Death's Head Legion (15 page)

They did not count on the brutality and resolve of one man, so obsessed with power and with overcoming death that he cut through all the secrets and lies and webs of misinformation. His name was Vlad Tepes.

He sought it, he found it.

No one knew what became of the spear after he was said to have died. In part, it was because Tepes didn't really die.

“For almost four hundred years no Rom or even
drabnari
would venture closer than a night's ride from Poenari Citadel,” Amria said.

And yet the
drabnari
women continued their ancient custom of passing down the stories of the Sacred Tshurri, certain that one day they would again safeguard the holy relic from the world of men.

They were wise, Amria said.

“Just a half century ago, the ancient spirit of the demon count was driven from Poenari Citadel. Driven away by mere mortal men of faith and science. I'm told some penny novelist named Stoker even wrote a book based on it. Shortly after the real events of their incursion into the castle, there was—well, they called it a rock slide, but we know better. A portion of the castle's southern tower fell into the valley. One of the sister
drabnari
—the curse finally broken—retrieved the Sacred Tshurri, and we began anew our sacred trust.”

“And it just so happened,” Terah said, “that when the demons of this day—the soldiers who bear the mark of the broken cross—came hunting the Tshurri, it was you who protected it.”

Amria nodded.

“My people were slaughtered not even knowing it was I the swine were searching for. Now I will not hide the Tshurri any longer. I will use it to destroy them. We Romani have long known the secrets of the Tshurri. It is much more powerful than those small minds could ever imagine.”

Rucker stopped her.

“Amria, the Nazis know the secret of the spear as well. They'll hunt down and execute every last Romani in Europe to find it.”

Her dark eyes flashed equal parts anger and passion, but they also held bitter regret and guilt. She felt guilt for surviving the Nazi massacre. She felt guilt because she should have thought of some way to stop them.

“Amria, your . . . that thing in the woods—Gavver, you called it? Is it, too, connected to the spear?” Rucker asked.

“That is my golem. Gavver, the soldier. I made him from the sacred earth of the Rom to protect me,” she said.

Terah nodded.

“What is the power of the Tshurri?”

“It can bring death and summon the legions of the underworld,” she said. “From the mindless, rotting feeders that eat the living to the ancient Lords of Darkness, like what Vlad Tepes became
.
”

Silence.

Rucker shook his head.

“I am so renegotiating my contract with Lysander,” he said. “I know he didn't mention Lords of Darkness.”

 

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Campsite

Near Poenari Citadel

Wallachia region of Romania

Eastern Europe

F
or a while everyone was quiet, sipping on lukewarm coffee. Amria wiped her mouth with her sleeve.

“Amria,” Rucker said, “you know we have to get you and the Tshurri—the spear—far away from here, don't you?”

She cast a wary look at the pilot.

“Don't fear. Just listen. You know what will happen if Hitler and his minions get hold of it. They will march across the world, and they will have their Thousand Year Reich,” Rucker said. “Or worse, the dead will rise and march across the earth—same outcome.”

The wind outside caught a hollow in the cave entrance, and there was a haunted howl.

“What if I told you I can take you and the spear to a place where you and it would be safe,” Rucker said.

Amria's eyes flashed with fire.

“The Tshurri is not for them and it is not for you,” she said, almost spitting out the words. “It will avenge the blood of my people, and then I will make sure no man ever sees it again.”

Rucker was undeterred.

“Look, you only have my word, but I can tell you it goes against everything I believe to take what rightfully belongs to someone else. Amria, we can take you and the Tshurri somewhere beyond the reach of the Nazis. And then we can return to exact the revenge you so rightly deserve. You don't need the spear for that.”

“You will die trying to take me or the Tshurri,” she hissed.

Amria peered into Rucker's blue eyes, trying to divine his soul again.

“Your eyes have the sky in them,” she said. “Your words might be as shifting as the winds.”

“We're the good guys, Amria. This is what we do,” he said.

She looked askance at him.

“Look, fine,” he said. “If you'll keep it away from the Nazis, we don't need to ever see it. At least let us help you keep it from them.”

“I am not concerned that they are hunting me,” she said. “I'm the one doing the hunting.”

It didn't matter that this girl was barely a teenager. The pain—the horror—she'd lived through gave finality to her words.

“Fine,” she said. “You have shared your food and your homes with me.” It was a particularly Roma thing to assume—that a camp was a home. “I will listen.”

“May we see the spear? The Tshurri?” Rucker asked.

She pulled the wrapping from her cloak, untied and unrolled it. Maybe it was the campfire reflecting off the metal, but it seemed to glow with its own inner light. It seemed to glitter. And yet it was just a metal pilum from a centurion's spear. Right?

But the fate of the entire world could rest on its sharpened edges.

Everyone sat transfixed.

“It's amazing,” Filotoma said finally. “Are we sure we can't buy it?”

Amria was on her feet wielding the spear like a knife. Her golem crashed into the cave and stood ready.

“Whoa whoa whoa whoa!” Rucker said. “My friend is kind of an idiot. He thought he was making a joke. It's not funny at all. We're sorry.”

Slowly, Amria's shoulder's relaxed. With a wave, the golem turned and walked back out into the early morning darkness to stand vigil. She quickly rewrapped the Tshurri.

Deitel spoke up. He wanted to put Amria at ease.

“I know precious little about your people except the fools who rule my homeland don't like you. Tell me of your people,” he said.

Amria sat back.

“It is said we were once rooted to another land long ago. But it was destroyed. Our people were never ones to dwell on the loss of things. We celebrated our freedom from the land. This angered a passing wizard, who demanded that we, as landless people, serve him. When the Romani refused, the necromancer cursed us, saying we would forever be made to wander, to never settle, and to always be seen as outcasts,” she said. Her hands conveyed her story as much as her words. Pacing around the fire, she drew shadows on the cave walls in the flickering firelight, mesmerizing her audience. Rucker was reminded of the old innkeeper's wife. There was a natural showmanship in even the most rustic of the Roma.

“The Romani left and gathered on a distant mountain. They gathered and drew a circle where they shed their blood with their own daggers, letting the blood baptize the earth. Roma cursed those who would curse us. They pledged to all Romani, and woe unto those who spill Rom blood. And woe unto the undead, the devil wolves, and the creatures of the night and the winged demons, who would prey on the Rom!”

Amria, settled back against a rock, smiling a disturbingly come-hither smile for a girl barely into her teens. Even more disturbing, given the fire in her eyes.

“We, too, have our own magic and our own curses,” she said. “What's wrong will be set right.”

Sensing a pause, Rucker asked the obvious.

“The ones responsible for murdering your tribe—do you know where they are?”

“Yes,” Amria said. “The castle on the hill. Poenari Castle, on the shore of Lakul Vidaru. After they came, they left here, but now they have returned with more.”

Everyone went silent.

“They have made it their camp,” she said. “It will be their graveyard when I am done.”

“Oh, great,” Deitel said. “Why are we still here?”

“Shhh,”
Rucker said.

The damned wind howled again.

After a moment, Deitel went on.

“It seems to me rather than worrying about vengeance now,” he said, “the smart thing to do is to take the spear and get it as far away from the Nazis in Poenari Citadel as possible. Right now. If Amria is right, they have everything they need at the citadel to start making their army of the undead . . .
except the spear
.”

Amria started to protest, but Rucker put a hand on her arm.

“And then we return,” he said, to reassure her. “To wipe them all out for what they did to your kin.”

Finally, she nodded. “Okay. I place my trust in your word. Woe unto you if you break it.”

Like the others and now Amria, Deitel knew it was a promise Rucker would keep. And what was strange, he knew he'd be right there beside Rucker.

The sun would be above the horizon soon, and Rucker wanted to be riding by then. They packed their gear and shouldered their saddles, filing out of the cave.

They all stopped short at the cave entrance. A squad of uniformed storm troopers, machine pistols pointed at them, surrounded the cave mouth. Off in the distance they saw a steam crawler, parked just far enough away that the sound of its arrival hadn't alerted them. At a glance, Rucker could see that these weren't run of the mill soldiers. Their positions were textbook perfect, allowing a cross-fire kill zone and yet close enough to cover to react to return fire. Their jackboots were muddy from the night march they'd been on, and their mottled coveralls helped them blend into the foliage.

The five of them raised their hands.

The ranks of SS storm troopers parted for Lieutenant Skorzeny. He stepped forward and stood with his fists on his hips, looking pleased with himself.

Damn, Rucker thought. He was harder to kill than those
wehr
-wolves.

“Okay,” Rucker said to those around him. “This isn't part of the plan.”

“There's a plan?” Terah asked.

“I don't know yet, I'm still making it up,” he said. “But I'm pretty sure this ain't part of it.”

“Surprised to see me again, Captain Rucker?” Skorzeny asked.

“Not without horns and a pitchfork,” Rucker said.

Amria leapt at Skorzeny, and Rucker grabbed her at the last second. She screeched like a banshee. Skorzeny motioned for his men to hold their fire.

“God damn you all!” she shouted, spitting at Skorzeny and struggling against Rucker.

“Amria!” Rucker said. “Not now. They'll kill you.”

She looked at him with not an ounce less hatred than she held for Skorzeny.

“And you stupid Amis. I have been as a ghost until you blundered in here,” she said between clenched teeth.

Rucker turned her around.

“Amria, look at me. He wants to talk or he'd have shot us already.” With a wink, he added, “Let's give Gavver a chance.”

It took a second for Amria's rage to fall away and comprehension to dawn. She nodded.

Rucker set her down in the middle in between the rest of them, then stepped in front of her and faced Skorzeny.

“Now what?” he asked.

Skorzeny relished the moment. In the distance, the steam crawlers were firing up and moving closer, now that the trap had been sprung. But having no idea how deep the cave ran or if there were other ways out, the German commando wanted to wait until his prey were out of it before the steam crawlers were brought close. He was nothing if not thorough.

“Ironic, isn't it?” he said to Rucker, as he removed his gloves. “You think you are looking at a dead man. I, in turn, know I am looking at a dead man. But it will not be as quick a death for you as you thought I had.”

“Yeah, Otto, how the hell did you . . . never mind” Rucker said, letting it trail off.

The stomp of the steam crawlers through the brush got louder.

“We will take you back to our base camp, where I am ordered to turn you over to the Gestapo interrogators. I would much rather settle matters between us my own way,” Skorzeny said, staring angrily into Rucker's eyes.

Though the crawlers had stopped thirty feet away, their mechanized heads peaking out over the lower treetops, the stomp and crash of the brush continued. But it was coming from behind the crawlers now.

Rucker looked around just as Amria's golem crashed out of the brush onto the promontory above the cave entrance. It howled then, chilling the bones of both enemy and ally, then leapt down in front of them, facing the Skorzeny and the storm troopers. Even the most hardened veteran SS man froze.

Amria splayed her fingers and spread her arms in an encompassing arc.
“Atch nai!”
she shouted, and light poured from her hands in all directions.

The golem howled again, and Amria fell limp to the ground.

Rucker and Terah were still drawing their pistols when the first SS troopers pulled their triggers. A chorus of clicks sounded through the clearing. Then more clicks. Troopers who remembered their training ducked behind cover before trying to clear their machine pistols. Others stood there dumbly, trying to work the bolts. Rucker and Terah targeted the easy shots first. But their hammers also fell to quiet clicks.

“What . . . the . . . hell?” Rucker said, looking at Terah.

“I think it was her,” Terah said, motioning to Amria as he switched out magazines. Still nothing. “She got us all.”

Rucker holstered his pistol. “You know what that means, don't you?”

Terah nodded. They charged at the troops, the golem leading the way. Its huge arms swung left and right. It wasn't fast, but when it connected with a storm trooper, the trooper was sent flying thirty feet and did not get up again.

“See you out there,” Terah said, pulling her twin daggers from her boots.

With the dual daggers out, she moved through the storm troopers at a full sprint, slashing and cutting like an artist. Filotoma simply bear-hugged the first trooper he came to and took him to the ground. Deitel did the smart thing; he grabbed Amria and pulled her back into the cave. Meanwhile, Rucker and Skorzeny circled one another.

This time it was no honorable duel. It was the real thing. Rucker had his Bowie knife out, and Skorzeny wielded his combat dagger. A lightning fast kick to his ribs sent Rucker sprawling to the ground. He rolled just in time to avoid being stabbed, throwing a handful of dirt into Skorzeny's face. Back on his feet, he feinted right and stepped left, slipping around Skorzeny and catching his upper right arm with a nasty slice as he tried to work around behind the man. Skorzeny lashed out behind him with a rear kick that struck Rucker in the gut. He went down but rolled away again, narrowly avoiding another slash.

The two faced off once more amidst the chaos around them. Rucker thought they had a good chance, as long as the golem was occupying most of the troopers and Amria's spell, doing whatever she'd done to everyone's guns, held out.

Without taking his eyes off Rucker, Skorzeny called out to the steam crawlers.

“Lassen Sie die nachtmenn!”

Release the
nachtmenn.
Shit, Rucker thought.

“Now who's cheating?” he said as he slashed again at Skorzeny.

They came tearing through the woods—five
nachtmenn—
like a pack of angry German shepherds. They ran at full speed on all fours. All five leapt onto the golem. It struggled against them but the sheer weight toppled the creature. It fought valiantly, breaking the neck of one of the beasts and tearing the jaw off another, but the remaining
nachtmenn
literally tore the golem to shreds.

Rucker turned away from his face-off with Skorzeny for just a split second when he heard Terah cry out. It was the opening Skorzeny needed. The toe of the commando's boot connected with Rucker's temple. The last thing he saw was Terah being held up, unconscious and bloody, by two storm troopers. Then it all went black.

T
wenty minutes later the prisoners were secured, four of them trussed together, for the moment, on the ground, two of them—Rucker and the woman, who had gone down fighting—unconscious. The three remaining
nachtmenn
patrolled the perimeter—searching to make sure there were no others. Two storm troopers brought Amria to Skorzeny, where a medic was stitching the gash in his right arm.

“We found her in the cave, sir,” the soldier reported. “She didn't put up much of a fight. The skinny male has apparently hidden her and then led us away from her.”