Bloodstone (26 page)

As the light began to fade, Shannow turned off the trail and up into a stand of pine, seeking a place to camp. The land rose sharply, and ahead of them a cliff face ran south to north. A narrow waterfall gushed over basaltic rock, the fading sunlight
casting rainbows through the spray and a rippling stream flowing on toward the plain.

Shannow dismounted and loosened the saddle cinch. “We could make at least another five miles,” said Amaziga, but he ignored her, his keen eyes picking up a flash of red in the undergrowth some sixty yards beyond the falls. Leaving the horse with trailing reins, he waded across the narrow stream and climbed the steep bank beyond. Gareth followed him.

“Jesus Christ!” whispered Gareth as he saw the crushed and ruined remains of a red jeep.

“Do not take His name in vain,” said Shannow. “I do not like profanity.”

The jeep was lying on its back, the roof twisted and bent. One door had been ripped clear, and Shannow could see the marks of talons scoring through the red paint and the thin steel beneath it. He glanced up. Torn and broken foliage on the cliff above the jeep showed that it had fallen from the cliff top and bounced several times against sharp outcrops before landing there. Ducking down, he pulled aside the bracken and peered into the interior. Gareth knelt alongside him.

Inside the jeep was a crushed and twisted body. All that could be seen was an outflung arm, half-severed. The arm was black, the blood-soaked shirtsleeve olive-green with a thin gray stripe. Gareth’s shirt was identical.

“It’s me,” said Gareth. “It’s me!”

Shannow rose and moved to the other side of the wreck. Glancing down, he saw huge paw prints in the soft earth and a trail of dried blood leading into the undergrowth. Drawing a pistol and cocking it, he followed the trail and twenty yards farther on found the remains of a grisly feast. Lying to the left was a small box, twisted, torn wires leading from it. Easing the hammer forward, he holstered his pistol, then picked up the blood-spattered box and walked back to where Gareth was still staring down at the body.

“Let’s go,” said the Jerusalem Man.

“We’ve got to bury him.”

“No.”

“I can’t just leave him there!”

Hearing the anguish in the young man’s voice, Shannow moved alongside him, laying a hand on his shoulder. “There are hoof marks around the vehicle as well as signs of the Devourers. If any of the riders return and find the corpses buried, they will know that others have passed this way. You understand? We must leave them as they are.”

Gareth nodded, then his head flicked up. “Corpses? There is only one, surely.”

Shannow shook his head and showed Gareth the blood-spattered box.

“I don’t understand …” the young man whispered.

“Your mother will,” Shannow said, as Amaziga strode to join them. He watched her as she examined the jeep, her face impassive. Then she saw the box, identical to the one she had strapped to her belt, and her dark eyes met Shannow’s gaze.

“Where is her body?” she asked.

“There is not much of a body left. The Devourers lived up to their name. A part of the head remains, enough to identify it.”

“Is it safe to remain here?”

“Nowhere in this land is safe, lady. But it offers concealment for the night.”

“I take it the twin of your body is not here, Mr. Shannow?”

“No,” he said.

She nodded. “Then she chose to undertake the mission without you, obviously a mistake which she paid for dearly.”

Amaziga turned away and returned to the horses as Gareth approached Shannow. “That’s the closest she’ll ever come to saying you were right about the jeep,” said the young man, attempting a smile. “You’re a wise man, Shannow.”

The Jerusalem Man shook his head. “The wise man was the Jon Shannow who
didn’t
travel with them.”

Gareth took the first watch, a thick blanket around his shoulders against the cool night breeze. He was sitting on a wide branch that must have snapped in a recent storm. The sight of
the body in the jeep had unnerved him as nothing else had in his young life. He
knew
the dead man better than he knew anyone, understood the hopes and dreams and fears the man had entertained or endured. And he could not help wondering what had gone through his twin’s mind as the jeep had crashed over the cliff. Despair? Terror? Anger? Had he been alive after the fall? Had the Devourers forced their way in and torn at his helpless body?

The young black man shivered and glanced to where Shannow slept peacefully beneath a spreading elm. This quest had seemed like an adventure to Gareth Archer, yet another exciting experience in his rich, full young life. The prospect of danger had been enticing. But to see his own corpse! Death was something that happened to other people … not to him. Nervously he glanced across at the ruined jeep.

The night was cold, and he noticed that his hands were trembling. He glanced at his watch: two more hours before he woke his mother. She had seemed unfazed by the tragedy that had befallen their twins, and just for a moment Gareth found himself envious of her calm. Amaziga had spread out her blanket, removed the boxes and headphones, and passed them to her son. “Lucas’s camera has an infrared capacity,” she had said. “Don’t leave it on for long. We must conserve the batteries. Two minutes every half hour should be sufficient.” Now she, too, seemed to be sleeping.

Gareth pressed the button on the box. “You are troubled,” whispered Lucas’s voice, sounding tinny and small through the earphones.

Gareth flipped the microphone into place. “What can you see?” he asked, turning his head slowly, giving the tiny camera on the headband a view of the plain below.

“Move your head to the right—about an inch,” ordered Lucas.

“What is it?” Gareth’s heart began to pound, and he slipped his Desert Eagle automatic from its shoulder holster.

“A beautiful spotted owl,” said Lucas. “It’s just caught a small lizard.” Gareth swore. “There is nothing on the plain to concern you,” the machine chided him. “Calm yourself.”

“Easy for you to say, Lucas. You haven’t seen your own corpse.”

“As a matter of fact, I have. I watched the original Lucas collapse with a heart attack. However, that is beside the point. Your resting heartbeat is currently 133 beats per minute. That is very close to panic, Gareth. Take some long, slow deep breaths.”

“It is 133 beats faster than the poor son of a bitch in the jeep,” snapped the young man. “And it is not panic. I’ve never panicked in my life. I won’t start now.”

A hand touched his shoulder, and Gareth lurched upright. “One hundred sixty-five beats,” he heard Lucas whisper, and he spun around to see Amaziga standing calmly behind him.

“I said use the machine,” she told him, “not get into an argument with it.” She held out her hand. “Let me have Lucas, and then you can get some sleep.”

“I’ve another two hours yet.”

“I’m not tired. Now do as you’re told.”

He grinned sheepishly and carefully removed the headband and boxes. Amaziga laid aside her Uzi and clipped the machine to her shoulder rig. Gareth moved to his blanket and lay down. The Desert Eagle dug into his waist, and easing it clear, he laid it alongside him.

Amaziga turned off the machine and walked to the edge of the trees, staring out over the moonlit landscape. Nothing moved, and there were no sounds except the rustling of leaves in the trees above her. She waited until Gareth was asleep and then waded back across the stream, past the ruined jeep, and onto the scene of the feast. The body—or what was left of it—was in three parts. The head and neck were resting against a boulder with the face—thankfully—turned away. Amaziga flicked on the machine.

“What are we looking for?” asked Lucas.

“I am carrying a Sipstrassi Stone. There is little power left. She should have an identical stone. Scan the ground.”

Slowly she turned her head. “Can you see anything?”

“No. Nothing of interest. Traverse to the left … no … more slowly. Was it in the trouser pocket or the shirt?”

“Trouser.”

“There’s not much left of the legs. Perhaps one of the beasts ate the stone.”

“Just keep looking!” snapped Amaziga.

“All right. Move to the right … 
Amaziga
!” The tone in his voice made her blood grow cold.

“Yes?”

“I hope the weapon you are holding is primed and ready. There is a beast some fifteen meters to your right. He is around eight feet tall …”

Amaziga flipped the Uzi into position and spun. As a huge, gray form hurtled toward her, the Uzi fired, a long thunderous roar of sound exploding into the silence of the night. Bullets smashed into the gray chest, blood sprayed from the wounds, but still it came on. Amaziga’s finger tightened on the trigger, emptying the long clip. The Devourer was flung backward, its chest torn open.

“
Amaziga!
” shouted Lucas. “There are two more!”

The Uzi was empty, and Amaziga scrabbled for the Beretta at her hip. Even as she did so, the beasts charged.

And she knew she was too slow …

“Down, woman!” bellowed Shannow.

Amaziga dived to her right. The booming sound of Shannow’s pistol was followed by a piercing howl from the first Devourer, which pitched backward with half its head blown away. The second swerved past Amaziga and ran directly at the tall man at the edge of the trees. Shannow fired once; the creature slowed. A second shot ripped into its skull, and Amaziga was showered with blood and brains.

Shannow stepped forward, pistols raised.

Amaziga turned her head. “Are there any more of them?” she whispered to Lucas. There was no answer, and she saw that one of the leads had pulled clear of the right-hand box. She swore softly and pressed it home.

“Are you all right?” Lucas asked.

“Yes. What can you see?” asked Amaziga, turning slowly through a full circle.

“There are riders some four kilometers to the north, heading away from us. I can see no beasts. But the cliff face is high; there may be others on the higher ground. Might I suggest you reload your weapon?”

Switching off the machine, Amaziga rose unsteadily to her feet. Shannow handed her the Uzi just as Gareth came running onto the scene, his Desert Eagle automatic in his hand.

“Thank you, Shannow,” said Amaziga. “You got here very fast.”

“I was here all the time,” he told her. “I followed you across the stream.”

“Why?”

He shrugged. “I felt uneasy. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll leave you to your watch.”

“Son of a bitch,” said Gareth, staring down at the three dead beasts. “They’re huge!”

“And dead,” Shannow pointed out as he strode past.

Gareth moved alongside Amaziga, who was pressing a full clip into the butt of the Uzi. “Jesus, but he’s like an iceman …” He stopped speaking, and Amaziga saw his gaze fall on the moonlit head of the other Amaziga. “Oh, my God! Sweet Jesus!”

His mother took him by the arm, leading him away. “I’m alive, Gareth. So are you. Hold to that! You hear me?”

He nodded. “I hear you. But Christ …”

“No buts, my son! They are dead—we are not. They came to rescue Sam. They failed; we will not. You understand?”

He took a long, deep breath. “I won’t let you down, Mother. You can trust me on that.”

“I know. Now go get some sleep. I’ll resume the watch.”

Samuel Archer was not a religious man. If there was a God, he had long since decided, he was either willful or incompetent. Perhaps both. Yet Sam stood now on the crest of the hill and prayed. Not for himself, though survival would be more than pleasant, but for the last survivors of those who had followed him in the war against the Bloodstone. Behind him were the
remaining rebels, twenty-two in all, counting the women. Before and below them on the plain were the Hellborn elite. Two hundred warriors, their skills enhanced by the demonseeds embedded in their foreheads. Killers all! Sam glanced around him. The rebels had picked a fine setting for their last stand, high above the plain, the tree line and thick undergrowth forming a rough stockade. The Hellborn would be forced to advance up a steep slope in the face of withering volleys. With enough ammunition we might even have held, thought Sam. He glanced down at the twin ammunition belts draped across his broad chest; there were more empty loops than full. Idly he counted the remaining shells. From the breast pocket of his torn gray shirt he drew a strip of dried beef, the last of his rations.

There would be no retreat from there, Sam knew. Two hundred yards behind them the mountains fell away into a deep gorge that opened out on to the edge of the Mardikh desert. Even if they could climb down, without horses they would die of thirst long before reaching the distant river.

Sam sighed and rubbed his tired eyes. For four years he had fought the Bloodstone, gathering fighters, battling against Hellborn warriors and Devourers. All for nothing. His own small store of Sipstrassi was used up, and without it they could not hope to hold off the killers. An ant crawled onto Sam’s hand. He brushed it away.

That’s what we are, he thought, ants standing defiantly before an avalanche.

Despair was a potent force and one Sam had resisted for most of these four years. It had not been hard back at the beginning. The remnants of the Guardians had gathered against Sarento and had won three battles against the Hellborn. None had proved decisive. Then the Bloodstone had mutated the Wolvers, and a new, terrible force had been unleashed against the human race. Whole communities had fled into the mountains to escape the beasts. The flight meant that the Guardian army, always small, was now without supplies as farming communities disappeared in the face of the Devourers. Ammunition was in short supply, and many fighters
left the army to travel to their homes in a vain bid to protect their families.

Now twenty-two were left. Tomorrow there would be none.

A young, beautiful olive-skinned woman approached Sam. She was tall and wore two pistols in shoulder holsters over a faded red shirt. Her jet-black hair was drawn tightly into a bun at the nape of her neck. He smiled as he saw her.

“I guess we’ve come to the end of a long, sorrowful road, Shammy. I’m sorry I brought you to this.”