Wine racks appeared in even rows that extended to a low ceiling. On the left, an entire wall was stacked high with beer barrels. Bottles of expensive spirits glowed briefly in the torchlight.
We were halfway down the middle aisle when Anatole rocked to a halt and stared into the gloom.
Bruno froze. ‘What is it?’
‘Damn.’ Anatole pointed at a crate. ‘That’s a whole case of Chateau Latour 1886!’
There was a pregnant pause. Bruno muttered something under his breath and started walking again.
‘Oh, come on!’ hissed Anatole, trotting after him. ‘Do you know how much a bottle of that would fetch on the open market?’
We reached a thick, iron-plated oak door at the other end of the cellar.
‘You’re still good to go,’ said the voice in my ear.
Ashely picked the lock; we could not risk using the blowtorch with the smoke alarms in the cellar. My fingers gripped the handle of the katana when the door swung open. Darkness and silence greeted us on the other side.
We exited the basement and ascended shallow stone steps to a deserted corridor at the rear of the mansion.
Muted voices rose south of our position. From what we had seen of the thermal images before we entered the property, the Crovir First Council was gathered in the reception rooms at the front.
‘Take the service stairs fifteen feet to your right,’ murmured the voice in my earpiece. ‘It should take you to the first floor.’
We turned and headed swiftly along the passage to a flight of carpeted steps. We were almost at the top when the voice barked an abrupt ‘Stop!’ in our ears.
We froze in the gloom.
‘There’re four bodies heading your way, two from above and two from below,’ the voice said tensely. ‘They’re not friendlies.’
I signaled to Ashely and Bruno. They headed back down the stairs.
Anatole and I ran up the last steps, guns in hand. We had barely pressed ourselves into the shallow recesses on either side of the door when it opened. Two Crovir Hunters stepped over the threshold.
They never heard our shots.
We dragged the bodies to the cellar and found Bruno and Ashely tying up the other two Hunters.
Bruno glanced from me to the still immortals. ‘You could finish them off with your sword. That will leave less of them for us to contend with.’
I finished securing the man at my feet with a pair of cable ties before rising to my full height.
‘I have never killed in cold blood.’
The Schwatz immortal observed me for a beat. ‘All right.’
We disposed the Hunters of their weapons and headed swiftly up the stairs to the first floor of the mansion. According to the blueprints, Benisek’s study was located on that level.
I glanced at my watch.
Fifteen minutes had elapsed since we entered the service tunnel under the gardens. With each precious second that passed, our chances of successfully completing our mission grew smaller.
My earpiece crackled again just as we entered the corridor at the top of the steps. ‘Three bodies moving toward you from the front of the house. ETA ten seconds.’
‘Thanks,’ I murmured, studying the passage we stood in.
Thick curtains framed the French windows lining one aspect of the gallery. Crystal chandeliers dangled from the high, ornately corniced ceiling and shed a muted light across the oil portraits adorning the walls.
We slipped in a shadowy alcove a moment before the doors at the end of the gallery swung open. Two Crovir Hunters crossed the threshold. A third man appeared behind them.
Bruno sucked in air through his teeth. ‘This is our lucky day.’
‘Why?’ I muttered.
‘That’s Kazimir Benisek.’
Chapter Eighteen
I stared at the man in the white evening suit.
Benisek was short and overweight. A silver beard crowded the lower half of his face, partly masking his thick jowls. The upper half was a mass of red wrinkles surrounding a pair of rat-like eyes.
He unlocked a door halfway down the passage and stepped into the room beyond. He turned and murmured something to the Hunters before closing the door behind him. They took up guard position outside the room.
I signaled my intentions to the others. They nodded. I stepped out of the alcove and strolled toward the guards.
The man on the right spotted me first. His eyes narrowed and he reached for the gun at his waist.
‘Hi.’ I plastered an engaging smile across my face. ‘I’m with the Schwatz escort. I’m kinda lost. Could you guys tell me how to get to the main hall?’
Recognition dawned in the second Hunter’s eyes. ‘Wait a minute, aren’t you—’
‘Wrong answer,’ I said.
Bullets whispered past me and hit them in the chest.
We caught the Hunters’ bodies before they hit the floor and tied them up in a bay beneath the French windows. We were back at the door seconds later.
‘There’s a man in the room in front of us,’ I said in the mouthpiece. ‘Is he alone?’
‘Yes,’ replied the Schwatz tech. ‘I’m getting a high heat signal from that place. Looks like he has a lot of hardware up and running in there.’
We found Benisek seated behind an oak desk in the middle of a large study. A row of monitors flickered on the wall in front of him; beneath them, stacks of slim hard drives rose from the floor, their faint hum almost inaudible.
Benisek’s eyes never left the screens when we locked the door behind us.
‘I thought I said I wasn’t to be disturbed!’ he barked, fat fingers flying over the ergonomic keyboard beneath his hands.
When this did not elicit the desired response, he finally looked in our direction. His hands froze on the keyboard. The rat-like eyes widened.
‘Hello,’ I said with a cold smile. ‘I believe you know who I am.’
‘You! But—but—you’re dead!’ stammered Benisek. ‘Thorne killed you!’
‘Funny how everyone keeps mentioning that. As a matter of fact, he did. I have to point out that the guy doesn’t exactly play fair though.’
Fear dawned in Benisek’s eyes. His fingers moved. A second later, he yelped and clutched at his hand.
A faint trail of smoke curled from the suppressor on Ashely’s gun. ‘I wouldn’t touch anything if I were you,’ he told Benisek in an affable voice.
‘You’ll never get out of here alive!’ shouted the fat man while Bruno and Anatole dragged him from the chair to a couch in a corner of the room. ‘Santana will have you—hmmff, hmmff!’
‘There!’ Anatole stepped back and admired his handiwork. ‘That’s much better, isn’t it?’
Benisek scowled behind his gag.
I took the seat he had been forcibly evicted from and studied the monitors on the wall.
‘Can you work this?’ said Ashely.
‘There’s only one way to find out.’ I looked at my watch. Another five minutes had passed since I’d last glanced at the dial.
Benisek had been in the process of transferring all the files on the hard drives to an off-site server; this was likely a security measure against the unexpected presence of the Dvorskys in the mansion. Fortunately, he had already entered the primary password to access the mainframe. The folders, however, were still in code; they would have to be decrypted before they could be moved.
I scrutinized the lists on the screens. Which ones did I need to access? My gaze shifted to the bound man on the couch. Benisek did not look like he was in a mood to cooperate and we hardly had time for harsher persuasive measures.
‘What’s wrong?’ said Ashely.
‘The data’s encrypted. I don’t know what I’m looking for.’
‘Can’t you just download all of it?’
I shook my head. ‘There’re hundreds of folders. It would take too long.’
I eventually found the original encryption file h
idden deep beneath clever layers of programming; whoever had installed Benisek’s security system was good. All I had to do now was decipher the code.
‘You probably don’t want to hear this, but there’s a whole boatful of unfriendlies heading your way,’ said the voice in my ear.
Bruno and Anatole moved to the door.
I typed “GeMBiT” into the password box. There was a beep from the machines; the words “Access Denied-Incorrect Password” appeared on the screens. I tried “Crovir”, then “Thorne” and “Santana” unsuccessfully. A series of unhappy high-pitched sounds rose from the speakers.
Sweat beaded my forehead. I had one more chance to get it right before the system locked me out. If that happened, I would have to reboot and start all over again. This was not an option under the current circumstances.
‘Those unfriendlies are almost on top of you,’ interrupted the voice through the earpiece. A strained pause followed. ‘By the sound of things, Roman and Gabriel have overstayed their welcome. They’re getting ready to leave.’
I yanked the receiver out of my ear, closed my eyes, and shut out the noise around me. Seconds passed. Three, then five and eight.
At ten, I opened my eyes and typed “Immortality”.
The screens flickered. Lists of decoded folders streamed down the monitors. There was a muffled scream of rage from Benisek.
My fingers fluttered over the keys while I grouped all the files containing the words “GeMBiT”, “Burnstein”, “Strauss”, and “Godard”. I sent the data through to the Schwatzs’ secured server and made a copy on a memory stick. As I moved to shut down the hard drives, a folder at the bottom of one of the screens drew my gaze. It was titled “Red Death”. I copied it and exited the system.
‘We have about a minute before the Dvorskys exit the building,’ said Bruno from the door.
I pushed back from the desk. ‘I’m done.’
The doorknob turned and rattled.
‘Kazimir, are you in there? Open the door,’ someone said through the woodwork.
Coldness gripped me. I knew that voice. I placed the receiver back in my ear and carefully rose from the chair.
‘Are Roman and Gabriel out of the building?’ I said softly in the mouthpiece, my gaze not shifting from the doorway.
Ashely frowned at my tone.
‘They’re walking to the cars,’ came the reply. ‘Seriously, you guys need to move. There’s an unfriendly right outside the room.’
I slid the daisho from my belt. ‘I know. It’s Amos Thorne.’
Ashely and the two Schwatz immortals stared from me to the door; behind us, Benisek’s struggles doubled in effort.
There was a buzz of static from the earpiece. ‘Shit,’ muttered the Schwatz tech.
Anatole grimaced. ‘He said it.’
‘Is he alone?’ I watched the doorknob turn again and tried to quiet the rapid thuds of my heart.
Mixed in with dread at the inevitable battle that now faced us was an unexpected sense of anticipation; I was looking forward to meeting Thorne again. In fact, I could hardly wait.
‘Yes. But there are others close by.’
‘How many?’
‘I count ten signals within twenty feet of your position,’ came the solemn response.
‘Okay. Thanks.’
‘Do you need back-up?’ the tech asked hesitantly.
I looked at Ashely and the two Schwatz immortals. They shrugged.
‘We’ll be fine,’ I said in the mouthpiece. ‘Just make sure Gabriel and Roman get through those gates safely.’
‘Will do.’ The tech paused. ‘And Carpenter?’
‘Yeah?’
‘Good luck.’
I smiled. ‘Sure.’ I took the earpiece out, crossed the study, and turned to observe the others. ‘When I open this door, I want you to run.’
Ashely’s eyes widened. ‘What?’
‘Hey, look here—’ Anatole started in a disgruntled voice.
‘None of you stand a chance against Thorne.’ Silence followed my words. I could tell from their aggravated expressions that they knew this to be true and were not pleased about the fact. ‘We haven’t got time to argue. Here, catch.’
I threw the memory stick at Ashely.
He palmed the device and glared at me. ‘So what, you’re saying you’re gonna fight all of them?’
‘No. Just Thorne. The others are yours.’
Bar a change of clothes, Amos Thorne was exactly as I remembered him. His tall frame was covered in a black evening suit and his ash-blonde hair gleamed under the light of the chandeliers. Chilly, gunmetal eyes widened slightly when he saw me.
I stepped out in the corridor. ‘Hello, Uncle.’
There was movement behind me as the others exited the room.
Thorne barely looked at them. Dark pupils dilated wildly within a sea of wintry gray. The thin lips pulled back in a sneer.
‘How is this possible? I watched you die.’
‘I’m afraid no one knows the answer to that yet,’ I said in a steady voice.
Thorne peered over my shoulder at Benisek. He scowled. ‘What have you done?’
I shrugged. ‘Nothing much. I just wanted to say hello. After all, we are family.’
An ugly expression distorted the immortal’s features. ‘You are no relative of mine, half-breed!’ he hissed.
A savage smile tugged at my lips. I finally recognized the feeling coursing through my veins; it was what a hunter probably experienced when he was closing in for the kill.
The whine of bullets rose behind me as Ashely and the Schwatzs engaged the Crovirs. I ignored the sound of the gunfight and glanced at Thorne’s waist.
‘I see you have your sword with you.’ My smile widened, which only seemed to infuriate Thorne further. ‘Would you care for a rematch?’
The Crovir noble glared at me. ‘I killed you once.’ He removed his blade from its sheath. ‘I can kill you again!’
His first move was so fast I barely blocked his blow. I grunted and took a step back.
‘I see you’ve improved,’ Thorne said in a condescending tone. ‘Still, you have far to go before you can hope to defeat me, boy.’
‘You forget, Uncle. This time, I’ll fight you without the benefit of bullet wounds,’ I retorted.
Thorne’s eyes narrowed.
The next seconds were a blur of movement. As with our previous battle in Vilanec, the Crovir’s speed verged on the supernatural. Our blades clashed again and again, sparks rising from the gleaming steel edges.
The tip of Thorne’s sword hummed past my face. I dropped to my heels, twisted, and brought my leg around in a sweeping kick. He jumped backward.
I rolled toward him, rose to one knee, and thrust the wakizashi upward. It slipped an inch past his guard and scored a gash across his chest.
A shocked grunt escaped Thorne’s lips. He raised his hand and fingered the cut.
‘You’ll regret this,’ he snarled, staring at his bloodied fingers. He touched the scar on his right cheek absent-mindedly and left a crimson trail on his pale skin. ‘Your father marked me once.’ A sadistic grin dawned on his face. ‘He paid for it with his life.’
A wave of blind rage shook me to my core; it took all my self-control not to rush the immortal there and then. I inhaled deeply and forced my fingers to relax on the handles of the daisho. My feet shifted into the basic stance of kendo. I felt my heart rate slow down.
‘Let’s do this.’
A growl ripped from Thorne’s throat as he lunged toward me. I blocked his first blow. He attacked again. I blocked his second, then his third blow. His eyes narrowed into silver slits.
He struck over and over again, the tip of his sword slicing through the air in nearly invisible moves. With every swing of the blade, his breathing grew more erratic.
I deflected his strikes with an ease that enraged him to no end.
That was when I realized something a
stounding. I was faster and stronger than he was.
Before I could assimilate this shocking observation and ponder whether it had something to do with surviving my seventeenth death, the doors at the end of the gallery opened. A murmur of muted voices washed over the threshold from the front of the mansion at the same time a figure in an ice-blue evening gown stepped through.
My heart stuttered in my chest. I knew without a doubt that I was looking at Christie Santana.
The woman’s silver-white hair was coiled in an elegant bun at the back of her head. Diamonds dangled from her ears and draped across the base of her throat, the gems catching the light and fracturing it into a thousand brilliant sparks. Her face was pale and ancient as the stars.
Set within it were gray eyes an identical shade to my father’s. But whereas Balthazar Thorne’s eyes had been smoky and warm, hers were as cold and bleak as the depths of space.
She stopped and studied us with a frown. ‘Amos? What’s going on?’
Thorne never looked away from me.
‘Why, don’t tell me you don’t recognize him, mother!’ he spat out. ‘It’s your grandson, the half-breed!’
The words had barely left his lips when he swung his sword round in a double-handed grip.
I broke his attack with the katana and forced him back a step. My gaze shifted to the woman in the doorway. Her mouth was pinched in a bitter expression.
‘You said you killed him,’ she said in a voice devoid of emotion.
‘I did!’ Thorne retorted. The woman’s frown deepened.
Until that moment, despite what I had been told by my grandfather and Gabriel Dvorsky, I had clung to a slim hope. The Schwatzs had to be wrong; how could the woman who gave birth to my father want me dead? The very thought struck a discordant chord deep within my carpenter.
At that very instant, the moment passed and the sliver of hope shattered into a million shards that pierced my heart with blinding pain. I should have blinked back tears. Instead, my vision had never been clearer.
I moved.
The katana slid along Thorne’s sword and entered his chest in a single blow. The immortal grunted, his gray eyes widening in shocked incredulity.