‘Seven years, Kieran,’ William said finally. ‘Seven bloody years? And those are the first words you greet me with?’
Kieran stared at him.
‘I haven’t seen you since you said goodbye in Villeda. I thought you were dead. Sometimes I even hoped you were. It hurt less to believe so. And now I see you . . .’ William fought his emotions, the despair and incredulity. ‘How dare you come to me and say this! How dare you greet me in this manner! After all our years of friendship!’
‘We are only here for Marresca, William,’ Kieran said and looked past him to the church.
William turned about and shook his head. ‘Why?’
‘One of us has fallen,’ the albino replied.
‘David,’ Kieran added, ‘was destroyed at the Gates of Hell. We need a replacement.’
‘A replacement?’ William said, aghast. ‘Just as you replaced that Dar’uka in Aosta?’
Kieran inclined his head slightly.
‘Always five we are. The five Dar’uka. No fewer, no more, to fight this war,’ the albino said.
William shook his head again, this time firmly. ‘No.’
‘No?’ The albino angel said. The word seemed to attack William, driving against his temple and crashing against his ears.
He stepped back again. ‘No,’ William replied, his hands at his head. ‘He is too young.’
‘Age matters little, William Saxon,’ The albino angel said.
‘Marresca is strong enough to be Dar’uka,’ Kieran said. ‘We have seen what he has become. We have seen what he has done.’
‘And he has done all this without you,’ William retorted. ‘Everything we have succeeded in doing has been done without you. We don’t need you.’ He turned to Kieran. ‘I don’t need you.’
Kieran stared back, his expression unflinching. ‘This is not your choice.’
William felt his rage rising. ‘To hell with you!’ he shouted. ‘He is under my command!’
‘But this is his choice, not yours,’ The albino angel replied calmly.
‘Just as it was mine, William,’ Kieran said, his voice almost serene, and for a moment the old Kieran returned. It disarmed William, who seemed to give in with a sob.
‘But I’ve lost you,’ William implored. ‘You willingly destroyed our friendship, Kieran. Can’t you see that? You abandoned me.’
‘Friendships do not matter,’ Kieran replied coldly. ‘All that matters is the War.’
‘I wait seven years for you to come back, and when you return, you don’t even know me,’ William moaned.
‘We know you, William,’ Kieran assured him. ‘We know everything.’
‘You don’t know me,’ William protested. ‘Much has happened in seven years.’
‘I know you are a man of honour, Captain William Saxon,’ Kieran replied. ‘And I know you will tell Marresca. It is not your decision, but Marresca’s alone. Only he can choose whether to become Dar’uka or not.’
‘And become like you? To become less than human, Kieran?’ William taunted. He hoped for something, just a sign of anger or indignation to crack that terribly calm and cold façade.
‘You will tell him, William,’ Kieran continued, ‘that we must have his answer by the third full moon. And then we will come to him.’
‘In all conscience, I cannot,’ William seethed.
‘Do you wish us to confront him now?’ Kieran asked.
William considered what this might do. To reveal the Dar’uka to his men in the church, and to Father Gessille, would only make matters worse. ‘No,’ he conceded.
‘Then tell him,’ Kieran said and turned away, the giant albino by his side. William watched them returning to those fractured shadows at the end of the street, back to obscurity, and in spite of himself he was still in awe. In awe of how someone could so suddenly disrupt his life, and make him question his feelings and beliefs.
There came another rumble, the world appeared to shake, and light blazed from the ground beyond the houses before the tremor subsided. As the Dar’uka disappeared, the storm above abated and the starry skies returned. Soon afterward came a chorus of barking as the dogs in the distance found their courage again to howl at the tempest that had left as quickly as it had arrived.
William didn’t return to the chapel immediately, but considered the turn of events that had brought him such heartbreak from his encounter with the Dar’uka. For a fleeting moment, William hated Kieran. Not just what he’d become, but Kieran Harte himself; he who had betrayed their friendship so easily. He looked down at his hands and opened his balled fists. Indents were in his palms where he’d squeezed his fingernails into the skin.
Inside the chapel, Father Gessille was brewing tea for Lieutenant Peruzo. He poured a mug for William, who took it gratefully yet silently.
‘I heard voices,’ Peruzo said. ‘Who was it?’
‘No one,’ William lied, his hands trembling.
‘There was thunder . . .’ Peruzo added.
‘The storm has passed us by,’ William said between sips, unable to look Peruzo in the eyes. He managed to look up for a moment to Marresca, who lay sleeping on one of the benches. His hands shook harder with fury.
Father Gessille noted the shaking and peered down at him. ‘Is there something still troubling you, my son?’
‘No. Thank you, Father. Everything is quite, quite clear to me now,’ he said as he sipped again from the cup, unable to stop his hands from trembling.
CHAPTER THREE
Another Homecoming
I
The burial of Brother Anthony of Turin was a muted affair. Peruzo elected to speak independently, having known Brother Anthony since initiation eight years before. During the burial, William’s thoughts strayed to the Scarimadaen they had captured, and he fought to master his frustration that their quarry, the flame-haired vampyre of Vienna, had escaped yet again. He was not accustomed to failing. But it was not just this disappointment that gnawed at his mind.
William had once harboured some hope that Kieran would return and the angels would fight alongside them in a common war. That this hadn’t happened, and worse, that Kieran would make such demands of him on his first appearance in seven years, caused William disbelief. If the Dar’uka felt so little towards what the Church was doing, then why were they doing it? Why take the risks? Why all the sacrifices, Brother Anthony’s for one?
It was these thoughts that haunted William during their long journey home from Prague, a journey that took longer than expected. Their passage across the Alps was beset by bad weather and for two weeks they were marooned in Innsbruck, a tiny place just inside Austria where the streets were often quiet and the evenings icy cold. During their reluctant stay William cultivated a beard. He spent long hours sitting inside their simple lodgings while he reviewed his motives.
This internal debate was a distraction he did not need. In the past his reasons had been simple. William fought for the glimmer of hope that Count Ordrane of Draak, that hated creature who commanded the vampyres and kafalas, would one day be defeated and William’s exile ended. He had not seen his mother, father, or sister in over seven years, yet his last words to them had been of a swift return. In light of what followed, The promise had been futile, but then William could not have foreseen the circumstances that would eventually drive both him and his lost friend Kieran out of England and across the Continent to Rome, where his exile began.
In the intervening years, William had written home often, if only to reassure his family, fashioning a fiction by telling them he was on business for the British army and would return when best he could.
He had once toyed with telling them that Kieran was now dead, but wasn’t sure how badly his sister would have taken the news. Elizabeth had love d Kieran dearly, and had designs to marry him, something that could never happen now.
Now that Kieran had become Dar’uka.
So William kept up the pretence that Kieran was serving alongside him, making up stories until it became too
much to endure. Finally he stopped, unable to write anything but meandering lies about transactions and travel, trite observations of places he had never visited. William had not written home to England for almost a year now.
After a mission to Spain, his motivations for fighting the War had begun to change. Victories had come, but they were costly. Yet as the war with the agents of Count Ordrane moved from the shadows and into the streets of cities such as Paris, Vienna and Prague, William greeted the open battles with relish. What mattered was destroying the enemy, not the issue of anonymity, and as the veil of secrecy over their clandestine war began to slip, notoriety and rumour grew.
The Vatican fought hard to keep the war quiet, fearing that the monarchs and governments of this fragile Continent would turn against the Church if it were revealed that the Vatican was warring with devils in their own territory. The Church feared the repercussions of doctrine clashing with disbelief. but it feared most the return of the Inquisition, an arm of the Church that had not been entirely quashed over the past hundred years. It would take little for the Inquisitors to return, especially if the heads of State demanded it.
Yet despite the Vatican’s attempts at controlling rumour, William had become a whispered legend even in the Church, one that bishops and cardinals spoke of in hushed voices, inventing wild stories sometimes to the point where they spread to the populace of Rome. In the brothels and the courts, people spoke of an Englishman who battled dragons, or a priest who faced the ‘Devil’ – and ‘for the first time, The Devil was frightened of his enemy’.
These stories travelled abroad upon merchant ships or buried in the columns of newspapers. Once The Times had run an article on the legend, hinting that several murders in Blackfriars had been the work of some diabolical creature that this so-called ‘warrior priest of Rome’ had vanquished. How ironic if Lord Saxon of Fairway Hall had read such a story, not suspecting that its source was nothing less than his own son.
William’s absence had been long. He knew nothing of the story The Times carried, but was aware of other legends and myths, rarely true, and even then inaccurate. His sudden reputation had brought him a respect he had never imagined before, and soon, if unconsciously, he’d craved it. It was like opium, alluring and captivating.
And if fame and adulation were not motivation enough to continue fighting, then Adriana was. She was everything he wanted, and William believed it was his heroics that kept their love alive. Each time he returned it was like seeing her anew again.
Yet there was a price. How many times had he considered marrying her? How many times been ready to propose, only to find himself thwarted by another mission, another leave-taking? He was sure that Adriana was in love with him, and hoped it would stay that way, but would her adoration fade if he left the Order?
If William was honest, he had everything he could possibly want right now: adventure, excitement, fame, and a beautiful woman he had never in his wildest dreams hoped to find. If fighting the War meant keeping all this, then wasn’t that reason enough?
At Innsbruck, after toiling with motive and doubt, he realized that he was not fighting this war for the Dar’uka or the Church.
He fought it for himself.
After the weather cleared, the four men left Innsbruck and travelled through bleak mountain passes, emerging days later into green fields and hills. A few nights in Verona sharpened the spirits again, and Brother Jericho recovered his confidence, much dented following the burial of Brother Anthony in Prague.
William approached him on the matter of his moment’s hesitation, and they spoke at length about the fear that the enemy projected. Vienna and Prague had been Jericho’s initial missions since enrolling as a monk, yet he thought himself a failure after Prague. William told him the truth of survival: ‘The enemy uses fear as its weapon. Disarm that fear, and the enemy is weak. This is a war of the mysterious. Believe, then, in everything you see, but do not fear the uncanny and grotesque.’
As the days of contemplation worked on him, the young monk began speaking of his eagerness to sign for another mission, to test himself. Before they left Verona, William agreed to send him on the next available assignment for the Secretariat and the Order.
Brother Jericho was not his only concern as they returned. It was during the final stage from Verona to Rome that William approached Marresca on the subject of recruitment as Dar’uka. The response was suitably calm. After a few minutes of serious conversation, when William spoke his mind and Marresca listened, the monk promised to consider what he’d said, and then the matter was closed.
From that moment on William felt exposed, with no control over Marresca’s fate. Marresca said nothing of his decision, not even confiding in Peruzo, and William found himself on several occasions wishing to broach the subject. But this was Marresca, and conversation with the lieutenant was difficult at the best of times.
II
Villeda was a welcome sight, even with the faint rain on the hills. Nothing could diminish their enthusiasm at finally returning home. The green fields and slender slopes were alive with lush spring grass. The trees were in blossom, yet already shedding a vivid carpet of pink and white along the road to town.
In the years since William had first arrived in Villeda, the place had thrived. Families had flourished, farmers had bought new lands and accrued wealth in the wake of the wars with France and Napoleon. At times the mystery of Villeda threatened to reveal itself to the region (how it prospered when much of the country was still suffering), but the people of Villeda were protective, and close-mouthed with strangers. To an outsider, the town was subdued, a place not obviously extraordinary. Opulence was never worn on the shirtsleeve, and reputation was often discounted, kept secret within this furtive society. Like the Order of Saint Sallian that made its home in the monastery just outside of town, Villeda craved anonymity.
But it never forgot to hail its heroes, and the people of Villeda knew how to celebrate. Street parties were not uncommon, especially for the returning monks, and they sometimes threatened to overshadow the mission.
Celebrations for Captain William Saxon were usually the grandest, if only to attract Adriana into the town (being deemed its fairest woman). At first the attention was overwhelming, but over the years it had ripened into custom, a welcomed way of life in Villeda and the Order.
On the day William and his men returned from Prague, it was quiet. They saw only one farmer attending to his fields as they rode to the outskirts of town.
Then as they stood talking, several locals appeared and began gesturing towards them, their faces alive with smiles and cheers.
‘They’ve returned! They’ve returned!’ shouted one beaming woman, the wife of the local baker.
William waved back. ‘So much for the quiet entrance!’ he grinned.
‘She’ll tell the entire town,’ Jericho laughed.
‘I reckon so,’ William agreed. ‘What do you think, Peruzo? A little merriment is in order, at least?’
Peruzo sighed. ‘Very well.’
‘And you will be attending?’ William pressed, making it sound like an order.
‘I don’t have much choice, do I?’ Peruzo replied.
They waved as more people turned out of their homes and shops to greet the surprise return of their heroes. Even Marresca managed a half-hearted salute.
At the junction just outside the piazza, they halted and parted ways. The monks trotted up the road to the monastery of St Laurence, while William turned right and headed towards the open fields at the edge of town. And home.
On the way he passed more locals who waved to him through the rain. The drizzle had grown fainter until only the occasional drop could be seen falling from the terracotta roofs of the homes he rode by. Very soon, the clouds melted away and the sun lit the road before him, warming the back of his neck as he rode his horse up the path to where the fields divided.
There, nestling in a dip and looking out across the hills of Rome, was William’s house. He clo
sed his eyes and drank in the smells of spring. He hadn’t been home since midwinter, and seeing the villa now made his heart ache with happiness. He kicked in his heels and as he galloped down the road his mind was already passing through the vine-entwined archway. As he rode under that, his thought was on leaping off his horse to find Adriana, a thought that progressed to kissing, as he pulled the horse up and dismounted, leaving the animal to stand and rest in the courtyard.
William tugged off his belt and scabbard and tossed them onto the porch at the front door. Then he jogged around the front and down the side of the villa, his heart beating fast, his face breaking into a grin, eager to see his lover.
Past the water pump he moved quickly and silently, through the garden and its banks of ivory and gold spring flowers that only Adriana knew the names of. At the rear corner of the villa he stopped and listened. Someone was humming an off-key tune, and he knew at once that it was Adriana. She had no ear for song, though when she hummed it was different. There was always a whimsical melody in that sound, and it lightened his mood whenever he heard it.
He stayed at the wall and smiled, waiting for as long as his heart could give him as it filled up suddenly with love. His first thought was to surprise her, to creep up and wrap his arms about her, but his desire was too great to wait. William marched from the corner of the villa and into the open, careless of how much noise he would make or whether she would see him coming.
Adriana was hanging out a sheet and undergarments to dry in the first sunshine of the season, and her back was towards him. Her long dark hair cascaded off her shoulders as she reached down to pick up another sheet and then paused, hearing footsteps. Turning quickly, she seemed to know it was William and she let out a joyous cry, dropping the clothes in the mud at her feet. He caught her in his arms and held her tightly. ‘Oh, I’ve missed you so much,’ he whispered into her ear. ‘So much.’
‘I can’t believe you’re here!’ she purred, kissing him time and time again on his neck and face.
The Hoard of Mhorrer Page 5