The Peregrine Omnibus, Volume Two (24 page)

Max helped support her as she moved towards a map of the area posted on the wall.

“Esteban’s place is right here,” she said, indicating a small red circle. “He’s sleazy, but he probably didn’t deserve whatever it was they did to him.”

* * *

Evelyn stood for a moment outside the plane, which was parked a quarter mile from the skull cave, in a clearing near the river. She’d made several jungle-based pictures, but all of them had been filmed on movie studio lots, and all of them had failed to grasp the true majesty of the African jungle. It was so beautiful and yet so dangerous here… Part of her reason for leaving Max and Sally to talk hadn’t just been to call home. She’d wanted to spend a few moments alone, communing with nature.

She was about to enter the plane and use the long-range radio when the unmistakable sound of a man clearing his throat froze her in place. She immediately dropped a hand into her coat, letting it emerge with a pistol.

“There is no need for that,
fraulein
.”

Evelyn found herself staring at several men in Nazi SS uniforms. The one in the front, who had addressed her, was very handsome, but slightly unearthly in appearance, with pale white skin that almost glowed in the moonlight.

“Stand down, Willem,” another man said, moving past him. Tall and thin, this was obviously the leader of this unit. “I am Baron Gustav and these are my men. We have come to take you with us to Berlin.”

“If you think you can hold me hostage, think again. The Peregrine will hunt you down like dogs.” Evelyn couldn’t hide her disgust when she caught sight of the Warlike Manchu, lurking in the shadows. “No,” she said with the shake of her head. “Scratch that. He’s going to hunt you down anyway for associating with the likes of him.”

Gustav smiled softly, studying the way her nostrils flared and her color rose to her cheeks as she grew angry. It reminded him so much of his Justine… surely this was her, given new form! “Miss Davies,” he said, almost gently, “I am sorry if his presence disturbs you, but he is a part of my plans. As are you.”

Evelyn bolted for the interior of the plane, yanking the door shut behind her. She cast a quick glance towards the front of the plane, where the radio lay waiting. Unlike her husband, she didn’t always carry a portable communicator with her, and on this occasion she’d forgotten to drop hers in her pocket. If she was going to contact Max, she had to make it up front…

And then she saw them: two of the vampire SS had jumped onto the nose of the plane and were peering in the front windows. One of them balled his hand into a fist and slammed it through the reinforced glass, shattering it. At that same moment, the door by which she was standing buckled inwards as a foot-shaped imprint appeared in its surface. Evelyn took a step backwards as a second kick sent the door flying inwards.

Baron Gustav was standing there, looking at her with an intense expression. “I swear to you,” he said with such sincerity that Evelyn was momentarily taken aback. “I will not allow you to be harmed.”

“I’m not coming with you,” she repeated. She pointed her pistol at his chest. “This gun’s loaded with silver-tipped bullets, all doused in holy water. I bet it’s going to hurt like hell.”

“I am sure it would, but I do not want to fight you.” The vampire climbed into the plane but kept his distance from Evelyn. Max’s wife spared a glimpse towards the front of the plane and saw the other vampires were now in the plane but remaining where they were, obviously allowing their leader to dictate what happened next.

“This may be difficult for you to believe,” he continued, drawing her attention back to him. Evelyn found herself becoming lost in his ancient eyes, seeing a depth of emotion in them that almost overwhelmed her. “But I believe that you and I knew one another… in what was another life for you. And I will do whatever I can to remind you of our love.”

Evelyn felt her willpower being sapped as he held her with a hypnotic gaze. Baron Gustav moved to take the gun from her limp grip and he tossed it aside. “Sleep,” he whispered as he brought her head to his shoulder.

A tiny part of Evelyn’s brain rebelled against this and she tried to resist, but it was no good. As soon as her cheek touched his uniform, she had begun to sag into his arms.

Gustav lifted her gently, cradling her like a baby. He turned his fiery gaze upon his men. “Go! We have to make it to the zeppelin quickly if we’re to meet our schedule!”

As the baron exited the plane, the Warlike Manchu stepped forward. “This is a mistake,” the Asian criminal stated. “Though I can see that you have made up your mind, I should remind you that I have far more experience with the Peregrine than you do. Kidnapping his female will only drive him to pursue you all the harder.”

The baron looked down at Evelyn’s face and he nodded. “You’re right. Deal with him.”

The expression on the Warlike Manchu’s face was almost enough to make the baron laugh out loud. With narrowed lids, the master criminal said “Please explain.”

“You’re not coming back to Berlin with us… not yet. I want you to stay here and kill the Peregrine. It’s an opportunity for you to get vengeance and for me to get a thorn removed from my side. When you’re done, you can try and find us again so that I can continue your treatments. If you fail against him, I imagine he’ll kill you… and if you can’t make it back to Berlin, you’ll become a statue again. It’s really all up to you.”

The Warlike Manchu heard the rough laughter of the other SS agents, who had stopped to watch the exchange before fleeing into the jungle. The Manchu had never felt so slighted in his life—had he truly sunk this low, that some vampire heathen was treating him like a lackey? Perhaps it would be better to throw himself at the fool now, kill him, and accept his eventual transition back into statue form with stoicism. Such a fate had to be more honorable than this… and yet, perhaps he could play along until such a time as his revenge could be possible?

“I will make sure he suffers,” was the only response that the Warlike Manchu made aloud. “And I will see you in Berlin.”

The baron watched as the Warlike Manchu turned and strode away purposefully. He knew that the Manchu was fully capable of making good on his words… but given the fact that the Peregrine had bested the criminal the last few times they’d meet, he didn’t think it likely that his path would ever cross that of the Manchu’s again. And that was just fine.

Gustav had the Rod of Aaron.

And now he had his beloved, once again.

He had all that he needed, Warlike Manchu or no.

CHAPTER IX

The Enemy of My Enemy

“Damn it!”

The Peregrine ran as fast as he could through the jungle, covering the distance between the skull cave and the plane in remarkable time. When he arrived, his chest burned and he felt extreme dizziness. As he skidded to a stop, the sight of the ruined airplane door and the shattered glass confirmed his worst suspicions.

Max drew the Knife of Elohim, the mystic dagger glowing brightly in the night air. As he approached the plane, he tried to keep the little voices in his head from demoralizing him. There was still a chance she was here… or at least there might be a clue as to where they were going. Was it Berlin, as he had earlier suspected? And was the plane still flight worthy? Could he take off in pursuit?

When Evelyn hadn’t returned, Max had gone off to look for her. En route, he had witnessed a massive zeppelin soaring above, the swastika on its side barely visible in the moonlight. At that moment, he’d known something was horribly wrong and had taken off into a sprint.

To his relief, he did not find any blood, but the blood nearly froze in his veins when he saw Evelyn’s gun lying on the floor of the plane. She would have never gone anywhere without it.

“The mother of your children still lives.”

Max’s lips compressed into a thin line. The voice that came from outside was that of his oldest enemy, the Warlike Manchu. The Peregrine moved to the remains of the doorway and looked out. He saw the Manchu at once, for the villain was sitting in the lotus position on the ground, not more than ten feet away. “You bastard,” Max hissed. He threw the Knife with all the force and accuracy he could muster, but the Warlike Manchu brought his hands up and together, catching the knife’s blade between his upraised palms.

“Your anger has always been your weakness,” the Manchu said, dropping the blade to the ground. His palms were sizzling, a result of his own evil nature coming into contact with the mystic knife. “One of your weaknesses,” the Manchu amended. “Sadly, you have so many. Another being, of course, your allegiance to family.”

The Peregrine jumped out of the plane, landing in a crouch. “What have you done with her?”

“I have done nothing. Like you, I have been vexed by one Baron Gustav, a vampire who rose to the ranks of commander in the SS. He controls a small group of vampire soldiers, all dedicated to his whims. He now possesses the Rod of Aaron, with which he plans to seize control of the Reich.”

The Peregrine stopped a few feet away from his enemy, fists clenched but hanging at his sides. “Why are you telling me this?”

“Because the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” The Warlike Manchu stood and brushed dirt off his robes. “You left me in quite a precarious state… barely conscious but unable to move or interact with the world around me. Gustav used mysticism to revive me, though sadly most of my Philosopher Stone induced powers were gone—but thankfully so was the hunger for human flesh that had plagued me since my last resurrection. Unfortunately, he claims that I have need of repeated healing from his device or else I will revert to my imprisoned state. Thus, I have served him as a lackey. It is beneath me, but I had no choice but to bide my time and wait.”

“And now you’ve thrown off the shackles of bondage?” the Peregrine asked with disbelief. “You really expect me to trust you? You’re more insane than I’ve always believed.”

“It’s not a matter of trust. It’s a matter of necessity. Gustav left me behind to kill you. But even if I do, I am still slave to his power. But if we work together, you can free your precious wife and I can wrest control of the cure from him. Separately, both of us face great turmoil in attaining victory. But united… our skills and minds make us most formidable.”

The Peregrine stared into the eyes of his former mentor, trying to remember the days when he thought the Warlike Manchu was a tough taskmaster, but someone still worthy of respect. Those days were sometime hard to recall since the Manchu’s evil had been so clearly delineated over the intervening years. “You know that I won’t let you walk away when all this is over. You have to pay for all the crimes you’ve committed.”

“And you would be free to hunt me down. But for now I offer you my assistance and knowledge of your enemies. For some reason, Gustav is quite taken with the female. If I didn’t know better, I would think he is in love with her.”

Max kept his face impassive but that particular news made him worry. Was the vampire a fan of Evelyn’s films? It wouldn’t be the first time that someone had developed an unhealthy obsession with Evelyn through her acting career. “Let’s get one thing straight,” the Peregrine warned. “If you’re still working with him and this is a trap, I’ll make certain you pay for this.”

“I am not,” the Warlike Manchu said definitively. “I wish to see Gustav dead and gone, for all eternity.”

The Peregrine nodded, having made his decision. He hoped he would not live to regret it. “Then let’s get aboard the plane and I’ll see if I can get it up in the air. You’re going to tell me everything you know about Gustav and the Rod of Aaron… I’d like to know if your information matches with my own.”

“How do you plan to get into Berlin?” the Manchu inquired.

“I’ve snuck in and out of there a few times over the years, as you know very well. Leave the airspace concerns to me. Besides, even if that zeppelin of theirs is souped-up, there’s no way it can outmatch this plane. With luck, I might be able to catch up to them.”

“As you wish.” The Manchu followed his former pupil, a faint smile on his lips. At long last, they were united as partners, just as he had always intended.

CHAPTER X

Beloved

Evelyn awoke in a soft bed, pink rose petals lying artful arrangement around her. The room was darkened, illuminated by candlelight, and only the deep thrum of the zeppelin’s engines kept the scene from being romantic in a slightly disturbed sort of way.

Though she couldn’t see him, she sensed that Gustav was in the room with her. “Step out where I can see you,” she demanded, noticing that her jacket, shoes, and weapons had been removed.

Gustav did as she commanded, moving close enough to her bed that she could make out his features. He looked at her with that same intense expression as he had back in the airfield. “I’m sorry for having kidnapped you like this, but I knew that we had to be alone if I was going to convince you.”

“Convince me about what? That you’re a lunatic? Don’t bother. I’ve already made up my mind about that.”

Gustav sat down on the foot of her bed and Evelyn recoiled from him, drawing her legs up. She took a better look around the room now; despite the darkness she could tell that she was in a man’s quarters. Gustav’s, no doubt. “You were not always Evelyn Gould Davies. Once, you were known by another name. And you were my lover.”

“Is this some sort of reincarnation thing? Because if it is, just stop right there.
If
I believed in that—and I’m not sure that I do—then whatever we had is long dead. I’m married to someone else now and I love him dearly. And besides, is this really how you’d try and woo your girl back? By kidnapping her?”

“As I said, I merely wanted to get you alone. And as for our love being in the past… I don’t believe that. I won’t believe that. You may think you love this Peregrine, but that’s only because you don’t remember what we had together!”

“Do you have any idea how arrogant that sounds?”

“It’s not a matter of who’s better for you: me or him,” Gustav tried to explain. “The fact is, our love was meant to be… you died for me. And now you’re reborn, in a form that I would recognize. Can’t you see it must be fate?”