Page 36 of Geist Fleisch
“Who the bloody hell are ‘They?’” Callum wheezed in the cold, then shivered as Heinrich pounced.
The man pinned one hand on either side of him and lowered his body with the elegance of a charmed snake until his nose was again inches from Callum’s. “A creature, both one and many, with countless names. Male, female, both and neither. The fury of mortals will sustain Them for centuries to come, just as it hasfor thousands upon thousands of years. But not like this. Never before on a scale like this.”
Callum pushed Heinrich away, allowing the big man to laugh at him as he sprawled in the snow. “You’re balmy, you are!”
“Oh?” Heinrich shook his head, getting to his feet and reclaiming his coat. “But you know I’m quite sane. You felt it, did you not? Watching those men melt, crushed by your own pain? Even your father—”
“I don’t want him dead! Fuck that and fuck you!”
“Callum, what is death if not life at its most raw and vulnerable? Ask Max if you don’t believe me. One day, a man filled with life and so much love. The next? Such tragedy need not be the end.”
“You can’t bloody do it though, can you?” Callum challenged, pulling on his clothes and shoving Heinrich hard again, not caring that the man barely flinched. “Bring back the dead? I must have been out of my tiny mind believing that!”
“I did not say they could be restored to mortality. Not to the life you know, nor the one that Max and his friends knew.Geist Fleish?Both spirit and skin? That is your gift, not Max’s. But he can walk the living world again. An army of men, returned after so many years stolen by human hatred? Immortal, beyond pain or death? The ones I serve require not their souls, only blood and fury. So will it be in the coming days, but those will pass. It will be even worse than last time, but it will pass, and what is my master to do then?”
Callum shivered again, not from the cold, but from the visions he’d seen. An army of dead men fighting an unending battle, robbed of their deaths as well as their lives. “Go to hell!”
Heinrich laughed again. The fading winter light turned him into a daemon on Earth as it scorched his skin, red as the sky. “Men will destroy one another with or without your help, Callum. With or without my help, or help from the one I serve. My master merely feeds on it, an act no more evil or malicious than a cat chasing down a rodent or a wolf stalking a deer. When your friends Robert and Jacqueline lure men to their deaths, it is a sin far more deliberate than any They require. Man will destroy man, Callum. From a shouting, drunken father to a weapon that will kill millions before they’ve had time to blink, it’s an evil borne of humans, not monsters or gods.”
“And love?” Callum challenged. “Your word, not mine! You said what I’m looking for more than anything is love. You might be right. Hell, you’ve probably crawled into my head and poked about ‘til you’re damn sure. If it costs what I just saw, you can shove your offer and your ‘master’ right up—”
“You resist the inevitable. I’m offering you the chance to be with Max in spite of it.”
Callum tried to imagine an eternity of dancing with Max while the mortal world burned around them. Together forever and ever while it just went on, the War all over again, only this time… He turned to Heinrich, sure at last. “Do you want to know exactly where you lost me?”
Heinrich’s eyes widened with playful bemusement.
“Your master… Old, are They? We talking centuries, or older than that? Are They a daemon? A god?”
“They’ve been called—”
“Yeah, all right, They’ve been called many things. So why now? Why suddenly this plan of grand and total destruction now, to extend a war you say—and I believe you on this—isinevitable? A war that’ll feed Them, like it did last time. Oh, yes. Last time. TheGreatWar. ‘The war to end all wars.’ Tell me what that means for a monster who feeds on anger. A feast They’re scared of never repeating? A fix They’ll never find again? Not with my help, you bastard. Do your own dirty business.”
“You deny yourself the freedom of truth? Your own happiness?” Heinrich allowed Callum to walk away in silence, waiting until he was almost past the trees before calling him again. “What about Anne?”
“You leave her alone!” Callum didn’t care who heard as he turned and advanced on Heinrich again. “You lay a bloody finger on her and I’ll—”
“There’s no need.” Heinrich calmly pointed to a spot behind Callum, where Anne’s blue hat lay in the snow. “But if she means so much to you, you should hurry.”
Callum clenched his fists, fighting the temptation to slam one into Heinrich’s smug, square jaw. The bastard would only thrash him in return, or disappear, or break his arm, or worse. “Where is she?”
“Power-hungry men need armies.” Heinrich pulled his coat tight around him and took his leave. “As I said, Callum, you’re smart. Figure it out.”
Callum swallowed, his naked fingers numbing in the twilight winter air. He knew exactly where he’d find Anne.
Shit.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The door to Suzi’s was shut tight, which didn’t surprise him for six o’clock. This was a place for midnight meetings, not casual daytime gatherings. It certainly wasn’t the place one expected to see a bloke in a long brown overcoat looking fervently up and down Kleiststrasse. The young tough lit a cigarette, then stalked off toward Kleist-Kasino, making a poor show of cool composure, just in case the outline of a revolver in his pocket didn’t give the game away. Callum didn’t know why he bothered. Brownshirts weren’t an unusual sighting in the queer clubs, but they had to be rare enough at Suzi’s.
What to make of that, then? Had they sent a scout out looking for him? Not unless Heinrich had tipped them off, which made every bit of sense from that slimy bastard. Callum looked at his hands again. They were faint, but he could see them. Perhaps he would be harder to see by the light of day. Or perhaps he was only visible after nightfall now—one of the ghosts, indeed!
His hands were also shaking. Invisible or not, he was not about to burst into a lesbian bar overrun by Nazis with no plan beyond scaring the wits out of them and hoping for the best. Besides, he was sure more than a few of them would be nursing black eyes and other injuries of their own. Anne and Suzi—and the American witch, Brigitte, if she was in there—hardly seemedthe sort to play damsels in distress. He had time to be clever about this. He could wait the scout out, then covertly follow him back in, assuming he couldn’t be seen… which of course he bloody could! Could he jump the bloke and steal his uniform? Even more daft. Think!
He jumped as a loud pop went off up the street near the Metropol. Callum spun to see a bright flash of light, followed by the proprietor of a news stand chasing three boys up the street. In front of Suzi’s, another one of the Brownshirts had stepped out to see what the fuss was about, which made Callum wonder if it was time for a little fuss of his own. Callum intercepted the slowest of the boys as the trio ran past him. As his friends beat a hasty retreat, the kid, ruddy cheeked in the cold and no more than nine years old, twisted and writhed in Callum’s grip. The old proprietor soon caught up to them, spouting off an angry slew of German.
“Entschuldegung,” Callum got out, trying to placate the man with an outstretched hand. “He’s my son. Son? Boy?Kinder?”
