A Scream of Angels
Book Two of the Templar Chronicles
by
Joseph Nassise
SMASHWORDS EDITION
* * * * *
A SCREAM OF ANGELS
Copyright © 2007 by Joseph Nassise
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.
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* * * * *
PROLOGUE
He stared down at the object at his feet with the dawning realization that what they had just uncovered could change the face of the world forever.
Never had he been more exhilarated. Or more frightened. He knew, too, that he was going to have to decide how to deal with the discovery in the next few minutes or the news would spread all over camp faster than a forest fire in the high Sierras. If that happened, it would be too late.
He and his team had been working along the shores of the Dead Sea for several months now and the season was just about over. In another week or two their permits would expire and, with little to show for all their work, it was doubtful that he could gain the funding for a return trip the following season. Never mind the rising violence in the Occupied Territories that threatened to close the borders permanently.
But now there was this.
He turned to the man crouched next to him. “Who else knows?”
The other shook his head. “No one. I’ve been working this end of the trench all day by myself. You’re the first to see it, other than me.”
Maybe, just maybe, they had a chance then.
After another moment of deep thought, he said, “Okay, here’s what we are going to do...”
* * *
Later that night.
His team moved swiftly through the camp and assembled on the far side. The rest of the area was quiet and no one seemed to have noticed their passage. With five hours before sunrise, they should have just enough time to extract the specimen, wrap it up, and get it loaded on the truck before their companions discovered what they were up to.
There were five of them. All men he’d known for years. All men he trusted implicitly. They had sworn the same oaths as he and so he had little doubt that they would go to the grave with the secret if it became necessary.
He hoped it would not. He hated to think of what he’d have to do if they were discovered in the midst of their activities.
It was difficult work. The specimen wasn’t too tall, just a hair over seven feet, but the width was twice that and he was determined to remove it in one piece if at all possible. It took them almost three hours just to free it from its ancient resting place. Getting it properly mounted and wrapped took another two. By the time the sky began to glow pink with the coming sunrise, they were working furiously to get the now-secured package loaded up into the back of one of the expedition’s half-ton trucks.
While the rest of his team had worked through the night to extract the specimen, he had reached out to his network and had set other, longer range plans in motion. He’d secured a site to store the specimen until they could decide what to do with it and had arranged for others to meet them a few hours drive north. Smuggling the specimen across the border and out of the country was going to be difficult, but thankfully he knew more than a few places where the border guards would look the other way for the right amount of money. He’d cross that particular bridge when they came to it. For now, he’d done all he could.
The team said their goodbyes quietly and then he climbed up beside the driver for the long ride north. The rest of the expedition’s personnel were just beginning to stir and there was no time to waste.
As they got underway, it occurred to him that he had just organized and carried out the biggest theft in the history of the free world.
And, God help him, it actually felt good.
CHAPTER ONE
MIRROR, MIRROR ON THE WALL
“You have got to be kidding me!” Sergeant Sean Duncan stared in disgusted disbelief at the hand-held cosmetic mirror that his commanding officer, Knight Commander Cade Williams, had just given to him. “What the heck am I supposed to do with this?” he asked.
His question was greeted with several raucous calls from the other men in the ranks, suggestions that he check to be sure his hair was in place or that he ask it who was the fairest of them all, which only caused the newest member of the Echo Team to scowl even deeper than usual.
Cade ignored both the question and its various replies as he finished handing out the mirrors that his executive officer, Master Sergeant Matthew Riley, had managed to procure. Heaven only knew where he’d appropriated them from, here in the midst of the Longfort Containment Facility, the Order’s most remote prison complex; Cade was just happy he had. They were desperately needed for what lay ahead.
When he was done he shot his exec a glance and the big black sergeant called the rest of the team to order.
“All right, that’s enough. Pipe down and pay attention!”
The men were all members of the Holy Order of the Poor Knights of Christ of the Temple of Solomon, or the Knights Templar, as they were once more commonly known. Long thought to have been destroyed in the fourteenth century, the Templars had emerged from hiding during the desperate days of World War II and had joined with the very entity that had excommunicated them en-masse so many centuries before, the Catholic Church. Reborn as a secret military arm of the Vatican, the Templars were now charged with defending mankind from the supernatural in all its many forms.
Williams was in command of the Echo Team, the most prestigious of the elite strike units fielded by the Templars, and was as known for his ruthless efficiency as he was for his unorthodox methods. His command squad was made up of four men; himself, Master Sergeant Matthew Riley, Sergeant Sean Duncan and Sergeant Nick Olsen. Riley and Olsen had been with him a long time; they had seen and heard things that would make the average Templar soldier sick with fear, but Cade had won them over with his leadership and his dedication to the cause. They would follow him anywhere, no questions asked.
Duncan had only been with Echo for a just a few weeks, having spent several years before that on the Preceptor’s security detail, but in that time the unit’s strange and often enigmatic leader had become important to him. Cade had helped him begin to recognize that his own unique gift was just that, a gift, rather than a temptation or a curse. And though he often had difficulty with Cade’s disregard for the Rule, the code of behavior that every knight was sworn to live by, he had come to quickly understand that he could learn a lot from the other man.
Cade waited until he had their undivided attention and then turned to the smaller man standing rather uneasily off to one side of the group and said, “Warden, if you wouldn’t mind?”
“Very good, Knight Commander.” The warden was a short, stout balding individual who looked more like a banker from the Midwest than the man in charge of two hundred of the Order’s most dangerous prisoners. “As you know, Longfort prides itself on the fact that we’ve never had a major riot or a successful escape. Since the facility’s construction in 1957, we have done our utmost to keep the beings you bring to us safely locked away from the rest of humanity in a place where they can do no further harm. I say that simply to let you know how unusual and dangerous our current situation is.”
The warden cleared his throat and then continued. “I’m afraid our illustrious history caught up with us last night. Somewhere around eleven pm there was an incident in Cell Block D. We don’t know what caused it or even exactly what happened. What we do know is that while a guard was escorting another prisoner back to cell 26, the door to cell 28 came open instead and the Eretiku confined there was released into the main corridor.”
The men were completely silent now, their attention fixed firmly on the warden.
“Things rapidly went downhill. We lost the guard and all of the prisoners along that section of the walk before we even knew we had a problem. When we did realize we had a breach, we responded the way we are trained to respond. We locked down the wing and sent in a squad to try and re-secure the prisoners that had escaped.”
The warden looked out at them and every single soldier in the room could see the regret so plain on his face. “It was exactly the wrong thing to do. We lost the entire squad, never mind a good portion of the prisoners, before we understood just what it was we were dealing with. When we did, we pulled out, sealed off that section of the complex, and called for help.”
Cade took over from there. “We’ve been ordered to secure the cell block and have been given authorization to put down the Eretiku and any of the other prisoners that we feel necessary in order to carry out that order. I don’t need to remind any of you just how difficult this is going to be; Delta lost five men during the initial capture and they were better equipped than we are right now. But we don’t dare delay any longer while waiting for the right equipment to be flown in because if that thing in there finds a way out of the complex we’ll have a much bigger problem on our hands.”
He picked up two stacks of photographs from the table beside him and handed one of them to Riley, who in turn made certain each member of the team received a copy.
“This is what you will be facing,” said Cade.
The photo showed an elderly woman in dark clothes and a shawl, her face turned mostly away from the camera.
Several of the men looked up at Cade, to see if he was joking. He most assuredly was not.
“And here is a picture of a guard who was unlucky enough to meet her gaze during the incident last night.”
Riley passed the second stack of photos around. This one showed a man in a hospital bed who appeared to be at the end of a long illness. His cheeks were sunken and hollow, his skin ghostly pale. Large red weeping sores could be seen across the exposed skin of his face, neck and hands and it was clear that they extended beneath his clothing as well. His hair had mostly fallen out; what was left was thin and lifeless.
“You’re looking at Private Jason Polnick, age 28. Yesterday he was perfectly healthy.” Cade paused, and then said, “They don’t expect him to live out the night.”
He looked them over, making certain that they understood the implications of what he was suggesting. “Some of you might not be familiar with the Eretiku. The name itself is Russian and it refers to a woman who has sold her soul to the Devil and returns after death from the grave to prey on the life-force of the living. Don’t let the old crone appearance fool you. She’s incredibly fast, incredibly strong, and meeting her gaze infects you with a wasting sickness that makes Ebola look like the common cold. She also has the unique ability to fool your eyes into thinking she isn’t there. Hence the mirrors. They’ll protect you from her gaze and let you see her at the same time.”
Cade moved over to a wall, where a map of the complex had been tacked up. It resembled nothing more than six pointed starfish, with each cell block arcing out like arms from the central hub. “We’ll station half of you here,” pointing to the thick set of blast doors that cut the cell block off from the central hub. “A second group will be here.” The blast doors he pointed to this time were deeper down the block corridor and cut off the cells themselves from the guard’s section.
“Olsen and Callavecchio, you’re with me. You’re the best I’ve got, shot-wise, and we’re going to need everything we can bring to the table in that department because we’ll be shooting at a target we can only see in a three-inch mirror.”
The two men nodded, but didn’t say anything.
Cade looked over at Riley. “Once we’re inside the doors, the first thing we’ll do is plant some demo charges along the walls, rigged to a set of controls that we’ll leave with you. If things go badly for us, and you suspect that thing will find a way out, don’t hesitate to blow the place. We can always rebuild but we can’t afford to let that thing loose.”
“Roger that,” said Riley, but it was clear that he wasn’t exactly thrilled with the order.
Cade turned back to the others. “We do this by the numbers, people, by the numbers. Watch your backs, keep your eyes open, and make absolutely certain you don’t look this thing in the eyes. Any questions?”
There weren’t any.
“All right then, let’s suit up.”
CHAPTER TWO
WITCHY WOMAN
As quietly as possible, Commander Williams, Sergeant Olsen, and Private Callavecchio slipped through the blast doors and into the corridor leading to the cell block proper. All of them were dressed in jumpsuits of black flame-retardant material worn over a set of ceramic body armor that had been blessed by the Holy Father himself. They carried the standard issue HK Mark 23 .45 caliber handgun, complete with a twelve round magazine, a flash suppressor, and a laser-targeting device. Two spare magazines for the pistols were affixed with Velcro to their left wrists. A combat knife was either clipped to their belt or in a calf sheath on the outside of their boots. Their swords, recently blessed again during Mass, were slung across their backs, the hilt of the weapon extending just beyond their right shoulders for easy access. On their heads were lightweight Kevlar tactical helmets with built-in communication gear.
Both Olsen and Callavecchio had their mirrors in hand and were using them to scan the walls and ceiling in their general vicinity as carefully as possible. Cade, however, had decided to rely on his own peculiar set of talents.
Several years before, he had barely survived an encounter with a supernatural entity he had since come to call the Adversary. The battle had resulted in the death of his wife and left him scarred both physically and emotionally. He’d lost the sight in his right eye and the flesh on that side of his face had been savagely disfigured, leaving him with a wide band of scar tissue that stretched from the hairline above his eye, down across his cheekbone, and around behind his ear. The eye itself was still intact, but was nothing more than a milky white orb floating in a sea of damaged flesh. Normally he wore an eye patch over it, more for the comfort of others than for himself, but he’d left the patch behind tonight, wanting nothing to obstruct his Sight.
While the damage to his eye had cost him his ability to see in any normal sense of the word, he had gained something unexpected in return. When he moved his ruined eye just so, the supernatural world was revealed to him in all its so-called glory. Nothing could hide from his Sight; he could see through the guises of demons and angels alike, as well as anything in between. Mystical power was as obvious to him as a mountain in the middle of a desert plain. For short periods of time he could even see into the Beyond itself, without setting foot outside his own plane of reality, but doing so also revealed him to the denizens of that realm and so he didn’t do it all that often.
As a reanimated corpse that fed on the life-force of the living, the Eretiku’s very nature would make it impossible for it to hide from him. What he didn’t know was whether or not its killing gaze would have any effect when seen through his Sight and so he intended to be as careful as possible in the confrontation ahead.
Still, he didn’t hesitate to activate his Sight.
Much of the spiritual world is driven by emotion, with objects and locations taking on the predominant feelings surrounding them. In a prison, the primary emotion is despair. The corridor before him went from cold, hard steel to looking like a diseased artery that pulsed and glistened with unidentifiable growths and sores in the eyes of his Sight. The bodies of the dead were black with fear and pain and the ghosts of several of the guards stood beside them, the confusion about what had happened clear on their faces. They became aware of Cade in the same moment he became aware of them and with a quiet word he sent them on their way, hoping their next existence would end better than this one had. At the end of the corridor, the doors were inscribed with a number of mystical seals and signs, the power within them glowing with a white-hot heat.
Of the Eretiku, there was no sign.
“All right,” he said to the others, “we’re clear. Keep those mirrors handy and let’s move out.”
Weapons drawn, they advanced down the corridor, through the guard station, and into the main cell block.
They emerged on the second and middle tier of the block, roughly in the center of one of the short sides of the rectangle. On each level a narrow walkway extended in front of the cells, with enough room for two men to walk abreast comfortably. A waist high railing prevented anyone from slipping over the edge.
Olsen leaned against the railing and used his mirror to allow him a look at what was beneath them and then did the same with the level above. The other two tiers were arranged just like this one, as the plans had indicted, and the center space below them was simply left empty. He didn’t see any sign of their quarry and he let the others know it.
For Cade, the cell block was even worse than the corridor, for it was the place that the inmates spent the majority of their time. The Mother Church had long ago decided that it was unjust to simply execute those enemies that surrendered to its mercy, but knew at the same time that it couldn’t allow those same enemies any chance of escape back into the world where they could continue to wreak havoc and harm. Containment facilities like this one were the best answer the Church had come up with and it had put its most battle hardened veterans, the Templars, in charge of their operation and maintenance. Cell Block D was in the lower security area of the prison, but even here inmates were not allowed to interact with each other, lest they combine their abilities and discover a way of getting past the guards and the wards built into the building itself, and so their existence was reduced to solitary confinement inside of soundproof cells. They were given an hour of exercise per day, in separate, isolated exercise rooms and only on rare occasions did they get the chance to see the sun and open sky.
Some of the creatures confined in this space had life spans that were all but indistinguishable from immortality to the humans who operated it and decades spent in confinement with only hope for centuries more of the same made for a blanket of rage and despair so thick that Cade had to take a moment to get used to looking at it all. When he was ready, they began moving along the walkway that extended the length of the cell block on the right hand side. Some of the cell were still sealed shut and secure; from within them the three knights caught glimpses of a variety of things that would have sent ordinary men away screaming in fear. They even recognized a few, captives from earlier missions Echo had carried out on the Order’s behalf. Others had been torn open, victims of the Eretiku’s search for nourishment and the corpses of more than one littered the walkway before them. The men from Echo were cautious, making certain the victims were actually dead before trying to move past them.
They had advanced almost to the end of the first walkway when it happened.
A hand snaked out from beneath the railing and clamped itself around Cade’s ankle. Before he had a chance to react, it yanked him off his feet and then dragged him with amazing strength across the walkway, beneath the railing, and out into the open air high above the floor three stories below.
But Cade would not be so easy a victim.
He released his grip on his pistol, sacrificing the weapon so as to leave both of his hands free. As his gun made the long fall to the floor below, Cade made a wild grab at the post of the railing as he was swept past.
Luck was with him. He caught a hold of it with one hand, arresting his fall, but the Eretiku still had a firm grip on his leg and was already trying to pull him loose from his makeshift anchor. Against the creature’s awesome strength, he knew he wouldn’t be able to hold out for long.
“Help!” he yelled and hoped the others would be in time.
He could feel the thing’s claws digging right through the thick leather of his boot, searching for a better hold, and he redoubled his efforts to kick himself free of its grasp.
Hands wrapped themselves around his wrists and he looked up to find Olsen holding on to him, the other man’s feet braced against the railing as he fought to keep Cade from falling any further. Beside him, Callavecchio leaned over the railing, his mirror in one hand, angled so as to give him a view of what was happening below, and his pistol in the other.
“Hold still!” he shouted, and Cade had a second to think “easier said than done” before the other man opened fire.
It was a difficult task, firing over a ledge at an angle, past the struggling body of a friend, with only a small hand-held mirror with which to aim. Cade was all but certain he was going to end up with a slug in the leg, but even that would be preferable to the thirty foot fall he was currently staring in the face, so he simply closed his eyes and hoped for the best.
Callavecchio made three quick shots, one after another without pause, and the third and final shot was followed by an angry shriek that echoed off the cold stone walls. Cade felt the grip on his leg loosen and realized with something close to shock that he was uninjured and free.
“Quick! Pull me up!” he said and Olsen did just that, while Callavecchio kept his eye on the space beneath them.
“Do you see it?” Cade asked, climbing to his feet and drawing his sword so that he wouldn’t be defenseless if it attacked again.
Callavecchio shook his head while continuing to scan the lower area with the help of his mirror. “No. It’s gone, for now.”
But they knew it was there. Somewhere. The attack had merely redoubled their determination to find it and end its miserable life.
An hour later, however, they were back where they had started, at the edge of the second tier, still empty-handed. They had searched the entire cell block and had not found any further sign of the creature. Cade knew it was here somewhere; there was nowhere else for it to go. But so far it had managed to elude their best efforts at tracking it down.
Just where the hell was it?
As he looked out over the open space at the walkway on the other side of the cell block, something swung down from the tier above, hanging upside down directly in front of his face. It was close enough that he could feel its fetid breath on his cheek, could smell the stink of its unwashed body.
With the help of his Sight, Cade could see through the creature’s human guise, could see it for what it truly was; a rotting corpse with slavering jaws and molted skin. A third eye existed in the center of its forehead and it was from this that its wasting gaze originated. With the help of his Sight he could even see a black wave of power emerging from that orifice and he didn’t stop to think, didn’t even take the time to reason out the options, knowing his companions would be dead the moment they turned to look. Instead, he simply squeezed his eyes shut and slammed his head forward as hard as he could.
His skull smashed into the Eretiku’s, dazing it, and he felt its weight fall upon him as its clawed feet lost their hold on the railing of the tier above. They tumbled to the floor, each fighting for the advantage, and ending up with Cade on his back and the Eretiku lying atop him, his hands wrapped around the other’s wrists as he fought to keep its slavering jaws from sinking into his unprotected neck. He bucked back and forth, trying to throw it off him, but it managed to wrap its feet around the back of his legs and held him close. He could hear it shrieking its rage and hunger at him, but he wouldn’t let that distract him for if it did he was dead.
As the creature shoved its face forward in another attempt, Callavecchio’s hand shot out and held a mirror directly in front of its eyes.
The result was astonishing.
Cade didn’t know if it was because its mystical gaze had been redirected back upon itself or if it simply couldn’t bear the sight of its true nature, but the Eretiku reared up, its prey beneath it forgotten for the moment as it clamped its hands over its eyes, shrieking in agony.
Olsen was ready and waiting. His sword flashed out in a savage blow, slashing through the creature’s arms just below the wrists and continuing forward, severing its head.
Its screams cut off abruptly and the body fell over backward, spewing blood as black as tar in every direction, as its head rolled off the edge and disappeared from sight.
For a moment no one moved, shocked into immobility by the suddenness of its end, and then Cade was kicking the thing’s rotting corpse off him in disgust as the other two men helped him to his feet.
“Are you all right?’ Olsen asked, his gaze never leaving the Eretiku’s corpse, as if he wasn’t quite convinced it was dead yet. It was a move learned from long experience; too many of the things they’d faced had a nasty habit of getting up again.
This time, however, the creature was good and gone.
Cade nodded in reply and fought to catch his breath. That had been closer than he liked. But the job was done and once more Echo had defied the odds, coming out on top without the loss of a single man. That made him smile, then laugh, and soon the other two men were laughing along with him in simple relief at the fact that they were alive while the enemy lay dead at their feet. They clapped each other on the back, congratulating themselves on the success of what they accomplished, and then turned toward the doors leading to the rest of the complex where their friends and squad mates were waiting.
Once again, Echo had triumphed.
But in the back of his mind Cade realized how close they had come to disaster.
Next time they might not be so lucky.
CHAPTER THREE
LOOKING FOR THE DEAD
“Come on! Pull!” Riley yelled from his seat on the flybridge of the Hatteras 50 fishing yacht they’d rented back in Islamorada. Duncan was in the aft cockpit below him, desperately trying to reel in his fifth marlin of the day, while at the same time ignoring the good-natured insults coming from his left where Nick Olsen was seated, a beer in each hand and a grin on his face.
With the defeat of the Eretiku at the Longfort Containment Facility coming so close on the heels of the confrontation with the necromantic Council of Nine and the recovery of the Spear of Longinus, the higher-ups had decided Echo was due some much needed rest and relaxation. After the debriefings were done, the team had been given two weeks of leave.
The three sergeants from Echo’s command unit wasted no time in getting out of town. They flew by commercial airline to Miami, rented a car and drove down to Islamorada where their charter boat was waiting for them. For the last six days they had done nothing but fish, drink beer, and bask in the warm Florida sunshine.
Riley was of the opinion that while danger could bring men closer, fishing can bond them for life. He had a standing deal with one of the charter boat captains on the island; he paid a handsome fee to keep a boat ready and waiting for him and the captain made certain it was available on a moment’s notice. Over the years he’d made it a habit to go out with each of the team’s newcomers, getting to know them in a non-stress environment, doing what he could in that short time to size them up and understand how well they were going to fit into the unit. Those that didn’t pass his unofficial test were quietly transferred out of the unit by Cade, no questions asked.
Riley had pretty much made up his mind about the new guy before the trip had even gotten underway; Duncan’s performance during the assault on the Necromancer’s stronghold had seen to that. He’d been pleased to see how well the young sergeant had fit in with the two of them and after six days of hard fishing followed by nights of hard drinking, the three were as close as brothers.
As he watched Duncan struggle with the fish, the satellite phone clipped to the helm console between the depth sounder and the VHF rang. Riley ignored it at first, intent on the battle in the aft cockpit below him, but by the sixth ring his dedication to duty got the better of him. He spun his deck chair around and snatched the phone from its cradle.
“This had better be good.”
“I assure you it is, Master Sergeant.”
The voice was crisp and clean, with more than a hint of arrogance. Riley recognized it immediately and came up out of his chair, surprised into standing nearly at attention. Despite the fact that the man on the other end of the line was some 2500 miles away, Riley’s back was ramrod stiff and he stared out at the horizon directly in front of him, his attention completely focused on what was being said.
“Sir. My apologies, sir. It won’t happen again.”
“See that it doesn’t, Master Sergeant.”
Riley held his tongue, though it took some effort. “What can I do for you, Preceptor?”
“It’s Knight Commander Williams. I haven’t been able to reach him by landline or satellite phone. Nor has he returned any of my pages. In light of recent events, I’m concerned something might have happened to him.”
Riley let the Preceptor’s comments sink in for a moment. Cade had always treated this man’s predecessor, Preceptor Michaels, with a fair degree of respect but it was equally obvious that he didn’t care for Preceptor Johannson at all. And unlike all of the other combat units in the Templar hierarchy, Echo reported directly to the Seneschal at the Order’s headquarters in Rosslyn, Scotland. If Cade didn’t want to respond to the Preceptor’s attempts at contacting him, he was perfectly within his rights not to do so.
But those recent events the Preceptor mentioned, including the attacks carried out by the Council of Nine against various Templar commanderies and the discovery of a mole deep within the Order itself, had left everyone shaken. Security was at an all-time high. At a time like this, Cade was unlikely to ignore any attempt at contacting him.
“What do you want me to do?” Riley asked.
“I understand you’ve been to the Knight Commander’s residence?”
“Yes, sir, I have.” Unlike the men in the ranks, the senior commanders were allowed to live in private residences rather than on the commandery grounds. Many did not, but Cade was certainly not a typical Templar commander, and he kept a small piece of property in rural Connecticut not far from the Ravensgate commandery.
“I’d like you to pay him a visit. Double-check that everything is alright. Once you’ve done so, I want you to report back to me. Understood?”
Riley didn’t say anything for a moment. He noted the way the sun sparked off the deep blue waters of the Atlantic, inhaled the crisp, clean scent of the ocean air, paused to watch a seagull soar high overhead, hoping for a scrap of bait. It had been a good trip, while it lasted. He sighed and then said into the phone, “Yes, sir. I’ll get right on it.”
Once the decision was made, the three of them moved in earnest. As the other two were bringing in the lines and cleaning up the deck, Riley turned the boat to the west and opened up the throttle. While he wasn’t yet convinced that Cade was in any real danger, he didn’t intend to waste any unnecessary time in proving it one way or the other either. He was headed straight for Miami, where he could catch a direct flight later that afternoon to New York. The other two would take the boat back down to the Keys, square things with the boat’s captain, and then join Riley as soon as they were able.
Hopefully, they’d get back to headquarters and discover Riley and Cade having a good laugh about the Preceptor’s unnecessary concern.
* * *
The sun had long since fled the coming of night by the time Riley pulled his rented Ford Explorer into the driveway of Cade’s personal residence in the quiet town of Willow Grove later that evening. The house was set a good distance back from the street and nestled amidst a thick grove of oak trees; a quiet, reserved place that seemed to be in direct contrast with Cade’s driven personality, until you considered the fact that even driven men need a sanctuary to call their own. Cade’s black Jeep Wrangler was parked in front of the house and Riley pulled his own vehicle in behind it.
As he got out of the car, the first faint tendrils of unease began stirring in his gut. The house ahead of him was dark. If Cade was home, and the presence of his Jeep seemed to indicate that he was, then there should have been lights, signs of activity. Instead, the space beyond the windows was dark and lifeless. Riley unzipped his coat, giving him access to the pistol he wore strapped in a shoulder holster, and then climbed the steps and rang the bell. When there was no answer, he rang it again. Finally, he tried the knob.
The door swung open at the touch of his hand.
“Cade?” he called, into the darkened interior.
There was no answer.
Maybe Cade had simply left his door unlocked, but then again, maybe he hadn’t. In this line of business, Riley had learned to be careful.
He stepped inside the house and quietly closed the door behind him. He stood there in the darkness, listening for signs of life.
The house around him was silent and the silence itself felt heavy, ominous even, as if the building was holding its breath, listening back.
That faint tendril of unease grew into a thick, ropy tentacle that wrapped itself around his heart.
Riley drew his gun, the heaviness of the weapon providing some sense of reassurance. Holding it in his right hand, he reached out with his left and flipped the light switch, illuminating the foyer and the living room beside him.
Everything looked to be in its proper place.
“Cade? You home, man?” Riley called, his concern over being accidentally shot as an intruder by his friend overcoming his worries that someone else might be present in the house.
There was no answer.
Riley moved through the lower rooms, turning on lights as he went. The living room and foyer led into a formal dining room and then a kitchen/great room combination. All were empty. The kitchen sink held a few dirty dishes, but they had been rinsed free of garbage and there was no way of knowing how long they had been there.
A staircase led upward from the great room and Riley climbed it to the second floor, calling out again as he did so. There still was no answer, but he didn’t take that as evidence that the house was empty. There was always the chance that Cade had been injured and was unable to respond. The upper floor held two guest rooms separated by a guest bath, all of which were empty, and there, at the end of the hall, a master bedroom.
Turning on the light, Riley was surprised at the Spartan nature of Cade’s personal sanctuary; a bed and a nightstand were the only furniture in the room. Equally surprising was the large photograph hanging on the wall opposite the bed. It was of a young woman, vibrant with life, caught in the act of turning toward the camera with a shy smile on her face. Her long, chestnut hair was in motion, twisting with her, and the light in her eyes made it seem as if she could come alive at any second.
Riley had no doubt that he was looking at a photo of Cade’s deceased wife, Gabrielle.
No wonder Cade missed her so.
Riley flipped the light back off and was turning away when a flash outside the window caught his attention. Crossing the room, he pulled back the edge of the curtain and looked out.
An old shed stood at the rear of the property and even from here Riley could see the light spilling out of the partially opened door. The faint memory of a conversation in which Cade mentioned his “workshop” swam up from the depths of his mind and he knew that must be what he was looking at. The fact that there were lights on eased his tension somewhat; perhaps Cade was home after all.
Riley left the bedroom behind, descended the stairs and made his way to the kitchen again where he had noticed a back door during his earlier search. Opening it, he left the house behind, crossed the yard, and approached the workshop.
He called out again as he did so. “Hey Cade! You in there?”
There was no answer.
Up close, he realized the workshop was much bigger than it had first appeared from the bedroom window. It was actually more a barn than a shed, the darkened window high above the door indicative of a second-story even. Riley inserted his hand into the opening between the double doors and pushed. The door rolled open on its well-oiled track without a sound.
Light spilled out into the darkness.
Riley cautiously stepped inside.
He could see immediately that the entire structure had been gutted and rebuilt, turning the lower floor into a well-furnished study. What had once been horse stables was now a large, open room with bookshelves lining the walls and several work tables arranged in a semi-circle facing toward the door. A wood-burning stove stood in the far corner, its thick black pipe running up through the floor of the second story high above.
He walked into the room, leaving the door open behind him, just in case he had to get out in a hurry. “Hello? Is anyone here?” he called but again was met only with silence.
He moved over to the closest table. It held several books, a pad of paper, and a mug of half-drunk coffee. A glance inside the cup showed that the cream had begun to curdle, giving Riley the sense that it had stood there untouched for several days. In fact, the whole place had that feeling of emptiness, as if events had been abruptly interrupted.
On the other side of the tables, he could see that a large mirror had been bolted to the floor in the semi-circle space between them. It seemed a strange place for it, Riley thought, for it would easy for someone to forget it was there and step right on it.
Step right on it…
Riley moved over to the other tables, a sudden suspicion flaring. They were covered in books, many of which were propped open to certain pages. He could tell they were old by just looking at them, their pages yellowed, the script elaborate and in many cases decorated with symbols and other illustrations. One table had a stool placed before it and Riley correctly assumed this was where Cade had been working last.
Only a single volume rested atop this one. A glance at the text told him he wouldn’t be able to understand a word of it; he recognized the strange script as Enochian, the language of the angels, but that was as far as he got. The pages of notes stacked beside it, on the other hand, appeared to be Cade’s English translation. He leafed through several of them, noting that the subject matter dealt with the powers of fallen angels and the ways in which one might bind them to your service. It wasn’t exactly the type of thing you’d expect a knight of the Order to be reading, but Riley wasn’t surprised. Cade would go anywhere, do anything, to understand what had happened to him and his beloved wife on that summer night seven years ago. Reading a few forbidden texts were the least of his sins. But this one might just offer some clue as to where Cade had gone.
Riley knew that Cade was convinced that the Adversary, that supernatural entity that had murdered his wife and given Cade some unusual gifts of his own, was in fact a fallen angel. Cade also believed that the both the spirit of his dead wife, Gabrielle, and the Adversary himself could be found in the Beyond, that mysterious purgatory-like realm that existed somewhere between this one and the next. One of the strange “powers” the Adversary had given to Cade was the ability to travel into and out of that place.
And he got there by stepping through the surface of a mirror.
A glance back down at the floor showed him something he’d missed the first time around. A long black case with silver clasps had been pushed beneath one of the tables. Retrieving it, Riley ran his fingers over the supple leather covering it and then threw open the three small clasps.
The space where Cade’s blessed sword usually rested was empty.
The pieces of the puzzle were starting to click into place. Cade’s inability to return phone calls or pages. His empty sword case. The books on understanding and controlling angels. The workshop with the mirror inlaid in the floor.
Cade was in the Beyond, Riley was all but certain of it.
From where he stood, Riley could see that the old hay loft above had undergone some changes. It had been walled off into its own enclosed room, with a set of simple wooden steps leading up to a door at this end.
Considering he’d looked everywhere else, he might as well check that out too, he thought, just to be on the safe side, though he was convinced he’d solved the problem.
He climbed the steps and opened the door.
Glass crunched underfoot.
At the sound, Riley went still; one foot inside the partially opened door, his hand still on the doorknob.
He stared into the darkness ahead of him, listening.
No other sound reached his ears.
Once again, he was convinced he was alone.
He pushed the door open wide and stepped inside the room, reaching out with his left hand for the light switch as he did so.
The darkness was banished by a dazzling display of light that was far brighter than he had expected. It was as if that single light bulb was multiplied a thousand times over, with all of the lights coming to life simultaneously. Riley was forced to turn away, shading his eyes as he waited for his vision to adjust, his skin crawling as he realized that he was all but helpless should something choose that moment to take advantage of him.
But nothing did.
Once his eyes adjusted to the light, he took a careful look around. What he saw raised his anxiety to new levels.
The room was drowning in mirrors.
Broken, shattered mirrors.
They were everywhere; on the floor, on the walls, on the small table by the doorway. Not a single one was intact, though a few fragile pieces remained hanging resolutely in some of the frames. Most of the glass was scattered across the floor, as if the mirrors had exploded from the inside out.
Riley’s suspicions were confirmed.
Traveling to and from the Beyond required incredible amounts of physical energy. Though he’d never been there himself, Riley had observed Cade making the trip a time or two and was at least conversational with the details. Truth be told, you’d never get him to voluntarily cross that line. The tales of the strange and twisted creatures encountered by Cade on his solitary explorations were enough to quench any curiosity he might have, thank you very much. He didn’t need to see them for himself.
But he’d learned enough through talking with Cade to understand that each and every trip through the barrier, or the Veil, was draining on the traveler. Time and distance were different on the other side and hours there could translate into days here. Should a visitor stay too long, he might find himself dehydrated, famished, even several days older when he returned.
Repeat trips, particularly in a short time frame, were extremely dangerous.
From the number of shattered mirrors before him, it appeared the Commander had made dozens of trips across the Veil recently, perhaps even more than that as Riley had no way of knowing how often the mirrors had been replaced.
That amount of travel was damn near suicidal.
Just what in heaven had he been thinking?
As Riley turned away to descend the stairs, a loud crash sounded from the room below.
Aiming his gun, Riley looked out the doorway.
The body of a man lay crumpled beside the now shattered mirror in the center of the room. Even from here Riley could recognize him. Cade’s eyes were wide open and he didn’t appear to be breathing.
Riley rushed down the stairs and over to his side. Kneeling, he placed the fingers of his left hand against Cade’s throat while his eyes scanned the rest of the room, just in case something had followed Cade back from the other side. Riley was able to find a pulse, but only after checking for it twice and even then its threadbare nature was not encouraging.
There were no visible wounds on Cade’s body, but he was clearly in bad shape. He’d lost an incredible amount of weight, so much so that his clothing hung off of him. His skin was a nasty shade of yellow and was stretched tight across his bones, as if his skeleton was trying to force itself through to the other side. Riley was reminded of the mummified remains he’d once seen in the Natural History Museum.
No one alive should ever look like this.
Knowing Cade was beyond the limited medical assistance that was his to give, Riley pulled out his cell phone. He dialed a ten digit number from memory and when the phone was answered on the other end he identified himself, gave his location, and indicated the need for immediate medical extraction for a senior commander.
After hanging up, he gently gathered Cade in his arms and lifted him, dismayed at how light he was. He made his way out of the workshop, across the lawn, and back inside the house, taking up a position in the living room by the front window, listening and waiting for the helicopter he knew was on its way. He tried not to think about Cade’s condition or the minutes slipping quickly past. The medical team would get here in time or it would not. It was all in the Lord’s hands.
Riley bowed his head in prayer.
As the first faint sounds of the approaching chopper finally reached him, he felt Cade shift in his arms. He looked down and was surprised to find his commanding officer looking up at him through his one good eye.
“I’ve got to find her, Matt. I’ve got to find her.”
The sound of his voice, so full of pain and desperate need, filled the big man’s heart with sorrow. He struggled to speak past the sudden lump in his throat and finally settled for a short, “I know, boss.”
Cade slipped back into unconsciousness, which was fine with Riley. He didn’t need any further explanation anyway; Cade could only be speaking of one person.
His dead wife.
Gabrielle.
CHAPTER FOUR
BACK IN THE SADDLE
Riley was waiting in the corridor outside of Cade’s hospital room when his teammates arrived. After returning the charter boat, the two men had taken a puddle jumper flight into Miami. There they had changed planes and flown directly to Boston, where an initiate brother had met them with a car and driven them the last fifty miles to the commandery.
“How is he?” Olsen asked.
Riley shook his head. “Not good. He’s so malnourished and dehydrated that his body is basically eating itself from the inside out. The doc said it was pretty touch-and-go there for awhile. Another day and he wouldn’t have made it, hospital or not. For now, it’s wait and see.”
The big sergeant went on to explain how he and Cade had been picked up by helicopter and flown to the nearest Connecticut commandery, only to have the medical officer there decide Cade’s condition was dire enough to transfer him to the Order’s primary hospital on the grounds of the Newport facility in Rhode Island.
Which was where all four of them were now.
Duncan glanced in through the open doorway to where Cade lay surrounded by a maze of life-support equipment. He was sleeping peacefully, but the sight of such a strong man laid so low was disquieting, to say the least.
“Just what in heaven’s name did he think he was doing?” Olsen asked, clearly frustrated over the inability to do anything to help their friend.
“He was looking for his wife,” Duncan answered absently, still staring at the Knight Commander.
Silence fell and when he turned away from the doorway to face the others he found them staring at him.
“What do you know about that?” Riley asked, and with his tone Duncan was abruptly reminded that he was still the outsider here. There was curiosity, but also more than a hint of protective anger in the big sergeant’s voice.
Duncan answered without flinching. “I saw her. Or at least think I did.”
“What? When?”
“That night we found Stones’ body, at the safe house outside of Otter Lake.”
Duncan remembered that evening with no small amount of trepidation. He and Cade had gone to see the head of the Custodes Veritatis, a secret faction within the Templar hierarchy that was responsible for defending the holy relics placed under the Order’s control, while Riley and Olsen had played rear guard, hoping to spot anyone who might be following them. They’d found Stone dead at the scene, an obvious victim of torture, and had then been ambushed by members of the necromantic Council of Nine that were intent on wresting the Spear of Longinus from the Order’s control. Unable to call for back-up, they had escaped with their lives only by using Cade’s strange power to travel into the Beyond.
The trip had only pulled them out of the frying pan and into the fire, however, for no sooner had they regained consciousness in that eerie mirror of reality than they had been set upon by ravenous packs of spectres. With their backs to a dark and unwelcoming sea, they’d had no choice but to stand and fight, despite being outnumbered significantly.
In the end, it had been Cade’s dead wife that had saved them. Or so Cade believed.
Duncan explained what he knew to the others.
“Why didn’t you say something about this earlier?” Olsen pressed.
Duncan snorted in disbelief. “Yeah, right. What did you want me to say? By the way guys, our illustrious commander thinks the ghost of his dead wife saved our asses while we were stuck on the other side of reality. Just thought you should know.”
Riley and Olsen simply stared, not saying anything. Their silence made it obvious that, yes, that was exactly what they had expected him to do.
Flabbergasted, Duncan opened his mouth to respond but was interrupted by the arrival of an initiate carrying a message for Riley. The Echo Team exec read the note and cursed once, softly.
“What is it?” Olsen asked.
“They’ve recalled the unit. Echo has a new assignment. We’re to assemble in the briefing room in thirty minutes.”
“They can’t do this now! What about Cade?” Duncan asked.
Riley looked pointedly through the doorway at Cade’s inert form. “As much as I hate to say it, it looks like we’re on our own for awhile.”
The three men agreed to meet at the assigned time and went their separate ways. Riley followed the initiate back down the hallway, asking questions of the younger man in a quiet voice, trying to learn all he could about the Preceptor’s mood before having to go see him. Olsen headed for the barracks, intending to bring the rest of the men up to speed on Cade’s condition and let them know about the recall.
Which left Duncan alone. As the newest member of the unit, he didn’t have any pressing assignments and so had nowhere in particular to be until the briefing commenced.
He glanced up and down the hall. Seeing no one, he pulled open the door and slipped inside Cade’s room.
The silence inside was broken only by the hiss of the ventilator and the occasional beep of the equipment monitoring Cade’s vital signs. Duncan spent several long moments standing next to Cade’s bed, staring down at him, his thoughts full of conflict. On more than one occasion he reached out to touch the injured man only to pull his hand back each time, remembering Cade’s admonition during their previous mission not to touch him under any circumstances.
You could heal him.
The thought came unbidden, but Duncan was honest enough to admit to himself that he’d certainly considered that fact once or twice since setting foot inside the room.
Wouldn’t take much at all.
And it wouldn’t; that was true. All he had to do was reach out and lay his hands on Cade’s body, to think about his injuries fading away as if they’d never been.
You’ve done it before, for people you didn’t even know.
True again. He’d healed hundreds of strangers while overseas a few years back. And since that time he’d vowed never to use his “gift” again.
But you broke that vow, didn’t you? You healed Sgt. Olsen when he was injured in that helicopter crash. And this man certainly isn’t a stranger; he’s your commanding officer.
Duncan began to pace back and forth in front of Cade’s bed, his indecision practically a physical torment. The voice in the back of his head had been silent for years. In the wake of his disgrace in China, he decided that his “gift” was more a curse than a blessing and had fervently made up his mind that he would never again call on the peculiar power that lived inside of him. For months that voice had pushed and cajoled, whined and complained, but he’d held strong to his conviction and eventually it had gone silent.
Until now.
Duncan sighed, knowing there was only one action to take.
With the hiss of the ventilator and the beeping of the heart monitor for company, Duncan got down on his knees in the middle of the room and began to pray.
“Heavenly Father, I come to you now with a heavy heart…”
After some time, Duncan finally came to a decision.
* * *
He dreamed.
Dreamed of a cold, grey sea that lapped at the shore of a grey beach, while a grey sun sank slowly down through a grey sky. He stood near the water’s edge, looking out over that grey expanse, waiting; though he knew not for what. A sense of expectation rose in his heart, an emotion that was certainly out of place in a setting such as this, yet it was undeniable and one he couldn’t ignore. He’d come here, to this time and place, wherever here might be, to…meet someone? See something?