Kastor leaped into the smoke, gun out, and fired a bullet into the figure’s head as soon he could make it out. The fellow’s head kicked back, and his body crumpled lifelessly. In the split second before he retreated from the open doorway, Kastor realized their attacker wore a Confed uniform. Must’ve been some elite trooper sent in to take back the building, which meant he wasn’t alone. Kastor holstered his handgun and swiped out his blazer in one swift motion.
As the blazer crackled to life, two more figures dashed out of the smoky office, already firing. Kastor reflexively darted between them, elbowing one in the side and slicing his blazer through the thigh of the other. It met an unexpected resistance, almost like activated nanoflex armor. But these were Confed soldiers. They wore no armor, at least nothing outside their uniforms.
Kastor wheeled around, slapped away one soldier’s gun just as it fired, and lunged his blade into the other’s ribs. But instead of slicing easily through flesh and bone, the blade merely shoved the soldier backwards into the wall, making the man grunt. They weredefinitely wearing armor.
The closer soldier kicked Kastor in the waist and lifted his gun again, but Kastor recovered and swiped his sword through the barrel of the gun, severing it with ease. More figures in Confed uniforms emerged from the smoke, guns up. Kastor would have to move fast, but how could he take them down if they wore armor that could deflect a blazer? He’d thought the Confed didn’t even have access to such technology. The Sagittarian nobility guarded it zealously.
They fired, and Kastor leaped sideways to dodge. He prepared to spring into the middle of them and start swinging until his sword hit something soft enough to puncture, but someone’s voice halted him. A woman’s voice.
“Cease fire!” she shouted.
Kastor stared at five combat rifle muzzles aimed at him as the smoke dissipated. His shoulder screamed for mercy as he breathed. He glanced between the faces of the men pointing their guns at him. Awe and surprise grew across their features, eyes seeming to stare at him in recognition.
Another figure emerged from the office, slighter than the others but only by a bit. Thin, blond bangs hung down, threatening to cover one eye but coming short of it. Delicate skin, but a strong jawbone and proud chin. She stood tall even among these hardened men. They obeyed her, respected her.
She stepped between them but kept her gleaming, aghast eyes on Kastor. Her gloved hand rose, rested on one of her soldiers’ gun barrels, and gently pushed it down. The others lowered their weapons. The young woman—even younger than Kastor, he realized—came within a few steps of him.
Face to face, Kastor recognized her. Not as a childhood friend, but as someone only ever known as an acquaintance, a figure at the periphery of one’s life. Vague, distant memories struggled to break through the thick clouds of time.
She opened her mouth to speak but, for a long time, couldn’t seem to. When she finally spoke, it was barely above a whisper.
“Kastor?”
Chapter Sixty-Two
Cristiana could not believe what she saw before her. Of course, she could see it plain as daylight: Kastor of Eagle, former Champion of Triumph. But she could not fathom why he stood before her, his neck wreathed with a shemagh like the backward Terran religionists.
Kastor was different somehow than she’d imagined him. The man standing before her, tall and square-shouldered and curved with muscle, lacked the genteel grace characteristic of a nobleman. His frayed shirt hung loose on his chest. His disheveled, umber brown hair had apparently not been touched by a comb in quite some time. Neither had his bristle-shadowed cheekbones been touched by a razor. His time on Earth had textured his skin with dirt and scrapes and burn marks, not to mention the messy wound staining his clothes around the left shoulder. He had aged noticeably since the announcement from Triumph that he had earned the championship.
And yet it was definitely Kastor. She knew those fierce eyes, that fearless face. She recognized his virile neck that reminded her of thick cords wrapped in soft leather. His sturdy, broad chest. His muscled forearms. The web of puffy veins bulging from the backs of his hands, stretching up his arms into his shirtsleeves.
He stared back at her, equally staggered, apparently. His features betrayed recognition, and thus a discomfort with standing in the presence of fellow Sagittarians.
Cristiana figured one of them needed to be the first to speak.
“What are you doing here?”
She felt intimidated questioning him. The last time they interacted—if it could be called an interaction—was at academy on Tyrannus. She was in a class below him back then. Not anymore, but in Cristiana’s mind, the relationship between them had not evolved. The hierarchy ran deep, even now, after Kastor had been disgraced.
He stared back, hardening again. His hands didn’t loosen on the handle of his powered-up blazer, stretched in the air between them. He didn’t want to speak to her, or any other Sagittarian, especially a fellow Eaglespawn. That’s how Cristiana would feel anyway, but she supposed she shouldn’t try to pin him down with guesswork. The Eagle warrior was an utter mystery to her.
“I could ask the same of you,” Kastor said, his voice low and dark. He narrowed his eyes at her. “Cristiana.”
She closed her lips and tried not to display the unease she felt at the loss of her last piece of anonymity.
“I didn’t think you’d remember me.”
“Female warrior-born are rather difficult to forget.”
Cristiana gave a wry smirk. Yes, the only female warrior-born of her class. Perhaps that was her only claim to fame now.
“You were memorable for other reasons,” Kastor said, seeming to read her mind. “The same reasons that propelled you within a horse’s stride of becoming Zantorian’s champion.”
“You think you can avoid my question with flattery?”
Kastor shook his head slightly. “I never flatter.”
“That still doesn’t answer my question,” Cristiana said, mustering the confidence to push him. “Why are on Earth? Why are you helping the Defenders of Glory?”
He stared, tight-lipped, but Cristiana didn’t budge, didn’t back down. She didn’t let his fierce stare weaken her. Finally, he let out his breath.
“You wouldn’t understand,” Kastor said. His eyes fell. “It’s complicated.”
“Complicated enough to work against the interests of the Regnum?” she asked.
His eyes snapped back up at her. “I would never do anything to harm the Regnum. If you knew me at all, you wouldn’t question that.”
“You clearly want to provoke a war we’re not ready for. Otherwise . . .” She gestured to the dead Defenders behind him. “Why help them?”
“They’re a stepping stone to something greater,” Kastor said, purposefully cryptic.
Cristiana furrowed her eyebrows at him. “Something greater . . . Kastor, you’re speaking in riddles. Tell me. Please.”
He shook his head. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“Make me understand.” She spread her open hands. “I’m listening.”
His shoulders slouched a bit. His features softened. A new light gleamed in his eyes. A tinge of sadness. A forlornness.
“I wish I could tell you,” he said plainly. “Honestly, I do. It’s a heavy burden to bear alone.”
Cristiana took a step closer and spoke softer, matching him. “You think you’re the first warrior-born to feel alone? You’re not.” She locked eyes with him and felt her hard edges melting away as the heat of his blazer warmed her face. “You don’t have to feel that way. You don’t deserve to.”
“Oh, yes I do,” he snapped. “I deserve far worse. That’s why I have to do this. I have to redeem myself.”
“By putting the Regnum in danger?” she countered. “Pushing us into a galactic war that will devastate us?”
“If I get my way, there won’tbe a galactic war.”
Cristiana’s brow tightened in confusion. “How?”
Kastor steeled hims
elf again, taking on that same reticent look as before.
“Leave Earth,” he commanded, then sliced his eyes up and down her. “Take off that ridiculous uniform and go back to Sagittarius. You shouldn’t have gotten involved. Zantorian should’ve have sent you.”
“I can’t just let you go,” she said. “What kind of warrior would I be if I did that?”
“One who makes her own way.” Kastor powered down his blazer and lowered it until the tip of the blade rested on the floor. His eyes took on that same faraway look. He was putting himself at her mercy.
Cristiana stepped away from him, feeling torn. Kastor was the mastermind behind the rapid success of the Terran rebels, and her mission was to kill him. But how could she? How could she kill one of her own? More than that, surprisingly, she saw a piece of herself in him. In his unguarded eyes. In the vulnerable, human part of him that she suspected no one else in the galaxy had ever witnessed.
She sighed and gathered the strength to do what she felt she had to.
“Stay away from the Temple Mount. We won’t let the Defenders take it.”
Kastor stared back, neither affirming nor denying her. She took his lack of dissent as an acknowledgement.
“Let’s move out,” she ordered.
Chapter Sixty-Three
The disguised Sagittarian warriors traded ambivalent glances with each other and looked back at the battle-pocked OCSS building down the long street behind them. Cristiana saw it on their faces—they would follow her commands, but they didn’t respect her. Each of them thought they would make a better leader than her.
As shrieks and earth-pounding booms continued all around, one every five or ten seconds, Cristiana hailed Larkin through her cuff. It took a few seconds for the line to connect. When the audio kicked on, she could heard a flurry of gunshots in the distant background.
“It’s Larkin,” he answered.
Cristiana slowed her pace on the sidewalk and sighed, realizing she hadn’t come up with the exact words to say to him.
“Larkin, uh . . .” She rubbed her temples with her thumb and fingers. “The mastermind behind the Defenders’ strategy and tactics, the whole reason they’ve gotten this far—”
“Yes?” Larkin goaded eagerly.
“It’s Kastor,” she pushed out. “Kastor of Eagle. I saw him.”
“What?” Larkin exclaimed. “Are you sure it was him?”
“Positive,” she said, feeling a sickening knot twist in her stomach. “He was fighting with the Defenders, dressed as one of them, but it was him. I saw his face. I saw his blazer.”
“Are you still at the OCSS?” Larkin asked. “If you’re asking, youhave my permission to kill him.”
“I—I tried,” Cristiana let out a ragged sigh. The knot in her stomach tightened. “We blasted into the facility, killed a few Defenders, but Kastor found us. He killed one of my warriors. I pulled back.”
“Youpulled back?” Larkin repeated, voice betraying utter shock. “Why didn’t you kill him?”
“You didn’t see him, Larkin. He’s fast, he’s strong. He could’ve killed half my men or more. Plus, I didn’t know how many Defenders were in there. They could’ve overwhelmed us.”
“Excuses, Cristiana? You’re better than that, dammit.” Larkin let out a heavy sigh. “You’ve already left the OCSS premises?”
“Yes,” Cristiana said, covering her eyes with her hand, ashamed.
“He will have called for reinforcements,” Larkin said. “Defenders will be crawling all over that area in a few minutes. Get back to the Temple Mount. The Terrans are pulling back and—”
Cristiana looked up in the sky as the shrill shriek changed to a different sound—a crackling in the sky, followed by a fiery fizzle. Fireballs formed high above the clouds, breaking apart into pieces in an umbrella pattern on their way down. The earth-shaking explosions had stopped. Cristiana remembered the Bastion.
“Dammit!” Larkin exclaimed. “They’re using the Bastion! They gained control of it! Are you fucking proud of this, Cristiana?”
She ground her teeth. “No, of course not.”
Her warriors stirred, sensing danger nearby.
“Down the street!” one of them shouted.
Everyone moved to cover or battle-ready stances as a handful of armed men and women rushed toward them down the narrow, winding lane. Both sides opened fire simultaneously. The few autos scattered across the street became riddled with holes as bullets whizzed past and plowed into them.
“Get back to the Temple Mount!” Larkin commanded.
“On our way.”
Cristiana cut off the comm connection and pulled around the Terran combat rifle hanging at her back. She may have had had pity on Kastor, but she felt no such thing for these rebels.
Chapter Sixty-Four
Siraj and several of his team captains had gathered with Kastor and Qasim in the storage basement under a cafe in the Old City. Kastor stood, arms crossed, over a table set amidst the stacks of boxes and plastic crates filled with various equipment. He stared at the creased, paper map unfolded on the table, but his mind kept returning to the conversation with Cristiana. It surprised him to even be alive right now, as if he was living in some alternate reality.
Why had she let him live? Would he have done the same for her were the roles reversed? He couldn’t help but think that, if it had been him commanding a team of warriors and her standing alone in defiance, she would be dead right now. Perhaps that was why he couldn’t shake the sense that he shouldn’t be alive.
On the other side of the room, lit dimly by a few hanging, bare bulbs, Qasim sat in a fold-out chair at a fold-out table working on a laptop. The master keychip, which apparently allowed him to control the Bastion remotely, was plugged into the side.
In the next room over, wounded Defenders moaned as two overworked medics bounced between pallets, treating bullet wounds and burns and shrapnel-mangled limbs. Their supplies had run dry, though, Kastor could tell. They reached in their backpacks, rifled through them, but wound up simply wrapping the wounds, giving the patient a painkiller shot with a used needle, and moving on.
Siraj stepped over to the table and planted his fists on the map. He let out a prolonged, weary sigh. The puffy bags under his eyes conveyed utter exhaustion and distress. For a while, neither spoke, just stared at the map, both their minds in faraway places.
Finally, Siraj drew in a quick breath through his nostrils.
“The good news . . .” He glanced back at Qasim. “The Bastion’s under our control. Our forces have completely surrounded and cut off the Temple Mount from the Lion Gate—” He pointed at a spot on the eastern wall of the Old City, and his finger ran along an avenue running west. “Along Sha’ar HaArayot to the Church of Saint Mary, and then south down El Wad to the Western Wall, where there’s still some fighting in the courtyard and the autobus stop.”
Kastor nodded. “And the bad news?”
Siraj’s eyebrows twitched up. “Too much to list.” He raked his fingers through his dark hair and sniffed. “The Defenders of Glory are spent. Two-thirds of our regional forces have been decimated.” His solemn eyes flicked up to Kastor. “About thirty thousand fighters. Either dead or wounded or missing.”
“You have more outside Jerusalem, yes?”
Siraj gave a slow nod. “Yes. Fifteen thousand in Tel-Aviv. Another ten in Beirut. More in Aleppo and Mosul, but none of them can get to us. We may have the Temple Mount surrounded, but the Confed has us surrounded, too. And taking the Mount won’t be easy. It’s practically a fortress. They’ve got snipers in two minarets, barricades all around the north and west, multiple sand bag walls, probably over a thousand fresh troops in there.” The lines in his cheeks and forehead ran deep. In a quieter voice, eyes down, he muttered, “I never imagined it would get this bad.”
“Overthrowing one-world governments isn’t terribly easy,” Kastor replied, then examined the map again, studying their positions. He thought through what assets they had left. �
��I think we have some rockets left. We’ll blow the tops off the minarets to start, use the rest hitting their strong points on the Mount.”
“Nothing near the Dome or the Mosque,” Siraj demanded. “And no explosives in the courtyard around the Western Wall.”
Kastor stared at him, thinking about it. The Terrans would realize the Defenders wouldn’t target those buildings and would thus cram as many troops inside them as possible. But Kastor saw no use fighting it. He doubted the rocket teams would obey his orders if he told them to fire at the Dome of Mosque.
“Fine,” Kastor consented. “Only at their strong points away from the holy buildings.”
“Don’t hit the shrines either,” Siraj added.
Kastor arched an eyebrow. “Shrines?”
“Yes,” Siraj said. “There are shrines by the Dome of the Rock. They shouldn’t be harmed either.”
Kastor rolled his eyes, then punched his finger over the light gray Temple Mount square on the map. “We’re going tohave to do some damage to take this hill. Alright? Get used to that idea.”
Siraj straightened, offended by the unbeliever’s insolence, apparently.
“Do you have any idea the importance of these buildings?” he asked in an exasperated tone. “These stones? The very ground on which they sit? You wouldn’t. Our history, our religion, our faith—you share none of those with us. You come here from ten thousand lightyears away, insinuate yourself into our world, our war. You don’t respect our cause. Our lives. Our holy places. You don’t respect anything about us. So why do you fight for us? Hm?”
His rant had garnered the attention of everyone in the room—a group of team captains, Qasim and his techs, the guards posted at the stairwell leading up to the street. Let them listen. Kastor didn’t care if they heard. These weren’t his people. They knew that. He knew that. He saw no point in trying to mitigate his relationship to them. And yet, he still needed to lead them to victory. He needed them on his side, at least for a little while longer.
Horns of the Ram (Dominion Book 2) Page 29
