The Dove (19 page)

“Dead.”  Mark nodded.  “Gone to God.”

“Yes.”

“Are we going to God, Sophia?”  He asked her.

“Eventually.”

“In the dirt?”

“Probably.”

“I don’t know.”  He kicked the camel again.  “I don’t like it.”

Sophia chewed her bottom lip.  For the first time she wondered about what had happened to them.  He no longer wore the white braid that he’d always worn in his hair.  It was simply gone. It had been there when they had been riding across the meadow together before Abaddon had abducted them.  She remembered seeing the sparkle of the silver ornaments in the moonlight and hearing the soft jingle when he turned his head, but when they had emerged from the caverns in New Persia, it had been gone. She had often wondered at the significance of this and if it had anything to do with his present state of mind.  But this encounter with death made her think of something even more disturbing. 

She felt the same and yet, she had the distinct impression that something had changed about herself as well.  There were times just before she drifted off to sleep she felt as if she were floating or flying and she heard voices and saw strange visions.  Great cavernous chambers of crystal, fields and meadows, streams and ponds and mountains that were totally unfamiliar to her, but always Mark was there with her and she felt comforted by his presence.  But this Mark was no comfort.  He was a constant source of worry, just like a small child.  Still, he did not want her out of his sight, unless he chose to run off from her, and then he expected her to chase after him. 

She had waited for him for a long time, hoping and planning to be his wife, his partner, and now she had become his mother!  Certainly an unexpected development. 

The sight of the mummified remains in the desert had brought another disturbing thought.  She had no idea if they were still immortal and had the nasty notion that they were not.  She had several bruises and scratches that should have been gone days ago.  Mark Andrew had suffered a fairly severe burn on his left hand that refused to heal
from the firestorm. The Colonel cleaned it everyday and bandaged it, but it had the distinct signs of infection in it now.  Colonel McGuffy was reluctant to use his meager supply of antibiotics on the wound, hoping that it would take care of itself, but she was going to have to insist, if it did not look any better by morning.  Mark, naturally, did not seem overly concerned about it, since it had stopped hurting for the most part.  Furthermore, the blisters he had acquired on his feet were hanging on stubbornly and these were dealing him some misery every time he dismounted.  She remembered seeing Nicole examining her father’s hand with great interest the day before and now realized why.  Nicole had suffered several burns on her face and arms, but those were all gone now, as were Bari’s injuries.  Sophia had been avoiding the inevitable conclusion.  They had lost more than his white braid in the caverns.  Much more.

((((((((((((()))))))))))))

Mark Andrew stood outside the perimeter of the circle he had mapped out on the ground with pieces of broken stone and a length of string.  The wind blew back his hair as he faced the setting sun.  The edge of the red-orange orb was a bare few degrees above the horizon.  He turned his back to the sun and planted the butt of the staff on the ground between his feet.

“Stand ready.”  He called to Sophia.  She stood on the tracing of the circle with a sizable white stone in her hands.

The wind seemed to pick up a bit as the shadow of the stave grew visibly across the ground toward the more massive gray stone in the center of the circle.  Another stave was placed in a hole in the gray rock and its shadow was growing opposite the center.  The shadows continued to grow from the Knight’s marker until they aligned perfectly.

“Now.”  He nodded to her and she marked the spot where the slender shadow crossed the circle with the white stone.  Mark lowered the staff and walked toward her.  He surveyed the circle briefly and then hurried across it to examine the spot on the other side where the shadow crossed.  It covered the opposite marker perfectly.  Sophia came to stand beside him, pulling her cloak about her against the wind.  The temperature dropped dramatically with the sun.

“Is that it?”  She asked him after a moment.

“We’ll lay out the rest tomorrow.”  He wrapped one arm about her waist and scanned the darkening sky.  “Tonight, I should be able to find it.”

Sophia shuddered as they walked back toward the flapping canvass of the tent.  The fire in front of the tent flap whipped back and forth in the wind.  Mark disappeared into the tent and came out with a small telescope.  Sophia sat down on a rock near the fire and watched as he walked back to the center of the circle.

Mark set up the telescope on its slender tripod and began to scan the western sky above the horizon, occasionally using his compass and his fingers extended at arm’s length to take measurements.  After a few moments, he called back to her excitedly.

Sophia joined him in the barren circle, and then had to lay down on the earth to peer into the eyepiece.

“Careful now. Don’t move it.”  He told her as she closed one eye and squinted through the aperture.

“Is that it?”  She looked up at him and then back in the telescope.

“That’s it.”  He nodded and pulled a small notebook from one of his pockets.  He scribbled on the page and consulted his watch.

“What will we do?”  She asked him when she had gotten up again.

“That depends on what happens day after tomorrow.”  He shrugged.

“What is so important about day after tomorrow?”  She asked and shuddered.

“Day after tomorrow is September 21, the Autumnal Equinox.  I will have the final reading.”  He hugged her again and picked up the telescope.

“And then we will know the date?”  She asked.

“Yes.  We will know the date.”

“It doesn’t look very big.  How do you know that’s it?”  She asked.

“I had a closer look last night.”  He pulled her to him and seemed to hold his breath as the sun dipped below the horizon.

“Why didn’t you take me?”  She frowned at him.

“You were sleeping.”  He smiled.  “But you are right.  It’s not very big and that’s good.  It might hold together.”

“And that would be good, too.”  She nodded.

“Very good.”  He agreed.

“Care for a spot of tea, Sir?”  She asked him more brightly.

“That would be nice, lassie.” 

“I don’t have any.”  She told him.  “How about a spot of mead?”

“Even nicer.” 

He held up the tent flap for her and then followed her inside.  The wind howled over the open terrain and nothing moved on the horizon in any direction.  The peat fire outside the tent sputtered, and then died to a glowing pile of embers.

((((((((((((()))))))))))))

Il Dolce Mio rode his pony about the base of the enormous, stone beast on the plain of Giza.  He rose up in the saddle and the hot wind off the desert blew its dying breath on him as the last vertical rays of the sun against the horizon faded to light blue and then purple. 

“It is much more impressive than I had expected.”  The King announced to his companions.  “I did not expect it to be so grand.  It did not seem so in the photographs.”

“Ahhh.”  Lemarik leaned down from his saddle to run one slender hand over the weathered stones.  “It is much less than what it once was, my brother.  You should have seen it when it was new, and the original lion’s regal face gazed out on the forest!  Much has been lost here even in light of the false restoration.”

Vanni sat on his horse between the great forelegs of the Sphinx, gazing up at the colorful face of the pharaoh.  An eagle sat on the King’s headdress, eyeing him suspiciously.

“Doesn’t he recognize us?”  Luke Andrew drew up beside him.

“I’m sure he does.”  Vanni told him. 

“Hey!!”  Luke shouted up to the bird.  “Stop being anti-social and get down here!”

Lemarik galloped around the base of the edifice and stopped near one of the paws.

“That is not wise, brother.”  He admonished the apprentice.  “You may call something unexpected down on our heads.”

Luke snorted and then turned his horse about.

“Brother!”  He called to Il Dolce Mio.  “We should make camp here.  We can set up a perimeter on the walls.  Station some of your archers on top of the thing and along the walls. We should be able to see anything coming our way.”

Il Dolce Mio dismounted and called his captains to him.  They dispersed shortly and began to make camp, herding the ponies into one of the buildings in front of the Sphinx.  A fire was soon blazing against the falling desert temperatures as Lemarik walked the perimeter, checking the horizon carefully.  He would remain on watch throughout the night.

Luke chose a spot between the front legs of the monument, refusing to allow his horse to be taken with the ponies.  Vanni joined him and brought the backpack from his red horse.  He pulled out his father’s clothes and laid them on the stones.

“Do you think he’ll come down?”  Luke asked him as he fished in his own backpack for a bottle of water.

“Eventually.”  Vanni sat down next to him. 

“And then what?”  Luke yawned.

“We will find out what he has learned.”

((((((((((((()))))))))))))

Jerusalem was a ghost town.  No one was home in any part of the city.  McGuffy was horrified by the site of the empty streets and deserted houses, apartment buildings and businesses.  Many of the stores had been looted and then burned, and there was very little left here for survivors, scavengers or even dogs and stray cats.  Dust covered everything and made the city a uniform color, obscuring many details of what had happened here before the people had left en masse for friendlier climes after the war, the plague and the coming of the great creatures from the deserts.  The monstrosities had destroyed anything left behind and then abandoned the city as well.  The only signs of life were the soldiers, who lived behind the walls of the Temple complex, protecting the building that contained the only valuable thing left in the city… the Ark of the Covenant.  But these soldiers knew McGuffy quite well.  They recognized the sovereignty of the Emperor of New Persia and welcomed the little troop with open arms, literally giving them with any and all the supplies that they had left, which, considering the remote location was considerable.

Sophia had been extremely relieved to have a bath, clean clothes of a more conventional style to wear, hot food and cold drinks.  The soldiers had set themselves up quite well inside the high walls that Omar had begun and Jozsef had completed.  They had all the conveniences of home, electricity, running water, along with diesel, gasoline, stockpiles of ammunition for the heavy artillery mounted on the walls, caches of smaller arms and ammo enough to supply a small army, but there were only thirty men here.  At the outset, there had been over a hundred men assigned to the Temple Zone, but one by one, they had disappeared, and none of the soldiers or their ranking officers could say exactly what had happened to them.  The man in charge was only a second lieutenant because the Major and the Captain had both become casualties early on.  The lieutenant had stopped sending out sorties into the city or the surrounding areas and kept all his remaining soldiers behind the walls and the disappearances had stopped.  Whatever was taking them was quick, silent and unseen, and most likely lurking in the burned out buildings in the city.  There were no witnesses.  No near misses.  No bodies or even visible remains of bodies to give clues as to what had happened to them.

The Colonel took command of the outpost and read everything that the lieutenant had recorded in his journals, but could add nothing to what the man already knew.  They had a radio and a series of connections with operational satellites and reported twice daily to headquarters in New Babylon.  The lieutenant, a young Greek named, oddly enough, Socrates Galipoli, was more than glad to turn over command to McGuffy.  His pleas for reinforcements and relief had been ignored by the high command in New Babylon, and he had resigned himself to spending the rest of his life confined to the white stone walls of the Temple Complex until he either died of old age or whatever was out there came inside the walls to carry them off.  His exuberant joy at seeing the Colonel had been quite apparent.  His dark good looks had attracted Nicole’s attention immediately and she had abandoned her nephew readily for the young lieutenant’s company.

Ironically enough, Sophia and Mark were assigned quarters in the officer barracks across the plaza from where Omar and Luke Andrew had once stayed very briefly under the guise of Temple Guards.  The great statue of Jozsef Daniel lay in ruins on the stones of the plaza.  The huge blocks of stone covered with gold sheeting, lay as it had fallen.  No one dared to touch it. 
Even the scavengers had avoided the place during the last mad scramble to evacuate the fallen city.  No one would venture near the Temple where the mysterious Ark lay concealed behind its purple and red draperies.  The gold tables, candlesticks and vessels remained untouched and unused.  The tall, gold-plated doors were chained from the outside and four guards stood a constant vigil in front of them on the steps.