The Templar Chronicles Omnibus

by Joseph Nassise

  It was a horrifying realization.

  To think that she had been trapped in that hellish existence, alone, for all of those years, made him want to rail at the heavens and hang his head in shame. He’d failed her earlier, when he was unable to prevent the Adversary from taking her away from him, and he’d apparently failed her again, leaving her to languish in that strange half-life on the other side of the Veil.

  But last night’s events had been the final blow to whatever equilibrium he had managed to maintain over the years in the wake of his wife’s death. The discovery of Gabrielle’s body, perfectly preserved after seven years in the grave, had struck Cade with all the delicate finesse of a sledgehammer. It made it unmistakably clear that Gabrielle was an important part of whatever plan the Adversary had set in motion, just as Cade himself was.

  The question was why? What had the two of them done to deserve being targeted in such a fashion? What made them special? Out of all the billions of people in the world, why had the Adversary chosen them?

  Cade’s musings were interrupted by a commotion at the door. He glanced up, startled back into the present, to find Riley standing with his head just inside the entrance, gesturing to him. Excusing himself, Cade joined his senior non-com outside the door.

  “Tell me you’ve come to rescue me,” Cade said with a relieved smile on his face.

  But Riley could only wearily shake his head. “We’ve got a problem.”

  *** ***

  The package sat opposite him, just on the other side of the gate, right in the center of the drive where it couldn’t be missed. Looking down at it, Cade could see the big black letters covering the white address label, the handwriting little better than a scrawl but still legible nonetheless.

  Cade Williams.

  He glanced over at Riley, who said, “The guard on duty is named Samuels. Claims he was at his post in the guard house the entire time. Swears no one could have come down that road without him knowing about it, never mind leave a package right under his nose.”

  “Yet there it is,” Cade said pointedly, looking down at the parcel. It wasn’t much bigger than a hardcover book, maybe eight by twelve or so, wrapped in a plain brown paper wrapper like hundreds of other parcels a person sees over the years.

  But this one was addressed to him personally.

  And it had been delivered to a place that was as far as the general public was concerned nothing more than a private residence. One that was in someone else’s name to boot.

  Something was very wrong here.

  “Does he think it just dropped out of the open sky?” Cade asked beneath his breath.

  There was no answer from Riley, who either hadn’t heard him or simply chose to pretend that he hadn’t. Either way, Cade figured that it was probably best.

  The explosives team showed up then and so he moved back a respectful distance, Riley at his side, and the two of them watched the specialists get to work.

  The gates were carefully opened, giving the team access to the package, but without disturbing it in any way. A pair of dogs was then brought up, one to check for explosive residue, the other for drugs. Neither of them alerted, so the team leader ordered a pair of bomb techs to approach the package and give it a closer look.

  The men were dressed in standard bomb suits that were made from an inner layer of ballistic cloth and an outer layer of fire retardant fabric and were composed of a sleeved coat and trousers, a chest plate and groin protector, and a helmet with face shield. Protective spats were also worn over the feet. The suits made them bulky and slow, but for what they were doing that was just fine. Bomb technicians who were in a hurry usually didn’t live very long.

  They laid a large piece of ballistic cloth, a bomb blanket, out on the ground next to the package. Checking first for an anti-lift device and not finding one, the tech used a pair of large metal tongs to gently lift the package and place it in the center of the blanket. Moving carefully, the two men then wrapped the package with the rest of the blanket. The material was designed to help contain the blast if something went wrong. That in turn went inside a heavily shielded transport crate and to Cade it seemed like everyone present breathed a sigh of relief as the door of the crate was closed.

  He knew the team would take the package inside where they would first x-ray it from every possible angle before running it through a barrage of additional tests including a full chemical and biological weapons scan and then, and only then, would they attempt to open it to see what it contained.

  As they watched the team move off, the crate carried carefully between them, Riley finally gave voice to what they both were thinking. “How did they know where to find you?”

  Cade couldn’t answer and that made him nervous, far more so than he cared to admit.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  When the news came back that the explosive and forensic teams were finished with the package, Cade assembled Echo Team’s command unit in the main hall’s conference room to go over what they’d found. Along with Cade and Riley, the team consisted of two other sergeants, Nick Olsen and Sean Duncan. Olsen, a veteran who’d been with Echo for fifteen years, almost as long as Riley had, was slim and short, with curling reddish-brown hair and the type of grin that had you constantly looking over your shoulder, waiting for the practical joke. Duncan was the newest member of Echo, having joined several months earlier, just prior to the showdown with the Necromancer and the Council of Nine. He’d been in charge of the Preceptor’s protective detail before having been transferred to the unit at Cade’s direct request. He was younger than the other three men and his blonde hair and good looks probably could have been an asset to him in some other line of work. He was also prone to speaking his mind, regardless of the circumstances, which had brought him in conflict a few times with the way Cade ran the show, but so far he’d been a valuable asset and Cade was pleased with his impulsive decision to add Duncan to the unit.

  By now the other two men had heard about the mysterious package Cade had received and so the knight commander wasted no time with preliminaries, instead moving directly into a discussion of what the investigative teams had found. Which, in truth, wasn’t that much. The package had been free of dangerous substances; no explosives, no biological or chemical agents, no mystical wards or traps. It had been plain brown paper wrapped around a simple cigar box, the kind you can buy in any office supply store, both so common that tracking down their specific origins just wasn’t worth the effort. The paper had not held any fingerprints, nor was there any trace evidence such as hair or fiber samples recovered from it. Since it had apparently been delivered by hand, there were no stamps or postmarks that could be used to try and pinpoint where it had come from either. Even the handwriting spelling out Cade’s name on the front of the wrapper turned out not to be handwriting at all, but a computer based font that only looked like handwritten script. It was as clean a dead end as Cade had ever seen in all his years in law enforcement.

  Which made the two items the box contained all the more interesting.

  The first was a hand-written note on plain white paper, addressed to Cade.

  Dear Captain Williams,

  Please come quickly. Information has come into my hands that I dare not entrust to anyone else. An old foe has returned and already I fear for my safety and the safety of those around me. Time is of the essence. I will explain further when you arrive.

  In Christ,

  Father Thomas Martin, S.J.

  The second item was a standard 4×6 snapshot of a crowd gathered in front of a church. The lab had confirmed that ordinary Kodak film had been used in processing the picture, the kind available in hundreds of thousands of drug and grocery stores across the country. The shot appeared to have been taken from a moving vehicle, for many of the faces of those gathered were slightly blurred. There was writing on the back of the photo, in the same script as the letter.

  Perhaps this will help you see the urgency of my request.

  The evidence team h
ad cleared the items for handling so Cade passed them around, letting each member take a good, long look. None of them knew what to make of the photo. It seemed completely ordinary. There were ten, maybe twelve people walking down the street with the church just barely visible in the background. Most of them were looking the other way, though a few had been caught in profile. Due to the quality of the picture, none of them were identifiable, however.

  Duncan asked the obvious question. “Who’s Father Martin? And why does he refer to you as Captain Williams?”

  “Because the last time I saw him, I was a Captain,” Cade said absently, still staring at the photo and trying to discern the meaning of Martin’s cryptic comment.

  Riley took pity on Duncan and tried to bring him up to speed when he saw that Cade was too preoccupied to do so. “We met Father Martin several years ago, shortly after Cade had taken command of Echo. As Cade said, he was just a lowly Captain back then,” he said, earning him an amused glance from the knight commander. “Martin and several other priests in the Boston archdiocese nearby were having trouble with a new cult that had sprung up among the street gangs in the area. They contacted the Order and, since the cult had shown no hesitation to use violence against the Church, a combat squad was sent in to deal with it.”

  Duncan shrugged. “Sounds fairly routine.”

  “Yeah, you’d think so. Unfortunately, we were way off base.”

  “What happened?”

  “The squad disappeared without a trace three weeks after arriving in the area. Eight highly trained men. Every single one of them a veteran combat soldier, trained specifically for situations like this. So of course Echo gets the call. Our orders were to find out what happened to the squad and to deal with the cult that had gotten the Order involved in the first place.”

  Olsen cut in. “Recognizing that the Order’s initial show of force had done little good, Cade decided to take a different approach. He sent one of our men, a lieutenant, into the neighborhood undercover with orders to set up a safe house and then to make contact with the local clergy. For the first few days, everything went without a hitch. Bishop, Jonathan Bishop, that was the lieutenant’s name, got us a secure location, rendezvoused with the locals, and let us know that it was okay to bring in the rest of the team. But by the time we had arrived, Bishop had vanished, just like the men from First Squad.”

  Olsen stared off into space as he continued and from the look on his face Duncan knew he was reliving it in his mind’s eye. “We got a lead that both Bishop and the leaders of the cult could be found in an abandoned warehouse over in Roxbury. Timing was critical. First Squad was guarding the Bishop’s residence in Cambridge and Second Squad was en-route. We knew we couldn’t wait, so Cade made the decision to hit the warehouse with only the command squad, hoping things wouldn’t get too hairy before the reinforcements arrived.”

  “Good Lord,” Duncan said, stealing a glance across the room at Cade. “Just the three of you?”

  The question brought Olsen back to the here and now. “Just the three of us. Me, Cade, and Riley. What can I say? We were younger then, younger and full of confidence. You know how it is. Sometimes you just think you’re invincible.”

  Riley picked up the story again. “We snuck in through the skylight and from the second floor walkway we could see Bishop tied to a post in the middle of the warehouse. He wasn’t moving, and with the place looking empty, we thought maybe we were too late. That they’d already executed him and left his body for us to find.”

  “So what did you do?”

  “We made our way down to the first floor and over to where they’d left Bishop. Olsen and me, we stood watch while Cade checked him out. Turned out we were right. Bishop was cold as ice.”

  Riley shook his head. “That was our first mistake.”

  “And it was a big one,” said Olsen, anger in his eyes at the memory. “Bishop might have been dead but that didn’t mean he was out of the fight. We found that out the hard way when he reared up and tried to rip Cade’s throat open. Course by then Riley and I had our hands full as a horde of Chiang Shih began pouring out of nowhere, charging right for us.”

  “Chiang what?”

  “Shih. Chiang Shih. Also known as the Shadow People. As far as anyone knows they originated in China, but they’ve spread over the last few centuries and now can be found throughout Central and Southeast Asia. Tradition says they are formed when an individual has an outstanding karmic debt that must be paid, a debt so enormous that it prevents the soul from moving onward through the Great Cycle and forces the body to rise again from death. More often than not, the higher, rational aspect of the soul, the Hun, becomes dormant, leaving the P’o, or the lower bestial aspect of the soul, in control of the resurrected creature.”

  Duncan grimaced. “Sounds pleasant.”

  “Neither truly living nor altogether dead, the Chiang Shih are creatures without the essence of life, or Chi as the Chinese call it, and therefore must constantly steal it from the living to sustain their existence. They also have the option of turning their victims into a lesser version of themselves, blood-thirsty undead creatures that crave the flesh rather than the life force of the living.

  “Which is just what we were facing,” Riley cut in.

  “Right. And good thing, too, as full-blood Chiang Shih aren’t as susceptible to firearms as are their lesser counterparts. Cade dealt with Bishop while Riley and I held off several attacks by the others. By the time we’d beaten back the third wave, we’d run out of ammunition and had to resort to using our blades.”

  Duncan could see it all in his head, the three combat veterans standing back to back, the bodies of their foes littering the floor at their feet. What he couldn’t understand was how they managed to survive if they were so badly outnumbered, so he asked them.

  “We almost didn’t,” answered Olsen. “We got lucky, that’s all. Second Squad showed up at the last moment, cutting into the Chiang Shih from behind, making them believe that we’d set a trap for them. Believing they were vastly outnumbered, they retreated, leaving us to clean up the mess, which wasn’t that hard since the bodies turned to ash the minute their Queen disappeared out the back door.”

  “And Bishop? Did you ever find out what happened to him?”

  Olsen and Riley shared a glance.

  “Yeah,” Olsen replied. “Yeah, we did.”

  But he didn’t say anything more and before Duncan could ask him to explain further, Cade tossed the photo onto the table top in front of them, a frown of disgust plain on his face.

  “I don’t get it. What does he expect us to see in this thing?”

  “Why don’t we just call him and ask,” Olsen suggested.

  With the others looking on, Cade summoned an initiate and gave instructions for him to bring them any and all telephone numbers for either Father Thomas Martin or the Church of the Blessed Sorrow, both in Brookline, Massachusetts. It didn’t take the initiate long to come back with the information; most of it was readily available through directory assistance and the single number that wasn’t, the priest’s personal cell phone, was in one of the Order’s databanks.

  Cade spent the next several minutes trying each number, all without success. In light of the nature of Martin’s message, the lack of response made Cade more than a little uneasy and so he made a snap decision based more on instinct than reason.

  “I think it’s time we take a little road trip. Grab a kit bag and meet me in the motor pool in twenty.”

  Just like that, Echo’s command unit was headed for Boston.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Nagged by his inability to understand whatever it was Father Martin expected him to learn from the photograph, Cade left the manor house behind, crossed the commandery grounds on foot, and entered the science building. Photo reconnaissance was on the second floor and upon arriving, Cade asked to speak to Jarvis.

  Though only twenty-five, Jarvis’ skills were miles above the other members of the unit and Cade preferred th
e use of his services whenever possible. He explained the situation to the photo tech and asked if Jarvis could sharpen up the picture enough for them to recognize the individuals in the photo.

  “Bloody piece of cake, chap,” Jarvis said, beaming. “When did ya want it?”

  “Yesterday.”

  “Got ten minutes?”

  Cade glanced at his watch and then nodded. “But no more than that.”

  Jarvis led him over to a computer workstation where he fed the photo into a nearby scanner. Once the picture had been digitized, he went to work.

  “Every photograph is composed of millions of little dots, known as pixels. The computer analyzes the entire image and then begins to work at it one pixel at a time. Using a complex series of algorithms, it attempts to identify the most likely arrangement for each individual pixel based on the hundreds that surround it. By doing so, we can gradually clean up the image, correcting the focus, the color, even the perspective if necessary.”

  There were eleven individuals in all, six women and five men, and as Cade watched their faces slowly began to grow clearer. One by one he eliminated all of the women and four of the men, either because he didn’t recognize them or because there was no reason to consider them a threat.

  The fifth, and final, man was a different story.

  The man stood with his face partially turned to the camera, a smile playing at the corners of his mouth. Judging from the other people around him, he was tall and well-built, with dirty blonde hair that came down just past the collar of the light coat he wore.

  Seeing his face, Cade understood exactly what Father Martin had been trying to tell him.