Sanya let out a cry as a blade tore through the car's roof and one of his legs collapsed. He fell to one knee.
Then brilliant light flared up within the car beneath the combatants, spears of white lancing out through the holes the blades had cut into the metal. I heard Deirdre's demon form shriek in the car beneath us, and the blades harassing Sanya vanished.
Nicodemus snarled. He flung a hand toward me, and his shadow sent the splinters of my blasting rod shrieking toward my face. As they did, Nicodemus attacked Sanya, his sword flickering in the moonlight.
I got my arms up in time to deflect the splinters, but I was helpless to assist Sanya. Nicodemus knocked Sanya's saber out to one side. Sanya rolled, avoiding the stroke that would have taken his head. Doing it left Sanya's wounded arm on the ground, and Nicodemus crushed the heel of his boot down upon it.
Sanya screamed in pain.
Nicodemus raised his sword for the death blow.
Gentleman Johnny Marcone opened up with the Kalashnikov.
Marcone shot in three chattering bursts of fire. The first one tore through Nicodemus's chest and neck, just above the Shroud. The next hit on his arm and shoulder opposite the Shroud, all but tearing it off his torso. The last burst ripped apart his hip and thigh, on the hip opposite the Shroud's drape. Nicodemus's expression blackened with fury, but the bullets had torn half his body to shreds, and he toppled from the car and out of sight.
Below, there was another demonic shriek, and the sound of wrenching metal. The shrieks faded toward the front of the train, and a moment later Michael climbed up the ladder rungs on the side of the boxcar, his sword in its sheath.
I leapt forward and ran to Sanya. He was bleeding a lot from his leg. He had already taken off his belt, and I helped him wrap it around the leg in a makeshift tourniquet.
Marcone stepped up to where Nicodemus had fallen, frowned, and said, "Dammit. He should have dropped in place. Now we'll have to go back for the Shroud."
"No, we won't," I said. "You didn't kill him. You probably just pissed him off."
Michael stepped past Marcone to help Sanya, tearing off a section off his white cloak.
"Do you think so?" Marcone asked. "The damage seemed fairly thorough."
"I don't think he can be killed," I said.
"Interesting. Can he run faster than a train?"
"Probably," I said.
Marcone said to Sanya, "Do you have another clip?"
"Where is Deirdre?" I asked Michael.
He shook his head. "Wounded. She tore her way through the front wall of the car into the next one. Too risky to pursue her alone in close quarters."
I stood up and crawled back over to the cattle car. I clambered down in it to fetch my staff. After a moment of hesitation, I got Marcone's rifle, too, and started back up.
As it turned out, I was mistaken. Nicodemus could not run faster than a train.
He flew faster than a train.
He came sailing down out of the sky, his shadow spread like immense bat wings. His sword flashed toward Marcone. Marcone's reflexes could make a striking snake look sluggish, and he dodged and rolled out of the way of the Denarian's sword.
Nicodemus sailed to the next car on the train and landed in a crouch, facing us. A glowing sigil had appeared on his forehead, the sign itself something twisting, nauseating to look upon. His skin was marred and ugly where Marcone's shots had hit him, but it was whole, and getting better by the second. His face twisted in fury and a kind of ecstatic agony, and his shadow flooded forward, over the length of the railcar in front of him and dipping down between his car and ours.
There was a wrenching sound and our car shook. Then the sound of tearing metal, and our car started shuddering.
"He's uncoupled the cars!" I shouted. As I did, Nicodemus's car began drawing away from us, as our own slowed down, the gap between them growing.
"Go!" Sanya shouted. "I'll be all right!"
Michael stood and threw himself over the gap without hesitation. Marcone ditched the assault rifle and sprinted toward the gap. He threw himself over it, arms windmilling, and landed, barely, on the other car's roof.
I got to the top of the car and did the same thing. I imagined missing the other car and landing on the tracks in front of the uncoupled end of the train. Even without an engine, pure momentum would be more than enough to kill me. I dropped Marcone's rifle and gathered my will in my staff. As I leapt, I thrust the staff back behind me and screamed, "Forzare!"
The raw force I sent out behind me shoved me forward. Actually, it shoved me too far forward. I landed closer to Nicodemus than either Michael or Marcone, but at least I didn't wind up sprawled at his feet.
Michael stepped up to stand beside me, and a second later Marcone did as well. He had an automatic pistol in either hand.
"The boy isn't very fast, is he, Michael?" said Nicodemus. "You're an adequate opponent, I suppose. Not as experienced as you could be, but it's hard to find someone with more than thirty or forty years of practice, much less twenty centuries. Not as talented as the Japanese, but then not many are."
"Give up the Shroud, Nicodemus," Michael shouted. "It is not yours to take."
"Oh, yes, it is," Nicodemus answered. "You certainly will not be able to stop me. And when I've finished you and the wizard, I'll go back for the boy. Three Knights in a day, as it were."
"He can't make bad puns," I muttered. "That's my shtick."
"At least he didn't overlook you entirely," Marcone answered. "I feel somewhat insulted."
"Hey!" I shouted. "Old Nick, can I ask you a question?"
"Please do, wizard. Once we get to the fighting, there really isn't going to be much opportunity for it."
"Why?" I said.
"Beg pardon?"
"Why?" I asked again. "Why the hell are you doing this? I mean, I get why you stole the Shroud. You needed a big battery. But why a plague?"
"Have you read Revelations?"
"Not in a while," I admitted. "But I just can't buy that you really think you're touching off the Apocalypse."
Nicodemus shook his head. "Dresden, Dresden. The Apocalypse, as you refer to it, isn't an event. At least, it isn't any specific event. One day, I'm sure, there will be an apocalypse that really does bring on the end, but I doubt it will be this event that begins it."
"Then why do this?"
Nicodemus studied me for a moment before smiling. "Apocalypse is a frame of mind," he said then. "A belief. A surrender to inevitability. It is despair for the future. It is the death of hope."
Michael said quietly, "And in that kind of environment, there is more suffering. More pain. More desperation. More power to the underworld and their servants."
"Exactly," Nicodemus said. "We have a terrorist group prepared to take credit for this plague. It will likely stir up reprisals, protests, hostilities. All sorts of things."
"One step closer," said Michael. "That's how he sees it. Progress."
"I like to think of it as simple entropy," Nicodemus said. "The real question, to my mind, is why do you stand against me? It is the way of the universe, Knight. Things fall apart. Your resistance to it is pointless."
In answer, Michael drew his sword.
"Ah," said Nicodemus. "Eloquence."
"Stay back," Michael said to me. "Don't distract me."
"Michael- "
"I mean it." He stepped forward to meet Nicodemus.
Nicodemus took his time, sauntering up to meet Michael. He crossed swords with him lightly, then lifted his blade in a salute. Michael did the same.
Nicodemus attacked, and Amoracchius flared into brilliant light. The two men met each other and traded a quick exchange of cuts and thrusts. They parted, and then clashed together again, steps carrying each past the other. Both of them emerged from it unscathed.