by Peter David
“Thereabouts.”
“And then the Nazis got their hands on it.” He shook his head. “I think…it was at that point that my faith first began to crack. I mean, all these holy orders running around, spending centuries searching in futility for these holy relics, and who gets his hands on the Spear of Destiny? A demented little hanger of wallpaper who rose to power on the backs of millions of innocent people. What does that tell you about the way of things?”
“It tells me that we cannot question God’s plan.”
“Of course not, any more than you can question the master plan of the dodo. You can’t question what doesn’t exist.”
“My son—”
“So anyway,” said Paracelsus, as if Ruehl hadn’t spoken, “the Nazis had the Spear of Destiny in their possession, until…”
“Until the Allies reacquired it.”
“Except you know that’s not true,” Paracelsus said quietly. “Because I acquired it first. I went down into Hitler’s bunker, and I took it away from the Nazis, for which you might want to bloody well thank me. My removing it from their possession guaranteed the fall of the Third Reich.”
“So it was you who made the switch. We always wondered.”
“Well, wonder no more. Of course, carrying a Spear around can be a bit…noticeable. But as an alchemist, I’ve learned a few tricks. Not just transmutation of elements, but also tinkering with size. Watch. Nothing up my sleeve…”
He extended an arm and Ruehl stepped back quickly as the Spear of Destiny snapped out from Paracelsus’s jacket sleeve and into his hand. He held it there at its full length, and now in his other hand was the Holy Grail.
“Looking for these?” he asked calmly.
Ruehl’s face could have been carved from stone. “They are not yours to possess, Paracelsus.”
“Ah, so you do know me.”
“Think of it as an educated guess. Although, frankly, I was expecting former President Penn to be in possession of the Grail. To come down here and cure Mrs. Cordoba…”
“Cure her of an illness that you inflicted upon her.” Ruehl didn’t answer at first, and Paracelsus prompted him, “Come on. You can admit it to me. I hear confession is good for the soul.”
“We did what we had to do,” Ruehl said tersely. “Our concern is for the greater good. We needed to get the Grail away from Arthur. It belongs to the Church. To the world.”
“Not anymore. Too bad your plan didn’t work.”
“Obviously, though…it did.”
Six more men slowly entered the Chapel. They were clothed identically to Ruehl, and two were holding shields with the sign of the cross upon them. The rest were carrying truncheons, which they slid out of their sleeves, as Ruehl also did. “For whatever perverse reason, you came here instead with the cup to complete Arthur’s mission,” said Ruehl. “Why, we cannot begin to guess. But you are here, and we are here, and you will turn both the Grail and the Spear over to us…”
“Well…in answer to your question,” Paracelsus said, “I came here with the cup because I killed Percival, the Grail’s previous protector.” He was pleased to see the slightly ashen tint that Ruehl’s face took on. “But the Cordoba woman doesn’t matter to me. She can lie there in whatever coma you bastards induced in her until the end of time, for all I care. No, I came here because I’m not stupid. I sensed the fine hand of your society or order or brotherhood or whatever you call yourself. I need to have the Grail work another miracle or two, you see, and I knew you’d be waiting for me. I didn’t come here to cure Mrs. Cordoba.” And he smiled. “I came here to slaughter the lot of you.”
He whipped the Spear around as the Holy Order of the Monks of Montserrat charged.
There were no screams, not because the monks were inured to pain, but because in one, fast sweep, Paracelsus brought the Spear around and severed their vocal cords.
When the blood really began to fly, it spattered on the statute of Jesus. He stood there, looking on in silence, as crimson tears flowed down his face.
RON CORDOBA SHOULD have been at home. The middle of the night was hardly the time for visiting hours. But he was who he was, and that certainly carried some degree of influence with the hospital staff, thus allowing an exception to be made. They’d brought in several chairs of the nonplastic variety, and Ron had managed to fashion a makeshift bed that he was certain was still going to destroy his back. He was drifting in and out of sleep when he looked up, convinced he was dreaming, to see Arthur staring down at him. He half smiled at the comforting sight and closed his eyes once more.
“Ron?”
The speaking of his name startled him to full wakefulness, and he almost fell out of the chairs. Arthur reached down and steadied him before he hit the floor. His vision clearing, Ron saw Gwen standing directly behind Arthur.
“My God,” he whispered, as Arthur helped him to his feet. “I…I thought I was dreaming.”
“No.” He glanced toward Nellie. “How is she?”
“No change in her condition…Arthur,” he suddenly said, “you can’t be here. The Grail…”
“We don’t have it.”
That brought him up short. “You came without it?”
“It was taken from us.”
“Where’s Percival?”
Gwen spoke up, her voice hollow. “He’s dead.”
“Dead?” Ron laughed nervously. “He can’t be dead. He’s…”
“He was killed, Ron,” said Arthur. “By Barry Seltzer…who, as it turns out, is an alchemist named Paracelsus.”
“Para…what the hell are you talking about? Percival can’t be dead—”
“Ron!” Arthur said sharply, gripping him by the shoulders so hard that Ron gasped from it. “This really isn’t the time to discuss it. We think he’s coming here for Nellie. Thank the gods I got here first.”
“But…why for Nellie? I don’t understand…”
“You explain it to him, Arthur,” Gwen said, and she headed for the door.
“Where are you going?”
She glanced over her shoulder at him. “You said you didn’t want me around. So I’m going to find the chapel and pray. I figure we need all the help we can get.”
CARDINAL RUEHL, HOVERING in blackness, felt something liquid and burning being forced between his lips. He was so disconnected from everything around him that he didn’t remember at first where he was, nor did he have a clue what was happening. Then it slowly began to dawn on him. He remembered that he had eyes, and he forced them open.
The cup of Christ was just within his sight line, and he saw Paracelsus’s face hovering just beyond it. Paracelsus was actually smiling at him gently, and he was upending the contents of the cup into Ruehl’s mouth. “Excellent,” he whispered. “There you go. Come on back. Don’t try to sit up. It’s going to take you a little while to get fully up to snuff.”
Ruehl found that he indeed couldn’t move. His mind was telling his body what to do, but it refused to obey. He turned his head slightly, then gasped, a low moan of distress.
His brethren lay scattered about the room, unmoving. There was blood everywhere. It was like something out of a horror film rather than a chapel.
“It’s a mess, I know,” said Paracelsus sadly. “But…what can you do? You fought. I had superior weaponry. That’s all there is to it.”
“You…monster…” At least, that’s what Ruehl tried to say. But his voice was a hoarse whisper, and a sharp stabbing pain lanced through his throat. He moaned in pain.
“I wouldn’t suggest talking. Your entire breathing apparatus is going to take a little while to mend. But it will mend. I brought you back.” And he held up the Grail. “It’s ready. Isn’t it beautiful?”
Ruehl’s eyes widened in confusion.
The Grail looked completely different than it had moments before. Earlier, the wood of the cup had been dark brown. Now it was ebony, as if carved from some sort of solid black wood. The gold lamination that had lined the edges had turned blood red.
“Isn’t it beautiful?” said Paracelsus, and he sounded as if he was going to cry with joy. “You have no idea of the lengths I’ve had to go to in my studies…the places I’ve traveled…the people I’ve sacrificed, the demons I’ve summoned…to learn what had to be done. It was just rumors…faint rumors…but I learned the facts of it. I learned how to accomplish my goal.”
“What…what’s your goal? What are you going to do?”
Paracelsus stared at him pityingly. “Do I look like a comic opera villain to you? What, I’m going to tell you everything while chortling, ‘I wanted you to know everything that will happen so you can die feeling helpless?’ And then have it come back to bite me on the ass? To hell with that. I much prefer that you die without knowing a damned thing. You’ve spent your life living in ignorance. Die the same way.”
He drew back the Spear, prepared to plunge it into Ruehl’s chest.
An abrupt scream drew his attention.
GWENDOLYNE PENN HAD walked into the chapel, so lost in thought that she noticed nothing until she was already a few feet in. Then she stopped, frozen in place, as she saw the bodies on the floor, a couple of shattered shields nearby them, the guy from the Vatican sprawled not far from her, and “Barry Seltzer” astride him, about to drive the Spear of Destiny into the Cardinal’s chest.
Understandably, she let out a startled scream.
Paracelsus looked up, and he grinned. “My, my. Mrs. Penn. You look a bit more singed than last I saw you.”
“G-get away from him!” Gwen managed to say.
“As you wish,” said Paracelsus. “Is your husband still with us?”
“Yes,” and her voice grew cold, regaining her nerve, “and he’s going to kill you for what you did.”
“Really. Then allow me to send him a message through you.”
Without hesitation, Paracelsus stepped around Ruehl, gripped the Spear with one hand while clutching the Grail in the other, and shoved the Spear forward right at Gwen’s chest.
Reflexively, Gwen stepped back, choking on sudden terror, her eyes fixed on the spearhead driving toward her chest. The only thing that saved her was blood. A pool of it had formed behind her, still seeping from the fallen body of one of the monks, and her foot hit it. She slipped, her foot going out from under her, and she fell flat. As it happened it was what she needed to do to save her life, for the Spear went right past where she’d been standing a second before. Paracelsus staggered, thrown off-balance, and this time Gwen didn’t hesitate. She drove both her feet up and forward, and Paracelsus let out a shout as Gwen made solid contact with his crotch.
Paracelsus staggered back, the wind knocked out, pain exploding behind his eyes. He managed to hold on to the Spear, but then he tripped over the fallen form of Cardinal Ruehl.
Instantly, Ruehl was atop him. Acting entirely on instinct, Ruehl grabbed Paracelsus by the throat, squeezing as hard as he could. Paracelsus spear arm was blocked by the weight of Ruehl’s arm, but he brought the Grail up and around as hard as he could. It was solid, ancient wood, and it struck Ruehl in the side of the head with the impact of a brick. Ruehl moaned but didn’t let go, and Paracelsus struck him a second time. This time Ruehl couldn’t hold on, rolling off to the side, and Paracelsus yanked the Spear of Destiny clear.
Gwen had clambered to her feet and was in a crouch, grabbing at a fallen truncheon from one of the monks. She brought it up just as Paracelsus—not moving especially fast since there was still pain lancing through him from where she’d kicked him—stabbed at her with the Spear. She batted it aside with the truncheon and whipped her fist around fast enough to slam Paracelsus square in the face. She felt the satisfying crunch of his nose breaking under the impact, and suddenly she let out a shriek as the spearhead slashed across her right thigh. Her leg bent, and it was just enough for Paracelsus to bring the Spear around again. She almost got out of the way, but not quite, as the point slashed across the upper part of her right breast. Gwen fell back, sprawling into a pew, blood welling from the two places where the Spear had sliced her.
Snarling in fury, Paracelsus gasped out, “I’m going to carve out your liver.”
“Go ahead,” said Gwen. “I hate liver.”
“Murderer!”
It was Arthur. He was standing in the door of the chapel, and there was fury in his eyes and death in his heart. “Now…now you will die…”
“Oh, to hell with it,” said Paracelsus. He shoved the Grail into his belt and, just as Arthur started to reach for Excalibur, Paracelsus pulled a gun out of a holster under his jacket. He aimed and fired in one smooth motion.
It was that exact moment that a young orderly, attracted by all the ruckus, came practically out of nowhere and stepped directly in front of Arthur. He said angrily, “What’s going on here? This is a hospital! What’s all the shouting about?”
At least, that’s what he started to say. He didn’t actually get much past “What’s—” before the bullets slammed into his body. One of them went completely through, continued through, and glanced off Arthur’s rib cage. The rest were stopped by his muscular form, and the orderly—without ever knowing what he had wandered into or what was going on—sank to the floor with a vague whimper and a confusing desire to call his mother. He was dead before his head struck the ground.
With an outraged cry of grief and fury, Arthur yanked Excalibur clear of its scabbard and came right at Paracelsus, shouting, “You’ll die slowly, Paracelsus!” Gwen realized that, seized with a warrior’s fury and desire for blood and punishing his enemy, Arthur didn’t care if she was there to see it or not. In fact, she wasn’t even sure he knew or remembered that she was there at all.
And what frightened her even more…was that Paracelsus didn’t look the least bit concerned.
He pulled the Holy Grail out of his belt, held it up, and suddenly the Grail was no longer a cup. Gwen’s eyes widened as she saw it had transformed into a sword. A solid black, glowing sword. She had known that Gilgamesh had wielded it as such; Arthur had told her, although she’d been unconscious at the time. But he’d said nothing about it looking dark and menacing and slightly evil. Even Arthur looked taken aback by what he was now witnessing.
“I hope this works,” she heard Paracelsus mutter as he brought the Spear of Destiny around and crossed it with the Grail sword in front of him, holding it up as if he were warding off Dracula.
The response was instantaneous.
A wave of force ripped out of the intersection point of the two ancient weapons. Arthur tried to deflect it with Excalibur, and almost managed to do so. But he wasn’t properly braced for it, and the force lifted him up and off his feet, slamming him back into the far wall of the hallway.
The only thing that saved Gwen was that Paracelsus wasn’t completely prepared for what he was unleashing either. In the same way that Arthur was flung in one direction, Paracelsus was hurled in another. He smashed into the large figure of Jesus, which was sent crashing off its fixture in the wall. Paracelsus sat there for a moment, stunned by the impact.
Gwen clambered to her feet, started for him, and Paracelsus saw her coming and brought the relics together once more. Yet again a powerful force erupted, and this time it struck Gwen directly. It was like being bitch-slapped by God as Gwen tumbled through the air ass over teakettle.
But it was more than just the force that hammered through her. When it struck her, there were images slamming through her mind. Images and sounds that she didn’t understand. Flames licking at the walls of a castle, and people screaming, and a loud whinnying sound like an agonized horse that sounded like more than a horse…that sounded almost human. She didn’t know where it was coming from; it wasn’t her memories at all. She knew though, instinctively, that she was bearing witness to something terrible, some ungodly, horrific sin that had been committed at some distant point in the past; a sin that mankind was still paying for.
All this went through her mind while she was still airborne, and then she thudded to the floor
barely a foot away from Arthur. Arthur was still trying to shake off the effects of the impact.
There was a crash from within the chapel, the sound of glass breaking. Gwen tried to haul herself to her feet, but Arthur put out a hand firmly, and said, “No. Stay here,” and pushed her back down. Excalibur gripped firmly in his hand, he staggered back into the chapel. Gwen braced herself, waiting to hear screaming or another blast of force, or the general sounds of battle, or something. But there was nothing, and a moment later, Arthur reappeared, hauling Cardinal Ruehl out with him. Ruehl looked ashen and weakened, but at least he was still alive.
“He’s gone,” Arthur said. “Out the window. Take him.” And he passed Ruehl over to Gwen, who prevented the Cardinal from slumping to the floor. By that point, hospital personnel were running up from all directions. By the time they got there, Arthur had already gone out the window after Paracelsus.
CHAPTRE
THE TWENTY-SECOND
ARTHUR RAN SEVERAL blocks, looking around desperately, trying to pick up some sort of track. But there was none to be had.
He circled the area, desperately wishing he had the forces at his command that he’d once had. Once upon a time, he could have had an entire phalanx of knights fanning out, sweeping around the area. If Paracelsus was anywhere on foot, they’d have had him in no time.
But there was no sign of him. He might simply have vanished into thin air—which, for all Arthur knew, might be within his abilities—or he might have done something as simple as find a cab or even steal a car. Hell, maybe he’d just driven himself there. There were any number of possibilities.
“Dammit,” he muttered, and then louder, “Dammit!” He pictured Percival’s corpse, a mute testimony to Arthur’s failures, and he brought Excalibur slamming down onto the sidewalk shouting, “Dammit!” one more time, shattering the pavement beneath his blade.
Frustrated, Arthur started back to the hospital, but as soon as he drew close, he stopped.