Waywalkers: Number 1 in Series (9 page)

‘Yes,’ he said quickly. ‘Moondance was broken up, it was no longer needed. But I kept on deploying some of the sources; for my own use, you understand. Remember Adamarus?’

‘Ah yes. He was the one who heard what people said as a kind of song. If someone lied, he heard discord. Or was that the other one…?’

‘Yes – Adamarus was the truthkeeper. I was the ringleader. And you were our link with the “real” world; you told us what was wanted when and where. Remember Whisperer?’

‘The one who called the fog. The emergency backup,’ she murmured, her mind far away in another time, another place. ‘The one I was supposed to call, if something went wrong.’

‘Yes. Yes, that’s him. What was the procedure he gave you for contact? How were you supposed to summon him?’

But she’d already lost hold. ‘Are your family still warring?’

‘Yes.’

‘Hum. And you?’

‘In a shit-load of trouble, thank you for asking. My prime contact is blown and I’ve got an angry relative trying to find me with intent pertaining to violence.’

‘Ah.’ This didn’t seem to worry her in the slightest. ‘You broke up the network when the Allies turned the tables. You said after four years fighting on the losing side, you couldn’t break the habit and went to Berlin to dig out Germans from the rubble they’d brought collapsing on themselves. You danced between causes like a troublesome child between tired friends.’

‘I fought for the French when they were dying. When they began killing I fought for the new sufferers. Any doctor would have done the same.’

‘But if you change sides you merely prolong the agony.’

‘If I don’t help I will be what they want me to be,’ he replied softly.

‘You and your pride.’ She sighed, tossing back her head as if posing for an unseen artist. ‘And why do you want to find Whisperer?’

‘Because even without the Moondance network officially functioning, they all hear something. I want to know what they’ve heard about who killed my sister.’

This still didn’t arouse any interest. He might as well have said, ‘I want to hear who put sugar on the table instead of salt.’

‘Why don’t you ever grow old, Luc?’

‘What’s the procedure?’

She began to hum. He held her hand tighter, willing her frail old mind to come up with the answer. She stopped singing and muttered, ‘Tell the man in the bookshop you’re looking for a first-edition copy of
The Whispering Game
and wait in the park.’

‘Which bookshop?’

‘River Bookshop,’ she said in French. ‘Paris. By the church.’

‘Is it still there? The bookshop, same owner? Is it still functioning?’

‘The owner was one of them,’ she replied, switching back to English with such ease that Sam wondered if she’d even noticed the change in language. ‘He’ll never die. Never, ever, ever die.’ She whispered the address.

He realised she was nearly in tears, so rose and wrapped an arm round her shoulders, letting her head droop against his side.

‘Why don’t you just die?’ she whispered.

‘I can’t. Not yet.’

‘I hate you, Luc. I hate you.’

‘And I still love you too.’

She sniffed. ‘Oh Luc. Why couldn’t you have been someone else?’

‘Because then I wouldn’t be me.’

‘Tell me again. When we die we all go to Heaven. Not to Hell. To Heaven. Tell me that, Luc.’

He stared down at her guiltily, feeling the horrible truth press against his tongue, demanding to be spoken.
No
, he wanted to say.
This is your great chance. This is your life, and Heaven or Hell is merely what you’ve made of it. Real Heaven, the place on the other side of the Portal, is somewhere neither you nor I can go.

‘Everyone goes to Heaven,’ he said softly, shamed at how easily the lie slid up his throat. ‘Everyone.’

T
he difficulty was getting to Paris. Fortunately he knew how rigorous Dover passport control would be on a freezing night when the rain came from all directions at once, and the white cliffs hurled the gale straight back at the ferry port below them.

Otherwise he would have been inclined to Waywalk again. But no. It would probably take no longer to catch the ferry, and thence the train to Paris. There’d been times when he’d had to walk miles across Paris, so low was the city’s ratio of Portals. Unlike London, a lot of its Portals had been built over. Sometimes he wished Paris was dirtier, darker than it was. That way he could use a Portal without worrying about whether he’d come out in the middle of some well-kept public park or children’s playground.

The bus from Dover Priory station swung towards the entrance to the ferry port, and Sam mentally began practising his German accent. If he was going out under Sebastian Teufel, he’d better sound the part. The result made him resemble the villain in a James Bond movie, but it was the best he could manage. If anyone asked him to speak in German, that was another matter. Hopefully no one would demand what he carried slung across his back with the rucksack. ‘Golf clubs,’ he said in his German accent, experimentally rolling the words around.

‘Uhuh. Have a good trip.’

‘Thank you,’ he told the woman in passport control, playing the polite German tourist to the full. She’d hardly glanced up to check his passport photo. His own senses were at full stretch, listening, feeling for any sign of Thor or his minions.
I’m the only one with the really good networks
,
he thought fervently.
The others have been so busy in Heaven, the systems they’ve got down here are ramshackle, to say the least.

Still, the
valkyries
.
 

The
Pride of Calais
was unusually full for an evening crossing. On a rough sea, and in such rain, everyone avoided going on deck, preferring to cower inside among arcade machines and shops. Impossibly, irrationally, as the ferry pulled away from the docks, and the lights of Dover were lost in foul weather, Sam realised he might just have made it. Thor was in England. The police were in England. He was going to find the Moondance network, undetected. They would know where Andrew had gone, and Andrew would explain everything. It seemed so simple.

He knew in his heart it couldn’t be.

Sitting in one of the many bars, sipping a beer, Sam felt something, and knew it was in response to his probes. He froze, looking around in sudden panic. A slumbering lorry driver, a tired woman trying to read
The Times
, a couple of businessmen talking. A lot of casually dressed people failing to sleep as the ship heaved up and down. Outside, on deck, it was dark.

‘Where are you going, then?’

‘Pardon?’ he asked, remembering his German accent just in time.

The barman, practically the only person on the boat not upset by its constant motion, was polishing a glass. ‘Oh, you’re German… Why are you going to Calais?’

‘I’m meeting my family. I’ve finished work, and now we’re going on holiday.’ He gave a nervous smile, made doubly so by the alarm now blazing across his sixth sense.
Danger. Danger is near.
‘I love golf, you know.’

‘Really? Those your clubs?’ he asked, nodding at the bundle across Sam’s knees.

‘Yes.’

‘Oh… You got kids?’

‘Two girls, little terrors,’ he lied with the embarrassed laugh of the fond father trying not to boast.

‘Really? I’ve got a girl myself. Birthday next week. Loves the Teletubbies, Lord help us.’

Sam gave another uneasy laugh, not sure if the Germans had Teletubbies or if they’d been spared. Something moved in the darkness outside, on the deck. His head snapped round like a snake, but there was no one there.

‘Rough night, isn’t it?’ said the barman, indifferently.

‘Oh, yes. I’m sorry, I’ve got to go and get a breath of fresh air. It’s a little hot, you know.’

‘Hey, it’s not nice out there.’

Sam ignored him. ‘Would you see no one takes my bag, please?’

Sliding open the glass door that led on deck, Sam was hit in the face by the slicing rain. His stomach lurched violently. He heaved the door shut behind him and edged along the darkened deck, choosing his footing carefully.
I can feel you. I know you’re here.

Above him, something moved. He burst into a run, swinging round a corner with his feet nearly going out beneath him on the soaking deck. Slipping and scrambling up a flight of metal stairs, turning to clamber up another staircase and peering through the darkness.

It was the top deck, the most exposed. Rain tore at him from everywhere at once, and the huge funnels of the ferry rumbled loud. Looking wildly round, he felt the movement in the air behind him. A valkyrie, soaked from her climb on to the deck, sprang over a railing, spun and thrust at him. He saw the gleam of a blade and ducked, bringing his hands up and locking them round her arm, before swinging his body into hers.

Centuries of surviving had given Sam his own method of fighting, requiring perfect coordination and never-ending practice. No part of his body stopped moving; as his elbows thrust back against her, one foot locked around her ankle, pulling forward to topple her. She fell – and he was already away, stepping behind her and pulling her arms so taut it seemed every bone might break. The dagger clattered from her fingers. With a look of disgust he picked it up.

‘Steel?’ he yelled in her ear. His pin had her locked on the soaking deck, teeth gritted in pain. ‘You
are
badly prepared!’

She tried to scream, not calling for help so much as in defiance. But he’d already braced a knee against her back in order to lock his hand across her mouth. Shouting straight into her ear over the storm he said, ‘Thor sent you, didn’t he? Nod.’

She didn’t.

‘Look, lady, I’m darkness incarnate, the bastard Son of Time. And I’m perfectly prepared to break your arms if I don’t get a good answer. I
know
Thor sent you, so just nod!’

She nodded, furious with herself. Struggling in his grasp, she strove to bite his hand.

‘How did he know I would leave by Dover?’ He removed his hand, and she began to scream. Immediately he covered her mouth again, and savagely twisted her arm. ‘Tell me! Or I’ll kill you!’ He removed his hand again, gave a sharp flick of his wrist and the silver dagger was in his hand, the point dangerously near her eye.

‘He knows you don’t like using Portals! He called in the valkyries to watch ferry ports and hired mercenaries to watch the airports!’

‘Mercenary humans, or spirits?’

‘Both! Some natural wizards, mostly spirits.’

That stood to reason. Mercenaries, wild spirits, were mainly the ones against whom Sam had established his networks. They obeyed nothing but their desire for magic to feed on, or serving the strongest master.

He shook the valkyrie harder. ‘Tell him I didn’t kill Freya. Tell him to leave me alone!’ he shouted, unmoved by her struggles. He laid his hand over her forehead. Her eyes flickered shut, and she slipped to the deck and lay there, face down in the water.

Sam re-sheathed his dagger, trembling with cold. For Thor to have his valkyries watch every port was to stretch them thin indeed.
He must really be angry.

Returning to the warmth of the inner decks he collected his bag without a word to the astonished barman, and hurried down to a cubicle in the men’s lavatories. He took off his wet black coat and replaced it with the green anorak. In the shop he purchased a different rucksack, describing him as a ‘world trekker’, and piled his belongings into that. He’d put on the baseball cap, but ruled out buying a pair of sunglasses, in gloomy February.

Holidaymakers are often disappointed by their arrival in Calais. After leaving Dover, which for the most part was bombed flat and poorly rebuilt, they usually want to arrive in a gleaming port where, for preference, a man wearing a silly hat is selling wine and garlic. Not so with Calais. From the port it’s straight on to a motorway which commands views over railyards and industrial estates. The bus to the centre of town goes past advertisement hoardings, and giant steel sheds in which foothills of builder’s cement are stacked for some unhappy day when the world finds itself needing that much of the stuff. The first indication of being in another land is the red-brick town hall, make-believe Flemish medieval, with a colossal clock tower. As the more cynical tourists point out, it surely isn’t Dover Castle. But it is different.

The bus’s final destination was the town’s two stations, one international, the other regional. Sam bought a ticket and ran on to the Paris platform, catching the last train seconds before the whistle went. But surely not too soon. When would his trance on the valkyrie have worn off? Was it known even now that he’d got off the ferry in Calais?

Did he dare sleep? he thought as the train clunked out of the station. Or were there more enemies out there, waiting for him? Because of a crime he hadn’t committed? Or for some truth whose discovery had got Freya killed?

Sam resolved to stay awake.

It had been on another train journey, Paris to Orleans, when he’d first decided, all those years ago, to intervene. He’d done so reluctantly, knowing how dangerous interference was in mortal affairs.

His travelling companions were a woman in a hat and a neat suit, sitting up straight, her face empty. Either a spy or an informer, he decided in a flight of fancy. A man wearing rough, greasy clothes, with uncombed hair and dirt on his hands and face. A pair of giggling young children, pressing their noses against the window and trying to see the darkened landscape rush by. Another woman, in a shabbier suit, sat with her husband. An indelible little frown was etched on her brow.

Sam had known he would intervene sooner or later. He’d seen the cratered homes in London, heard whispers about concentration camps, witnessed the Warsaw ghetto. In his heart he knew the only thing holding him back was fear. Even now, he feared mortals.

‘Papers.’ A German soldier, speaking heavily accented French, entered the carriage. Sam’s Luc Satise ID was briefly examined, and given back. The papers of the frowning woman and her husband were inspected, however, and not returned. Outside the closed compartment door the soldier engaged in a half-heard conversation with his commander.

‘There’s a notice about them, sir…’

‘Are they the ones?’

Sam glanced at the couple, their faces now empty, hands locked in each other’s.
Resistance workers. They’ve been betrayed, the soldiers can identify them.

The compartment door opened again, and the soldier gestured with a pistol. ‘You two. Out.’

They rose without a word, the fear evident in their eyes. Sam looked at their faces, at the darkness outside, and back again. Even the children had fallen silent.

The man and woman were led away towards the front of the train, their heads already bowed in the submissive emptiness of prisoners. Sam turned to his neighbour and spoke in a low voice. ‘How far to Orleans?’

‘We’re nearly there.’

‘They’re going to be shot, aren’t they?’

‘Interrogated first.’ The man seemed indifferent.

Sam rose to his feet. Clinging to the handrail in the narrow corridor, he staggered to the end of the carriage, and flung open a window. Luckily the wind was carrying the smoke to the other side of the train. Sticking his head out, he looked towards the engine. His eyes flickered shut briefly, as his mind detached itself. There was a scream of brakes, and he was thrown to one side. The train groaned under the pressure of sudden deceleration. As it juddered to a halt, Sam slipped a door open and jumped down into the night.

He ran through the darkness, keeping close to the train. Suddenly a German soldier sprang out ahead and began yelling at the driver. Sam dived underneath a carriage, crawled to the other side and continued running, keeping his head low, before climbing back up. Now there were two soldiers shouting at the train crew, who were standing in confusion by the engine, trying to understand why its oiled and efficient parts should have locked so violently in place.

Outside the first-class compartments Sam risked peering round the edge of the window. Two bored German soldiers were staring over their rifles at the silent French couple, now handcuffed, with the man already showing signs of a large bruise across his mouth.

Again Sam intervened, hating himself for a blind fool even as he did so. All four heads snapped around as he tapped on the glass. He knocked gently once more, then moved quickly back against the side of the train. The door opened, and a German soldier stuck his head out. Sam leapt up, catching him round the neck and pulling him into the darkness, digging through his mind as he went. Mortal mind, unprepared – besides, humans had never understood how to defend themselves against another’s thoughts. There was a cry from his comrade, who sprang from the carriage, gun raised. But Sam was ready to catch him in magic. As the man jumped, his leap carried him down on to the far bank, where he sprawled, one leg at an odd angle. There were more shouts.