James Rollins: Innocent Blood

James

To Carolyn McCray, for her inspiration, encouragement, and boundless friendship

Rebecca

To my husband, son, and Twinkle the Cat

As the screams of the dying rose up toward the desert sun, Bernard’s bone-white fingers clutched the cross hanging from his neck. The touch of its blessed silver seared his sword-calloused palm, branding his damned flesh. He ignored the smell of his charred skin and tightened his grip. He accepted the pain.

For this pain had a purpose — to serve God.

Around him foot soldiers and knights washed into Jerusalem on a wave of blood. For the past months, the Crusaders had fought their way across hostile lands. Nine out of every ten men were lost before ever reaching the Holy City: felled by battle, by the pitiless desert, by heathen diseases. Those who survived wept openly upon seeing Jerusalem for the first time. But all that blood spilt had not been in vain, for now the city would be restored to Christians yet again, a harsh victory marked by the deaths of thousands of infidels.

For those slain, Bernard whispered a quick prayer.

He had time for no more.

As he sheltered beside the horse-drawn wagon, he drew the rough cowl of his hood lower over his eyes, cloaking his white hair and pale face deeper into shadow. He then took hold of the stallion’s bridle and stroked the beast’s warm neck, hearing the thunder of its heart as much with his fingertips as his ears. Terror stoked the steed’s blood and steamed from its sweating flanks.

Still, with a firm tug, the animal stepped forward next to him, drawing the wooden cart over the blood-soaked paving stones. The wagon’s bed held a single iron cage, large enough to imprison a man. Thick leather wrapped the cage tightly, hiding what was inside. But he knew. And so did the horse. Its ears flicked back anxiously. It shook its unkempt black mane.

Ranged in a tight phalanx ahead of him, Bernard’s dark brethren — his fellow knights from the Order of the Sanguines — battled to clear a path forward. All valued this mission more than their own existence. They fought with strength and determination no human could match. One of his brothers vaulted high into the air, a sword in each hand, revealing his inhuman nature as much by the flurry of his steel as by the flash of his sharp teeth. They were all once unholy beasts, like the one caged in the wagon, stripped of their souls and left forsaken — until offered a path back to salvation by Christ. Each made a dark compact to slake his thirst no more upon the blood of man, but only upon the consecrated blood of Christ, a blessing that allowed them to walk half in shadow, half in sunlight, balanced on a sword’s edge between grace and damnation.

Sworn now to the Church, each served God as both warrior and priest.

Those very duties had drawn Bernard and the others to the gates of Jerusalem.

Through the cries and carnage, the wooden cart rolled at a steady pace. Bernard willed the wheels to turn faster as dread clutched him.

Must hurry…

Still, another need rang through him just as urgently. As he marched, blood dripped down the walls around him, ran in rivers across the stones underfoot. The iron saltiness filled his head, misting the very air, igniting a bone-deep hunger. He licked his dry lips, as if trying to taste what was forbidden him.

He wasn’t the only one suffering.

From the dark cage, the beast howled, scenting the bloodshed. Its cries sang to the same monster still hidden inside Bernard — only his monster was not caged by iron, but by oath and blessing. Still, in response to that scream of raw hunger, the points of Bernard’s teeth grew longer and sharper, his craving keener still.

Hearing these screams, his brothers surged forward with renewed strength, as if fleeing their former selves.

The same could not be said for the horse.

As the beast howled, the stallion froze in its harness.

As well it should.

Bernard had captured the caged fiend ten months ago at an abandoned wooden stable outside Avignon in France. Such cursed creatures went by many names over the centuries. Though once men themselves, they were now a scourge that haunted dark places, surviving on the blood of man and beasts.

Once Bernard had the fiend trapped inside the cage, he had swaddled its new prison with layers of thick leather so that not a mote of light could penetrate. The shielding protected the beast from the burning light of day, but such protection came with a price. Bernard kept it ravenous, feeding it only enough blood to survive, but never enough to sate it.

Such hunger would serve God this day.

With their goal agonizingly close, Bernard attempted to get the horse moving again. He stroked a soothing hand down its sweat-stained nose, but the animal would not be calmed. It heaved against one side of the traces, then the other, struggling to break free.

Around him, Sanguinists swirled in the familiar dance of battle. The shrieks of dying men echoed off the uncaring stone. The beast inside the cage beat the leather sides like a drum and screamed to join the slaughter, to taste the blood.

The horse whinnied and threw its head in fright.

By now, smoke rolled out from neighboring streets and alleys. The smell of burnt wool and flesh stung his nostrils. The Crusaders had begun to torch sections of the city. Bernard feared they might raze the only part of Jerusalem he needed to reach — the part where the holy weapon might be found.

Recognizing the horse was of no more use, Bernard drew his sword. With a few deft strokes, he severed its leather harness. Freed, the stallion needed no urging. With a leap out of its traces, it knocked aside a Sanguinist and bolted through the carnage.

Godspeed, he willed it.

He moved to the rear of the wagon, knowing none of his brothers could be spared from the battle. These last steps he must take alone.

As Christ had with his heavy cross.

He sheathed his sword and put his shoulder to the back of the cart.

He would push it the remaining distance. In a different life, when his heart still beat, he was a strong, vigorous man. Now he had strength beyond that of any mortal.

With the tang of blood becoming a humid stew in the air, he drew a shaky breath. Red desire ringed the edges of his vision. He wanted to drink from every man, woman, and child in the city. The lust filled him near to bursting.

Instead, he gripped his searing cross, allowing the holy pain to steady him.

He took a slow step, forcing the cart’s wheels forward one revolution, then another. Each turn brought him closer to his goal.

But a gnawing fear grew with every step gained.

Am I already too late?

As the sun sank toward the horizon, Bernard finally spotted his goal. He trembled with exertion, nearly spent of even his fierce strength.

At the end of the street, past where the last of the city’s defenders fought intensely, the leaden dome of a mosque rose to an indifferent blue sky. Dark blotches of blood marred its white facade. Even from this distance, he heard the frightened heartbeats of men, women, and children sheltering within the mosque’s thick walls.

As he strained against the wagon, he listened to their prayers for mercy from their foreign god. They would find none from the beast in the cart.