Chapter 13
Dimmed Amongst the Lilies
"Shrouded by the night
and by the secret stair I quickly fled
The veil concealed my eyes
while all within lay quiet as the dead."
"The Dark Night Of The Soul" - Loreena McKennitt
18 September 1999
Isle of Skye, Scotland
Even though it was only mid-September, Siobhan O'Banian could already smell autumn in the air. It was in the cool wind that blew from the north and the greenery that was beginning to hint at fall color. She glanced out the side window of the Land Rover, looking across the Sound of Rasaay to the Isle itself that no matter what the weather, was shrouded in mist.
It was the third Saturday of the month, a day reserved for her monthly pilgrimage into Portree to stock up on food and other necessities. She had also picked up her mail, all six pieces of it, and paid a few bills. Now, late in the afternoon, she was back on the single lane road that looped the coastline of Trotternish, the most northern part of Skye.
O'Banian drove on, listening to the Gaelic CD she had playing, sometimes joining in, but more often simply listening, letting the language of her childhood flow over her. They spoke Gaelic on Skye, or Eilean a Cheo as it was known in that language, but it was different. She had had to learn to adapt in the ten years she had lived here. Still, it was good once in a while to hear it the way she had originally learned it.
She passed the "Old Man of Storr" and Kilt Rock, meeting only one other vehicle in her journey home. Her mind drifted while she drove, mulling over the short letter she had received.
Siobhan,
You need to know. A renegade band of Watchers are hunting Immortals. They play by no rules, shooting first and taking heads - even on holy ground. None of you are safe. Be aware.
Patrick
It had been two years since she had heard from him, longer since they had seen each other. She had been in Paris several times, even stood outside the church once, but couldn't quite bring herself to go inside. It was better this way, she told herself. And sometimes she actually believed it.
Watchers? Hunting Immortals? She shook her head at the thought, but her expression was grave.
O'Banian had first become aware of the existence of Watchers five years ago. She had marked a face in a crowd at a busy train station in Berlin. When she had seen the same face in the airport in Paris, she thought it simple coincidence. He could easily have been another weary traveller who had taken the train and was now flying somewhere. When she saw the same man in Glasgow, she began to get suspicious. Confirmation came when she caught his reflection in a shop window at Fort William. He wasn't Immortal, that much she knew for sure.
At first, she thought the IRA was onto her. There had been a price on her head since her departure in early 1989. She had sat at home, loaded gun across her knees, waiting for them to come bursting through the door.
They hadn't.
Three weeks passed, and she had almost convinced herself that she had made it all up, gotten confused and only seen someone similar, when she noticed him again, this time in Portree. O'Banian had hidden behind a corner, reaching out and grabbing the man by the collar and dragging him into the backstreet. He had, at first, been reluctant to talk, but a .357 Magnum muzzle against his temple had quickly erased his reluctance and he had stutteringly told her about Watchers.
She hadn't believed him and pointedly told him so in rather descriptive terms that included some colorful discussion as to his parentage, then he had shown her his notebook and let her listen to the voicetape commentary he had made of her comings and goings. It slowly dawned on her that he was telling her the truth.
She had, of course, let him go. Killing him was of no use and besides, she had promised herself that she would never kill anyone again…not unless she had to.
She hadn't seen that particular Watcher again, but she had been aware of new ones. Some stayed for a few weeks, others a few months. She would slowly become aware of a familiar face wherever she went. It actually became a game - letting them think she didn't know they were there, then surprising them. Having a pizza delivered to their car, leaving a thermos of hot coffee for them, turning around and taking their picture. It made her laugh to see the stunned expressions on their faces when they realized they had been caught. The last one was a woman. She had only lasted three weeks before she disappeared. O'Banian hadn't even had time to let on that she knew about her.
Now there didn't appear to be anyone - perhaps the note was an indication why. Perhaps the Watchers were meeting somewhere, plotting the complete demise of the Immortal race. O'Banian shuddered at the thought.
She finally turned off the main road and onto what was no more than a cart track across the rough, heather-covered terrain. The twelfth century renovated church she called home was two miles inland. It sat in a natural basin, surrounded on all but the approaching side by the climbing cliffs that gradually rose into the Quiraing.
When O'Banian had first seen the church, ten years ago, it had been a gutted stone building with half a roof and no windows. She had spent a small fortune just to make it habitable, replacing the roof, the windows and the floor, adding indoor plumbing. A generator supplied a limited amount of electricity, and heat in the winter came from a huge stone fireplace set along the sidewall in what used to be the right transept.
She parked to the side of the church and hurried to open the huge oak front door. Silence greeted her. She thought again of getting a dog or a cat - someone that would be pleased to see her when she returned. But that would mean getting attached to something, and getting attached to anything, be it animal or human, was never a good idea. Experience had taught her that much.
With the exception of a small bathroom, the inside of the church itself was still one large room. The door opened into a low ceilinged entryway above which was the small loft that used to be for a choir, but now served as the bedroom. The rest of the church was open to the beamed roof.
O'Banian quickly hauled in the groceries, storing items in the fridge, freezer or pantry as needed. Then she wandered over and lit the fire. Once the sun went down, the place would be cold. She hung her fleece-lined leather jacket on the hook by the door and returned to the kitchen.
Three hours later, it was dark. The remnants of a meal sat cold and congealed on a plate on the scrubbed oak table. An almost empty wine bottle stood beside a low burning candle. Strains of Davy Spillane played on the small stereo.
O'Banian herself was curled up in a large armchair placed on an angle to the left of the fireplace. She was reading, book in one hand, wineglass in the other, deeply engrossed in the latest Michael Slade offering. She finished a chapter, then set the book down and drained her wine glass.
Over by the table, she emptied the dregs of the wine bottle into her glass. She leaned and blew out the candle, then turned back toward the chair. One minute the room had been bathed in a warm glow from two lamps and the roaring fireplace, the next, only the light of the fireplace remained.
O'Banian halted, a sixth sense kicking in and telling her something was not right. Mentally she counted off the seconds before the emergency generator kicked in. She absently brushed aside a strand of long, dark red hair, waiting.
"Eight."
"Nine."
"Ten."
"Eleven."
"Twelve."
Every time the power had failed before, the generator had kicked in by ten - but not now.
O'Banian willed her breathing to stay low and even, her eyes scanning each of the windows in turn. Outside it was pitch black, no lights, no torches, no headlights. No prickling sensation crawled up her spine. If someone was out there, they weren't Immortal. She remembered the letter from Patrick and her heart skipped a beat.
Hunters.
Could they be here for her?
Cautiously, all senses alert, she crossed to the chair, picking up the fifteenth century Templar sword that lay in its scabbard under the armchair. A heavy thud on the roof followed by three more brought her head up. She waited, unsheathed sword in hand, wondering what the noise signified.
It began as a low hum, building in sound and tempo. O'Banian turned in a circle, eyes still scanning the ceiling. Her olfactory sense gave her the first clue.
Smoke.
The roof was on fire. It was made of thatch and wouldn't last long.
Her first action was to pick up her cell phone, quickly punching in numbers for the closest fire station in Uig. It would take them a while to get there, but perhaps they could salvage something of her home.
A friendly female voice informed her that communications were temporarily unavailable and invited her to try her call later.
"There won't be much bloody point later," she hissed, throwing the phone on the table.
The smoke was heavier now; starting to sting her eyes and clog her throat. The hum had become a roar and O'Banian could see flames eating through the wooden beams, licking away at the supports.
It's going to come down. I have to get out of here, she thought. Her eyes scanned the room, agonising over what to save and what to leave. She grabbed the oversized carryall that sat by the door.
Years of late night phone calls requesting her to be halfway around the world in a few short hours had taught O'Banian to be in a constant state of readiness to leave. The bag already contained two complete changes of clothes, tooth and hairbrushes, her passport, a pair of 4x40 binoculars, and her camera. It also contained items most people did not carry in their travel gear - mineral oil, a whetstone, and paste wax.
She grabbed her Walkman and a few precious CDs, her address book, and her wallet, stuffing them all into the tote. She hesitated a second, then returned to the bookcase, retracting a dog-eared book. An Anthology of Irish Poets by Devlin Aucoin, given to her by her teacher, Anastacia Delmar, disappeared into the bag, too. The last thing to go in was a .357 Magnum revolver and, through its carrying handles, a semi-automatic carbine, a Mini-14.
The room was filled with smoke by this time and O'Banian coughed continuously. She could hear the cracking and popping of the beams overhead. A loud whoosh filled the air and a beam dropped, crashing down onto the shelves that had held the stereo and books. A shower of sparks followed, dropping onto the furniture and rugs.
O'Banian put one hand over her head, frantically brushing away the embers that had landed in her hair. She slung the carryall over her shoulder, grabbed her jacket from the peg and stuffed her feet into her hiking boots. Then, crouching low, rescabbarded sword in hand, she hurried to the door.
Hand on the doorknob, she hesitated. First rule of being under attack - never go out the front door. She swore softly in Gaelic at her near blunder. She didn't doubt that whoever had set her house on fire was waiting on the other side of that door, guns ready. Well, she wasn't about to make it that easy for them.
She scrambled across the hardwood floor, on her belly now, trying to find pockets of rapidly disappearing oxygen. The room was falling around her, fragments of beams, a rainstorm of cinders and ash, all dropping onto her.
A large piece of inflamed roof fell, catching her across her shoulder and searing her clothing to her skin. O'Banian hissed, closing her eyes at the pain that ripped through her body.
I will heal, she told herself. 'Twill all be gone by tomorrow. She muttered a Gaelic prayer that she would still be alive tomorrow.
In the darkness, she felt for the rug that had been laid across the floor. It had been a beautiful wool tapestry, something she had picked up on one of her trips to the mainland. Now it was a burning, smouldering mass. O'Banian pushed the rug aside, her fingers scrabbling frantically across the planks of the wood floor. Finally she found it.
A small handle, fitted perfectly into the wooden floor so that, unless one knew where to look, it would never be found.
O'Banian took a deep breath and stood, her eyes streaming tears and her throat aching. With all of her remaining strength, she yanked the handle, the muscles in her arms and her burnt shoulder screaming in protest.
At last, the trapdoor gave way. O'Banian tossed her bag, her jacket and the sword down into the hole. She looked around her, coughing. The house was an inferno. Thick smoke made it difficult to see and the heat was becoming unbearable. O'Banian dropped to her knees and then dropped further into the hole in the floor, pulling the cover down behind her. As she did so, she wondered if this would be her saviour, or her tomb.
It wasn't until two hours later that she finally gulped clean, fresh air. The crypt under the church had been clammy and dusty, but nothing had prepared her for the dank, putrid passageway along which she had had to crawl on her belly.
One of the workmen who had helped with the renovations had shown her the passageway. He told her he thought it was used at one point for smuggling and suspected that the other end came out somewhere along the cliffs at Staffin Bay, which made it all the more surprising for O'Banian when she emerged. She was nowhere near the sea. Instead, she was fully the other way, the passage had headed straight north, not east to the coast.
She was barely one and a half kilometers from her house. She hauled herself out of the tunnel after tossing her things up first. It was a cleverly concealed entranceway, set just to the side of a large rock and surrounded by gorse and rhododendron bushes.
O'Banian turned, her eyes training on the glowing building in the distance. It lit up the night sky, enough for her to see the three vehicles in addition to her own that were parked there. She counted eight bodies, all appearing to be men, in various places around the church.
The wind rippled cool down the Quiraing and she shivered, pulling the jacket tighter around her. It was going to be a cold night and she was far from anywhere. She couldn't walk the hills; she wouldn't get far before she fell down a crag or got caught in a sinkhole. The farmers in this area lost dozens of sheep every year to the terrain. Ordinarily, the safest place to walk would have been the road, but not with Hunters driving on them. She would have to wait until they left, or until dawn, whichever came first.
With a sigh of resolution, Siobhan O'Banian settled herself against the rock and watched her home burn.
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18 September 1999
Swansea, Wales
Robyn Radway yawned and pushed her computer keyboard away. Her eyes were crossing on her and there was no way she could continue writing this paper any longer. She needed a break. Maybe a nap, too.
The young brunette shook her head. She couldn't sleep right now. Her head was too much of a tornado at the moment, spinning too fast with various facts about the history of the Germanic tribes and their conflicts with the Roman armies. She'd have to let her brain relax for a while before there would be any hope of her body following suit.
Radway looked at the small television in the corner of her apartment. That would do nicely. A little time vegetating in front of the tube would do the trick quite well. Who cared what was on right now? Just turn the thing on and set the circuits to receive for an hour or so. That would work. Slumping into her secondhand recliner, she hit the power button on her remote control to rejuvenate the box.
There was a news program currently running. Radway allowed herself a slight eye roll but did not change the channel. She had told herself she would stick with whatever was on when she sat down and, damn it, that's what she was going to do. She set the remote on the small table by her chair, kicked up the footrest, and looked in the direction of the screen with unfocused eyes.
As usual with television news, the mantra was "if it bleeds, it leads." The pretty blonde anchorwoman gave an update on the story of Tony Martin, Norfolk farmer who had shot dead a sixteen-year-old burglar on the twentieth of August. He was also charged with wounding a twenty-nine-year-old man who was also present at the time of the burglary. The anchorwoman continued with stories about the continued gruesome murders by decapitation that were spreading across Europe.
"Ugh," moaned Radway. "Just let it go for a while. Give us something else, for once."
"And now, we go to a story from the United States," said the anchorwoman, as if hearing Radway's words, "which just took place two hours ago. At least ten armed men attacked a young boy at the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport early in the morning and shot him multiple times at close range. Witnesses say they then seized the boy's lifeless body and carried it away to a waiting van. When people in the crowd tried to intervene, the gunmen then turned their weapons on the crowd before making their escape. Three people are confirmed dead and another eight wounded, according to reports from the Seattle police department. We have this video from security cameras at the airport. We would like to warn viewers that the following scenes are of a graphic nature and may be shocking to some."
"Well," muttered Radway as she took in the video of the airport massacre, "that's certainly a bit different. You don't hear of that happening at Heathrow."
She watched in stunned silence as the teenager made a call from the phone booth. Seeming to sense the approach of the men behind him, he hung up and turned. He tried to grab his bag and run, but they drew their weapons and fired at him before he could get away. The teen crumpled to his knees. Radway gasped as she saw the shot to the back of the boy's head explode out of the front. The boy dropped in a heap to the floor.
The attackers kicked the child's bag away from the body as if they expected him to still reach into it and extract a weapon. The men approaching from the front retrieved it. Radway continued to sit, her footrest now lowered and her body leaning toward the screen, as the men picked up the lifeless body and made their way to the exit. She winced as the silent video displayed the men firing into the crowd and several bodies dropped. In her mind, she could hear the screams of the wounded people. The dark-clothed men then departed through the front door with the blood-soaked teen's body and disappeared from sight.
Radway turned off the television. Taking a deep breath, she picked up her phone and dialed. She was fully awake now. She needed to talk to someone. This may be an event from thousands of kilometers away, but the horror of it required an outlet of some kind. Her foot tapped impatiently as she waited through the series of rings.
"Hello?"
"Hi, Nicola? It's Robyn. Have you seen the news from America? At the airport in Washington? Can we get together for a drink and talk about it?"
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19 September 1999
Isle of Skye, Scotland
It was the wetness that brought her back to reality. A cold wetness that dripped steadily onto her face.
O'Banian opened her eyes to heavy mist and rain. She had tried to stay awake, but finally exhaustion had taken over and she had fallen into a troubled sleep. She sat up, eyes scanning the horizon. A horizon that was only ten feet in front of her. After that there was only misty greyness.
She could smell the smoke, but she couldn't see the church, the fog obscuring it completely.
Well, if I can't see them, at least the bastards can't see me, she mused. Her stomach rumbled in hunger and she wished she had grabbed something from the cupboard to bring with her.
She sat all day in the fog, waiting for it to lift. It didn't. O'Banian began to get nervous when darkness once again descended. The mists up here could last for days, weeks even. Cold and starvation couldn't kill her, not completely, but it could make life a living hell. The damp cold penetrated her to the bone and she shivered uncontrollably.
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O'Banian revived with a gasp, sitting straight up, breath deep and shuddery. She'd tried to stay awake, stay alive, but somewhere around four thirty, hypothermia had set in and she had fallen asleep. Soon after, her heartbeat slowed until it stopped completely. She didn't resuscitate until the sun was high and warmed her body.
The day was clear, the mist of yesterday forgotten. Using her binoculars, her first glance at the burned out ruin that had once been her home told her the Hunters had left. Then her eye caught a slight movement along the church's southwest corner. Someone was still there, waiting for her to return.
"Yer about to be disappointed, ye bastard," she croaked. She forced her body to move, grabbing the carryall and her sword. Quickly she skirted round, keeping low to the ground and taking cover behind hedgerows and rocks where she could. Finally, she was level with the south wall of the church. There wasn't one of them but two, sitting on the ground, their backs against the cool stone of the church wall.
O'Banian narrowed her eyes and scanned the terrain. It would be tricky, but if she moved slowly and kept low she would be fine. A large outcrop of rock sat straight across from the two men. It would make a perfect shelter. She dropped her sword and her carryall, removing only what she would need. Then she moved.
An hour later, she was safely tucked in along the top of a low cliff. She was still two hundred or so meters away, but she looked down on them, and that would help. O'Banian scrabbled along the top of the cliff, staying as low to the ground as she could. She reached the lip of the precipice, bringing the carbine up from her side and resting it on the rock. She narrowed one eye, taking aim and carefully releasing the safety. She took three deep breaths, steadying her heartbeat. Her finger slowly squeezed the trigger.
The man on the right went first, the bullet hitting him square between the eyes. His partner started in horror, then jumped to his feet and turned, eyes frantically scanning the rock formation in front of him. O'Banian took careful aim again and fired.
The first shot caught him in the shoulder, the second in the leg. The man dropped like a rock, his hand covering his knee, his mouth open in high-pitched scream that was half pain, half fear.
O'Banian rolled to her back, the Mini-14 crossways across her body. Her heart thundered in her chest and her mind raced. She had thought never to do this again. Not like this. As much as it sickened her to acknowledge it - she had missed it.
She pulled herself up, warily coming down from the cliff; her eyes firmly set on the man writhing in pain on the grass beside the church. She hadn't missed with either shot. She had intended to kill one, severely injure the other. She wanted to find out who had sent them.
.357 Magnum in hand, she cautiously walked up to the man. Sweat beaded his forehead and his breath was raspy and ragged. He stared up at her, trying not to cringe.
O'Banian gave him a swift kick in the injured knee, smiling coldly at his cry of pain. She kicked him again, this time in the belly, watching him curl up like a child, groaning.
"Tough day at the office?" she spat. The toe of her hiking boot made contact with his neck, forcing his body straight, his head back onto the grass. Then she placed one foot on his chest, leaning her weight on it and balancing the gun on her knee, loosely pointed at his head.
"What's yer name?" she asked casually.
The man stared up at her, but made no answer.
O'Banian sighed and studied the horizon for a brief moment, then turned her attention back to the Hunter. "Unless you've got a damn good union, you don't get extra pay fer being dead. And if yer thinking that you might be like me," she smiled. "Let me assure you, you aren't. Fer you, dead is most definitely dead." Her eye caught a slight movement of the man's left hand. A brief second later the hand was lying useless by his side and he was sobbing in agony. The knife he'd try to pull from a pocket lay nearby.
O'Banian pressed her foot firmly down on his chest, fixing the gun muzzle inches from the man's face. "I believe I asked you a fucking question, and if you don't want to find your brains sprayed across the beautiful landscape of Skye, I suggest you answer it.
"Dixon," he gasped. "Andrew Dixon."
O'Banian smiled coldly. "Well, Andrew Dixon, I want to know who sent you? Who's the bastard behind this?"
"I don't know. I just know we got orders - to take your head." He stared up at her pleadingly. "Please, I have a wife. I have a child."
O'Banian scowled, weighing up the situation. "A wife and child, huh? That's…nice. And I suppose you have a nice house, too?"
Dixon nodded mutely.
The Immortal sighed and shook her head. "I used to have a nice house…'til you fucking burnt it to the ground!" She pulled back the hammer on the gun. Dixon began to whimper.
"I have a wife. A little boy. He's three mo…"
The last word of Andrew Dixon's mortal life died on his lips, the bullet neatly placed between his two blue eyes.
"How very nice for you, Andrew."
O'Banian stepped back, eyes flat and cold. Her hands swept the Hunter's still warm body, finally finding the keys to the car in his pants pocket. She took his wallet and that of the other man, whose credit cards identified him as Roy Hardley.
She retrieved her bag and her sword from the hill. Then, without a backward glance, she let herself into Hardley's car and drove off.
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22 Sep 1999
Armagh, Ireland
"Hé, Razumov. Neem deze nieuwe batterij voor een schiethamer mee naar Nils op het vijfde niveau, wil je?" (Hey, Razumov. Take this new battery for a nail gun up to Nils on the fifth level, would you?) MacNaughton grinned at Razumov as the man formulated a response to his question. There was no preset answer. It was purely contextual, based on the conversation they were having.
"Wacht," (Wait,) Razumov said. "Deze batterij is voor een Paslode. Nils gebruikt een Hitachi." (Wait. This battery is for a Paslode. Nils is using a Hitachi.)
MacNaughton's grin blossomed into a full-blown smile as he switched back to English. "Very good. You remembered all of the details from earlier and incorporated them correctly into your reply. Excellent."
Razumov chuckled and scratched his head nervously. "I thought there might be a little trap in your question. That's why I thought about it for a second. It seemed so obvious after some contemplation." Razumov returned MacNaughton's smile. "I am so grateful for the conversational help you have given me over these last two weeks. It has been most beneficial."
MacNaughton laughed. "My pleasure. And I am amazed at the progress you have made in the language in such a short time. You are already speaking it incredibly well. At this rate, you'll be talking like a native in just a few more weeks."
With another snort of laughter, Razumov said, "I've always had a skill with languages when I actually apply myself to them. I just need the right motivation for it. The desire to eat can be a strong motivation."
MacNaughton threw his head back, letting his own laugh flow unabated. "That it can," he replied as his phone started to ring. "You are quite correct." He reached for the jinggling phone.
"Hello?" he said. He listened briefly. "Siobhan? What's happened?" He frowned.
With a glance at Razumov, he stood. "Yes, Marton is still here, as well. He's safe." Another pause. "Of course, we can. Just say where." He waited again. "That won't be a problem. I have a place in Glencoe. Would that work? Okay, here's the address."
Razumov gave the Scotsman an inquiring look as he rattled off an address into the handset. He remained silent, though, waiting.
"We'll be there in two days," said MacNaughton. "I'll call on some others who are trustworthy, if that's okay. Good. Who else have you called?" More waiting. "That's good. Stay safe, Siobhan. Goodbye." He hung up.
"What happened?" asked Razumov, his curiosity being vented before his host could even sit again.
MacNaughton ran a hand through his dark hair and sat on the couch with a sigh. He immediately stood again and walked over to the small bar across the room.
"Drink?" he inquired. "I'm having bourbon. Neat. A triple."
"Sure. Same, please."
MacNaughton poured the beverages into crystal tumblers and brought them back. Handing one to the Russian, he sat again. He took a long pull on his own liquor and let it slide down his throat before replying to his guest's original question.
"Some mortals attacked Siobhan at her home on Skye a few days ago. They had guns and set fire to her converted church. They then waited for her to come running out. She went out a different way and came up behind them. She killed two of them and got information on who sent them. She says they are from a group that seeks to destroy all Immortals. She wants to meet with some dependable Immortals and discuss her plans to counter them. She's called several others besides me and I'm going to call a few myself. I suggested we meet at my home in Glencoe. She agreed and we'll meet there in two days."
"My God," said Razumov. "It's just like what happened to me in Canada." He gulped his bourbon and sighed. A shiver ran through him.
"It looks that way," agreed MacNaughton. "Someone is trying to kill us all. If I know Siobhan, she wants to kill some of them first."
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MacNaughton spent the next two hours compiling and editing a list of Immortals he knew whom he thought would be worthwhile additions to O'Banian's likely cause. He started with a list of nineteen but, for one reason or another, mostly the fact that many of them he suspected would not be able to sync with O'Banian's personality, he crossed off eleven of them. He finally had eight names remaining: Darmond Bilsby, Karl Eichmann, Dasmius Mikal, Ruth Okin, Julia Palmer, Hewett Penn, Aaron Pittmann, and Sergei Tuppanokovich. He picked up his address book and thumbed through it, wondering how many of his phone numbers were still accurate.
Darmond Bilsby sounded bored when he answered the phone. He probably was. MacNaughton carried on a conversation with him for several minutes before coming to his point. Bilsby was intrigued particularly since he made no effort to keep up with current events. MacNaughton apologized when the man pressed for more details about what O'Banian's intent would be, saying he did not know. Bilsby readily agreed to meet with the other Immortals in Glencoe nonetheless.
Eichmann's was a good number, as well. He picked up on the third ring. The German seemed open to MacNaughton's proposal, even with the scant details provided to him, and said he would be available in a few days, but could not make the meeting on the twenty-fourth. MacNaughton promised to keep him updated.
Mikal agreed to come right away and MacNaughton moved on to Ruth Okin. He was surprised to learn she was already aware of the problem. She was in Paris with another Immortal named Omeir Faaris. She agreed to come anyway. MacNaughton asked if her friend would accompany her. He said he was interested, but would await details from Okin. MacNaughton was fine with that. He continued with his list.
Julia Palmer did not answer any of her phone numbers. MacNaughton was concerned over this and wondered if this meant the mortals in question had already gotten to her. He made a note to check the news reports for mention of any of her current aliases and moved on. He left a message for Hewett Penn and called Aaron Pittmann next. It did not take much convincing to elicit a promise of attendance from the man. MacNaughton gave him the address, put a check by his name, and hung up.
His phone rang immediately. It was Penn. MacNaughton gave him a précis of the reason for his call. Penn thought about it only briefly before agreeing to come to the meeting. MacNaughton thanked him. He then dialed Sergei Tuppanokovich. The Russian answered after four rings, his deep voice resounding over the line. MacNaughton spoke cheerfully but professionally to him, giving him all the necessary details. Tuppanokovich grunted in response, thinking. After ten seconds of silence, he asked, like Eichmann, for MacNaughton to keep him informed of developments. He had to wrap up a few responsibilities at home before he travelled west to assist his Scottish friend. MacNaughton promised he would do so.
Hanging up, MacNaughton tried all of the numbers for Julia Palmer one more time. He got the same result as before. No answer. He set the phone down and went to his computer. A quick search of recent news quickly brought up the name Alexa Torrence, one of her preferred aliases. Her headless body had been found in Auchavan, England nine days ago. MacNaughton spat a curse and crossed her name from the list.
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22 September 1999
Paris, France
David Ashton sat at his laptop computer, his fingers flying over its keyboard. The To field of the message contained the personal email addresses of fourteen Immortals he believed would be assets in the coming campaign against the Hunters. He checked each name again, just to be sure. Turan Abjer, Dominic Ackart, Hotsuma Bentenrai, Jonas Cartell, Eric Doyle, Darren Dublin, Jennifer Ellis, Jacob Forrester, Wallace Frazier, Winter Kjellson, Joseph Madsen, Chris Pellier, James Pellier, and Dalla Selbjorgsdottir.
The Minoan nodded to himself. Each of these men and women were proven to be resourceful and skilled in the abilities that would be needed in the effort to come. The Copy Furnished line contained the addresses of Lawrence Channing, Paderau Griffin, Maximillian Honnecker, Jasper Marion, Viktor Petrov, Payton Swift, and Charles Ulrich.
Ashton counted the names. Twenty-one in total, twenty-two counting himself. It was hardly enough to mount a counteroffensive against a faceless enemy of unknown size and scope. He sighed. It would have to do as a start, at least. He knew a few others he could contact, mortals, who could assist, as well. He did not like the idea of risking mortal lives. They were much more fragile than Immortals. It might come to that, though. He began to write.
All,
As some of you may already be aware, a serious threat to the continued existence of Immortals has arisen in Europe and also, to a more limited extent, in North America. This threat stems from a shadow organization known as the Watchers - whose mission is to track and record the lives of Immortals - and is in the form of a rogue element of that organization, a splinter cell known as Hunters. These Hunters, being Watchers themselves and having full knowledge of our identities, are seeking us out, ambushing us wherever they find us - even on holy ground - and taking our heads. Part of their standard practice is to always take our heads in a manner so that other Immortals are not present and the Quickenings are lost forever.
Thus far, in the past five weeks, based on the news reports available, we have been able to ascertain that at least one hundred Immortals have been killed in the manner in Europe alone. As you can imagine, this constitutes a serious peril for us and demands immediate action. I write to you today to request your personal presence to discuss plans for that action.
I will be hosting this meeting in conference room two on the third of October at the Winchester Royal Hotel. There are rooms for all of you already reserved. I have paid all costs of the rooms and meals in advance for you, as well. You need only to get here. The reservation is under the name McEntyre. The address is Saint Peter Street, Winchester SO23 8BS, UK. The number to RSVP your reservation is +44 330 107 2242.
There are extra rooms available, if needed. If you know other trustworthy individuals who may be beneficial in the effort, please pass this message on to them. For any responses for more information, please hit "reply all" so that all may benefit from those replies.
Thank you in advance,
David Ashton
It was a short message, but full of critical intent. Ashton reviewed it once to make sure he had not missed any important point. He noticed nothing out of sorts. As he hit Send on the email, he wondered how many of these friends of his would show up to help and, of those, how many of them would still be alive when it was all over.
.
