The Mortality Principle

“So, what do they say?”

“Ostensibly they cover a spate of murders in the Czech capital, and the journalist who wrote these articles—Jan Turek—has found a way of linking them to the legend of the golem. But this, I suspect, you already know.”

“I do. It’s why I sent you them.”

“Almost everything in Prague can be linked to the legend in some way, Annja. It is a city filled with hidden dangers. Most of the time they stay hidden, but every now and then one of them finds its way out into the daylight.”

“What does it say, Roux? I’m a big girl. I can look after myself.”

“Just that Turek believes some ancient evil has stirred. I want you to promise me you won’t do anything stupid, Annja.”

“I can’t promise that,” she said, trying her best to sound light and breezy rather than like some petulant teenager. “Anyway, it’s not like I’m on my own.”

“I don’t think that cameraman of yours is likely to be much help.”

“I’m not talking about Lars. Garin turned up this morning.”

“Garin? What on earth is he doing there?” Roux asked. Annja noted the change in his voice. It was more than just the mention of Garin’s name. Maybe, she surmised, it was even part of the reason why he was here in Prague.

“Did he say why he wanted to see you?” Roux asked, following an identical train of thought.

“No. He made out that he was bored. And to be brutally honest, he seemed intent on relieving that boredom with the waitress who served us breakfast.” She expected some kind of response from Roux, some barbed comment about the younger man’s proclivities, some damning indictment of his lifestyle. None came.

Instead, he said, “If we’re going to do this, we’re going to do it properly. I’m coming. Don’t go out after sunset. I’ll be there in a few hours.”

“Roux?” Something really had him spooked. “You don’t have to.”

“I do. Believe me. There are things about that city you don’t understand. Ancient forces. Evil. I am not leaving you alone there.”

“Okay, Roux, now you’re scaring me.”

“Good. It’s good to be scared.”

“Should I warn Garin?”

“He went there with his eyes open. He almost certainly knows what these murders mean. He isn’t a fool, and to use one of your own rather eloquent turns of phrase, he’s big enough and ugly enough to take care of himself. I have a few things to take care of, but I’ll be with you before sunrise. In the meantime, do not go out after dark. Promise me.”

“I promise,” Annja said, knowing it was a promise she was absolutely going to break, but promising it, anyway.

He hung up on her again. Twice within the hour, now that was almost a record.

What had gotten him so spooked? Ancient evil, dark forces. He wasn’t prone to talk like that. So what was so bad it would bring him running? And why no concern for Garin’s well-being? There was something she wasn’t being told and she didn’t like that. She didn’t like it at all. While she was the first to admit that she had a habit of getting into scrapes, she had something none of her enemies had: Joan of Arc’s sword. She didn’t need a bodyguard. All she had to do was to reach out into the otherwhere and close her hand around the reassuring familiarity of the hilt and it was there.

The sword had been reforged after so many years shattered, Roux having scoured the four corners of the Earth to find the shards of metal. That was how this had all begun so many years ago. It wasn’t a blacksmith who had healed the wounded blade—and yes, she’d come to think of the sword as something very much alive—she had done it, with nothing more than her bare hands. Garin had been there, as had Roux. They’d all been in this together from that moment on, despite some hiccups along the way.

Roux hadn’t exactly told her not to talk to Garin, only that he could look after himself. There was no way that she was going to stay cooped up in the hotel room. She thought about checking in with Garin, see if he wanted to do a patrol of the streets, try to shake something loose, but decided to call Lars, her cameraman, to warn him that he wouldn’t be getting a lot of sleep later.

“We’re going monster hunting,” she said when he answered.

“Now?”

“After sundown.”

Lars Mortensen sounded like his head was still somewhere up in Stockholm, his home base. When she’d settled on Prague for the segment, she’d reached out to a few of the cameramen she’d worked with in the region. Lars, who had been with her during their coverage of the Beowulf dig in Skalunda Barrow a couple of years back, jumped at the chance to work with her again. He’d told her he’d meet her under the astronomical clock in twenty-four hours, and like the punctual guy he was, he’d been waiting there for her twenty-three hours and fifty-nine minutes later.

“When you say monsters, you mean?”

“We’ve got a segment to tape.”

“Excellent. I’ve been getting antsy kicking my heels here all day.”

She laughed at that. “I don’t know if you’ve been watching the news, but there’s a killer on the loose in the city and we didn’t even know about it.”

The penny dropped. “Are you out of your mind? There’s a lunatic out there and you want us to go looking for him? I thought we were here to shoot a segment about the golem.”

“We are. But it’s not quite that simple,” she said. “There’s a journalist who seems to think that there’s a link to the golem.”

“You mean like it’s the golem doing the killing kind of link? Or some kind of homage?”

“I don’t know. I want to talk to him, but that means finding him, and the best link I’ve got is that he’s living on the street right now. He’s been covering the story since it began, living among the people who are the most vulnerable.”

“You mean he’s sleeping outside when there’s a killer who’s preying on the homeless? That’s one crazy mofo.”

“He’s certainly dedicated to the truth,” Annja said.

“And you want us to go out into his hunting ground? Are you planning on painting a target on our backs, as well?”

“Nothing so risky. I just want to poke about a bit.”

“I remember the last time you just wanted to poke about, Annja. Just promise me no burning churches this time.”

“We’ll be fine,” Annja said, trying to reassure him even though she remembered all too vividly what had happened the last time they’d gone out on a shoot together. How could she forget? She really hated fire.

She didn’t have to take him out on this little recce, but given what she had in mind for the live show, grabbing some footage of the homeless on the streets of Prague might just be useful filler, assuming the program came together the way she wanted it to. It certainly wouldn’t hurt.

“I’ll hold you to that. Just tell me what time you want me and I’ll be there.”

“I always want you,” Annja said, deliberately flirting with the Swede. They enjoyed a good bit of lighthearted banter. It helped to take her mind off what they were about to do, and that was not a bad thing. “There’s no point in heading out before dark, and this place doesn’t feel like it slows down even then. All the shops around the Charles Bridge are still open, selling their tourist crap, so we’re looking at a late night. Probably after eleven. Turek, the journalist, is almost certainly going to be tucked up in bed until then, but if I hear from him earlier I’ll let you know.”

“He knows you’re trying to get hold of him?”

“I left a message with the newspaper that’s been running his stories, and they promised to reach out to him. Who knows?”

“Well, if that’s the case I may just continue my sightseeing tour. First stop, I think, the House of the Black Madonna, the cubist café. Might even catch a movie after that. Someone mentioned an English theater in town.”

“Knock yourself out.”

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