Tantrics Of Old (10 page)

The compartment door up front slid open again. Maya caught a brief glimpse of the empty vestibule beyond as an old woman entered and slid the door shut behind her. She was old, undoubtedly in her seventies. She walked with a curled walking stick and wore black—a twisted, curving sari. Wrinkles cut deep and strong on her face, almost like scars; there must be a million of them on the face alone, thought Maya. Her hair was a dirty white, neatly tied in a bun, and her eyes, steel grey, looked at the three of them with interest. She did not approach them, choosing a seat right next to the door.

Maya decided to start reading the diary again. She opened it, and the lights flickered. She looked up. Strange. The lights seemed fine. Suddenly, another flicker. Then again. And again. And again.

Maya was wondering if she should call Adri. She looked behind her. The sleeping man hadn’t noticed. Nor had the old woman, though Maya could just see the back of her head. The tube lights crackled as the electricity in them shorted. Bursts of dark overpowering the feeble flickers of luminance.

Darkness. Light. Darkness. Light. Darkness. Darkness. Darkness.

‘Adri!’ Maya called softly. No response. Gray’s snores continued, uninterrupted.

Light. A moment of clarity. The old woman was not in her seat anymore. Disturbing. Uneasiness built steadily within Maya. Darkness. Yet again. The train continued moving at its unnervingly high speed.

Another sudden spark of electricity. The lights flared back, this time staying for a fraction of a second. Maya’s eyes, reeling from the flash, glimpsed the old woman. She was on the
ceiling
, nestled among the fans, on all fours, her hair hanging, her clothes billowing.

Maya screamed.

Her scream was cut off as a strong hand clamped itself firmly over her mouth. As she desperately tried to fight the hand away, a voice whispered in her ear. ‘Sssshhh!’

Adri’s voice helped Maya overcome her hysteria. ‘Adri!’ She shrieked in relief, but his hand tightened down on her mouth. Maya, even in panic, realised that the Tantric wanted her to shut up. She was relieved to have him, have someone to help her overcome what she had seen. She wanted to hug him and bury her face in his shoulder and not face the darkness, but Adri whispered again, and she struggled to listen.

‘Maya! Maya, I need you to be brave,’ his voice spoke in the dark. ‘You have to trust me, trust what I say. Everything . . .
your life
depends on it.’

Tears were running down Maya’s cheeks, and she nodded.

‘First of all, silence. Whisper, don’t talk,’ Adri continued, still covering her mouth. She nodded again, and Adri slowly relaxed his grip, letting go.

‘Hold my hand, Adri. I’m scared. I’m so scared,’ Maya whispered, her voice thin. Adri did.

‘Listen to me. This is important.’ He paused. No sounds, nothing except the occasional loud snore from the still-sleeping Gray and the jangles of the speeding train. ‘What you saw, the old woman, she is a Dyne. She cannot harm you here, but neither can I harm her while we’re on the train.’

‘Wh-what does she want?’ Maya stammered.

‘She wants your
scent
. And we have no choice but to give it to her.’

‘My scent?’

‘Yes, your smell. She is a smell collector, and she wants to collect from all three of us, if I’m not wrong.’

‘So-so what will she do, Adri? What—’

‘She will creep over and smell all of us, one by one. It’s
very
important, Maya, that you pretend to be asleep when she does. Do not react under any circumstance, no matter what she does. She cannot harm you while you’re on the train, but I do not want her to give you the Mark. And that is something vile, I assure you.’

‘I-I can’t do this!’

‘You can. Maya. Listen to me, you’re strong. You can do this. And we aren’t even in the Old City yet. Now, buckle up!’

Silence, for a while. Then Maya spoke slowly, ‘She can’t harm me?’

‘Not here, no.’

‘What is the Mark?’

‘I will explain later, I promise. Right now let’s concentrate on
not
getting it, shall we?’

Maya nodded after a moment, though Adri didn’t see it in the darkness.

‘All right, Adri,’ she spoke, her voice almost inaudible.

‘I have to go back to my seat,’ Adri spoke, an apology creeping into his voice.

‘Oh.’ She gently let go of his hand.

‘I’m here. Don’t worry. Just sleep off right now if you can.’

Maya knew she wouldn’t be able to sleep. That hair-raising flash of light had made her a wreck. She shut her eyes tight, wishing for the image to go away. She prayed to her God with burning urgency, feeling guilty about not being a more regular devotee. But she called his name and she did it again and again and again, trying to dispel the darkness. He would see her through this, she hoped and prayed. Her mind was a whirl of emotions, contrary to her body which was playing dead.

And then she heard a sniff. Right next to her. Then another. She turned extremely rigid, slowly, not even daring to breathe; and in the silence, she waited. Something cold touched her cheek. She almost screamed. It retracted, then touched her forehead, something icy and soft. It stayed for a while, then retreated once more. Biting her lip, Maya readied herself for the next touch; it did not come again. She heard the sniff a moment later, but to her left, where Adri was. It took Maya more than a moment to realise that the worst had passed, that the thing, the Dyne had moved on. But still she lay as one dead, not daring to move. For how long she sat like this, she did not know, nor did she know when the tears started to slowly make their way down her cheeks. By the time the lights came back on, however, she had regained her composure completely, her eyes and cheeks dry as rock. The Dyne was gone. Gray was still sleeping and looked untouched—much to her relief. Adri was looking at her.

‘You okay?’ he asked.

‘Yes,’ Maya replied, embarrassed, not meeting his eye.

‘Don’t feel ashamed. Their kind has what we call an
influence
over our senses; they can affect us in various ways, the most common being the sapping of courage, of will. How you reacted wasn’t your fault entirely.’

‘How were you so calm?’ Maya asked, as she realised why she had panicked.

‘Training. And all the experience with their kind.’

‘What are they?’

‘Witches. Dynes. One of the most terrible races out there in the Old City. I don’t know why this one was on the train. But they can’t transform here, not on the train, and thus we were comparatively safe.’

‘Transform? Transform into what?’

‘Their true form. They’re not human.’

‘
What
are they, then?’

‘Savage beings ruled by a hunger for flesh. One of the damned races, also one of the most feared.’

Maya was quiet. ‘We aren’t even
there
yet. And look what’s happening already,’ she spoke.

Adri nodded. ‘It’s certainly not a good start.’

‘Why did she smell us?’ Maya asked. ‘You said she’s a smell collector. What does she do with the smells?’

Adri looked into his bag, searching for something. He groped around till he finally withdrew a clutch of bullets coated in what looked like silver. ‘You’re not going to like the answer,’ he replied drily.

‘I suppose I must know,’ Maya said. ‘If I am going with you all the way to where my brother is, then it’s best I start preparing.’

Adri nodded in understanding. ‘Witches,’ he said, ‘are predators. And this one has taken our smell because she intends to hunt us down in Old Kolkata.’

‘My God. Silver bullets, they kill witches, then?’ Maya asked hopefully.

Adri laughed a short laugh. He had laughed after a long while, and it felt good. ‘They aren’t werewolves, and this isn’t silver. It’s mercury inside crystal with a couple of more ingredients thrown in.’

‘Is it meant for the witches?’

‘Yes,’ Adri said, removing the current rounds from the shooter and putting in the mercury bullets.

‘Okay. I’m glad to know you have
some
sort of defence against them.’

‘Not enough. I will need to buy ingredients in the Old City. I need to make more bullets.’ Adri pocketed the last two shots for ease of access.

‘Will we be okay?’

‘Yes, hopefully. I’m not planning to take us through witch territory yet, so if we’re lucky they won’t bother us again. They’re quite territorial, Dynes.’

Maya felt a bit better. Her opinion of him, she had to admit, was beginning to change. Where she had been sceptical about his claims of being a Tantric, she now knew that he had evidently been trained in Necromancy, and trained well—so far he had proved knowledgeable and dependable. And calm in the face of danger. No, he was definitely no pushover Tantric. Sigh. It would be tough to take care of her little business in the Old City. It was something even Gray did not know. No, she knew she would have to move alone. No Gray. No Adri. She needed a map of the Old City, she realised. She considered Adri, taking them along for his own ends and thus, she did not intend to feel guilty about ditching him. If all went well, maybe his problem would get sorted out as well. But her problems had the upper hand for now. The Tantric was never generous with information anyway; he kept to his own devices. And she realised she preferred a taciturn Adri to a talkative one. He had not told them why he stayed in New Kolkata. She realised that he must have had his reasons.

‘Adri,’ she spoke, ‘I didn’t tell you back then, I’m a student of Demonology.’

Adri was surprised, incredibly. The study of Demons was not something MYTH would allow easily. It was almost like studying magic—but not quite so—by limiting it to a certain race with magic in their veins. Demons. ‘How is your government allowing that?’ he asked.

‘MYTH has scruples about the idea. But we have a very stubborn HoD, and that is why negotiations with MYTH are still on. The department might shut down any moment, which doesn’t make it a very popular subject.’

Adri figured that only the rich and the curious would take a chance with Demonology. Most parents would want their children to study something safer, something with better career options.

‘Demonology is safe,’ Maya continued, as if she had been reading Adri’s mind. ‘It’s just theory, about everything on Demons.’

‘So where do you see your future?’

‘The only place the department promises to send us to is MYTH, as advisors to the Sorcerers. Seeing that the Tantrics are Demonologists themselves.’ True. For Necromancers it was one of the compulsory degrees they needed to have.

‘Yes,’ Adri nodded. ‘We needed to get the degree early.’

‘Were you coached at MYTH Castle?’

‘Yes,’ Adri paused. ‘Which year are you in?’

‘My fourth.’

‘Hmmm. So you’re supposed to know about most Demons by now.’

‘I’ve read a lot of fifth level books as well,’ Maya admitted. Like you did in your childhood, she thought.

‘Your time in the Old City will not be as dull as we had thought then, Miss Ghosh,’ Adri replied, a smile slowly forming on his lips. ‘You will be able to recognise a lot.’

‘Never seen them,’ Maya said. ‘Read everything there is to read about them, but I’ve never actually seen a Demon. Yes, the physical descriptions are there, but MYTH has banned all visual representation. So no photographs, no sketches.’

‘They’re not pretty,’ Adri said. Maya laughed, despite herself.

They talked more. Not that they had much to discuss, the only thing in common being Demons; but it didn’t take long for Maya to understand that Adri did not mingle with people much. It was a good conversation though.

Adri was shamelessly making sure she wouldn’t back out. The witch incident had unnerved him even more than Maya; if the siblings got scared enough to take the train back to New Kolkata, there would be nothing he could do to stop them. He thought he had the capabilities to protect them and he did not want them thinking otherwise. He had to placate them. Being nice to Maya was a start, and Adri didn’t even have to feign interest in what she was saying. He knew little about MYTH’s current education plans and agendas and it was good to catch up.

Gray was the one who interrupted them, muttering in his sleep. Maya stopped mid-sentence and turned to him to find that he had woken up and was very, very confused.

‘I screamed and you did not wake up,’ Maya told him immediately.

‘Whaa?’ Gray mumbled, disoriented.

‘It’s probably the influence that made him sleep this strong,’ Adri suggested. He had never seen a witch’s influence do that to anyone before, but if his guess averted another loud fight between the siblings then he was all for it. Luckily, Maya believed him.

‘I guess it’s not your fault, then,’ she told Gray, who rubbed his eyes.

‘
What’s
not my fault?’ Gray asked, scratching his head. ‘God, I’m stiff all over.’

Maya recounted the details, and Gray’s eyes bulged.

‘No way! You guys are ripping on me for sleeping—’ he began.

‘She has your scent now, cretin,’ Maya cut in. ‘That bloody witch will be after us in Old Kolkata.’

Gray looked at her unbelievingly. ‘What exactly is a witch?’

‘Something MYTH tries extremely hard to keep out of New Kolkata. The great walls were built exclusively to keep out their kind,’ Adri explained, careful to keep the panic meter in check.

‘Are they photographable?’ Gray asked.

He sounded excited.

‘Put an address on that damn camera though, so they can mail it back after they find it. I give up,’ Maya spoke, and taking out a bottle from her bag, took a drink of water.

Adri looked outside the window and saw a wall-mounted light zoom by. Then another. The train was slowing down. The Old City was coming, and with it a whole lot of accompanying emotions that crowded his mind.

It wasn’t just the journey ahead that was bothering Adri. His apprehension was about dawn, and Death’s promise to hunt him down in a few hours after sunrise.
Wherever
he was. He could not outrun the Horseman, certainly not in Old Kolkata. No, his life now lay in the undependable hands of a Fallen. A dark smirk edged up Adri’s lips. His situation could be laughed at, and if it weren’t happening to him, he would have certainly laughed his innards out. Life, it seemed, had a very twisted sense of humour. A joke perhaps, one he was struggling to live through. One thing he was still sure about, though—his companions could not know about his personal agendas. He needed them just long enough to get the Angel’s blood. Nothing more. That done, he could make arrangements for their safe return. Perhaps the Angel himself would do that. They were his earth siblings, after all. Who knew?