The Last Guardian Read online

  “For you, my friend,” he said.

  Nu picked it up and felt the warmth emanating from within the purse. Then he opened it with trembling fingers and tipped out the stone within. It was not a fragment but a whole stone, round as if polished, golden with thin black veins. He closed his hand around it, feeling the power surging in him. Gently he placed it on the tabletop and gazed at the bald, elderly man before him.

  “With this you could be young again, Bali. You could live for a thousand years. Why? Why would you give it to me?”

  “Because you need it, Nu. And because I never had a friend before.”

  “But it is worth perhaps ten times as much money as is contained in the entire city. I could not possibly accept it.”

  “You must. It is life. The Daggers are seeking you, and you know what that means: torture and death. They have closed the city, and you cannot escape, save by the journey. There is a gateway within the stone circle the princes used to use, to the north of the seventh square. You know it? By the crystal lake? Good. Go there. Use these words and hold the stone high.” He passed Nu a small square of parchment.

  “The enchantment will take you to Balacris. From there you will be on your own.”

  “I have funds in Balacris,” said Nu, “but the Lord wants me to stay and continue to warn the people.”

  “You gave me the secret of the Great One,” Bali told him, “and I accept that His will overrides any wishes of our own. But similarly you have done as He commanded. You gave your warnings, but their ears were closed to you. Added to this, Nu, my friend, I prayed for a way in which I might help you, and now this stone has come into my possession. And yes, I wanted to keep it, but the Great One touched me and let me know it was for you.”

  “How did you come by it?”

  “An Achean trader brought it to my shop. He thought it was a gold nugget and wished to sell it to me in return for the money to buy a new sail.”

  “A sail? With this you could buy a thousand sails, perhaps more.”

  “I told him it was worth half the price of a sail, and he sold it to me for sixty pieces of silver.” Bali shrugged. “It was with such dealings that I first became rich. You must go now. The Daggers surely know we are friends.”

  “Come with me, Bali,” Nu urged. “With this stone we could reach my new ship. We could sail far from the reach of the king and his Daggers.”

  “No. My place is here. My life is here. My death will be here.” Bali rose and led the way to the gate. “One thing more,” he told his friend as they stood in the moonlight. “Last night, as I held the stone, I had a strange dream. I saw a man in golden armor. He came to me and sat beside me. He gave me a message for you; he said you must seek the Sword of God. Does it mean anything to you?”

  “Nothing. Did you recognize him?”

  “No. His face shone like the sun, and I could not look at him.”

  “The Great One will make it plain to me,” said Nu as he reached out to embrace the smaller man. “May He watch over you, Bali.”

  “And you, my friend.”

  Bali silently opened the gate and peered out into the shadows. “It is clear,” he whispered. “Go quickly.”

  Nu embraced him once more, then stepped into the shadows and was gone. Bali rebolted the gate and returned to his room, where he sank into his chair and tried to repress his regrets. With the stone he could have rebuilt his empire and enjoyed eternal youth. Without it? Penury and death.

  He moved back into the main house, stepping over the body of the Achean sailor who had brought him the stone. Bali had not even possessed the sixty silver pieces the man had requested, but he still owned a knife with a sharp blade.

  The sound of crashing timber caused him to spin and run back toward the garden. He arrived to see the gate on its hinges and three dark-armored Daggers moving toward him, their reptilian eyes gleaming in the moonlight, their scaled skin glistening.

  “What … what do you want?” asked Bali, trembling.

  “Where iss hee?”

  “Who?”

  Two of the Daggers moved around the garden, sucking the air through their slitted nostrils.

  “He wass here,” hissed one of them, and Bali backed away. One of the Daggers lifted a strangely shaped club from a scabbard at his side, pointing it at the little trader.

  “Lasst chance. Where iss he?”

  “Where you will never find him,” said Bali, and drawing his knife, he leapt at the Dagger. A sound like thunder came from the small club in the reptile’s hand, and a hammer smote Bali in the chest. The little man was hurled onto his back to the path, where he lay sprawled, staring sightlessly up at the stars.

  A second shot sounded, and the Dagger pitched to the ground, a black hole in his wedge-shaped head. The other creatures spun to see the golden-haired woman, Sharazad. “I wanted Bali alive,” she said softly. “And my orders will be obeyed.”

  Behind her a dozen more Daggers crowded into the garden.

  “Search the house,” she ordered. “Rip it apart. If Nu-Khasisatra escapes, I will see you all flayed alive.”

  7

  OF ALL THE seasons God had granted, it was the spring that Shannow loved above all others, with its heady music of life and growth, its chorus of birdsong, and richly colored flowers pushing back the snow. The air, too, was clean, and a man could drink it in like wine filling his lungs with the essence of life itself.

  Shannow dismounted before the crest of a hill and walked to the summit, gazing out over the rippling grass of the plain. Then he squatted on the ground and scanned the rolling lands before him. In the far distance he could see a wandering herd of cattle, and to the west several mountain sheep grazing on a hillside. He moved back from the skyline and studied the back trail through the mountain valley, memorizing the jagged peaks and narrow ways he had passed. He did not expect to return this way, but if he did, he needed to be sure of his bearings. He unbuckled the thick belt that carried his gun scabbards and removed his heavy topcoat, then slung the guns around his hips once more and buckled the belt in place before rolling his coat and tying it behind his saddle. The stallion was contentedly cropping grass, and Shannow loosened the saddle cinch.

  Taking his Bible, he sat with his back to a boulder, slowly reading the story of King Saul. He always found it hard to avoid sympathizing with the first king of Israel. The man had fought: hard and well to make the nation strong, only to have a usurper preparing to steal his crown. Even at the end, when God had deserted him, Saul still had fought gallantly against the enemy and had died alongside his sons in a great battle.

  Shannow closed the book and took a long cool drink from his canteen. His wounds were almost healed now, and the previous night he had cut the stitches with the blade of his hunting knife. Although he could not yet move his right arm with the customary speed, his strength was returning.

  He tightened the saddle and rode out onto the plain. Here and there were the tracks of horses, cattle, and deer. He rode warily, watching the horizon, constantly hitching himself in the saddle to study the trail behind.

  The plain stretched on endlessly, and the far blue mountains to the south seemed small and insubstantial. A bird suddenly flew up to Shannow’s left. His eyes fastened to it, and he realized that he was following its flight with the barrel of his pistol; the weapon was cocked and ready. He eased the hammer back into place and sheathed the gun.

  A long time ago he would have been delighted with the speed at which he reacted to possible danger, but bitter experience had long since corroded his pride. He had been attacked outside Allion by several men and had killed them all; then a sound from behind had caused him to swivel and fire … and he had killed a child who had happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

  That child would have been a grown man by now, with children of his own. A farmer, a builder, a preacher? No one would ever know. Shannow tried to push the memory from his mind, but it clung to him with talons of fire.

  Who would want to
be you, Shannow? he asked himself. Who would want to be the Jerusalem Man?

  The children of Allion had followed him during his nightly tours, copying the smooth straight-backed walk. They carried wooden guns thrust in their belts, and they worshiped him; they thought it wonderful to be so respected and feared, to have a name that traveled the land ahead of one.

  Is it wonderful, Shannow?

  The people of Allion had been grateful when Jon Shannow had put the brigands to flight—or buried them. But when the town was clean, they had paid him and asked him to move on. And the brigands had returned, as they always did. And perhaps the children followed them around, copying their walks and fighting pretend battles with their wooden guns.

  How far to Jerusalem, Shannow?

  “Over the next mountain,” he answered aloud. The stallion’s ears pricked up, and he snorted. Shannow chuckled as he patted the beast’s neck and urged him into a run over the level ground. It was not a sensible move, he knew; a rabbit hole or a loose rock could cause the horse to stumble and break a leg or throw a shoe. But the wind in his face felt good, and life was never without peril.

  He let the horse have his head for about a half mile, then drew back on the reins as he saw wagon tracks. They were fresh, maybe two days old; Shannow dismounted and examined them. The wheels had bit deep into the dry earth—a family moving south with all its possessions. Silently he wished them good fortune and remounted.

  By midafternoon he came upon the broken wheel. By then he knew a little of the family: There were two children and a woman. The children had gathered sticks and dried cattle droppings for fuel, probably depositing them in a net slung under the tailboard. The woman had walked beside the lead oxen; her feet were small, but her stride was long. There was no sign of a man, but then, thought Shannow, perhaps he is lazy and rides in the wagon. The broken wheel, though, was a mystery.

  Shannow studied the tracks of the horsemen. They had ridden to the camp and changed the wheel, then had returned the way they had come. The woman had stood close to one of the riders, and they had walked together to a boulder. By the wagon tracks Shannow found six brass caps, still with their fulminates intact. At some time during the encounter someone had unloaded a pistol. Why?

  He built a fire on the ashes of the old one and sat pondering the problem. Perhaps the caps were old and the woman—for he knew now there was no man with them—had doubted their effectiveness. But if the caps were old, then so would be the wads and charges, and those had not been stripped clear. He read the track signs once more but could make no more of them save that one of the horsemen had ridden to the right of the main group or had left at a different time. Shannow walked out along the trail, and a hundred paces from the camp he saw a hoofprint from the lone horse that had overstamped a previous print. So, then, the lone rider had left after the main group. He had obviously sat talking with the woman. Why had they not all stayed?

  He prepared some tea and ate the last of the fruit from Shir-ran’s store. As he delved at the bottom of the sack, his fingers touched something cold and metallic, and he drew it out. It was like a coin but made of gold, and on the surface was a raised motif that Shannow could not make out in the gathering dusk. He tucked the coin into his pocket and settled down beside the fire. But the tracks had disturbed him, and sleep would not come; the moon was bright, and he rose, saddled the stallion, and rode off after the horsemen.

  When he came to their campsite, they were gone, but a man lay with his head in the ashes of a dead fire, his face burned. He had been shot several times, and his boots and gun were missing, though the belt and scabbard remained. Shannow was about to return to his horse when he heard a groan. He could hardly believe that life still survived in that ruined body. Unhooking his canteen from the saddle, he knelt by the man, lifting the burned head.

  The man’s eyes opened. “They gone after the woman,” he whispered. Shannow held the canteen to his lips, but he choked and could not swallow. He said no more, and Shannow waited for the inevitable. The man died within minutes.

  Something glinted to Shannow’s right. Under a bush, where it must have fallen, lay the man’s gun. Shannow retrieved it. The caps had been removed; he had had no chance to defend himself against the attack. Shannow pondered the evidence. The men were obviously brigands who had shot down one of their own. Why? Over the woman? But they had all been at the camp. Why leave?

  A group of men had come across a woman and two children by a wagon with a broken wheel. They had mended the wheel and left—save one, who had followed afterward. His pistol had been tampered with. But then, surely he would have known that. When he had arrived, his … friends?… had shot him. Then they had headed back to the woman. There was no sense in it unless he had stopped them from taking the woman in the first place. But then, why would he unload his gun before returning?

  There was only one way to find out.

  Shannow stepped into the saddle and searched for the tracks.

  “Why did God kill my dad?” asked Samuel as he dipped his flat baked bread in the last of his broth. Beth put aside her own plate and looked across the campfire at the boy, his face white in the moonlight, his blond hair shining like silver threads.

  “God didn’t kill him, Sam. The Red Fever done that.”

  “But the preacher used to say that nobody died unless God wanted them to. Then they went to heaven or hell.”

  “That’s what the preacher believes,” she said slowly, “but it don’t necessarily mean it’s true. The preacher used to say that Holy Jesus died less than four hundred years ago, and then the world toppled. But your dad didn’t believe that, did he? He said there were thousands of years between then and now. You remember?”

  “Maybe that’s why God killed him,” said Samuel, “ ’cos he didn’t believe the preacher.”

  “Ain’t nothin’ in life that easy,” Beth told him. “There’s wicked men that God don’t kill, and there’s good men—like your pa—who die out of their time. That’s just life, Samuel; it don’t come with no promises.”

  Mary, who had said nothing throughout, cleared away the dishes, carrying them beyond the campsite and scrubbing them with grass. Beth stood and stretched her back. “You’ve a lot still to learn, Samuel,” she said. “You want something, then you have to fight for it. You don’t give ground, and you don’t complain and whine. You take your knocks and get on with living. Now help your sister clear up and put that fire out.”

  “But it’s cold, Ma,” Samuel protested. “Couldn’t we just sleep out here with the fire?”

  “The fire can be seen for miles. You want them raiders coming back?”

  “But they helped us with the wheel.”

  “Put out the fire, snapper-gut!” she stormed, and the boy leapt to his feet and began to kick earth over the blaze. Beth walked away to the wagon and stood staring out over the plain. She didn’t know if there was a god, and she didn’t care. God had not helped her mother against the brutality of the man she had married, and sure as sin, God had never helped her. Such a shame, she thought. It would have been nice to feel her children were safe under the security of a benign deity, with the faith that all their troubles could be safely left to a supreme being.

  She remembered the terrible beating her mother had suffered the day she died; could still hear the awful sounds of fists on flesh. She had watched as he dragged her body out to the waste ground behind the house and had listened as the spade bit into the earth for an unmarked grave. He had staggered back into the house and stared at her, his hands filthy and his eyes red-streaked. Then he had drunk himself into a stupor and fallen asleep in the heavy chair. “Jus’ you an’ me now,” he had mumbled. The carving knife had slid across his throat, and he had died without waking.

  Beth shook her head and stared up at the stars, her eyes misting with unaccustomed tears. She glanced back at the children as they spread their blankets on the warm ground beside the dead fire. Sean McAdam had not been a bad man, but she did not miss him as the
y did. He had learned early on that his wife did not love him, but he had doted on his children, played with them, taught them, helped them. So devoted had he been that he had not noticed his wife’s affection growing, not until close to the end, when he had lain almost paralyzed in the wagon.

  “Sorry, Beth,” he had whispered.

  “Nothin’ to be sorry for. Rest and get well.”

  For an hour or more he had slept, then his eyes had opened and his hand had trembled and lifted from the blanket. She had taken hold of it, squeezing it firmly.

  “I love you,” he said. “God’s truth.”

  She stared at him hard. “I know. Sleep. Go to sleep.”

  “I … didn’t do too bad … by you and the kids, did I?”

  “Stop talkin’ like that,” she ordered. “You’ll feel better in the morning.”

  He shook his head. “It’s over, Beth. I’m hanging by a thread. Tell me. Please.”

  “Tell you what?”

  “Just tell me …” His eyes closed, and his breathing became shallow.

  She held his hand to her breast and leaned in close. “I love you, Sean. I do. God knows I do. Now, please get well.”

  He had slipped away in the night while the children were sleeping. Beth sat with him for some time but then considered the effect on the children of seeing their father’s corpse. So she had dragged the body from the wagon and dug a grave on the hillside while they slept.

  Lost in her memories now, she did not hear Mary approach. The child laid her hand on her mother’s shoulder, and Beth turned and instinctively took her in her arms.

  “Don’t fret, Mary love. Nothing’s going to happen.”

  “I miss my pa. I wish we were still back home.”

  “I know,” said Beth, stroking the child’s long auburn hair. “But if wishes were horses, then beggars would ride. We just got to move on.” She pushed the girl from her. “Now, it’s important that you remember what I showed you today and do it. There’s no tellin’ how many bad men there are ’twixt here and Pilgrim’s Valley. And I need you, Mary. Can I trust you?”