The Magpye: Circus (34 page)

Taylor's smirk spread into a
shark-like smile.

"Planning on going out with a
bang?" asked Able.

In his head, the cops and
Malcolm were already assessing the precise make-up and construction
of the explosives. To Able, it didn't matter. He had been beaten,
stabbed, slashed, and shot. Being blown up, being burnt up to
nothing? Maybe he couldn't survive that, maybe he could. He had no
intention of finding out.

"Like I said," said Taylor,
standing up and straightening his clothes. "It's all about the
blood. The power of the Kings? It's in the blood. Your power, what
you've got in your head? That runs on blood too. I'm sure you know
that."

Able didn't react. He didn't
want Taylor to know how little he really understood of his power,
even after all the training from Adam King. He had assumed that
what was a mystery to him was a mystery to the Kings as well, but
was it possible that Taylor knew more? There was a white hot
intelligence behind Taylor's piercing eyes, and Able wondered what
Taylor could have deduced about him, and about the Magpye, given
enough time and information.

"You got your power from Adam
King when you died, trapped in that stupid box. Your blood, his
blood, mingled together in the moment of death. A fluke, a one in a
million chance. Adam's power should have gone to Cane, but you
screwed that up. Unlucky for him, eh?"

Taylor pulled his jacket off,
revealing the bomb strapped to him and the detonator switch placed
over his heart. Able's hand tightened around one of his holstered
pistols.

"The bomb goes off if my heart
stops or if I hit this button right here," explained Taylor,
pointing to a red button on the side of the detonator. "So you
shoot me? We both die."

"You might have mentioned that
earlier," quipped Able.

"Well, that's the fun part,"
replied Taylor. "Because I'm ready for this thing to go off. I just
want to be really close to you when it does."

"You're not making sense," said
Able.

"It's like I said," replied
Taylor, "You and your idiot father, dying together, blood into
blood, he passed the Magpye into you even though you weren't a part
of the real King line. The Kings are sired by Kings in the wombs of
witches. Your circus trollop mother just didn't cut it. You just
another bastard, did you really think you were the first of those?
Don't be ridiculous. You're just the first to be in the right place
at the right time. And if it could work for you, it could work for
me."

Able pulled his gun and
levelled it at Taylor.

"He's right," said Hartley
voice's in Able's head. "That detonator's wired in, I can see it.
You end him, we're all gone."

"You can't be serious," said
Able. "You want to take my place?"

"I'm always serious," replied
Taylor. "I'm going to blow us up and while we're both just a mist
of blood and shit, I'm going to take what's yours."

"You're crazy," said Able.

"No I'm not," said Taylor, taking a determined step towards
Able. "I know exactly what I'm doing. I always do. It's my gift,
you see. Clarity.
Perfect
clarity. In
the last few months I've seen things, read things, discovered
things. Things even you wouldn't believe. You're the tip of the
iceberg. Anyone else, I think their mind would have snapped, but
not me. Blow myself up? It's the sanest response to an insane world
there is."

Rosa Blind, the eternal
analyst, shrugged somewhere inside Able's shared psyche.

"Bat shit crazy," she said
simply. "Put him down."

The two men rushed at each
other again, but this time there were no punches thrown. Taylor
tried to throw his arms around Able again, but Able grabbed both
his arms by the wrists. With a sudden twist, engineered by Rigby
and Dorothy in unison, Able shattered both of Taylor's wrists.
Keeping his grip firm, Able bent Taylor's wrists back further,
breaking more bones and driving his assailant to his knees.

"You talk too much," said Able.
It was Rosa Blind speaking, the dead cop taking control of Able's
voice as easily as the others drove his limbs. "That whole
'craziest man in the room' bullshit might scare your criminal
friends, might scare crooked cops, might even impress Cane King,
but it doesn't work on me. I've seen crazy, I've seen evil, I've
seen everything in between and, you know what? I put you all in a
spreadsheet, I added you up, I took you away, and you call came out
the same. You don't impress me Jack Taylor, you're just another
broken machine, another man with a cog gone astray who thinks that
he's special."

Able's boot came up, hit Taylor
on the chest, and drove him backwards. Legs bent backwards, arms
pinned as Able twisted his shattered wrists, Taylor squirmed and
twisted to try and regain control as Rosa continued.

"And that's how we're going to
leave you," said Rosa. “Broken.”

Able watched, almost
disembodied, as his hands took hold of one of Taylor arms and
snapped it backwards at the elbow, the bone snapping with a
sickening wet crunch.

Taylor didn't scream, even
though Able could tell he wanted to. There was panic in his eyes
now. Able wondered if having perfect clarity ever left room for
accepting the possibility of what would happen if your perfect plan
didn't come to fruition.

Able's hands moved across and
broke Taylor's other arm, the bone bursting through the skin with a
spurt of blood that turned the sleeve of Taylor's shirt dark red.
Able watched as his foot lifted, then came down hard on Taylor's
ribs. More sounds of snapping and cracking came from inside Taylor,
and the pain finally tore a scream from between Taylor's thin
lips.

His arms shattered, ribs
snapped, Taylor struggled to roll over onto his stomach. He
floundered like a fish, flopping his torso up and down in a
desperate attempt to trigger the detonator. Able watched as one of
the cops grabbed hold of Taylor's left ankle and twisted his foot
backwards until the bone snapped.

"You're done, Taylor," said
Able, stepping over the squirming mess of broken bones that had
once been the most feared and dangerous man in the city. "If you're
lucky, you'll burn to death up here."

"Wait."

It was the voice of the Magpye,
that strangely ancient and yet childlike voice, that stopped Able
in his tracks. The creature surfaced through the turbulent waters
of Able's mind, a dark shape that resolved itself in his mind's eye
into the form of the little girl who had haunted him in the
circus.

"What?" hissed Able in
response.

"I want him."

"He's a psychopath," said Able.
"I can't have him in my head."

"It's
my
head," replied the creature. "And I
want him. I want him, or I'm going to open up every little wound of
yours I ever stitched. I'll leave you lying next to him as nothing
but a mess of meat and agony and let him work out what to do with
you. Maybe his plan will work after all."

"You're bluffing," said Able,
glancing back at Taylor. He was crawling, somehow, impossibly,
towards him. His body moved in a way that a body shouldn't move,
driven by his insane mind. His shark eyes were locked on Able,
ignoring the pain, ignoring the injuries, a pure predator that
would never give up the hunt. Two broken arms, shattered ribs, and
to Able the man was still terrifying.

"I want him," said the creature
again, and instantly Able doubled over with pain. He felt blood on
his abdomen, felt parts of him opening suddenly, wounds like hungry
mouths crying out to be fed.

He could feel Taylor's eyes on
his back and felt like he was trapped in a vice. The creature
wanted Taylor, Taylor wanted the creature, and Able would be
crushed in the middle.

Cane slammed his fist into
Marv's face. The magician's head snapped back and bounced off the
chair frame, leaving him reeling.

"Why didn't anyone tell me he
had a fucking airship?" spat Cane, shouting to no one in
particular. Downstairs, his men were busy corralling the assembled
dignitaries and celebrities, maintaining the illusion that this was
an attack on Cane, whilst upstairs Cane was pretty sure that
whoever Taylor and Garrity had taken with them was already
dead.

That left Cane, with his devils
below and a devil above, and Marv.

Marv rolled his tongue to the
side of his mouth and fished out a dislodged tooth. He spat it out
onto the floor.

"You don't like surprises, do
you Cane?"

"Fuck you," said King. "You think I'm worried about burning
this place down? It couldn't be better for me. The whole of America
is watching and they're all going to see that I'm the victim here.
You know how
frightened
Americans
are these days? They'll give me a fucking medal. Hell, I could ride
this thing all the way to the White House."

"Why own a president when you
can be the president, is that it?"

"You're clever for a guy who
lives in a fucking cave."

"Don't need to be clever to see
what you're thinking, son," said Marv with a bloody grin. "It's
written all over your face."

Cane spun around to face
himself in one of the casino's mirrored walls.

The Ink was right there,
staring back at him.

Able hauled Taylor by his shirt
across the corridor and into a hotel room, trailing blood behind
them both. Taylor was laughing every step of the way.

"It's him, isn't it? It's your
demon making you do this."

Demon. Able had never thought
of the Magpye that way, but it made sense. The dark thing inside,
the presence that whispered in his ear and, occasionally, took
control of him in ways that he didn't understand. This was one of
those times.

"Shut up," said Able, talking
to Taylor and the Magpye at the same time.

In his mind, the creature
didn't stop talking.

"He's unique," it said, "And I want him. He should
be
… delicious."

Able could feel heat through
the ceiling of the room, smell smoke in the air. The fire was
getting closer. He reached the balcony window and kicked it open.
The cold air rushed in, bringing with it the sound of sirens and
the cloying smell of burning.

Able pulled Taylor up by his
shoulders and rammed him against the balcony railing.

Taylor stared at him, his eyes
still fearless.

"What's the play, freak?"

"Take off the bomb, toss it, or
I toss you."

"What happens after I take it
off?" asked Taylor.

Able looked him right in the
eye. He could tell that there was no lying to Taylor. To Able, he
still looked simultaneously like more than just a man and somehow
less than a human. He couldn't imagine what it would be like to
have that thing in his head. He had one monster already.

"After you take it off... I kill you," replied Able flatly.
"And when you're dead, I eat some of your flesh. And
then
… you're in."

"Hmm," said Taylor. "Doesn't
sound like there's much in it for me."

"You don't die down there as a
smudge on the floor, that's what's in it for you."

Taylor twisted his head to one
side and took a look down off the balcony. The crowds were still
being held back, the fire fighters locked in a pitched battle with
the blaze from the nose-cone of the crashed airship.

Meanwhile, Rosa was talking to
Able.

"If you let him in, we're going
to need to contain him," she said. "If we don't then his mind is
going to be like poison to you."

Able didn't answer. His eyes,
and his focus, were on Taylor. The Magpye wanted him and if it
didn't get what it wanted, then Able might die right here. But he
couldn't take the chance that Taylor was right, that there was a
way for him to take control of the Magpye and take control of the
ghosts. Able owed them more than that. He wouldn't fail now, not
when he was so close, and not when Marv's life still hung in the
balance. But he knew that, if it came to it, it would be better for
them all to die than for Taylor to have the power that Able had.
His fate, one way or another, was suddenly in Jack Taylor's hands.
It was just as Taylor had planned.

"Don't worry, he'll go for it,"
Rosa said. "He won't be able to resist it."

Able shoved Taylor, pushing his
head and shoulders over the railing.

"Take it off or you fly," he
growled.

"You need to lock him away, the
minute you have him," said Rosa. "Lock him up with me, I'll take
care of it."

Able wanted to argue with her,
to remind her how crucial she was, but saying a word would have
tipped his hand to Taylor. It didn't matter, as there was another
voice in Able's head a second later.

"No," said the voice. "Rosa,
you're needed here. I'm the one we can do without. You've got
enough shooters to make it without me. And I owe this guy. I owe
him for Grice."

Nutt, thought Able. Yossarian
Nutt. The self confessed bad cop and Lee Grice's partner. His guilt
was almost as heavy as Able's own.

"Lock him up with me," repeated
Nutt.

Able brought his hand up around
Taylor's throat.

"Out of time," said Able. He
ignoring the fluttering in his stomach as the Magpye slowly
un-stitched a part of his gut. He had no doubt that the creature
could open him up, but he was banking on being able to pitch Taylor
over the edge before that happened. If Taylor was dead, there would
be nothing for the creature to do but die up here with Able if it
did open him up. For a creature so inextricably linked with death,
Able had noted that it wanted to live more than he did
sometimes.

It was a gamble. But he was in
a casino. Time to live a little.