The Traiteur's Ring (48 page)

He’s dead because of me. I killed him as sure as if I’d shot him myself.

Your destiny was no longer yours to choose, Ben.

He turned and looked at the old man who squatted on the floor beside him.

“Fuck that,” he hollered. “These men are my family, and Chris is dead because of me. How do I fix that? How?” He wiped the tears violently from his face. “Can I heal him? Can I heal him even if he is dead?”

The spirit is still in your friend, and the life is not gone yet from him, so it is possible. It is not likely you could survive, though. You are weak already from healing the other, and it would take time to replace the life energy you have used.

Ben looked back at Chris and for a moment thought of Christy and his son, still inside her. Then, he thought of Viper Team and how they had all come here with him. None had even understood why he had to be here, but they had come anyway.

I love you, Christy. I love you, and I love our son.

He concentrated with all his might, and once he was sure the heart message would make it to his wife, he reached out and placed his hands on Chris. Again the world took on a milky white blurriness and he took a long, slow tactical breath and closed his eyes.

*   *   *

It took Reed a moment to remember just where the hell he was, and when he did he sat up. With one hand, he frisked his body for wounds and with the other snatched his rifle out of the dirt. He sensed more than heard movement to his right and spun in that direction, raising his rifle to a firing position just as his heart beat accelerated at the feel of warm, sticky wetness on his bare chest. The memory came exploding into his head – the zombie-like corpses firing their rifles at him and Chris.

He saw Ben.

He kept his rifle up in a one-handed grip and scanned a circle around them as his left hand continued its search for the holes in his flesh that had to be there. He remembered the bullets tearing into his chest, and he was covered in blood. But he found no holes.

And, I’m awake and standing here for Christ sake, so let it go for now
.

There was no one in the tunnel except him, Ben who knelt over Chris’s body, and the now-motionless corpses. Had he dreamed the whole Goddamn shooting? But then why was he covered in blood ,and why the shit was he naked from the waist up?

“Ben?” he called out.

But Ben stayed kneeled over their officer, who Reed now saw was unmoving and covered in blood. His best friend seemed to moan as he rocked back and forth but as he listened the soft moan sounded more like a chant in some strange language he had never heard. He felt a weird sort of déjà vu.

He walked around his teammates, his rifle now limp in his grip. As he circled around to the front of Ben, he saw his friend’s eyes were open.  Even in the soft bluish light, which he now noticed seemed to actually emanate from Ben, he could see their milky-white appearance. It was less like a film over his eyes and more like Ben’s eyes were filled from the inside with a white smoke that swirled around behind his corneas.

Ben’s hands rested on Chris’s chest, and Reed saw the flickering beams that seemed to dance around his hands and arms, pulsing from his fingers.

He knew that Chris was dead. The dark hole in his forehead and unseeing eyes told the whole story, and he felt his throat tighten at the loss. He thought for a moment about Emily and how her world would unravel when she found out her husband had died in the service of his country. He had seen it too many friggin’ times.

“Ben,” he called out softly again.

His mind went suddenly to the dream – the dream of Ben with his hands glowing blue, surrounded by flickering white light. He remembered the ring – that damn ring – glowing orange and the energy that came from his fingertips.

He watched Ben chant, his eyes swirling with the white smoke, his hands glowing, the ring pulsating orange, and he knew. He knew it had not been a dream.

Or else I’m dreaming now.

But he knew that wasn’t true. He knelt beside Ben and began to cry.

“Please, Ben,” he whispered. “Please save him.”

As he watched the little firefly lights seemed to fill the hole in Chris’s head.  He saw they danced around the back of his skull where the huge exit wound almost certainly dumped blood and brains into the dirt behind it. Reed gasped as the hole in his team mate’s head began to lighten, and the edges pulled together, filling in.

He excitedly slapped Ben on the back, but his smile disappeared when he felt warm stickiness there. Reed looked at his hand which was covered now in bright red blood and watery grey gore. He leaned left, and to his horror saw a large gaping hole in the back of Ben’s head. As he watched the hole grew, and blood poured out onto his best friend’s neck.

“Ben,” he screamed, this time in terror.

Then, Ben pitched forward face-first into the dirt.

*   *   *

Ben raised the warm glass of iceless lemonade to his lips and waited for his Gammy to speak. He felt a crushing sadness at what he had left behind, but he had no regret. He had done only what he had to. He was a SEAL. He was also a Traiteur.

There had really been no choice to make.

Gammy patted the back of his hand and sipped her own drink. She turned to him and smiled the way he remembered from his childhood. It was the smile that said your scraped knee hurts now, but it’s gonna be alright, chile, and you gonna be jess fine. He smiled back.

“No room for no sadness now, chile. Gammy’s as proud as can be now. You done been turn inna one helluva a man.” She patted his hand again. “You done been a sight good Traiteur, too, no doubt dat.”

“What about my family?” he asked and felt his eyes swell with tears. “Who will look after them?”

“Look affa them yo’ own self, I expect,” his Gammy said patiently.

He sighed a pain-filled sigh.

“Is that how it works?”

His Gammy said nothing, but patted his hand again and then sipped her lemonade.

“I did what I had to do,” he said and sipped his sweet, warm drink.

“Did whatcha had to do,” she agreed. “’Course now you always did, chile. Ever since dat night, dincha?”

Ben thought a moment. He didn’t really know.

He saw the fire – saw it swallowing up his home and could almost feel its heat. He could also feel the tears on his young cheeks as he stood there alone in the woods. He remembered the figures in the fire, flames consuming them as still they grappled with each other. And, he remembered her voice – soft and gentle as always, a grandma’s voice – telling him to run. She told him where to go, who to find, and what to say.

And, he had never been back after that, not even in his mind until just a few weeks ago he realized. He had never even wondered.

“You saved me that night, didn’t you?” he asked and looked at her wrinkled and beautiful face with the grey, but sparkling, eyes.

“Oh, my, shit no, chile,” she said and squeezed his hand and laughed. “Done saved yo’ self dat night. Saved yo’ self and one whole lot more. Same as always I expect. Proud dat night, too.”

For a moment he saw it – through his own little boy eyes – the demon-like yellow orbs of the creature and his Gammy screaming for him to find something he was supposed to have inside. Then, the heat in his little chest had grown, and the glow around his small hands had pulsated. The fire shot from his little body, and then he listened to the shrieks from the creatures as the fire consumed them – and his Gammy, too, he supposed.

And, he had left his home in the woods and never looked back.

“Done been dat man since yo been a boy, huh, chile?”

She patted his hand again.

“So,” he said and looked out from their porch on the woods he now remembered he loved. “Now what? We just sit here on our porch forever? Is this supposed to be Heaven?”

His Gammy laughed a big belly laugh.

“Might jess sit a bit my own self,” she said. “But you gots stuff to be doin’ I think, now. No time to be jess sittin’.”

“Might just sit a minute,” he said, and leaned back and sipped his lemonade. “Just a minute.”

“Okay,” she said. “But jess a minute, chile. Gots no more time den dat.”

Chapter 48

The light blinded Reed as they burst out of the tunnel behind the waterfall, and he squinted, unable to raise an arm to block the intruding sun. Both his hands were busy pushing down rhythmically on Ben’s chest just as he had been taught.

I think Ben actually recertified me in CPR.

The irony didn’t seem particularly important right now. The Air Force PJ’s, the special ops medics extraordinaire, had slipped a tube down his best friend’s throat and periodically squeezed the green plastic bag they had attached to it.

“Helo is on the ground,” Auger hollered at them. “This way, this way,” he shouted and dashed off to the left.

The SEALs and two Air Force medics struggled to keep the stretcher level as they started down the rough terrain leading off the ruins, and Reed struggled to keep up the chest compressions without losing his footing and falling to the ground. The hole he thought he had seen in the back of Ben’s head –

I did see it – it was there, and then Ben – wherever he is, or was – somehow healed it. He’s trying to make it back.

– had mysteriously disappeared. But the round hole in his forehead remained, and blood soaked his body below his waist. His right leg flopped around like it wasn’t even attached to his body, and his left leg had turned around nearly completely backwards.

Come on, Ben – please don’t do this. Please don’t leave us. Christy needs you – and I need you.

“Come on – let’s go, let’s go,” Chris hollered out from the head of the stretcher as they approached the helicopter whose rotor still spun overhead, ready to take off as soon as the patient was secure. Chris looked completely unharmed except his pants were soaked with blood from the waist down. He walked without so much as a limp.

They slid the stretcher into the helicopter, and Reed started to climb up after him. One of the medics inside put a hand on his chest.

“We got him from here,” he said gently.

“I need to go with him,” Reed said in a trembling voice and felt tears spill onto his face. “Please. He’s my only real family in the world.”

Chris took him by the shoulders and pulled him gently back from the doorway.

“They’ll take good care of him, bro,” he said softly.

Reed watched as one of the medics took up the chest compressions he had been responsible for. On an impulse, he reached inside and took Ben’s right hand a moment and squeezed. Then, he slipped the dull, bone-colored ring off of his finger.

“Gunshot wound to the head,” one of the PJs from the tunnel said.

“Oh, Jesus,” the medic inside responded, and then pushed the microphone from his flight helmet to his lips and started to talk to someone far away.

“He’s gonna be fine,” Reed screamed up at them as the helicopter spun and began to hover just above the ground. “He’s my family, Goddammit, and he is going to be okay. You hear me?”

The medic in the helicopter gave him a halfhearted thumbs-up as the helicopter lifted off, and Chris held him by the shoulders as he began to sob. Reed wiped the tears from his face and looked down at the ring. It lay in his hand, a pale grayish white ring of unpolished stone. He slipped his dog tags over his head and slipped the chain through the center of the ring and let it slide down on top of his tags. Then, he slipped them back over his head. He turned to Chris.

“He’s going to be fine.”

“Okay,” Chris said, but Reed knew he didn’t believe it. They watched the helicopter fade to a speck in the distance, and then Reed grabbed his rifle and headed back to the team of SEALs and the small group of flex-cuffed bad guys who knelt in a circle at their feet.

“He’s going to be fine,” he mumbled again to himself.

Chapter 49

Christy sat in the large wicker chair on their deck and looked out at the Chesapeake Bay as she stroked the hair of the baby in her lap who fought valiantly against sleep.  It had started to turn cold again after a short early summer weekend, but the beach was still busy with the hard-core beach bums who wore sweatshirts over their shorts. A group of them tossed a Frisbee back and forth and laughed and drank beer from red plastic cups. She missed that, she realized.

You’ll have it again. And anyway, look what you do have.

She hugged little Jason to her chest and pulled the soft blanket around him. For a moment he looked up at her with his grey and stormy eyes. Then, he sucked harder on his Binky and gave up, his eyes closing as he snuggled against his Mommy’s warmth.

Totally worth it. Besides, life is getting more and more normal every day.

She had everything she needed in the world right here in this house. She wondered if she would ever know the truth of what happened to her husband in Africa. He sure as hell wasn’t talking now was he?

Her thoughts were interrupted by the bang of the front door and heavy footsteps in the house. Then, she heard the screen door creak open.

“Hey, Reed,” she loud-whispered over her shoulder.

“Hey, sis,” he said back softly and kissed her on the back of the head before settling into the chair beside her, two beers now evident in his hands. He twisted the top off one and set it on the rail in front of her and then opened the other and took a long swig. “How’s everything in the Morvant household?”

She smiled a genuine smile. “Better all the time,” she said and reached for the beer slowly, careful not to jostle her now sleeping son. “You look great,” she added.

“Only member of Viper Team to escape without a scratch – well, me and Lash, but he’s not really a mortal as you know.”

She held the bottle up, and Reed clicked his bottle against hers.

“To Ben,” he said.

She smiled agreement. “To Ben,” she said and took a long swig.