by Marc Olden
The arrow tore into Rajah’s neck, lifting the hawk inches off the ground and driving him several feet across the courtyard, a trail of warm blood behind him on the cobblestones. His wings flapped like a child’s broken toy now out of control, beating hard against the cold ground. Then he lay still.
“Lisa! Here! Quick!” Her head snapped toward his voice. Moving her hair from her eyes, she stared into the darkness.
“Now!” His voice was a command. The naked woman began to crawl and scramble toward him.
He notched another arrow. As a second hawk swooped low, spreading its black-and-white wings wide, slowing down its flight, its ugly yellow claws tensed to attack, Sand let the arrow fly.
It ripped into the hawk’s chest, blood spurting out around the arrow, the hawk stopping in midair for a fraction of a second, then dropping down to the cobblestones below.
She was on her hands and knees, almost within reach of the darkness. Above them on the walk, Talon screamed, a weird cry in the night, as though a part of him had been ripped from his body, then destroyed. “Rajah!” His voice echoed across the torchlit courtyard.
Stepping from the darkness, the Black Samurai reached down to Lisa, his strong hand grasping her wrist, pulling her toward him. In seconds they disappeared inside the small room, the door slamming hard behind them.
Talon’s eyes were glazed. The men around him pointed their flashlights to the ground, the lighting coming up to touch his face and framing it. His voice hissed softly in the eerie light. “Don’t kill the black. He’s mine. Anyone who kills him, I’ll kill. Take him alive. Wound him, slow him down, but I, and no one else, will kill him.”
Turning, he pushed through the semi-circle of hard-faced men and walked across the courtyard into the castle. Three men followed close behind him, each carrying a two-foot length of rusty iron pipe.
The courtyard emptied except for three guards, also with lengths of pipe, standing with their backs to the front gate, their eyes on the dark, quiet castle.
They moved through the narrow secret passage, the sounds of men rushing and shouting now louder on either side of them. She wore his black turtleneck sweater, her eyes straining to see his bare back as he walked in front of her.
He stopped, his hand motioning her to keep quiet. Silence. She reached out for him, her hands cool on his bare skin.
“They’re inside the passage,” he whispered.
She frowned. “I don’t hear anything.”
He said nothing. Then: “They’re here. That means Talon’s inside the castle guiding the search. He’s probably sent them in from your room and in from behind us. We’re boxed in.”
“What’ll we do?” Her voice was soft and strained in the darkness.
They had been heading for a way out of the castle known to Robert Sand but regarded by him as almost useless. Because, in one sense, it was not a way out at all. The exit he headed toward had been sealed up years ago, when the need for quick escapes had died with medieval warfare. The passage they were stumbling through was not merely an escape in time of siege for the privileged few. It also allowed access to every part of the castle.
At the moment, the passage was keeping the Black Samurai and Lisa alive.
“Wait here,” he said, moving ahead of her.
She leaned against the wall, hearing no sounds except him moving away from her, leaving her in total darkness. Her legs ached from running, and still bled from Rajah’s attack. Stumbling across the cold stone in the narrow passage had driven sharp pains into her feet.
But she was alive. She was alive.
Sand stopped, placed his right knee on the ground, and quietly notched an arrow to his bow. He waited. There was no sound in front of him, nor in back, but he waited.
Then …
Ahead of him in the darkness, the flashlight beam raced along the floor. He brought the bow even with his cheek, the string drawn back as far as it would go. The light grew brighter, then brighter still. It had crept within feet of him before he let go of the arrow.
A man cried aloud, and the flashlight clattered to the stone floor and rolled around, the light moving crazily around in the darkness. A second man cursed, his voice deep and echoing in the long, narrow space.
Sand fired a second arrow. “Christ! Oh, Jesus Christ!” The man’s deep voice rang out in pain, carrying inside the stone walls. Dropping the bow, Sand yanked the sword from his belt and raced forward. In seconds he would be certain that both men would remain silent
“I know,” he said.
Lisa had told him that men were behind them. Stopping, he listened, hearing the sounds of boots on stone, knowing that soon they would find the two dead guards, each with his throat cut.
The thin beam of his flashlight brushed over her dirty, bleeding feet. “They’ll use your blood to follow us,” he said.
She glanced in horror down at her feet, sharply inhaled, then looked at Sand. “I didn’t know. Oh, God.”
“Let’s go,” he said, turning from her and moving forward.
“Where?”
“Out of the passage.”
The dogs barked again and again, caught up in the excitement of the hunt. “Her feet,” said Talon. “She’s trailing blood. Follow it. But remember, don’t kill him. Don’t kill him.”
The two huge black Great Danes barked and moved anxiously around in circles. Talon, an iron pipe in his hand, started up the huge wide staircase, the two monstrous dogs racing ahead of him, three men behind him.
Flickering flames from the huge fireplace in the great hall threw huge shadows out of the room and almost to the wide staircase. At the top of the staircase Talon turned to his right, the men following him, the dogs dancing beside them, then speeding on ahead.
Talon’s flashlight swept the deep-brown floor in front of him, its white beam pushing a lighted path through the darkness. “Here!” he cried. “Right here!”
Blood.
Part of a small footprint, a heel.
Talon bent low, touched it with his fingertips, then brought his bloody fingertips to his mouth, his pink tongue licking the blood, his eyes wild. “Yes,” he hissed. “Yes. They’re ahead of us.”
The Black Samurai heard the dogs. “The dogs are out front,” he whispered to Lisa. “I’ve got to stop them. Here. This chair.” He turned a huge wooden chair around, its high back facing the direction the dogs would be coming from. “Get down behind this. One more thing,” he whispered softly. “Don’t watch what happens. Just stay behind the chair, no matter what.”
She nodded her head, pulling the black woolen sweater down to her hips.
Taking off the black canvas bag, he hung that on the chair and laid his bow beside it. He turned off the small pencil-thin green flashlight beam, slipping that into his pocket.
Drawing his sword, he moved through the darkness, back toward the sound of the barking dogs speeding toward him and the woman. The sword was best. Quick, silent. He had used the bow in the dark against men in the narrow passage. The tight space had been his advantage.
But now, on the castle’s top floor, with plenty of room to move quickly, the dogs would be a tougher target for an arrow. Besides, the dogs were to serve another purpose.
He heard their nails speeding and scratching across the wooden floor, going silent where there was carpet, then flicking swiftly across the hard wood once more. He found his spot. Back along the hall, a door on either side of him leading to a room. Slowly he opened one door, slipped inside, and listened. Outside the room, the dogs grew closer. He heard no sounds in the room. Quickly the green beam from his flashlight swept the room. It was empty.
He opened the door, then stepped back into the hall. The dogs rounded the corner and came for him, sensing him in the darkness. He stamped his foot twice, letting them hear the sound. Their barking grew louder and more urgent as they sped toward him.
Stepping back into the room, he left the door open, stepping to the side, the sword in his hand.
They came through th
e door swiftly, deadly huge animals, crying out for the kill.
Quickly the Black Samurai slammed the door and moved forward to meet them.
Chapter XIX
TALON’S EYES WERE ON the blood, his flashlight picking up the bright redness. He breathed quickly, eyes on the ground, walking fast, cradling the iron pipe across his chest. Suddenly he stopped. “The dogs,” he whispered. “They’ve stopped barking.” His eyes were wide, and he stood still as though listening for a sound that only a man with uncanny hearing could ever hope to hear. “They’ve stopped barking,” he whispered.
He began to run along the hall, his boots coming down hard on the wood. He ran past a staircase and continued along the hallway into darkness. Then he stopped.
Slowly he moved toward the black object on the floor ahead of him, lying at the base of a huge shield and crossed spears hanging on the wall.
A dog’s leg, black, still warm and bleeding.
Bending over it, Talon picked it up, held it in his hands, then raised his head and cried aloud, “Samurai! I’ll kill you, Samurai! I swear it!” The three men behind him looked at him, then stared silently at each other. One man turned and threw up, his hands going to his face, catching the warm yellow vomit.
The Samurai had made them feel fear.
“It brought us a little time,” Sand whispered, “but not much. They’ll know soon they’ve been tricked, and they’ll come for us.”
“Talon. He’s got more than enough reason to kill you,” she said.
The Black Samurai was silent. It took more than reasons to kill a man.
Right now he had to get to that front gate and set off an explosion. There was one hand grenade in his black canvas bag, enough for an explosion, but not enough of a charge to drop that heavy drawbridge. The small bomb he had given to Lisa would have been enough, but the hand grenade was not.
They were downstairs on the first floor, moving in darkness close to the wall, heading toward the great hall in a desperate attempt to get out into the courtyard.
The flashlight beam picked them up, blinding Sand, who crouched and drew his .45. “They’re here!” cried a voice, and he heard the sounds as they rushed him. He fired twice at the blinding white light, hearing a man scream, hearing the echo of the powerful handgun, then feeling blazing pain as a bolt—a small crossbow arrow—ripped across his bare back and smashed against a stone wall His voice carried above the shouting men rushing toward him. “Run, Lisa, run!”
A mace with a steel head came down on his gun hand, knocking the .45 crashing to the stone floor and sending pain up along Sand’s right arm.
A grazing blow on his thigh from a club dropped him to one knee. Scrambling to his feet, he screamed “Kiaaaii!” throwing a powerful side-thrust kick into the ribs of a dark figure near him. The man went backward, arms flailing for balance, his steel-headed club clattering to the floor.
Hands clutched at him.
Samurai! Reaching inside himself for fighting spirit, he fought like the martial-arts warrior he had trained years to become. Samurai! Die fighting! Master Konuma’s face flashed across his mind.
Sand’s hands reached for the head of the nearest man, pulling it down sharply, at the same time raising his right knee high. The man’s nose was smashed against Sand’s knee.
More pain as a chain whipped across his bare chest, digging into his flesh, coming away with pieces of his skin.
His right leg came up hard between the man’s legs, and the man screamed. Sand’s right arm swung behind him in a powerful backfist blow to another man’s temple. Hands encircled his waist from the front, trying to push him back and down to the floor.
Sand lifted his right arm high in the air, then drove his elbow down hard, the bone smashing into the base of the man’s skull. The man went down at Sand’s feet. A club smashed the Black Samurai in his kidneys, the pain shooting to his brain, the breath going from his body.
Stumbling over the man at his feet, Sand went down, mouth open, and greedily gulping air. In pain, in the darkness, the Black Samurai fought on instinct.
Pulling the sword from his belt, he scrambled to his knees in time to see the iron pipe coming down toward his head. Still on his knees, he shoved the short sword just inches over his head, the blade parallel to his forehead.
The pipe crashed down on the sword. In one smooth movement the Black Samurai backhanded the sword across the stomach of the man in front of him, slicing deep into his flesh. The man screamed, dropping to his knees.
Sand was on his feet, crouching in the darkness, feeling the pain in every inch of skin on his back.
He was the only one standing.
“Robert.” Lisa whispered his name.
Bending over to pick up a flashlight, he then moved toward her voice. “I told you to run.” The words came out slow between heavy breaths.
“They’re coming,” she cried. Sand turned toward the sound of footsteps drawing near. He turned the flashlight on the men lying on the stone floor around him. His gun could not be found. Lisa moved toward him, clutching his black canvas bag.
Her face was tense and frightened. Her hand trembled as she reached toward his bruised, bleeding body. Softly he said, “Look.” He turned the flashlight beam down to the floor.
The last man Sand had killed, the man he had sliced across the stomach, was Talon, now lying dead with both hands across his bleeding stomach.
Taking the black canvas bag from her, Sand painfully stumbled across the dark room. Barefoot and trembling, Lisa silently followed him.
The three guards at the front gate paced back and forth, each eyeing the castle. They had stared at the huge, darkened building for forty-five minutes, seeing no one go in or out of it. They waited.
No word from Talon. So they continued to pace, watch, and wait.
They had settled into a routine, relaxing slightly, and walking easily in the cold, dark night Sand moved swiftly.
Stepping from the darkness of the courtyard, he stood directly in front of one guard, who, surprised, could only stare back. The sword caught a dim flicker of flame from the torches high above the courtyard as Sand swiftly brought it up, then across the guard’s throat.
The guard’s hands went to the bleeding slash, and as he fell to his knees, Sand said quietly to the other two, “Lay the pipes down, and don’t cry out. Talon’s dead.”
The men stood motionless, their hands still gripping the pipes. “He died like this man did.” Sand moved toward them. “You can live, or you can die. What you have in your hands won’t save you.”
The men laid the pipes down and backed away. One guard, small, with a salt-and-pepper beard, said, “Forget about going through that gate. The two of us aren’t strong enough to open it. By the time we lower the drawbridge, there’ll be a lot of men out here.”
“Fewer men than you think,” said Sand. “Those gasoline cans over on that truck. Each of you get two, bring them back here.” Reaching into the black canvas bag, he took out the hand grenade, letting them see it. They turned and moved across the courtyard toward the small truck that had brought the virus to the castle earlier today.
After laying the four cans against the gate, they turned to Sand. “Run,” he told them. “Run toward the castle.” He held the grenade tightly in his right hand.
They ran past him across the courtyard.
Sand didn’t just want the gate open. He wanted an explosion.
Turning, he ran after them, then cut to his left, heading for the darkness under the ramp, the darkness he had silently moved through minutes before. Stopping, he turned, pulled the pin, waited for a count of three, then lobbed it at the gate, throwing himself to the ground and covering Lisa Warren’s body.
The explosion made the ground shake. Chunks of wood and metal flew across the courtyard, clanging and clattering across the cobblestones. The noise punched Sand’s ears, deafening him for seconds, and a huge bright-orange flame, wrapped in black smoke, climbed toward the sky.
Now on his
feet, he reached down, grabbed Lisa’s wrist, and dragging her off the ground, ran for the now wide-open gate, the black canvas bag bouncing off his left hip.
She stumbled, and he dragged her back to her feet, the both of them racing toward the open space.
Turning, he picked her up in his arms, then stepped through the smoking, twisted steel and burning wood. Flames singed his shoulders. Far. ahead of him he saw the tiny, bright points of a car’s headlights speeding toward the castle.
Calling on all the strength, and speed he had left, the Black Samurai ran down the side of the empty moat, across it, then up the other side, Lisa clinging to his neck.
He wanted to rest, to lie down, to sleep. But he didn’t.
Clutching the girl, he ran through the darkness toward the twin points of light now growing larger.
The Baron drawled across the Atlantic Ocean, “You ain’t got no kick comin’, son. You done had a day and a night to yourself.”
Sand pressed the telephone closer to his head. “Less,” he said. “Your man woke me up to pick up that metal package you’re so anxious to get your hands on.”
Clarke chuckled. “You done just fine, son, just fine. Treaty’s been signed by our leftist friends. Two hours ago. Don’t know what the hell’s”—The Baron pronounced it “hail”—”gonna come of it. But they signed.
“Which leaves Print Drewcolt in a godawful hole,” he continued. “His company just lost some mines down in Chile, and they’re about to go under, from what my people tell me. Three months at the most, then CCE becomes the latest in modern economic disasters. Ol’ Print ain’t gonna be smilin’. Tell me something, son, how come Print survived the doin’s at the castle?”
Sand was silent. “Wrong place at the right time, I guess.”
“You O.K.? You sound funny.”
“I’ll be fine,” said Sand. “Talk to you soon.”
“Whoa,” said The Baron. “Got something for you. A new mission.”
“It’ll have to wait, I’ve got something to do.”
Clarke was silent. “How long?”
“Not long. I’ll check in.” Without waiting for an answer, he hung up.