Chapter 17
Luna Cove
Kym cut the engine and let the Crescent Moon glide toward the dock. When
close enough, she jumped off and pulled the launch into its place beside Derek's speed
boat. Cassie's words kept playing through her mind. "It's how the world works."
God! Why had she bought into the fairy tale? The prince on the white horse who
would sweep her off her feet, and they would live in the palace, happily ever after. But
then it dawned on her. "I have the fairy tale," she told herself. "I live in a honest-to-gosh castle, with the closest thing to a prince I'll ever have a shot at. Hell, he's even
got a sword. I've met dukes and countesses, ambassadors and movie stars. I do have
the fairy tale."
Then her other voice spoke, "But it's the real, true fairy tale of the Brothers
Grimm... not of the animated movies... it has the dark side of powerful witches and
demons... goulies and ghosties and long-legged beasties and things that go bump in the
night."
< < + > >
Angel Island
Derek trotted along the dark path that led a winding route from the edge of the
wide lawn to the small craft dock a half mile away at, Luna Cove, the island's only south facing
anchorage. He knew Kym would be coming up this trail soon. He should be there to greet
her, but not tonight. Tonight, he had to get away... he had to avoid complications. He
couldn't involve anyone else in this escapade... not with international and State
Department sanctions against North Africa's rogue nation. If things went wrong, and
the Legacy was somehow tied to the situation... he wouldn't allow that to happen...
and he certainly couldn't allow his friends to get caught out on a limb about to be
chopped off. The responsibility lay with Derek Rayne, and no one else.
A lizard scurried across the trail in front of him. He could hear grass rustle and
twigs crack as it scuttled into the brush. Far below, San Francisco Bay lapped against
the rocks. He trotted on. A fallen branch snatched at his pants leg. Though he knew
the path as well as the route to his own bedroom, he had to be careful not let his mind
wander. A stray root could break an ankle.
The moisture of the light fog enhanced the pungency of the trees, eucalyptus and
pepper, that rose on either side. Derek could distinguish the fragrances of the sweet,
wild mustard and the sharp Mexican sage, whose purple fronds, he knew, covered the
hillside above.
He heard more brush rustling and snapping behind him. A larger animal...
perhaps, a deer.
"Derek! Stop right there!"
He turned to see William Sloan on the trail thirty odd feet behind him... the deer.
He spun about, ready to sprint the last quarter mile, but saw a dark figure in front of
him... Johnny. Trapped, Derek considered cutting down the brush covered hillside to
the shoreline, but he knew that at this point the downslope was quite steep and ended
in a sharp ten foot drop to the water. Besides, even with his leather jacket, the
chaparral, yucca, and unseen patches of pear blossom cactus could rip to pieces
someone foolish enough to challenge the terrain in the dark. As he turned to again face
a breathless Sloan, slowly walking toward him, Derek tossed his leather haversack
behind a trail-side boulder.
"Out for a midnight stroll, gentlemen?" he said flippantly.
Sloan's fury was tightly contained. His jaw and neck muscles were taut with the
effort. "We might ask the same of you," he quietly said.
"It's my island."
"And just where on your island were you going at this time of night?" the older
man asked.
If he could just maneuver past Johnny, he could make a dash for it. Derek saw
no option save a bald-faced lie. "Kym's due back from the city... I was just going
down to wait for her," he replied, unblinking.
He always was a good liar, William thought... in fact, one of the best he'd ever
encountered. Deception was one of Derek's fortes, but not this time. Sloan's toe
kicked the leather knapsack from it's hiding place. "What's in here?" he asked. "Love
toys? Watch out for the poison oak," he taunted.
"Semper paratus," Derek countered. "I'm sure you remember the Boy Scout
motto, but then you never were one, were you?"
"I'm surprised you remember the Latin... not your strong point, was it?" mocked
Sloan. "...and you weren't a Boy Scout either."
Derek moved to pick up the backpack, but the elder precept put his foot on it.
Derek thought to grasp the straps and give Sloan a tumble for his trouble, but decided
he could do without the bag. He had his two passports, Dutch and US, a credit card,
a large bearer bond, and sufficient cash for any crisis safely tucked in his money belt.
He began to edge around Johnny on the up-slope side of the trail. Johnny shifted his
weight to block the way.
"William... honest to Got... I've got to go, before Kym gets back," the younger
man said. "This is important," he pleaded.
"When were you going to tell her?" William asked with a pseudo-calm. "Or
were you going to call her from Amsterdam, or Benghazi?" Sloan could no longer
contain his fury. Why did Derek always do this to him... always prick his bubble of
self-control? "...or let her hear about it on the evening news... or from a State
Department telegram...
Or... how about an anonymous phone call:
"William," Derek said, his voice rising, "butt out! I'll handle it."
"And say what?" Sloan countered with acid. "Good-bye, darling. I'm off to
summer camp with a bunch of mass murderers in a country that hates our guts."
Derek replied softly with hesitation, knowing that he was in the wrong, but
seeing no other option. "No... good-bye darling... I love you, and I'll be back soon."
"Derek, for the love of...," William said in pure exasperation. "From one
husband to another... she's not going to buy that."
"Fine!" he retorted. "And I suppose Patty always gives you a loving peck on the
cheek, packs your lunch, and tells you supper will be waiting after you've slain that
nasty old demon... huh?"
"William?" Kym said as she walked up behind Johnny and shone her flashlight
on the tense threesome. "What are you doing here?... Derek... what's going on?"
The young precept looked at his wife, then at Sloan and Johnny. He was
trapped. All he could see was delay.
Sloan saw Derek's gaze wander and his weight shift. He's still contemplating
making a run for it. "Actually, my dear...," William said casually, "your husband was
just off to catch a one-way flight to Timbuktu... and points beyond."
Derek snatched at the opening, devious as it was. "William's right." He bent to
give Kym a peck on the cheek. "I've got to go... Luna Foundation emergency." He
quickly grabbed his bag.
Sloan was beyond his limit, as only Derek could push him. "Derek!" he said.
"Cut the crap!" He detested sinking to this language level... and only Derek forced him
to it. But, he'd learned long ago that it was the one way to end the game and blast
through Derek Rayne's barricades. "Tell her now, or I will."
Derek hesitated, then slung the knapsack over his shoulder.
"Tell her now!" William Sloan shouted.
Kym was bewildered. Something momentous was happening and she hadn't a
clue. "Tell me what, Derek?" she asked softly.
Derek surrendered... for the moment. "It's a long story... let's go back to the
house."
William sighed with relief... now for rounds three, four, and five. How to deliver
the knockout punch on this one?
<< + >>
Legacy House
"That's it," said Derek. "Hassan called me by routing his call from Al-Jawf
through his office in Khartoum. He risked his life to do that. He's frightened and so are
the others who seem to have remained unaffected. Hassan believes that the more
hatred a person carries, the more they seem to be affected by whatever it is." Derek
began to pace, as he always did when a crisis neared. "He says that he and those who
support him are not fanatics... they do not hate their enemies. Instead, they consider
themselves to be true followers of the Prophet and soldiers in a just war."
"I don't understand," said Kym. "You mean those Russian children were
sacrifices to this goddess, Tanit?"
Videotape of the Aeroflot crash played on the control room monitors. "So it
would seem," said Derek, leaning across the table to pull one of the autopsy photos
toward him. The black and white photo showed a child's body, which appeared
virtually unscathed by the violent impact of the crash. She seemed to be sleeping. The
one anomaly was the reddish brand, a horned triangle. "This is definitely one of
Tanit's marks on this girl's chest," Derek continued. "All of the children have this.
These children being branded would seem to be unlikely enough... but when the same
mark turns up on their hearts... I'd say that definitely indicates a supernatural cause.
In Tunisia, archaeologists recently unearthed whole Carthaginian cemeteries filled with
children who were sacrifices to her... Tanit preferred children.
"Not only that... but the defaced markings on the granite cap stone are Tanit's
symbols... the one undamaged mark was this one." Derek held up a sketch of the letter
L, pierced by a short a short Roman sword. "It's the seal of the Legatus... the ancient
Roman Legacy," he explained.
"So... what's this got to do with you?" Kym asked, dreading the answer. She
had been unable to look at the photos of the children or of the crash in which they died.
It was one of the things that mystified her about her husband... such horrors seemed
to fascinate him. He could even study the photos while eating. Of course, she had to
remind herself that one of his degrees was in forensic anthropology.
Sloan saw a look of hesitancy flick across Derek's face. He's got no way to
avoid telling her. If the situation weren't so deadly, he would be heartily amused at his
friend's chagrin. It wasn't often that he got to see Derek Rayne squirm.
"Hassan wants me to come to Al-Kufrah to see for myself," Derek admitted
quickly.
Kym's face blanched in disbelief.
"He doesn't know about Tanit," he continued. "That's been our research. There
it is... I'm going in as a Dutch arms dealer. Hassan has already spread the story. I have
to make certain that it is Tanit, and if it is, discover the type of manifestation."
The control room was silent. Johnny had retreated to lean against the wall, but
his eyes never left Kym's face. He couldn't get past his distrust of the woman. She was
too immature to accept the consequences of this marriage... she was too meddlesome,
too cloying for Derek's own good... for the good of the House.
At length, Kym broke the hush. In a bewildered tone, she said quietly, "I can't
believe this... and you weren't going to tell me? Didn't our vows mean anything? What
about this ring you just gave me?" She held up her finger with the crescent ring. "The
inscription reads: Love hath need of faith. Is that a one-way street? I'm supposed to
have faith in you, but you don't trust me?"
"There's nothing to it," her husband said, carefully switching to an upbeat tone.
"I just go in... check things out... and get out. That's all... in and out."
Johnny pushed himself away from the paneling. "You can't go in there alone,"
said the former officer. "If something goes wrong... no way out."
Sloan glanced at the soldier. At last, a voice of common sense that Derek might
listen to.
"Let's take a chopper in,"said the retired army major. "I could go in as your
pilot and bodyguard. We could...." He saw a look of total vexation cross Sloan's face.
"Wait!" Kym interrupted. "Will you all just shut up!" She turned on Derek.
"The window upstairs has your motto... 'Faith hath need of the whole truth.' Well,
if Faith needs Truth, and Love needs Faith... then," she reasoned, "doesn't Love need
Truth? For Christ's sake, what were you going to do? Call me from the airport?"
Derek looked down to toy with his precept's ring. Sloan watched him. Good,
he can't look at her... perhaps, we'll win yet.
"I left you a letter," Derek said in a voice almost too low to hear, "...on your
pillow."
Kym sat unmoving, her young face expressionless as she stared at her husband
and tried to grapple with what he had just admitted. Finally she hung her head. She
grasped a handful of red hair and pulled it forward to shield her tearing eyes. "A letter?
I can't believe this," she whispered to no one in particular.
"I'm sorry," said Derek. "I'm not used to having to deal with another person...
a wife. When I make decisions as a precept, they are based on the demands of an
investigation... not on someone's emotions," he explained weakly.
"Excuse me," said Johnny, stepping forward. "It could work.... Listen! Sloan...
it could get expensive, but we could base ourselves in southwestern Egypt... take a
chopper... pop over the border into Al-Kufrah... scope it out. We'd have an exit."
"Come on, Derek," said Kym, lifting her head, her anger growing, "...it's not
that late... you can think of a better excuse than that! You just wanted to sneak off and
play your little games without having to listen to any objections from me," she
continued bitterly.
Sloan looked up at Johnny and said with a quiet firmness, "I thought we agreed
this wasn't for the best."
"I'm sorry, Kymberlee," said Derek, fixing his hazel eyes upon her with a gaze
that made most people uncomfortable. "It's the best I have to offer. I don't want
anyone else involved." He proceeded in an uncompromising tone, "... not even you,
Major Boyle... and certainly not the Legacy. If it backfires, or something goes wrong,
no one is involved but me.... It's my responsibility as Precept."
William could no longer contain himself, and Derek had left him an opening.
"You see!" he said harshly. "Damn it, Derek...You doubt Hassan's motives too."
"How can you say I'm not involved?" Kym asked with hurt and anger rolled into
one big lump in her throat.
Derek ignored his wife and rounded on the older man. "No, William... I'm just
playing by the rules you taught me."
With his most hawkish stare, Sloan looked Derek straight in the eyes and said
with every ounce of sincerity he had in his being, "If it is a trap... if it's something
purely political, how do you expect us to be able to help you, if you're in there alone?"
Derek's eyes flicked toward Kym. Wishing he and William were alone, he
hesitated, then at last answered with a quiet earnestness, "Honestly? If it is a trap...,"
He paused. "I don't think you'd be able to do anything... any more than Uncle Sam
could help the hostages in Tehran or the people who were at the embassy in Beruit
yesterday."
Kym's world spun. The people at the Beruit embassy were dead... blown to bits
by a truck bomb. She had never really understood her husband at all.
Sloan didn't know how to respond. Derek had again managed to take him by
surprise. He could feel his blood pressure rise, his anger reaching what his wife called
"Stage 9." "How can you be so irresponsible?" he shouted.
"I'm being very responsible," the young precept responded calmly. "It's all on
me... no one else."
Sloan grasped for control. "And what about your family... Kym, your mother,
Ingrid?... and this House? What about the foundation, and the museum? They're your
responsibility... not a manifestation of some long dead goddess in a murderers'
paradise that by rights should be Cairo's concern."
"Everything is going to be fine," reassured Derek. "I know it... but, if not, I've
made provisions... I rely on you, William, to carry them out."
"I'm sorry," Sloan said flatly, "but I have other responsibilities. I can't take on
yours as well," he added brusquely.
"And why not?" Derek asked. "You always seem to try."
"I try to help."
"You try to tell me what to do. Sometimes it's just the same as it was at Oxford.
I didn't want to go there, but Mother insisted on Balliol, because you were already
there... a teaching assistant and a god-almighty proctor, no less."
"Derek," responded William to the young man's sudden outpouring. "You were
so young.... It hadn't even been two years since you saw your father killed. She
wanted to make sure you weren't alone... that you'd be OK," he explained.
"She wanted a spy," stated Derek. "I was sixteen. I wanted to go to Stanford...
I wanted to be here," he continued. "Then when I finally got to come home, guess who
was the damned precept? Just for once, William... butt out! Johnny," he said without
taking his eyes off Sloan, "see if you can line up a chopper in Cairo... and get some
fake ID from that Englishman."
The room was quiet. Sloan's hard gaze nailed Johnny in his place. Kym was
stunned at her husband's outburst. She had never before heard him so starkly lay bare
his emotions.
"Well, what?" asked Derek, annoyed by the silence. "No acid retort, Mr.
Sloan?"
With total composure, William replied, "Take a look around, Derek. I don't
think I need words to make my point."
Still fuming and uncertain at the meaning of the older man's comment, Derek
plunged on. "Well, Johnny?" he said, throwing an insistent look at his security chief.
"Get on it!... Now!... It's one a.m. here, so it's got to be nearly noon in Cairo."
"Are you sure?" asked Boyle.
"I have to be," said San Francisco's Precept. "If I'm not, then who will be? If
a power like this had risen in Nazi Germany or Cambodia or Uganda, wouldn't the
Legacy have wanted to know? Wouldn't they have fought it?" Derek demanded.
"What if it's happened in Al-Kufrah... an entity amongst some of mankind's most
fanatic, perhaps most perverted minds?"
"That's not what I meant," said Boyle.
"Well, what?" demanded Derek.
As much as he disliked her, Johnny cleared his throat and nodded his head
toward Kym, who sat quietly, sensing that her world was crumbling.
"Liefje," Derek said solemnly. "It's what I do. You've always known that.... No
one else can do this," he continued amidst an apprehensive silence. "I'm the only one
Hassan trusts... I have to go."
Kymberlee Rayne's mind was in turmoil. Her emotions were seething,
directionless, like the tumultuous pool at the base of a waterfall.
"William... help me," Derek begged. "How many times have you had to leave
Patty?... Johnny?"
Suddenly, Kym surged to her feet, all confusion dispelled. "Derek Rayne! You
self-absorbed, arrogant bastard! I am your wife! You cannot be married and have
nothing change."
Derek could find no guiltless response. "I have no choice," he finally said.
"Johnny, make the arrangements... but, you're not piloting me in. I'll fly myself in...
and out."
Sloan decided he had to play his last card. He rose to his feet, stretched himself
to his full, lanky height, and said in his most magisterial manner, "Dr. Rayne, you may
be precept here, but I
Dear Mrs. Rayne: We regret to inform you that your idiot
husband got himself shot as a spy by Khaddafi.
Your husband, who is not in very good shape thanks to the beatings we
are happily administering, will be held hostage, in very unhealthy conditions, until
all assets of the Luna Foundation have been transferred to the Cayman Islands
bank account of our choice.... Then, maybe... just maybe, we won't kill him.
"And I go," said Kym as she rose. "I do speak Arabic, if you recall... and if it's going to be a walk in the park, I'll be perfectly safe... won't I?" With that, to quash further discussion, she walked to the door, slapped the exit button, and, as the paneling slid aside, stepped into the library.
< < + > >
It was three in the morning and the great house was silent except for the deep ticking of the mantle clock. Sloan paced the Turkish carpet in front of the drawing room fireplace. The last of the red embers were dying. He hadn't done this, here, in this place, since he'd surrendered the preceptorship to Derek two years before. He couldn't think his way out of this one. They had done nothing but argue in circles for four hours, and he was still going in circles.
Derek Rayne infuriated him more than any person on the face of the earth. He was the most obstinate, stubborn individual Sloan had ever known... and the bravest, and, sometimes, the most impulsive, and, beyond a doubt, often one of the most brilliant. Not a good combination. He had tried every argument he could think of to convince his friend not to go to Libya, but, as always, Derek countered every one of them... he was a master at circular logic. It was their game... to never agree, usually played for their own private amusement, frequently to the consternation of others... but at times like these the arguments became deadly serious, and both knew it.
He couldn't let Derek walk in there. All the "what if's" ran through his mind yet again: What if there is nothing of interest to the Legacy? What if it's all purely political? What if it's a trap to take a hostage... or create an international incident? Derek Rayne was extremely wealthy, socially prominent, with influential ties on both sides of the Atlantic... a perfect target. What if there is an evil on the loose that knows about the Legacy? What if the Legacy is the target? What if... what if.
He could take the matter before the Ruling Council in London, but they might side with Derek, or they might call him before an inquiry and censure him. Yet, Derek, in his present self-righteous mood, would probably go anyway. He believed ibn Aziz, and Sloan knew from experience that Derek was usually correct, after his own fashion. His argument was a good one... how could they risk allowing a supernatural evil to rise amongst terrorists, the worst of mortal evil? They had to know for certain, and Derek did have the invitation. Dammit!... no way out.
He finished the last of his brandy, his decision had been made for him. William yawned and headed for bed, perhaps not sleep, but bed. He slowly climbed the stairs.
"William Sloan!" a tiny voice called.
He turned to see Christina, the three-hundred-year old sprite who had, for some reason known only to herself, adopted the San Francisco Legacy House as her own personal project. Twice before she had appeared to him. Always she brought cryptic warnings in times of immense danger. Sloan shut his eyes, hoping that when he opened them, the small, cherry-cheeked figure would be gone. She wasn't. Her long white gown rippling in some unfelt breeze, she floated inches above the foyer's parquet floor.
William Sloan! Fear shall all sense impair.
A brother's loss must you bear,
When a ring doth rend and tear,
And of hope you do despair.If a blesséd sacrament be his to gain,
Then, as the Phoenix doth end his reign
In a sacrifice of fire and pain.
Thus be the fate of Derek Rayne.
Her message delivered, Christina evaporated. Sloan clutched the railing, suddenly weak kneed, and lowered himself to the steps.
| CHAPTER 18 |
| E-mail: Dubricus | CONTENTS | E-mail: Selena |
