Circle Series 4-in-1

by Ted Dekker

The leader lifted an eyebrow. “She will be yours when you marry. What else could you want?”

  I want to teach her who her master is, Woref wanted to say. I want to break a bone or two so that she never forgets who I am.

  Instead he bowed his head. “I want her hand in marriage without any further restrictions.”

  Qurong faced the railing and looked south again. “Agreed. Your plan?”

  “We still have the albino we took captive two months ago in the deep dungeons. Set him free to find the albinos with a message that if Thomas doesn’t turn himself in within three days’ time, Qurong, supreme leader of the Horde, will drown his daughter, Chelise, for treason against the throne.”

  Qurong glanced at him, but only for a moment. “Thomas of Hunter would never be such a fool. Even if he was, I could never drown my own daughter.”

  “You won’t have to. If I’m right, Thomas will return. That will be my proof.”

  “You’re not thinking straight. He would never risk his life for a woman he hardly knows.”

  “Unless she has seduced him.”

  The supreme leader glared.

  “Then test me,” Woref said.

  “And if he doesn’t come?”

  “Then you will sign her death over to me. I will take her as a wife and forgive her in my own way. If I betray my word, then you may kill me yourself.”

  Qurong looked thoughtful for the first time since Woref had made the suggestion. “So even if you’re wrong, you end up with my daughter? What’s at stake for you?”

  “My honor! If I’m wrong, my honor will be restored by my marriage to Chelise. If I’m right, my honor will be restored by the death of Thomas.”

  “What if Thomas never receives the message?”

  “We’ll send one warrior with the albino to return with his answer. At the same time we will conduct the single largest hunt for the tribe that escaped us in the Southern Forest. The tribe is without Thomas and Martyn and other leaders and will be vulnerable.”

  “Unless Thomas returns to them.”

  “He won’t. Not if I’m right.”

  Qurong mulled the plan over in his mind, but the lights were already flashing in his eyes.

  “They were touching when you saw them in the library?”

  Woref spit over the railing. “I saw them.”

  Qurong grunted. “She always was headstrong. We will keep this quiet. You have your agreement. I’m not sure whether to pray that you’re right or that you’re wrong. Either way you seem to win.”

  “I’ve lost already,” Woref said. “I saw what no man should ever have to see.”

  The route they’d been forced to travel had slowed them through the day. Not so long ago, sight of the desert had always filled Thomas with an uneasiness. This was where battles were fought and men killed. This was where the enemy lived. Justin’s drowning had reversed their roles, and the desert had become their home.

  But as Thomas led the group of eight out of the forest along the lip of the same canyon where they’d once trapped and slaughtered forty thousand of the Horde, he felt the same underlying dread he’d once felt leaving the trees.

  He stopped his horse by a catapult that had been torched by the Horde. This was the first time since the great battle of the Natalga Gap that he’d revisited the scene. Tufts of grass now grew on the ledge where black powder had blasted huge chunks of the cliff into the canyon below, crushing Scabs like ants.

  Johan nudged his mount to the lip and gazed at the canyon floor. He hadn’t led the Horde army that day, but their attack had been his plan.

  Thomas eased up next to him. The rubble was still piled high. Birds and animals had long ago picked the dead clean where they could dislodge the battle armor. From this vantage point, the remains of the Horde army looked like a dumping ground for armory, scattered by strong winds and faded by the sun.

  “Thank goodness the Horde hasn’t figured out how to make black powder,” Johan said.

  “They’ve been trying. They know the ingredients, but besides me, only William and Mikil know the proportions. Give them a few more months—they’ll stumble on it eventually.”

  The others had pulled close to the lip and were peering over. Thomas looked back at the forest, nearly a mile behind them now. It appeared dark in the sinking sun, an appropriate contrast to the red canyon lands that butted up against it. The black Horde holed up in their prison while the Circle roamed free in their sea of red.

  But something deep in the black forest called to him. An image of Chelise drifted through his mind. Her white face and gray eyes, gazing longingly at the Books of Histories. He had only shrugged when the others questioned him about his prolonged silence during the flight from the Horde city—he wasn’t sure why he felt so miserable himself. They were thinking he was sober over his use of force, and he had half-convinced himself that they were right.

  Still, he knew it was more. He knew it was Chelise.

  Thomas turned his horse from the canyon and walked it slowly along the rocky plateau. The others talked quietly, reminiscing, but another horse followed him—Mikil probably. Kara. They had work to do.

  “So there’s no doubting now, Kara,” he said. “Which is more real to you? Here or there?”

  “I wouldn’t know.” He turned. It was Suzan. She glanced at the forest.

  “I thought you were Mikil.”

  “You’re distracted. It’s more than the escape, isn’t it?”

  “Why would you say that?”

  “Because I was the one who suggested it in the first place. I think it worked.”

  “It was a good plan. Maybe I should give you command over one of our divisions.” He grinned. But he knew she wasn’t talking about the plan.

  “I’m not talking about keeping us alive. I’m talking about winning the trust of Chelise.”

  “Yes, well, that was good too.”

  “I think maybe she won your trust as well.”

  He looked at Suzan in the waning light. Her darker skin was smooth and rich. He knew several who’d courted her without success. She was both cautious and wise. There was no fooling her. Suzan would make any man a stunning wife.

  “Maybe,” he said.

  “I want you to know that I don’t think it’s a bad thing.”

  “Trust is one thing, Suzan,” he said quietly, not entirely sure why he was telling her this. “Anything more smacks of sacrilege. I would never go there. You understand that, don’t you?”

  She waited for a moment. “Of course.”

  “Justin calls the Horde, and so we do as well. You could call it love. But an albino such as myself and a Horde woman . . .”

  “Impossible.”

  “Disgusting.”

  “I don’t know how you put up with the smell in the library for three days,” she agreed.

  “It was horrible.”

  “Horrible.”

  “Where are we camping?” Mikil asked, trotting up behind.

  “In the canyon,” Thomas said. “In one of the protected alcoves, away from the bodies. The Horde will steer clear of their dead.”

  “Then we should go. We have to bring Johan up to speed and get back.”

  No campfire. No warm clothes. No bedrolls other than the three brought by Mikil, Jamous, and Johan. Only sand.

  Thomas shivered and tried to focus on the next task at hand. Johan.

  They sat in a circle of eight, but the conversation was among the three who spoke of dreams. The others listened with a mixture of fascination and, he suspected, some incredulity. The fact that Mikil had known precisely where Thomas was kept them all from expressing their lingering reservation.

  It was rather like the drowning—only the experience itself could ultimately turn one into a believer.

  Johan stood and paced the perimeter. “Let me summarize this for you, Mikil, so that you can hear just how . . . unique it is. You’re saying that if I cut myself and Thomas cuts himself, and we fall asleep with our blood mixed, that I will share hi
s dreams.”

  “Not his dreams,” Mikil said. “His dream world.”

  “Whatever. His dream world, then. I will hopefully wake up as a man named Carlos because he’s made some connection with me earlier, and he thinks he may be me.”

  “Something like that,” Thomas said. “We’re not saying we know how it works exactly. But you know that Kara and Mikil had the same experience. For all we know, all of us could have the same experience. For some reason, I am the link to another reality. Another dimension. I’m the only gateway that we know of. If I don’t dream, no one dreams. Only life, skill, and knowledge are transferable. Which is what happened to the blank Book.”

  “It disappeared into your dream world because Mikil wrote in it,” Johan said.

  “Yes. And if I’m right, the rest of the blank Books went with it.”

  “You saw them there?”

  “No, only the one that I can be sure of. It’s a hunch.”

  Johan sighed.

  “Please, Johan,” Mikil said. “Our future may depend on you. You have to do this.”

  “I’m not saying I won’t. If you insist, I’d let you use a pint of my blood. But that doesn’t mean I have to believe.”

  “You will believe, trust me,” Thomas said. “Now sit. There’s more.”

  Johan glanced around at the others, then seated himself.

  They had to be careful what they told Johan about the situation in Washington. He might accidentally plant knowledge in Carlos’s mind. And they couldn’t risk tipping their hand in the event Carlos refused to play along.

  Thomas leaned forward. “When you wake as Carlos, you will be disoriented. Confused. Distracted by what’s happening to you. But you have to pay attention and come back with as much information as you can about the virus, Svensson, Fortier—anything and everything to do with their plans. Above all, the antivirus. Remember that.”

  “Who are these people?”

  Thomas waved a hand. “Forget that. The minute you’re Carlos, you’ll know who they are. But when you wake up back here, you may forget details you knew as Carlos. So concentrate on the antivirus. Are you clear?”

  “The antivirus.”

  “And while you’re there, see if he knows who has the blank Book of History. One of his guards took it. Clear?”

  “The blank Book of History.”

  “Good. In addition, there are two primary pieces of information we need you to plant in Carlos’s mind. Our objective is to turn him, but short of that we need him to believe two things.”

  “Okay. I think I can handle two things.”

  24

  FOR A moment that stretched long into the next, Carlos lay in the attic. Far below was the basement from which Thomas (and Monique) had escaped only days ago, after telling Carlos that he was connected to another man beyond this world—the one who was bleeding from his neck. That was him, Johan.

  Carlos touched his neck. Wet. He pulled his fingers back. Sweat, not blood.

  Of course there’s no blood, Johan thought. That was thirteen months ago. But here in this world it was only a week ago. I’m in the dream that Thomas told me about! Does Carlos realize that I’m here? Johan sat up.

  Carlos knew immediately that something had changed, but he couldn’t define that change. He felt unnerved. He was sweating. A distant voice warned him of danger, but he couldn’t hear the voice. Intuition.

  Or was it more? His mother’s whispers of mysticism had come alive to him these last few weeks. Thomas Hunter had found a way to tap the unseen. He’d lain dead on the cot for two days before apparently throwing off the sheet and climbing the stairs to the main level. True, a doctor hadn’t confirmed his death, as Fortier had pointed out. There were stranger examples of near death. But Carlos dismissed the Frenchman’s agnostic analysis. Hunter had been dead.

  He looked around the room. And now he was here?

  No, Johan thought. It’s not Carlos; it’s me. And although I know his thoughts, he doesn’t necessarily know mine, at least not yet. Carlos isn’t the one dreaming. I am. It’s just like Thomas said it would be.

  Why Carlos? Because Carlos believed that there was a unique connection between them, although not enough belief to wake Carlos up to the fact that Johan was present, as in the case of Mikil and Kara.

  And the man had a week-old cut on his neck to prove it. The same cut that Johan had received from Thomas thirteen months ago in the amphitheater when Justin had exposed him. Mind-bending. But real. As real as Thomas and Mikil had promised it would be.

  He was in the histories at this very moment. How, he couldn’t imagine— some kind of time warp or spatial distortion, whatever Mikil could possibly mean by that. More importantly, according to Thomas, he could affect history by depositing thoughts into Carlos’s mind and by learning his intentions. Two things, Thomas had insisted. Convince him of these two things, learn what you can, and then get out.

  Carlos had a sense of déjà vu. Something familiar resided in his mind, but he couldn’t shake it loose to examine it properly. He stood and walked to the dresser. He mopped his face with a handkerchief. His breathing felt ragged and his face hot.

  This is how you will feel when Fortier slips poison in your drink after he’s used you like an animal—sooner than you think.

  The thought caught him off guard. Naturally, he had some reason to distrust Fortier. Hunter had suggested as much himself. The moment Carlos had the antivirus, he would take the necessary steps to protect himself. He’d already told Fortier that Hunter had claimed a coup would come on the heels of the virus. They couldn’t possibly know that the coup would be orchestrated by Carlos himself. But he was powerless until he had the antivirus.

  Now he was thinking that waiting so long might be a problem.

  Why will Fortier let anyone even capable of a coup live long enough to conduct it? You have a day, maybe two; then he will snuff you out.

  A chill flashed down his spine as the thought worked its way into his mind, not because this simple suggestion was new or even surprising, but because he suddenly knew it was true. Fortier might even do away with Svensson. His grip on this newfound power would last only as long as opportunity to strike back eluded his many new enemies. Fortier would isolate himself for protection. He would burn his bridges behind him.

  It was all just a theory, of course, but Carlos was suddenly sure he’d stumbled onto something he could no longer ignore.

  A day’s stubble darkened his chin. He splashed cologne in his hands and patted his cheeks. A shower would have been part of his normal morning routine. This wasn’t a desert camp in Syria.

  Another thought occurred to him: he had to meet Fortier. Now. Immediately.

  Exactly why, he wasn’t so sure.

  Yes, he was sure. He had to test the man. Feel him out without sounding obvious. Fortier was leaving for the city this morning.

  Carlos stepped to the closet, pulled a beige silk shirt off the hanger, and slipped into it. He lifted the radio from his dresser.

  “Perimeter check.”

  A slight pause. Static.

  Then the guards in place around the compound started calling off their status. “One clear.” “Two clear.” “Three clear.” “Four clear” . . . The check ended at eleven.

  Satisfied, Carlos checked his reflection one last time in the mirror and exited the loft. Three flights to the basement. Down the long hall. He entered the security code, heard the bolts disengage, and stepped into the large secure room.

  A conference table ringed by ten white chairs sat on rich green carpet. The monitors along the south wall were fed by a dozen antennas, only one of which was located on this building. Most were many miles away. Fortier had spared no expense in cloaking the compound’s signature. It no longer mattered—the facility was already compromised by Monique and now Thomas. This was Fortier’s last visit.

  No sign of the Frenchman.

  An intercom behind Carlos came to life. “Carlos, please join me in the map room.”

/>   He knew. He always knew.

  And he might even take care of you now.

  Carlos shrugged off the thought and walked to the third door on his left. Why did this Frenchman unnerve him so easily? He was simply one man, and he possessed half the killing skills Carlos did.

  Which guard took the Book?

  What on earth was that? What book? Had a guard taken the log book—if so, he couldn’t remember being told about it.

  He shook his head and stepped into the room, closing the door behind him. There were three others in the room besides Fortier. Military strategists. As Carlos understood it, they would all be gone today.

  Fortier turned from a wall of maps that showed the exact location of each nuclear power’s arsenal, inbound to France. Several had already off-loaded—the Chinese and the Russians were nearly intact on French soil now. The British and the Israelis had followed the United States’ lead by offering their arsenals in exchange for the antivirus. There was to be a massive showdown on the Atlantic off France’s coast. But the terms of the exchange only ensured that Fortier would get what he wanted.

  The weapons.

  “Please leave us,” Fortier said to the others.

  They glanced at Carlos and left the room without comment.

  “Carlos,” Fortier said, wearing a slight grin. He clasped his hands behind his back and faced the maps. “So close, yet so far.”

  “I would say you have them in a corner, sir,” Carlos said.

  “Perhaps. Have you ever known the Israelis to allow themselves into a corner?”

  From the beginning, the destruction of Israel had been Carlos’s primary concern. Fortier looked back.

  “I don’t think they are allowing anything, sir. They are being forced. And in a week it won’t matter.”

  “Because in a week we will wipe them out, regardless of what happens in this exchange,” Fortier said. “Is that what you mean?”

  “Assuming that we take their weapons, yes.”

  “And what if we don’t take their weapons? What if they’re bluffing?”

  “Then we call their bluff and destroy them anyway. We have the weapons to do that.”