grigor’s corpse and leapt into the passenger seat as Cameron gunned the engine and the Discovery skidded in a wide arc and began to power away down the narrow road. Cameron ducked as his side window shattered and showered his lap with glass.
“Are you hit?” Crowley yelled.
“No.” Cameron’s voice was tight, his focus entirely on driving.
Tourists leapt aside, many screaming and shouting, as another couple of bullets pinged against the car’s bodywork. The rear window suddenly burst into a crazy field of glass cubes, made Rose cry out in surprise, but it didn’t fall, then they were gaining speed back between the houses.
“That guy would make a great Stormtrooper, right?” Rose quipped, her adrenaline a furious rushing in her ears.
Crowley laughed, his face flushed from his exertions as he looked back from the front seat. “Sounds like you’re okay then?”
“I’ve been better,” Rose admitted. “But I have never been happier to see someone in my entire life!”
Chapter 46
Lindisfarne, Holy Island
Cameron drove expertly through narrow streets lined with stone walls, small shops and buildings built right up to the edges. Tourists milled about, some cars moving slowly, causing Cameron to brake and downshift to roar past at the first chance. People angrily shook fists and yelled abuse as they went. Crowley had watched Landvik’s car skid around hard and come powering after them, but lost sight of it quickly. He knew they were not at all far behind.
A small red car with its hazard lights blinking and the hood up appeared as they rounded a shallow bend. Traffic in the other direction blocked the way. Cameron stood on the brakes, the tires squealing, making several people jump and hurl fresh abuse.
“They’re right behind us!” Crowley said tightly.
Cameron nodded. “I know.” He revved up and forced the Discovery into an unbelievably tight turn given the size of the vehicle and headed into a right turn.
“That was the only road back to the causeway,” Rose said. “There’s no other way off the island.”
“Again,” Cameron said with a tight smile, “I know. Going to have to try to go around.”
He continued to wind too fast through the tiny village, steering subtly left and right, trying not to kill pedestrians. Crowley trusted the man’s driving skills, but not so much the likelihood that a member of the public wouldn’t do something stupid. People tended to react in bizarre ways when they were scared. He was tense, sitting forward, hands on the dash. He leaned back repeatedly, watching for Landvik in the wing mirror, but couldn’t see the man’s large black Lexus.
Cameron made a hard left, presumably attempting to double-back toward the causeway, but braked hard. Landvik’s Lexus was parked a hundred meters ahead, facing them. The passenger door popped open and one of Landvik’s heavies rose up, leveling a gun at them as he did so.
Cameron spat an eloquent curse and slammed the Discovery into reverse. He hammered backwards, grabbed the handbrake and made a skillful bootlegger turn, especially impressive in such a narrow space. As the Discovery slewed around, the shattered back window exploded inwards in a ringing shower of glass as a bullet whined into the car and tore up the ceiling fabric above Crowley’s head. Crowley ducked reflexively and Cameron cursed once more. A knot of wide-eyed tourists and stationary cars blocked the way to their right, which led back to the causeway in the direction they had first tried to go. Crowley saw Landvik’s car powering up behind them as Cameron turned a sharp left, heading away from the village.
As they went, some of the cars began to move again and there were screeching tires on the wet road and shouts of abuse as Landvik’s car was momentarily blocked. As the people shrank with distance, Crowley saw Landvik’s man waving his gun around, tourists fleeing, and the cars once again trying to back up, but getting in each other’s way in the small available space.
“Why is he so desperate for you?” Cameron asked, eyes focused on the road ahead. “Crowley said he didn’t want you, just information.”
Crowley turned again in his seat to see Rose. “That’s right. Did you give him anything?”
“Apparently I did,” Rose said. “Honestly, I can’t remember much of the ritual. It’s all a weird blur. But I gave him enough info to bring him here. He’s keeping me around in case he needs to delve deeper into my memories.”
“For what?” Crowley asked. “Have you found out yet what the point of all this is?”
Rose let out a small, humorless laugh. “He thinks I can help him find Mjolnir. You know, Thor’s Hammer?”
Silence fell in the car but for the rush of tires on the rain-soaked tarmac.
Cameron eventually let out a chuckle and Crowley said, “Seriously? Thor’s Hammer? That’s some serious comic book bollocks, isn’t it?”
Rose shrugged. “Is it?”
“It has to be. It’s a ridiculous idea!”
“Well, normally I would agree,” Rose said. “But then again, a few days ago I thought the idea of extracting past life memories was ridiculous.”
Crowley stared at her for a moment, having to accept there was some truth to what she said. “That really happened?” he asked.
She nodded. “Something happened. I experienc
ed things I simply have never known about before. I didn’t just remember them, I re-lived them. It was uncanny. Terrifying.” She winced and Crowley realized there was a memory of considerable pain in there somewhere too.
The road they followed cut across a wide open space, grassy fields to their left, water to the right. They were fast approaching a lonely crag, the silhouette of a castle standing atop it, striking against the slate sky.
“This road is a dead end,” Rose said.
Crowley’s eyebrows rose. “Seriously? No junctions?”
Rose shook her head. “I’ve been to the island a few times, I know it quite well. This road leads there, to Lindisfarne Castle, and nowhere else.” She narrowed her eyes. “But you know what? I’m feeling strangely drawn to it. The feeling I had during the ritual, a kind of visceral longing... I can’t explain it, but I’m feeling it again now.”
“Well,” Crowley said. “Looks like we have no choice but to make a stand there.”
Chapter 47
Lindisfarne, Holy Island
Landvik leaned from the passenger window and yelled at the halfwit in his employ. “Hurry up, Levi! This place will be crawling with police soon.”