As he walked slowly across the market square towards its central monument, Scoggins observed the movement of people and machines from place to place. There were plenty of people here walking in groups and pairs from the ale houses which were now alive with the sound of music and raised voices, shining like beacons to attract custom.
Scoggins scanned his potential prey, wetting his lips with the tip of his tongue. He sensed the purity Flax had spoken of. It hit him as whiteness, softness, a smoothness waiting to be darkened, cleaved and corrupted. Not all had it and many bore the dark grain of life, had been tainted by it, though all were a thousand times more pure than their counterparts in Dubh.
The assassin sauntered towards a street corner opposite the huge church and watched as a young couple approached him. The young man was powerfully built, his muscular frame displayed under a tight fitting vest. His dark hair was set in a mass of collar length curls and his face was smooth and devoid of any hair. The youth was dressed in denim and, as he and his female companion approached the stranger who loitered on the corner of the street, he looked up at Scoggins and laughed as she
whispered something in his ear.
They both looked at him as they passed by. The youth was confident and his look was intended to intimidate Scoggins who remained expressionless. His female companion smiled. She was attractive in her culture, but to Scoggins she was attractive because of what she was irrespective of any physical attributes or gender.
She was pure and untouched, yet despite the male on her arm and her innocence, her physical attitude, her body language, reached out to summon Ivor Scoggins. But it was not taking her virginity which aroused Scoggins, no minor physical rupture was his goal.
To fulfil himself he would have violate her soul then end her life in the slowest and most despicable way possible. Unconsciously, he sighed and fingered the knife belt strapped across his stomach and hidden beneath his baggy Motorhead tee-shirt.
As the girl passed close to him, so deliberately close that he could feel the warmth of her body. She looked him up and down, her eyes teasing him, as did her body covered in skin tight, white leggings and an equally tight body stocking.
The assassin's heart began to pound. Her provocative attire did nothing for an animal which was neither male or female, or a libido which lusted not for its own satisfaction through the gendered procurement of pleasure. Scoggins arousal was centred on the simple prospect of inflicting pain and destruction upon the living flesh of another organism. The non-physical eyes that saw this prospect began to glow darkly; a voice spoke.
"I am the centre of all things."
The couple passed by and the youth cast another warning look at the assassin, who just grinned back unimpressed by the threat. Scoggins inhaled the perfume of her innocence as the object of his lust went by, his eyes watching her long blonde hair it gently caressed her shoulders. The youth tightened his grip around his companion’s waist as he looked back, now nervously at the stranger who he had failed to warn off and who remained at the street corner staring as they made their way across the street towards the churchyard.
She would be his. He would present no obstacle - him first, then her. He waited until the darkness of the churchyard swallowed his prey then followed slowly. As the inky blackness enveloped him, Ivor Scoggins felt safe and at home. His eyes quickly adjusted to the darkness and he became tense and excited.
Moving with a practised stealth, he followed the couple as they wandered aimlessly amongst the gravestones toward the top of the river bank and thin strip of woodland on the bank top. He could not see them, but did not have to. He sensed her presence, the purity of her life force shone for his dark soul like a beacon, which he must extinguish.
Scoggins kept his distance, moving in the darkest shadows and always in complete silence, he did not even seem to breathe, the couple blissfully unaware of that which stalked them. He was an animal of pure instinct now, his senses heightened by the hunt. He smelt the odours of human arousal as he slipped from the shadow of one gravestone to the next, crouching low as he did so.
He startled a cat which hissed when he materialised at its side. He silenced it automatically with a thin sharp blade that twisted skilfully through its skull. The couple, only a few yards ahead, became quiet, stopped and listened before they dismissed the sound and continued laughing and giggling towards the thinly spaced trees at the top of the river bank where soon they slipped to the floor wrapped in one another's embrace.
Despite the coldness of the night the youth's passion did not cool. They kissed noisily and gasped in the icy air. The youth's instincts had control of him now. His rationality had been used to make this moment possible, had become enslaved to his passion, he wanted her badly becoming more aggressive and, squealing playfully in mock protest, she pushed him off.
Then she looked at him and he knew that they had both been playing the same primal game. The girl peeled off her legging to reveal nothing beneath and lay back on the grass, her eyes holding him. Tonight would be her night. He raised himself to his knees and began to unbuckle his belt unaware, lost in the rising of his animal passions, that a shadow rose up behind him and steel glinted in the starlight. But she could see everything.
The slim shadow solidified into a menacing human form against the moon. Time slowed, almost stopped. Her would-be lover smiled at her terrified expression, he thought she was afraid of him, he himself unaware of the shadow's arms which had risen slowly above his own head. Two thin, steel blades glinted in the moonlight.
Time froze for her and her heart seemed to stop, its pounding ceasing as she waited for the knives to descend in flashing silver arcs, each one aimed at weak spots in the skull of her naively, grinning boyfriend's temples.
The shadows mouth opened and a crescent of a smile appeared. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw three dark shapes emerged out of the dense undergrowth which covered the river bank. A horned beast stood upright and howled. The smile of her boyfriend and his assailant
disappeared as their heads snapped towards the source of the chilling cry. The boyfriend's jaw dropped open in disbelief and terror and the shadows teeth flashed in a grimace of anger at the leading intruder which hurtled with an unnatural speed from the bank edge.
A split second later the horned intruder thundered into Ivor Scoggins. The assassin's knives flashed toward his attacker only to be deflected by the shield it held in front of it. The fist of Scoggins's attacker struck him in the neck and its sharp talons dug into his throat and he found himself lifted easily from his feet to hang in the air.
The fury of the attack released the shocked couple from the paralysis of fear and they stumbled to their feet and began to flee. He sprinted before her, forgetting her existence in his haste. She stumbled after him, leggings around her ankles, allowing herself only one brief glance toward the scene they had left.
There, behind her, three dark figures stood over a crumpled form which twitched on the ground in front of them. She saw a impossibly tall and gangly man, a crouched and horned monster and one other figure standing over the body of the shadow which had meant to attack her and her would-be lover.
The scene then disappeared as a ragged grey cloud passed over the moon, deepening the shadows and covering her nightmare vision as she ran sobbing through the graveyard towards the sanctuary of the neon lights, wondering where her heroic lover, who only moments ago seemed so keen on taking her virginity from her, had disappeared so quickly.
Chapter Twenty
Jonathon wiped the tears from his red rimmed eyes and shivered involuntarily as he attempted to regain his composure. If he was to find Milly here in Dubh, he would have to his wits about him he realised.
The small tavern below was a hive of activity, its visitors exclusively High Hats. Unknown to Jonathon the great hall Silus Flax had built around his gate was several levels below the Black Leopard and on each level, at this crucial time, his minions swarmed like excited ants.
In the absence of
Silus Flax, Edgar Morrell, the Chief of Assassins, ran the High Hat organisation in the Lower City. Morrell was a cold and calculating, yet intensely loyal individual. To him, as with his master, people were no more than commodities, tools, weapons and he used ruthlessly them as such to further his ends and those of Silus Flax, showing no emotion as he acquired and disposed of them on the basis of efficiency. Morrell had always been Flax's right hand and showed a devotion to him that exceeded all else. If his master had told him that to die, he would have done so immediately without thought or emotion and he expected the evotion and loyalty same from all his subordinates.
At present, he presided in the great ante-room to Flax's personal apartments and considered the fate of Amaril Caldecott who had failed to carry out Flax's wishes to the letter. Behind Morrell was the great barred door to the chambers in which the dimension door was now open and above it a huge clock showed the time, day and date, ticking loudly in the silence of the chamber.
Amaril Caldecott stood quaking before his judge staring at his feet and listened to the wooden ticking of the clock which stretched out the seconds while he waited for Morrell to speak. The deputy High Hat leader stood and stared at his underling him through his one good eye, while his false eye attempted to imitate its working companion but failed miserably, appearing to gaze outwards and away from the working eye's focal point.
After fifteen long minutes of scrutiny, he sat down again on the throne-like chair positioned on a raised dais, his hands cupped under his chin. Morrell's massive hunched and muscular form terrified Amaril, not to mention his uncompromising reputation.
The Chief of Assassins had questioned Caldecott for nearly an hour and now considered his bungling underling's fate. Amaril twitched nervously and scratched the mole on his nose. Not even for a second had been able to meet Morrell's accusing gaze. Smiling menacingly, he laughed softly at the quaking Caldecott.
Amaril looked up briefly and giggled back, trying to peer into the Chief of Assassin’s eyes but could not sustain contact, being forced to turn away shivering. Another long silence ensued. Eventually Morrell sighed and lifted his muscular bulk from the chair. Amaril whimpered as the monstrous ox-like form of Flax's deputy walked slowly towards him. Morrell stood over him, his good eye burning a hole in the top of Amaril's skull, his stinking breath torturing his nostrils and stomach.
A large, heavy hand came to rest around the back of the weeping man's neck. Amaril winced and closed his eyes, but the vice-like pressure he expected to come and crush the life slowly out of him never came. Morrell spoke in a voice like gravel sliding down a steel tube. “So you still have the nerve to claim a reward?” he croaked “A reward for what exactly?"
Amaril replied in a whisper, his answer more of a question, a confused plea.
“For the boy? "
Morrell bent over and stared directly into Amaril's face.
“Yes of course! I forgot. Mmm, the boy." he stood upright, turned away and began to pace around the shaking Assassin. Hands clasped behind his back, his head nodding in mock consideration, Morrell laughed quietly.
“Yes of course. The 'boy' ......with tits. Is that what you are claiming this reward for? he grated. “The boy who was in fact a girl." he chuckled.
“Have you visited a brothel recently Amaril?"
“Tits!?" Amaril Caldecott croaked in genuine surprise. The circling continued.
“Yes, my dear Amaril, under those rags was a girl, a female, a woman. Understand? You burned down a whole block of the City, brought the Tans down on our backs for a girl! And failed Amaril. Failed! Failed! Failed! " he howled.
Edgar Morrell's face had turned white with rage, sweat rolled down his forehead into his grey, bushy eyebrows as his burning rage set his body on fire. He marched back towards the chair and leaned heavily on its back while Amaril contemplated the penalty for failure, not just a simple ordinary failure. He had failed Silus Flax and no-one failed him and lived.
He considered escape, but was trapped, the only way out guarded by High Hats who smirked with amusement at his predicament. Amaril's brain began to work overtime and an idea drifted into his scheming mind. Then he smiled.
He stiffened and stood upright, his shivering ceased and he scratched the mole on his nose again as he smiled broadly at Morrell's back. He would take a chance, but he knew that Morrell could not challenge the excuse he had concocted under pressure. It was a last ditch effort on his part and an idea was born, necessity was the Mother of its invention and its Father self- preservation and, unknown to him, was almost true.
Amaril cleared his throat confidently and Morrell whirled around. “Did you say something idiot!" he howled, staring at a smirking and confidant Amaril.
"I knew the boy would escape, so I captured the girl....er.....she is the boy's wench. My plan was that he would come to us seeking her, as he will soon." he said quietly and assuredly. Morrell stared at him in disbelief for a moment, then laughed and shook his head.
“But my dear, bungling, Amaril. She's not here and it’s doubtful that she still lives, since she was sent to the Tallmen for their amusement. They don't last long in the Towers. Surely this 'boy' would realise this don't you think, and why would he bother anyway? Would you risk your life for a female?"
Amaril considered Morrell's reasoning and realised he had lost.
"There was a chance that he would " he ventured. " if he err .. loved her."
Morrell roared with laughter.
“Did what! LOVE ? Amaril are you ill? No-one loves
anyone anymore, they never did. It's just lust dear Amaril, an animal thing. Any thinking man knows that. The boy'll just find something else to shag, like the rest of us." he mocked.
Amaril felt embarrassed more than frightened. Of course no one loved anyone any more or so they said. But he had loved his Mother dearly until her death and he didn't want to shag her. He knew what love was. Amaril was sure that the emotion was still existent in the city, just a little lost, buried. People like Morrell made him sick, they knew but were not man enough to admit it. He grew strangely angry.
“You’re wrong Morrell! Wrong! He did love her I know about love and he wasn’t like us" He screamed as tears streamed into his eyes along with the memories of his Mother's unselfish affection. “And you destroyed my plan! It's your fault! You fat bastard! Flax'll sort you out when he hears about it, he will understand!" he threatened, pointing an accusing finger at Morrell who promptly reached out and broke it with a sickening crack. He laughed as Amaril staggered around in pain.
"Plans! Plans! “the amusement drained from Morrell's face. "It doesn't matter anyway, Amaril. No one threatens me! “he spat.
Amaril looked up into Morrell's face and realised that the Chief of Assassins actually might have believed him. He was frightened that he had made an error and was dangerous. Morrell nodded to the guards and stepped back sneering.
"Better send you to see your Mummy then Caldecott, seeing as you love her so much!"
Amaril whirled around quickly enough to see the flash from the guards' musket barrels, but did not live to hear the roar of them or feel Morrell's knife drawn across his throat to make sure of his silence.
Chapter Twenty One
Jonathon crouched low on the rooftop overlooking the Black Leopard and considering his options when the City's bells began to ring, unaware of the minor dramas taking place below. The Tallmen had decided, because of the result Amaril's arson, to vent the City of the billowing clouds of smoke which hung above the rooftops, dimmed the light and poisoned the stagnant air.
At the sound of the bells, the crowds below were flung into panic. High Hats, Tans and ordinary citizens alike, began to run in terror for the cover relative sanctuary of the lower levels. Seeing an opportunity to get inside the Black Leopard in the confusion, he and scrambled quickly down the building to the street level. Swiftly he entered a side alley and waited. Down the alley a High Hat sprinted toward the shelter of the Black Leopard.
As the
galloping High Hat Captain drew level with the place where Jonathon waited, he threw out an arm to make contact under the High Hat's chin, snapping back his head as his body continued forward. He hit the cobbles hard and unconscious. Jonathon dragged the helpless man into the darkness at the side of the alleyway then, dressed in his black coat and top hat, ran to join the crowd which jostled and fought with one another at the door of the Black Leopard.
Two large and bar room ugly door men fought back the crowd with heavy sticks, admitting only High Hats and throwing the rest away from safety. A rough pair of hands reached expertly outwards and dragged Jonathon from the crowd and pushed him into the packed bar of the Black Leopard.
A few faces turned and nodded acknowledgement to Jonathon and the other High Hats who had been hauled in from the street. The staff of the Tavern secured heavy shutters on the inside of the building and then the two doormen entered and closed the door, barring it against the crowd outside and the din of the bells which continued their warning.
The inside of the High Hat headquarters was bigger than it looked from the street. High Hats by the hundred sat in their back coats around wooden tables drinking, smoking and laughing, oblivious to the chaos which would ensue outside when the venting began.
There would be no frantic hammering on strangers' doors for them while watching fearfully as dark, crescents opened in the sky above and heralded the rapid and lethal replacement of the City's atmosphere. They were safe and that was all that mattered to them.
Jonathon wandered slowly across the sawdust and spittle strewn floor and amongst the tables, studying the relaxing High Hats. They played cards and chatted. Some sat alone and silent, smoking huge reefers. An assassin sat in a corner and cleaned and sharpened his knives.
Another dissected a large rat which he had nailed alive to the table top. No one paid the impostor any attention as he strolled in the dim light yellow light of the oil lamps towards the bar at the end of the room.
The Chronicles of Jonathon Postlethwaite: The Seed of Corruption Page 20