The Altar Of Bones Part 35

"I thought you didn't want anyone to see us with your biologist," Zoe said. "In case we end up landing a pile of trouble in his lap." Actually Ry had said a s.h.i.+tload s.h.i.+tload of trouble, but she didn't want to be indelicate in public. "Won't he stick out here like orange Day-Glo paint?" of trouble, but she didn't want to be indelicate in public. "Won't he stick out here like orange Day-Glo paint?"

Ry shook his head. His cheekbones were chapped pink from the cold, and his eyes glimmered in the harsh white light cast by the 1950s-era streetlamps. "We won't be meeting up with Dr. Nikitin in the club. That's where we're gonna let Popov's son, the mafiya pakhan mafiya pakhan, know we're in town."

"Oh, right. Him." Zoe s.h.i.+vered inside her new down parka. It was supposed to keep her warm up to minus fifty degrees and it was almost succeeding. "I almost managed to forget about the rotten schmuck for all of two seconds."

She couldn't believe they were doing this, even more that it had all been her idea. After that insane chase through the mountains above the Danube Bend, wild s.e.x with Ry on the hood of a car, and then finding the altar of bones where it had been, with her, all along, hidden in the icon-she'd felt so wrung out and exhausted, she was asleep on her feet by the time they got back to their hotel in Budapest. She couldn't remember crawling into bed, although when she woke up late the next morning, she was in her underwear, beneath the covers, and the smell of freshly brewed coffee filled the room.

She didn't know how he'd managed to do it, or if he slept at all, but by the time she emerged from the shower, Ry had shopping bags full of the heavy-duty clothes they would need for a St. Petersburg winter laid out on the sofa, and on the coffee table a new set of fake doc.u.ments, including visas to get into Russia.

"They're not up to Kareem's standards," he said, as she came up behind him. "But they'll get us in."

She let the towel she was wearing fall to the floor as she slipped her arms around his waist, pressing into him with her damp, naked belly. "You know, O'Malley, you're kind of handy to have around." She kissed him behind the ear, little nibbling kisses. Then one thing led to another, and- "Come on," Ry said now, wrapping a gloved hand around her upper arm to steer her around a girl with platinum hair and kohl-smudged eyes who seemed to be swaying to the beat of her own inner music. "We're on the A-list, so we might as well cut to the head of the line."

They got a few dirty looks as they pushed their way to the door, where a bouncer in a dirty white quilted coat stood, feet splayed, arms behind his back. He looked like the Michelin tire man, only mean. He eyed them up and down, started to shake his head, then stopped when Ry pushed up the sleeve of his coat far enough to show the dagger tattoo on his arm.

The bouncer let them into a tiny foyer filled with a double-helix staircase that stretched up into an eerie blue-haloed blackness. "Uh, Ry," Zoe said. "I don't see any way down, except for an elevator over there in the corner that's no bigger than a Porta Potti."

"I'll be in it with you," Ry said. "Just shut your eyes."

Zoe snorted a scared laugh. "Like that's going to work."

Somehow-probably under the theory that if she was going to die, at least she wouldn't die alone-she let Ry maneuver into the tiny cage. She regretted it an instant later, when the door clattered shut, the low-watt bare bulb that was plugged into the ceiling dimmed even more, and the car plunged with a violent shudder.

It was an eternity going down, and Zoe spent it with her face pressed against Ry's chest to keep from screaming.

The elevator landed with another shudder and such a hard thud the lightbulb went out completely, and even Ry looked relieved to be out of it once the door finally rattled open. In front of them was a steel door outlined by pulsating green neon tubes and an old woman wearing a babushka and earplugs, who was there to take their coats.

The door opened into a large, square room with chrome-and-mirror columns, blue strobe lighting, and a broad band of twinkling pink lights that snaked across a midnight-blue ceiling like the Milky Way. The music, a painful mix of Russian techno and American hip hop, was so loud Zoe was surprised her eyes and ears didn't start bleeding.

She saw a few tables scattered about, but most of the people in the impossibly crowded room were dancing, their bodies grinding together in rhythm with the thumping techno beat. Suddenly the music switched to something softer-a Russian folk song, but with a touch of Harlem soul thrown in to s.e.x it up, sung in a husky, melancholy voice. And on the far back wall a giant video screen came alive.

In the video a young man with the piercing, fanatic blue eyes of a martyred priest and the s.e.x appeal of a movie star sang into a microphone as if he were making love to it with his song. He was dressed like a pirate, in a white s.h.i.+rt with billowing sleeves and a red silk sash tied around his forehead to hold back his shoulder-length blond hair. The neck of the s.h.i.+rt slashed open deep enough to reveal glimpses of a well-cut chest, and as he moved, Zoe caught the distinctive blue ink of prison tattoos.

Just then she felt Ry tense a little beside her and she turned to see a couple of security guards in black tie coming toward them. They stopped in front of Ry, and one of them said something to him Zoe couldn't hear, but Ry nodded, then he took her by the hand and they followed the men past the long, s.h.i.+ny black-lacquer bar and into a corner that was marked off with a red velvet rope.

Behind the rope, seated at a chrome-and-gla.s.s table and throwing back a tumbler full of vodka, was the beautiful young man still singing his heart out from the giant video screen. A couple of empty chrome stools flanked either side of him, but Zoe didn't realize that he was actually waiting for them, until one of the security men snapped open the rope and waved them toward the table.

The young man raised his head. Unlike in the video, he wasn't wearing the red sash, and she could see that the skin just below his hairline was marred by a raw, red scar. And those martyred-priest's eyes of his had fastened hard onto Ry's face.

He stared at Ry for a long moment, then leapt to his feet and came around the table to sweep Ry up in a big man-hug, thumping him hard on the back with bunched-up fists.

A BOTTLE OF BOTTLE OF Dom Perignon and three fluted gla.s.ses appeared at the table, but the music was too loud for them to talk over. So they sat and sipped their champagne in silence, only from time to time the young man would lean over and drape his arm across Ry's shoulder and smile, posing for a seemingly endless clicking of digital cameras and cell phones from the people in the club. Dom Perignon and three fluted gla.s.ses appeared at the table, but the music was too loud for them to talk over. So they sat and sipped their champagne in silence, only from time to time the young man would lean over and drape his arm across Ry's shoulder and smile, posing for a seemingly endless clicking of digital cameras and cell phones from the people in the club.

Then after ten minutes or so of this, he abruptly pushed back from the table and got to his feet. Ry stood as well, holding out his hand. The young man started to take it, but then he pulled Ry into him for another fierce hug instead, and Zoe saw his eyes clench tightly shut as if he were in pain.

He said something in Ry's ear, and Ry nodded. Then they broke apart and the man disappeared into the crowd, one of the security guards close on his heels. The other jerked his head at Zoe and Ry for them to follow him through a small, narrow door behind the bar.

"I will return in a moment with your coats," the guard said, then the door swung closed, leaving them alone in a small room mostly taken up by a plush, white leather sofa. A huge plasma TV took up one wall; another was filled with rows of platinum records and framed CD jackets.

"Well, if Popov's son didn't know we were here before, he will soon," Zoe said, "Only about a hundred kids just took our picture with that singer. Who was he, by the way?"

"Sasha Nikitin. He's a big deal here in Russia, maybe not on the level of a Bono or the Boss, but getting there. He's a big enough celebrity, anyway, to cause a stir wherever he goes, and whoever gets seen with him gets noticed."

"Nikitin ... Is he related to the Dr. Nikitin we're going to meet with?"

"Sasha's his son," Ry said, as the door behind them opened again, letting in a shuddering blast of music and the security guard carrying their coats under one arm and a pair of large-size men's boots in his hand.

"Should you choose to put your hand in your right pocket," the man said to Ry while watching them bundle up, "you will find a Beretta Px4 Storm, along with an extra ammunition clip. In your left pocket is the key to an apartment near the Pevchesky Bridge that I believe you know of. We'll let it be known where you will be staying, accidentally on purpose, you understand? So the pakhan pakhan's men can find you."

"Yeah. Thanks."

"You might want to put these on now." The guard handed Ry the boots. "I've hidden the GPS tracking device in the left heel. We'll be monitoring it, so that once the pakahn pakahn's men have you, we'll be able to follow it to where they bring you, but at a discreet distance, of course."

"How soon do you think he'll make his move?"

"Not before morning, I shouldn't think. We have inserted into the down lining of your coat a short-range voice transmitter...." The security man paused, his forehead knotted in a frown. "As per your wishes, we won't move in for the rescue until we get the signal from you, and that worries me. You will be well searched for weapons, and anything else of that nature, before you are allowed in the pakhan pakhan's presence. Which means you will have to improvise should trouble suddenly hit the fan, and there may not be a lot of time or opportunity to preserve your lives before we can arrive."

"I know," Ry said. "But there's no way around it. We need to talk to the man before you guys come in with guns blazing." He held out his hand. "Thank you for everything. And tell Sasha-"

"He knows," the security man said, shaking Ry's hand and cutting off whatever Ry had been about to say. "He said to tell you it is the least he can do for the man who gave him back his life." The guard paused again, cleared his throat. "You will find the entrance to the back tunnel inside the closet over there. It is a small hatch in the floor, beneath the filing cabinet."

"Tunnel?" Zoe said. "Oh, s.h.i.+t. And pardon my Russian."

THE TUNNEL WAS a little bigger than the laundry cute. Just. They were going to have to crawl through it on their hands and knees. a little bigger than the laundry cute. Just. They were going to have to crawl through it on their hands and knees.

Zoe groaned. "I really hate this."

"I know. But look at it this way-it beats having to go back up in that death trap of an elevator."

Zoe gave a squeaky laugh. "You do have a point. So how far do we have to crawl down this thing?"

"Not far."

"You're lying through your pearly whites, O'Malley. I can tell.... I can do this, though. I can do it."

"Yeah, you can."

"Only do I have to do it now? Right this very minute, I mean?"

"Yeah, you do."

Zoe crawled down into the opening in the raw dirt, and it was worse than she imagined it would be. Thick wooden planks were fitted into the walls to hold back dirt that smelled wet and musty. The way a grave would smell, she thought, then wished she hadn't. Every ten feet or so, a bare, dim lightbulb hung from a wire that looped across the ceiling.

Her breath rasped in and out of her throat like rough sandpaper, her heart hammered in her ears, but somehow she kept putting one knee in front of the other.

Ry had lied, though. It was really, really far.

THEY CAME OUT of the tunnel through a dummy sewer grate, into a small, triangular square with a bronze statue of the poet Pushkin in its center. A white Lada rolled along the curb and rattled to a stop in front of them, vapor spewing from its exhaust pipe- of the tunnel through a dummy sewer grate, into a small, triangular square with a bronze statue of the poet Pushkin in its center. A white Lada rolled along the curb and rattled to a stop in front of them, vapor spewing from its exhaust pipe- Ry opened the back door for Zoe to get in, then climbed into the pa.s.senger seat alongside a small figure, so enveloped in a brown fur coat and matching hat that Zoe could barely make out a face.

"Zoe," Ry said. "This is Dr. Nikitin. Dr. Nikitin, Zoe Dmitroff."

Their gazes met in the rearview mirror. Behind a pair of thick bifocals, his scientist's eyes were round and liquid as a ba.s.set hound's.

"It's an honor to meet you, sir," Zoe said.

"The honor is all mine." He put the Lada into gear, and they lurched out into the street. "We will park in front of the Ploshad Vosstania metro station," he said to Ry. "As if we are waiting there to pick up a friend. That way we can talk here in the car without drawing attention to ourselves."

As they turned a corner, a blast of cold air blew up Zoe's pant legs. She looked down and saw the snowy street rus.h.i.+ng by through a hole in the floorboard. She turned sideways and drew her legs up onto the seat, tucking her knees up under her chin. The car smelled of boiled cabbage and the pine-scented air freshener that swung from the rear-view mirror.

They drove for about five minutes through dark and mostly deserted streets before pulling up in front of a large, domed-roof building, ringed by a bright necklace of streetlights.

Nikitin lit up a foul-smelling cigarette. "Did you just come from my Sasha's nightclub? I have heard that you can get ecstasy pills there out of a vending machine."

Zoe caught the flash of Ry's smile as he turned to look at the older man. "It's possible, but I didn't see any."

Nikitin shrugged. "He won't let me come check it out for myself. He says the style is not to my taste."

"It's modern," Ry said. "And loud."

Nikitin grunted. "So, tell me ... where is this thing you wish for me to a.n.a.lyze?"

"I've got it back here." Zoe dug into her parka for the clear gla.s.s ampoule with its rubber stopper that Ry had bought in Budapest, along with the eyedropper she'd used to take a tiny drop of the bone juice from the amulet. In the semidark of the hotel bathroom, the juice had been the color of swamp water. But now, as she handed the ampoule to Dr. Nikitin, she was more than a little spooked to see the bone juice was glowing a bright, iridescent red.

Ry was spooked by it, too. She could see it in his face.

"Interesting," Dr. Nikitin said, peering closely at the ampoule through the thick lenses of his gla.s.ses. "Where did it come from?"

"A cave in Siberia," Ry said. "The people there believe it's some kind of fountain of youth. That if you drink one drop of it, you will live forever."

"Interesting."

"Could it be real?" Zoe asked. "I mean, is it possible? Scientifically?"

"Theoretically, perhaps. But it is highly unlikely given the complexity of the aging process. All the genetic and lifestyle factors, the hundreds, possibly thousands, of individual factors in our cells and organs that affect our longevity."

Dr. Nikitin gave the ampoule a little shake, and Zoe would have sworn the red iridescent goo glowed brighter.

"Because of its phosph.o.r.escent property," Nikitin went on, "it is understandable that a primitive people would imbue it with special powers. Perhaps one day a witch doctor or a healer mixed it with some herbs and the patient recovered. And a legend grew from there."

"But you'll a.n.a.lyze it for us anyway?" Zoe asked.

"I could a.n.a.lyze it, certainly, but my area is in developmental biology. Who you should really have take a look at it is a biochemist. There is a woman I know with the Inst.i.tute of Bioregulation and Gerontology who has done some experiments with the longevity genes in Caenorhabditis elegans Caenorhabditis elegans-that is, roundworms. Nearly transparent little things, are roundworms. You can see their heart, neurons, and other innards clearly through a microscope. They are a favorite of Olga's because of their simple anatomy and because they have a minimal number of genes. I would like to include her in our discovery, if I may. Her expertise would be invaluable."

Ry shook his head. "I don't know.... How much do you trust her?"

Nikitin looked surprised by the question. "We have been lovers on occasion. Why would-Ah," he said, interrupting himself to answer his own question. "You need her to be discreet because there is danger involved. Because if a man truly believed there was such a thing as a fountain of youth, he might kill to get his hands on it."

"He has killed," Ry said.

Nikitin stared at Ry for another long moment, then nodded slowly. "I can take the subway home. You might have use for a car while you are here."

Nikitin slipped the ampoule into the pocket of his fur coat, but he made no move to get out of the Lada. "It has just occurred to me," he said after a moment, "that if such a thing as a true fountain of youth existed, it could be a terrible thing to let loose upon the earth. Overpopulation, wars, famine ..." He shuddered. "How often has mankind seen our salvation in something which turns out later to be the means of our destruction?"

He turned to look at Ry, and Zoe saw a sadness come over Nikitin's face. "When you were in the nightclub, did you see my son?"

"Only for a few minutes. There was no chance for us to talk."

"But he looked well?"

"Yes, he did. Very well."

"His music-it, too, must not be to my tastes, for I admit it makes my ears cry out in pain. Yet he's made himself rich and famous with it. Anything he wants he can have...."

Nikitin looked away, through the winds.h.i.+eld at the dark and cold Russian night. "But that place where you found him, the place you saved him from-he had fear etched into his soul there, etched like acid into stone. Will he ever recover from it? That is the question I ask myself, and cannot answer."

46.

THE OPEN cast-iron railings of the Pevchesky Bridge were throwing spiky shadows onto the river ice when Ry pulled over to the curb and killed the ignition. The Lada's engine sputtered on out of spite for a few seconds more, then finally died. cast-iron railings of the Pevchesky Bridge were throwing spiky shadows onto the river ice when Ry pulled over to the curb and killed the ignition. The Lada's engine sputtered on out of spite for a few seconds more, then finally died.

"You've stayed here before?" Zoe said, as she got out of the car. She tilted her head to look up at the tall, elegant cream-stone building. "With Sasha?"

Ry shook his head. "Sasha's lover lives here. She inherited it from her grandfather, who was quite the Communist Party apparatchik in his day."

He slipped his arm around her waist and pulled her against him. She looked up into his face, and soft, feathery snowflakes fell from the night sky into her eyes and open, smiling mouth.

"I've been told," Ry said, "that the bed in the master bedroom came from one of the Tsar Nicholas's palaces."

THEY FELL ONTO the postered bed with its rose silk canopy, mouths together, trying to tear off all their clothes at once. It was like it had been on the hood of the car, coming at them, coming over them, hard and fast. He nearly strangled her with her bra, funny really, but their need was so urgent, so vital to what they were and what they were becoming to each other, that there was no laughter, no attempt at anything other than coming together as quickly as possible, joining into one. the postered bed with its rose silk canopy, mouths together, trying to tear off all their clothes at once. It was like it had been on the hood of the car, coming at them, coming over them, hard and fast. He nearly strangled her with her bra, funny really, but their need was so urgent, so vital to what they were and what they were becoming to each other, that there was no laughter, no attempt at anything other than coming together as quickly as possible, joining into one.

When, at last, they were quiet, lying beside each other, replete and at peace, she said, "You almost yelled down the ceiling."

He tried to laugh, but it came out as an exhausted sigh. "Maybe, but you were louder, the loudest scream I've ever heard. I hope we don't get arrested."

She snuggled against him. "Thank you, Ry."

"For what?"

"Being you and finding me."

He felt the need for her build again, and this time they took it slowly, touches easy and unhurried. He kissed her mouth, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, her belly, kissed all of her, lingering, and she screamed again.

LATER, THE ROOM dark, lying within the crook of his arm, she said, "What did you save Sasha Nikitin from?" dark, lying within the crook of his arm, she said, "What did you save Sasha Nikitin from?"