The Firstborn (44 page)

Dust hung in the air.

The place was a mess. Dirt and grime were everywhere. The smell of mildew blurred with the scent of rotting wood. Where there was still wallpaper, it peeled from the walls. Where there was still carpet, there were ratty holes with exposed floorboards beneath.

John stepped carefully.

A floorboard squeaked. He paused, trying not to make noise. Above, maybe a floor or so higher, he could hear chattering voices and the sounds of chair legs scraping across linoleum. He held his breath as he stepped, his leather boots coming down gently on the soggy, decomposing boards beneath his heel.

A shriek.

He threw his back against the wall, sending a thumping noise through the frame of the building as his eyes shot down to the floor—a giant screaming rat, the size of a healthy kitten, shot across the hall toward a yawning hole on the far wall. Its tail slurped into the darkness like a noodle in the lips of a ten-year-old boy—then was gone.

The voices upstairs went silent for a moment.

John stayed.

He could feel their demeanor—curious but not startled. Why? He took a breath and concentrated his thoughts on the source of his gifts—

—the cross.

They weren’t worried because there was something else going on. Someone was supposed to be in the building. There was someone else who hadn’t arrived yet.

“Ibrahim?” a voice shouted down the stairs.

His voice caught in his throat, choking at him. Did he have the guts to reply?

He grunted a reply of some kind.

“Get up here,” the voice announced again. “We’re going to pray.”

John put a hand to his chest and moved toward the stairs, ambling up the squealing, splintering steps. He stopped at the top and looked at the door, a small gap where it had been left ajar.

His eyes squinted as he moved toward the gap, trying to see in.

A figure moved by his view and then passed by. Like a parting curtain the passing body revealed what lay beyond.

A table, strewn with plastic and wires, bricks of white and bags of screws. An automatic rifle hung from the back of a chair by its strap.

There were three of them in there. He could feel it.

John took a step back.

This was a bad idea. He shouldn’t have come. He couldn’t take on three of them. This was ridiculous. It was time to call the police.

He turned around and moved down the stairs as quickly as his feet would carry him. At the bottom of the steps he took one last look upward, then looked back—

He stopped. A man glared at him—handsome, young, and muscular.

John darted forward—shoving his weight past the other man, ramming by.

A sinewy fist grabbed John by the arm, an open hand slamming into his back between the shoulder blades. His body spun, then hit the drywall. The soft material caved as John’s shoulder punched through the wall.

The man lunged at him, and John threw himself from the wall, his arm, covered in soggy white powder, sweeping out in a vicious swing.

The young man took the blow to the face, snapping back fast.

John turned to flee and felt the sharp strike of a booted heel connect with the small of his back, sending him sprawling forward. A hand grabbed his ankle and John kicked back, trying to fight free, flipping onto his back.

His eyes lifted. The other three stood at the bottom of the steps, staring. One had a pistol.

The man reached down, taking John by the hair.

“Who are you?”

Chapter 25

B
LAKE STOOD IN THE
hall as they threw Devin into the space below the stairs and slammed the door shut. They’d removed the light-bulb from the ceiling to make sure that he’d remain in the dark. That was important. Devin Bathurst was smart, tough, and tenacious. Superman, no—but well worth keeping in darkness.

Devin stood in the shadows, upper body illuminated by the ambient light of the hall. Blake gave him a nod, then motioned for the nearby guards to shut the heavy oak door.

“Put a towel at the bottom of the door to keep out the light from the hall. And I want three people here at all times.” Blake reached into his pocket and removed a skeleton key, twisting it in the old-fashioned lock. All the doors were antique Victorian doors that Morris Childs’s wife apparently couldn’t live without—a lucky break that had simply saved them all the trouble of changing the interior locks.

He held up the skeleton key. “And I’ll hang on to this.”

He stomped away.

Blake liked the feeling of his boots stomping on the floor, the way he watched the other Firstborn scatter to the corners of a room and silence the whispered chatter. He liked that he felt tired, the weight of the office bearing down on his shoulders. He was Overseer now, and that meant he couldn’t be wrong. It was exhausting, but he liked the feeling.

At last, the Firstborn were all under one flag—and he was their weary captain.

“Blake.”

He turned, looking down the hall. Morris Childs stood there, fully dressed now, arms crossed.

“What are you doing with Devin?”

Blake let his eyes wander across the walls as he considered what he was going to say. There were a thousand things he could say, but there would be only one that was right in his mind. He was Overseer; Morris would have to wait for him to speak.

“I’m making sure he doesn’t cause any more trouble.” He turned to walk away.

“Blake?”

He stopped, letting out an audible groan, hoping it sent the message. “Yes?” He looked back.

“I was wondering if you might have a word with me in my office.”

Blake examined Morris for a moment, then let his eyes drift lazily toward the men who stood at the door where Devin was held. They all looked away. He didn’t feel it was appropriate for Morris to question him like this—not in front of the others. The task of Overseer was difficult enough without…

“I only need a few minutes.”

Blake cleared his throat and nodded, following the older man into his office. The door creaked, then clicked shut.

“How can I help you, Morris?”

Morris took a long breath, moving toward his desk. He sat on the edge.

Blake considered how much he disliked Morris’s informality around him.

“What are you doing, Mr. Jackson?”

“I’m unifying the Firstborn.”

“I mean, what are you doing with Mr. Bathurst?”

Blake considered for a moment, then nodded. “Look, you should know sooner or later. Devin is a traitor to everything that we stand for.”

“What do we stand for?”

“Unity.”

“What about virtue?” Morris asked, his tone smacking of flippancy.

“Unity is a virtue.”

“What about love?”

Blake heaved a sigh, hoping that Morris would get off his back. “Devin is opposition to Overseer—that means he’s in opposition to God. We have to make sure this ends here.”

“What are you talking about?”

“We’re trying to save lives here…and all he cares about is what the idiot Temple has to say.”

“I’m not certain he’s wrong.”

Blake let his head tip to the side, trying his best to convey the incredulity that was bubbling up inside. “We were trying to stop a terrorist attack!”

Morris looked down. “And did we act like terrorists ourselves?” “That’s ridiculous.”

“No,” Morris replied. “We were so convinced that we were right. What if we were wrong?”

“What did he say to you?” Blake snapped.

“Nothing. I just started to think—what if we were wrong? Sometimes it’s good to keep people around who disagree with us.”

“No,” Blake said definitively, “no, that’s not right. That’s absolutely wrong.”

“Just listen to what I have to say…”

“No,” Blake snapped, annoyed. “I’m not listening to any more of this. If you want to disagree, that’s fine—but you keep it to yourself. Got it?”

“I don’t think—”

“I’m Overseer,” Blake said flatly, taking a step toward Morris, “and I don’t like your tone.”

A look of sudden shock and realization crossed the older man’s face.

“I’m done with Bathurst. Tomorrow I’m going to take everybody out, and they’re going to see what happens when you defy God.” Blake turned on his heel and moved to the door.

“What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to make him choose,” he announced, reaching for the knob, “and then everybody is going to see him accept the consequences.”

“Blake Jackson,” Morris announced, as if scolding a small child.

Blake turned back. “No,” he announced flatly. “I decide around here. Got it?”

Then he left the room, locking the door shut behind him.

Dr. Saul Mancuso sat in the garage, watching the shadowy forms of guards move past the glossy gray windows.

Ten men sat around him. The Fallen, as they were called—but they were the most elevated men here, as far as he could tell.

He grunted to himself. Half the men in the room had lost their faith in God because of hypocrisy; the other half had left because they were fed up with the politics. He’d been saying it for years: religion was dangerous. And now Blake and his unquestioning cronies were proving him right.

Saul leaned against the wall, waiting for morning.

The pale glow of dawn felt empty somehow. And lonely.

He heaved a sigh. Ten years ago he would have prayed. That would always take the edge off of the bad parts of life. And now it was such a bitter pill. He coughed into his hand to hide the audible sigh that was coming. Academia was his religion now. At least there they used facts as a basis for crucifying you.

Hannah sat in the room, staring at the locked door. After her talk with Morris she’d slept some, but it wasn’t much at all, not enough to be well rested.

She stood as she heard the approaching footfalls and the sound of a heavy body stopping at the door. Something twisted in the lock, and the door floated open. Blake stood in the door, looking her over.

Hannah sat, drawing back into her seat.

“Are you OK?” he asked, dipping his head.

She looked at her feet.

“Look…” He broke off for a moment, then stepped into the room, closing the door behind him. “I want you to know that I don’t want you to get hurt. OK?”

She nodded, still refusing him eye contact.

He took a seat on the bed near her, trying to lean close. Her gaze drifted to the wallpaper.

“The Firstborn are fracturing,” he said in a soft, low voice, “and I don’t want you to get hurt.”

No reply.

“I can’t guarantee you’ll be safe unless you’re on the right side.”

She looked at him, feeling a frosty gaze lift off her face. Hannah wanted to yell, to scream, to tell him he was a despot and traitor, a power-mad lunatic who had lost sight of everything good about the Firstborn. Her eyes tipped down toward the floor.

“Are you on my side?”

She didn’t say anything.

“Hannah,” he demanded, “can I count on you?”

“I…” she began, then broke off. “I had a chance to have a normal life. I could have lived in a nice neighborhood with children and a future.” She laughed, weakly. “I could have been one of the church ladies that all the other women look up to.”

He took her wrists in his big, ragged hands, the sinew closing gently. “You can still have it,” he said softly. “I can make sure that you never have to get pulled into the dangers of the Firstborn—but you’ll have to stay near me. I can’t do it unless you’re willing to make it very clear to everyone that you’re on the right side. Do you understand?”