The Dragon’s Mark (20 page)

Annja kept walking, but began to steer herself toward one of the side paths, away from the crowds. She knew the layout of the park pretty well and was counting on the fact that her mysterious follower more than likely did not. It would give her the chance to spring the trap that she was getting ready to set.

The direction she chose led the two of them along a paved footpath through a thick copse of trees. A few hundred yards into the trees was an old discarded construction pipe, the kind that was large enough to drive a truck through. At night it would be a haven for drunks and junkies, a place to avoid the police patrols that routinely went through the park, but at this hour it would more than likely be empty.

It was there that Annja intended to spring her ambush.

The trail took a quick little dogleg before it reached that particular point in the walkway, and as soon as she knew she was out of sight, Annja broke into a jog. Reaching the construction pipe, she slipped inside, her back to the wall.

It took a few minutes but soon she heard the hurried pace of her pursuer. Annja waited until he stepped past the mouth of the pipe and then she struck.

Stepping out of the shadows, she grabbed him by the shirtfront and hauled him back into the pipe, using her momentum to slam him against the nearby wall hard enough to make his teeth rattle. Half a second later she had the tip of her sword against his throat.

“You’ve got ten seconds to start talking,” she said, applying a little pressure to the blade for emphasis.

“No need for violence, Ms. Creed,” a familiar voice said in response.

Lowering her sword, Annja stepped back, surprise and annoyance vying for dominance on her face. “Henshaw! What are you doing here?”

In his typically unruffled kind of way, Roux’s man replied, “Following you.”

He glanced down at the sword in her hand. “And not very well apparently.”

Annja released the sword. She wasn’t in any danger. Not from Henshaw.

“Following me? Why would you do that?”

Henshaw didn’t say anything.

It didn’t take her long to figure out what his silence meant. Henshaw would be acting on orders and those orders came from one person only. “Roux,” she said.

But why?

Henshaw didn’t know. Or if he did, he wasn’t saying. When she asked, he simply shrugged his shoulders.

“Was it your people in the subway the other night?”

Again the shrug.

“Fine,” she said, and she let the heat show in her voice. If Henshaw wouldn’t tell her, she’d just have to ask Roux himself. “Give me your phone and I’ll speak to Roux myself.”

He handed it over without objection and perhaps the slightest trace of relief.

She hit the redial button, figuring that Henshaw would have been in constant contact with Roux as he followed her through the city streets. She waited for her mentor to answer.

The phone rang several times.

She began to get an uneasy feeling as it went on and on. If Roux had said he would wait for Henshaw’s call, then that was what he would do.

She hung up and handed the cell phone back to Henshaw. “No answer,” she told him. “Are you sure he’s waiting for your call?”

Henshaw looked concerned. He immediately pressed Redial and waited through a set of rings. The longer it went on without an answer the more concerned Annja became.

Something wasn’t right, an inner voice told her.

The longer she watched Henshaw waiting for Roux to answer the phone, the more certain of it she became.

Something had happened to Roux.

“Come on,” she said, and headed for the exit to the park. Once on Fifth Avenue she flagged down a passing cab, waited for it to come to a stop and then climbed inside with Henshaw at her heels.

“Waldorf-Astoria,” Henshaw said as the cab pulled away from the curb and headed into traffic. “Please hurry.”

Annja’s anxiety ratcheted up a notch. She’d never seen Henshaw in a hurry, not even when under fire. Apparently his inner alarms were going off, too.

The cabbie got them through the city streets in record time. Henshaw shoved a handful of bills through the slot and the two of them were out the door and rushing into the hotel before the doorman could even get out his usual “Good evening.”

The elevator seemed to take forever and Annja was grateful that no one else tried to get on board with them. Henshaw was practically vibrating with tension and she didn’t think listening to the prattle of civilians, for lack of a better word, was going to do him any favors.

When they hit the eighth floor, Henshaw drew a gun from his jacket and led the way down the hall, toward the suite at the other end where Roux was staying for the duration of his visit to New York.

They were still a half dozen rooms away when they saw that the door to the suite was partially open.

Annja called her sword to her, getting a firm grip on the hilt with two hands, ready to deal with whatever might be waiting for them inside.

Henshaw glanced back, saw that she was ready for a confrontation if it came to that and crept down the corridor to the room itself. Reaching out with his free hand, he silently pushed the door the rest of the way open.

There was a short corridor between the front door and the living area and this naturally limited what they could see from outside in the hall, but even from there they could tell that a struggle had taken place inside the room. Cushions had been pulled off the coach and a chair had been knocked to the ground.

Cautiously they stepped forward.

The living room looked as though it had been the scene of a fight. In addition to the furniture that had been knocked over, the glass top of the coffee table had a starred crack in the center, as if someone had driven the heel of their foot into it, and the television had been knocked out of the entertainment cabinet to lay shattered in a heap on the floor.

Seeing the damage, they quickly checked the rest of the suite, doing it as a team so that they could provide cover for each other if they found someone or something unexpected.

In the end, they didn’t find anything more.

The suite was empty.

Roux was gone.

“Maybe he wasn’t here,” Annja suggested, trying to see the bright side. “Maybe he’s down in the bar or in the dining room right now.”

She could tell by his face that Henshaw didn’t think it was very likely, but he pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and called down to the front desk where he asked to speak to the manager. They spoke for a few minutes and then Henshaw thanked the man and hung up.

He did not look happy with what he had learned.

“Roux left the restaurant in the company of a young Asian woman around nine. The manager says he’d never seen her before, so that reduces the possibility she was one of the professionals that they’re used to seeing who use the hotel as a meeting place. They tend to be known quantities in a place like this. Then he checked with room service and they confirmed that they delivered a bottle of brandy to an older gentleman and a younger woman here in this room about an hour ago.”

Annja’s mind went immediately to her encounter at the café with the mysterious Shizu. Was that who Roux had been seen with? If so, how had she found him? Had the Dragon had them all under surveillance without their knowing it? Could they be under observation even now?

She was just about to say something along those lines to Henshaw when she was startled into silence by the ringing of a telephone.

The two of them immediately checked their individual cells, but neither one was receiving a call, which left the hotel phone somewhere beneath all the debris. Luckily the caller just let the phone ring until, at last, Annja was able to locate it.

“Hello?”

“Ms. Creed. What a surprise to find you there.”

The voice seemed to be older, deeper, but Annja recognized it nonetheless.

Shizu.

“You’re not surprised and you know it. Where’s Roux?”

At the mention of his employer’s name, Henshaw walked into the bedroom next door and Annja soon heard him searching around in the debris, looking for another extension to listen in on.

“The old goat is fine. For now,” Shizu said.

Annja heard a gentle click and knew Henshaw had found the other phone.

“Whether or not he remains that way depends on you, however.”

Annja frowned. “What do you want?”

“I thought that would have been obvious by now. I want the sword.”

The bold statement left her at a momentary loss for words.

Shizu laughed. “My, my, my. Has the proverbial cat got your tongue?”

At last Annja found her voice. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. What sword?”

Shizu said something to someone else in Japanese and in the background there came a sudden wail of pain. When silence returned she said to Annja, “I can do this all night, if you’d like, but I don’t think your friend Roux is up to it. Are you sure you want to play it this way?”

Annja bit down on her lip, fighting for control. “I told you, I don’t know what you are talking about,” she said again, trying to stall for time as she fought to figure out just what to do.

This time Roux let out a long mewling cry of such pain and terror that it didn’t even sound human. Annja felt her stomach churn at the thought of what they had to do to a man, particularly one as tough as Roux, to get him to make a sound like that, never mind keep it going for several very long minutes. In the other room, she thought she could hear Henshaw retching.

Yeah, you and me both, buddy.

To Shizu, she said sharply, “All right. Lay off. I know what sword you mean.”

“Of course you do. Seems you’re not so tough, after all, Ms. Creed.”

We’ll see about that, she thought.

“Bring the sword with you to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden tomorrow at sunset. Come alone. Walk to the viewing pavilion inside the Japanese Hill-and-Pond Garden. I will meet you there with the old man and we’ll do an exchange, your sword for your friend’s life. Understood?”

“Yes, I understand. I’ll be there,” Annja said.

“Good,” Shizu said, her voice dripping with satisfaction. “And one other thing. Be sure to leave that British bastard, Henshaw, behind. You don’t need him trying to be a hero and messing up what should be a simple exchange.”

With that parting shot, Shizu hung up the phone.

Henshaw came out of the bedroom, his face set in a mask of fury. “I can have that garden flooded with men inside of twenty-four hours. We’ll grab her and…”

Annja wasn’t listening. A sudden suspicion had swept over her, one that would change everything if it was correct. She dug through her backpack for the drawing pad that she’d been carrying around with her since her session with Dr. Laurent. When she found it, she pulled it out and flipped to the first image, the one of the swordsman’s face.

She stared at it intently, trying to see beyond the mask and hood. She studied the bridge of the nose, the shape of the eyes, the overall sense of what the picture was telling her, trying to answer a single question.

Could the Dragon be a woman instead of a man?

“What is it?” Henshaw asked, noting the intensity of her study and the way she’d stopped listening to him.

“I’m not sure yet….” She trailed off, not ready to explain. Her thoughts went back to that day in the café, to the young woman she’d met. Shizu. Could she have been far more than she appeared to be? Annja had been convinced she was an agent of the Dragon, sent to harass her, throw her off balance, just like those who had been following her and the men who’d been sent to try to kidnap her on the streets later that night.

But what if she was something more than just a foot soldier?

What if
she
was the Dragon?

It would certainly explain a few things.

Annja summoned up a memory of Shizu’s face and tried to mentally impose it over the image of the swordsman she’d drawn on the pad.

As best as she could tell, the two were a match.

Annja explained her theory to Henshaw, showing him the drawing and explaining how she’d arrived at her conclusion.

He was shaking his head before she was finished. “That can’t be right, Annja. The Dragon has been operating since the late seventies. Every single scrap of information about him points to the fact that he is a man.”

She moved to interrupt him and he held up a hand. “Hell, even if that was all a front, even if she cleverly used misinformation to throw everyone off track for decades, you’ve still got a problem with the time frame. The girl you saw couldn’t have been more than thirty, yet the Dragon has been claiming credit for political assassinations for more than three decades.”

But Annja had already considered that. “She’s his successor,” she said, and the act of verbalizing it made the theory crystalize into fact in her mind. She was right; she knew it.

“I’m sorry, she’s what?”

“His successor.” Annja began to pace back and forth. It helped her think things through sometimes, just like walking did. “Most everyone, and by that I mean the various law-enforcement agencies, believes that the Dragon, the real Dragon, died in that explosion in Madrid, right?”

Henshaw nodded.

“Okay, so let’s assume that is true. The Dragon
did
die. And I’ll bet that your intelligence information would support that theory, too, wouldn’t it? For years there was no further activity associated with the Dragon after the failure in Madrid.”

Again, the nod. “Word that the Dragon had resurfaced didn’t start up again until about three years ago,” Henshaw said.

Annja stopped pacing and turned to face him. “You see, that’s the key. Someone else has taken up the mantle of the Dragon, has suborned his identity and has been using it as their own for the past several years.”

“But why? What would be the point?”

Annja shrugged. “Fame. Fortune. A sense of adventure. Who knows?”

“And the rumors about the sword?”

Annja didn’t have an answer for that and it was the one part of her theory that was bothering her. Had it been the sword that had influenced Shizu to pick up the tattered image of the Dragon and wrap it about herself? Had the sword somehow guided her actions, given her the skills she needed to step into the role, to fool the law-enforcement community for so long?

If so, then it was all the more important for Annja to stop her and destroy the sword.

Perhaps even more important than rescuing Roux.

“I’m not sure,” she replied. “But I think I know the reason.”

She explained about the conversation she’d had with Garin and his theory that the Dragon and her weapon were a polar opposite to Annja and the sword she carried.

For the second time that day Annja was treated to a view behind the mask that Henshaw usually wore. She could see the wonder of it all on his face.

“Two swords, created for cross-purposes, one representing the light and one representing the dark,” he said, his thoughts distant and his gaze focused on something far away.

He shook his head as if to clear it and asked, “So what do we do now?”

“We get Roux back, whole and in one piece,” she said, letting her anger at how one of her friends had been treated in order to influence her show through. “And then we deal with the Dragon once and for all.”

It didn’t take them long to come up with a plan. Using Annja’s laptop they discovered that the park opened up at eight every morning and closed again at six. Sunset would happen just a few minutes before closing, so they should have the park to themselves at that point and they intended to use that to their advantage.

Henshaw would go in shortly after the park opened the next morning. He’d find a suitable position where he wouldn’t be stumbled upon by park visitors, but one that at the same time would allow him to keep the pavilion itself under observation.

They had little doubt that Shizu would have the park under surveillance, but they hoped she wouldn’t have it in place that early. Just to be safe Henshaw agreed to wear a disguise when he made the entrance attempt.

By arriving so far in advance of their scheduled meeting time, Annja hoped to be able to spot Shizu’s people getting into position. Once Henshaw knew where they were, he could relay that information via directional radio to Annja. It would be a lot easier for her to take them out once she knew where they were.

Henshaw would be armed with a high-powered rifle and he would keep Annja in view at all times. When the Dragon appeared, hopefully with Roux in tow, it would be Henshaw’s job to deal with anyone who posed a threat to Roux’s continued well-being. Annja, on the other hand, would focus her energy and attention on the Dragon. If things got too dangerous, she’d call in a little extra help from Henshaw.

In order to pull it off, they were going to need a communication system that would be difficult to intercept. Henshaw knew where to get one. Just in case the phone in Roux’s suite had been bugged, Henshaw went down to the lobby and used a pay phone to make arrangements.

While he was gone, Annja tried to clean up things a little; she put the cushions back on the couch, put the chairs in their places and swept up the loose glass from the smashed coffee table and television set.

When Henshaw returned half an hour later, he had a well-built dark-haired man who looked a bit like Antonio Banderas with him.

Seeing him, another piece of the puzzle fell into place in Annja’s mind.

“Well, if it isn’t my rooftop savior,” she said. She shouldn’t have been surprised, but she was. Score one for Henshaw, she thought.

The newcomer at least had the grace to look sheepish about the deception. “Sorry I couldn’t say anything to you then. Operational parameters and all that.”

If there had been even a trace of smugness in his response she would have made him regret it, but since he sounded entirely sincere, Annja let it go.

“Thank you,” she said.

“You’re welcome.”

Henshaw made the formal introductions. “Annja, meet Marco. Marco, Annja. Now let’s get on with this.”

Marco explained that he was there to show Annja how to wire herself up with a microphone and receiver for the next night. “Have you ever used anything like this before?” he asked.

She shook her head. “I know how to use a walkie-talkie. Does that count?”

Marco laughed. “Technology has come a long way since then, but at least the principle is the same.”

He walked over to the desk and took several small black cases the size of jewelry boxes from the pockets of his light coat.

He opened one of them and removed two flesh-colored pieces of plastic from inside. To Annja they looked like earbud headphones minus the wires.

Marco handed one to Annja and one to Henshaw.

“This is your receiver,” he said. “It sits inside your ear just like a hearing aid does, except it is so small it is practically invisible to anyone standing nearby. They would need to actively look inside your ear to spot it. Go on and try it—we need to make sure we get the fit right.”

Henshaw had obviously used one before. He popped it, tugged on his earlobe for a moment and announced that it was fine.

Annja, on the other hand, had to twist and turn hers for a moment before she got a good fit.

Marco picked up one of the other boxes, opened it and showed them both the wafer-thin piece of flesh-colored plastic it contained. “This is a microphone disk. Peel away the protective covering to expose the adhesive and then just press it firmly against your skin. Somewhere near your neck or upper chest is usually the best place. It’s extremely sensitive, but I wouldn’t count on it picking up your words if you stick it on your calf, for instance.”

Marco picked up the mini-walkie-talkie from the pile of gear on the table in front of him. “Go ahead and put on a mike, then we’ll give them a test.”

He waited to be certain they both followed the instructions he’d given and then walked into the bedroom, closing the door behind him.

A moment later Annja could hear Marco’s voice in her ear. “Testing, one, two, three. Can you hear me, Annja?”

“Yes, I can hear you.”

“All right, hang on a minute while I check Henshaw’s gear.”

He repeated the sequence with her partner and then returned to the living room. He collected their equipment, put the each set of earpieces and corresponding mikes into a single case and handed a case to each of them.

“They have a battery life of twenty-four hours, so don’t put them on until you’re ready to go—” he hesitated for a moment “—wherever it is you’re going.”

Annja eyed the box in her hand thoughtfully. “What about interception or interference?”

Marco shrugged. “The radios use a pretty rare frequency and the signals are encrypted automatically, so you won’t pick up anyone else’s traffic, nor will they pick up yours. The transmitter might be small but it’s powerful. You should be able to remain in contact with each other up to two miles away. It will even penetrate solid rock up to five hundred feet thick, so the walls of a building or even an entire house shouldn’t be any kind of problem for you. That’s the best I can do on short notice.”

Annja nearly laughed. If that was what he could do on short notice, she wasn’t sure she wanted to know what he’d be capable of when given more time. Probably reroute the NSA’s supersecret satellites just to get his voice mail, she thought.

With the communications issues resolved, Henshaw saw Marco out the door. He was gone for a few minutes, and when he came back Annja was waiting for him with an annoyed look on her face.

“Let me guess. He’s an old friend who just happened to be hanging around down the street when you called. Out with it, Henshaw.”

He mumbled something about not knowing what she was talking about.

But after all that had happened, there was no way she was going to settle for a feeble excuse.

“I said, spill it!”

Henshaw hesitated for another moment or two, then sighed. “No sense in keeping things a secret now, is there?” he asked.

Annja chose to take that as a rhetorical question and simply waited for him to continue.

“We’ve had you under surveillance ever since the day you left the estate,” he said.

“Why?”

“Roux was worried. He knew about the Dragon—knew what he was capable of, how far he would go to get something he wanted. At the same time he’d heard rumors about an artifact the Dragon was supposed to possess.”

“You mean Muramasa’s sword?”

“Yes, right, the sword.” Henshaw tried but failed to hide his surprise that she knew about the weapon.

Of course she knew about the weapon. Did they think she was an idiot?

“And then what?” she prompted, feeling her anger rise. “Did he think he was going to just dangle me out there as bait? Wait and see what happened?”

Henshaw’s face went still. “I wasn’t privy to all his plans, Ms. Creed.”

So they were back to Ms. Creed now, were they? “I have half a mind to just leave him there, Henshaw. He was playing games with my life!”

Wisely her companion remained silent.

After several minutes, Annja said, “Okay, we both know that I can’t leave him in her hands any more than you can, no matter how angry I am. So let’s figure out the rest of this plan and call it a night.”

They talked for another hour, getting everything straight so that when the time came they both knew what they were supposed to be doing and when. It was a reasonable plan, straightforward, without too many things that could trip them up. Of course, she thought, there was always the unexpected, but that couldn’t be helped.

Afterward they made arrangements with the manager to have a cab waiting for them in the hotel’s underground garage so they could slip away from the hotel without being seen.

Assuming that Annja’s loft was being watched, they staged an argument just outside, with Annja yelling at Henshaw through the cab’s window, telling him she didn’t want anything to do with him and that she would handle things on her own, all in an attempt to convince the watchers they knew were out there that Annja was following the Dragon’s instructions to the letter.

Sleep was a long time in coming for Annja that night.