While they ate, the two men picked up the thread of a conversation that had occupied them over many previous secret meetings.
“I am taking the matter to a priest,” said Sir Guy. “One of the Hospitallers of my order. An old friend of the family. He is a wise and subtle man, and I think he will see the logic of our plan.”
Ibrahim frowned. “What will happen if he does not agree with us? What will he do?”
“Do?” laughed Sir Guy. “He would denounce me and I would be lucky to escape being publically whipped to death. My lands and fortune would be seized and I would be excommunicated.” The Frenchman waved a hand at the expression of alarm on Ibrahim’s face. “No, no, my friend, that’s what could happen, but I do not think that it will happen. I know this man.”
“So far,” Ibrahim said, “this has all been nothing but an intellectual exercise, a discourse of a philosophical nature. Once you speak to this priest, it becomes something else.”
“I know. With the first words I say to the priest it becomes treason and heresy.”
They thought about that for several moments, each of them staring through the flickering fire at the future.
“We could turn back,” suggested Ibrahim. “Now, I mean. We could finish our meal and you could ride back to your camp and I to mine, and we could never speak of this again.”
“We could,” agreed Sir Guy.
“If we do not, then we are irrevocably set on a course that will wash the world in blood and pain and destruction from now until the ending of time.”
“Yes.”
“We must be sure.”
“I am sure,” said Sir Guy. “If you were not a heathen of a Saracen then we would drink wine together to seal the bargain.”
“And if you were not an infidel deserving of a jackal’s death we would spit on our palms and shake upon it.”
They smiled at each other.
“Let us do this, then,” proposed Sir Guy. He sat forward and took a knife and held the edge of the blade in the heat of the fire. The steel grew hot very quickly. “Since flame and steel and blood are the things with which we will prove our allegiance to God and with which we will preserve His holy name here on earth, then let it be with flame and steel and blood that we seal our agreement.”
“Our Holy Agreement,” corrected Ibrahim.
Their eyes met across the flame.
“Our Holy Agreement,” said Sir Guy.
He removed the smoking blade from the fire and opened his left hand. “The Crusades and the armies of the church are the right hand of God. We will be His left hand.”
He cocked an amused eye at Ibrahim, “And don’t tell me that your left is the hand you wipe your ass with, for I know that. No one will look there for proof of your fealty. And every time I see it I’ll laugh.”
“You are a whore’s son and the grandson of a leper,” replied Ibrahim, but he was laughing aloud as he said it.
Their laughter and smiles ebbed away as the edge of the blade turned from flat gray to a hellish red gold.
“Swear it, my brother,” said Ibrahim, nodding to the blade.
“I swear to defend the church, and to preserve it, and insure that it will endure forever. By my heart, by my hand, by my honor, and by my blood I so swear.” He set his teeth and pressed the flat of the blade into his palm. The glowing blade melted his flesh with a hiss and a curl of smoke. Sir Guy growled out in agony and then turned his cry into a ferocious prayer. “By God I swear!”
Gasping, gray-faced, he pulled the knife away and handed it to Ibrahim, then slumped back against the pillows. Ibrahim held the blade in the flames until the fading glow flared again. Then he, too, swore by his faith and on his God as he burned his promise into his skin. Then he dropped the knife into the heart of the fire where it would eventually melt into nothingness.
The smell of burning meat filled the tent.
The faces of the two diplomats were greasy with sweat.
Ibrahim held out his burned hand to his friend. “The left hand of God,” he said.
Sir Guy grunted and leaned forward, reaching out to clasp hand to hand.
“The left hand of God.”
They shook and it seemed to them that all around them the world itself trembled.
Chapter Forty-Six
The Hangar
Floyd Bennett Field, Brooklyn
June 15, 2:30 a.m. EST
“I say we pull him,” growled Aunt Sallie. She flung herself into the leather guest chair across the desk from Mr. Church. “Pull him now before he screws everything up.”
“Why?” asked Church. He sat back, his elbows on the arms of his chair, fingers steepled, eyes unreadable behind the tinted lenses of his glasses. “Beyond your general dislike of Ledger.”
“He can’t handle the knights and you damn well know it.”
“He survived one encounter.”
“Because some psycho bitch with a sniper rifle bailed him out. Pure luck.”
“Ledger is lucky, Auntie. You have to admit that.”
She snorted. “He may be, but the people around him sure as shit aren’t.”
“That’s not entirely fair.”
“Isn’t it? Grace Courtland? Marty Hanler? Sergeant Faraday? I could keep going.”
“How are any of those his fault?”
“Come on, Deke, we both know his history. Everyone who’s ever been close to him has gotten killed or hurt.”
“Again, that’s not a fair assessment.” Church took a Nilla wafer and pushed the plate across the desk. Aunt Sallie took one and snapped off a piece with her sharp white teeth; then she pointed the other half at Church. “If we’re being fair here… then you tell me how it’s fair to leave him in play? You actually like that ass clown. Do you want to see him torn apart?”
“No.”
“Do you remember what happened in Stuttgart? In Florence? In-”
“I remember, Auntie.”
“No, I think you need to refresh your mind on what happened, Deke. The knights are tougher than they ever were. Someone or something has amped them up. They tore apart an entire Mossad team. Sixteen trained agents. Dead. Drained. Is that what you want to do here? Feed your boy Ledger to those things?”
“Of course not. The Mossad team had no idea what they were up against.”
“Does Ledger?” snapped Aunt Sallie, her eyes blazing.
They regarded each other across Church’s broad desk. Aunt Sallie cocked an eyebrow.
“That sniper chick,” she said.
“Violin? What about her?”
“She’s with Arklight, isn’t she?”
“Possibly.”
“‘Possibly,’ my ass. The number of woman snipers is pretty small, and the number of those who work the Middle East is a lot smaller. You do realize that she fits a certain profile.”
“Yes,” he said, “that has occurred to me.”
“Does that mean you’re going to call the Mothers?”
“Do you think I should?”
“If one of their gals is involved in this thing, I think you damn well better. I mean… who knows the knights better than Lilith and her secret society of psycho bitches?”
Despite everything, Church smiled. “I may actually tell her you said that.”
Aunt Sallie shrugged. “I’ve called her worse things over the years.” She leaned forward, forearms resting on her knees.
Church pressed a button on his phone. “Gus? Pack a go-bag and meet me on the roof. The situation in Iran is going south on us.”
As he sat back, he caught Aunt Sallie’s cocked eyebrow.
“You going over there to hold Ledger’s hand?”
“Hardly. I want to have a face-to-face with Lilith.”
“Wear armor.”
They regarded each other for a moment, sharing without word all of the implications that were unfolding before them.
“Have you told Ledger?” asked Aunt Sallie quietly. “Have you told him what he’s really facing over there?”