With both hands on Garrett’s shoulders, his mother looked him in the eyes. “I know you have a thousand questions about what’s going on, and I’m not even sure how much John told you but—”
“John?” Garrett managed, bringing his emotions under control.
“Sorry,” she said, her mouth a tight line. “John to us. Mr. B to you.”
“You knew him then?” Garrett asked.
“Of course we knew him – we are all Keepers of the Light,” she said, as if that were a given.
So, there it was, the confirmation he needed. We are all Keepers of the Light. “But I still don’t—”
She cut him off. “Didn’t he tell you all of this? He was supposed to tell you everything. That was the point of giving the signal. The point of announcing your closed test session. He was supposed to test your focus and then tell you everything.” She smiled weakly. “But I guess none of us could have guessed Apep would get the God Stones and come so quickly. Well, there’s no time for this now. Look, the wall is open,” she said, pointing at the hole. “We must go.”
Above them came a loud boom of splintering wood and shattering glass. Dust rained down from the ceiling as if a hundred people had jumped all at once.
“He’s here!” James said, drawing two sai from his waistband, one in each hand.
Garrett pulled back, his eyes going wide.
His father limped over to the king’s chair and threw himself down hard. “I have waited for this day for a very long time.”
Slow footsteps clunked overhead.
“As have I,” James said.
“No. We stick to the plan. You get them out.” Phillip said, pointing toward the opening in the brick.
“And what about you? You expect us to just leave you here?” he asked, lowering his voice to an urgent whisper. “We’ll be stronger together.”
Phillip shook his head. “No, James. You knew the plan. You must go and keep them safe.” He turned in his chair and faced Garrett. “Come here, son,” he said, motioning him over with two fingers.
Garrett approached his father.
“We are out of time now,” his father said. “But I need you to know a few things before you go.” He placed a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Everything we have done has been for you and for this moment and the moments that will follow. All the training and all the rules. It’s all been for this day – to prepare you for right now. You will fulfill the prophecy. The world doesn’t know it now, but it’s depending on you.” He pressed his lips into a tight line. “I’m going to be honest with you, son. This situation isn’t fair and it isn’t right, but your whole world… no, the whole world is going to change.”
Elaine, Lenny, and James crowded around as his father continued to speak. In the low light of the lantern, Garrett felt as if he were receiving some ancient wisdom from a man he had never met.
“In the coming hours and days, or maybe even longer, things are going to be difficult, but know this, my son – every single day of your life has been to prepare you for this. The martial arts, sword training, survival training, even the running at school. I know I was strict, Garrett, because that’s what you needed – what you had to have. But you did it, Garrett. You did all the hard work – you are ready.” Phillip turned to Lenny. “You too, Len. I know it must have been strange for you. But you have both done so well.” He turned back to Garrett. “Now, did John tell you what you must do?”
Garrett hesitated, almost forgetting who John referred to. “Umm… yes. He said I must go to the temple and destroy what’s inside before Apep gets there with the God Stones but—”
“No buts, Garrett. Do it. You must! James can’t do it. Your mother can’t do it. I can’t do it. Only you. You take only the sages with you and you get it done,” he said, pointing a thick finger at Garrett.
Muffled laughter filtered through the floorboards overhead. The laugh was high-pitched, then low and angry. The psychotic laughter sounded as if it were coming from separate people. “Do you think you can hide? Maybe you hope I will assume you fled away, off to the temple?” The voice above them degraded into a seething, hateful slur. “I can feel you, smell the stench of your fear, each and every miserable one of you! Cowering down there like rats in a barrel won’t save you!”
“Go get it, James,” Phillip said motioning to the void.
James nodded then slid his sai back into his waistband. He quickly crossed the room and stepped inside the newly opened void, disappearing into the darkness only to reappear seconds later with a long parcel, wrapped in an old-looking piece of canvas.
Phillip pushed aside the glasses of tea and lifted the lantern. “Here,” he said, motioning to James.
James placed the bundle of canvas down on the card table.
The footsteps faded toward the back of the house.
Garrett watched silently as Phillip unrolled the canvas, revealing a sword sheathed in some sort of leather hide. The hilt gleamed white as bone or maybe ivory. There were carvings in the handle, but Garrett couldn’t make them out in the low light.
“This is yours,” Phillip said. “It was Turek’s, but now it belongs to you.” He picked it up and handed it to the boy. “This sword is exceptional, Garrett. Turek told me it was made especially for him long, long ago. The stories say he used it to slay a great beast.” He lifted it from the table and cradled it in his hands like a newborn baby. “He wanted you to have it. When you get to the temple, use this sword to destroy the—”
“Give me the boy, Phillip!” came a shout through the door.
“Time’s up, son. James, get them out of here,” Phillip said, then he placed his hand under the card table and flipped it.
With a quickness Garrett could never have fathomed possible, his father leapt to his feet, snatching up his cane before the table even struck the far wall.
Elaine and Lenny disappeared into the void, but James stood fast, grappling with the decision to leave his father.
Phillip turned toward Garrett and James. “Garrett, I love you. I always have – like you were my very own son. Always know that.”
Garrett paused, meeting his father’s eyes. “I… I love you too, Dad.”
For a brief moment, Phillip’s eyes softened, and he managed a small smile. With a final nod to his son, he flicked the wrist of the hand holding the cane. The ivory handle flipped up, locking into place to run parallel with the body of the cane. But this was no old, warped cane. Phillip drew a gleaming, curved sword from the bamboo body. His soft eyes turned hard once more, and the smile hardened into a grimace. “Now go!” he shouted.
The eye contact between his father having been broken, Garrett’s eyes welled once more as he turned to go. But something compelled him to hesitate, to risk a final sidelong glance back at the man who had spent the last ten years as his father, and when he did, he froze in awe. Phillip faced the door with his back to them, assuming a strange sword-fighting stance. Familiar, yet different. Garrett’s experience was limited to the sword instruction from Mr. B. This was something else, something… other. He stood paralyzed now, transfixed by his father’s flawless technique. He had slid into the stance as if sliding into a pair of old slippers, as if he had spent years waking every morning before the sun to practice this very technique. After all, one does not simply learn the sword and hold that knowledge in one’s back pocket for a rainy day. Even Garrett knew a skilled swordsman lives the way of the sword, breathes it, day in and day out.
Garrett gaped, transfixed by the technique. Had he? Had Phillip woken every day and practiced the sword while we slept? Who was this man? Without breaking his gaze, he nudged James. “James, how does he know how to do that?” Garrett asked.
James lifted his chin. “This is the chudan stance in Japanese kenjutsu.”
Garrett blinked. “But how does—”
“You would be surprised what he knows, Garrett,” James interrupted. He drew his sai and ran to their father’s side. “No! You’re supposed to come with us. We ge
t out together. Then we set the trap!” he said in a forceful whisper.
Phillip shook his head and forced a reassuring smile. “I must stay. It’s the only way.”
James clenched his jaw. “Then I will stay and fight with you. You’re not settling the score without me. Please, father. We had a plan!”
From the other side of the door, a slow mummering chant could be heard.
“Son, please,” Phillip said. “This was always the plan. I just didn’t tell you. Now, go… save our family.” He wore a thin, pleading smile, like a tin badge false in its comfort. Suddenly the smile transformed into a hard line. “Go, set the trap – settle the score. Avenge Turek!”
“I love you, father,” James said.
Phillip nodded then looked to the door, once more adjusting his grip on the hilt of his sword.
James’s eyes pooled as he grabbed Garrett by the arm and pulled. “Let’s go! What the hell are you waiting for?”
Garrett’s trance broke with James’s tug, and he rushed into the void just as the door to the room ripped outward from its hinges as if sucked into a tornado.
Once inside the void they made it about a dozen steps when James stopped and turned back.
“What is it? You heard Dad. You can’t go back, James,” Garrett said uneasily.
“I’m not going back,” James said as he reached up and pulled a lever. The small tunnel they had entered was narrow, and they had to stay in a half squat to avoid hitting their heads. Once inside it opened much wider, but the ceiling stayed low. The wide area lasted only a short distance before they crossed back into a narrow tunnel.
What Garrett hadn’t known – couldn’t have known – was that they had crossed under his concrete porch and were now standing just on the other side, under Fourth Street.
The lever released whatever cleverly created system was in place to hold up that thick slab of concrete porch. In a thundering instant, the whole porch and probably the roof above came crashing down into the tunnel. The ground beneath Garrett’s feet shook as the tunnel was sealed by the falling concrete slab.
“Jesus Christ, James, how is Dad going to get out?” Garrett asked.
“He isn’t getting out, Garrett,” James said.
“What? but he’ll… Apep—”
“What he’ll do is give us time – time we desperately need. Now move,” he said, flicking his Zippo to life.
Up ahead, Lenny and Elaine waited where the narrow tunnel turned.
Apep stepped easily through the doorway to a waiting Phillip. Rather than acknowledging him and the sword he held out with ill intent, his attention fell beyond the man, to the hole in the wall. The hole now sealed with concrete.
“Hello, Phillip. I see you’re trying to be clever,” Apep said.
Phillip stood fixed, looking at Apep with a combination of disgust and hate.
“You know you’re only delaying the inevitable, don’t you? And because you force me to play this petty game – I will make you suffer. Just like I made your friend, Master Brockridge, suffer.”
Phillip’s mouth twitched.
It was a small thing, but Apep noticed and beneath his hood, he smiled. “Oh yes, he suffered horribly,” Apep said, unclasping his duster. “This Master Brockridge of yours was a kwan jang nim, was he not? A supposed grand master, and yet, what I find amusing is that he died so easily. Just like you will. Please,” Apep said in a mock plea as he pressed his gloved palms together in the gesture of a beggar. “Please understand, Phillip, I don’t say this as a threat. It is but a simple truth.” His hands separated, palms out, showing he had nothing to hide. He laughed softly and reached into the duster, drawing from it the blood-stained sword he had plunged through Mr. Brockridge.
Now Phillip’s jaw clenched, his flexing cheek muscles the only sign of the rage he fought to contain. He began to slowly move, circling Apep with the tip of his sword pointing at the man’s throat.
“You were Turek’s best swordsman? Better even than your Mr. B. You were his number one,” Apep said, pointing a bony finger. “I wonder though, were you a better swordsman than Turek himself? I only ask because I killed him so easily.” Apep raised his own sword above his head.
Phillip leaned back, centering his weight perfectly in his abdomen, choosing the stance specifically to hide whether he intended to defend or attack. Then, summoning strength and flexibility that hadn’t been his for years, Phillip launched his attack.
Humans were so predictable. Even ancient ones.
8
Meet the Neighbors
Wednesday, April 6 – God Stones Day 1
Petersburg, Illinois
They reached the end of the tunnel and faced another brick-and-mortar wall. “James, where are we? We can’t have gone very far,” Garrett asked, his heart still pounding violently, threatening to break out of his chest.
“We haven’t, we’re at Glen’s.”
“What? Glen’s basement?”
“Yep.”
Garrett and Lenny shared a confused look.
“Wait a minute, you’re telling me even our neighbor is a Keeper of the Light?” Garrett asked in disbelief.
James frowned. “Glen? Not hardly. We wouldn’t take a wife beater into the Keepers. He doesn’t even know he’s about to be invaded.” He handed Garrett his Zippo. “Now, all of you stay behind me and let me go in first.”
James stepped back. Then, stepping forward, he gave the brick wall a powerful kick. The mortar cracked, but the bricks held.
“Um, guys, have you ever been in Glen’s basement? Because if not there’s… um… something you should know before we go in there,” Lenny said, stone-faced serious.
Garrett had not been in Glen’s basement, but he already knew Lenny’s big secret and nodded in agreement.
“It happened last summer,” Lenny began. “Glen’s son, Tyler, had been begging me to play catch with him. I kinda felt sorry for the little guy and figured what the heck, I’ve got a few minutes, so I’ll play with the kid for a bit and get him off my back. The problem with Tyler is he’s the kind of kid that never stops talking – to the point it’s annoying. Anyway, we’re playing catch and he’s babbling on and on. I’m only half listening when suddenly he mentions his dad grows flowers in the basement.” Lenny paused, looking nervously back down the dark tunnel.
James narrowed his eyes at the wall, repositioning his stance for another kick. He stepped forward and kicked again. The cracks in the mortar extended further, but still the wall held.
“I thought, flowers in the basement? That makes no sense. So, I start asking him more questions. He really wanted me to stay and play catch, so he had no problem telling me all about his dad’s flowers. He says the flowers were growing in large metal tubs under some special lights. Tyler said they were all green and didn’t have any flowers on top yet, but he was sure they would soon.”
Elaine frowned.
“I know, right? I asked if I could see the flowers, but Tyler said he would get in big trouble if he got caught showing anyone. But once I agreed to play catch for a while longer Tyler agreed to sneak me into the basement. The basement was big and empty except for these big metal horse troughs. They were lined up in rows under fluorescent lighting. But I knew before reaching the bottom of the stairs, the flowers were definitely pot plants,” Lenny said.
“Because people don’t usually grow flowers in the basement?” James asked, rearing back to give the wall another kick before launching his foot with a loud thwack. This time a large section of the wall flexed outward.
“No, because they stunk so bad,” Lenny said, twisting up his face. “The plants were huge and bushy, with large buds. I didn’t stay but a second before I freaked out and ran back up the stairs – and straight into Glen. Literally – I ran right into him, practically knocking him off his feet. He started yelling, ‘What the hell were you doing? Did you go down there!’ I bolted out the back door and never looked back. It scared the crap out of me. For weeks I thought the guy was
going to come kill me in my sleep!”
“Lenny, why didn’t you tell someone?” Elaine asked.
“No way, I was too sca—”
Thwack! James’s next kick cut Lenny off. A shaft of light from the other side of the wall funneled through as the first brick fell away, thudding across the floor. Garrett flipped James’s Zippo shut and handed it back to his brother.
James reared back and gave the wall another kick and then another. Artificial lighting poured through the small opening, along with a faint smell of marijuana. Making no effort at stealth, James began rapidly kicking free brick after brick around the newly created hole. On the other side, bricks clattered noisily to the basement floor. A few moments later he was able to step through the hole into the bright basement light. “Wait here,” he said, holding up a hand.
Garrett peered through the jagged hole to find the basement was just as Lenny described, but in place of large pot plants there were small ones, only a few inches tall. That would explain why the overpowering smell of weed he expected to encounter was only a faint odor now.
Being very still, James waited just inside, holding up a hand. From above came a hurried shuffle of footsteps, followed by a rummaging sound. A moment later the basement door burst open.
A voice shouted down the stairs. “Whoever’s in my goddamned basement better believe I’m armed, and I will shoot you on sight!” The angry man’s threat was followed by the sound of a pump-action shotgun racking a shell.
Garrett recognized the voice. It was Glen.
James reached toward his waistline, feeling for something that wasn’t there. When he couldn’t find it, he just paused, felt around for a second longer, then continued forward. By the time Glen made it to the last step, James was there blocking his path.
The lights flickered off, then back on.
“James?” Glen said in surprise. “What are you doing in my basement?” Glen craned to see around James. “Who’s with you back there? What the…” he started then gasped. His forehead creased into deep lines, and his eyes widened at the sight of the hole in his basement wall. “You… you were trying to steal my crop! My god, you tunneled here from… from where? Your house? To steal my crop! You tunneled here from your house!”
The Keepers Of The Light (God Stone Book 2) Page 6
