Zealot Page 9

  There were children everywhere. He moved into the exhibit rooms and found them punching all the buttons, climbing on the equipment. He stopped for a moment as he sensed Constantine at the far end of the marble hall. Two little girls careened into MacLeod at great speed, jolting him from his reverie, both armed to the teeth with Ned swords and cardboard bucklers, whaling away at each other—and MacLeod—with great abandon, like extras in a gladiator film. He man aged to disentangle himself and move away quickly, leaving them to their own private Circus Maximus.

  “Marcus!” he called out over the din of young voices and chattering displays as he neared the end of the exhibit, and Constantine poked his head out of a side cubicle.

  “In here, MacLeod.”

  MacLeod followed him into a room with a large glass case on a dais, its top removed while Constantine fiddled with the contents. “What in heaven’s name is going on here? I thought you didn’t open until tomorrow.”

  “Beta testing. If we can survive St. Catherine’s fifth grade, we can survive anything. We’ve had a minor disaster in here, but nothing that a rigorous application of glue couldn’t fix.” Constantine reached into the open case and pulled out a small figurine. He turned toward MacLeod, holding the figurine up against his own face. “Not a very good likeness, don’t you think?”

  “That’s you?”

  “Unfortunately. Not that I told that to the model makers, of course.” He gestured expansively over the architectural model in front of him. “Behold Jerusalem’s Second Temple, King Herod’s greatest masterpiece.” The Temple Mount was encircled by a wall of massive stones—an engineering marvel, the wall in some places twenty times higher than the figurines representing people—and paved in stone. The Temple itself was of gleaming marble highlighted in gold. Against the splendid backdrop of the Temple, the figurines of the Roman conquerors were painted a ghostly gray. “And behold Rome’s finest,” he continued, placing the figure he called his own discreetly behind and to the left of the commanders. “Fools, every last one of them.”

  Constantine tapped a finger against a wall labeled Court of the Gentiles and seemed pleased when nothing moved. “That should hold it.” He picked up one end of the glass lid, and MacLeod helped him lower it into place on top of the case. “It’s amazing what havoc the average ten-year-old can wreak.”

  “This,” MacLeod indicated the Temple model, “isn’t from memory, is it?”

  Constantine laughed. “Oh, no, no, no. Based on the most sound archaeological evidence available. Archaeologists have very set ideas about what these sites looked like and where everything was. Far be it from me to rock their boat with the unprovable truth. If the great minds of archaeology want to insist that some hole in the ground is a swimming pool, then it’s a swimming pool. Let them have their fun.”

  After the Temple was safely back behind glass, MacLeod handed Constantine his box. “Paul Karros’s sword, per request.”

  Setting the box on the top of the Temple’s display case, Constantine opened it and withdrew the short sword, admiring the way it caught the light as he sliced it through the air in a short combination pass. “Oh, that is nice.” His face lit with the pleasure of a fine blade in his hands and he felt a sense of power tingle through his body. God, how he missed it sometimes, locked away among his books and papers. He lunged and slashed, and the sword danced in the light.

  “Marcus, the children,” MacLeod warned quietly as a couple of St. Catherine’s finest dashed past the doorway.

  Constantine put the sword back in the box with obvious regret. “I’ll indulge some other time. Come, we’ll put it in its case, so I won’t be tempted.”

  MacLeod looked at the delicate Temple model once again, remembering his visits to Jerusalem. The first had been nearly 250 years before, in those dark, tortured years after the Scottish failure at Culloden. He’d fled Scotland like a banshee, trying to escape the ghosts of his people and the demons in his own mind. For a time he’d thought perhaps the answers would lie in the Holy Land. Instead he’d found a land in many ways like his beloved Scotland, occupied by invader after invader, downtrodden, her holy places in neglect and decay. Even then, only a fragment of the Western wall remained of what was once Herod’s magnificent temple. It was hard for him to envision this splendid edifice atop Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, where the Dome of the Rock—the center of the world, to Islam—had already stood for a thousand years when MacLeod saw it for the first time. “Marcus, you’ve been around…”

  “That, my dear man, is an understatement.”

  “You know what I mean. What’s your take on Israel?” Constantine laughed. “Much more favorable since the invention of air-conditioning, I’ll tell you.” He saw MacLeod’s earnest look and took the question a little more seriously. “Two hard lessons learned from four of the worst years of my life. First, always remember that, no matter what, incompetence will always rise to the highest level possible. And second, never, ever get involved in the politics of Palestine. It will only bring you grief.” He paused, remembering. “I swear, the only decent thing to come out of my service there was Avram Mordecai.”

  Masada, Province of Judaea: 10 Avrilis in the fourth year of the reign of Imperator Caesar Vespasianus Augustus (A.D. 73)

  “The men are ready, sir,” Gaius Marius, the First Centurion, announced to Governor Silva’s aide, Constantine. Constantine and Marius, the Primus Pilus of the legion X Fretensis, stood to the side on the staging platform in the dim light inside the massive siege tower. With the battering ram removed, the wooden platform accommodated nearly the en-tire First Cohort, nearly 360 men, all ready and eager to put an end to the year they’d spent camped in the miserable desert, waiting for the traitorous Jews of Masada to surrender.

  Constantine was more than ready for it to end, as well. More than ready to brush the dust of Judaea from his heels and regain the brilliant military career he’d once given up. Thirteen years prior, while a general quelling a different rebellion, that one in Britannia, he had chanced upon one of his own, newly Immortal, amid the bodies of the recalcitrant Britons on the blood-soaked field of battle. He’d always disliked taking students. Like wives or children, they were a drain on his resources, both in terms of money and time. But above all things, Marcus Constantine was an honorable man, and honor dictated he initiate the Briton female into the Game. He had known it would be a challenge to civilize the blue-painted hellion called Ceirdwyn, but almost more than life itself, Constantine relished a good challenge.

  He had resigned his military commission and retired to Rome, where he became both teacher and lover to Ceirdwyn, but never master—she made that abundantly clear. She was, indeed, a challenge. They were happy together, or so he thought, but slowly he realized that Rome was killing them both. Ceirdwyn pined for the untamed freedom of her native land as much as he longed to return to the order and discipline of the military life. With many regrets, they finally parted.

  Constantine began to rebuild his military career. He had had to remake himself, a Marcus Constantine from a new generation, and work his way back up, if not from the bottom—a few forged records of meritorious service in Germania took care of that—then at least from the middle. It would be years before he could be General Marcus Constantine once again.

  Or maybe longer, if this posting was any indication: aide-de-camp to Provincial Governor Flavius Silva, a mediocre general with a few family connections, in the absolute armpit of the Empire, Judaea. One might as well be exiled to a deserted island, for all the good service in Judaea did for a military record. The gala celebration of Vespasian and Titus’s heroic triumph over the Jews was three years past, the citizenry of Rome totally unaware of this last holdout of cursed Jewish stubbornness on a barren spit of rock in the middle of nowhere. When Masada finally fell, there would be no triumphant procession through the streets of Rome for the legion of Flavius Silva. In the camps, the men of the X Fretensis joked about the bitter irony of receiving their pay in coins proclaiming “Judaea Capr
a,” when far above them the allegedly conquered Jews sang and feasted and openly mocked them. They, like Constantine, were more than ready to take the hilltop and be done with Masada.

  Constantine raised his arm, signaling the engineers to break through the final fire-damaged barricade to the summit. Flanking each engineer were two legionnaires, with shield and pilum at the ready, prepared to use the thrusting spears to protect the engineers if necessary from the onslaught of the armed rebels waiting within the fortress. The charred wood was brittle and gave way easily. Constantine raised his other arm, and, with a huge cry, the First Cohort thundered through the debris and into Masada. The great siege tower shook with the force of their charge and the rush of the Second Cohort up the tower to the staging platform to move into position behind them.

  This day would never have arrived without Constantine. Silva had seemed content to wait the Jews out, counting on time and hunger to bring Masada to its knees. The survivors of the Roman garrison who had occupied the rock prior to their defeat by the insurgents seven years previous told of tremendous storehouses of supplies and weapons and huge cisterns of water, but Silva had discounted their reports. Constantine knew a small army could hole up on Masada for a decade. It was Constantine who had calculated the precise spot for the earthen ramp to we the heights, Constantine who designed the siege engine to batter down the walls, and most importantly, Constantine who convinced the Provincial Governor of Judaea it was all his own idea. Silva would more than likely receive a commendation from the Emperor for his brilliant tactics once the fortress fell, perhaps even the governorship of a much more desirable province. All Constantine wanted was a ticket out of Judaea.

  The Second Cohort held at the ready on the staging platform like runners at the starting line eager for the race. All they lacked was a signal from the Primus Pilus of the First Cohort to join the fray.

  Suddenly Constantine realized he could hear no fray. Where were the sounds of battle? The clashing of sword against shield? The battle cries? The screams of dying men and the shrieks of their women? He started toward the opening in the wall as Marius returned, signaling to him.

  “Sir, I think you need to see this.” Constantine pulled his gladius from its sheath and weighed it in his hand for a moment before following.

  The troops parted in waves as Marcus Constantine passed through the rubble of the breach in the Jewish defenses and strode onto the top of the mesa. It was no secret to the men of the X Fretensis who was really in command of the legion. In the brilliant sunlight of the summit, Constantine’s helmet and lorica shone bright, his cloak rippling behind him in the mild breeze, and he carried himself with strength and pride. No matter his rank, he bore himself like a general, a talent the weaselly Silva had yet to learn.

  Constantine looked around warily. Masada was silent and still, the only movement that of his own troops as they moved cautiously from building to building. “What’s happened here, Manus?” he asked the First Centurion. “Where have they all gone?”

  “They’re dead, sir, all dead,” the Centurion answered, making a sign with his hands to ward off evil. Like the majority of the legion, he was from the provinces and still clung to his primitive superstitions. Constantine had little patience for such nonsense.

  Constantine turned a hard look on the Centurion. “You can’t mean all—where are the women? The children?”

  “All, sir,” he confirmed, a bit spooked, “the old men, the women, the babies…” He made the symbol again.

  “Show me,” Constantine commanded.

  The First Centurion indicated three men to accompany them, then led the way to a Roman-style villa just south of the breach. He motioned for two of the legionnaires to enter first, alert for ambush, but none came. Then Constantine and the Centurion entered. The third soldier stationed himself in the doorway to protect their backs.

  As they passed through the foyer toward the center courtyard, Constantine could smell death. He gripped his sword tighter and pushed past the soldiers leading the way, impatient. In the villa courtyard he saw for himself that the Centurion was right. Infants and small children silenced by a knife to their throats, cradled protectively by their parents, just as dead. Old men, young women barely past their girlhood, no one was spared. At least forty people in this one yard, dead in the arms of those they’d held dear. And one man, alone, who’d obviously fallen on his sword after he’d helped dispatch the others. From the blood lying in pools around him, Constantine knew it had taken him a long time to die.

  “Damn them!” Constantine raged. “Damn them all!” He stormed across the courtyard to the rooms beyond. He broke on one door with a kick of a hobnailed sandal, then another door. And another. Every room, the same story. The same death.

  He sheathed his sword angrily. “Cowards!” he roared, frustrated beyond belief. “Cowards!” But in his heart he knew that wasn’t true. It wasn’t their cowardice that angered him, but their nobility. In his four hundred years in the service of Rome, never before had he seen such determination, and it ate away at him. Damn them for flaunting their dignity in his face.

  Constantine moved farther into the living quarters of the villa. Here the paint could barely be seen on the soot-blackened walls and the tiled floor was covered in ash. “It’s the same throughout the complex, sir,” the Centurion reported from the doorway behind him.

  Constantine crouched down and picked up a handful of broken, charred pottery shards. “They couldn’t take it with them, but they made sure we couldn’t have it. What kind of people are these, Marius?”

  Before the Centurion could answer, Constantine suddenly knew there was another Immortal on Masada. The sensation surprised him with its unexpectedness, and the Centurion could note the sudden change in Constantine’s face as he looked up. “Are you unwell, sir?”

  Constantine quickly schooled his expression and stood up. “Bring in the Second Cohort,” he ordered. “Initiate a room-by-room search of the fortress. Every storehouse, every cistern, inch by inch. I want a complete accounting. Start at the northern palace.” He started to leave the room through a door to the south. The Centurion called to him.

  “You should take a guard.”

  “Why, Marius? In case the dead rise up and come for their revenge?” Constantine laughed a bitter laugh. “Let them come.” He dismissed the Centurion and strode purposefully out of the villa through the southern porch.

  He pulled his gladius again and proceeded cautiously, tracking the sensation south along the outer wall of the fortress. Within earshot of an entire Roman legion was not the optimum place for a Quickening, but he wanted answers, and this was the only indication of life on the entire cursed rock. He hoped it wouldn’t have to come to taking a head.

  At 150 paces from the villa, he found an entrance into the wall surrounding the complex. Sword first, he entered the dimly lit stone corridor. Oil lamps stood in niches along the wall, but most had long run out of oil, and only a few still sputtered. The Immortal was closer now, he could tell, possibly within only a few feet. Constantine set himself and drove his hobnailed sandal into a wooden door, forcing it from its hinges. He planted himself in the doorway and announced, “Mihi Nomen est Marcus Constantinius.“

  Two bloodied bodies lay on the floor. One, a Jewish gray-beard. The other, veiled, unmistakably a woman. And near her, cringing against the wall, wild eyes wide, a Jewish youth trying in vain to shake away the lightning flashing in his brain. He looked up and with effort focused his eyes on Constantine, suddenly aware that the Roman was the source of his pain.

  “I am Marcus Constantine,” Constantine announced again, waiting for the answering challenge. Avram dived for the bloodstained iron knife lying on the floor and Constantine raised his sword, on the defensive. “I don’t want to fight you.” The youth’s information would be more valuable to Constantine than his head.

  Avram screamed something incomprehensible to Constantine and, before Constantine could stop him, plunged the knife into his own chest. The
Jew fell to the ground, dead once more, and Constantine realized that the young man had no idea of his own Immortality. Like it or not, Constantine had just inherited another student.

  It was only a few seconds after Avram revived, chest still burning with fire, that he realized his hands were bound be-hind him. He thrashed about on the floor, then on his knees, desperate to free himself.

  “It’s for your own good, boy,” Constantine explained gently. He had removed his helmet and his shining breastplate in order to appear less intimidating when the terrified young man awoke, but his flame red tunic and noble bearing still proclaimed him as Roman. “Quod Nomen tibi est?” he asked.

  Avram, breathing hard, glared at the Roman with hate in his eyes, but did not speak.

  “What is your name?” Constantine asked again, less gently. Damn these Jews! They all knew Latin well enough, the dogs, but they would not dignify it with a response. “Tell me your name!” he demanded.

  Avram’s only response was to spit in the Roman’s face.

  Constantine grabbed the Jew viciously by the length of his hair. Marcus Constantine tolerated such insubordination from no man! He drew a fist back to strike—then hesitated. Angrily, he pushed the youth away from him and took a step back. This was a student, he reminded himself, not an interrogation. He would need a different tactic.

  He knew no Aramaic, rarely bothered to learn the native languages of the subjugated peoples because they were so quickly supplanted by Latin. But the young Jew refused to respond to Latin. A compromise: “Athanatos, “ he said in Greek. “You are Immortal, you cannot die.” The Jewish scholars all seemed to know some Greek, and the robes of the dead old man on the floor proclaimed him a scholar. With luck, his boy was one as well. “We are alike, you and I. We are Immortal. I am Marcus Constantine, and I’ve come to help you.”