Spellbinders Collection

by Molly Cochran

  "What's this on the bottom?" He squinted to read her crabbed handwriting.

  "That's the part that doesn't make sense. It looks like, 'Bless your name.'"

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  Saladin was winning the chess game. The boy had been a much more resourceful opponent than he had expected, but gradually, through the accretion of a number of tiny advantages, Saladin had gained a winning position and would soon finish Arthur off.

  He looked away from the board as one of his men entered the sitting room and stood quietly inside the door waiting.

  "Yes?" Saladin said irritably. "Have you delivered the message?"

  The servant bowed.

  "Very well." Saladin nodded in dismissal.

  "What message?" Arthur asked.

  "That does not concern you." He glanced down at the chessboard. "You should concede. The game is over."

  "It's not over yet," Arthur said. He was thirsty, but he would not give his captor the advantage of knowing it.

  Saladin sighed. "I find nothing so tiresome as a mechanical endgame."

  "I won't concede." Arthur hunched closer over the board so that Saladin could see only the red hair on the top of his head. Then he moved, sacrificing a bishop.

  "That was stupid of you," Saladin said, quickly taking the piece.

  Arthur said nothing. His next move was another sacrifice, then another. Saladin rolled his eyes. It was the mindless play of a tired and willful child. Without thinking, he captured each piece as it was offered until Arthur was left with only a queen and a king against ten of Saladin's pieces.

  Suddenly Arthur moved his queen near Saladin's king and called, "Check."

  The response was simple. All Saladin had to do was to capture the queen with his own queen to render Arthur's king defenseless. Naturally, if he did not capture Arthur's queen, if he simply moved his king away, Arthur would play queen-takes-queen with a chance of winning.

  Saladin squinted at the board, studying it. Obviously the boy, confused and hungry, had missed the fact that Saladin could just take his queen. He moved his queen sideways, snapping Arthur's queen off the board with passionless contempt.

  Then Arthur leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest. "Stalemate," he said.

  Saladin's eyes flashed back to the board.

  It was true. Arthur's king was safe on the square he now occupied. But if he moved to any other square, he would be placing his king in jeopardy. That made the position a draw. Neither player could win.

  "Stalemate," Saladin whispered incredulously. With a ten-year-old! It was not possible. He scanned the board, looking for a way out. There was none. "Incredible," he said.

  "Next time I won't settle for a draw," the boy announced grandly.

  Saladin looked over to Arthur in angry disbelief. The insolence of the pup! Nobody had spoken to him in such a manner in centuries. But Arthur met his eyes calmly, every inch the king he had once been, long ago in another life that the boy himself could not remember.

  "You like to win," Saladin said.

  Arthur said nothing. His young blue eyes held only amusement.

  Saladin caught the look. The boy clearly loved the sweet taste of victory. Even the constrictions of his current situation could not frighten him away from it. And why not? He was a warrior, with the blood of battle running in his veins.

  Such a boy is worthy of you, Saladin remarked to himself. As a man, he might have been magnificent.

  He stood up. "It is late, and I have business to attend to," he said. "My servants will make up a bed for you here."

  "I'm not sleepy."

  "Ah, yes. That's understandable." He clapped twice, and the door opened. Saladin left for a moment, then returned with two large men who walked directly to Arthur and held him down.

  "Get away from me!" the boy shouted. He kicked and squirmed, but Saladin paid no attention to him as he filled a syringe with clear liquid.

  "No!" Arthur howled. He bit one of the men who held him.

  "There's no need for such theatrics," Saladin said, easing the needle into Arthur's arm. "It's just something to make you sleep. You've had it before."

  "I'll kill you!" Arthur shouted. "I swear I'll kill you!" He croaked out something else, but his lips were feeling blubbery and his limbs felt as if they were sinking through the floor.

  "That's good, Arthur," Saladin said smoothly. "I dislike a spiritless child. You have possibilities."

  They were the last words Arthur heard before he was enveloped in darkness again.

  Upstairs at the inn, Hal made sure all of the windows in Emily's room were locked tight. "Don't let anyone in unless I'm with them," he said.

  Emily was standing in the middle of the room, reading through page sixty-one of the book for the tenth time. "Bless your name," she mused. "I've gone over it again and again, and I don't think the translation's wrong. But why would someone write that?"

  Hal shook his head. "We'll leave that to Candy and his assistants. It might be a code."

  "You mean the Urdu words themselves might be a code for another message?"

  "Could be. Or the English translation of them. Or the French translation, or Italian, or Swahili . . . We'd be wasting our time trying to figure it out. Let Candy have someone feed it into the computer at Scotland Yard."

  "All right." She set down the book.

  "Think you'll be able to get some sleep?" Hal asked.

  "Yes, but. . . Don't leave yet, Hal." She turned away and sat on the edge of the bed.

  "What's the matter?"

  She shrugged tiredly and took off her glasses. "I just don't want to be alone yet." She looked up at him apologetically. "That is, if you don't mind."

  Hal smiled. "I don't mind."

  "I've been thinking about the cup." As she spoke, she pulled some pins out of her hair and shook it loose. To Hal's astonishment, it hung nearly to her waist.

  Why, she's gorgeous, he thought. He had never met a woman who worked at making herself terrible-looking before. And yet, for some reason, that was apparently what Emily did. "You look like a different person," he said.

  "What? Oh." She blushed. "I'm just tired, I guess."

  It was a strange comment, almost an apology. Hal guessed that she wasn't terribly familiar with receiving compliments. "What about the cup?" Hal prompted.

  She sighed. "We left Chicago because some men came to get it. Arthur wasn't home at the time, but I was. They shot me and left me for dead. When Arthur came back, he accidentally touched me with the cup, and . . ."

  "And you healed without a mark."

  She blinked. "That's right."

  "Arthur showed me what it can do."

  Emily leaned forward on the bed. "But that's not all it can do." She pushed her hair away from her face. "Everything's happened so fast since the day we started running, I haven't had time to think. But when we started talking about the man named Saladin tonight, it sparked something in the back of my mind about the cup." She grimaced.

  "Go ahead."

  "It's going to sound crazy," she said, "but if it can reconstruct damaged tissues—heal wounds—then it can also prevent bacteria or other foreign matter from destroying normal cells. In other words, it can prevent disease. Doesn't that stand to reason?"

  Hal nodded, realizing a moment before she spoke what she was going to say.

  "So if the cup can heal wounds and prevent disease, whoever holds it will never be in anything other than a perfect physical state. He'll never age."

  "Or die," Hal added quietly.

  Emily bit her lip. "Is it conceivable?"

  Hal didn't answer.

  "The results of the lab tests I ran on it were unlike anything I'd ever seen. It cleaved in a curve. It showed no magnetic response. It's different from everything else on earth."

  Slowly, her expression changed from excitement to grim fear. "Oh, God," she said. "No one knows about it. No one except for those men and us." Her eyes welled with tears. "They aren't going to le
t Arthur go," she said softly.

  "We'll find him," Hal said. "Inspector Candy is close. His assistants have plenty—"

  "Don't lie to me, Hal. The police don't have any idea where Arthur is. And it wouldn't matter if they did. Don't you see? To keep something as important as that cup a secret, they're going to have to kill Arthur. They're going to kill all of us, and Arthur will be first."

  She was sobbing now, holding on to Hal for her life, but he had nothing to give her. She was right, of course. He had known from the moment of Arthur's capture that the boy would never be released willingly.

  Suddenly the image of the red-haired boy tied to the chair in the attic room of the house in Queens came into his mind. The red-haired boy, already dead, while the laughter of the maniac who had killed him still rang in Hal's ears.

  Hal started to shake. Another child's death . . . another failure . . .

  You were the best, kid.

  Hal stifled the scream that threatened to escape from him and held Emily, feeling as helpless as she did, wishing above all things that he had died in the hospital so that he would not have to face what lay ahead.

  And then Emily's lips were on his, feverish and violent, her tears hot against his skin. "Don't think," she said in a ragged voice. "I don't want to think anymore."

  She pulled him on top of her on the bed. "Make love to me, Hal. Please."

  Her fingers fumbled awkwardly with his clothes. Emily was not an experienced seductress, Hal knew. But he also knew that somehow she needed him now, needed to have his body on hers and inside hers, as if that temporary union would make her entire shattered world whole again for a moment. And he needed that, too.

  He opened her blouse and kissed her breasts. She arched backward, her white throat exposed, her long dark hair spilling wildly over the pillow.

  He lost himself in her. He filled her with his flesh and touched her with his passion, and for that stolen time there was no fear, no guilt, no worry, no death. There was nothing but the raw sensation of pleasure and the release of something small but bright. Something almost like hope.

  When it was over, Hal lay gasping, covered with sweat. Emily moved her hand to touch him, then retracted it and turned on her side, away from him. "I'm sorry," she said.

  "Why?"

  "Because we should have loved each other first."

  Hal smiled. "It doesn't always happen that way," he said.

  Her eyes glistened with tears. "We might have. At least I might have."

  "There's time."

  She shook her head, and the tears sheeted down her face. "No, there isn't. It's too late for us. Too late for everything."

  She turned away. Hal leaned over her and kissed her cheek. It didn't take long to get old, he thought.

  Saladin sat in the darkness, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the lack of light. He had worked before like this, when he painted the tomb of the Pharaoh Ikhnaton. He had been little more than a child then, led blindfolded through the labyrinth of the pyramid with the other artists, then forced to remain inside the tomb with only candles for light and bread for food until the work was done.

  How proud he had been to have been chosen! Ikhnaton himself had seen his work and selected him. Saladin had not known that his reward for painting the tomb would be death.

  It had not happened quickly. First, the artists were given gold and other gifts for their work. Then, one by one, they disappeared into the desert, where the Pharaoh's men buried them in the sand.

  "It is the price of too much knowledge," one of the soldiers told him sadly. And they had lowered him into the dry, shifting earth with his charm, the dun-colored cup, to protect him in the afterlife.

  "Too much knowledge," he repeated quietly now. Arthur, too, had too much knowledge, and would die for it. The thought made Saladin morose. In four thousand years, he had seen only one human being return . . . and he would have to kill that one.

  He lit a match, and for an instant the large black rock beside him came into view, along with an array of paints and brushes at his feet.

  No, not just one. Three people had come back, although Merlin hardly counted as a human being, then or now. A spirit who could vanish at will did not, in Saladin's opinion, constitute any sort of real man. Only Arthur and the other one were real.

  Saladin had recognized him, of course. Stumbling around the meadow, trying to fight six armed men on horseback with his bare hands, the fool had announced who he was before Saladin ever saw his face.

  And it was the same face, to be sure, albeit with a few more years on it. The knight who had so bravely—and stupidly—led Saladin to the cup had come again to champion his king.

  Saladin had almost laughed aloud. Why him, of all people? He had been a failure in that life, as he doubtless was in this. Launcelot would have been a far better protector. He was a better fighter, a better thinker, a better man all around. And yet Arthur—for Saladin felt sure that it had somehow been the king's own decision—had chosen Galahad as his champion.

  The match burned his fingers. He dropped it, cursing, and its light went out.

  But then, Launcelot left him, Saladin thought. Galahad would have followed Arthur into the fires of hell. Such was the extent of the man's idiocy.

  For you, my king.

  Those had been the last words formed in Galahad's mind, and Saladin had heard them.

  The knight had not spoken; the words were no more than a thought. But Saladin had read many of Galahad's thoughts by then.

  It had been an inadvertent gift from Merlin, the ability to enter another man's mind. Of course, Saladin could not read everyone's thoughts, as Merlin could. The sorcerer's gift had been with him from birth. Saladin had practiced for years to develop his limited extrasensory faculties.

  It had begun with Galahad. During the twelve years that Saladin followed the young knight in search of the cup, he had made Galahad the focus of his thoughts. He studied him, concentrated on him, pictured him in his mind when Galahad was not in sight, devoured him with his eyes when he came into view. He had discovered early that the two of them thought alike, but Saladin made it his ambition to divine the man's actual thoughts as they occurred.

  It was a worthless activity, perhaps. Saladin often thought as much when, after years of trying, he could receive no mental messages whatever from the distant knight, who rarely spoke and always traveled alone. But twelve years pass slowly when one has neither home nor acquaintances. There were no books to read on his journey and few adventures to bring the pleasure of life to the surface. There was only the Quest, and the realization that each day he was growing older, and the enigmatic presence of the young knight who had vowed to spend the rest of his life searching for the Grail to bring to his king.

  That was a lie, Saladin decided after the first few years. No one would search so long for a treasure in order to turn it over to someone else. Once he was certain that Galahad's motive was greed, Saladin felt more comfortable about him. He warmed to him, in a way. And when he felt the first thought—a desire for water in a drought-stricken land—Saladin had nearly shouted in triumph.

  There were other times, although never as complete as that first powerful image of thirst: Bits of thoughts, parts of pictures, the face of an old woman, a stained glass window showing Christ on the cross. Until Galahad found the cup.

  For you, my king.

  Good God, he'd been serious, Saladin thought with contempt. He hadn't wanted it for himself, after all. Why, the whole journey's been a waste for the poor sod.

  And when he'd swung his sword to meet Galahad's neck, the knight's eyes had not even registered fear. They had shown only disappointment in his own failure.

  So he's brought you back with him, Saladin thought as he lit another match. He touched it to the thick candle he'd brought with him. The flame burned steadily, without a flicker. Saladin gazed at it. I can find you now. I've had sixteen centuries to practice.

  He brought the man's face into focus in his mind. The brown hai
r, the wide jaw, the beautiful features marred in this life by a scar and the ravages of too many misspent years. For this Galahad, too, has been on a quest of sorts, but without the advantage of knowing what it was he sought. More than likely, Saladin mused, the fool did not even realize that he had finally found it.

  Saladin's mind ranged, searching, calling. Hal. His name is Hal. He is a policeman. He wants to be drunk. He is in the arms of a woman. He is afraid. There was a boy with red hair . . .

  You're the best, kid.

  Saladin smiled. By the light of the candle, he mixed some colors on a palette. Then, turning to the black rock, he began to paint.

  Hal tiptoed out of Emily's room and drove the Morris to the site of the castle ruins.

  The weather had cleared completely, and the moon shone bright as a lantern over the ancient stones.

  "Merlin," Hal called.

  His voice echoed off the mossy walls.

  "Merlin, come here!" he shouted.

  Nothing.

  "How am I supposed to help him? I don't know where he is, for God's sake! I haven't got the cup to trade. I don't even have a gun!"

  A bat swooped overhead. Nearby, a chorus of crickets began to sing all at once.

  "Damn it, he'll die, can't you see that?" His voice cracked. "They'll kill him, and I don't know how to stop them!"

  He sank down to the ground and sobbed. And all around him, there was no answer except the silence of the night.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  "The only fingerprints on the windows were yours," Inspector Candy said.

  He stood in front of the door of the police van, squinting into the early morning sun. He did not invite Hal inside.

  "Then the guy must have been wearing gloves," Hal said.

  Candy shrugged noncommitally.

  "How'd you get my prints?"

  "We coated the plaster cast of the horse's hoofprint you were holding."

  Hal sighed. So he was a suspect, too. Still, it was what he himself would have done in the same situation. "Good police work," he said.