The Child Thief

slid down the railing to the platform, and pushed into the crowd.

Fine, Nick thought. Fine. Go get killed. See if I give a fuck. He watched her rush into the crowd. She looked so small now, here, back among adults. The crush of people knocked her about as they jostled forward, some businessman shoved her into the wall as he barreled past. Cricket stumbled but kept trying to press forward, then a large, red-faced woman crashed into her, knocking her to the walkway. “Goddamn it,” Nick said and leaped down, rushing, shoving his way to her. He pushed a man aside, then grabbed Cricket by the arm, pulling her to her feet.

She shook him off. “I don’t need your help.”

“Like hell you don’t.”

Alarms were blaring everywhere. Nick searched for an exit, caught sight of Tanngnost up ahead. The troll wasn’t having any trouble getting through the crowd—people were literally falling over themselves to get out of his way. Nick spotted several people pushing out an emergency exit off to the left. He grabbed Cricket’s hand and pulled her through the door, down a short set of metal stairs, and into a dark parking lot. People scurried about in every direction, but they saw no sign of the Devils or the Flesh-eaters. They were deciding what to do next when several sharp reports came from somewhere back in the terminal; they sounded like gunshots.

A GARBLED SQUAWK blared through Officer Julio Sanchez’s radio, followed by a snip of static. He hit the mic. “Come again?”

The voice repeated the message.

“Copy, we’ll look into it.” Julio spun to his partner—the bored-looking, paunchy officer leaning against the ferry turnstile. “Mac, holy shit, dispatch just got a frantic call from the ferry pilot. Something about a gang of black men terrorizing the passengers! Station thinks the pilot might be drinking though, he also said something about a large monster with horns.”

Officer Mac suppressed a yawn. “Relax, rookie. The guy’s overreacting. Just some kids screwing around.”

Julio narrowed his eyes. How long had he shared this beat with Mac? At least three years. It seemed the man could call him something besides rookie.

“When you been at this job as long as I have, you’ve seen it all,” Mac continued. “And believe me, I’ve seen it all. Just stay cool and everything will be peachy-keen. Got me?”

A sudden jolt shook the terminal.

“Whoa, what was that?” Julio said.

They could hear feet drumming along on the upper level, accompanied by shouts and yelling. Then alarms began going off. Four dock hands, a janitor, and some woman in a business suit came running down the corridor and leaped over the turnstile like they were in a steeple chase.

“I’m calling backup,” Julio said.

Mac laughed. “Backup? For wh—” His face went pale and his eyes grew round.

Right about then, Julio was ready to bet that Officer “I’ve Seen It All” Mac had never seen a horde of black- skinned demons wearing rags and armor and carrying swords and spears, dragging a naked woman and a chubby boy by a rope. No, he was willing to bet his left nut that even Officer Mac had never ever seen such a thing.

The monsters filed down the wide walkway and into the turnstile. To Julio’s surprise, they lined up in a rather orderly fashion and pushed through one at a time. Each of them appeared pretty taken with the apparatus.

His first thought was this was some sort of theater group, or maybe a bunch of hardcore Dungeons and Dragons players. He’d heard those gamers were into some pretty weird role-playing shit. He glanced again at the woman and the boy, saw the red welts on the woman’s back, and ventured that this might be an S&M cult. But those weren’t costumes. He could see their wiry muscles and veins working below their scaly skin, and on top of that, they smelled atrocious. These people, he thought, whatever they are, they’re real!

Julio finally found his voice. “Hold up,” he said as calmly as he could manage, wanting to keep things from getting out of hand.

“STOP RIGHT THERE!” Officer Mac cried, his voice high and shrill. Julio realized with horror that Mac had his gun out and was pointing it at the monsters. “Don’t nobody fucking move!”

“Cool it, Mac,” Julio whispered. “Would you please just cool it!”

A tall man in a black cape stepped forward. “Who are you?” he asked, looking Julio up and down. “Are you the Lord’s men?”

“Just a sec, buddy,” Julio said. “I’ll ask the questions.”

Another monster stepped up. “They’re some sort of constables. Perhaps guards.”

“A constable?” the caped man asked. “Where is your lord? We need to see the king.”

The rest of the monsters had filed through the turnstile and were quietly surrounding the two officers. Julio found himself backing up, trying to keep them in front of him. He set his hand on the butt of his revolver and clicked off the safety.

“THAT’S FAR ENOUGH!” Officer Mac squealed. The gun was trembling in his hand.

Julio put in a quick call for backup and prayed Mac wouldn’t do anything stupid in the meantime. Julio held up a hand diplomatically. “If I can just get you to—”

BLAM! Officer Mac shot one of the monsters.

The bullet punched a hole in the monster’s stomach. It looked at the bullet hole and furrowed its brows, then stuck a finger in the wound and brought it back out covered in black blood. Its eyes flared and it grabbed Mac by the wrist.

The gun fired five more sharp reports. Some of the monsters stepped back, but the one that had hold of Mac, the one who now had six bullets in its gullet, groaned and fell over.

In a blink, one of the monsters drew a short sword and shoved the blade, to the hilt, right in Officer Mac’s eye. The blade punched out the back of Mac’s head, sending his hat flying off his comb-over.

Julio made a play for his gun, managed to get it clear of his holster, but that was as far as he got. Hard hands seized him and he felt something long and cold sink into his stomach over and over until everything went black.

THE CAPTAIN STOOD over the two dead men. Killing them hadn’t been a very smart thing to do. Those men had been constables or guards, and he was sure that killing them wouldn’t sit well with whatever powers lorded over this kingdom.

The Captain waited for the others to move on, then bent down and retrieved the weapon from the guard. It was obviously a pistol, but of a sort he’d never seen—so small, and with no powder or fuses. Such a weapon could come in handy. He stuck it in his belt and caught up with the men.

What is this place? the Captain wondered. He caught sight of two filthy men sleeping next to a rifled garbage can. Not Heaven, he thought. This is now, that’s all. What the world has turned into while we were gone. He studied the spiraling pillars of poured masonry, ran his hand along the gleaming metal and glass. And it is both ugly and beautiful.

The Captain suspected there’d be more guards coming soon. Will they kill us? he wondered. Or worse, send us to their dungeons to rot? Have I merely traded one hellhole for another? Now was the time to free Daniel and get out of here—escape these madmen before they got them both killed.

The men had stopped, bunched up around the bottom of a long flight of silver stairs. The stairs led to the next level. The Captain’s eyes grew wide. The stairs were moving!

“Just jump on,” Sid, the gangly midshipman, grumbled, and gave Robertson a bump.

Robertson shoved Sid backward and growled, “You just jump on.”

Ox pushed them both. The two men tumbled onto the escalator and were slowly drawn up the moving stairs, soliciting a cheer from the rest of the men, who then began to push and shove one another to be next.

By the time the Captain had gotten on, he saw that many of the men were actually riding back down on the