City Of Swords

The kid nodded. “Under the bridge. Away from the rain and people. He hides there and...you will pay him to talk to you, right? He said he would only talk for money.”

“He talks, and then I make arrangements to pay him. I didn’t bring the money with me.” Annja had not wanted to set herself up for a mugging. “I’m not carrying cash.” She pulled her pants pockets inside out to show him they were empty. “The money is at the hotel. He talks to me, you come back with me to the hotel and get it. I promise to pay.”

The nod became vigorous. “All right. That is all right, I guess. You come now, and then you give me money.”

He turned and tromped out into the rain, Annja and a reluctant Rembert following.

“Wait!” Annja called. “What’s your name?”

Without stopping, the boy replied “Jacques” over his shoulder.

“It’ll be a bitzer, that’s for sure,” Rembert grumbled.

The bank was slick, but Annja navigated it. Her cameraman was not as sure-footed and slid halfway down on the seat of his pants, cradling his camera to his chest and cursing when he bumped across rocks. The city above was clean, but the riverbank was another matter. Plastic foam cups, crushed cigarette packs and other assorted garbage pooled in low spots. The stink of refuse and sodden earth was strong.

“Let’s wrap this up,” Annja said, extending a hand to Rembert.

“I second and third that.” He checked over his camera and wiped at the water again, a futile gesture, as it was raining harder. “Doug’s bad idea is getting worse and worse and worse.”

“Miss Creed.” Jacques slogged forward, pointing to a recess under the bridge. “My brother waits there.”

“Now I have a bad feeling about this,” Annja whispered. The whole thing hadn’t felt quite right, not since she’d read the note from Doug about this interview. Actually, not since she’d set foot in Avignon... But she needed to pursue this. Something niggled at the back of her mind. “Gaston?” She raised her voice to be heard over the running river, the drumming of the rain and the slapping of Jacques’s footsteps ahead of them.

A figure emerged from the shadows. He had a build similar to Jacques’s, but she couldn’t make out any details other than that he looked bedraggled and rumpled.

“I am Gaston.” He spoke English, but his accent was thick.

Annja paused, but Rembert, camera to his face, crunched forward over broken glass and gravel. His backside looked like a mud slick.

“She said she would pay us,” Jacques announced. “Miss Creed has money and—”

“So you’re a cynocephalus?” Rembert asked. He paused and stood directly in front of the man, blocking Annja’s view of him. “One of the dog-men of France? You look pretty human to me. In fact...hey, what are you—”

It happened fast. The two grabbed Rembert and spun him around, the taller putting a knife to his throat, the other producing a blade and holding it to his stomach. Rembert dropped the camera, his arms flailing, but stopped moving when the one named Gaston drew blood.

“Stay still,” Gaston said. “If you want to live.”

Annja had been reaching for the sword with her mind, had felt the sensation of the pommel forming against her palm, but didn’t take it. The blade hung in the otherwhere, waiting.

“I told Jacques the money’s at the hotel.” She peered through the driving rain, eyes locking onto Rembert’s panicked stare. “I’ve only got a few euros with me. You can have them, but—”

“We don’t want your money, Annja Creed. We want your sword.”

The accent. It wasn’t French. Close, but there was a difference.

Gaston nudged Rembert farther out from under the bridge.

“You.” Annja recognized Gaston. He was one of the gang she’d fought in Paris, outside the train station. He was one of the Romanies who’d fled before the police arrived.

What was he doing here?

Had Gaston overheard her talking to Roux, telling him she was coming to this city for another episode of Chasing History’s Monsters?

“The sword! If you hand over the sword, Annja Creed, we’ll let your friend live.”

Chapter 9

“Annja!” Rembert’s face was pale. “What do they want? Money? I’ve got euros. Give them our money!”

Although Rembert didn’t know much French beyond asking where the nearest restaurant and bathroom were—and though he was oblivious to what the pair were really after—he recognized their intent. Annja saw his lower lip quiver. He had broken out in a sweat. He clumsily tried to reach into his pockets, maybe to pull out a wallet, but the Romanies snarled and poked him with their knives. Rembert stood still. Her photographer was not a physically weak man, but neither was he a stupid one.

“The sword, American archaeologist!” the taller of the two shouted. He pressed the knife harder against Rembert’s skin, which was white around the tip of the blade, with a splotch of red showing. “It was not in your hotel room. At either hotel. Where is it? Where is the old sword?”

“I don’t have a sword,” she snapped. Only the two of them, right? Not much of a threat... No threat at all, if Rembert wasn’t in the equation. “Do you see a sword?”

There could be more, hiding behind the embankment or up on the bridge, maybe behind her. She couldn’t hear any other people talking, no crunch of shoes over the gravel and glass at the edge of the river. She wasn’t going to risk a glance over her shoulder—not yet.

Her mind raced. They’d followed her from Paris.... Was it possible that night outside the old train station, when she’d been looking for a fight to ease her soul, they’d actually been looking for her? Her, specifically? That they were the ones doing the stalking? Had they known about her sword before the street fight? Was that possible?

Annja had always tried to be circumspect when she called the sword. She’d never been caught on tape wielding it. She would know if that had been the case; she had contacts all over the world who followed her interests on the internet and who would have notified her. If nothing else, Roux would have said something.

“The sword! Hand it over! Hurry!”

“I’ve got no sword here. No gun. No knife. You can see I have no weapon.” She paused. “But I have money. Euros. We were going to pay for an interview. We’ve got money for that. We can go back to the hotel, all of us, Gaston, and—”

He laughed. “A ruse to get you here. Dog-men.” He spat.

“Look, whoever you are—” She stopped when she heard the cry of some large bird passing low over the river, followed by the noise of a siren, which quickly receded. What sounded like a boat behind her on the river... She doubted anyone on board could see into the shadows under the bridge, but maybe she could do something to get their attention.

“We don’t want your money, American.” The tall one spat again, as if the notion of cash left a bad taste in his mouth, and drew the knife down Rembert’s throat. The pressure was enough to produce a line of blood, but not enough to cause the photographer serious harm.

“Annja!” Rembert howled. “Give them what they want.”

“I do not think you worry about your friend, American archaeologist. I do not think you consider us serious. I can promise you, we are serious. We will kill if we have to.”

His companion laughed and jabbed Rembert in the stomach, again enough to draw blood. “She should take us serious, eh, Dimitru?”

The tall one scowled.

So she had one piece of information, a name: Dimitru. Definitely Romany.

“Dimitru!” Annja had the thug’s complete attention. “You say you want a sword. I could—”

“No. Not a sword. Your sword. The one you flashed in Paris, that night so late. Before the police came and took my brothers.”

“I’ll have to go get it for you.” She extended her arms to her sides and opened her hands as wide as her fingers would stretch. “I’m not carrying a sword.” She turned slowly, taking a deep breath, glad for the opportunity to look behind her. She saw the ship, a barge. Not yet close enough. It didn’t look as if anyone was on deck. She hadn’t heard anyone come up behind her. Other than the threats of the Romanies, she’d heard only the sounds of traffic across the bridge and past the embankment. Finished her circle, she faced the Romany again. They’d pulled Rembert a little deeper into the shadows under the bridge. “It won’t take me long.”

“You think me simple,” the tall one hissed. “You have the sword, Annja Creed. You have it with you. Maybe it is invisible. Maybe it is a ghost thing. But I know you have it.”