Twilight Illusions

by Maggie Shayne

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

 

  They'd tried for hours to pick up some sense of the rogue in the city. They'd sought a hint of his thoughts, his presence, in the places where the victims had been found, and in the theater, and in and around Shannon's office. The sense of him should be stronger where his physical self had been. But their efforts got them nothing. He was concealing himself against them, and doing it well.

  They returned to the house then, and Damien braced himself to come face-to-face with Shannon again, to see the despair in her eyes, the fear of him, the anger. Maybe this time there would be hatred in her amber eyes, as well. He had no idea what he could say to her. She despised what he'd done, hated what he'd made her. So how could she not hate him? How could she even bear to see him again, let alone sleep another day under his roof? What would she say when he told her he'd failed, and asked her to stay with him for one more day, give him one more night to make it safe for her to leave him? He couldn't let her go until this threat was removed, even though he was sure the hatred he'd felt emanating from this rogue had been directed at himself alone.

  Hell, he didn't want her to leave at all, to be honest. He couldn't bear the thought of living a night without her vibrance to brighten it. Irony tasted bitter. He no longer had to fear he had become a ruthless killer, that to love her would be to endanger her. And he no longer had to fear that death would tear her from him. But he'd lost her all the same, hadn't he?

  He felt Eric tense beside him. And then he sensed it. The feeling of something wrong, terribly wrong, of danger. The knowledge that the rogue had been here.

  He ran to the front steps, up them, and found the note, impaled on the point of a dagger as old as time, pinned to the door.

  Eric tore it down, leaving the blade where it was, and struggled to read, but he shook his head. "It's not in any language I know. "

  Damien frowned, taking the sheet of paper from him. "It's cuneiform script. " The symbols on the paper were similar to those chiseled into stone aeons ago. A cold shiver racing through him, Damien translated aloud: "'Gilgamesh, king of Uruk, lord of a people long dead, vile betrayer of the gods, immortal, demon, murderer. For your role in the death of one who loved you, for your hand in her murder, for the life of Siduri, my betrothed, you will stand trial. In the temple of Inanna, you will be judged, that the gods might witness your sentence carried out. No longer does the temple lie buried beneath the burning sands of Uruk. Still buried, yes, but not there. Never to be seen by mortal eyes. Brick by brick did I move it. I await you there. Your lover waits at my side. Ready she stands to take your sentence upon herself in case you fail to heed my summons. Long have I anticipated this reunion, man of old. Anthar. '"

  Damien looked up from the note, to see the fear, the wonder in Eric's eyes.

  "Gilgamesh," he muttered, staring at Damien. "My God. "

  "I'm no one's god, just an immortal like you. We have to go now, fast. "

  Eric's brows rose. "But how? You've no idea where you're going. "

  Damien gripped his arm. "Your Tamara--"

  "Will stubbornly erect a fortress around her mind rather than lure me into what she must know is a trap. " Eric closed his eyes. "I'll try, but if she really doesn't want me to know where she is. . . " He shook his head and tried to concentrate.

  * * * * *

  "What the hell is this?" Shannon watched the huge doors slide slowly open, then jerked against the hands that tugged her into an elevator big enough to hold an elephant. God, he was strong. His bony hand gripped her arm so hard she thought he'd break it. Tears streamed down her face. Her throat closed so tightly she could barely draw a breath. Her chest spasmed with sobs she tried to stop. And still she fought him.

  She was afraid, terrified of what this skeletal man planned to do to her. But more than that was the fear of what he'd already done. To Tamara. They'd been airborne, soaring through the night at a speed that seemed impossible, with the wind stinging Shannon's face, screaming in her ears. So high the ground seemed no more than a fast-moving, colorful blur. And he'd just let Tamara go. Just let her go!

  She hadn't even screamed. Not a sound. Nothing. And Shannon couldn't see where she landed, because the bony bastard had still been speeding through space, still been clutching her tight. But Shannon had screamed. And she hadn't stopped screaming until he'd hit her with a skinny fist and knocked her close to senseless.

  And now she was in this elevator, going down at a sickening speed, deep into the bowels of some kind of structure that seemed to sit in the middle of nowhere.

  The doors opened almost before they'd come to a teeth-jarring stop. The hand on her upper arm closed tighter, and wincing in pain, she stepped out into a stadium-size room where every step echoed a thousand times. In the center of the room, she saw it, a towering wonder of whitewashed brick, gleaming, immaculate. Her gaze traveled over the angular ramps and steps and corners, all leading upward. A squared spiral at least forty feet high, topped by what looked like a temple.

  "What the hell is this?" she asked again.

  * * * * *

  "Who is this Anthar?"

  Damien shook his head. "He must be from my time to now who I am and understand the cuneiform so well. The ilade is ancient. Sumerian. And he must have known me once to have heard of Siduri. "

  "A woman?"

  Damien nodded. "I'll explain later. We have to hurry. " Already a cold knot of foreboding twisted inside his heart. He wished he could blink his eyes and be at her side. But he knew better. He was as attuned to her mind as he could get, and all he felt was her fear. It overwhelmed everything else. There was a dim sense of the direction in which she'd traveled, and Damien followed that sense, felt himself getting closer.

  Anthar. Who the hell was he, and why this quest for vengeance? Damien didn't know. He knew only that if the bastard hurt Shannon in any way, no matter how small, Damien would ill him a little at a time. She must be so frightened. By Inanna's mercy, she must be twice as sorry he'd brought her over by now. She probably wished he'd simply let her die. He'd wanted to do so much for her. To show her happiness, to make up for all the sorrow in her life. Instead he'd brought her into a world of darkness, and so far all she'd known had been fear.

  He'd get her out of this safely. He would, if it cost him his life to do it. And then he'd give her what she craved. Her freedom. No matter how much it would hurt him, Damien knew he had to let her go.

  Eric had been silent for some time, and when Damien broke out of his own thoughts long enough to glance at the man, he saw turmoil contorting Eric's face. He stopped, facing him. "Marquand, what? What is it?"

  His jaw tight, eyes moist, Eric kept moving. Then faster. And a moment later, he knelt beside a still form on the ground, cradling it in his arms and quivering with silent rage.

  Damien ran forward. "Tamara!" Her left leg bent at an unnatural angle, and one arm was twisted beneath her body. Obviously broken. Damien's heart turned to ice as he saw Eric's pain. But her lovely black lashes fluttered, and she stared up at the man who held her with so much love in her eyes it hurt Damien to witness it.

  "I'm . . . glad to see you. "

  "Tamara. " Eric's voice wavered. He bent lower, kissed her face.

  "Gently, Eric. It . . . hurts. "

  "I'll kill him," Eric whispered. "I'll kill him for this. "

  Damien felt tears choking him. When the hell had he become so attached to these people? "You're going to have to move her, Eric, pain or not. Find her some shelter before dawn. "

  Eric nodded and glanced around. "Where the hell are we?"

  "Somewhere in Ohio, I think. " Damien glanced around him. "There are houses. I can--"

  "No. " Tamara tried to lift her head, her good hand clutching Eric's arm. "Damien, you have to go on. Find Shannon before that beast hurts her. " She drew a pained breath. "But be careful. It's you he wants. "

  "I know. " Damien straightened and stared off into the distance.
<
br />   "Go ahead, go after them," Eric said. "I'll take care of Tamara. We'll be fine. "

  "Are you sure?"

  Tamara nodded. "I'll be okay after a day's rest, Damien. And we'll join you. . . with reinforcements. "

  Eric's jaw went rigid. "Tamara, you didn't--"

  "I most certainly did. We have to end this bastard's killing spree, Eric. And we need all the help we can get. " She relaxed a little, letting her head fall onto Eric's knees. "I pity that bastard if Rhiannon gets to him before Damien does. "

  Eric glanced back at Damien. "I wouldn't be too sure about that, Tamara. "

  "Neither would I. " Damien turned, and started off again toward Shannon.

  * * * * *

  He was forced to seek shelter when the sun rose. But he resumed his search the instant it set, and he knew when he'd found her.

  His best guess was that the structure dead center of a barren field had once been a missile silo. One of those sold by the government to private owners when arms-reduction deals took the place of the cold war. He approached the doors, and they opened. Then the bastard knew he'd arrived. Damien stepped inside what appeared to be an elevator, not caring if he was walking into a trap as long as he could get to Shannon. The car swept downward, clanged to a stop and opened as if to spit him out.

  Damien stood frozen for a single moment, reeling at the sensation of having stepped back in time. The ziggurat stood as haughty and immaculate as it had been when it was new. This same temple had been the center of his city once. It had been filled with his people, his gods. A man-made mountain is what it was. A high, white monster of stairs and ramps, sharp corners turning this way and that, a path to the heavens marching its way to the cella at the very top. The temple proper. The chamber of the gods, where sacrifices had been offered.

  He knew the temple well, remembered the way the white bricks had gleamed beneath a blazing desert sun. Now it stood in darkness. Appropriate. Ironic.

  Mounting the first steps, Damien went upward, following the same path he had thousands of times so many years ago, only faster now, his strides more powerful than ever before. And more desperate. In seconds he stood at the entrance to the cella. He stiffened his spine and went inside.

  A figure like a walking skeleton moved from sconce to sconce with a torch in his hand, lighting each as he came to it. The main room, sixty feet in length and lined with sconces on both sides, soon glowed with amber light as it had in days long past. Shadows fled the touch of the torchlight, ducking into the darkened doorways that lined the chamber. Every few yards a smaller chamber opened off one side or the other. But this was the room of worship, the room of the gods, the room of sacrifice.

  Damien stepped forward, marveling that the place had been so well restored. The stone figures that depicted the worshippers were just as he remembered them, some standing as high as his knees, others smaller. Male and female, bearded and smooth skinned, eyes too large, hands folded in prayer.

  Damien moved past them, tearing his gaze away from the figures that represented his people. Instead he focused on the emaciated man who'd stopped at the opposite end of the chamber, and turned to face him.

  "I'm here, Anthar. I've done as you asked. Where is Shannon?"

  Anthar only smiled, an evil expression, the flickering orange torchlight making it more so. He stepped aside, waving a hand beyond him to the life-size statue of the god Anu. Anu's golden hair and beard had been polished until they gleamed, and his eyes, inlaid with lapis lazuli, danced with fierceness in the firelight. At his sandaled feet, upon the stone offering table. Shannon lay wide-eyed, trembling, her hands bound at the wrists, clenched together on her stomach. Her ankles, too, were bound together. She was dressed in a white gown, fastened with a jeweled brooch at one shoulder, leaving the other bare. Golden bands encircled her arms. Her feet were bare.

  As Damien's gaze met hers, he felt her fear, her absolute misery. He tried to convey reassurance, hope, comfort. Anthar stepped forward to ignite the torches near her head and at her feet. She cringed from him, and a sound of terror came from deep in her throat. Damien lunged forward, but Anthar stepped into his path.

  "Look around you, Gilgamesh. See the gods you betrayed by seeking to become one of them. " He lifted the torch toward each of the deities that towered at Anu's right and his left. The goddess Inanna, whose name you cursed from the deathbed of your friend. Ea, of the fresh springs, friend to mankind. Even him you have offended. Enlil, god of earth, wind and spirit, whom you have defiled. Ninurta, god of war, furious with you now. "

  Damien held his temper in check with an effort. "It seems, Anthar, the only one I've offended is you. The gods haven't acted against me in all this time. I hardly think their justice would be so slow in coming. "

  "Their justice is at hand," Anthar said in a deep monotone.

  Damien shook his head. "If that's true, then I'm ready for it. Let's get on with this, Anthar. Release the woman now. Whatever you have in mind, it's meant for me to suffer, not her. "

  '"Not just yet, Gilgamesh. "

  Damien moved forward, meaning to free Shannon himself. But Anthar reached to a small stone stand and snatched up a ritual dagger, its handle inlaid with glittering jewels--emeralds aid sapphires, diamonds and rubies. The blade was honed to a razor's edge. He held it poised at Shannon's throat and she creamed, her voice echoing endlessly in the hollow room long after she'd gone utterly still. She stared at Damien, her gaze clinging to his almost desperately.

  "If you move, blasphemer, I will hurt her. Badly I will hurt her. Likely she'll bleed dry before you can help her. "

  "I'm very old, rogue," Damien said softly, his voice oddly hoarse. "Older than any, except Utnapishtim himself, who made me. You ought to be careful about angering me. "

  "Utnapishtim made me, as well, great king of Uruk. Only moments after you. "

  Damien looked quickly at the gaunt-faced man. "He wouldn't have--"

  "He had no choice. His exchange of blood with a young madman left him weak. I forced him to repeat the ritual, only so that I would live to see you die. "

  Eric's voice came into Damien's mind then, and he knew his friend--yes, friend--was on the way, monitoring events mentally, offering advice. The blood was diluted then, when this Anthar was made. You 're still stronger.

  Damien nodded, sensing Eric guarded his thoughts from Anthar. He tried to do the same. Maybe.

  "What crime have I committed to anger you so much that you'd follow me into eternity just to see me pay?"

  "Do you recall Siduri? My beautiful Siduri, who gave her heart to a beast?"

  Damien nodded, stepping a bit closer, only to wince as Anthar pressed the tip of his blade harder into Shannon's neck. "Answer aloud, so that the gods present may know of your sins. "

  He licked his lips. "I was half out of my mind with grief when Enkidu, my friend, died. I went on a quest in search of immortality, thinking I could somehow bring that gift back to him and raise him up again. When I came to Siduri's cottage by the sea I was near starved, sunburned, travel-weary and all but insane. She brought me inside, washed the sand and the sweat from my skin. She fed me and clothed me, restored my health and part of my senses. "

  Anthar grimaced, his thin lips drawing away from his foul, uneven teeth. "Is that all she gave you, heathen?"

  "She gave me comfort, Anthar. We shared a bed. "

  "She was my betrothed!" he screamed, nearly rattling the brick walls. That declaration shocked Damien. But still it didn't seem reason enough for so much hatred. "I didn't know--"

  "You used her as chattel and cast her aside to resume your mad quest. She begged of you to stay, but you turned a deaf ear to her tears. "

  "No. She knew I'd go on from the day I crossed her threshold. She knew--"

  "You killed her. She thought herself in love with you, gave you all of herself as proof of it, even though she'd promised herself to me. "

  "And that was no crime!" Damien
stepped forward once more, staring at this shell of a man. "You know as well as I do that in that time it was a king's right to take the virgin brides before their husbands did. Right or wrong, it was the law. So how can you say that I committed some crime by bedding your woman?" A flimsy argument, he knew, but all he could think of at the moment.

  "Bastard, she lost her soul when you left her. But you wouldn't know, would you? You never looked back to see how she fared. You didn't know that she walked into the sea the very next dawn, walked and kept walking. Drowned herself for the love of a worthless king who would make himself a god!"

  Eric's voice came again, like a solid hand clasping his shoulder. It wasn't your fault. Don't let it distract you.

  But Damien felt the blow. He staggered a bit, then caught himself. "I didn't know. She. . . she was kind to me, Anthar. I cared for her. I am sorry. More sorry than I can say. "

  "Your sorrow will not suffice, Gilgamesh. You must suffer as I did. "

  Incinerate him.

  Damien shook his head quickly, responding to Eric in the silent form of communication he'd so recently mastered. I'm not sure it would work, and it takes an unbelievable amount of energy to incinerate anything. If it failed, I'd be practically helpless.

  Damien had gone utterly still, watching the way the firelight played on Shannon's skin, in her hair, a terrible fear of what this bastard intended settling like ice water in his veins. "What are you going to do, Anthar?"

  "I'm going to take your woman as you took mine. " He glanced down at Shannon as he spoke. "And then I'm going to drain her, and let her die. And you are going to stand witness to it, Gilgamesh. For I want to see you suffer, before I kill you. "

  "You haven't got the strength to kill me. "

  "We'll soon see. "

  The man, blade still in his hand, bent over Shannon, and she screamed.

  At the same instant there was a tremendous crash and a rain of footsteps at the entrance. Damien knew without turning that four immortals had entered the cella. A powerful female voice echoed like that of Inanna herself. For a second Damien wondered if the statue of the Queen of Heaven had come to life. "Exactly what kind of death wish do you have, you sorry excuse for an immortal!"

  "You're in for it now, Anthar," Tamara stated flatly.

  The rogue was distracted for a bare instant, and that was all Damien needed. He spun in a circle, becoming a blur, and an instant later, a massive wolf launched itself at the evil vampire, sending him crashing to the floor, the knife skittering away.

  * * * * *

  Shannon tried hard to cling to her sanity as the horror played out before her eyes. The wolf snapped at the man's throat, but then they rolled, and a second later the wolf backed away from a coiled king cobra, cape unfurled, poised to strike. The wolf leapt into the air, and as it hurtled earthward, it became a hawk that swooped and dove, drawing the snake away from her. She rolled her body off the stone table, pulled herself to her feet, both hands working as one, and began hopping toward the two who fought. The snake had the hawk cornered now, and would strike at any second. She had to stop this.

  But a tug at her hands brought her to a stop. The woman, tall and slender, regal as a queen, with her ebony hair all swept to one side and diamonds and onyx dripping from her ears, leaned over the rope at Shannon's ankles. "You fledglings are nothing but trouble. " With a flick of her scarlet-painted, dagger-tipped fingers, she freed Shannon's ankles, then her wrists. "I'm Rhiannon," she said, as if she were saying "I'm Queen Elizabeth. " She pulled Shannon toward the corner where Eric and Tamara waited with another man Shannon didn't know. At their feet, a sleek black panther crouched, watching the struggling beasts with predatory eyes.

  "None of them for you, Pandora. " The woman stroked the cat's head lovingly, but her eyes were on the floor where the two battled.

  Shannon whirled, half expecting to see Damien dead on the floor. But there was a lion now, and a jaguar, ripping at each other's throats, rolling in a tangle of claws and teeth.

  "Do something!" She screamed.

  Tamara touched her shoulder. "I don't know what we can--"

  She broke off when Shannon jerked away from her touch. Shannon had spotted the glittering dagger on the floor, and she lunged for it, falling to her knees to snatch it up. Rising slowly, her gaze on the combatants, she started forward, lifting the blade high above her head, giving a little growl she'd never heard herself utter before.

  The tall woman caught her shoulders.

  "Fool, you'll be killed! Come with us. Damien wants us to take you out of here, someplace safe. "

  Shannon turned on her, the blade between them an unspoken threat. "I'm not going anywhere. You try to force me and you'll wish you hadn't, lady. "

  Tamara's eyes went saucer-wide. The two men, who'd been talking urgently, went silent.

  The woman eyed Shannon for a moment. "I'll forgive that fledgling. Once. "

  Shannon ignored her imperious words and turned once more. The forms on the floor had become men again. They stood, facing each other, panting, bleeding from various wounds. Eric and the strange man both lunged forward, but Damien held up a hand to stop them.

  "Get Shannon out of here, for the love of Inanna!"

  "I won't go!" she shrieked.

  "Anthar, stop this at once. You're no match for all of us!" It was the stranger who shouted it.

  "Care to put that theory to the test?"

  Anthar whispered. He looked at the stranger, his gaze hardening, intensifying in a way Shannon had never seen. It was as if an energy pulsed from his sunken eyes.

  "Roland!" Rhiannon threw herself at the stranger, sending him sprawling to the stone floor just as a ball of flame exploded in the air where he'd stood.

  She rose, facing Anthar, rage in her eyes. "Oh, now you will pay--"

  He laughed at her, and Shannon thought the woman's rage was so full-blown it made the air around them quiver.

  Anthar turned away from her and lunged, shoving Damien onto his back on the floor. He yanked a blade from his boot and lifted his arm to plunge it into Damien's throat.

  "Noooo!" It was a battle cry, emitted as Shannon launched herself. She landed squarely on the man's back, both hands gripping his wrist, pulling it away from Damien with every ounce of strength she possessed.

  Anthar flung her from him like a dog ridding itself of a flea. She felt herself fly through the air. She landed brutally hard. Her head connected with the stone offering table, sending her senses reeling. Dizzy, her head exploding with pain, her body weakened by it, she forced her eyes open.

  Damien growled his rage, flinging the man away from him, then focusing his eyes on the bastard as he struggled to get to his feet.

  The man seemed to feel that heated gaze. He froze for an instant in time, and turned to face Damien. "Can you do it, do you think?" His thin brows rose, and he moved forward, menacingly. The black panther growled deep in its throat, crouching low. "Better question, can you do it fast enough?" Anthar sprang forward, arm swinging in a deadly arc, the knife he clutched on a collision coarse with Damien's neck. He'd behead him!

  Damien stood his ground, staring harder, not backing away even an inch, and Shannon shrieked at him to move.

  Just before he reached Damien, Anthar's body froze. It began to tremble, then vibrated head to toe. His eyes bulged and a wisp of gray smoke writhed from his hair. A tremor rocked the temple floor, and then a roar, as Anthar burst into a blinding ball of white flame. His keening came more loudly than the blast, and seemed to echo within the temple chamber even after he was silent. It died slowly, an eternal prisoner of the cella walls. And there was nothing, just nothing. Anthar was gone.

  Damien sank to the floor as if the act had drained every ounce of his energy. Shannon struggled to her feet and ran to him, fell to her knees, not caring that the stone floor scraped them raw. She pulled him to her, her hands cradling his head. She couldn't speak. She only moaned sof
tly and rocked him against her as the tears flowed. God, she loved him. She hadn't realized just how much until she'd thought he might die trying to save her. If he had, what would she have done? How could she have gone on?

  His arms went around her waist, his face nestling in the white linen that covered her, nuzzling her belly. His hands stroked her back again and again. "It's over now. Shannon. It's all right. You're safe now. " He pulled himself up a little, pressed his lips to her wet cheeks, to her burning eyes. "Safe now," he whispered again, as her arms encircled his neck. "And free of me. You'll leave with the others. One more day, Shannon. You'll recover from all of this while you rest tomorrow, and then I want you to go. I just hope you can find some kind of contentment in this life I've condemned you to live. "

  She blinked, her tears ceasing abruptly.