The Firstborn (40 page)

John rolled to his side, rising to his knees. He looked Devin over. “If we aren’t doing this out of love, then why are we doing any of this at all?”

He kept his eyes on Devin, looking into his profile set against the distant glow of the dim light. “You know what the right thing to do is.”

Devin remained silent for a moment, cold and unmoving. “There are things that need to be done.”

Then Devin turned away and disappeared up the steps.

John knelt on the cement, staring at the dark, cold floor. His body ached. His joints whined. His brain, overwhelmed, seemed to shut down. He stayed there, kneeling, staring at the floor. How long, he couldn’t say, but it felt like hours.

Suddenly he moved, placing his clenched fists behind his head, face turning to the ceiling.

He took a moment and let his feelings slip away. John was a man of feelings, and the world needed people like him—but right now the world needed him to think in straight lines, from the problem to the solution and back again.

“God,” he said as unassumingly as he knew how, “I’ve made mistakes. We’ve all made horrible mistakes.” He breathed a lungful of dewy night air. “I feel my guilt—but I need You more than I need my guilt. Take it away from me.” He began to seethe, the passion of his prayer welling up inside. “Take every inexcusable thing and rip it to shreds—I don’t want it; I want You!” His fists began to beat his chest. “The world doesn’t need me, God. Not really. The world needs You. I need You, and tonight I need You more than ever.”

His hands fell gently at his sides, knuckles brushing the rough concrete.

“Give me what I need so that I can do Your will.”

Then he felt it—a stabbing in his side—

A man in an abandoned building. Weapons. Explosives. Prayer. Preparing for his attack—in the morning—

John’s eyes snapped open.

“Thank You.”

John stood, moving from his place on the floor. He felt rejuvenated now, body loose. He moved up the steps and looked around in the darkened tactical building. All quiet.

On the wall there was a panel of keys, hanging from hooks—one set missing. Devin must have taken one of the cars already.

He stepped out of the building, set of keys in hand, moving with purpose toward the row of parked vehicles, punching the keyless entry as he walked until a set of headlights winked on. He moved toward the car—a broken headlight cover, but the bulb wasn’t broken and there were no bullet holes. It wouldn’t attract too much attention.

Three minutes later he was headed toward the highway—to Washington DC.

Chapter 22

T
HE DRIVE WAS LONG
, even longer with the blindfold on. Her captors insisted that the drive was only four hours, but it felt like an eternity.

Hannah had been led from the SUV by the arm, taken into a house, up a flight of steps, and shoved into a room.

They hadn’t tied her up, so removing the blindfold itself was easy. She looked around. A guest bedroom—red walls, green sheets. The place had a rustic quality to it. She tried the doorknob—locked. She continued scanning the room.

At the far end of the room she saw a window and the dark world beyond.

She held for a moment, listening for the sounds of approaching footsteps, wondering if they could hear her movements.

A step toward the window—a string of chatter came to life just beyond the door. She stopped, waiting for the sounds to pass, then took another step forward.

A creaking floorboard.

She lifted her foot, and the board relaxed back into place with a long squeaking whine. A grimace crossed her face.

Another step—almost at the window. Then she was there. She looked down.

Down below, three armed guards stood in a loose circle, talking with one another. One held a large Rottweiler on a leash. The big dog looked up at her, its green eyes flashing in the light of the window. An alarming roar broke the night air as the creature barked through jagged teeth set within its frothing mouth.

The guards looked up—one shining a flashlight.

Hannah backed away from the window, nearly falling over—the floorboards protesting under her heels.

She sat on the bed and thought.

She’d been detained before—in the snowy countryside, in the city, and now here, wherever here was. The first time it had been horrifying—kidnapped for no apparent reason—but the next time she’d been detained by an angry young man she felt sympathy for. Each time she grew stronger—slightly more so than the time before. Now she felt defiance bubbling up inside her.

This was what Devin had warned her about—the way she was becoming comfortable with atrocity inflicted upon her.

Someone worked a key in the lock.

Hannah looked around for whatever she could find, anything hard enough to knock a man flat—a telephone, a drawer, or a chair. Her eyes fell on a lamp and she lunged for it, reaching for the cord in the wall. Unplugging it would plunge the room into darkness—she’d use that to her advantage.

She was in this world now.

“Hello, Ms. Rice,” Morris said as he snapped on the overhead light.

Too slow. She held.

“Mr. Childs?”

“Yes,” Morris said. She could feel him approaching from behind. The door was closed behind him and locked with the clicking of a key from the hall.

Morris placed a hand on her shoulder. “How do you feel? Have you been mistreated?”

She felt his hand, warm and endearing—like her grandfather. Then her thoughts returned to who he was and what he’d done. She shrugged his hand away, turning to face him as she stood.

Hannah looked deep into the older man’s eyes, glaring. She said nothing.

Morris looked her over for the moment, features softening as a realization came to him—her glare breaking through his exterior.

“I’m sorry about all of this,” he said with a nod. “I’m trying to justify my actions—there are simply things I must do.”

Her mind swam—here she stood in the presence of the man who had cut into her life, thrust her into this dark world of hatred and mistrust, and she couldn’t think of anything to say. A string of insults and fury came to mind, but all at the level of a third grader.

“Why’d you do it?” she asked, wondering where the words had come from.

“Do what?”

Her thoughts worked. It was an unexpected question, even for her. She wanted to know what she meant too. “Why did you do all of this?” she asked, looking him over. “Why did you tear the Firstborn apart?”

His features sank. “I’m trying to save the Firstborn,” he replied, looking somber and misunderstood. He nodded to himself as he looked at the floor and then lifted his face to her. “Are you familiar with Alessandro D’Angelo?”

“The monk who brought the Firstborn together,” she said with a nod.

“Are you familiar with his prophecies?”

“Like Thresher?”

“Yes,” he said with a warm nod, voice low and sagelike. Morris looked her over, examining her reaction, trying to determine something—but what?

“Come with me,” he said, and motioned her to the door.

A moment later they were moving through the big house, the halls littered with soldiers. Morris waved a hand in an understated gesture. “This is my home. My wife isn’t here at the moment—I sent her to stay with our eldest daughter until all of this is resolved.”

He led her to a door on the ground floor and turned the knob. She looked down into the basement below—dark and foreboding.

“What’s down there?”

“Come with me,” he said tenderly, reaching out with a hand. “I’ll show you.”

They descended the stairs, Hannah going first. “This is the old wine cellar,” he said as the cool air permeated her body, licking at her flesh. “Wine hasn’t been kept down here in years, but it still serves a very important purpose.”

Morris reached out, flipping a switch. A solitary light bulb snapped on, dangling from a low-hanging wire over an old wooden table. “Have a seat.” He waved at an empty chair and Hannah took it.

She watched from the table as Morris walked to a large safe in the corner of the room, twisting the knob with a clattering twirl. Three spins then he stopped, reaching for the heavy metal handle, pushing it down.

A solid metallic slam reverberated through the entirety of the basement as the mechanism drew the thick bar out of place. The door yawned open—the safe filled with darkness.

She watched as Morris reached his hand into the shadows and removed something—a file.

He returned to the table and sat at the corner adjacent to Hannah. She examined the file as he carefully opened it. Inside was a folded piece of parchment, brown and faded from the years.

Morris’s face seemed to light up as he looked at the scrap. “Six hundred years old,” he said. “We wanted to keep it in a plastic bag, but the chemical composition of plastic will eat through a document this old.”

“What is it?”

He smiled. “This is one of the prophesies of D’Angelo, written on this very parchment six hundred years ago—telling us of ourselves right now.”

Her eyes wandered over it. Six hundred years old—a piece of history.

“Here,” he said, reaching for her hand, taking it gently, “touch it.” Morris placed her hand on the parchment.

Real people had written on this—people with hopes and dreams and families had scrawled out the letters and drawn the ornate embellishments that covered its surface. Someone else’s hands had touched this, and now she was touching it also. She was reaching out to the past—and the past was reaching back. Her mouth spread into a smile.

“You feel it, don’t you?”

She nodded.

“The power of prophecy—you’re reaching out to the future and the future is reaching back.”

“What does it say?”

He took the folder and removed a photocopy of the parchment and another sheet. “This is a copy of the original text in Italian, and this is an English translation.” He cleared his throat and read, “‘When the little children are threatened with Saracen hands in the capital of the world’s greatest nation, the Firstborn will face Thresher from within. Those who follow Thresher will destroy the Firstborn as agents of evil, but those who stand firm in the truth, completely destroying evil, will see God.’”

She nodded. “Who are you following?”

“I’m here to see evil destroyed. Not allowed to thrive.”

Hannah shook her head. “But Devin…?”

“Devin was never meant to get involved. But he captured an agent of evil…and allowed him to live. He harbored and protected that which should have been destroyed without hesitation.”

“But,” she stammered, “Tariq? A person? Destroyed? How is that doing good?”

“I understand your dilemma,” Morris agreed, paternally, “but he wanted to kill children. Specifically targeting innocents. How is that not evil?”

Hannah considered for a moment. “But you and Blake wanted to kill innocent people at that mosque too. How is that not evil?”

Morris leaned close, “Evil has thrived because it has been
allowed
to. Someone must stand up and do what must be done. And D’Angelo predicted it all—that those who allowed evil to thrive would be destroyed. The compound has been raided, and everyone who tried to stop this important action have been captured. Who do you think is being blessed by God?”

Hannah’s body relaxed, fingertips gliding along the edge of the parchment. She breathed in the cool, damp air of the cellar. “It’s all happening,” she muttered. “It’s all happening right now.”

“Yes,” he said. “Everything D’Angelo said would happen is coming true.”

“Have his other prophecies come true?”

“Yes,” he said, “all of them.”

She sat quietly.

“That’s why I had to do what I did,” Morris implored. “The truth of the Firstborn is to honor God on Earth—to protect the innocent and the weak. I had to stand fast in that truth or Thresher would have overtaken us all—destroying the Firstborn. That’s why we have to destroy the evil—completely.”

“That’s why you want to kill Tariq?”

“That’s why it must be done. If the evil is allowed to flourish, then—” He stopped and looked away. Then he turned his eyes on her, challenging. “Have you ever tried honing your ability?” he asked.

Hannah shook her head. “I don’t think I understand.”

“Did your grandfather ever teach you how to use your ability as a Firstborn?”

“Is that possible?”

Morris leaned in toward her. “Do you know why I became the leader of the Domani?”

“No.”

“Because I became the most powerful of the forward-seers.”

“But how?”

He leaned closer still, his voice a whisper. “Because I could see.”

“See what? I’m confused.”

“You know where our gift comes from, right?”

“God.”

“Yes. He shows us what needs to be seen so that His will can be done on Earth. We see the world outside of time.”

“Outside of time?”

“Yes,” he said with a nod, “time is a container that holds humanity, not unlike a fleshly body. It’s a vehicle that carries us forward. But when we are needed, God shows us the world outside of the confines of space and time.”

Hannah nodded, trying to understand.

“You see, when we don’t see clearly enough, there’s only one recourse as a member of the Firstborn—to ask God for more.”