by Dante King
Immortal Swordslinger (Book 1)
Dante King
Copyright © 2018 by Dante King
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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Contents
1. Himalayan Temple
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
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1
Himalayan Temple
I turned away from the helicopter’s window, and the man sitting uncomfortably close to me stared back with piggy eyes screwed up behind a pair of thick-framed glasses.
“You look foreign,” he said in Russian, shouting to be heard over the aircraft’s engines. His tone made clear how little he thought of foreigners. I wasn’t surprised. Half were probably hardline nationalists, trusted by the Russian government to do exactly as they were told. The rest…
Well, that was how I’d infiltrated this mission. A group of insurgents had caught word of a special government project, and the bigs at Running Blade Security were more than happy to assist. Too bad it meant sharing a ride with the buffoon sitting next to me.
“My father was Chinese,” I replied in Russian with a hint of an eastern accent that made it sound like I was trying to hide a rural upbringing. What I’d said was entirely true, and it was the only half of my background the man needed to know. That my mother was from north London wouldn’t exactly fit with my cover story.
“I like the Chinese,” the man said. “They’re industrious. Like ants.”
“I always wanted to be compared to an insect,” I replied with a cool smile. “Got any more compliments for the journey?”
The man opened his mouth, then hesitated as he caught the edge in my voice. He looked me up and down, clearly recognizing all six feet and one inch of my athletically muscled body beneath layers of warm clothing. That look was all it took for him to shut his mouth and stare out the window for what I hoped would be the rest of the trip.
I peered through the window on my side of the helicopter and saw the Himalayas standing like proud and ancient giants, their gray shoulders draped in deep drifts of snow, their feet planted in the Asian earth thousands of feet below. It was a breathtaking sight: craggy peaks dark against a perfect blue sky with rivers and trails winding between them in the valleys far below. I’d never seen anything so awe-inspiring.
Talbot, my superior at Running Blade Security, had sent me on this mission because he thought it wouldn’t amount to anything—the Russian insurgents were a paranoid bunch with lofty goals and grand imaginations, he said. The briefing had listed government-supported scientists experimenting with ancient magic. Talbot had himself a right chuckle at that. Me? I didn’t care whether I’d actually discover any classified government secrets, let alone magic. I was just happy to get out of the office and venture onto the field for a solo mission.
“Don’t forget to wear something warm, Ethan Murphy,” Talbot had said the last time I called HQ, his tone full of mockery. He loved using my full name whenever we spoke, as though I was ashamed of it for some reason. It was my name, so I didn’t really give a damn when he used it. Still, I’d hung up immediately after rather than listen to my superior laughing at his own supposed joke. Life was too short to be wasted on some people.
I dozed with the memory on my mind before the soft thud of the helicopter jolting woke me up. Outside the window, a mountain’s face stood very close by, and I realized that we’d landed.
Nearby, huts clustered around several openings in the mountainside. Behind them, on the side of the mountain, stood a temple. Its style was ancient, from the tiled pagoda roof down to the dragon statues out front, yet it looked like it was newly built. Though snow lay all around it, there was none on the temple itself. It was as if it had appeared suddenly, out of nowhere, all pristine and glistening. Except that was impossible, so I supposed that its owner possessed a sizable team of groundskeepers to keep it free of snow and in immaculate condition. There was probably a religious reason for maintaining the temple, but I didn’t give it a second thought—my mission involved the team of scientists inside a facility within the mountain, not the temple.
The helicopter’s doors opened, and a pair of soldiers approached. They each sported rifles and wore snow terrain fatigues. Neither said anything as they almost forcefully ushered me and the other passenger across a concrete landing pad and into the mouth of a tunnel in the mountainside. A steel door slammed shut behind us, then another, as we were led deeper into the facility.
We crossed bare concrete hallways illuminated by overhead lights, pausing every so often at an armed door that the soldiers would open via retina scanners. I noted the number of doors and kept track of the path back to the landing pad in case I ever needed to make a quick exit. The retina scanners might prove troublesome, but it looked like they were only necessary to enter deeper into the facility, not to backtrack out of it.
At last, we reached a room warm enough to remove our coats. Several men in suits stood there waiting.
“Vasily Leontev?” one of them called out.
“That’s me,” I said as I wriggled out of my coat.
“Come with me,”he said.
I followed him down a corridor, relieved to leave my traveling companion behind. As we walked, I paid careful attention to the details of the facility—how it was constructed, signs labeling facilities such as a chemical lab and medical bay, and the way the security detail were armed. I wanted my first solo mission to make a good impression, and that meant noting everything.
“I’m you’re supervisor, Director Chugayev.” My guide turned to look at me as we strode down a tunnel. “I have to say, you’re not what I expected from an expert in philosophy and anthropology.”
“Let me guess,” I said. “You pictured an old guy in a gray suit, with patches on the elbows and maybe a bow tie?”
Chugayev laughed. “Yes, I suppose I was.”
I laughed too. I’d chosen the jeans and hoody outfit on purpose. Though I really did have two top degrees—political science and philosophy, both earned by the time I was 18—it was hard for people to believe that a 24-year-old was some kind of academic expert. Dressing like the old guard would have made me look like a fake. Instead, I’d modeled my cover on youthful entrepreneurs and tech geniuses, the kind of guys who bucked the rules of how important people should dress and behave. That was a cover story I could live up to.
“Have they briefed you on your role here?” Chugayev asked.
“Not at all,” I replied. The less I said myself, the more I could learn from him.
“Argh, those idiots at the ministry!” He shook a skinny fist in the air. “Can’t they ever do their jobs?”
“Bureaucrats, huh? What are you going to do?”
“I’m not going to deliver their stupid induction briefing, that’s for sure.” Chugayev sighed. “It’s all out of date now anyway. Better to just s
how you the site.”
“The site?”
He grinned. “You’ll see.”
At the end of the corridor, Chugayev entered a numerical code to open a security door. We emerged onto the mountainside, but higher up, close to the temple. I pulled my coat back on, but as we reached the doors of the temple, I realized that I didn’t need it. The place had the gentle warmth of a spring morning, not the icy chill of the world around it.
We walked through the temple’s main gate, across a courtyard, and through a pair of double doors. Inside was a chamber of ancient-looking stone. Symbols were carved into the walls, and ethereal green lights glowed at the heart of some of the carvings. Around the room, men and women were examining the symbols, scanning them with high-tech gadgets and making notes on computer tablets. Two were arguing fiercely about what a certain symbol meant. On a pedestal in the center of the room stood an orb carved with intricate markings similar to those on the walls, the same eerie green light emerging from around the edges.
“What is this?” I asked, staring in amazement.
“You’ll see.” Chugayev grinned even more broadly, then raised his voice. “Everybody out!”
“But, Director—” a woman began.
“Exactly, I’m the director,” he said. “Now, get out.”
Chugayev winked at me as the researchers filed past, grumbling.
“Scientists,” he said. “Got to keep them in line.”
When the room was empty, he strode over to the orb and ran his fingers over it, marking out a pattern.
“I’ve been watching them do this,” he said. “Worked it out for myself.”
I stepped closer to see what was happening.
The world seemed to lurch around me. For a moment, there was nothing beneath my feet. Then, I found myself back in the tunnel in the research complex, striding toward the exit alongside Chugayev.
I stopped, touched the wall to make sure it was real, and stared at him. The director laughed.
“Did you just teleport us?” I asked.
“Even better,” Chugayev said. “Time travel. When we get back there, those scientists will be where we left them, waiting to be kicked out all over again.”
The director led me out of the security door and toward the temple again.
My mind was spinning. I now knew why the Russians were pouring so many resources into an obscure temple hidden up in the Himalayas. If they could travel back in time, what might they do with that technology? Go back to the Cold War and change its end in their favor? Why not go even further back and transform the whole of human history to fit their agenda? Clearly, they hadn’t mastered the tech yet or they would have changed things already.
I had to learn everything I could and get a message out fast.
“Everybody out!” Chugayev shouted as we entered the chamber again.
Once more, the scientists grudgingly obeyed.
The director pulled a hip flask from his pocket and took a swig, then passed it to me. “Here, Mr Leontev,” he said. “Something to help you cope.”
I accepted the flask and tipped it back, making a small sip look like a huge swallow. It was good-quality vodka and I could have done with more, but I needed to stay alert.
“It’s magical, of course.” Chugayev ran a hand over the orb.
“Of course.” I handed back the flask.
However Chugayev had received the post of Director, it clearly wasn’t because of his brains. Though the style of the orb was ancient, and its engravings somewhere between Chinese and Japanese characters, it was also clearly a work of technology. Its body was transparent, and the lines within it were all circuitry rather than veins running through stone. Although the device’s surface was worn and looked as if it’d weathered the passing of centuries, it had to be something modern.
A chirping sound came from Chugayev’s pocket, and he pulled out his phone to answer a call.
“What?” he snapped. “...Fine. I’m on my way.” He turned to me. “We have to go.”
“Perhaps I could stay and look at this some more?”
“Not without supervision.” Chugayev looked distracted. His eyes flitted between me and the door. “Come, we have to go.”
We walked out of the temple, through the security door, and back into the tunnels.
“Wait here,” Chugayev ordered, then strode away.
As soon as he was out of sight, I turned back to the door. It had been easy to note and memorize the director’s security code when we passed through before. In a moment, I was through the door, across the hillside, and back in the temple chamber.
I pulled out my cell phone and started hastily taking pictures, saving them to the hidden secure drive developed by Running Blade’s tech division. I started with the orb, then captured the area around the walls, zooming into the symbols and green lights.
As I was working my way around, frantically snapping with the camera, I noticed something that I’d missed before. At the back of the room was a recess in the wall, creating a shelf four feet long and a foot deep. On it lay a sword, double-edged and with an intricately carved blade. Rust caked the weapon’s metal surface, but patches had been cleaned with some kind of archeological tool. Symbols I didn’t recognize glistened on the clean parts of the blade, and they seemed to draw my attention like a hypnotist’s pocket watch.
“Come to me,” a voice whispered.
My heart seized in my chest, and I glanced around, searching for the voice. I half-thought I’d been caught, but the voice wasn’t threatening. The alluring invitation carried an almost sultry tone and bore a puzzling accent.
I looked around but couldn’t see anyone. To be on the safe side, I slid the phone into my pocket. I returned my attention to the sword for only a split-second before the voice whispered again.
“Come to me.”
It seemed to be coming from the sword.
“Swords don’t speak,” I reminded myself, searching around for another source of the voice.
“Come to me,” it said a third time.
It was my job to see through the lies and to challenge the truths I was presented with. But that didn’t mean that I had to disbelieve. Sometimes, the ability to believe the extraordinary was an agent’s greatest asset, when the real workings of the world were revealed. Normally, that meant plots and conspiracies. But in a room with an ancient, time-traveling orb, was it really so hard to believe in a talking sword?
I reached out and took the handle, then held the blade up in the green light. The engravings gleamed red, revealing the shape of a dragon.
“I am Nydarth,” The voice announced as it rang loudly in my head. “I am the dragon familiar of the Sundered Heart, your guide on the journey to become an Immortal.”
“My what?” I asked, incredulous.
“I have learned much from my stay in this world,” Nydarth said. “I can help you become more than you ever imagined. The journey will never be easy, for you are not the only Augmenter with a demon to guide them, but the rewards will be worth the struggle.”
“Augmenter? Demon? What the fuck was in that drink Chugayev gave me?”
As I stood staring at the sword, footsteps sounded from outside. I quickly returned the sword to its shelf and looked around for somewhere to hide. But there was no nook or cranny, no crevice or corner to squeeze myself into.
Chugayev appeared in the doorway. His jacket was gone, revealing a GSh-18 pistol in a holster under his left shoulder. And, oh yeah, he was holding an AK-12 assault rifle.
I swallowed and recalled the times I’d faced men with guns before. They’d been insurgents on the early missions for my Running Blade training. Earlier in my life, I’d chased drug dealers out of my mum’s neighborhood. But those times, I’d had backup. This time, I was all alone, cut off in a foreign country, surrounded by hostile forces. If the Russians had somehow found out who I really was, then it was death now, or death in a Siberian prison camp. Neither sounded like good options.
If Chugayev
planned on killing me, then he was sure taking his time. His rifle wasn’t even pointed at me—did he intend to use it or not? If he was trying to intimidate me, then he was doing a terrible job.
“There’s been an attack.” Chugayev looked back the way he had come. “The whole place is teeming with… with…”
The director’s eyes were wide, his expression one of alarm. For a man who carried a gun beneath his suit, he looked surprisingly rattled.
I strode across the room and grabbed Chugayev by his shoulders. “Who is it?” I asked. “Gangsters? Locals? Chinese agents?”
“It might be the Japanese.” He made an audible gulp.
“Japanese? What would they want in the Himalayas?” I paused and recalled what I’d just seen. I knew exactly what they were searching for. A time-traveling device would prove as useful for the Japanese as it would for the Russians. They had just as much to gain by returning to the past—if not more. “You’re sure it’s the Japanese?” I pressed.
Chugayev craned his neck to look out across the courtyard. “I can’t be certain, but they definitely look Japanese. They… They’re ninjas.”
“Ninjas?” I asked.
I struggled to make sense of it all. A magical orb, a talking sword, and now this. It really wasn’t what I’d expected from my first solo mission. Still, I was unarmed and about to face a group of so-called ninjas. “Mind giving me a weapon?” I indicated the director’s sidearm.
Chugayev drew the pistol from his holster and held it out. “You know how to use one of these?”
“I’ve done a little shooting,” I said nonchalantly as I shrugged and accepted the weapon.
I released the magazine, checked that it carried a full load of 18 rounds, and slid it back into place. With a flick of my thumb, I released the safety catch, then chambered a round ready for action.
