“Father Sergio has been hit,” said the monsignor. “I don’t think he knew it himself until we collapsed here, but they got him in the leg, and there is arterial bleeding.”
“Noooo!” shouted J.E., now watching his friend’s leg pumping blood. “Albert, we have a kit. Do what you can, and I’ll hold the Karik off. Hurry!”
J.E. took the medical kit from his pack and tossed it to the monsignor. He then leaped to the wall and surveyed the area. It was quiet and empty. But in the silence he could hear the telltale clang and clink of men getting into position. He looked at the timer on his watch and saw it would be ten minutes still before the mines would go off.
BLAM! A huge blast erupted as one of the corridor mines was tripped. This backlit the Karik’s forces for a moment, and J.E. got a pretty good look at their deployment. J.E. was unsure whether the poor SOB who had tripped the Claymore was lucky or unlucky.
“How is he?” J.E. called back to the monsignor.
“Not good, but I think I’ve slowed the bleeding. I have it pretty tightly wrapped,” responded the monsignor. “He needs a doctor now.”
As J.E. peered over the rock wall, the Karik’s men let go with a great fusillade of fire. The rocks around J.E. were blasted, and the air was filled with dust and grit. He hunkered down but still checked to see if they were coming.
As the gunfire slacked a bit, he turned, feeling a presence at his arm. There was his mother, crouched down with her .45 aimed at the Karik’s forces.
“Mom, what are you doing here?” he yelled over the noise of the sporadic firing.
“The jars aren’t here,” said Cloe. “I have searched all three levels, and there’s nothing.”
“But you must have missed something,” replied J.E. “All the clues lead here.”
“I have looked everywhere there is to look in and near Herod’s palace … in the storehouses, the caves, and the cisterns,” she said. “The low-light glasses made it easier and quicker than I would have thought. Unless, somehow, the jars are buried, they are not here.”
J.E. took this in. “Mom, Serge is badly wounded,” he said solemnly. “Can you see what you can do to help? I need Albert on the line if we are to defend our position.”
“Sure, J.E.,” she said, turning toward the priest. Then Cloe turned back and said, “I want to see an end to the Karik, but if Serge needs medical treatment and if there are no jars here, we need to rethink what we are doing … Let’s just get out of here.”
“We’re trapped against the northern side of the fortress,” he replied. “No matter how we go, we would have to pass the Karik. I doubt we would get a get-out-of-jail-free card from him.”
“But there’s nothing here,” she said. “There’s nothing to defend or to fight for.”
“I think the Karik would feel otherwise,” responded J.E. “We’re fighting now for our lives.”
CHAPTER 104
“No jars?” queried the monsignor. Cloe had gone back to help Father Sergio, and the monsignor had come up to man a fighting position.
“No jars,” agreed J.E.
“So Masada and all the clues were never about the jars,” mused the monsignor. “What does that mean?”
“It means it was always a trap,” responded J.E. “In the mountains when she came back from their camp, Mom said the Sicarii would deal once and for all with this devil, the Karik, and his organization. I remember her saying we were not invited. Of course, the kidnapping changed all that. The Sicarii laid a clever trap.”
“Clever, indeed, with your mother in the center with just enough information to convince the Karik to come here,” replied the monsignor. “The only thing they did not count on was the ruthlessness of the Karik and his weaponry. Now they are all dead, caught in their own trap.”
“True, but they must have considered that a possibility since the jars were apparently never here, or if they were, they were moved again,” observed J.E. “Belt and suspenders.”
Just then Cloe appeared at the wall.
“How’s Serge?” asked J.E.
“We’ve got the blood loss slowed but not stopped. He needs a doctor and a hospital now,” she said urgently.
“The only way out from this end of Masada is to fight our way out. We are outgunned four or five to one,” said J.E. “We need a miracle.”
J.E. had been watching the no man’s land between the Karik’s position and the inner wall. Now he straightened and peered down at them. “They are coming,” he said simply, glancing at his watch. “We still have two minutes before the forward Claymores go off. Albert, let’s spray their positions with fire and see if we can back them down a bit.”
“Okay … I’ll go east and try to get a cross fire going,” responded the monsignor.
“Remember, they will target your position with their RPGs. Don’t stay in the same place for long,” said J.E.
The monsignor responded with a sardonic smile and said, “With God’s help, we will get out of this thing yet.”
The priest turned and ran up the wall to the east, and J.E. looked at his watch: one minute. He could see the thugs edging their way out from behind the wall and then jumping back. They were working up their nerve now, but eventually, they would come.
J.E. leveled his AR-15 and sprayed the Karik’s position with high-velocity .223 rifle slugs. Immediately, his assault was answered by a great volley of return fire. He and Cloe dove down behind the wall as far as they could get. They could hear the screams of the charging men coming for the inner wall.
At almost the same time came the sound of the monsignor opening up with his AK-47, the heavy slugs making a womp, womp sound when they hit dirt, stone, or flesh.
J.E. and Cloe looked out and saw that the men who had charged were conflicted. The monsignor’s fire had them in a cross fire, but the Karik was screaming to charge. J.E. lifted his rifle with a new clip and added to the melee. Some of the men dove for cover, and some went back to the wall they had only just left.
At that point, the two Claymores exploded and lit up the night. Men screamed and cried in the aftermath of the explosions. If only he had had more mines, he might have been able to lay them out properly and finish it right here, J.E. thought. But with just the two last mines, planting them the way he had was the only thing he could do. It was not the most lethal use of the explosives because only the men on the ends of the trench formed by the walls would be hit. Still, it was a start.
Whoosh. Following the now familiar sound of the RPGs, the wall near where the monsignor had been positioned exploded in flame. J.E. grabbed Cloe and ran about ten yards to the west and then dove for cover. No sooner had he done that than the place where they had been positioned also exploded in flames.
They looked out and saw that the Karik’s men were once again running across the no man’s land below. J.E. emptied another clip on them and shouted to the monsignor, “Fall back!”
As Cloe ran to Father Sergio and J.E. followed, the sound of the monsignor’s AK pounding the oncoming forces filled the air.
The three of them converged on Father Sergio. The monsignor and J.E. grabbed him under his arms and carried him down the stairs to the next level of the palace. He was not fully conscious.
“What do we do now, J.E.?” asked the monsignor.
“From now on, we improvise. We watch our ammo, and we lay in wait for the Karik’s soldiers, guerilla fashion,” responded J.E. “We have to sting them to the point they give up, or we have to annihilate them. One by one, we get them all. That’s it.”
“All right, they have to come down these steps along the outer edge of the cliff face unless they have some way of rappelling down from above,” said the monsignor. “Take Father Sergio to the last level below. He is likely to be safer there. I’ll guard these steps and hold them off.”
“Albert, we have to hold them here. The next level is little more than a terrace overlooking a thousand-foot drop,” said J.E. “It’s indefensible.”
The monsignor looked at
him seriously and said, “I know.”
CHAPTER 105
Cloe and J.E. frog-walked Father Sergio down to the lower terrace and put him in a sheltered place under a stone outcropping where he could not be seen or shot at from above. Cloe turned and looked out into space dimly lit in the moonless night and wondered what would happen to them if they were trapped here. There was no further retreat and no place to go. She shivered at the thought in the gathering coolness of the mountain air.
Cloe and J.E. bent over Father Sergio and briefly loosened the bandages binding his wounds so that he would not completely lose circulation. The blood began to once again pump from the bullet hole. Clearly, an artery had been damaged or, God forbid, severed.
As J.E. turned to rise, Cloe saw the injured man’s hand reach out and grab her son’s leg. “J.E.,” whispered Father Sergio.
Ducking back down, J.E. looked at his friend. “Yes, Serge,” he replied. Cloe silently watched, tears in her eyes.
“Thanks, J.E., for everything. Please tell His Holiness I did my best,” said the priest, struggling to get out the words.
“Tell him yourself,” said J.E. with a smile. “You’re not going anywhere.”
“You’ll be fine, as soon as we get out of here and get you to a hospital,” echoed Cloe.
“I’m sorry to be such a burden,” whispered the young camerlengo wearily.
Cloe and J.E. looked at each other, and after a moment of silence, it seemed Father Sergio had passed out from his wounds. But he surprised them.
“J.E., leave me a weapon. I can still try to fight,” said the priest gamely. “I will make my village proud.”
J.E. placed a pistol next to him just as the priest did lose consciousness. God help us, Cloe prayed.
As they finished securing the young camerlengo, Cloe heard shots from above. Hustling back to the second level, she and J.E. found the monsignor hunkered down behind good cover, watching the steps. He had not fired his weapon.
“They are just trying to goad us into revealing our position,” said the monsignor quietly. “Pay that no mind.”
“I can hear them scrambling above us,” whispered Cloe.
“They are looking for some other route down, but if I know the Roman engineers who built this place, there is no other way down … just the steps,” said J.E. “I suspect they are also carefully searching for more mines. We did some damage a little while ago with them.”
“What do you think the odds are now, J.E.?” asked the monsignor.
“Well, based on what I could see just before we moved back, I think they are down to about one-third of their original strength … maybe six or seven left,” said J.E. softly. “Not bad for a day’s work, but they still have plenty enough to do the job.”
Just then Cloe heard a loud clunk and a rolling sound.
“Grenade!” hissed J.E. “Down!”
BLAM! With the explosive report from the grenade, Cloe and the others were showered with bits and pieces of stone and dust.
Cloe started to speak.
“Quiet,” J.E. whispered in her ear. “They don’t know where we are. They are dropping the grenades at random, hoping to hit us or scare us out.”
Then came the clunk of two more of the explosives, which rolled to the center of the plaza and detonated. These were actually farther away than the first grenade, so no real damage was done.
“It’s working. I’m scared to death,” cried Cloe.
“They will be coming down the steps in a minute,” said J.E. “Be ready.”
After a couple more grenades, the automatic fire opened up from above.
“Here they come,” cautioned the monsignor.
Several men pounded down the stairs firing wildly, hoping to get lucky or at least to keep them down. J.E. and the monsignor opened up with their weapons, and Cloe could hear the AK rattle above the fray. Ricochets, rocks, and stone particles flew everywhere. At least one of the men was hit before the others held up and retreated. Still, the Karik’s men had succeeded in locating their position.
“We’ve got to go,” J.E. said hoarsely. “They know our position, so we can’t stay here; the grenades are going to start coming again very soon.”
“There’s no other cover on this level,” replied the monsignor. “We will have to go down.”
“But the lower terrace is nothing but a death trap,” said Cloe. “There is little cover and no escape.”
“Have faith, Cloe,” said the monsignor. “God has not led us all this way to abandon us in our moment of greatest need.”
She looked at the monsignor and smiled. “Then I hope he has a few extra angels he can send.”
CHAPTER 106
Noosh looked at the Karik, who was exhorting the men to get down the stairs at any cost. Plainly, he was willing to lead them from behind.
“Sir, we have plenty of grenades,” Noosh said to the Karik. “Are we not better conserving the men, now that we know where Dr. Lejeune and her friends are? We can drop explosives on them until we get them, they give up, or move lower.”
“Yes, yes,” replied the Karik restively. “Let it be so.”
“In effect, our strategy will be to herd them to the last terrace below, from which there is no escape,” offered Noosh.
“Yes, there I will have my revenge and the jars too,” said the Karik, “for surely that is where they are hidden.”
Noosh gave the order, and his men began dropping the pint-size bombs on the very area where they now knew J.E. and his forces were located.
The Karik laughed as the explosives blew up.
CHAPTER 107
In the hiatus after the firefight and before the grenade assault began again in earnest, J.E., Cloe, and the monsignor bolted for the steps along the side of the cliff leading to the lowest area of the palace. If any of them had questioned the decision to retreat, the explosions that rang out above just after they left convinced them they would now be dead had they stayed.
Although Cloe knew they had escaped one death trap, she recognized that it was a temporary reprieve unless something fundamentally changed. There was just nowhere to go. They were still outnumbered by the Karik at least two or three to one, and he had the high ground. “J.E., we are in a bad way here,” she said. “What do we do?”
Her son turned and surveyed the plaza, only a low wall separating it from eternity below and the surrounding rocks. The place was maybe thirty to forty feet across, ringed by the low wall on three sides and perched atop a rocky point. The cold night wind blew briskly over them as it had cooled others here for thousands of years. The only access was the way they had come, a rocky staircase that swung out over the edge of the mountain. At one time, J.E. knew, there had been access by means of an internal corridor, but the stone walls had long since collapsed, blocking the way.
“The old corridor provides some shelter and enough rock and overhang that it will be difficult to drop grenades directly on us,” said J.E. “This will be where we make our stand.”
“Let’s get Father Sergio in there and get ready,” said the monsignor.
As they hunkered down, Cloe noted that from their shelter, they could not see all of the steps down from the upper level. The Karik’s men would be almost all the way down before they could get a good shot. If the assailants could rush down in force throwing grenades and shooting, they might overwhelm them.
Seeming to read her mind, J.E. said, “Don’t worry about the blind spot. The Karik’s men don’t know about it, and there are not so many of them to try to rush us. They will drop their grenades and try to lure us out into a firefight.”
No sooner had J.E. spoken than the first explosive hit the terrace, rolled, and exploded. Shrapnel and debris showered their position, but the grenade was not near enough to do any damage to them. Several more followed, blasting away a part of the retaining wall overlooking the thousand-foot drop.
Cloe stared at the opening, which led only to oblivion. Waves of gooseflesh assaulted her arms as she huddled
from the wind, the cold, and the fear.
Just as suddenly as the grenades had ended, automatic weapon fire began. But the bullets merely ricocheted off the rock floor and walls. After a few moments, there was silence.
“Dr. Lejeune,” called a voice from above.
“J.E., what should I do?” she asked.
“Why not answer him?” asked the monsignor. “We might learn something. What do we have to lose?”
Cloe looked at J.E., who nodded and said, “Draw it out.”
“Yes?” she yelled.
“Dr. Lejeune, it seems we have a situation,” shouted the Karik. “You cannot leave, but I cannot get at you without exposing my men.”
“That works just fine for me,” Cloe responded. “Come on down and let us show you some American hospitality with my two friends, Smith and Wesson.”
J.E. smiled, and the monsignor chuckled.
“I offer you a deal,” screamed the Karik, clearly frustrated. “I only want the jars. You and your friends can leave. Just give me what I want.”
“Karik, I have a deal for you,” said Cloe loudly. “You and your men get off my mountain, and I won’t destroy the jars right where they sit. We have rigged them with explosives. My first job was to recover the relics, but my second was to keep you from getting them. It would be a damn shame, but I can still accomplish my mission by blowing them up.”
The monsignor was gazing at her with new respect. J.E. smiled with pride.
At first there was a deep silence, and then in answer to her offer, a terrible fusillade of grenades, RPGs, and automatic-weapons fire ignited the night. It was the loudest and most dangerous display of firepower yet, but still it did nothing but push Cloe and friends a little deeper into the corridor.
“Okay, be ready,” said J.E. “This may be when they rush us.”
As J.E. crept out a bit to get an angle on the steps, another terrible blast of firepower came from above, but it was markedly different from the previous one. It did not seem to be aimed at them, and it seemed to have a more distant origin.
The Last Sicarius Page 29