Certain there was nothing more I could do for Jessica here, I looked to Richard and asked him for the favor I’d mentioned earlier—with an added caveat. “I need you to break the spell binding me and Jessica. I also require a Dreamlands vision-quest. You’ve said it’s possible to travel the mists of time through ghoul ceremonies to this place. I have lost memories I need to recover. The spell breaking the connection between me and Jessica takes priority, however. If we can break our link, maybe she’ll have the strength to recover.”
It was a lot to ask of my friend; Richard was only a hedge magician and I’d never seen him do anything remotely comparable to what I was asking. Yet, I wasn’t sure if I could ask Katryn to do it. Even if she was capable of such magic, things had ended … badly between us.
Richard coughed and raised his hands defensively. “You’re talking some serious juju here. The dream-walking is easy enough. I can do that with just the right smoke and mirrors. Breaking an invocation to Nyarlathotep, though? That requires ancient Pre-Babylonian ‘Age of Sorcerer Kings’ stuff. I’d need to get things from the elders underground for that.”
“Can you do it or not?” My voice rose, I was about ready to snap. I had to know; if not, I’d find someone else.
“Yes.” Richard grinned, and it was highly unsettling. “The issue is cost, John.”
“I see.” Nothing came free in the Wasteland, even from friends. I was disappointed in Richard, though not by much. Thankfully, I had something to barter with. It was another reason I owed Martha. “I have a copy of the English translation of the Necronomicon, Richard. It has the original Arabic text included. I will allow you to read it if you do this for me.”
Richard stopped motionless, his posture suddenly threatening. “Don’t lie to me, John.”
I pulled out the book and opened it, flashing Richard a couple of pages. Specifically, a despicable set describing how the Great Old One Dagon lay with human women in order to sire the debased Deep One race. That particular set on pages had numerous illustrations on how to perform spells designed to attract them.
Richard’s eyes grew wide, taking in the reality of my offer. “Uh … well now… that’s … big.”
Pleased by his reaction, I asked, “Is this enough?”
“Easily. I’ll go get the necessary stuff. See you in five or six hours.” Richard spoke no more and left.
Little Jackie, who had been silent for much of the conversation, stared at Jessica and then glanced up at Mercury. “Is she going to live?”
“The facilities are crude but sufficient. If there’s a scientific basis for this life-transfer phenomenon, which there has to be, then it’s mostly a case of getting her strength built back up,” Mercury said, looking positively tickled to have a patient before her.
“So, yes?” Jackie asked.
“Yes.”
I hoped she was right. “Are you alright staying here for the time being, Jackie?”
“Sure!” Jackie said, more enthusiastically than expected. “Mister Jameson is awesome! I once was dared to sneak into his place but my father smacked me for it after the fact. He’s got some nifty stuff here.”
“Good,” I said. “He’s the only person I really trust here. It’s only temporary, though. I promise.”
“I don’t like it,” Mercury said. “We should take her with us.”
“You’re going to assist her in regaining consciousness?” I ignored Mercury’s objections; it was becoming the chief way I dealt with her.
“As soon as I make sure that won’t adversely affect her health, unless you have any objections to a ‘professional torturer’ helping your friend?” Mercury said, looking up at me with a strained expression on her face. She looked genuinely hurt by my earlier words, something I was unprepared for.
“Just do it. If you can, I will speak no more ill of you,” I said, leaving the room, trying to catch my breath. Seeing Jessica in her current condition, knowing it was my fault, was too much. I also didn’t want to watch Mercury working on her given how I’d treated her. Despite all the things she’d done, I owed her my life and soon I would owe her my squad mate’s life. She deserved better.
“I need a minute alone,” I muttered, talking to myself. I decided Richard’s guest bedroom was the best place to do so. I’d stayed there a couple of nights in the past.
Heading inside, I felt someone coming up behind me. Slightly moving my head to the left, I saw Katryn’s fist coming at the back of my head. Immediately, I ducked underneath her blow.
Barely.
“What the hell are you doing!?” I asked, turning around and backing into the room. Katryn was ready to fight, that much was easy to see from her battle-ready stance and flaring eyes.
Katryn spun around with her bare foot moving to spin-kick me in the stomach. I managed to catch it and proceeded to sweep her other foot out from under her.
Katryn moved with an effortless grace, somersaulting out of my grip onto her feet. Her fighting style was reminiscent of Brazilian capoeira, more dance-like than my own training.
I raised my fists defensively. “I thought we were going to hold off on killing me until after this Necromancer business was settled.”
“Fighting you is not killing you,” Katryn said, tossing her spear to one side.
“I’m glad that distinction is being made!” I said, annoyed. I didn’t have time for this. Jessica was dying and Katryn wanted to fight? What was wrong with her?
Katryn continued her explanation, her movements graceful yet deadly. “You have a way of showing up when most needed. I am not one to question the will of the gods, but I need to know if your reflexes are still as capable as they were a year ago.”
“There are easier ways to test my reflexes!” I said, my frown turning into a smirk. It was hard not to think of our time together. It had been four years into the disintegration of my marriage; she’d been both forward and exotic, two things I loved.
“You gave up that right when you left the mating circle,” Katryn said, coolly. Her words held hints of her own attraction, however. Just the way she spoke them said that she still wanted me as much as I wanted her.
“I didn’t have a choice to enter it!”
Jumping up, she attempted to knee me in the face. I managed to grab her by the arms and tossed her on the ground. That proved a mistake as she somehow reversed my hold and sent me flying up against the wall. By the time I was looking up, she was already moving to bring down her foot onto my face. I barely managed to roll out of the way before her foot slammed into the ground beside me. The dust of the floor was now flying up from our athletic contest, covering us both.
“You’re lucky I’m holding back.” I moved my hands up in front of my face, guarding it against her attacks.
In truth, I wasn’t, but psychological warfare was the only edge I had. The Dunwych valued strength as much as they did honor. I had called into question both by leaving her, showing myself to be weak-willed and an oath-breaker. It was now up to me to prove I still had the personal fortitude to be a worthy ally. I had no intention of disappointing.
“If you were holding back, I’d know it.” Katryn proceeded to pull a knife from her leather outfit.
I was surprised by that, less because of her willingness to escalate our conflict than because hers was not the most concealing of garments. It opened up all sorts of questions as to where exactly she’d been hiding it.
Slashing toward my chest, I avoided each of her blows before making a move for her knife. I could have drawn my R’lyehian blade, but I intended to prove I didn’t need it. “Maybe you overestimate yourself.”
“Show me.” Katryn anticipated my attack and immediately spun around to kick me in the chest. It was here the general discrepancy of our body weights proved to my advantage. Most men could not stand a blow from Katryn and remain standing; once they were down, she killed them with one easy blow. If I’d had any less of a pound advantage, I’d be on the ground crippled.
Still, it hurt like hell.
Ignoring the pain of her blow, I managed to pull the knife from her hand and brought it up against her throat. Another second and she would have been able to turn the situation to her advantage, but the battle favored me this time.
“Yield,” I said, holding the knife steady at the base of her throat, “or die.”
No sooner had I done so than I found myself going over her shoulder with the knife pulled from my grip. A second later, I was on the ground with the weapon once more in Katryn’s hands. She had it pressed against the tip of my Adam’s apple, a single motion ready to slit my throat at the slightest movement.
“Well,” I coughed out, stunned by my defeat. “It seems my reflexes have dulled somewhat.”
Katryn let out a tinkle of melodic laughter, a great contrast to her normal seriousness. “Perhaps I have merely grown faster.”
“That you have.”
Katryn snorted and assumed a combat-ready position a couple of feet away, apparently ready to continue our battle. “You’re skilled enough for me to believe you’re still a worthy ally. The care you show to your subordinate makes you soft, though. I do not know why warriors from your homeland are so sentimental. It is a weakness.”
Realizing this contest was now a friendly one, I went to the guest-room door and shut it tightly before locking it. The chance to spar with Katryn was a rare opportunity.
“I’ve been accused of many things, but being sentimental is not one of them,” I said. “Even so, most of my fellow soldiers don’t feel as I do. Surely, you’ve learned that from your lover.”
“My lover?” She seemed genuinely surprised by my words.
“Peter,” I said, letting a hint of jealousy taint my words as I entered into a combat-ready pose. It was an affectation since I couldn’t help but feel only trauma recalling our time together, but I had to let her think otherwise. I needed her help to take down Ward and that required her thinking she had a hold on me. No matter how disgusted I was by all this.
Katryn stared at me for a moment, her eyes seemingly searching me for some hint of irony. After a second, she let forth a torrent of stunned laughter.
“Is something funny?” I asked, already suspecting the truth.
“I’d sooner bed a Deep One.” Katryn delivered a playful series of blows toward my face, ones I blocked one after the other. The combat had become slower paced, more like a practice session than genuine combat. “He is an oath-breaker, one who has no honor.”
“You accused me of that, too.” I would never regret the fact I’d chosen to flee Dunwych territory, it had been for my family after all, but I’d always feel a bit of sadness over doing so.
“You are an oath-keeper, John, even when circumstances prevent you from fulfilling the letter of them. You left me because you still loved your wife and children. I suspect you left the Remnant because you love your squadron. I see how their absence tortures you now.” Katryn’s voice took on a sympathetic tone.
I loved my children but I’d been a horrible father to them and an even worse husband to my wife. I’d left because I loathed the Dunwych. What Katryn was saying was nothing more than the product of her mind trying to rationalize my departure. I needed her to play on her justifications. “I never meant to hurt you.”
“Spare me the sentimentality, John. You may need it but I do not,” Katryn said as her next kick went a little high and I was able to easily dodge it. She continued to talk as I watched her motions closely, trying to guess her next move. “Blasphemer or not, I might be able to forgive you. Peter, on the other hand, left my people as soon as you did. He started selling his services to the highest bidder, serving everyone from Kingsport’s gangsters to Arizonian slavers.”
“He’s a slaver?” That shocked me. Desertion was one thing, slavery was another. I could no more work with a slaver than I could a cannibal or child-murderer.
“Peter came as close as humanly possible without actually becoming one himself. He guarded their caravans, directed them to villages willing to sell their members, and killed those who would strike out against them. Only recently has he returned, claiming to have seen the light.” The suspicion in her voice spoke volumes about her opinion of the man.
The Dunwych were brutal and efficient conquerors but they had their own set of ethics. Like the Remnant, it seemed they could look down on slavery as long as they didn’t call it that. “Why accept him as a member of your tribe, then?”
“We need every warrior we can get. The Necromancer grows stronger every day,” Katryn explained, right before I managed to successfully toss her onto the ground. She smiled, pleased at my getting the best of her even temporarily.
“Who is he to you?” I decided to hold on to what I knew for the time being. I knew of Alan Ward’s identity a decade ago but not what he’d been doing since.
“A wizard, a priest, a scientist, a warlord, and everything in between. Rumors attest he wandered in from the desert like you have been described doing. Boiling down corpses to their essential salts, he raised them from the dead. He also displayed other powers, like healing and making crops grow.”
“I take it his benevolence had a darker side?”
The two of us began practicing other holds, close ones. It burned me to have Katryn so near and not wrap my arms around her in more intimate ways. I should have been thinking about the Necromancer, but as we grappled with one another, my mind wandered to other things. The stress of everything I had endured longed for a release, a release which could only come from the union of a man with his lover.
Katryn pulled my arm around my back, shifting her weight as she put me into a painful wristlock, an action which momentarily dulled my emerging feelings. “Soon, reports of corpses stolen in the night were whispered. Women were sent to him and their bodies were found elsewhere, drained of blood. His followers were joined by Deep Ones and those who worship Kaithooloo. Whole villages were enslaved or exterminated at his command, their children taken away for some evil purpose. One of the Dunwych’s outlying villages was amongst them. We don’t have a name for him, though, if he has one.”
“Alan Ward.”
“You encountered him, encountered him and survived.” Katryn let go of her wrist hold.
“Yes.” I took a deep breath. “I just can’t remember how.”
“We will find out,” Katryn said, walking close to me. She took my face into her hands and pressed her lips against mine.
Pulling away, I said, “We shouldn’t.”
I pretended to be reluctant because I knew it would drive her to desire me more. I hated the thought of her touching me, though. “I need you sharp and alert, John,” Katryn said. “You are a warrior in distress and we still made oaths to be with one another. It is my right.”
“I …” I trailed off. “Alright.”