The Night's Legacy Read online

  At least she assumed they were thieves. There was plenty of stuff in a natural history museum worth stealing, especially up here on the second floor. There were the gemstones for one, some worth millions of dollars. Some of the old weapons and such could be pawned to private collectors for a healthy profit as well.

  She kept scurrying along the railing until she was in the meteor exhibit. The meteors weren’t all that valuable; most of their value was sentimental for Mom. She had begun her career at the Thorne Museum as a junior researcher studying meteors. Space rocks had never interested Lois much; she far more enjoyed the mummies Dr. Johnson studied.

  The meteors served now to hide her. She crouched behind a black pedestal holding up a rock the size of a beach ball. Behind the pedestal she found a bright red box containing an emergency phone installed for just this reason. Mom hadn’t bothered getting rid of the phones even with the popularity of cell phones. That decision might save both of their lives.

  She grunted as she pried open the box. Then she took the receiver from the box and put it to her ear. There was no sound of the phone dialing 911, no dial tone, nothing. The phone was dead. She resisted the urge to slam the phone down and scream a curse word or two. Had the thieves cut the lines or was the phone simply dead from age and neglect?

  There was no point wasting time trying to find out. Mom would have a phone up on the fourth floor. A cell phone if her desk phone didn’t work. Though since no alarms had gone off yet, maybe the thieves were bright enough to jam the cell phones too.

  She just about slammed right into one of the thieves as she headed back for the stairs. She skidded to a stop in time to avoid him and then began backpedaling while a scream died in her throat. For his part the thief stared at her for a moment. She could only see his brown eyes with the ski mask he wore. These narrowed at her and then he swung an Uzi up from his hip.

  She didn’t give him the chance to use it. Her training kicked in and she slapped the weapon from the thief’s hand. Before he could do anything else, she kicked him in the knee, one of the spots not covered with body armor. He groaned and dropped onto his good knee. She kneed him in the face to finish him off.

  Before she could congratulate herself on her victory, she heard a metallic click behind her. “Don’t move, kid,” a harsh voice growled. “Not unless you want your pretty little brains sprayed all over the carpet.”

  “You old flatterer,” she said and put up her hands. Rough hands began patting her down, probably belonging to another of the thieves. She could imagine what they were going to do to her now. They might drag her off to a secluded corner or they might just put a bullet in her right here, depending on how much time they had. Either way, she was going to wind up a corpse.

  She chided herself for her stupidity. She should have gone straight up to the fourth floor. Though then she might have led them to Mom’s office. At least now her mother might be spared, unless she came down to look for Lois. She hoped Mom’s respect for her privacy won out. Then at least one of them might survive.

  Before the thieves could decide what to do with her, Lois smelled something that brought tears to her eyes. She’d spent enough time in alleys to know what a sewer smelled like and this was even more pungent. The thieves must have smelled it too because one said, “What the hell died in here?”

  “You,” a voice hissed.

  Lois threw herself to the floor, sensing that her attackers had something else to worry about. She heard another coughing sound followed by a thud behind her. Rolling onto her knees she watched as a man who looked like a film noir detective slit a second thief’s throat. The man landed in a heap on top of his compatriot.

  “You hurt?” the detective asked.

  “No.”

  “Good,” he said. When he bent down to offer a grimy hand, she could tell that he was the source of the terrible smell. Hadn’t he ever heard of soap? He hefted her to her feet and then pulled her away from the corpses. She didn’t have time for the shock of this to sink in.

  Like the thieves he wore a ski mask to conceal his identity, though his was dark red instead of black. All she could see of him were brown eyes and a long, pointed nose. Who was he? And what was he going to do with her?

  The answer to the latter was answered when he stopped in front of the gift shop door. She was going to tell him that she didn’t have a key, but he was already reaching into one of his coat’s pockets for a ring of keys. “You have a key to the gift shop?” she asked.

  “Never know when you might need it,” he said. He flipped through the ring until he found a small silver key. He stuck this into the lock and then gave the mesh screen a tug up. To her surprise it lifted.

  “What—?” Before she could finish the question, she felt something heavy hit her on the back of the head. She landed on her back, looking up at the foul-smelling man. He held a revolver with a silencer in his hand. That must have been what he’d used to hit her.

  “Sorry,” he said. “I’ll be back for you later.”

  She fell asleep to the feeling of being dragged into the gift shop. She hoped whoever this strange man was, he could save Mom too.

  * * *

  In his long history as a criminal, Rahnasto had never robbed a museum before. He hadn’t seen any reason to start, but his mysterious contact claimed there was something in this museum that could get rid of the Silver Seraph. Such a possibility was too intriguing for him to pass up.

  That it was the Thorne Museum also persuaded him. Ten years ago, when the museum was raising money for a new wing, he had offered to donate a few million to use as a tax write-off for one of his front corporations. That bitch of a director had had the nerve to turn him down. He had gone to meet with her personally after the initial brush-off. She sat beside her desk and glared at him with such disdain that he shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “This museum does not take funds from criminal enterprises,” she said. “Good day, Mr. Rahnasto.”

  He would take great pleasure in looting the wing she had built without his help. So much that he had come along with his soldiers—and the mysterious contact. Like the rest of them, the man was wearing a ski mask to cover his face. Unlike the others, he was wearing night vision goggles so that not even his eyes were visible and Rahnasto was fairly certain the man had some kind of voice-changing device as well. This man wasn’t taking any chances.

  The contact had gone in first. He had shot one security guard, captured the rest, and disabled the museum’s security systems far quicker than Rahnasto thought possible. This man was a professional too. Rahnasto’s soldiers went in next to secure the building and begin taking some of the most valuable objects. Only then did Rahnasto step inside, accompanied by Kamensky.

  They wandered around the great hall, Rahnasto staring up at the giant elephant skeleton and the blue whale overhead. Those would certainly make great trophies if he were into hunting, which he wasn’t. He lit a cigarette and then looked around the darkened hall. “Where did our man go?”

  Kamensky barked a few Russian words into a walkie-talkie and then answered, “The Egypt exhibit. Over here.”

  Through a set of double doors they found two soldiers breaking open glass display cases of gold necklaces and bracelets. They stuffed these into bags for melting down and reselling later. Those would make a good profit, though not as much as a boatload of coke or guns.

  The contact was at the end of the hall, standing before a half-naked mannequin wearing a skirt and sandals. The mannequin wore a strange headdress that looked like a black dog wearing a golden helmet. The dog-man clutched a golden staff with a head shaped like a dog as well. The contact turned to Rahnasto and said, “Beautiful, isn’t it?”

  Rahnasto shrugged. “The staff and helmet might net a few thousand.”

  “All you care about is money, isn’t it?”

  “Not entirely. You promised me the do-gooder.”

  “And you’ll have her. Very soon.” With that the contact smashed the mannequin’s glass case open. He rea
ched inside to pry the staff loose from its plastic hand. “This is what we need.”

  “A gold stick?”

  “You have no vision. That is why you haven’t killed either of them yet.”

  Kamensky brought up his gun. “Don’t talk like that to the boss.”

  The man brought up the gold stick. Rahnasto watched as the eyes of the dog’s head began glowing red. Lightning leaped from its eyes and mouth, through Kamensky’s body armor. Kamensky dropped to the floor, the smell of burnt flesh hanging in the air. Rahnasto shook his head and reached into his jacket for a roll of Tums. “Now I need another lieutenant.”

  “You still don’t see, do you?”

  “That was a nice trick.”

  “We’re only getting started.”

  Rahnasto heard gunshots coming from upstairs. He motioned for his two soldiers in the room to drop their loot and check it out. “Sounds like she’s here,” he said.

  “That’s not her,” the contact said. “It’s the other one.”

  “Maybe you can go use your stick on him.”

  “Not yet.” The man raised the staff to bash open the rest of the case. Keeping the staff tucked under his arm, he took the headdress from off the mannequin. “You’d better go too,” the man said. “She’s almost here.”

  Rahnasto thought about arguing, but he could still smell Kamensky roasting. It would be best to find somewhere safe before the woman showed up. He hurried out of the exhibit, back into the great hall. He was about to down a couple more Tums when he looked up at the elephant again. Only now there was a silver shape dropping from off of its head, her arms spread wide and cape billowing.

  She landed delicately in front of him and put one hand on the sword still in its sheath. “You’re under arrest,” she said without preamble.

  He didn’t bother going for his gun, knowing that would be futile. Instead, he dropped his roll of Tums and raised his hands. “You know this is pointless. Even if you arrest me, I have the best lawyers in the world. They’ll get me out before lunchtime.”

  “Maybe you won’t make it to the station.”

  “You’re not going to kill me. You’re too good for that. Unless you plan to turn me over to your friend.”

  “I might.”

  From the corner of his eye, Rahnasto saw the exhibit doors open. The woman saw it as well. She reached to her belt for the sword that glittered as if it were made of diamond. Rahnasto used this opening to dive behind a bench for cover.

  The contact was wearing the dog headdress now, its eyes glowing as red as those of the staff. As it had in the exhibit, the dog’s head at the end of the staff fired a bolt of lightning. Rahnasto watched with awe as the Silver Seraph went flying backwards, over his bench. He smelled the same roasted flesh as before. Turning, he saw a black hole in the abdomen of her armor.

  She got onto her knees and then winked out of his vision as she wrapped the cape over her body. The man in the dog headdress took a few steps forward. He raised the staff again, its eyes glowing. “You can’t hide from me,” he growled. “I am Set, God of Chaos. You will bow to me or be destroyed.”

  He fired another bolt from the staff. To Rahnasto’s surprise it hit the mark. Again the woman went flying back, this time into a wall. Her sword lay on the floor, close enough for Rahnasto to touch it. The sword’s hilt glowed red at his touch.

  The sword began trembling and then rose into the air a few inches. It arced towards the man calling himself Set. He used the gold staff to deflect it into a corner. Then he leveled the staff at the Silver Seraph, who had managed to get herself into a standing position. “Your time is over, fool. This is my world now.”

  Rahnasto had always thought he would enjoy the woman’s death. Yet he found it a sobering moment as she screamed, the lightning bolt hitting her right between the breasts. When she pitched forward, Rahnasto found it to be more pitiful than exciting. Even more pitiful, the armor disappeared to reveal an old woman in the charred remains of a business suit. She lay unmoving on the floor, but he could hear her breath still rattling from her chest.

  Set turned to him, his eyes glowing red. “You may finish her now. She will be of no more trouble to you.”

  Rahnasto didn’t know what to say. He reached into his jacket for his pistol. This was the moment he had dreamed of for years, when he would be rid of the annoying do-gooder. Yet as he crossed the great hall to her, he still didn’t feel any triumph. Perhaps it was because this Set had done all the work or perhaps it was disheartening to see that his adversary was nothing more than an ordinary old woman.

  As he came closer, he saw enough of her face to recognize her. Now he understood why the museum director had been so adamant about rejecting his donation—the museum director was the Silver Seraph! Her eyes were tightly closed, but she kept whispering one word over and over again: Lois.

  “It’s a pity it has to end like this,” he said. He thought of how badly he had wanted her head on his desk, but now that the armor had disappeared, there was no point in it. He fired three bullets into her back, not caring what he hit. There was little chance she would survive now. After holstering his pistol, he took out a walkie-talkie. “Let’s get out of here. Now.”

  He turned to ask Set about where to meet to divide the loot, but the man was already gone. Rahnasto shrugged and then started towards the front door, leaving the old woman to her fate.

  Chapter 8

  Lois waited in front of the administration building with the three suitcases she had arrived at Brown with five months earlier. No one sat with her or told her goodbye; they were probably glad to be rid of her. She was equally glad to be rid of them.

  The fire in the dorm room hadn’t really been her fault. She hadn’t been the one smoking; that was her roommate Madison, eight years older than her but as responsible as a sixteen-year-old. Lois had stuck with alcohol, drinking bourbon straight from the bottle. She hoped to kill enough brain cells so that she might be able to stand it here. So far she’d found this Ivy League school to be inhabited by rich snobs and rich idiots in equal numbers. She didn’t like either group and they didn’t like her.

  There was someone else in the room, Madison’s boyfriend George. “Hey, maybe we should ask the kid if she wants to do a three-way,” George said and then laughed stupidly.

  “Come on, she probably still plays with Barbie dolls. Don’t you, Lou?”

  “A Ken doll would be smarter than your boyfriend. Probably a bigger dick too.”

  They were baked enough that they laughed at this. “Isn’t the kid a riot?” Madison said.

  “Hey, kid, you want to watch?”

  “Oh yeah, I’m sure that would be educational,” Lois said and then took another pull from the bottle of bourbon. “An example of what not to do.”

  Again they just laughed at her. She set the bottle aside and then fell asleep. The next thing she knew, the room felt really warm and a woman was screaming. She blinked her eyes open, but couldn’t see anything more than smoke and shadows. She coughed violently while her eyes watered.

  The advantage of being short was that she could get down to where the air was cooler and easier to breathe. She couldn’t see any sign of Madison or George. Maybe those two assholes had already burned up in the flames. More likely they had fled, leaving her behind. Fucking assholes, she thought to herself as she crawled towards the door.

  She made it to the door a few seconds before the firemen. One of them got her to her feet and then helped her downstairs. The paramedics checked her out, diagnosed her with mild smoke inhalation. She drank a couple gallons of water while the police worked her over. They already had a statement from Madison and George. They blamed the whole thing on her, saying the pot and booze belonged to her.

  Her reputation preceded her, so there was little point in trying to fight the charges. She’d already gotten into two fights on campus and had three professors complain about her disrupting classes. Her “disruptions” had been because she knew more than they did about the ma
terial they taught.

  It didn’t matter to her; she hated fucking Brown anyway. Stupid fucking Ivy League assholes. She didn’t need them, just as she hadn’t needed Northwestern, Cornell, Michigan, or Ren City Community College. Fuck college.

  She waited in front of the administration building for two hours before Aunt Betty’s car showed up. Mom climbed out of the passenger’s seat, looking calm as usual. She Glared at Lois and said, “Do you have everything?”

  “Yes.” Everything she wanted to take. Anything else she wouldn’t need.

  Mom helped her with the bags; Ren City was close enough that they didn’t have any luggage of their own, making it easy for all three suitcases to fit. Lois sat in the backseat behind her mother, Betty’s seat pushed back to the limit to accommodate her stomach.

  As they had since Lois was a baby, they went into their good cop-bad cop routine. While Mom would never shout or swear or lose her temper, Aunt Betty was more than willing to do so. She hadn’t even shifted out of park before she said, “What the hell were you thinking, kid?”

  That was how Betty always referred to her, as “kid.” The irony was that Betty often used the same pet name for Mom as well, being a year older than her. When Lois had been little it had been cute, but now she’d begun to see it as demeaning. She crossed her arms over her chest and said, “It wasn’t my fault.”

  “And I’m sure none of those fights were your fault either.”

  “I didn’t start them.”

  “You sure as hell finished them.” In both cases Lois had sent her aggressors to the hospital, one with a shattered femur and the other with a broken pelvis.

  “That was their fault.”

  “It doesn’t matter whose fault it was,” Mom said. “You know better to be drinking and smoking, don’t you? It’s illegal for a girl your age.”

  “I wasn’t smoking. Madison’s boyfriend brought the stuff.”