The Wereling 3: Resurrection Page 15

  Kate faked a yawn. ‘I’m sure it’s a big honour.’

  ‘It will be an incredible achievement. But merely the prelude to the real miracles I shall provide for our people.’ He grinned at her. ‘As our numbers dwindle under human oppression, so I shall boost them through genetic manipulation. As the ambition of most ’wolves fades to simple survival, so I shall create an army of newbloods and control them through the bloodlust drug.’

  ‘I’ve heard that before,’ Kate sneered.

  ‘New York was a trial, an experiment,’ said Takapa. ‘Jicaque spoiled my supply of the drug with his herbal potions, it is true – but in doing so, he has helped me a great deal. Now I am aware of the drug’s deficiencies, I can develop a new strain that no one may tamper with. It will take time, but I will have my army, Kate.’

  Kate saw the maniacal glow in his unblinking, pink eyes, the determination.

  ‘You’re crazy,’ she breathed hoarsely.

  ‘You’re mistaken.’ Takapa gripped hold of her shoulders and pulled her towards him. His meaty breath made her want to hurl. ‘Everything I do is to ensure the long-term survival of the werewolf race. Once I have strengthened the genetic makeup of future pureblood generations – putting your wereling friend’s DNA to good use – I must ensure they are properly educated. They must have the ambition to fight humanity, to reclaim the world that once was theirs.’ He seemed to look past her, as if already surveying some magnificent new werewolf order.

  ‘Purebloods will never accept your tampering with their bloodline,’ Kate argued, pulling herself free of his bruising grip. ‘Don’t you see? It’s sacred to them – the history and tradition.’

  Takapa smiled. ‘And what could be more historic, more steeped in tradition, than the figure of Peter Stubbe, raised from the ancient dead? When it is understood that the Great Wolf himself understands and appreciates my ambitions, the purebloods will have no grounds for grievances.’

  ‘And they’ll open their wallets for you with smiles on their faces, right?’ Kate backed away, wringing her tied hands. ‘Why are you even bothering to tell me this?’ she yelled. ‘You couldn’t guess what my reaction would be?’

  ‘I tell you because I wish to share this with you,’ cried Takapa, holding out his hands to her, ‘because I have chosen you to share my life.’

  She laughed in his face. ‘If you were the last man or ’wolf on the planet—’

  Takapa cuffed her hard on the cheek, stopping her laughter short. ‘You have no choice,’ he snarled. ‘Once I am wed into a pureblood family, the last possible objections to my supreme leadership over the lupine race will fall away.’ He cupped her cheeks in his sweaty hands, and his voice grew colder and harder. ‘You shall be mine. And you shall bear us so many children, Kate …’

  ‘I’d rather die,’ Kate whispered, hot tears stinging in her eyes.

  She heard him tutting softly. ‘Death, my dear, is a luxury that I shall never allow you.’

  g

  g

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Tom felt antsy and restless. Chung, exhausted from his ordeal at Brook Mansion and their subsequent escape, had fallen into an uneasy sleep. Sunday was busy helping Stacy with her work, poring over beakers and test tubes. Stacy had been gripped with a sudden schoolgirl enthusiasm, but she was keeping tight-lipped about whatever the hell she was doing. It seemed she didn’t want to raise any hopes, just to send them crashing back down to earth if her idea didn’t work out.

  So Tom sat uselessly on an uncomfortable stool, haunted by the memory of Kate’s arms around him in the penthouse as the ’wolf-change engulfed him.

  The idea that he might never see her again when there was still so much left unsaid between them – together with this endless, nervous waiting – was driving him out of his mind. ‘I’ve never felt so useless in my life,’ he declared. ‘I think I’ll go find Blood and Jicaque over at the Bane Gallery.’

  Stacy shrugged, a gesture that turned into an awkward stretch. She looked completely beat. ‘I hope I’m not going to be too much longer.’ She checked her watch. ‘Seven o’clock. I can’t be too much longer.’

  Sunday looked at Tom. ‘What’s the point in your going? You’ll just be waiting around there instead of here.’

  ‘There’s a chance Kate could be taken to the gallery,’ he said doubtfully, ‘and if she is, I might be able to snatch her back. I mean, there’s a chance, right?’

  Sunday didn’t look overly optimistic, but managed a smile. ‘Take care. We’ll see you soon.’ She glanced at Chung. ‘You taking him with you?’

  ‘No,’ said Stacy, ‘he isn’t. Chung stays here. I need him.’

  Sunday frowned. ‘Why?’

  ‘I just do,’ mumbled Stacy distractedly, peering again down her microscope.

  ‘Well, since I’m so totally redundant,’ Tom said, ‘can I take your cell?’

  ‘Sure.’ She tapped a slide. ‘Got enough cells to be worrying about here in any case.’ She passed him the tiny phone. ‘I’ll call from the landline when we’re on our way, but you’d better take the number here just in case.’

  Tom did so, and went outside cheerlessly into the neon-coloured night.

  Chicago was buzzing in these last few hours before Christmas. The busy streets were slick with rain and humming with restless energy. Tom could see it in the faces of the passers-by – everyone seemed focused and intent, thinking about what was left to do before abandoning themselves to the holiday.

  He fell in with the crowd, lonely and adrift, and together they strode past bright shop windows, and bare trees whose skeletal branches were entangled with strings of fairy lights. Cars and buses blared past. The cold air steamed with the smell of street vendors’ hot dogs and roasting chestnuts.

  Tom drank in the atmosphere like a man condemned, who might never get another chance. The skyline ranged away, bright and proud. He could see the giant corncobs of Marina City stretching up high over the river, and the sparkling cream façade of the Wrigley Building, bathed in brilliance from a hundred low-level spotlights.

  He reached for the cell in his pocket and dialled a familiar number, made strange through disuse.

  His mother’s voice sounded in his ear, bright and chipper. ‘Hello?’

  Tom took a deep breath. ‘Mom, it’s me.’

  ‘Tom.’ She sounded twenty years older in a single second. ‘Oh God, Tom, where are you, baby? Are you all right? We miss you so much, we’re trying to act like everything is OK but it just isn’t—’

  ‘Mom, I’m OK, I promise,’ he said. ‘I … I just wanted to say …’

  He paused. Goodbye? How could he do that to her? She sounded so distraught already …

  ‘Tom? Are you still there?’

  ‘I just didn’t know when I’d get the chance to call again, Mom.’ He swallowed hard, keeping back the tears. ‘And … well, it’s Christmas, right?’

  ‘Come home to us, baby,’ croaked his mother down the phone. ‘We can sort this whole thing out. The police only want to know your side of the story …’

  ‘Trust me, Mom, no one is ready for this story. Is … is Dad OK? Joe?’

  ‘We need you back with us, Tom.’

  ‘Mom …’ He stopped still in the middle of the street, as the crowds surged past all around him. ‘I promise that if … if I can – if it’s within my power – I will come back to you.’

  ‘What do you mean, “if I can”? Where are you?’

  ‘I love you, Mom. I’m so sorry. Sorry for messing up. Sorry for everything.’

  His numb finger stabbed clumsily at the ‘end call’ button. The phone gave a curt beep and went dead.

  Tom pushed it in his pocket, wiped his nose on the sleeve of his hoodie and quickened his step towards the gallery district.

  g

  Kate was being herded down a corridor towards an imposing mahogany door. When Takapa opened it, she saw it gave on to a warmly-lit office overlooking the sparkling street below.

  A crowded office. />
  Araminta Black glared at her from behind an antique oak desk. Russ Fayn was tied to a chair in the centre of the room, his face streaked with bloody welts and tears. And behind him, hovering grimly like an angel of death, was her mother. Her dad was sitting on a modern, uncomfortable-looking chair in one corner, and started suddenly when she entered.

  ‘I thought perhaps a reunion was in order,’ said Takapa. ‘It is Christmas, after all.’

  ‘Dad,’ Kate blurted, ‘Dad, tell me you’re not going along with this craziness!’

  He looked away, and Marcie laughed. ‘Oh dear. Looks like Daddy’s little girl can’t wind him around her little finger anymore.’ She crossed to Kate and seized hold of her hand. ‘How many times did I think I’d have to bite that finger clean off …’

  Kate ignored her, nodding instead towards Fayn. ‘What’s he doing here?’

  ‘Filling in for his egocentric friend, Mr Chung,’ said Takapa. ‘A pureblood sacrifice.’

  ‘So he’s going to end up a pile of mulch and his psychic energy goes into Wolfenstein’s monster,’ Kate concluded. She looked at Fayn. ‘So this is what you sold out your friends for, huh?’

  ‘They said I could head up the Chapter,’ whined Fayn. ‘That they’d recognise me in the new order …’ He slumped back in his chair, shivering like it was ten below.

  ‘The Chungs are a respected family,’ observed Marcie. ‘The boy’s well known to many of the purebloods. His sacrifice would have served to inspire our audience still further.’ She sighed. ‘A Fayn is a good deal less impressive, especially in this state, but he will have to suffice.’

  ‘I won’t do it!’ he shouted, straining against the ropes that bound him.

  ‘This morning’s experiment has proved that the energy needed to revive Stubbe’s sleeping spirit must be transferred swiftly,’ Takapa told him. ‘Your energy shall be taken from you and passed on to the Great Wolf at once. You have no choice.’

  ‘Just like that poor security guard had no choice,’ Kate muttered.

  ‘There is a choice,’ said Hal, rising from his chair. ‘You’re a disgrace to your name, boy. Duplicitous, cowardly … not fit to call yourself a pureblood.’

  ‘Go to hell,’ muttered Fayn.

  Hal rested his hands on Fayn’s shoulders. ‘And certainly not worthy of laying down your life to bring back the Great Wolf.’ He cupped his hands under Fayn’s chin and twisted hard. With a sound like eggshells crushing, Fayn’s neck snapped.

  ‘Dad!’ Kate yelled. She stared in horror as he released Fayn’s bloody head and it lolled forwards.

  Takapa stared at him. ‘I hope you can explain yourself, Folan.’

  ‘Yes, I think I can,’ said Hal. Marcie opened her mouth to speak but he rounded on her. ‘Shut up!’ he yelled. ‘I will have my say, woman.’

  Marcie actually took a step backwards, stunned into silence.

  Kate had never seen such anger in her father’s eyes before.

  Araminta looked down at her desk as if suddenly absorbed in something else, clearly uneasy at this sudden change in Hal.

  ‘The Fayn boy is not a suitable offering for the Master,’ said Hal, his jaw trembling. ‘I must insist that … that you take me.’

  ‘Dad, no,’ Kate croaked.

  For once she and her mom were in agreement. ‘Hal, you can’t be serious, don’t be a—’

  ‘A fool?’ Hal challenged her. ‘I know that is what you think of me. A lupine fool, content to live in isolation from the world of humans, when I could be dreaming up rebellion as you do, Takapa.’

  ‘You cower in the dark like a child,’ hissed Marcie.

  Hal ignored her, his gaze fixed on Takapa’s raw red eyes. ‘You have seduced my wife with your ambitions, excited the bloodlust I had hoped to heal in her. Now you have my daughter as well.’

  ‘Only because you let him, Dad!’ Kate gasped, before Takapa pushed her aside.

  ‘I’m sorry, Kate. But I can see why Takapa has done all he has. Change is essential if the ’wolf is to survive. Humanity has come to rely on technology and so must the lupine race.’ He looked around at each of them in turn. ‘Our kind faces a stark choice – a slow, eventual extinction as the lights of humanity’s progress ward off the final shadows … or to fight back. To challenge man.’ He squared up to Takapa. ‘Personally, I believe it is a fight we can never win. A suicidal flight into madness.’

  Takapa sneered at him, then glanced at Marcie. ‘How did a woman of such fire come to marry a ’wolf so toothless?’

  ‘Oh, I could show you teeth, Takapa,’ hissed Hal.

  Do it, Dad, Kate willed him. Do it for me, for all of us.

  ‘But I have no right.’ Hal took a meek step back. ‘Not all ’wolves feel as I do, I know. Many will welcome and embrace strong leadership, a chance to thrive again … however slim that chance is.’

  ‘We are summoning Stubbe from the dead,’ snapped Takapa. ‘With such a miracle in our grasp, who dares limit our ambition?’

  ‘It is a miracle, I agree,’ Hal conceded. ‘You will raise a magnificent spectre from our past, and I wish to join with him. To bring about his rebirth.’

  Kate stared at him helplessly. ‘To die?’

  ‘You dare to call the Fayn boy a coward?’ Marcie grabbed hold of Hal, spun him around to face her. ‘You weakling. You don’t dare to face up to the future so you sacrifice yourself to the past!’

  ‘My family have served the Great Wolf since the beginning,’ stormed Hal. ‘It was a Folan who rescued Stubbe’s body from his tormentors. A Folan who destroyed the fools who had tortured and killed him.’

  Marcie nodded. ‘Back then, a Folan had courage to act.’

  Hal’s body seemed to sag. ‘I’m so tired, Marcie,’ he said. ‘I have tried to embrace the coming changes as you have, but I cannot. I am bound by the old ways. The ancient principles of the ’wolf brotherhood.’

  Marcie touched his cheek, almost tenderly. ‘Principles evolve, Hal, just like anything else. Just like we have to.’

  Hal shook his head. ‘I have made my choice.’

  ‘Then you are a servile fool. And you are only fit for extinction.’ Marcie slowly raked her nails down Hal’s face. She tasted his blood on her fingertips and closed her eyes. ‘Let him do it, Takapa. The Master will revel in the old stench of his blood.’

  ‘Very well,’ said Takapa, his eyes dancing between Kate and Marcie and Hal. ‘A willing volunteer? So much the better.’

  ‘No!’ Kate threw herself at her mother, grasped her by the throat and squeezed with all her strength, the cord binding her wrists biting into her flesh as savagely as her fingers were digging into her mother’s neck.

  Marcie stared at her, shocked eyes bulging in her gaunt face.

  ‘When you’ve given me to that albino freak and turned me ’wolf,’ Kate shrieked, ‘I swear that I will shred you into tiny pieces.’ She felt both Araminta and Takapa trying to pull her off and tightened her grip. ‘I’ll kill you, hear me? All of you! All of you!’ Then Araminta smacked her hard in the face and Takapa yanked her clear.

  Marcie fell choking to the floor, clutching blindly at Fayn’s corpse for support.

  Kate struggled furiously against her captors as they bundled her out of the room, still screaming her hate for her mother. Before her tears clouded the scene into broad smears of light and dark, she saw her dad standing alone in the room, shoulders slumped, staring after her. Emotionless.

  Defeated.

  g

  g

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Tom held himself dead still against the back wall of the Bane Gallery as the guards came into view. To the world at large they could’ve been just a pair of workmen popping outside for a crafty smoke. But Tom saw the sick spark of yellow that lit their eyes as they peered about. The moon was high in the sky, and Tom felt its brightness like a searchlight. Surely they would see him?

  He held his breath, cursing himself for his stupidity in thinking he might stumble on some secret way ins
ide the gallery. Blood had already given the place a stealthy once-over and found no way in, and Tom had failed in just the same way. The door around the back was locked and bolted; you’d need a battering ram to get inside.

  But he’d been nervous and restless, the bright moon picking at his nerves as he sat in Blood’s car beside the silent Jicaque, hour after hour. It was after nine o’clock now, and Tom had needed to do something. A quick scout around just in case, he’d told Blood. Except, as the hour of resurrection approached, so security had gone through the roof.

  Tom knew he would get himself killed if he kept taking risks like this. Chucking his life away wouldn’t help Kate …

  But then the guards moved away, not prepared to probe the darkness of the alleyway any further.

  Tom muttered a thank you to anyone up in the moonlit sky who might be listening, scaled the fence at the end of the alley, and made his way back around to where Blood had parked further down the street.

  Blood’s electric window hummed down as Tom approached. ‘Well?’ he asked.

  ‘No way in. Risked my neck for nothing.’

  ‘I did tell you, you silly little sod,’ Blood sighed. ‘Get back in.’

  Tom gloomily did as he was told.

  ‘Cheer up,’ said Blood, jerking his head back at Jicaque. ‘Our mystic friend’s probably out in the astral plane, walking through the walls and sussing out all the weak points in their security.’

  Tom glanced behind him at the old medicine man sprawled on the back seat, his eyes tightly closed, mouth set in a grim line. ‘Or he could just be asleep,’ he suggested.

  ‘Wonderful, isn’t it?’ sighed Blood. ‘He’s deep in meditation – while we should be put on medication for thinking we might actually be of use here.’

  ‘Hey, it’s Christmas,’ Tom reminded him. ‘A time for miracles.’

  ‘Bollocks to miracles,’ snorted Blood. He tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. ‘I wonder if they have werewolves in the Seychelles. You know the old saying – if you can’t beat them, piss off to an island paradise and pretend it’s not happening.’