THUMP.
His insides erupted, and he felt pain shoot through his whole body. There was no stopping it. The price for wielding the Scarlet Sword took hold of his being, and he felt his heart bursting. His end had come for him now that he lost his weapon.
As he dropped to his knees, dying, he watched the enemy who had acquired the sword. He saw how he now moved so much faster than before. He saw how he swatted the Templar Knights away with little effort. All of that strength had been transferred to a man that he should have struck down. It was horrible to see his weapon be wielded by the enemy, especially when it gave him so much power to use against his fellow Templars. The same armored knights that had cheered William on and stared at the blade with so much envy were now looking at it in horror as it sliced through them. Their steel plated armor couldn't stop the Scarlet Sword from tearing through their flesh. They might as well have been wearing blades of grass, or have been naked entirely.
The man who swung the Scarlet Sword couldn't be stopped. It was just like when William had held it. He became a god in the middle of an army of men. But, just like with William, one slip up could cost him all of that power. Hopefully, the curse that came when losing the blade would come to his enemy someday as well.
Darkness came for William, and the knight stared at the sword in his opponent's grasp. It was the last thing he ever saw as he succumbed to the price for losing the blade. That sword had become his lifeline, and without it...death was an absolute certainty.
Despite all of his small victories in the fight, his blood was added to the sand.
1
CHAPTER ONE – THE NEXT STEPS ON BOTH SIDES
David Purdue was glad to have his feet on solid ground again. Between searching for a hidden hoard of treasure and finding a mystical pearl at the very bottom of the ocean, he had spent far too much time at sea lately. He liked that he wasn't swaying back and forth, worrying about drowning down in the ocean depths where no one would ever find his body. He would be happy to not see that salty brine for years to come. He'd had more than enough of it for now.
Luckily, those long sea voyages hadn't been in vain. He was able to recuperate some of his funds and even find a new artifact that he could use as a weapon against his enemies. This recuperation, though, had been a trial all on its own, facing modern day pirates that wanted him dead. He had finally gotten rid of the Wharf Man. That crime boss had turned out to be a very persistent threat, but he wouldn't be bothering him anymore. That monster would rot at the bottom of the sea where he belonged.
Now, with his feet firmly planted on the earth, Purdue could figure out how to defeat his real enemies—the Order of the Black Sun. That secret society took everything from him: his fortune, his collection of priceless artifacts, his home, and even his closest friends and allies. He had only recently started being able to prepare to take them on again, but he was still severely outnumbered and outgunned. He had made progress, but it would take even more to really stand any sort of chance of recovering his relics and saving his allies from captivity. It would probably be impossible for one man to do it alone.
All he really had as an advantage was that the Black Sun's leader, Julian Corvus, thought he was dead. That meant that the order wasn't looking for him, and they wouldn't be expecting an attack from a dead man. As long as he kept his head down, he still had a trump card he could use in this coming war. He still was the one who would launch the first shots. He just had to stay dead a little longer, until the time was right to reveal his survival.
Until then, he just head to keep his head down, continue to prepare, and keep playing dead.
The footsteps came pattering down the steps, and a shadow moved quickly behind them.
“Did you know?” The visitor snapped the moment he came up to the cell bars.
“Did I know what?”
Julian Corvus examined Dr. Nina Gould with those shards of ice in his eye sockets. He tried to read her very thoughts, but she had nothing of value to give him, especially since she had no idea what he was even talking about. He kept looking at her through the bars of the cell like he was expecting her face to tell a different story than her words.
Nina had been the Order of the Black Sun's prisoner for quite some time now, and she hadn't seen Julian Corvus looking so rattled before. He was usually so dominant and in control of every encounter they had. After all, he was the leader of the Black Sun, and they were deep in the bowels of their hidden base. What did he have to fear in his own home, where he was king?
He stared at her for a few more moments before stepping back from the cell.
“It doesn't matter,” he sneered, relenting and stepping away from the cell. “Things are already being put into motion to fix this. If I were you, I wouldn't expect him to come save you. We won't give him the chance. I can promise you that.”
She tried to process what Julian was saying, but her mind was racing with wild thoughts. Someone was coming for her?
Sam? Was Sam Cleave still out there trying to get her out of this? He could be, but she had been under the impression that the Black Sun had gotten rid of him. If he had survived, then maybe he was but...it didn't feel right. Sam being around wouldn't upset Julian that much. He would deal with it with the same vicious precision that he handled most of the problems that got in his secret society's way.
No.
There was only one person that could drive Julian Corvus that crazy.
“Purdue!?”
The name left her mouth through a gasp. It couldn't be true. She had watched that house fill with fire and crumble with Purdue still inside. He'd been bound to a chair, and there was no way he could have gotten out in time. The flames had already consumed so much of the house when she had been taken away by the Black Sun. He couldn't be alive...he couldn't.
She was trembling from so many emotions mixing through her at once.
“Is he—is Purdue alive!?”
Julian looked back at her and seemed to finally accept that she wasn't lying. Her confusion was real, alright. He saw that she was just as startled by all of this as he was.
The anger festering on his face contorted into a cruel, little smirk.
“Not for long.”
With that simple answer, Julian stormed out of the corridor, leaving Nina alone to her many, scattered thoughts.
Purdue really was alive.
She had no idea how he'd done it, but that crazy man actually escaped death yet again. All this time she had spent as the Black Sun's captive, wallowing in her grief and despair, while Purdue was out there somewhere, still fighting. He must have been keeping really quiet to have slipped under the Black Sun's radar for so long. And what Julian said about him coming for her...was he really?
The Order of the Black Sun hadn't won after all.
Purdue sure was stubborn—and for the first time since knowing him, she loved him for it.
Elijah Dane had been the curator for the Order of the Black Sun for quite some time, but he wasn't used to having to sprawl all of the artifacts he protected out on display. So many weapons from wars long ago lay side by side; from all kinds of cultures and from many different centuries. The history of bloodshed was being showcased. Spears that dated back to the days of Alexander the Great, swords used by the kings of Wessex and Northumbria, and even bayonets used on the bloody fields of Gettysburg.
Julian Corvus stood close by, keeping watch as their visitor examined the relics that were just pulled from their secure storage in the deep vaults. It had taken Julian some effort to convince Elijah to take out all of these items from where they were kept. They were also so meticulously stored for both security and for preservation purposes of the items themselves that it had taken Elijah hours to have them all removed from the large pit in the floor where they were organized and stored.
Even now, Elijah looked at Julian like all of this was against everything they stood for because to him, it was. While Elijah thought that the relics their secret society collected should
be handled gently and with care, Julian was much more open to using them for other purposes. After all, many ancient artifacts contained old world powers that almost bordered on the supernatural. Julian himself had been revived by the legendary Spear of Destiny some time ago. Many of the weapons sprawled out in front of them had abilities that could turn a normal man into something extraordinary. It all just depended on the weapon, and if the wielder was capable of using it properly.
A muscular bald man stood beside them. A jet black tattoo of a cross was etched into the back of his skull. He looked over all of the old relics displayed in front of him like he was shopping for groceries. He would occasionally pick one, give it a quick inspection, and then drop it back down on the table. He discarded them more flippantly than Elijah would have liked, but he didn't speak out about it. He knew better than to oppose that particular man.
Victor Moore was one of the Order of the Black Sun's most dangerous enforcers. He had been part of the once maligned subgroup of the order, the Eclipsed, serving under Julian before he had ascended to become the leader of the whole society. They shared a history of violence and sadism, and most members of the Black Sun knew not to get on the bad side of either of them.
Victor was infamous among his peers for his brutality and his habit of creating a lot of property damage. He was a brute; a tank, but an effective one at getting the job done. It didn't matter that he always left a large mess in his wake. That was part of the job, he would tell any of his critics. They could tiptoe around, but it was far more efficient to just sprint ahead and knock over anything that got in the way.
If Julian had to pick anyone to deal with David Purdue's miraculous survival, then Victor Moore was a great choice. He was all about finishing jobs quickly, even if it meant dropping countless bodies to the floor in the process. Purdue wouldn't stand a chance against a monster like him.
The brute picked up a long, slender spear and held it tightly in his hands, looking up at the blade on its tip. Elijah, as he had been doing with most of the weapons that Victor showed interest in, provided commentary on their history and what other advantages they might have.
“That spear was said to be used during the Battle of Marathon. When the Greeks were able to repel--”
The shaft of the spear snapped in half in Victor's hands. Elijah's face grew pale, but his eyes filled with anger. He looked like he was about to fall over and convulse, but Julian put a hand on his shoulder to calm him.
“It was just a spear,” Julian muttered under his breath. “Not your first born child.”
“It wasn't just a spear,” Elijah mumbled between gasps. “That was a priceless piece of history that we can't just mend. The power it had inside of it is now gone--”
“Relax, Elijah,” Julian said, glancing at Victor. Victor didn't even seem to notice that anyone was upset. He just went on rummaging through the stockpile of old weaponry. Julian continued, still keeping his voice down. “There are plenty of choices here, and we have plenty to spare. What's the harm in cracking an egg or two?”
Elijah readjusted his glasses, which had almost fallen off of his nose during his panic. He still couldn't believe his leader's disregard for the value of these weapons. They weren't simple tools, and they most certainly weren't anything like eggs. All of these had taken so much effort to collect, and he would argue just as much effort to log and keep secure in the deep vault. To see something that was worth more than entire cities be broken and disposed of so carelessly...it made him sick to his stomach. He wanted to just remove his glasses, since his terrible, natural vision would make it much harder for him to have to watch the damage that was being done.
He should have never agreed to let these weapons be used by any of the Black Sun's enforcers. They weren't meant for combat anymore. Sure, many of them still could be used, if needed, but the risk of losing them or—in Victor's case—breaking them apart made them too high of a risk to use. He would have much preferred if Victor was given something like a rocket launcher rather than an antiquity that has lasted millennia.
Some of the items he had brought out were more recent additions that had been acquired from when they raided billionaire David Purdue's private collection. He had to admit, some of the things Purdue had traveled all over the world to collect were far more impressive than anything the Order of the Black Sun had ever managed to recover. Sure, they had a lot of great items, but his were often another caliber entirely.
Elijah saw one of those items that had been Purdue's—the legendary sword Excalibur—and silently prayed that Victor wouldn't select that to be his weapon. It was one thing to break an old spear from a famous battle. It was another thing entirely to damage a weapon that was so revered that most people didn't even think it was real. Excalibur was far too good of a weapon for a man like that. Elijah would prefer to toss it back into the lake that King Arthur found it in rather than hand it over to someone who had no respect for its importance.
Victor ran his hand over a few different bladed weapons. One of them was one of the daggers that had been used to murder Julius Caesar on the Ides of March. Another was an Ancient Egyptian khopesh dating all the way back to the Bronze Age. Then he moved on to one of the Ulfberht swords from the Viking raids of Europe a millennia ago. From there, he seemed interested in an old Roman gladius that Elijah knew had unique powers of its own. That sword could raise an army of undead Roman soldiers from the earth when it was plunged into the ground. It was a terrifying weapon for anyone to use, let alone a renowned butcher like Victor Moore.
But the more of the blades that he touched, the more fidgety Elijah became. He couldn't stand the sight of someone like him running his big, greasy fingers all over the remnants of history. It was a disgusting sight to behold.
He passed by so many incredible weapons without giving a second look. His disregard for their majesty infuriated Elijah, but he was also relieved. Maybe there was a chance that Victor wouldn't choose any of them, and Elijah could put them all back where they belonged in the bowels of the deep vault, safe and sound.
Unfortunately for Elijah's anxiety, there was one weapon on the table that seemed to particularly catch Victor's attention. He looked down at a short sword that had a hilt wrapped in red cloth. A gem rested in its pommel. A strangely long pair of pliers lay beside the sword. Victor reached out for the weapon, but Elijah quickly spoke up. “I wouldn't touch that one! Not without the pliers!”
Victor ignored him and brushed off his warnings like he didn't even hear them. He picked up the short sword and twirled it around a couple of rotations in his hand. He then swung it about and listened to it sing as it sliced through the air.
Victor's mouth opened into an excited smile. Elijah gave a worried glance to Julian who just shrugged and motioned for him to relax.
“You like that one?” Julian asked Victor as the enforcer continued to look over the sword in his hand. “The Scarlet Sword. That's what it's been called. Ah yes, I helped pick that one up back when I was still running errands for the order. Found it in France, I believe. It was a sword forged by the Knights Templar and used to great effect during the crusades. According to some of the old texts we unearthed, the wielder of that blade is blessed with the strength and speed of ten men. Makes someone into quite the capable warrior. In the hands of someone who is already skilled at killing like yourself...you'll be unstoppable.”
Elijah interrupted, looking very worried. “There is a catch, though. If the one who wields it loses possession of the sword, they die. It's a bit more of a curse than a blessing if you ask me.”
“He's right,” Julian said, looking a little annoyed that Elijah brought up that point. “We had to be careful when we acquired it. We eventually had to use tools to carry it...kept our hands far away. Had to make sure none of us were considered the sole owner. Lost two men that way before we knew better.”
Victor seemed to consider what he heard but didn't seem to mind. He gave the sword a few more excited swipes. He could probably feel the
blessings of that sword coursing through his body now. Hopefully, he wouldn't have to feel the curse as well.
“Try not to lose it,” Julian said.
Elijah continued to elaborate. “You can have the Scarlet Sword in a sheath at your side or even on your back. Just don't be away from it for too long, and especially don't let it fall into someone else's hands. The moment another person has it...that's when the full brunt of the curse will fall upon you...and you'll die.”
Victor snorted. “I won't lose it.”
“Good,” Julian said, patting the large man on the back. “Fantastic. What is your objective then, Mr. Moore? You do remember it, I hope.”
Victor stood up and made his posture bend as straight as he could, towering over them. “I need to find David Purdue, and I need to kill him. As quickly as possible. Whatever it takes.”
“Yes,” Julian cooed. “That is exactly right. Get it done and over with, understood? By any means necessary. Use whatever is at your disposal. Do try and refrain from civilian casualties, but if they are necessary, then they will be allowed. Am I clear on that?”
“Yes,” Victor said sternly. “I won't fail you, Julian.”
“I know you won't. You never have before. Bring me his head. I need to see his lifeless face this time...just to be certain.”
Victor nodded and started walking out of the room to prepare for his mission. Julian glanced at the shining sword in his hand and imagined it was stained with David Purdue's blood. Soon enough, his greatest foe would be dead—for real this time, and Julian could move forward with his plans.
“Do you think it's wise...giving him the Scarlet Sword of all things?”
“According to our latest recruit, Mr. Oniel,Purdue has found a relic that can control the sea, and he still has that Book of Shadows that he picked up from Salem. Those are two powerful relics to have at his disposal, wouldn't you agree?” Elijah nodded and Julian continued to make his point. “He's well-armed, trying to make up for all of the damage we did to him. If we're going to kill him as soon as we can, we needed to make sure we're armed for the job.”
Order of the Black Sun Box Set 10 Page 19
