C. Palov - Ark of Fire

Slowly, in no apparent hurry to kill his quarry, Sanchez aimed the powerful pistol at a point somewhere in the middle of Caedmon’s head.

There being nothing he could do to stop the bullet from reaching its intended target, he defiantly stood his ground.

Smiling, Sanchez pulled the trigger.

A dull click.

The smile having suddenly vanished from his lips, Sanchez pulled the trigger a second time. Again, the only sound was the hollow click of the firing pin.

Sanchez was out of ammunition.

With a muttered oath, he dropped the gun. Then, in a quick blur, he was on Caedmon, swinging his arm, the ax blade aimed at his soft underbelly, the man clearly of a mind to eviscerate him. Caedmon leaped sideways, the blade missing him by a scant inch.

Out of the corner of his eye, Caedmon saw Edie lurch to her feet.

“You bastard!” she screamed. Wild-eyed, she grabbed a chain from a nearby wall hook and began swinging it over her head like a medieval mace.

Endowed with enviably quick reflexes, Sanchez pivoted in Edie’s direction.

Which is when Caedmon lifted his left foot off the ground, ramming his wellie into Sanchez’s kidneys. The well-aimed kick propelled the other man several feet, smashing his head into an array of metal instruments hanging from the wall. The ax slipped through his fingers, falling to the floor.

Not giving his foe time to recover, Caedmon rushed forward. Securing one hand against the back of Sanchez’s skull and the other against his spine, he rammed the brute’s head against the metal cart.

The rickety walls of the abattoir shook with the impact.

Sanchez, a stunned, owl-like expression on his face, rolled into a fetal ball. A moment later, he opened his lips. To speak or scream, Caedmon knew not. The only thing emitted from his gaping mouth was a bright red trickle of blood. A second later his body shook with a mighty spasm, his feet convulsively jerking. Caedmon suspected that the other man’s brain battled on, still sending fight-or-flight messages to his limbs, his brain refusing to accept the inevitable, refusing to lie down and quietly die.

Edie turned her head, unable to watch Sanchez in his death throes.

A few seconds later, Caedmon placed a comforting hand on her shoulder.

“He is gone. Where to, I can not say. Although I suspect he will be refused entry to the heavenly realm.”

Edie glanced at the sprawled corpse. Deprived of that bit of animating spirit called the soul, bulging muscles were flaccid, eyes open wide in a ghoulish stare.

“I need to get out of here.” Pushing him aside, Edie staggered toward the door.

Going down on bent knee, Caedmon quickly searched through Sanchez’s pockets. The search concluded, he followed Edie out of the abattoir.

Silently they stared at the wreck of a farm. On the wet breeze Caedmon heard the creak and groan of rotted wood. In the distance, a dilapidated shutter rattled against an equally dilapidated window frame.

“Now what?”

“If we are to steer the ship through the dense fog, we must remain calm,” he told her.

“Couldn’t you have come up with a more uplifting cliché?”

“Sorry. My brain is a bit mashed.” He showed her the cell phone that he had discovered in Sanchez’s coat pocket.

“Do you think MacFarlane will give chase?”

Caedmon thought about it for a moment before finally shaking his head. “He has the Ark. That is all he cares about.”

CHAPTER 74

Surely in that day there shall be a great earthquake in the land of Israel, so that the fish of the sea, the birds of the heavens, the beasts of the field, all creeping things that creep on the earth, and all men who are on the face of the earth shall shake at My presence. The mountains shall be thrown down, the steep places shall fall, and every wall shall fall to the ground.

Opening the storage compartment in the middle of the SUV’s console, Stanford MacFarlane stowed his well-worn Bible; the words of the prophet Ezekiel never ceased to inspire him.

Beside him in the driver’s seat, his gunnery sergeant muttered under his breath, complaining yet again about having to drive on the left side of the road. Stan ignored him. They would be in Margate soon enough. A small fishing boat docked at the harbor would enable them to bypass British customs.

Again, he craned his neck, his eyes alighting on the well-padded shipping crate placed in the Range Rover’s cargo hold.

The Ark of the Covenant.

It had taken more than twenty years for him to find that most sacred of relics. His search ordained by God, he had tracked down every lead, every rumor, every crackpot theory regarding the Ark; his search had taken him to the distant corners of the globe. Ethiopia. Iraq. Southern France. One by one, each theory had been discredited, leaving only the quatrains of the medieval knight Galen of Godmersham.

Again, he glanced at the shipping container, experiencing a tingling sensation. As though his entire body were enveloped in a static electric field.

The Lord was near at hand! He could feel it!

For it was at the Ark that God, made manifest, had appeared to Moses. The Ark not only embodied the Almighty, it was the symbol of God’s promise to His chosen people. Nothing had changed. It was now as it had been then. Adorned with the Stones of Fire, he, too, would be able to speak with the Almighty. Just as Moses had conversed with God in the wilderness.

That heady thought gave rise to a vision in his mind’s eye; Stan could hear the blast of trumpets and the clang of cymbals, the shouts and cheers, a throng of men joyfully singing hosannas. As though thirty-five hundred years had come and gone in the blink of an eye.

All praise to God the Almighty!

He knew full well that God’s plan for mankind had been formulated in the Garden of Eden and that it would end with a new paradise where those worthy of God’s blessings would enjoy a thousand years of peace and prosperity. Finally, the rest well deserved, the warriors would put aside their bloody weapons and lie side by side with the meek and gentle lamb.

With astounding clarity, the prophet Ezekiel had seen the crimson future that would proceed the golden dawn.

Stan did not doubt that Ezekiel’s prophecy would soon unfold, taking an unprepared world by storm. The future was already written, prophecy the gift that God gave to quell man’s fear in the face of the dark and violent nights that were to come.

And when Ezekiel’s prophesized war finally came, sinful man would have no doubt as to God’s existence.

Those would be dark days. Days that would push human-kind to the limits of their endurance. But those who refused to traffic with the enemy would be reborn in the new world to come. A time of rest for the people of God. When the deserts of the earth would be made fertile and when the Dead Sea would no longer be dead. Ezekiel foretold of how those waters would be stocked with the very fish that would feed the new kingdom of God.

A thousand years of peace. Time for an old warhorse to at long last take his rest.

Reaching into his pocket, Stan removed his BlackBerry, quickly typing out a numeric code with his thumbs. Double-checking each digit, he sent the text message, knowing it would simultaneously reach members of Rosemont Security Consultants stationed in Europe and the Middle East. Battle orders issued, he returned the device to his pocket.

As they approached the Margate town limits, Stan thought of the Englishman and his harlot. Their execution was well deserved, and he felt no pity for them. Instead, a wave of hatred washed over him. Hate was good. Cleansing even. Hate enabled a man to slay the infidel and slaughter the sinner.