Chapter 6 Winter Solstice
December 2012. West Keep, Kansas
The scrape of shovels and the soft thuds of the removed snow echoed off the curtain wall as Dean walked down the cleared path between the two towers. Wrapped from head to foot in whatever spare winter clothing Alex, Maria and Jeff had been able to come up with, the shovellers were anonymous, standing aside as he moved past, resuming the widening of the path when he'd gone. They'd had twelve inches of snow last night, and in the closed-in baileys, it had drifted well over head-height, the bitter cold freezing the mounds as their weight pushed the air out.
The tunnel between the two keeps was at least a couple of degrees warmer, sloppy with slush and loud with the sound of trickling water escaping from the churned up snow and mud down through the wide drains that led out to the fields beyond the walls. Still cold enough for his breath to be icy in his lungs, he thought cheerlessly, splashing across a drain and emerging into the frigid air of the east courtyard.
Each one of the four enclosed baileys, dividing the defences between the two keeps, was large, almost a thousand feet long and slightly over half that in width. Another group of anonymous people shovelled the path on this side as well, making throughways from the keep to the tunnel, and to the buildings that lined the high walls.
"Franklin!" Dean grunted through the frozen-over collar pulled up around his face as he stomped his feet in the entrance of the ex-soldier's building. "You in there?"
"Here," Franklin roared out from the back. "Come all the way back."
Behind the vehicles parked in the entrance, and the walls of shelving and racks of tools, the interior had been divided into several big workshops, all high-ceilinged and well-ventilated for the work Franklin did there.
Two metal drums were cherry-red with heat, and the relative warmth of the workshop made Dean's eyes water and his nose run as he walked to the benches that lined the back wall.
"What have we got that's going to get through this?" Dean asked without preamble, putting his back to the nearer of the open drum fires.
Franklin glanced around at him, setting down the fine callipers and shaking his head. "Not much," he said doubtfully. "You still thinking of going down to McAlester?"
"We have to," Dean said, looking with interest at the bench top and the casings that Franklin was working on. "We need those vehicles. And a lot more artillery if Chuck's vision is right."
"Well, you're in luck so far as the susvees are concerned. I know McAlester kept at least four of them to send up to Alaska as replacements for the Haggslunds. You should be able to get a reasonable load in them, and they'll bring you home okay."
"And getting there?"
"With the freeze, there'll be a lot of ice," he said with a sniff. "Take the Jeep. You'll get five into it, and one of 'em can bring it back. It's high enough to get over most problems, four-wheel drive and has plenty of weight. You'll need to shovel your way through any drifts anyhow. Tell Connor to set you up – we got snow tyres and the heavy chains in the shop, ready to go."
"Thanks," Dean said, his expression souring a little at the thought of shovelling their way down to Ohio. So-called leader of the free world and he was still digging. "Anything we're especially low on?"
"Mines," Franklin said, turning back to the bench. "Anything we can set off remotely would be good, no pressure mines – and tell Ryan we need new lookout towers in the forests to the north and west asap, the ones they built six months ago are already too low for the tree growth."
"Yeah, okay," Dean said, turning away.
"Dean," Franklin said, looking over his shoulder at the younger man. "You talked to Jackson or Riley about this weather?"
"No. Why?"
"Might be nothing." Franklin shrugged. "Just seems like a big fall for this early. Jackson's been around here a long time, thought he might have an opinion."
Dean looked at him, a faint frown drawing his brows together. "On a freak snowstorm? We had a few big ones in Michigan last year, Franklin."
"Yeah," the older man agreed, his expression dour. "That bothered me then as well."
"I'll talk to them," Dean said, not sure what he was going to ask the farmers.
"Good." Franklin shivered slightly as he turned back to the bench.
The bedroom was in darkness, the fire nothing but coals and slowly rising curls of smoke in the hearth when Dean came in. He looked at the drawn curtains and the still hump under the bedcovers and walked around the bed.
"Hey."
Reaching out, he laid a hand lightly on Alex's shoulder. It was mid-afternoon and he'd spent almost an hour searching the keep for her.
"Alex?"
"Mm-hmmm?" She rolled over, looking at him through half-closed eyes. "What is it?"
"You okay?"
She opened her eyes a little wider and he watched her gaze flick to the clock beside the bed. "Yeah, just didn't get a good night's sleep."
He'd been up late the previous night, and hadn't noticed that she'd had trouble sleeping. In fact, she'd been so deeply asleep when he'd finally made it to the bed they shared that she hadn't stirred at all.
"You're heading out now?" she asked, pushing herself upright and rubbing a hand over her eyes.
"Yeah," he said distractedly, wondering if he should be worried about her. "Taking Rufus, Nate, Toby and Jack and Billy to bring back the car."
"I guess there's no time-frame on this trip?"
"Nothing accurate," he confirmed. "I'm just hoping we're not going to be snow-shoeing it down there."
Alex yawned and shook her head. "Be careful."
He watched her eyes slip shut again. "Alex, you sure you're okay?"
"Just tired," she murmured drowsily. "That's all."
He shifted closer to her and she opened her eyes again, looking up at him.
"Did you need me to do something before you go?"
"No," he said, leaning forward and dropping a light kiss on her forehead. "No, go back to sleep."
She nodded and rolled over, away from him, and he felt a flutter in his stomach. Do you … still, he wondered? This wasn't exactly the way he'd pictured saying goodbye to her.
Getting up, he walked out of the room, closing the door behind him, the flutter still there, uncertainty making him hesitate. People get tired, he told himself forcefully, walking across the living room to the front door. Doesn't mean anything's changed. But the feeling that something had … had changed without him noticing it … lurked around the edges of his thoughts.
The Jeep was parked in front of the keep steps and he walked down to it slowly, noticing absently that everyone was there, waiting for him, chains already half-filled with snow, gleaming dully in the flat grey light.
"You okay?" Rufus said, walking around the front of the car, his eyes narrowing as he took in the darkness of Dean's eyes, the edge he could see in the tightness of the muscles around the younger man's mouth.
"Yeah," Dean said, looking at him and nodding. "Yeah, we got everything?"
"Loaded for bear," Rufus confirmed, getting into the car and watching Dean get into the driver's seat. "You get some bad news or something?"
"No." He twisted the key and the engine rumbled into life. "No."
Shrugging inwardly, Rufus pulled the map from the glove box and looked again at the twisting route they'd marked out, sticking to the landscape where drifts would be the least likely.
"You still want to bypass Wichita and Tulsa?"
"Yeah," Dean said, glancing down at the map.
He turned the wheel and sent a rooster-tail of snow spurting up behind him, the shovelled path narrower than the wheel base.
"Don't need any extra distractions for this trip."
"You're the boss," Rufus said.
Dean made a derisory noise in his throat and slowed as the gates opened with their approach.
Catacombs, Vatican City, Rome
The tunnel dipped slightly and Elena ducked her head, following Andante down the narrow stairs.
"How the hell did you come here, Peter?" she asked, bracing her hands against the walls to either side as her foot slid slightly on the moisture-slick stone steps.
"I was in Jordan," Peter said, glancing back at her. "I got to the coast and came by boat."
"Did you see Luc, at the mouth of the Tiber?"
"No, I left my boat up the coast and came to the river closer to the city," he said. "There is a canal – more of a drain, really, that leads through the lowest vaults from the river. We'll get out that way."
"You spoke to the Irin?"
He nodded, slowing as the tunnel widened. "They are looking for a trap box for the goddesses."
He held up a hand and the hunters stopped, standing silently. All of them heard the metallic rasp over the stone, echoing softly in the rock tunnel.
Peter stepped soundlessly back up to the step to Elena, pressing his lips against her ear. "I found the body of a vermithrax in upper catacombs," he breathed. "And traces of others."
She turned her head so that her mouth was next to his ear. "Young?"
He nodded once. "Six, possibly more. There was a nest under the libraries. The shell fragments were recent."
Elena's breath gusted out. "We carry mirrors, but they're small –"
"So far as I can tell them, they're keeping to these two levels," Peter said, his breath warm against her skin. "I didn't see them coming up, but I could hear them. Their sight is bad, taste and smell and hearing are much stronger. We might be able to get through unseen. If we're careful."
She tapped his shoulder twice to let him know she'd understood, and turned to lean close to Isabeau, telling the young woman what Peter had told her.
The sound had gone and they crept down the stairs, waiting by the wider tunnel opening for five minutes before crossing the junction and heading down again.
US 177 S, Oklahoma
The hilly ground began to flatten out and Dean turned his head, feeling the stiffness in his shoulders and back, the vibration through the wheel from the chains over the buried concrete making driving a bitch of a job. Snow-goggles covered his eyes, cutting the glare from the unrelenting white blanket that covered everything as far as he could see. He slowed as he saw the faint mauve shadow at the base of a drift ahead of them, hearing the muttered complaints from the backseat with a slight grin. It was the fifteenth they'd had to dig through in the last four hours.
The Jeep came to a stop and Billy, Jack and Nate climbed out, yanking the wide-bladed snow shovels from the back and spreading out as they walked up to the base of the drift in front of the car.
Rufus leaned back, pulling a small flask from his jacket pocket and unscrewing it. He swallowed a mouthful and offered it to Dean.
"Haven't seen a fall like this in long time," he remarked, looking around as Dean tipped the flask up and let the whiskey run down his throat, leaving a warm blaze in his stomach. "Not since '67. And not in December, man. February, March, maybe but no way December in Okie."
Dean looked at him. "You sound like Jackson."
The back of his neck prickled suddenly, and he straightened in the seat, looking around, his hand reaching for the door-handle automatically.
"What?"
"Ssh." He pushed the door open, pulling the rifle from the sling on the door, scanning the featureless white mounds and hollows around them.
On the other side of the car, Rufus reached under the dash and pulled out his shotgun, opening his door and stepping out, the barrel of the gun raised.
"What?" he asked Dean again.
"I don't know," Dean said shortly, glancing at the three men working furiously with the shovels ahead of him.
The movement was very slight, but his peripheral vision caught it anyway and he turned his head sharply to look at the deeper shadow beneath the upturned, snow-covered wreck forty yards from the road, separating shadow from shape, and colour from colour. The huge blunt head became obvious a second before the big cat leapt out from behind the snowbank, his shout and its guttural snarl tangled.
Billy was the closest and he turned, the shovel in his hands rising sharply and instinctively. The load of snow it held hit the tiger in the face a second before it knocked him down.
"Get clear!" Dean roared at Jack and Nate, both men diving and rolling to the other side of the road, giving both shooters a clear field. Ignoring Billy's wretched scream, Dean put the first shot into the thick neck behind the ear, lifting the rifle to shoulder-height as he heard the concussive retort of the shotgun. The tiger turned, snarling furiously and leapt for Dean as he worked the bolt. Rufus' spray hit the ribs, barely able to expand at the range and knocking the animal sideways. Dean jumped clear, backing to the end of the Jeep to draw it further from Billy. Standing three and a half feet at the shoulder, the cat was huge, and he watched it respectfully as it rolled to its feet, yellow-gold eyes fixed on him.
"Dean!"
"I got it," he shouted back at Rufus. "Get Billy."
"Christ, no!" Nate yelled. "Behind you!"
Dean heard the crunch and squeak of the snow and dropped instantly, rolling under the Jeep, the flash of thick, striped white fur filling his vision as a second Siberian crouched and swiped a paw under the vehicle. He heard Rufus shooting, the pump action blasting shot after shot at one or the other of the animals, the sharp yap-yap of Nate's automatic and the frenzied growls of the tigers as they kept their focus on getting him. He saw one twisting away from the side of the car, paws crunching on the snow as it came around the rear and swore, scrambling out from under the chassis and reaching up for the door. Swinging it open, he saw the head clear the back corner, jacknifing up and throwing himself inside as the cat accelerated, the door slammed shut and the high-pitched screak of the long claws setting his teeth on edge as they skated down the metal.
On the other side, the smaller of the two tigers was lying on its side, flanks rising and falling rapidly, a dozen red-rimmed holes down the length of the long, powerful body. His head snapped back as he felt the Jeep rock, seeing the male on its hind feet now, thick white belly fur filling the passenger side window completely and claws scrabbling for a hold across the metal roof.
He felt them catch on something, felt the car tilt and rock and he threw himself across to the driver's side to get more weight there as the tiger's muscles bunched under the thick pelt and the Jeep listed to the side, the driver's side wheels lifting off the ground. The snarling escalated into a full-throated roar as Rufus and Nate shot at it, then the animal fell backwards, off the road's shoulder, and its weight dragged the car over the edge and down the bank.
Bracing himself, Dean heard the crunch as the Jeep landed on top of the tiger, sliding down the steep slope on its side with the animal dragged underneath. He flicked the safety on the rifle and jammed a hand against the roof, hoping there were no trees or boulders along the way likely to punch through the metal skin and impale him as the car careened down the slope, his jaw clenching with each of the bangs and jarring jerks until it stopped, half-canted onto its roof at the bottom.
"Dean!"
He picked up the rifle and forced the driver's door open, looking at the bloody trail the Jeep had left of the tiger as it had come down from the road.
"Okay!" he shouted back, waving his gun as he climbed out of the doorframe and jumped the six foot drop to the side of the slope. He looked back at the Jeep, which was more or less intact, except for the two wheels that had taken the brunt of the slide and fall. Both were bent in directions that were not usually possible for the car. He sighed, and turned to climb back up the bank.
"What the fuck?" he asked Rufus as the older hunter extended a hand and pulled him the last couple of feet.
"Siberian," Rufus offered unhelpfully. "Must have gotten free from a private or public zoo sometime."
"So now we got exotic carnivores as well as our usual ones?"
"Looks like," Rufus said with a shrug. "Good news is that they're territorial, so we're not likely to run into more here at the moment."
"How's Billy?" Dean walked fast to Nate, kneeling beside the boy in the snow.
"Not good," Nate said. "Jack, take the gun and get down to the Jeep and get the kit."
Dean dropped to his knees next to the other man, looking at the deep claw gouges that ran from under the collarbone on the left side to the hip on the right, seeing the cartilage over the ribs through the shredded flesh, the purplish-pink gleam of internal organs through the horrific rents in the skin and muscle of the boy's abdomen. He didn't need to be told that the animal's claws had probably deposited a crap-load of debris inside the boy, that the wounds would be impossible to clean out and keep clean, or to keep still, with what they had with them. Billy was twenty-two, strong and fit and healthy. Those were the only advantages he had going for him.
"We're going on foot from here," he told Nate and Rufus quietly. "Jeep's not fixable."
Nate looked down at the boy and nodded. "Need a travois."
"Yeah," Dean agreed. "Rufus, get the axes, take Nate and see if you can find a couple of saplings. We can use the sleeping bags for the sling. Snowshoes are in the back."
Rufus nodded and turned away, passing Jack as he struggled up the bank with the medical kit.
"Is he going to be okay?" Jack looked down at the mess of his friend's abdomen, his face screwing up as he took in the injuries.
"You're the paramedic," Dean said tiredly. "We'll do our best."
Nate got to his feet, following Rufus down the bank to the car.
"Those were tigers, right?" Jack said, his face hardening as he pulled on gloves and took scissors from the kit, starting to cut away Billy's clothing.
"Yep."
"And we're in Oklahoma, right?"
Dean's mouth quirked a little. "Yep. Something to look forward to."
"Zoos?"
"Or private owners, I guess."
"I need you to help, keep him completely still and straight," Jack said. Dean nodded and moved around to the other side of Billy, setting his hands over the boy's arms just above the elbows.
Jack looked up at him. "I can't get in there to clean this out," he warned the other man. "I'm gonna pull out what I can see, flush it out with the saline as much as I can and then pour the alcohol over it."
Dean nodded again, knowing what to expect. Once the wounds were cleaner, they'd at least be able to stitch what could be stitched and bind up the rest. In the kit there were several tubs of the thick, honey-based healing paste Oliver had made up from the order's books. That would probably help the most, he thought, tightening his hold as Jack bent over Billy and began to pull the shreds of fabric that had been driven into the wounds out.
Tawas Camp, Lake Tawas, Michigan
The wide room was warm and well-lit, the daylight fluorescents giving an even light across the examination table and work benches. Bernice frowned as she looked at the form on her clipboard.
"Sorry, Connie, when did you say was the last time you had your menses?"
"It was the last week of October," Connie said, sitting on the edge of the table comfortably. "Finished on the 29th. I remember because I was supposed to be training that night, and that's always such a pain if it's still going, but it wasn't."
Bernice nodded, making a note. "And your sexual encounters were …?"
The nurse looked up at the silence that followed the question, seeing the young woman's neck and face had turned crimson. "It's alright, dear, these are confidential files."
"It's not that," Connie said quietly. "I don't know what happened the next week, Bernice. I –"
"Why don't you tell me the dates and we'll go from there?"
"Um, yeah, well the first was the night of the 29th, then the 30th, 31st, uh … 2nd, 3rd, 5th and 6th."
Bernice noted the dates, her face expressionless. "Who was your partner?"
"Does that matter?" Connie hedged. "I mean – what's it got to do with anything?"
"Well, dear, in nine months you're going to be a mother and you'll need help – we're trying to organise a system of support –"
Connie shook her head. "Look, they were all different guys, all those dates."
"Oh," Bernice said, looking down at the form again.
"That's not – I'm not usually like that," the young woman told her defensively. "I – that week? I just couldn't – it was like – there was just no way …" Her shoulders slumped as she gave up trying to explain.
Bernie looked at her. "Don't feel badly about this, Connie. A lot of women have come in with the same problem. We'll run the blood tests when the baby comes and sort out some kind of assistance then?"
"Yeah, thanks," she said, looking away. "Are we done?"
"Yes, you can get dressed. We'll need to see you in two weeks, for the first sonogram."
"What's that for?" Her brows arched up.
"Firstly, to get a more accurate estimate of your due date, check on the baby's growth, make sure there are no problems for that stage – just routine, really," Bernice said, omitting the main worry both Meredyth and Bob had expressed.
"Can you tell the sex then?"
"No, we won't see that until you're further along."
"Oh, that's a shame," Connie said, sliding off the edge of the table and looking around for her clothes.
Bernice sighed as she closed the door behind Connie and walked through the examination room to the surgeries and offices behind it.
Meredyth looked up as she came in, brows rising at the expression on the nurse's face.
"You look disenchanted."
"I realise that I grew up in a different era to the girls of the last twenty years, but I've never seen anything like this," Bernice said, putting the clipboard down on the desk.
"It's not them, Bernice," Bob said with rueful smile. "I saw a dozen young men over at Lake West at the end of October who were worried they were turning into sex addicts."
Meredyth glanced at him. "The rest weren't?"
"Well, I didn't talk to them, but I'd guess that they thought they'd hit Paradise," Bob acknowledged wryly.
Meredyth nodded. "I talked to Jerome, the man from the library in Lebanon. He said that the effect of this … goddess … or whatever it is, is very strong. I'm not sure how much to buy into his story, but he said that she must have passed close to us that week, exacerbating the effect." She looked down at her desk. "How many have we've seen now?"
"Connie's part of the last batch," Bernice said, picking up the clipboard and flicking through the forms. "We've got another thirty to see tomorrow, and that will be all of them, at least here. Jo sent a message up from Lake West, they've tested all the women there as well."
"And the totals?"
"It's a hundred percent success rate, Meredyth," Bernice told her. "Seventeen hundred and forty-five here, twelve hundred and eighty-six in Lake West."
"Kim says the same about Kansas," Bob added.
"What are we going to do with them?"
"How many do we have in training now?" Meredyth asked.
"Just over a hundred and eighty-five here," the nurse said dryly. "But they won't be nearly ready by the time they're needed."
"No, and we need somewhere for those who are going to have problems," Bob said tiredly.
"Renee said Liev and Ryan are coming back here as soon as the roads clear. They'll get started on modifying some of our existing buildings so that we can set up wards," Bernice told him. "I already told them we needed aircraft hangers!"
East Keep, Lebanon, Kansas
Alex walked through the tunnel, feeling the cold sinking into her even through four layers of clothing, socks and thick boots. The new people brought in by Rufus and Maurice had settled into the eastern tower, and she'd been delighted to find several experienced spinners and weavers with them, setting them to work to teach anyone else who was interested. Fabric – clothing – was going to be an issue of massive proportions when the population doubled – or tripled – over the next year.
The all-too familiar pang of grief came with the thought and she pushed it aside automatically, narrowing her attention to what she had to discuss with Aileen and Murray about supplies, storage and getting more people out to the farms in the spring.
Behind the surface thoughts, the feeling persisted. She'd made her decision six months ago, knowing what the situation was, knowing that it would probably never change. Doubting him now, doubting what they had, wasn't helpful. The feelings had risen over the last month gradually, and she wasn't sure where they'd come from, or why. She didn't think anything had changed. They were both busy, so much so that the tiredness that was sucking the energy from her more and more each day, it seemed, could only be an accumulation of too many late nights and early mornings. The sudden spurts of emotion, grief or anger or a wordless, formless longing for she didn't even know what, were inexplicable but so powerful sometimes that she'd ended up spending more and more time in the apartment, unable to eat or do anything other than curl up in the bed and let it out in the dark.
The couple of inches of fresh powder squeaked under her boot soles as she came out into the southern bailey and walked faster toward the steps of the tower. It was barely nine, and she could already feel the sapping lassitude coming over her. She needed to get the decisions squared away before the ability to think clearly disappeared altogether.
The huge hall was empty when she pushed the door open and stomped her feet to loosen and shed the packed snow from her boots. She hurried through the arch to the long corridor, wondering where everyone was, slowing as she rounded the corner and saw a long line of people in front of her, the hallway packed.
"What's going on?" she asked the woman at the back of the line.
"Tests," the woman said shortly. "Been with a man once in the last six months, but we all have to have them apparently."
Alex nodded and walked down the corridor toward the keep's offices. She almost ran into Merrin as the older woman stepped out of a doorway.
"There you are," Merrin said, brows drawing together as she looked at Alex's face. "I need to talk to you."
Alex looked down at her watch. "About what? I need to see Aileen about –"
"That'll wait for a few minutes, dear, Aileen's seeing Kim right now anyway," the nurse told her and steered her into the room, ignoring the muttered protest from those waiting in the line and closing the door behind her.
"You look like hell, Alex," Merrin said bluntly as Alex turned around. "What's going on?"
Alex shrugged, shaking her head. "Just busy, same as usual."
"You look –" she cut herself off abruptly, gesturing to the padded table to one side of the room. "You haven't been tested, so we'll do that first."
"What?"
Merrin looked at her, one brow cocked. "Every woman in good health and child-bearing age, Alex – you were in the meeting."
"But –" she said, waving a hand vaguely. "No uterus, Merrin. I really don't think it applies."
The nurse gave her a sharp look. "Humour me."
Alex thought about arguing and decided it was too much effort. "Fine."
"Are you eating?"
She looked at the older woman and shrugged. "I haven't been all that hungry lately. Just tired."
"You don't look like you're getting enough sleep."
Alex snorted. "I had fifteen hours yesterday."
"Are you worried about something?"
She hesitated for a moment, then shook her head. "No, nothing in particular."
Merrin frowned at the hesitation but let it go. "Blood, urine, and I want to Kim to examine you."
"Is this really necessary?" Alex asked, looking at her watch again.
Catching the movement from the corner of her eye, the nurse smiled blandly at her. "Yes, it is. You can get undressed in here," she said, handing her a thin cotton gown. "It won't take long."
Looking at the gown, Alex sighed inwardly and began to undress.
Church Vaults, Vatican City, Rome
They moved in silence through the tunnels and down the stairs, every sense acutely attuned to the slightest noise, the slightest difference in their surroundings. Twice, Peter froze as he heard something moving through the catacombs ahead of them, moving on only when he sure that whatever it was had gone.
The vermithrax – the Thracian worm – was a creature that was similar to a basilisk, with the ability to petrify the cells of its victim with the sight of it, direct or reflected. They were snake-like, with thick, rough scales over the sides and belly and a standing crest of feathers from the back of the skull to the tip of the tail, growing to more than thirty metres and living for hundreds of years. There hadn't been a reliable reported sighting of one for more than a thousand years and most of the lore claimed they'd been exterminated from the shores of the Mediterranean Sea since the taking of Troy, but plainly the lore was wrong.
In the last junction before they crossed from the catacombs to the older ossuary that lay beneath, the young serpent took them by surprise.
Elena was looking behind her, checking to see that Francois had come through the tunnel, when she heard the metallic brush of the scales over the stone floor. She dove to the side, landing on her shoulder and lifting the small mirror in her hand, angling it to show her the uneven ground behind her. The mirror was purely to see the movement, not the creature.
"No!" Marc's roar filled the junction and she swung the mirror, catching a glimpse of him, machete drawn and swinging blindly as he strode forward with his eyes tightly shut.
"Left!" Peter yelled, his back to the man and monster, the mirror in his hand angled to the floor to avoid seeing the whole.
Elena closed her eyes and rolled over, ears straining to pinpoint location by the sounds, aware that between the hissing of the vermithrax, the harsh breathing of Marc and the others, she could barely hear the sounds well enough to get a fix on where everyone was.
"Elena, three o'clock!" Francois screamed at her, panic is his voice. She swung around and reversed the mirror, pointing it where she hoped the juvenile might be, opening her eyes a slit and looking at the floor as the monster solidified in front of her.
More than one, she thought frantically, hearing the rasp of scales over the rock. She dropped and rolled to the wall, swinging the mirror in a wide, low arc, seeing another sinuous body moving up on her flank.
Behind her there was a thud and a sound like a steam pressure pipe being relieved, and she rolled forward, eyes slitted and gaze locked to the ground as her ears gave her the locations of two of the juveniles, her sword in her hand as she stepped forward, sensing more than hearing the lunge of the nearer and turning fast, the singing of the metal through the air stopped suddenly as it bit into and through the thick neck. She swung around and lifted the point, feeling it bite into something less than two feet from her and she thrust the mirror out, dragging her sword free as the mirror caught the monster's eye and it petrified into solidity at the sight of its own reflection.
Another thump from the other side of the junction and she edged along the wall cautiously, moving the mirror so that she could see the rough rock floor to either side of her. She saw four bodies … two of them rigid statues, two lying lifeless and headless.
"Peter?"
"Can you hear the others?"
"No," he said shortly. "Francois?"
"I can't hear anything," the French hunter said from the other side of the junction. "Marc?"
There was a deeply indrawn breath from the centre of the room. "No, there were four, I think. They're dead."
"Isabeau?" Elena called.
"Elena," Marc said, his voice raw suddenly as he crossed the junction to her. "She – the serpent surprised her."
She knew what he meant, but she couldn't seem to relate that to the young woman she'd known from a baby, had trained and protected.
"What?"
"Come on," Peter said harshly. "We may mourn when we are out of here."
"No."
She felt a hand close around her arm, Marc's strength pulling her to her feet, pushing her in front of him. She threw out a hand and felt the wall beside her, letting her hand trail along it as she stumbled forward, her mind filled with memories that she couldn't push away. Jean. The man's face appeared in her mind's eye and she stopped, head dropping. Marc's arm slid around her shoulders and guiding her forward.
The tunnel that led down was much smaller than the ones they'd come through, the steps almost bowl-shaped by the passage of feet. She could smell dampness rising through the cold air and she dragged in a deep breath, locking away thought and feeling to focus on what they were here to do.
The flickering torch light led them to the lowest vaults and she noted the long, narrow boat tied to the side of the rocky ledge that divided the tombs from the canal.
"Through here," Peter said abruptly, leading them away from the canal and boat, through a narrow passage and into a much larger cavern, its walls lined with open tombs, bones gleaming in the torchlight in those carved holes. In the centre of the space, shelving and cabinets and tables stood, coated in grime and dust, their contents wrapped tightly in plastic.
"Francois, you and I will remain here, to get the loads ready and protect them," Peter said. "Elena, you and Marc take the first boatload out to the Tiber. Marc, you'll find more of these small craft near the canal entrance, bring another back while Elena takes the texts down to Luc."
"Without backup?" Marc frowned at him.
"We don't have much time," Peter snapped. "We need to take as many of these as we can. Francois will go with you and bring back a third boat while you go down river."
Elena straightened up, clearing her throat and forcing her emotions far away. "It is correct, Marc. This is why we are here."
She picked up an armload of the wrapped manuscripts nearest to her and carried them back through the passage to the boat. Marc looked after her for a moment then turned to grab a load and follow her. Peter nodded to Francois and went to the shelves.
US 270 E, Oklahoma
The landscape was eerie, shades of white and grey and pale purples, covering everything that might've provided relief, the thick, leafless woods to one side of the road, thinner saplings on the other. The squeak and crunch of the snow packing under their snowshoes and the persistent hiss of the ends of the travois were the only sounds Dean could hear in the flat, still country. Nightfall was another hour away, but he was already looking for someplace they could dig into and defend when darkness settled around them.
"You see them?" Rufus asked quietly, walking beside him.
He shook his head. "No, but I think there're more now than there were an hour ago."
The older hunter nodded, his rifle held tucked under his arm, the pack weighing heavily over his shoulders.
"We're still about twenty miles from McAlester."
Dean snorted softly. "Think there'll be anything left in any of the little towns around here?"
"Basements, maybe," Rufus shrugged. "It's not just the wildlife we got to worry about, Billy won't last long if he gets too cold and Nate and me, not in our prime anymore either."
Dean slid a sideways look at him. "You finally admitting to getting old, Rufus? Now?"
He saw the flash of the hunter's teeth in the gloomy light. "Might be."
"We'll have to stop before dusk," Dean said, chewing the corner of his lip as he thought through the best possible defences they could give themselves if they were still in the more-or-less open ground. "We'll ring the camp in fires, two watching, two off."
"Plenty of wood."
"Yeah."
The night didn't fall discernibly, but imperceptibly, moment by moment it got harder to see, to make out the road, the trees that sometimes crowded close, sometimes drew back.
Dean looked at the small rise in the midst of the narrow band of saplings. It was the best there was here.
"There," he called out softly, catching the sense of movement in his peripheral again.
Rufus nodded and he and Nate lifted the end of the travois, helping Jack to carry it up the slope and into the shelter of the saplings. None of the men needed to be told what to do, moving together through the trees to get wood enough for several fires that would last through the increasingly bitter night.
Dean stood next to Billy's litter, watching the timber line, the long, black barrel of the automatic rifle he held following his gaze as he scanned the perimeter. They'd brought what they could carry with them. Humping forty-pound packs on snowshoes was not a fun way to spend the day. But they had ammo, food, the small tent, rated for arctic conditions. They could manage, if the goddamned wolves that had been tracking them most of the afternoon could be dissuaded from believing that they were good to eat and easy prey.
He saw the shadow emerge from the trees, low to the ground, twenty yards behind Nate and the rifle was against his shoulder in the same single, fluid movement of the trigger squeeze. The crack was loud in the gathering dusk and the wolf dropped to the snow unmoving as the men looked behind them and started to move faster with their loads.
A long howl rose and was answered by a dozen others, the song degenerating into a rabble of growls and yelps from every point of the compass. Dean swung around, his flashlight held against the barrel, looking for the tell-tale reflectivity in the darkness, firing at the eyes he saw. Two more fell, the others withdrawing and scattering.
"How many d'you think?" Rufus asked Nate as they dropped the last load of wood beside the fires.
"Grey wolves usually don't have big packs," Nate said, crouching by the central fire. "Family groups, between maybe four and twelve, the adult pair and their offspring." He gestured to the darkness surrounding them. "You heard them, more than one leader, maybe two-three packs joined together, the strongest male leading them all?"
"There has to be plenty of food around here," Dean said, looking past the flames into night. "Why gang up just for us?"
"I don't know," Nate said, shrugging one shoulder. "But we're going to have a hard time keeping them off if they're not afraid."
Rufus glanced at Dean. "Show 'em what the guns do?"
Dean nodded slowly. "Yeah, we've got at least ten more miles to the base, going straight across country. That'll be either a dark-to-dark or another camp, and either way we don't need company." He turned to look at Jack. "How's Billy?"
The ex-paramedic glanced over his shoulder, one side of his face brightly lit by the fire, the other in partial shadow. "He's running a fever, I was hoping the alcohol and the antibiotics would take care of it, but I'm not sure he's responding to them."
"We've been dragging him for two days," Nate said, looking at Jack. "He might stabilise once we've stopped moving."
"He might," Jack agreed reluctantly.
"We can't just sit here and use up everything we've got," Dean decided. "We'll push for McAlester tomorrow, as hard as we can."
"They'll chase us if they think we're running," Nate said to no one in particular, staring at the fire.
"Then tonight we make sure that they know we're not running," Dean answered him coldly. "Get Billy into the tent. Rufus, you and Jack take first watches. Nate and me'll take graveyard."
Rufus nodded, getting up to help Jack get the boy into the relative warmth of the small tent. It was going to be a long night, he could already feel it.
Dean shifted his position on the ground, feeling something digging into his ribs. There'd been a couple of shots, after he and Nate had moved into the tent.
"Testing us," Nate had said, his voice drowsy. "They'll save the big attack for later – that'll be you and me."
He'd nodded and heard Nate's bandsaw snore start up a few minutes later.
Tigers. Wolves. Monsters. Demons. Fallen angels. A bitch of a bitter winter. What else, he thought dourly, what else you gonna throw at us? The thing sticking into him shifted its position and he rolled onto his side away from it, relaxing fractionally as he realised that his new position was moderately comfortable.
A population increase. Of everything, apparently. But it was the human increase he was worried about. They could spread out, of course, nothing to stop them but labour and materials. He thought of Chuck's vision and felt an icy finger slide down his spine. A demon army, the prophet had seen. Marching on Lebanon in the spring. Where was he gonna get the time to build more accommodation – solid, fortified and defended accommodation – with that coming down on them? How was he was supposed to protect a population that big?
Spread it around, Dean. Her voice, soft and low in his head. She was right. And Boze was doing a good job with Michigan, no problems there. Who else? Bobby and Ellen? Nate was experienced. And Elias.
It never should have just been on you to start with, she whispered to him in memory.
Maybe not, but it had and he'd learned a long time ago to live with what he was given, to pick it up and carry it.
You deserve more.
Did he? He didn't know that. He didn't even know if she did … still. Since he'd returned from Jordan, she'd been increasingly tired and withdrawn, and he didn't know why. Just knew it was leaving a small ache, where he couldn't reach, that he couldn't ignore.
The thin synthetic material of the tent let the light of the multiple fires through easily and he found himself staring at the flickering shapes on the wall closest to him. He didn't know how to unpick the habits of a lifetime. It'd always been his brother, the one he put everything else aside for. One job. One duty that had priority over everything else. He'd turned it away from that and the devil had found Sam and brought down the world. That'd been on him, cutting Sam loose, leaving him to deal with what he'd done, on his own.
He wouldn't do it again, but when was it his turn, he wondered irritably? When did he get to have what he wanted? He stared at the outlines of the flames on the other side of the thin fabric. Did he even know what he wanted?
I do, you know.
Lisa had told him that she loved him. The words had passed over him without impact, without stirring any feeling in him at all. She'd said it without knowing him, without knowing anything about him, really. And she'd told him she hadn't wanted to know.
That's not love. He rolled his eyes. What the fuck did he know about it? He'd never let anyone in, not even Cassie when he'd thought he couldn't live without her and had told her the truth. No one. He'd loved his family with everything that was in him and had lost them. Given up on his brother when Sam had needed him the most. You're afraid. The thought slipped insidiously past his guard. His eyes screwed shut. He was. Afraid of the way it'd felt to lose what he'd wanted – had loved - most. Afraid to take the risk of that happening again.
I do, you know. Did she? Still? He hadn't doubted it before. Why now? What'd had changed?
He rolled onto his back, rubbing a hand tiredly over his face. He didn't know.
They came an hour before dawn, eyes reflecting in the firelight and flashlight beams, silent over the snow. Dean switched from semi to auto, and sprayed the shallow slope as the wolves accelerated up it, the cannonade of gunfire filling the night, the flash from the muzzle strobing his face as he turned through ninety degrees, holding the rifle steady and watching the animals drop. Nothing supernatural about them, he thought regretfully, the big calibre bullets punching in and through and killing them instantly, the over-penetration at the close range taking out the ones behind as well.
The pack lost more than half before they stopped coming and the last remnants of the night were filled with howls, receding into the forest, but answered by others more distant.
Nate reloaded, crouched beside the central fire. "Think they'll give us a wide berth now."
Dean looked down the slope. Little more than shadowed humps against the lighter snow, he counted twenty-five on his side. "Makes you wonder how that would've gone down if we didn't have the guns."
Nate stood, walking to stand beside him. "We wouldn't be alive," he said quietly. "I spent a bit of time up north. Ran into a guy working up there, some college guy, doing research on wolves." He looked down at the bodies. "Told me a few things about wolves, grey wolf, like these. Type-species, he called them. All the others came from them. Dogs too. He was looking at pack behaviour. Said that wolves co-operate when there's a lot of food around."
"Like these? Why would they need a big pack when everything's growing out of control?"
"I don't know," Nate said, drawing in a deep breath. "He just said that they were about as successful as humans in terms of apex predators."
"That's – not reassuring."
"No."
Dean turned back to the fire, freeing his clip and pushing a new one in, tucking the warm, nearly empty magazine into his jacket pocket. "We'll go as soon as it's light."
East Keep, Lebanon, Kansas
"Well, you're pregnant," Merrin said without preamble as she came back into the room. "Kim wants to see you straight away."
Alex looked up at her, mouth open. "Don't you need to do another test? Sometimes you get false positives?"
"Not this one." Merrin shook her head. "Come on."
Alex stood up and looked around the room. "But –"
"No buts, Alex, Kim's waiting for you."
She followed the nurse out of the room, through the connecting doorways that led to the doctor's small office. Kim looked up from the file on her desk as they entered.
"Sit down, Alex, I realise it's a shock," the small-framed doctor said gently.
Merrin turned and left and Alex sat on the edge of the examination table.
"How?"
Kim stood up and walked to her. "You said that Death removed all the wounds, when he brought you back?"
"Yes, but –"
"It's seems likely that he repaired the internal damage as well?"
"That wasn't 'damage', Kim," Alex said sharply. "It was gone."
"And you haven't had a period since May?"
"No!" Alex looked down at her fingers, curled up in fists in her lap. "Don't you think I'd have said something about that!?"
"Well, let's take a look and see what we can see, shall we?" Kim said soothingly. "Lie down, I'd usually wait another couple of weeks for the normal sonogram, but we'll do a transvaginal and I should be able to see the organs clearly."
Alex lay down on the table, her heart thumping against her ribs, her thoughts spinning chaotically.
"This will feel a little cold," Kim said quietly, inserting the gel-covered probe carefully. "Can you see the monitor?"
Alex turned her head. On a bracket on the wall next to the table, a small monitor showed a shifting and grainy black and white image. Kim watched it intently, as she slid the probe a little deeper.
"There," she said, holding still. "You can't see the foetus yet, it's too small, but that's the uterine wall." She turned to look at Alex. "Everything's fine, just where I'd expect to be."
Alex stared at the flickering picture, blinking as Kim removed the probe and the monitor became blank.
Everything she'd spent the past six years telling herself, trying to accept, trying to find a way through and past was now non-applicable, she thought. And she had no idea of what to think now.
"Are you alright?" Kim watched her sit up slowly.
She looked at the doctor and nodded. "Yes, I'm fine."
"Merrin said you were having difficulties with eating? Were you feeling nauseous?"
"In the evenings," Alex confirmed. That explained that, didn't it, she thought. "And I was just too tired to worry about it most of the time, when I'm there on my own."
On my own, she thought, the words taking on an ominous tone suddenly. She didn't know what he would say, how he would feel.
"The first few weeks can have that effect on a lot of women," Kim said reassuringly. "Your body is going through some monumental changes, getting itself ready, growing a new person – it all comes out of the mother. You need to eat, Alex, and you need to eat well. I can give you some supplements –"
"No, that's –" she hesitated, shaking her head slightly. "I'll cook properly now."
"How are you sleeping?"
Alex's mouth lifting in a twisting smile. "Like the dead. Usually ten to twelve hours."
"That's alright," Kim nodded, making a note on the file. "That's needed. What about your emotions? Mood swings?"
She hesitated. "Some."
"It's normal," Kim said quickly, seeing the reticence in her face to discussing the exact nature of what she'd been feeling. "A woman's body releases a lot of hormones at this time, to facilitate the changes that are needed and the growth of the baby – those hormones will exacerbate anything you're worried about, sometimes out of sight, you might feel weepy for no reason, angry, upset – all of it is quite normal and nothing to worry about."
Alex looked at the door. Had the hormones been driving her doubts? How could she tell what was real and what was her body just doing its job?
"Kim, if I've been – whole – all this time, why haven't I gotten pregnant before this? We haven't used any – I mean, it just seemed redundant, so –" she said, her brow furrowed as she pushed the problem of her feelings aside.
"I don't know," Kim said bluntly. "If you weren't cycling before, perhaps Death restored it all but it needed something else to get it working? The goddess walking through here, jump-starting everything might've done that?"
Yeah, Alex thought, remembering Jerome's description of what they would have to expect. That might've done it.
"I want you back in three weeks," Kim said, looking at the calendar on her desk. "First week of January. We'll do the ultrasound and we should be able to narrow down the due date." She turned back to her. "And in the meantime, you start taking care of yourself properly, okay?"
Alex nodded.
"See Merrin for the supplements – there are some things that help that are hard to get in winter, and in our situation; she'll give you what's needed."
Sitting at the table in the apartment, Alex stared absently at the small bottles in front of her. She'd lit the fire, cleaned the entire place, chopped the ingredients for a casserole and it was in the oven, cooking slowly and gradually filling the small place with rich and tantalising aromas. When she'd run out of things to do, she'd sat down, looking at the pills that were supposed to supplement her diet. Folic acid. Magnesium. Iodine. Potassium. Essential minerals, Merrin had said.
She had a vivid memory of Dean's face, two years ago when Liev had shown them around the half-finished buildings of Tawas. The stocky builder had congratulated him on the news of his impending fatherhood. And she'd seen, under his surprise, a flicker of discomfort in his expression. She'd never asked him about it.
She didn't want this to be a trap, didn't want him to feel that he had to stay if he didn't want to. And how much more of one would it seem to him since she was supposed to be a hundred percent safe, she wondered bitterly? She knew him intimately, knew his scars and fears and his doubts about himself, but she didn't know how he felt about her, about them. He didn't say anything, and she couldn't ask and everything else, everything that he did, the way he looked at her, the way he was when it was just them and nothing and no one else … she didn't know if that was real or not.
It's real, you know that, a small voice said in her mind. She shook her head. She wanted it to be, but that was part of the problem, wasn't it? Wanting something so much, it was easy to kid yourself that something was there when maybe it wasn't.
He wants to be here, the voice told her and she knew that was true. She didn't doubt that. But … did he want to be here when it wasn't just the present, in the moment, did he want to be here when it was the future, did he want that future?
The voice was silent. She didn't know.
Port-Au-Nouvelle, France
The sea glittered as the sunlight speared from the wave-tops, the deep chug of the boat's engines a lazy counterpoint to the gentle rolling from side-to-side as they approached the coast.
"And the Qaddiysh have gone to find this box?" Elena leaned on the rail, staring over the water to the indistinct land.
Peter nodded. "They will come to Lourdes if they find it."
"An' you will take them to America?"
"Yes." And hope we are in time, he thought bleakly.
"But these tablets – prophet stones – or whatever you are calling them … they give the details on destroying the demons? The creatures we hunt?" Elena asked carefully.
"I don't know, chère," he said, turning his head to look down at her. "It seems that they were written down for that purpose, but no one in the last two thousand years has seen one, and only a prophet can read them."
She hadn't mentioned Isabeau. He wondered what she was thinking.
"I would like to come with you," she said, straightening up and looking at him.
"You are needed here."
She shook her head. "No, I'm not." Gesturing toward the pilot house, she added. "We are so few that we are better placed to research and defend the chapter, than actually look for survivors as the Americans have done. That does not require my presence."
"You are their leader, Elena," Peter argued cautiously. "How will it be with them if you leave?"
"Luc is stronger," she said, turning away with a one-shouldered shrug. "And they will understand, I think."
"Isabeau was taken by surprise –"
"She was under my care, Peter," Elena cut him off. "An' Jean will not be able to forgive me for not bringing her back."
"There was nothing you could've done," he persisted, his hand closing around her arm, bringing her attention back to him. "I don't need a reckless hunter looking for death when I take the Watchers to the US."
She pulled her arm free. "I am not that, Peter."
"Then why?"
"You said it yourself, you need all the experienced hunters you can find –"
"We have enough," he said, shaking his head.
"You don't," she said bluntly. "You – and the Americans – are hunting too many trails."
He couldn't argue that point. He thought of the hunters in Kansas and Michigan. They had a population to protect and there was no way that Winchester would leave that population unguarded, not even to find the tablets, to find the goddesses and lock them back under mountain. He sighed, closing his eyes.
"We will discuss it when the Qaddiysh come."
"That is satisfactory."
Luc manoeuvred the boat alongside the long concrete wharf carefully and the hunters leapt ashore to secure the ship to the pilings. The trucks were where they left them, parked close to the concrete and metal freight buildings, and Marc and Francois walked to get them, reversing them up the wharf to the gangplank.
Luc came down the narrow companionway stairs from the wheelhouse, glancing at Peter.
"She asked you, oui?"
Peter nodded. "Will they let her?" He glanced out through the portholes to the dock.
Luc nodded. "I think so."
He looked at the crates that were stacked from side to side of the cabin, held back to the hull with nets. "Do you think it was worth it?"
The hunter exhaled. "I no longer make such valuations, Luc," he said tiredly. "We had a job. We did it. That is as far as my responsibility extends."
"Probably a better way to look at this," the blond hunter agreed. "The weather is coming down; we need to get out of here before the passes are blocked again."
McAlester, Oklahoma
Rufus adjusted the focus on the binoculars he stared through. "Base looks intact."
"How much open ground to the nearest building?" Dean rolled onto his back and looked back down the shallow incline at the others. Jack and Nate stood to either side of the travois, rifles raised. The pack had not attacked again through the long, gruelling trek across the thick snow, but they'd followed, flitting like shadows along the edges of the forest and their howls sounding through the day, sometimes behind them, sometimes ahead.
"Five hundred yards," Rufus said. "Most of the fence is down."
"Think they'll let us across without attacking again?"
The older hunter turned onto his shoulder, the glasses scanning the base of the forest to their right. They were still there, in the gloom under the bare canopies.
"Probably not."
Dean nodded, his lips thinning at the thought of the next bit. "You and Jack take Billy," he said. "We'll cover."
Rufus thought of the numbers and wondered how many had joined the remnants of the pack they'd decimated in the night.
"Let's do it."
They slid down the hill, binoculars returned to the packs at the bottom. Nate looked at Dean. "They're going to try and cut us off from the building."
"How many clips have you got?"
"Twenty in the pack, five in my jacket," Nate said. "That's all that'll fit."
Dean nodded, transferring his full magazines from the pack to his jacket pockets. He glanced toward the base. "You take point, cut them down and keep the way clear."
Rufus turned his head to look at the younger man. "Don't fall behind."
Dean gave him a crooked smile. "I won't."
They shouldered the packs again. The weight would slow them down but leaving anything behind that they couldn't make themselves had rapidly become a less viable option. Nate moved out ahead, choosing a line where the downed fence wouldn't hang up the travois and walking fast. Behind him, Rufus and Jack had the long sapling ends, Billy lying on the stretched out sleeping bags between them, his face white and bloodless, his eyes closed as the ends left furrows in the snow and bounced over the hummocks.
Dean followed them, scanning behind and to both sides continuously. The dreary grey light from the low cloud cover had made the day seem endless, but he realised they were going to lose even that advantage soon, colour bleeding out of the landscape incrementally as the sun fell behind the low hills to the west.
They crossed the twisted and mostly buried chainlink and razor-wire fence line and the last of the light faded into a shadowless murk, dimming moment by moment. Behind him, Dean heard the single shots of Nate's gun, and he swung around, seeing the first of the distant wolves, their outlines blurring into the featureless grey snow-covered field, only their movement letting him pick them out. Sixty yards and too spread out, he thought.
"Go, go!" he yelled over his shoulder to Rufus and Jack, swinging his gun from side to side as he followed them, not even trying to fire at the half-stumbling run, he kept close to the travois, waiting for the animals to get closer and close up together.
His eyes widened slightly as he saw them converging, a lot more than they'd seen through the day, the sinuous shapes, darker and lighter, racing toward them. Throwing a look behind him, he could see that they had another hundred yards to go, at least. The high concrete wall had a single small door set in the side, and it would almost certainly be locked. He stopped and picked off the two closest, turning and running after the men again.
Nate had stopped as well, as Rufus and Jack barrelled past him, the travois jumping and bouncing after them. The machine gun stuttered and a dozen wolves fell at a distance of twenty yards from him. He saw more coming from the eastern side of the base and followed the travois, stopping again a little short of fifty yards from the building.
Dean flipped the gun's switch to automatic and sprayed the rounds of the clip into the oncoming animals as they closed with him, watching them fall, spinning and racing for the building when the clip was empty, his thumb ejecting it and letting it fall as he slammed the fresh one in and stopped again, turning and sweeping the barrel across the line of wolves that was much closer now. It was the most bizarre chase of his life, he thought distantly, the wolves moving much faster than he could over the deep snow, gaining on him with every stop, and more coming, almost invisible now in the near-darkness, his ears straining to hear the rushing sounds of their paws on the iced-over snow. He ejected the next clip as it emptied, thrusting the new one in and grabbing his flashlight from his pocket as he pounded toward the building. A bullet whistled past him and he felt a bump from behind as the wolf Nate had taken down slid into his heels.
"Now!" he panted.
Rufus lit a handful of flares and threw them in a broad sweep, lighting up the snow with a violently pink glare as Nate began to shoot steadily. Dean was ten yards from them when the animal hit him in the back and he was thrown forward and down, skidding over the snow, feeling jaws closing around the back of his thigh. He rolled and swore, swinging the barrel hard and feeling the metal stock connect with bone, the wolf yelping in surprise. Pushing hard with his heels, Dean slid closer to the building, dropping the barrel, his finger tightening on the trigger and the gun chattering in his hands as he swept it across the wolf that had brought him down and those to either side.
He heard the crunch of snow behind him and rolled fast to his knees, his heart hammering furiously until he saw Nate striding toward him, the flashes from his rifle's muzzle continuous as the older man jerked his head back to the others.
Staggering to his feet, Dean backed toward the others, Nate moving with him, the two rifles taking in a hundred-and-eighty degrees between them. There was a single gunshot from the door and Rufus yelled out that they were in. Turning together, Dean and Nate ran for the door, slamming it shut, Dean throwing his weight against it as Nate shot the flat bolts through the brackets.
It was pitch-black inside and Dean shook his flashlight, the beam recovering and lighting up one wall. Nate dropped his pack, pulling his flashlight out and packing another five mags into his jacket.
"Any other entrances?" Nate asked, refastening the pack and getting to his feet.
"No idea," Dean said shortly. He looked at Rufus and Jack. "You two stay here. We'll do a recce."
Rufus nodded and helped Jack get the travois raised a little.
Walking down the length of the building, Dean wondered if they'd be left alone long enough to find the damned susvees and everything else they'd come here for.
"How many were there?"
Nate shook his head. "I don't know. A lot."
"But they don't do this, usually?"
"Not that I've ever seen or heard of."
"What makes us so lucky?" Dean asked irritably.
Nate scratched his head, his flashlight beam jumping around. "Must be your good looks, I never have this kind of luck on my own."
Dean looked at him sourly. "Wow, hilarious."
They turned as they reached the end. Most of the floor was empty, battered shelving lining the walls holding nothing but a few shreds of plastic.
"No debris in here," Nate commented as they came to the corner and turned down.
"Good." It meant there was a good chance that whatever other doors there were in the building were closed.
The edge of the light gleamed on shiny paint and Dean swung it to his left, showing the interior. He grinned as he saw the boxy shape in the beam, bright red and looking more like a kid's blocky toy than anything else.
"I believe the word you're looking for is 'bingo'," Nate said dryly, his flashlight showing the wide grin.
"Are the others here?"
They moved the beams across the interior. Another boxy shape loomed out of the dimness behind the first.
"Two's a good start." Nate flicked the light back to the wall. "We got another floor here."
"We'll check it tomorrow," Dean decided, feeling the tension easing out of his shoulders and neck as they saw the last wall ahead, three monstrous roller doors locked tight down to the ground taking up most of it. They checked each of them, ensuring that the chains that rolled them were firmly fastened and bolting the small postern door on that side at the same time.
"Dean," Nate stopped by the corner, his flashlight shining on a tall white cupboard near the kitchen area. On the door, a bold red cross had been painted.
Dean nodded and walked to it, pulling out the set of picks that lived permanently in his inside coat pocket. He unlocked it and whistled softly, as Nate's light showed the thickly stocked shelves.
"Well, this'll help," he muttered, pulling out a couple of ampoules of broad-spectrum antibiotics, needles, syringes and a handful of sterilised dressings. "See if we can't do something with Billy's wounds now."
Next day
The susvee started reluctantly but ran perfectly once Dean had changed the oil and fuel and it had warmed up. The upstairs floor had been cleaned out as well, to Dean's annoyance. They'd have to do a tour of the place to find what they needed, but at least they'd be doing in style, he thought, watching the side-mirror as Nate ran the door up and he started to back out.
They'd looked around at first light. Forty wolves lay in an eighty yard radius around the postern door on the other side of the building, churned snow and multiple tracks making it hard to tell how many others had been with them. The tracks had stopped at the line of flares, the snow marked by their own bootprints but no pads beyond that. He wondered if the flares were a deterrent they should check into.
The vehicle rumbled out of the building and into the thin, wan sunshine and Dean stopped it as Nate ran for the other one, climbing in and starting it up. When he was out, they turned and headed for the furthest building, Rufus riding shotgun, Jack and Billy in the rear seat of the cab behind Dean. The antibiotics had helped, Jack said, but the wounds were still angry-looking and he was still running a fever.
US 24 W, Kansas, two days later.
Dean watched the flakes flutter against the high, flat windshield, the wipers sweeping off periodically, the sky to the north iron-grey and louring. Behind him, Rufus drove the second susvee, Jack and Billy in his cab, and Nate was following along behind him, driving the third one. They'd left the fourth one in the first building, fully-loaded. He'd come back later and get it before spring.
The long tracks didn't care if they were running over snow-packed road, fields or frozen lakes, and they'd held firm even in the blizzard they'd gone through the previous evening, their wide base and low-down weight keeping them moving steadily in the howling crosswind. If the Grigori were holed up someplace in Colorado or Idaho, he would be able to find them there and, he hoped, circumvent whatever plan they had for getting to Kansas, long before they could move around freely.
They'd been gone for almost three weeks, with the digging out and the walking and fighting and then searching the buildings at the base one by one. But it wasn't far now, less than fifty miles and they'd be home.
Stretching a little, he watched the snow fall, lit by the headlights. He wanted a beer, and something not reconstituted to eat. A hot shower. About ten hours of uninterrupted sleep. And more than that, a lot more than that, he wanted to see Alex, walk through the door and see her look up, see her eyes warm and the smile he thought she reserved for him widen her mouth, and he wanted to breathe in her scent and feel her pressed against him and feel the weight of everything he carried slide off.
His foot pressed down a bit more firmly on the accelerator and the susvee lumbered ahead a little faster, the heater keeping the cab warm and snug.