by Jasmine Walt
I stood across the room, unsure of whether to go into the room full of knights or to cross the divide and join my best friend. But then Loren stepped in front of Igraine, effectively closing the circle and closing me out.
I smoothed my hand over the blades at my sides, seeking their cold comfort. Turning myself toward the mission, I picked up my feet to make my way into the throne room.
“Hey,” Loren called.
I looked up as she broke away from the group, her true family. As she walked away from Gwin and Morgan in the background, I saw the family resemblance even more prominently. Their eyes were shaped the same. The descendants of Galahad all had a haughty air to their chins, even though they carried themselves differently. Morgan was full of defiance, Gwin full of compassion, and Loren filled with mischief.
Loren came to stand before me, that mischievous grin spread across her face. But the moment it reached up to her eyes, it fell. “What’s wrong?”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“You’ve got the look,” she said.
“What look?”
“The same look you had after we left Greece.” She frowned. “Did you call Zane?”
“No.” My tone may have been a bit defensive. Loren had said she thought Zane and I were codependent. We obviously weren’t if I was here alone and he was off somewhere… doing whatever he was doing without me. I decided to turn the tables on her. “Where’d you spend your night? Or better yet, with whom?”
I wondered if I needed to check in on Gawain. Knights healed fast, too, thanks to the magic in their veins as well as the reinforcements that a witch could give to them.
“I had a sleepover with the kids,” Loren said. “It was awesome. We slept in the armory and built forts.”
“The armory?”
“It’s the safest place in the castle.” She shrugged.
“It seems like you’re really fitting in here.”
Again, she shrugged. “There’s something that feels familiar about this place.”
“I was thinking maybe you should stay behind today. There’s more questions you want to have answered about your mother. This isn’t so much a magical mission as it is entering a militarized zone.”
“Why are we having this conversation again?” she asked. “If I were going into a militarized zone, would you be behind me?”
“That’s different.”
“Because you’re Immortal? Well, it turns out I’m not human anymore. I’ve got some magic in me, too.”
“Loren.” I sighed.
“This is the third time you’ve tried to get rid of me. Is it because of the mascara stain on your Saint Laurent blouse?”
“No. Wait! What?”
“Is it that you think I’m competition for Tres? Because I swear—my breasts, they just perk up at the sign of millions. I can’t help it.”
She took in a breath and her chest rose. Then she tried to slump her arsenal in to no avail. A giggle escaped my lips as I watched her antics. Then I chuckled. Next came a full-blown laugh. I reached out and wrapped her in my arms.
“I know you worry about me,” Loren said into my shoulder. “If I stayed behind, you’d worry what I might get into. If you went without me, I’d worry about you. Isn’t it better if we just stick together?”
I sighed again as I let her go.
“Look, I’ll be smart,” she said. “I won’t do anything unnecessarily heroic, which will be a challenge for me because we all know how awesome I am. Plus, I promised Morgan I’d represent the Galahad Girls. It rankles Arthur to have women infiltrate his little boy band.”
Speaking of the king, he came to the doorway. His eyes glanced over Loren and me with barely checked disdain. Then went to the corner where Gwin stood.
“We’re ready,” he said, his voice thick.
It was obvious he didn’t want any of us on this mission. But his hands were tied. He needed Gwin to open the doorway. He needed me to be his tour guide. And I wasn’t going anywhere without Loren.
So the three of us took a step forward. Loren and I practically skipped into the room. Gwin took a wobbly step forward. But by the second step, her legs were sure.
Morgan took a step behind her, but one look from Arthur and the dark-haired beauty stutter-stepped and stopped. That defiant chin looked as though it would cut granite.
“You’re not coming with us,” Arthur said. “And that’s final.”
“Two witches against one is far better odds,” Morgan said.
“I’d prefer it was no witches, but we need Gwin to open the ley line. And she still has a connection to Merlin. She’ll be able to tell us if he’s near.”
“But doesn’t that mean he’ll know where she is?” Morgan asked. “Basically making her bait.”
“As I said, it’s unavoidable. And she’ll have the full contingent of the knights to protect her. She’ll also stay on the holy ground of the temple connected to the ley line and evacuate at the first sign of danger. We’ll find our own way back in that case.”
This he spoke directly to Gwin. She took a deep breath and nodded once.
Morgan opened her mouth to protest. “But—”
“Enough.” His growl was enough to shake the stones in the walls. “I’ve lost enough family. I won’t put another witch or wizard in danger.”
“I’m not your family,” Morgan said quietly, carefully. “I’m also not a child. And one day you’ll realize that.”
She turned on her heel and stormed off. Arthur closed his eyes for a moment, as though he were alone. I saw the stress and strain in the bags under his eyes. The man was truly stretched to his wit’s end, and this wasn’t near to being over.
When he opened his eyes again, his gray gaze was calm and sure. “It’s time to go.”
We filed into the throne room. The knights all stood as we came in. Then we all moved to the door that would take us through the ley line.
I saw Lance catch Gwin’s eyes. His gaze would usually soften for her. It didn’t today. I knew why; he had every intention of taking down the man he believed violated her. The man she’d pledged to spend her life with and had apparently given a chunk of it to.
“There is a monastery about twelve miles outside of Mosul, the Mar Mattai,” said Arthur.
I knew it. There was an amazing library at the monastery. It was filled with Syriac Christian manuscripts. I’d spent a few weeks poring over the tomes a few centuries ago.
“It’s on the ley line. The monks there are of an order that was allied to our cause. Gwin will stay there while we journey into the heart of Mosul to the Mosque of Yunus.”
That was where we decided was the most likely place for Joseph of Arimathea to have taken the Grail. It was an ancient temple dedicated to the biblical figure Jonah, who had been swallowed by a whale. In Joseph’s poem, there had been a mention of travel by sea. It was the best lead we had, and we were running with it.
“Open the line,” Arthur said to Gwin.
She stepped up and gathered the energy needed to open the ley line. The sound of the energy filled my ears as it did my veins. When I stepped through, the pounding sound didn’t stop. It increased, and the ground continued to shake.
I heard someone yell for me to duck, and then I was thrown bodily to the ground. Sand and brick exploded all around me even though the energy had left. When I opened my eyes, I didn’t see the walls of a temple. I didn’t see a roof. The monastery was a pile of rubble, and shells rained down upon us.
19
Mar Mattai was also known as Saint Matthew Monastery. The monastery was founded by Matthew in the year 361 after he fled into the mountains of the country that came to be known as Iraq. Like many religious leaders before him, Matthew had been fleeing from the persecution of the Roman Empire.
It was said that Matthew brought a knowledge of healing with him to the northern part of the country, and that he’d cured members of the royal family from life-threatening illnesses. As thanks for his service, the king fortified t
he monastery Matthew came to call home.
Over the ages, people came to the monastery to pay homage, to find healing, and to find peace. The monastery was a refuge in times of strife, which was a constant occurrence. I hadn’t known it was built on a ley line that connected witches and wizards the world over.
Mar Mattai had been a thriving place of devotion and scholarship when I’d last visited. That was back in the twelfth century, and there had been a series of attacks and counter-attacks led by neighboring Kurds. Inside the walls of the holy place, the monks continued their daily devotions of protecting the knowledge inside, the villagers below, and the spirituality in their hearts.
Centuries later, the fighting raged on. These days, the monastery housed refugees fleeing ISIS. Those protecting the monks and their charges were the Dwek Nawsha, an Assyrian Patriotic Party, and Kurdish Peshmerga fighters. There was nothing like war to make adversaries take a closer look at the battle lines they’d drawn in the past.
Here in present day, as I rose from the blast, I turned around and looked up at the once-vibrant building. It still sat proudly on the sand-hued horizon. Its steeples stretched up toward a smoke-filled sky. Down below, the village looked like a desert ghost town.
Once upon a time, there was grass rolling down the hills and pilgrims lining the way. It was now an overrun dirt path with crumbling stone from the church dotting here and there like decapitated flower heads.
I could see the lights from Mosul, only twelve miles away, through the hazy smoke. Oil coated my tongue as I tried to take a full breath of air. And that wasn’t the worst of it.
Pieces of parchment filled the air. The paper looked old, ancient. I reached up and grabbed one. My stomach lurched as I recognized the ancient Syriac characters.
I knew what this was. It was pieces of the prized manuscripts the monks had sequestered inside. Syriac was the written form of the Syrian language, which was closely related to the Aramaic language spoken by Jesus. These documents were priceless.
I reached out my hands, trying to grab all the precious pieces of paper I could. But it was a fool’s errand. They burned up and wilted in the smoke-filled air. Then another thunderous boom sent the shards out of my reach.
Fighter jets flew over our heads, leaving behind a trail of dark smoke. A second later, the sky turned orange from the mortar that had left the jet.
Red clouded my vision as the papers continued their trickling rain shower. I took another breath, but it was once again cut short by the smoke, oil, and chemical components in the air. I turned toward the oncoming fire, tugging free one of my sais and filling my other hand with a dagger.
A small army of ISIS fighters were headed for the bottom of the hill that led up to the monastery. They wore the sandy-colored uniforms and yellow face coverings to indicate they were not the front-line soldiers. Nor were they the suicide bombers who wore all black. No. These were the elite guard—the executioners. And they were headed for the gates of the monastery.
I gripped my weapons and opened my arms for them. They were the reason for the destruction. They would pay for those lost words with their lives.
But I couldn’t advance down the hill. I was shoved forward and through the gates of the temple. When I tried to fight back, to get at the real enemy, Arthur gripped my forearms, stopping the motion of my body and my blades.
“They have guns and grenades,” he said. “We have swords.”
I chewed over his words, my anger dying down slower than we had time for. The knights and I might survive a bullet or two, but not an array of bullets. And most likely, not a grenade. Finally, I relented and allowed him to tug me toward the monastery.
Lance had Gwin tucked into his chest. When another blast sounded, he swooped her into his arms, shielding her body with his. Loren ran in the cluster of the other knights. Arthur and I brought up the rear, his large body taking most of the dust and rocks that flew about.
“We need a tactical advantage,” he said. “Maybe we can get up high in one of the towers?”
“There are secret passages for hiding in the monastery,” I said. It was how many of the monks had survived over the centuries as war continuously knocked on their door.
We raced into the monastery. The doors had been left wide open, and I feared the worst. The walls were bare and the pews were empty. But off in the distance, I heard chanting.
When we came upon the men dressed in black robes with their heads bowed and their voices raised in a melodious chant, we all froze. Our sense of urgency came at odds with our manners. But only for a second. This was life or death.
I called to them in their language. They didn’t raise their heads as they continued their song of praise. Outside, the sounds of war raged on. The ground shook beneath our feet. The pitter-patter of stones falling to the ground punctuated the silence that followed the end of the monks’ prayer.
Finally, one male raised his dark head. Though he couldn’t tell if we were friend or foe, he offered us a peaceful smile and rose. In his hands was a shiny metal object. The knights around me tensed. Lance brought Gwin behind his body. Gawain stepped in front of Loren. Arthur blocked me with one of his massive arms.
The monk brought his hands to his chest in a prayer motion. The piece of metal slipped from his fingers, and at the bottom of the chain swung a cross. A collective sigh of relief, and a sniff of chagrin, went through the knights.
“You’re in danger,” Arthur said. “We have to get to the highest point in the monastery.”
The monk smiled. “We have been under attack for sixteen hundred years. Romans, Kurds, ISIS—the names and faces change. Only we remain. Saint Matthew and the Father will provide. They always have.”
The monk turned and went to an opening in the wall. He pulled on a long rope. A bell sounded above us. But as it sounded, another blast shook the ground, drowning out the sound of the ringing and replacing it with that constant tone that vibrated the eardrum.
I went over to the window and saw that the ISIS soldiers were halfway up the hill. But not only that. In their wake came a tank. The idea of hiding out in the walls was now a moot point. A hiding spot would do us no good if the walls came tumbling down around us, blasted by the gun power of a tank.
I felt Arthur over my shoulder. The tension ran off him like hot oil.
“Can Gwin open another ley line?” I asked.
Arthur shook his head. “The way we came in is destroyed. It’s too unstable to try and make another connection.”
“Let me try,” said Gwin. “If we can get back outside, I might be able to raise a protective shield and then open the ley line back up.”
“Over my dead body will you be put in the line of fire,” growled Lance. “This was supposed to be a safe place for you and it’s not.”
“So what do we do?” I asked, deferring to Arthur because I was out of ideas as the men in deathly yellow continued up the hill, running as though their lives depended on it.
In fact, they weren’t running in any formation that I’d seen soldiers run. They looked as though they were running from the tank, not as the advance guard of it.
They reached the top of the monastery and came face-to-face with the gates that we’d locked. A few of the enemy soldiers worked at the lock while others turned and fired on the tank. And then I saw it.
The American flag on the side of the tank.
“Praise God,” said the monk who’d rung the bell.
Down below, the ISIS soldiers were laying down their arms. The tank opened, and men in the camouflage colors of the Allied Forces got out and took the enemy down.
I leaned further out the window as another dark head emerged out of the top of the tank. This man wore no soldier’s uniform. He didn’t look out at the ISIS soldiers. He looked up.
A tickle hit the back of my throat as my breathing went decidedly shallow. Finally, Tres found my gaze. His smile spread across his face as he waved up at the tower.
20
“You just can’
t seem to keep yourself out of trouble, can you, Dr. Rivers?” said Tres.
I walked out of the monastery as Tres swaggered into the gates. The army pants he wore hugged his thighs. The shirt tucked into his waistband showed off his narrow hips and hinted at the six-pack beneath the fabric.
“Hi, Tres.” Loren wiggled her fingers. She inhaled and her breasts swelled.
I turned to her, glaring.
Her expression turned pinched and she exhaled, but her boobs were still facing the same direction, headed for Tres. Loren shrugged, completely unapologetic. Then she crossed her arms over her chest. At the approach of the military men, she uncrossed them again.
I turned back to Tres. “What are you doing here?”
“What does it look like?” he said. “Trying to get a date.”
He came and stood toe to toe with me. I was a tall woman, but I had to tilt my head up to look into his dark gaze. I wasn’t used to feeling small. I didn’t feel small when I was around him. More like overwhelmed by the power that he exuded.
Tres was the third oldest Immortal, but he looked as though he wasn’t a day over thirty at best. With his honey-golden skin, dark hair, and dark eyes, he looked like he’d walked out of his tent across the way, not out of the million-dollar condo he’d probably come from.
“When you said Sarras, I figured there were only a few places that might interest you,” he continued. “When you weren’t at the Mosque of the Prophet Yunus, I figured you might be here looking for the Syriac Translations.”
The mention of the destroyed documents made my fingers clench. I eyed one of the ISIS soldiers, ready to take out my anger at the destruction these men had caused to these people present, past, and ancient. But that would have to be another time. There was still more work to do.
