Andy McDermott - The Tomb Of Hercules

Tchink!

The sword blade went right through the book, effortlessly piercing leather and metal and glass and parchment.

And clothing.

And flesh .

Nina was slammed against the back wall of the little elevator, the book pressed against her chest. She let out an almost silent gasp, mouth open in a stunned O as she looked down.

The pointed tip of the sword blade was stuck in her chest, right over her heart…

But only the tip. The book had taken the brunt of the blow, only a centimeter of sharpened metal making it all the way through to bury itself in her left breast.

Nina forced the book away from her body. The sword’s tip slid free. A circle of blood swelled around the cut in her blouse, pain now searing through her shock.

Fang drew his sword hand back sharply, almost tearing the book from Nina’s grip. The text dropped heavily to the floor, more glass cracking. With the clasp broken, the book swung open as the blade withdrew.

The elevator started to ascend.

Fang snatched his sword clear and grasped the near edge of the open book with his free hand, standing the whole thing on its end and pulling it towards him. The two halves of the outer gate sprang apart, forced open by the book as it rose between them.

The chain around Nina’s wrist pulled tight. Fang only needed to bring the book a few inches closer before it dropped over the edge of the elevator’s floor and the chain was severed by the approaching ceiling-

Despite her pain, Nina grabbed the chain with both hands and hauled with all her strength. “Screw- you!”

Still on its end, the book slid back just as it reached the ceiling-

The elevator continued relentlessly upwards, the edge of the ceiling slicing downwards through the metal spine of the book like a guillotine blade. With a crunch, the volume was ripped in two. Nina fell back and banged her head as her half broke free. The chamber below, and her enemy, disappeared from view.

Dizzy, she shoved herself into a sitting position. The patch of blood on her chest was about the size of her palm, slowly spreading through the sodden material. She pressed a hand against it, wincing. The wound hurt like hell, but didn’t seem to be life-threatening.

Other things were, however. She might have briefly escaped her pursuer, but she still wasn’t safe. There was a flight of stairs alongside the elevator-he was probably running up them already.

Nina scooped up the loose pieces of the book, then dragged herself to her feet as the upper floor slid into view. The elevator came to a stop. She threw the doors open and rushed out, hearing the ponytailed man pounding up the stairs.

She spotted a door along the corridor, a fire exit, and burst through it to find herself at the end of a subway platform. Canal Street, one stop north of Brooklyn Bridge station. She’d run much farther than she realized, several blocks.

But she didn’t care, because all that mattered was the train at the platform, doors open-

She ran into the nearest car, looking back at the fire door. Her attacker could appear at any moment.

The doors began to groan shut.

The fire exit flew open. The ponytailed man barreled onto the platform and ran at the train. His sword flashed again-

The doors slammed closed.

Nina jumped back with a shriek as the sword sliced through the rubber seal between the doors. The train started moving. Fang ran alongside, glaring at Nina, then was forced to admit defeat and pull out his blade before the accelerating train tore it from his grip. A few seconds later, he vanished from sight as the train entered the tunnel.

She let out a long breath of relief, then turned to see that she had an audience. The other occupants of the car were staring at her. Even by the blasé standards of New Yorkers, a soaking, bloodied, slime-covered woman being chased on to a train by a man wielding a sword was hard to ignore.

“Hi,” Nina said wearily, holding up the book. “Overdue. The guy didn’t want to pay his fine.” A couple of people chuckled. She slumped into a seat, belatedly realizing that the man next to her was her erstwhile Good Samaritan from the street near the Brotherhood’s safe house. “Oh, hey, you again,” she said to him, shaking something out from inside the sleeve of her ruined Armani jacket. “Can you hold this for me?”

He looked at the cockroach she’d just deposited in his hands with utter horror, then threw it onto the floor and hurriedly found a new seat as far away from her as possible. Nina shot him a tired, sarcastic smile, then examined what was left of the book.

The front cover was missing, as were several folios. She quickly checked the remainder, splinters of cracked glass tinkling out as she turned the pages. She realized that her attacker now had the first four sheets of parchment, almost a fifth of the whole thing.

She had copies of the text, of course. But clearly there was something that could only be learned from the original, just as she’d thought-otherwise why go to such extreme lengths to steal it?

That was something she could figure out later, however. Right now, she needed to reach somewhere safe, where she could get first aid.

And have a very long shower.

Popadopoulos soundlessly opened and closed his mouth like a fish as Nina spread out what was left of the book containing the ancient dialogue of Hermocrates on her office desk. Pieces of broken glass spilled from the bent frames. “This-this-this is a catastrophe!” he finally managed to say.

Nina scowled. “I’m fine, thank you.” It was now evening, most of her day having been spent in a police station trying to explain the events that had left several men dead in a downtown office building, and three more burned, crushed or drowned in New York’s subways and sewers. “By the way, our ponytailed pal now has the first four pages.” She picked through the book to show him the missing section, more smashed glass crunching. “I don’t suppose you have any idea who he was or who he works for?”

“I was about to ask you that very question!” said the little historian, flustered. “I have no idea! The only person I have dealt with directly about the Hermocrates parchments…is you.” He regarded her with sudden suspicion from behind his glasses. “Perhaps this is all your doing, hmm? Hmm?”

Nina rubbed her temples in exasperation. “Yeah, because whenever I hire a gang of psychos to steal ancient documents, I also ask them to try to kill me!”

“You survived.”

“So did you!” She regarded him quizzically, arching an eyebrow. “Anyway, how did you survive? What happened to you?”

“Let us not speak of that,” Popadopoulos said hurriedly. He bent down, lowering Nina’s desk lamp to illuminate one of the pages. “Oh, no, no! Look! The parchment has been damaged!” He indicated the vertical slit made by the blade.

“It’s like that on every page, I’m afraid. It got skewered by a sword.” Popadopoulos’s eyes widened. Nina continued before he could express his outrage. “And be glad it did, because if it hadn’t , I’d be dead and our friend would have the entire thing.”

Popadopoulos’s expression suggested he was weighing the pros and cons of that particular scenario. “None of this would have happened if you hadn’t insisted on removing the text from my archive in Rome,” he finally said, turning the page over. The sheet of glass backing it broke into pieces and fell onto the desk. Nina gingerly lifted the shards away from the fragile parchment as he examined the blank side of the page for more signs of damage. “Such a thing would never have happened there, no, no, no.”

Nina was about to ask if he was sure about that when Hector Amoros entered the office. “Nina! Mr. Popadopoulos! I’m glad you’re both all right.”