Waging War (41 page)

My heart was pounding so hard it could
probably have been heard across the church. Loogie had just entered
the nave, pushing three women and a baby ahead of him. A wary young
soldier trailed after them and didn’t take his eyes off Loogie when
the sniper joined the six other soldiers arrayed in a loose
formation around the edges of the nave.

My reaction was kind of ridiculous given
that Loogie had never seen me, but having a sniper in a room full
of women, children, and
my husband
was not comforting.

My husband. It was almost too weird to even
think, and it sounded far older and more respectable than I felt.
I’d been married all of about half an hour, and the peace I’d had
in the garden already seemed like a lifetime ago.

The soldiers had begun bringing women and
children to the church just after Ringo had slipped out to check on
Marianne and Marcel. Bas had loaned Archer one of his priest’s
robes, and it had helped to calm the women down who came in
terrified and frantic about husbands, brothers, and sons. It also
meant he could stay in the church, unlike a teenaged boy who came
in with his mother and was immediately escorted back out with
directions to take him to the village square with the rest of the
men.

When the first SS soldiers came in
brandishing rifles and yelling at the women to move their prams to
the sides of the nave, I had to push the panic down to somewhere
around my knees. It rose when they barred the doors, and rose again
with every new Frenchwoman who was shoved inside the stone walls
“for their protection,” the soldiers had told Bas. And now,
watching the men arrayed around the perimeter of the nave holding
their rifles at the ready, all I could see in my mind was Archer’s
vision of this exact scene.

I had to get Archer out of there.

Bas had shown me the hidden entrance to the
crypt, accessible from behind the altar in the south transept, and
with his help, I’d been very slowly leading a couple of women with
nursing babies to the doorway and hiding them from view as they
slipped into the darkness that Bas had lit with a shielded lantern.
I’d gone down once, with a woman whose two-year-old was too scared
to walk down the stairs. I carried her down in my arms and set her
next to her mother on the cold stone floor. About ten women were
huddled against the walls holding sleeping or nursing babies or
quietly whimpering toddlers in their laps. The terror in their eyes
was excruciating, and I was ashamed to admit I was afraid to stay
down there with them. Because I was afraid their fear was
infectious.

I had taken a moment to find a piece of
chalky stone that I now carried in my pocket. There was a wall in
the south transept that was somewhat protected from casual view,
and I knew it was our escape hatch if things played out like they
had in Archer’s vision. I didn’t like the idea of leaving the
church full of women and children to their fates, but I had a way
out, and I’d take it if I had to so I could save Archer.

Archer slipped up behind me, and I felt him
the way I’d always felt Mongers – except not. Instead of the
stomach-squeezing nausea, a feeling of warm tingles spread through
my chest. Maybe it had always been there, or maybe I was imagining
it, but somehow I thought that with the marriage bond had come the
ability to sense his presence nearby.

I know my mate
, my Cat rumbled from
deep inside my head. She’d startled me, and I immediately sent
apologies to her. Of course she knew her mate. I just hadn’t
realized mating could be affected by something like marriage.

Archer leaned in to whisper, “How are you
holding up?”

“Mostly fine,” I murmured, “except Loogie
just came in with the ginger kid who looks like he wants to throw
up.”

Archer’s eyes narrowed. “I saw him. I can
take him out of the equation if I need to.”

I slipped behind a column so we were hidden
from casual view. “See that wall over there?” I nodded toward the
back corner of the transept.

“Yes,” he said.

“I’ll spiral us out there. Just tell me
when.”

“We’ll need Ringo.”

“We’ll get him from the farm.”

Archer nodded thoughtfully. “I’ll talk to
Bas, then we’ll go.”

A wave of relief washed through me. He
didn’t need to be a hero here. He was willing to go before the
events of the vision came to pass. Archer’s touch left an imprint
of warmth on my back as he slipped past me to return to the nave. I
took my first deep breath since the nightmare of armed men had
invaded the church.

And then I stopped breathing when Marianne
and Marcel were shoved through the door.

I almost darted out into the growing crowd
to go to them, but Archer saved me from a stupid move by calmly
changing trajectory and gliding to them himself. My presence hadn’t
yet been really registered by any of the soldiers. They might have
seen me, but since none of them brought me in, I was still wearing
a scrap of a cloak of invisibility. It’s what allowed me to stay in
the transept and lead the few people who stumbled close enough to
me down to the crypt.

Marianne looked equal parts stoic, poised,
and terrified, and Marcel did too. Bas must have seen Archer change
direction because his eyes followed his friend, and he saw what I
saw – Loogie had noticed Marianne too. There was more than casual
interest in those laser-focused eyes, and they frowned at the
relief on Marianne’s face when she saw Archer.

The ginger kid seemed to notice Loogie’s
interest too, and I wondered if he was part of the same Werwolf
pack. He wore an armband of some kind, but it wasn’t identifiable
from where I stood. Then Loogie changed his hold on the rifle and
he suddenly had all of my attention.

I was dimly aware of motion in the north
transept because my eyes were locked on Loogie as he moved his
finger to the trigger of his gun. He took a step forward just as
Archer turned to lead Marianne and Marcel toward me. Ginger Boy
readied his own rifle, and suddenly there were two too many fingers
on triggers in the enclosed church for my taste. Something needed
to happen. Something needed to distract the sniper and his watchdog
so they would stand down from their ready position.

I stepped out from the protection of the
south transept, and I saw Archer’s eyes widen. I didn’t look at
him, but kept my gaze locked on Loogie. He hadn’t seen me yet, but
I needed his gaze to shift away from Archer, so I took another step
forward.

That was when I saw Tom enter the
church.

Loogie saw him too, and swung his rifle
along with his gaze.

“Tom!”

I yelled his name without thinking of the
consequences. Loogie fired, and people screamed. Tom’s eyes caught
mine, and he reached a hand out to me just as the bullet hit him
squarely in the chest. I lurched forward instinctively.

That’s when Gaspard, the Maquis leader,
materialized from his hiding spot in the north transept. That’s
when he threw something into the nave. That’s when the world
exploded.

The floor seemed to burst open, and the
blast of fire sent chips of glass and stone into the air like
shrapnel.

Archer shoved Marianne and Marcel away from
the blast toward Bas and tried to use his own body to shield them
from it. Tom staggered and fell near the entrance to the
church.

And then the shooting began in earnest.

Loogie’s rifle swept the room before he even
brought it up to aim, and Ginger Boy’s finger clenched on the
trigger, sending a volley of bullets into the ground. Archer had
turned toward me and taken a step forward when Loogie’s shot found
its home in his back.

The screams of women and children were
deafening, and the roar of another blast literally shook the stones
of the church. Gunfire erupted from all sides, and I saw one of
Ginger Boy’s bullets tear the arm off a doll that had been dropped
in the panic. I knew it would have done worse to the child the doll
belonged to, and I wrenched my eyes back to Archer.

Blood gushed from the gunshot wound, and he
stumbled forward right into the path of the flames that began
licking their way along the wooden pews. Loogie’s second shot hit
Archer in the shoulder and spun him away from a lectern that had
just exploded with fire. There wasn’t a third shot. My heart had
stopped, and all I could see in front of me was Archer’s blood.

There was a hail of bullets that seemed to
ping around the nave like a scene from The Matrix, and one of
Ginger Boy’s shots found its home in Loogie’s throat. I saw the
explosion of blood over Archer’s shoulder as I reached him and
grabbed his robes with both fists. I felt fire graze my thigh, but
I ignored the burn and focused all my strength into hurling Archer
toward the transept. He stumbled and went down, but was back up a
moment later with enough forward momentum to make it out of the
hailstorm of bullets.

As I turned, the world around me slowed to
bullet time, and I really was in a Matrix movie. Women were
climbing the altar to reach the window ledge. An older woman was
shot as she jumped out, and a younger one threw her baby out before
she dove after it. Loogie’s body was still upright, but had filled
with holes as Ginger Boy’s rifle discharged everything it had into
the sniper. Ginger Boy seemed barely conscious of pressing the
trigger until one of his bullets hit a little boy, and then he
finally stopped. He threw himself toward Tom, who struggled to get
to his feet. Bas had covered Marianne and Marcel with his body and
was pushing them toward the south transept. His walk was jerky and
unsteady, and I realized he was being hit by gunfire with every
step.

The sound of my name finally pulled me out
of my bullet-time trance, and I spun to find Archer reaching for me
from the shelter of the transept. I reached back, and a bullet
grazed my wrist as it embedded into the pillar near Archer’s head.
He grabbed me and pulled me to his body.

“Ringo—” he gasped. I Saw what he Saw
through the touch of his skin. Archer’s vision of Ringo was as
clear as if we were standing next to him in the town square among
the village men surrounded by soldiers with guns.

I didn’t go back for Tom; I didn’t even look
back. I didn’t want to see the faces of anyone I left behind as we
stumbled to the tucked-away wall and I began to draw. The chalk
rock slipped twice, and Archer finally held my hand closed around
it as the spiral hummed and pulled us in. The one conscious thought
I formed was of a barn. Not Marianne’s farm, because she was in
this church filled with death and pain, but a barn that housed a
mechanic’s garage at the edge of the village square – the square
where they had Ringo.

A moment later we were in Rachel’s barn,
where the hulk of a half-repaired car stood in the darkness. Sounds
here were muffled and vastly different than the mayhem in the
church. Outside in the village square there was anger and outrage,
and soldiers shouting in German demanding to know where the weapons
were and who had set the fire. The dark and quiet of the barn had
dampened the noise but not the fear, and it leaked in through every
crack and crevice in the walls.

Archer’s gasps filled the silence with
something tangible, and I found him by the dim light of the moon
through a rear window. He had let go of my hand and was on the
floor struggling for breath.

“Archer!” I whispered, dropping to my knees
beside him.

The barn door slammed open and someone – no,
two people – hurtled inside. I threw myself over Archer’s body to
shield him, but a sob escaped my throat.

The people stilled. One closed the door
carefully and silently, while the other moved closer, but stayed
out of range. I didn’t sense a Monger, but I was frozen in
place.

And then Archer moaned, and I stopped caring
who else was in the barn. “Shh, Archer.”

“Saira?” A voice whispered from the dark in
surprise.

I sobbed with relief. “Ringo – help me.
Archer’s been shot.”

Ringo raced forward and knelt beside me. A
candle sputtered to life and came forward too, but not in his hand.
I looked up to find Rachel, the mechanic’s daughter, holding the
light as close to us as she dared. I darted a glance at Ringo.

“She ‘elped me escape the square.” His
breath caught. “They took Marianne and Marcel.”

“I know.” I didn’t say more. Archer was the
only one I could hope to save at that moment. Ringo reached for
Archer, and I suddenly realized how horrible Archer looked. He was
pale and sweating, and his skin was freezing cold. Blood continued
to seep out around his shoulder. I moved to touch it, but Ringo
stopped me.

“Not you.”

I stared at him, stunned. “Why not me? It’s
safer for me than you. At least his infection won’t kill me.”

“You can’t touch him with that hand.” He
nodded his head at my right hand. It was bleeding, and I remembered
the flying bits of rock from the bullet storm. I wiped the blood
away, but a rock or a bullet had torn off a chunk of skin and it
was an open wound. He was right.

Ringo looked up at Rachel and spoke quietly
to her. “Are ye cut anywhere on yer ‘ands?”

She stared at him as if he was talking
nonsense, so Archer translated into gasping French. She turned her
stare to him, then held up her hands and answered in English.

“I have no injuries.”

“Can you help me with him?” Ringo asked her
as he lifted Archer into a sitting position. Rachel handed me the
candle without hesitation and helped pull Archer’s coat off him. I
moved the light around to his back and then nearly dropped the
candle. Two bullet holes had shredded the fabric of Archer’s
blood-soaked shirt.

“Why is he still bleeding?” I tried to keep
the frantic edge in my voice under control. “It should have stopped
by now.”

Ringo tore what was left of Archer’s shirt
away and wiped the blood away from the two bullet wounds. The one
at his shoulder wiped away fairly clean, but the hole under the
edge of his scapula bubbled blood.