Hidden City: Lost in the Shadows (Book 1) Read online

  The night's chill clung to his raincoat. Gumshoe lived in the loft of an abandoned building on the fringes of the City's inhabited quarter, but at least he'd set up his lab as close to the square as he could.

  In the City, there was plenty of living space—and clothing. Clothes hung in abandoned shops for everyone to browse. Gumshoe preferred classic suits and light-colored shirts. He didn't wear ties but had amassed a nice collection of fedoras. As for shoes, he liked his soft and light.

  His eyes on the square, he reached into his raincoat pocket for a silver cigarette case with a crest on the top. He had no idea what the squiggles on the crest signified. He'd picked up the case from the abandoned tobacconist's shop by the river. Inside, little rectangles of rolling paper lay clipped down next to a sealed tobacco compartment. The tobacco smelled great—high quality. Where Gumshoe used to live before, you'd have had to pay a fortune for tobacco like that, and the riverside shop still had cratefuls of it left.

  He rolled himself a cigarette, his big fingers strong and agile. Then he clicked the button of the lighter on the side of the cigarette case and lit up. He snapped the case shut, the sound reaching far over the silent square.

  Gumshoe put the cigarette case back into his pocket and checked his holstered gun. Unlike clothes, guns were a problem here. Certain machinery didn't work in the City at all. Besides, you'd be hard-pressed to find anything modern—that is, anything from the period Gumshoe used to live in. The gun in his holster was an older type and unknown to him, a basic break-barrel single-shot affair without a drum.

  So! Was anything going to happen here tonight or what? His cigarette glowed red in the dark. There were no lamps in the square, only the moon and some streetlights that cast their glow over some of the adjacent streets. Train Attendant used to say that they were lit by Lamplighter, who made his rounds across the City on moonless nights.

  The air stood still in the quiet. On the edge of the square, thick clouds of mist slowly shifted their shapes. If they rolled closer, you'd have to take shelter in one of the houses, lock the door, and wait till the mist subsided. Entering it was dangerous. You either risked an unwanted meeting or could lose your way, ending up in the middle of nowhere.

  A light flickered in one of the side streets opposite the square. Gumshoe pushed himself away from the wall and raised his head, lunging forward. What was going on there? Cautiously, he skirted the square along the house walls. Anyone could hide in the shadows—anyone or anything deadly—taking your life or sucking your strength, turning you into a corpse or a ghost. The City produced some remarkable creatures indeed.

  The flicker in the side street disappeared and came back on, then another one, and another—all red.

  Gumshoe was far from being a coward. Still, he hesitated.

  The red lights? Could it be—

  The House of Crimson Windows?

  At that moment, in a dull flash of murky green light, a girl appeared in the square. She lay on the cobblestones. Then, she raised her head, looking around, and sat up. Slowly, she forced herself onto her feet, shaking the dirt off her clothes.

  She was alive. Did it mean that the others, too, had arrived here alive and only died afterward? He could clearly see the girl's silhouette against the pile of old casks left here by God knew whom or when.

  Men in dark, hooded robes appeared from behind the casks. Gumshoe ran.

  Nicole lay on a hard, cold surface. Pale spots swam before her eyes, her thoughts scattered and confused. First, her dream, then the phone message, the company logo and the interview, Mr. Chuck, and the door concealing the void beneath. What had happened to her?

  A black, starless sky loomed overhead. To her right, a moon hung over the rooftops, unusually large, its unfamiliar spots forming a woman's face or some kind of crest. The air was damp and chilly. Nicole felt beside her. She seemed to be lying on a cobblestone pavement. The stones were wet.

  Nicole sat up and started shaking the mud off her clothes. Her jeans were now ruined, and so was Grandma's sweater. Slowly, she scrambled to her feet and looked around, biting her lip.

  Nicole stood in the deserted square of an old town next to a pile of some decaying old casks. Some of the buildings around lay in ruins, their roofs caved in, their doors and windows broken. Others next to them looked as good as new though. A few others were so overgrown with ivy that they reminded her of mossy cliffs.

  Also, the shadows. Lots of them. On the stairs, under the ledges, hiding by the walls and in gateways, even between the cobblestones. The entire square around Nicole was alive with a thick web of moving shadows.

  Her gaze stopped at an old house lurking in a lane to her right. Its windows glowed red. A broken clock over the house's front door pointed its only remaining hand at a quarter past two.

  Shivering, Nicole grasped her shoulders. She had to be going crazy.

  No, not crazy. Just waking up. Wasn't she? Her old world, the one she'd been forced to live in ever since she'd been a baby, had now dissipated like a bad dream.

  The house with the clock seemed to be calling her name, luring her closer. Nicole froze, undecided. Should she go there? Or shouldn't she? With curiosity fighting fear, she knew she'd end up answering its call and pushing the creepy door below the broken one-handed clock. Then she'd enter the crimson haze from her dream.

  Only now, she wasn't asleep. But . . . if it wasn't a dream, why was the place deserted?

  As if answering her silent question, the heap of casks rustled. Several men appeared from behind it, their faces concealed by the hoods of their robes. They walked toward her, their feet unseen under their mantles. The strangers seemed to float over the pavement like so many black apparitions, like in a fantasy book . . . or a horror movie.

  Before she knew it, the dark-clad men had approached her. Five of them. Another one trailed behind, his clothes different from the others.

  Her chest burned. The pendant? Nicole touched it. Ouch! The eye-shaped gem was scorching hot. What was going on here?

  Without taking her eyes off the strangers, Nicole licked her burned finger. They walked on, surrounding her. She'd better run . . . but where to? The dark robes were now all around her, stepping nearer, closing in.

  Then they stopped. Two of them moved aside. The last one—the one who'd stayed behind—walked toward her.

  He was tall and broad-shouldered, with penetrating bright blue eyes and an air of danger and menace. He wore a black velvet suit with silver stitching. For an instant, the young man peered into her face. Then he stepped closer and laid his hands on her shoulders. Nicole was expecting anything but that. She shrank back, noticing a pale scar crossing the stranger's temple over his left eyebrow. It added a touch of predatory brutality to his face.

  The thoughts rushed through her head while the man pulled Nicole close and . . . he kissed her.

  His lips were unexpectedly soft. The moment they touched hers, Nicole's legs gave way, her head spinning, her body limp in the arms of the olive-skinned young man with the scar. Her ears rang. The night swam before her eyes. She shut her eyes, feeling the world whirl around her. Now that's what I call a kiss, she thought, and fainted.

  Then the pendant kicked in, glowing, pouring warmth into her body, until finally, Nicole felt strong enough to protest. What did he think he was doing? A total stranger, coming out of nowhere and offering his kisses? It wasn't as if she'd led him on, was it? What nerve. Admittedly, there was something definitely cute about his decisiveness, but she was a 21st century girl, after all, not some prissy Victorian missy who faints in a stranger's arms after one kiss.

  Nicole mustered her strength and pushed him away. His slim arms slid off her shoulders with unexpected ease. The boy looked up at her, surprised. His eyes, so mesmerizingly blue, glistened as if he'd seen a ghost.

  "What do you think you're—" she started and trailed off as steel glistened in the black-robed men’s hands. They could be knives, or even daggers, for all she knew. The thin blades glinted ominously in
the moonlight.

  The robed figures stepped forward.

  "Don't." The boy raised his hand. "Wait. She—"

  Then a new character came on the scene. And he did so with a bang, or at least so she remembered later.

  A bang—a shot. One of the assailants stumbled. A man walked into her field of vision wearing one of those old-fashioned suits from the black-and-white suspense movies, the kind Humphrey Bogart would have worn. Over the suit, the man wore a raincoat. A hat on his head. A gun in his hand.

  The man shoved the gun under his coat, lifted a cask off the pavement, and hurled it at the robed men, knocking two of them over. They were still falling when he punched another one in the jaw.

  Four of them were now lying on the cobblestones, leaving one more assailant and the olive-skinned young man with the scar. The last guy in a black robe ran up to the man in the raincoat, his back now concealing them both from Nicole. She didn't see what happened next. Her attacker sagged onto the pavement.

  Her rescuer stepped toward her, the black-robed man's knife now in his hand.

  The young man with the scar grasped Nicole's shoulder and pulled her along, but she wriggled herself free. "Wait!" he shouted.

  Not listening, she dashed toward the casks. She could hear footsteps running after her, and she saw a flash of greenish light. The back of Nicole’s shoe got stuck between the thick cast-iron rods of the sewer grate, and she stumbled and nearly fell. She tugged at her leg. There was a crunching in her shoe, and her foot came loose. Nicole limped on. She stopped and looked back. The murky greenish light behind the casks had already faded. She heard the footsteps again, and her rescuer appeared beside her.

  “Hey, you need to be more careful.” He pulled off his raincoat and threw it over her shoulders. “You cold? Here, warm up. We need to get out of here. The sooner we get to the Station and lie low, the better. We’ve got to run now.”

  He grabbed her hand and pulled her toward a narrow alley between the buildings. Nicole's head spun. She had no idea where she was, why the olive-skinned young man had kissed her, why the guys in black robes wanted to kill her, or what kind of man her savior was . . . but her gut feeling told her she could rely on him, and it had never let her down before. Friend or foe, he was the one she could trust.

  Which was why she followed him, running through the thickening mist.

  Chapter Three

  When that stupid girl had pushed him away, Mike, in his astonishment, let go of her and stepped back.

  Now, he gave the City's new visitor a second look.

  Quite homely, really, just like tons of other girls he'd met and kissed recently. They'd arrived in droves, all thanks to his emissaries working under the Quarter Past Two cafe cover. They arrived—and then they died.

  This one hadn't.

  Mike's surprised look met with the fear and indignation in her glare. Homely. Ordinary. But not quite.

  The Shadow's servants didn't normally venture near the square, let alone step on its cobblestones, as the City's natural force flooded the nearby buildings, the House of Fate and City Hall. But for some magical reasons of their own, the girls kept arriving via the square. Luckily, they did so at night, when shadows were at their strongest. But even so, the Shadow's servants felt weak, especially low-ranking ones. Now Mike, an Inquisitor, sensed the City's invisible pressure enchain his body and daze his mind.

  But in spite of it all, Mike could still feel the girl's frame pulsate with the City force, its source located somewhere near her heart or maybe to its right side. You needed a Dark Lens or some other such artifact to be more precise. And although he always used to carry various useful things around, now he had nothing on him he could use. The scar on his forehead throbbed in unison with the force.

  So she'd survived. Could it mean she was the one? The one? Or could it be a mistake? Maybe she was just more resilient than the others had been before her. As simple as that.

  His men—the Shadow's servants, or the dark ones, as the townspeople called them—drew their knives all at once.

  The girl glanced at them, then looked back at him, her lightning-like glare piercing his tall olive forehead, eating his brain. Her glare, her eyes, and the depth within them that harbored the . . . .

  She mustn't die. The thought caught him unawares. She mustn't. Even though the Shadow wasn't really going to kill her. Not straight off, anyway. First, they had to get all the necessary information out of her. That could take a long time. Only then would they exterminate her, erasing her existence once and for all.

  He shouldn't let it happen. But what was he supposed to do now? Should he allow his associates to take her? Although they obeyed him, the situation was crystal clear—upon detecting the one, they had to immediately take her to Master Shadow. No discussions or objections. The Shadow had given them explicit instructions in this respect. Mike's men knew just as well as he did that they had to take the girl to the Castle that very night.

  A gun shot interrupted his musings. Everything happened quickly, so quickly. A cask rattled. A body thudded over. A thump.

  The girl bolted. Mike grabbed her shoulder, but she wriggled herself free. A man's voice shouting—it was that redneck . . . what's his name? Yes. Gumshoe, a miserable little squirt like so many of those in the City. He had a gun in his hand, and one of Mike's men lay slumped at his feet.

  Mike's slender hand slid into his jacket pocket. The gun could be a single charge . . . then again, it might not. Mike's informers in the City had reported about Gumshoe's nasty habit of loading it with silver bullets. Not that it could hurt Mike—he wasn't a shapeshifter, after all—but still, it was an unpleasant thing to feel, especially here in the square, where his Inquisitor's force couldn't help him much.

  The sleuth approached. Mike wasn't afraid of him—in fact, he wasn't afraid of anyone, the Shadow included—but he didn't look forward to a fight. He needed the one, not this idiot. He didn't even need his dead body.

  Mike's fingers squeezed a vial sealed with the Shadow's wax seal in his pocket. The sleuth charged. Mike took a swing, and the vial smashed against the cobblestones, exploding in a fountain of blinding light.

  The rest was easy. In two big bounds, Mike retreated and ran. A few seconds later, the Inquisitor disappeared around the corner.

  Standing there, he could see the light fade. The one, behind the casks, collapsed onto the paving stones. Gumshoe ran to her, helped her up and threw his raincoat onto her shoulders before dragging her away, all the while glancing back. Soon, they disappeared in the mist enveloping the neighboring streets.

  Here the City's force still pressed against him, although not as bad as on the square. Mike gave a sigh of relief. The throbbing of his scar started to subside. Mike looked back and raised one eyebrow. What was it now? Too many surprises for one night, really.

  Crimson lights glowed deep down the lane where he now stood. The House of Crimson Windows—the ghost building, whose apparition always signified the approach of dangerous and peculiar events. A legend in itself, the House of Crimson Windows served as a source of dark, spooky rumors.

  How long had the House been standing there? Who had been watching the square from behind its windows? And was there anyone inside at all? The crimson spots faded as the House vanished just as silently as it had appeared. After a few more moments, the legendary building melted into the night.

  Mike shrugged. He left his hiding place around the corner and walked back to where the fight had taken place. With his every step, the invisible force pressed harder against him. Fighting it felt as if he was braving a strong wind. Mike walked past the casks and looked around. One of his men lay dead, shot down. Another one had already gotten back to his feet, and yet another sat on the stones holding his head. Two more were scrambling back to their feet.

  They had seen that the girl wasn't dead, which meant they'd tell the Shadow about it at the first opportunity. Master Shadow would do whatever it took to find her and force everything he needed to know out
of her. Then the one would die a terrible death.

  Mike listened to his feelings. He didn't want her to die. The look she'd given him . . . .

  "You've lost her," he accused them.

  "But, Inquisitor—" the one called Greene began.

  "Now you've got to find her."

  "We will, Inquisitor. Absolutely," another one spoke, still holding his head. "We've got to. She's the one, isn't she?"

  "What made you think so?" Mike tried to sound amazed.

  "But you—"

  "I didn't touch her lips. I didn't have the time," Mike snapped. "She pushed me away, and then Gumshoe shot at us, didn't he?"

  His men exchanged unsure glances. It was true that the center of the square had been too badly lit for them to have seen any details, but . . . hadn't Inquisitor hugged the girl, and hadn't she slumped in his arms? On the other hand, it had all happened way too quickly, and then Gumshoe had come out of nowhere, shooting . . . .

  Mike wasn't sure whether they'd believed him. He couldn't do much else at the moment, anyway. Now, he had to start looking for her, the sooner the better, before someone reported his odd behavior to the Shadow. He raised his voice.

  "Everybody listen. They're heading for the Station. It's a good hiding place, but we can find them. Call the others, whoever else is around. Now go!"

  The mist between the houses was so thick that Nicole could barely see her own feet. Her torn tennis shoe made it hard for her to walk. She thought she could hear an occasional whisper—an echo of laughter, an exchange of ethereal voices. Good thing her rescuer held her hand tightly. Otherwise, she'd have lost her way a long time ago.

  As they ran, she kept thinking about the olive-skinned young man who'd kissed her. And about the scar on his face. Nicole could have sworn that when she'd pushed the stranger away, his scar pulsated with a greenish light. It couldn't have happened, surely? And still, his scar had resembled a thin, neon wire, flashing on his high forehead.