MARKUS HEITZ
Translated by Sheelagh Alabaster
Homburg, Saarland, Germany
And so it was that Asa came upon the beast up on its hind legs, a foot and a half taller than she was herself. Its sharp fangs were each as long as her little finger and the eyes glowed red and evil. From the depths of its throat the werewolf growled as it stared hungrily down at the brown-haired girl, pointed claws opening and closing in greedy anticipation, saliva dripping from its jaws.
Asa had quite different problems to cope with, werewolf or no werewolf.
She glanced up at the roof of the sandstone cave where she and the werewolf stood. It looked as if the stonework just above Tinkerbell—Tinkerbell the Lycanthrope, her favorite—was going to crash down any moment now. Tinkerbell had four processors to control movement, brilliant red eyes, real fur and a shockingly convincing snout. On the press of a button, gobs of slobber and stage blood came shooting out.
Asa picked up her radio. “Martin, we’ve got a problem on Level Eight in the Throne Room,” she reported. “The rock face has got to be glued back pronto or the whole lot’s going to come down on top of Tinkerbell.”
“How bad is it?”
“I really think it should be dealt with tonight.” She turned back to the werewolf, burying her fingers in its fur to find the switch at the side of its neck. She pressed it, and the creature’s growling ceased and the red eyes stopped flashing. “Good werewolf,” she grinned, patting it.
“Okay. I’ll let the boss know. Are you coming out now?”
“Not yet. I’ve got some stuff to do on Goldilocks. See you in the morning.”
“Don’t know the meaning of sleep, do you?”
“Nope.”
“And you don’t know the meaning of fear, either,” he retorted. “What’s a nice young girl like you doing here with all these—”
She laughed. “Piss off, Martin.” She switched the radio off and left the cave they called the Throne Room. The soft sand under her feet silenced her steps.
Altogether there were twelve levels in the Schlossberg, Europe’s largest sandstone cave system. A wealthy investor had turned it into a massive horror attraction. Hundreds of years ago the quartz sand here had been dug out for the manufacture of glass, and now people came here in droves to get scared out of their wits. Each level had its own theme: from werewolves to vampires, ghosts, demons, serial killers, execution scenes and torture chambers. There were actors to boost the effects of the motorized figures, ensuring terrified screams from the punters.
But the whole place reeked of history, and some said the mountain itself was properly haunted. Visitors had reported seeing strange things on parts of the tour where there were no show installations at all. And Martin, one of the staff, claimed to have experienced it himself.
Asa wasn’t just a splendid technician; she would dress up in costume like the actors and steal round corners, creeping up on the paying public to terrify the life out of them.
She’d give anything to catch sight of one of the real ghosts herself.
She thought of herself as being a kind of phantom. Her boss hadn’t ever put her on the books—he paid her in cash—and she didn’t have a fixed address.
What did she need an address for? She could live wherever she wanted to.
Her breath was like white fog in the air. The temperature in these caves was a steady 10°C, which wasn’t necessarily very good for the valuable figures, so it was vital to carry out regular maintenance.
Asa reached her workshop at the back of Level Ten and surveyed Goldilocks: a seven-foot-tall zombie, its body in an advanced state of decay, but very muscular and cleverly airbrush-finished in an aggressive pose—enough to make weak hearts falter any time it came whizzing out from a side corridor, groaning horribly.
The girl fastened back her longish brown hair with a quick movement and started up the gas turbine heating. She took off her coat, displaying the neat body that she mostly kept concealed under a black roll-neck sweater and dark cargo pants. On her feet she wore Doc Martens, which helped insulate her feet from the cold.
Asa began the intricate repair work on the zombie, resoldering a few points on the motherboard before checking the programming.
In general people called her a geek, and thought her reserved and difficult to get on with. Others assumed that she was highly gifted. Now thirty, she’d never completed any apprenticeship or course of study, but she was good at anything she cared to turn her hand to. If you didn’t know her and had never seen her work you might think she was a bit dim—but in fact she had an inquiring mind and wasn’t afraid of anything—all good qualities for a research scientist, really.
Asa didn’t give a damn what other people thought of her. She had her little sweeties, her own created monsters—and nothing shocked or disgusted her. Why would it?
A faint sound issued from the corridor.
Asa put down the soldering iron and cocked her head to listen.
Another rustle—something was being dragged along on the sand.
She glanced at the time. Could it be the technicians, off to the Throne Room to mend that precarious roof?
Then there was a clink, followed by a noise she couldn’t identify, but it sounded a little like sobbing. A high voice started begging desperately, “Don’t! Please don’t—please don’t—”
That was definitely not the tech-crew. Asa picked the hammer up from the bench and started toward the noise. She was thrilled to think it might be real ghosts.
Stepping out into the long corridor, she saw a dark figure swish past. A ghoulish laugh reverberated off the walls. “This is our mountain,” a voice breathed in her ear. “Get out of here, human, or we will kill you!”
“Hey—stop!” She raced off, hammer in hand, toward Tinkerbell’s cave.
The emergency lighting gave the sandstone a fascinating, magical appearance. The werewolf looked like a living creature frozen by a sorcerer’s spell. But where was the fog coming from? Asa had no idea. She’d never noticed that phenomenon here before.
Her heart was thumping in anticipation. “Who are you?”
“The souls of dead mine workers,” came the whispers from all sides, out of the drifting mist.
She took another step and grinned with delight. “Then show yourselves—I want to see you!”
“Go away, get out of our mines,” came the hissed warning, “or you will forfeit your life.”
“Let me get a look at you.” She forced her way through the damp mist. “This is so much better than my mechanical creations—”
“We warned you, woman,” came the thundering, angry voice behind her. “Now you shall die!”
Asa spun round and saw a sketchy figure with long, skeleton-like fingers reaching for her—and she lashed out with the hammer.
The tip of the weapon hit home, demolishing the face. The ghost spun back, screaming.
“Not so fast,” Asa shouted as she followed through and swung the iron hammer at the phantom again, forcing it to flee, stumbling, back into the protection of the mist.
Then something grabbed Asa’s shoulder.
“I’ll show you, you stupid ghost,” she cried as she twisted herself skillfully out of the phantom’s grasp and slammed the hammer into the lost soul’s skull. “I’m not going to let you kill me—”
The blunt end of the hammer burst through the cranium and the metal was now stuck fast, deep inside the skull. The figure collapsed with a gurgling sound and lay convulsing at Asa’s feet, blood gushing out over the tips of her shoes and sinking into the sand.
Asa realized something wasn’t quite right. “What the hell—?” She bent down to examine the ghost.
The fog lifted slowly and it became clear that the figure collapsed at her feet was no ghost, but a human in disguise. The man had transformed himself into a ghoul by means of an elaborate costume.
She pulled the fabric away and saw the shattered bone where the hammer was lodged. It was Martin, her coworker; the microphone he’d used to activate the loudspeaker at his waist had distorted his voice. Now it hung, broken, on his jaw. There was little point in checking for a pulse.
Asa began to realize that the other figure hadn’t been a ghost, either. It, too, was human, and decidedly mortal.
Dismayed, she rushed back to the spot where she had beaten off her first attacker. She did not have to search for long. The girl could see from the scuffs and blood splatters that the other victim must have dragged himself a few yards further on. He lay in the sand, smashed face upward, with splinters of bone piercing the skin. The battered features looked grotesque, inhuman. There was blood streaming from the ears and the nose, and one eye had burst open. The man’s headset mouthpiece had been slammed right into his teeth, and there were broken stumps showing.
It could be Bernard, one of Martin’s buddies, the sound techie for the Ghost Ride, but there was so much blood that Asa couldn’t be sure. She remembered he’d once threatened to play a trick on her—he’d said he wanted to make her so afraid she’d crap herself.
Looked like it had all gone disastrously wrong, for him and for Martin.
“Hell.” She glanced at her filthy sweater, her bloodied hands and the glistening hammer with strands of hair still sticking to it—Martin’s hair.
Nobody was ever going to believe her.
At the very least she’d be banged up for ages in custody while they tried to fathom exactly what had happened. And her boss would be in trouble, too, for employing her illegally. Perhaps he’d be so scared that he’d just deny he’d ever met her . . .
Asa decided to take the simple way out. It was the easiest thing in the world for someone who didn’t officially exist and who had no fixed address to just disappear.
She sent her boss a quick text, explaining and apologizing for everything, expressing her distress at the two deaths, then she collected her things and set off.
She’d been working on the Ghost Ride for such a long time, and now, thanks to her and to a misunderstanding, the show sported a couple of genuine lost souls.
Ten kilometers south of Hannover, Germany
“So, do you do this a lot, bombing up the autobahn in the dead of night?” Asa was hitchhiking again, as she’d so often done in the past. She was enjoying the luxury of stretching her legs out in the roomy limo. Her kit was stowed in the trunk of the car, and Angelika, a blond in a bright red business suit, turned out to be a film director, and really easy to talk to. She’d picked Asa up at the last motorway service station, offering to take her to Hannover. It wouldn’t be far to Hamburg from there.
Angelika nodded. “It’s always easier driving at night. There’s no traffic on the autobahn and the Merc does a cool 220 k.p.h., no bother. You cover the distances in no time at all.”
“That’s quite a lifestyle.”
“Yup, always fast and dangerous.”
“Dangerous?” Asa asked with a grin. “Why?”
“Well, a tire blow-out at 220 and you’ve had it.” Angelika gave her a sidelong glance. “Doesn’t the thought scare you?”
“No—it’s exciting. How about going a bit faster?” She grinned.
Asa had never been afraid of taking lifts with strangers. So far there had been only two disconcerting situations. Once there’d been a young student who was high as a kite and really not fit to drive at all, and then another time the guy had insisted on sex as payment for the ride. But Asa knew how to look after herself—the many and varied jobs she’d done had given her quick reactions, and in spite of her slim build she was strong and used to defending herself. The guy who tried to get it on with her got his comeuppance with a few sharp jabs high and a well-aimed blow lower down. He’d even ended up giving her 500 euros not to go to the police about him.
Angelika laughed. “I don’t get passengers saying that very often.”
“Do you give rides to hitchhikers a lot?” Asa was loving watching the landscape fly past. The speedometer showed 181 k.p.h.
“From time to time.” The woman nodded to the sign for the motorway junction. “Nearly there. Do you need a hotel?”
Asa hesitated. “I . . .” Her finances weren’t looking great.
Angelika must have been reading her thoughts. “If you like, you can stay with me,” came the surprise offer. “I’ve got a spare room. Then tomorrow, shower, breakfast and on your way to Hamburg.”
“Oh, that’s really nice of you!” Asa jumped at the opportunity. “Tell me, what’s your most recent film?”
“Night of the Corpses, Part 11,” Angelika replied proudly. “DVD production, a classic splatter-horror. We sold 150,000 copies and it’s in all the video shops.” She took the exit to Hannover into an obviously well-to-do suburb. “A lot of it was filmed at my house, in the cellar.”
“Really? What fun!”
“That’s what I thought. There are still a few extras hanging around. They sort of suit the place. You never know when you might need them again.” Angelika pulled up in front of an impressive-looking mansion and got out of the car.
She led the way into the building, where it was as silent as the sandstone caves had always been after the last visitor had left. Asa was still upset about the way Martin and Bernard had died, but it hadn’t been her fault. Unsurprisingly, her boss had not responded to her text.
Angelika switched on the light. “Welcome!”
The spotlights in the hallway picked out gruesome specimens displayed in niches or on pedestals; there were glass jars containing human and animal remains: malformed fetuses, hydrocephalic brains, the embryo stages of Siamese twins, misshapen body parts. And no fewer than four skeletons—one of them giant-size, one of them tiny, one twisted and another one bent nearly double—stood in huge display cabinets. It looked as if the doors would open any second for the bones of the dead to hurl themselves out onto the living.
Asa put down her duffel bag and clapped her hands with glee. “Wow! What a collection. Where did you get it all?”
Angelika blinked in astonishment. “Aren’t you even a little bit . . . well, taken aback?”
“No. Should I be?”
The horror film director gave a loud laugh. It sounded cruel, like an archetypal film villain. “Well, in that case, I’ve got an idea. What would you think of spending the night in the room we made the films in?”
“Why not?” Asa took a look around, drinking in her impressions. This would all have been great for a new level at the Ghost Ride, but of course, unfortunately . . . It occurred to her that one day, maybe, she might open her own Horror Park—one with a built-in heart attack warning.
“It might be horrible.”
“Doesn’t bother me.”
Angelika folded her arms and all of a sudden her eyes grew ice-cold and murderous. “Let’s say, if you stick it out till morning, I’ll give you 1,000 euros.”
Asa regarded her hostess with surprise. “I’ll win that bet at all events—unless there’s something down there that’s going to kill me.”
Angelika shook her head and led her through the lobby, going past the glass displays to the back of the hall where there was a heavy metal door secured with an electronic lock. She tapped in the code and the door swung open. Neon lighting clicked on automatically and the stairs became visible. There were splashes of blood on the steps, and a sickly-sweet smell—like the smell of decay. Warm air streamed up, and there was a distant roar, as if from a huge fire.
Asa was reminded of the gas burners in the workshop. “It looks as if your cleaners haven’t been very thorough,” she murmured, and she went down the steps, her duffel bag over her shoulder. “See you in the morning. Bacon and eggs.”
“What?”
“For my breakfast.” Asa turned round, grinning. “I’ll be hungry.”
Angelika looked at her in surprise, one hand playing with the pendant that hung around her neck. The metal door clanged shut and the locking mechanism clicked into place.
The brown-haired girl went down slowly, noting how the smell of decay increased with each step she took. There were even more bloodstains down here. It looked as if someone had chucked a load of intestines down the stairs—or people, perhaps, with open wounds. Otherwise Asa couldn’t explain the mess. The smell was appalling.
When she reached the tiled area at the bottom of the stairs the sight took her breath away: in the cold neon light she saw eleven naked corpses in various stages of decay hanging from the ceiling. Some were strung up, as if on a gallows, and some had been suspended, skewered on sharp meat-hooks.
The dead bodies twisted slowly as they hung there, blind eyes fixed on the young woman below. Their gray flesh showed deep cuts and ax wounds and was covered in mold. Coagulated blood that had dripped down was black and sticky, like jam; bellies were bloated with the expanding internal gases and some had even burst open. Evil-smelling fluids seeped down the legs, forming stinking puddles on the floor.
Asa sighed. That made clear where the awful smell was coming from. She’d never be able to sleep with that stink.
But between the hanging cadavers she could see a bed, made up with clean fresh linen. It was worth a try.
The girl put her duffel bag down on the duvet cover and investigated her surroundings.
She soon found where the roaring sound was coming from: there was a central-heating furnace in the next room. It was computer-operated, but there was a large drop-door that could be opened to shovel in coal.
In the tiled room Asa found a tap, a wide roll of heavy-duty cling-film, a hosepipe and some cleaning fluid. The detergent didn’t smell bad at all.
She soon had a plan. She estimated the time at her disposal. It was shortly before midnight now; if she put her back into it, she’d be finished in an hour and could get a good night’s sleep. She hadn’t made any promises to the film producer about not altering the state of the room. The deal was whether she could stick it out down there all night. She wouldn’t be losing that bet.
Asa took the cling-film and wrapped herself up in it, clothes and all, as protection against the noxious fluids from the corpses. One-by-one she lifted the dead bodies down from the ceiling. She assumed Angelika must have stolen them from a cemetery. Weirdo horror-film-woman freak.
She didn’t find it hard to drag the bodies, male and female, over to the furnace. One cadaver at a time was pushed into the roaring fire to roast in the flames. The ghastly smell in the cellar lessened.
As she was heaving the last of the corpses in through the furnace door, the young man turned his head. His blinded eyes were fixed on Asa.
“Thank you for letting us all find rest,” he said, speaking through cracked and blackened lips oozing dark blood like thick oil. “Avenge us, and you will receive a greater reward still.”
The man’s legs were already alight and flames were licking up at the rest of the body that Asa was still carrying. She was holding a ghost in her arms: a real live dead ghost—no imitation this time. Fantastic! It was so exciting, such a turn-on. “What do you mean?”
“Angelika murdered us—we were all hitchhikers, like you. She took us home and made films with us, horrible films. We were tortured to death. Then she used what was left of us as props for her next films,” the dead man said. “Kill her—or you’ll suffer the same fate!”
Fire spread, crackling, over the rotten flesh, consuming it. The corpse uttered one long last cry before Asa dropped him into the inferno. She clanged the furnace door shut.
She didn’t succumb to panic, or rush around like a headless chicken. The important thing was to get some sleep now so that she’d be strong enough to stand up to the film director in the morning.
She quickly set about hosing the juices from the rotten cadavers down the drain, then she took off her cling-film protection and hurled it into the furnace. After that she dispensed cleaning fluid liberally into every corner of the room, filling the whole place with the fragrance of oranges.
For her own security she took a length of nylon thread out of her kit and used the meat-hooks to fasten it like a tripwire across the stairs. She hung the rest of the sharpened S-shaped hooks off the bed-rail.
Satisfied, Asa lay down, in a clean, warm environment that smelled of citrus.
A loud crash woke her.
She sat bolt upright, and saw Angelika getting up from where she’d tripped over the nylon thread. There was a shattered video camera on the tiles, and a case containing knives and surgical instruments had burst open, shedding its wickedly-sharp contents all over the floor.
The film director was wearing a long butcher’s apron and metal-ringed gloves, the sort used to protect against slipping knives when working with carcasses.
Angelika pushed herself to her feet with a curse and grabbed a meat cleaver and a scalpel. When she fell, her pendant had slipped outside the apron: it was oval, made of gold, with a symbol engraved upon it. Asa knew at once that the dead man had not lied to her. She indeed was to have been the next victim.
She jumped up from the bed, seizing the hammer she’d concealed under her pillow. “It was bacon and eggs I ordered for breakfast,” she said in greeting. “Not my own execution.”
“What have you done with my corpses?” The film director was baffled. “And why is everything so clean?”
Asa gestured toward the furnace with the hammer. “I cremated them, and then I tidied up. Otherwise I couldn’t have got any sleep. They told me you’d killed them—hitchhikers, like me.” She twirled the hammer in her hand, her heart beating faster. The sight of those deadly blades coming at her was a stronger stimulus than any espresso.
“But I needed them to make Night of the Corpses, Part 12!” shrieked Angelika, leaping toward Asa.
The girl swerved out of her attacker’s path, fending off the chopper blow with her hammer. The sound of metal clashing against metal was exaggerated by the tiled surfaces of the killing room.
Angelika stabbed and chopped, fast as lightning, but Asa stayed unruffled, parrying or avoiding blows with agility, skillfully turning aside to snatch up a meat-hook, which she rammed into her opponent’s wrist. She did not let go of the other end.
The other woman screamed out, dropping the scalpel, and in the same instant she was hurled backward by a powerful kick in the chest. As she was still attached by the meat-hook, she did not travel far.
Asa dropped, dragging the film director down and over, rolling on top of her and driving the free end of the giant meat-hook into the woman’s back so that her right arm was anchored to her own body, the cleaver dropped by her nerveless fingers.
“Going to kill me, were you?” The girl hammered repeatedly at the woman’s left shoulder until it cracked. “I’ll teach you—”
Angelika screamed in pain.
Using half a dozen of the meat-hooks, Asa neatly fixed her opponent’s legs together and clamped her arms to her body. Blood flowed from where the sharp ends of the hooks had been driven into the woman’s torn flesh, but Asa was not overly sympathetic. “I’ll give the police a tip-off,” she announced. “I’m sure they’ll soon get the picture. They’ll find all the evidence they need.”
“Let me go,” whimpered the filmmaker. “Please—I’ve got money—”
“I’ll be taking that anyway. And the ghosts promised me a further reward.” Asa forced the ends of two more hooks through the skin under the woman’s collarbones, making Angelika moan in agony. “You wait here for the police.” With surprising strength, Asa dragged the woman over to the bed and from there attached her to one of the ceiling fixtures from which the corpses had been suspended.
Angelika screamed at the top of her lungs, spinning on the hooks, blood flowing down over her shoes from all the incisions and forming a sticky puddle on the freshly cleaned floor.
Asa shouldered her duffel bag and left the cellar. She conducted a thorough search of the mansion and pocketed several thousand euros in cash she found in a desk drawer.
As she was crossing the lobby, passing the display cases and the glass jars of curiosities, one of the containers started to glow, and then shifted, as if moved by an unseen hand.
The jar crashed to the ground in front of the girl, revealing a human rib cage; in the middle of the bones something shimmered metallically.
Is this the ghosts’ reward for me? Asa bent down and picked up two silver brass knuckles, each with beautifully engraved patterns. The business edge of each weapon was encrusted with sharp-edged, skin-splitting diamond fragments.
She couldn’t understand the symbols, but she was sure this was indeed her gift from the dead. She wiped the artifacts clean and put them in her pocket. These would be more use to her than a hammer.
The girl disguised her voice to call the police and then hurried away from the ghoulish mansion.
It would just be Angelika’s bad luck if the police did not open the cellar door in time to find and arrest her while she was still alive.
The murder victims would all be rubbing their ghostly hands with glee.
Germany, two kilometers south of Hamburg
“. . . so her soul will still be hanging around in the cellar as we speak, suspended on those pointy meat-hooks.” Asa wound up the horror story she had improvised to entertain the long-distance truck driver she was sitting next to in the cab of his thirty-two-ton truck. She was in her element.
“Epic! That’s some story!” Charon, as he’d said he liked to be known, shouted with laughter and slammed out a double fanfare on the truck’s horn in appreciation.
He was old enough to be her father, and looked like Lemmy from Motörhead, except just a little more debauched. His arms and throat were covered in tattoos indicating a penchant for violence and an interest in the occult. It didn’t bother Asa.
“You’re a tough one,” he crowed, laughing. “You know what? If it’d been me in that cellar, I’d’ve shit meself.”
“Not me.” She reached behind her and grabbed a sandwich out of her lunch pack: tasty wholemeal bread and a can of Coke, courtesy of the last service station.
“You mean, you really weren’t frightened?” Charon gaped. “Any normal person would have been scared witless!”
“Not me,” Asa insisted with a grin.
“Show-off!”
“No, really. That’s just how I am. I’m never scared at all, whether it’s bungee jumping or white-water rafting or being face-to-face with a poisonous snake or if someone dares me to eat blowfish. It used to drive my parents mad. I was always plunging headlong into the next adventure.” She politely suppressed a burp the Coke had given her. “I just think it’s all . . . exciting. My brother, on the other hand—he’s the quiet one. He runs an upmarket restaurant in Hamburg—it’s called Chagall. Ever been there?”
“Do I look like I go to fancy restaurants?” Charon glanced over at her. His expression had changed and he had a nasty look about him. “Right, then, Fräulein Fearless—what if I held a knife to your throat and raped you?” The lights in the cab dimmed.
“I’d smash your face in.” Asa grinned. “You planning on it?” She finished her last mouthful of sandwich and wiped her hands clean on her trouser-legs. “Okay, so are you going to try?”
Charon’s eyes took on a yellowish gleam and the tattoos grew brighter, as if burning into his flesh. One of the ink designs was exactly like the symbol on Angelika’s pendant. The pattern became more prominent. His skinny fingers clutched the steering wheel, bonier than ever, as the fingernails started to sprout. “I’ll violate your body and I’ll swallow up your soul,” he growled.
The truck with its cargo of chemicals was plowing up the autobahn at a good 100 k.p.h., heading straight at the truck in front.
Asa grimaced. “Keep your eyes on the road, or you’ll have nobody left to violate.”
Charon gave a dirty laugh. Blue flames shot from out of his mouth and played around Asa, surrounding her, but not burning. “I’ll fuck you so hard you won’t know what’s—”
Asa did not intend to end her days by crashing into the back-end of some random vehicle. She slipped one of the brass knuckles over her fingers and hit Charon full in the face, breaking his nose. He screeched like a stuck pig as dark-red blood spurted out of the ruined flesh of his face. Suddenly the tattoos all went pale.
She gave him a second blow to be on the safe side, just so he’d know who he was dealing with, this time on the mouth, driving back those blue flames.
Charon fell back, half-conscious.
“There you are, you see.” Asa leaned over and grabbed the wheel. She indicated as per the Highway Code and pulled out into the fast lane to overtake the slower vehicle. “That’s exactly what would happen if you tried anything,” she explained with a laugh as she wiped the bloodied knuckle-duster clean on his shirt.
Charon gave a hesitant nod and pulled himself together, once again taking control of the wheel and driving on as if nothing had happened. But he was bleeding heavily, all over his shirt, his pants and the nice seat cover. It took a long time for the wound to start to heal, but eventually he looked like a normal man again.
Asa did not worry about the blue flames, the glowing eyes and the strange thing that had happened to the tattoos. Stuff like that happened to her occasionally. She seemed to imagine these things sometimes. Must have been working on the Ghost Ride too long, she said to herself.
Charon set her down when they got to the container port in Hamburg. As he pulled away, Asa noticed he was talking into his cell phone while quickly glancing her way. He was probably telling another truck driver about some girl who meant what she said when her answer was no.
Asa had the address of her brother’s Hamburg restaurant memorized. He’d be glad to see her after all these years—and she had sufficient cash in her pocket to treat them both to the most expensive items on the menu and still have enough left over for a generous tip for the staff. Imagine their faces! This was going to be some evening.
It was just after three o’clock in the afternoon, so she thought it might be a good idea to find a hotel near the restaurant before she splashed out on the evening meal.
She sauntered off, looking for the nearest subway station, or perhaps a taxi. She passed a snack bar, and decided she fancied a coffee.
She entered the empty café and ordered a double espresso, some mineral water and, because they looked so good, a doughnut with chocolate filling.
As the machine got to work and churned out the coffee. Asa smiled at the man behind the counter, pushing the strands of brown hair out of her face. “Always as quiet as this?”
“Everyone’s at work,” he replied. “It’ll fill up at five.”
“I see.” Asa looked round in surprise and couldn’t really believe it. “So you’ll take a break?”
The young man merely sniffed.
Asa took a seat in the corner with a view of the port, relishing the sight of all the big ships. It made her want to go on a long journey. Perhaps she’d stow away, go to a foreign land; that would be exciting—a real challenge. China—that’d be the place.
But that would have to wait till after the meal in Chagall with her brother.
Somebody came to sit near her—she could hear the rustle of a jacket as whoever it was moved closer.
Asa stopped looking at the huge barges in the port and turned in surprise to the two uninvited guests, then she looked around the café. Music was coming out of the loudspeakers, but the place was as empty as ever. There was no earthly reason for this older man and his younger female companion to sit at her table. There was plenty of room elsewhere, so there was certainly no excuse for their pushing up so close.
“If you’d just let me by?” she asked politely, getting to her feet. “I’ll find somewhere else to sit.”
The man sitting opposite her produced a chilly smile and did not move. He was wearing an expensive pin-striped suit and his aristocratic features were framed by an elegant beard. His hands were in glacé leather gloves, revealing the bones of his fingers; in his right hand he held a cane which bore a picture of a glowing-eyed dragon embossed on the head.
The black-haired woman with him, about Asa’s own age, did not move, either. She wore a pleasant perfume—a warm, spicy fragrance, which for some reason reminded Asa of a fiery smithy. Her clothing was light; she was dressed in red and black, very stylish—her shapely figure and impressive breasts were shown off to advantage. Her face was flawless, the lips full and curved. For a kiss from those lips men would surely have braved any danger, any battlefield. But most normal people would have been repelled by the cold light in her eyes. Asa, on the contrary, was enchanted by her gaze—it was like love at first sight.
Asa sat down again.
She was in no mood for an argument and the doughnut looked delicious, so she stayed where she was and started to sip her espresso. She took a bite from the doughnut. The mysterious visitors would let her know what they wanted in due course. Or perhaps they were the local crazies, on the lookout for their next victim.
But the filling was coagulated blood, oozing out of the doughnut, and it tasted foul.
Revolted, Asa spat out what she was eating and went to rinse her mouth out with coffee—but again all she tasted was blood. She spat the liquid back into the cup.
The man sitting opposite gave a quiet laugh. “If you want to complain to the manager, look no further. That’s me.” He sketched a polite bow in her direction. “Barabbas Prince.”
Asa was considering whether to try the mineral water, but she supposed it would probably taste of urine. “Now I know why no one comes here.” She put the doughnut back down on the plate.
The woman gave a low, enticing laugh, and Asa caught herself wondering what it would be like to kiss that full mouth. She had never before felt such a strong attraction, either for a man or a woman. “She’s got a sense of humor, Father.”
“Not really. I’m just making deductions.” Asa put her hand in her pocket and slipped the silver brass knuckles on, in case the situation escalated.
Barabbas Prince laid his arm along the upholstered back of the bench, then leaned forward in a lordly and condescending manner. “You are a girl who knows no fear, I understand.”
Asa shrugged. She saw the man had a pin in the lapel of his jacket with the same design she had noticed in the trucker’s tattoos and on the film director’s pendant. They must all belong to the same organization, though probably not all at the same level of membership. This man Prince would surely have platinum status. “Who says so?”
“Truck drivers you’ve had rides with. And directors whose cellars you’ve slept in,” he answered, a touch of amusement in his voice. “You will do me a favor.” Prince’s snakelike eyes narrowed. “No, three favors. But the rewards are high. Fearless as you are, you should be able to cope with these tasks easily.”
“No. Why should I?”
“Because otherwise he’ll kill your brother,” the young woman broke in.
“There are not many restaurant managers in the Chagall who look a lot like you,” the man added as his companion held out a cell phone to Asa. On the display she could see her brother, bound and gagged.
“My father is generous if his wishes are met,” whispered the raven-haired beauty. “All the gold you could wish for.”
Asa looked at the photos and surreptitiously removed the brass knuckles from her hands. She believed every word Barabbas Prince was saying. There would be no reason for him to lie. Also no point in her offering resistance to these two without first knowing where they were keeping her brother. “Three favors,” she repeated. “Go on.”
The man laughed and twirled his walking cane so that the eyes of the embossed dragon on its head shimmered. “We’ll fly you to Leipzig in a private jet. There you’ll spend three days in different locations. My daughter will give you your instructions.”
“You’re to spend the night in each of these places,” the woman put in.
“And I’ll be doing what, exactly?” Asa felt confused.
“Nothing. All you have to do is stay there. And survive.” Prince looked her up and down. “If you succeed, you’ll be the first to do so.”
“Why is that?”
“The others all died.” The daughter stared at Asa intently, the corners of her mouth lifting slightly. Then she stopped. Perhaps she had been watching for Asa to react, one way or another. Her expression changed to one of surprise and curiosity. “Of fear,” she added as an afterthought.
“Ah.” Asa’s mouth still held the disgusting taste of blood. “And what guarantee do I have that you won’t kill my brother while I’m there? Or afterward?”
Barabbas stopped twirling his cane and the embossed dragon’s head pointed directly at Asa. “There’s the snag. You’ll have to accept my word of honor, won’t you?”
Asa looked at his daughter. “She goes with me. She’s my security.” Asa stretched out her hand. “Agreed?”
The black-haired woman laughed out loud. “No way—!”
“Done,” said Barabbas, silencing his astonished daughter’s outburst. “She will remain at your side, as far as this is practicable.” He shook Asa’s hand.
“I’ll come up with something. She gets whatever happens to my brother.”
“Father!” exclaimed the black-haired woman in protest.
But the man got to his feet. The deal had been done. “I’ll take you both to the airport. When you are in Leipzig, you’ll be in charge.”
The woman jumped up and grabbed his arm. “But, Father,” she implored, “how can you—?”
There was no warning when he struck out with his cane. The heavy dragon-head struck her a calculated, glancing blow on the left cheek, enough to make her cry out and stagger back, her black hair flying up round her head in a dark corona.
Asa caught the young woman in her arms and breathed in the heady fragrance.
Barabbas pointed the end of the cane at his daughter’s stomach. “Obey me, Bathseda! Soon we shall have reached our goal, after a thousand long years. Have a care to remember that you serve a higher cause than your own vanity.” With that he left them and went over to the door—and seemed to dissolve into thin air as he left the café.
All of a sudden a limousine with smoked-glass windows appeared as if from nowhere.
Bathseda straightened up and shook off Asa’s hands. “Let’s go,” she hissed, and the sound of her voice made the server at the counter give a strangled cry as he fell to the floor in a faint. Again she looked at Asa in surprise, because the girl appeared to be completely unaffected. Bathseda opened her mouth, but said nothing.
I can’t help it! Asa stepped forward and to her own astonishment planted a kiss full on those tantalizing lips. The taste was amazing—it was certainly a thrill to kiss Bathseda. A feeling like static electricity coursed through Asa’s body.
With a shattering crash all the windows in the café imploded as jagged glass splinters flew through the air, just missing the two women and burying themselves in the upholstery or into the walls.
Bathseda pushed Asa away. “How dare you—?” She stumbled backward, then staggered blindly toward the doorway to leave the building, not realizing that, with all the glass gone, she could have exited anywhere.
Asa felt like she had wings on her heels; she had superpowers—she could do anything. She would master the tasks they set her, and she would save her brother. As she picked up her duffel bag and got into the car next to the fascinating ebony-haired woman, it occurred to her that she was only having this adventure because she had killed a couple of people by mistake. What else could possibly happen to her?
Leipzig, Germany
“This is where you’re going to spend the night.” Bathseda pointed to a floodlit monstrosity of a building positioned in front of a large rectangular pool. It reared up into the darkening sky like some dire threat made manifest.
The two young women were standing at the far end of the water basin, about two hundred yards away from the building.
Asa had to admit that it was impressive. There were enormous stone sculptures at the top of the memorial, of warriors leaning on huge swords. The whole place had a martial air and epitomized the aesthetic of a bygone era, but this did not detract from the powerful visual effect.
Asa had seen the monument once before, but could not remember what it was for. “What is that?”
“The Völkerschlachtdenkmal—it commemorates the dead of the Battle of Leipzig.” Bathseda was wearing a black coat with red stripes down the sides, which only emphasized her slim figure. “It is dedicated to those who died in the Battle of the Nations. Austria, Prussia, Russia and Sweden formed an alliance to combat the French. Napoleon’s troops suffered a bitter defeat here.” She gazed at the monument in respect. “This pool is known as the Lake of Tears for the Fallen. The building itself serves as the funeral urn for all their lost souls.”
“The souls of the fallen soldiers are housed here. It is their receptacle, since they are prevented from entering either Heaven or Hell.”
“How many lost souls are we talking about here?”
“A hundred and twenty thousand. None of them was innocent enough or cruel enough to be assigned to one side or the other. That is the irony of mediocrity—you get nothing.” Bathseda moved off. “Come on. You have to be there before midnight.”
“Because?”
“Because that’s when the transformation begins, and the dead take over the halls. Your task is to spend the night there. In the crypt. I know a secret entrance.”
Asa followed the other girl, walking along the narrow path at the edge of the pool. She was aware they were alone there. This was certainly not a coincidence. She looked up at the monument again, guessing its height to be about three hundred feet. “Where’s the way in?”
“By the steps. You press a certain area on the stonework of the archangel Michael and a hidden door opens.” Bathseda had reached the platform in front of the statue. The figure, portrayed as a medieval knight complete with sword and shield, towered above them, as if defending the monument, or perhaps preventing the souls of the dead from escaping. To the right and to the left there was a pair of carved reliefs, three feet square, showing the archangel in a chariot on the battlefield surrounded by warring Furies. There was a door set into the base of the statue, but this did not appear to be the secret entrance.
Asa stopped short at the top of the steps leading to the Lake of Tears. “I assume you’re not coming in with me?”
“No. I don’t want to die.” Bathseda grinned and her icy-blue eyes radiated an attraction Asa found irresistible. Against all odds, this must be the thing called love.
“But I’m afraid I can’t leave you unsupervised. You’re my security hostage.”
“If you don’t get inside right now, you won’t complete the task and your brother will die,” Bathseda countered. “That’s what’s known as a dilemma.” In a feat of superhuman strength she catapulted herself up from where she was standing to land on the statue’s shoulder, her coattails fluttering out behind her. She pressed down on the lower half of the grim-faced figure’s visor and there was a loud click, revealing a narrow opening in the wall behind the archangel’s shield.
“Go through! And stay in the crypt until sunrise,” came the instruction, before Bathseda leaped back down from the angel’s shoulder, landing at Asa’s feet.
“Is that all?”
“That’s all.”
Asa grasped Bathseda’s wrist. “Wait for me while I tackle the first task.”
Bathseda chuckled, covering her mouth with her free hand, unable to hide her amusement. Then she burst out laughing. “And why would I do that?”
“Because I say so. And because your father agreed.”
“I couldn’t care less.”
“Then I’ll have to make you.”
The other woman suddenly looked deadly earnest, and her eyes took on that expression that Asa was so drawn to. “You have no idea who or what I am,” she whispered. “Nothing can stop me. There is nothing that can force me to do anything!”
Asa, without being seen, had managed to slip one of the brass knuckles onto her right hand and she now dealt the black-haired girl a sudden blow to the cheek, finely calculated in strength and not violent enough to kill.
Bathseda gave a cry of surprise; the engravings on the weapon glowed brightly and she fell unconscious into Asa’s waiting arms. The power of the magical artifact had proved stronger than she was.
Asa laid the other girl down gently in a sheltered corner and placed her own coat over the inert figure. Then she clambered up the statue to enter the monument. The narrow door behind the shield gave on to steps that led down to the waiting crypt of the Völkerschlachtdenkmal.
The girl passed through a hidden entranceway into the Hall of the Dead. Behind her the door slid into place and then disappeared as if it had never existed.
Asa looked around the vaults of this symbolic grave with its mysterious illumination. In the center of the hall there was a bronze memorial plate set into the floor. Stone warriors stood guard around the chamber walls, their heads bowed. The figures stood in eight groups of two, their sculpted faces earnest and dignified.
Every step Asa took made a sound that echoed back from the roof. The dome of the chamber was far above her. She did not know what was in the gigantic room above the crypt, but she thought she could make out even larger sculptures up there in the shadows.
There was no escape. The proper entrance was locked and the stairs up to the Hall of Fame above the crypt were blocked off.
Asa sat down in the center of the room, on the memorial plate, closed her eyes and waited. She was ready for her confrontation with one hundred and twenty thousand souls.
It was not in her nature to feel any unease. On the contrary, she wanted to know everything they could tell her—how they had lived their lives, what it was like living on as a cursed soul. She was bursting with curiosity. So many different fates, so many individual stories!
And if the souls were not prepared to behave themselves, well—for that circumstance she always had her special brass knuckles . . .
Whistling quietly to herself the next morning, Asa strode past the astonished security guard who was just unlocking and opening up the steel doors to the memorial. She left the crypt feeling more alive and invigorated and happy than she had for a long time.
“Excuse me. Where have you just come from?” asked the man in surprise.
“You can see where I’ve been,” she answered blithely.
He took a look inside the circular crypt, noticing that the stone figures seemed to have lost their usual mournful appearance. He was also aware of a change in the atmosphere in the room. “You spent the night in here?” Asa nodded. “But . . . the ghosts? The one hundred and twenty lost souls?”
“Oh, so you’ve heard of them?” She stopped and smiled at him. “I don’t know what’s supposed to be so terrible about them. We talked all night and they were delighted I was so interested in what they had to say. They were all really nice. And when they’d had a chance to tell their stories they just melted away. We managed to get through everyone’s tales by the time the sun came up. My ears are still buzzing.”
The guard, a man of about fifty dressed in a cheap gray uniform suit, scratched his head. His expression wavered between surprise and alarm. “Then . . . in that case, the first spell is broken!”
Asa plunged her hands into her pockets. This was getting even more exciting. “What spell is that?”
He leaned forward slightly. “Only a few people are initiated into the secret. The whole town has been under a curse since Doctor Faustus made his pact with Mephistopheles. The town can only be freed from the curse if . . . if a hero turns up, able to complete all the tasks set for them. In my time I’ve removed several dead bodies from this crypt. None of them managed to get past the first hurdle.” He looked the young woman up and down. “Can it be that you are the hero we’ve been waiting for?”
“Possibly—what do I need to know in order to complete the other two tasks?” She had a vague memory of having read something about Faustus. Wasn’t it a play by Goethe? A tragedy? That was all she could remember.
The security guard shrugged. “Nobody knows that. But I’ll pray for you. Good-bye for now, although I feel we’ll meet again.”
Asa thanked him and stepped out of the monument that was now no longer a refuge for lost souls. She hurried down the steps to where Bathseda was still unconscious in the corner.
She awakened the raven-haired beauty with a gentle kiss on the lips.
Bathseda opened her eyes and stared up at her, perplexed.
“Right. What’s next?” asked Asa.
“You’re . . . still alive?” The young woman rubbed her face in amazement, briefly fingering the place where Asa’s knuckle-duster had grazed her cheek. “And you knocked me out? How could you possibly do that? No normal human being could do that!”
Asa simply smiled and helped the girl to her feet. “So, what’s the next thing I have to do to free my brother?”
Bathseda gave her a long, searching look as if she were struggling to make sense of a thousand wild thoughts, then she grasped Asa’s hand and pulled her along. “I’ll show you.”
They took the limousine back into town, past houses that had seen better days and splendid buildings that had been restored; past dazzling, brightly lit palaces of glass and stubbornly defiant ruins that harked back to darker times. Asa sensed that they were headed into the very heart of Leipzig.
The vehicle suddenly stopped and they got out. The smoked-glass windows gave no clue as to who or what was actually their driver.
Asa and Bethseda made their way through the streets under an already darkening sky, past ancient façades, stone statues and lofty towers, until they arrived at the magnificent entrance to an impressive-looking shopping mall.
Everything was bright: there were cafés and shops full of glittering luxury goods, but the black-haired girl took Asa past a group of figures cast in bronze and down some steep steps leading to Auerbachs Keller.
Instead of going through the main door, Bathseda chose a side entrance giving onto a smallish room which contained only a large wine barrel against the wall and a table and some chairs.
“Wait here for midnight,” she instructed. “I’m eager to know whether we’ll meet again in the morning.”
“What’s going to happen?”
Bathseda looked at her. “I don’t know. I didn’t set the tasks.” She turned around, all set to leave.
“What’s the story with you and your father?” Asa saw her words had rooted the young woman to the spot.
“What do you mean?” she asked without turning.
“You both behave very strangely,” Asa announced. “You can do peculiar things and I feel very odd when you’re near me. Then there’s the hint you gave—that no normal person could best you in a fight.”
Bathseda glanced back provocatively over her shoulder. “If you can work it out, then I am yours.” That was all she said. The girl lowered her eyes, and then left the dark room.
Asa looked around and then, with no further ado, made herself comfortable on the table, using her jacket as a pillow. She closed her eyes, needing to recover from an eventful night.
The stories she had been told were still buzzing around in her head. The ghosts had related many different fates, and they had all been speaking at once. It had been very loud and confused, but somehow every single tale had registered in her brain. She could well understand how any normal person would have died of fright.
Asa was not sure, but she had the impression that she had allowed those ghosts to find their rest, although Bathseda had maintained that there was no place for them in either Heaven or Hell.
“She has traveled far, her journey long. Her strange apparel—she looks all wrong.” This was said in a loud masculine voice, and it was followed by a chorus of laughter.
Asa thought it best to pretend that she was still asleep. She must have nodded off.
“In truth, my friend, how right you are! The things you see in Leipzig nowadays! We’re just like Paris, and our people so cultured,” came a second voice, mocking the previous speaker.
“Who do you suppose this stranger is?” asked another.
Asa lay still upon the table, her eyes tight shut. Let these newcomers chatter if they wanted to.
The antiquated manner of their speech indicated these might be more ghosts from a very long time ago. So far as she could work it out, there were four of them, and she soon picked up their names: Frosch, Siebel, Altmayer and Brandner. From the sound of their voices she thought they must be young men.
And suddenly she remembered: they were in Goethe’s play! The bronzes she had passed on her way down to Auerbachs Keller had been the students in Faust! Could they have been real people, not just invented characters in a drama? Her pulse was now racing with excitement.
Asa opened her eyes and sat up, stretching and pretending she had just woken up.
She looked about and saw four figures gathered around the table. They looked real enough, of flesh and blood, unlike the misty phantoms from the crypt beneath the Völkerschlacht monument.
The quartet were wearing clothes which had been fashionable centuries ago, and they had very odd-looking haircuts, although possibly quite the height of style in their day.
“Wake up, good lady,” Brandner called encouragingly. “You shall be our guest—let us offer you a drink!”
“Many are the guests that come, yet most in fear take flight when they of us catch sight,” added Frosch.
Brandner helped her down from the table, and Altmayer held out a chair for her. She sat down and smiled at the four students. She was surprised to see a wine-tap set into the table at each of their places, as if the furniture itself was a wine barrel filled with the fermented juices of the vine.
“My thanks. What do you have to offer?”
“Here I have the finest Rhenish wine,” announced Frosch, raising his goblet.
Brandner laughed at him. “Champagne is mine! Foaming, sparkling, tastes divine!” He indicated the tap nearest his own seat.
Siebel gave a dismissive gesture. “Fair Fräulein, I offer you Tokaji, Hungary’s very best.”
Altmayer broke into contemptuous laughter. “The wine I pour will never tire. It’s any taste you may desire.”
Asa was beginning to realize what her next challenge was going to be—a peculiar kind of wine-tasting. As soon as she removed any of the bungs, one of the various wines described would fill the cup she apparently now held.
The girl quickly racked her brains to consider what the dangers might be, apart from getting really drunk and having a major hangover.
“I can’t refuse?”
“No, we insist!” the spirits chorused.
Frosch got up first, offering Asa his seat. “Now, dear lady. Take the cup. You must not spill a single drop.”
The other three chuckled, eyeing her expectantly.
Asa stepped over, sat down and held out her goblet. The tap was level with her navel. She hoped the wine would not come shooting out at high pressure, or else it would soak her.
The expressions on the students’ faces made her wary. One of them licked his lips, and they all watched her hungrily. Were they waiting for her to make a mistake? Would they attack her if she did?
Asa was excited and in high spirits. She loosened the first bung carefully. “Tell me, friends dear, how long you’ve been residing here?” She had to grin when she realized she was mimicking their way of speaking.
“Oh, ever since Doctor Faustus and his friend deigned to honor us with their company,” answered Brandner, not taking his eyes off her for a second.
“It is as if it were but yesterday,” added Altmayer.
“But yet, a whole eternity,” sighed Siebel. “How I wish I might return to my own home.”
Asa held the cup in position, removed the plug and caught the wine carefully without spilling a drop.
“Go on, go on—fill the goblet to the brim,” Frosch whispered in an ugly tone. “To the brim!”
“If you let it spill, with you it will go ill!” warned Siebel with a cruel laugh.
Asa nodded, filled the cup right up and closed off the tap, lifting the wine. “And with you!” Taking long, slow drafts, she drained the alcohol. It wasn’t bad at all, but very strong, with an intense aftertaste.
Altmayer looked disappointed. “They nearly all succeed the first time round.”
“Let’s pop the next cork!” Brandner moved to make way for Asa. “Champagne!”
The students crowded around her as Asa heaved herself with some difficulty into the next chair. Her limbs were heavy and she could already feel the effect of the alcohol. She did not usually have this problem. Ghost wine was apparently strong stuff.
She took more care this time as she attempted to open the champagne. The cup filled with foaming liquid and this time, too, she managed to avoid any spillage. The four ghostly beings were starting to look annoyed.
Despite her efforts, some of the champagne bubbled over the edge of the goblet, flowing down the side and wetting her thumb.
Asa drew in her breath sharply at the dreadful pain. The skin on her thumb went black and a brownish smoke curled up from the wound. The wine had burned her flesh right through to the bone. She nearly wobbled, risking the loss of more of the cup’s contents, which would surely have caused grave injury.
Frosch giggled maliciously. “There you are! Burns like hellfire, don’t it?”
“We did warn you.” Brandner had a diabolical grin on his face. “Now drink it down, all in one go. Inside your throat it won’t hurt so.”
Asa was very drunk by the time she slammed the empty cup down onto the table. In order not to stumble as she changed seats once more, she held fast to the edge and slid herself along to get to where Siebel was.
She was having difficulty focusing; the four figures looked demon-like. Asa thought it was all getting very intriguing.
What made her furious was that the drink was making her hands shake. This could all get very dangerous. Hadn’t the wine in Goethe’s play turned to fire when it touched the floor? That meant that if she let a single drop fall, she would be engulfed in flames like a human torch.
Asa fiddled clumsily with the next bung as her fingers slipped, but finally it popped out and she managed to catch the wine in her cup.
The four students were bent over laughing at her. However, their high-spirited enjoyment had an evil, malevolent side—they were hoping that she would fail.
Asa drank down the Tokaji wine, then crawled over the table while the young men screamed with laughter as she fell off the other side, landing with her face under the final wine-tap. She was gasping for breath and felt nauseous, but she reckoned this accursed wine would turn into hellfire if she was sick.
“Now,” Altmayer bent down, grabbed her by the hair and pulled her up. “The final cup. Drink!”
“And what if I can’t?” Asa’s words were slurred.
“Then you will die!” all four of them roared in unison, laughing hysterically.
“Not nearly ready to do that yet.” She hiccoughed, screwed up her eyes and struggled with the last bung. Guessing rather than seeing where the liquid was going, she caught it in the goblet while the ghouls howled and shrieked with anger.
But suddenly she could not drink any more. The stuff smelled like vinegar and she found it abominable.
“That’s not . . . wine,” she stammered, about to put down her cup in disgust. “You’ve tricked me.”
“No, there’s no deceit here, my tap dispenses any drink, my dear,” Altmayer contradicted her. “You must have been wishing for vinegar, I think, so now that cupful you must drink.”
“Or you fail the whole,” Siebel hissed, “and that means the end for you!”
Brandner started a rhythmic slow hand-clap. “Drink, Fräulein, drink!” Now they were all egging her on. She could barely bring herself to set the cup to her lips. But there was no choice, unless she wanted to die. And if she died, that would mean death for her brother as well.
Asa shut her eyes and stood up, and though she staggered around in circles, she drank the revolting liquid, though it ran sour down her throat. Mouthful by mouthful, she swallowed it, right up to the last ghastly drop.
“She’s done it,” screamed Frosch in horror. “That’s the Devil’s own work!”
“It can’t be true,” howled Altmayer, pulling out his knife. “It shan’t be true. My knife will make short work of you!”
Asa forced her eyes open and hurled the goblet at the wall with a laugh. It broke into pieces. She stuck her hands into her pockets and none too elegantly slipped the brass knuckles onto her fingers. “I have passed the test,” she called out in a muffled voice. She could hardly feel her own tongue. That must have been the vinegar. “Now it’s your turn to drink my wine. See how you like what I’m going to serve you.”
Asa whirled round and crashed both her fists down onto the tabletop.
The diamonds embedded in the silver brass knuckles flared up, and under the mystic strength of the twin artifacts, the piece of furniture shattered into four segments. Wine gushed out of the ruined wood, flooding the little chamber. It was as if an immense dam had suddenly burst.
Miraculously, the torrents of wine spared the young woman, but they caught hold of the four ghostly students, spinning them around and forcing them beneath the surface, so that they all drowned.
“Drink up!” Asa staggered and fell into a chair, laughing, as the maelstrom swirled past with its four ghoulish victims. “Drink up, you rotten . . .” She toppled over in an alcoholic haze and passed out.
By the time that Asa woke up again in that room—lying on the floor this time—there was no sign of the students and not even a puddle of wine to be seen. The shattered table, however, was evidence enough that the events of the night had not been entirely normal.
She got to her feet and found she had neither a raging thirst nor a hangover. The only thing that bothered her was the nasty taste of vinegar that she still had in her mouth.
“Now tell me not to believe in miracles,” she quoted from Faust, the only line she remembered. She pulled off the sparkling brass knuckles and put them in her pocket as she left the room.
To her surprise she saw the guard from the Völkerschlacht memorial waiting outside for her. He was still in uniform. “I don’t believe it!” he exclaimed in delight. “You’ve broken the second spell!”
“You’re stalking me.” Asa walked past him. It was Bathseda’s face she had wanted to see, not his.
“No, I’m following you,” he corrected swiftly, grasping her arm. “People are saying that you’ve taken up the challenge to remove the curse that Faust and Mephistopheles laid upon the town. You’ve no idea how long we’ve all been waiting for this!”
Asa stopped and looked him up and down. “I must get on—to the third test.”
The guard nodded eagerly. “Of course! I won’t hold you up. My best wishes go with you. All of us, the whole town, we’re all rooting for you.” Asa was about to walk on, but he stopped her once more. “Tell me one thing. How did you come to take up this challenge?”
“I was forced into doing it,” she replied, giving an honest answer.
He looked at her in shock. “How could anyone force you to do anything when you are afraid of nothing?”
“My brother has been kidnapped and I’m to carry out the tasks in exchange for his life.”
“Oh, no! I have a terrible feeling—” The guard blanched and took two steps backward. “Would the kidnapper’s name be . . . Barabbas Prince?” She gave no answer, but the truth must have been written all over her face. The man wore a horrified expression. “So that devil has found a way—”
His words were interrupted by the arrival of Bathseda.
The man staggered back with a cry as he saw the black-haired woman, and when she turned her gaze on him, he collapsed into a whimpering heap.
“Come, Asa,” she said, her voice cold as the North Wind. “We have things to do.”
“But he—”
“Don’t worry about him.” Bathseda looked at Asa, and this time her face showed relief rather than surprise. She was glad to see the brown-haired girl alive. “We’ll solve the third test.”
In silence they left Auerbachs Keller, walking up the steps and passing the bronze statues portraying Faustus, Mephistopheles and the students.
Asa noticed that the sculptor had omitted one of the students. Brandner, Altmayer and Frosch were all represented, larger-than-life and condemned to live on in metal, if not as ghosts, but Siebel had been omitted.
Bathseda led her out of the shopping mall to where the car was waiting. They climbed into the backseat.
Without exchanging a word they started off, out of the pedestrian zone, through the center of Leipzig and away from the town.
Asa’s eyes kept closing. The events of the previous night were demanding their rightful tribute—but suddenly she felt warm soft lips touching her own. She knew, she could smell, that it was Bathseda kissing her. The attraction was now mutual, and Asa gave herself up to the other girl’s caresses.
“I’ve never met anyone like you before,” the raven-haired beauty whispered tenderly. “You have won my heart, Asa. Now you must win the last test.”
“Will your father honor his part of the bargain?”
Bathseda hesitated. “I suppose so. I am still your hostage.”
“Does he value you highly enough?”
Again the other girl hesitated.
That was enough of a response for Asa, before she slipped into deep slumber, broken only by her companion’s kisses.
Toward evening Asa opened her eyes and stared out of the car window. The limousine was parked at the edge of a lake. A floodlit church tower rose up from the water, and a floating platform surrounded by railings had been erected around the exterior of the building.
Bathseda was waiting on the pebble-strewn beach, and nearby a motorboat rocked on the rippling waves. The car was buffeted by a strong wind whistling through the surrounding trees, and it caught Bathseda’s jet-black hair.
Asa already had an idea what the next challenge was to be—to spend the night in the drowned church.
She stepped out of the car and walked over to Bathseda, who took her hand at once. “This is the Störmthaler See,” the girl explained softly. “Once upon a time they quarried coal here. Many villages were sacrificed to the mining, the houses demolished and the people evacuated. That’s the story, anyway.”
“It’s not true?”
“No. The ground here opened up and swallowed the villages, killing everyone. The authorities started the myth about mining. They brought in excavators and diggers to explain the hole. Many years later they flooded the whole blighted region.”
“Nobody asked questions about the people who used to live here?”
“No. All sorts of lies were made up to cover their disappearance.”
Bathseda pointed to the artificial island. “That’s where the parish of Magdeborn originally had their church. It was the first building to go. What you see here is a monument to mark the place where the disaster began.” She gave Asa a long kiss, placing a hand gently on the nape of the other girl’s neck to pull her closer. “Survive the night. But be warned—there’s a terrible monster that lives in the lake. It is the reason that the ground around here opened up in the first place. Even today it sometimes swallows the occasional careless swimmer, or a fisherman along with his boat.”
Asa nodded and strode over to the motorboat, the wind tugging at her body and whipping her hair across her face.
Stepping in to the small craft, she started the outboard motor and was quickly chugging across the choppy surface. The increasingly powerful waves crashed against the hull of the boat and spray hit her face, blinding her momentarily. Asa imagined the monster hidden by the murky waters and creeping along the lakebed beneath her fragile nutshell of a craft. The idea gave her a thrill.
She was getting closer to the dark island with its fake bell tower. It was about forty-five feet tall, a floating construction made of wood and plaster anchored by chains to the bed of the lake.
Asa brought the boat alongside the platform and tied up to the railings. She stepped quickly across the wooden boards and entered the tower.
Immediately she noticed wet footprints on the dusty floor. Then the darker patches.
Turning around, she saw the guard from the memorial lying out of breath and exhausted among upturned chairs. His suit was dripping wet—he must have swum over to the island. There was blood pouring from a gaping wound in his side.
She hurried over and knelt down next to the badly injured man. “What on earth—?”
“You must not succeed in this final test,” he groaned, obviously in intense pain. “Faust’s curse is as nothing compared to what will happen if you do.”
“But my brother and I will die if—”
“Your lives are not important,” the guard interrupted her, clinging hard to her arm. “Whatever happens, Barabbas must not gain control of Leipzig.”
“Just who is he?”
“You don’t recognize the name? He is one of the criminals Pontius Pilate set free in place of Jesus. He is under a curse and cannot die. He’s condemned to roam the earth for eternity, doing evil.” The man’s words came quickly and were difficult to understand. Asa had to concentrate to make sense of what he was saying. “Over the centuries he has made many pacts with fellow demons, but he always broke his promises, and sometimes he was tricked by the devils, too. Mephistopheles is his arch-enemy. If Barabbas were to break the Faustian spell and take control of the town, it would be his greatest triumph.”
Asa suddenly wondered just how old Bathseda was. “He and his daughter—”
“She is the daughter of Mephistopheles,” the guard interrupted her. “He has tricked her into remaining with him and she has no choice but to keep up the charade.” The man coughed and convulsed with pain. “Barabbas will raze Leipzig to the ground to celebrate his victory. Everyone will perish!” His grip on Asa’s arm was growing painful. “Fail in this last test, or the whole town and all its people will be destroyed!” A final gasp of breath left his lips and his eyes rolled back.
Asa loosened the dead fingers from her arm. “What shall I do?” she murmured.
Searching through the pockets of the dead man, she found nothing to indicate how the guard had been so well-informed.
The hour of midnight struck above her.
The wind dropped abruptly and the sudden deathly quiet was like that following a disaster, or the final scream of a murder victim.
Asa stepped outside, eager to find out what spectacle might await her.
The whole lake was a luminous jade-green, glowing from below as if the sun had set in a sea of ink. Coils of mist rose and floated over the surface, making her head spin, but she did not waver. She held fast to the platform’s railings.
Suddenly the waters divided.
A gargantuan creature shot up from the depths, half-fish, half-monstrosity; something Asa had never even seen in any book before. It displaced the shimmering waters of the lake. Seven ice-gray eyes stared down out of an ugly visage forty feet above her. The jaws opened, revealing rows of long, sharp teeth.
“You dare to measure your strength against mine, wretched human?” the creature thundered.
“Yes, I dare.” Asa smiled, even though its booming voice hurt her ears. This was quite some monster—awesome!
“And you are prepared to risk death, worthless worm?” The monstrosity lifted its tentacles and whipped the surface of the lake, sending clouds of spray over her, soaking her through. Waves washed over the boards of the platform.
Yet Asa stood firm. “Yes.”
“The cruelest of deaths? The sharpest pain and the worst of tortures?” The monster opened its mouth wider and displayed teeth that were certainly strong enough to crunch through wood.
“You might end up between my fangs. Or I might swallow you whole and you’ll rot away in my stomach.” The creature was enjoying itself. “And I’ll—”
Asa interrupted the beast. “You’re wasting my precious time.” She was sizzling with excitement. “Get to the point.”
The monster rose up further still out of the bubbling water, much taller even than the Völkerschlachtdenkmal. “So you really and truly are willing to risk life and soul in combat with me?” it screamed out. “This is my last warning, puny human!”
Asa nodded firmly, though she had no idea what would happen next. She spat out the lake water she’d had to swallow while being splashed. Not yet loosening her grip on the railings, she slipped the silver brass knuckles onto her fingers. Given the size of the monster, they would probably be too small to have any effect anyway. Let him swallow me up. I’ll punch my way out of his belly! she thought.
Amazingly, the creature sank back down in front of her very eyes, turning and twisting in the water and sending up huge waves that swamped the man-made island. The tentacles lashed the air close by her, but she kept a tight hold on the railings and stood her ground despite the raging floodwater.
Screaming at the top of its voice, the creature thrashed around in the glowing jade-green waters, sending up more violent waves. It opened its gaping mouth wide to release a ghastly sound, together with the stink of rotting fish and fetid water.
Asa was expecting it to attack her at any second, and she wiped the spray out of her eyes to be ready for it. “Bring it on!” she yelled, competing with the creature’s mighty roar.
“I’m going to eat you up!” boomed the monster, racing through the turbulent waves toward her, fast as a torpedo.
Asa could hardly believe her eyes, but . . . the closer her monstrous opponent came, the smaller it appeared to be.
It shrank and shrank until eventually it was the size of a small fish, which catapulted itself out of the lake and landed, flapping wildly, at her feet.
Asa wasted no time, but stamped her foot down on the ridiculously helpless monster, crushing it to slime beneath her heel.
Abruptly the windows of the church tower streamed with brilliant light and the air was filled with the ringing of what sounded like a hundred cathedral bells.
The lake monster fed purely on its victims’ fear! Since Asa had never been afraid, not even for a second, the beast had had no power over her and had ceased to exist.
All three ordeals had been successfully withstood!
She jumped into the small boat and started back to dry land, where she hoped to find Bathseda waiting for her.
When she reached the shore she found not only her darling girl but also Barabbas Prince.
He smiled and lifted his cane in greeting, sketching a bow. “How could I ever have doubted you or your love for your brother?” he said sarcastically.
“I carried out all the tasks. Now give him back to me.” Asa put her hands in her pockets and was able to slip the brass knuckles on without being observed.
“Oh, I shall. As soon as you’ve left here,” the man replied with a malicious grin. “I can’t have anyone near me as bold and fearless as you.”
“That’s not the deal we made. But I’ve been told you have a reputation for always breaking your word.” Asa approached her startled opponent, pulling her hands out of her pockets and hitting him hard with the magical artifacts. “It’s time to teach you some manners!”
Try as he might to avoid her blows, the immortal criminal could not match her strength!
His dragon-headed cane snapped under the girl’s violent attack, his bones fractured, piercing him from the inside, and his flesh was slashed by the sharp edges of the jewels. Finally, even his skull burst open as Asa directed ferocious blows to both temples simultaneously. Blood gushed out of his nose and ears and he uttered a ghastly cry.
“I’m not going to let you take over the town!” Asa punched both fists into his face. “This time you will not escape your punishment!”
The sharp diamond tips of the brass knuckles gouged into his eye sockets—and then, with an enormous thunderclap, Barabbas Prince exploded in a puff of smoke! His immortality had suddenly run out, and all that remained were his bloodstained clothes and the broken cane, lying amongst the pebbles beside the lake. The dragon’s eyes on the cane glowed with fire for a final time before growing dark.
Asa looked at Bathseda. There was another spell that now needed to be broken. “And as for you,” she said, “you promised that you would stay with me if I named your true identity.”
The black-haired girl surveyed the pile of bloodied rags and splintered cane in astonishment. “But you know who I am.”
“No. He was not your father. You are really the daughter of Mephistopheles.”
With a cry of delighted astonishment, Bathseda immediately flung her arms around Asa’s neck and covered her companion with kisses. “You have released me!” she cried joyfully. “The curse has finally been lifted!”
Asa embraced her. “And will you still come with me?”
“Yes, yes, yes and three times yes,” she answered happily. “Let me tell you this: I have never met anyone braver than you.” Bathseda took both Asa’s hands in hers. “Now all Barabbas’s fortune belongs to you. I can take you to where he hoarded all his treasure—he was immensely rich. You can buy yourself everything you’ve ever dreamed of—all your wishes can come true!”
Asa only had the one wish. “Do you know where he has been keeping my brother?”
Bathseda nodded. “Of course. We can go there and free him this very instant.”
And off they went, together.
Now listen here to how the story goes:
So this was how the fearless young Asa freed the town of Leipzig from the dreadful curse laid on it by Doctor Faustus and Mephistopheles; how she destroyed the immortal demon Barabbas Prince; how she won the heart of the beautiful Bethseda and, last but not least, how she saved her brother’s life.
On top of these successes Asa was heaped with riches and rewards, enough to open her very own Horror Park, in which the main attractions, thanks to the splendid connections she made through Bethseda, were genuine ghosts and demons and monsters, who respected Asa as their mistress because she never for a single moment showed any fear.
Her brother was made the manager of the attraction and visitors came from far and wide to experience the ultimate in bloodcurdling, spine-chilling frights.
Asa’s Horror Park soon gained a worldwide reputation for being the most scary place on earth.
But you should also know this: there was a very simple reason why Asa was never afraid.
In fact, she suffered from Urbach-Wiethe syndrome—a very rare brain disease affecting the area known as the amygdala or corpus amygdaloideum. And the amygdala, of course, is the seat of fear.
So everything she experienced that would have driven any normal person insane with fear, she experienced as hugely exciting—and very entertaining.
However hard her brother and Bathseda tried to show Asa what it was like to feel fear, they had no earthly chance of success.
But one day, many years later, Asa happened to glance in a mirror—and suddenly she realized: she couldn’t live with Bathseda forever. As a mortal woman, she would die someday, she must die someday, some hour, suddenly or slowly, suffering or without warning.
I will die, Asa thought. And lose my love.
She shook with horror, and her skin was covered in goose bumps. She gasped and felt as though her heart would burst. Quivering all over, she was nearly sick, she was so upset.
What a revelation—so this was what fear was like!
Then Asa realized that nothing could be more terrible, nothing more cruel, nothing more indescribably awful, than losing the love of her life.