The Jealous God Read online

  “I’m sure my son would not bring someone of questionable character into our midst. If Levi can vouchsafe for her reputation and conduct, then I feel she will be most pleasant. Anyone Levi likes should be likeable to the rest of us. He is… gifted in that respect. He knows character when he sees it.”

  “You are too trusting and so is Levi. Just because Levi is your son and a priest in the bargain, and has a gift, as you say, does not mean he is infallible. He is most likely in love, which means his reasoning abilities has gone out the window.”

  “I did not detect such in his voice.” Simon refused to be swayed and if Levi was, indeed, in love, then all the better. He could shed his priestly collar and take the title of Rabbi. The sooner, the better. Levi had always had an innate ability to detect insincerity in a person. He was like a living, breathing lie detector. If Levi approved of this woman, then Simon was satisfied with her sight unseen.

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  Merry trotted back and forth in the hallway and up and down the stairs, following Luke Matthew as he packed for their trip. He had already packed her belongings and was now running back and forth between the shed and the house, trying to decide what to take with him. He kept changing his mind about what was important and what was not.

  “Why haven’t you summoned Lemarik back here like you promised?” she nagged at him.

  “It’s not something t’ be dawdled with, lassie!” he told her for the hundredth time. “’e’ll show up again, sooner or later.”

  “But you should have asked him when he was here!” she whined and he cringed.

  She had been complaining off and on about his failure to inquire about their missing daughter. He had borne the brunt of her anger and her indignation ever since the meeting with the Lords and Ladies of the Abyss. She was positive someone among the illustrious assembly had known what had become of her baby girl. The last she had seen of the child was when Bombarik had left her and Michael to freeze in the snowy mountains. Jasmine had subsequently told her the baby had been left behind in the Punjab when Anna had rescued her from the very jaws of a tiger. No one had seen or heard anything of the child, and Luke had missed his chance to question Lord Marduk. If only she had known he was at the meeting, she would have confronted him herself. She had yet to forgive Luke for missing his chance.

  But the situation had been quite overwhelming for the Knight of the Orient. He had learned too much, too fast and had almost suffered a complete breakdown as a result of the meetings. His simple brain had revolted entirely. After the meetings, Mark Andrew had insisted he remain at his house and rest, refusing to allow him to work on any of the committees and subcommittees assigned to the translations and planning. Mark had fended Merry off for two days before allowing his brother to return home with her. Mark had also warned her not to pursue the question of the baby… not just now. Not yet. She had relented in order to get her husband back.

  Now he felt much better and he was ready for action… anything it seemed! Anything that would get his mind off of everything that had transpired would do him good, but Merry only knew he had sworn to her when he encountered Lord Marduk again, he would challenge him concerning the child even though he had no real desire to know what had become of her for now. He had already mourned for the baby and put her away from him as he called it. It was not in his character to disturb the dead. Merry did not believe her baby was dead.

  Luke glanced at her and sighed. Merry had learned far too much from her encounter with Sister Meredith and Queen Semiramis about the little curse the queen had inflicted on Mark Andrew, but she had no idea what it meant or exactly when it had happened and she never made the connection between Andrea Larmenius and Mark Andrew, but the bit about his brother somehow being his father?! His brother! His protector! His anathema! All these years, he had practically worshipped Mark Andrew and now he knew why. Now he understood. Now he could not bring himself to even be alone in the same room with him. And Luke knew Mark knew it.

  Now Merry was insisting he speak to Mark Andrew about the baby. That he insist Mark Andrew speak to the Lord of the Sixth Gate, but he could not bring himself to do it. If Mark Andrew had wanted to bring the child back, he would have done it already. There was something highly suspicious about his brother’s seeming lack of concern about the loss of his niece. Something that made his blood boil when he thought of it and yet, frightened him severely and made him not want to know what it was. After all, he could compare his daughter with Mark’s daughter. What if Mark’s niece was no better than Luke’s niece, Nicole? What then?

  Merry caught his arm as he started up the stairs.

  “Why?!” she practically shouted at him. These bouts were growing worse and worse.

  “Look!” He turned on the step, took her by the arms and stared into her eyes for a moment. “I cannot ask him!”

  “Why?” she asked again in more normal tones.

  “Because and leave it at that!” he told her over his shoulder.

  “Are you afraid of him now?” she asked him and he stiffened visibly and then continued up the stairs.

  “You are afraid of him, aren’t you?” she continued, when he failed to answer her. “I’m not afraid of him!” she shouted up after him. “I will ask him!!”

  He turned on the landing and looked down at her. The look on his face caused her to freeze in her tracks and made her stomach lurch.

  Luke clambered back down the stairs haphazardly and leaned over her with his head turned slightly to one side.

  “You will do no such thing,” he told her. “You will stay away from him. He is not human!! He had you once; he’ll not have you again!”

  Her mouth fell open in shock. In all the years they had been married, not once… not ever had he mentioned her one indiscretion with Mark Andrew. It had been so brief and so very long ago and so much had happened afterwards so fast she’d almost totally wiped the memory from her mind and simply replaced them with her memories of Luke, even pretending it had never happened. She had even eventually assumed Luke knew nothing of it, but she had been wrong.

  “Luke!” she said after a moment and her face clouded over. “That’s not… fair.”

  “Not fair?” He narrowed his eyes at her. “Not fair that everything I’ve ever had was first handled and inspected by my brother? And why? I don’t hold it against you, lassie. You could never have resisted him, if you had tried.”

  “That’s not fair either!” she told him, tearing up.

  “Oh? Well, believe it or not. It’s no matter.” He turned away from her as he continued down the stairs and down the hall. He was going back to the shed again.

  “It is a great matter to me.” She was following him again. “Prove you love me, Luke! Go and ask him where our daughter is," she said, unwilling to give up just yet. "Ask him what they did with her. Ask him if they used her in some unholy sacrifice!”

  Luke spun around and knocked her to the floor with the back of his hand.

  She pushed herself up, staring at him in shock and disbelief. Tears ran down her face.

  “I’m sorry, Merry!” he blurted, but she was not listening, she was running away from him toward the stairs.

  Luke spun around in the kitchen and then ripped the tablecloth from the table, dumping everything on the floor in his rage. Mark Andrew was ruining his marriage. He’d ruined everything else and now this. He’d taken his home and consigned him to this old place. Luke been happy in Lothian once… long ago when the sky was bluer and the grass greener and the woods stretched away forever to the sea. But now even the memory of Elizabeth had been usurped by his brother. Even Ian McShan had been Mark’s son, not his. And Galen! Galen was never his son to start with. He belonged to Lucio! And who had brought Lucio Dambretti through in this lifetime? Who? None other than his brother. Lucio had been meant to replace him. Mark had allowed him to die in Jerusalem and then replaced him with the Italian. The only reason he was here now was because of a series of mistakes and accidents.
r />   He fled through the back yard and ran across the clearing to catch the reins of the black mare, he had ridden home from the stables earlier in the morning. Earlier when he had gone, once again, to confront his brother about the child and failed. This time, he would not fail!

  When he reached the house, he found Gil Pairaud in the kitchen. His anger terrified the chef, and the man simply pointed to the cellar door when he asked after the whereabouts of Mark Andrew.

  Luke stomped down the stairs and then stopped in front of the closed door.

  He bit his lip and then pounded on the door with his fist. He had to act before his resolve ran out and his anger subsided.

  “Wot?!” came the muffled response from beyond the heavy door.

  “It’s me! Luke Matthew! Your brother!" he shouted and the door opened slowly.

  Luke drew a deep breath and stepped inside the dim laboratory. The smell was acrid, overpowering. Several flasks boiled on the counter over low flames. Mark went back to his stool at the counter, apparently unaware of his brother’s anger.

  “Brother!” Luke tried to calm his racing heart.

  “Aye?” Mark bent over the counter working on something. The glint of gold sparkled on the rough wooden surface.

  “Brother, I have business to discuss with you,” Luke’s voice trembled slightly and his brogue was missing.

  Mark straightened up and turned slowly on the stool to face him. The lamp and the burners worked to cast his face in shadows, and Luke’s courage faltered.

  “Wot business wud thot be, brother?” Mark’s voice was very low.

  “I came to ask… I want to know…” Luke closed his eyes, and his face fell along with his heart, all the way to his feet.

  “Ye want t’ know something? Oll ye ’ave t’ do is ask,” Mark told him, but he could not open his eyes now. The last thing he had wanted and the last thing he had expected was to break down in tears.

  “Did ye think thot I ’adna noticed thot ye wair avoidin’ me?" Mark continued. "Did ye think thot I wudna miss thee? Wot ye’ve done dusna surproise me and I dunna blame thee atoll. When a man loses evra thing, it is ’ard t’ accept, but thair ’tis and thair’s nothing t’ be done aboot it. Go on and ask wot ye will.”

  Luke felt weak and his knees were like water.

  “Come on ovar ’ere and sit fur a spell.” Mark Andrew jerked his head toward the other stool. “Keep an old mon comp’ny fur a while and a bit.”

  Luke crossed the space and sat heavily on the stool.

  “Now tell me wot’s botherin’ ye, brother.” Mark went back to shining the golden sword. The sword that never needed cleaning, shining or honing.

  “It’s Merry,” Luke almost choked. This was not what he had meant to say. “I struck her.”

  “You hit her?” Mark looked up at the flask of yellow liquid in front of him.

  “Aye! Struck her down… down on the floor.” Luke told him miserably.

  “If it’s confession you need, Simon is with…”

  “No!” Luke shook his head. “Tis no confession I am in need of. She deserved what she got. She had no right to say what she said.”

  “And what was that?”

  “She said… she asked me if you might have used our daughter in some unholy mass,” Luke blurted and then felt he would faint. This was not right. It was almost as if he had transferred his anger with his brother to his wife. Her words rang in his ears. That’s not fair, Luke!

  “That’s preposterous,” Mark said calmly and almost smiled at his brother’s discomfiture, though it was hardly a laughing matter and his own brogue had disappeared. “Here. Have a drink.”

  Mark dragged a glass beaker from the shelf and filled it with Scotch. Luke picked it up quickly and drained it in two long swallows. He coughed and then seemed to relax a bit.

  “Ye know whair th’ baby is, don’t ye?” Luke plunged on. If he was going to be a coward, so be it, but at least he could try to learn something to appease Merry.

  “Not really,” Mark said, frowned and tapped his thumbnail against his bottom teeth.

  “Wot does thot mean, ‘not really’? Ye either know or ye don’t.”

  “I don’t know where she is geographically speaking,” Mark told him.

  “Whoy do I not believe you?”

  “Perhaps you don’t trust me anymore. But I do not know where she is.” Mark turned to look at him. “Even if I did know her exact location, I would not bring her here.”

  Luke stood up abruptly and felt the anger had only just begun to leave him, returning with a vengeance.

  “Before you ask why, take this.” Mark handed him the golden sword, hilt first.

  Luke took the sword automatically. It felt heavy and cold in his hands. He looked down at its twisted blade and then up at his brother’s darkly gleaming eyes.

  “Why?” Luke asked the question in a whisper.

  “You can kill me before I tell you or you can kill me afterwards or you can lay the sword down and leave without hearing the answer,” Mark Andrew told him evenly. “I think the first and third options would be most beneficial to you and your wife.”

  “You make no sense! Why would I kill you? Is there something to what Merry said? Has something happened to the bairn? Is she dead? Did you kill her?” Luke Matthew had lost his brogue, and that usually meant he was extremely perturbed.

  “No. She’s not dead and no one has sacrificed her in an unholy ceremony. And I repeat, I do not know where she is, but she is not your daughter, Luke. She is the daughter of Marduk.”

  Luke dropped the sword on the floor and it rang in the laboratory like a death knell.

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  “This is a great journey, is it not?” Selwig asked and looked up at Vanni from where he sat on the rug in the boy’s room, meticulously folding his socks into neat little squares.

  “Oh, yes! Very great,” Vanni told him importantly. “We are going to travel across the blue sea in a ship. My father says it will take quite some time to reach this island on the edge of the water.”

  “The edge of the water?” Selwig frowned. “We are not going to the land of the dragons, are we? I, for one, do not like dragons. I have seen all the dragons I wish to see in my lifetime.”

  “You have seen a dragon?” Vanni stopped packing and plopped down in front of the Tuathan with wide eyes.

  “Of course,” Selwig told him as he continued to stack the folded socks into towers according to color. “The very same dragon King Corrigan and King Il Dolce Mio fought and trapped on the battlefield of Ahasuerus. She was a fearsome beast, blurting out flames and smoke, scorching the earth, rending the sky with her rage-filled bellows, flying about on leathery wings, wreaking havoc and destruction of untold proportions. Most frightening! Most terrible! And the boggans! The fearsome beasts of muscle, bone and sinew and covered with foul hair as stiff as daggers. Their teeth as long as spears and their yellow eyes full of evil menace. Great clubs they wielded in their knotty hands. Long claws on hideous, knobby fingers. Horrible voices wailing on the wind like fearsome creatures from the unknown abyss. Most awful! Most horrendous!”

  “Oh! Did you see my father there?” Vanni asked excitedly. “I heard he was there. And the Templars! The great Knights of old with their long white cloaks and great broadswords, mounted on fine, prancing destriers. Did you see them?”

  “I saw them,” Selwig shuddered at the memory of the shades of the Templars commanded by the mighty Jinn. “Twas a soul-shattering night.”

  “Speaking of souls, my friend.” Vanni stood up abruptly. “My father’s soul has returned to him. Sir Ramsay has given it back. I am very glad for him. He was bothered by its mislocation.”

  “Ahhh. He has misplaced his soul?” Selwig’s reddish blonde eyebrows went up. “Is this common among men?”

  “I don’t think so,” Vanni went back to his packing. “And my father has also recovered the crystal skull the angel hid for me.”

  “What?!” Selwig sho
uted and leapt to his feet in terror.

  “Oh, and by the way,” Vanni turned an appraising eye on the Tuathan. “My father says only men have souls.”

  “Did you say crystal skull?” Selwig stared at him.

  “Yes. Yes. The treasure was hidden in the chapel. We are taking it to the island. If only men have souls, then you are a man.”

  “What?!” Selwig cried and sank to the floor again, pressing his hands over his ears. “Do not say that. You say too much, too fast! My head is too little to hear it all.”

  “But you have a soul, Selwig.” Vanni knelt beside him. “I can see it. It is very beautiful. You would be proud of it and it smells like wild flowers and honey.”

  “Of course I have a soul.” Selwig looked up at him. “But I am not a man. I am Tuatha de Danann.”

  “Yes. Yes. I know, but of the elves, only King Il Dolce Mio has a soul and that is because his father is King Ramsay. Therefore, you are either half-man or all man, but you are not an elf.”

  “This is most distressing.” Selwig reached down for the pile of socks and handed them to his friend. “We must be very careful. Do not tell anyone of what you know. Also, please do not mention my soul to anyone. I am in enough trouble already.”

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  Luke Matthew returned to his house on foot. He thought his mind would evaporate at any moment. His brother had offered his neck to him in proof of his word as the truth and waited patiently while Luke stood over the sword that could have easily taken his life, or at least sent him on his way somewhere in another form. When Luke had done nothing, Mark had eventually picked up the sword and taken him by the arm and led him outside to the stone in Simon’s star-shaped patio.

  “Look at this place, brother,” Mark had said, turned him about and showed him the points of the star surrounded by the glorious array of sceau de Solomon lilies, amaranths and violets.

  “Are you my father?” Luke had asked him.