Age of Mystics (Saga of Mystics Book 1) (29 page)

As the light steadily grew toward the day, Jenny walked on. She was rounding the area toward the south side of the cliffs over which hung the Hillside Restaurant, and no longer needed to hide. Her friends might be able to see her now, but they could not get to her in time to stop her from ending this violence. If she could put an end to it by anything, up to and including sacrificing her life, she would do it. She didn’t want any more people to die on her behalf.

As she got close to the cliffs, she smelled something similar to meat cooking on a grill, but with a slight hint of foulness. She saw the burnt shrubs first, and then the charred corpses, three of them under a tree. She stopped in her tracks at the sight of it, the flesh burned off of the faces of these people lying there, seemingly where they had caught fire. She turned away and continued on, seeing so many burnt bodies, some partially charred and some complete charcoal. Nearby, she heard someone move and ran forward to try to help.

Kneeling over one of the corpses was a portly man with peppered hair and a goatee. He turned as she came up. It was too late by the time she saw the dojo patch on his jacket. She turned to run, but was stopped by another man in the same garb who had been behind her and she didn’t even realize it.

“I am Jenny Martinez.” She blurted out, “I am giving myself up to Eric Fine. You stop all of this butchery now.”

The man smiled, a twinkle in his eye. “Good luck for us. I was going to have to tell Shogun that we had lost the whole company, but now I have you to bring to him.”

“Fine, I am ready to go. You can call off the attack now, let my friends live. I gave myself up before dawn.”

The men all laughed. “Cute idea, Jenny. But your friends are all dead.”

“I just left them. They are not dead.”

“They might as well be,” said the man on her right, “They will be soon enough.” The men chuckled again, but not the portly man, who was looking at something past her.

“No. It can’t be, you are dead!” The man said.

Jenny cowered as he moved forward, but it was like he had forgotten entirely that she was there. He pushed his way past her and the other two men turned around to see what he was looking at. Standing at the edge of the clearing she had just come through was the homeless man who had saved her before. His beard was a little longer, but other than that he looked the same. His hood was up and even in this light; he wore those sunglasses. Cliff called him the Hermit, the portly man called him something as he ran at him and swung a huge punch at him.

The man sidestepped the punch with ease and cracked the other man on the back of the skull, sending him sprawling into some thorny looking bushes. The other two men rushed, it was a bad idea. The man apparently had a samurai sword on him as well, and with dizzying speed he sliced the air. Jenny saw the man’s bowels fall to the ground in front of him while he was still running. Slipping in his own entrails, he fell to the ground and lay still. The other man might have fared a little better. He lost his head in one swipe of the man’s sword. Just like that, the sword was back in its scabbard and the man just stood there calmly. Jenny lost her lunch on the dirt at her feet.

“When Shogun hears that you are still alive…” the portly man began. Before he could finish that sentence, the hermit had drawn the sword again and hurled it through the air. It went through the man’s throat and lodged in the tree behind him. He reached up and tried to remove the sword, but there was no chance, he just died there, propped in a standing position by the sword in his neck.

Jenny wiped the bile from her mouth, trying hard not to look at the carnage that surrounded her. “I have to turn myself in to these men’s boss.”

The Hermit looked off south and shook his head no.

She pleaded with him, “You must understand, my friends will die if I don’t.”

The Hermit pointed to the charred corpses, as well as the ones he had just killed and shook his head no again.

“Okay,” she said, realizing that he was saying there was no need, “But you can come meet them. You can stay with us, be part of our group.”

He turned and looked at her, something like pain or regret covering his face and he again shook his head no. He turned on the spot and walked back into the brush. When Jenny tried to follow, she could find neither him, nor any trace of his passing. He seemed to have just vanished.

Jenny walked back to where the other men died, and one of the dogs was standing there staring at her. She knew that Maxine was now telling her father where Jenny was, that they would all be along shortly to save her. She had also heard the tone and tenor of what the dead men had said. Jenny giving herself up would not save the group, they would either save themselves or perish. This was the way of the world now. She began to make her way back to the Hillside, with just the dog for company.

Eric seethed with anger as he rounded up the remaining four hundred soldiers and twenty-nine Tigers for their final attack. He decided he would make an example out of Meyer, since Damiano was no longer available to him. He had been very specific about his orders. He said nothing about burning. Why could they not just do as instructed? He hated when his men got creative. For lighting a fire and ruining his moment, he would burn Zane Meyer alive. This would be an example to those who tried to be creative with his instructions in the future.

Light was peering over the eastern horizon now, and as the sun bared its corona into the eastern plains, Eric raised his hand to ready the men. He was pleased about one thing. The snow was lighter, and the visibility was better. From his camp, he could now see the Hillside, though it was far away. It would take his men a half hour to get to the Hillside, maybe more.

Turning back to his men, the extended visibility showed him something else. Far to the south, about an equal distance from how far his camp was from the Hillside, a small band approached. They walked openly, and wore all black, so they were easy to spot.

“Hold, men!” He called out, “We have company to the south. Give me five Tigers.” Six Tigers came forward and Eric just shook his head, he was certain he had to stupidest force in the history of military armies. “Five, I said five. One of you go back to formation.”

The last one running up sort of slinked off. It would have been comical, if it were not so tragic. “You five, run to the south to that group of men flanking us. If they are a threat, deal with them. If they are not a threat, wave this.” He handed them a large red flag he had removed from one of the mansions that made up the Inner Circle. “Am I clear?”

“Yes, Shogun!” The men all shouted in unison.

“At ease, men,” He shouted out to his force. “We have a short delay and should get back to the attack within the hour. Dismissed.”

The men all went back to what they were doing before, small conversation and such. Eric sat in his saddle and watched the north and the south for any sign. For its part, the north looked as it would any other day. He could just make out the charred outline of a burn area at the foot of the cliffs below the Hillside.
Meyer’s group,
he thought to himself and renewed his resolve to kill that man.

With nothing of note to the north, he spent most of the next half hour watching the five Tigers head south. He had not given credence to the more than a foot of snow on the ground that the men had to walk through. This changed his view of the men heading their way. Those men were moving with a speed that was greater than the Tigers. The two groups met up roughly half way between where Eric had sent the Tigers, and the place he had first seen those approaching. He waited for the flag, but none came. Instead, without much hesitation, the group started heading his way again.

“Fall in!” He yelled out, “We are headed south to see about this new threat.” He saw the confusion in the ranks, but refused to explain himself. He just trotted his mount over to the other side of the ranks and led them toward the oncoming group. Eric guessed their size at forty to forty-five men, nothing his force could not dispatch.

Within ten minutes, he was close enough to see that the Tigers walked with them, having fallen in line behind some leader. Another few minutes showed him that the leader was none other than one of the men he had left in charge at the compound, Chief Summers.

“What is the meaning of this?” Eric yelled as they approached.

The small man looked around at the force, “Good morning, Shogun. May I speak to you in private?”

Did the man really think he could get Eric Fine alone and deal with him? Eric could see what this was, it was mutiny. “You may speak to me here, Chief. Why have you interrupted my operation? Who is watching over the compound?”

Summers looked around and seemed to resign himself to speaking in front of everyone. “The compound is no more, Shogun.”

Eric didn’t know what the young man was trying to say. “What do you mean, ‘no more’?”

Summers exhibited genuine sadness. “It burned two days ago, everything. We tried to stop it, but didn’t have the means. People had lit fires to protect them from the cold, there was trash and refuse everywhere, it fueled the fire. It started in the Inner Circle, and then went to the Outer Circle. People broke through the barricades to escape. Other people from the Inner Circle escaped inward. When we put some of them down, they began to riot and intentionally burned the Tower and the outer buildings. We couldn’t put it out.”

Eric took all of this in. Summers was clearly not making this up, but there were things he still wasn’t saying. “Is Colson watching over the rest of the people?” There was a long pause, “Summers, where is Colson?”

“Mister Colson fooled me, sir. He left the compound with all of the people from the Outer Circle, to dispose of them. He took some of his people to help him out. I believed him, he was one of us. That was only two days after you left. They headed south, we haven’t heard from them or seen them since.”

“Who is watching the rest of the people?” Eric asked in bewilderment. The fear and shame in the young man’s face as he looked up at his leader was difficult to see.

“This is it, Shogun. Forty-Two men. None of the women made it, none of the villagers, just us.” He paused for a moment, “I have failed you, Shogun.”

For the first time since this all began, Eric had someone before him who understood his role. Eric was short-handed right now, so Summers would not be an example. “You have, Chief, that you have. But this is not the time for recriminations; this is the time for action. Add your men to the ranks of soldiers. We are all one now. Come with me and let us make a new plan. This changes everything.”

Summers gave his men orders, while Eric thought on what he had just learned. He had nowhere to bring Jenny Martinez to; he saw more snow falling and the dense clouds moving back in over the front range. There was a reason why ancient armies went to war in the spring, and not in the winter. He would train this young man to be a leader, beginning with their first move.

Kyle, Natalee, Ted, Kin and a newly invigorated Kim led a small group out to meet the army that was waiting for them. A much larger force than they had first expected was marching up the road to the ground gates. Ted had no idea where Major Fine had found an army of this size, but his group could not defend itself against them. There had to be a couple of thousand soldiers heading their way. Ted had already determined that he would try to leverage his own sacrifice to save his family and friends, when he saw the four people break off from the group and trudge through the growing snow toward them.

There was a moment when the snowfall broke and it looked like the little over a foot they had already on the ground would be all the snow they would see in this storm. But much like the rain of the summer, it did not look like this snow was done. The wind wasn’t a problem, and it wasn’t quite as cold as it had been, so Ted was thankful for the small things. As the four came close, their leader looked up and ted was surprised to see one of his own council members, Commandant Britton Casco of the Academy.

“Rumor has it you need some help,” Casco said with a large grin.

Ted smiled and walked toward him, but Kyle ran in front of him and embraced the other man in a large bear hug. It held for quite a while before they broke off and Kyle gave a smaller hug to the woman standing at Casco’s side, who turned out to be Jessica.

Casco looked up at Ted, “We have a lot to talk about, but right now, we have something else to deal with. Shall we go meet your foe?”

Ted liked the young man immensely, and his manner only improved that affection. Rather than giving himself up, Ted would be meeting Eric army with a force ten times its size. They turned and began to walk back down to where the Academy Army was waiting.

“Who did you leave to watch the Academy?” Ted asked.

“No one, this is everyone. I was going to wait, but I guess we can talk about it as we march.” A group of about two hundred cadets were passing them to take up a guard position at the ground gates, they saluted Casco as they passed and he returned the salute with a smile. “As you know, the flu killed many people and weakened even more. This is all we have left, about twenty-six hundred. We are mostly former cadets, since the locals were released by the old Commandant to go to their families. We have a few of the old instructors, but the rest are cadets. Many of those killed were the professors, since they were older, their bodies did not adapt to the virus and they went just like the Commandant. After some discussion, we think it unwise to remain tightly packed like we were at the stadium. Also, the Academy was made for a different kind of defense. It isn’t a great place to defend with this kind of warfare. We need higher ground.”

Ted could not argue with the Commandant’s logic. He just listened intently.

“So, I want to propose merging our groups and making a true community.”

“It sounds great, Britton.” Ted began, “But where are we going to house your twenty-six hundred and our fifty or so?”

“Funny you should ask. Kyle and I spent many hours looking over maps of the area and we talked a bit about maybe someday building up Red Rock Bluffs.”

Ted looked at him with confusion, “What the hell is that?”

Casco laughed, “I can tell you weren’t in town long before this all happened. It was in the paper, online, every hour or so you would hear a commercial for the newest gated community, a planned community on a bluff over cliffs even higher than the Hillside’s that had one entrance, a narrow road they built up with a bridge over a chasm. They had not yet built any of the houses. From what I understood, they built the infrastructure and laid out the street. They built the bridge and the gate, but had not yet built the houses. We would have to figure out this winter, but then we could have a real community. It was designed for two hundred and seventy homes, well really mansions. We could build a lot more for our people.”

Ted loved the idea. “Where is this place?”

Casco pointed to their left as they round a corner, “Right against the mountains there.” He pointed to a place just south and up higher, where the cliffs were a little more west, just barely north of the Garden of the Gods Park. “Also, one of the reasons that they hadn’t built house yet, is that in laying the ground work, they found natural springs of the kind about which this city made its name.”

Ted had heard these stories before, of the springs that gave towns like Colorado Springs and Manitou Springs their names. But those springs had all dried up more than a hundred years ago. Ted’s thoughts on this were interrupted by the sight of charred ground and charred corpses.

They came to the place where Nat and Kim had taken on a hundred men with flame and fists. It was a bit gruesome, even for someone like Ted who had seen his share of war.

“Commandant!” the call came from the point up ahead. Ted and Britton moved quickly forward.

“Meyer,” was all that Ted could get out. His former colleague was stuck to a tree with a samurai sword through his throat. “Let’s get him down from there. We will bury him with the rest.”

Casco made a small nod, but it took three cadets to get the sword out of the tree, it was embedded so deeply. They moved on, leaving a group of twenty behind to bury the bodies that they could find. Ted looked up and saw one of his daughter’s dogs, it whimpered and ran off to the west. Ted followed as quickly as he could until he found Jenny balled up under a tree, her head in her hands.

Ted kneeled next to her. “Hey, Jenny, you okay?”

She looked up, tears in her eyes, and shook her head.

“Were you here for this?” he asked, pointing back to the corpses.

“Just the fat man, and the guts guy, and the headless one.” She said, trying to sound funny, but it only caused her to tear up more.

“Aw, kid, I am so sorry you had to see that.” Ted put his arm around her shoulder, “Who did it?”

“You know that homeless guy I told you about, the one that Cliff called the Hermit?”

Kin happened to be standing nearby and walked closer, “My brother has a vivid imagination, there is no Hermit.”

“Tell that to those guys!” Jenny almost shouted at Kin.

They helped her up, but she demanded to go on to the battle with them, no matter how much Ted encouraged her to get help form Erica back at the Hillside. In the end, Ted made the decision to let her have her own way, saying it was the freedom that defined their group.

The army marched on, and within fifteen minutes, they found Eric Fine’s camp. It was totally abandoned.

“Ted?” Casco called out and Ted walked to a rock onto which he had climbed. Far off to the south, they could just make out a few hundred men moving away from their location. The snow was picking up, but it seemed that they had sent their foe packing. Ted put a damper on any celebration, instead encouraging the group to retreat to the safety of the Hillside. They needed to rest, to recuperate, and the Council had some decisions to make.