Mr. Church’s eyes were flat and dead behind his tinted lenses.
“No,” he said. “He’s scared enough as it is.”
Chapter Forty-Seven
On the Streets
Tehran, Iran
June 15, 11:04 a.m.
The call with Church did not exactly have the effect I was looking for. I wanted support, some fresh intel, and a clear direction. Instead he tried to scare the crap out of me-and maybe succeeded more than I’d ever let him know.
I sat on the floor of the deserted living room and checked Ghost again. He was not severely injured, but he probably needed at least a full day to shake off that Taser. So far I hadn’t given him ten minutes.
When I got to my feet and clicked my tongue for him to follow, he looked at me with huge eyes filled with equal parts hurt and disgust.
“Don’t look at me like that,” I told him. “We’re fugitives. No rest for the weary. Miles to go before we sleep, and all that.”
Nothing.
“Cobbler wouldn’t sissy out on me.” Cobbler was my aging house cat. He and Ghost had failed to bond. Spectacularly.
As Ghost finally hauled himself to all fours he gave me a look that could have chiseled my name on a tombstone.
I smoothed my clothes and ran my fingers through my hair, but I knew I still looked like crap. We slipped out the door and began heading toward the CIA safe house.
Even with a clean face and shirt, I looked like a street person, and I had a limping dog with blood on his fur. Not exactly the definition of nondescript, but as I walked I muttered to myself, reciting snatches of popular Persian songs and occasionally twitching my face and shoulder muscles. Even here, where suspicious characters are often questioned, no one likes to initiate contact with a disheveled man who is speaking to himself while twitching. People tend to pointedly ignore you, which is what I wanted. When anyone came too close I asked them for money, which usually guarantees that they quicken their steps while pleading poverty. A few threw blessings at me, which, hey… I took, all things considering. Twice people gave me money.
It’s a weird world.
Ghost and I kept moving.
Interlude Two
Jaffa, The Holy Land
September 1191 C.E.
Sir Guy LaRoque waited while the little priest read through the document. They stood in a shaded courtyard of the Jerusalem hospital that was the local headquarters of the Knights Hospitaller. No other of the knights were around. Their only company was a sun-drowsy wasp that drifted through the shadows under the fig trees.
Finally the priest smiled as he sharpened his gaze on Sir Guy.
“Have you considered the consequences of what you are asking of me?”
Sir Guy half bowed. “I have. But weighed against what we stand to gain, now and in future years, I-”
The priest held up a hand to halt a repeat of the argument.
“You come here, to a sanctified and sacred hospital dedicated to the treatment of those wounded in God’s own Crusade, and ask me, a priest, to willingly break the seal of the confessional.”
“No, Father, that is not what I ask. To break the seal would be to share with another person that which was said to God through you, the confessor. I do not want to know the secrets of my brother crusaders. I would not ask such a thing. I ask only that you consider what you have heard, and to balance it against what needs to be done to protect our holy church. I ask that these insights guide you in the selection of men-righteous Christian men-who will join with us in this new crusade.”
“You propose a crusade of secrets and lies.”
“They are only lies if you disagree with our viewpoint. We have discussed this many times, Father, and each time you did agree with me. Do you say now that you lied before? Or has fear stolen away your faith in your own opinion?”
The priest turned, not quickly, not in anger, but slowly and with a calculated deliberation that was far more threatening. As he did so, his eyes seemed to change and Sir Guy nearly took a backward step. The color seemed to shift from gray to a swirl of greens and browns. It was certainly a result of the priest’s movement through the sunlight and shadow, but it was momentarily unnerving.
“Softly now,” said the priest, “for there are snares and nettles in the grass around your feet. Do not let ill-chosen words lead you to take a painful misstep.”
Sir Guy placed a hand over his heart and bowed again. A deeper bow this time, held longer, the demonstration of apology and humility. “Have I offended, Father, then I am truly sorry. Before God and your holiness, I beg forgiveness for rude and rash words, poorly chosen and hastily spoken.”
He felt a touch on his head. The priest’s thin fingers caressed the brown curls that twisted out from under the silk cap.
“Peace, my son,” murmured the priest. “Look at me.”
Sir Guy slowly straightened, almost afraid to see that unnatural swirl of colors in the cleric’s eyes, but what he saw was the same golden brown he had known for years.
“Thank you, Father.”
“My son… this undertaking… it is with the consent and cooperation of the infidel and heretic Ibrahim al-Asiri? Cousin and private advisor to Saladin, enemy of God? You have made a preliminary bargain with a representative of the Antichrist on earth?”
“He is a Saracen, to be sure, but-”
“Yes or no, my friend?” asked the priest. “Did you enter into an agreement with Ibrahim al-Asiri?”
“I did. In the name of God and for my love of the Church, I did.”
The priest took his hand and patted it. “I just wanted you to say it aloud. Plain and not couched in the twisted language of diplomacy which, I must admit, often sounds like the mutterings of the devil. Tell me the truth, Sir Guy, for much hangs on it. If I were to say no-if I threatened to do the terrible things that we both know I can do and indeed should do to a man who has brought this to me and asked of me what you have asked-would you be willing to kill me?”
Sir Guy said nothing.
“Speak now or I will call the guards.”
“Yes,” croaked the diplomat, though he knew that he could never do such a thing. He could kill an uncle or brother before he killed a priest.
“Then tell me one more thing. If you escaped; if you fled this hospital and the city, if you took a boat to Spain or some other port, if you changed your name and lived forever in hiding… would you still want this plan of yours to go forward? Does the substance of this agreement matter more to you than titles, land, wealth, or your own name? Does this agreement matter more to you than your own life?”
“Yes,” Sir Guy said again. His throat felt like it was filled with shards of broken pottery.
The priest stepped closer, his face as severe as one of the saints of antiquity. “If I were to call my guards in here and have them strike you down and cut off your head and scatter the worthless pieces of your body to the vultures… would you even then want this agreement to move forward?”
Tears broke from Sir Guy’s eyes and he buckled slowly to his knees. He drew his sword and let it clatter to the flagstones. His dagger clanged as he dropped that across the sword. Sir Guy bowed his head.
“Yes,” he said in a voice that was filled with passion but without hope.
The tears dropped from his face onto the toe of the priest’s shoe. A moment later the priest raised his foot and touched the tearstained toe to the tip of the dagger. It lay almost parallel to the sword, but the priest nudged it slowly until it sat crosswise so that the dagger formed the bar of a cross. Or the hilt of a sword. How often Sir Guy had noticed how similar cross and sword were to one another.
“Look at me.”
Sir Guy raised his eyes and saw that the priest was smiling. It was not a nice smile. It was like looking at a snake smile, and as his seamed faced wrinkled with the smile, the priest’s eyes once more seemed to be as much green as brown. Like the mottled skin of a toad.