Darren Shan - Procession of the dead

"I shouldn't be more than a couple of hours," I told him. I felt the handle of the knife through the fabric of my jacket. I was going to bring a gun but decided on the knife in the end-quieter, cleaner. "If you see any cars circling, or anything that looks suspect, take off. I don't want you getting killed."

"You're all heart," he said. "A true humanitarian."

"No," I replied, "but I might need to use you again one day." I slapped the roof of the car. "See you soon. I hope."

I left Nathanael Mead with his radio and papers and made the trek across to Pier 15. There was a breeze blowing in off the river, dispersing the covering fog. There was nobody in sight but I skulked along in the shadows of enormous, empty warehouses anyway. They smelled of salt and dead fish. I'd need to bathe for hours to rid myself of the stench.

I was early but she'd gotten there before me nonetheless. She was leaning against a rotting wooden door eight times her height, held together with the huge steel bolts they were so fond of back in the old days. She was dressed in blue jeans, a white Aran sweater and a long black trench coat. The wind caught the tails of the coat when she turned at my call, whipping it into the air.

I tried not to think about how she looked. This woman might be able to clear up the mystery of Adrian and Y Tse. And whether she did or not, I had to keep in mind that she was an enemy. Once I'd heard what she had to say-unless it was something truly extraordinary-I'd slit her throat and dump her in the river. She'd be my first kill. I wasn't certain I could do it but I'd give it a damn good try.

"You came," she said. "I didn't think you'd show. How'd you get here?"

"I know a guy who's no fan of The Cardinal. He brought me. You?"

"Scooter." She pointed it out. A small model, nestled behind an abandoned Dumpster.

"So what do you have to tell me?" I asked. "What's the Ayuamarca file?"

"You don't beat about the bush," she commented. "Don't worry, I'll get around to that. First I want to know more about you. I don't really know anything except you work for The Cardinal, you sell insurance, and you're a pretty good lay. Tell me about yourself. Don't hold back."

I thought for a few seconds. "My name's Capac Raimi. I came to this city about a year ago to be a gangster with my Uncle Theo…"

I told her about the early days, Theo's untimely demise, meeting The Cardinal, Adrian, Y Tse, Leonora (I left out Conchita). I even told her my favorite foods and movies. I talked for twenty minutes solid.

"All done?" she asked when I ran out of breath. I nodded. "Good. I'll know better than to ask you such a vague question again. Jesus on an accordion! But for all you said, you left much out. You didn't tell me about the real Capac Raimi. All I got was recent history. How about your youth? Was your father a gangster? What were your brothers and sisters like? When did you decide to embark on a life of crime? Come on, Capac, fill me in. I'm fascinated." She was taunting me, trying to make me feel uncomfortable. She was succeeding.

"That stuff's not important," I waved it away. "Who cares where I was born and how I grew up? It's old hat."

"I like old hats. They keep my ears warm."

"It doesn't matter."

"Everything matters." She tickled my nose, then quickly licked it. "Come on," she breathed, "tell Auntie Ama all about it." I tried to grab her but she danced away. "Uh-uh, not until you've told me about your past."

"Fuck the past!" I shouted angrily. "I don't care about it. The past didn't matter when we were screwing like rabbits on the stairs."

"True," she said. "But rabbits always end up with a bullet in their brains and their bones on a plate." She left the shadow of the building and crossed to the edge of the pier. Picked up a handful of small pebbles and skimmed them across the face of the calm river. I followed her into what little sun was managing to creep through the eddying clouds of fog. We could have been the last man and woman in a postapocalyptic ghost town. She spoke without looking at me.

"I went to Party Central again last night. I wanted to check on you. I pulled your files, the special ones that The Cardinal keeps hidden where only the elite can find them. Have you seen those files?"

"No."

"They're incredibly detailed. Obsessively so. Lists of your clients, your friends and associates. A full itinerary of your time in the city, going back to when you were working for your uncle. Clubs you went to, women you've fucked, deals you were in on. Your favorite drinks and hobbies, notes on the way you walk and talk. Pictures of you, from pissing in urinals to making love to sleeping. Where you shop, what you buy, what you eat. Samples of your handwriting, with specialist assessments. They note the shaving foam you use, how often you wash, how often you change clothes. Details of your finances. The most complete files I've ever seen. But there's one thing missing. One minor discrepancy."

"Go on," I told her grimly. "What's the punch line?"

"There's nothing about your past." She got a stone to skim eight times. I counted each jump automatically. "Nothing about when you were born, where you grew up, who your parents were, where you went to school."

"That's not so odd," I said. "Like I told you, my past isn't important. My life before I came here doesn't mean shit. I was just an ordinary hick."

"That's bullshit and you know it," she snapped. "Everybody in those files has a past, from the cleaners up to Ford Tasso. You think The Cardinal wouldn't have copies of your birth certificate, your school grades, letters from previous employers? You don't take someone on without knowing anything about him. Where are your medical records, your Social Security number, your driver's license, your passport details? There's nothing. It's like you never existed. Every name in that building has a past. Except yours." She paused. "And mine."

A filthy trawler passed. One of the crew was standing at the rail nearest us and waved. Ama waved back but I couldn't muster the enthusiasm. I kept examining her, saying nothing, waiting for her to go on. She watched the boat sail out of sight around a bend in the river before proceeding.

"I was happy when I came to this city," she said. "I was with my father, delighted to be reunited after so many years apart. I made new friends, played around with a few men, worked in the restaurant and took to it with ease. Life was simple and enjoyable. I felt I was where I belonged. Thought I was going to live happily ever after, like in the fairy tales, take over the restaurant when Cafran passed on, have kids, raise a family of my own.

"Then, one day, my friends were discussing their youth, schools, teachers and boys. I usually kept quiet in those kinds of conversations, always feeling awkward. One of the girls tried to draw me into the debate. She asked what my hometown was like, my family, my friends. I brushed her inquiries away as I normally did, with a few halfhearted mutters, but she persisted. The others saw my reluctance and joined in, thinking I had something deep and mysterious in my past.

"I scoured my memories for some small tidbit to toss them. I didn't ask much of myself. All I wanted was a simple anecdote they could laugh at, my first kiss or a spat I'd had with my mother. Something like that.

"I couldn't think of anything." She turned and I saw she was forcing back tears. "There was nothing. No images of my mother, home or friends. I knew the story of how Cafran and his wife had split, how she'd whisked me away and reared me, but it was a tale I'd heard rather than experienced. I couldn't remember growing up. Everything before coming here was a blank.

"I went to Cafran. I thought he'd be able to jog my memory with reminiscences of his own." She shook her head. "He knew nothing either. He spun me the same old story but couldn't embellish it. He didn't know where I'd lived, when I'd been born, or which relatives I'd lived with after my mother's death.