Chapter 15

Years had passed since Oswald Cobblepot had decided to leave that rundown old farm that sat like an ignored dog a few miles outside of Gotham. He had trudged through the night to catch a bus back to the city, having missed the one that always stopped close to Cassandra's house. He had not paid attention to the other bus that went by him on the other side of that lonely road as it sped away from Gotham and into the swampy, rural area that lay just outside its borders. On that bus was an elderly gentleman who knew where he was going and was steadfast in his purpose.

When the bus slowed down and made that familiar gasping noise, almost like a whale sneezing, Nicholas Sokol disembarked with the noted intent of finding lodging at a particular residence—the one from which Oswald had just made his heart-rendering escape. This new visitor had no mind of Oswald's short presence at the homestead, but would have found the news interesting if he had known.

That was ten years ago.

Now the same said gentleman stared down at a burning convent from his perch in what had to be the smelliest hotel in Gotham, except for of course the Powers and Orchard hotels. At this moment, they were the rankest smelling places in Gotham, but he would bet money that this place was a close second.

Nicholas would joke with his granddaughters later, telling them that even the cockroaches picked up their crumbs and left. Might be a good thing for The Court to do as well, he mused. Back off. At least lay low.

Am I being paranoid? He was unsettled. Something did not seem right. Did the little firebird lay flame to her temporary shelter?

He sighed heavily. Sometimes Nicholas wished they just could blend back into the shadows for a while. Become a grim fairy tale. Convince the ignorance masses that they were only a legend. Remain a poem meant to scare misbehaving children.

A black vehicle pulled up, and he watched Oswald Cobblepot step out of it. Nicholas froze. The man was supposed to be dead, but instead he is across the street waving his arms around like a fanatical bird. Cassandra was with him. Nicholas did not know whether to be bat-shit scared or highly impressed. He settled on both. Nobody escapes the claws of Sebastian Clark but, somehow, this pipsqueak did.

The youngster below is stirred up, he thought. More than stirred up. Out for vengeance. This is getting out of hand. It is not supposed to be this hard to kill a penguin. This nunnery fire was no accident, and he guessed the purpose. Cobblepot knew where Cassandra had been before they did. Now the crippled man had her all to himself, before they deemed her ready. Still, it had been ten years. If the training of their latest protégé proved to be pissant and the memory-reducing drug did not work by now, would it ever?

Someone should have guessed that at some point—that there were unexplained complications, judging by the electrum in her system that was working overtime. It was not like they did not know it from the start—from the moment that Dulchamer had her—that her healing capacities where stronger than normal. Well, normal for a person like her. Someone should have realized that and made adjustments, found out why, in case there were other recruits running around with the same . . . problem. Yes, someone should have been on top of that.

Someone like Sebastian Clark.

But Sebastian was too busy being obsessed with this quest against Cobblepot and Cassandra's ancestors. It was true—their families were enemies of The Court, and nothing is more fun than torturing and devouring ones enemies, but this had gone on long enough and was circumventing their original purpose.

The rumblings within the ranks were growing louder, fiercer—and not just where Sebastian's special project was concerned. Many were displeased with the progress, or lack thereof, of reclaiming Gotham outright—the prelude to coming out of the dark worldwide. They wanted to make their existence known, tired of hiding in the shadows. It was their right after all—to reign over the lesser beings, these mortals.

Sebastian was taking too long.

The man looked in the mirror and rubbed his gray whiskers. I wonder if I will live long enough to see total domination. Probably not if Sebastian continues to move towards their goal like a snail on Benadryl. He even started to wonder if Sebastian was treasonous—if the lead owl believed the words his dearly departed father had written long ago and had formed into a book—now lost.

The idea of the young John Wycliffe leading The Court was growing sweeter by the moment. He was certainly ambitious enough.

Nicholas turned on the TV set and adjusted the rabbit ears. Who was the genius that started calling them rabbit ears? They look more like the feelers of a bug. Not cute and fluffy (and tasty!) like a bunny, but skinny and creepy like an insect.

He moved them back and forth until the picture sharpened. He wanted to see what the news was saying about the fire. He could see the reporter and her cameraman below. It was that blond woman-Amanda Becker. She always got way too excited about disaster and mayhem. Made her eyes sparkle. He liked that quality in a woman. Not to mention she was damn cute. He looked in the mirror again. Too bad he looked old enough to be her great-grandfather.

He had liked Cassandra too. She had been kind to him when he had shown up so late at night on her doorstep. That she was up at that hour surprised him. He had resolved to camp out on the porch until morning, but there she was, awake! What stumped him more was that the whole house was milling around, all bleary eyed and frazzle haired. The atmosphere was sullen.

A room had just been vacated and it was his if he wanted it, the man with the oxygen tank had told him. Then he seemed to go into cardiac arrest.

It had been a long and dreadful night, but after that, the time had been good, pleasant. Cheery even, except for that Jeb Green, who even Nicholas did not like. He wondered what had happened to him. Just disappeared one day, said the papers. Good riddance. No loss to the world.

Not that he should care about the world. Unless it concerned him. Or The Court.

Except . . . He drummed his fingers upon the windowsill. He had liked Cassandra, as one would have affection for a lamb that had been raised for slaughter. He had felt a twinge of guilt back then, knowing he was about to turn the spotlight upon her for The Court to see, especially after the death of her uncle.

But it had to be done. She would be nourishment for many generations of owls to come, and would help in vindicating those who had already passed. She would join others like herself in overtaking the city, the world—and, as an added bonus to her free training and upkeep—if any of the owls deemed it so—she would live as a pampered pet amongst them. If she behaved.

Besides, the Anders line owed them.

It would work out for all in the end. Well, most all. Not the peasants. But that is to be expected. Why should it be any other way? The very thought was absurd.

The snooping he had done around the farmhouse, flipping through photo albums believed hidden. Questions had been asked of the tenants and those living in the township. The way the young woman manipulated various brass contraptions in the same manner of her father. Spying on her when she played with fire, thinking she was alone. She wore gardenias in her hair the way her mother had done.

The farmhouse was a beacon and The Court was a ship. Or in this case a blimp.

She had been all too willing to burn down the place after his suggestion. Of course, he was taking too much credit. Cassandra would have probably—and had probably—thought about doing that on her own. She had just needed a little encouragement and he was happy to give it to her on his last night as a tenant at the farm. If only he could have framed her work and displayed it in the Musée du Louvre.

He watched the TV screen and shook his head. More firetrucks showed up.

It would have been better for her if she had just died in the blaze with her parents, or had accidentally gotten trapped in the flames of her beautiful piece of arson.

He remembered them—Cassandra's parents. He had visited the circus not long before the tragedy occurred. To this day, Nicholas was convinced that someone had overheard him talking to Haly in the elephants' quarters, but the two of them had not seen anyone.

The woman on the tellie was suddenly interrupted as the anchor cut in to inform his audience that another breaking story was coming out of Gotham. Sebastian Clark had gone missing as well as three prominent business leaders. Isabella Nikolaev was on the scene at the Orchard Hotel. Nicholas leaned forward to get a better look at her.

She had red hair, which was quite striking against her dark olive complexion and forest green suit. Spitting image of Rita Hayworth, but with a really dark tan. He was intrigued. She was gorgeous! If only she wasn't wearing a wedding band. Not that he had a chance anyway.

"Thank you, Skip. As you can see, I am standing outside the Orchard Hotel—a resort that has recently come under fire as being uninhabitable, as well as its sibling establishment the Powers Hotel. A search of the CEO's penthouse at what is the now condemned Orchard Hotel indicated that there had been a dinner party for at least eight people, but no one was there when the police arrived at the apartment. When asked how they knew that something was amiss, the GCPD said an early morning anonymous tip had lead them to the scene. They are collecting evidence and retrieving the security tapes from the hotel . . . As. We. Speak. Right now they are treating it as a missing person case."

"Don't you mean, 'missing persons', Isabella?" asked the anchor. He liked to think he was in charge.

"Sorry, Skip, that's right—missing persons." Isabella made it look like she had messed up on purpose. Made it seem that it was so much more theatrical to emphasis again that several people were simply gone. Poof. Vanished into thin air. Half of them unidentified.

Also, Skip was a jerk.

Nicholas laughed at the term "missing persons". Well, she's half right, he thought. But WE have evolved.

"The police are not releasing the names of the other three until family members have been interviewed." She paused for dramatic effect. "Skip, the names of the other four persons who are missing have not been discovered yet, and there are no recent missing persons reports as of this moment. We will keep the citizens of Gotham City updated. This is Isabella Nikolaev coming to you live from the Orchard Hotel. Skip (you asshole), back to you."

Huh, thought the gentleman. Missing, you say? He walked back over to the window and peered down. Cassandra was being lead back to Cobblepot's car and they were getting inside. Sebastian had planned a special meeting for the young man and, obviously, it did not go as planned. Now our great leader is missing.

Jeb Green was missing.

After being sent to threaten Cobblepot ten years ago, Tawny had gone missing too. The last time he had seen her was at a Christmas party at Mooney's place. Then Fish had gone missing.

Twice.

He did not want to go missing.

Nicholas turned off the television and was about to exit the room when the phone rang. He traced his steps to the window and saw that Cobblepot's vehicle was gone and hesitated about answering the phone.

What if it's him? What if he has found me? When it stopped ringing, he breathed a sigh of relief. He was getting too old for this. When his cellphone rang, he nearly came out of his skin.

"Nicholas, get back here now. I suppose you've seen the news." The person on the other end of the line did not give him time to respond. "Sebastian is with us now and we are tending to him. Cobblepot tried to kill him with poison, but did not succeed. Luckily. Sebastian managed to call us just in time to save him." There was a moment of silence. "Cobblepot did kill the others. They're dead. We have their bodies."

Nicholas felt his gut twist. He was kind of hoping Sebastian was dead. He also wondered how they were going to spin the disappearances of the three business leaders. That is, if they were to remain dead.

"Are you going to deliver the others to Strange?" There was a pause. Then a click.

Nicholas snapped his phone shut and bolted from the hotel. He thought now would be a good time to become a missing person after all.