Path of the Tiger, стр. 23
‘Where do I come in?’ Abou asked.
Mira looked up, her eyes still aflame with the heat of a vicious lust for power.
‘For now, I do still need the Alliance project to function. And the reason I brought you here, is that you do too.’
Abou swallowed slowly, clasping his hands together and nodding as he began to grasp the gravity of everything she was telling him.
‘I think I get that now. If the Alliance dies … I die. Whether I want it or not, the War has come to me.’
Mira’s eyes narrowed, and something that looked like a parody of a smile appeared on her thin lips.
‘There is a plan in place should the Alliance fall,’ she said. ‘It goes like this: once the Alliance is annulled, all beastwalkers will become immediate targets, whether Rebel, neutral or Alliance members. Elimination will be centrally coordinated and will be executed with absolute precision; a Night of the Long Knives for your kind, if you will. Already Huntsmen intelligence is documenting and updating the status and whereabouts of all known beastwalkers in preparation for a synchronised strike. The current beastwalker members of the Alliance will be the first to die; we will take them completely unawares.’
‘Cold. Mechanical. Efficient. Merciless,’ Abou muttered. ‘Knowing what I know about your organisation, this does not surprise me in the least. Now that I know that my life is at stake, you may as well tell me what I need to do to, to survive a little longer.’
Mira brushed a loose lock of hair behind her left ear and glanced off to the side before answering.
‘I want William Gisborne, of course. Preferably alive, but dead if there’s no other option. You are his friend, are you not?’
‘Was … I suppose you could say I am, although he and I were never close, as such. He sailed with me on a few voyages in my days of captaining a trade ship in the Indian ocean in the late 19th century. However, I haven’t had much contact with him for the last hundred years or so … obviously, he’s been keeping a very low profile after your Alliance and Huntsmen destroyed everything he lived for. What makes you think I could help you to get to him?’
‘You are one of the last non-Rebel beastwalker friends of his who still draws breath. Believe me on this; I’ve done my homework.’
‘Still, I don’t understand what you expect me to do. I’m no fighter, no master of espionage. I’m a businessman, plain and simple.’
‘You’ve forgotten about one other very unique skill you possess: you have the ability to turn into a two-ton black rhinoceros. If we can get him alone with you, you can either use your past ties of friendship to convince him to join the Alliance … or you can use your animal form to crush him. In a fight pitting a black rhinoceros against a tiger, I certainly know which one I’d put my money on.’
‘You know that he’ll never accept any terms you offer him!’ Abou protested. ‘Never! And if I fight him, he will not surrender. He’ll die before he does that.’
‘If that’s the only way, then we’ll have to let him die. But I have some faith in you, Aboubakar; you didn’t get as rich as you are without at least a little guile, a little tact, and a good dollop of cunning, no? Use your business acumen; figure out what carrot you can dangle in front of Gisborne. Can you at least do that?’
‘I can try … as you tried to help me,’ Abou muttered sourly. He stared at the floor between his feet, once more massaging his temples with heavy fingers as he masticated on everything that he had just learned, and the offer that had just been presented to him. ‘There is no other way?’ he eventually asked.
‘Not for you, Aboubakar. I’ve explained everything, exactly how it is. Your life, as you know it, is over. The only way you can save what’s left of it is to join the Alliance and bring us William Gisborne … alive or dead.’
He shifted his feet and rubbed the back of his head with sweaty palms for a few moments before he answered.
‘Fine … I’ll…’
Aboubakar looked up but saw only the rustling black curtain that separated the backstage area from the rest of the club. Mira was gone, and the hunt was now on.
3
WILLIAM
17th September 2020. New York City
William awoke with a start, a headache pounding its tribal rhythm behind his eyeballs as his mind tried to claw its way back to the present through the sticky cobwebs of half-remembered dreams. Hearing movement in his immediate vicinity, his senses kicked into sudden overdrive, and he sprang nude from his bed and lunged for the revolver that lay under the pile of last night’s clothes. He lay flat on the floor, cocked the firearm’s hammer quietly, and peered cautiously around the room, his vision punctuated always by the gleaming barrel of the .357.
It was only when he heard his shower running that he realised that it was the young woman he had taken home from the club. Exhaling a long sigh of relief, he uncocked the firearm, lowered its barrel from his line of sight and relaxed his arms. He paused to stare at the gleaming chrome finish of the gun. It would have been useful to have had last night, when he had fought Hernández … but it had lain on the floor here, forgotten, while he’d been getting high.
‘I’ve got to stop forgetting this thing,’ William murmured to himself.
Despite the lack of immediate danger, he nonetheless took comfort in the weapon’s deadly weight in his right hand. Looking down, he saw that his hands were covered in blood; one of the deep cuts Hernández had inflicted on him had opened up. Despite how severe the wounds looked, though, with his beastwalker blood they would heal very quickly, and there would be no danger of