XIV
Howl
Oslo, 2077
The man standing between Ma?l and the exit was almost twice his size. He wore a heavy winter coat, open to reveal a damaged flak jacket underneath. The right arm of the coat was missing entirely, the fleece lining torn and spilling out around the shoulder of his carbon black cyberarm. His face held no discernible expression—most of it was gone, overtaken by chrome. An angry red glow burned behind the insectile optical lenses that covered the upper half of his face.
Ma?l didn’t even have a chance to speak. He was about to ask if he could help the visitor, but before he could open his mouth, the man was already lunging for him. Ma?l ducked under a sharp right hook, raising his fists to guard himself. In the time it took for him to block the attacker’s next strike, a left cross, Ma?l had sent a message to both Soren Alvik and Karin Holtmark, warning them of the intruder. It wasn’t enough time to get a message to Sofie as well.
A flash accompanied the cyborg’s third strike as his claws emerged. Blood sprayed across the floor and Ma?l’s arm bloomed in pain. He tried to stagger away, but was grabbed by his assailant. The man pulled him up by the shirt collar, bringing them nose-to-nose.
“Where is it?” The cyborg growled. It was a deep, rumbling, voice that reminded Ma?l of a knife being sharpened. “Where is it?” The voice repeated.
“What?” Ma?l coughed. The glowing optics bored into him as he tried to figure out who he was talking to.
“The key! Where is the key?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Ma?l growled. He fought through the pain in his arm, reaching up and grasping the cyborg’s arm with both hands. He lifted his legs and planted his feet in the man’s chest, kicking off hard and activating his Jump Boosters. The implants exponentially increased the force of the impact, knocking the cyborg back as Ma?l broke free of his grip and launched himself across the room.
The cyborg slammed into the glass door he’d entered through as Ma?l slid to a halt in a combat-ready crouch. He barely had time to think before his opponent was back on his feet and charging again. The cyborg moved with impossible speed, too fast for someone his size. Too fast for someone without military-grade chrome, or a seriously overclocked piece of speedware.
Ma?l’s cybereyes adjusted, sharpening the man’s silhouette as he closed the distance. The battered flak jacket, the carbon black arm, the red spider-like lenses—pieces of a puzzle Sofie and Ares had shown him days ago. He knew who this intruder was: a ghost who had hacked Ares without leaving a trace. The source of the static that Karin had been chasing outside the Yawning Gate.
“Monterro,” Ma?l breathed, as he connected the dots.
The optics flared, burning brighter as their owner grinned.
“
Ma?l leapt out of the way as claws shattered the ground he had been standing on. Marble chunks flew everywhere as Monterro charged again.
“I know you have it. You came from within the gate, little prince,” Deathwing snarled, flashing his steel shark teeth. He lunged again, extending his left arm and grabbing at Ma?l’s foot. That was a mistake.
Ma?l thought as he twisted midair, and brought down his heel on Monterro’s hand. His shoes were rent to shreds as the talons hidden in his feet unfurled. Sparks flew as Monterro’s ring and little fingers were severed.
Monterro didn’t even flinch. He yanked his mutilated hand back, metal stubs hissing as exposed actuators sparked, then surged forward with his other arm. Ma?l barely rolled aside as the claws tore through the space where his chest had been. He launched himself into the air again, clamping his talons down as he landed feet first against the mural wall. He needed distance—a moment to think—but Deathwing was already turning, already tracking him with those burning red lenses that saw right through him. The mural’s shifting light washed over them both and the wolf stared with rapt attention.
Deathwing grinned and raised his right arm. The black plates unfurled, revealing the barrel of a popup weapon. Ma?l barely had time to react before the shot rang out. He was barely able to process the next attack.
A flash in the distance. A spray of blood. Deathwing turned.
It was Soren Alvik. Instead of evacuating or hiding, as Ma?l had instructed, he’d come to help. He was the security chief, after all. It was his job. A job that had just gotten him killed.
Deathwing spun on his heel and fired the Popup Grenade Launcher at the man who had just shot him. In an instant—a single, bright, deafening instant—Soren Alvik had been reduced to bloody pulp and smoldering ash.
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Ma?l had no time to grieve his friend. He launched himself down toward Monterro. He pulled the strap of his bag over his head and wrapped it around Monterro’s throat as his clawed feet plunged into the cyborg’s back. Ma?l pulled the strap tight, straightening his legs and back as far as he could. The strap cut into Monterro’s throat, but it wasn’t enough.
Before Ma?l could pull it any tighter, Deathwing reached back with his uninjured arm and seized the strap. In a single, brutal motion he hauled Ma?l forward, slamming him down over his shoulder like a sack of wet concrete. Agony flared across Ma?l’s ribs as something cracked, then the world lurched sideways. The talons in his feet scraped trenches through Deathwing’s jackets and back before tearing free as the cyborg lifted Ma?l above his head and threw him against the wall.
Ma?l’s ears rang. He gasped for air. If his ribs hadn’t already been broken against Deathwing’s shoulder, the wall had finished the job. He was still clutching the strap of his satchel. One end of the strap had torn, and the bag had gone with him as he sailed through the air.
“The mountain,” Deathwing growled. He cast a dark shadow over Ma?l as he approached and grew more monstrous by the second. “Open the gate. I must meet Him.”
Monterro was making less and less sense. Sofie had told Ma?l the contents of the data Monterro had stolen, so surely he must know that most of the team who had entered with himself and Sofie had died inside.
“We locked the gate for a reason!” Ma?l gasped. “The AI tried to kill everyone who went in there!”
“Blasphemers, all of you,” Deathwing said. He stopped short of where Ma?l still lay trying to catch his breath and rise. “Prosopon is no rabid dog to be put down or caged. Of course corpo rats like you would never recognize divinity even when it revealed itself right before your eyes.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“I alone walk the path of truth. You will stand in my way no longer.” Deathwing reached down to the holster at his hip, and withdrew his handgun. “If you will not open the way, I will move through you.”
Deathwing leveled the weapon at Ma?l’s chest. The barrel tracked him with cold precision. Ma?l forced himself upright with a groan, barely managing to get his feet under him. From his crouched position, Deathwing towered over him. With his many eyes and metal arms, he impressed upon Ma?l the image of a fallen angel. A terrible thought, considering the dogma he was spouting.
Before his attacker could pull the trigger, Ma?l charged forward. He activated his jump boosters and clumsily slammed his shoulder into Deathwing’s hip. The shot went wide, exploding against the wall behind Ma?l, showering them with marble dust and shrapnel. He drove his elbow into the junction between Deathwing’s legs, a desperate attempt to stun him.
Deathwing only snarled in response. The cyborg slammed his knee into Ma?l’s abdomen—a piston-like blow that knocked the breath from his lungs and sent a fresh bolt of pain through his fractured ribs. Ma?l’s vision blurred, but he stayed on his feet. He activated his Jump Boosters again, launching himself over Monterro’s head. The cyborg turned to follow him. As Ma?l fell, he had intended to rake his talons down Monterro’s back again. Instead, a harsh metallic screech rang out as a pair of gashes were rent across Deathwing’s face. Several of his insectile lenses were ripped out of place, and a mess of meat, wire, and bone was revealed through the damaged faceplate.
Deathwing hissed and grabbed Ma?l by the ankle. With the other hand, he fired the gun twice. The first shot missed. The second burst through Ma?l’s right shoulder. Deathwing swung Ma?l like a wet rag, slamming him into the floor.
His ears rang. The world spun. A warning flashed across Ma?l’s vision. His bio monitor was alerting him to substantial blood loss, and a spike of adrenaline. Deathwing, still holding Ma?l by the leg, fired the gun again, hitting him in the hip this time. Then he swung him around again and threw him across the room.
Ma?l crashed into the mural. He fell to the floor with a cry of pain. He landed on his bag. It had fallen open after the strap broke and the contents had spilled out.
Another warning appeared in his vision: his left leg had been disabled. Still—he stood. Wobbling, hunched, bleeding—but he stood.
Deathwing turned toward him with a predator’s certainty, remaining optical lenses flickering. “You are persistent, Prince,” he growled. “But you are still nothing more than an obstacle.” He raised the handgun again, this time aiming directly at Ma?l’s head.
And Ma?l—because he had no choice, because he would not die on his knees—stepped forward to meet him.
Deathwing’s finger tightened on the trigger.
The lobby was flooded in crimson light.
A voice—thin, strained, but forced into clarity—echoed through every speaker in the tower.
“Monterro. Stop.” Karin Holtmark filled the entire building with her voice. “Do not fire. You want entry to Nástr?nd—fine. I’ll grant you clearance. Right now. But only if you let him live.”
Deathwing tilted his head, optics flickering irregularly as he considered her words. Ma?l swayed, blood running down his side. Behind him, Fenrir took on a demonic visage in the sanguine glow.
“You will grant me passage, Gatekeeper?” Deathwing intoned reverently. His voice had grown even closer to the grating of metal plates thanks to the damage he had sustained.
“Yes,” Karin said. “Only if you leave now. If you take another life tonight, I will destroy our data fortress and the access keys with it. The Yawning Gate will never open again.”
Deathwing didn’t move. The barrel of his gun never wavered.
“The Nástr?nd facility is fully isolated from the rest of the Net. Once you have the access code we won’t be able to revoke it. You’ll be able to open the Yawning Gate yourself when you reach it.”
Deathwing lowered the handgun—not all the way, but enough that Ma?l could breathe again.
“Do it,” he said.
A heartbeat. Another.
Then the lights flickered back to normal.
“Authorization… verified,” Karin announced. Ma?l could hear her voice trembling with dread, even over the echoing speakers.
Deathwing inhaled, the sound wet and metallic. Like gears grinding through molasses. “Your obedience is noted.”
For a moment—for three long seconds—it seemed over.
Deathwing turned toward the shattered glass door he had entered through.
Then he stopped.
He looked back at Ma?l.
“But obstacles must be removed.”
A thunderous crack split the air.
Ma?l jerked as the bullet punched through him, and into the mural behind him. The light behind the wolf’s fractured silhouette flickered and died, darkening under splattered blood.
He collapsed wordlessly.
Deathwing didn’t spare him a second glance. He strode to the destroyed entryway, boots clicking through the debris and gore. Silence followed.
Near Ma?l’s outstretched hand lay a single object that had tumbled out of his bag: Astrid’s book. The second volume of , soaked in her brother’s blood.
