The Knights of the Spring Dream

by Tom Hunter

  “Quit stalling and tell us already,” snapped Josh. “It’s not like we’re going anywhere any time soon, is it?”

  “Okay,” Samuel agreed. “The reason why I didn’t get much sleep the night before I met with Rimon was because Akhenaton came up with a plan that involved proving to the High Marshal that I respected his Order and might be willing to join it.”

  “You joined the Order without telling us?” gasped Shafira.

  “Not exactly.” Samuel shook his head. “Although we have been sent on this mission under the auspices of the Knights of the Spring Dream. In any case, the High Marshal wasn’t exactly convinced that I was genuine in my aspirations, so he decided that Akhenaton and I should decide between us which one of us would be punished for our transgressions, Akhenaton for telling me more than he should have and failing in his duty, or me for making it possible for the Bruard to snatch St. Augustine’s secret. He gave us one sword between the two of us and said that whichever of us killed the other would be allowed to walk free.”

  “And yet you’re both still standing,” observed Waleed.

  “It was a test,” Samuel smiled. “And one which I’m pleased to say that we passed. But Akhenaton here doesn’t seem to be able to get over the fact that I saved us.”

  “You saved us?” sneered Akhenaton. “Is that what you call your showboating? So quick to take credit, so slow to truly lead. What he’s missing out of his little story is the fact that he picked up the blade and was clearly tempted to run it through me before thinking better of it. Now since you’ve been appointed leader of this little troupe, are you going to step up and do your duty or are you going to let Basile and your friends dictate to you?”

  “This is ridiculous,” scoffed Samuel, as Akhenaton came to stand too close, staring him straight in the eye. “We want the same thing. We both want to stop the Bruard. Fighting among ourselves only helps them. You need to tone it down.”

  “Come on, Akhenaton.” Josh reached out to pull him away. “I’m as annoyed as you are about waiting around, but this isn’t helping anything.”

  Akhenaton shook him off. “Samuel is putting the world at risk for one man. He needs to get his priorities in order. If he can’t see that then maybe it’s time I taught him a lesson.”

  “You know, if I can’t help one man, then I have no business trying to save the world,” Samuel countered. “I don’t think I’m the one who needs to learn a thing or two.” He started to unbutton his shirt, preparing to defend himself.

  “Stop this, the pair of you!” protested Shafira. “Are you men or are you boys? You’re both acting like children. We’ve already got one injured man. I can’t believe you’re happy to add to that number. You’re doing the Bruard’s work for them.”

  “This isn’t my choice,” Samuel pointed out. “But it seems that Akhenaton needs to blow off some steam. He hasn’t been able to stop talking about what happened ever since that night. If we settle this now, let it be an end to the matter. Whatever happens, you stop beating me–and yourself–up about the fact that I picked up the sword. Deal, Akhenaton?”

  “Deal.” The knight nodded curtly.

  “I give up.” Shafira shook her head, going back to Basile to look after him, while Akhenaton traced a large circle in the sand.

  “My Order has strict guidelines to what constitutes a fair duel. This line marks out the battle zone,” he explained. “Should either of us step foot outside of it, we immediately forfeit the fight. No blows below the belt–that will also lead to instant forfeit. Only weapons used by the Order are permitted, so no guns are allowed, although you may choose to use a blade. Should you choose to do so, then we are both to bring with us the same type of knife to keep things even. When the fight begins, it will continue until one of us either concedes or dies. Is that clear?”

  “Clear,” agreed Samuel.

  “In that case, take your position opposite me. Josh, please count us down from three to one to start the fight.”

  Samuel and Akhenaton stood on either side of the circle, jogging from one foot to the other as they waited for the pilot to give them the word.

  “All right, you two madmen,” Josh began. “Are you ready? Three… two… one… fight!”

  Samuel and Akhenaton stepped forward, glaring at each other as they sized up their opponent. Akhenaton darted forward and threw a punch at Samuel, who dodged to the side. However, he wasn’t quite fast enough to avoid the blow and he was knocked back, almost falling out of the circle. Akhenaton followed it up with a right hook, but this time, instead of moving away, Samuel put up his arm and blocked it.

  The two men put their fists up in front of their faces, circling each other again, before Akhenaton suddenly rushed forward to tackle Samuel around the waist to shove him out of the circle. This time, the archaeologist was prepared for the move and he stepped to the side, jabbing Akhenaton in the kidney with a mean punch.

  The larger man tried to stand up, but Samuel was on a roll and didn’t give him any time to recover, following the jab with a flurry of blows. It was all Akhenaton could do to put his arms up in front of his face to fend off the worst of them as Samuel pounded away at his torso, hitting wherever he could reach.

  At last, Samuel jogged back, giving Akhenaton a moment’s respite. As the Knight panted, still trying to keep his fists up while he plotted his next move, Samuel swiftly darted forward, punching him square in the nose. Akhenaton staggered back, blood gushing from his face as Samuel pummeled him relentlessly, hitting his chest, his stomach, his face, each blow unpredictable and hard as a rock.

  At last, a powerful right hook sent Akhenaton sprawling out of the circle.

  “Samuel wins!” announced Josh as Samuel strode over to offer his hand to his opponent, who lay flat on his back, momentarily dazed.

  “I wasn’t bluffing when I told you I was a trained boxer,” he told Akhenaton, pulling him to his feet, careful not to hurt him any further. “Now are you going to respect the result of the duel, or are we going to have any further problems?”

  “You’ll have no more issues with me,” Akhenaton promised, wiping blood away from his face with the back of his hand.

  “You two are the world’s biggest idiots!” yelled Shafira, getting up and running off to the opposite side of the oasis.

  “Shafira!” called Samuel making to go after her, but Josh shook his head.

  “Leave her be,” he advised. “Trust me. I speak from experience. Let her have some time by herself to calm down before you even think of approaching her. Otherwise Akhenaton’s face is nothing compared to what she’ll do to you.”

  Samuel sighed heavily, but took Josh’s advice.

  “I suppose I owe you five bucks,” Waleed said to Basile, who frowned.

  “What are you talking about?” he retorted, as Akhenaton shot them a black look. “I didn’t make any bets with you.”

  “Just joking,” Waleed grinned, enjoying getting a rise out of Akhenaton.

  Twenty-Three

  Shafira angrily splashed water over her face, kneeling down beside the pool in the oasis as far away from the men as she could get.

  “Stupid, stupid, stupid,” she muttered to herself, finally slamming her fist into the water, and getting wet from the resulting plume, before sitting back on her heels. Shaking her head in incomprehension, she gazed out across the midnight black sand dunes, calculating how long she was going to have to put up with the idiocy of her companions before they could get back to civilization.

  “Someone’s annoyed with the world,” observed Josh, casually striding towards her.

  “Go away, Josh.” Shafira shuffled around, turning her back to him as she shooed at him with one hand to leave her alone.

  “Sorry, kiddo, no can do. We’re in hostile territory and you’ve had enough time to indulge your temper, so you’re stuck with a bodyguard.” Ignoring her command, the pilot squatted down next to her. “Do you want to tell me what’s up?”

  “Are you kidding me?” Shafira
rolled her eyes and folded her arms. “I can’t have been the only one to have seen how childish that display of male bravado was. We’ve already got one wounded man to worry about. What if Samuel or Akhenaton had been badly hurt during that fight? How would that have helped against the raiders?”

  “Samuel would have never let it get that far,” Josh reassured, but Shafira wasn’t in the mood to be placated.

  “He had no means of knowing what was going to happen,” she pointed out. “For all he knew, Akhenaton could have been a black belt in ten different martial arts and then Samuel would have been doomed, despite his boxing experience.”

  “But he wasn’t, and no one got seriously injured. No harm, no foul.” Josh shrugged, giving Shafira’s shoulder a little shake to let her know that everything was okay.

  “All that drama and for no reason,” she moaned. “I don’t understand. What is it with you men and your need to show off all the time?”

  “I think there’s a lot more going on between Samuel and Akhenaton than simply showing off,” Josh said gently. “They’ve been through a lot together and they’re both still figuring out where they fit together in the team dynamic. You can’t have two alphas butting heads and expect to succeed in your mission. Isn’t it better that they sort this out between themselves now, when we’re not under fire from yet another enemy? I don’t know Akhenaton all that well, but I get the sense that he’s the kind of man whose word means a great deal to him. If he says that he’s settled his differences with Samuel, I believe him.”

  “I guess.” Shafira pulled up a handful of grass, letting it fall through her fingers before pulling out more, still avoiding Josh’s eyes.

  “There’s more going on, isn’t there?” Josh pressed. “I mean, I can’t believe that someone who grew up with Yusuf is this upset over some male grandstanding. I’d have thought you’d be well used to it by now. What else is bugging you?”

  Shafira sighed deeply. “You always could see straight through me,” she told him. “You’re right. There’s a whole heap of things bothering me and I don’t know where to start unpicking it all.”

  “Choose one thing and we’ll go from there,” Josh advised. “Sometimes we feel as though we’re climbing a mountain, when if we just take it step by step, we find that that mountain is nothing but a small hill, a minor blip on the horizon. Talk to me. Let me help you.”

  “Oddly enough, Yusuf is one of the issues,” Shafira told her friend. “I mean, my parents expect him to mess up. He’s always been the black sheep of the family. The only reason he’s been able to get away with so much is because he’s their only son. I’m supposed to be a good girl, but look at me now. I’m stuck in an oasis, miles away from anywhere, and we don’t know if the raiders are going to find us here or if we’ll survive another attack when they do. And that’s without having to deal with the Bruard once we get out of the desert. I mean, I’m just a desk clerk. What do I know about defeating a world superpower? If the combined might of our allies can’t eliminate the Bruard, what chance do we have?”

  “We’re not looking to defeat them, just thwart this one, small plan,” Josh pointed out. “We can leave the rest to the big guns.”

  Shafira shook her head. “I don’t think I can ever go home again,” she sniffed, tears brimming in the corner of her eyes. “My family has no idea what’s going on and I can’t tell them what’s happening. I can’t put them in the line of fire like that, and my father’s the kind of person who’d want to go straight to the authorities. It isn’t just my life that’s over. This will finish them. My father will have to sell his business, my mother won’t be able to host another one of her charity galas…” Shafira burst into tears. Josh put an arm around her to comfort her, but she pushed him away. Undeterred, he pulled her to him and this time, she let him hold her, and brush her hair as she cried.

  “Feel better?” Josh asked, a little while later, as the flood subsided. He took out a handkerchief and passed it to Shafira, who nodded as she tidied herself up. “Look, I’m not going to tell you you’re worrying about nothing. Everything that you’ve said is perfectly valid. But how many times have you complained about how boring your life was? You’ve got the excitement you’ve always wanted. Sure, you’re discovering for yourself that going on adventures isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be, but look at it this way: all you’ve done is swap one set of responsibilities for another. You’ll have one hell of a story to tell your grandchildren.”

  “How can you be so calm?” Shafira asked.

  “I’ve got the perspective of years of near death experiences,” he reminded her. “All right, maybe this mission is a little closer to the wire than some of my other assignments, but dead is dead, regardless of who you’re dealing with. After a while, you realize that we’ve all got to go sometime, so you might as well make the most of the time you’ve got and grab every moment with both hands.”

  He shifted his position so that he was sitting more comfortably, gesturing to Shafira to come and rest her head against his shoulder. He put his arm around her as the pair of them sat together, gazing up at the breathtaking band that the Milky Way painted across the night sky.

  “Look over there!” Josh pointed to their right. “A falling star! I never did believe that wishing on one did any good, but I’ve always found that whenever I’ve seen one, it’s been a good omen for the job I was working on.”

  Shafira looked over and when she spotted the shooting star, she closed her eyes, sending up a silent prayer that everything would turn out fine in the end. Josh might not believe in the power of wishes, but Shafira was superstitious enough to want to make the most of any advantage they could get.

  “You know, this reminds me a little of the time I was contracted to fly a businessman into Abu Dhabi,” Josh told her. “It was meant to be a straightforward job. Pick up the guy, fly him to his hotel helipad, get paid, go home. Little did I know that he’d accrued a crap ton of debts in the casino I was collecting him from. They didn’t want to see him leave without paying what he owed. He’d made himself comfortable in the back of the ‘copter and I was just starting my final flight checks, when a gang of armed men came out and surrounded us. They told me that if I didn’t hand over my passenger, they were going to open fire and kill us both.”

  “What did you do?” gasped Shafira

  “What could I do?” Josh shrugged. “I pulled out my revolver and handed it back to my passenger, telling him to start shooting while I got us the hell out of Dodge. It was close–they opened fire and if one of their bullets had hit us in the right spot, it would have been game over. It helped that my client had spent some time at firing ranges, so he knew how to handle a gun. Between his cover and my flying skills, we escaped with both our skins intact. But needless to say, I never worked with him again.”

  “But you could have been killed!” scolded Shafira. “Why didn’t you just hand over the man? He was in the wrong, after all. He shouldn’t have tried to run away from his debts.”

  “That wasn’t my problem,” Josh shrugged. “My job was to get my client to where he needed to go, so that’s what I did. It was up to him to sort out his debts later–or not. Either way, none of my business. That’s the point, Shafira. When we accept certain responsibilities, we’re agreeing to deal with everything that comes with it. We can never know for certain what’s going to come our way. I mean, you could survive shoot outs, dramatic car chases, and murderous Bruard thugs, only to get hit by a bus when you’re crossing the road outside your house. It’s pointless worrying about what might be. Deal with what is, what’s facing us in the moment and let the future take care of itself.”

  Feeling Shafira shiver in the chill of the night, Josh took off his jacket and put it around her.

  “How do you cope with it all, Josh?” she asked, snuggling into him to get warm. “How can you get into your chopper knowing that the next mission could be your last?”

  “I simply keep moving forward, taking one day at a time,” came t
he reply. “I made a promise to myself years ago that I’d always be true to myself, and one of the things I’ve come to realize about myself is that protecting as many people as I can is one of my biggest priorities. If we succeed in our mission, we could potentially be saving the lives of millions. When you look at it like that, it’s easier to put up with a few hardships along the way.”

  “I guess.” Shafira nodded slowly as she considered his words.

  Josh patted her on the shoulder before pulling his arm away and standing up. “I’m going to go back and sit with the others,” he told her. “You don’t have to come back with me just yet if you still need some more alone time, but I wouldn’t advise you sleep on your own out here.”

  He started to walk away, then turned around as another thought occurred to him.

  “You can always ask to stay in Cairo when we get back there if you want. You don’t have to come with us to find this elusive great leader. Nobody would think any less of you if you chose to go back to your job at the Ministry instead.”

  “That’s if I even have a job after all this,” Shafira pointed out. “Still, it’s not a bad idea. I might just do that. Thanks, Josh. For the support as well as the advice.”

  “Any time.” Josh gave her a little salute before going off to sit with the others by the skimmer.

  Shafira pulled his jacket tight around her as she rested her chin on her knees, gazing at the placid water while she mulled over everything he’d just said. Josh was right. She did have options. The question was, which one was the best?

  Twenty-Four

  “Welcome to Rabah Bitat. We hope you had a pleasant flight and look forward to welcoming you aboard in the future,” beamed the air steward as Gord disembarked the commercial flight Pin had insisted he take to Algeria. He’d mentioned something about Gord needing to blend in and a private jet being too showy, but Gord didn’t see why he couldn’t have enjoyed the privacy of his own VTOL. Despite changing into casual clothes in an attempt to appear like just another tourist, Gord’s height and broad shoulders meant that he stood out, no matter what he did. It didn’t help that he moved through the crowds like a shark swimming through the waves on the hunt for its next meal.