Exodus, page 31
“You’re not leaving,” Tulane said.
“We sedated Kelli,” Naomi said. “When you started convulsing, she began screaming like she was in pain.”
Warren continued the search for his clothing. “Is she all right?”
“I don’t know.”
What if she isn’t? If something happened to her, it’s your fault. Warren struggled with the guilt he suddenly felt, then pushed it away and concentrated on finding his clothes. They had to be somewhere in the room.
“I said, you’re not leaving.” Tulane stepped in front of Warren.
Angry and feeling trapped, Warren turned on the man. “I am leaving, and I’m leaving now.”
“We’ll see about that.” Tulane barked orders.
Instantly the room filled with armed Cabalists in security gear.
Do not let them stop you, Merihim commanded.
Unconsciously, Warren squatted and slapped his left hand—the one that was covered in the greenish-black scales—against the floor. He operated on instinct, unleashing the power inside him.
Immediately, pale violet electrical bolts sped through the floor and reached the men. When it touched them, they were blown into the air and fell down, unconscious to a man.
Standing again, Warren spun around and grabbed Tulane with his left hand, bunching the man’s shirt and coat in his left fist. He lifted Tulane almost effortlessly from the floor, realizing that he could just as easily have thrown the man from the room.
“I’m leaving,” Warren said. “You can’t stop me. You won’t stop me.” He used some of his old power, the one that he had grown up with and was most familiar with. “Do you understand?”
Tulane fought against the persuasion. Sweat blossomed on his brow and his face knotted up.
“It’s the demon.” Naomi came around the side, stepping into Warren’s view but addressing Tulane. “The demon is siphoning power into him. I can’t do anything.”
“All right,” Tulane said. “You can leave. But let us come with you. There’s so much we can learn.”
No, Merihim said.
Warren fought against the demon’s wishes, but it was hard. Still, there was a part of him that wanted to be in control.
“I can help you,” Tulane said. Despite his effort at appearing calm, Warren could smell the stink of fear on the man. “What are you going to do? Leave here on foot? I can put vehicles at your disposal.”
You will not let him come, Merihim said.
Releasing his hold, Warren dropped Tulane. The man slid bonelessly to the floor. “Do whatever you want,” Warren said. “Bring me my clothes.”
A few minutes later, dressed and still feeling strong, Warren stepped from the Cabalists’ house and into the large landscaped yard. Tulane already had the panel truck waiting.
You won’t defy me, human, Merihim said. I can kill you where you stand.
Warren closed his eyes and shut out the demon’s voice for a moment. He concentrated on the urging that filled him. Almost immediately, an image popped into his head.
It was somewhere down on the River Thames. The building was a large, rambling affair, dark now because the city’s power was off. He struggled to read the faded name painted across the building’s brick walls.
HOLDSTOCK GLASSWORKS MANUFACTURING.
“I can get you what you want,” Warren whispered to the demon. And he knew that he would. He was too afraid of Merihim not to. “But I can’t do it alone. I need their help.”
When there was no further argument from the demon, Warren joined Tulane and Naomi in the panel truck. The vehicle was packed. Another followed behind them as they pulled through the gates and sped out onto the road.
“Do you know where we’re going?” Naomi asked.
“Yes.” Warren ignored Tulane’s baleful stare. The Cabalist leader was less of a threat than the demon, and at the moment Warren knew that he had enough power to save himself from Tulane. Even if he was doing the demon’s bidding, it was enough that he knew he had enough power to save himself. The realization was comforting.
“Where?” she asked.
Warren ignored the question and looked through the front windshield. London’s tall buildings could be seen in the distance.
“Warren,” Naomi tried again.
“No,” he told her. “You’ll know when you need to.”
“What about the other demons?” Tulane asked. “Will we be protected from them?”
“No.”
“Then this is foolish.”
“You can leave if you want.”
For a moment, Tulane glared at him, then broke eye contact and looked away.
Warren didn’t let the other man’s animosity bother him. He was more worried about surviving the coming encounter. Part of whatever the arcane spell was that tied him to Balekor’s Hammer also told him others were searching for it as well. He didn’t know if he would live to see morning, but he was going to do everything within his power to see that he did.
Thirty-Eight
T he deadest light of the day came at dusk. Light drained from the sky, leaving the world monochromatic gray and black, the two colors blending into each other effortlessly. Mornings came with some color that intensified, but evenings only got darker until it was night.
Dusk was also the most dangerous time of day. Many predators naturally came out at that time to hunt, staking out water holes and game trails. They went where prey gathered.
As it turned out, many of the demons held that same predatory inclination. And much of their prey gathered inside buildings, hunkered around fires too small to stave off the bitter winter cold.
Crouched in the shadows of a manufacturing plant not far from Queen Anne’s Docks, Simon watched as Darkspawn and Gremlins hunted through the streets. He’d seen only the bodies of humans, and some of those had been freshly killed. Sickness twisted in his stomach and he barely kept it at bay.
Gazing out along the Thames, Simon spotted more demons along the London Bridge. Cars littered the bridge, many of them burned-out hulks. Several boats and ships floated out on the river as well, creating a mire of vessels that would make navigation through them almost impossible. Dense fog eddied at the river’s edge, thicker than was normal at this time of year. Light snow fell in tight, dry flakes no bigger than shirt buttons.
Blood Angels circled over the river, occasionally dropping down to the ships. They rose again almost immediately, clutching corpses in their claws.
“What are they doing with the bodies?” someone asked.
“Prolly eating them,” another said.
As a Blood Angel descended toward a boat, the vessel suddenly powered up and sped away. The demon changed directions in mid-descent and took off in pursuit. It screamed, and the piercing shriek could be heard plainly where Simon was concealed.
Three other Blood Angels leaped from London Bridge and shot toward the fleeing boat as well. They closed rapidly, wings drumming fiercely.
Simon increased the magnification on the HUD, locking onto the frantic figures taking up defensive positions onboard the boat. The crew raised their weapons, but they were standard military arms, light machine guns and machine pistols that did nothing to the demons. The tracer rounds stopped dead against the demons’ hides.
Ignoring the gunfire, the Blood Angels swooped to the deck and began rending the crew. Claws flashed and the dead dropped to the ground.
The boat’s pilot abandoned his post and leaped over the side. He hit the water and went under just before the boat slammed into a cargo ship and exploded into a ball of flame. The sound of the explosion reached Simon after the flaming debris started descending into the river.
The pilot surfaced several yards away, coming up long enough for a breath of air, then diving back under to swim some more. A Blood Angel skimmed the water toward his last position. When the man surfaced again, the demon was there. She grasped him by the head and one shoulder, claws digging in cruelly. The man kicked and fought but to no avail. Almost effortlessly, the Blood Angel carried her prize into the dark sky.
The remains of the boat burned for a time before sinking below the river’s surface. Flames clung to the side of the cargo ship, but the metal sides quickly burned clean. Within minutes, the Thames was once more dark.
None of the Templar spoke. And the demons kept taking corpses.
“The river level’s dropping,” Wertham said. “It’s five, maybe six feet lower than it was before the Hellgate opened.”
Accompanied by a small group of Templar, Simon surveyed the Thames. Their objective lay close to the river’s edge and they were currently only twenty yards distant. He couldn’t tell any difference in the river.
“Are you sure?” Naughton asked.
“I am,” Wertham replied. “I fished this river every day for the last thirty years. I didn’t spend all my time in the Underground the way some did. I had my fishing business. And I’m telling you the river is lower than it’s ever been. It must have something to do with what the demons are doing.”
Reports had continued to come in concerning the changes being made in the landscape around St. Paul’s Cathedral. The Burn—which was what the Templar had taken to calling the manifestation—was growing larger every day, consuming everything in its path. Part of it had overlapped the Thames.
“You think the demons are behind this?” Naughton asked.
“I can’t think of another reason,” Wertham answered.
“That’s impossible. Even if the Burn was capable of affecting the river, the Thames feeds into the North Sea. They can’t be draining an ocean.”
Simon heard the nervousness in the man’s voice. None of them knew for certain what the demons were capable of.
“Could be they’re draining the water from the locks,” Wertham said. “There are forty-five locks along the Thames. If the locks were closed, they could drain the river.”
“They wouldn’t close the locks,” Cedric Southard said. Like Simon, Cedric was young, but he was black and intense, normally quiet.
“And why not?” Naughton asked.
“Because that would shut off people’s escape routes,” Cedric replied. His dark red and gold-trimmed armor glimmered slightly in the shadows. “The river’s still the fastest way out of London and the interior of England.”
Simon knew that was true. But if the locks weren’t closed, they had to accept that not only could the demons drain the River Thames, but they were capable of draining the oceans of the world, too.
“And if they drain the river,” Cedric said, “that’s going to pull the sea in. Instead of fresh water here, we’ll have brackish, with the salt mixing with the fresh. They already got that problem in the lowlands.”
That thought was too horrible to contemplate. The environmental changes alone would cripple humanity’s efforts to survive. A lot of food came from the sea, and without the sea to provide airborne moisture in the form of rain, crops on land wouldn’t receive the necessary irrigations. Crops, livestock, and wild game would die out. But fresh water was the key to all of it.
After a few more minutes of sober silence, Derek’s scouts returned, informing them that there was a problem.
“We found the private museum where we were told it would be,” Mercer said. He was short and wiry, a perfect scout. “But someone got there before us.”
“Who?” Derek asked.
The Templar’s disgust tightened his voice. “A group of those demon-worshipping Cabalists.”
“They don’t worship the demons. They study them.”
“The Cabalists want to leave the demons alive,” Mercer growled. “For me, that’s enough to put the Cabalists in the enemy camp. I don’t trust them.”
“They helped Lord Sumerisle gather the information he needed to stage the attack on St. Paul’s Cathedral.”
Mercer cursed. “By morning, whose blood was it that soaked into the battlefield there?”
Derek didn’t say anything.
“The Cabalists didn’t fight and die with us,” Mercer went on. “That tells you something. They’re more interested in saving their own necks.”
Simon had yet to see the Cabalists, though he had heard about them. He didn’t know how he felt about them, either. Anyone that wanted to study the demons was suspect in his book.
“They’re making themselves look like the demons,” Mercer went on. “They wear demon armor and are covered with tattoos. Some of these I saw had horns. Not horns that you wear, but ones growing right out of their heads. Some of them look like they’re wearing lizard skins, only it’s their flesh and not some kind of garment.”
“Could be they’re trying to pass as demons,” someone offered. “As a disguise, maybe.”
“And maybe they’re trying to worship the demons,” Mercer snarled. He spat. “I’d just as soon kill ’em all.”
“What are the Cabalists doing at the museum?” Derek asked.
“I don’t know. There’s a manufacturing plant there. Used to be Holdstock Glassworks before they closed it down a few years back.”
Simon knew why the Cabalists’ presence there troubled Derek so much. Even though the Cabalists had remained separate—for the most part—from the Templar, they still apparently knew a great many things from their own studies of the demons.
“Well then,” Derek said, “let’s go see what’s brought the Cabalists out.”
The Templar stayed in the shadows of the back alleys and skirted the riverfront. The dead littered the way. Some of them had been there since the demons had arrived, but others looked fresh.
Tense minutes later, Simon fell into position with his group and scanned the museum with the thermographic display capabilities of the HUD.
Located next to the manufacturing plant that had closed nearly thirty years ago but hadn’t yet been revitalized, the Turnbull Museum was a privately owned collection that extended visitation privileges to only a few. From what Derek had told them earlier, Geoffrey Turnbull had been something of an adventurer and had journeyed to the far corners of the earth gathering artifacts. His taste, and his collection, had been eclectic. An invited guest might find a shrunken head from the wilds of Borneo as easily as he could find Ashanti pottery or Mongolian trade coins.
However, what no one had known until lately, was that Geoffrey Turnbull also had a taste for the arcane. This information the Templar had ferreted out from the same document they’d gotten their hands on that had told them of Robert Thornton’s cursed book. When they’d learned that, the Templar team hadn’t exactly been excited about the prospect. The story about the book devouring Bruce was still fresh in their minds.
What the Templar were there to find was a hammer that was supposedly forged by a demon blacksmith. The entry regarding the weapon called it Balekor’s Hammer. It was supposed to have the power to open gateways into the demon world.
The Templar hoped to use that power to their advantage. But, failing that, they wanted it safely locked away so the demons couldn’t use it.
The museum occupied the bottom two floors of a six-story building. The upper four floors held small business offices and storage areas. If the information they’d received was correct, Turnbull had another museum holding even more exotic items secretly hidden in a sub-basement level no one but the builders had known about. Wealth had its privileges, and the wealthy enjoyed their secrets.
Across the alley, the Cabalists entered the manufacturing plant.
Simon used the magnification application in the HUD to take a closer look at them. Their appearance, most of them looking like demons themselves with their grafted-on horns and demon-hide armor, put him off at once. He couldn’t muster much sympathy for them.
The sight of the two women in the ranks of the Cabalists reminded Simon of Leah Creasey. He wondered why the young woman had left the Templar Underground, but realized that she might have been just as put off by the Templar as he was by the Cabalists.
Derek called for the scouts, then got them moving once again. They froze against the alley wall as a Blood Angel flew by overhead. Then they resumed their approach to the museum.
A thick chain secured the museum’s main doors. The broken windows overhead offered mute testimony that someone had broken into the building, though. The occasional scream sounded somewhere out on the river.
Simon couldn’t help thinking about the people seeking refuge from the demons. None of them had been trained to fight the demons. Or to survive in winter conditions when power to the city was nonexistent, he added. Even if some of them managed to avoid getting killed by the demons, they wouldn’t make it through the winter months.
Some of them would be children like the two he’d rescued. That didn’t sit easily in his mind.
“Everybody go easy inside,” Derek advised. “We may have innocents lurking.”
The Templar acknowledged that, then Mercer gripped the chain in his mailed fists, pulled, and shattered a link. He stripped the chain from the doors and pushed them open.
Thirty-Nine
W arren stepped into the darkness that filled the manufacturing plant. His physical senses relayed images of detritus and abandoned equipment, the sounds of the wind outside the building and the cries of the demons and their prey, the smell of must, and the biting cold that permeated the warehouse.
But it was other senses, ones that had grown steadily stronger since they’d left the Cabalist redoubt, that conveyed more to him than he’d ever believed possible. The new senses overlapped his accustomed ones, though, creating some confusion.
From the corner of his eye, he saw shadows of work and workers that had once filled the plant. The heavy steel pots that had carried molten glass in the past glowed cherry-red but held only shadows. The large furnaces were empty and blazing at the same time. Warren heard the whisper of voices, jokes, and curses, intermingled in the heavy silence enhanced by the layer of snow on the building. Heat mixed in with the cold, so hot and fierce that Warren wanted to take his coat off.
