by Ted Dekker
“Hello, Thomas.”
Justin’s kind eyes flashed, not with reflected light, but with their own brilliance. Thomas thought he should fall to his knees. He was surprised the others hadn’t dropped already. They, like him, had been immobilized by Justin’s sudden appearance.
“I’ve been watching you, my friend. What I see makes me proud.”
Thomas opened his mouth, but nothing came out.
“I’ve shared my mind with you,” Justin said. “I’ve given my body for you.” His mouth twisted into a grin and he spoke each word clearly. “Now I will show you my heart,” he said. “I will show you my love.”
Thomas felt each word hit his chest, as if they were soft objects flung through the air, impacting one at a time. Now I will show you my heart. My love.
Thomas turned his head toward the others. They stared at him, not comprehending. Surely they saw! Surely they heard.
“This is for you, Thomas,” Justin said. “Only you.”
Thomas looked back at—
Justin was gone!
The morning air felt heavy.
“Thomas!”
Thomas turned back toward the camp in time to see Mikil rushing around the cliff. She pulled up and stared at him, face white.
“What is it?” he asked absently, mind still split.
“I’m . . . I think I know something about Kara,” she said.
“Kara? Who’s Kara?”
But as soon as he asked, he remembered. His sister. From the histories.
3
WOREF SWUNG his leg over the stallion and dropped to the sand. Behind him, a hundred of his best soldiers waited on horses that stamped and occasionally snorted in the cool morning air. They’d approached the firelit sky last night, camped at the edge of the Southern Forest, and risen while it was still dark. This could be the day that marked the beginning of the end for the albinos.
The lieutenant who’d first located this camp had never been wrong— once again he hadn’t disappointed. Still, they’d been in similar situations a dozen times, the albinos within reach, only to return home empty-handed. The Circle didn’t fight, but they had perfected the art of evasion.
Woref stared at the canyons ahead. The blue smoke of burning horse manure was unmistakable. Soren had reported a small oasis south of the camp—roughly a hundred trees around one of the poisonous red pools— but the albinos were too smart to use any wood unless it was already fallen. Instead they used recycled fuel, as a Scab would. They’d adapted to the desert well with Martyn’s help. Johan’s help.
Woref ’s dreadlocks hung heavy on his head, and he rolled his neck to clear one from his face. Truth be told, he’d never liked Martyn. His defection was appropriate. Better, it had opened the way for Woref ’s own promotion. Now he was the hunter and Martyn the prey, along with Thomas. The reward for their heads was a heady prospect.
“Show me their retreat paths,” he said.
Soren dropped to one knee and drew in the sand. “The canyon looks like a box, but there are two exits, here and here. One leads to the pool, here; the other to the open desert.”
“How many women and children?”
“Twenty or thirty. Roughly half.”
“And you’re sure that Thomas is among the men?”
“Yes sir. I will stake my life on it.”
Woref grunted. “You may regret it. Qurong’s losing his patience.”
A thousand or so dissidents sworn to nonviolence didn’t present a threat to the Horde, but the number of defections from the Horde to the Circle was water on Qurong’s flaky skin. He was adamant about preempting any deterioration in his power base. Thomas of Hunter had defeated him one too many times in battle to take any chances.
“As are we.” Soren dipped his head then added, “Sir.”
Woref spit to one side. The whole army knew that Thomas of Hunter’s head wasn’t the only head at stake here. What they didn’t know was that Qurong’s own daughter, Chelise, was also at stake.
The supreme leader had long ago promised to allow his daughter to marry once the Horde captured the forests, but he had changed his mind when Thomas escaped. As long as Thomas of Hunter was free to lead a rebellion, Chelise would remain single. At the outset of this campaign, he’d secretly sworn his daughter’s hand to Woref, pending the capture of Thomas.
At times Woref wondered if Qurong was only protecting his daughter, who’d made it clear that she wasn’t interested in marrying any general, including Woref. Her dismissal only fueled Woref ’s desire. If Qurong refused him this time, he would kill the leader and take Chelise by force.
“They have no intelligence of our approach?” he asked.
“No sign of it. I can’t recall an opportunity as promising as this.”
“Send twenty to cover each escape route. Death to the man who alerts them before we are ready. We attack in twenty minutes. Go.”
Soren ran back and quietly leveled his orders.
Woref squeezed his fingers into fists and relaxed them. He missed the days when the Forest Guard fought like men. Their fearless leader had turned into a mouse. One loud word and he would scamper for the rocks, where the Horde had little chance of ferreting him out. The albinos were still much quicker than Scabs.
Woref had watched the battle at the Natalga Gap, when Thomas had rained fire down on them with the thunder he called bombs. None had been used since, but that would change once they had Thomas in chains. The battle leading up to that crushing defeat had been the best kind. Thousands had died on both sides. Granted, many more thousands of the Horde than the Forest Guard, but they had Thomas on his heels before the cliffs had crushed the Horde.
Woref had killed eight of the Guard that day. He could still remember each blow, severing flesh and bone. The smell of blood. The cries of pain. The white eyes of terror. Killing. There was no experience that even closely compared.
His orders were to bring Thomas in alive, in part because of information the rogue leader could offer, in part because Qurong meant to make an example of him. But if given the excuse, Woref would kill the man. Thomas was responsible for his loneliness these last thirteen months— these past three years, in fact, ever since Chelise had grown into the woman she was, tempting any whole-blooded man with her leveled chin and long flowing hair and flashing gray eyes. He’d known that she would be his. But he hadn’t expected such a delay.
He’d objected bitterly to Qurong’s decision to delay her marriage after the drowning of Justin. If Martyn had still been with them, Woref ’s indiscretion that night might have cost him his life. But in the confusion of such wholesale change, Qurong needed a strong hand to keep the peace. Woref had assumed Martyn’s place and performed without fault. There wasn’t a Scab alive who didn’t fear his name.
“Sir?”
Soren stepped up to him, but Woref didn’t acknowledge him. He suppressed a flash of anger. Did I say come? No, but you came anyway. One day no one will dare approach me without permission.
“They’ve gone, as you ordered.”
Woref walked back to his horse, lifted his boot into the stirrup, paused to let the pain in his joints pass, then mounted. The albinos claimed not to have any pain. It was a lie.
“Tell the men that we will execute one of them for every albino who escapes,” he said.
“And how many of the albinos do we kill?”
“Only as many as it takes to capture Thomas. They’re more useful alive.”
4
“YOUR SISTER,” Mikil said. “Kara.”
Mikil felt her knees weaken. They stood deadlocked, stares unbroken. The others were looking at both of them as if they’d gone crazy.
“I . . .” Thomas finally stammered. “Is that possible? I . . . I haven’t dreamed for thirteen months.”
She’d awakened in her tent with the certain knowledge that she wasn’t entirely herself. Her mind was full of thoughts beyond those she would ordinarily entertain. In fact, she was considering the strange possibility that sh
e was Thomas of Hunter’s sister. Kara.
The moment she considered the possibility, her mind seemed to embrace it. The more she embraced it, the more she remembered Thomas’s dreams, and more, Rachelle’s dreams. As a woman named Monique.
Then she knew the truth. Kara of Hunter had made a connection with her. Details seeped into her mind. Thomas’s sister, who’d just fallen asleep in Dr. Bancroft’s laboratory, was dreaming as if she were Mikil at this very moment. Mikil’s own husband, Jamous, lay asleep beside her. She had no children. She was well liked if a bit stiff-necked on occasion. She was Thomas’s “right-hand man.”
But she was also privy to Kara’s situation in the histories. She had Mikil’s memories and Kara’s memories at once. She was technically Mikil—that much was obvious—but she was suddenly feeling nearly as much like Kara.
So Kara had joined her brother in his dreams—at least that was how she thought of it. Now Kara stood gaping at a spitting image of her own brother plus about fifteen years. He wore a sleeveless tunic that accentuated bulging biceps. Below, a short leather skirt that hung midthigh over a well-worn beige tunic. His boots were strapped up high over well-defined calves. The man before her had to be twice as strong as her brother.
“Wow,” she said. “You’re quite the stud.”
Stud? Where had that word come from? Kara.
“A horse?” William said. “You insult him?”
“No, she means something else,” Thomas said. “My friends, I would like to introduce you to my sister from my dream world. There, her name is Kara.”
William’s left eyebrow arched high. “She looks like Mikil to me.”
“Yes, but evidently Mikil’s brought Kara for a visit.”
“Surely you can’t be serious,” William scoffed.
Mikil grinned. “More serious than you imagine. How else would I know to call him a stud? In the histories it means ‘strong,’ among other things. Kara’s never seen him in this state, and she’s surprised by just how strong our Thomas is compared to her brother, who looks the same, less about fifteen years and forty pounds of muscle.”
Mikil nearly laughed out loud at the twists in her mind. She felt like both women at once—an exhilarating experience, to say the least.
To Thomas: “Can I speak with you in private? Just a moment.”
They stepped to the side and she spoke in a whisper. “You haven’t dreamed for thirteen months, you said. Do you know why?”
By his frown, he seemed to be second-guessing his initial conclusion that Kara was dreaming through Mikil. “Where did we grow up?”
“Manila,” she said.
“Where does our mother live?”
“New York. Satisfied?”
Slowly a smile crossed his face. “So you’re alive, then. The virus didn’t kill you?”
“Not yet. We still have ten days to go. You were killed in France by Carlos two, maybe three, days ago. And now Monique’s missing as well.”
He stared at her, mind grappling with her information.
“Rachelle was killed thirteen months ago by the Horde,” he said.
“I know. I’m Mikil. And Kara’s sorry . . . terribly sorry.”
“So you’re saying that thirteen months have passed here but only a couple of days there?” he asked.
“Evidently. And you’re saying that you haven’t dreamed of Thomas in France in all this time?”
“The last dream I had of Thomas was falling asleep next to Monique.”
“Where you were shot by Carlos,” Mikil said.
His eyes widened. “Then I was right! I fell from my horse here. I was killed, but Justin healed me through Rachelle.”
“But you’re not alive in France?” she asked. “When you were brought back before, you came back to life in both realities.”
“No. I never died before. I was healed instantly, before I actually died. Both times at the lake. This time I was dead for hours before Rachelle found me.”
The exchange stalled.
“By the Hordes who pursue us, what is all this nonsense?” Ronin demanded. They were obviously being overheard.
William grinned. “It’s our fearless leader’s dream world. Apparently Mikil has joined the game.”
Mikil ignored them. “Then you are dead in France, aren’t you?”
“I must be.”
“But you’ve only been dead for a couple days. Maybe three.”
“So it would seem. And Monique’s missing because she died when Rachelle died. She was connected with Rachelle the way you are with Mikil. I haven’t dreamed because there’s nothing for me to dream.”
“And I’m here to bring you back,” Mikil said.
Thomas set his jaw. “I can’t go back. I don’t want to go back. I’m dead there! I’m better off thinking that the histories were a dream.”
“I’m no dream. My knowledge of our childhood in the Philippines is nothing like a dream.” She shoved out her arm and showed him the cut. “Is this cut a dream? The Raison Strain is only days from showing its first real teeth, France has just fired a nuke at Israel, the world is about to die, and the best I can figure it, you’re the only man alive who can stop any of it. Don’t tell me it’s a dream.”
He looked at her skeptically.
“It’s been thirteen months—you’ve lost your edge,” she said. “But as you said yourself, you died here when Thomas was killed in France. So now that I’m linked with Mikil, will she also die when the virus kills me in ten days?”
The lights were starting to fire in his mind. She pushed.
“I—Mikil, that is—was wrong to doubt you. The world depends on—”
“Then the world is depending on a dead man,” he said.
“This is utter nonsense!” William said. “There are more important matters to deal with than this game. You’ve lost your mind along with him, Mikil. Now, I would like the blessing of this council to take my tribe deep into the desert to form our own faction of the Circle. That is why I’ve come, not to reminisce about your dreams.”
Mikil and Thomas closed ranks with the group.
“You forget so quickly, William?” Thomas said. “How do you think I made the bombs that blew the Horde back to hell? Was that my magic? No, that was information I learned from the histories.”
“Yes, your memories of the Books of Histories, recalled in some trance or dream; I can accept that, however unlikely it sounds. But this nonsense of saving people in history . . . please! It’s laughable!”
“You’ve always doubted me, William. Always. I can see now that you always will. Even Justin talked about the blank Book . . .”
Thomas stopped.
Mikil recalled Justin’s words to them in the desert thirteen months earlier. She said what Thomas was thinking. “Justin said the blank Book of History created history. But only in the histories. What could that have meant?”
“We’ve never known,” Thomas said. “Never had a reason to care much about the histories since . . .” He looked at Mikil with wide eyes. “Only a couple of days, you say?”
“Believe me, the histories are real. And if you don’t care about them because you’ve gone and died in France, you should care about them because Kara is still alive.”
Thomas studied her. He turned to Ronin. “You have the Book?”
“Which Book?”
“The blank Book. This Book that supposedly only works in the histories.”
Ronin hesitated, then pulled out a second Book wrapped in canvas. He extracted it from the packaging. He ran a hand over the cover. The title was embossed in a corroded gold foil. The Story of History.
“How would a history book make history?” Mikil asked, walking up next to Thomas.
“You’re saying that this Book has power in another dimension that is called ‘the histories’?” Jeremiah asked. “How is that possible?”
Thomas hurried toward Ronin, suddenly eager. “May I?”
Ronin handed him the Book.
“Could it be
?”
“Nonsense,” Jeremiah said.
“You said it yourself,” Thomas said. “The analogies and metaphors. The stories,” he said, his fingers tracing the title. “They’re real. Words become flesh and dwell among us. Isn’t that how the Beloved’s Book begins?”
Thomas opened the Book. Plain parchment. No words. Thomas’s eyes met Mikil’s, wide with wonder.
She looked at the Book again. “Do you think . . .” But she couldn’t say what she was thinking. How was it possible?
“This is the most outlandish thing I’ve heard,” William said. “You expect us to believe that if you write in that Book, something will actually happen, based on the words alone?”
“Why not?” Thomas said.
“Because the whole notion of the word becoming flesh is a metaphor, as you said. Justin was not some scribbling in a book. You’re crossing a line here.”
“You’re wrong,” Thomas told him. Then to Mikil, “Where Kara and I come from, no one is required to dive into a pool of red water and drown to follow Justin. They are simply required to die metaphorically.” He looked at Kara. “They take up their crosses, so to speak. Tell them, Kara.”
She was making the connections as quickly as he was. Neither of them had been practicing Christians, but they’d grown up with a chaplain for a father. They knew the basics of Christianity well enough.
“‘Take up your cross and follow me,’ Jesus said. He was executed on a cross, as were many of his followers later. But his followers aren’t required to die in that fashion.”
“Exactly,” Thomas said. “Yet here our following isn’t metaphorical at all. The same could be said about evil. There the people don’t wear a disease on their skin—it’s said to be in their hearts. But look at the Scabs. Their refusal to follow Justin in drowning shows up as a physical disease.”
William seemed somewhat stunned by this revelation. He glanced at the others, then back at Thomas. “So now you think this Book, which is from here where metaphors express themselves literally, might do the same in this dream world of yours?”
