Gabriel Hunt - Hunt at World's End

Before Gabriel could answer, they all heard the roar of engines behind them. Turning, Gabriel saw a half dozen jeeps speeding toward them across the desert, clouds of sand billowing in their wake. Gabriel cursed under his breath and drew his Colt. Even before he saw the man’s face through the grimy windshield of the lead jeep, he knew it was Grissom. And Grissom had brought an army with him. With five or six men in each jeep, they were hopelessly outnumbered.

The jeeps pulled to a stop a few yards in front of them. Grissom and his men climbed out of the vehicles and raised a variety of shotguns and automatic handguns into view.

Grissom stepped forward. “Well, well. Here we are again.” He reached out his free hand for the gemstone. “Hand it over.”

Gabriel cocked the hammer of his Colt.

“Come now, Mr. Hunt. I know you’re an excellent shot. And I know,” Grissom said, his face clouding over for a moment, a twitch pounding on his temple, “that you have no qualms about taking a life. But I don’t think of you as suicidal. And how long do you think you’d live after you pulled that trigger? How long would your friends live? It would be a foolish gesture.”

Gabriel surveyed the crowd around them. Six jeeps, some three dozen men, all of them armed and all of them looking well trained in the use of arms. He ground his teeth. He wasn’t confident they’d live a whole lot longer if he lowered his gun, but in cases like this, every minute was worth something. He tossed the Colt onto the sand.

“Now the gemstones.”

Gabriel looked at the ruby in his hand. Its energy buzzed along his arm, a thousand feathers tickling on his skin.

Grissom held out his hand. “My men aren’t used to having to restrain themselves, Mr. Hunt. I will not ask again.”

Gabriel handed the ruby to Grissom, who slipped it into one of the large side pockets of his cargo vest. He turned to the gunman beside him, a man with a pockmarked face and an eyepatch over his right eye. He wore a bandolier filled with shells across his chest and was carrying a pump-action shotgun. “Bring me the other one, DeVoe,” Grissom said. The mercenary went to the jeep, retrieved a black velvet sack and brought it back. Grissom took the sack from him, opened it, and let the emerald from Borneo slide onto his palm. He slid it into another pocket of his vest.

Grissom turned back to Gabriel. “Now, the last one. The gemstone from Turkey.”

“Sorry, but I can’t give you that one,” Gabriel said. “We don’t have it anymore.”

Grissom’s stare darkened. “What are you talking about?”

“It was stolen on the way over here,” Gabriel said. “By the Cult of Ulikummis.”

“Oh, that’s rich,” Grissom said, and he laughed. “It was stolen, was it? By the, what is it, by the cult of…?” He turned to his men. “It was stolen from them!” His men didn’t move. Grissom spun, his fist connecting with Gabriel’s face. Unprepared for the blow, Gabriel fell backward, landing hard on the sand. Joyce launched herself toward Grissom, her hands balled into fists, but Daniel grabbed her and held her back. Gabriel got to his feet again, wiping blood from his nose on the back of his hand.

“Enough games, Hunt,” Grissom said. “Give me the other gemstone.”

Gabriel spat on the sand. “I can’t. It’s gone. You can search us if you don’t believe me.”

Grissom spoke to DeVoe: “Do it. Search their jeep, and search them.”

DeVoe gave instructions to several of the other men and within minutes a thorough search had been completed. DeVoe took responsibility himself for patting them down, taking rather longer in Joyce’s case than would have been necessary just to confirm she didn’t have a softball-sized emerald on her person. Gabriel saw her gritting her teeth as the eyepatched mercenary worked his way up and down her person.

“Nothing,” DeVoe reported.

“All right, Hunt,” Grissom said, stepping forward and whipping out the ivory-handled dagger. In a flash its three blades were open and glinting in the moonlight. “Where is it?”

“I told you,” Gabriel said. “The Cult of Ulikummis took it.”

“And where, exactly,” Grissom said, raising the dagger to Gabriel’s throat, “did they take it?”

Gabriel stared over Grissom’s shoulder. “Apparently,” he said, “right here.”

Grissom turned, and his men turned with him. Several yards behind them, standing silent in the darkness, was an army of skull-masked men in white robes, at least one hundred of them, their bows loaded with arrows and ready to be fired. At the head of the army stood the high priest. The stolen emerald was lashed with rope to the top of his staff. They heard him shout a single word to his men.

The cultists released their bowstrings, and a wave of arrows sailed across the sky toward them.

Chapter 23

“Take cover!” Grissom shouted. He and his men scattered, crouching behind the jeeps as the arrows bore down. Gabriel snatched his gun off the ground and, together with Joyce and Daniel, ran toward the statue, the only other source of cover in sight. Behind them, the arrows came down, landing in the sand or bouncing loudly off the hoods and frames of the jeeps. Gabriel heard several of Grissom’s men cry out, but he didn’t turn around or stop running until he reached the statue. Ducking behind one of its massive stone legs, he grabbed Joyce’s arm and pulled her down next to him. Daniel dropped to the sand behind her.

Grissom’s men frantically signaled each other and shifted position behind the jeeps. The cult let loose another volley of arrows and, under cover of the assault, ran forward, exchanging their bows for swords. Grissom’s men opened fire as they came, the chatter of automatic weapons erupting loudly in the night. The smell of gunsmoke drifted over to where Gabriel was, that and the smell of blood.

Gabriel turned away from the battlefield. Daniel was still watching the battle, an expression of horror on his face. “The three armies,” he murmured.

“I only see two,” Joyce said.

Daniel turned to her. “No, there are three. The cult, Grissom’s men…and us.”

Gabriel raised his gun. He had six bullets. “Some army.”

Cult members dropped under the avalanche of gunfire, their white-robed bodies littering the sand, but more kept coming, flooding into Grissom’s men like a tidal wave, transforming the battle into hand-to-hand combat, where they had the advantage. Swords clashed against shotguns raised to block them.

Scanning across the carnage, Gabriel realized he didn’t see Grissom in the thick of things—or the high priest, for that matter.

A figure suddenly rounded the statue’s leg: DeVoe. “Hold it!” he said, leveling his shotgun at Gabriel.

Gabriel swung his leg out, sweeping it across DeVoe’s feet and knocking the mercenary backward onto the ground. He jumped on top of him, wrestled the shotgun out of his hands, and butted DeVoe in the face with the stock. DeVoe groaned briefly and fell back, unconscious. Gabriel pocketed a handful of DeVoe’s extra shells, then stood up and inspected the shotgun. Their army had just doubled its arms. He tossed his Colt to Joyce. “Here, take this. And keep an eye on this guy—if he’s some sort of second in command, Grissom might actually value him, which would give us a bargaining chip.”

“I don’t think that man values anyone,” Joyce said. But she knelt beside the unconscious mercenary and aimed the gun at him. “What are you going to do?”

Gabriel opened the shotgun, inspected it quickly, and snapped it closed again. “I’m going to get the gemstones.”

“I guess Grissom was wrong,” Daniel said. “You are suicidal.”

Joyce leaned forward and kissed him. “Don’t go getting yourself killed,” she said quietly. “Not now. Not after all this.”