Victory of Coins (The Judas Chronicles, #7) (8 page)

“Are you going to just sit there and continue to feel sorry for yourself, Willie Boy, or do I have to kick your scrawny ass out of your bed and keep kicking it all the way downstairs and out of this house?”

Cedric Tomlinson stood next to my bed, an ornery twinkle in his warm brown eyes that defied the sternness in his tone. My former CIA boss shook his head while flashing his pearly whites that stood out sharply against his barely-lined ebony skin, his smile somewhere between cynical disappointment and compassion.

He and Roderick had returned after spending the morning fishing on the Holston River, and I overheard Cedric tell Roderick, “It’s time to get his ass out of bed and do something about Kaslow before the fucker takes over the world!”

As loud as he said it, from the grand foyer in Roderick’s spacious antebellum home, one might believe this would motivate me to at least get up and get dressed in a robe and slippers that had been set out for me nearly two weeks ago. Really, I needed a damned shower first... but would I ever give a shit to get it done?

“I suggest you shit, shower, and shave this time, William, and then come down to the library,” said Roderick, peering in through the bedroom doorway, bedecked in a true fly-fisherman’s wardrobe, complete with home-tied flies hooked to his cap and vest. “A package came for you today.”

“Why don’t you open it yourself, Rod?”

I bit my tongue to avoid saying something unkind about his latest peek into my thoughts. Granted, there wasn’t much going on in my head other than the repeated loop of events from the fateful June visit to Shiloh and Corinth. I couldn’t stop myself from trying to figure out a different outcome, despite Kaslow’s apparent advantage of time and space. If only I had understood that his abilities in that regard more than rivaled what Krontos could do with dimensional manipulation, perhaps we could’ve avoided the trip from Vicksburg to Shiloh, and for certain never bothered to visit the General Johnson House in Corinth. We could’ve come straight home to Abingdon. We could’ve chosen differently... we
should’ve
....

“Cedric, you’re going to have to forgive me for this, since I know how much you hate it when I comment on the thought impressions I get from William,” Roderick advised, stepping into the room and pulling up a desk chair to the side of my bed. “But this needs to be handled right now while it’s happening. All right?”

“Sure. Just don’t make it a habit like it used to be,” he said.

Roderick returned his attention solely to me.

“It ends today.”

“What ends today?” I asked, coyly.

“Don’t bullshit me, William. You know exactly what I’m talking about,” said Roderick. “The endless cycle of thinking you could’ve changed anything that happened. It wouldn’t have mattered if we had skipped our visit to Shiloh, Corinth, or even Vicksburg. Hell, as you would say, it wouldn’t have mattered if we had skipped the entire damned Civil War tour and purchased a Ken Burns DVD and watched it on the big screen downstairs instead. Kaslow was coming for you... for all of us. Whether here or
any
place else, he wouldn’t have spared Amy, Jeremy... or even Beatrice. I wish it could be different—more than you know, my cherished brother. But it can’t... and punishing yourself like this won’t bring any of them back.”

“But why, Rod?
Why?”
I began to weep, and the deluge of pain felt like a tidal wave welling up from my soul. If only it could envelope me in one fell swoop and kill my bitter emotions and forlorn memories....

“I wish I could tell you, William...
Judas
,” he whispered, nodding to Cedric before going on, as if this were a cue previously discussed, perhaps that morning while fishing for sunfish and small-mouth bass. Cedric responded in kind and stepped out of the room. “I know of what you feel.... Surely you realize I have never fully healed from my losses either. True?”

“That’s what worries me,” I said, thinking of the wife and two children he never talked about from one of the happier times in our long shared existence. I could picture the joy we both felt in those days, when we lived carefree for the better part of two hundred years, and the last three decades of the third century were the very best in that Mediterranean paradise.... But it ended badly for Roderick, when his beloved wife at the time died after a difficult birth that also claimed one child. As for me? Suffice it to say that I wasn’t anywhere near the husband or father I would eventually become nearly seventeen hundred years later, and promptly forgot the nagging wench who provided the lone blight upon those years....

“You form scar tissue over time, and you cherish the hope of eventual reunion,” he said, his voice still subdued. “I know you have never heard me speak of it, but it’s the truth—and a notion that I hold more dearly since Alistair’s passing. Do you know why?”

I hadn’t a damned clue. In fact, all I could think of at that very moment was why he hadn’t killed himself before now. He could die—we both deduced that fact from the near misses he had endured down through the centuries. Unlike me, if ever Roderick were to suffer a fatal wound, it would be permanent. There wouldn’t be the surprise of waking up naked in another location and time, as always had happened to me whenever a physical body of mine became damaged beyond what my cells could repair.

I shook my head, feeling a moment’s relief from my own thoughts’ assault since he had caught me off guard.

“The world on the other side of the veil that Alistair’s spirit described to you seems so wonderful,” he said. “I don’t know why other descriptions of the place haven’t affected me so... but Alistair’s words painted a picture of exactly where I want to be someday.”

“Why don’t you go now?” I asked. “What are you waiting for? Hell, if it were me, I’d go there right fucking
now!”

“Yes... you would go,” he acknowledged, and his tone sounded as empty as I felt at present. The specs of gold in his eyes had been swirling steadily for the past few minutes, but slowed down, and his brilliant lavender eyes grew dim. “That is where you and I are different, Judas.... You would leave me to be with those whom you’ve loved on earth, and understandably so, since it is what most people would choose. But as for me... I would never go as long as you are here walking the earth. Until your existence ends, I will continue to fight off the urges to end my immortal state. I will always be your brother, and will always be here for you.”

I had no idea Roderick felt that way about me, and a burning dagger pierced my soul. As I have stated, I felt my life was over without Alistair and Beatrice... and I had carelessly discarded the devotion of the very best friend I ever had. Despite our differences at times, and the fact that we could disappear from each other’s lives for nearly a century at a time, we remained brothers in every sense of the word except by physical birth. And I had long loved Roderick as he did me.

How could I heal from such a terrible event as losing Beatrice? Perhaps never... but I had to try to carry on somehow. I couldn’t let Roderick down any more than I could turn my back on trying to make things right with Jesus Christ by offering my reclaimed thirty silver coins as restitution to The Almighty.

“I’m sorry, Rod,” I told him, choosing my words carefully so I wouldn’t choke on them as I spoke. “You are a better friend than I have ever deserved, and I cherish our bond.... So for you, I will get up out of this bed and bravely face the day once more.”

“You need to do it for you, Judas,” he said. “Otherwise, it won’t last.”

“In time it will be for me, too,” I assured him. “And, who knows.... Maybe I will finally make peace with the Lord soon, and then we can share a blissful afterlife together.”

It’s all I could give him for now. But it was a significant first step.

For the first time in many weeks, I was ready to resume my life. Beatrice and Alistair would always be the biggest part of me, and my beloved wife would forever own my heart. Yet, I could take more steps and in time I
would
move on... finally.

* * * * *

“W
ell, look who’s decided to join the land of the living again!” Cedric enthused, as I stepped into the library. He and Roderick sat at a long cherry table that would be as suitable for a corporate boardroom as it once was for the founders of the original thirteen stars of the United States when they would meet here in secret long ago. “Come on over here, Willie Boy, and pull up a chair.”

Admittedly, it would take a while for me not to flinch from hearing Cedric’s pet name for me after Viktor Kaslow had stolen and used it to taunt me in Corinth. But I resolved to not let it deter me from embracing our task at hand with urgency. Roderick had briefly informed me before my shower that Kaslow kept a continual flow of correspondences to Abingdon from various points in Europe; and the occasional emails from the Russian that had miraculously skirted past the expensive firewalls Roderick installed this past year had increased tenfold during the past two weeks.

Not only that, but also several letters came in the mail. Interestingly, all were addressed to Roderick, until the one received that afternoon. It was addressed to me, as if Kaslow somehow knew I would return to the land of the living that Tuesday in late August.

“Would you like to eat something first, William?” Roderick asked, while motioning for me to join them at the table. “Surely you must be quite hungry... I can have Margolise whip something up for you.”

“Maybe in a while,” I said, feeling my stomach rumble, but wanting to get started on a plan that would give us a fighting chance to intercept Kaslow before he beat us to the Damascus Coin. “Where is the package addressed to me that you mentioned?”

“It’s on the table with the others,” said Cedric.

“Others?”

I should’ve waited for him to point to the small stacks of iPads gathered at the table’s far end. Six stacks, by my quick count, and each one had at least three of the devices.

“Those all came from Kaslow?”

“Yep,” said Cedric. “Some in the mail... some on a doorstop... one intended for me was waiting in the john downstairs about a week ago, and Roderick found one waiting for him on the breakfast nook where he likes to read the morning paper with his coffee.”

“Obviously, Kaslow seems to prefer this particular Apple product, although knowing his deep hatred for anything hailing from the United States, I would say the brand is just coincidence,” said Roderick, chuckling sadly. “Most likely it has something to do with either his previous familiarity with the device, or something he especially enjoys about the video functions. He only used the tablets to record messages for the three of us, until earlier this week when he added torture updates in regard to Dr. Anderson and Dr. Cirillo.”

“They’re still alive, then?”

“Probably not for long,” Cedric advised. “There’s no telling what he’s doing to them, but I’m inclined to believe the professors have already told Kaslow everything they know about the Damascus Coin.”

“And you’ve already viewed his messages intended for me, I take it?” This question was directed mostly to Roderick, after I noticed a small pile of yellow mailers lying on the floor below the electronic tablet stacks.

“Not the one from today,” he replied. “And, the only other verbiage thrown in your direction were mostly crass asides Kaslow included in the messages he left specifically for Cedric and me.... As for the few details he has given us regarding you? Kaslow intends for the two of you to battle it out for the last coin of your original thirty shekels. The winner takes all, and the loser gets to watch the world burn while suffering for eternity.”

“That’s not at all what I’d want to see!” I shouted indignantly.

“There’s no need to get upset... at least not yet,” said Cedric. “But that fire will come in handy once we’re on Kaslow’s trail overseas, William.”

“Perhaps Kaslow’s arrogance will work against him at some point, since certainly his description of the loser’s fate in this contest indicates he expects to win handily,” Roderick added. “Why don’t you open your package?”

He pointed to a lone yellow mailer sitting next to the piles.

“If it comes with a letter, I’m not reading it,” I advised.

“But you’ll watch the video, won’t you?”

“Yes, Rod.... I’ll watch it, but just once. After that, you can destroy it or add it to your pile for all I care.”

I hated being this crusty. However, I wasn’t even sure I could make it through one time listening to the Russian bastard’s message to me, especially since whatever he had to tell me would likely contain a mixture of truth and bullshit—and definitely weigh heaviest on the latter.

I moved over to the package and picked it up. There wasn’t an address written on it, just my name. Likely it had been deposited in Roderick’s mailbox out front by Kaslow or by one of the emissaries from Bochicha’s realm. I gently shook the package holding it close to my ear while listening for an incendiary link to the seal.

“I assure you that you’ll find nothing but an electronic video device waiting for you,” said Roderick, while he and Cedric shook their heads with some amusement, watching me. “You continue to picture Kaslow as the KGB agent he once was, instead of the monster he has become.”

“Then why wouldn’t he blow us up?” I asked, eyeing him defensively. “He did it once already.... Why not take out everyone else dear to me and really make this fun!”

“Do you want me to open the damned package for you, William?” said Cedric, rising wearily from his seat, like I was an obstinate toddler refusing to behave and in need of a good whipping.

“Maybe you do need to be spanked,” teased Roderick, drawing a suspicious glance from Cedric. “Just humor us and open the package, slide the letter that has accompanied every one of these things to me, and then turn the damned thing on. Once you watch the three minute video, we can finally pack for a flight to Europe—maybe even save a couple of old men who have been at Kaslow’s mercy for the past two months.”

A low blow of sorts—especially the mention of the historians that surely had suffered far longer than necessary, while waiting for me to come to terms with what Kaslow had taken from me. But rather than draw out the experience any longer, I went ahead and tore open the package.