Day of the Serpent (Ouroboros Book 3) Read online

  Lisa wriggled impatiently as the knife sliced through the tape.

  “I am a normal person!” she protested. “In fact, I got one better. I am two normal people, and both of me are fun-loving girls with oodles of charm!”

  Seeing Knapton's expression she went on, “Okay, two fun-loving girls plus one scary monster from the dawn of time. But nobody is perfect, right?”

  Chapter 5. A Second Bite

  “You share dreams with your daughter?” said Norton, after Brad had finished. “What she dreams, you dream? And this only began when she fell in with Ouroboros?”

  “That's about the size of it,” admitted Brad. “But why, I don't know.”

  The academic pondered his empty whiskey glass.

  “I've heard of such psychic connections before, but there must be a reason why this happened so suddenly. Perhaps that's the key to the whole business?” suggested Norton. “It might explain why Kelly is so important to the cult. And why they haven't killed you.”

  For a moment Brad stared at the professor, dumbfounded by the idea.

  “We assumed that was because Kelly didn't want her dad crushed to death,” put in Denny.

  Norton made an impatient gesture, as if family ties were a minor point.

  “Sentiment is all well and good,” he said, “but this is a cult dedicated to power. You say in one dream she showed you a vision of some of kind of rural Utopia, presided over by the benevolent spirit of Ouroboros.”

  “That's right,” said Brad. “It struck me as kind of absurd, fake. You know, a sort of Disney-world paradise.”

  “The kind of place you'd like to visit but you'd go crazy if you had to live in?” asked Denny.

  Brad nodded.

  “Exactly that,” he said. “A world devoid of conflicts, suffering, inequality, all presided over by some supernatural being. People living like that wouldn't really be human, would they?”

  Norton gave a humorless bark of laughter.

  “What you describe would be paradise for millions of less fortunate folk alive today,” he pointed out. “But I take your point. They want to remake the world and remake humanity in the process. And their ideal world is one with very few people in it, all living in little villages, yes?”

  “Which implies a lot of death and destruction to get to that ideal,” said Denny. “Big heaps of corpses and cities in flames.”

  “And how does that tie in to Loch Ness, exactly?” asked Norton.

  Brad tried to describe his dreams of the earth cracking along the fault lines in its crust.

  “And I think,” he went on, “that they're in Scotland because it’s where the nearest fault line is. It runs straight down the middle of Loch Ness, through what they call the Great Glen.”

  Brad noticed that Denny was not giving her full attention, and looked over his shoulder to see the television screen. The volume was turned low, but he could make out an amateurish-looking video clip.

  “Oh my God,” he said.

  “Is that what you saw in Wychmere?” asked Denny, eyes wide.

  Norton, too, was staring. Others in the pub were scornfully dismissing the footage as a hoax, part of the same 'viral campaign' that had produced the mermaid. Only Brad and his companions kept straight faces.

  “Yes,” he said. “That's what we saw in the stone circle. Only I think that one is way bigger.”

  The TV news moved on to the day's sports highlights. Clearly the Loch Ness item had been the piece of fun that drew a line under the 'real news.’

  “At least that settles it,” said Denny, sounding subdued. “We're going to Scotland. Care to join us, Professor Norton?”

  Norton looked nonplussed.

  “A sane man would stay well away from murderous cultists trying to raise a giant monster from the dawn of time,” he mused. “But my students all think I'm a mad old coot, so why not? I'm on sabbatical anyway. And if I get myself killed, my colleagues will probably heave a sigh of relief, because everyone else will get promoted.”

  For the first time Brad felt himself getting to like James Norton.

  ***

  “What is this place?” asked Lisa Valentine as Knapton closed the door behind her.

  “Safe house,” said the detective. Then, seeing her puzzlement, Knapton added, “It's a place where we put witnesses who are in danger before they give evidence.”

  Lisa stood, looking up at him, and for a moment Knapton forgot what she was. He made himself remember that this young woman was not a pretty, slightly ditzy Polish tourist adrift in England.

  She's so naïve about the real world, he thought. But that's not so surprising, given that the real world doesn't acknowledge things like her exist.

  “It does not look very safe,” said Lisa, dubiously. “Also, the curtains and the furniture are tacky.”

  “We're not here to discuss the décor,” Knapton said. “He's upstairs. I had to sedate him.”

  He led her up to the main bedroom where Detective Sergeant Healy lay on the bed, fully clothed except for his jacket and shoes. He was looking toward them as they walked in, but his eyes did not quite focus.

  “This man, he is slave to that bitch, yes?” asked Lisa, looking down at Healy's unshaven face.

  “Right,” said Knapton. “And the only time he got free of her, just for a moment–”

  “I know, you tell me a million times!” she interrupted, waving him aside. “I never tried this before. My gut tells me it might work, but I don't know why.”

  Without another word, Lisa started to undress, kicking off her shoes then removing her oversized football shirt and jogging pants. When she got down to her bra and panties, she stopped and arched an eyebrow.

  “You always stand there watching while a girl changes?”

  “Not this kind of change,” Knapton muttered, turning his back. But in the mirror on the door of the wardrobe he could still catch glimpses of the girl as she finished unclothing and stood for a moment, taking deep breaths.

  “Okay,” said Lisa, “here we go!”

  At first, Knapton saw and heard nothing unusual. But then Lisa's breathing became labored and there was a sickening crunch. Knapton imagined cartilage and bone being wrenched apart. He resisted the temptation to turn around as the girl vanished from his field of view.

  “No!” shouted Healy. “Not again, no!”

  He's forgotten what he told me, thought Knapton. Maybe because he's just bloody terrified, which is hardly surprising.

  “It will not hurt much,” said a voice that was still just recognizable as Lisa's. “I promise.”

  Healy shouted some more and Knapton heard a thrashing on the bed, then a crash. He recalled a cheap lamp on the bedside table. Then there was a cry of panic and despair from Healy. He sounded half-smothered.

  “What are you doing?” Knapton shouted, turning only to freeze.

  He saw a flailing mass of limbs, hair, and clothing roll off the bed onto the floor at his feet. Lisa's body from the waist down was a pale silver, shining with smooth scales. It was wound around Healy's legs. She had her arms around him, pinning him down while she bit into his neck. Her face was contorted, no longer fully human. Her expression spoke of desire, a kind of lust that Knapton had never seen before. Her fangs were deep in the folds of flesh. There was a spot of blood on one of her scaly cheeks.

  “Get off him you bitch!” shouted a voice that was familiar, but not Healy's. It was the voice of the woman from the interview, the one Steiger had called Cleo. The woman's voice cursed at Lisa, who seemed to be chuckling between bites. After what seemed an eternity, the shouting ceased and Healy stopped fighting.

  “That's enough!” Knapton shouted, groping for the Taser. But before he could draw the weapon, the lamia uncoiled itself, releasing Healy, and wriggled into the far corner of the room. Knapton bent over his boss, his friend, checking for a pulse. Healy was alive, but seemed paralyzed.

  “If you've killed him,” he began.

  The lamia reared up and, too late, Knapto
n realized he had strayed too close. The creature wrapped its arms around him, pinning the Taser at his side. The immense snake-tail coiled around his legs. Lisa's face rose until she was gazing into his eyes. He saw himself reflected in bright green irises with pupils that were vertical slits.

  “You would be such a useful little friend,” she said. “A nice English policeman who would keep me informed about all sorts of things.”

  She opened her mouth, and he stared at the inch-long fangs protruding from her upper jaw.

  “No!” he shouted. “That wasn't the deal.”

  Even as he protested he realized he sounded like a prize idiot. As if this monster, this grotesque hybrid of serpent and woman, would keep her word. Lisa giggled and dipped her head in a parody of nuzzling his neck. He felt the coldness of her fangs on his neck, and tried to brace himself.

  But she did not break the skin. Instead, Lisa leaned back, smiled, and then gave Knapton a long, sensuous kiss. He felt her tongue flicker around his lips. Her grip on him grew tighter and he gasped as the air was forced out of his lungs. The forked tongue darted to the back of his mouth. Then the pressure was gone and Knapton fell to his knees as Lisa uncoiled, withdrew.

  “A deal's a deal, Constable,” she said. “But remember, I am not someone you can push around. Don't make that mistake again.”

  Knapton could not reply, as he was still gulping great lungfuls of air. He doubled over, and out of the corner of one eye saw Lisa start to transform again. By the time he could stand up again, she was pulling on her shoes.

  “He'll be fine, I think,” she said, looking down at Healy. “I get no sense of anyone in control, you know? Well, apart from him.”

  “Boss?” said Knapton, kneeling beside Healy and gently slapping his face.

  “Maybe you should call an ambulance?” suggested Lisa as she stepped around the men. “Tell them some story. Sort of lie people tell you all the time, yes?”

  “Yes,” said Knapton numbly, taking out his phone. By the time he'd made the call, the girl was gone. It was only then that it occurred to Knapton that he was alone in a half-wrecked bedroom.

  Alone with a man who had what might well appear to be love bites on his neck.

  “They'll be here in five minutes, boss,” he said to Knapton's impassive face. “By then I'll have worked out a brilliant cover story. Just you wait.”

  Knapton started to rack his brains, but by the time the paramedics had arrived he still had not come up with a good explanation.

  “We were checking the place out and he just had a fit,” he lied, adding. “He's been feeling unwell for a few days now.”

  At least that last bit is kind of true, he thought.

  ***

  “She neutralized him,” snarled Cleo. She punched the jamb of the door to the cabin. Wood splintered. The big woman kept pacing back and forth like a caged beast until Kelly put a hand on Cleo's arm.

  “I don't get it,” said Kelly. “Why should one bite cancel out another?”

  “Interference,” said Clay, who was sitting in the corner of the boat's cabin, as far away from Cleo as the limited space permitted. “It's like two people trying to control a model airplane with radio signals on the same frequency. The plane crashes. Or, in this case, goes catatonic.”

  “A true follower of Ouroboros would never do such a thing!” shouted Cleo. Then, in a lower voice. “We have to kill her.”

  “She's certainly a loose cannon,” said Kelly, in a conciliatory tone, “but she's just one person. And she's crazy. How much harm can she really do?”

  “Perhaps we should stay focused on the greater task,” put in Clay.

  Cleo looked from girl to man and back.

  “You still don't get it, do you? She could ruin it all for us. If she barges into the middle of the raising process, she could run just the kind of interference she did with Healy. Only to a far worse effect. No, first that creature dies. Then we raise Ouroboros in all its forms.”

  Clay looked as if he might continue to argue, but Kelly said quickly, “Time for the news, let's see if there's anything about Culloden.”

  Again the story was relegated to what Clay derisively called 'the skateboarding duck slot' after business and politics had been covered. This time the interview was with a woman clutching a little girl, who was in her turn clutching a plush mermaid doll. The caption read, Julie Finnegan, Tourist. The backdrop was a low building in front of which a bemused-looking policeman was talking to some agitated people.

  “I really thought we were going to be killed,” said Julie. “At first, they looked like historical re-enactors, but then cannonballs started flying overhead and these men came charging out of the mist. We were all terrified!”

  “What did you think, Cressida?” asked the interviewer off camera. The microphone was pointed at the little girl, who looked at it dubiously before speaking.

  “I was scared,” said Cressida. “I don't like ghosts very much. I liked the mermaid better.”

  “Well,” laughed the interviewer, “that's one way of looking at it. Now back to Kirsty in the studio.”

  Kelly killed the broadcast and tossed the remote onto Cleo's couch.

  “Still not taking us seriously,” she said. “I guess that's a good thing?”

  “The media doesn’t know what to make of it,” agreed Clay. “But that doesn't mean the government isn't sniffing around.”

  “I sensed nothing from Healy, in all those weeks,” Cleo pointed out. “He wasn't very senior, true, but he had connections. Called in favors. Nothing official.”

  “So who cleared up the mess at Wychmere?” countered Clay. Cleo snorted but did not reply.

  “Someone knows more about us than we'd like,” Clay went on. “And they know about Kelly's father. Maybe he's being used as a decoy, a way of drawing us out into the open. Giving us the chance to make a mistake.”

  “Dad's no threat,” said Kelly. Then added hastily, “I mean he can't stop us without risking hurting me.”

  “He shot me,” said Cleo. “More than once.”

  “And stopped when I stood between you,” Kelly pointed out. “We've been over this. If he comes, I'll deal with it.”

  “You'd better,” warned Cleo. “Because if you don't, well, I have unfinished business with Brad.”

  Cleo threw herself down onto her improvised bed and pulled her knees up. It was her sign that the others were dismissed. Clay stood up.

  “I'll go and check if Andreas is finished,” said Clay. “His English is a bit shaky. We want to look irrelevant, not stupid.”

  “I wrote it out for him clearly enough,” Kelly pointed out, following him up the ladder onto the deck of the Talisman.

  “I think Cleo has taken a lot out of Andreas,” said Clay quietly as they paused in the hatchway. “He's looking pretty washed out.”

  “Do you really think they can – you know?” asked Kelly. They were both speaking more freely than usual because they no longer felt Cleo's watchful presence in their minds. As usual she had gone to sleep almost immediately.

  “I have no idea,” replied Clay. “But I can't say the idea fills me with joy. This was not what I expected when I began all this.”

  Andreas was standing on the little pier of the village of Invercraig, paintbrush in hand. A small crowd of locals, mostly children, were standing around him surveying his handiwork. Kelly and Clay stepped off the boat and went to stand by Andreas to get a clear look at the new lettering on the cabin of the Talisman. In foot-high letters, it read LOCH NESS MONSTER SURVEY.

  “A bit amateurish, but clear enough,” commented Clay.

  Kelly agreed, adding, “It makes it clear what we're about, anyhow.”

  Clay glanced around at the villagers.

  “Yes, at least people will know why we're sailing up and down the loch at all hours.”

  Hiding in plain sight, he thought, taking some pride in his idea. Nobody takes monster hunters seriously.

  “Hey mister!” shouted a little boy, one o
f a group of smirking friends. “Do you really think there's a monster out there?”

  Clay looked at the kids without smiling.

  “Oh yes,” he said. “I'm quite sure of it.”

  ***

  “That was my good deed for today,” said Lisa, watching the paramedics carry Healy out of the safe house. Knapton followed his boss into the ambulance.

  “Good deed,” said Pavel, staring blankly as the ambulance sped away, lights flashing, siren wailing. Other vehicles gave way, pulling over to the curb. Soon the ambulance had vanished and London traffic was restored to its customary ill-tempered chaos.

  “You see how they obey the rules, Pavel?” said Lisa. “Even the selfish bastards, even the bad guys. Sometimes they work together. But not most of the time, and not very well.”

  “Work together,” said Pavel. He turned to look into Lisa's eyes. “Like you and me.”

  Surprised, it took her a moment to find words.

  “Yes, like you and me,” she repeated, running her fingers around his cheek. “Oh God, you're still there, aren't you? The big guy I took. And I killed your girlfriend, your Lenka, and took her clothes, passport, all of it.”

  “Lenka,” said Pavel. A tear appeared at the corner of his left eye and rolled down his cheek. Lisa brushed it away, sucked the salt from her fingertip.

  “I'm sorry,” she said. “It was before I was reborn. Before Marcus. Before I became human again. Kind of.”

  A sudden thought struck her with the impact of a blow. She sat bolt upright, then started the ignition.

  “My God, it's so obvious!” she cried. “I can save you. I can beat that bitch and save the world and give you your life back.”

  “Lenka,” repeated Pavel, staring ahead of them as Lisa pulled out. Soon horns were blaring and Lisa was giving outraged road users the finger.

  “Yeah, you too buddy,” she shouted joyfully. “I'm a woman on a mission, asshole!”

  Chapter 6: Heads, Hearts, and Eyes

  That night, Brad's dream was even stranger than before.