Son of the Morning (4 page)

"Heresy," she murmured, turning her attention back to the screen. "Fire was the punishment for a lot of crimes, not just for witchcraft."

"Guess people back then took their religion seriously."
Kristian
wrinkled his nose at the electronic display of a crude drawing of three men bound to a center pole while flames licked around their knees. All three men were dressed in white tunics with crosses emblazoned on their chests. Their mouths were little black holes, opened in screams of agony.

"People are still executed because of religion today," Grace said, shuddering a little as she stared at the small drawing, imagining the sheer horror of being burned alive. "In the Middle Ages, religion was the center of people's lives, and anyone who went against it was a threat to them. Religion gave them the rules of civilization, but it was more than that. There was so much that wasn't known, or understood; they were terrified by eclipses, by comets, by sicknesses that struck without warning, by things we know now are normal but which they had no way of understanding. Imagine how frightening, and deadly, appendicitis must have been to them, or a stroke or heart attack. They didn't know what was happening, what caused it, or how to prevent it. Magic was very real to them, and religion gave them a sort of protection against these unknown, frightening forces. Even if they died, God was still taking care of them, and the evil spirits didn't win."

His brow furrowed as he tried to imagine living in such ignorance. It was almost beyond him, this child of the computer age. "I guess television would've given them a real spasm, huh?"

"Especially if they saw a talk show," she muttered. "Now
there
are some evil spirits."

Kristian
giggled, sending his glasses slipping down his nose. He pushed them up again and squinted at the screen. "Did you find what you want?"

"No. I'm looking for mention of one particular Templar-at least, I think he was a Templar."

"Any cross-references you can check?" She shook her head. "I don't know his last name."
Niall of
Scotland
.
She had already found his name several times in the portion of the documents written in Old French. Why wasn't his surname recorded, in a time when family and heritage were so important? From what she had gleaned from her translations so far, he'd been a man of immense importance to the Templars, a Knight himself, which meant he was well born and not a serf. Part of the documents were also in Gaelic, strengthening the unknown tie with Scotland. She'd read up on Scotland's history in her encyclopedia, but there hadn't been any mention of a mysterious Niall at all, much less one in the time frame of the Templars' existence.

"Dead end, then,"
Kristian
said cheerfully, evidently deciding they had wasted enough time on someone who had died even before the age of analog. His blue eyes sparkled as he moved his chair a little closer. "Want to see this cool accounting program I've worked up?"

"I don't think the words
cool
and
accounting
go together," Grace observed, keeping her expression deadpan.

Shocked,
Kristian
stared at her. He blinked several times, making him look like a myopic crane. "Are you kidding?" he blurted. "It's the greatest! Wait until you see-wait. You
are
kidding. I can tell."

Grace's lips curved as she deftly tapped keys, backing out of the university's library system. "Oh, yeah? How?"

"You always tighten your mouth to keep from smiling. " He glanced at her mouth, then quickly looked away, blushing a little.

Grace felt her own cheeks heating and carefully glued her eyes to the screen.
Kristian
had a tiny crush on her, based mostly on his enthusiasm for her expensive, powerful laptop, but on a few rare occasions he had said or done something that bespoke a physical awareness of her as well.

It always disconcerted her; she was thirty years old, for heaven's sake, and was certainly not a femme fatale by any stretch of the imagination. She considered herself very ordinary, with nothing about her to inspire lust in a nineteen-year-old-though God knows, almost anything female and breathing could inspire lust in a nineteen-year old boy. If
Kristian
was the stereotypical image of a computer nerd, she'd always thought she looked the typical shy academic type: dark brown hair, impossibly straight, which she had long ago given up trying to coax into curls and now wore pulled back into a single thick braid; light blue eyes, almost gray, usually framed by reading glasses; no makeup, because she didn't know how to apply it; sensible clothes, tending toward corduroy slacks and denim skirts. She was hardly the stuff of an erotic dream.

But Ford had always said she had the most kissable mouth he'd ever seen, and it flustered her that
Kristian
had looked so pointedly at her lips. To distract him, she said, "Okay, let's see this hotshot program." She hoped the Chevelle would work its macho magic soon, and lure into
Kristian's
orbit some smart girl who appreciated both horsepower and multitasking.

Looking grateful for the change of subject, he opened a plastic case and removed the diskette, then inserted it into the disk drive. Grace scooted to the side, giving him better access to the keys. He directed the computer to access the disk in the A drive, there was some electronic whirring, and a menu appeared on the screen.

"What bank do you use?"
Kristian
asked. Grace told him, frowning as she scanned down the menu.
Kristian
zipped the cursor to the item he wanted, clicked on it, and the screen changed again. "Bingo," he crowed as a new menu appeared, this time of bank services. "Am I slick, or what?"

"You're illegal, is what you are!" Appalled, Grace watched as he chose another item, clicked on it, then typed "St. John, Grace." Instantly a record of her checking account transactions appeared on the screen. "You've hacked into the bank's computers! Get out of there before you get in big trouble. I mean it, Kris! This is a felony. You told me you had an accounting program, not a back door into every bank in the area."

"Don't you want to know how I did it?" he asked, clearly disappointed that she didn't share his enthusiasm for the deed. "I'm not stealing or anything. This lets you see how long it takes each check to clear, so you can establish a pattern. Some places only deposit once a week. You can get a better handle on your cash flow if you know how long it takes for a particular check to clear. That way, if you have an interest-bearing checking account, you can time your payments so your average balance doesn't dip below the minimum."

Grace simply stared at him, amazed at the wiring of his brain. To her, money matters were a straightforward affair: you had
X
amount of money coming in, and you had to keep your expenses below that amount. Simple. She had long ago decided there were two types of people on earth: math people, and non-math people. She was an intelligent woman; she had a doctoral degree. But the intricacies of math, whether it dealt with finance or quantum physics, had simply never appealed to her. Words, now. . . she reveled in words, wallowed deliriously in the nuances of meaning, delighted in the magic of them. Ford was even less interested in math than she was, which was why she took care of the checkbook. Bryant tried; he read the financial section of the newspaper, subscribed to investment magazines-in case he ever had enough money to invest-but he didn't have a real grasp of the dynamics. After fifteen minutes of wading through one of his investment magazines, he was tossing it aside and reaching for something, anything, on archaeology.

But
Kristian
was a math person. Grace had no doubt he'd be a billionaire by the time he was thirty. He would write some brilliant computer program, wisely invest the profits, and retire happily to tinker away at more innovative programs.

"I'm sure it's a real boon to depositors," she said dryly, "but it's still illegal. You can't market it."

"Oh, it's not for public knowledge, it's just goofing around. You'd think banks would have better security programs, but I haven't found one yet that's much of a challenge."

Grace propped her chin on her hand and eyed him. "My boy, you're either going to be famous, or in jail."

He ducked his head, grinning. "I've got something else to show you," he said enthusiastically, his fingers darting over the keyboard as he exited the bank's accounting records.

Grace watched as the screen changed rapidly, flickering from one display to another. "Won't they be able to tell you've been in their files?"

"Not with this baby. See, I got in through a legitimate password. Basically, I put on an electronic sheepskin, and they never knew a wolf was prowling around."

"How did you get the password?" "Snooping. No matter how coded the info, there's always a back door. Not that your bank has very good computer security," he said with obvious disapproval. "If I were you, I'd consider moving my account."

"I'll think about it," she assured him, with a baleful glare that had him grinning again.

"That's just part of the program. Here's the accounting system." He pulled up another screen and motioned Grace closer. She obligingly scooted her chair forward an inch or so, and he launched into the intricacies of his digitalized baby. Grace paid attention, because she could easily see it
was
a good system, deceptively simple to execute. He had programmed it to compare the current entry against past entries in the same account, so if anyone accidentally typed in, say, "$115.00" instead of "$ 15.00," the program alerted the user that the amount wasn't within the previously established range, and to check for an input error.

"I like that," she mused. She had always paid bills and done her bookkeeping the old-fashioned way, by hand and on paper. However, she was completely at home with computers, so there was no reason for her not to do their household finances electronically.

Kristian
beamed. "I knew you would." His long fingers stroked the keys, downloading the program into her hard disk. "Its name is Go Figure."

She groaned at the sly corniness of it, the groan changing midway into a laugh. "Do me a favor. When you get busted for playing around in the bank's computers, don't tell the feds that I have a copy of the program, okay?"

"I'm telling you, it's safe, at least until the banks change all their passwords. Then you simply won't be able to get in.
I
could get in," he boasted, "but most people couldn't. Here, let me give you a list of the passwords."

"I don't want it," she said quickly, but
Kristian
ignored her. He rifled through a stack of papers and plucked out three sheets of closely printed material, which he stuck in her computer case.

"There. Now you'll have it if you need it." He paused, staring at the computer with the ongoing chess game. His opponent had made a move. He studied the board, head cocked slightly to one side, then he chortled. "Aha! I know that gambit, and it won't work." Gleefully he moved a knight and clicked the mouse.

"Who are you playing with?" "I
dunno
," he said absently. "He calls himself the Fishman."

Grace blinked, staring at the screen.
Naw
, it couldn't be.
Kristian
was playing with someone who had probably chosen that Net name with malice aforethought, to trick people into making just that assumption. The real Bobby Fischer wouldn't be surfing the Net looking for games; he could play anyone, anywhere, and get paid huge amounts of money for doing it.

"Who usually wins?" "We're about even. He's good,"
Kristian
allowed as he
rehooked
his other desktop.

Grace opened her purse and pulled out her checkbook. "Want a pizza?" she asked.

His head cocked as he pulled his mind back from cyberspace to check the status of his stomach. "Boy, do I ever," he declared. "I'm starving."

"Then call it in; this one's on me." "Are you going to stay and split it with me?" She shook her head. "I can't. I have things waiting for me at home." She barely controlled a blush. Ford would have roared with laughter if he'd heard her.

She wrote out a check for fifty dollars, then pulled out a twenty to pay for the pizza. "Thanks, buddy. You're a lifesaver."

Kristian
took the check and tip, grinning as he looked at it. "This is going to be a good career, isn't it?" he asked, beaming.

Grace had to laugh. "If you can stay out of jail." She placed the laptop in the case and balanced the repaired modem on top of. her unzipped purse.
Kristian
gallantly took the heavy case from her and carried it downstairs for her. Neither of his parents was in sight, but the sounds of gunshots and a car chase drifted from the den and pinpointed their location; both of the older
Siebers
unabashedly loved Arnold Schwarzenegger's action movies.

Kristian's
gallantry lasted only as far as the kitchen, where the proximity to food reminded him of the pizza he hadn't yet ordered. Grace retrieved the computer case from him as he halted at the wall phone. "Thanks, Kris," she said, and left the same way she had entered, through the darkened laundry room and out the back door.

She paused for a moment to let her eyes adjust to the darkness. During the time she had been with
Kristian
, clouds had rolled in to block most of the starlight, though here and there was a clear patch of sky. Crickets chirped, and a cool breeze stirred around her, bringing with it the scent of rain.