Rune Warrior

by Frank Morin

  Tomas had regained consciousness long enough to explain some of what happened. It might not have been Alter who pulled the trigger, but Alter’s actions prevented Tomas from stopping Reuben. Medical staff had rushed Tomas to the hospital wing, and she hadn’t wanted to sit in the cold waiting room. She’d needed to do something.

  The sight of Alter sagging on the couch, clearly horrified by the revelation that he was Cui Dashi, quelled most of Sarah’s wrath. The only Cui Dashi she had interacted with were Mai Luan and Paul, and they were both super-freak madmen. She wasn’t sure how she’d react if she learned she possessed the same powers.

  Worse, Alter was a hunter. His entire life, he’d been taught that Cui Dashi were evil incarnate, worthy of nothing but death. That would be like Sarah telling her protestant parents she was really spawn of the devil.

  Alter looked to be beating himself up enough for the both of them at the moment, so she didn’t yell at him. She’d save it for later. Instead, she sat next to him.

  “This was the craziest morning I’ve ever had.”

  “I am sorry.” He faced her. “I let myself be swayed by my brother, but I should have known better. I chose wrongly.”

  “You did,” she agreed.

  His shoulders sagged and he looked down at his hands.

  She took them in hers. “But you realized your mistake and fought to protect us. For that, I thank you.”

  “I am unworthy of thanks.”

  “Maybe, but I’ll decide who to thank, thank you very much.”

  That triggered the hint of a smile. “How is Tomas?”

  “He’ll live. And maybe he’ll learn not to change bodies again.”

  Now that the initial terror was past, her overwhelming fear for his safety had transitioned to annoyance. If he hadn’t been so stupid and loaned his body to Carl, he might have avoided those injuries.

  “I am glad.”

  “You’re not off the hook though. I need my rune made permanent.”

  “Now’s not a good time.”

  “You’re wrong. Now’s the best time. We need to find Paul and end this before Reuben returns or…something else. I don’t know why, but I know it. We need to move fast or worse things will happen.”

  “I’m a demon,” he whispered. “I might hurt you.”

  “You are who you’ve always been,” she said. “And I know you. You’d never hurt me.”

  Alter took a deep breath and gazed at her for a long moment. His eyes were red-rimmed and his face looked aged, exhausted.

  “All right,” he said, rubbing his face vigorously as if to scrape away all the baggage from the morning.

  Sarah was glad he decided to help. She needed the rune, and he needed something to focus on besides his despair, the fight with his brother, and the crazy revelation that he was not who he thought he was.

  Instead of asking for one of the special knives from her runesmith kit to mark the rune on her thigh he said, “I need some paper.”

  “But we’ve already marked it.”

  “We’ll deal with that rune in a minute,” he said, sounding more like himself. “Stop arguing for once, Sarah, and get me some paper.”

  It took a few minutes. All available staff were busy tending the injured or helping to clean up. Enforcement teams were sweeping the building, disarming and removing the explosives that the hunters had planted. Sarah couldn’t imagine why Reuben hadn’t triggered them, but she was grateful. It was a sign of how crazy the morning had been that the thought of explosives scattered around the building barely fazed her.

  Alter took the paper and pen to a nearby table and began to draw a rune. From the first strokes, Sarah realized it was one she had never seen before, but it felt familiar.

  As the complex shape progressed, she began to guess some of the lines before he drew them. That rune called to her as if it was already bonded to her soul, and she leaned over the table, barely restraining the urge to snatch the paper from Alter until he finished it.

  “What is this?” she breathed, staring in wonder at the rune that burned into her mind as she gazed upon it.

  “This is the rune warrior symbol,” he said. “I received it last night.”

  “It’s amazing.” Sarah traced the lines with a finger, even though she had already memorized it. It was a flowing, graceful design, centered on a curious symbol that gave the impression of two open hands wrapping each other in a yin yang circle.

  There was power there, and Sarah concentrated over it, but couldn’t quite place it. She recognized a series of Chinese pictograms that combined to tie in elements of strength, honor and, she was startled to see, history. The Egyptian ankh symbol of life stood atop the crest of the rune, with other symbols worked into the design.

  It was one of the most beautiful things she had ever seen.

  “Somehow I know this rune,” she said softly. “Where have we seen this before?”

  “You’ve never seen this one, not complete.” Alter was watching her closely, his expression guarded. “It’s not often seen, and it’s never used.”

  “Why not? This rune is so powerful.” She felt that power radiating off of it in near-tangible waves. She was surprised she couldn’t see it, like shimmering heat floating above the rune.

  “It doesn’t work for anyone with regular rounon powers,” Alter said. “Some runes are like that, this one most of all. This is the symbol of the rune warriors and only they can bond to it.”

  “It feels so right though, doesn’t it?”

  He shrugged. “Not to me.”

  “How do rune warriors use it?”

  Alter hesitated, looking worried. “Sarah, don’t try it.”

  “Why not?” Looking away from the rune was difficult.

  “Because there’s no going back.” He took her hands, then dropped them, glaring at his hands in disgust. “Sarah, I drew too near the facetakers, even though I felt the danger, and look what happened to me.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I felt them, Sarah.” He looked anguished. “When I helped them run the machines, I felt their nevron touching me, melding with my soul through my rounon. What if…What if I hadn’t done that? I might not have become the devil I am now.”

  Sarah frowned. “Alter, I don’t think it works that way.”

  “But what if it did?” he exclaimed. “Sarah, I’m worried you might be able to bond the rune warrior mark.”

  “That would be amazing.”

  “No! It would change you.” He took her hands again, and his shook. “Sarah, if you walk away from this rune, maybe you won’t activate any rounon gift. I don’t want you getting hurt.”

  “That’s why I have to try it. If I really can activate some kind of rounon power, it’ll make me stronger, help me fight Paul.”

  “It could destroy your soul,” Alter whispered. He dropped his gaze, but his expression made it clear he wanted to add, ‘like mine.’

  Sarah touched his cheek, drawing his gaze back to her. “Alter, you are who you’ve always been. You’re a hunter, a man of honor, and you will help us defeat the ones who hurt your family.”

  When he looked like he wanted to argue, she added, “And that rune calls to me. Alter, if I can do it, I want to. I need to grow, to become the most I can be. That’s the only way I can truly know myself, and the only hope I have for surviving whatever evil Paul has planned for me.”

  “I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

  “Do you really want me to turn away from who I could be?”

  “I don’t want your soul spoiled.”

  She shook her head. “Alter, I don’t have your depth of learning, but I know that a soul is spoiled only if one gives in to evil. You’d never do that, and I don’t intend to either.” She gave him an encouraging smile. “Now show me how to try out this rune.”

  Even though he looked like he wanted to argue further, he nodded. “Just promise me you won’t change.”

  “I promise.” Bonding to that rune would chan
ge some things, but she doubted it would change her heart or her goals.

  “There’s no halfway about this rune,” Alter said. “I have to cut it into your skin. It can only be activated by blood and steel. There are no temporary rune warriors.”

  Sarah took his hand. “Come on, then.” She led him to her suite, into her sitting room, and produced her runesmith kit. He selected a slender blade a little longer than the one he’d used to mark her last enhancement.

  “You have to tell me where to inscribe it,” he said.

  “It only works in one place, doesn’t it?”

  He nodded. “If you choose wrong, it’s a sign that you’re not meant to be a rune warrior.”

  Or it was one last hurdle he was trying to place in her path. It didn’t matter. She knew where the rune needed to go.

  “Mark it in the center of my lower back,” she said, and he didn’t quite hide his disappointment. She’d chosen correctly.

  She stripped off her bulletproof vest and pulled up the back of her soggy shirt. Alter crouched behind her, with one steadying hand on her hip. As soon as he began to mark the rune, she felt it, like a trickle of ice along her skin.

  She shivered. “What are you doing?”

  “Don’t move,” he ordered.

  “But I feel it already.”

  He didn’t respond, but the icy sensation continued, spreading across her lower back. She felt every mark of the blade, felt the image taking shape on her back with startling clarity. She felt no pain, but the chill seeping into her skin from those marks spread through her until her teeth actually chattered. She started to wonder if she’d made a wise choice.

  When he finished, he pulled her right hand back, pressing it over the mark. “There’s less blood than I expected.”

  “You marked every line,” she said. “I felt it. Now what do I do?”

  Alter dropped his hand and spoke, his voice soft, but intense. “Focus on the rune, Sarah. Feel it, and will it to life.”

  “How?”

  “It’s something I cannot teach you. You have to do it alone.”

  Sarah pressed her hand against the rune and closed her eyes. She concentrated, willing something to happen, although she wasn’t sure what. For several seconds, nothing happened, and she began to fear it wouldn’t work.

  She needed it to!

  She needed the strength that rune promised. She wanted it to work with the same desperation she’d felt while marking that healing rune for Tomas the day he’d almost died.

  As the intensity of that need filled her, her heartbeat began to accelerate, and she felt a rush of adrenaline. The chill of the rune drew back to the marks on her skin, leaving the rest of her body feeling flushed with heat. The lines of the rune seemed to freeze into her back and into her hand, even while heat coursed through the rest of her, as if she were standing in front of a blast furnace.

  Then the cold shattered, like shards of ice skittering along her skin, radiating out to every extremity. The heat that had been burning her up compressed in an instant, as if sucking into the rune, and for a second the mark blazed against her skin. It drew into it all her strength, and she sagged where she stood, nearly swooning.

  “Sarah?” Alter’s voice reached her from a great distance, but she couldn’t open her eyes. She was so very tired.

  Then her strength returned in a rush, magnified tenfold.

  Sarah rose to her toes with a gasp, eyes wide with wonder as every muscle quivered with vibrant energy. The rune blazed on her back with intense white light, filling the room with its glow.

  As the light began to fade, she spun to Alter, who was rising, his expression a mixture of wonder and despair.

  “It worked!” She hugged him until he grunted from the pressure.

  She laughed and twirled around the room, unable to stand still with so much energy burning through her limbs. “This is amazing. I really did it. I’m a rune warrior.”

  Her good humor finally lifted the scowl from his face. “I’m glad you’re so happy.”

  “How could I not be?”

  “Now that you’ve activated your rounon, you can create your own runes,” Alter said. “For most of us, we need a few days or weeks before we’re consistent at activating runes, but I’m thinking it won’t take so long for you.”

  “I’m going to test it right now.” She snatched a little knife from the runesmith kit and started unbuckling her belt to get at her temporary rune. Alter stood watching her, his expression startled.

  “Hey, look away,” she said. “This isn’t a peep show.”

  A little disappointed, he turned. She was tempted to order him out of the room, but she didn’t want to waste another second.

  Pulling the front of her pants down, she dropped into a chair and extended her leg. She studied her rune before beginning to mark it permanently. It still took her breath away, but the feeling of not-quite-completeness tugged at her.

  All of a sudden, she knew what the rune needed.

  With swift, sure strokes, she marked the rune into her thigh, the razor-sharp blade slicing her skin like butter. She felt no pain, only eagerness as she included the central symbol from her rune warrior symbol around the heart of the rune.

  “Hey, what are you doing?” Alter had turned and was watching her.

  “Turn!”

  “But, Sarah.”

  “I told you not to look. Turn, or get out.”

  He turned, and Sarah completed her work. With trembling fingers, she placed her hands over the newly-completed rune and concentrated, willing it to life.

  Immediately, a rush of heat rolled through her from her rune warrior mark and connected with a well of strength in her heart that she’d never felt before. It was as if a door in her soul had opened, a door to a fountain of blazing strength. That strength poured out and flowed through her hands and into the new rune, encircling and powering it.

  The rune activated, bonding to her soul, and this time she felt it link back to that new well of strength in her heart. That was the power of her rounon, fueling the rune and being fueled in turn. The rune blazed against her skin and she leaped to her feet. Barely remembering to buckle her pants, she pulled Alter around and hugged him again, although not quite as hard.

  “It worked! I bonded the rune. This is amazing.”

  Laughing, she spun with him, and the two of them danced across the room. His glum expression turned happy and he grinned with her. They finally stopped near the window and rested together. “Oh, Alter. Thank you.”

  He said nothing, but leaned closer, his arms tightening around her waist. They were already standing close together, all but embracing. As he leaned in close, she was still riding the exultant wave of joy, filled with vibrant life and the wonder of the birth of that amazing new part of herself that she still barely comprehended.

  She hesitated a second too long before retreating.

  Their lips touched, then he pressed against her hungrily. He wasn’t a very good kisser, but was very enthusiastic. Sarah kissed him back. Just once. She decided she owed him that much.

  Alter seemed ready to kiss her all day, but she broke away and gently disentangled from his embrace. “That’s more than enough, Alter.”

  He let her go reluctantly, grinning like a fool.

  If he ever breathed a word about that kiss to anyone, Tomas was going to kill her.

  Her bonding with the rune progressed to another level and Sarah’s senses expanded outward in a rush. She felt Alter standing nearby, even when she closed her eyes. She felt the power of his soul like a light shining in her mind.

  “What is it?” Alter asked.

  She held up a hand to forestall the question and turned toward the distant medical wing. When she focused in that direction, it was like her thoughts slipped through the distance, honing in on another pair of souls that shone in her mind like beacons.

  With a start, she realized she was feeling Gregorios and Eirene.

  “I think I can feel them,” she whispered
.

  “Who?”

  “The facetakers. Come on!”

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  Why did I come to Constantinople, raise and finance a force of over seven hundred fighting men, and embrace a cause that to the world must seem hopeless? For the advantage of the Christian faith and for the honour of the world, or course.

  Mehmed claims the enhancements of his Janissaries are blessed by Allah, but our faith in the one and only true god cannot leave such claims unanswered. Let him break his army against these mighty walls, and our victory shall proclaim to all the world that enhancements of pure, Christian souls can never be vanquished.

  ~Giovanni Giustiniani Longo, of Genoa, who played a critical role in the defense of Constantinople, shortly before its fall and his fatal wound, 1453

  Gregorios called the meeting in the Suntara conference room to order. He wore a muscular body with almost as many runes as his favorite battle suit. When that upstart Reuben had escaped Quentin’s mansion, he had freed the two squads of his men they had subdued earlier. He had not found the three snipers Quentin had neutralized on the second floor. This body came from one of them.

  Tomas, who stood just off Gregorios’ right shoulder, wore another.

  Everyone was already seated around the council table in the Suntara headquarters. Harriett had arrived last, pushing a catering cart with eight of her best pies. Two pieces sat on a plate in front of Gregorios, but he hadn’t touched them yet.

  The rest of the decimated council had joined him, along with Eirene and their children. Sarah, Alter, and Quentin had been invited, although Gregorios had wanted to force Alter to wear chains. Eirene had talked him out of the idea, but he still thought it would have best driven home the point.

  Paul had irritated him with his games and shadowy plots, but now Gregorios was well and truly angry. He didn’t get there often and was really looking forward to meeting Paul in person and beating out his frustration on the man’s face.