The Book Of Secrets Part 32

'This was the plate for the ten of beasts.' Drach lined up the saw blade on the edge of the plate and drew it slowly across the metal. Sparks flew.

'What are you doing? There is no need to destroy these. This is your art.'

The saw bit. A jagged gash appeared in the copper.

'I am not destroying it; I am remaking it. We will need more money to continue with your art. I can make more cards and sell them. It will not be much, but it may tide us through.'

'But you told me half the plates were gone. And now you are breaking this one too.'

'This card is the sum of all the others. He put his palms against the plate so that he masked off different portions of it. 'Here is one, and two, and three . . . I can break it into its parts and combine them to make any number I like.'

I wrapped my arms around him and hugged him close to me. His body was warm against mine, a perfect fit. I loved him.

And in that moment, an angel began to sing inside me. What Kaspar had done with the card, I could do with the indulgences.

We would tear it up and start again.

LV.

Strasbourg

On the dresser, the television played silent images of war and grief. Nick watched, hypnotised. The shock of Brother Jerome's death left him numb.

He had to break the spell. He grabbed the remote and turned off the TV. 'We need to leave.'

There was an unusual firmness in his voice, an urgency he'd never felt before. It snapped Emily out of her daze.

'Where? There's nowhere to go.'

'Let's start by getting out of here. The TV said the neighbours heard the shots this afternoon. Whoever did it was only a few hours behind us.'

'Could they have followed us?'

'Jerome was the one who suggested Strasbourg. He showed us the ex libris, told us the whole story of the Count of Lorraine. He must have guessed we'd come here. If he told them . . .'

They took the stairs down to the lobby, out into the street. He didn't notice the black Audi parked opposite the hotel. The snow seemed to be coming down less heavily now, though there were still flakes whirling in the cones of light under the street lamps. Plenty had fallen already. They crunched deep footprints as they walked around the cathedral and down one of the side streets. Nick looked back but saw no one. The shops were shut, the workers gone home.

A few streets away, they found a small bistro that was open for dinner. It was only half full, but after the wintry solitude outside it felt cosy and welcoming, filled with candlelight and smoky smells of herbs, roasted meat and wine. They took a table behind a wooden pillar, hidden from the windows but with a view of the door, and ordered vin chaud and tartiflettes. In other circ.u.mstances it would have been a perfect romantic evening: candelight, hot wine, knees b.u.mping under the small table. Now the intimacy just seemed another rebuke, a taunt from a world that had abandoned him.

He swirled his gla.s.s and stared at the dregs. 'Atheldene was right. I don't know what any of this means but it's crazy.'

'It means something to somebody,' Emily countered. 'If we weren't on the right track, they wouldn't keep trying to stop us.'

'We're not going to find Gillian.' The words were bitter in his mouth. 'All I've done is get people killed. Bret, Dr Haltung, now Brother Jerome.'

'Brother Jerome was my fault,' said Emily quietly. 'If I hadn't taken you there he'd never have been involved.'

'If I hadn't brought you here you'd never have been involved.' Nick squeezed the stem of his wine gla.s.s, so hard he thought it would shatter.

He glanced up. Emily seemed not to have heard him; her face was fixed in an emotionless stare over his shoulder. He began to turn to follow, but she grabbed his hand and pulled him back.

'Keep looking at me. There's a man three tables behind you who's been watching us for the last five minutes.'

Nick felt a familiar surge of dread. 'What does he look like?'

'Dark, heavy build. A crooked nose. Italian, maybe. He hasn't taken off his coat since he came in.'

Nick flicked his eyes to the gilded mirror on the wall but couldn't pick him out. His mind raced.

'I've got an idea.' His whole body was tensed, half expecting to feel a gun in his back any second. He locked his eyes on Emily's to steady himself. 'In a moment, we'll have a blazing row. You'll run off in tears to the bathroom. I'll storm out the door. We'll leave the bag on the table and see what he does.'

'What if he comes after you?'

'Then you come after him.'

'And if he comes after me?'

'Scream the place down. I'll be right there.' Nick gripped her wrist. 'Are you ready?'

She nodded then suddenly pushed back her chair and leaped to her feet.

'How dare you say that?' she shouted. Around the restaurant, the rattle of cutlery and conversation went still. Even Nick was shocked. 'You don't have a clue what I'm feeling.'

She looked wildly around, then threw up her hands and ran out to the toilets. Nick sat stunned for a moment, then pushed back his chair so that the bag hanging on the arm was clearly visible. He slammed a twenty-euro note down on the table and stalked to the exit, keeping his eyes glued to the floor.

Even before the door shut, he heard the sc.r.a.pe of a chair being hurriedly vacated. He ran along the well-trampled pavement to the nearest corner, ducked behind it and looked back.

Almost at once, the restaurant door banged open again. A thickset man in a long black coat strode out. The lantern over the door bathed him in yellow light. Nick glimpsed dark hair, dark skin, a boxer's nose and his own backpack dangling from the man's fist. There was something familiar about him from the Belgian warehouse, perhaps? He looked briskly up and down the street, then pulled his keys out of his pocket. The man pressed whatever was in his hand. Orange lights blinked on a black Audi across the street. No snow had settled on the roof: it couldn't have been there long. Nick tried to look inside, wondering if there was anyone else behind the dark windows.

The man crossed the street and opened the driver-side door. Nick made up his mind. The snow was silent underfoot. The man had his back to Nick and was fumbling with the backpack, perhaps making sure that the book was inside. He didn't hear Nick coming until he was almost on top of him. Nick dropped his shoulder and drove his fists into the man's stomach. All the anger, fear and frustration he'd endured in the last week released itself in that one moment of contact, a perfect spear of rage. The man doubled over; the keys fell out of his hand into the snow. Nick kicked them under the car, then kneed his adversary in the face. He grabbed for the bag.

But Nick was an amateur. The other man was a pro. Nick's knee had unbalanced his opponent but not knocked him over. As Nick stretched out for the bag, the man's big hand whipped out and closed around his arm. He twisted; Nick felt his arm almost torn off its elbow. His whole body was wrenched around. His feet skidded on the snow, lost their grip and slid from underneath him. The man threw him back onto the ground.

Nick gasped as the breath was forced out of him. Looming above, the man took a step back. For a split second Nick thought he might just turn and run. But he was only giving himself more s.p.a.ce. He reached inside his coat and pulled out a pistol. It looked tiny in his hoof-like fist.

This was how it would end. Lying in the road, his blood melting into the snow around him until it cooled and froze. He'd never know what had happened to Gillian, never understand why he'd come to this icy corner of France to die. He raged at the injustice of it.

With a scream, Emily flew out of the night and hurled herself against the man. She was too slight to have much effect, but she wrapped herself around his arm and dragged it down, away from Nick.

Nick sprang to his feet and grabbed for the gun. His hand closed around the cold barrel and clung on for his life. For a moment the three of them were caught in a heaving tangle of limbs and steel, swaying and staggering in the snow. Then something gave. Nick lost his balance; the next thing he knew his cheek was planted in the snow, pinned down by somebody on top of him.

'Are you OK?'

Emily pushed herself off him and stood. Nick scrambled up after her. He still had the gun, holding it by its muzzle like a club. Where was their opponent?

Halfway down the street, a large shadow flitted across the snow under a street lamp. Nick looked around.

'He's still got the bag.'

'Wait,' Emily called. But Nick was already running. His feet crunched in the snow; his arms pumped so fast he barely noticed the weight of the gun. The man might be strong but he wasn't quick on his feet. Nick had little trouble keeping him in sight as they sprinted along the empty streets. The black and white frames of the half-timbered houses were skeletal in the gloom, their shuttered windows blind to the frantic chase.

The man glanced over his shoulder, then ducked down an unlit side street. His heavy tracks were printed clearly in the snow especially here, where few other feet had disturbed it. Nick followed, gaining. He glimpsed the black gleam of water below as he crossed a bridge and turned again.

The houses thinned, giving way to a strip of gra.s.s and trees. To his right, he saw a jumble of wooden battlements and turrets a children's playground. The chill air rasped in Nick's lungs. But he could see his quarry clearly now, barely twenty yards ahead of him. He swallowed the pain and kept going.

Between the trees, Nick saw water on all sides. They must have come onto some sort of island in the river. Ahead, a row of high stone towers stood floodlit against the darkness where the island ended.

The man was trapped. He slowed to a walk, then stopped. Nick skidded to a halt on the icy path, keeping well back. He raised the gun as his quarry turned to face him. They stood there among the trees and snow in silence, a dozen paces apart like duellists. But only one of them had a gun.

'Who are you?' Nick shouted. The night seemed to swallow his words.

The man didn't answer. He looked down at the bag still dangling from his hand, then let it drop. It landed in the snow at his feet. The movement drew Nick's attention; in that moment, the Italian's hand dipped inside his pocket. Nick's gaze snapped back. With the sickening knowledge that he'd made a fatal mistake, he raised the pistol. But his finger hesitated on the trigger.

The man hadn't pulled another gun. Instead, he'd extracted a sheet of paper. His hands scrabbled with it as he folded it over and over, then began tearing it into pieces.

'Stop!' Nick shouted. Tiny fragments fluttered to the ground like a shower of snow. Nick jerked the gun but he couldn't shoot a man in cold blood.

A brilliant beam of light swept across the park behind him. A barge was coming up the river, its captain taking no chances in the darkness. In a second, Nick would be picked out like an actor on stage. He lowered the gun to his side, into the shadows. Like deer caught on a road, neither he nor the man dared move.

The barge drew level with them. The river was so narrow here that the boat's hull almost touched the embankment, its deck only a foot or so below Nick's feet. Floodlights bathed the park in light, blinding Nick. In that moment, the Italian jumped. He heaved himself over the railing and dropped like a stone onto the barge. Nick ran to the rail, but all he saw was a wall of dazzling light blazing back at him.

Footsteps crunched behind him; he swung around. Emily was running across the park, her breath fogging the night.

'Where is he?'

Nick pointed to the barge, now disappearing around a bend in the river. 'He got away.'

He walked over to where the bag lay and scanned the ground. As his eyes readjusted to the darkness he found he could pick out a few of the sc.r.a.ps of paper lying limp in the snow. He picked one up. It seemed to be normal office paper, with a fragment of a word on it.

'What's that?'

'Something important. When I had the guy cornered, the one thing he cared about was destroying it.'

They knelt together in the snow, sweeping the ground and gathering the fragments in shivering hands. Nick thanked G.o.d there was no wind. When they had collected as many as they could find, they shook the snow off them and bagged them in a pocket of Nick's backpack. Emily looked doubtfully at the pile of sodden sc.r.a.ps, not much bigger than confetti.

'Do you think we'll make any sense of that?'

Nick grimaced. The city glow reflected off the snow and gave his face a ghoulish cast. I piece things together.

'We have the technology. We can fix it.'

LVI.

We would tear it up and piece it back together.

By liberating the beasts from the flat cage of their copper plates, Drach could make any card he wanted. Even if only one animal remained, he could print and reprint it as often as he wanted onto the same card. The system was not only perfect, it was infinitely variable.

It was not a new idea. We had started down this road when we divided the indulgence plate into four paragraphs. But we had not gone nearly far enough. One afternoon I counted three thousand and seventy-four individual characters in the indulgence. We would cast each one individually and bring them together to form a single page, as thousand of souls form a single Church.

Hans Dunne disliked the plan. 'Each time you encounter a problem, you find an answer that creates ten new problems and does not solve the first,' he warned me. But he had earned more than a hundred gulden from me for creating the copper plates which had proved so troublesome, so I ignored him.

Kaspar did not like it either. 'You are turning in on yourself. You are trying to climb a mountain by counting pebbles. You will spend the rest of your life making this art so intricate that nothing can be done with it.'

We were journeying through a forest in late October. It was like walking through fire: all around us the leaves burned vivid shades of scarlet, ochre, yellow and orange, shimmering in the breeze. It was a dangerous time to be abroad.

'And even if you succeed, it will just turn out like the mirrors,' Kaspar prodded me.

Much had happened since the night Andreas Dritzehn died. His brother Jorg had sued me to be admitted to our partnership and lost. The judge awarded him fifteen gulden. The Aachen pilgrimage had come and gone, the relics put away for another seven years. Some of the mirrors waved aloft to capture the holy rays had been mine, but not many. First, a good portion of our metals had been sold to pay the interest on my debts. Then we had been swindled by our barge captain and decimated by tolls along the river, before being opposed at every turn by the Aachen guilds. By the time we were finished, the torrent of tin and lead I had prepared to pour down the Rhine had dwindled to a trickle. The torrent of gold I had hoped would flow back to me suffered a similar fate. Once I had paid our costs, paid the investors, paid my debts, including the fifteen gulden to Jorg Dritzehn, only the thinnest residue remained.

Kaspar hated it when his comments drew no reaction. He tried a third time. 'And it is madness to be on the road now. I heard that a week ago Breisgau was razed to the ground. They made a bonfire of the village and roasted its livestock on the coals. Some say they also roasted the inhabitants and ate them too.'

I shuddered. For months now the country around Stra.s.sburg had been infested with a plague of wild men, the Armagnaken or 'poor fools', the remnants of a great army which had been marauding around Europe in the service of one duke or another for years. An unholy cabal of the French king, the German emperor and the Italian pope had schemed to send them to Switzerland to sack Basle: the king because he wanted them out of France, the emperor because he aimed to annex Switzerland to the empire; the pope because he wanted to put a stop once and for all to the council which Aeneas and his friends had conducted now for over ten years. The Swiss had defied the Armagnaken and defeated them at terrible cost. The survivors had fled, rampaging down the Rhine in a storm of fire and blood that men said only the Apocalypse would equal. They had arrived near Stra.s.sburg in the spring. Many thousands had died.

The forest was no longer beautiful. I peered into its depths, trying to see what lurked behind the blaze of foliage.

'Nick? What the h.e.l.l happened to you? I've been hearing some bad things.'

Urthred the Necromancer paced his chamber in front of a roaring fire. A unicorn stood tethered obediently in the corner.

'Long story. I need some help.'

'Where are you?'

'Strasbourg.'

'Is that Kentucky?'

'France.'

'Right.' A waxwork scowl was fixed on Urthred's face. 'Um, I'm kind of a long way from France right now.'

'I need a high-res scanner and a fat data pipe. As fast as possible. I thought you might know someone.'

Urthred tapped his staff on the stone floor. Blue sparks fizzed from its tip. 'Sheesh, Nick, you don't make it easy. What time is it with you?'

Nick checked his watch. 'Nine at night.'

'You know, this is not cool Nick.' A pause, then a grumpy sigh. 'OK. I'll check my contacts for insomniac French data-centre managers with a hard-on for fugitives from justice. Stick around.'

Urthred disappeared in a puff of smoke. Nick unhooked the headset from his ear and looked up from the laptop. The cobwebbed walls and swirling mists of the Necromancer's tower were replaced with thick red paint and cigarette smoke, an underground bar off the Quai Saint Jean. To Nick, the other customers seemed as outlandish as anything in Gothic Lair: piercings through every permeable patch of skin, hair dyed red or purple or green, steel chains around their necks and waists. None of them looked as if they'd come to take advantage of the free wireless Internet.