Warrior of the Ages (Warriors of the Ages) (17 page)

The difficulty was in going back to the police station and finishing his day. The difficulty was in making small talk and drinking still more coffee and pretending to see to paperwork and mundane tasks. The difficulty was in pretending to be what he was not.

IN THE FLICKERING torchlight the cave, a sea of white, waited. Women moved slowly in flowing white gowns, men stood in white tunics and leggings, even the Old Guard of Cultuelle Khristos dressed in a white version of their usual gladiator skirting. Kahtar’s quilted tunic shimmered pristine white, his blouse beneath it matched perfectly, his double balteus gleamed silver, belted on his hips and a blade dangled from each side. The tears of the clan over the deaths of two of their finest washed through his heart, a river of sorrow, and he cried with them. This was the time to grieve their loss. Every member of Cultuelle Khristos seemed to fill the cave, thousands stood as one.

Consider Drake and Squire Tupper lay upon limestone tables, both clad in the traditional white of a funeral. Consider’s face gone, his thick, muscular build diminished in death, the thick hair on his arms and above the collar of his snow white blouse the only identifier of who he had been. Squire’s head remained turned to the left, a small bullet wound barely visible through his thick red hair. Hidden was the fact that most of the left side of his face had been blown away with the exit wound. Consider’s family enjoyed no illusion as to the fate of their son, yet his father stood at his side, lovingly smoothing grizzled hair over the ghoulish skull. The sight tugged Kahtar’s heart more brutally than the death of a perfect angelic child might. This is the fate of a soldier, a sacrifice given willingly. Don’t turn away from what he suffered for you. Look and know. Kahtar’s heart seared with that knowledge.

As one Cultuelle Khristos prayed and cried for their loss into the night, and eventually the ceremony took a turn. The clan’s own grief was set aside, and as one their hearts turned to the two men they loved, gone on now.

A dozen young girls dressed in the blue-grey dress of Avalon filed out to surround the bodies. They sang, and the hearts in the cavern swelled with joy, the loving touch of the girls’ hearts reached through the crowd encompassing all, absorbing pain and birthing hope. Now was the time to let Consider and Squire go, departing earth armed with the joy that they had made. Their pain had gone. It would become a shade now, a shade that would stay on earth to haunt those left behind. Their joy, they would take that with them, it was their reward. Kahtar’s heart swelled with that thought and he sang too, tears running down his face. Forcing his focus on the joy of warriors moving on, as so many warriors he had known over his existence had done. They all went on eventually. Everyone did, except him—he alone was trapped here, forever repeating again and again. It was his fate, his life, his legacy. Every being in the cave would die and take their joy with them, except him.

It came to Kahtar then, while the voices of Cultuelle Khristos were raised in joy, with the touch of so many hearts pressed against his own. Revealing itself in a split second, a moment of crystal clear clarity descended and he understood. Loose ends came together making sense. Images flashed through his mind, while joyful singing echoed through the great cavern, but he no longer participated or heard it.

Glancing at Honor Monroe, he remembered the warrior shot through the chest, it had been the day Kahtar had stopped Beth White. His mind flashed to Brenda Blake, killed while she sat in Beth’s yellow convertible in the driveway of her home, her body dumped in the lake. The young boy from University, Douglas Jeffries, slumped over the wheel of his cream colored convertible, his corn silk hair hanging over his face. Driving down the highway in the evening the slight boy surely could have been mistaken for Beth. Consider Drake and Squire Tupper had been shot to death moments after Beth White drove past. The connection seemed so clear. How had he missed it? Someone was hunting Beth White.

THERE WAS NO moon, but light from gas lamps shone faintly through the dark of Pearl Street. An Old Guard left Kahtar in the thin woods behind Beth’s shop, still clad in his white funeral tunic with his weapons dangling from their sheaths. To his left, a black SUV had been parked where Pearl Street dead-ended. Faint light reflected off the shiny paint like moonlight on water. The front bumper rested carelessly against the guardrail. The tires were the same tread that had been left in the dirt off the roadway where Honor had been shot.

One hand went automatically to the hilt of a blade and then Kahtar stepped deeper inside the trees to obscure the bright white of his clothing, his mind racing. Whoever wanted Beth had found her. For a moment he considered that the problem of Beth White would be solved tonight if he did nothing, but judging by the fate of Brenda Blake and Douglas Jeffries, she was in mortal danger. Kahtar moved then, a silent white streak across the back yard, sliding around the edges of flowering snowball bushes, thick with huge clusters of the unscented white blooms. The smell of fresh cut grass seemed to grow stronger with each footfall.

Ghosting around the corner of the house, he scanned inside, sensing unfamiliar scans moving towards him. Warriors! Strange Warriors of ilu were who had been hunting Beth? These scans were not of his clan.

Clarity flashed again. The image of Consider Drake sitting in the middle of a highway, and Squire’s comment, “… I see what you mean, Squire. It’s almost like they step precisely the same distance with each footfall. Odd.” Who besides Warriors of ilu were trained to such exacting precision? How had he missed it?

The strange scans neared and Kahtar ducked down, crouching against the stone foundation of the house, closing his eyes and forcing his own scan over himself. It was disorienting, it felt like a stroke, as though the left and right side of his brain had swapped places. Shoving his cloaked scan forward, towards Beth, felt like running without breathing. His scan moved slowly now, impervious to detection. Grabbing the bottom of the porch railing, he pulled himself up and over, landing silent and moving towards the front door.

Kahtar could sense three warriors inside the shop, and they all had guns. Two of the men stood near the front door, weapons at the ready. The third approached Beth with his gun held loosely, pointing at the floor. Kahtar could sense that he was a burly, muscular man, short, but with shoulders like a gladiator and arms like a gorilla, strong. His voice carried the thick brogue of the Germanic language spoken in Lowland Scotland, his words clear as they drifted through the narrow window above the front door.

“Elusive ya are, Beth. Were ya not expectin’ to see me agin? Or Doric?”

One of the henchmen near the door grunted, whether it was a greeting or acknowledgement of his name Kahtar couldn’t tell.

Beth sounded angry. “How dare you just walk into my house! Why did you come here, Berwick?”

With his knife, Kahtar began to work the lock on the door, listening.

“Yer my declared. I tole ya that.”

“And do you remember what I told you?”

“Ya doan understand. I—we need ya to build our Arc.”

Kahtar’s stomach clenched as he worked his razor sharp knife against the metal of the deadbolt.

“You need me to build a—Berwick! Why do you have a gun?”

Only millennia of experience kept Kahtar from breaking the door down.

“Ta protect ya.”

“To protect me from what?”

The lock clicked open and before the warrior in the entryway could turn towards the sound, Kahtar silenced him forever. Lowering him quietly to the floor, Kahtar moved into the first room. Every window and flat surface held faux candles casting faint circles of battery operated light. Standing in the main room, the squat warrior named Doric was picking through barrels, lifting colored cubes to sniff. Examining a pale blue square, he took a small bite out of it before Kahtar reached him. Then Kahtar’s hands slid under Doric’s arms to wrap behind his head, with a quick jerk Kahtar shoved the man’s head forward, the snap of his neck barely audible.

Oblivious to the drama in the shadows, Beth shouted at Berwick. “You come here with a gun and bodyguards to protect me? You’re the only thing I need protection from!”

Berwick’s brogue grew thicker as he argued with her. “Dis village issa clan, yer’na safe ‘ere amongst such Cove’nt Keh’pers. I kin offer ya an Arc.”

Beth turned her back on Berwick, reaching for something on the shelf behind her. Kahtar glided to Berwick’s side, silent in suede bottom boots. He reached for Berwick’s gun at the exact moment Beth turned with her cell phone in her hand and gasped. Instantly alert, Berwick jerked the gun up and attempted to turn, momentarily leveling the weapon straight at Beth. Kahtar reacted without a single rational thought. Foolishly he put his left hand over the muzzle of the weapon, attempting to jerk it away at the exact instant that Berwick fired. The bullet burned right through the palm of his hand and blew an exit wound out the back as large as most men’s fists.

Beth screamed, but Kahtar focused, knocking his head against Berwick’s, hard. Kahtar’s right arm slid under Berwick’s, grabbing his head Kahtar twisted, straining to break the man’s neck. Kahtar’s left arm hung useless at his side, momentarily numb even from pain. Berwick was strong, he resisted, struggling to break the grasp with his right hand, his left hand swung the gun. Beth jumped instantly into the fray, both hands locked around Berwick’s left arm she managed to pull the gun point blank against her own chest. If the man had ever wanted to kill her, he would have surely done so then. Kahtar used a knee, momentarily lifting the man off the ground as his knee slammed into the man’s groin area.

Like a machine Berwick kept to his feet, Beth tugged with all of her weight on his left arm. Berwick shoved her to the floor so hard that she hit the ground with an audible thump and slid several feet. His gun hand free, Berwick fired and a bullet went through the inside sole of Kahtar’s boot and into the floorboards. The flash burn seared the inside of his left foot, but the bullet went shy of any real damage. Kahtar braced for a second shot, but Beth prevented it.

Back on her feet with her zebra print cell phone clutched in one hand she knocked it against Berwick’s elbow, smacking his ulnar nerve so hard that the man grunted even though his neck was bent almost to the breaking point. The second bullet missed both Beth and Kahtar, splintering the hardwood floor. While Berwick’s left hand loosened reflexively from the assault to his funny bone, Beth grabbed hold of the gun and jerked, simultaneously lifting her left leg and jamming the long heel of her shoe against Berwick’s knee with one hard kick. The gun dropped and a smile flickered briefly on Kahtar’s mouth, vanishing completely when Berwick hit Beth with an upper cuff, and the sound of her teeth slamming together mingled with the sound of the gun sliding across the floor. Back on the floor Beth scrabbled backwards, grabbing something off the floor. Propelling herself away from both men, Kahtar sensed her clutching the cell phone again. With the gun no longer a threat, he now had to contend with both Berwick’s hands struggling to break his grip. Again kneeing the man in the groin, Kahtar wrapped his right leg around Berwick’s and used his greater height to his advantage.