She had barely reached the words ‘so be it’ when she was asleep; and within a few seconds, An-Gryferai arose from her somnolent body, and floated upward to the ceiling.
Lincoln was watching MTV when Springer came into his room at the Case Medical Center. Springer had taken on the appearance of Eulalie Passebon again, so Lincoln immediately knew who he was.
‘How are doing?’ Springer asked him, drawing up a chair and sitting beside his bed.
‘Not so bad. Doctors say I should have my spine operation tomorrow. I like your cornrows, by the way, sweet cheeks.’
Springer remained serious. ‘You have to go back to the circus tonight. In fact you have to go back right now.’
‘Don’t tell me. Mago Verde kidnapped victim number nine.’
‘We’re almost certain that he has, yes.’
‘This is it, then? Armageddon come early?’
‘It will be, unless you can stop Brother Albrecht from receiving this one last sacrifice.’
‘OK, then. Let’s lock and load.’
Springer reached out and held Lincoln’s hand. He was even wearing all of those elaborate silver rings that Eulalie wore, with tigers’ eyes and garnets and opals. ‘I want you to know how much Ashapola will appreciate what you and your fellow Night Warriors are doing tonight. Whatever happens, your names will be celebrated for all eternity.’
‘Hey, Ukulele, we ain’t dead yet!’
Springer stood up. ‘Your dreamer is a music promoter called Mickey Veralnik. He’s asleep in Room one-oh-three-three at the Cleveland Marriott. The sooner you can join us there, the better.’
‘Mickey Veralnik? I know that slimeball. He would have a dream about freaks. He’s a frickin’ freak himself.’
‘I’ll see you at his bedside,’ said Springer. ‘I’ll tell the nurse that you’re feeling tired and that you need a few hours’ sleep. I’ll tell her not to disturb you.’
‘Thanks. I don’t want her trying to wake me up in the middle of a firefight to give me a bed bath.’
Once they had recited their invocation to Ashapola, the Night Warriors fell asleep in less than twenty minutes. Their dream personalities rose from their beds and floated up into the night like ghostly kites. They sailed high above the sparkling streets of downtown Cleveland until they reached the Cleveland Marriott on Public Square, and then they descended through the ceiling of Room 1033. Dom Magator was first, followed by Jekkalon and Jemexxa, and then Xyrena and Zebenjo Y’xx. Shortly afterward, Springer appeared, looking like An-Gryferai’s music teacher, Mr Flight.
The magnolia-painted bedroom was vast, with a bed wide enough for three people to sleep in, but tonight the only person sleeping in it was Mickey Veralnik. He was lying on his back with his mouth open, snoring. His dyed black comb-over had flapped to one side, like a crow’s wing, and he was puffy-eyed and unshaven. He reeked of Jim Beam.
The Night Warriors looked at each other and none of them could hide their anxiety.
‘This is crunch time,’ said Dom Magator. ‘If any of you want to back out, that will be perfectly understandable. We won’t think any the worse of you.’
Springer added, ‘There’s a blessing that Ashapola bestows on those who are about to go into battle on the side of purity. “May your way be brightly lit by your devotion to duty, and may you be protected at all times by the shield of your honor.”’
‘And may we kick Brother Albrecht’s ass into the middle of next week,’ added Zebenjo’Yyx.
Mickey Veralnik snorted and mumbled and said, ‘For Christ’s sake, Vera, what have you done to your hair?’
The Night Warriors all held their breath and stood absolutely motionless. Ten long seconds passed, but Mickey Veralnik didn’t wake up. ‘OK,’ said Dom Magator, at last. ‘Let’s get going.’
He raised both hands and drew the brilliant blue octagon in the air. It opened up, but this time it seemed to shimmer and flicker more unsteadily than usual, like a faltering fluorescent tube before it pops out for ever.
‘What the hell’s wrong with the goddamned portal?’ asked Dom Magator. ‘Why is it jinking around like that?’
‘Mickey Veralnik’s dream is highly unstable,’ Springer explained. ‘Partly because he’s drunk, and partly because he’s dreaming that he’s in Brother Albrecht’s dream, and Brother Albrecht’s dream is close to becoming reality. It’s like a storm approaching. More than a storm — a major earth tremor. Go very carefully, all of you.’
Zebenjo’Yyx said, ‘Come on. Let’s do it, before it’s too late.’
With that, he ducked his head down and disappeared through the portal. Jekkalon followed close behind him, and then An-Gryferai and Jemexxa and Xyrena. Dom Magator went last, but before he went through, Springer laid a hand on his arm and said, ‘Ashapola be with you, Dom Magator. Ashapola be with all of you.’
‘Yeah,’ said Dom Magator. ‘And you, too, Springer, whatever the hell you are.’
He stepped through the portal. The crackle of energy was much fiercer than it usually was, and showers of sparks bounced off his armor.
He found himself in Brother Albrecht’s dream again, but this was a very different landscape from the dark and rainy hillside that they had visited last night. This was a sunbaked prairie, with fields of tawny wheat stretching all the way to the horizon, and not a single tree in sight. The sky was purple, with huge white cumulus clouds rolling slowly across it from west to east.
An-Gryferai turned around and said, ‘There it is. Look.’
About a mile away, they could see a small township, with a church spire and a water tower and a single main street lined with stores. A few hundred yards to the south, Brother Albrecht’s circus had been set up, with its black tents and its black caravans and its black pennants flapping in the summer breeze.
Very faintly, they could hear the discordant strains of In The Good Old Summertime. An-Gryferai shivered. For some reason, she found the sound of that music even more unsettling than that cluster of black tents. It was like all her childhood fears returning to visit her. And more than anything it reminded her of Daisy, her dead sister, and Daisy’s persistent nightmares about circuses.
‘How about an aerial reconnaissance?’ Dom Magator asked her.
‘Is that such a good idea?’ said Zebenjo’Yyx. ‘As soon as those clowns see An-Gryferai circlin’ around, they’ll know we’re here, won’t they?’
‘Yes, they probably will. But they’ll soon spot us, right out here in the open, even if they haven’t spotted us already. And don’t tell me they haven’t been expecting us.’
‘In that case, I ain’t takin’ no chances,’ said Zebenjo’Yyx. He cocked the quarrel-firing mechanisms on both of his forearms. ‘One peep out of any of those freaks, and they’re goin’ to wind up seriously ventilated.’
An-Gryferai took a short run through the wheat field, flapping her wings. The air was warm and she rose quickly, until she was nearly a hundred feet up. She looked up at the clouds as she flew, and she saw that as they rolled their way from one horizon to the other, they continually changed their shape, from ghostly galleons with tattered sails to monstrous dogs with bulging eyes. For a brief moment, she thought that one of them looked like the face of her dead grandmother, watching her with sadness in her eyes.
As she approached the township, she could make out its name painted on the side of the water tower, Melancholy, IA. The main street was almost deserted except for three or four pick-up trucks and a few pedestrians. She could see a store with a sign saying Clavicle’s General Supplies and a barber shop named for its proprietor, W. Severe.