Marco stiffened as the blade pressed harder and harder against his neck and Syfax hunched his larger frame behind his hostage. He locked eyes with Jorge. “Drop it. Drop the gun.”
Jorge did not flinch. He held his rifle tight into his shoulder, sighting along the barrel at Syfax’s head, which was mostly obscured by his hostage’s sweating face. The major made a small show of resetting his feet and retightening his grip on the knife. He bore down on Marco’s arms to make the young man gasp and shudder a bit, and then pulled back on the knife. Marco’s jaw shook and he rasped out, “For God’s sake, drop the rifle.”
Jorge didn’t move. “Diego, who is this man?”
Diego, huddled back with his friends against the far wall, stammered out, “I don’t really know them. We don’t know them. They’re friends of Don Lorenzo. Don Lorenzo Quesada de Gadir. The diestro. You’ve heard of him. You know him, right?”
“Yeah, I’ve heard of him,” Jorge said. “But what are these two doing here? Why’d he lie about Cordoba? What’s going on here, Diego?”
“Look, look, I swear, they just showed up at the Don’s house yesterday. I don’t know what it was all about. We were all getting ready to leave for our winter holiday, we were packing and getting ready. Then we all ate lunch together, and everyone left, and these two men came south with us.” Diego’s hand went up to his hair. The boy was shaking. “Please, that’s all I know. Please don’t shoot. They’re just friends of the Don. I swear. Please don’t shoot them.”
“Don’t lie to me, Diego!” Jorge shouted without sending even a slight shudder though the weapon held tight against his body. “He has a knife to Marco’s throat. He lied about who he is. And not an hour ago we got orders to be on the lookout for Mazigh spies. So you tell me who he is or I kill him right now. Right now!”
Holy hell, why couldn’t Kenan be more like this guy? The major locked eyes with the young soldier, not daring to blink. He’s steady as a rock and cold as ice. I sure could have used him back when I was running down serial killers in Arafez.
“Leave the kid alone,” Syfax said. “He doesn’t know anything. And we’re not spies. We just came to visit the Don. We’re old buddies, me and him. But it turned out to be a bad time, so now we’re heading home. Maybe we’ll get together later this summer.”
“Then why lie about it?” Jorge asked.
“The Don told me to. He said you people were getting antsy about foreigners,” Syfax said. “And it looks like he was right.”
“Jorge, for God’s sake, let them go,” Marco whispered. “Put your rifle down. Please.”
The major frowned. “Don’t worry, soldier. If he was going to shoot me he would have, and if I was going to slit your throat, you’d have drowned in your own blood a minute or two ago.” Syfax eased the knife away from the young man’s neck. “Now, Jorge, you’re going to put that gun down, and I’m going to walk out that door, and no one is going to get shot or stabbed. Deal?”
For the first time that the major had seen, Jorge blinked. The soldier nodded, ever so slightly. And then he began lowering his rifle. Syfax took his blade away from Marco’s neck but kept it high and visible. When the rifle was low enough for his taste, Syfax said, “Kenan, out the door now. Make sure these fellas don’t have any buddies out there.”
The lieutenant slipped to the door and poked his head out into the street. “Looks clear.”
Syfax kept one hand firmly on Marco’s collar to hold him in place. He sheathed his knife and for a moment considered grabbing the other rifle on the floor behind him.
No. That would probably be a bad idea, eventually.
He shuffled sideways toward the door, still holding Marco between himself and Jorge. And when he reached the door, he shoved the soldier toward his friend and bolted backward into the street. He stumbled into Kenan, who was still hovering by the doorway, but he grabbed the young pilot and steered him into the bustle of porters, horses, and carts threading up and down the narrow streets of Toledo.
“Do we run?” Kenan asked breathlessly.
“Not yet.” Syfax glanced back. There was no sign of pursuit.
“Where are we going?”
“Out of this town, I hope.” They came to an intersection and he scanned for street signs. There were none. But there were soldiers loitering here and there, pacing slowly along the shop windows and sitting on the wide steps of every church in sight. And there were quite a few churches in sight. He glanced up, hunting for a gleam of sunlight beyond the iron curtain of the winter clouds, but there was no hint of the sun’s position. “Damn it, which way is south?”
“There.” Kenan pointed at one street out of the square that looked as good as any other so they walked quickly and quietly down that road, and another, and another, and soon the buildings became smaller and slightly cleaner. Over the rooftops, he glimpsed a few trees, and then a bald hill, and finally the cobbled street became a road of frozen mud and dirty slush as they emerged from the town proper. Syfax slowed the pace. “I think we’re okay for the moment. They don’t know where we’re going since we don’t even know where we’re going. Level playing field.”
Kenan shook his head. “If you say so.” He kicked a lump of icy snow off the road.
“Something on your mind?”
“Were you really going to kill that soldier back there? Slit his throat?”
Hell yes, him and his brave little friend. We’ve got a boat to report, because warships mean war, and war means a hell of a lot more than two dead bodies. Syfax winced. Since when do I let the math decide who lives and who dies? I really am getting older. “Nah, I was just doing what I needed to do to get us out of there. Now pick up the pace. We need to put a few miles between us and this town.”
Chapter 11. Lorenzo
As the sun set on their second day on the road to Zaragoza, Lorenzo watched the tiny black line of the northern mountains with an eager eye. The loss of his journal had been as personally devastating as it was politically terrifying, and the appearance of the Mazigh refugees had been as unexpected as it was annoying, but now… now I’m on the road. All of the anxiety and anger and fear seemed so far away, so unimportant. Every hour brought him closer to the mountains, closer to the stone.
Ariel’s stone. Our stone. The skyfire stone. A piece of heaven fallen to earth. A holy relic that burns like molten gold and sings like a hundred thousand choirs of angels.
It was out there. It was real. And when he brought it back to the world and showed it to the quailing hearts of Espani men and women, they would remember who and what they were, and what God meant them to be, and a bright new future would be born.
It will.
It has to.
They had made good time from Alovera, even without the horse that the Italian woman had disappeared on. The sky had glowered at them throughout the day, but withheld its icy sleet and hail and snow, keeping the roads firm and clear all the way to Algora. When they arrived in the village it had taken a bit of effort to find enough beds for nine people and accommodations for four horses and a giant bird, but shortly after sunset everyone was settled either at the inn by the main road or a large farmhouse just up the lane. Qhora had suggested that the foreigners stay at the farm, farther out of sight and thus less likely to attract attention from anyone until long after they had left the next morning. And that left him, his wife, and his students to enjoy the quiet little inn. Qhora seemed to particularly enjoy the enormous fireplace.
Supper was still nearly an hour away, but no one was in the mood to do anything productive. The boys were in their rooms, probably sleeping if history was any indication. Lorenzo appreciated their ability to fall asleep at a moment’s notice at almost any time, in any place, in any position. It was something he himself had learned in the army and had often wished his wife had picked up as well. There were quite a few mornings when she woke up not entirely prepared to face the day with a smile. And sometimes she liked to tell him about it.