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  Many people were crowding into the stone-built Crusader building, while others continued to run along the main street. As a horse came bolting from a side street, Sam jumped at it, grabbing the mane and trying to vault onto the animal’s bare back. He missed and was dragged for some thirty yards before falling to the dust. Scrambling up, he gazed around him. A huge Wolver was running at him. When Samuel’s hand swept down to his holster, it was empty.

  A shotgun blast came from the right and above. Hit full in the chest, the creature staggered back, letting out a bellow of pain. Samuel glanced up to see the youngster Wallace Nash leaning out of a window above him. “Better get in here, Sam!” shouted Wallace. Samuel ran up the three short steps to the main door and swiftly moved inside. Out on the street the wounded beast bounded forward to hurl itself at the door, which broke into two pieces as it burst open. Samuel fled for the stairs, taking them two at a time, the beast just behind him. Wallace Nash appeared at the top. “Drop, Sam!” shouted the youngster.

  Samuel threw himself down as the shotgun blasted, and he heard the body of the beast tumbling back behind him. Scrambling up, he joined the redheaded youngster at the top of the stairs. He did not know Wallace well, but remembered that the boy was a sprinter who had once outrun Edric Scayse’s racing horse, Rimfire.

  “Thanks, Wallace,” he said as the youngster thumbed two shells into the double-barreled gun.

  “We got to get out of here,” said Wallace. “This old bird gun ain’t going to hold them, that’s for damn sure. Where’s your pistol?” he asked, glancing down at the empty scabbard.

  Samuel was embarrassed. “Dropped it out on the street. I panicked.”

  Wallace nodded, then reached into his belt to pull clear an old single-action Hellborn pistol.

  Fresh screaming erupted from the street, and the two young men ran through to the upper front room and looked out the window. A young woman carrying a baby was hammering on the door of the Crusader building, but the people inside were too frightened to let her in.

  A beast loped toward her.

  “Over here!” shouted Samuel. The woman spun, and Samuel could see her gauging the distance against the speed of the Wolver. She would never make it …

  But she tried.

  Wallace leveled the shotgun and let fly with both barrels, taking the beast high in the shoulder and spinning it. Regaining its balance, it lurched after the woman. Samuel pushed open the window and climbed out. To the eternal regret of his mother, Beth, he had never been blessed with great courage or stamina. Samuel believed he had failed her in almost everything. Taking a deep breath, he jumped, landing heavily and twisting his ankle. The woman was almost at the steps, the beast just behind her, as Samuel moved left and fired, his first bullet smashing into the creature’s open mouth. His second took it in the throat, and blood sprayed from the exit wound. Still it came on.

  In that instant Samuel McAdam knew he was going to die, and an icy calm settled on him.

  The woman ran by him without a glance, her baby screaming. Other beasts were gathering now. The first creature loomed above Samuel, and he fired twice more, straight into the heart. The Wolver slumped—then its taloned hand slashed out.

  “Get back, Sam!” he heard Wallace shout. The beast fell dead. Something hot and sticky was drenching Sam’s shirt. He glanced down. It was blood gushing from a gaping wound in his throat.

  Samuel fell to his knees, all strength seeping from him. As he toppled sideways, his face struck the hard-packed dirt of the street. There was no pain. I’m dying, he thought dispassionately. This is it. A great weariness settled over him, and an old nursery prayer drifted into his mind. Samuel tried to say it, but there was no time.

  This was the day Dr. Julian Meredith had long dreaded. Isis lay in the wagon, unconscious, her pulse weak and fluttering erratically, her eyelids tinged with blue, her cheeks sunken. With hindsight he knew this day had been coming for several weeks. Her energy was low, and it was becoming an effort even to talk.

  Meredith sat by the bedside as Jeremiah drove the wagon. How long, he wondered, before the end? Leaning forward, he kissed her cold brow. His eyes misted, and a warm tear splashed to the pale cheek below him. When the wagon creaked to a stop, Meredith rose and opened the rear door, climbing down to the ground. Jeremiah looped the reins around the brake handle and joined him.

  “Is she any better?” asked the old man.

  Meredith shook his head. “I think it will be tonight.”

  “Oh, dear,” whispered Jeremiah. “She’s such a sweet lass. There’s no justice, is there, Doctor?”

  “Not in cases like hers,” Meredith agreed.

  Jeremiah built a fire and carried two chairs down from the wagon. “I still don’t understand what’s killing her,” he said. “Cancer I can understand, or a weak heart. Not this.”

  “It’s very rare,” explained Meredith. “In the old world it used to be called Addison’s disease. We all have a defense system inside our bodies which can isolate germs and destroy them. In the case of Isis the system malfunctioned and began to turn on itself, destroying the adrenal glands, among others.”

  “Then she is killing herself,” said Jeremiah.

  “Yes. The old race found cortisonal substitutes, and these kept Addisonians alive. These days we do not know how they were manufactured.”

  Jeremiah sighed and glanced around at the vast, empty prairie. They had left the other wagons outside Domango when Isis had fallen sick and were heading now for Pilgrim’s Valley, searching for a miracle. The Apostle Saul was the last of the Deacon’s disciples, and it was said that he had performed miracles in Unity years before. When they had heard he was in Pilgrim’s Valley, Jeremiah had left the others and headed the wagon across the prairie.

  They were only two days from the valley now, but those two days might just as well be two centuries. For Isis was dying before their eyes.

  Jeremiah lapsed into silence and fed the blaze as Meredith returned to the wagon. Isis lay so still, he thought she had passed away, but he held a small mirror beneath her nostrils, and the merest ghost of vapor appeared on the surface. Taking her hand, he began to talk to her, saying the words he had longed to speak. “I love you, Isis. Almost from the first day I saw you. You had a basket of flowers, and you were walking down the main street offering them for sale. The sun was shining, and your hair was like a cap of gold. I bought three bunches. They were daffodils, I think.” He fell silent and squeezed her fingers; there was no answering pressure, and he sighed. “And now you are going to leave me and journey where I cannot follow.” His voice broke, and the tears flowed. “I find that hard to take. Terribly hard.”

  When Meredith climbed down from the wagon, Jeremiah had a pot of stew on the fire and was stirring it with a wooden spoon. “Thought I saw a Wolver,” said the old man, “over there in the trees.” Meredith squinted but could see nothing except the breeze flickering over the top of the grass, causing the stems to imitate the action of waves on an ocean.

  From the distance came an eerie howling. “Do you have a gun?” asked Meredith.

  “Nope. Gave it to Malcolm. Said I’d pick it up when next we met.”

  Meredith sat down and extended his fingers to the blaze. Camped in the open, there was little heat to be felt, for the breeze dispersed it swiftly. Normally they would have found a sheltered place to set the fire, against a rock or even a fallen tree. But the oxen were tired, and there was good grass here.

  “I don’t suppose we’ll need a weapon,” said Meredith. “I have never heard of a single instance of Wolvers attacking humans.”

  “What will you do, Doctor, when …?” Jeremiah stumbled to silence, unable to finish the sentence.

  “When she dies?” Meredith rubbed his hand over his face. His eyes were tired, his heart heavy. “I shall leave the Wanderers, Jeremiah. I’ll find a little town that has no doctor, and I’ll settle there. I only joined you to be close to Isis. You?”

  “Oh, I’ll keep traveling. I
like to see new land, fresh scenery. I love to bathe in forgotten streams and watch the sun rise over unnamed mountains.”

  A silver-gray form moved out from the grass and stood unnoticed some twenty yards from the wagon. Meredith was the first to see the Wolver, and he tapped Jeremiah on the shoulder.

  The old man looked up. “Come join us, little friend,” he said.

  The Wolver hesitated, then loped forward to squat by the fire. “I am Pakia,” it said, head tilting to one side, long tongue lolling from its mouth.

  “Welcome, Pakia,” said Jeremiah. “Are you hungry? The stew is almost ready.”

  “No hunger. But very frightened.”

  Jeremiah chuckled. “You have nothing to fear from us. I am Jeremiah, and this is my friend, Doctor Meredith. We do not hunt your people.”

  “I fear you not,” said the Wolver. “Where do you go?”

  “Pilgrim’s Valley,” answered the old man.

  The Wolver shook her head vehemently. “No go there. Much evil. Much death. All dead.”

  “A plague?” asked Meredith. Pakia tilted her head, her eyes questioning the word. “A great sickness?”

  “Not sickness. The Blood Beasts come, kill everyone. I smell them now,” she added, lifting her long snout into the air. “Far away but coming closer. You have guns?”

  “No,” said Meredith.

  “Then you will die,” said Pakia, “and my Beth will die.”

  “Who is Beth?” asked Jeremiah.

  “Good friend. Farms land south of here. You go to her; she has guns. Maybe then you live. She live.”

  Pakia stood and loped away without another word. “Curious creature,” said Meredith. “Was it a male or a female?”

  “Female,” said Jeremiah, “and she was jumpy. I’ve traveled these lands for years, and I know of no Blood Beasts. Maybe she meant lions or bears. I shouldn’t have given Malcolm my rifle.”

  “What do you think we should do?”

  Jeremiah shrugged. “We’ll finish the stew and then head for the farm.” The howling came again, and Jeremiah shivered. “Let’s forget the stew,” he said.

  Beth McAdam was dozing when Tobe Harris tapped lightly on the door frame. She came awake instantly and rubbed her eyes. “Been a long day, Tobe,” she said.

  The workman doffed his cap and grinned. “There’s still some old bulls up in the thickets. Take a sight of work to move ’em out.”

  Beth stretched her back and rose. Tobe Harris had arrived two weeks before on a worn-out horse that was in better condition than he was. A small wiry man with a stoop, he had worked as a miner in Purity and as a horse breaker on a ranch near Unity and had been a sailor for four years before that. On an impulse he had decided to ride into what used to be termed the wild lands and make his fortune. When he had arrived at Beth McAdam’s farm, he had been out of food, out of Barta coin, and just about out of luck. Beth had taken an instant liking to the little man; he had a cheeky grin that took years from his weather-beaten face and bright blue eyes that sparkled with humor.

  Tobe ran a hand through his thinning black hair. “I seen a wagon heading this way,” he said. “Wanderers, most like. Guess they’ll stop by and beg a little food.”

  “How many?” asked Beth.

  “One wagon, all brightly painted. Ox-drawn. Two men riding it.”

  “Let’s hope one of them’s a tinker. I’ve some pots that need repairing and some knives that are long overdue for a sharpening. Tell them they’re welcome to camp in the south meadow; there’s a good stream there.”

  Tobe nodded and backed out of the door as Beth took a long, deep breath. With winter coming, she had needed a good workman. Her few cattle had wandered high into the hills, deep into the thickets and the woods. Driving them out was at least a four-man job, but Tobe worked as hard as any three workmen she had employed before. Samuel used to help, but he now spent all his time in the settlement, studying to be a Crusader. Beth sighed; they could not meet now without harsh words.

  “I raised him too hard,” she said aloud.

  Tobe reappeared. “Begging your pardon, Frey McAdam, but there’s a rider coming. Two to be precise. Riding double on an old mule. I think one of them’s ill—or drunk.”

  Beth nodded, then moved to the mantel, lifting down the old rifle. Levering a shell into the breech, she stepped out into the fading light. The riders were coming down from the mountains, and even from there she could see the sweat-streaked flanks of the mule. In the waning light she could just make out a white beard on one of the riders; the other looked familiar, but his head and upper body were bent low across the mule’s neck, the old man holding him steady. The mule pounded up, and the old man slid from its back, turning to support his companion. Beth saw that it was Josiah Broome and, laying the rifle aside, ran forward to help.

  “He’s been shot,” said White-beard.

  “Tobe!” yelled Beth. The wiry workman came forward, and together they lowered the wounded man. Broome was unconscious, his face pale, the gleam of fever sweat on his brow. “Get him to my room,” said Beth, leaving the two men to carry Broome into the house.

  “Pick up your rifle, Frey McAdam,” said White-beard. “There’s killers close by.”

  They laid Broome in Beth’s wide bed and covered him with a thick blanket. White-beard moved outside. “What killers?” she asked.

  “The most terrible creatures you’ll ever see,” he told her. “Huge Wolvers. Right about now they’ll be moving in on Pilgrim’s Valley. I hope the Crusaders there are good, steady men.”

  “Wolvers would never attack anyone,” said Beth suspiciously.

  “I agree with you, but these aren’t just Wolvers. Is that rifle fully loaded?”

  “Be pretty useless if it wasn’t!” she snapped. The old man was tall and commanding, but there was about him an unconscious arrogance that nettled Beth McAdam. If there were such beasts as he described, she certainly had never seen one, and she had lived near Pilgrim’s Valley for twenty years. “How did Josiah get his wound?” she asked, changing the subject.

  “Shot down in his home. They killed Daniel Cade, too.”

  “The Prophet? My God! Why?”

  “The same reason Bull Kovac was killed. Broome was going to give Oath for you.”

  “That makes no sense,” she said. “What difference could it make?”

  “This is rich land, Frey McAdam. Saul has taken to gathering such land to himself through Jacob Moon and his men. I should have seen what was happening. But I had other, more pressing problems on my mind. I’ll deal with Saul—if we survive what is coming.”

  “You’ll deal with Saul. By what right?”

  White-beard turned, his gaze locking to hers. “I made him, Beth; he is my responsibility. I am the Deacon.”

  “This is insane,” stormed Beth. “Giant Wolvers and supposed murders are bad enough. You’re obviously deranged.”

  “Begging your pardon, Frey McAdam,” said Tobe, “but he is the Deacon. I seen him at Unity Cathedral last year; it’s him, all right.”

  The Deacon smiled at Tobe. “I remember you,” he said. “You worked with horses, and you brought in the young rider with the broken back. He was healed, I recall.”

  “Yes, sir, Deacon. Then he got killed in a flash flood.”

  Beth’s anger flared. “If you are the Deacon, then you are not welcome in my house,” she said icily. “Because of you a good man saw his church burned, his people slaughtered. And he’s out there now, suffering. By God, you should be ashamed of yourself.”

  “And I am, lady,” he said softly. “I gave orders that the Wolvers should be moved back away from human settlements. My reasons will be all too clear within days. There is an enemy coming with powers you could not dream of; he has mutated Wolvers into creatures of colossal power. But yes, I am ashamed. It does not matter that I did what I thought was right. Whatever evil was done in my name is my responsibility, and I will live with that. As to not being welcome …” He spread his hands. “I c
an do nothing about that save ask you to bear with me. Only I can fight what is coming.”

  “Why should I believe that?” countered Beth. “Everything you have is built on lies. The Jerusalem Man never predicted your coming. Shall I tell you how I know?”

  “I’ll tell you,” he said mildly. “Because Jon Shannow, after sending the Sword of God through to destroy Atlantis, came back here to live a life as Jon Cade, a preacher. He lived with you for many years, but you tired of his purity and cast him out. Now understand this: Nothing was built on lies. Shannow brought me down from the sky, but more than that, he is my reason for being! He is why I am here, at this time, to fight this enemy. It is not necessary that you believe me, Beth. It is only necessary that you put aside your disbelief.”

  “I have a friend out looking for him,” she said, her words cold. “He’ll come back. Then you can explain it to him!”

  An eerie howl echoed in the valley. It was answered by several others.

  “I saw a wagon to the north,” said the Deacon. “I suggest you invite the occupants to join you. They may not survive the night if you don’t.”

  11

  When the farmer seeds his field with corn, he knows that the weeds will grow also. They will grow faster than his crop, the roots digging deep, drawing the nutrients from the land. Therefore, if he is wise, he patrols his field, uprooting the weeds. Every human heart is like that farmer’s field. Evil lurks there, and a wise man will search out the weeds of evil. Beware the man who says, “My heart is pure,” for evil is growing within him unchecked.

  The Wisdom of the Deacon

  Chapter XIV

  THE CITY WAS vast and silent, the shutters on open windows flapping in the early-morning breeze, open doors yawning and creaking. The only other sound to break the silence was the steady clopping of the horses. Shannow was in the lead, Amaziga and Sam sharing the horse behind, with Gareth bringing up the rear.

  The great south gate of Babylon was open, but there were no guards, no sentries patrolling the high walls. The silence was eerie, almost threatening.