A Knight Of The Word

Why had Nest Freemark been sent to him?

For just a moment he experienced an almost overpowering urge to flee. Just pack his bags, pick up Stefanie, and catch the first bus out of town. He stood facing into the park, and the movement in the shadows seemed to be reaching for him. He felt trapped in his life and by his decisions, and he could feel his control over things slipping away.

Then the moment passed. He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, and he was all right again. He studied the shadows and saw nothing. The park was still and empty. He felt foolish and slightly embarrassed. He supposed he was not yet entirely free of the emotional fallout of San Sobel. He guessed that’s what it was.

That was what he told himself as he turned away from the park and went down the sidewalk. That was how he dismissed the matter.

But deep inside, where hunches and instinct kept separate counsel, he wasn’t really sure.





* * *





Chapter Fifteen


After Two Bears disappeared. Nest Freemark sat back down on the bench they had shared and stared out at the bay. Her thoughts kept returning to five years ago when she had first met him. She kept trying to reconcile what she remembered from then with what she knew from now. She kept trying to make the parts fit.

I fought in Vietnam. I walked and slept with death. I knew her as I would a lover. I was young before, but afterward I was very old. I died in the Nam so many times, I lost count. But I killed a lot of men, too.

He had told her that right after he had told her his name. He had told her he was a killer. But nothing else he had told her had made him seem so. There had been no hint of violence about him. He had gone out of his way to dispel her concerns.

I am a stranger, a big man, a combat veteran who speaks of terrifying things. You should be afraid. But we are friends, Nest. Our friendship was sealed with our handshake. I will not hurt you.

But he might hurt John Ross. He might have to, because that was what he had been sent to do. She pondered the idea, thinking that in some strange way they had all changed places from five years ago. John Ross was on trial instead of her, and Two Bears might become his executioner. Ross now stood in her shoes, and Two Bears stood in his.

But where did she stand?

She was aware after a while that there were eyes watching her, and she glanced around cautiously. The shabby, sad-eyed Native Americans whom Two Bears had dismissed from their bench were staring at her from a short distance away. They huddled together on the grass, sitting cross-legged, their coats pulled over their shoulders, their heads hunched close, their dark eyes haunted. She wondered what they were thinking. Maybe they were wondering about her. Maybe about Two Bears. Maybe they just wanted their bench back.

I’m afraid, she had said five years ago to Two Bears. And he had replied. Fear is a fire to temper courage and resolve. Use it so.

She was afraid again, and she wondered if she could use her fear now as he had taught her to use it then.

Speak my name once more, he had asked her, and she had done so. O’olish Amaneh. Yes, he had said. Say it often when I am gone, so that I will not be forgotten.

Speak my name, he asked her again, just moments ago. As if by saying it, she could keep him alive.

The last of his kind, the last of the Sinnissippi, appearing and disappearing like a ghost. But his connection to her, while she didn’t pretend to understand it completely, was as settled as concrete. They were linked in a way that transcended time and distance, and she felt her kinship to him so strongly it seemed as if they had been joined always. She wondered at its meaning. She knew now he was a servant of the Word, just like John Ross. So he shared with her a knowledge of the war with the Void, and they were possessed of magic, and they knew of demons and feeders, and they walked a line between two worlds that others didn’t even know existed.

But there was more. In some strange way, she knew, they needed each other. It was hard to explain, but it was there. She took strength from him, but he took something from her, as well. Something. Her brow furrowed. Something.

She rose and walked to the railing, abandoning the bench. She stared out over the bay to the mountains, their jagged peaks cutting across the horizon. What was it he took from her? A hope? A comfort? A companionship? Something. It was there, a shape, a form at the back of her mind, but she could not quite put a name to it.