"That was much easier than I thought it would be," Narcist confessed from her spot in the cargo area.
"Thanks to Truk," Lash said with a nod to the Ventru nestari. "He didn't volunteer extra information and said exactly the right thing with the right tone to reach common ground with the officer."
"A flawless check on the ID didn't hurt," Narcist pointed out, earning herself a nod of her own.
"No, it did not," Lash added before looking through the windshield. Along the length of the winding highway into the city, he could see several more checkpoints installed at every onramp bringing traffic onto the highway from the city itself.
"Which is good, since it'll be checked another half dozen times before we manage to get through the city!"
As it turned out, Lash was wrong. It was a full dozen times they were forced to pass a checkpoint before they left Strasbourg. Following that, a short distance on the A4 then they were at the German border and another series of checkpoints, these ones manned by not only the French National Police and the National Gendarmerie on the French side, but the German Federal Police, or Bundespolizei, and the Bavarian Landespolizei, or State Police, on the German side.
"The humans seem intent on capturing these terrorists," Fiadh observed as they passed through the last of the French side of the border checkpoint.
"The humans have been dealing with terrorist attacks for the last decade. Paris was attacked several times a few years ago, and Germany has been dealing with terrorist attacks since the Isreali contingent was attacked at the Olympic Games in 1972," Bronwyn noted as she looked the German side of the checkpoint over with a critical eye. "Both countries are fairly sensitive to the situation."
Then she was falling silent as Truk was rolling his window down for a blue uniformed German Federal Police officer.
"Guten Tag," the officer said in the distinct Bavarian dialect of German.
"Hello," Truk responded in much the same way he had with the French police officer.
"May I see your travel papers, please?" she then asked. Already prepared to show them, Narcist handed Truk a portfolio with all of their passport booklets in it. Which the nestari then handed to the officer.
Nodding her thanks, she opened up the portfolio and went one by one with the booklets, opening each, looking in to find the matching face, then using a hand scanner to verify the document's authenticity.
"A multinational group," she observed as she slipped the last one back into the portfolio and handed it back to Truk. "What is your reason for visiting Germany?"
Truk handed her his Interpol ID, which she promptly opened, examined and scanned.
"Our team is following up on a lead in Salzburg concerning the cult behind the recent terror attacks in Ireland and the UK," he said as she handed it back to him. She immediately nodded.
"Our investigative services have found evidence in several locations across the country of the same," she indicated, her English clipped and precise. "We were advised that Interpol was dispatching taskforce units throughout Western Europe to track these down."
The officer paused to pull something out of a pocket. She then handed it, a card with a name and local number on it, to a curious Truk.
"I was instructed to give that to any Interpol team that came through our checkpoint. It's your investigative contact in the Munich state police headquarters," she indicated as he took it and gave it a quick read. "He'll be able to connect you to his counterpart in Salzburg, should you need assistance."
"Ah, thank you!" Truk said with a smile, slipping the card into a pocket. "Your help is much appreciated."
"Of course," the officer replied with a smile of her own. She then leaned back and, while looking down the checkpoint to a small temporary shelter, she quickly said something in German into her radio handset, clipped to a loop on her uniform.
"I've cleared you through to the other side of the checkpoint," she said, letting her hand drop from her radio. "Good hunting."
"Thanks again," Truk said. And then they were on their way.
As they passed through the last barricade and onto the highway beyond, Truk brought up the map on the navigation system.
"A quick jog north on the A5 to the A8 autobahn and we should have a straight run past Stuttgart, through Munich and to Salzburg in about six hours," he indicated.
Nodding, Lash gestured for Narcist to hand him her tablet. So far they had done good work with their Interpol and human civilian IDs to get them through the checkpoints. But, if he didn't do some follow up work with his Interpol identity to support his claim of cults and terrorist attacks, it could throw up a flag if his 'superiors' at the international policing agency began looking into his activities.
"You bookmarked the Interpol login?" he asked. Narcist nodded.
"And left a shortcut on the desktop for easy access," she added. "I anticipated you needing to fill out a report or two to back up what we've been saying this whole time!"
"Well done," he replied with a nod. Then he tapped the indicated shortcut to open up the website. Finding the agent login, he pulled his login input from his memory and inputted it, smiling thinly when it went through and he was looking at his official agent access point.
That smile disappeared as he focused on first filling out his movement report, updating his location from North America to first Frankfurt, then to Galway to support his reason for being on the train. Then it was the incident reports that needed to be filed as supporting documents for his claims. Those, as he looked at the blank space in front of him, promised to take up a considerable amount of time to make sure they were accurate enough to do what they were supposed to without throwing up flags, and compromising their true purpose.
His estimate proved to be a shade conservative. Three hours passed in a blur before he was able to close the final form and hand the tablet back to Narcist after reading his agent status and next assignment.
"Good news, my friends," he said as he settled back and Fiadh snuggled up against him with a satisfied smile. "Interpol has assigned us to track down leads in Austria."
"Ha," Truk said with a grin. "That's a relief. For a second there, I thought we drove across half of Western Europe for nothing!"
Thankfully they were able to transition from the A5 to the A8 while Lash was still working on his reports and started their transition across southern Germany. And they were past Stuttgart and halfway to Munich by the time he was finished. After handing the tablet back, Lash pulled out his smartphone and used it to tap into the Ventru telecommunications network, intending on taking a look at several Ventru safehouses sprinkled throughout the area on his smartphone.
Using his personal password, he was to log into the House Lash portal, which gave him unlimited access to the entire Ventru network, including the safehouse database. Accessing that enabled him to check each house's inventory in regards to supplies, munitions, and weapons. A scan of their garage contents he also made, in case they could find an SUV larger than the Land Rover they were currently using, to make the trip slightly more comfortable. Munich, in particular, had no less than ten safehouses scattered through the city, reflecting Ventru's love of the mountains.
In the end, however, while the exercise occupied his mind during the long periods of time between stops for gas or the occasional rest stop to use the facilities, he ended up shelving it. When he first fled the Hand during their attack on his family's hunting lodge and made his way into Frankfurt, the center of Ventru power, he had discovered their safehouse network had already been compromised. A discovery that nearly cost him his life.
Only his sister's timely arrival prevented him from getting a car'dieth in the neck and an ignominious end as a pile of ash on the floor. The familiars, tattooed and recognized as Ventru's, were turned and left as bait for a fairly sophisticated ambush. Which made him wonder just how many of his clansfolk were caught in the same way? And how many of the thousands of Ventru familiars had been turned against the clan they had sworn blood allegiance to?
He was still pondering those questions when they finally reached the Austrian border. Manned by the Federal Police of Germany on one side, and the Federal Police of Austria on the other, they were quickly ushered through after showing their Interpol credentials. Forty-five minutes later they were approaching the city of Salzburg, with its iconic Fortress Hohensalzburg sitting on a hill overlooking the Old Town.
Before entering the city proper, however, Lash had them pull into the last rest stop before city limits. They then gathered around the back of the vehicle where Lash once again produced the holographic emitter that contained the map of the city and its secret Night Market, the entrance to the winding path leading to the hidden fortress of Nachtfeuer, the sanctuary of the Liliths.
The map, a three-dimensional representation of the city, swung around at a gesture before Lash expanded the section that covered the Salzburger Altstadt, or Old Town.
"Here," he said, pointing at a square that glowed slightly brighter than the rest of the surrounding buildings. "There we will find the hidden entrance to the Night Market and the Blood Exchange."
"Will it be guarded?" Truk asked. Lash quickly shook his head.
"According to the guide that came with the map, it has a hidden recessed door, much like we saw in Galway. Except, instead of a simple pressure switch to open it, we'll need to fit blocks marked with runes into certain slots in a certain order to trigger the locking mechanism." He again pointed at the map, but this time he moved his finger tip along one of the courtyard walls until he reached a particular spot.
"The door should be here," he indicated.
"Is that something Mistress Fiadh could take care of?" Narcist asked, looking over at the Irish lilith. Who, frowning thoughtfully, slowly shook her head.
"There is a different access point for my sisters and I," she said, reaching out to touch a spot on the opposite side of the same square Lash had isolated. "According to my initiation guide, given after I was raised to a Lilith, it is also a hidden, recessed door, but one opened by a blood sample, not a trigger sequence. Sadly, as much as I would like to give you the sequence, it was never given to me as I would never be required to use it."
She leaned back and folded her arms beneath her breasts.
"I was also given a code to call in a helicopter to carry me directly to the fortress, but I very much doubt any of you will be allowed onboard." She looked at Lash. "And, before you suggest I do that, my wolf, I won't abandon you at the end of this long journey. I will either pass through the blood door, or through the puzzle door and enter the Night Market with you."
"With the Night Market likely heavily patrolled and guarded by the Silver Legion, having a lilith with us could be very helpful," Narcist pointed out.
"No doubt," Truk added.
"And what about me?" Bronwyn wanted to know. "As much as I would like to see this fabled 'Night Market' of yours, I very much doubt that, as a werewolf, I'll be allowed to enter. Even if I got past the puzzle door, the Silver Legion would make sure I whistled from more than one hole before I took more than a step. They won't have forgotten their losses against the werewolves in the Time of Howling."
Truk pointed at her and nodded in agreement.
"She makes a point."
Lash nodded as well.
"We'll have to stash you somewhere in the city to wait for us, unfortunately," he said to the frowning werewolf elder. "Unless your pack has holdings here."
"Even if they did, they'd be similar to what you saw in Dublin," Bronwyn said. "If it's all the same to you, I'll take you up on your offer to put me somewhere. A nice comfie bed and a mini-bar would be appreciated after all the shoulder rubbing with humans we've been doing the last couple of days. I could take a real nap and maybe do some sightseeing after, if it isn't too busy." She smiled. "I've never been to Salzburg, home of the Sound of Music and Mozart. I think I might want to take in some of the history."
"Having her scout the city for us wouldn't be a bad thing," Narcist said.
"No, it wouldn't," Lash said. "Find an upper end hotel in the city, Narcist, with good transportation access and amenities and book her a single room online." He looked back at Bronwyn with a smile. "No need for your sleeping bag quite yet, Bronwyn."
He then turned his attention back to the vampires in his company.
"Here's how I see things rolling out from here," he said. "We drop Bronwyn off at the hotel, along with the SUV and proceed to the square on public transportation to get us close, then by foot the remainder of the way. Once there, we use the puzzle door, as Fiadh called it, to access the Night Market. Inside, we identify ourselves and hopefully Fiadh's presence will get us quickly ushered to the Blood Exchange where we can meet with the creche mistresses and pass our Irish queen to them for safekeeping."
He folded his arms.
"Barring any unforeseen complications, we then withdraw, pick Bronwyn back up and get ourselves to the Salzburg airport where we catch a flight to Cologne, where both Ventru and House Lash have significant holdings. We can get vehicles, weapons, tech, and supplies then make our way into Belgium from there with it only being a two hour drive." He let his gaze sweep over the four vampires.
"Hopefully all the moving around has gotten us off their tracking and she won't see us coming."
Tablet already in hand, Narcist nodded.
"Got four seats in Business class on Lufthansa flying out from the Salzburg airport tonight, at 11pm local time," she indicated. Lash nodded and handed her his issued credit card.
"Should be more than enough time to get Mistress Fiadh to safety," he said as she took it and began finishing the booking. "Last point and then we'll get moving." He looked over at a frowning Fiadh, the Irish lilith obviously not enjoying the thoughts of them parting in the next few hours.
"There's a good chance of running into other vampires in the city," he said. "Liliths traveling to NachtFeuer with their M'tada, liliths already ensconced in the refuge out for a visit to the city and moving about with their own escorts, and various local vampires going about their business. Thankfully, without protection against daylight, we won't see them until the sun goes down, giving us two or three hours to make our way through the Old Town to the square. Regardless, we shouldn't see any opposition from either of those three groups."
Lash paused there and folded his arms.
"That being said, we also must acknowledge the possibility that the Hand is also operating in the city. In the Qos Viran we have a saying: assume you travel with the enemy, and they will never catch you by surprise." He looked at Fiadh, who returned his gaze with a wide eyed, emerald green one of her own, before scanning back over Truk and Narcist.
"Meredith told me at Heathrow that she was attacked immediately upon arrival at the airport and before she could get to her transport. Her M'tada did their best to keep her safe during the running battle fought while they tried to secure secondary transport, but ultimately they failed after running into Hand agents using sundog rounds. She then said she thought it was because she publicly supported Ventru against the pogrom."
Lash paused, his expression intent.
"If that's true, and I have little reason to believe that it isn't, we can logically conclude that the Hand has been ordered to directly strike at liliths who support us. And, if there are other liliths here openly supporting our clan against the Council, they could also be targeted."
"Which just about guarantees those feckless bastards are here," Truk grimly pointed out. "Even if they didn't know NachtFeuer is the lilith refuge, they could've just as easily been following the liliths to the city."
"Right. And where the Hand has been operating recently ..."
"So too do the White Flames," Narcist finished for him, her expression equally grim.
"Precisely," Lash confirmed. "So, while we take public transit, and walk the streets, we need to be equally aware that both of those groups are likely here, and operating regardless of the time of day. I don't want either to catch us by surprise. We won't be able to go full tactical, because that would guarantee the Silver Legion sends us packing, leaving Fiadh unprotected. But I won't have us go unarmed, either. So Shiva's, neuron armor, and kevlar under our jackets."
"You could put a bug in the ear of the local cops as well," Bronwyn spoke up to suggest. "Get them looking for heavily armed humans moving through the city. That may delay any White Flame action against you enough to get you into the Night Market unscathed."
Lash nodded and pointed at Bronwyn.
"Excellent suggestion, Bronwyn. Get the locals to run interference for us." He looked at Truk. "Do you still have that card from that German border patrol officer?"