London Wild (8 page)

Next was the
Lesser Patriarch. He was quite a contrast: fairly handsome, but his stripes were virtually non-existent. If it hadn’t been for his eyes, he could have probably passed for herd without having to wear any makeup. He was quite a contrast from the deep the coloring of his wife.

The third was a herd. Myajes didn’t know him and had never heard of him, but the legend on the screen claimed the man was some sort of renegade, a card
-carrying member of the Church of the Goddess. He had apparently attacked and killed a number of soldiers to free a group of besieged Herbaht. It was true that occasionally a human with stronger-than-normal feelings about the Goddess would take up arms against his own people on behalf of the Herbaht, but they were few and far between, though there were a few notable historical examples. Nevertheless, Myajes was skeptical, and he felt it was far more likely to be some elaborate hoax, an attempt to get some herd into the confidence of the Herbaht.

The fourth was also human and fairly young. It seemed
that this one had nothing to do with the Herbaht at all. He was a young drug baron who had built up a small empire in the center of the city. Normally this wouldn’t be enough to get him to fourth place, but according to the blurb, he had recently wiped out a rival during a gun battle in the streets that had endangered and indeed killed many innocent citizens.

The fifth was a group picture, a group of seven Herbaht who appeared to actually be posing for the picture. It seemed that other than being Herbaht, which was usually crime enough, they had robbed a series of shops. There was something not quite right about two of the figures in the picture
; maybe it had been enhanced or something.

The sixth picture was Myajes himself
—not a very flattering picture, but then he wasn’t exactly standing still so they could take it. The legend explained to the crowd that Myajes was the bodyguard of the Lesser Matriarch. That, it seemed, was all that was needed.

The next three pictures were of each of the other bodyguards. One was male
(his brother Jamick), the other two female (his half-sister Hamdrill and her half-sister Mickie).

By the eighth image
, though, Myajes had scrambled through the crowd and was strolling down the road relatively unhindered, except perhaps for the other people going the same way that seemed to have no feeling of urgency.

Myajes was lucky that the soldier he suddenly noticed approaching with the sniffer dog was downwind of him
, so he smelled the soldier before the dog got scent of him. The soldier was alone, likely just walking the dog and not expecting an encounter.

Sniffer dogs were trained for the smell of Herbaht. Usually they would bark to notify their handler
that they were on the trail.

Myajes had had a long day
; he really didn’t want to kill the man, thus revealing himself to all those watching. It was a crowded road, and even if the crowd panicked and scattered he’d have a hard time getting away before more soldiers were sent for. Besides, how many of those in the crowd might have a go themselves? Many were likely armed, and if only one percent of those armed in the crowd tried to shoot him, he’d be dead before nightfall and no use at all to Lara then.   

There was this one herd by the name of Slim Dorris,
(Myajes was sure that wasn’t his real name), but he had gotten a reputation as a Herbaht killer by being in a crowd such as this when three Herbaht had been forced to break cover together. This herd was called a hero now. How many ‘heroes’ might there be waiting to prove themselves amidst this crowd?

He headed back towards the shopping mall. Hopefully he’d be safely in the mall before the dog picked up his scent
, and if the soldier had half as much trouble as he had had getting through the crowd gathered at the big screen, he could use the time to escape.

Again the crowd insisted on blocking his way, and he heard the dog barking long before he had entered the mall. He looked back
, unable to resist seeing where the soldier was and what he intended to do.

The soldier was looking up into the crowd. Myajes was sure that he and the soldier made eye
-to-eye contact across the distance. The soldier must have known he was the one the dog had caught the scent of. And there was plenty more crowd to work his way through. He then knew the soldier would have no trouble following; he’d just ask the crowd to let him through. Tell them he was chasing a Herbaht and he’d be on Myajes before he made it to the mall.

The soldier looked down at his dog, then up into the crowd again. He seemed to be smiling directly at Myajes, and then he pulled the dog’s leash and started heading back the way he had come.

Myajes felt his entire body relax. He let out a breath he hadn’t realized he had been holding. The soldier hadn’t wanted a confrontation either, especially not as he was on his own. It seemed that discretion was the better part of valor.

He even felt a bit of respect for the soldier
; Myajes knew who he was, whereas the soldier had no idea who the dog had caught scent of. He was sure that he had imagined that the soldier had been looking at him now. The soldier hadn’t allowed testosterone to make him act rashly and get himself, and probably Myajes, killed.

As he entered the mall, he thought for a moment that at least the prison camp wouldn’t have any sniffer dogs. With the number of Herbaht prisoners they had, the dog’s barking would drive the guards crazy. Of course, they might have normal guard dogs there.

There were four levels of the mall, with escalators and elevators and even stairs going between each level. The big important department stores were on the lowest floor where the rent was highest, and some of these were on more than one floor themselves, having their own elevators or stairs to move from one floor to the next.

The third and fourth floors were smaller and more specialized. Some of these shops were even in the price range of small business owners who still felt they were paying too much for their little space.

Myajes hadn’t really planned to come into the mall at all, but now that he was here he tried to make his way through the stinking crush of bodies to the bottom of the nearest escalator. There was a map of the mall and a list of the shops in the mall here. Spending a couple of minutes here could save him a lot of time.

On the fourth floor of the mall was a map shop. It didn’t mean much to him
; he had been in a lot of map shops so far today, and not one had had anything that might be of use. They all had the same maps of London and nothing of the forest to the west.

He was tired
and his mind was feeling numb from the day’s search, but he couldn’t afford to allow even the slightest possibility of a lead to get away. He got on the escalator and made his way up to the fourth floor.

It was a small shop. A small opening between two glass walls allowed ingress. A very bored
-looking shopkeeper sat at the counter to the left of the entry as he walked in. The shopkeeper looked up briefly but seemed more interested in the book he was reading than in potentially making a sale. To the right of the entryway there was a set of cascading shelves containing books of maps, books on maps and books on the history of mapmaking. The other two walls seemed to contain wine racks, but the various partitions were currently being used by large rolled-up maps. In the middle of the shop there was even a table so these could be unfurled and checked properly to see if they were really what the customer was looking for.

Myajes turned to face the shopkeeper, but the man seemed so engrossed in his book that he didn’t respond at all.

‘Do you have any large maps of the forest?’ Myajes asked. He didn’t think it likely, but he had to ask.

The man grumbled to himself and placed the book he was reading grumpily down on the counter, keeping it open
to the page he was on. ‘Which forest?’

‘The one just to the west of us,’ Myajes responded
, a little surprised. What forest did the man think he meant?

‘Which era?’
The shopkeeper walked over to the further of the two wine racks and began to check through them.

‘As recent as possible!’
Myajes replied.

The shopkeeper shook his head slowly and moved away from the racks. ‘I have nothing of that area printed in this century. I guess the roads that pass through that part of the country don’t change enough to require new maps all that often.’

Myajes couldn’t help wondering how often the streets in London itself changed, since there seemed to have been a deluge of such maps during his search.

The man moved over to the rack of books and pulled one off the shelves. ‘I seem to remember seeing an old one in
here, a historically important map because it’s the last one ever made of the area.’ He flipped through the book until he found the right page and then handed it to Myajes. It was quite a large format book, maybe eleven inches by nine, but the map shown only took up half a page.

Myajes looked at the map for a moment
, finding it very hard to make out any of the details. The caption claimed it was printed over seventy years ago. ‘Do you also sell magnifying glasses?’

‘I don’t,’ the shopkeeper commented, ‘although I have no doubt you can find one in the mall somewhere. I do
, however, have one for incidental use. I just can’t sell it to you.’

‘Is it powerful?’ Myajes asked.

‘Well, it’s intended for use with the larger maps, but I’m sure it’ll be better than nothing,’ the shopkeeper replied. He fetched the glass from its normal home behind the counter.

Myajes didn’t have a lot of hope as he examined the map, but the Cattery had been there for a few hundred years, so maybe there would be some clue on this map. If only it
had been bigger. No doubt the publisher had been given instructions not to print a readable-sized version by the same people who had prevented any map being printed since.

The roads seemed to have no real form to them. If there was any clue in where the roads went, then he wasn’t seeing it. A couple of the roads seemed to lead nowhere. The words ‘nature reserve’ sat on the ends of these roads
; they were unlikely to put something like that in a place they didn’t want people to visit.

Something then caught his eye. It was a road in the forest leading to a small camp
that bore the legend
Army Training Camp and Grounds – Keep out.
It was true that there might have been an army camp there seventy years ago. There might even be a good chance it was still there. A forest like this might be ideal for those in the military who wanted to put on the occasional war game, and a nearby billet would be perfect, but something about it seemed wrong. Myajes couldn’t be sure it was the right place, but it’d be a good place to start. If he was wrong, he’d just have to study the map again.

‘Do you want the book?’ the shopkeeper asked.

‘I’ll take it,’ Myajes responded, ‘and if you can tell me where I might find a magnifying glass of my own I’ll be most grateful.’

‘One of the stationers on the first floor ought to have what you want,’ the shopkeeper replied as he made his way back behind the counter to ring up the bill.

The Professor And His Pet

Professor George Lomax, late of the University of London, sat in the back of the patrol car watching the two police officers in the front calmly. The driver seemed quite angry, almost frantic. His partner, fingering a laser pistol that sat on his lap in the passenger seat, was trying to talk to him calmly.

‘Stop it, Steve!’
he was saying, almost shouting, ‘There’s no way of knowing how many cats there might be.’

The driver seemed to ignore him, but there was burst of speed from the vehicle
, showing the driver’s annoyance with his partner.

On the road ahead the Professor could see the article of the driver’s anger. It was a small yellow van of the sort that might be used to deliver to small
, privately-owned shops. There were words on the side of the vehicle, but it never turned at the right angle for George to see them clearly. There were also a number of burn marks across the rear doors that had been made when the current occupants had first stolen it. A face peering through the rear windows of the van at the pursuing vehicle in which George was sitting confirmed that it had been stolen by Herbaht.

‘Steve, please, there are special units trained to deal with cats, and there are only the two of us. Please stop!’ He continued to finger his pistol
nervously, sure he would need it at any moment.

George leaned forwards as far as he could to get a better look at the two officers and the weapon that one of them was playing with. He didn’t get any better view of the actual vehicle they were pursuing, no matter where he moved to on the back seat.

The driver, Steve, continued to ignore him and, if it was possible, actually gave the vehicle yet another burst of speed. In fact, they didn’t seem to be going much faster, but the engine roared as if to suggest it was laboring at a faster pace.

Then everything changed. Suddenly George was no longer in the back of the patrol car. Now he sat on a hard
wooden bench in the back of the yellow van that the police were chasing. There were four Herbaht in the back here, all of them heavily armed and wearing some sort of body armor. Three of them sat on benches similar to the one George sat on; the fourth was peering out the back of the van towards the pursuers. As well as these four, there were two more up front, the driver and the one driving shotgun.