Nightbringer (18 page)

"You said Caiaphas ordered you to break His legs to insure He was dead!" Cassius shouted so that all could hear. "I just proved He is already dead! You no longer have a reason to break His bones unless you wish only to break the words of your prophets!"

The captain of the temple guard glanced to the sudden chorus of angry voices that swelled from the hundreds surrounding
   the   crucifix—voices that  were immediately amplified by other voices and still others so that a riot began to rise.

Cassius stood, poised for battle.

The captain glanced nervously at the crowd.

With a quick gesture—as if he did not even want word of this to spread—the captain ordered his men to follow him through the crowd. Gina wondered if they would be attacked by the surrounding mob
but they roughly shouldered their way through the crowd as if they feared nothing, though she knew they feared because they wasted no time in their retreat.

Afterward, Cassius stood alone upon the hill at the base of the crucifix, still holding the spear. He did not raise his head again to Jesus but, with a strange expression, lifted his wounded hand, staring. Then he scowled before raising his face to gaze upon the crowd, as if he had not previously noticed them. Only when a group of older men slowly climbed the hill did the centurion lower his gaze, as if remembering where he stood.

"What do you desire?" Cassius asked, and it seemed that he would collapse.

A big man with a flowing white beard and a tunic worn only by the very rich replied humbly, "I am Josephus. I have prepared a tomb for
The Messiah. I ask only for your permission to remove His body from this cursed place, for cursed is any man that hangs upon a tree past sunset, and bury Him, as our rites require. We shall gently care for Him, nor shall a bone be broken."

Cassius stared into the old man's eyes
, and nodded. "Take His body ... and bury Him as your ritual requires."

Slowly the old men moved farther up the hill as the centurion, still holding the spear, walked down the mound. The crowd parted reverently, though many hesitantly reached out
to touch his cloak. Many fell to their knees. Women moaned. Children stood frozen with fright. Old and strong men wept.

Holding the spear so that it did not touch the ground, Cassius passed Gina with steps made solemn with sadness, pure with purpose. Then he removed his helmet and cast it to the mud so that Gina recognized the ice-blue eyes, weary now with weariness like death—the familiar, sad bend of his head.

“
Cassius
,” Gina whispered.

***

A hideous bellow from somewhere deep within the abbey brought them together to their feet. Then the bellow was followed by a scream that continued on and on and on until the children raised their hands to cover their heads and fell to the floor.

Gina was struggling to awaken—deep inside slumber— and snatched up the MP-5. It took her another moment to clear her head—Yes!

Livid, she spun to Melanchthon. "Who's not here!"

It took him only a moment. "Barnabas!" Melanchthon pounced on Jaqual. "Where's Barnabas!"

Jaqual dropped a bottle of wine, stammered, "H-He—"

"Speak, boy!" Melanchthon roared.

"He-He went for more food! Only a second—"

"Foolish old man!" Melanchthon bawled and snatched up a spear. He spun toward Cassius, just as Gina did, to see Josh and Rachel, alone and in shock, at the table.

Cassius was gone.

***

Frantic shouts erupted everywhere and Gina learned that Cassius had moved with the first cry, snatching up the katana and his Colt .45 and within seconds was in the corridor that boomed with the sound.

"He said don't follow him!" Rachel and Josh screamed at once. "He said for nobody to follow him!"

Exactly what she expected but Gina couldn't do it—not with the sound so close. Still, she had to insure that the children remained safe. The professor was before her.

"Give me a weapon!" he said quickly. "I'll watch the children!"

"Here!" Gina threw the SIG to the professor and tore out the MP-5 as she grabbed a torch. She spun to Melanchthon. "I can't let him go alone! If Cassius dies we all die!"

The monk snatched up a spear.

"We go!"

The howls continued as Gina, Melanchthon close behind her, descended far into the corridor, angling quickly around corners with less caution than she would have preferred. But from the distance of the cries she knew they weren't even close to the creature. Yet in another five minutes they were in the center of what happened and she held out an arm to slow Melanchthon, who obeyed instantly.

A strange thought passed through Gina's mind—the kind of thought that happens even in life-and-death situations—that the monk would have made a good FBI agent. Then she saw a cave-like tunnel completely unlike the rest.

"The catacombs," Melanchthon rumbled. Sweat glistened silver on his face, framed by white hair. "It's the only entrance. But there are
more than forty miles of tunnels. It is built within an old cave system."

The screams had ceased and Gina felt a distinct temptation to retreat back into the Hall. But if they were even close to one of the creatures now, which was likely, maybe she could get a clear shot with the MP-5 and do more damage. The memory of how fast it moved in the stairway flashed across her vision.

No time to debate.

She moved into the tunnel, sweeping left and right to the corridors that instantly sprawled into the vastness of the catacombs. Somehow she managed to ignore the bones resting in crude niches, the gaping mouths of skulls, the depthless black eyes.

By reflex she searched the floor for a sign of direction, but all she read were multitudinous tracks of hundreds who had walked through here across centuries. Only then did it occur to her that tracks in this place would never vanish because there was no wind, no rain.

She whirled, crouching.

A sound...

She'd seen this creature move. It was incredibly fast and struck but once to kill. So if she didn't catch it when it was at least a hundred feet away, then it would survive the onslaught of the MP-5 to kill her and Melanchthon together. Even a human being could travel tw
enty feet after they'd been mortally wounded—this thing could easily triple that.

A scrape...

Gina shouted as she spun.

In a well of torn gray clothing and a widening black pool, Barnabas lay unmoving.

"Barnabas!" Gina shouted as she pitched forward and was over the old man. She saw at once that he was wounded.

Melanchthon knelt beside him and, despite the obvious lightness of his wounds, felt along them. Even at the slight touch, Barnabas moaned, and Melanchthon bowed his head, quickly working to bind up the old monk's wounds.

"Barnabas!" Gina said loudly enough to get the old man's attention. At a faint stir, Gina leaned closer. "Was it the same Nephilim that Cassius fought on the ledge? Could you see?"

Rubbing his neck, Barnabas groggily formed a reply. Gina waited without a breath. "It was
... another."

Then the answer continued in a long breath, and whatever animation remained in the old man's eyes froze over like frost over glass. No one needed to say it, and no one did. Slowly she and Melanchthon stood, staring down, and Gina shook her head.

"Come on." She held the MP-5 closer as she turned. "Let's get out of—"

***

Dreaming, Gina wondered why light wavered across the ceiling, why she was floating.

She heard a howl and a roar and felt her face against dirt. Dust rose around her, and she wondered why she wasn't standing and some reflex told her she'd been hit. She cried out, rolled, and saw shadows wrestling across the ceiling.

No ... not the ceiling.

She didn't know what had happened but whatever had happened was horrifying. She screamed in pain as she gained a knee, seeing the MP-5 on the ground.

Yeah, something hit me
...

Clumsily she grasped the weapon and saw a gigantic gargoyle shape holding Melanchthon aloft as it flung the monk into a wall. But Melanchthon was strong and rose almost in the same breath. He crouched barehanded—as Cassius had— though he stood no chance
at all against the beast.

Both torches were lost, so they were fighting almost in total darkness. Gina couldn't see
exact details of the Nephilim's form though she sensed somehow by the way darkness faded at the silhouette that it was far larger than Raphael.

Melanchthon laughed through mashed lips. "Now we face each other in our true forms!"

The Nephilim seemed to laugh and sank farther into shadow, farther and farther until Gina could barely see the scarlet reflection of its eyes. And then the eyes, too, were gone.

From the opposite direction of where the eyes sank into the darkness, Gina heard movement. A sharp step caused her to shout and whirl, firing the MP-5 in the darkness.
And although her brain wasn't working fast enough to transmit images at the strobe light of the blasts, she realized this section of the catacombs was an amphitheater.

She froze on the trigger and, remarkably, remembered to sweep the barrel slowly so as not to leave any man-sized holes in the pattern and then the bolt locked.

Change clips
!

Sound.

Black rising...

Raphael—

A massive hand hit her throat, cutting off a scream, and Gina was smashed against the wall. Her head cracked painfully against the stone and she must have lost consciousness for a second because she awoke with hot breath steaming across her face. Turning away as much as possible, Gina gasped painfully and drew a burning breath.

Her hand was empty. She'd lost the semiautomatic.

Eyes inhabited by a red world of lost souls gazed deep into hers.

It
laughed.

Gina closed her eyes and tried to kick, to fight, but there was no fighting stone and iron. She had as much chance of moving it as she had of lifting a ton of granite.
Then the Nephilim threw back his head to laugh and it was an unearthly howl of the blackest mirth, inhuman at its source. Gina screamed and in the next second her legs caved as she hit the ground.

Stunned and surprised—her mind not fast enough to catch up with what had happened as she scrambled back—she grabbed wildly for the MP-5 and then it was in her hands again.

By force of will she saw the beast—this one was Raphael— less than a stride away. But it was bowed back, and a human arm was locked around its neck, another arm hooking its bicep, holding back the blow that would have severed her head from her neck.

Cassius
!

Enraged, the beast whirled, swiping, but it couldn't reach Cassius from such a position. It bellowed in mindless animal fury, spinning, raging and rebounding from wall to wall. Fangs gaped and snapped again and again but Cassius didn't release either neck or arm. And although they
had initially seemed almost equal in strength, Cassius began to lose his hold inch by inch.

As Gina stood she ejected the spent clip in the MP-5 and slammed in another, pulling open the bolt for a quick burst. But she couldn't fire with Cassius so close and moved to the side for the best angle if they separated.

With a thunderous bellow it finally tore free from Cassius' hold and spun with its claws rising, but Cassius took a quick jerk-step backward, and the katana flashed like lightning from ceiling to floor.

Raphael—she had no idea where the larger one had gone—howled and Gina fired an entire clip. She knew she'd done massive damage when the Nephilim turned and staggered into another corridor.
Then its clawed hand swept out to blast a torch from its pedestal and it was swallowed by darkness.

Gasping, Cassius stood in the center of the corridor but he didn't pursue as Gina expected any man caught in the heat
of combat to pursue. Instead he turned to her and seemed to check her visually for wounds, then walked to Melanchthon. He rolled the old man onto his back. He had a severe cut on his forehead.

Cassius bent and lifted him from the floor with ease. Then he pitched the monk over his shoulder and gazed upon Gina.

"Can you walk?"

"I think so. But Barnabas is badly wounded."

Cassius hesitated for only one instant, but it was enough for Gina to know his sorrow. He nodded as he motioned for Gina to help him lift Barnabas. Clutching Melanchthon tightly, Cassius gently hoisted Barnabas onto his other shoulder, looking into the old monk's glassy eyes. Cassius' tone was somber but also tempered. He would not allow sorrow to dull his thoughts.

"We have to go to the sanctuary."

"The sanctuary? Why?"

"I have to know something."

"Let’s go."

***

Despite the ominous air that surrounded the sanctuary, Gina sensed nothing so special when they entered. Even after Cassius lit torches they had retrieved from the main tunnel system, she saw nothing that should inspire awe or even fear.