Order of the Black Sun Box Set 10

by Preston William Child

  His assailant simply said, “I am Victor.”

  “How the hell did you find me?” Purdue settled on.

  Victor smirked. “The Order of the Black Sun has eyes everywhere. Once they knew you still walked the earth, it was not hard to find you.”

  “Eyes everywhere, eh?” Purdue thought about any prying eyes that could have been watching him lately. He considered anything out of the ordinary that could have lead them to him, and only one recent event struck him. One single name stood out. “Kendra.”

  “Kendra,” Victor said smugly.

  “She is one of yours, then?” Purdue had trouble hiding his disappointment, which was kind of humiliating. “She is one of the fine employees of the esteemed Order of the Black Sun?”

  “She is.”

  “I suppose I won't be getting that drink with her anytime soon...and here I thought she and I had a genuine connection.”

  “No need to cancel your date,” Victor stepped closer. “You wouldn't have been able to make it anyway.”

  Victor lunged forward suddenly, and Purdue just barely managed to roll away from the tip of the sword. He avoided another swipe but knew he couldn't keep it up much longer. Victor was remarkably quick for someone of his size, and his strength was still startling.

  The few people that had been inside were running out of the store, screaming for help out in the street. The old man who owned the place shuffled out as quickly as he could with his dog beside him. Hopefully some sort of police would come, but they probably wouldn't get there soon enough. Purdue doubted he could survive that long against a man like this.

  Purdue picked up a thick dictionary that was on the shelf beside him and used it as a shield when Victor lunged forward. The blade punctured right through the many pages of the dictionary, but it had been effective enough in blocking that attack. Purdue picked up a much larger atlas and swung it at Victor, trying to hit him, but Victor swatted it away with ease. Purdue retreated, tossing book after book at his attacker. Unfortunately, all they really did was agitate him and make him even more aggressive. Purdue would have to apologize to the owner if he survived this. He might even have to offer to organize the place for him properly.

  Victor charged him through the aisle, and Purdue doubted he'd ever get the chance to make up for the damage he'd done to the place.

  A voice rang out. “Victor!”

  Purdue recognized the voice and turned to find Sasha standing in the doorway with a gun raised. She wasn't exactly the police, but Purdue was grateful for the assistance nonetheless. She aimed the weapon straight at the murderous swordsman and Victor frowned.

  “Sasha...what exactly do you think you are doing? Corvus gave me this assignment personally. This is my kill. You have no right to interfere.”

  “I have more right than you know,” Sasha replied, looking over at Purdue with some concern. She wasn't wrong exactly. She was the only reason Purdue was still alive, but he was sure the Black Sun didn't know about that. If anyone was going to get to kill him, it should be the woman who stopped his death before. In a weird way, his life was owed to her. Thankfully, she didn't seem like she wanted to collect. “Step away from him, Victor.”

  Victor didn't move an inch. He just stared at Sasha, looking like he was struggling to figure out what she was doing. Unlike Purdue's survival, Sasha's betrayal must have still been secret to the Order of the Black Sun. Sasha' gaze drifted to the sword in Victor's hand.

  “Is that...? Do you know what that is?”

  “I do,” Victor said calmly. “Julian told me all about it when I got it from the deep vault.”

  “Everything about it?” Sasha asked, gritting her teeth. “Like what it will do to you?”

  “Yes. He did.” Victor gave the small sword a spin in his large hand. “And it is worth the risk. This strength is incredible. I don't know what you think you are doing, Sasha, but maybe...maybe I should show you the power of this sword.”

  With his unnatural agility, Victor dashed at Sasha. She fired her weapon a few times defensively, but Victor avoided most of the shots and deflected the last one with his blade. It was unbelievable to see a person do that, but Victor had made his way through the gunfire and was in front of Sasha in seconds.

  Purdue was already pursuing him, though and tackled him before he could reach Sasha. The two men crashed through the store window, rolling out into the pavement of the streets. The sword bounced out of Victor's hand, lying in the broken glass beside Purdue.

  Purdue reached for the weapon, glad that he'd managed to at least disarm his opponent. That at least evened the playing field a little. Now if that man wanted to kill him, he'd have to do it with his bare hands. It would be a lot harder to stab him then.

  Purdue picked up the broadsword. The moment his fingers took hold of the hilt, he felt something pass through him. The injuries and fatigue he had just been feeling evaporated, and he got something akin to a second wind. Energy pumped through his whole body like he'd just been injected with adrenaline.

  Victor lumbered to his feet, looking dazed before turning his attention to his lost sword with wide, uncertain eyes. His expression quickly turned into panic. He was a few feet away and reached out toward Purdue desperately. He let out a loud, guttural groan and grabbed at his chest. He was gasping for air, his face twitching. The enormous man collapsed to his knees, and he looked at Purdue and the sword pleadingly, reaching out with a trembling arm. He let out a pained yell before collapsing on his stomach with the force of a falling tree trunk. He became silent and still, a large heap of flesh on the street. His eyes were still bulging wide open, and his mouth looked like it was trying to release more screams. Out of nowhere, the man who had been so formidable, had dropped dead.

  It looked like a heart attack was the cause.

  Maybe being that absurdly fast and strong was too much for his heart to take. Or maybe divine intervention had played a part. Whatever the case, he was relieved that this sudden assassination attempt hadn't been successful.

  Panicked onlookers on the street stared at him and the fresh corpse, looking at the sword in his hand in fear. This attack might have caught him by surprise, but at least he knew where it came from. To these people, all of this had just been some random act of violence, and now they had seen a man die as a result.

  Purdue held up his free hand and the sword, trying to show them that it was over. He was about to toss the blade aside when Sasha came running out of the store screaming.

  “Don't you dare let go of that blade, you moron!”

  Purdue looked over to her with some confusion and then looked at the sword in his hand. Finally, his gaze fell to the body at his feet.

  “Do you mind telling me just what the hell is going on?” Purdue shouted as she approached. He didn't care if all of the public could hear their conversation; he needed answers, and he needed them now. His quiet afternoon had turned into a fight for his life, and the Order of the Black Sun apparently knew he was alive. “What happened to him?”

  Sasha came close, panting from having to rush to him. “The same thing that will happen to you if you're not careful with that sword. It's not normal.”

  “Well, obviously,” Purdue said, having felt different from the moment he touched it. He felt like he could run ten miles with ease. The sword must have been the cause for Victor's strength and agility too. That made sense.

  Police sirens were ringing nearby and getting closer. There were mutters and gasps from the spectators, who looked very happy to hear the encroaching sirens.

  Sasha crouched beside the dead man and started rummaging around the inside of his jacket.

  “Looting dead bodies?” Purdue asked.

  She ignored Purdue's snarky comment, yanked hard, and pulled out a leather sheath that had been attached to the inside of Victor's coat. She handed it to Purdue, who noticed it was the perfect size for the short sword in his hand. “Put it in there. We can't have you stabbing anyone by accident.”

  The sirens wer
e down the street now.

  “We need to move. Now.”

  Purdue and Sasha pushed through the nervous little audience that had gathered. There was one familiar face at the back of the pack that Purdue recognized immediately. It was Kendra, looking shocked by what she was seeing. This obviously hadn't turned out the way she expected. Purdue would have thrown her phone number back in her face, but he was too concerned about keeping hold of the sword in his hand.

  “You can forget about that drink!” Purdue called as they pushed through the crowd and made for an alleyway. Sasha glanced at him like there was some big piece of the puzzle that she was missing. He ignored her. He didn't feel like explaining his unfortunate lack of a dating life.

  Purdue could hear the police coming to a screeching halt where they would find the man who dropped dead from a heart attack.

  “Who was that guy back there?” Purdue asked as they hurried through the alleyways. He cradled the sheathed weapon under his arm, hugging it securely. He remembered what Sasha had warned, and he saw its apparent effects firsthand. He didn't feel like losing it and dying of a heart attack.

  “Victor Moore,” Sasha said as she moved briskly beside him. “He used to part of the Eclipsed.”

  That said a lot, Purdue thought. The Eclipsed used to be the Order of the Black Sun's top secret sect of sadistic murderers. The worst of the worst. It was where Julian Corvus started rising through the secret society, having led the pack of mad dogs. Ironically enough, Sasha had been one of them too before she started secretly helping Purdue survive.

  “Now he's one of the order's top enforcers. Julian uses him to squash any sort of resistance. He's the perfect hammer to use when he wants something to be broken.”

  “He was,” Purdue corrected with a little bit of pride, needing to find a sliver of humor in all of this chaos.

  After a few more minutes of running, they hid out underneath an overpass. The sirens had long since faded into the distance, and it seemed like they were far away from any sort of danger now. Rain had started falling, and Sasha pulled up the hood of her jacket, looking out at the roads as the water poured down on them. It provided a nice sense of cover, like nature itself was keeping people away.

  Purdue looked over the sword in his hand. It was a beautiful piece of craftsmanship, and the jewel in its pommel was probably worth quite a bit of money. Wherever this strange sword came from, it had been made by a capable, long dead, blacksmith.

  “What exactly is this?” Purdue asked.

  “The Scarlet Sword. It was forged by the Knights Templar centuries ago, as a weapon to use against all of their many enemies during the crusades. They had it blessed by hundreds of priests at once, and that blessing gave the sword properties that helped its wielder.”

  “Like the strength and speed,” Purdue surmised.

  “Exactly,” Sasha said, “but as time went on, and more warriors used the sword, they realized that this blessing came with a terrible price. That the one who used the sword would be granted power, but if they lost it, their life was forfeited. They would die within minutes. The Scarlet Sword is blessed—but more importantly it is cursed. Julian must have really wanted you dead to loan it to Victor.”

  “How does he even know I'm alive!?”

  “That's what I came to warn you about,” Sasha said.

  A little too late, Purdue thought, but kept that to himself.

  “A man came looking for the Order of the Black Sun. He wanted to speak with us about you...and he found us. He told Julian everything about what you've been doing lately. Your journeys with the Wharf Man...”

  “Who? Who the hell knows about that?”

  “He was Jamaican. A mute man. His tongue was cut out.”

  Purdue had his answer immediately—Oniel. He'd survived after that fight with the submarine. Not only that, he'd gone out of his way to find Purdue's enemies and give them information. He should have made sure he drowned just like the Wharf Man. Now a man who couldn't speak had told the Order of the Black Sun everything they needed to know.

  Purdue wanted to kick himself in the ass for letting that happen. He'd been so careful about keeping a low profile. One slip up, letting one enemy live, and now his plans were falling apart around him.

  “Damn it,” Purdue said bitterly.

  “We can't worry about that right now,” Sasha said. “We need to worry about that sword.”

  “So because I took it from...Victor, right...because I took it from him, he died moments later. The curse and all that...”

  “Yes,” Sasha said. “You can't lose that sword, or the same thing will happen to you.”

  “So I'm just supposed to hold onto this thing for the rest of my life, eh?” Purdue groaned. “That's your solution? No offense, but that's really not much of one at all!”

  “Well if you want to live, you have very few options. Two, actually. One is that you never, ever lose that blade. That you keep it with you at all times and make sure no one takes it. The moment they do, you're a dead man.”

  Purdue waited a minute for her to go into the other option, but she didn't. He prompted her anyway. “And...?”

  “And what?”

  “What is the other option?”

  Sasha hesitated. She looked like she regretted ever even mentioning an alternative. Purdue couldn't believe there was something worse than having your life be entirely reliant on how good you were at not losing an old knight's sword.

  Finally, Sasha elaborated. “We bring the Scarlet Sword back to where the Order of the Black Sun found it to begin with—to its resting place. Once we return it, the curse is lifted until someone else takes it from its resting place, but you will be free of it once you put it back.”

  “That sounds easy enough...but nothing really is, aye?”

  “You're right about that. It's not an easy journey at all, and the chances of you even making it there before that cursed sword of yours kills you are slim at best. You're bound to lose it along the way. There's also the whole matter of Julian sending his hit squads after you. If you think he's going to just stop at Victor, then you're wrong. He'll keep throwing assassins at you until you're dead. You'll have to avoid that as well.”

  “Obviously,” Purdue said. “But you mean they'll keep throwing them at us. Not just at me.”

  “No,” Sasha said with a firm tilt of her head. “I said exactly what I meant.”

  Purdue couldn't believe it. She showed up out of the blue to try and help him fight off an assassin but now was going to leave again? “You're up and ditching me again, aye? You show up for five minutes just to tell me I'm cursed by some sword and then tuck tail and run?”

  “I'm not tucking tail,” Sasha said defensively. “And you forgot about the part where I helped save your life.”

  “Sure, let's say you did,” Purdue balked. “I had it handled but for the sake of argument, let's just say you did. So now you're going to leave, putting me completely at risk of being found and put down by your Black Sun friends again...”

  Sasha folded her arms uncertainly. “I need to see if me and the Black Sun really are still friends. Hopefully, word didn't get out of my involvement. And if I'm still welcomed in their circle, I could find information to help you again. Locations of operatives and all kinds of inside information that will make your journey a hell of a lot easier.”

  Purdue still wasn't happy. “Sounds like a lot of excuses to me.”

  “My membership with the Order of the Black Sun is the only reason you didn't burn to death in your head, remember? It's the only reason I knew that they found out about you and came to help. Like it or not, it's proven to be kind of essential to the cause.”

  “What cause!?” Purdue asked, raising his voice. “Killing Julian? You pulled me out of that fire and told me to stay dead. That I might be the only chance to kill Julian. What kind of shit is that? Why not just kill him yourself if you hate him so much?”

  “I do hate him...” Sasha said. “But me killing Julian would p
ut me in a very bad spot with the rest of the order. If I'm going to steer them in the right direction, I can't start by murdering their leader, can I? Taking a throne by force usually doesn't end well for usurpers, and that is exactly what I would be.”

  “It worked fine for Julian...” Purdue grumbled, thinking about how Julian butchered the old council of elders in the secret society. He'd taken charge of the Black Sun after getting rid of them, and besides Sasha, didn't seem to have been met with much resistance.

  “That wasn't an ordinary situation.”

  “But you want to lead the Black Sun, right?” Purdue asked. “That's what you're after? That's why you really want Julian gone. You hate him, of course, but even more than that...he's in your way.”

  Sasha sighed. “I do, but it's not about being on top of the order. With all of our resources and our amassed knowledge, we could really make a difference in the world. I've seen how dirty the order is. I've had my fair share of that shit all over my hands. But we could change things for the better if we really tried. Unfortunately, our leaders don't ever really want that. They never have. Julian acted like he was going to be different. He's not. He's more of the same but even worse than before. And his time as leader has barely even started. He's only going to get worse. Trust me.”

  “And how do you know that?” Purdue asked, but he had seen Julian's cruelty for himself.

  “Because I know him,” Sasha said grimly. “I was part of the Eclipsed, remember? I've worked with Julian for a long time. I know exactly what he is, and it's worse than you know. Worse than you can probably even imagine.”

  “I don't know...” Purdue said. “When it comes to everything I've seen him do, my imagination when it comes to Julian Corvus is pretty expansive.”

  “That's a good frame of mind to be in when it comes to him,” Sasha said. “I will leave in the morning, after we find a safe spot to recuperate.”

  Purdue wasn't looking forward to having to spend a night with a trained killer like Sasha, but he'd rather that than be completely alone with a cursed sword and more assassins possibly on his trail.