Day of the Serpent (Ouroboros Book 3) Read online

  Glad he's on my side, thought Brad. Or at least, not on the side of Ouroboros.

  “Do I need to sign a form or something?” he asked. “If not, I'll just go.”

  “Be careful, sir,” said Knapton, helping Healy to his feet. “Maybe you should get some air.”

  “How long has he been – like this?” asked Brad, hesitating at the door.

  “Happened a few days after you first met him,” said Knapton, speaking fast and low. “Now go, sir, please.”

  Brad did not need urging and within a couple of minutes was outside Scotland Yard looking for a cab. He caught sight of Denny waving from her car. She was illegally parked outside the national police headquarters, so he got in as quickly as he could.

  “What was that about?” she asked, as she drove confidently into London’s chaotic traffic.

  “Healy, the detective? He’s under their control,” he replied, and gave a quick account of the bizarre interrogation.

  “Well, we know Cleo survived and is not your number one fan,” she commented. “But it doesn’t take us any nearer to Kelly and her merry band of rascals. Which is why we’re on our way to see a man about a magician. One of the network of experts Marcus used in his battles to rescue cult victims.”

  “What?” Brad was puzzled. “Did this guy get in touch with you?”

  “Not exactly,” replied Denny. “Let’s just say he sent Marcus a few emails, and I happen to have our friend’s phone. And I know a man who can hack into accounts, that kind of thing.”

  “You British journalists really do sail pretty close to the wind,” he remarked.

  Denny laughed.

  “You’d be amazed at the stuff some of my colleagues get up to,” she said. “Believe me, a bit of phone hacking is trivial by comparison. Anyway, this bloke is called Professor James Norton, and he’s some kind of lecturer here in London. We’re meeting him for lunch. He sounds like a hoot.”

  Brad gave her a quizzical glance.

  “I meant,” she said, “he’s just the sort of old-school academic you’d expect Marcus to know.”

  They drove in silence for a while, then Brad said, “It wasn’t your fault. It was mine. I left you, I split the party. The one thing you don’t do and I did it.”

  “Yes,” she said, “but then I left him behind to try and rescue someone who was probably dead already.”

  “We both screwed up, big time, and equally,” he insisted. “And the best we can do now is finish the job. For Marcus.”

  ***

  Knapton walked Healy around Scotland Yard's inner courtyard for a few minutes. Healy seemed confused, disoriented. Holding Healy upright, Knapton could feel how thin he had become. His ribs, once well-padded thanks to fast-food lunches, were all too evident.

  He's almost starving, thought Knapton. Who or whatever is controlling him doesn't care about his health. Steiger was right, this man's a puppet.

  “You should take a few weeks' leave, boss,” said Knapton. “Get away from it all, maybe go abroad. I hear there are some good deals for holidays in Cyprus.”

  Healy nodded, but his vague expression make Knapton wonder if he was being understood. He sat Healy down on a bench and stood over him, wanting to question him about Ouroboros.

  “I'll be fine, mate,” said Healy, eyes still unfocused. “Just leave me to it. I'll be back in the office after lunch.”

  “Can I get you anything, boss?” asked Knapton. “How about a pastry, or we could push the boat out and have fish and chips?”

  Healy looked Knapton in the eye, and grinned. It was a mirthless grin, so out of character that Knapton took a step back.

  “Let's stop playing games, Sherlock,” hissed Healy in the strange, feminine voice. “We both know I'm the third wheel in this relationship.”

  “Who are you?” asked the detective.

  “Wrong question,” sneered the voice. “What am I? Something you will never comprehend. Something that will soon engulf your worn-out, rotten world, with its uniforms and laws and petty concerns. I am the Alpha and Omega, Mister Policeman. I am the storm that will blow all your kind away.”

  Healy's face went blank, his eyes rolled up showing their whites, and he fell forward. Reaching out to catch him again, Knapton wondered if the entity was still playing games. But then he heard Healy's voice, his real voice, and was in no doubt that the possessor had gone for now.

  “Help me,” croaked Healy. “Help me before she comes back.”

  Knapton felt exasperated, all too aware he was out of his depth.

  “What can I do?” he demanded. Healy replied with one word.

  “Valentine!”

  “What?” asked Knapton. “You mean the guy who was injured? In Poland?”

  “I can't … I can't–” repeated Healy, clearly struggling to retain control of his own faculties. He began to spasm violently, and Knapton realized his boss was having a fit. Struggling to stop Healy from swallowing his tongue, he heard one more word before the detective passed out. It was a simple word, but in the circumstances he found it ominous.

  “Bite!”

  ***

  Lunch took place in a pub near one of London University's many campuses. Professor James Norton proved to be a thin, precise man. Brad guessed Norton was in his early sixties, wearing a tweed suit that looked to be in its mid-thirties.

  “Denny tells me you're an expert in folklore, magic, and all related areas,” said Brad, after they had ordered. “How well do you know Marcus Valentine?”

  “Not very well at all,” replied Norton. He had a dry, precise manner. “He attended some of my lectures three years ago, then asked me for help on occasion. Ouroboros was by far the most interesting case. I was unable to provide much information, though. And I understand that now Marcus has become a bit of a cropper. Very foolish to tangle with such people, in my humble opinion.”

  Brad found himself resenting Norton's tone on behalf of his friend. But he was careful to disguise his annoyance.

  “On the way here, Denny mentioned a magician,” he said. “Who might that be?”

  Norton gave a slightly smug smile.

  “Have you ever heard of Aleister Crowley?”

  Brad shook his head, prompting a sigh from Norton.

  “How quickly notoriety fades,” said the professor. “He did try so very hard to be famous.”

  “This Crowley, he has some link to Ouroboros?” asked Brad.

  “Indirectly,” said Norton, shifting his gaze to Denny. “If this strange story of a bare-bosomed mermaid in Loch Ness is to be credited.”

  “According to my sources, the picture is genuine,” she said. “It's not a standard hoax, or viral advertising. But I don't see how Crowley fits in. Wasn't he just some kind of nutcase back in the nineteen hundreds?”

  “An understatement, Miss Pollard,” replied Norton, as if talking to a student at a seminar. “Crowley was, depending on who you ask, the supreme nutcase of the early twentieth century. He called himself a magician.”

  “Let me guess,” put Brad, “he didn't pull rabbits out of hats or make girls in spangled costumes disappear?”

  “No,” said Norton. “He invoked what he claimed were guardian angels. Others said they were demons. But the point is that he lived in a place called Boleskine House on the shores of Loch Ness.”

  “Crowley was a member of the famous Order of the Golden Dawn,” put in Denny, “which was supposedly all about spirituality and improving the world. A lot of famous people were members, including famous writers and aristocrats.”

  Norton looked peeved at the interruption.

  “That's partly true,” he said. “In fact, Crowley belonged to a splinter group that was less interested in spiritual purity and more into sex and power. Crowley formed a cult and performed rituals that were rumored to be fairly debauched and cruel. Hard to say where truth ends and myth begins.”

  The waitress arrived with their food and Norton paused his mini-lecture until she left.

  “What we do
know is that, in 1913, Crowley suddenly left Boleskine House after spending months trying to raise some powerful entity. He went to Paris, supposedly for some kind of showdown with the Golden Dawn. But it's a fact that he never went back to Loch Ness, even though he lived to a ripe old age. And a few years later, the legendary creature in the loch started to be seen more frequently. Just before World War 2, sightings came in thick and fast. Then they gradually tapered off.”

  Brad pondered the idea. It seemed tenuous, but not quite flimsy enough to be dismissed.

  “You think Crowley stirred up some archetype of Ouroboros?” he asked. “And that it somehow manifested itself as a monster in the loch? That's quite a reach.”

  Norton shrugged.

  “Unlike Marcus, my activities are purely academic,” he pointed out. “I advance suggestions, hypotheses, guesses, if you like. But it seems quite a coincidence that Crowley should lead to Nessie, and then your cult gravitates to the same area.”

  “Which just happens to be on a major fault line,” added Brad. Norton, he was pleased to see, seemed baffled by that. He told Norton about Marcus's drawings, and the first dreams he had shared with Kelly.

  “You saw the world end in a dream?” said Norton. “I am impressed. That's what you Americans call old-school visionary material. Biblical, in fact. Clearly, we are in possession of a number of puzzle pieces. I wonder what links them together.”

  “The Zamyatin device,” said Denny. “That must be it.”

  Again, Norton looked puzzled. This time it was Denny's turn to explain.

  ***

  “Okay, honey, you wait here and I'll be back in half an hour,” said Lisa, giving Pavel a peck on the cheek. He nodded, not speaking.

  “I do wish we could talk some more, Pavel,” she said in Polish as she unbuckled her seat-belt. “Have little chats. I remember, a long time ago, when I was Olga and human, I enjoyed little chats. It was one of those things that make you feel warm and safe.”

  She gave a pout, ruffled Pavel's hair. He returned a faint smile, like a man concussed or heavily sedated.

  “Ah, if I could give you your freedom, would you love me?” she said.

  No, she thought, mostly because I killed your girlfriend. Poor Lenka. We could have been friends, and I went and did that. I am terrible sometimes.

  She got out of the car and went into the hospital, beaming at a group of nurses having a smoke around by the bins.

  “Those things will kill you!” she shouted cheerfully.

  “Up yours!” replied one of the smokers.

  English sense of humor is the best in the world, she thought. I wonder what Scotland is like? I know there must be bagpipes, played by men in those skirts with strange furry pockets at the front. But what else? So much to learn!

  Nurse Sharma was at the reception, as usual, which was a break. Lisa had timed her visits to coincide with the shifts of the nurse she controlled. Anita Sharma had been happy to help when Lisa had pretended to sprain her ankle outside the foyer. After helping Lisa to the car, it had taken just a couple of minutes to get her under control. With access to Anita's mind, Lisa could time her visits according to the nurse's shifts.

  “Hello, Lisa,” said the nurse, “your dad's had a good day. He's been listening to music and he ate all his lunch.”

  “That is truly good news,” replied Lisa, choosing the English words carefully. “If he is enjoying hospital food then he must be in a very optimistic frame of mind.”

  The conversation was for the benefit of bystanders, both staff and members of the public. Anita buzzed Lisa through into the ward, and the thrice-born daughter was soon with her spiritual father again. As usual, Marcus seemed alarmed to see her, and his smile had a nervous look about it. But Lisa had convinced herself that he loved her as she loved him.

  “You are looking a little better, I think,” she said, sitting down on the bed.

  Marcus, seated at his desk by the window, ran a nervous hand through his hair.

  “I am in good health, I think,” he said, “but my mind is not behaving itself. It is as if fragments of my memories are swirling in a maelstrom, spiraling …”

  He stopped. Lisa nodded, reaching out to touch his wounded mind with hers. The American and the journalist had been asking about her, as expected. But Marcus and Anita knew nothing of importance.

  Besides, she thought, they are Marcus's friends. Therefore, they are my friends. They just don't know it yet.

  She tended to skim the surface of Marcus's mind because the depths of his being had been wounded and left in disarray by her attack. Every visit was an act of repentance, an attempt to make amends.

  “I brought you some grapes,” she said, “I almost forgot! And more CDs. Bach, and Monterverdi, and Chopin, of course, a great Polish composer. You have such good taste!”

  “Thank you,” said Marcus, “you're very kind.”

  “But you are still afraid of me,” she said, sadly. She felt tears start to come.

  “These talks are so upsetting for both of us!”

  On impulse, she jumped up and went over to him, hugging him even as he flinched.

  “I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, please forgive me!”

  Tentatively, Marcus patted her on the back. She might have felt better about this had it not been for the way their close contact enhanced the psychic link. Lisa received a jolt as the deep-rooted trauma she had inflicted was replayed, like an old wound being opened. What made it worse was how well she remembered the pleasure of attacking Marcus, the defenseless man trapped like a cornered animal.

  But there was something else, a rogue memory that she almost missed as it swirled past. She glimpsed a face, some questions, a stranger standing in this room, examining Marcus's drawings.

  “You've had another visitor!” she exclaimed, leaning back to hold her adopted father at arm’s length.

  “It was just a policeman asking some routine questions,” he replied. “I don't think I was much help. So many things I know I shouldn't tell him, and others I can't remember.”

  Lisa nodded, uncertain. Marcus had failed to retain even the memory of the officer's name. All she got was the impression of a face, quite young and handsome, and a kindly manner.

  “Well, he can interrogate me any time,” she said. “Quite a hottie, eh?”

  Marcus joined in her laughter, sounding nervous.

  “I am going now, Daddy,” she said, releasing him. “I have to go and deal with the baddies. A super-heroine's work is never done! But when I get back we can–”

  Lisa's enhanced senses told her a third person had entered the room and she was already turning when something struck her in the back. A tremendous jolt of energy shot through her, and she dropped to the floor.

  Lightning, the weapon of gods and magicians.

  Nausea, panic, anger welled up as she tried to reach around and pull the darts out of her shirt. Her arms would not obey her. The face that she had just seen in Marcus's mind appeared, upside down, as she writhed on the floor.

  “Sorry about that,” said the face. “But I thought it best if we discussed this matter on roughly equal terms. And as you could crush me to death without really trying, this is my equalizer.”

  He held up a black plastic gun. It looked like a toy. But when he pushed a button on the side, the lightning shot through her again.

  Chapter 4: Strong Spirits

  Mike Carlton was annoyed. His phone had not stopped ringing for at least twenty-four hours. As leader of the Loch Ness Cryptozoologists' Network, Carlton took his self-appointed task seriously. It was his job to collect and collate data on the unidentified creature called 'Nessie' by the popular press. He did not appreciate being asked about mermaids.

  “No, I have not seen her,” he was saying to a Japanese reporter whose English was not equal to her enthusiasm. “That's because she is a hoax. Hoax. No, a hoax. It means something made up. No, she wasn't wearing make-up, that's not–”

  Another call came in, and Carlton used it as
an opportunity to put Ms. Tanaka on hold. Unfortunately, the other call was from a local newspaper reporter in Colorado asking if he had seen the latest Bigfoot video.

  “No,” said Carlton in an icily polite tone. “But I hope the zipper on the guy's costume isn't quite so conspicuous in this one.”

  That got rid of one nuisance but more kept calling. After a few more minutes, he did the unthinkable and turned off his phone. The silence in his small office was oddly disturbing. Gradually, though, the sounds of the Scottish Highlands began to assert themselves through the half-open window. The wind over the loch, distant bird-calls, the sounds of children playing on the shore.

  “Sanity,” Carlton sighed. “I should switch off more often.”

  He stood up and, after a momentary hesitation, left his phone on the desk. Today he would go to the pub for lunch without his link to the silly, shallow outside world. He was just closing the door to his office – a small wooden cabin – when someone waylaid him.

  “Mister Carlton?”

  Turning, he saw a young woman toting a substantial camera. Behind her, parked on the loch-side road, was a bright orange car bearing a spiky logo and some kind of dish antenna. A small group of onlookers were gathered by the vehicle. He recognized a couple of people. One shouted something inaudible in a jocular tone.

  “Katie Fox, Midland News Network,” the woman explained. “Can I ask you–”

  “No!” Carlton snapped and turned to walk off. Unfortunately, he was flustered by Fox and found himself stalking towards the loch. The pub was in the opposite direction.

  If I turn around and walk the other way, I'll look like a proper clown, he thought, and continued down to the shore. The reporter followed him, repeatedly asking for an interview.

  “You are the recognized authority on the Loch Ness Monster,” she wheedled. “Just a few words?”

  Carlton sighed and turned to look into the lens of the camera.

  “The term 'Loch Ness Monster' is one I find most objectionable,” he said, adjusting his anorak and resettling his glasses on his nose.