Infernal Games (Templar Chronicles Urban Fantasy Series) (4 page)

––––––––

T
he
hair and blood samples taken from the Necromancer when the Templars had first
incarcerated him arrived by mid-afternoon. Riley met the courier at the door
personally, took control of the samples, and then walked them down to the
ritual chamber where several of the Order’s mystics had been preparing for the scrying
ceremony for the last several hours.

Mystics
had long been a part of Christian tradition and the Order had reluctantly
embraced them hundreds of years before. Since that time the use of arcane
powers like those the mystics could command had become a standard part of the
Order’s response to supernatural threats and enemies, for without those powers
they were vulnerable to the abilities their enemies could bring to bear against
them. Certain practices were more accepted than others while some – scrying
and protection magick, to name just two – had become quite commonplace.

The room in which the ceremony was going to
take place looked like a bizarre combination of high-tech command center and a
centuries old place of religious worship. Several high-speed computers were
networked together on a table in the center of the room and were linked to a
fifty-six inch flatscreen that was hanging on the chamber wall, while inscribed
on the floor surrounding it all was a giant hermeutaugic protection circle that
looked like it had come out of some ancient magician's text, which was
precisely where it
had
come from. Acolytes from the information
technology section manned the equipment, ready to jump in to solve any hardware
or software issues that might erupt in the midst of the ritual.

At the appointed time the nine mystics filed
silently into the room and took up their assigned positions around the great
circle; four at the cardinal points of the compass and the others at positions
that represented the points of a Star of David. Each man was dressed in a dark
robe tied at the waist with thick white cords, but the hoods of each robe were
tossed back, exposing their features to all that were present. What they did
here today was for the benefit of those they were sworn to protect and there
was no reason to hide their faces away in the darkness.

Behind them came five other similarly dressed
men, who took up position kneeling in the center of the formation. Riley,
standing opposite them, knew that they were there to step up and replace any of
the primary participants if something went wrong. They would not be able to
enter the circle once the ritual had begun, however, hence their position at
the center of it all. Riley hoped they wouldn’t be needed at all, but he
suspected this ceremony would be tougher than most. They were, after all,
going up against a necromancer with more than a little skill in such arts
himself.

Silence settled about the room as the men
stepped into position and mentally prepared themselves for what was to come.
Riley could feel the tension in the room go up several notches.

The man standing at the point of the Star of
David raised his hands in a posture of supplication and looked heavenward as
his voice rang out.

"Heavenly Father. Blessed Redeemer.
Creator and Protector of Man. Hear us, O Lord. Fill this place with your
Spirit. Guide our hearts, our minds, our hands as we seek to do Your will this
night. Turn Your gaze upon the world and show us the one we seek."

One by one those around him added their own
prayers to his, each man invoking the Lord's blessing and asking for His
protection and benevolence in what they were about to attempt. The air seemed
to grow more heavily charged as each new voice was added to the mix and when
Riley looked down he could see the hair on his arms standing on end in reaction
to the power slowly building in the room.

But that was just the beginning.

The call to the archangels came next, the
invocations announced by each of the men standing at one of the four points of
the compass, beginning with the man facing north.

"Uriel, Angel of the north, Ancient one
of the Earth, I call you to attend to us this night. I do summon, stir and
charge you to witness our rite and to send your blessings upon it. We ask you
to protect our actions and guard us with your holy might.”

A shimmering wall of light erupted from the
floor and rose upward toward the ceiling, forming an arc of power between the
speaker and the next man a quarter of the way around the circle. For just an
instant Riley thought he heard the sound of stone grinding against stone
filling the chamber, but it was gone too quickly to be certain. The light
before him flared brilliantly and then faded slightly until it was just a
luminescent glow through which the other participants were partially visible.

The ritual team didn’t waste any time. As
soon as the light had settled the next man began speaking.

"Raphael, Angel of the east, Ancient one
of the Air, I call you to attend to us this night. I do summon, stir and
charge you to witness our rite and guide us with truth and precision. Bless our
actions and guard us with your holy might.”

Again there was a brilliant flash of light
and a rising wall of power, charging another quarter of the protective circle.
A gale force wind rushed over the group for a moment, forcing Riley to squint,
and then it was gone.

Despite this, the next man’s voice was steady
and strong as he called out, "Michael, Angel of the south, Ancient one of
the Flames and General of the Lord’s Armies, I call you to attend to us this
night. Protect us with your sword and guard us from the actions of the Evil
One and his minions with your holy might.”

With the ringing sound of a thousand swords
leaving their sheaths, the third quarter of the circle burst into flame. Riley
could feel the ferocious heat of the flames on his face and hands for an
instant and wondered how those who were much closer managed to bear it before
it died away.

Then, at last, the final invocation rang out.

"Gabriel, Angel of the west, Ancient one
of the Waves, I call to you to attend to us this night. Cleanse us with your holy
waters and make our hearts and minds full of the purity of your blessed strength.”

With the crashing sound of waves striking the
seashore, the final portion of the protective circle flared to life, sealing
the ritual workers inside its boundary. With the circle activated, nothing
could pass in or out of its confines until the ritual either reached its proper
conclusion or failed spectacularly. The mystics were committed now; there was
no turning back.

The real work of the ritual could now begin.
The leader of the group, the same man who had started the invocation, began to
chant in a low voice. It was hard to hear exactly what he was saying, but to Riley
the music had the same form and pattern as that of a Gregorian chant. One by
one the other three mystics who had called the invocation joined in. When
their four voices were raised together in harmony, the computer screen at the
back of the room suddenly flickered into life, displaying an image of the earth
as seen from space. Riley knew from previous experience that the image was
being beamed directly from a network of satellites that the Order had put into
orbit through a series of dummy corporations that had been set up for just that
purpose. Other organizations had tried to unravel the ties between the shell
companies in the past; all had failed. If need be the Order could tap into any
of the various government satellite systems orbiting the planet, but doing so
allowed for the possibility of their covert use to be discovered. By creating
a network of their own, the Order effectively minimized that risk while at the
same time providing an incalculable resource for use in its day to day
operations.

As the Order's mystics continued their chant,
the image on the screen began to change. Slowly at first and then with
increasing intensity, the image shifted from one of the earth seen from space
to that of the North American continent and then to the continental United
States. The chant continued, the mystics’ voices raised together in a deep,
throaty sound that filled the room and seeped into the spaces between things
until it seemed to Riley that it was a physical presence standing there in the
room with them.

The screens continued to shift and change,
the view shrinking with each change as the mystics began to hone in on their
prey. The image of the United States was replaced with one of the Northeast
coast and then with a shot of the state of Connecticut.

Riley glanced at the mystics, saw several of
them swaying on their feet. Sweat rolled off their faces and several of them
had their eyes clenched tightly shut as they pushed harder toward their goal.
From the way they held their bodies and the expressions on their faces it was obvious
that their prey would not come easy; Riley could easily imagine that the
Necromancer had used his own dark magick to try and make the task of finding
him as difficult as possible.

Still they persisted. Their chanting grew
louder, their efforts more focused, and the screens flashed again. Gone was the
map showing the state of Connecticut and in its place was a map of Fairfield
County.

Riley felt his heart rate jump as his
excitement grew.
They were getting close.

A sharp cry of pain burst from the lips of
one of those performing the ritual and Riley turned just in time to see the man
standing at the southern point of the compass collapse to the ground. The
loose, fluid nature of his fall told Riley that the man was unconscious before
he hit the ground. Thankfully he fell forward and did not break the sanctity
of the circle.

Who knows what would have happened then?

The man was barely on the ground before one
of the others who was crouched in the center of the pattern took his place, his
voice added to those of the others without missing a beat.

On the screen, the image flickered for a
moment, then solidified once more before drilling down another level to a map
of the city of Bridgeport.

Now we’re getting somewhere
, Riley thought.

The Templar mystics must have broken through
whatever spell defense the Necromancer had employed to keep them from tracking
him, for things moved much more quickly after that. The focal point on the
screen slid east, then west, then south before settling on a section of the
city down by the harbor.

Another shift and the map was replaced by a
live satellite view of the same region. The screen gave the illusion that the
camera was plunging earthward as the viewpoint zoomed closer. Riley recognized
the area as being on the east side of the harbor, diagonally opposite the ferry
landing.

Like a hawk swooping in on its prey, the
satellite view suddenly centered on a large fenced-in lot right along the water
at the end of East Main Street. Several smaller buildings and one large
warehouse were on the lot but there were no cars parked nearby and it looked
like the place was not in active use.

With a grim sense of finality, the view
settled on the warehouse in the center of the lot.

Gotcha!
Riley mused.

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T
en
minutes later Echo Team was airborne aboard the three Blackhawk helicopters
Riley had arranged to transport them from Rhode Island to Connecticut. They
would land at Sigorsky Memorial Airport inside the Bridgeport city limits,
where they would transfer to a set of SUVs that local knights would have ready
and waiting. A few minutes after that they would be breaking down the doors of
the warehouse revealed in the scrying ceremony and hopefully taking the
Necromancer back into custody.

The men of Echo, including Riley, were dressed in jumpsuits of
black flame-retardant material worn over a set of ceramic body armor that had
been blessed by the Holy Father himself. They carried the standard issue HK
Mark 23 .45 caliber handgun, complete with a twelve round magazine, a flash
suppressor, and a laser-targeting device. Two spare magazines for the pistols
were affixed with Velcro to their left wrists. A combat knife was either
clipped to their belt or in a calf sheath on the outside of their boots. Their
swords, recently blessed again during Mass, were slung across their backs, the
hilt of the weapon extending just beyond their right shoulders for easy access.
On their heads were lightweight Kevlar tactical helmets with built-in
communication gear.

Subtract
the swords and they could be mistaken for your average SWAT or tactical
response team from any major agency on the planet, which was the entirely the
point. In fact, Riley carried false I.D. which identified him as Agent Wilson
of the Department of Homeland Security’s Rapid Response Team if he needed to
discourage further investigation by a local law enforcement officer or nosy
citizen. It was amazing what the public would accept in the name of national
security nowadays and it was a rare occasion when the Order had to back up any
of Riley’s creative storytelling with some actual data.

God
bless the Patriot Act.

Riley
handed out copies of the satellite image of the warehouse complex to the men in
his chopper and knew the squad leaders in the other two were doing the same.

“A
scrying ritual has put the Necromancer inside this building here,” he said over
the intercom system, pointing to the large warehouse at the back of the
property. Local eyes and ears on the ground have indicated that no one has
gone in or out of the building since the satellite shots were taken, so we’re
pretty confident we’ve found his bolthole.

“I
want First Squad on overwatch, protecting our backs while I take Command and
Second Squad with me into the building proper. Radio silence and hand signals
only until we breach, then use Tac channel 9 for all communications. We are
cleared for deadly force, so don’t hesitate to put this SOB down if given the
chance. He certainly won’t hesitate to use his powers against you. Take it
from me, that’s not something you want to experience.”

Riley
had been there with Cade when they’d last fought the Necromancer. He remembered
all too vividly the pain he’d felt when hit by a blast of power from the
Necromancer’s staff, how he’d been lifted up and tossed away like so much
trash. Granted, the Necromancer wouldn’t have the power of the Spear of
Destiny at his beck and call this time around, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t a
force to be reckoned with all on his own.

This
was not going to be an easy assignment.

The
trip to Bridgeport didn’t take long at all and before he knew it, Riley was
climbing down from the chopper and rushing across the tarmac to the trio of
black SUVs waiting for them a few yards away. The cars were running, the
onboard GPS devices preprogrammed with information on how to get to the address
in question, and within seconds of arrival the team was driving through the city
streets toward their destination.

Despite
their urgency they kept their speed down to just over the legal limit, not
wanting to call attention to themselves. Even so, it took them less than ten
minutes to reach their objective. The gates to the property were chained shut
but as the SUVs came around the corner at the end of the street the Templar who
had been watching the complex on their behalf stepped out of the shadows with
bolt-cutters in hand and quickly took care of the problem. He hauled the gate
open on rusted wheels as first one, then two more, SUVS swung into the entrance
and raced on past.

The
vehicles charged across the parking lot and pulled to a halt in front of the
warehouse. Doors burst open and men swarmed out almost before the vehicles had
come to a complete stop.

Riley
raced over to the office door along the side of the warehouse, ignoring the
larger, loading bay doors that were directly ahead of him, knowing that the
former would be much easier to breach. Martinez was to his right, carrying the
breaching ram while to his left and slightly behind him were Ortega and Simmons.
Behind them came First Squad, led by Sgt. Stevens.

Confident
that his men knew what they were doing, Riley kept his focus on the task before
him. Gun in one hand, flashlight in the other, he waited to the side while
Martinez employed the breaching ram and then he was the first through the door,
his light swiveling left to right and back again as he took in his immediate
surroundings and searched for threats. Behind him, the others followed suit.

The
warehouse was huge, a good three stories high and probably two hundred feet in
length. The front of the building was to his immediate right and included two
large loading-dock style doors, both currently closed and chained shut on the
outside. No one was coming in that way to bother them without giving away
their location, so Riley turned his attention to the rest of the warehouse.

The
main portion of the warehouse stretched out to his left and was filled with
massive steel shipping containers, the kind you would see aboard an ocean
freighter. They were arranged into three rows. Each row was three containers
wide, four containers high, and stretched an unknown distance into the dark
depths of the warehouse, creating two lanes in which to walk between.

Using
hand signals, Riley indicated that he and his men would take the left lane
while First squad would take the right.

As
they moved deeper into the warehouse, Riley kept waiting for the Necromancer’s
followers to erupt out of the shipping containers where they were hiding and
fall on his team, but the doors around them remained sealed firmly shut.

Still,
something about the place felt wrong. Riley could feel it at the base of his
spine and in the uneasy tightening of his gut. He kept wanting to turn around
and head back the way he had come before he found whatever it was waiting for
him ahead.

For
make no mistake, there was something waiting.

Of
that he was certain.

He
counted twenty containers, stacked lengthwise end to end, before he was able to
get a glimpse of the end.

And
something else, too.

Light.

It
was spilling into the aisle from a larger, open space at the end of the row.

Cautiously,
Riley moved forward.

As
he reached the end, he caught movement to the right out of the corner of his
eye, but it was only Sgt. Stevens and his squad emerging from the other aisle.
Together, they surveyed the scene in front of them.

The
final third of the warehouse stretched out before them, free of the shipping
containers that had filled the building to this point. Instead, it held the
bodies of five men.

A
large casting circle had been drawn on the floor with what looked from this
distance to be salt. Inside the circle was a strange Hermenuitical symbol that
Riley didn’t recognize, also etched in salt.

Extending
outward from the circle were four bodies, arranged in a position reminiscent of
the Vitruvian Man by Leonardo Da Vinci, with their feet closest to the casting
circle and their heads pointing away from it toward the Templars. Blood could
be seen pooling beneath and around each of the bodies.

But
what really drew Riley’s attention where the two portable spotlights set up at
the back of the room, shining on the metal framework that was the focal point
beyond the casting circle. Suspended in the framework, his arms and legs also
stretched wide, was the corpse of a naked man.

Even
from here Riley could see that the man had been tortured, for his body was
covered in a thousand different cuts going every which way across his flesh;
his skin a canvas painted in blood.

The
grotesque scene drew your attention automatically, whether you wanted to look
or not, and Riley knew that it had been intentionally designed that way. With
all of them staring forward in shock, their enemies would have the perfect
opportunity to strike.

Riley
raised a hand, index finger pointed skyward, and spun it around in a quick
circle. The men were moving almost before they’d given the signal any conscious
thought; the reaction had become simple muscle memory after training as long
and as hard as Echo Team had. The two groups became one, their backs to each
other as they formed into a tight circle, their weapons pointed outward,
covering both the tops of the shipping containers that were now at their backs
and the area at the front of the warehouse lost in darkness behind the bright
wash of the portable floodlights.

Riley
braced for an attack, knowing that this is exactly when he would have ordered
his own people out of hiding if their positions had been reversed, yet none
came.

They
moved forward, skirting the gruesome tableau in front of them, and made sure
there wasn’t anyone waiting to ambush them in the darkness behind the portable
spotlights. Then, and only then, when he was certain they were alone, did
Riley give the signal to stand down.

There
were still dozens of shipping containers to check – and check they would, each
and every one of them – but Riley could already tell that they were the only
ones here; at some point, their target had flown the coop and seemingly had
done so right under their watcher’s noses.

For
the second time since the hunt for Logan had begun, Riley got the sense that he
was in over his head.