Chapter 1 - Secret Foes - Part 1

Before reading PLEASE check out the Word from the Author in the previous chapter. It contains important information that will affect your reading later on.

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Not until the LiteraTours coach skidded around the corner, climbed the kerb and almost flattened a Gelati stand did Ike realise the group was in trouble. The tourists behind her, by now acclimatised to Brigitte's driving style, chattered on unconcerned. A quick glance at her colleague, usually so Zen, shock-frosted Ike's innards. The Frenchwoman's lips were flatlining in a grim face; white knuckles gripped the steering wheel in a death grip. Again, and again, Brigitte's foot stomped on the brake pedal, but other than a series of hollow thumps she drew no response.

Ike's stomach lurched in synch with the vehicle as it bounced back onto the road. Next, it cannonballed downhill, gathering speed while somehow still dodging the infernal traffic that clogged the eternal city.

A cold, wet nose pressed against Ike's elbow, and her head shot around. With a whimper, Boris the Corgi, aka the true Frankenstein monster, sent a questioning look from his big brown doggie eyes. The poor beast must have sniffed the sharp pang of panic clawing into Ike's guts. She dug her fingers into his fluffy fur and held on to his body just like an aeroplane passenger would grip the handle of her seat during turbulence.

Reassuring, but futile.

Another wild wobble drew a collective "Whoa!" from the cabin.

Great. Now the tourists had been shaken from their ignorance.

As acceleration pressed her against the backrest, Ike's head whipped back to face their driver.

"Brigitte?"

Slim fingers, half-submerged in the overlong sleeves of a silky mauve sweater yanked at the wheel, and the LiteraTours coach roared past a swarm of Vespas hogging the road—straight into the path of one of Rome's geriatric public transport buses, belching oily diesel fumes. Another yank and their vehicle veered back into the right lane.

Ike ducked, expecting a crunch, a scream coming from the foremost Vespa.

Not so. A lucky miss.

"Brigitte!"

"Mince alors!" Brigitte crunched gears, the engine yowled in response and, serenaded by horns, the coach shot through a crossing, into a narrow street on the other side. Nothing more than a cobbled lane really, it was lined by crumbling mansions whose glory days had faded into history together with their plasterwork.

Bang!

A dustbin slammed against a wall covered in graffiti and spilt its contents onto the sidewalk.

Accompanied by a chemical burning stink and the cloying aromas of over-ripe rubbish, the coach sped on uphill until the road levelled out in a cul-de-sac.

There, it slowed down.

Came to a standstill.

Brigitte groaned and slumped over her steering wheel.

Above them, thunder clapped from the clouds, then the heavens opened.

Jupiter, being pissed off about our escape?

Behind them, cheers bounced through the cabin, accompanied by loud applause.

Ike wriggled her jaw to unclench her muscles and fixed a grimace on her face that, with a bit of luck, might pass for a professional smile.

The explanation she gave for their bumpy ride sounded suitably harmless: just a temporary mechanical failure. The coach would be repaired. Ike would find an alternative way of conveying the group towards the final highlight of the tour.

No worries, ladies and gentlemen, we nearly died, but all is well.

Not quite. Not when the real reason for the disaster was something else entirely.

Another boom from above.

Sabotage.

###

"Can you manage?" Ike addressed Brigitte's woolly back. She squatted next to the coach's front right tyre to shine a torch at their vehicle's underbelly.

The response sounded somewhat muffled. "Huh? Yes. Sure. I've called the garage, they'll tow the blasted thing. Me, I tell you, that brake line is crimped."

"Crimped?"

With a groan, Brigitte unfolded her gangly limbs until she stood next to Ike.

"Pardon. Cut. Brakes suddenly went spongy, and I wanted to stop, but it was too late. Sod's law that we had to be on a hill when it happened."

Rome sported seven of the buggers, chances of accidents happening while atop of one ran high.

At least the cloudbreak was over, only a faint drizzle left behind that seeped through Ike's supposedly weatherproof jacket.

The tourists, all thirty-two of them, kept dry in their stranded transport, but they would have to brave the elements now that relief was on its way.

Ike's smartphone barked twice as a message came in.

Relief had arrived, coming in the shape of the super-sized coach of the group from Serious Study Tours they shared the hotel with. Shalon, their guide, was as friendly as she was helpful.

"Okay, we need to move. Do you think you'll make it to the ministry?"

The Ministerio de Economia e delle Finanze was their final destination for today. Not the building as such, as buildings came it was spectacularly unexciting. But under its foundations, bits of ancient Rome had been found. Ike understood this happened quite often in this place. People dug, and bingo—walls, pillars and potsherds turned up. Or catacombs. In this case, the latter: When faulty sewage pipes required the builders to burrow deep into the soil under the cellars of the ministry, the workmen hit a crumbling wall. Archaeologists were called on site, stabilised the whole shebang and declared the find to be the remains of an old Roman city gate, the so-called Porta Collina. Upon examining the ruins, the scientists literally tumbled into yet another discovery: an unexplored section of catacombs below the rutted boulders that once paved the street.

The discovery caused quite a stir. With his trademark panache, Gary, founder and managing director of LiteraTours, had weaselled his way into the excavations. Now the group would be larger than planned: Ike, grateful for Shalon's help, had suggested her tourists might join the fun.

Brigitte ran her fingers through her spiky grey hair. "No, I don't think I'll be there. It'll take a while to fix this."

"Okay, you sort out the coach. I'll call the cops once I'm back."

Brigitte frowned. "Why bother? Me, I'm not convinced it will bring much. As to the other incidents, we still have no evidence. Don't tell Gary, he'll freak."

His lordship did lots of things, but freaking was rarely on the cards. Instead, the 13th Baron Nettlehole was as cool as the proverbial cucumber sandwich and drove Ike nuts. One look from his Husky eyes and she felt like an ill-dressed, gauche underachiever, not a successful businesswoman in her prime.

Did almost forty count as prime these days? Ike didn't read many women's magazines so she wouldn't have a clue. All she knew was Gary lived in a semi-detached starter home and seemed nearly as broke as she was; no idea where he shopped for assertiveness.

She checked her watch. "No time to dump intel on my lord, we're running late already. Guess, I'll see you for dinner."

Brigitte's thin lips drew into a smile. It smoothened the deep lines of a face that had seen more than half a century pass by and take with it her only child.

"Bien sur, I won't miss that for the life of me."

Ike waggled her fingers in response, then took a firm grip on Boris's leash lest he got distracted by the tempting aromas of rotting garbage and shepherded her tourists down to the main road where the other coach was gleefully adding to the pre-siesta congestion.

Wrong country.

Siena, not siesta.

"Hurry up, please, I think we are causing a bit of a traffic problem." Ike's charges dutifully hurried, only one stayed behind. She had never been vertically challenged, but the man towered above her, white teeth blinking from his bushy beard.

"After that little adventure, I was worried you would cancel the visit," he said, as he followed her into the coach, almost banging his head on the doorframe.

"Ah, Viktor, come on. I'm sure you have connections. You're the only one capable of sneaking into the excavations even without LiteraTours."

The smothered sounds of a mini-earthquake came from the beard. Viktor, the German archaeologist, was laughing.

They had met on the ill-fated inaugural tour in the footsteps of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Viktor and his mates had unearthed an alchemist's lab on Castle Frankenstein that once provided the inspiration for Mary's world-famous novel. It also was the place where Boris, the Corgi puppy, died and was revived again to live—well, not forever but for a long enough time. When Ike used her unique not-quite-magical gift and dived into Mary's story, she saw him as a tiny newborn. Two hundred years later, Boris was still alive and kicking, the canine equivalent of a rambunctious teenager. Other than his eerie past, the dog displayed no supernatural tendencies whatsoever.

That was Ike's domain. Well, sort of.

Viktor was talking, so she let go of her memories and focussed on the present. "Sorry?"

"I said, I could, but as I told you already, I needed a break. Let others do the work for once. Others meaning you." He bared his teeth at her once more, then turned and lumbered towards the last free seats at the back.

Ike swung into the front row next to her colleague from Serious Study Tours. Boris followed and dutifully plonked himself on her feet.

"All on board?" Shalon asked.

"Yes. Go!" This time Ike had counted her tourists as they embarked. Losing some of them like she did two weeks ago in Germany really was a rookie's mistake.

The doors hissed shut, blocking the miasma of exhaust fumes, oil and over-used frying fat. They didn't block the aroma of soggy canine that came from the specimen panting at her feet.

Give me a cat anytime!

Boris, oblivious of her treacherous thoughts, drooled on her trainer.

"I love you, really," Ike said to the dog.

Boris woofed and closed his eyes.

The coach rumbled along, filled with motoring sounds and the soft babble of conversation as the LiteraTours guests shared the latest excitement that might well have been their last.

"What happened?" Shalon asked. She was everything Ike wasn't: Young, optimistic, with her whole life before her. It appeared, she studied something frightfully modern such as Earth Sciences in Atlanta and guided tours to earn cash on the side.

"Brake failure, but Brigitte is a heroine. For the guests, I made it sound like a minor mishap. But that was a rather hairy situation, so keep it to yourself, if you please."

Shalon tucked a shining curl, very much like Ike's honey-blond mop, only less unruly, behind her ear.

"Brigitte's fab. I'd love to work for you guys. Far more fascinating than all this boring stuff. Glad you let us come along for the ride, my tourists are, like, totally thrilled?"

Her excitement was infectious, and Ike laughed. "Well, given that we're along on your ride it was the least I could do. And I promise I'll ask Gary. If the tours keep filling up like they do at the moment, we'll need help."

Do let me know if you have questions or comments on my novel. Constructive suggestions and feedback are always welcome! And thank you for reading. In doing so, you give my writing a purpose.

Image is of the Collosseum, Rome. Photo by Willian West from Unsplash