Spellbinders Collection Page 7

  "This stuff belongs to us?"

  "Yep."

  "It's all real?"

  "Ayuh."

  "That painting — that's Picasso, isn't it? And the one next to it is Gauguin?"

  "Yep." So those art-history lessons had took. No need to tell him that the good stuff was mostly failures, things that you couldn't sell, sometimes couldn't even hang on the walls of your own house because they were all too well known. A copy of that Picasso was considered the real painting, and this one had been labeled "a clever forgery," unsellable. Granddad had painted the other one, and he damned well had known which one was which. However, the so-called experts had the final say. That Gauguin, the guy who'd commissioned the theft had tried to cut his price after Dan had already lifted the painting. After all, the Morgans couldn't sell it anywhere else . . . .

  Gary had stopped in his prowl around the room. He tilted his head to one side, studying a mannequin covered with charcoal-gray velvet. The featureless head bore twin diadems of woven gold, intricate pendant earrings, and a wide gold necklace hung with patterned plates. Brooches and bracelets lay on more velvet at the base.

  "I've seen this stuff before. A photograph."

  Ben grinned. Dan had told him about the boy studying Homer in his senior World Lit course. "Priam's Treasure. Guy named Schliemann dug that up, in a place called Hisarlik in Turkey. He thought it came from the Trojan War. He was only off a thousand years or so."

  "But . . . Mrs. Allen told us he took it back to Germany, and the Red Army looted it at the end of the Second World War. Disappeared for about forty years, but it's on display in Moscow, now."

  "Copies, son, really good copies. If somebody ever analyzes the metal they've got in the Pushkin Museum, the alloy would match a South African Krugerrand."

  "How on earth did it end up here?"

  "Well, this Greek billionaire didn't think his people's heritage belonged to either the Russians or the Germans. He paid for the copies and the substitution, back before the Kremlin even knew what they had in those Nazi crates. Too bad he died before he could enjoy the loot."

  Or before he could pay us, either. Of course, Dad never told that old buzzard that the stuff really belonged to the Turks. The customer is always right.

  "Where'd we get all this stuff?"

  "It's simple, son. We got it the old fashioned way. We stole it."

  Chapter Seven

  Daniel glanced at his watch: 8:37 PM, in this cave that didn't have days or nights. He was surprised that they hadn't taken the watch away from him, to add to his isolation. Maybe they were still in the "good cop" phase. He'd like to encourage such behavior. Up to a point.

  Antonio looked very sleek tonight. Daniel had thrown away the rest of that caravan of names, mainly because stringing them together granted the thug more status than he deserved. They also seemed more suited to silver hair and the wisdom of old age, and didn't seem to fit a man who grew younger every day. Today he looked more like a Tony.

  Anyway, the Colombian looked like a well-fed cat staring at his favorite catnip mouse. "I wish you to tell me some things." The cat spread his paws in a gesture of friendship, but claw-tips still peeked out from the fur.

  "There are two women, one very large and blonde, one very small and dark. I see them together. Who are these?"

  That one was obvious. "Alice Haskell and Kate Rowley. Alice is the small one."

  The Dragon's power allowed Daniel to deflect some of the questions, answering them with half-truths and evasions. Not straight-out lies, though, and this Colombian had a knack for asking the right questions. Besides, he could get that information from the Pratts. Daniel saved his weapons for more important battles.

  "Which one of these is the bruja, the witch?"

  Now that was a peculiar question. Anybody who knew enough to ask it should already know the answer. "Alice."

  As interrogations went, these sessions seemed almost friendly — no rubber hose, no truth drugs, not even a hard chair and bright lights in Daniel's face. Yet. The brujo had even returned the Dragon pendant, when some of its peculiarities started to show. So far, all Daniel had to face were long and very polite sessions of questions, and a maddening lack of will to resist them. He intended to keep things neighborly for as long as possible.

  "The small one, not the large?" The brujo paused and his eyes focused beyond the granite wall. "And yet it is the blonde goddess who smells of flint and lightning. I think I will continue to examine that link in the chain. Weakening one weakens both." He spoke quietly, as if thinking aloud. Then he shook himself and came back to the cave. "Most curious. Tell me, what are the powers of this Alice?"

  "Damned if I know. She's a nurse, rich, queer, got a tongue that could flay an ox at a hundred yards. Purebred Naskeag Indian. The Haskell Women have been around this area since Noah stepped off the Ark. They aren't mean, but if one of them tells you to do something, you do it. People avoid crossing them."

  "Crossing? Oh, yes, angering. This word you use, 'queer,' it means something other than strange?"

  "Homosexual. In this case, Lesbian." The brujo had gaps like that in his vocabulary, places where the idioms didn't work.

  "Ah. The large woman, this Kate, then she is the small one's lover? What is her work, her family, her personality?"

  "Town constable, works about fifty part-time jobs, divorced, one daughter. Nice woman, not as dumb as she looks, but she can be a severe bitch if she thinks you deserve it. Tossed a man halfway through a wall once, busting up a bar fight."

  The man's eyes narrowed, and he tilted his head slightly as if mentally adding up his data. "This daughter, she looks like the mother? Large, and blonde? A young woman?"

  "She's in high school, can't remember what grade. Not quite as large. Hair a little darker, honey blonde instead of straw."

  "And the mother's associates, these many jobs she holds?"

  Daniel couldn't figure where this was going, but it seemed harmless enough. After all, smart drug smugglers wouldn't attack a cop. Drew too much heat. And Tom Pratt knew all of it, anyway. "Kate runs a contracting business, odd jobs and renovations, serves as caretaker for a bunch of summer places. She did some masonry work for us, and I think she did some carpentry for the Pratts. Small crew, two helpers. One's an old coot named Charlie Sickles, the other is a kid she picked up out of juvenile court. Don't remember his name."

  The Colombian nodded, pausing, pushing his lips in and out in thought. His eyes seemed to lose focus, freeing Dan's mind for a moment. Not that he could act on that freedom: His cell was carved from solid granite and the steel door was firmly bolted on the outside. He doubted if attacking the brujo would have any good results. And then there was the closed-circuit TV camera in one corner of the ceiling, God's omniscient eye.

  Just like the interrogation, the cell could have been much worse. It was warm and dry, with lights Dan could control and a comfortable bed. He doubted if it was originally intended as a cell — they gave him a chemical toilet and water in jugs, for example, and the room wasn't vented so he could still smell the last five meals. He guessed it had been some kind of storeroom in a former life. They trusted him with an electric heater to fight the chill of the stone, evidently sure he had no thoughts of suicide. The only thing really wrong with the place was that lock on the outside.

  And the Colombians on the other side of it.

  Tom Pratt had spent too much time with those Colombians. The Pratts had always been Stonefort smugglers, members of a tight-knit community that closed ranks against outsiders. That was how Stonefort survived.

  Now the old rules were dead. Tom had joined with an outsider against his own neighbors. The brujo was the kind of man who took what he wanted. He wouldn't mind using torture and murder to get it. He dominated the Pratts. Tom had become either too ruthless or too scared to argue.

  Daniel wondered where the cell was. A blackout separated this room from the floating dock — they could have moved him miles away while he was out. The solid wall
s were the same pink Stonefort granite, so he hadn't been moved off the island.

  So he couldn't tell Ben, or now Gary, where to look for him. Best guess would be somewhere under the Pratt compound, still in the smuggling tunnels.

  Antonio came back from wherever his thoughts had taken him. "So these two women are lovers. It is open? They do not try to hide their love?"

  Daniel scratched his right ear and grimaced. "I don't think they've ever posted a notice on the town hall door. They don't live together. But it's common knowledge around town, been twenty years or so. Nobody cares, if that's what you're asking. You can't blackmail them."

  "This Viking goddess, she also likes men? She has been married?"

  "Town gossip says her marriage broke up over booze, not sex. I know I've seen her truck in front of her ex-husband's house at four in the morning."

  Antonio's eyes narrowed. "And the daughter, she and the mother do not get along? Like all children, she wishes to rule her own life before it is time?"

  Daniel shrugged. He didn't know the family that well.

  The brujo smiled gently as he studied Daniel's face. "You wonder why I bother with these things, why I ask you questions my associates can answer. These things help me to know how you act when you are telling truth. They give me, what is the word, a baseline to tell truth from lie."

  That didn't sound good. Time to grab the bull by the horns. "When are you going to let me go?"

  "You have something I want. We can discuss your future when you give it to me."

  "It wouldn't do you any good. You saw that it started to die when you kept it."

  "Idioto! You think I want that foolish bit of silver? No. As I have said, I want the power behind it. Now, tell me where your brother lives, this Benjamin Morgan who died twenty years ago."

  The compulsion blossomed into something squeezing Daniel's chest. Sweat beaded on his forehead. He clenched his teeth, trying to keep control of his tongue.

  He lost. "I don't know."

  The Dragon turned chilly against the skin of his chest, not the cold of the brujo pulling power from it but a sense of separation blocking Daniel's own connection with it. It felt as if the pendant had changed into a piece of jewelry instead of a living thing.

  The brujo cocked his head to one side. "You truly do not know. What you do not know, you cannot tell. Very wise. Perhaps. Who else knows you are alive?"

  Daniel gave up on his jaw and clenched his fists instead. He drove his fingernails into his palms, concentrating on the pain. Maybe pain would draw his focus away from those hypnotic eyes.

  "My wife. My son." The words felt like they had been torn out of Daniel's throat.

  "You can talk through that interesting jewel?"

  "Sometimes."

  Again the brujo seemed to study Daniel's soul. "Sometimes? You do not seem to understand this thing you have. Curious. You could do so much more with it than that."

  Talking through the Dragon didn't seem to bother the brujo, or even come as a surprise. He nodded as if he followed Daniel's thoughts.

  "Perhaps you should tell this ghost of your brother to make himself more visible, more solid. That would save me the trouble of having other members of your family become dead. I mean truly dead, not this game your clan seems to play with the government. Maria, I believe she is called? And Ellen, and Margaret?"

  Daniel felt the blood drain from his face, and spots danced in front of his eyes. He blinked until the small room came back into focus.

  The brujo smiled at him, almost sadly. "You seem surprised. My people have learned how to be ruthless, you know. We have had excellent teachers, from the days of the conquistadores and even earlier. It shows in our national character. What do you call them in English, the Shining Path? The guerrilleros know: Kill everyone in a village, and the next village over the hill is most generous with their food and shelter."

  "But I can't give you what you want! The Dragon only speaks to Morgan blood. You saw what happened when a stranger touched it!"

  Now the brujo's smile turned mocking. "I saw what happened when you set a trap. I let my man walk into it because he was cheating me. The rest of my men know what that meant. But I would not try to take this thing by force." He shook his head, emphasizing the point.

  "I know more about these things than you do. I have the tales of my people, the wisdom of my Master's centuries. I know how to have a thing such as this accept a new friend, watch through new eyes, recognize new blood. If you give it freely, your family will live. Your choice is how and when I get this thing, not if. Your choice is whether your family lives or dies."

  Daniel grimaced. "And when we give you the Dragon's Eye, tell it to recognize your blood, then you kill us anyway. I've heard about the way you Colombians do business."

  "Colombians? Ai! You norteamericanos! Always you make the large pot of stew, mixing everyone into one lump. I am Peruvian. My men are Peruvian. The Colombians are trash. They are cowboys, they are gangsters. They come from the swamps and still smell of the mud."

  "I'm not sure I can see the difference. Drug bosses don't have a reputation for honesty."

  "Es verdad." The brujo sat thinking for a moment, then nodded. "There is one other thing that I am not, my men are not. We are not Dons." He said the word with an overlay of acid that turned it into a curse in Spanish. "We are Inca, and we have pride. We do not carry the blood of liars and thieves and rapists in our veins. When I say I will do a thing, I do it."

  Daniel blinked. He studied the face in front of him: broad and round, brown skin, smooth cheeks and chin even though the hour was late. That was not the face of a Spanish hidalgo. So much for snap judgments and stereotypes.

  "What happened to Don Antonio Estevan Francisco Juan Carlos da Silva y Gomes?" Daniel rattled the lengthy name off with the correct Spanish pronunciation, feeling inordinately proud of his memory, and tried to dip the Don in the same acid the brujo had used.

  "A name and a passport for which the original user had no further need. You may call me Tupash if you wish. It is close to the pronunciation of my name in Quechua."

  "Inca, Spanish, it makes a difference? I'm supposed to trust you more because you descend from people who practiced human sacrifice?"

  The Peruvian shrugged. "That was done rarely, only in times of great crisis. The sacrifices were condemned criminals or volunteers. We were not like the Aztec, piling up a mountain of corpses to make the sun rise in the morning. This remains — the blood of Viracocha and Manco Capac flows in my veins. I do not lie, and when I say a thing I do that thing. Ask your Dragon to look into my heart and tell you what it finds."

  Daniel nodded, thinking. At the least, pretending to go along would buy him time, buy Ben and Gary time to figure out an escape. "How do you know so much about the Dragon? I've never heard of anything else like it."

  "These things, they are very old and very secret. I tell you what I know to show my trust, to show how much you can gain if you trust me. Great power is there for the taking. I know how to use it. You have forgotten."

  A wry smile twisted Daniel's face. "Trust? And here I thought you were gloating like a villain in a cheap movie."

  "I wish you would not think of me as a villain. I came here as a businessman, trading a product your people want. Your family is not troubled by laws. Neither am I. Laws are made by others, to be obeyed by others. I offer you wealth and power, security, peace. Give me this thing and your family will prosper. Refuse me and your family will die. But you have no reason to refuse."

  "Perhaps I prefer to keep the power in my own hands?"

  "You do not hold it now. You do not know how to hold it, or you would not be here."

  "Perhaps I would prefer that no one held it?"

  The brujo shook his head. "I will hold it. Now that I know that it exists, where it exists, it will be mine. I say again, I know how to reach this thing. Think of how your gem turned dull, away from your touch. Think of your Eye itself, with no Morgan blood left living. A year, two yea
rs, it will seek another ally. I will be there."

  Any delay helped Ben, gathering the ideas, the bits and pieces of information he needed to make one of his plans. Ben always figured something out. Just give him time. Daniel glanced up at the TV camera. "What about the Pratts?"

  The brujo waved his hand at the box on the ceiling, and the light under its lens winked out. "They have no part of this. Drugs they can have, as before. Drugs are cheap. The power? That will be mine, and also yours. If you are vindictive, they can be destroyed. I wish to make a deal with you, and they can be part of the price. But you do not seem that kind of man."

  The arguments made a perverted kind of sense. Morgans had worked with many allies over the centuries, some far worse than a South American drug lord. They'd sold looted art for Mengele, Cambodian artifacts for the Khmer Rouge. The only rule had always been the good of the family. This man had the power to end the family, and the will to do it, and a reason.

  He nodded, slowly, warily. "I need to believe we can trust you. Why do you need us, if you can simply take the Dragon without my help?"

  "I tell you these things because I want to be your friend, your partner. That is why you still live. I have no need of corpses. Corpses have no value. Clever minds have value. Clever minds are very rare, and ones with the skills of your family are even rarer. I need you. Can you believe this, trust this? A single man does not use power such as your Dragon offers. That kind of greatness calls for an army, and an army needs many generals."

  His words were seductive. Daniel wondered how much of that was hypnosis and how much the power of the arguments themselves. He'd always sensed that the things the Tear gave him — the ear for truth and lies, the ability to hide in plain sight, the mastery of locks and hidden places that seemed to run in his family — that all these things barely scratched the surface of the Dragon.

  The selkie change, that was something separate from the Dragon. Morgans had changed their skins since before time began. So far, the brujo hadn't asked any questions that hinted he knew about that. Daniel had no plans to mention it.