Alex Archer - Gabriel's Horn

Forcing herself to remain calm, Annja turned slowly. Thoughts of the pistol the man had been only too willing to use were foremost in her mind. She’d only been in Prague for a few days. She didn’t know anyone there who wanted to kill her.

The keening wail of the sirens drew closer.

From the corner of her eye, she glimpsed the three men running across the next building. Annja launched herself in pursuit. She drove her legs hard and reached the building’s edge in a dozen strides. By that time she was up to speed.

A narrow gulf nearly three stories deep loomed before her. She never slackened her effort. Her left foot landed on the building’s edge and she propelled herself over the intervening distance.

Almost immediately she knew she hadn’t jumped high enough. She had the distance covered easily, but she dropped too quickly. Desperate, she threw her arms out and slammed against the other building with enough force to knock the wind from her lungs.

Her fingers curled as she slid down, then caught the lip of the roof. She pushed her hiking boots against the stone wall and found purchase. When she climbed up, she started to run again.

The men she pursued remained a building ahead of her. Concentrating, she found her rhythm. She leaped the next alley, landed and didn’t miss a stride. The distance between her and the three men was shrinking.

Ahead of her, the three men turned and looked back. The man with the pistol stopped suddenly and whirled around with the weapon before him. A green tattoo of a curved sword covered the hollow of his throat.

A quick step to the side put Annja out of range of the first bullet. The second chopped into the roof where she’d been. By that time she had taken cover behind a chimney. She felt the vibrations of bullets squarely striking it.

Were the men going to continue to flee? Or were they going to come back to finish the job? Especially since she’d cut herself off from possible help.

You really need to stop and think some of these things through before you do them, she chided herself. The problem with that was there generally wasn’t much time for thinking when something like this happened.

And information—any information—was better than no information. She wanted to know who the men were and why they’d tried to kill her.

She was sure they’d been there to kill her, not anyone connected with the movie.

Squatting down, her breath still coming smoothly in spite of her exertion, Annja reached for her sword. She felt it with her hand and drew it forth from the otherwhere.

The sword was a part of her life she was still struggling to understand. She set herself, arms bent at the elbow, balancing the sword straight up in front of her.

Her hearing was still muffled so Annja watched for moving shadows to either side of her. It was late enough in the afternoon that the shadows would be long, but they wouldn’t be bent toward her since the men were south of her position. She also paid attention to the vibrations throbbing through the rooftop.

Three more rounds slammed into the chimney. Stone chips sprayed the rooftop. After a moment, Annja glanced around the chimney and saw the men fleeing. She sped after them with the sword in her hand.

After leaping to the next building, she made it to the fire escape before they could reach the ground. The man with the pistol leaned out from the second-floor landing and fired several shots.

Annja dodged back just in time for the shots to miss her. The bullets ripped along the low brick wall in front of her and tore through the air. She reversed her grip on the sword, stepped along the wall four paces and leaned out again.

The man stood farther down the stairs, almost to the ground.

As the man turned toward her and froze in his position, Annja whipped the sword at him. The keen blade caught the man high in the chest and knocked him over the railing. He dropped in a loose heap to the ground and writhed in pain.

He wasn’t dead. She hadn’t intended to kill him. Although she had killed while saving her life or the lives of others, the idea of doing that didn’t sit well with her.

Annja started to climb down, but the other two men pulled out pistols. She ducked back again. Great, she thought. Everyone has a gun but me.

Bullets smacked against the building. She felt the vibrations more than she heard the harsh cracks of the gunshots.

She concentrated for just a moment, felt for the sword and pulled it through otherwhere again. On the ground, the man screamed in agony. The blade appeared in her hands blood free. Annja still didn’t know how the sword did what it did, but she’d come to trust it and use it when necessary.

She shifted and moved to a new position. Then she looked over the roof’s edge again. Below, the two healthy men had the third man between them in a fireman’s carry. They ran toward the street. One of the men talked on a phone.

Annja started down the fire escape with the sword in her hand. She took the steps two and three at a time, boots thudding against the steps, almost spilling over the landings in her haste. At the second-floor landing she let her momentum get the best of her and vaulted over the side. She flipped and landed on her feet, her sword swept back and ready.

A dark sedan screeched to a stop near the three fleeing men. The rear door swung open. The two men carrying the third stared in awe at Annja. They passed their wounded comrade inside and climbed in after him.

Annja ran after them, thinking that she might be able to keep pace. She willed the sword away and reached for her phone. For a moment she kept up with the retreating vehicle and strained to make out the license plate.

The rear window sank down smoothly. The wicked mouth of a submachine pistol jutted out just as Annja closed in on an outdoor café packed with diners.

Annja couldn’t risk innocent bystanders. The people at the café would never see the threat in time, much less be able to take evasive action. Frustrated, she stopped, then dived for cover as the submachine gun chattered to life. Bullets passed over her head and shattered the windows of the clothing store behind her.

Glass shards rattled down all around her. She kept her hands and arms wrapped around her head to protect her face. The deadly rain had stopped, and she made sure she wasn’t bleeding from anything serious. When she looked up, the dark sedan was gone.

She punched the car’s license plate number into her phone’s memory and hoped the police would arrive soon.

Annja watched the Prague police detective and tried to read his lips. The man’s mouth hardly moved, and the bushy mustache further disguised what he was saying.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “You’re going to have to speak up.” Her own words barely penetrated the thick cotton in her ears. “I can’t hear very well since the explosions.”

The detective, whose name was Skromach, calmly started over. He looked like a patient man. Slight of stature, he exuded an air of competence. His salt-and-pepper hair needed the attention of a barber, but his suit was impeccable.

“You ran after the men, Miss Creed?” Skromach asked.

“Yes.” Annja sat on the steps of a nearby building. An ambulance attendant treated a thin cut below her left eye and another along her jawline. Neither was bad enough to scar, but they would show for a while. She hoped Garin wasn’t planning on taking her anywhere too elegant because she would look like a ragamuffin.

Skromach held his pen poised over his notepad. “Why would you do such a thing?”

“I didn’t want the men who did this to get away.”

The detective nodded. “You think they did this?”

Annja nodded at the burning pyre of cars the local fire department was dealing with. Water streamed from hoses. Gray steam clouds mixed with the black smoke.