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The more Barren thought about it, his training days at Riker’s Island had been invaluable. He moved quickly to complete mastery of the guise and mien of residents of this clamorous village. It was all in preparation. He told himself he would, as always, complete his duty without hesitation or mercy.
His base skill set—stealth, lying, assassination—was fully intact. Long practice in the arts of concealment in the service of evil had honed these talents to the acute focus of an exquisitely sharpened blade. And yet, just yesterday, he had stayed his hand. Never before had he done such a thing. He knew that such weakness, once indulged, could infect its host with corrosive sentiment. So while he reprieved Cadence’s life for a few days, it was but a temporary stay.
He stood drab and unnoticed in a knit pullover cap, once again outside the West Forty-Fourth Street entrance to the Algonquin.
Cadence emerged, a plastic shopping bag in hand. Following a mere step behind her, he naturally assessed the quick kill he might execute without a break in his stride. But that was not the instruction for this errand. No.
Bind her, trembling and quick-lipped, to the place of your choosing. There answers may be taken as to the hiding place of these writings.
Cadence, all but oblivious to his presence, rubbed the annoying tingle at the nape of her neck. She walked for another block, finally reaching Fifth Avenue. She bounded up the steps to the New York Public Library.
Barren followed, almost at her side, just another patron impatient to enter. He passed the stone lions, bemused by their inert and ineffectual presence. They were hardly the watchful gateway sentinels of the Valley of Shadows.
As he watched her, she checked at the information desk and then struck out, maneuvering hallways and perusing door numbers.
Cadence scanned the door numbers. There it was. 229. The office of the library’s paleographer. As long as she was subjecting herself to Les Inspecteurs, she was going to get more opinions. She knocked politely, heard a voice invite her in, and turned the door handle.
As she entered, a man in his late twenties, tall, lean, and wearing horn-rimmed reading glasses, got up from a desk and came to shake her hand. “Ms. Grande? Bossier Thornton.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Boe-sher. Cajun grandparents. With that last name you must have some French in your family?”
That same question, she thought, embarrassed by the answer.
“I don’t really know. My pedigree is pretty fuzzy. American, I guess.”
“Can’t beat that. So.”
She took in his watch, smart not flashy, his shined shoes and trimmed hair.
“Thank you for seeing me on your day off.”
“That’s OK. I don’t really have any of those.”
“You look more like a detective than a forensic paleographer.”
He looked at her, surprised.
“The museum website. Your bio?”
“Well, you do your homework. Take your pick. Right now, I’m both. I can’t tell which job I’m moonlighting. Neither one pays much.” He smiled. “Sit down, please. Now show me the documents.”
In her bag was a scroll on a wooden spindle, along with some of Osley’s translations. She took the scroll and opened it. There before them, in the middle of an ornate forest of Elvish, lay the great rune that resembled an “A” with eyes and other filigree about it. Ara’s sign. Bossier put on rubber gloves and gingerly unrolled the entire scroll on a large plastic examination table. He weighted its corners and sides with beanbags. He flicked a switch and the table surface illuminated, giving a rich, yellow glow to the parchment. She watched his movements, the careful note-taking, the apparent cross-reference to his computer.
After awhile he looked up at her. “It’s a very old document or a very clever fake. I can give you a pretty clear answer right now, to about seventy per cent certainty.” He uncased a small digital device that looked like a hand-held scanner. “Behold the Mancuso Analytics 43. A test model. Wireless, non-invasive, no sample needed. Laser-enabled. Designed for quick analysis in the field and for national security uses. It’s a chemical and atomic variance reader. Uses Raman patterns. Instant and accurate enough for on-the-ground decisions. The real brains are in the 429-level server slaved to it.”
“Uh-huh.” She sounded dubious. “Sounds like Spock’s tri-corder.”
“Raman—no relation to Romulon and not a noodle dish. He was an Indian scientist. He won the Nobel Prize in 1928. In any case, put simply, it’s a digital bloodhound.” He held it up, his eyebrows lifting in question.
“OK, let’s do it.”
He ran the device over the middle of the document. A touch screen menu gave him access to several national databases. After a few moments he looked up at her.
“Unless someone had eight-hundred year-old ink and vellum, this is legit.”
Cadence blinked at him. “You’re finished? Already? And it’s real …”
Bossier nodded. “Yeah, you can’t fake this.”
She held her breath as she looked at him. “I’d been afraid to ask.”
“That’s just the science, of course. The real truth, the magic, I like to call it, may be in what it says.”
“Well, you want to read some? Here’s a translation of some of this stuff. Knock yourself out. Please.”
She handed him several pages and pointed to a spot. “Start here.” She sat back in a chair and he began reading in silence.
After a few moments he looked up. “OK, Ms. Grande, this is pretty … out there. I was expecting some royal decrees or land-rent tallies.”
“Just keep going, please.”
He gave the slightest ‘oh-well’ shift of the eyes and continued to read.
When he finished, he put down the translation and gave a courtesy cough. Cadence stared at him like he was the last sane man on the planet. “What do you think?”
“It’s some made-up story from long ago. I wouldn’t think it’s all that important. The physical document, not its contents, may be the real prize here.”
She thought about the pragmatic wisdom in his words. “Only one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“Someone thought this story was important enough to preserve on this scroll and a bunch of others.”
“So what are you going to do with this?”
“That’s a really, really good question. Look, I want to thank you.” Then she hesitated, “Is there a charge?”
“No, not for using this bloodhound. Here’s my card. Call me if you have any other questions.”
“OK I will.”
Cadence left and ran for the stairs, passing a figure in a knit cap studying a 1930s mural of American Industrial Progress: heroic figures, big skies and big machines. She glanced at the man and the mural but kept going. Before following her, Barren stayed a moment longer, lingering to study the great towers and trains and boats and planes.
He felt resolved now. He would gather his allies and then close on this steward when she had her precious scribblings in hand.
Besides, other of the Dark Lord’s emissaries, unknown to Barren but surely already here, would be hunting her now. If her fate was to be in his hands, he must set his traps with speed.