Warrior of the Ages (Warriors of the Ages) (29 page)

FOR A MOMENT Kahtar thought he’d gone someplace else, to a war zone, or perhaps he was imploding. Fire roared towards the sky and explosions rocketed, the force of them blasted him through the air. He’d been in enough wars that he knew he should cover his ears. The problem was he couldn’t feel his arms. The percussion hurt deep inside, reverberating through his skull. The bone behind his ears felt as though it shattered, within moments of arriving he couldn’t hear anything, only feel the thunderous booms hammering through him. How long he lay on the grass staring up at columns of orange and black clouds, he wasn’t certain. The smoke was so thick and greasy he was almost choking to death. His lungs burned with fumes when an Old Guard yanked him to his feet and stuffed big fingers into his ears, healing them in seconds. Sound came back with a violent roar.

The gas station was gone, the building, the pumps, the vehicles that had been there. Berwick was gone. Beth was gone. The black eyes of an Old Guard stared into his, both of them encased in a tornado of smoke.

“
Take me home.”
The second voice was all Kahtar could manage.

WHEN KAHTAR STUMBLED to his porch steps, blackened and aching, he stared at the buffalo blanket still in a heap by the front door. Just three days ago…his head dropped into his hands and he cried silently, his big body shaking with sobs like a little boy.

THE ONLY EVIDENCE the Old Guard found of Berwick was his skull, it had shot through the air and landed in a ditch between the east and west lanes on the nearby freeway. The jaw was missing. While sitting in the police station the following morning, they’d shimmered into Kahtar’s office and put a shoe on his desk. A five inch straw colored pump. Unable to stop himself he’d picked it up, then looked up at the Old Guard.

Clearing his throat he asked. “Is that all you found?”

“No. It is all we retrieved. There is more of her, but we will not bring it to you. She is not clan. A dozen non-keepers were killed. Their own kind is collecting their remains.”

“Go!” It made him feel sick, to think of Beth’s blackened jawbone lying in a ditch off the freeway. Caressing the shoe he stared blindly, another failure in his millennia of failures.

EVEN WOLVES DRAGGED. The dog slept on the buffalo blanket on the porch as though he too missed Beth. Honor wouldn’t come to the house. The plebes moved woodenly, blindly, and Kahtar barely noticed nor cared enough to correct them. Suddenly nothing seemed to matter much, and although it was a sin, he wished for this repeat to end. Perhaps distance would help with the pain. There would be years before he again remembered who he’d been, years of sheer being as a babe and then a boy before consciousness would intrude. Sometimes he didn’t survive long enough to even remember, once there had been a gap of twenty years. Twenty years of oblivion from Golgotha, or from remembering this, he would take it gladly.

The best solution for the clan would be for Beth’s shop to disappear. The Mother was not happy about Kahtar’s solution. An explosion and fire within the village would cause pollution, enough to settle through the veils in the surrounding area, at least in some small proportion. Kahtar was resolute. It was the best way to eliminate too many questions. Besides, a natural gas explosion, with Beth’s remains left in the rubble, would give her parents an explanation as to what happened to her. If they came into town themselves, and sensed Cultuelle Khristos, it could start another round of chasing away Orphans. Kahtar left orders for Honor to collect Beth’s remains from the morgue downtown, while he took care of the explosion.

AT NIGHT BATTERY run candles lit every window in the shop. Forcing open the lock on the front door and stepping inside, Kahtar tried to avoid looking around. He didn’t want to see Beth in the details, refused to scan and feel the mysterious boxes and jars that stacked the shelves. Memories of her would haunt him forever. There was no point in stirring them on purpose. Kahtar decided to focus on his duty and turned his mind to the new gas line in the basement.

There would be an investigation and publicity, but it would be worse if she simply vanished. Galloping woodenly down the basement steps, Kahtar forced his eyes away from the clothesline strung across the basement with Beth’s clothes clipped to it. Standing in front of the gas lines Kahtar wiggled the copper tubing a few times, checking to see if it was soldered well, if it could be jostled enough to look defective. Ignoring the fact that an echo of Beth’s heart seemed to remain in this house even after her death, the ghost of it leaping in the background as hers had once done, he forced his attention wholly on what needed to be done. It would take awhile for the house to fill with enough fumes for the explosion. Then the explosion would move upwards and out, any damage done here would likely leave evidence intact in the basement. This had to be done properly.

“What are you doing?” An impossibly familiar voice demanded.

Kahtar almost jumped out of his skin, as it was he jerked around so fast he banged his head on the metal cover of the fuse box, catching the corner with his forehead and leaving a gash that sliced right through to his skull.

A click sounded and light from a battery operated lantern lit the basement. Beth stood, perfectly alive, holding a little green lamp by the handle. Stunned, his eyes slid over her neon t-shirt that said “THE RAMONES” across the front, it hung to her thighs, there were silver and pink heeled slippers on her feet and her hair looked perfect as always.

“Are you kidding me? After all I went through you’re going to kill me in an explosion now?”

His mouth moved, but it was so dry absolutely no words would come out.

“I mean it’s a messy way to go, have I really earned that?”

In shock Kahtar sagged against one of the old oak beams that supported the floor above them, his heart thundering in his chest so hard he thought he might pass out. Gesturing futilely towards her he still couldn’t get his tongue, throat and mouth in sync to speak, but he managed to shake his head.

Beth’s eyes widened in surprise, she sat the lantern on the floor.

“You thought I was already dead?”

Kahtar nodded. He could manage that much.

“So you didn’t come to kill me then?”

She’s alive!
Biting back a sob of joy he simply shook his head again. His hand was shaking as he lifted it to touch the wound on his forehead, barely aware that it ran from his eyebrow up and over the top of his head. When he realized, somewhere in the back of his brain, that he was bleeding, he held the flesh together to stop it.

“I couldn’t find the entrance to your driveway or I would have gone back, but I thought—assumed—you’d all scan me here—or your Old Guards would,” said Beth.

His mouth was dry, his voice hoarse but he managed. “You know? About Old Guard?”

“I do have shades. And Berwick did talk a lot.”

Mutely Kahtar shook his head again, it was a mistake this time, blood splattered and for a moment he used two hands to try to hold his wound together before gesturing questioningly towards her with a bloody hand, unable to believe that she could be alive. Palm up was the best he could do forming a question.

“How’d I get away? Remember I told you on the phone that sometimes I get so focused on what I’m doing that I don’t look ahead? I realized I was doing it again, focusing on saying goodbye instead of on how to escape. I noticed the cigarette lighter while we were talking. So I lit it and rolled out the back window, ran and threw it back at Berwick. He was standing in a puddle of gasoline. I didn’t even think really, I just did it….

“The first explosion wasn’t as bad as what I saw by the time I got down the street. I didn’t realize, you know that the pumps would explode and…I never thought I could kill someone and I didn’t realize there would be a chain reaction. That everyone inside the store would...a lot of people died because of what I did, because I didn’t stop to think.”

Those clear, sky blue eyes were filled with remorse and then tears. A quiver started in her mouth, and moved through her entire body as she fought to master it. This he could help her with.

“Everyone is capable of killing, given the wrong set of circumstances. There is no sin in protecting yourself. It is human nature.”

Looking at the floor of the basement, Beth’s curtain of hair hid her expression from him, but her tears plummeted all the way to the floor, landing with splashes, like raindrops.

“Sweet Beth.” The term of endearment slipped naturally from his lips and he realized it was who she would always be to him. He loved her, and pretending otherwise would be a lie. It wasn’t difficult then to walk towards her and wrap his arms around her offering comfort. Countless women had sought safe harbor against his chest, but not a single one had had a heart that pressed against his with strength to equal his own. Beth’s heart was there, focusing on his. Briefly he rested his cheek against the top of her head, pulling away immediately when he saw his blood matting the silky perfection.