Post by Lorpius Prime on Dec 2, 2008 6:19:34 GMT -5
Once she realized that she was going to die, Margaret found the idea surprisingly easy to accept. As long as she still had some slight hope of living, Margaret had been willing to fight for that chance, and with that will had come the fear that she might fail. For a moment, she had thought that Martin might still be able to save her, but he had been pulled away again, and the fear was almost unbearable.
Then she fell into the crowd of people below, and she knew her fate without a doubt. They might have been people, but they were utterly incomprehensible to Margaret. Not just their words but the hungry looks on their faces, the exaggerated way they moved, and the way they began pawing at Margaret as soon as she was in their midst, they seemed to lack all humanity. Margaret shut her eyes; she could accept whatever they would do to her, but she did not want to watch.
Someone twisted Margaret's arms around behind her back and held them there. She set her teeth against the pain in her elbows and waited for it to get worse, but nothing happened. After a minute or so, she opened her eyes again.
The shouting had died down to a few quiet murmurs among some of the people standing around. So far as Margaret could tell that was all most of them were doing, just standing. Someone was still holding her arms, of course, and someone else was dragging a body down the stairs from the house into which they had tried to escape.
The body was Colonel Holland, his legs bouncing uselessly against the concrete steps as a man half his size pulled him down the steps by his shirt collar. He appeared almost completely uninjured except for a superficial cut across one cheek and the fact that he was not moving at all. The little man finished his task and dropped Martin facedown onto the street with a thud. Margaret shuddered.
The little man rubbed his hands together and spat on the ground near Colonel Holland's head. Then he stepped backwards as someone else walked forward out of the crowd. He was a skeletally thin man with short, messy gray hair who walked with a hunch and a pronounced limp in his left leg. Margaret had the horrible idea that he was the man Martin had shot just a few minutes ago.
He squatted down beside the body and grabbed Martin's head by the chin to examine his face. Margaret sucked in a deep breath when she noticed that her companion was still breathing. Perhaps he would have been better off dead, but Margaret still could not help but feel relieved that whoever these people were, they had merely beaten Martin unconscious. After a few moments, the hunchback let go of Martin's head and stood back up. He muttered something to one of the clumps of people now clustered around him, and waved an arm at Margaret without even turning to look at her.
Whoever was holding onto Margaret's arms tugged at them, hard, and pulled her hands together. She felt something being wrapped around her wrists, and winced as the rough rope bindings sawed into her skin. Someone else stepped forward out of the shadows with a length of rope and knelt to tie Martin's hands behind him; the Colonel offered considerably less resistance than Margaret. When that was done, the shadowy figure—who was of considerably larger stature than most of the others—lifted Martin up and onto his shoulders. Then he turned to Margaret, which was when she noticed that he was carrying a revolver.
He pointed it straight at her face. Margaret tried to step back and away, but whoever had tied her hands was still behind her, and shoved her back into place.
"Walk," said the man with the gun, and he moved the weapon very slightly to indicate the direction he meant.
Margaret started walking. The fear was back.
Their captors marched them to the palace. Martin had said that the British consulate was there, along with the men from his office whose help he would enlist in finding Jay Thomson. That might have been the case once, but the great building was clearly under different management now. Great torches lit up the approaches to the palace, and its entrances were guarded by soldiers in elaborate uniforms wholly unfamiliar to Margaret.
Martin had regained consciousness a few blocks after the start of their march and tried unsuccessfully to roll off the back of his captor. It didn't seem likely that he could have escaped in any event; after being set back on his feet, Martin seemed to have trouble keeping his balance and had to be frog-marched the rest of the way to their destination. Margaret had tried to say a few things to him, but he only muttered vaguely in response and anyway they were kept too far apart to have a comfortable conversation. The two prisoners walked in silence surrounded by twenty or so guards who kept up a low buzz of conversation in what Margaret presumed was German. They only stopped on a few occasions to drag Martin back to his feet whenever he stumbled. Margaret feared he had been seriously injured.
He barely made it up the stone stairs at the palace entrance, and the big man who had carried him at first lifted him into the air by the back of his coat for the last few steps. Margaret herself nearly fell when one of the guards shoved her, apparently she wasn't moving as fast as she should have been. Several soldiers carrying ornate spears blocked their way at the doors, and the whole group stopped for a minute as the hunchback spoke to the soldiers.
They were wearing blue and red uniforms better suited to another era, especially the ridiculous horsehair plumes that crested their helmets. They listened to the hunchback for a moment, then shouldered their absurdly fanciful weapons in a single synchronized motion and stepped aside to let the party pass through the doors.
It was dark inside the palace. Outside light had been provided the moon, stars, and various fires and lamps around the palace grounds. Inside, there was nothing. Margaret wanted to wait for her eyes to adjust to the darkness, but someone poked her between the shoulder blades with a hard object and she started forward again, hoping she wouldn't trip over anything.
Her eyes did not adjust. She walked in complete blackness with only the footsteps of the guards in front of her to tell her that she was still going in the right direction. There was also something to the atmosphere inside the palace that was making it difficult for her to breathe. After less than a minute, she was struggling against the feeling that her lungs were being pulled forcibly out of her chest. It was not very hot, but she was beginning to sweat noticeably.
Finally a door opened on their left, and a dim orange glow showed through. It was being held by the gray-haired hunchback, and he stood behind it, glowering at his captives. Martin and Margaret were shoved forward again, but Martin had at least regained enough of his balance to stay on his feet, barely. They passed through the door and into a large room, like a banquet hall except it was empty of most furniture. The hunchback closed the door behind them, the rest of their captors remained outside.
There was a large stone fireplace at one end of the hall, and the fire burning inside was the only source of light. It was mostly obscured, however, by a large chair placed in front of the fireplace, casting dim and wickedly dancing shadows over the entire room.
"Gut gemacht, Gerd." called a strong voice. It came from the chair by the fireplace but resonated through all the walls of the room, and Margaret thought she could feel its vibrations tugging on her very bones.
The hunchback who had ushered them in sneered and waved them towards the fire and the voice. Margaret was still very aware of her own fear, but now she felt even more curiosity about just what was going on, and she turned to approach whoever had spoken. Martin plodded forward beside her, breathing heavily and looking as if he was about to collapse again. Now only a few feet away, Margaret could see the blood which was congealing in the hair on the back of his head.
It was difficult to see the person who sat waiting for them. But the chair in which he sat was a throne, and one well-suited to a place in a child's illustrated fairy-tale. The whole outer surface was an elaborately carved wooden sculpture, which rose up in the back to support a pair of massive outstretched bird's wings. The wings appeared to be made of gold, of course.
By the time she had finished gawking at the thing, Margaret's eyes had adjusted well enough that she could see the person sitting on the throne's velvet cushions; and she switched to gawking at him, for he, too, was worthy of an illustrated fantasy. He was a young man, with a face that might have been carved out of marble. Half of Margaret's friends would have fawned all over him just for that, but his rakish mustache would have certainly broken down the best defenses of the other half. Yet for all his handsome features, his clothes were just as badly at out of style as the soldiers outside the palace. He was wearing a wig, of all things, a rolled and powdered one that might have been appropriate on an English judge, but just looked weird on anyone else. He had a woolen green coat that could not have been comfortable even in cool weather, and his shirt was obscured by an absurd cravat tied about his neck. Worst, however, were his breeches, an article of clothing Margaret had only seen in theater, and always felt bad for the people forced to wear them even then. The breeches showed off white leggings that ended in a pair of black buckled shoes. The whole ensemble was ridiculous, and Margaret would have laughed at him even despite the circumstances were it not for his eyes.
His eyes were red, red all-through. He did not even appear to have pupils, just two crimson orbs sunk into his eye sockets. Margaret was immensely grateful that his head was turned away from her at the moment; he appeared to be looking at Martin.
Martin, for his part, was meeting the man's gaze. Even in his terrible condition, it didn't seem possible to intimidate him. Margaret felt herself smile just slightly at the man's tenacity.
The hunchback walked around the two of them and moved to stand behind and to one side of the big throne. The red-eyed man pressed his ivory fingers together in a pyramid beneath his chin.
"Welcome to Nymphenburg, Colonel Holland," he said, and Margaret could feel her innards twisting up again at the sound of his voice. "I was rather surprised to discover you here."
Margaret blinked. Did Martin know this man? It didn't seem possible.
"You were something of a role-model to Major Farragut, you know?" the red-eyed man continued. "But he and I were under the impression that you had been confined to a desk in London. I suppose we were mistaken."
He sounded like someone that worked for the Security Service too; perhaps he was one of the ones that Martin had been looking for. But something was clearly very wrong with him. Martin stayed silent. The red-eyed man flexed his fingers, possibly in frustration.
"Well you have failed all the same," he hissed. "And let me assure you this will be the last time you people are able to play your little games. The reporter came to me, and my people have found Mr. Blake's papers quite enlight—"
"You have Jay Thomson?" Margaret blurted. She had almost forgotten her original purpose for coming here amid her terror.
The man in the throne snapped his head to one side to fix her with a stare from those awful eyes. Margaret's heart and lungs leaped up her throat, trying to escape, causing her to choke. She took a half-step forward towards the red-eyed man as if he'd caught her by a fishhook and was reeling her in.
"And who is this, Colonel Holland?" he asked without looking away from Margaret. "I know you British like your whores, but hauling one all the way to Munich on assignment strikes me as rather unprofessional."
"I'm Jay Thomson's sister," Margaret rasped, rubbing her throat with one hand. "Please, we just want him back."
The choking sensation stopped as suddenly as it had begun, and Margaret gulped in air. The red-eyed man turned his head slowly away from her to Martin, then leaned back in his chair.
"Well," he said, "how… typical."
The word was delivered with a malice that Margaret didn't understand, but she saw Martin twitch slightly. She opened her mouth to speak again, but the red-eyed man held up a hand and the words died in her throat.
"I am afraid, Miss Blake, that your brother is eluding me at the moment. He and some less imaginative associates of mine have fled to the Herreninsel, which they believe to be beyond my reach."
He stood up, clasping his arms behind his back. "I will soon correct that oversight, however." He took a step toward Margaret, and tilted his head slightly, "Especially now that I have such a spirit—"
"No." Martin spoke for the first time, and there was an edge in his voice that Margaret had not heard before.
"I believe I understand your sentiment now, Colonel Holland," the red-eyed man said, still without looking away from Margaret. He held out one hand as if to touch her chin, Margaret tried to shrink away, but found that she could not move her legs.
The red-eyed man stepped forward again, "But I am afraid you cannot possibly—"
There was a loud crack, like the sound of breaking furniture. Margaret could not tell what Martin had done, except that he had somehow gotten free of the rope tying his hands. His right arm was thrust beneath his coat, grabbing at something.
It came out with a gun. Martin's face was contorted in a terrifying mix of pain and anger as he pointed a tiny, snub-nosed revolver at the red-eyed man's forehead.
The hunchback behind the throne dropped into a tense crouch, but the red-eyed man just turned to face Martin and smiled in amusement.
"I see my men need to do a better job searching prisoners," he said, then shook his head. "However, I think you will be disappointed by the results if you shoot me, you would hardly be the first."
Martin shot him.
The red-eyed man's knees gave out and he crumpled in a heap at Margaret's feet. Martin shot the body twice more.
The hunchback let out an unholy shriek, and Margaret started to shake uncontrollably. She thought he was going to pounce on Martin, but instead he tumbled backwards, right into the fireplace. The flames hissed and swelled to engulf the body.
Still shivering, Margaret looked away from the carnage to stare open-mouthed at Martin. He looked up at her from the corpse of the red-eyed man.
"Not disappointing at all," he said. Then he doubled over and collapsed.
Then she fell into the crowd of people below, and she knew her fate without a doubt. They might have been people, but they were utterly incomprehensible to Margaret. Not just their words but the hungry looks on their faces, the exaggerated way they moved, and the way they began pawing at Margaret as soon as she was in their midst, they seemed to lack all humanity. Margaret shut her eyes; she could accept whatever they would do to her, but she did not want to watch.
Someone twisted Margaret's arms around behind her back and held them there. She set her teeth against the pain in her elbows and waited for it to get worse, but nothing happened. After a minute or so, she opened her eyes again.
The shouting had died down to a few quiet murmurs among some of the people standing around. So far as Margaret could tell that was all most of them were doing, just standing. Someone was still holding her arms, of course, and someone else was dragging a body down the stairs from the house into which they had tried to escape.
The body was Colonel Holland, his legs bouncing uselessly against the concrete steps as a man half his size pulled him down the steps by his shirt collar. He appeared almost completely uninjured except for a superficial cut across one cheek and the fact that he was not moving at all. The little man finished his task and dropped Martin facedown onto the street with a thud. Margaret shuddered.
The little man rubbed his hands together and spat on the ground near Colonel Holland's head. Then he stepped backwards as someone else walked forward out of the crowd. He was a skeletally thin man with short, messy gray hair who walked with a hunch and a pronounced limp in his left leg. Margaret had the horrible idea that he was the man Martin had shot just a few minutes ago.
He squatted down beside the body and grabbed Martin's head by the chin to examine his face. Margaret sucked in a deep breath when she noticed that her companion was still breathing. Perhaps he would have been better off dead, but Margaret still could not help but feel relieved that whoever these people were, they had merely beaten Martin unconscious. After a few moments, the hunchback let go of Martin's head and stood back up. He muttered something to one of the clumps of people now clustered around him, and waved an arm at Margaret without even turning to look at her.
Whoever was holding onto Margaret's arms tugged at them, hard, and pulled her hands together. She felt something being wrapped around her wrists, and winced as the rough rope bindings sawed into her skin. Someone else stepped forward out of the shadows with a length of rope and knelt to tie Martin's hands behind him; the Colonel offered considerably less resistance than Margaret. When that was done, the shadowy figure—who was of considerably larger stature than most of the others—lifted Martin up and onto his shoulders. Then he turned to Margaret, which was when she noticed that he was carrying a revolver.
He pointed it straight at her face. Margaret tried to step back and away, but whoever had tied her hands was still behind her, and shoved her back into place.
"Walk," said the man with the gun, and he moved the weapon very slightly to indicate the direction he meant.
Margaret started walking. The fear was back.
* * *
Their captors marched them to the palace. Martin had said that the British consulate was there, along with the men from his office whose help he would enlist in finding Jay Thomson. That might have been the case once, but the great building was clearly under different management now. Great torches lit up the approaches to the palace, and its entrances were guarded by soldiers in elaborate uniforms wholly unfamiliar to Margaret.
Martin had regained consciousness a few blocks after the start of their march and tried unsuccessfully to roll off the back of his captor. It didn't seem likely that he could have escaped in any event; after being set back on his feet, Martin seemed to have trouble keeping his balance and had to be frog-marched the rest of the way to their destination. Margaret had tried to say a few things to him, but he only muttered vaguely in response and anyway they were kept too far apart to have a comfortable conversation. The two prisoners walked in silence surrounded by twenty or so guards who kept up a low buzz of conversation in what Margaret presumed was German. They only stopped on a few occasions to drag Martin back to his feet whenever he stumbled. Margaret feared he had been seriously injured.
He barely made it up the stone stairs at the palace entrance, and the big man who had carried him at first lifted him into the air by the back of his coat for the last few steps. Margaret herself nearly fell when one of the guards shoved her, apparently she wasn't moving as fast as she should have been. Several soldiers carrying ornate spears blocked their way at the doors, and the whole group stopped for a minute as the hunchback spoke to the soldiers.
They were wearing blue and red uniforms better suited to another era, especially the ridiculous horsehair plumes that crested their helmets. They listened to the hunchback for a moment, then shouldered their absurdly fanciful weapons in a single synchronized motion and stepped aside to let the party pass through the doors.
It was dark inside the palace. Outside light had been provided the moon, stars, and various fires and lamps around the palace grounds. Inside, there was nothing. Margaret wanted to wait for her eyes to adjust to the darkness, but someone poked her between the shoulder blades with a hard object and she started forward again, hoping she wouldn't trip over anything.
Her eyes did not adjust. She walked in complete blackness with only the footsteps of the guards in front of her to tell her that she was still going in the right direction. There was also something to the atmosphere inside the palace that was making it difficult for her to breathe. After less than a minute, she was struggling against the feeling that her lungs were being pulled forcibly out of her chest. It was not very hot, but she was beginning to sweat noticeably.
Finally a door opened on their left, and a dim orange glow showed through. It was being held by the gray-haired hunchback, and he stood behind it, glowering at his captives. Martin and Margaret were shoved forward again, but Martin had at least regained enough of his balance to stay on his feet, barely. They passed through the door and into a large room, like a banquet hall except it was empty of most furniture. The hunchback closed the door behind them, the rest of their captors remained outside.
There was a large stone fireplace at one end of the hall, and the fire burning inside was the only source of light. It was mostly obscured, however, by a large chair placed in front of the fireplace, casting dim and wickedly dancing shadows over the entire room.
"Gut gemacht, Gerd." called a strong voice. It came from the chair by the fireplace but resonated through all the walls of the room, and Margaret thought she could feel its vibrations tugging on her very bones.
The hunchback who had ushered them in sneered and waved them towards the fire and the voice. Margaret was still very aware of her own fear, but now she felt even more curiosity about just what was going on, and she turned to approach whoever had spoken. Martin plodded forward beside her, breathing heavily and looking as if he was about to collapse again. Now only a few feet away, Margaret could see the blood which was congealing in the hair on the back of his head.
It was difficult to see the person who sat waiting for them. But the chair in which he sat was a throne, and one well-suited to a place in a child's illustrated fairy-tale. The whole outer surface was an elaborately carved wooden sculpture, which rose up in the back to support a pair of massive outstretched bird's wings. The wings appeared to be made of gold, of course.
By the time she had finished gawking at the thing, Margaret's eyes had adjusted well enough that she could see the person sitting on the throne's velvet cushions; and she switched to gawking at him, for he, too, was worthy of an illustrated fantasy. He was a young man, with a face that might have been carved out of marble. Half of Margaret's friends would have fawned all over him just for that, but his rakish mustache would have certainly broken down the best defenses of the other half. Yet for all his handsome features, his clothes were just as badly at out of style as the soldiers outside the palace. He was wearing a wig, of all things, a rolled and powdered one that might have been appropriate on an English judge, but just looked weird on anyone else. He had a woolen green coat that could not have been comfortable even in cool weather, and his shirt was obscured by an absurd cravat tied about his neck. Worst, however, were his breeches, an article of clothing Margaret had only seen in theater, and always felt bad for the people forced to wear them even then. The breeches showed off white leggings that ended in a pair of black buckled shoes. The whole ensemble was ridiculous, and Margaret would have laughed at him even despite the circumstances were it not for his eyes.
His eyes were red, red all-through. He did not even appear to have pupils, just two crimson orbs sunk into his eye sockets. Margaret was immensely grateful that his head was turned away from her at the moment; he appeared to be looking at Martin.
Martin, for his part, was meeting the man's gaze. Even in his terrible condition, it didn't seem possible to intimidate him. Margaret felt herself smile just slightly at the man's tenacity.
The hunchback walked around the two of them and moved to stand behind and to one side of the big throne. The red-eyed man pressed his ivory fingers together in a pyramid beneath his chin.
"Welcome to Nymphenburg, Colonel Holland," he said, and Margaret could feel her innards twisting up again at the sound of his voice. "I was rather surprised to discover you here."
Margaret blinked. Did Martin know this man? It didn't seem possible.
"You were something of a role-model to Major Farragut, you know?" the red-eyed man continued. "But he and I were under the impression that you had been confined to a desk in London. I suppose we were mistaken."
He sounded like someone that worked for the Security Service too; perhaps he was one of the ones that Martin had been looking for. But something was clearly very wrong with him. Martin stayed silent. The red-eyed man flexed his fingers, possibly in frustration.
"Well you have failed all the same," he hissed. "And let me assure you this will be the last time you people are able to play your little games. The reporter came to me, and my people have found Mr. Blake's papers quite enlight—"
"You have Jay Thomson?" Margaret blurted. She had almost forgotten her original purpose for coming here amid her terror.
The man in the throne snapped his head to one side to fix her with a stare from those awful eyes. Margaret's heart and lungs leaped up her throat, trying to escape, causing her to choke. She took a half-step forward towards the red-eyed man as if he'd caught her by a fishhook and was reeling her in.
"And who is this, Colonel Holland?" he asked without looking away from Margaret. "I know you British like your whores, but hauling one all the way to Munich on assignment strikes me as rather unprofessional."
"I'm Jay Thomson's sister," Margaret rasped, rubbing her throat with one hand. "Please, we just want him back."
The choking sensation stopped as suddenly as it had begun, and Margaret gulped in air. The red-eyed man turned his head slowly away from her to Martin, then leaned back in his chair.
"Well," he said, "how… typical."
The word was delivered with a malice that Margaret didn't understand, but she saw Martin twitch slightly. She opened her mouth to speak again, but the red-eyed man held up a hand and the words died in her throat.
"I am afraid, Miss Blake, that your brother is eluding me at the moment. He and some less imaginative associates of mine have fled to the Herreninsel, which they believe to be beyond my reach."
He stood up, clasping his arms behind his back. "I will soon correct that oversight, however." He took a step toward Margaret, and tilted his head slightly, "Especially now that I have such a spirit—"
"No." Martin spoke for the first time, and there was an edge in his voice that Margaret had not heard before.
"I believe I understand your sentiment now, Colonel Holland," the red-eyed man said, still without looking away from Margaret. He held out one hand as if to touch her chin, Margaret tried to shrink away, but found that she could not move her legs.
The red-eyed man stepped forward again, "But I am afraid you cannot possibly—"
There was a loud crack, like the sound of breaking furniture. Margaret could not tell what Martin had done, except that he had somehow gotten free of the rope tying his hands. His right arm was thrust beneath his coat, grabbing at something.
It came out with a gun. Martin's face was contorted in a terrifying mix of pain and anger as he pointed a tiny, snub-nosed revolver at the red-eyed man's forehead.
The hunchback behind the throne dropped into a tense crouch, but the red-eyed man just turned to face Martin and smiled in amusement.
"I see my men need to do a better job searching prisoners," he said, then shook his head. "However, I think you will be disappointed by the results if you shoot me, you would hardly be the first."
Martin shot him.
The red-eyed man's knees gave out and he crumpled in a heap at Margaret's feet. Martin shot the body twice more.
The hunchback let out an unholy shriek, and Margaret started to shake uncontrollably. She thought he was going to pounce on Martin, but instead he tumbled backwards, right into the fireplace. The flames hissed and swelled to engulf the body.
Still shivering, Margaret looked away from the carnage to stare open-mouthed at Martin. He looked up at her from the corpse of the red-eyed man.
"Not disappointing at all," he said. Then he doubled over and collapsed.