When the Regent reached Gabrielle, his eyes widened. The other prisoners had been too intimidated to meet his gaze but Gabrielle stared straight ahead, pinning him with her own.
"Where did we find this one?" the Regent asked.
The captain glanced at his pad and then said, "She led an assault on Work Camp 352."
"An assault? How interesting."
He looked Gabrielle over, deliberating lingering at various places on her muscular body. When at least he raised his gaze to her face again, he looked her in the eyes and said, "So you fancy yourself a fighter, do you?"
Her only reply was to spit in his face.
The Regent recoiled, his face going red with anger.
It was precisely the reaction Gabrielle had been waiting for. This man was the cause of so much pain and oppression that she knew any chance to remove him from the equation would be worth the risk. With the captain's attention on the Regent and the Regent's attention elsewhere, Gabrielle took advantage of the opportunity and attacked.
She lashed out with her hands and feet, striking the exposed points of vulnerability, trying to cripple him enough that she could deliver a fatal blow. She drove a foot into his groin, then followed it with a heel strike to his knee, driving him off balance so that she could surge forward, inside his reach. There she delivered a hard chop to his throat with one hand, smashed his nose with the heel of her other, and then tried to tear out his eyes with her fingers.
By that point the captain and the other guards had recovered from their surprise and had moved in, dragging her off the Regent and holding her between them as other prepared to beat her for daring to assault their leader.
The captain managed to land a single blow to her solar plexus, driving the air from her lungs, before a short, sharp command from the Regent stopped him.
Gabrielle fought to get her diaphragm to take in a breath as the Regent stepped forward, grabbed her by the hair, and raised her face to look at him.
She almost smiled when she saw the crooked bend in his formerly perfect nose and the deep, bloody furrows that ran from above his eyes and down his cheeks to end at his jawline.
She'd marked him for life, she thought.
Except she hadn't.
Even as she looked on the wounds in his face were closing. The bend in his nose straightened on its own. She had no doubt that the pain in his knee and groin was disappearing just as quickly.
"Satisfied?" he asked. "Got that out of your system now?"
Gabrielle refused to respond.
"No matter. Nice to see you've got such sweet energy because you're going to need it."
The Regent, now fully healed, turned to the captain and said, "Put her with the others for now. I'm going to enjoy questioning this one myself later."
With a final grin, he turned and walked out of the room.
30
Gabrielle and the rest of the team were already gone by the time Cade regained consciousness late that evening. Furious that Hale had let them go without him, Cade slipped out of bed, dressed in the clothes he found folded on the chair next to him, and made his way down to the major's command room.
"Good God, man," Hale cried, when Cade stormed into the room. "You shouldn't be out of bed."
"I'm fine," Cade replied and something in his tone must have warned the major off for he didn't object again. "What's the status on the assault?" he asked.
Hale glanced at the watch on his wrist, one of the few working timepieces Cade had seen in the commandery. "They're due back in half an hour."
That wasn't that long to wait, but Cade had a bad feeling. Something had gone wrong without him there; he was certain of it.
He made his way back to the upper levels and, in unconscious mimicry of a few days before, slipped out the main doors and stood in the early light watching for their return.
By the time the first of the assault vehicles pulled into the lot, Cade was almost frantic with worry.
Things didn't get better when he caught sight of all of the casualties being unloaded from the truck. He was searching the faces of the injured when Sergeant Dean appeared out of the darkness.
His expression confirmed Cade's worst fears.
"Reinforcements arrived out of nowhere," Dean said, "almost as if they were waiting for us. I had already left the compound and was bringing my squad back to cover Gabrielle's retreat when we were cut off by a group of armed vehicles. We did what we could to break through, but they were too much for us. After taking heavy casualties, I had no choice but to get my people out of there."
"And Gabrielle?"
Dean shook his head. "I think she was captured, but I'm not positive."
Cade considered that response, then said, "Perhaps, then, there's still time," and ran for the driver's door of the assault vehicle.
"What are you doing?" Dean cried, trying to stop him.
"I'm going after her. What do you think I'm doing?"
"Cade, you can't. That's suicide."
Williams shrugged him off. "Maybe for you."
He opened the door and climbed up into the truck, firing its engine up once more. Those near the rear of the vehicle scrambled to finish unloading it as began to get underway. Dean watched him for a moment and then, at the last second, raced forward and climbed into the rear of the vehicle, pulling the doors shut behind him. Once inside, he made his way forward and took the passenger seat next to Cade.
"If you're going to do something stupid, you'd probably be better off not doing it alone."
Cade couldn't help but laugh. "That's the spirit. Now buckle up, as its going to be a bumpy ride."
"That's the commander's residence right there," Dean said, pointing out the small structure to the right of what he said was the admin building.
He and Cade were perched in the branches of a tree overlooking the camp. With all the activity going on below them, Cade was reminded of a freshly kicked hornet's nest that was buzzing with fury. It was going to be tough, but he thought he could still manage it.
"Okay, if I'm not back in thirty minutes, go back to the base without me."
"Not back," said Dean, startled. "Where the heck are you going?"
"I'm going to have a chat with the camp commander."
Cade knew that he'd been changing since returning to this world. Something about what the Seven had done to the place had activated something deep inside him. He was still learning the extent of what he could and couldn't do, but he was certain of a couple things. One, he was faster than he used to be. Two, he could analyze information in the midst of combat much quicker than he'd ever thought possible. And Three, there was no way he was leaving this place without finding out what had happened to Gabrielle.
He suspected the answer to that question could be found with the camp commander so he intended to have a little chat with the man.
Cade made his way down the ridge line, sticking to the shadows wherever possible. When he reached the fence, he took out his sword and slashed an opening in it, not worried about the noise he made because no one was going to hear it above the din the locals were making. Slipping through the gap he'd made, he watched the guards that were wandering the field between him and his target, mapped out their paths and relative positions in his head, and then made his way swiftly and silently along the path of least resistance, avoiding all of them in the process.
All right, Williams, he thought, so far so good.
He reached the residence and slid around to the side out of the line of sight from the field. Light from a nearby window allow him to see inside, to where a tall, thin white haired individual in a dark uniform was picking at his meal, clearly annoyed with all the commotion going on outside in the rest of the camp.
Without hesitation Cade stepped over to the door, opened it, and strode into the room.
"Uh uh, don't think about it," he said, his sword extended, as the other man dropped his fork and went for the gun at his side.
"Nice and easy. Two fingers only. Put it on t
he table top," Cade told him, pressing the tip of his sword against the man's neck just hard enough to draw a drop of blood.
The commander wasn't entirely a fool; he did what he was told, removing the weapon and then dropping it on the table top within Cade's reach.
Holding his sword with one hand, Cade reached out with the other and slipped the gun into his pocket.
"What do you want? You realize all I need to do is yell and you'll have fifty guards come down on your head?"
Cade put a little more pressure on the tip of his sword, watching as it bit a shade deeper into the commander's neck.
"You realize I could just shove this through your spine, yes?
The commander nodded ever so gently.
"Where are the prisoners?" Cade demanded.
"I don't know what you are talking about."
"You do, and you'll tell me or I'll rip the thoughts right out of your head."
"I told you I don't..."
"Okay, your choice. I don't have time to fuck around."
Cade dropped the sword and stepped forward, grabbing the man's head by the hair and slamming it onto the table top in front of him. Now dazed, the man put up little defense as Cade gagged him with a table napkin and secured his hands behind his back with the sleeves of his own uniform jacket that Cade found nearby. Then Cade stripped off his gloves and put his hands on either side of the commander's face, thumbs pressed down over his eyes. The moment Cade's hands, sans gloves, were touching the commander's face, the man went still, held by the power that Cade was now pouring down the link between them.
Cade meant it; he was going to tear the memory out of the commander's head even if it killed him in the process. Images flashed by on the surface of his mind, all the petty bullshit and vile little acts that the commander got off on in the typical day, replayed a thousand times over of this pressure.
Cade dug deeper.
The commander twisted and jerked beneath his hands. A line of blood was flowing out of both his nostrils, evidence of the mental routing about that Cade was doing. Memories of the events of that evening began playing out on the film screen of his mind and Cade watched them with interest, until he found the one he wanted.
"You sent her to the Regent," he said aloud, but by then the commander was far too damaged to reply.
No matter, Cade thought, he'd gotten when he'd come there for.
He pulled his hands free and studying the man before him. It was clear that what Cade had done had damaged him permanently; he stared off into space without seeing anything.
For just a moment Cade thought about putting him out of his misery. Then decided against it.
Let him suffer, just like he's forced others to suffer.
Replacing his gloves and picking up his sword, Cade slipped out the way he'd come in, with no one the wiser.
He found Dean waiting for him back at the rendezvous point and nearly got a bullet in his head for his troubles when he called out to warn him that he was back.
Dean was behind the wheel in seconds, more than ready to get the hell out of there. They were forced to hide out beneath the trees twice on the way back to base to avoid the Regent's aerial patrols, but thankfully they weren't seen and they managed to return to the commandery without being detected.
Cade knew Gabrielle's well-being depended on the swiftest rescue possible. He was already thinking of how to sneak onto Manhattan and breach the Regent's headquarters as he made his way to Hale's command room, deep in the heart of the commandery. He had no intention of taking no for an answer; he'd do it on his own if necessary.
Still, a squad of Templars at his back certainly wouldn't hurt.
Reaching the fifth level, Cade stalked down the hall and burst into Hale's office without knocking.
Only to be brought up short.
Hale was there, as expected, but he had two visitors with him.
One was a giant of a man in a dark cloak and hood that covered him from head to foot, concealing his face, but Cade was immediately aware of the power flowing off of him,
Next to him, stood a dark-skinned man with a shaven head and beard, dressed in black BDUs and combat boots.
Or rather one boot, as the man's right leg from the knee down was missing and had been replaced with a futuristic looking prosthetic made from carbon fiber and steel.
Cade could only stare, struck dumb with surprise.
The other man chuckled.
"After all this time, you've got nothing to say?" his oldest friend, Matthew Riley, asked.
To Be Continued in Nephilim's Rise
(Coming 2019)
About the Author
Joseph Nassise is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of more than forty novels, including the TEMPLAR CHRONICLES series, the JEREMIAH HUNT trilogy, and the GREAT UNDEAD WAR series.
Joe is a multiple Bram Stoker Award and International Horror Guild Award nominee and served two terms as president of the Horror Writers Association, the world's largest organization of professional horror and dark fantasy writers.
If you want to stay up-to-date on the very latest news, you can follow Joe on Twitter @jnassise, hang out at his Facebook page, or visit his website at josephnassise.com.
For more information
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Darkness Reigns
Copyright 2018 by Joseph Nassise
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.
All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author.
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