Their temples had been burned. His brothers had been hunted down, accused of heresy and put to death, until the once-thriving magi had been all but erased from the earth. Until all that remained was one lone disciple. One man with mastery over ancient darkness. And that, quite frankly, was a lonely existence.
Herod had been right about one thing: The world had no use for men like him anymore. But the king was weak. And his greatest weakness was that he thought himself wise. All it had taken was a little enchantment. A little trickery. As ancient spells went, it was relatively simple, and it worked only on those desperate enough to believe its effects. Fortunately, the king was such a man.
In reality, Herod’s illness was irreversible. Whatever curse had coiled itself around his innards was far stronger than anything the magus could conjure. But while he couldn’t actually make the puppet king healthy again, he could make the king think he was healthy. In Herod’s bewitched eyes, his lesions and sores were fading away, and his health was roaring back. In the eyes of the rest of the world, he was the same repulsive creature.
Yes, his courtesans and whores might think it strange that their king was suddenly so ebullient and spending so much time admiring himself in the mirror. Yes, they might think it strange when he skipped about with renewed vigor or remarked on his renewed appearance. But the beauty of it was, no one would dare tell him differently. And even if they did, Herod would simply think them mad.
Judea’s puppet king had become the magus’s personal puppet. And he would remain so, even as the disease he could no longer see or feel ate him to death.
And it will. Soon. Unless Augustus kills him first. Kills him for stealing his prized magus away.
And when Herod was gone? The magus would be there to take full ownership of the throne. A kingdom all to himself. An army, guided by ancient darkness, to challenge Rome. And a chance to rebuild an ancient brotherhood that had been all but lost to history.
A strange silence permeated the dungeon, broken only by the sound of rainwater seeping through the ceiling and falling to the stone floor, the crackling of the clay oven and its suffocating heat. Balthazar hung limply from the wooden beam above, trying to take his mind off the agony that radiated from the two strips of raw, exposed muscle on his sides. Even the slightest movement of air caused a severe pain that tensed his body and took his breath away.
He looked up through strands of wet hair and saw that the room was empty, save for two Roman guards posted on either side of the door. His torturers had excused themselves. Apparently, watching a man suffer is hard work. Water dripped steadily from the ceiling, seeping through the cracked mortar between the bricks, where it clung in defiance of gravity until each individual droplet grew fat enough to fall. Some of those droplets ran down the rope that held him aloft by his wrists. Some fell onto Balthazar, running down his body, mixing with the blood on his skin and aiding it on its way to the floor, where puddles had begun to form.
Balthazar was having trouble focusing his eyes through the mixture of seeping raindrops and the involuntary tears that came when the waves of pain crashed ashore. He heard the cell door creak open and saw the ghostly white outline of a large man enter.
“So, here he is,” said the man, taking off his cape and handing it to one of the guards. “Here’s the great ‘Antioch Ghost’ in the flesh. I had to come and see for myself.”
He was older. Grayed, though still upright and muscular. He was an officer of some kind, a general maybe. A career soldier in the twilight of his fighting years.
“I was stationed in Antioch some time ago,” he said, moving forward. “I found it to be a filthy place, truth be told. And, please, I mean no offense.”
Soon would come the slight hunch, the withering of muscles. Next, the weight would fall off of his bones with alarming speed, dark spots would appear on the tops of his hands, and he would use a cane to carry himself a few last wintry steps to the grave. But not yet. There was still power left in this man. Balthazar could tell, just by the way he carried himself.
“The river, the Colonnaded Street…the forum. Antioch had its charms.”
There was something flittering and gold under his chin. Something that caught the torchlight and threw it back in all directions.
“It’s just that…as beautiful as it was, I could never get over the people. They reminded me of…rats. Thieving little rats.”
Balthazar felt whatever strength he had left retreat. He felt his breath leave his chest and his body go numb.
It was a pendant.
Abdi’s pendant.
V
Sela didn’t know whose knife it was. She only knew it was pressed dangerously, painfully against her throat.
“To your feet, slowly,” said the voice. “You so much as twitch, and I’ll cut your throat.”
She rose, damning herself for being caught unaware. Damning herself for staying long enough to get caught in the first place. They’d held freedom in their hands, but they were all dead now. Ripped away. And for what? A moment of stupid sentimentality. She never should have led them here. She should have done what she promised Balthazar and hurried them to Egypt. “Don’t look back!” he’d told her.
She was standing up tall now, still unable to see the man who had a knife to her throat. In the corner of her right eye, she could see Joseph and Mary being forced to stand in the same fashion, with knives to their throats—Joseph with his hands held high over his head, Mary holding the baby beneath her robes and muttering, “No, no, no” again and again.
No, thought Sela. Not like this. They’d gotten Balthazar. They’d gotten Abdi. They could have Joseph and Mary for all she cared. And they could have her. But they didn’t get to have the baby.
Not a chance.
She exploded, grabbing the wrist of whoever held the knife and forcing it away from her neck. In the same motion, she spun around so that she was facing her attacker, a Roman sentry—no surprise there—and brought her right knee firmly up into his testicles, so hard that she was sure she’d rendered them forever useless. The soldier couldn’t help himself. He dropped the knife and brought both hands instinctively to his groin. And as he doubled over in the customary fashion and vomited, Sela brought her knee up again, this time to his face, where it jarred several of his front teeth loose and turned his nose into a mere suggestion of its former shape. He fell, unconscious, and Sela quickly picked up the knife he’d dropped.
This, of course, had drawn the attention of the other two sentries, who left Joseph and Mary and rushed at Sela, their blades out front. But while two of them rushed her, only one made it more than a step—for Joseph jumped on the back of the second and put him in a headlock, choking him from behind. Sela moved out of the other sentry’s path just in time, his knife grazing her face. He tried to regain his footing and come back for another attack, but he slipped on the wet rock and had to put one hand on the ground to keep from falling over.
In that vulnerable moment, Sela thrust her knife into his kidney. She was surprised how easily it went in and how quickly the sentry went down, screaming out and clutching at the wound. She looked down at the two soldiers she’d just sent to the ground, then spun around and saw the third, red-faced and about to pass out for lack of oxygen. Joseph remained on the sentry’s back, choking him with all his might, even as he thrashed and pulled at the carpenter’s hair.
“Run, Mary!” he said. “RUN!”
Sela froze, not knowing whether she should help Joseph or speed Mary and the baby away. She looked down at the bloody knife in her hand and thought about charging at the sentry Joseph was choking. But if I missed? And why is Mary just standing there, looking at me and pointing?
“Sela!” cried Mary. “Behind y—”
Sela’s eyes crossed, and the sound of rain and waves grew suddenly distant. She stood perfectly upright as the whole world tilted on its axis, bringing her face to the ground with a thud. She’d been struck on the head. She knew this somehow, even though the pain had yet to re
gister, and her hair had yet to become matted with the blood that poured from her skull. A pair of sandals came into view, jumping over her and half running, half limping toward Joseph. Though Sela couldn’t see his face, the limp told her that the sandals belonged to the first soldier. The one she’d rendered childless.
Despite his injury, it seemed he’d summoned the strength to rise, clobber the back of her skull, and rush to the aid of his fellow Roman. She watched as he tackled Joseph, bringing all three men to the ground. She watched as he pummeled the carpenter with a series of punches. And as Sela watched these sideways events transpire, helpless to affect their outcome, another pair of sandals came into view—droplets of blood and rainwater running down their owner’s legs and ankles.
Stabbed Kidney…it’s the one with the stabbed kidney.
Sela also saw the bottom of a wooden club. It disappeared from her field of view as the sentry raised it high. A moment later, everything went dark.
VI
Adbi’s pendant hung from a weathered neck. The red, leathery neck of a man who’d spent many a carefree day in the sun. A man who’d been permitted to grow old. The hairs on his chest were white, as was his beard. Both stood in stark contrast to the burned pigment of the skin beneath. The admiral—the centurion—had changed drastically in the past nine years. But the eyes were the same. The ones that’d been seared into Balthazar’s mind that day in the forum. The ones that had kept him company under the dark desert skies for all those years as he’d searched the empire for the man in front of him and for the pendant, still hanging there, as it had around Abdi’s neck.
Give me this, O Lord…give me this. Let me see my enemy’s face again. Let me strike him down for what he’s done. Let me do this before my life on this earth is ended. Let me do this, whatever awaits me across the gulf of death. No matter the consequences of time or punishment.
God had delivered him to Balthazar, as Mary said he might. Only he hadn’t delivered him to kill. God had delivered the centurion to taunt Balthazar. To further punish him for all the terrible things he’d done in his life. All the futures and fortunes he’d stolen.
And I deserve to be taunted.
The admiral, however, had no idea who the dirty, bloody beast hanging before him was. He looked Syrian. Like one of the little street rats in Antioch. The thieving little pieces of garbage I had to suffer. Whose stench I can still smell. He didn’t like the way this particular rat was looking at him. Like he knows something I don’t. Like he’s going to kill me. And why do his eyes go to my pendant so often?
This likely would’ve remained a mystery to the admiral had Balthazar’s anger not driven him to bite down on his lip. Bite down so hard that a trickle of blood ran from the corner of his mouth. And as it did, the admiral saw it. The little scar on Balthazar’s right cheek. That distinctive little scar in the shape of an “X.”
The scar I gave him…
“GLORY!” cried Herod, the magus at his side.
It wasn’t the perfect word by any means, but it was the first one that jumped off his tongue. He looked down at the baby lying on the table, naked and crying out for his mother in the center of a crowded throne room. The fugitives had been captured sneaking around outside in the rain. It was too good to be true. Herod had expected to endure one final push in this great chase. One last obstacle from the meddling Hebrew God. Instead, the Hebrew God’s little messenger—this so-called Messiah—had walked right to his back door and offered himself up.
“Glory to the people of Judea! Glory to Rome and her emperor!”
Pilate watched the wretched old king celebrate, the infant’s mother and father in chains, in tears—held by Roman guards near the throne room’s entrance. There was another woman with them, also in chains. Probably the same one who harbored them in Beersheba. From the looks of it, she’d been beaten to within an inch of her life. His sentries had done well, and they were being treated by the king’s personal physicians. He was told two would live, though one—the one who’d been stabbed—would likely die of infection. At least he’ll die a hero.
Herod reached down and slid his fingers under the infant’s back. My fingers…no longer blistered. No longer twisted and aching. He picked the child up and held him aloft for all to see. Held him as a temple priest holds an offering to heaven.
And I’ll burn him as an offering, he thought. I’ll burn a god…hear his screams. I’ll watch his flesh melt away and his bones blacken.
He wanted the Hebrew God to get a good look at this. If this baby was destined to topple the kingdoms of the world—if it was truly, as the Jews said, the “son of God”—then what did that make the king who held him in his hands? He walked around the room, displaying the child for the assembled courtesans and officers.
Yes, a man could be bigger than a god. Here was proof. Here was a king holding a god in his hands. My hands…which move without pain for the first time in years. He handed the child to a Roman guard.
“Take him to the dungeon and wait for us…I want to put him in the oven myself.”
These words brought screams of anguished protest from Mary and Joseph, which did nothing to dissuade Herod but did remind him: “Kill the male,” he said before walking toward the door. Then, almost an afterthought, he turned back and gave a nod to the guards.
“Do with the women what you will.”
The admiral could’ve laughed at the wonder of it. If the man before him was the Antioch Ghost, and the Antioch Ghost was the little rat he’d cut in the forum all those years ago, then—
Then I made him…I made the Antioch Ghost.
“He was your…brother,” said the admiral. “The boy in the forum…”
There was no condescension in the way the admiral said this. On the contrary, there seemed to be genuine sympathy behind the words. A sadness. The admiral was, in fact, touched by what was happening before him. He was overwhelmed with all sorts of emotions, sadness among them. He marveled at the fates. Of all the dungeons in the world, he’d been sent to this one. Sent to face a monster that he created.
“I’m going to kill you,” said Balthazar.
“I know.”
“I swear it…”
“I know…I know you do,” he said with that same sadness. “My God, what you must think I am…”
The admiral came closer still. Close enough so Balthazar could see the burst capillaries on the tip of his nose. The scars of a wine-soaked life. After taking in Balthazar’s face, he stepped away and helped himself to a seat in Herod’s chair. A sigh escaped him.
“I have sons, you know,” he said. “Four of them. They’re grown now, of course, but I remember feeling that fear. That fear that they would be taken from me. And if anyone had ever harmed them when they were young, well…”
“He was a boy…” Just saying the words brought fresh tears to Balthazar’s eyes.
“He was a thief,” said the admiral. “And I was an officer, in a city where a Roman couldn’t walk from one side of the street to the other without having his pocket picked.”
“HE DIDN’T UNDERSTAND!”
And that’s what hurts the most, when you get right down to it. That look on his face. The one I see over and over in my mind. That fear, that confusion. Why, Bal-faza? What did I do? Why is this man hurting me, Bal-faza? I looked up to you. I loved you and imitated you, Bal-faza, and this wouldn’t have happened to me if you weren’t so bad, Bal-faza. IT’S YOUR FAULT, BAL-FAZA. IT’S YOUR—
Balthazar gritted his teeth, trying to banish the tears. But they came.
“He didn’t understand,” said Balthazar. “He was good. He would’ve had a good life. A beautiful life. And you took it. You took everything he would ever have. We…we would ever have.”
“Maybe,” said the admiral. “Maybe he would’ve had a good life. Maybe he would’ve had a tragic life. But you…” He rose from Herod’s chair and came forward again. “Look at you. You’ve devoted your whole life to this. To killing me. And now it ends. Useless. Unfulf
illed. You’re a cunning man, a strong man. You could’ve done anything. You could have grieved for him and moved on. You could’ve found love and fortune, had children of your own. But you’ve wasted it.”
Balthazar heard a voice whispering in his ears: How does killing honor his memory? How does it bring you any closer to having Abdi in your arms again? Isn’t it better to walk away? Doesn’t that make you the more powerful man? Besides, this admiral was right. He’d wrapped up an entire existence in revenge. His entire being was devoted to a single, murderous purpose. But now that he was so close, a new, terrifying question presented itself: And then what? What does your life mean after that? What comes next?
“It’s haunted you,” said Balthazar. “His face…I know it has…”
The admiral looked at him with real pity. “The truth?” he asked. “Look at me. Do you want me to tell you the truth?”
Balthazar looked up. Glared at him.
“I’ve hardly thought about him.”
He’s lying. He wants me to believe that. But no man is that callous.
“I didn’t like my father all that much,” said the admiral. “But before he died, he gave me a piece of advice. The only one that ever really made a difference in my life. ‘Hug your children,’ he said. ‘Kiss your mothers and fathers, your brothers and sisters. Tell them how much you love them, every day. Because every day is the last day. Every light casts a shadow. And only the gods know when the darkness will find us.’”
The admiral turned away and helped himself to one of the orange slices on the platter. He sucked on it, enjoying the taste and the moisture until there was nothing left. As he did this, Balthazar made a decision.
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