Harvey turned utterly serious. “Now we’ve got to plan how to hold him up once we get ashore. Hold him just long enough.”
Anjali and Farmer looked at each other. “You don’t want us to go to Tbilisi with you?” Farmer said carefully.
“You particularly want to come?” Harvey asked. “’Cause when I set the timer…if I get a chance to do it that way…”
Chances of getting out alive will range from slim to absolutely none, went unspoken.
“We are willing to take the risk if it is crucial to the mission,” Anjali said flatly, if not enthusiastically; Farmer grunted and nodded.
Harvey shook his head. “I can’t fight my way into Tbilisi. With every adept in the world there? I wish! And I can sneak as well alone…maybe better. What I need you to do is hold up pursuit as long as you can, pick up some local assets and use a few tricks I can give you. Which considering you’re going up against Adrian…and maybe the Brotherhood…is plenty risky, believe me.”
Also unspoken was that Adrian and the Brotherhood would kill them cleanly if it came to that, or in Adrian’s case even let them surrender. Both were extremely unlikely in the convocation of demons gathering in Tbilisi.
“We should be ashore in a spot I know around about noon, with some services laid on. No nightwalkers to worry about, at least.”
“Small mercies,” Farmer said, and they all laughed again.
The dolphin came barreling out of the depths, its body flexing in an up-and-down rippling motion, aiming at the location of the periodic explosions. The colossal squid skulking at a safe distance barely had time to register the motion before the beak hit like a fifteen-hundred-pound battering ram moving at over twenty miles an hour, all concentrated behind a hard punching surface a couple of inches square. The whole gelatinous mass of the monster’s form flexed and rippled in shock as the force propagated through it.
Adrian heard himself grunt-at least, that was how his Tursiops truncates body and brain interpreted the shower of bubbles and pulsed sounds it emitted at the stunning impact. He twisted away by reflex through the forest of tentacles as the squid thrashed helplessly and drifted downward. A swift gliding curve like a fighter jet brought him in for another attack run.
The squid sparkled and reformed. Without silver it was very difficult to do lasting damage to an aetheric body, if the guiding intelligence preserved enough presence of mind to go impalpable and switch back again despite the shock and pain of a wound; that reset the form to default in a fraction of a second. Then its tentacles darted out for him, malign intelligence sparkling in its giant eyes, ready to rip and rend with arms intended to do battle with eighty-ton sperm whales ten thousand feet beneath the surface.
Tearing a body in half often did kill, persuading the hindbrain it was dead before the intelligence could recover.
Amss-aui-ock!
The tentacles closed on the sperm whale where the dolphin had been, but the black giant threw itself forward, its scores of tons carrying the squid effortlessly along, its thick skin and protective blubber shrugging off the terrible barbed grip. A third of the whale’s eighty-foot length was jaw, lined on the lower side with massive teeth. They began to close-
— and the great white shark flashed by, twisting to take a huge bite as it did, its rows of bone saw ripping out a semicircular chunk-
— and the orca flexed to pursue-
— and the other orca maneuvered, and Adrienne’s sardonic:
And…this…is…ridiculous…we’ve…done…it…before…and…it…just…wastes…the…night! i…am…taking…my…bat…and…ball…and…going…home!
He responded with a wordless snarl of rage after the echolocation of the disappearing black-and-white shape, and fainter came: nyah…nyah…can’t…catch…me!
The urge to pursue was overwhelming, but he fought it down; it was getting towards dawn and their speed and strength were too closely matched. He suppressed the impulse to cast a malediction after her as well. A battle of Wreakings would drain them even more, and already the blood-hunger was gnawing at him.
This is a distraction. Time to go home.
Home was where Ellen was. He turned and surfaced briefly, disappointed but not surprised to see that the Tulip was under sail-the high chance that the engine would be destroyed was why he’d picked a vessel with sail backup, after all. Then he drove towards it with powerful strokes of his flukes, leapt…
…and transformed.
A naked man went to one knee on the deck, looking down a grand total of six shotgun barrels full of silver shot; he could feel the cold menace in the cartridges, enough to wound even his aetheric form to the very edge of probable recovery, particularly as depleted as he was. Adrian grinned wearily.
“Commendable vigilance, my friends.”
It would be simplicity itself for Adrienne to take his form, and only a little harder to mimic his mannerisms.
“Griffyndor,” he said.
Their faces relaxed as the prearranged password activated the confirmation Wreakings in their minds. “Ellen?” he said sharply, noticing that she was gone.
“Hurt but not too bad,” Eric said crisply. “I patched her up and gave her a shot of joyjuice.”
“Good. I must-”
He staggered a little as he came to his feet. Peter started towards him with a look of concern on his face, then stopped when Adrian held up a hand.
“No!” Then more gently: “Not now. Don’t come closer until I have…refreshed. I’ve been using the Power rather extravagantly.”
Eric followed him below to his stateroom; the ex-policeman didn’t completely relax until he saw the eyes of Adrian’s blood-body open and heard his sigh. From his aura he still found the sight of two apparently identical bodies merging mind-boggling and unpleasant in equal measure, but he nodded and holstered his coach gun.
“Yeah, it’s absolutely you,” he said.
“You weren’t sure?” Adrian said, sitting up; he was dressed except for his boots.
Ellen rested beside him, her eyelids opening slightly; he could feel how deep her sleep was, urged by the narcotic, but that was wearing off.
“There’s sure and then there’s absolutely completely sure. How’d the mission go, boss?”
“I slowed Harvey down, and I have a better idea of where he’s headed than he thinks-he is not the only one who took precautions against something like this long ago.”
Eric nodded. “Yeah, that extra bit never hurts. Cheba’s cooking up something…don’t know what to call it, clock-wise, but it’ll be ready in about an hour.”
“That will do nicely. We can plan then. And now, if you will excuse me for a little…”
He felt better, although the wounds to the aetheric body usually transferred to the physical one as stigmata for a little while; that meant the equivalent of bruises and scuffs. And he was ravenous, of course. Ellen was resting, and in any case in no fit state to accommodate him; he reached into the cooler and took out the plastic pint container of blood. Warming it made it slightly less nauseating…at the cost of increasing the subsequent headache.
“Best to rip the bandage off quickly,” he muttered to himself and drank it down, trying to avoid holding it in his mouth.
He’d heard Englishmen describe pouring beer down their throats without touching the sides, and did his best to do that literally. He didn’t succeed, and spent a long moment in silent misery, fighting the impulse to retch-if he vomited, he’d have to do this again. And he tried not to breathe through his nose, either. The closest he’d ever been able to come to describing the scent of old dead blood was dog vomit on a hot day, combined with stale diapers and sulfuric acid. The taste was similar, with an overtone of rotten bananas.