Darren Shan - City of the Snakes

Holding on to Ama, I follow her down the stairs into the unknown, only dimly aware of the coffin sliding back into place overhead, plunging us into total, all-encompassing darkness.

My father was a demon. He killed thousands of people, wicked and just, innocent and guilty — it made no difference to him. Paucar Wami was tall, black as the devil’s heart, bald, with uncanny green eyes and colorful tattooed snakes running the gamut of both cheeks, meeting just beneath his lower lip. He butchered for pleasure and gain. He lived solely to destroy. Ten years ago he passed from the face of this Earth and his unique strain of evil passed with him.

Between murders, Wami fathered a crop of children. I was the firstborn. I’ve spent the past decade trying to revive my father’s twisted legacy. I’ve become his living ghost. I’m an assassin’s shade, death to all who cross me.

My name is Al Jeery.

Call me Paucar Wami.

Friday, 23:00. I’ve been shadowing Basil Collinson since early evening. If the pimp sticks to his schedule, he should roll out of the Madam Luck casino shortly after midnight and head for a club. That’s when he dies.

Basil’s a poor gambler but he never drops more than a thousand in a single sitting. He’s careful that way. Likes to maintain control of his life. Dresses in the same smart suit every day. Takes care of his wife and kids, hides the true nature of his business from them. Cuts a slice of his profits to all the right people. On drinking terms with influential police officers and lawyers. Even pays his taxes in full and on time.

Basil’s only weakness is his violent appetite for the women who work for him. He has between fifteen and twenty ladies on the books at any given time, and though he sees that they’re fairly paid, every now and then he takes one off for a weekend and goes to work on her. He drops the façade, hits the bottle and subjects his victim to a torrent of abuse and torment. Mostly they limp away nursing bruises and cuts, but occasionally he’ll put one in the hospital, and at least twice that I know of, the damage has been fatal.

Pimps don’t ruffle my feathers — live and let live — but murderers are fair game.

My motorcycle’s parked out back of the casino, ready if I need it, though I doubt I will. Collinson normally walks to a nearby club when he’s done gambling. I’m waiting for him in an apartment on the fourth floor of the building opposite the casino. It belongs to a guy called George Adams. He works nights. Lives alone. He’ll never know I’ve been here. I prefer to stake out prey from the comfort of an apartment or office. Beats loitering on the streets, disguised as a beggar, hidden behind layers of soggy newspapers and cardboard.

Midnight comes and goes. The air fills with the vicious beat of fuck-it-all music, guilty laughter, drunken cheers and jeers, the growl of taxis, occasional gunfire. The city’s hotting up. There’s been a lot of unrest recently. Gang clashes, street riots, attacks on police. Word is The Cardinal Mk II has gone AWOL. If it’s true, it’s bad news. I have no sympathy for Dorak’s successor, but at least he held things together. If he’s been killed or abducted, this city will erupt and the streets will run with blood.

Collinson exits through the arched, glittering doorway of Madam Luck. I check my watch: 01:23. Later than usual. Must have been on a winning streak. Letting myself out of the apartment, careful not to leave any trace, I slip down the stairs and tag Basil as he turns the corner at the end of the street. He’s alone, which is a bonus. A companion would have complicated things. Now it’s simply a case of picking the ideal moment to strike.

Keeping to the sides, stepping over broken glass and sleeping bums, I close on Collinson, unseen, unheard, a child of the shadows. Ahead, my prey hums and clicks his fingers in time to the tune. Chances are he wouldn’t hear me even if he weren’t so self-absorbed. I’ve had nine years of practice. Only the very rare victim sees or hears me coming. To the rest I materialize out of the night like the monsters they were told not to fear when they were children.

Basil turns onto Hodgson Street. Angling for the Nevermind club—’90s retro. He’ll have to detour through Steine Avenue. The lights are inadequate there at the best of times. Useless these last four nights, since vandals smashed two of the lamps. That’s where I’ll take him.

I get close enough to Basil to identify the tune he’s humming. Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone.” A good song, and he carries it well, but I turn a deaf ear to it. Can’t afford to think of him as human. He’s a pimp, a killer, prey. I’m Paucar Wami, self-appointed executioner. I show no mercy. Fuck his taste in music.

Collinson hits the darkened Steine Avenue. Picking up speed, I stroke the varnished human finger hanging by a chain from my neck and slip up silently behind him, sliding a long curved knife from my belt. The blade’s freshly honed. I take no chances. Murder’s messy if you don’t put your target down with a single swipe.

At the last moment Basil senses me. He begins to turn, but too late. Bringing the knife up, hissing like the jungle cat I become at the moment of death, I slash it sharply across his throat, using the momentum of his swiveling head to drive the blade deep into his flesh, all the way across from right to left.

Basil’s dead before he hits the floor, though it takes him awhile to realize it. He jerks spasmodically, blood arcing high into the air from his severed throat. I stand clear of the spray, letting the wall take the burst, watching emotionlessly as his legs and arms go still. When he’s at rest and the flow of blood has subsided to a steady trickle, I step forward and crouch, working quickly. I’m wearing disposable plastic gloves. Dipping my index finger into the pool of blood spreading around his head, I rip the front of his shirt open, then scrawl on his chest (pausing to re-bloody my finger several times), THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS TO PIMPS WHO MALTREAT THEIR WOMEN. P.W.

Done, I close Basil Collinson’s eyes and say a silent prayer over him. “This son of a bitch is yours, Lord. Do with him as you will. Just don’t send him back.” The prayer’s instinctive. I mutter similar words over many of those I kill. A force of habit I’ve never bothered to break, though I should — wasted seconds.

Standing, I check I haven’t been seen, then slip away, offering myself to the shadows of the streets and alleys. As usual they accept me, and soon I’m invisible to all but the city itself.

I wake early, before seven. I’d have appreciated another couple of hours, but once I’m awake there’s no slipping back to sleep. Better to get up and on with the day than lie here thinking about Collinson and the other lives I’ve taken. I can reconcile myself to the life I lead when I’m active

( when I’m Paucar Wami )

but if I sit back and brood, doubts flood in, and doubts will be the end of me if I give them their head. I have to keep busy. My sanity depends on it.

Temperatures have been hotter than usual for this time of year, but it’s cold this morning and I start with a series of push-ups to warm up. I break three hundred before the first beads of sweat flow. I’ve spent most of the last ten years exercising. Approximately six hours of sleep each day, a couple of hours wasted on eating, washing, cleaning and shopping, the rest working out or pounding the streets. No leisure time. I don’t read, watch TV or listen to the radio. Sometimes I dip into newspapers, do research in libraries and scan computer files to check on certain facts, but otherwise I’m continually on the move, acting and reacting, thinking only of the challenges at hand.