The Dragon’s Mark

by Alex Archer

  She kept her eyes on the landing above, not wanting to be surprised by the sudden appearance of an intruder. She made it to the top of the staircase without incident. She found herself faced with a long corridor that ran in opposite directions. She knew the area to the right held a series of guest bedrooms, for she had stayed there in the past and was even using one of them now. The left side of the hallway held a bathroom, an office and a small gallery for some of Roux’s art. She ignored all of them; the crashing sound had come from the room at the far end of the hall, the one now facing her, and as she moved toward it, she tried to remember just what it was used for.

  A spare bedroom? Another office? Maybe a study?

  Then it came to her.

  A display room.

  The room held a portion of the weapons collection Roux had accumulated over the course of his extended lifetime. There were many more rooms just like it scattered throughout his home. But this room was special, Annja recalled. She had spent some time in it during a previous visit, for it contained a certain type of weapon that she had grown rather attached to lately.

  Swords.

  The collection contained both working blades and a few museum-quality relics, but nothing that was overly valuable and certainly not much that could be moved easily on the open market. The thieves, if that was indeed what they were, were in for a rude surprise if they thought differently.

  And they still had to contend with her.

  She raced to the door and flattened herself against the wall beside it. She put her head against the wall, listening, but Roux’s mansion had been built in the days when they had used quality building materials rather than the cheap substitutes that had become so common today. She couldn’t hear anything but her own breathing.

  She was going to have to do this the hard way.

  Gripping her sword in one hand, Annja grabbed the doorknob with the other, took a deep breath and then pulled it open, slipping inside with barely a sound.

  She’d been right; it was one of the display rooms. Swords lined the walls by the hundreds—long swords, short swords, broadswords, cutlasses, épées, scimitars—every make, model and size, it seemed. The carefully polished blades shone in the spotlights that had been artfully arranged to draw attention to the weapons, and here and there the wink of precious gems gleamed back at her from scabbards or hilts.

  But Annja barely noticed the swords on the walls, for her attention was captured by those held in the hands of the intruders facing her.

  One week earlier

  ANNJA WAS CARRYING SEVERAL bags of groceries up the stairs to her Brooklyn loft when her cell phone rang.

  “Hang on, hang on…” she said to it as she juggled the bags, managed to get the key in the lock and kicked the door open with her foot.

  Her phone continued to ring.

  “I’m coming, just hang on!” she told it again, as if the inanimate hunk of metal and plastic could actually hear her. She rushed to the island in the kitchen, dumped the bags on the counter and grabbed for her phone.

  Just as she managed to pull it from the front pocket of her jeans it stopped ringing.

  “You have got to be kidding!” She scowled at it, ready to fling it across the room in a pique of anger, only to have it ring again.

  “Hello?” She practically shouted it into the tiny device.

  A deep, rich voice answered her back. “Annja, did I catch you at a bad time?”

  There was no mistaking the voice. That teasing tone, that undercurrent of danger—only one man in her life sounded like that.

  “What do you want, Garin?”

  All that rushing? For him? It said something about her social life, that was for sure, she thought.

  “Now is that any way to treat an old friend?”

  “Old, yes. Friend, that remains to be seen.”

  “You wound me, Annja, you really do.”

  She kicked off her shoes, wandered into the living room and dropped onto the couch.

  Garin Braden. Empire builder, artifact hunter, rogue—he had a thousand different faces. The problem was, you never really knew which one you were dealing with, and by the time you did, it was often too late to save yourself. Annja had seen him ruthlessly kill more than one individual and yet had also known him to be charming and tender. She still wasn’t sure just what she felt about him; he was larger than life, with his rakish good looks, thick black hair and piercing gaze, but at the same time he had the heart of a devil.

  “So be wounded,” she said. “Then when you’ve finished feeling sorry for yourself maybe you could tell me what you want.”

  Garin swore under his breath and the sound of his frustration made Annja smile. She wasn’t the only one with mixed feelings, she realized.

  “I am calling,” he said, “to invite you to Paris.”

  Paris? That was a surprise.

  “What for?” she asked.

  “Can’t I just invite you to Paris?”

  “You could, but you know I wouldn’t come, so what’s the real reason?”

  Garin was silent for a moment, and then grudgingly said, “It’s the old man’s birthday.”

  Annja knew there was only one individual Garin could legitimately refer to that way.

  Roux.

  Old was right, she thought. More than five hundred years old, if the truth were told. Garin himself wasn’t that far behind, for only a few decades separated the two men. The same mystical force that had preserved the sword of Joan of Arc, the sword that Annja now carried as her own, had also given the two of them an extended lifetime. One measured in centuries, rather than decades.

  “It’s Roux’s birthday?”

  “I just said that, didn’t I?”

  Yes, yes, he had. Despite Roux’s long life, Annja knew that he wasn’t the type to celebrate birthdays, so that only increased rather than eased her suspicions.

  “You’re going to throw Roux a birthday party?” She couldn’t mask the incredulity in her voice.

  Garin had apparently lost his patience with her for he let loose a stream of curses that could have burned the hair off a pirate’s chest.

  Annja waited him out and then said, “Okay. I’m in. When is it?”

  Still grumbling, he named a date only three days away.

  “Nothing like giving a girl time to think it over,” she said.

  “What? Like you’ve got something else on your social calendar?” Garin shot back and from his tone Annja knew he was rather pleased with himself for that one. Before she could think of a retort, he went on. “I have tickets reserved in your name on the 9:00 p.m. flight out of Kennedy on the twelfth. My driver will pick you at DeGaulle, take you to Roux’s for the party and drive you back to your hotel afterward.”

  And with that, he hung up.

  “Garin? Garin!”

  Hanging up the phone, she went back to putting away the groceries. While doing so she glanced at her calendar. The bare white spaces stared back at her. Well, what did you expect? she asked herself. Given your lifestyle, it is amazing you have any friends at all.

  She had to admit, she’d never been one to stay in one place for long before she’d taken up Joan’s sword, never mind afterward. If she wasn’t headed off to some remote spot to film a new episode of Chasing History’s Monsters, the cable television show she cohosted, then she was off volunteering at some dig site in the back end of nowhere just to satisfy her love of history and her need to feel the thrill of discovery. That didn’t leave much time for friendships, never mind romantic entanglements longer than a few days in length.

  While she occasionally wondered what it would be like to have a normal life, when she really got down to it, she found that she didn’t mind all the craziness. After all, boring was the last thing you could call her life.

  The party was on the thirteenth. On the sixteenth she was due in studio to shoot some green-screen work for her next episode and to wade through the piles of footage she’d brought back from her last trip. Both would be nece
ssary to cut the raw material into a show worth watching, and while she knew the guys in the editing room could do it without her, she preferred to keep an eye on them to help tone down the inevitable “suggestions” her producer, Doug Morrell, was constantly trying to fill their ears with. Doug was a good guy, but he’d be just as happy to have a show revolving around blood-sucking alien chupacabras as he would some ancient civilization most people had never heard of. He’d once gone so far as to produce and distribute a memorial video of her final moments when she’d lost touch with him during a tsunami in India. That fact that she’d called in shortly thereafter, clearly alive and well, had only added fuel to his marketing efforts and had him envisioning a second volume highlighting her “miraculous” survival. If she’d been closer at the time she might have strangled him herself.

  So she’d make the party, but had to be sure to be back in New York by the sixteenth, come hell or high water.

  ANNJA WAS FIVE FEET TEN inches tall with chestnut hair and amber-green eyes. She had an athlete’s build, with smooth rounded muscles and curves in all the right places. Dressed as she was in a pair of jeans, leather boots and a lightweight tank top, she knew she probably made quite a sight rushing helter-skelter through the airport with her long hair flying out behind her, but it just couldn’t be helped. She’d gotten absorbed in research and hadn’t left herself enough time. If she didn’t make it to the gate on time, Garin would never let her forget it.

  As was her usual luck, after convincing her cab driver to set new land-speed records in making it to the airport and then dashing through the terminal after clearing security, she reached the gate only to discover that her flight had been delayed due to a mechanical problem. At least the ticket was for first class, which let her pass the time in the executive lounge while she waited. Once she did board the plane almost an hour later, she popped on her iPod, stretched out and slept through most of the trip, determined to arrive ready to enjoy Roux’s party.

  Garin had a driver and car waiting, just as he’d said he would, and as she relaxed in the backseat and she watched the Paris streets roll by out her window, she had to admit that the whole thing made her feel a bit special.

  Until she remembered just who was waiting for her on the other end.

  It’s for Roux, she reminded herself, for Roux.

  As they drove, she thought about the circumstances that were bringing the three of them—Roux, Annja and Garin—together again. Despite her misgivings, she had to admit to being surprised, pleasantly so, that Garin was going out of his way for Roux; that wasn’t something Garin was particularly known for. Ruthlessness, arrogance, a sense of entitlement ten miles wide—yes, he had more than his share of those qualities. But doing something just because it would make another person happy? Not so much.

  Still, anyone could turn over a new leaf and in the past several months it was obvious that Garin was trying, in his own way, to smooth over some of the damage from the past, so she supposed she had to give him credit. It wasn’t easy for anyone to change, least of all someone so set in their ways as Garin Braden.

  The party they were throwing for Roux was, of course, a surprise. Or rather, Garin was throwing the party, with Annja and Henshaw, Roux’s butler and majordomo, as the only guests. It pained Annja to think that after such a long life they were the only people Roux could claim as friends, but she didn’t consider it too deeply lest she see the glaring similarities with her own life.

  That the party was all Garin’s idea was equally unusual, given the history between the two men. After all, they’d tried to kill each other on more than one occasion and no doubt would try again at some point in the future. On any given day they could go from friends to enemies in the space of a heartbeat. Still, there was a bond between them that transcended such petty squabbles, and as fate would have it, Annja had become part of their inner circle.

  After all, who better to understand just what it meant to carry the sword that had belonged to Joan of Arc than the two men who had once been responsible for protecting Joan herself from the hands of her enemies? The same mystical force that had preserved the sword and ultimately brought it into Annja’s possession had also given them their extended life span. It was also part of the discord between them. Neither of them knew what would happen should the sword somehow come to harm. Would they at last be able to live out the rest of their natural lives, free from the influence of the sword, or would time suddenly catch up to them, exacting its toll then and there for all the years they’d escaped its grasp? They didn’t know and so, as a result, they had different ideas about how to handle the situation. Roux wanted the sword to remain with Annja, its chosen bearer, while Garin had made it clear he felt the sword should be locked away and protected. If that was even possible.

  Annja shifted her attention from the scenery outside the car to the sword itself. It rested there in the otherwhere, just as it always did, glimmering faintly as it waited for her to call it forth with just a thought. For a moment she was tempted, for she loved to feel its weight in her hand, loved the sensation it gave her as she carried it forth into battle, but her good sense reasserted itself before she did so; having a huge broadsword suddenly appear in the back of the limousine probably wouldn’t be a good thing for the upholstery, never mind the driver’s sense of reality.

  It was enough that it was there, waiting for her, and that she could claim it when necessary. She’d had to do so more times than she could count since taking possession of it and she knew that there would be plenty of other such situations in the future. It had become a part of her and she could no more give it up now than she could marry a pig farmer and retire to the country.

  The celebration was being held at Roux’s estate outside of Paris and it took them about half an hour to reach their destination.

  Roux’s house was huge, so huge that the word home just didn’t seem to do it justice. Palace might have been better. Ivy clung to the stone walls and helped the structure blend into the trees that surrounded it. It butted up against a hill and the overall effect was as if the house itself were a part of the natural environment around it, and from past experience Annja knew that the design was deliberate. Roux was a man who liked his privacy and went to some lengths to see that it remained protected.

  The driver must have called ahead, as Garin was waiting for her on the front steps when they pulled up. Standing with him was Henshaw.

  “Welcome back, Ms. Creed,” Henshaw said, giving her a small nod of welcome as she stepped from the car.

  She grinned. That was Henshaw, positively overwhelming with his emotional displays, she thought.

  “Good to see you,” she told him. She turned her attention to his companion. “Hello, Garin.”

  “Annja,” he answered just as solemnly, but his eyes twinkled with mischief behind his unruffled exterior.

  With her ever-present backpack slung over her shoulder, Annja entered the house with Garin while Henshaw got her overnight bag from the trunk. She could already imagine his scowl as he saw the size of her suitcase. She wasn’t the type to travel with more than the few basic items she needed, while he was a firm believer in a woman’s right to be prepared for anything and to travel with a wardrobe large enough to let her do so, especially a woman as attractive as Annja. He’d never come right out and said so—the sun would stop revolving around the earth when that happened—but she’d managed to piece together the gist of his viewpoint from the few comments and frowns he’d made to her over the years.

  The knowledge that he’d scowl all the more should he discover that she intentionally packed as light as she could just to tease him when coming here made her laugh aloud.

  Maybe this was going to be a fun three days, after all.

  Annja stepped into the foyer, with its vaulted ceiling and Italian marble floors. No matter how many time she visited, it never ceased to amaze her at the luxury Roux had surrounded himself with over the years. He seemed to be trying to forget the long, hard years he’d serve
d in the field with nothing more than his arms and armor for material possessions and she had to admit he was doing an excellent job of it.

  Garin led her through the lower floor to Roux’s personal study, one of the largest rooms in the entire house. It was two stories tall and stuffed to the gills with shelves full of books, artifacts and artwork. Stacks of paper streamers rested on a nearby table, along with a pile of balloons. A tank of helium gas stood beside it.

  “Roux is out at a high-stakes poker game for the afternoon,” Garin told her. “Henshaw will be picking him up around dinnertime, which means we only have a couple of hours to get the place decorated and…”

  He trailed off at seeing her expression. “What?” he growled.

  Annja laughed; she couldn’t help it. Imagining him with those blue and yellow streamers in his huge hands was just too much. It was so not Garin. From cold-blooded killer to interior decorator—would wonders never cease?

  When at last she could find her voice again, she said, “I’m sorry, Garin, really, I am. I just never expected you to go to so much trouble for Roux and the change is a bit, um, unexpected. Nice, but unexpected.”

  He accepted her apology with a shrug and the two of them got to work. By the time Henshaw came in an hour later to check on them, they had finished strewing paper streamers throughout the room, even draping them on the massive stone sarcophagus that occupied one corner and wrapping them around the stuffed and mounted corpse of an Old West gunfighter that stood in the other, turning him from a cigar-store Indian-style display to a blue-and-yellow mummy. They were getting started on tying the balloons together into bunches.

  Henshaw gave the room a once-over, his only discernible reaction the slight raising of an eyebrow as he took in the steamerwrapped gunfighter in the corner. Turning back to his partners in crime, he said, “I’m off to get Mr. Roux. I shall return in approximately one hour. We shall dine shortly after that.”

  Garin had several phone calls to make so Annja spent the time wandering through Roux’s house, looking at the variety of artifacts that he had on display. While she might not agree with his methods of acquisition, since he had several items that were on current lists of objects either stolen or banned from being removed from their countries of origin, she could appreciate the beauty of the collection itself. She was examining a vase that had apparently been discovered in the remains of Knossos, the king’s palace on the island of Crete, when her phone chirped. Pulling it out of her pocket, she saw that she had a text message from Garin.