Hunt at World's End gh-3

by Gabriel Hunt

  He heard the back door of Veda’s house open and close, but didn’t turn from the view until Joyce sat down next to him. She kicked off her shoes and let her feet touch the water beside his.

  “Are you sure you want to come? You know you don’t have to, right?”

  “I don’t think Veda would let me stay here,” Gabriel said.

  “You know what I mean. You could fly home from Madagascar. You’ve done everything Michael asked you to. You don’t have to keep helping me.”

  “And who would watch your back in the desert—Daniel? Even if he deserves the second chance you’re so keen on giving him, he can’t protect you the way…”

  Joyce smiled. “The way you can?”

  “The way you need,” Gabriel said.

  She watched the sunset with him for a while. “Can I ask you something?”

  “Sure.”

  “All this treasure hunting you do, all this exploring…it’s like you can’t sit still, you’re never happy where you are. It’s like you’re always looking for something, but you never find it.”

  “And your question is…?”

  “What are you really looking for, Gabriel?”

  He watched the water lap against the side of the floating dock. He thought of the hospital in Gibraltar, the authorities telling him they had no idea what had happened to the ship his parents were on during the three days it had apparently vanished from the Mediterranean Sea.

  “People think it’s all been found,” Gabriel said, “that we live in a world that has no secrets anymore. The modern world, with every inch catalogued and mapped and photographed and recorded. They don’t know how wrong they are. There are still things in the world that no one’s seen in thousands of years or that no one’s ever seen, things no one can explain. Things that could have an enormous impact on people’s lives, for good or bad. Someone’s got to find them. And preferably not men like Grissom.”

  Joyce nodded.

  “You know,” Gabriel said, “your uncle wanted me to try to talk you out of pursuing a life like mine. He’d like to see you in a safe, comfortable university position, not running around in a jungle getting shot at.”

  “He said that to you?” Joyce asked. Gabriel nodded. “Sorry, but my uncle doesn’t get to make my decisions for me. Neither do you.”

  “Good,” Gabriel said. “Because you’re going to be great at this someday.” And he leaned over to kiss her.

  Chapter 20

  The cruise ship African Princess stretched six hundred feet from bow to stern, with three balconied levels rising above the main deck, all filled with restaurants, ballrooms, shops, two casinos, and luxury staterooms for nearly one thousand passengers. These luxury staterooms had all been booked months in advance; what Michael had managed to reserve was a pair of small cabins belowdecks where the white-noise hum of the engines was ever-present.

  “Before this, I would’ve guessed you traveled everywhere first class,” Joyce said.

  “Actually, I prefer not to,” Gabriel said. “Especially when I’m trying to stay out of sight.” He leaned against the closed connecting door between the cabin he and Joyce were sharing and the one they’d put Daniel in; Gabriel had told him he was confined to quarters for the duration, and he’d accepted this without complaint. He’d seemed to be glad for a way to do penance.

  Gabriel watched through the porthole as they made slow progress through the rolling whitecaps. The sun dipped low in the sky, silhouetting the African coastline in the distance. They’d been sailing for two days. Madagascar wouldn’t be far now, he thought. And from there, Botswana.

  Behind him, Joyce gathered the rumpled sheets around her on the bunk and propped herself up on one elbow. “You look a thousand miles away.”

  “Just thinking about what we’re going to find when we get to the desert,” Gabriel said. “We’ve been chasing after the gemstones so much we haven’t even thought about the Spearhead itself. What it is, what it looks like. How we’ll recognize it. We don’t even know where it is.”

  “I doubt Grissom knows either,” Joyce said. “That’s something, at least.”

  “It is,” Gabriel said, “but it’s not enough.”

  “He also doesn’t know the third Eye is at World’s End.”

  “We hope,” Gabriel said. “He found ways to follow us the first two times.”

  “Well, even if he has again—hell, even if he’s somehow figured it out for himself and gotten there first—we still have one of the Eyes ourselves. He can’t do anything without it, right?”

  Gabriel turned to look out the window again. Could the Spearhead be activated or used with only two of the three Eyes? It seemed unlikely. But if Grissom did find his way to the last Eye before them, all he’d have to do would be wait for them to show up carrying the one they had. They could be walking into an ambush.

  “Well, there’s nothing we can do about it from aboard this ship,” Joyce said. “We may as well enjoy ourselves while we’re here.”

  “Low profile, remember?”

  “I’m not talking about dancing naked on deck,” Joyce said, “I’m thinking we could have a nice dinner. The three of us.”

  “Daniel’s under house arrest,” Gabriel said. “No leaving his cabin.” They’d been bringing him three meals a day and paperbacks from the ship’s convenience store to keep him occupied. He’d asked for nothing more.

  “We can let him out for just one night, can’t we?” Joyce asked. “Hasn’t he been punished enough?”

  “This isn’t about punishment,” Gabriel said. “This is about keeping us safe. He almost got us killed, for heaven’s sake.”

  She nodded. “I know, but he hasn’t tried to contact Grissom again, right?”

  “He hasn’t had the opportunity.”

  “That’s not true, he could have done it anytime at Veda’s house. She had a phone in every room, and a computer too, but he didn’t.”

  “Because one of us was with him at all times,” Gabriel said.

  “Maybe that’s why,” Joyce said, “but I think he wouldn’t have anyway.” Gabriel looked unconvinced. “Besides, we won’t be able to keep him locked up when we get to wherever we’re going. We’re going to have to take a chance on him again at some point. We may as well start now.”

  Gabriel sighed. “If anything happens, if he tries to get away…”

  “We’re on a boat. Where’s he going to go?” She climbed off the bed and started picking through the pile of clothing on the floor, no doubt looking for something appropriate to wear among all her field gear. Good luck finding a cocktail dress in there, Gabriel thought. But it was just as well, since he only had the one outfit himself—and, just to be safe, he’d be accessorizing it his usual way, with a leather jacket just long enough to conceal his hip holster.

  Under cover of night, the thirty-foot ketch cut smoothly and quietly through the waters of the Indian Ocean. They’d taken down the sails so they wouldn’t be seen by the African Princess, instead propelling themselves forward with a small, muffled motor attached to the stern. At Vassily’s command, the engine was cut, and they floated up silently, small as an insect next to the hulking cruise ship. An emergency hatch in the African Princess’s hull stood just above sea level. They tied mooring ropes to the thick bolt beside the hatch, securing the ketch in place in the shadow of the ship.

  The brethren of the Cult of Ulikummis—more than a dozen men in all—stood at the ready, awaiting Vassily’s orders. Arkady stood with the others in their robes and skull masks, in some cases with bows slung over one shoulder, quivers over the other, in all cases with swords through their belts. Tonight Vassily would let them spill all the blood they wanted.

  Arkady reached out and pressed a square of explosives firmly against the seam of the hatch, then inserted a fuse. It took three attempts in the damp night air to get a match lit, but once he had, it took no time at all to set the fuse burning. Hastily, all the men dropped to the bottom of the ketch. The explosion, when it came, was qu
iet, as explosions went. Looking up, they saw that the blast had knocked the hatch off its hinges and onto the floor inside. One by one they climbed in through the opening, Vassily going last.

  They found themselves in a hot, dimly lit, graywalled hallway that ran past the engine room. A loud mechanical hum filled the corridor. At the far end, a staircase led up to the passenger decks. As they moved forward, the door of the engine room opened and two men rushed out, summoned by the noise of the explosion—it hadn’t been quiet enough for no one to notice—or else the hull breach had set off some automatic monitor. Upon seeing the heavily armed cult members, the men skidded to a halt, their eyes wide with surprise.

  “What the hell—” the first one sputtered. Before he’d even finished his sentence, one of the cult members had pulled the sword from his belt and slashed it mercilessly across his throat.

  Vassily spun his staff and thrust its bronze blade into the second man’s neck, pinning him to the wall. He made wet choking sounds as blood flowed down his shirt, and he clawed at his throat. When his grasping hands slackened and dropped to his sides, Vassily pulled the blade out. The second man’s corpse fell on top of the first.

  They continued silently toward the stairs.

  “I appreciate this, Gabriel,” Daniel Wingard said. The plate before him was empty except for a few decapitated asparagus stalks. “I hope this means we’ve come to some kind of détente.”

  “That depends entirely on you,” Gabriel replied.

  They were dining on the upper deck of the ship, the cloudless sky above them filled with bright stars and a waning gibbous moon. The open-air restaurant was called the Safari Club. It was separated from the rest of the deck by latticed wooden walls, each decorated with spears, leopard-skin shields and large mural paintings of the African savannah and its wildlife. The waiter cleared their dishes and disappeared inside the serving station housed in a small square “hut” with a straw-thatched roof. The cruise line had spared no expense on the décor, but Gabriel couldn’t help the disdain he felt for this sort of tourist’s-eye rendition of Africa. Whoever designed it had obviously never set foot in the real savannah, he’d just watched old Tarzan pictures or ridden the Jungle Cruise at Disneyland.

  “That’s certainly fair,” Daniel said, sipping at his water. “So why don’t I do something to make myself useful? I’ve had a lot of time to think, cooped up in that cabin, and something dawned on me that I don’t recall any of us bringing up before.”

  “What’s that?” Gabriel said.

  “I’ve seen dozens of images of Teshub over the years, drawings and paintings and sculptures, I’ve probably read hundreds of descriptions, and every one of them is pretty much the same—oh, details vary from one to the next, but he’s always portrayed as looking like a man, with ordinary human features. Nowhere is there any suggestion that Teshub has three eyes, like Shiva or Mahadeva. Teshub is always shown as having the ordinary number of eyes.”

  Daniel looked up from his plate and met Gabriel’s gaze across the table.

  “You see what I’m getting at?” Daniel continued. “We’re looking for the three Eyes of Teshub. The number three keeps showing up in the legend—three elements, the three armies that will determine the Spearhead’s fate, even the three blades on the Death’s Head Key. But why three eyes when he’s always shown as only having two?”

  “Could it be another mistranslation?” Gabriel asked. “Maybe the word that’s been translated as ‘eye’ also means something else…?”

  Daniel shook his head. “Unlikely. The Nesili symbol for ‘eye’ isn’t one that has multiple meanings, and the one meaning it does have is amply documented.”

  Gabriel took one last sip of wine, emptying his glass. More riddles. That was how Daniel chose to make himself useful? If he wanted to be useful, he’d supply some answers, not more questions.

  He watched a waiter walk out of the restaurant and onto the deck with a tray of drinks, disappearing past the serving station. When he came back, maybe Gabriel would ask him for a refill…

  The sudden noise of shattering glass made Gabriel spring to his feet.

  He saw the crowd of white-robed cultists flooding onto the deck. “Get down!”

  Joyce and Daniel threw themselves to the floor. Gabriel pulled his Colt from its holster. The other passengers in the restaurant screamed and backed away from their tables.

  Three cult members nocked arrows into their bows on the run.

  Gabriel kicked the table onto its side, sending their wineglasses, the empty bottle and the floral centerpiece smashing to the floor, then ducked behind it with Joyce and Daniel. The hiss of multiple arrows cut the air, and the table jolted and thumped as they struck it.

  “I thought we’d seen the last of them,” Joyce said.

  “They must have followed us from Borneo.”

  “Is this the Cult of Ulikummis?” Daniel asked. His eyebrows lifted and he peeked around the side of the table. “Fascinating! Look at those masks! Twelfth century B.C. design, I’d say.”

  “Very helpful, Professor,” Gabriel said, pulling him back behind the table. More arrows flew past, embedding in the polished wooden floor around them. “But you’re not watching a slide show in a lecture hall. Stay down.”

  He didn’t take his own advice. He leapt up instead, firing the Colt. His first shot struck one of the archers and sent him spinning over the deck railing. His second and third, carefully placed, took down the other two. The remaining cult members rushed forward with their swords drawn.

  “Get him out of here,” Gabriel shouted to Joyce. “I’ll hold them off as long as I can.”

  “We can’t leave,” Joyce shouted back.

  “Don’t be a hero, Joyce, just go,” Gabriel said, but glancing back he saw she wasn’t being a hero, she was just describing the situation. The rear wall of the restaurant blocked their escape. They were penned in.

  Chapter 21

  Gabriel got to his feet fast and, ducking under the swinging sword of the cult member closest to him, rushed to a side wall of the restaurant where one of the pairs of spears was held crossed in a metal bracket. He wrenched them out of their mounting and threw one to Joyce. She caught it in both hands and swung it like a staff to parry another swordsman’s attack. Daniel, meanwhile, had grabbed one of the leopard-skin shields off the wall and was hiding behind it while another cultist battered it with his blade.

  Gabriel’s attention was swiftly brought back to his own situation when the attacker whose last blow he’d ducked came back for a second try. Gabriel made as if to duck it again, but then stepped back and plunged the spear downward, like a primitive fisherman spearing a catch in a stream. The catch in this case being the cult member’s foot. The man howled in pain as the blade plunged through his boot, pinning him to the deck, and Gabriel breathed a silent thanks to the decorator whose taste he’d been mentally condemning earlier. It was still poor taste—but at least the man had gone as far as investing in real spears, not plastic or cast-resin fakes.

  The swordsman sank to one knee, both hands going to the shaft of the spear in order to pull it out, and Gabriel snatched up the man’s sword as it fell to the deck. Spinning when he heard racing footsteps behind him, Gabriel swept it upward to meet the descending blade of one of the speared man’s compatriots. The blades struck in midair with a clang of metal against metal. Gabriel brought his down and under for a riposte that caught the other man across his unprotected wrist. A spray of blood jetted out.

  But more of them kept coming. Good god, how many were there?

  Gabriel fired his Colt twice more and he saw two more men fall. But he’d be out of bullets before they’d be out of men. He looked around desperately. Where could he get away from them…?

  The hut. There had to be an exit there, leading to a belowdecks galley if nothing else. He ran for it, hooking a chair with one foot as he sprinted and kicking it backward into the knees of the man closest behind him. The man went over in a tangle of robes.

 
Gabriel plunged into the hut—and found his way blocked by a figure he had hoped never to see again. The high priest of the Cult of Ulikummis, wearing his red and gold tunic and tall, rectangular headdress, whirled the bronze-bladed staff in his hands. Gabriel fell back as the blade sliced past his face. He blocked the next blow with his sword, though just barely—the man was attacking fiercely and with more strength than Gabriel found himself able to muster. And probably without a glass of Montepulciano in him, either.

  Gabriel raised his gun and fired—only to hear the hammer land on an empty chamber. He saw a vicious smile blossom on the high priest’s face at the sound.

  Holstering his gun, Gabriel swung the sword in his other hand in a huge arc, not expecting to hit the high priest, just buying himself room to back out of the hut. The high priest shrank back, then came after him as he retreated.

  Out in the open again, Gabriel shot a glance over at Joyce. She and Daniel were surrounded by the remaining cultists. Joyce had pulled a second shield off the wall and together with Daniel had formed an approximation of a phalanx, shield to shield, as a barrier against the swords crashing down on them.