“I’m going to kill you,” said Balthazar.
“I know.”
“I swear it… ”
“I know… I know you do,” he said with that same sadness. “My God, what you must think I am… ”
The admiral came closer still. Close enough so Balthazar could see the burst capillaries on the tip of his nose. The scars of a wine-soaked life. After taking in Balthazar’s face, he stepped away and helped himself to a seat in Herod’s chair. A sigh escaped him.
“I have sons, you know,” he said. “Four of them. They’re grown now, of course, but I remember feeling that fear. That fear that they would be taken from me. And if anyone had ever harmed them when they were young, well… ”
“He was a boy… ” Just saying the words brought fresh tears to Balthazar’s eyes.
“He was a thief,” said the admiral. “And I was an officer, in a city where a Roman couldn’t walk from one side of the street to the other without having his pocket picked.”
“HE DIDN’T UNDERSTAND!”
And that’s what hurts the most, when you get right down to it. That look on his face. The one I see over and over in my mind. That fear, that confusion. Why, Bal-faza? What did I do? Why is this man hurting me, Bal-faza? I looked up to you. I loved you and imitated you, Bal-faza, and this wouldn’t have happened to me if you weren’t so bad, Bal-faza. IT’S YOUR FAULT, BAL-FAZA. IT’S YOUR —
Balthazar gritted his teeth, trying to banish the tears. But they came.
“He didn’t understand,” said Balthazar. “He was good. He would’ve had a good life. A beautiful life. And you took it. You took everything he would ever have. We… we would ever have.”
“Maybe,” said the admiral. “Maybe he would’ve had a good life. Maybe he would’ve had a tragic life. But you… ” He rose from Herod’s chair and came forward again. “Look at you. You’ve devoted your whole life to this. To killing me. And now it ends. Useless. Unfulfilled. You’re a cunning man, a strong man. You could’ve done anything. You could have grieved for him and moved on. You could’ve found love and fortune, had children of your own. But you’ve wasted it.”
Balthazar heard a voice whispering in his ears: How does killing honor his memory? How does it bring you any closer to having Abdi in your arms again? Isn’t it better to walk away? Doesn’t that make you the more powerful man? Besides, this admiral was right. He’d wrapped up an entire existence in revenge. His entire being was devoted to a single, murderous purpose. But now that he was so close, a new, terrifying question presented itself: And then what? What does your life mean after that? What comes next?
“It’s haunted you,” said Balthazar. “His face… I know it has… ”
The admiral looked at him with real pity. “The truth?” he asked. “Look at me. Do you want me to tell you the truth?”
Balthazar looked up. Glared at him.
“I’ve hardly thought about him.”
He’s lying. He wants me to believe that. But no man is that callous.
“I didn’t like my father all that much,” said the admiral. “But before he died, he gave me a piece of advice. The only one that ever really made a difference in my life. ‘Hug your children,’ he said. ‘Kiss your mothers and fathers, your brothers and sisters. Tell them how much you love them, every day. Because every day is the last day. Every light casts a shadow. And only the gods know when the darkness will find us.’”
The admiral turned away and helped himself to one of the orange slices on the platter. He sucked on it, enjoying the taste and the moisture until there was nothing left. As he did this, Balthazar made a decision.
I’m going to find out what comes next.
Blood trickled down Balthazar’s wrists as he pulled down on the rope with all his strength, pulled down on the wooden beam that it was tied to. The beam began to groan under the stress, and the admiral turned. He looked up at the beam — sturdy as any beam had any right to be. He looked down at Balthazar, pulling with what limited strength he had left in his body. The math didn’t hold up. There was no way a man could free himself under these circumstance. Satisfied, he turned his thoughts back to the orange slice in his mouth.
The magus grabbed his head and bolted upright from his couch in the throne room, knocking over his cup in the process. Something was terribly wrong.
“What is it?” asked Herod, standing up from his throne. By the time Herod got the words out, the magus was on his feet, shoving courtesans and advisors aside, looking for something. Anything. When Herod realized what he was doing, he shouted, “Bring him something to write with, at once!”
A piece of parchment was hurried into the magus’s hands as advisors tried to make themselves look busy. Herod crossed the throne room and stood over the little priest’s shoulder, reading along with every letter:
Prisoner is free. Ghost fr —
“Impossible!” cried Herod. “He’s under guard!”
The magus hurriedly scribbled again, then shoved the paper so close to Herod’s face that he nearly broke the king’s nose.
Guards dead. Everyone dead.
Balthazar is born again. He’s Samson slaying an entire army with a jawbone. He’s Hercules killing the Nemean lion. David killing Goliath. He pulls his arms until they shake, pulls on the ropes that bind each of his wrists to the wooden beam above. And witness now the sound of cracking wood.
The admiral’s eyes nearly leap out of his head, because he doesn’t believe what he sees. The math doesn’t hold up. A man can’t be that powerful, especially one whose body has been so battered. Yet the beam splinters, then splits in two and falls to the stone floor with a crash, freeing Balthazar’s hands.
The guards draw their swords and come at him. Balthazar charges too. He goes for the table against the wall — the one filled with an assortment of scalpels and clamps and scissors. He grabs the first one his fingers touch, unaware that it’s the very scalpel that was used to cut away the missing flesh beneath both of his arms. With long ropes still attached to both wrists, Balthazar turns and swings the blade in front of his body just in time.
And as weak and battered as he is, he swings with more strength than he’s ever known. His blade cuts through the droplets of rainwater that fall from the stone ceiling, splitting the ones it touches as it strikes the side of the first guard’s face — flaying it open like his own flesh had been flayed. He pierces the other beneath the armpit, driving the blade deeper — deeper past his ribs and into his lungs. He withdraws it and the man falls to the wet floor, where he’ll either drown in his own blood in seconds or die from infection in weeks. It doesn’t matter, as long as he leaves the earth in pain.
But no time for these thoughts. Not yet. For the admiral has just realized that he’s next and begins his hasty retreat toward the closed cell door. Balthazar has to cover twice the distance to beat him there. It’s impossible. But not today. The world has bowed before him. Time has wrapped him in its arms. Balthazar moves with wings on his feet, sees with eyes in the back of his head. He takes a sword from one of the guards and moves across the wet floor with impossible speed, blocking the admiral’s escape. And the admiral is afraid. He backs away, for he can see the truth written on Balthazar’s face. He can see that this man will not fail, no matter what he aims to do. He’s afraid because he knows that these are his last moments on this earth and that they’re going to be terrible moments.