Alex Archer - Swordsman's Legacy

“Exactly. We cannot allow them to divide and conquer us.”

Holding back the retort, “Whatever you say, Napoleon” seemed wise.

Each slowly opened a car door, and before Annja could get her hands up, the gun barrel pressed into her rib cage. She wore a white, sleeveless T-shirt and khaki hiking shorts, and she was sweating.

A tall, brutish man dressed in nondescript dark pants and a short gray coat wielded the gun. A thick gold chain snaked about his tree-trunk neck. High-top sneakers rounded off the attire that was strange for only a drive in the countryside. He looked ready for a hike through an urban nightclub.

Pressing the backs of her thighs to the car door, Annja surreptitiously glanced over the roof of the rental. Ascher stood with hands raised, and a gun about a foot from his nose.

“You had no intention to invite us to the dig?” the gunman beside Ascher asked in French.

She heard Ascher fumble for a reply. “And have you get your hands dirty? Of course not.”

“Who is she?”

The gunman eyeing Annja lifted a blocky chin and eyed her down his nose. One crushing palm to the tip of that nose and he’d be snorting blood. But though she knew Ascher was athletic, she couldn’t be sure he’d know to react defensively when she did. Just because he was an enthusiast for sports didn’t make him a self-defense expert.

“A girlfriend,” Ascher volunteered. “No one you know, or need to know. She can stay in the car while we go on to the dig.”

She felt to her bones that Ascher knew these men, or at least wasn’t as surprised to see them as she was. And while his efforts to protect her fell flat in the chivalry department, she wasn’t about to stay behind when the situation could turn dangerous.

And did you just hear your own thoughts, Annja? You know it’s going to be dangerous, so you intend to march right into the fray. You really buy into all this protect-the-innocent stuff the sword has brought into your life.

If she couldn’t avoid danger, she figured might as well join it. That would grant her more control than if she simply surrendered. Besides, she was armed, but the sword wasn’t exactly a weapon to win against bullets.

“She comes along.” The gunman gripped her upper arm, hard, and poked the Glock into Annja’s back. She hated unnecessary aggression focused through the barrel of a gun. “Vallois, you will take us to the sword,” he ordered.

They knew about the sword? And they knew Ascher’s name.

Good job on checking the online contact’s history, Annja, she chided herself.

Once around the hood of the car and shoved to Ascher’s side, Annja saw he had a pistol barrel stuck against his temple.

“Does she know where the sword is?” the thug with the gun stuck into her side asked.

“I—I’m not—” the safety on the pistol aimed at Ascher’s skull clicked off, which made the truth flow easily from him. “No, but I have told her about it. The dig site is through the forest.”

“Then lead us.” Both of them were given a shove.

Annja stumbled in the growing darkness as they descended into the shallow roadside ditch, but kept her balance. Her hiking boots squished over soggy grass, but didn’t sink in far. An owl questioned them from somewhere in the distant forest. A cloud of gnats pinged against her shoulders and neck. She didn’t shoo them away. Any sudden moves could result in a bullet wound, which was less desirable than a few insect bites.

As she trudged up the incline and through the long grass, she felt fingers touch her hand. Ascher tugged her up the opposite side of the ditch and they continued onward, close, hands clasped.

“Trust me,” he whispered.

“So not going to,” Annja replied. Keeping her voice to a whisper, she asked, “Are there others at the site?”

“Two. They camp overnight.”

Not good. Annja didn’t want to endanger anyone else, and it wasn’t as if she expected a rescue team to be waiting for their arrival. Archaeologists did not the cavalry make.

At the moment, no other option presented itself. She’d play this one with a feint, holding back the riposte for the right moment. Now was no time to bring out the sword. Not until she determined if their guides were eager to use their weapons, or if they were more for show. She wouldn’t kill unless her life was threatened or the lives of others were. But a few slices to injure were warranted.

Ascher stumbled and she instinctively reached to catch him. A shout from behind, “Don’t touch him!” parted them quickly.

Ascher and Annja entered a copse of maples capping the tip of the forest. Surrounded by trees, twisting branches and leaf canopy obliterated any light lingering in the sky. Verdant moss and autumn-dried leaves thickened the air with must. They slowly navigated the uneven ground, snapping twigs and dodging low branches. Boots crunched branches; leaves brushed her skin. Briefly, she hoped there was no poison ivy.

“It is growing difficult to see without a flashlight,” Ascher hollered over his shoulder. Rather loudly, Annja noted. The dig site must be close. Ascher might be trying to warn whoever was camped there.

A fine red beam zigged across the ground between the two of them. It came from the rifle scope one of the men had pulled out of his coat. It was bright, but only beamed a narrow line across the forest floor. It illuminated nothing.

It occurred to Annja to be worried about wild animals as they tromped over an obvious trail worn into crisp fallen leaves between birch trees. Wolves were rampant in France, though Annja knew they were most prevalent in the southern Alps.

Right now, taking her chances with one of them almost sounded favorable. At least with a wolf she stood a chance of escape, or if she was attacked, knew it wasn’t personal.

Was this personal for Ascher?

Knowing little about this situation notched up her apprehension. Annja flexed the fingers of her right hand, itching to hold her sword. Was Ascher an ally or foe?

“Just ahead!” Ascher suddenly shouted.

The small golden glow of a camp light beamed across the front of a large pitched tent. Inside the tent, another muted glow lit up the two visible sides of the structure.

She hoped no one would rush to greet them and thus freak out the gunmen and result in someone getting shot.

The tent was pitched outside what Annja determined to be a shallow dig site. Pitons and rope marked off a territory about thirty feet square—a guess, for darkness cloaked most of the area. A small leather case, likely for tools, sat open next to the roped-off area alongside two buckets and a short-handled shovel.

Pale light illuminated the interior of the tent, and as the foursome approached, a man in slouchy blue jeans and crisp yellow button-up shirt emerged, saw the situation and immediately put up his hands.

“Vallois,” the surprised man said in English. “Didn’t know you were bringing more than the girl. Guns. Christ, two guns. Evening, gentlemen. What’s up?”

“You have the sword?” the thug who held the gun on Annja demanded.

“Ah.” The man considered that request for a moment. He eyed Ascher, who remained stoic, the gun at his temple. “The sword.”

British, Annja decided of the man. Probably midthirties, and slender, with long graceful fingers. He had expected Ascher to bring her along with him, but the gunmen were a surprise.

Of course, when were gunmen not a surprise?

“Are there others in the tent?” Annja asked, and then mentally kicked herself, because if there were others they might have been planning an ambush. Until she had opened her big mouth.

“Just the one,” the Brit offered. “Jay is sleeping.”

“With the sword?” Her henchman was persistent.