by Matt Gross
“We should head there. I don't think they'll be back, but my place is better protected.” Codex started to lift Tao. “Help me with her.”
They both draped an arm around their shoulders and carried her. They made their way through the chaos of the street and entered the alley. Kira noticed that the two guards who were there the last time were gone.
“Codex, where are your guards?” Kira wondered.
“I sent them to follow that Dorne fellow. They should report back in a few minutes. Can you get the door?” She wheezed.
Kira turned the handle and slid it open. The hall immediately lit up. The short corridor ended in another door. Kira grabbed Tao's dangling arm and the three of them entered. The door shut on its own behind them. Codex led through the lobby and down a twisting hall that took them to her living space. The place came alive as soon as they entered. Lights turned on and music came from a box. They laid Tao down on a couch.
“I don't see Khayin.” Kira whipped her head round quickly scanning her surroundings. “Do you see Khayin?”
“I didn't see him on the way in. Hold a sec.” Codex left and checked a thin box with a glass panel. It light up with words and pictures. “He never entered. Looks like he got a call on the phone I gave him and he left. That doesn't make any sense. I never called him. No one else should have that number. Who has that number? Why would they call him? I have a bad feeling about this.” Codex grabbed a similar phone to Khayin's, punched some numbers in and put it to her ear. “Nothing.” She looked worried. “Kira, wait here. I'll be right back.”
Kira stayed close to Tao. She couldn't find any outward injuries and she wondered what exactly had happened. She seemed to be breathing fine and Codex said her heartbeat was normal as well. She brushed Tao's long black hair back and she examined her neck. That was where she noticed a tiny pin prick.
Codex burst through the door and her face was red. “I don't know how they did it, but they got one of my phones. That's how they called him. They must have a skilled wizard with them. Dammit, how could I be so careless? Did I have one on me and I dropped it? No. How would they have known that it was mine? They had to have gotten into my inner sanctum, but how? I took all precautions. No one can get through my defenses. I must have left a door open. That is the only way. Yes, that's got to be it. I was in a rush when all the commotion was happening and I left without arming my defenses. That has to be it. They couldn't possibly have someone who could crack my security. But if that is what happened then it is my fault that Khayin is in trouble. He can't take on that whole army. But, what if...”
“Codex,” Kira said sharply. “Can you track him somehow? Do you know where that army went?
“Yes and no.” She punched a couple of different numbers into the phone. “Huey, what's going on?” Kira couldn't hear the other half of the conversation. “He just arrived and they just let him in. OK, stay put. I'm going to send you some help and the three of you are going to break him out.” She closed the phone and looked at Kira. “Khayin went to Nellis Air Force Base. I'm going to send you to Huey and Dewey's location.”
“OK, send me.” Kira straightened up.
“Do you need a weapon?”
Kira smiled. “I am a weapon.”
Codex smiled back. “Good, bring our boy back.”
Kira nodded and Codex snapped her fingers. Kira was gone.
****
Huey and Dewey were hiding behind a wrecked plane. The base was large, but Kira noticed some mercenaries at the front gate. They looked to be leaving. There were two horse-drawn buggies and everyone else was on horseback. This isn't going to be easy.
“OK, Khayin is probably in one of the wagons. Everyone else is expendable.” She looked at the two brothers. “What're you two capable of?”
They smiled and shed their human guises. Two massive ogres towered over Kira. “If you can distract the wagons, we can eliminate the soldiers,” Huey said.
“They'll probably have some battlemages,” Kira said.
“If Khayin didn't take them out already. There was a fight inside the hanger. He wouldn't have been taken easily.” Huey flashed his enormous teeth.
She knew that. That's what she liked about him, among other things. “Alright. I'll lift the wagons and place them well out of the way, but you have to keep them off me. I won't be able to defend myself.”
“No problem, little lady,” Dewey said. And the two of them charged the front gate.
Huey and Dewey ripped the gates from the hinges and used them like fly swatters, hitting horses and riders alike. The militia didn't have time to prepare. They saw the ogres coming, but were unable to get out of the way. Some fired their weapons, but nothing slowed the brothers down.
Kira could feel her adrenaline rise. Her magic filled her. Her skin began to tingle with the energy and her tattoos swirled into a menacing pattern. She stepped out of cover to get a clear view of the wagons. With a raise of her hands she Pulled the wagons high above the ground. She moved them through the air and put them down just a few yards from her and well out of the way of the carnage the brothers had started.
She tapped a little deeper into her will and ripped the doors off the wagons as soon as their wheels touched down. Metal squealed for only a moment before they snapped. Kira Pulled the first two people she saw in the doorway of one of the wagons. She let their bodies hang in the open air for a couple of seconds. Neither of them were Khayin. Kira widened the gap between them and then slammed them together as hard as she could. The bones shattered; she could hear them--the distinct sound of a skull cracking and bones breaking.
The pain was first, then the sound of gun fire. Kira saw a man in a white suit with a handgun peeking out of the wagon to her left. She let the bodies drop. Her right arm was screaming with pain. She grimaced. The gunman popped off another couple of rounds. The first went wide but the other grazed her right leg. She didn't have time to react to her injuries. She Pulled the gun from his hand and tossed it aside. Biting her lower lip, she pushed back the pain. She violently Pulled him from his hiding space and threw him a hundred yards into the mayhem of Huey and Dewey.
Kira ran to the wagon on her right and saw an injured, unconscious battlemage. She backed away from the wagon and her blood began to boil. Her hands curled into fists. Her rage fueling her magic, she Pulled and the wagon imploded, crushing the mage inside. Kira spun and marched toward the last remaining wagon. She peeked inside and saw Khayin lying unconscious on the floor. Her magic pulsated and her reflexes quickened. Kira grabbed Khayin and dragged him as far as her muscles allowed. She briefly turned to watch the ogre brothers causing their mayhem and used the precious moments they gave her to escape.
She was worried for them and her tattoos expressed as much. “Please get home alive,” she whispered, before she turned her attention on Khayin.
She shook him. Slapped him. Yelled at him. But nothing woke him. She grunted in frustration. Kira then noticed that not all of Khayin's weapons were on him, so she ran back to the wagon and took everything she could find, including some rations and canteens of water.
Khayin was still out when she returned. She Pulled him to help lift him and she carried him to Sunrise Manor, a mile off base. The minor city was just as abandoned as Nellis. She managed to find one building intact enough for shelter. She was weak. The magic was draining her and she hoped that Dorne and his men wouldn't try tracking them down. Kira barricaded and warded all windows and doors. The building must have been home to squatters at one time, because she found old clothes and blankets. She made a makeshift bed and laid Khayin down on them.
She rummaged through his stuff and found the container with the healing balm, applying a generous amount to both Khayin’s wounds and her own. She watched Khayin as he lay there, barely making any sound at all. Her stomach churned and her heart beat irregularly when she thought about him too long, and that scared her.
Her sister was behind this. Her sister wanted her dead. That was no surprise to her, but w
hat had gotten into her head to kill their whole tribe? All the tribes. She and her sister were the last of their people and soon there will be only one. Kira meditated and waited for her friend to awake.
Chapter 25 The Verdad
The smell of mildew and mold permeated the air. It was a cool evening, jacket kind of weather. Khayin opened his eyes and felt a little groggy. Remnants of the sedative lingering in his system made him feel a little nauseated. It was night and he saw Kira huddled close by shivering. He took a large blanket, laid it over her and he watched her till her body stopped shaking.
The building was small and remarkably preserved. He checked his wounded leg and arm that were now just bruised and sore. His chest still ached from the beating he took, but his ribs had healed. Well, if there is a bright side to my immortality, it's the healing.
A small ray of daylight shone through a crack in a boarded-up window. Khayin decided not to disturb Kira's barricades and wards. He looked down at her. Fuck! What did I get myself into? What is it about this girl that's got me all... He shook his head.
Kira's eyes slowly opened and she stretched. Khayin looked away in time, he hoped, to not appear to be creepy. He heard her shuffle into a sitting position. He turned around as she rubbed her eyes. Khayin walked over to the pile of his weapons and equipment. He found some food rations that he didn't recognize and grabbed them.
“I thought we might need them,” Kira explained. “I wasn't sure how long you were going to be out so I grabbed everything I could from the wagon they had you in.” Khayin nodded and tossed her some. “That was kind of dumb of you, you know.”
Khayin nodded again and sat down on the pile of blankets and clothes. “How long was I out?”
“Through the night.” She broke open the food. “You were shot twice, had a broken rib and they sedated you. I figured you'd probably be out awhile.”
“Thank you,” he said sincerely.
“Of course.” She smiled and he liked it. It was a pleasant progression from the scowls she had worn when they first met.
“Well,” he began, “since we're here with no distractions, I guess I owe you some answers.”
“No, you really don't owe me anything.” She looked down and away from him. “I still feel like shit for killing you. I shouldn't have lost control like that.” She looked back up at him, a small tear rolling down her cheek.
Khayin got up and moved to sit beside her. He put his arm around her shoulders and gave a light side hug. “Hey, I'm right here and speaking. I'm not a zombie or a vampire. I'm...hell, I don't know what I am, but I'm here. I'm not mad at you. If you're looking for forgiveness, you’ve got it, but I don't think it is all that necessary.” He smiled.
“You're not a what?”
“That's what you take away? All right, when we're done tracking down your sister, I'm taking you to the movies, starting with Star Wars, of course.” He tried to joke through his frustration.
“So, how old are you?” she asked.
“Nice and direct, good first question, and before I answer, I hope you will answer some of mine later.” She nodded. “Alright then.” Khayin broke the embrace and let out a heavy sigh. “I don't know how old I am. There's a good portion of my life missing, probably because of the curse. I do have vague recollections of a life before the gods.”
“What?” she gasped.
“Yeah, the gods are nothing more than ancient humans with lost magic. They grew so powerful that people started worshiping them as gods. Most of them have inflated egos.” Khayin took out his cigarette tin and started to roll a couple of cigarettes. “I think I wound up pissing one off. I don't really remember, on account of losing that part of my memory?”
“Were you one of these 'gods'?”
“No, but killing one made me public enemy number one for a while. It was that god's death curse that made me what I am. I live as long as they do, without all the magical perks.” He handed one of the cigarettes to Kira.
“So you've wandered the world for millennia?” She lit the tobacco-filled paper with the tip of her finger.
“Many, but I didn't disappear when magic left the world like everything else that was affiliated with magic. Science became the new god and with it a prejudice that spread rapidly.” He let her light his as well. “Knowing and using any kind of magic marked you and you were hunted down and killed. So, a group of powerful wizards banded together and cast a very powerful spell that shrouded any and all magic, including creatures that relied on it.”
“What is science?” She looked confused.
“Science is the study of, well, everything that isn't supernatural. They started to create things--objects to mimic magic, like all the electronics you see Codex using. That used to be the new magic and in turn became their new gods.” He took a long drag. “Then the old magic returned and, well, this happened.” He gestured all around him.
“But who did my sister align herself with? A phone?”
Khayin laughed. “I don't think so. I don't know.”
“Lilith said she made a pact with the gods for power,” she said.
“Lilith? Who's that?”
“The Dragon-Mother.” She breathed in a lung full of smoke. “She said she knew you.”
Lilith? THE Lilith?
“Stories can be powerful. They were used as entertainment and teaching. In fact, ancient primitive tribes used stories to tell their past rather than hard facts, which makes discerning actual history hard. Some figures in these stories became so popular that people began to worship them and thus make them real, some say.”
“There is a figure named Lilith from several of these ancient stories that your Lilith may fit. She didn't much care for men, or at least she wasn't too happy with the way women were treated like second class citizens. Sometimes worse, a lot of times worse. I have met that Lilith.” He paused in thought. “It would make sense for that Lilith to create her own tribe that hated men, though she never mentioned having worshipers. Maybe she didn't want to let on that she was a god?” He said the last bit in a very hushed tone, more of a spoken thought than anything else.
“Weird that we'd have a connection like that,” Kira said.
“I don't know if I'd call it a connection, but it's definitely weird.” He scratched his head and stared off into the distance.
“Lilith and Muma both took different identities through the ages. Did you?”
He snapped his head back to her as if just remembering he was having a conversation with someone. “Umm...yeah. Some have called me Ziusudra of Shuruppak, Parashuram, Tithonus, Cain from the Christian bible and the Jewish Torah, The Wandering Jew, Sir Galahad.” He chuckled. “Count of St. Germain, some have even referred me to as Gilgamesh. All stories of beings who were thought to be immortal. Are any of them true? Am I tied to these names? Maybe. Stories get twisted over the ages.” He leaned forward.
“Anyway, to be honest I really don't know.” He flicked some ash from his cigarette. “A drawback of being so old is that time passes differently for me. Something that happened just yesterday could seem like a very distant memory and sometimes the opposite is true.”
“What about that guy you saw on the coin?” she asked. “Was he a god?”
“Yeah, I think I may have to take a trip to Atlantis. There's a reason he came to me in a flash image. Hmm...” He thought a moment about the face. It scared him, but it also stirred up hate and rage. He shook his head. “All right, what about you? Talk, Princess.”
Kira told him about her tribe, the slaves, her sister and mother. She even told him about the slave boy. Khayin could tell it wasn't easy for her to talk about it, from her shifting anxiously and causing her to snuggle even closer to him. He saw her a bit differently. She wasn't as cold as he had first thought. The telling of her story made recent events, including the midnight rendezvous, make a lot more sense. He lightly stroked her back.
“So, you still haven't explained how you were caught by the infamous Bounty Hunter Extraordinaire Juan
Rodriguez?” He was wide-eyed and raised his voice on the latter part of the question as if he were making a grand announcement.
“My mother was the Crone, the spiritual leader of the tribe, as you already know. Other sisters, when they reach a venerable age, become teachers, guides, and mentors. That includes the Crone's predecessors.” She paused. “One such mentor was Sister-Mother Helga. She was very much loved and respected in the tribe. Her word was second only to the Crone's. Anyway, my sister had always been jealous of me. I was next to be the Crone and my power was growing fast. She had hoped that my little escapade with Quinn would have ruined that.” She tensed slightly when she mentioned Quinn’s name.
“Brianna killed Sister-Mother Helga, and made it look like I did it. She was quite convincing. She wore my clothing doing it and then she stashed those garments in the bottom of my foot chest. She used my Gnoxel Knife to slit her throat. In my opinion she made it 'too' obvious, but the tribe believed her, and at first, so did my mother. There was to be a trial. The trial would have been just for show. It had already been decided that I was going to die.” She grabbed the cigarette tin from Khayin's hand. “Wow, it wasn't until our trip to my homeland that I remembered any of this. Lilith?” The name was barely audible.
“It wasn't uncommon for a sister to die at the hands of another sister, if it were under the law, but murder never was. If I had done it I would have proudly taken my punishment, but I knew Brianna was behind it. I wasn't going to let her win. So, I ran.” Kira started to roll a cigarette. “I loved to explore when I was younger and I knew that island better than anyone. I lived off the land for weeks. My sister knew that eventually I would go to the mainland, so she hired bounty hunters.” She finished her roll and pocketed the tin.
“One of them finally got me. Actually, it took several of them and they drugged me. Drugged me to the point that I can't remember how I ended up with the Mexican. I was in and out of consciousness for a month or so, maybe. It was all really foggy. I was able to use my magic to cleanse my system of the toxins when they finally stopped giving me the drugs. And shortly after that I met you.” She smiled a warm smile.