by Jim Butcher
“I’m going with you,” Marcone said.
“No, you aren’t.”
“I can always order Miss Gard to return to O’Hare.”
“Where we’ll all die of the plague, since we didn’t stop the Denarians.”
“That may be. Either way, I’m going with you.”
I scowled at him, then shook my head and leaned back against the seat, shivering. “You suck. You suck diseased moose wang, Marcone.”
Marcone smiled with just his mouth. “How colorful.” He looked out the window and said, “My people tell me there are only three trains leaving Chicago for St. Louis this evening. Two freight trains and a passenger train.”
“They won’t be on the passenger train,” I said. “They’d have to ditch weapons and goons, and they won’t.”
“Even odds that this is the one, then,” Marcone said.
The chopper descended until the trees near the tracks were swaying in the downblast. That’s the nice part about the Midwest. Go twenty miles from a town hall and there’s nothing but lightly settled farm country. I looked out the window and saw a long train rumbling along the tracks.
Michael sat bolt upright and nodded to me.
“This is it,” I said to Marcone. “Now what?”
“I bought this helicopter as Coast Guard surplus. It’s fitted with a rescue winch. We climb down it onto the train.”
“You’re joking, right?”
“Nothing worth doing is ever easy, Dresden.” Marcone took off the headphones and shouted to Sanya and Michael. Sanya’s reaction was about like mine, but Michael only nodded and got unstrapped. Marcone opened a locker and drew out several nylon harnesses. He strapped one on himself and passed out another to each of us. Then he hauled the side door of the helicopter open. Wind filled the cabin. Marcone opened a cabinet, and started drawing a length of cable from it. I looked and saw the winch inside. Marcone looped the cable through a ring outside the door then said, “Who first?”
Michael stepped forward. “Me.”
Marcone nodded and clipped the cable onto the harness. A minute later, Michael hopped out of the helicopter. Marcone flicked a switch near the electric winch, and cable began playing out. Marcone watched intently and then nodded. “He’s down.”
The winch reeled back in, and Sanya stepped up to the door. It took a couple of minutes, and it felt like the chopper was doing too much lurching around, but Marcone eventually nodded. “Dresden.”
My mouth felt dry as Marcone checked my harness and clipped the cable to it. Then he shouted, “Go!”
I didn’t want to go but I sure as hell wasn’t going to chicken out in front of Marcone. I clutched my staff and rod to me, made sure Shiro’s cane was strapped to my back, took a deep breath, and jumped. I swung around a little on the cable, and then felt myself going down.
The downdraft from the chopper all but blinded me, but when I did look around I could see the train beneath me. We were being lowered onto a car just forward of the end of the train, a large metal container with a flat lid. The helicopter had a searchlight pointed at the train, and I could see Michael and Sanya crouching and looking up at me.
I swayed and dangled like a kid’s first yo-yo. My legs got clipped by an outgrown tree branch that hit me hard enough to leave bruises. When I got close, Michael and Sanya grabbed me and brought me down in one piece.
Marcone came down, his rifle hanging on his shoulder. I figured Hendricks was operating the winch. The Knights pulled Marcone safely in, and he detached the cable. It swung away and the chopper arched up and away, turning its searchlight out. It took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the brilliant moon, and I stayed crouched so that I could keep my balance.
“Harry,” Michael called. “Where now?”
“Head for the engine and look for a boxcar,” I told him. “Something it would be easy for them to hop into.”
Michael nodded. “Sanya, rear guard.”
The big Russian held his rifle like trained military and fell back to the rear of our group, watching behind us. Michael took the lead, one hand on his sword, and moved forward with a predatory grace and purpose.
I glowered at Marcone and said, “I’m not going anywhere with you behind me.”
Marcone smiled again, and took his gun off his shoulder. He looked like trained military, too. He fell into line behind Michael.
I pulled my old duster back until it fell behind the handle of my pistol, leaving it clear for a draw. It probably didn’t look military. It probably looked more like a spaghetti Western. I moved in behind Marcone, staff in my left hand, rod in my right.
We all moved forward over the rumbling freight cars, just like every Western movie you’ve ever seen. If I hadn’t been feverish and nauseous, it might have been fun.
Michael abruptly crouched and held a closed fist beside his ear. Marcone stopped immediately, crouching, the rifle at his shoulder. Closed fist means stop, check. I crouched too.
Michael turned around to face us, poked a couple of fingers at his eyes, held three fingers up, and pointed at the car ahead of us. I took it to mean that he could see three bad guys up there. Michael beckoned Sanya, and the Russian slipped silently forward. Michael pointed at me and then at the back of the train. I nodded to him, and kept an eye out behind us.
I checked over my shoulder, and saw Michael and Sanya both swing down between the cars and out of sight.
When I faced the rear of the train again, I saw a nightmare running toward me over the cars.
Whatever creation process this thing had undergone, it hadn’t been a kind one. Four-legged and lanky, it looked vaguely like a cat. But it didn’t have fur. Its skin was leathery, wrinkled and mottled. Its head was somewhere between that of a jaguar and a wild boar. It had both tusks and fangs in its gaping, drooling mouth, and it moved with graceless speed.
I let out a strangled cry, lifting my blasting rod. I pushed power through it, yelled the word, and loosed a flashing bolt of fire at it. The bolt hit the thing in the face just as it gathered itself to leap at me. It let out an unnerving, wailing cry, then convulsed in pain as it jumped and sailed off the side of the car.
The fire blinded me for a moment, leaving a bright green dot over my vision. I heard the next one coming, but I couldn’t see it. I dropped down to my stomach and yelled, “Marcone!”
The rifle cracked three times in deliberately spaced reports. I heard the thing squeal, and then saw it as my eyes started to adjust. It lay on top of the car maybe ten feet from me, hindquarters dragging, struggling to haul itself forward with one claw.
Marcone stepped closer, lifted the hunting rifle, and coolly put another shot right between its eyes. The creature twitched, fell, and slid bonelessly over the side of the train.
Marcone peered after it. “What was that?”
“Some kind of guard dog,” I said.
“Interesting. Demon?”
I pushed myself to my feet. “Doubt it. Demons are usually a lot tougher.”
“Then what was it?”
“How the hell should I know? Never seen anything like it before. Where are Michael and Sanya?”
We went to look. The next car was an empty one with spaced wooden slats and an open top. It looked like something used to haul cattle. There were three men in it, unconscious or dead. Michael climbed the far wall of the cattle car and onto the next car in line.
We climbed down into the car. “Dead?” Marcone asked.
“Napping,” Sanya said.
Marcone nodded. “We should finish them. These men are fanatics. If they wake up, they’ll attack us without hesitation, armed or not.”
I eyed him. “We’re not going to murder them in cold blood.”
“Is there a particular reason why not?”
“Shut up, Marcone.”
“They would show us no such mercy. And if they are allowed to live they will surely be used by the Denarians to cause pain and death. It’s their purpose.”
“We’re not killing them.”<
br />
Marcone’s mouth curled into a bitter smile. “How did I guess.” He snapped open a case on his belt and tossed two sets of handcuffs at Sanya. The Russian caught them and cuffed the downed men together, looping one of the sets around a metal strut of the car.
“There,” Marcone said. “I suppose we’ll just have to take the chance that none of them will chew off his own hand at the wrist and slip free.”
“Sanya!” Michael’s voice thundered over the noise of the train, and a sudden, brilliant glare of white light leapt up from the top of the next car. Steel chimed on steel.
Sanya shoved his assault rifle at me. I caught it, and he pushed past me to start climbing out of the car. He hauled himself up with his right arm, his injured arm dangling, and heaved himself to the lip of the cattle car. He stood, drew Esperacchius in a blaze of more white light, and threw himself to the next car with a rumbling shout.
I let my staff drop and fumbled with the assault rifle, trying to find the safety. Marcone set his hunting rifle aside and said, “You’re going to hurt yourself.” He took the assault rifle out of my hands, checked a couple of things without needing to look at the weapon, and then slung it over his shoulder as he climbed out of the car. I muttered to myself and went up the wooden slats beside him.
The next car was another metal box. Michael’s and Sanya’s swords shone like the sun, and I had to shield my eyes against them. They stood side by side with their backs to me, facing the front of the train.
Nicodemus stood against them.
The lord of the Denarians wore a grey silk shirt and black pants. The Shroud had been draped over his body, like a contestant in a beauty pageant. The noose around his neck blew out toward the rear of the train in the wind. He held a sword in his hands, a Japanese katana with a worn hilt. Droplets of blood stained the very tip of the sword. He held the sword at his side, a small smile on his lips, to all appearances relaxed.
Michael checked over his shoulder, and I saw a line of blood on his cheek. “Stay back, Harry.”
Nicodemus attacked in the moment Michael’s attention was elsewhere. The Denarian’s weapon blurred, and Michael barely managed to get Amoracchius into a parry. He was thrown off balance and to one knee for a fatal second, but Sanya roared and attacked, whipping his saber through whistling arcs, and driving Nicodemus back. The Russian drove the Denarian toward the far side of the car.
I saw the trap coming and shouted, “Sanya, back off!”
The Russian couldn’t stop his forward momentum entirely, but he pivoted and lunged to one side. As he did, steely blades erupted from within the car. The metal of the roof screamed as the blades pierced it, rising to a height of four or five feet in a line, a half breath behind Sanya. Nicodemus turned to pursue the Russian.
Michael got his feet, whipped the heavy blade of Amoracchius around, and slashed three times at the roof of the railcar. A triangular section three feet across fell down into the car, and the edges of the metal glowed dull orange with the heat of the parted steel. Michael dropped down through the hole and out of sight.
I lifted up my blasting rod and focused on Nicodemus. He shot a glance at me and flicked his wrist in my direction.
His shadow flashed across the top of the railcar and smashed into me. The shadow wrenched the blasting rod from my grip, dragged it through the air, and then crushed it to splinters.
Sanya let out a cry as a blade tore through the car’s roof and one of his legs collapsed. He fell to one knee.
Then brilliant light flared up within the car beneath the combatants, spears of white lancing out through the holes the blades had cut into the metal. I heard Deirdre’s demon form shriek in the car beneath us, and the blades harassing Sanya vanished.
Nicodemus snarled. He flung a hand toward me, and his shadow sent the splinters of my blasting rod shrieking toward my face. As they did, Nicodemus attacked Sanya, his sword flickering in the moonlight.
I got my arms up in time to deflect the splinters, but I was helpless to assist Sanya. Nicodemus knocked Sanya’s saber out to one side. Sanya rolled, avoiding the stroke that would have taken his head. Doing it left Sanya’s wounded arm on the ground, and Nicodemus crushed the heel of his boot down upon it.
Sanya screamed in pain.
Nicodemus raised his sword for the death blow.
Gentleman Johnny Marcone opened up with the Kalashnikov.
Marcone shot in three chattering bursts of fire. The first one tore through Nicodemus’s chest and neck, just above the Shroud. The next hit on his arm and shoulder opposite the Shroud, all but tearing it off his torso. The last burst ripped apart his hip and thigh, on the hip opposite the Shroud’s drape. Nicodemus’s expression blackened with fury, but the bullets had torn half his body to shreds, and he toppled from the car and out of sight.
Below, there was another demonic shriek, and the sound of wrenching metal. The shrieks faded toward the front of the train, and a moment later Michael climbed up the ladder rungs on the side of the boxcar, his sword in its sheath.
I leapt forward and ran to Sanya. He was bleeding a lot from his leg. He had already taken off his belt, and I helped him wrap it around the leg in a makeshift tourniquet.
Marcone stepped up to where Nicodemus had fallen, frowned, and said, “Dammit. He should have dropped in place. Now we’ll have to go back for the Shroud.”
“No, we won’t,” I said. “You didn’t kill him. You probably just pissed him off.”
Michael stepped past Marcone to help Sanya, tearing off a section off his white cloak.
“Do you think so?” Marcone asked. “The damage seemed fairly thorough.”
“I don’t think he can be killed,” I said.
“Interesting. Can he run faster than a train?”
“Probably,” I said.
Marcone said to Sanya, “Do you have another clip?”
“Where is Deirdre?” I asked Michael.
He shook his head. “Wounded. She tore her way through the front wall of the car into the next one. Too risky to pursue her alone in close quarters.”
I stood up and crawled back over to the cattle car. I clambered down in it to fetch my staff. After a moment of hesitation, I got Marcone’s rifle, too, and started back up.
As it turned out, I was mistaken. Nicodemus could not run faster than a train.
He flew faster than a train.
He came sailing down out of the sky, his shadow spread like immense bat wings. His sword flashed toward Marcone. Marcone’s reflexes could make a striking snake look sluggish, and he dodged and rolled out of the way of the Denarian’s sword.
Nicodemus sailed to the next car on the train and landed in a crouch, facing us. A glowing sigil had appeared on his forehead, the sign itself something twisting, nauseating to look upon. His skin was marred and ugly where Marcone’s shots had hit him, but it was whole, and getting better by the second. His face twisted in fury and a kind of ecstatic agony, and his shadow flooded forward, over the length of the railcar in front of him and dipping down between his car and ours.
There was a wrenching sound and our car shook. Then the sound of tearing metal, and our car started shuddering.
“He’s uncoupled the cars!” I shouted. As I did, Nicodemus’s car began drawing away from us, as our own slowed down, the gap between them growing.
“Go!” Sanya shouted. “I’ll be all right!”
Michael stood and threw himself over the gap without hesitation. Marcone ditched the assault rifle and sprinted toward the gap. He threw himself over it, arms windmilling, and landed, barely, on the other car’s roof.
I got to the top of the car and did the same thing. I imagined missing the other car and landing on the tracks in front of the uncoupled end of the train. Even without an engine, pure momentum would be more than enough to kill me. I dropped Marcone’s rifle and gathered my will in my staff. As I leapt, I thrust the staff back behind me and screamed, “Forzare!”
The raw force I sent out behind me shoved me forward.
Actually, it shoved me too far forward. I landed closer to Nicodemus than either Michael or Marcone, but at least I didn’t wind up sprawled at his feet.
Michael stepped up to stand beside me, and a second later Marcone did as well. He had an automatic pistol in either hand.
“The boy isn’t very fast, is he, Michael?” said Nicodemus. “You’re an adequate opponent, I suppose. Not as experienced as you could be, but it’s hard to find someone with more than thirty or forty years of practice, much less twenty centuries. Not as talented as the Japanese, but then not many are.”
“Give up the Shroud, Nicodemus,” Michael shouted. “It is not yours to take.”
“Oh, yes, it is,” Nicodemus answered. “You certainly will not be able to stop me. And when I’ve finished you and the wizard, I’ll go back for the boy. Three Knights in a day, as it were.”
“He can’t make bad puns,” I muttered. “That’s my shtick.”
“At least he didn’t overlook you entirely,” Marcone answered. “I feel somewhat insulted.”
“Hey!” I shouted. “Old Nick, can I ask you a question?”
“Please do, wizard. Once we get to the fighting, there really isn’t going to be much opportunity for it.”
“Why?” I said.
“Beg pardon?”
“Why?” I asked again. “Why the hell are you doing this? I mean, I get why you stole the Shroud. You needed a big battery. But why a plague?”
“Have you read Revelations?”
“Not in a while,” I admitted. “But I just can’t buy that you really think you’re touching off the Apocalypse.”
Nicodemus shook his head. “Dresden, Dresden. The Apocalypse, as you refer to it, isn’t an event. At least, it isn’t any specific event. One day, I’m sure, there will be an apocalypse that really does bring on the end, but I doubt it will be this event that begins it.”
“Then why do this?”
Nicodemus studied me for a moment before smiling. “Apocalypse is a frame of mind,” he said then. “A belief. A surrender to inevitability. It is despair for the future. It is the death of hope.”
Michael said quietly, “And in that kind of environment, there is more suffering. More pain. More desperation. More power to the underworld and their servants.”