'What in the name of…!?' said Jake, and at once, instinctively, brought mental barriers crashing down to shut whatever it was — this thing, this Other, this Korath — out of his mind.
The other fled or was banished at once, and Jake heard him
go: his frustrated cry of rage, denial, as he disappeared into the deadspeak aether:
No, Jake, no! Don't send me away! You'll know soon enough how much you need me. And you must always remember: I have the numbers! I have the numbers, Jake, and I know the waaayyy!
Then he was gone…
'Eh?' said Lardis, staring hard at Jake, at a face turned pale and gaunt. 'Eh, what? Is there something? You gave a start just then. You said something. And the way you look…' But:
'Shhh!' Jake shook his head, concentrated, and remembered! Remembered it all, but most of all that he'd almost made a deal with a vampire. And he remembered something else: Harry Keogh's warning, that even a dead vampire is a dangerous thing that you should never, ever, let into your mind!
'You look peculiar,' said the Old Lidesci.
Jake looked at him, swallowed hard, and slowly got a grip of himself. 'It was… it was nothing,' he said. 'Nothing that I want to talk about now, anyway. Later, maybe — to Liz and Ben Trask — when tonight's business is over.'
And between times… he dug out a ballpoint and began to make shaky notes on Liz's scrap of paper.
For while he still hadn't quite come to terms with everything that was happening to him, and whether or not this latest manifestation was some kind of daydream, mental quirk, evidence of a dual personality, or whatever, still Jake knew that it was something he must remember in detail, something that he really couldn't afford to forget…
Chopper Two disembarked its task force in Gladstone and refuelled. Earlier that day, three SAS men had made the long drive up to Gladstone to check that all was in order with the coastguard vessel. Now the two units met up for a final briefing.
The attack on the island would be two-pronged. Along with WO II Joe Davis and four NCOs, Jake and Lardis Lidesci would be airborne; four more NCOs would be in the boat.
Zero Hour — the time scheduled for the launch of simultaneous attacks on both the Capricorn Group island and the mountain resort of Xanadu — had been set for 6:30 p.m. The weather was good and the sea flat calm, and with just ninety minutes to go to Zero Hour, the boat cast off.
And an hour later, with the light failing as the sun sank down behind the Great Dividing Range, Chopper Two got airborne again…
At the same time, at the Brisbane flying club, Chopper One was warming up ready to go. Ben Trask and the SAS Major, joint operational commanders, were in a hangar using a radio in one of the vehicles. The precog lan Goodly, Liz Merrick, and the rest of the SAS men were trooping out to the jetcopter, their combat suits fluttering in the bluster of disturbed night air that stank of hot exhaust fumes.
At 6:15 Trask transmitted: 'Callsigns One, Two, and Three, signals — over?'
And the answers came back: 'One, okay — over,' (the locator David Chung's voice, from the Xanadu approach road).
'Two, okay — over,' (Joe Davis's voice from Chopper Two).
'Three, okay — over,' (the senior NCO on the boat).
'Sitreps/ said Trask.
And three identical answers came back one after the other: 'On schedule, and all systems are go.'
'Synchronizing watches,' said Trask, then waited a second. 'Set your watches to 6:17. I say again figures sixer, one, seven. Counting down, I now have — three, two, one, zero — 6:17 precisely. Good hunting, and good luck. Over?'
'Roger that, and out,' (from the same three sources). And:
'Let's go,' said Trask. He and the Major ran out under the gleaming vanes of the jetcopter and boarded her. Moments later she took off and headed south for Xanadu…
In Chopper One Trask had just minutes left to talk to Liz,
lan Goodly, and the Major. 'I'm concerned/ he said. 'There's something wrong and I don't know what it is. It's a feeling that — I don't know — that everything we've done or we're trying to do is somehow misguided, as if we're on the wrong track, or we've been misled, or there's something we've overlooked.'
'That sounds like your talent at work, Ben,' said the precog. And then he sighed. 'Well, I'm glad that someone's talent is working!'
'And you?' Trask looked at him. 'Nothing?'
'Just trouble,' Goodly sighed again. 'Just problems, frustration, confusion. But as you know, I can't force it; it comes when it comes. But in your case… is it anything specific?'
'No,' Trask shook his head. 'So it seems we're in the same boat — or airplane! It's a.feeling, that's all. I had it today up at the observation post on the mountain road. When I looked up the road, toward Xanadu… it was all so quiet, so normal. Perhaps too quiet, too normal.'
'A lie?'
'More like I was deceiving myself,' said Trask. 'This is a covert operation, but it didn't feel like one. Especially after that incident with Liz's watcher.' He glanced at her — a guilty look, she thought — and said, 'I should have paid more attention to you.'
'But I wasn't that sure myself,' Liz said. 'And anyway, I'm the new kid on the block; I could have been wrong.'
'That's what I mean/ said Trask. 'We all have our talents, and I should have listened to yours. If we had turned back and I had seen that fellow, I would have known at once. But we didn't, and I didn't. I blame myself.'
At which the Major, looking more than a little concerned, came in with: 'Miss, gentlemen, I have some difficulty following you — these skills of yours, you understand — but are you saying the operation is in jeopardy?'
Trask shook his head, then changed his mind and said: 'Any operation concerning these creatures is hazardous. But we have to go in, no matter what. It's all set up, and we mightn't get a better chance. But with our weapons, and providing everyone remembers the drills, I can't see what can go wrong.'
Liz glanced at her watch. 'Five minutes/ she said. And as at a signal the intercom began buzzing.
The pilot was on the earphones saying: 'Message from Callsign One. The mindsmog has been 'awake' but more or less static for some time. Now it's on the move, but only locally. Callsign One is also mobile. His ETA the target area is five minutes.'
Trask answered, 'Tell him roger that. We'll see him there, and not to forget his nose-plugs.' Then, turning to the bulk of the helicopter party, 'And you mustn't forget yours.'
They hadn't forgotten. Aerosol sprays were hissing; a fine garlic mist filled the air, settling on everyone's clothing; it was almost a pleasure to insert filter plugs like fat cigarette tips deep into their nostrils…
In Xanadu, from a position some two hundred feet up the almost sheer rock wall of the mountainside, Lord Malinari of the Wamphyri looked down on the sprawling dark cobweb of the deserted resort, and at the single road that wound its serpentine route up the steep mountain contours to Xanadu's gates.
Malinari's vantage point was a roughly-hewn 'room' carved from the solid rock at the head of a natural chimney. When Xanadu was being built, it had been Jethro Manchester's intention to create a special entertainment here. There was to have been a ski-lift or cable-car from the gardens up to this point, and a series of aquachutes back down to the pools. The chimney had been fitted with a spiralling service-and/or emergency-staircase behind a facade constructed to match the flanking cliffs, so disguising the chimney's vertical fault, and work had commenced on this room or landing stage. At which point technical difficulties had caused the project to be abandoned.
Now the chimney was Lord Malinari's bolthole from Xanadu. From this window he would fly out on the night
wind, and glide down to a place in which he had long since secreted a cache of clothing, money and other necessaries to speed him on his way to his next venture. But not before he ensured that the chase ended here, and that this E-Branch had suffered such losses as to finish it forever, or at least slow it down until his, Vavara's, and Szwart's greater scheme was brought into play…
Malinari looked down on Xanadu and smiled a hideous smile. If only he could be down there to see the
