The thought struck him so hard that he abruptly let go.
This was most certainly a trap, but maybe not how he’d anticipated.
Ingrid made for her knives, her head coming into contact with Jamie’s knee as he half-heartedly bashed her nose. Blood spooled out from her face onto the ground below, down his robe and the white of Ingrid’s shirt. She tried to right herself, but he pushed her down, grabbing the knives for himself. He had to go back and find the others.
“Well, it looks like you’ve won.”
Jamie went rigid at the sound of a new person. It was a man’s voice, calm and low, with a dizzying edge like a snake’s hiss. It was a voice that could hypnotize you.
He turned to greet his new assailant and found that there was more than one. Three to be exact, covered with animal masks and hoods. In a strange fever dream a rabbit, a bird, and a goat were dressed in black like undertakers, demons ready to guide him to the afterlife. Their masks were split below their noses, creating dark, twisted versions of animals with human mouths. It was the goat who’d spoken; he was taller than the others by at least a head and his mask extended upward in two sharp horns like the devil himself.
Ingrid’s face became elated as she saw the new arrivals.
“Master! You came!” she cried, rising to her knees, before hobbling to the safety of her black-clad comrades. The rabbit extended its cloak, welcoming her into its shadows.
The Master of Leviathan. The man who had tormented them for the last two years.
Jamie knew he was vastly outnumbered, that only a fool would attempt to fight his way through what he assumed were three trained fighters, but Jamie was feeling very foolish that night.
He took a deep breath and his shoulders relaxed, eyes focusing. He took one final look at the moon and thought how much it looked like a boat in the sky, just as it floated behind a cloud, submerging them in darkness. He let out the breath, let the rage consume him, falling into a fighting stance.
The goat cackled, a wide-jawed laugh that revealed a perfect set of white teeth. “Such aggression . . .” His words were thick with humor, unafraid.
The mocking half-smile made Jamie both furious and confused.
“We don’t want to fight you, although I’m sure it would be fascinating to see.”
Jamie was standing on a knife’s edge; one misstep and he would fall. “What do you want?” he demanded, still holding his stance.
“I simply came to wish you a happy birthday.” The goat raised his arms invitingly, but the words had Jamie frozen. They caught in his nose, oily and foul, reaching down his throat, and into his blood, coursing through his body in greasy panic. Jamie willed his heartbeat to slow.
Saskia had told them he was at the top of their list, and, if he could just keep steady, maybe he would find out why.
“And once you’ve done your talking”—he felt his head cock to the side, amazed by how easy it was to talk to this strange devil man—“can I leave?”
“So long as you do us no harm, although it seems a shame when you are finally in our home.” The Goat Man smiled again, the split below his mask like the call of an abyss. It felt familiar, disarmingly so, but the most important thing was that Jamie had gained new information.
“Home” . . . Leviathan is based in Japan.
Despite everything his body screamed at him to do, Jamie dropped his stance, placing the knives away in his robe in a show of passivity, but in such a way that he knew he could reach them easily at a moment’s notice. “Okay. Talk.”
Ingrid remained hidden, wrapped in the cloak of the rabbit, but the shiver of the fabric was a dead giveaway; she was trembling with fear.
“Are you happy, being a Partizan?” The question came so abruptly it might have knocked a lesser person, but Jamie answered without hesitation.
“Yes. It is my vocation.”
The rabbit sneered at his response until silenced by the goat-masked leader.
“And your master. Does she feel the same way?”
The moon boat in the sky reappeared, illuminating the masked creatures and casting shadows along the concrete floor. Jamie didn’t want to answer; he didn’t want to think about this. Ellie didn’t want him to be her Partizan—she didn’t keep it a secret—but he wanted to keep them safe, Lottie and his princess, and if he couldn’t do that, he was useless.
“No.” It took all his willpower not to look away as he spoke. “But it’s not her choice. She needs protecting from people like you.” Jamie blinked. It was not Ellie he conjured in his mind; it was Lottie—which infuriated him.
“We mean no harm.”
“Kidnapping and brainwashing seem pretty harmful to me.”
“That is not what we do—”
“The rabbit and the bird, did you kidnap and brainwash them too?”
The masked figures switched into a defensive pose, shadows that morphed around the Goat Man.
“Now, now.” The devil gestured with his hands again. “He is only playing.”
A slimy feeling, like being washed with dirt, spread over Jamie at the insinuation. It made him feel as if he were being mocked for taking this situation so seriously.
“These are my children,” the goat said grandly, posturing proudly in a way that had an instant effect on his two masked marionettes. “Everyone who joins me does so of their own accord, and we welcome them to their new home graciously.”
“Why are you collecting children?” Jamie asked, matching his casual tone. “Seems a little creepy.” If he was going to treat him like a petulant child, then he was going to act like one.
The Goat Man laughed again, but there was an edge to it now, and Jamie could practically smell
