Thornfalcon (The ARC Legacy Book 1)

by Matthew W. Harrill

  Lucas, or Karael, moved toward her with catlike steps, stalking her.

  “I don't care who, or what you are,” Io said. “You'll not raise a hand against her.” He ran forward, one hand outstretched to grab, the other balled in a fist, ready to punch. Crossing the distance between them in only a few steps, Io launched himself at his sword-wielding opponent, only to be caught in mid-air by Karael's free hand.

  “You think yourself in any way my equal?” Karael shouted, eyes blazing, lips peeled back. He threw Io in the same direction he had thrown Mitch. Io slammed into the wall, dropping to his knees as the stonework crumbled behind him. Strangely, Io appeared unharmed.

  Samantha cowered, naked and alone in front of Karael's fury.

  Karael turned away from her, his attention again on Io. “Even were you at full strength with all of your knowledge and experience, you don't have my virtues. He set me on His ordained path, to rid our ranks of dissenters. He imbued me with His essence, from His very hand. Do you not understand? This is the sword of Jophiel. I wield its righteous power.” The sword glowed brighter and a flame wrapped around the blade, as Karael stalked after Io, the edge held low. As the sword burned, the eggy stench of sulfur filled the air.

  “Even without this, I could end you with my bare hands, traitor. Were you at your full strength, with the Powers at your command, you would not prevail. If you remembered who you were, who I was, you would wish for my Divine mercy. As it is…” Karael raised his face skyward. “Let this be a lesson to those who would choose the path of the fallen over the service their creation demands!”

  Io staggered to his feet, evidently unharmed. “I … won't … let … you…”

  Karael hit Io with a series of punches and kicks, forcing him to drop to his knees, head bowed as he tried to support himself with his hands.

  “What makes you think you have a choice?” Karael moved his sword arm across his chest so that the sword angled up behind his head, tensing for a backswing that would end in a killing strike.

  But the blow never came. From behind, something tugged at Karael's hand, pulling it past his throat and back over his shoulder. A metallic cord wrapped his arms to his chest, two, three times. The cord tightened and one sharp tug jerked Karael from his feet, his body crashing face-first to the ground. The sword fell loose, dimming to a dull grey as it did so.

  On the other end of the line, Charlotte Benson said, “Don't you wish everything was tech, like Helltech? Io pick up that sword.”

  Pushing himself to his feet, Io did as asked. The sword failed to respond when he touched it. He looked to Samantha and shrugged.

  “Do with it what you will,” Karael growled from the ground. “End me as I would have ended you. This will be your only chance, Ioviel.”

  Io raised the sword above his vanquished foe, trembling as he held it aloft.

  Karael watched, waiting for the blow. “Do it.”

  “No,” Io lowered the sword, letting the tip touch the ground as he leaned on it. “This isn't right. I would never do such a thing.”

  Karael began to laugh, a wheezing, guttural noise. “If you only knew who you are, what you are, you would have struck a killing blow. It's what you do best.”

  “That may be your truth but I will discover the reality on my own, without your poisonous words to taint me.” He looked to Charlotte. “Will that hold him?”

  “Hard to say. It's doing a good job of it so far. What do you reckon, boss?”

  Clare took her phone away from her ear. “I'd say we've found a prettier prize than some Barbegazi. I need to stay here and help coordinate the search for Secretary-General Tran. He's still not been found. ARC are sending some people to pick this one up and take him to a facility.” Clare looked from Benson to Io. “Him? I'm still not convinced, but Sammy you're doing a good job with him. See what else you can discover. I'm giving you Charlotte. I need Jim here. Carrot?” she called over to the pilot, “Can you fly?”

  Her face stained with tears, Carrot looked up from the body of Mitch. “Whatever you want, boss.”

  “Get these guys to our Dubrovnik hangar and see them onto a plane. Then come back. We could use you here. We will move Mitch's body in the meantime, and see him given the respect he deserves.”

  “Gotcha.” Carrot stood, walking over to Samantha. Looking her in the eye, Carrot turned, and with a few quick steps, kicked Karael in the face. “That was for Mitch. Come on, guys.”

  As Samantha walked off, Io followed, still trailing the sword in the dirt. “What does this mean?” he asked her.

  “I don't know. Together we'll find out.”

  “It means I will escape this,” Karael roared from between broken teeth. “Soon. This body is weak. I'll make it stronger. I will come for you, forsaken prey!”

  Karael continued to bellow curses at them as they climbed into the Huey, his voice soon drowned out by the chop of the rotors.

  “Something unhinged about that one,” Charlotte commented as they took off.

  “You think?” Carrot said over the headsets. Her voice was subdued. How she wasn't in shock was beyond Samantha's comprehension. This group was tough.

  “I'm sorry, sweetie. I know you two were close. This is all happening so quickly.”

  Io sat staring at the sword. It gave off the faintest glimmer as he turned it in his hands. “It looks familiar.” He hefted the sword in one hand. “It feels familiar.”

  “Maybe holding on to it will help you remember more?” Samantha suggested. “What was it he called you? Io Vel?”

  “Something like that.”

  “Well it's something to go on. He called himself Karael. That's something else. First though, what was that rope you bound him with, Charlotte?”

  “Helltech, reverse-engineered from what your mother brought back from her trip down below.”

  This made Io look up. “What did you call it?”

  “Helltech. It's a pretty appropriate description.”

  Samantha asked, “May I fill him in?”

  “If your stray dog is gonna stay to heel, you may as well,” Charlotte agreed. “It's not like he doesn't have his own secrets.”

  Samantha flashed a grateful smile. “Twenty years ago, Mom went to Hell. Literally. It's in no way a figure of speech. Do you remember the disturbances across the Earth?”

  Io shook his head.

  “Demon incursion. They found a way to come to Earth to flee Hell. By all accounts something worse broke free and Hell was freezing over. They needed to balance the numbers on the mortal plane and this would have become a new Hell. One demon prince, Belphegor, kidnapped my sister Nina just after birth, and took her to Hell. They wanted Mom to follow. In time she did, with my father, and a small group to rescue Nina. I don't know every detail but in short, my father became the new Satan.”

  “Surely such a feat is not possible,” Io said. “Satan was a fallen angel.”

  “And yet, happen it did. My mother was given a piece of technology while there. Armor that drew on an energy source and regenerated both her and itself. For a while she was nigh-on immortal. The armor came back with her.”

  “We can't make the armor work without the power source it drew on in Hell,” Charlotte said, “yet using it we have been able to enhance our own tech. Armor, transport, weapons.”

  “And yet you fly in this machine?”

  Charlotte laughed. “We've developed transport, though nowhere near perfected it. This however, might be useful.” She reached beneath her seat and pulled out a shiny black case. Two locks opened with a clunk as Charlotte opened the lid. She turned the case so Samantha could see. “Take it.”

  Nestled in the foam-lined interior was a handgun. Samantha reached in and withdrew the weapon. “It's nearly weightless.”

  “It's as close as they could replicate to the material used in the armor. It's a polymer. The pin and a lot of the internals are still metal, but the bullets are made of the same material. It might be useful if he finds you again.”


  Samantha was dubious as she gripped the gun and turned it. “I hope that's not gonna be the case. Won't your rope hold him?”

  “Maybe. But better to have every fighting chance if you're going to be looking over your shoulder the rest of your life. Let me tell you a little about your aunt. You know she's diabetic?”

  Samantha nodded.

  “Her first job was hunting down a creature that preyed on diabetics. She killed it, but in doing so, almost killed herself. Now that illness stalks her every day of her life. She accepts it and makes the best of what she has. I think she wants you to learn that you're more than the shadow of your mother, or your sister. Maybe it's time for Samantha Scott to embrace her responsibility to the world.”

  “Is that what we're doing here? It seems more like an escape.”

  “Whoever it was back there wanted Io here, and manifested a sword out of thin air. A flaming sword. If you don't agree you've been plunged deep into the mire with the rest of us, you're kidding yourself, Sammy. Now do you want to let us have a look at this book you've been carting about? Maybe I can help you make sense of it.”

  “Book?”

  Charlotte gave her a knowing look. “You two weren't the only ones present at your demonstration with the crows. There's always someone watching. Show me the sign that perplexed you.”

  Confused, Samantha placed the gun in her bag, pulled her crow divination book out and opened it at the page with the Thornfalcon drawn on it.

  Charlotte reached over and took the book. For a moment she stared, turning the book in different directions and frowning as she did so. “It says Thornfalcon but that's not what it means.”

  “You recognise it?” Samantha began to tense with expectation.

  “Yeah. It's Hebrew. One word. The letters are basically drawn but nonetheless recognisable.” She looked up at the both of them. “The word is Karael.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  What had she done? “Io?”

  “Are you an angel?” Charlotte asked.

  Io's face darkened as he considered this. Confused as he was, he probably remembered nothing.

  Samantha watched him struggle and felt for the man, if he were a man at all.

  “I don't know. I can't remember.”

  “That excuse is gonna wear thin soon. Karael certainly seems to think you are,” Charlotte pressed. She flipped the book so they could see the pages. “You carry a book around full of divination and prophecy. The one unexplainable glyph that forms out of wild birds, points at you. Five minutes later, a man Sammy expects to be dead is walking around throwing people through walls and manifesting glowing swords out of thin air, and he is looking for you. On top of that, a city lies destroyed from a landslide that should never have happened. We've got evidence that something impacted the surface and turned limestone to marble. You're at the centre of this, and you can't remember a thing? Or is it that you refuse to remember? Or tell?”

  “Charlotte enough,” Sammy intervened. “Can't you see he's distressed enough without this grilling? It's not his fault Mitch is dead. The blame for that lies ultimately at the doorstep of Aeon Fall. Without them we wouldn't be here.”

  Io shuddered at the mention of the name.

  Samantha paused, “What is it?”

  “That name. Aeon Fall, a thousand years of darkness. I feel it all around me, the apathy. Even from you. One can be blind to their own mind and still see that looking to demons for salvation is a bad choice.”

  “It got you out of Dubrovnik though, didn't it?” Charlotte countered. “Humanity will remember the big picture, not necessarily the events that brought us there. It's what we do best. Foreboding is another thing we do well. These weapons, that armor, the technology ARC is developing may one day mean the difference between survival and extinction. Mankind may never know what saved them, but we sure as hell will.” Charlotte flicked through the book, pausing at the front cover and frowning. “Divine Mercy—where have I heard that before?”

  “What do you see?” Samantha tried to get a better look but Charlotte had the book tilted up.

  “It's a stamp on the inside of the cover.” She ran her hands over the cover and along the spine of the book. “This feels off. Anyone got a knife?”

  “No, you can't,” Samantha protested.

  “Never mind,” Charlotte continued, pulling a penknife from her pack. “Have you never noticed how thick the cover is?”

  Samantha shrugged. “I just figured it was an old book.”

  Charlotte snorted. “Kids today. Surprised you lot know what a book is!”

  Before Samantha could cry out again, Charlotte ran the blade down the inside of the cover where it met the spine. As the blade cut through the material, the inside of the cover pushed up, revealing folded sheets almost the entire size of the cover. “Jackpot. We may get to the bottom of your strange crow antics yet. How far to the airport Carrot?”

  “Ten miles or so. Not long. We'll be touching down soon.”

  Samantha looked out of the window, the Adriatic hurtling beneath her while she was lost in thought. The icon meant Karael and now he knew of them. Was Io's peril her doing? Would Karael be soon following them? Angels did have wings. She looked at the tormented Io. Well they are supposed to. Most of the time.

  Supposed to what? Intervened a voice in her head.

  Nina? How can you hear me so far away?

  You're my little sis. I know what to listen out for.

  Where are you?

  There was a brief pause. On my way to meet my contact. I won't be able to do this much after now. Just stay safe, and listen to Mom. Now what's up?

  Nina, there are angels on Earth and your book has a map in it. When there was no reply she continued. Nina? You there?

  Nothing.

  “Let's see if we can solve your conundrum before we do,” Charlotte decided, not having been a party to the conversation in Samantha's head. As she unfolded the pages, she said, “Moresby? Who's Moresby? The author?”

  “Where does it say that?”

  Charlotte turned the book around again, holding the opened page flat against the cover. There was a map on it, along with rows of numbers. “A series of navigational jottings and one word. 'Moresby'. This is an island somewhere. This points here,” she indicated the top of the page, “is where the map ends.”

  “Is that where we will find Divine mercy?” Io asked.

  “Why don't we cross reference that?” Samantha suggested. “This is the age of technology, after all. Give me your tablet.”

  Still occupied with the new pages, Charlotte handed over the computer without looking up. It didn't take long for Samantha to bring up a search engine. She typed in 'Divine Mercy Publications in Port Moresby.' “This could be it.”

  “Or, a convenient combination of words,” Charlotte replied. “That's a real leap of faith. Where's Port Moresby?”

  “Papua New Guinea. It's the capital city.”

  “It's also on the other side of the world.”

  Samantha's face brightened. “Perfect! Aunt Clare said she wanted us far out of the way. No better reason than to visit this place and find out if they know anything. And besides, we could do with some sleep.”

  “If only she'd been through the special forces sleep deprivation training,” Carrot muttered over the headset. “Then she'd know what tired is.”

  * * *

  In a couple of minutes, the helicopter began to descend. The sun was high in the sky, an astounding contrast to the day before when the malfunctioning satellite set off bizarre weather systems on a global scale.

  The bleached concrete of the airport glared at them annoyingly as they touched town at the warehouses constructed at the end of the runway—far from prying eyes and the airport main terminal at the other end of the complex.

  Samantha squinted as she jumped down, not sure where to look. She raised her arm above her face against the blowing dust and tugged Io along with her free hand.

  “This way,” Charlotte shouted a
bove the noise of the rotors and led them out of the daylight across a windswept pile of refuse, the mess still everywhere at ground level.

  As they slipped into one of the hangars, Samantha asked, “Is this ARC?” It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the looming shapes of two small airliners above her.

  “Of course. The organisation has a hangar at every airport. It began with main airports decades back and now they maintain a presence at pretty much everything bigger than an airfield.”

  “Hello?” A voice called from an office at the rear of the hangar.

  “Captain Novak?” Charlotte asked.

  “Ah, Miss Benson.”

  The voice continued in the dark; the monotonous accent was familiar to Samantha after a night in Dubrovnik.

  “Your boss, Director Rosser, called ahead of you. Give us thirty minutes to complete fuelling and pre-flight checks and we will have a plane worthy of you. Where is your destination?”

  “Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea,” Samantha spoke before Charlotte could answer. “As soon as you can, Captain.”

  “We have a change of plane. The ARC jet was damaged during the fun yesterday. We have borrowed this passenger jet from Croatia Airlines for your journey.”

  The discussion went on, but Samantha found her eyes drooping now that there wasn't an immediate need to do anything. The lack of sleep had finally caught up with her. Strong hands caught her by the shoulders. “Time for some rest,” Io said in a low voice, guiding her toward stairs that led onto the plane.

  Samantha let herself be guided. She had fallen into the middle of this mess, and the one person she wanted to look out for was now her guardian. Angel or not, she trusted him and the feeling comforted her.

  Five days until Aeon Fall carries out their first threat, she thought as she watched the earth fly by.

  Sleep meant Samantha missed most of the first leg of their journey, as the pilot flew across the middle-east and India before refuelling at Mumbai. Through sleepy eyes, she looked out at the Java Sea, the mass of water that formed the heart of the Indonesian archipelago. Daylight had caught them up, the surface of the water below glistened in shades of silver around the green specks of islands dotted in the sea.