The Red Cross of Gold I:. The Knight of Death (67 page)

“He said…” Mark stopped. He couldn’t tell her
what Lucio had said. Lucio had said nothing. “He said…” he tried
again and then stopped.

There was no need to say more as the
realization of what he was not saying sunk into her brain.

She stood staring at him and then she was
leaping on him again, but not with kisses this time. She hit him in
the stomach with her fist then slapped him surprisingly hard on the
face. He grabbed his side, but there was little real pain. She
grabbed his arms and banged her forehead against his chest in
frustration, all the while telling him how much she hated him for
thinking such a thing of her. Contrary to his belief, she was not a
whore and she did not go around throwing herself into bed with
strangers. That she had somehow known from the moment she saw him
that he was the one she wanted to spend her life with, that he was
everything she had ever dreamed of. And now he had hurt her more
than she had ever imagined possible. Now she hated him! Hated all
of them! Cecile had been right. Etceteras. Etceteras. Et… cet… te…
ras...

This reaction, he could deal with. This
emotion was all too familiar to him. He blinked at her in confusion
momentarily and then suddenly took her wrists in his hands, holding
her easily in place. She continued to shout and kick at him. This
was much more normal. He understood this. Plain and simple rage.
Hatred. Rage. Fighting.

He pushed her hands behind her back, bringing
her close to him and then forced her back and down until she lay on
the floor beneath him. This was how it always was. There was no
love here. Only hatred. She hated him. He hated her. A familiar red
haze clouded his vision as he began to pull her clothes from her
with one hand while she kicked and screamed at him. It was just too
easy. Too easy. He kissed her neck and she stopped screaming. Too
easy. He covered her mouth with his and she stopped screaming. He
let go of her hands and she pushed against him. Suddenly she
relaxed under him and wrapped her arms around his neck. He froze.
This was not right. Not the right reaction at all. His desire to
hurt her fled from him, leaving him bereft of feelings at all.
Hollow and sick. He raised his head and looked down into her clear
blue eyes. She smiled up at him, astonishing him and he thought he
would throw up.

“You don’t have to play games with me, Mark
Andrew,” she told him breathlessly. “All you have to do is
ask.”

“Ask?” He looked at her in amazement.

“But it certainly is kinky,” she said and
giggled. “You scared the bee-jesus out of me.”

“Kinky?” His mind drifted between reality and
some other plane where he was no longer Mark Andrew, but something
or someone entirely different. He saw a laughing man of Arab
descent wearing a blue turban fastened with a huge yellow gemstone.
He felt himself go limp from head to toe and everywhere in between.
Cold sweat stood out on his brow.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she frowned at him when he
relaxed on her. “I didn’t mean to spoil the effect it for you.”

He rolled over on his back and stared up at
the clouds through the overhead windows, breathing shallowly
through his mouth. He closed his eyes and she got up on her knees
next to him. He could not believe what had almost happened… again.
His soul had to be as black as the pits of hell.

“Oh, this is a bad cut,” she said as she
looked closely at his hip where Beaujold had slashed through his
pants with his broadsword. “Does it hurt?”

“Not nearly as bad as my heart,” he told her
and put one hand on his chest where he could feel his own heart
pounding. She had no idea what had almost happened to her. It would
never work between them. He really was dangerous just like Cecile
had said. He had some kind of sickness in his mind. Something that
he felt he had only just discovered about himself and something
that he intended to remedy… one way or another. Simon didn’t have
his particular problem in his mystical bag of healing tricks.

He allowed his mind to drift in a blurry
state of confusion while trying to calm his heart. It was very nice
here in the tiny observatory. Yet, only a few hundred yards away,
three Knights who would have his head waited for him to return and
somewhere out there was another, waiting for him to make a mistake
and there were others if these failed to accomplish the mission.
More than he cared to think about. But the observatory seemed
somehow displaced from everything else like an impenetrable
fortress that no one could breach. A dozen such places flashed
through his mind and he saw different observatories made of
different materials, situated in different places. Mud bricks,
stone, wooden. All set high on cleared mounds, hills or mountain
sides. Each one surrounded by silvery circles of water illuminated
by the light of the full moon. Was he an astronomer as well as an
alchemist, assassin and rapist?

“I would really like to check that out,” she
told him quietly and he realized that she had been talking to him
about his wounds for several seconds. She scooted around on the
floor and pulled off his boots, then started unbuttoning his
pants.

“Check what out?” he asked in alarm and
grabbed her hands, thinking of what had just happened, or more
precisely what had not happened and his subsequent thoughts about
Simon d’Ornan.

“That cut on your leg, silly,” she giggled
and brushed his hands away. “And I need to look at your stomach and
your back. Those were awful wounds. And if there is any time left,
I’ll examine your other… parts.”

“Trust me. I know how my other parts are
doing,” he rolled his head back and forth on the hard floor and
began to laugh.

She stopped what she was doing and looked at
him in surprise. It was the first time she remembered hearing him
actually laugh out loud. It was a pleasing sound and suited him
very well. She could imagine him laughing at a great many things,
but this was not funny. Perhaps his sense of humor was as morbid as
his trade.

“What’s so funny, Chevalier du Morte?” She
frowned at him and goosed him in his ribs. “Did you think I was
going to take advantage of you… again?” She laughed at him.

“No! Yes! I mean, would you? I am at your
mercy, but remember, I’m injured so you must be gentle.” He
couldn’t remember the last time he had truly laughed aloud. The
sound of it was strange in his own ears. She crawled over him,
carefully avoiding his hip and lay next to him on the hard wooden
floor. He kissed her feverishly on her neck and face and the world
seemed to retreat, leaving them in their own private dimension.

“Don’t you ever worry about anything
important?” he whispered in her ear and wrapped his arms around
her. “You haven’t even asked me about what happened. We may be
killed any moment.” His words were incongruent with his actions. He
didn’t seem to be incapacitated in the least, nor did he seem
overly concerned about dying at the moment. In fact, he seemed
oblivious to the world outside their tiny sanctuary.

“The Indians like to say ‘It’s a good day to
die’. I don’t care what happened. All that matters is that you are
here with me now,” she told him softly. “Just love me before it’s
too late.”

((((((((((((()))))))))))))

D’Brouchart sat in the leather armchair in
the library with a glass of brandy in his hand. Montague stood in
front of one of the tall bookshelves, perusing the titles of the
numerous volumes there as if he were in a public library. Cecile
leaned against the desk with her arms folded across her stomach.
They were waiting for Maxie to return with the Chevalier d’Epee.
Sir Montague kept clearing his throat and coughing as they
conversed, obviously displeased with the topic of conversation. He
purposefully kept his back to the woman as he tried to concentrate
on the titles. He would have given anything for the opportunity to
browse this library at his leisure, but the woman had said
something that made his mind reel and vision blur. She had asked
the Grand Master to explain what she would have to do to become a
Templar, if she decided to try it at a later date.

“You would have to prove yourself,” the Grand
Master was telling her. “Submit to an investigation of your
character. Show that you are worthy of the title. Study the works
of the ancient Church Fathers. Accept the Christ as your Savior.
Learn the secret doctrines kept by the Order. Learn the true nature
of Christianity as the Christ taught it. Learn the history of the
Order… the true history. Learn your trade, so to speak. All those
things and more. Apprenticeship takes years. But there is something
that you must know.”

“And what is that?” She asked him raising one
eyebrow.

“There are vows,” he told her casually. “You
would have to take the vows and pass through the Initiation.”

“I hardly see a problem with your
initiation,” she shrugged. “I have read as much as I could find
about it. Surely there is nothing involved that I could not manage
to survive. Is it true that you spit on the cross, worship a
severed head and exchange obscene kisses?” Montague almost choked
before controlling himself. These were the trumped up charges of
the Roman Church which were used against the Templars during the
Inquisition. Untrue. Lies, misrepresentations and slander that had
brought about the early demise of some very decent men.

“You most likely know nothing of our
Initiation,” he shook his head condescendingly. “What you have read
is but speculation, guesswork, lies at best or, even worse,
accounts taken from the confessions tortured from the Brothers
during the Inquisition and most of them were but servants, not
Initiated Knights or Officers. I believe that there is one part of
the vows that you would find most difficult, my lady.”

“And what part is that?” she asked him,
displaying some amusement at his archaic mannerisms.

“The vow of chastity. The thing that you find
most amusing about us. Never to allow your lips to touch the lips
of women. Avoiding the company of women. Could you do that?” He
raised both eyebrows.

“Wouldn’t it be the lips of any man for me?”
she asked in surprise.

“No, why should it be changed to accommodate
you?” he asked. “I believe that the vow in its present form would
suit you just as it suits the rest of us. You would have to give up
your sex life, mademoiselle. Simply put, wanton association between
men and women is forbidden, but in your case, it would be the same
since you insert yourself into the male role. Once the vow is
taken, we devote ourselves to the Order and the fulfillment of its
goals. If an action does not benefit the entire Order, it is not
indulged simply for pleasure. If an association between the sexes
is for the purpose of procreation, the bearing of children, then
such associations are acceptable, even for Templars. Otherwise,
chastity is required of the Knights of the Order.”

“That’s preposterous!” She laughed. “Your
Knights are not sexless, sir. I can attest to that.”

“My Knights are only human,” he countered.
“That is what confession is for.”

This was the same thing Dambretti had told
her. It didn’t make sense.

“But that is not to say that you would be
free to do as you please and then confess as often as you need to
cover your sins. We are not Born Again Christians, Miss Valentino.
We take our vows quite seriously. The Initiation Rites were
designed to sort the truly devout from the riffraff. The
enlightened from the profane. The wheat from the chaff, so to
speak. You would not make it through the Initiation unless you were
sincere in your devotion to God and, in order to do that, you must
know who God is.”

“But it doesn’t matter,” she shrugged. “I
don’t want to be one of your Knights. I just asked out of
curiosity. I only want to share their immortality. I couldn’t care
less about your vows and your moral responsibilities and your
arcane lifestyle. It holds no interest for me and immortality would
not affect my lifestyle in any way that I know of. I see that it
does nothing to quell the desires of the flesh. I mean, it doesn’t
make you impotent, does it?”

“No, it doesn’t,” he nodded and smiled at
her. “In fact, it keeps most of my Knights in the prime of their
lives. Ready for almost anything… any time.”

Maxie opened the door to the library and
ushered the Knight of the Sword into the room. The man looked
ghastly. His thin hair was muddy and stuck to his head, his clothes
were disheveled and dirty. He had a long rip in the fabric of his
shirt under his right arm and a slash in his left boot just above
his ankle. He limped slowly into the room, pressing his right arm
against his side where Ramsay’s deadly sword had struck at his
ribs. He locked eyes with d’Brouchart briefly and then stood with
his eyes lowered, silently waiting for the Master to speak. He was
outdone and totally ashamed.

“Sir Beaujold, what of Ramsay?” D’Brouchart
spoke to the man in French and then stood up.

“He has escaped me,” Beaujold told him flatly
in French and looked back at the security agent frowning. “I would
have had him, but for the interference of these two… morons.”

“Had him?” Montague turned from the
bookshelf, casting a disdainful look at the man. “You mean you
would have cut off his head without waiting to ascertain his
condition.” The Knight of the Holy City was also fluent in French
and extremely agitated to see the Knight of the Sword in such poor
condition. He was embarrassed for him, ashamed to be associated
with him. The man deserved it as far as he was concerned. The
Frenchman would have killed Ramsay without a decent hearing.

“You will have some explaining to do, sir,”
the Grand Master narrowed his eyes at the Knight of the Sword.
“Where are your Brothers? Your incompetence has embarrassed this
office. I should have placed Dambretti or Barry in charge of the
mission!”