The Traiteur's Ring

by Jeffrey Wilson

  They are all your family. Not just the little one, but all of them.

  At the Elder’s voice Ben opened his eyes and saw for the first time the small band of villagers that stood in a loose circle around him. At the sight of him opening his eyes, his people smiled and nodded their heads. He felt a warmth of kinship as he looked at their smiling faces. Or maybe not kinship so much as responsibility. He wondered if that came mostly from the guilt about the massacre they had not just failed to stop, but had likely caused.

  The small circle parted, and the Village Elder strode towards him on the strong body of a much younger man than his old face suggested. Like his stride his eyes were full of youth. He smiled down at Ben a moment and then joined him on the ground and folded his legs beneath him.

  You have encountered one of the dark ones?

  Ben thought about the glowing eyes of the terrorist at the target. He thought about the second voice that had blended with the Al Qaeda fighter – the voice that commanded the man to kill the Rougarou. He knew that voice came from another world.

  “I think so,” Ben answered. “He’s dead. I killed him. He won’t hurt our people anymore.”

  The old man shook his head, and his young eyes looked sad. His lips stayed pursed tightly as he spoke in Ben’s head.

  You have killed the man but not the evil. The dark ones can travel quickly from one vessel to the next. The Attakapa know a way to stop them in the moments after the death of the vessel, but it is no matter. The dark ones are dangerous to our people but it is the one with the black blood who threatens not just the Living Jungle but the Living Earth. He must be stopped before his power grows beyond us. The dark ones can lead you to him. Only you can stop him now. You are the Rougarou.

  Ben knew the truth when he heard it and chuckled at his fantasy that his mission might be only to rescue his little girl. He felt suddenly afraid – not for his own safety, but of failure. He knew he really didn’t understand any of this, but the magnitude of it seemed almost in his reach.

  “How will I know him? What will he look like?” For a moment Ben had an image of the demon-like creature, the burnt orange skin taunt over rippling muscles and the animal face, snarling over fang-like teeth. The eyes were yellow and cat-like. He doubted his M-4 would do much more than piss something like that off.

  That image is not far from the truth. The one of the black blood is much like a demon, a monster that inspired legends over the thousands of years since he once walked in our world. He will appear as a man – a leader. You will know him to be of the other world by his eyes, much like his army of dark ones. But it will be his thoughts that will reveal him to you, Ben. His thoughts will tell you, and you will know. He must be stopped before he can cross over to our world and become the creature you imagine.

  The old man looked up at the break in the jungle canopy and seemed to read the stars like a watch.

  The time is quite short, Ben.

  Ben felt Jewel’s chubby hands tug on his cheeks, and he hugged her tighter to his chest.

  Tonight I will see you father.

  “Goo, Da da, eh.”

  You must come to us tonight, Ben. There is no time left to wait. Tonight you will battle again with the dark ones and their numbers may be greater. Then, you must leave your friends and come to us. You will need our people to guide you to where the one with the black blood hides.

  “How will I find you?’

  I will send you a heart message when the time comes. That will guide you to what is left of the keepers of the Living Jungle. From there we can lead you to your prey.

  Ben startled at the Elder’s use of the word, but that was right, wasn’t it? He was, indeed, a predator.

  Jewel kissed his cheek softly with an exaggerated “Hmmm Mmmuh,” and then crawled out of his lap. She struggled to her feet, teetered a moment, and then toddled over to the Elder. Ben felt his eyes grow heavy but sensed he had one more place to go.

  He rose on fatigued, achy legs, and the villagers parted for him to pass through the circle. He left the clearing, walked only a few yards before he smelled the familiar smells of home, and saw the light from two lanterns on the sagging wooden porch that hung off their shack like the after thought it had probably once been. Gammy sat in her rocker, a warm glass of sweet tea in her hand and another on the railing. She waved to him and smiled.

  “Hurry it on now, chile. You be needin’ some rest more dan a long goodbye.”

  Ben climbed the three creaking steps, moving to the left side to avoid the cracked board he knew was in the middle of the second one, and kissed his Gammy’s chubby cheek. He then grabbed his jelly glass of tea and took his seat in the wooden chair beside her. She took his hand and held it as they both sipped a moment in silence.

  “Guessin’ dis be goodbye fo’ now, boy,” she said. Her voice sounded sad, but she turned and looked at him and smiled. “Be seein’ you ‘gain, though, Benny, don’ worry’n none ‘bout dat. Jes gots to wait a bit now – least I hope so.” She chuckled at some inside joke and then squeezed his hand. “Proud o’ you, Benny boy,” her voice sounded tight. “Hope I gave you enuff, is all. But I sho’ is proud of my Benny.”

  She looked out over their yard and sipped her tea. Ben squeezed her hand back. For a moment he saw her face surrounded by raging flames – her voice screaming in pain and urgency and directing a much younger grandson what he must do and where he must go. The memory evaporated again before he could make sense of it, and he realized he would need another time to chase it down.

  Got enough on my plate, for sure that.

  He sat and sipped tea and held hands with his grandmother.

  * * *

  Ben leaned back against the edge of the door and felt the cool wind whip his face. The familiarity cleared his head more than the wind. His NVGs were flipped up and he stared at total darkness. He knew the jungle slid by only a hundred feet below. But the blackness was so complete he might have floated anywhere – over the ocean, in space, anywhere. He listened to Toby Keith in his headset from the iPod in his kit, but for a moment the song about a big blue note was interrupted by a static-filled voice in his ears.

  “Weapons test,” a cool deep voice said.

  He lowered his head and a few seconds later the fifty caliber machine gun mounted in the front of his doorway coughed out a dozen rounds. Ben felt the spent casings bounce off his helmet a moment after the long tongue of flame disturbed his dark mental security blanket.

  “Left.”

  Another burst from the other doorway. This time he couldn’t see the flame but the glow lit up the inside of the UH-60 Blackhawk for a moment.

  “Right.”

  “Weapons clear.”

  And, then the darkness returned. He leaned his head back against the doorway and again felt the wind on his face. He tried to keep his mind far away from dreams and thoughts of dead Indians and grandmothers. Jewel kept coming back to him none the less – Jewel with her big eyes and chubby little hands tugging at his ears. He knew now beyond more than a little doubt (the strange hope that maybe he really was just crazy) he would see her – if not tonight then before the sun set again. He tried not to think too much about how that must mean he would not be riding home with his team from this op.

  He listened to his music and forced his thoughts back to the mission as it had been briefed. He still had a job to do no matter where the rest of the night led him on his crusade. Viper Team – his friends who were more like family – needed him to be at his iced best. He would do his job the only way he knew how, the way he had trained and executed since his days in SEAL training. Ben reviewed the operational plan in his head as they hurtled through the darkness in the Blackhawk. The half-hour sped by like mere minutes, and then another voice broke into his music, this time cutting off one of his favorite Credence tunes.

  “Five minutes,” Chris’s voice announced.

  He flipped his NVGs down and checked over his gear in the green-grey world they opened up for him. He check
ed his rifle last, confirmed (again) that a round was chambered, and then tugged his gloves to make sure they were tight.

  “One minute.”

  A few moments later, he lay prone in the brush and scanned his sector quietly through his NVGs as the thumping sound of the helicopters faded into the distance. At the sound of Chris’s one-word command, he rose silently, rifle up and ready, and began the forty-five minute trek to the target. He knew from the brief the fighters that waited at this camp would not be the children they had fought the night before. They had been told to expect a smaller but heavily armed and seasoned fighting force.

  They anticipated a second perimeter farther out from the camp and scouts patrolling the area. Fortunately, they had the support of a predator drone orbiting high above, this one equipped with infrared heat signaling. They would have real time data on anyone alive in the jungle around them. They may not know who they were, but they would see them. They would assume anyone moving about at two o’clock in the morning in the middle of the jungle and in proximity to an Al Qaeda command post were bad guys.

  Their first contact came from the Task Force commander in the form of relayed information from the life-saving predator.

  “Viper Two – Viper Three – two targets fifteen meters left and moving towards you.” The calm voice in his headset dropped Ben down into the brush.

  He scanned through the bushes to his left, the green-grey world in his NVGs so far devoid of motion.

  “Viper Two – target just past you and is moving away – Viper Three – target now only a few meters and heading right towards you.”

  He crouched lower into the dense vegetation just as the man came into view. The Al Qaeda terrorist moved slowly and deliberately toward him, and his head seemed to move side-to-side. He had one hand on the grip of his rifle, and the other held something to his face. Ben recognized the hand-held night vision system and sunk lower. The terrorist also had a radio. Ben closed his eyes a moment and reached out with his mind, but he heard nothing that made him think the man thought American soldiers might be hidden in the jungle. He seemed to want only to return to camp and get something to eat.

  The man turned suddenly and looked behind him at the same moment Ben heard the quiet sound that he knew meant Lash had taken out his partner. Ben took advantage of the man’s distraction.

  He leapt to his feet and sprinted forward, drawing his SOG knife from its scabbard on his vest as he did. The man heard him, but way too late, and Ben threw an arm around his neck as the terrorist turned toward him. He shifted all his weight to the right, pulling the man off his feet by his head just as he plunged his combat knife into the soft spot at the base of his skull. He instantly went limp in his arms, and Ben lowered him gently to the floor of the jungle.

  “Viper Three, clear,” he whispered into his microphone. He knelt beside the body and scanned the dark jungle around him but saw nothing else that concerned him.

  “Viper Two, clear,” Lash’s voice told him in his earpiece.

  Ben looked down at the lifeless body beside him. The Terrorist stared blankly at nothing.

  Can’t breathe– can’t move– can’t breathe!

  Ben shut off the voice in his head quickly, not wanting to hear the last terrified thoughts of the man who died slowly beside him as his brain screamed for more oxygen – the message never reaching his body through the now severed spinal cord. Ben saw the lifeless eyes held no orange light, and he heard only the single frightened voice in his head – no dark one here.

  He waited another few seconds and then continued his quiet movement towards the objective. The Operators monitoring the predator feed from the operations center warned them of nothing else, and in a few more minutes he again lay prone at the edge of an Al Qaeda camp.

  Unlike the night before, this camp had no real clearing, just a slight thinning of the jungle, so the dozen or so terrorists that sat beside two open fires in front of three large tents would have plenty of cover during the attack. He also grimly noted they had a fifty caliber machine gun in a trench dug beside the corrugated tin shack where the true objective would no doubt be found. The weapon was not manned, but he had an inkling any attack would immediately drive several trained gunners to the efficient weapon. That would have to be the first order of business.

  “Viper Lead – Two – you see the fifty?” Lash must clearly be in place and had seen the gun nest, as well.

  “Rog– Two, that’s your target.”

  “Two.”

  “Three in position,” Ben whispered into his mike.

  “Four.”

  “Five.”

  Only a few moments of silence passed that as usual felt like an eternity. Finally, Chris’s voice came over the headset.

  “Four and One are the breachers now – Two on the Fifty – Three and Five secure the camp. Smoke and bang on my mark.”

  Ben pulled out a smoke grenade and a concussion grenade and waited.

  “Viper Team, go.”

  He tossed both of his grenades into the center of camp just as others lobbed in from what would appear as all directions to the bad guys. Unlike the children from the camp the night before, these fighters reacted instantly. They quickly scrambled to their feet and raised their weapons as they moved in all directions away from the grenades which rolled around on the jungle floor. Two men sprinted towards the machine gun as they all hollered at each other. Ben heard the spit of Lash’s rifle and watched the two collapse to the ground before they had made it two paces. Ben sighted in on his own targets from the fighters who scattered like rats and began to fire.

  Moments later all but two of the dozen or so of the enemy lay dead, the tents had been torn down to clear them of additional fighters, and Viper Team moved toward the tin shack beside which Lash sat at the fifty and gave a grin and mock salute. The two wounded terrorists crumpled through the door to the building and slammed it behind them. Chris and Reed were already there as it closed. Reed pressed a shaped charge around the door knob then plunged wires into the charge and flattened himself against the wall.

  “Fire in the hole,” he hollered, and the door disappeared in a flash of white light and smoke. Immediately, he and Chris entered the shack, and Auger followed a split second later. Two cracks of M-4 fire were followed by Chris’s voice yelling commands in English. Then, he heard Reed’s voice.

  “Squirters out the back – three of them!”

  Ben sprinted around the corner and saw three figures in grey robes and high-top tennis shoes tear off into the jungle. He fired his M-4 on instinct, and the tail-end Charlie in the group pitched forward face-first onto the ground. Ben was on him in a second, a knee between the man’s shoulder blades as he scanned the jungle through his rifle sight.

  “Two are still on the move,” he hollered. “I got one.”

  “Hold,” Chris commanded from inside the shack. “We have both of the primary objectives.” Apparently the big fish had been captured.

  The Rougarou is here. We must warn the master.

  Ben grabbed the terrorist by the hair and pulled his head up off the ground. The eyes opened and looked terrified, but they clearly were not the eyes of a dark one. Ben probed the man’s mind and found only a single voice, full of disjointed fear and pain – but alone. He had not been the source of the new voice who knew him as the protector and hunter he had become.

  He stood up, shifted from a knee to a foot keeping them man pinned to the ground, and scanned more intently the ten or so yards of jungle he could see. He had to get the two squirters – at least one of them was a dark one and could help him find his own primary objective. He wanted only to do what fate had decided he must do and get the hell home. He felt his heart pound at the thought of losing the trail of the escaped terrorists. A hand fell on his shoulder.

  “Nice work,” Lash said as he looked at the bad guy under Ben’s boot.

  “You got him?” Ben asked.

  “Sure,” Lash said but looked confused.

  Ben sprinted
off into the jungle. As he moved swiftly through the brush he searched through his NVGs, but also sent out the blue light of his mind. If he could hear their thoughts again he could track them. He slung his rifle across his chest so he could move more quickly and use both hands to clear the brush ahead of him. He wouldn’t need it now.

  He had other weapons at his disposal.

  Chris’s voice in his headset demanded that he come back – that they had completed their mission. Ben pulled the earpiece out of his ear, and let it bounce against his kit as he moved swiftly, tracking his prey.

  Chapter 38

  “What the hell do you mean he’s gone?”

  The boss sounded highly pissed as he led two Al Qaeda leaders out of the shack, their hands bound behind them. Reed followed with his own prisoner.

  “He took off after the squirters,” Lash said as he pulled plastic cuffs onto the terrorist he knelt over.

  “Didn’t you guys hear me order a hold? We got what we came for,” he said and gestured to the two prisoners who both stared at their feet. Lash shrugged.

  “Maybe he didn’t hear you,” Reed offered.

  Chris shot him a look that kept him from saying anything else.

  “Goddammit,” he mumbled then reached up to key his mike. “Viper Three – this is lead. Return to the camp. We got ‘em, Three. Return to camp.”

  There was a long, awkward pause while Viper Team looked off and waited for Ben to check in that he understood and would be there in a minute. The pause stretched out longer, and Reed cursed in his mind.

  “Three, this is Viper Lead – how do you read?”

  Another long pause, and then Chris repeated his call. The officer rubbed his temple with a gloved hand.

  “Did you hear any weapons fire?” Chris asked.

  Lash shook his head.

  Reed felt a tight band around his chest. Where the hell was Ben? Had he been hurt or – oh, Jesus no – killed? Maybe his radio was dicked up. That made the most sense. Ben would never ignore the radio calls, and he couldn’t be dead, right? Reed ran through all of the ways you could kill a man without firing a weapon. Still, he found it hard to imagine these shit heads could kill a fully armed SEAL, especially Ben, without shooting him.