Michael Scott Rohan - Chase the ...

Michael Scott Rohan - Chase the Morning, Ebook

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Chase the Morning
Michael Scott Rohan
CHAPTER ONE
I BRAKED HARD and pulled up; but the car in front of me shot through the
lights just as they changed. I sat cursing myself as I watched those
tail-lights dwindle away into the gathering gloom, and the other endless lanes
of traffic come swarming out after them. The idiot in the flash German sport
behind me beeped his horn, but I was too irritated with myself to pay any
attention to him. There had been time, the half-second or so before the other
lights changed; I could have put my foot flat down and raced through. I'd been
close enough to the lights to get away with it, but this was a difficult,
twisty junction, with lousy visibility on all four sides. All it would need
was somebody else as impatient as me ... Damn it to hell, I'd done the safe
thing! But then that was me all over, wasn't it? Safe driver; safe car; safe
job; safe life ...
Then why was I so furious? At work it hadn't been the sort of day that
leaves you snarling; it rarely was. Momentarily, idiotically, I found myself
wishing it had been, that I'd had something to snarl at, to tussle with, to
put a sharper flavour into the day. I raised my eyes to the skies, and at once
forgot all my irritation. The sun had already left the ground in gloom, but it
was lighting up a whole new landscape among the lowering clouds, one of those
rare fantastic sunset coasts of rolling hills, deep bays, stretches of tidal
sands, endless archipelagoes of islands in a calm estuary of molten gold. This
one was made even more convincing by the shallow slope of the road; I might
have been looking down from some steeper hill onto the real estuary. Except
that that was far less picturesque, a flat, grim industrial riverside first
laid waste when ships and shipbuilding boomed, then stricken a second time
when they collapsed. None of the goods I dealt with passed through the docks
here now; they were as dead as that skyscape was alive. A horrible blaring
discord of horns jolted me out of my dream. The lights had changed again, and
I was holding up the queue. With a touch of malice I stabbed my foot down and
shot across the gap so fast the glittering brute behind me was left standing.
But the ring-road opened out into two lanes here, and in seconds he'd
overhauled me and gone purring past with ruthless ease. I had a terrible urge
to chase him, to dice and duel with him for pride of place, but I refused to
give in to it. What was the matter with me? I'd always loathed the kind of
moron who played stock-car on overcrowded commuter routes; I still did, come
to that. No question of cowardice - it was other people that sort put at risk.
Anyway, we were coming back into speed limits again. Another car whined past
me, the same make, model, year as mine, the same colour even. I had to look
closely to be sure it really wasn't mine - and swore at myself again. Was I
feeling the strain, or something? It had leopard-skin seats, anyway, and a
nodding dog on the parcel shelf. At least mine didn't; but right then it might
as well have had, the way I felt about it, and about myself. Christ, I ought
to be driving a Porsche too! Or something less crass - a Range Rover, a
vintage MG even, something to stir cold blood a bit more than my neat sports
saloon. It wasn't as if I couldn't afford to. If I was the real high-flyer
everyone said I was, the wonder boy, shouldn't I at least be getting a little
more fun out of it - instead of stashing all my cash away in gilt-edge and
blue-chip and just a little under-the-counter gold?
I pulled off at the exit - the same, the usual exit, the fastest way home.
Home to what? The prospect of my flat loomed up at me, my neat, empty,
expensive little designer garret, warming up as the heating came on. The idea
of cooking dinner suddenly sickened me, the prospect of eating something
heated up from the freezer even more so; I changed gear sharply, signalled
only just in time that I was changing lanes. I was going to eat out; and not
in any of my usual places. I might regret it in the morning, but I was going
to find somewhere more exotic, even if it wasn't as well-scrubbed. Thinking of
 the docks had started me on that tack; I remembered there'd been lots of crazy
little places there, when I'd last passed through - and lord, how long ago was
that? I'd been in my teens; it might have been ten years ago, even. And that
was just on a bus, looking out on my way to somewhere else. I'd been a child
when last I'd trodden those pavements, the times when my father had taken me
down to see the ships unloading. I'd loved the ships; but the docks themselves
had always seemed rather sad to me, with weeds growing up between the worn
flagstones and the crane rails rusting. Even then they'd been dying. I
remembered dimly that there'd been attempts recently to tart up parts of them
for tourism, as somewhere picturesque; but how, or with what success, escaped
me.
Why had I never been back? There'd been no time, not with the job, not
with the social life and the sport, all the other excitements and ambitions.
Things that got me somewhere. I hadn't actually set out to bury my taste for
useless mooching about, but I'd had to let it slip away. Like a lot of other
things. There was no choice, really, if I wanted to keep on the ball, to get
ahead. And yet those trips to the docks, the sight of all those cases and
containers with their mysterious foreign labels - they'd sparked off something
in me, hadn't they?
Not exactly steered me into my career; I'd thought that choice out very
carefully, back at college. But they'd added something extra, a touch of
living colour other likely jobs didn't quite have. That hadn't lasted, of
course. You wouldn't expect it to survive the rigours of routine, the dry
daily round of forms and bills and credits. I hadn't missed it much. Other
satisfactions had taken its place, more realistic ones. But thinking about the
docks just now, when I was feeling a bit adventurous, a bit rebellious, had
woken a queer, nagging sort of regret. Maybe that was what had really sparked
off this craving to go and eat there - the urge to rediscover the original
excitement, the inspiration, of what I was doing. I did feel rather empty
without it - hollow, almost.
I frowned. That brought back a less comfortable memory, something Jacquie had
thrown at me years ago, in those last sullen rows. Typical; one of those daft
images she was always coming up with, something about the delicate Singapore
painted eggs on her mantelpiece. How they'd drained the yolk to make the paint
... 'You'd be good at that! You should take it up! Suck out the heart to paint
up the shell! All nice an' bright on the outside, never mind it's empty
inside! Never mind it won't hatch! Appearances, they're what you're so fond of
-'
I snorted. I shouldn't have expected her to see things the way they were.
But all the same ... The turn-off wasn't far, just at the bottom of the hill
here was - what was it called? I knew the turn, I didn't need the name, but I
saw it on the wall as 1 turned off the roundabout. Danube Street.
All the street names were like that round here, as far as I remembered.
Danube Street; Baltic Street; Norway Street - all the far-off places which had
once seemed as familiar as home to the people who lived and worked here, even
if they never saw them. It was from them their prosperity came, from them the
money that paid for these looming walls of stone, once imposing in light
sandstone, now blackened with caked grime. Herring and spices and timber,
amber and furs and silks, all manner of strange and exotic stuffs had paid for
the cobbles that drummed beneath my tyres now, at a time when the town's prime
street was a rutted wallow of mud and horse-dung. Some of the smaller
side-streets had really arcane names -Sereth Street, Penobscot Lane; it was in
Tampere Street I stopped finally and parked.
I hoped the name didn't reflect the local habits, and that the car would be
all right; but I couldn't face being shut in it any longer. I wanted to
explore on foot, smelling the sea in the wind. I felt a few drops of rain in
it instead, turned back a moment, then looked up at the sky and caught my
breath. Over the warehouse rooftop opposite blazed the last streaks of the
glorious sunset; and against them, stark and black as trees in winter, loomed
a network of mastheads. Not the simple mastheads of modern yachts, nor the
 glorified radar rigs of the larger ships; these were the mastheads of a
square-rigged sailing ship, and a huge one at that, the sort of things you
would expect on the Victory or the Cutty Sark. The last time I'd seen anything
like them was when a Tall Ships rally had put in, and that only on local TV.
Had the tourist bods moored one here, or something really old? This I had to
see. I pulled my light anorak closer about me and walked on into the deep
shadows between the wide-set streetlights. The hell with the weather, the hell
with everything! I was a bit surprised at myself. No doubt about it, rebellion
had me in its grip.
An hour and a half later, of course, I was regretting it bitterly. My
hair was plastered flat to my wind-chilled scalp, my soaking collar was sawing
at my neck, and I was desperate for my dinner. All those odd little places I
remembered were just boarded holes in the high walls now, or seedy little
cafes with fading pop posters and plastic tables barely visible through the
grimy glass; and every one of them was closed, and might have been for years.
The sea was within earshot, but never in sight; and there was no trace of
masts, or of the signs you'd expect to a tourist attraction either. I would
have been happy enough now with something microwaved at home, if I could only
get back to my car; but just to cap everything, I'd lost my way, taken a wrong
turn somewhere around those featureless warehouse walls, and now everywhere
was strange. Or simply invisible; either some of the streets had no lighting,
or it had failed. And there wasn't a soul about, nor even a sound except my
own footsteps on the cobbles and the distant breath of the ocean. I felt like
a lost child.
Then I heard voices. They seemed to be echoing out around the corner of the
street ahead, and so desperate was I that I'd gone rushing round before I'd
realized that they didn't sound at all friendly; more like a brawl. And that,
in fact, was what was going on. At the street's end was the sea, with only a
dim glimmer to distinguish it from the sky above; but I hardly noticed it.
There was a single light in the street, over the arched doorway of a large
warehouse, now half-open; and before it, on a weed-grown forecourt, a tight
knot of men were struggling this way and that. One tore himself loose and
staggered free, and 1 saw that the remaining three - all huge - were after
him. One swung at him, he ducked back, stumbling among the weeds and litter,
and with a twinge of horror I saw metal gleam in the fist as it swung, and in
the others as they feinted at him. They had knives, long ones; and that slash,
if it had connected, would have opened his throat from ear to ear. They were
out to kill.
I stood horrified, hesitant, unable to link up what I was seeing with
reality, with the need to act. I had a mad urge to run away, to shout for the
police-, it was their business, after all, not my fight. If I hadn't baulked
at that stop light, perhaps, I might have done just that, and probably
suffered for it. But something inside me - that spirit of rebellion I'd raised
- knew better; it wasn't seeking help I was after, it was an excuse to run
away, to avoid getting involved, to pass by on the other side. And this was a
life at stake, far more important than a stupid trick like running a light -
far more important even than any question of courage or cowardice. I had to
help ... but how?
I took a hesitant step forward. Maybe just running at them, shouting,
would scare them enough; but what if it didn't? I hadn't hit anybody since I
had left school, and there were three of them. Then in the faint gleam my eyes
lit on a pile of metal tubes lying at the roadside, beside a builder's sign,
remnants of dismantled scaffolding. They were slippery with filth and rain,
but with a heave that made my shoulders crack I got one about seven feet long
loose, heaved it over my head and ran down the slippery cobbles.
None of them saw me at first; the victim slipped and fell, and they were on
him. I meant to shout, but at first only a ridiculous strangulated hey! came
out; in the middle it cracked and became a banshee howl. Then they noticed me,
all right. And to my horror they didn't run, but rounded on me all three. I
was past turning back now; I swung the tube at the first one, and missed by a
 mile. He leapt at me, and in a fit of panic 1 just clipped his outstretched
arm on the backswing. He fell with a howl, and I saw a knife fly up glittering
into the air. Another feinted at me, jumped back as I swung the tube, then
flung himself forward as it passed. But it was slippery enough to slide
through my hands; the end poked him in the belly and stretched him on his back
on the cobbles. Hardly believing what I was doing, I swung on the third -and
my feet skidded from under me on the wet smooth stones, and I sat down with an
agonizing jar. He loomed up, a hulking shadow against the halo of light; I
glimpsed white teeth in a contorted snarl, the knife lifting and slashing
down.
Then something flashed over me, feet crashed on the cobbles, and the shadow
drew back. It was the man they'd been attacking, a hunched, taut figure with a
shock of red-brown hair, bounding and bouncing forward, dodging the clumsy
slashes the bigger man aimed at him with an ease that looked effortless.
Suddenly his own arms lashed out; there was a gleam of metal and a terrible
tearing sound. They whirled into the light for a moment, and I saw long
slashes in the tall man's rough coat, and blood spurting from them. I
struggled up, then flinched back in fright as the darkness seemed to burst out
at me; I flung out a punch, and felt a stab of agony in my upper arm. I yelled
with the sudden pain, and louder with the anger that hissed up like a rocket
in my head. A leering, slobbbering face, greyish and sickly in the dim light,
shone out suddenly in front of me, capped by a cockatoo crest of green, a mass
of gold ear-rings jangling. I smashed at it with my good arm, felt the blow
connect and exulted -till the rocket burst, or so it felt, and my teeth
slammed together with the force of the impact. I doubled over, clutching my
head, unable to see or even think straight, my mind crazed across like a
mirror by the blow. I heard a yell beside me, a burst of noise and expected
the worst, the sharp agony of the knife or the blunt bite of boots. But my
back bumped against a wall and I straightened up, grateful for its support,
and forced my eyes open in time to see the three shadows go clattering away
for their lives down the street towards the sea, one limping badly, another
clutching his chest; the third they were dragging between them, his feet
scrabbling helplessly at the rounded stones. A black trail like a snail's
glistened where he had passed.
The man they'd been after was crouched down against the wall to my right,
by the doorpost, clutching his ribs and breathing heavily. I thought at first
he was injured, but he looked up and grinned. An ordinary enough grin, on a
lean, mobile face. 'Now that's what I call timing!' he said, and chuckled.
'Who were they?' I managed to croak out.
'Them? Just Wolves, as usual. Out for anything that's not nailed down,
and a good few things that are - you know!' He looked up suddenly. 'Hey - you
don't know, do you? You're not from this side of town, are you?'
I shook my head, forgetting, and dissolved the world into needles of
blinding pain. I swayed, stunned and sick, and he sprang up and caught me.
'What's the matter? Didn't stop one, did you? Ach ... not from this side.' The
questioning in his voice had turned to certainty without any answer from me.
'Not a local. Might've known, the way you came barreling in like that.' He
propped me against the doorpost and searched my scalp with blunt fingers,
causing me more bouts of agony. 'Well, that's nothing!' he concluded, with
infuriating briskness.
'You try it awhile and say that!' 1 croaked at him, and he grinned
again.
'No offense, friend. Just relieved your dome's not cracked, that's all.
A bump and a little blood, no sweat. But that arm of yours, that's different.'
'Doesn't hurt as much -'
'Aye, maybe; but it's a blade in the muscle. Could be dirty, if no worse. Hold
on a moment ...' The blade he himself had used to such effect flashed in his
hand, and I was astonished to see it was no knife, but a fully-fledged sword,
a sabre of some kind; he twitched it adroitly into a scabbard on his belt,
unhooked from beside it a ring of huge old-fashioned keys and locked the
 warehouse door behind him with one of them, muttering to himself the while.
'C'mon now, nothing to worry about; I'll see you right. Just lean on your old
mate Jyp - that's it! Just round the corner a few steps - lean on me if you
like!'
That seemed a daft idea - he was such a short man. But as he bore me up
by my good arm I was astonished to realize he was hardly any shorter than me,
and I am over six feet. It was next to the others he'd looked unusually small;
so how tall were they?
This close, too, he didn't look so ordinary. His face was bony,
hard-jawed, but his features were open and regular; a bit Scandinavian, maybe,
except that expressions played across them like shifting light. Lines appeared
and disappeared, making his age hard to guess; early forties, maybe, by the
lines about the eyes. Below them the remains of a tan welded together a great
blaze of freckles across his cheekbones. His eyes were calm, wide and
intelligent. The look in them seemed remote and far-seeing, till I caught the
twinkle that matched the mercurial expressions and the wry smile. I rarely
take to people on sight, men especially; but there was something instantly
likeable about him. Which was pretty damn surprising, as I couldn't have
placed him in any way. Liking, of course, doesn't have to mean trusting; but
right then I'd very little choice in the matter.
Together, like a pair of companionable drunks, we staggered down towards the
seaward end of the lane; but before we reached it my old mate Jyp, whoever he
was, manouevred us across the road and down a dank and evil-smelling back
alley to emerge into a much wider street, like all too many I had tramped down
that night. In this one, though, was what I'd been looking for all along; a
single building bright with lights, and the unmistakeable look of a pub, or
perhaps even a proper restaurant, about it. Grimy diamond-leaded windows
glowed a warm gold between peeling shutters, and above them a sign spanned the
building, brightly painted even in the dim light of the flickering lamps on
the wall below. My head was clearing in the cold air, and I stared at it,
fascinated; this must be one of the little specialty places. The sign read
TVERNA ILLYRIKO in tall letters, red upon black, and beneath them lllyrian
Tavern - Old Style Delicacies - Dravic Myrko, Prop. On a board above the door
I saw repeated Taverne Illyrique, Illyrisches Gasthof, the name in every
language I could recognize, and a good few I couldn't.
'Come along, we'll get you fixed up here!' said Jyp cheerfully, and added
something else I wasn't sure I'd heard.
'What was that?'
'Not a bad place, I was saying, so long as you steer clear of the
sea-slugs.'
I closed my eyes. 'I'll try to. Where are they? On the floor?'
'On the menu.'
'Christ!'
That did it; I had to stop and retch, painfully and unproductively, while
Jyp watched with sympathetic amusement. 'Guts empty?' he enquired. 'Pity; a
good puke can help, when you've had a dunt on the head. Like with seasickness;
if you're going to throw up, at least get something inside you to throw,
that's what I always tell 'em. Ammunition, as it were.'
'I'll remember that,' I promised, and he chuckled.
'All right now? Mind the steps, they're worn.' He kicked open the faded
red door with a ringing crash. 'Hoi, Myrko! Malinka! Katjka!' he shouted, and
bundled me inside.
Half an hour earlier I might have welcomed the gust of smells that came
boiling out. There were a hundred I couldn't put a name to and a few I didn't
care to, but there was also garlic and paprika and beer and frying onions.
Now, though, the mix made my aching stomach shrivel.
'It's you, is it, pylotV came a hoarse answer from inside. There was the
sound of somebody shovelling coal into a stove. 'Malinka's out, you'll just
have to make do with me.'
'Got a friend here, Myrko,' Jyp shouted. 'Hey, what's your name, friend?
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