A Pound of Flesh

Chapter 35





Sacha stood in the doorway, listening hard. The house seemed to be listening back, waiting for him to make the slightest sound. His uncle and aunt had gone to bed hours ago and Sacha had heard them snoring as he’d passed their room. Light from the moon shone down through the landing window, a cold brightness that flooded across the stair carpet, silvering the metal stair rods as he crept down to the hall.

They had no idea about his nocturnal wanderings, though he knew that his uncle Vladimir had kept a watchful eye on him for the first few weeks after his arrival in the city. That was more than two years ago and Sacha was one of the family now, though sometimes he felt that they treated him more like a family pet that had a wayward disposition and had to be guarded with care.

The big man padded across the remaining length of hallway and pushed open the door of the lounge. The armoury was located through a panelled archway at the far end of the room and through another door, but first he had to make his way across this place without knocking into any of the furniture or sending one of Andrea’s precious ornaments tumbling to the floor. One small sound and his aunt might come pattering down the stairs, her fear of burglars no doubt fuelled by his uncle’s refusal to insure all her stupid china figurines. Once he had asked about the antique weapons: did Uncle Vlad have any idea of their worth? But Vladimir Badica had shaken his head as if such a question was not to be asked. They were, he told Sacha coldly, of historic value, as though any mention of a price tag on his collection was somehow vulgar.

To Sacha, the weapons meant more than money or history. As he stood before the glass case he peered through the gloom to make out each and every different sword and scimitar: each piece was endowed with a magic that only one who had held and wielded the weapon could understand. After each of the executions, he had wiped the blades clean, careful to ensure that there was not a single mark left on blade or heft, before returning them to the display case. It was almost time to choose again, he thought, reaching up to unfasten the catch that held them behind the glass. It would be the third time he had chosen one of these special instruments of death. Three was a significant number, he knew, though what it truly meant was hidden somewhere beyond his understanding. And if he succeeded in vanquishing another of these females, then his blood count would have risen to ten, a number that made him tingle with apprehension and delight.

They were easy prey, these feeble creatures waiting for him in the darkness, standing on the edge of pavements, teetering in their thin-heeled shoes. He remembered how their heads would bend forwards like anxious birds to peer into his wonderful car, willing him to stop for them and barter their stricken bodies for his hard-earned cash.

It gleamed out at him as the case door swung open, a blade so magnificent that for a moment Sacha wondered why he had not chosen it before. As his fingers closed over the hilt, he realised that it was something he had not seen before. Uncle Vlad must have made a recent purchase, possibly in the wake of trading in the one that had been his very favourite of all the white sports cars. The sabre was heavy as he lifted it from its place against the velvet back cloth and he weighed it carefully in both hands. A cavalry sword, he decided, a Hungarian szablya, perhaps, gazing at all that intricate tooling on its heft. The curved blade had a single cutting edge, designed to cut a swathe through the enemy as the weapon was raised above the head of a galloping horse. Sacha could hear the screams of his adversaries as he sliced through them, the whinnying of his steed as he surged against the tide of bodies coming at him.

Then the moment passed and he was stood there in the darkness, the sabre in his right hand, no sounds but his own breath and the blood ringing in his ears.

Carefully, reverently, he replaced the weapon and nodded his approbation. His choice was made. Now all he needed was a new victim.