Bloodstone Read online

  Could the man be an angel? Could the whole sorry Bible fairy tale be fact? No. He could not believe that. If God exists, then why does he not strike me down? Christ alive, I’ve killed enough people! He was quick enough to strike down Jenny, and she had never harmed anyone.

  It’s all random, he thought. A game of chance.

  The strong survive; the weak die.

  Bullshit! We all die someday.

  The town was unnaturally quiet. The previous day’s shooting had astonished them. True, Dillon had been a feared man, but more than that he had been full of life. A loud, powerful bull of a man radiating strength and certainty. Yet in the space of a few heartbeats he had been cut down by a stranger who had stood in the street and named their sins.

  Jacob Moon had arrived in Domango three hours after the killing, when the hunters had just been returning. Then a rider had come in from the Hankin farm. Two more men dead. The Jerusalem Man? Probably, thought Moon.

  Still, sooner or later he would have Shannow in his sights. Then that problem would be over.

  Moon smiled and recalled the woman. With Dillon’s blood still staining the street, she had walked into the Crusader office and approached him. “I understand, sir, that you are a Jerusalem Rider.” Moon had nodded, his hooded eyes raking the slender lines of her body. “My name is Isis. I have come to you for justice, sir. Our doctor, Meredith, has been wrongly imprisoned. Would you release him?”

  Moon had leaned back in his chair and thrown a glance at the stocky Crusader standing by the gun rack. The man cleared his throat. “They’re Movers,” he said. “They come in beggin’.”

  “That is not true,” said Isis. “Doctor Meredith merely erected a sign saying that he was a doctor and inviting people to visit him.”

  “We already got a doctor,” snapped the Crusader.

  “Let him go,” said Moon.

  The Crusader stood silent for a moment, then lifted a ring of keys from a hook by the gun rack and moved back through to the rear of the building.

  “I thank you, sir,” said Isis. “You are a good man.”

  Moon smiled then, but he said nothing. He glanced up as the Crusader brought out Meredith, a tall young man with sandy hair and a weak face. Moon wondered if he was the girl’s lover and idly pictured them coupling. “They knew Dillon’s killer,” said the Crusader. “That’s a fact.”

  Moon turned his stare to the woman. “He was wounded,” she said. “We found him near to death and nursed him. Then, later, when we were attacked, he fought off the raiders.” Moon nodded but remained silent. “Then he killed the Oath Taker from Purity. After that he rode away. I don’t know where.”

  “Did he say his name?” asked Moon.

  “Yes. He said he was Jon Shannow. Our leader, Jeremiah, thinks the wound to his head has confused him. He has no memory, you see. He cannot remember who shot him or why. Jeremiah believes he has taken refuge in the identity of the Jerusalem Man.”

  The sandy-haired young man stepped alongside Isis, putting his arm around her shoulder. The action annoyed Moon, but he remained silent. “The mind is very complex,” said Meredith. “It is likely that his memories of childhood included many stories about Shannow. Now that he is an amnesiac, the mind is trying to piece together those memories. Hence his belief that he is the fabled Jerusalem Man.”

  “So,” said Moon softly, “he does not remember where he is from?”

  “No,” said Isis. “He struck me as a lonely man. Will you treat him with understanding when you find him?”

  “You can rely on that,” promised Jacob Moon.

  Shannow watched the screen, noting landmarks and listening as Lucas talked of the lands of the Bloodstone. Mostly the terrain was unfamiliar to Shannow, but occasionally he would see in the distance the shape of a mountain that seemed to strike a chord in his memory.

  “You must remember, Mr. Shannow, that this is a world gone mad. Those disciples who follow the Bloodstone receive great gifts, but for the vast majority the future is only to die to serve his hunger. We will not have long to find Samuel Archer. The jeep will get us within range within a day. We will then have perhaps another twenty-four hours to save him.”

  “Jeep?” queried Shannow.

  “The vehicle outside. It can travel at around sixty miles per hour over difficult terrain. And no Devourer or horseman will catch it.”

  Shannow said nothing for a moment. Then: “You can see many places and many people.”

  “Yes, I have extensive files,” agreed Lucas.

  “Then show me Jon Shannow.”

  “Amaziga does not wish you to see your past, Mr. Shannow.”

  “The lady’s wishes are not at issue. I am asking you to show me.”

  “What would you like to see?”

  “I know who I was twenty years ago, when I fought the lizard-men and sent the Sword of God through to destroy Atlantis. But what happened then? How did I use those years? And why am I still relatively young?”

  “Wait for a moment,” said Lucas. “I will assemble the information.”

  Shannow immediately felt a sensation he had long forgotten, and it surprised him. His stomach trembled, and he could feel his heart beating wildly. In that moment nameless terrors seemed to be clawing at him from deep within his mind, and he realized with a sickening certainty that he did not want to know. His mouth was dry, and he found himself breathing too quickly, becoming dizzy. The desire rose in him to stop the machine, to command it to silence. “I will not be a coward,” he whispered. Gripping the arms of the chair, he sat rigid as the screen flickered and he saw himself on a tower of rock, the Sword of God blazing across the sky. The man on the rock slumped down, his black and silver beard darkening.

  “That,” came Lucas’s voice, “is the moment when you regained youth. The last fractions of Sipstrassi power seeping through the tower, regenerating aging tissue.” The scene shifted to Pilgrim’s Valley, and Shannow watched as the preacher Jon Cade gave his first sermon, listened to the words and the message of hope and peace. Beth McAdam was sitting in the front row, her eyes on the speaker, the light of love shining in them.

  Sadness engulfed the Jerusalem Man … the sadness of love, the grief of bereavement. His love for Beth came roaring from his subconscious to rip at his heart. Forcing himself to stare at the screen, he watched the passing of the years, saw himself struck down by Shem Jackson, and felt again the numbing shame that came from having the strength to walk away. He heard once more the man’s scornful laughter behind him.

  At the last he saw the burning of the church and the murder of the Wolvers. “Enough,” he said softly. “I want to see no more.”

  “You remember it?” asked the machine.

  “I remember it.”

  “You are a man of extremes, Mr. Shannow, and great inner strength. You cannot walk the middle ground, and you have never learned how to compromise. You became a preacher, and you preached of love and understanding—at its best a gentle doctrine. You could not be a man of violence and preach such a doctrine; therefore, you put aside your guns and lived it, using the same iron control that you enjoyed as a brigand slayer.”

  “But it was a fraud,” said Shannow. “I was living a lie.”

  “I doubt that. You gave it everything you could—even to losing the woman you loved. That is a commitment beyond most men. Even iron, however, can be ripped apart. When the raiders burned the church, the iron gave way. You pursued them and slew them. The mind is a very sensitive creature, Mr. Shannow. To all intents and purposes you had betrayed everything you had stood for during those twenty years. So the mind, in self-protection, threw the memories of those years into a box and held it from your view. The question is, Now that the box has been opened, who are you? Are you Jon Cade, preacher and man of God, or are you Jon Shannow, fearless killer?”

  Shannow ignored the question and rose. “Thank you, Lucas. You have been of great service to me.”

  “It was my pleasure, Mr. Shannow.”

  Ou
tside the light was beginning to fade, the desert heat abating. Shannow wandered to the paddock and climbed to the fence, watching the four horses cropping grass. They were standing in two pairs, nose to tail, protecting each other’s faces from the swarms of flies that surrounded them.

  He drew one of the long, blue-barreled pistols.

  The question is, Now that the box has been opened, who are you? Are you Jon Cade, preacher and man of God, or are you Jon Shannow, fearless killer?

  As Nestor Garrity and Clem Steiner were riding toward Purity and Jon Shannow stood alone on the streets of Domango, the Apostle Saul urged his tired mount toward the ruined city.

  Saul was seething with suppressed fury. Word had reached him that the Deacon had survived Moon’s attack, that the man killed had been Geoffrey, the Deacon’s secretary. The council in Unity was in turmoil. The Deacon was missing.

  Missing! My God, thought Saul, what if he knows it was me?

  A mosquito stung Saul’s right leg, and he slapped it angrily, the sound causing the horse to shy. He swore. The heat was unbearable, and stinking horse sweat had seeped through his trousers. His back ached from hours in the saddle, and the ancient city seemed no closer. He swore again.

  The Deacon was alive! Josiah Broome was alive! Jon Shannow was alive! It was all coming to nothing, all the years of careful planning unraveling before his eyes.

  I’ve always been cursed, he thought, remembering his childhood in Chicago, the taunts he had taken from his fellow schoolchildren over his lack of size and his weasel features, the mockery from girls who would not be seen dead with a “runt like you.” And always in his work there were others who would succeed, moving past him on the promotional ladder, men and women with far less talent. Always it was Saul Wilkins who was overlooked. Little Saul.

  It was not as if he did not play the game. He sucked up to those above him, laughed at their jokes, supported their endeavors, and worked hard to be as good as anyone. Yet never did he gain the recognition he craved.

  Now it was happening again, this time to the tall, handsome, golden-haired Apostle Saul. Overlooked by the Deacon, he had for the first time in his life planned for the great gamble. And he was failing.

  As he had always failed …

  No, not always, he thought. There had been the golden time at the tabernacle when he had first found God. Laid off from his job in the north, Saul had moved to Florida. One Thursday afternoon late in February he had been driving along I-4 West and had pulled in for a coffee at a fast-food outlet. There had been a trailer parked there, and several young people had been handing out leaflets. A girl had offered one to Saul. It was an invitation to a Bible picnic being held near Kissimmee the following Sunday. The girl’s smile had been radiant, and she had called him “Brother.”

  That Sunday Saul had attended the picnic with some three hundred other people. He had enjoyed himself, and the sermon from the fat preacher had touched a chord in him with its emphasis on the meek and the lowly. God’s love was very special for them.

  Short of friends, his layoff money running out, Saul had joined the small church. It had been the happiest time of his life, especially after the Deacon had arrived and appointed him as full-time church treasurer. Jason had been set for the role, had coveted it, and he was tall and handsome. Saul had been convinced that yet again he would be overlooked. But no. The Deacon had called him in and calmly offered him the post. Jason, bitter and vengeful, had quit the church.

  Good days. Great days, Saul realized.

  Then had come the fateful flight and the end of the world he had known. Even then there were joys ahead, the gifts of the Sipstrassi, a handsome body, endless women.

  I had it all, thought Saul. But the Sipstrassi was running out, the Deacon was getting older, and soon it would all end. Without the Sipstrassi I would be little Saul Wilkins again, bald and bent, peering at the world through watery eyes. Who would take me seriously? What would I do?

  The answer was simple. Become rich in this new world. Take control like the hard, ruthless men of the old world. Control land and resources, oil, silver, gold. And all the while search for Sipstrassi.

  The Deacon had found his hoard soon after arriving. He had ridden off into the wild lands and returned with a bag of stones.

  Oh, God, thought Saul, there must have been thirty of them! He had asked him where he had found them.

  “On my travels,” the Deacon had answered with a smile.

  Then, the previous year, a man had come to Unity who claimed to know the Deacon. He had been ushered into Saul’s office. He was an old prospector who said he had met the Deacon during his wanderings in the land beyond the Wall. “Whereabouts?” Saul had asked.

  “Near Pilgrim’s Valley—you know,” the man had said, “where the Lord guided your flying machine to land.”

  Somewhere near here the Deacon had discovered the stones of power.

  There must be more! Please God, let there be more!

  With enough Sipstrassi he could still gain power. Just five stones! Three. Dear God, help me find them!

  He was close enough to see the towering columns of stone that marked the southern gate of the Atlantean city. One was taller than the other, reaching almost sixty feet. Once there had been a lintel stone between them, but it had fallen to the paved area below, shattering into fragments.

  For several moments Saul forgot his mission as he gazed over the miles and miles of what had once been a magnificent city. There were statues in marble, mostly toppled and broken, but some remaining still on their plinths, stone eyes staring at this latest observer of their silent grief. Many of the buildings were still standing, seemingly untouched by thousands of years on the ocean floor. Saul rode on, his horse’s hooves clattering on the paved streets, the sound echoing eerily.

  The Deacon had told him that there was an ancient king of Atlantis named Pendarric. It was he who had brought about the doom of his people, the earth toppling, drowning the empire under a tidal wave of colossal proportions.

  Saul rode his tired mount up a long hill, toward a multi-turreted palace. The horse was breathing heavily, its flanks white with foaming sweat. At the top he dismounted and tethered the poor creature in the sunshine. The horse stood with its head hung low. Ignoring the beast’s discomfort, Saul strode into the palace. The floor was covered in thick dry dust that had once been silt. Close to the windows, where the wind had blown away the dust, Saul could see evidence of an elaborate mosaic on the floor, deep blues and reds in shifting patterns. There was no furniture or any sign of wood. That had long since been destroyed, probably adding to the dust. But there were statues of warriors in breastplates and helms, reminding Saul of pictures he had seen of Greek soldiers during the battle for Troy.

  He walked on through many doorways until he came to a vast, round hall at the center of which stood a circle of beautifully crafted rectangular stones standing vertically. The dust was everywhere, and as he walked, it rose up around him, drying his throat and causing him to cough.

  Slowly he searched the hall but found nothing except the golden hilt of a ceremonial dagger, which he dropped into the pocket of his coat. Returning to the horse, he took a drink from his canteen. From there he could see even more powerfully the vastness of this ancient city. Ruins as far as the eye could see, stretching in all directions.

  Despair touched him. Even if the stones are here, how will I find them?

  Then an idea came to him. It was brilliant in its simplicity, and although he did not know it, Saul Wilkins had arrived at a conclusion that had evaded thousands of brilliant men in the past. He licked his lips and fought to control his rising excitement.

  Sipstrassi power could do anything! Could it not therefore be used like a magnet, calling upon other stones, drawing them to it or at the very least guiding him to where they lay hidden?

  Saul delved into his pocket, pulling clear the stone. Only three threads of gold remained. Would they be enough? And where to test his theory?

  The
stones were too powerful to have been owned by many people in the city. Only the rich would have had access, and the man who had owned this palace must have been rich indeed.

  The circular hall was at the very center of the building. That is where to begin, thought Saul. Hurrying back through the empty palace, he made his way to the center of the circle of stones. There he paused. How to use the power? Think, man!

  Clenching the stone tightly in his fist, he pictured a full golden stone and willed it to come to him. Nothing happened. The stone in his fist did not grow warm, as was usual when power was drawn from it. What he could not know was that there was no Sipstrassi left in that ancient ruin. He tightened his grip. A small, sharp fragment of the stone bit into his palm. Saul swore and opened his fingers. A tiny bead of blood swelled there, touching the stone. The bright yellow threads darkened, turning red-gold in the dim light.

  But now the stone was warm. Saul tried again. Holding up his fist, he willed the stone to seek out its fellows. And the new Bloodstone obeyed, sending its power through the gateway of the circle.

  Violet light filled the air around him. Saul was exultant: it was working! The light was blinding, and when it cleared, he saw a strange scene. Some thirty yards away a powerful man was sitting on a huge golden throne, staring directly at Saul. The man’s skin was deep red and seemed to be decorated with thin black lines. Saul glanced over his shoulder. Behind him everything was as it should be, the stone circle and the dust-covered hall. But ahead was this curious man.

  “Who are you?” asked the tattooed man, his voice rich and deep.

  “Saul Wilkins.”

  “Saul … Wilkins,” echoed the man. “Let me read your mind, Saul Wilkins.” Saul felt a curious warmth creep into his head, flowing through him. When it finally receded, he felt lost and alone. “I don’t need you, Saul Wilkins,” said the tattooed man. “I need Jacob Moon.”

  A shape reared up before Saul, obscuring his view. He had a fraction of a second to register sleek gray fur, bloodred eyes, and yellow-stained fangs in a gaping maw. There was no time to scream. Talons ripped into his chest, and the terrible mouth opened before him, the fangs closing on his face.