by Ted Dekker
She was right, but Chelise didn’t let the horse slow until she was nearly over the rim.
The sight that greeted her nearly stopped her heart. Marie was whispering harshly, throwing herself and her horse to the ground, but Chelise couldn’t do the same.
The depression was at least half a mile across, sinking twenty or thirty feet to dusty earth. A large ring of boulders circled the center, where a rectangular cube of stone stood in the graying dawn.
An altar. Wet with fresh blood.
But it was the bodies that struck terror into Chelise’s chest. Hundreds of dead bodies strewn about the altar. The putrid stench of the scabbing disease washed over her, crowding her taxed lungs.
No sign of Thomas. Nor of Samuel. Nor of her father.
“Down! For the love of Elyon—”
“They’re gone,” Chelise said. Then again, as if to convince herself, “They’re gone. We’re too late.”
“It could be a trap. There could be Throaters down there.”
“No.” Few knew the Horde’s ways like she did. None knew Qurong’s ways as well as Chelise. “No, Marie. No, but I see something more disturbing.”
She slapped her mare and rode the beast down the slope, into the depression, picking up speed as she approached the ring of boulders. Marie followed far to the rear. Only when she passed the long stones that reached for the sky did Chelise let the horse slow.
Here the smell was almost too much, a thick fog of invisible scabbing disease that covered her face like a muzzle. She held her breath and pushed on, scanning the scene for any trace of evidence that might give her hope.
The dark priest, Ba’al, dead. Charred stones or burned corpses, anything.
But no sign indicated that Elyon had had his way with these priests, and none of the bodies looked to be dressed in purple, the color that Ba’al would likely be wearing.
And no sign of Thomas or Samuel.
“Elyon have mercy on their souls,” Marie said, pulling her horse into a walk beside her. “They look like they’ve been through a meat grinder.”
Chelise stopped her horse five feet from a corpse and studied the carnage. “Suicide,” she said.
“They did this to themselves?”
“They cut their wrists and bled to appease Teeleh.”
“Their bodies are torn apart!”
“By Shataiki. You can see the claw marks on the flesh.”
Where are you, Thomas?
Chelise sat on the horse, struggling to remain calm in the face of her failure to reach them in time. She lifted her eyes to the far rim.
What have you done, Father?
“Then I would say this is a good sign,” Marie said.
“Good? The only thing good about this is that we don’t know for certain that my lover is dead. Nothing else is good.”
“This is my father we’re talking about,” Marie snapped. “If he’s not here, then he’s alive! And if he’s alive, then he’s doing what he thinks is right.”
“I don’t need you to tell me that he’s safe. The man he’s up against is my father, and you know nothing about him. Qurong may not be the craftiest fox in the forest, but he’s as stubborn as a bull and he follows his heart. I can promise you his heart despises my husband.”
Marie stared at the bloody altar. “Then why don’t you enlighten me? What happened here? Where is my father? And what do we do now?”
“A challenge happened here. Qurong agreed to Thomas’s terms, and Ba’al, that snake of his, brought two hundred priests as a gift for Teeleh. The Shataiki came, and Ba’al no doubt went mad for the beast. He either won the challenge and took Thomas with him, back to Qurongi, or . . .”
“Or he failed, and your father took my father anyway, as you predicted. Or Father won and fled when Qurong refused to keep his end.”
“Thomas would never kill Horde.”
“Did I say kill?”
“If my father planned to betray Thomas, he would have set a trap,” Chelise said. “Without the use of weapons, not even Thomas would be able to escape.”
“Unless there was a distraction.”
“Such as?”
“Such as Elyon.”
“Do you see any sign that Elyon was here?”
“What do we know about what evidence Elyon leaves behind?”
Either way, Thomas was gone. Qurong was gone. Chelise wasn’t eager to debate the comings and goings of Elyon.
She grunted and nudged her horse forward, dug her heels into its flank when it resisted her. She drove the mare over the bodies, slapping its rear hard to urge it closer to the altar. She became sick at the sight of so much blood, enough to feed a thousand of the beasts for a month. The trough around the base was full and overflowing.
At this very moment, Thomas could be in a spirited debate with Qurong, in chains headed for his dungeons. The thought was enough to fray her nerves. Not only was the man she loved more than her own life in terrible danger, but he was in the hands of Qurong, the only other grown man she would move heaven and earth to save.
“Thomas is with my father,” she announced. “And I belong with them. He needs me.”
“Who does, Thomas or Qurong?”
“Both. Johan should look for me in the dungeons if I don’t return in three days.”
“What are you talking about? We can’t go to Qurongi under these circumstances.”
“We’re not going. I am. You’re going back to the Gathering.”
“No. No, that is not acceptable! If you insist on going, I’m coming with you. This whole mission was my idea!”
“They need to know, Marie. The three thousand are gathered, waiting since Thomas dropped this hot coal in their laps. The rest are on the way.”
“Going in alone is suicide.”
“I know the Horde, child. You’re a half-breed who drowned before she knew what it felt like to be Horde. If anyone can get into Qurongi, I can.”
“You haven’t been with them for ten years.”
“Don’t argue with me! Turn your horse around and head back before the Shataiki decide to come back for the rotting flesh!”
They glared at each other for a full ten seconds before Marie broke her line of sight, but her face was still red. The thought of the long trek home alone was no doubt a factor.
“I have to do this, Marie.” Chelise was surprised to feel the strength of the knot that rose in her throat. How could she put this delicately? “Jake. He’s so young, so innocent . . .” Her eyes watered and she looked away. “Promise me.”
Marie didn’t answer immediately, and when she did, her voice was calm. “Don’t worry about Jake. He’s my brother, isn’t he? If anything happens, I’ll take care of him as if he were my own son.”
“Thank you.”
Chelise jerked her horse around and struck its flank with such force that it bolted away from the altar, over the dead carcasses. Headed south.
Headed directly toward Qurongi City.
16
THEY’D LOST the Throaters in the canyons to the north of Ba’al Bek, but not easily. This general, Cassak, seemed particularly adept at anticipating their moves. The Circle had always enjoyed the advantage of speed in the Horde’s constant game of seek-and-destroy. This edge was somewhat mitigated by the Horde’s dogged persistence and overwhelming size. Still, the Circle survived. But this general had eerily strong instincts.
Much like Ba’al, who had demonstrated an uncanny familiarity with parts of their legends. The horror Thomas felt at seeing his son on the altar had been replaced by curiosity about the dark priest’s prayer to Teeleh. His words about the books demanded more explanation.
They pounded through the sand, twisted through canyons, and urged their horses up steep inclines only to plunge down a cliff fifty yards farther, mindless of where they were going except to safety, away from the two dozen armed warriors who gave pursuit.
Still, the sound of hammering hooves followed them.
Still, the cries of Ba’al echoed t
hrough Thomas’s mind.
Then Samuel pulled his stallion to a standstill at the intersection of two large ravines, each cluttered with boulders the size of horses. He held his hand up to stop them all.
“What?” Mikil demanded. “Which way?”
He motioned silence with his finger and listened to the faint sounds of hooves. Scabbing disease stench clung to the dried blood that still covered Samuel’s hair, face, and body. The cloak he’d borrowed from a fallen Horde priest, along with the Scab sword he’d snatched from another, made him look Horde. Thomas preferred him half-naked and unarmed to this.
Ba’al’s cry whispered through his mind again. Send me back to the other world where you sent the chosen one through the lost books . . .
What could this possibly mean? Surely not back to the other world, as in back to the histories. How would Ba’al know of the other world?
The lost books must be the ones spoken about in legend. Could they be real? The mere thought that there was still a way back to the histories was enough to make Thomas’s blood run cold. Dreaming had long ago failed to take him anywhere but to a fantasy.
“They’re splitting,” Samuel said, lowering his hand. “Cutting us off to the west where the canyon opens to the desert. That would be our way back.”
“North would take us into Eramite country,” Mikil said, eyeing the long canyon to their right.
“And the Horde fear the Eramites.”
Thomas followed his son’s gaze. “Then north. You know this land?”
Samuel turned his horse without responding and spurred it into the long canyon. He hadn’t looked Thomas in the eyes once since he’d crawled off the altar. Thomas slapped his horse and followed with the others.
Samuel led them for fifteen minutes at a steady run before cutting right into a small ravine, climbing to the crest of a plateau, and stopping to listen again.
“We’ve lost them,” Mikil announced.
Samuel jerked his horse around in a tight circle. “For now. They know we will head west—there are only two routes through the canyons west.”
“So, they’ll lie and wait.”
Samuel shrugged. “This is Cassak, not just any Scab. Not since Martyn or Woref has there been a full-breed as crafty as this general.”
“Martyn was a half-breed,” Thomas corrected. Not that it mattered.
“Was he?” Samuel stared north. For the first time he turned his eyes on his father, and the look chilled Thomas. “And what would that make me?”
“My son,” Thomas said. “Purebred albino.”
“I don’t think so. I don’t think we even know how this so-called scabbing disease works. Do you?”
“Now isn’t the time to discuss doctrine.”
“No? This from a man who just put his son’s head on the chopping block to prove his doctrine.”
Thomas wanted to lash out at the boy, but he stayed in control of his words. “Samuel, I know what just happened doesn’t make sense to you now, but it will, and when it does, your life will never be the same.”
“You almost had me killed back there!”
“Elyon saved you back there!” So much for calm. “You have the audacity to sit here and challenge me after the one you doubt breathed new life into you?”
“I only know what I know, Father, and that isn’t much. I’m sick of all this guessing. Elyon did this, Elyon did that. Everything good is credited to this unseen God of yours, and everything remotely evil is blamed on Teeleh.”
“You didn’t see the Shataiki? You didn’t watch two hundred priests pour their blood on you in worship of that devil? You didn’t feel the green light lift you from the altar? What was that, my imagination?”
“Of course I saw something. But I no more understand it than you do. So Shataiki exist; did anyone say they didn’t? So there is power in the heavens to affect us all; does that mean we understand it? If it was so plain, then why put your son on an altar to prove your point?” His accusations cut deeply, in part because they carried so much truth. “If the truth is so obvious, wouldn’t the whole world easily see it?”
“Seal that loose mouth, boy!” Mikil snapped.
Thomas held up his hand. “Let him speak. He’s owed at least that much.”
Samuel walked his horse closer to Thomas, glaring. “That’s right, Father. After you refused to lift a hand to save me from their blades, the least you can do is let me say my piece. Well, I will.”
“This is not—”
“Mikil! He’s right.”
“Sir—”
“Speak, boy. Tell us all how little we know.”
Samuel hardly needed Thomas’s encouragement. “I’m not the one challenging you, Father. This Circle of yours is falling apart, not on account of me or the Horde. It’s splitting apart inside. The rumors and speculations have spawned a dozen different groups that claim to know the full truth, and you don’t even know what the truth is, isn’t that right?”
Yes, it was right.
Samuel thrust a finger into the air for emphasis. “Some say Elyon will arrive in the clouds before a time of great suffering.” He snapped a second finger into the air. “Others say he will only come after the time of great suffering.” Another finger. “Still others say in the middle. Some say Elyon doesn’t show his face the way he once did because the time of the supernatural is past. Others say he refuses to show himself to cold hearts.”
The splintering had been growing over the past several years, but not until now had it alarmed Thomas, thanks to Samuel and his severed Horde head.
Samuel dispensed with the finger counting and threw his arm wide in exasperation. “Then there are those who claim to have seen Elyon. Behind every bush, it would seem. But they call him out into the open and he never shows. Never. They’re a fanciful lot lost in delusional hope.”
“And what of you, Samuel? Where is your hope?”
Samuel plowed on. “Do you even know where the disease comes from, Father? Do you know how the red waters work? How do you know they’re anything more than plain old disease and natural medicinal water?”
The questions bordered on blasphemy, but they were at the very core of Samuel’s struggle for meaning. Had Thomas known . . .
But the past was gone. The fact was, Samuel wasn’t simply confused about which doctrinal path to take when it came to the Horde; he had lost his way entirely.
“Are you done?” Thomas asked.
“Not even close. But I won’t waste my breath. You don’t have the answers.”
“The disease comes from Teeleh. His worms, evil incarnate, like a virus, infiltrate the skin and muscle and mind, making one stupid to the truth.”
“That’s your version.”
“But Teeleh despises Elyon’s waters,” Thomas continued. “They kept his disease away when we bathed every day. The virus of Teeleh was killed by the waters. And when the Horde drowned Elyon, those waters turned red. Now we drown as Elyon drowned, and our flesh becomes new, resistant to Teeleh’s virus, so that we don’t have to bathe every day as we once did. Is this too much for your mind to hold?”
“I don’t know, Father. Maybe my mind’s full of worms. Like the half-breeds.”
He snorted through his nostrils and stilled his stamping horse.
“What I do know is that I can no longer follow a man who feels justified in putting his own son on the block for the sake of his Circle.”
“And yet Elyon did the same.”
“Then Elyon should go back into the sky where he belongs!”
“Stop it!” Jamous glared at them. “Both of you. We’re in enemy territory. The Horde is out there. And Eram. For all we know, our enemy is watching us at this very moment.”
“Enemy to whom?” Samuel said, drilling Thomas with a hard stare. “It seems that my own people think of me as their enemy. The halfbreeds would welcome a warrior like me.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Thomas said. “Your ego is bruised, but I will raise you up as a hero when we return.
The Circle will embrace you like a long-lost son.”
But Samuel was already stripping off the priest’s robes. “For how long? Until I dare speak the truth again?” He cast them aside, then turned his horse away.
“You can’t be serious,” Mikil challenged. “What fool albino would join the Eramites?”
Samuel twisted back in his saddle. “The fool albino who knows that all half-breeds were once albinos, Forest Guard, despised by the Horde as much as you are. The son of Thomas Hunter will join the Forest Guard once again.”
Thomas was so taken aback by what his son was suggesting that words failed him. Elyon had just saved the boy, and now Samuel, covered in Horde blood, would turn his back on the Circle and join forces with Eram? Samuel had thought this through. A naked man would be less threatening to the Eramites than one dressed like a Horde priest.
He must have planned this. He and his band. They were waiting for him.
“Samuel! They wait for you?”
Without turning, his son kicked his horse into a full run, plunged into the canyon they’d just climbed out of, and galloped north, toward the land of the Eramites.
Mikil and Jamous seemed as much at a loss as Thomas. This . . . this had to be a show. Elyon’s green waters had just saved the boy, for the love of Elyon! He was toying with them to make a point.
No, Thomas. You’ve seen this coming.
No, not this. Rebellion, yes. A strong spirit like his own father’s, predisposed to stumble into danger, yes. But to betray his own blood? Never!
“He means it,” Mikil said.
And Thomas knew that she was right. He sat on his horse and stared at the empty horizon, trying to disbelieve. His son was gone.
For a few moments his mind spun around empty thoughts. Had he been alone he might have fallen from his horse and wept into the sand. But the Horde was in pursuit and the Circle waited and . . .
Thomas released his reins, closed his eyes, and struggled to breathe calmly. What was happening? He’d faced his son’s death through the night, and they’d survived only to face this?
“He’s bluffing,” Mikil said, reversing her earlier position.
She was only saying it to give him hope, and she was failing miserably.
