Stones of Fire

that fear was the tool of the devil. Fear was what he had felt that long-ago night in Beirut. When his best friend, his comrades, his CO were ripped to shreds by an Islamist bomb. When he had stood shaking in the bomb’s aftermath, snot dribbling from his nose, piss puddling at his feet. Afraid to grab his weapon and take action. Afraid to do anything other than drop to his knees and beg God’s mercy.

That’s when the angels came to him. Gabriel and Michael. The same two angels that adorned the lid of the Ark. They took his fear from him, asking only that he take up the Lord’s fight.

And every day since, he had done just that.

This day would be no different.

For he knew no fear.

He had complete and certain faith in the sanctity of his mission.

The same faith that had guided Abraham and Moses in their darkest hour. The same faith that had enabled David to face the mighty Goliath.

‘You come at me with a sword and spear. I come to you in the name of the Lord!’

Those were words to live by. Words to die by.

‘The battle for the Temple will soon be upon us! Praise be to the Lord!’ he joyfully shouted, retaking control of the truck, steering it straight towards the green beam of light.

93

C?dmon ran towards the pencil-thin erratic green glow.

‘Turn it off!’ he shouted, able to see that MacFarlane had taken control of the careering vehicle. Able to see that he was steering the truck directly towards the source of the beam.

Edie turned her head in his direction. With her curly hair wildly blowing all about her, she looked like one of the Furies in pursuit of the wicked among them.

Her expression resolute, she shook her head, refusing to move out of the path of the oncoming truck.

C?dmon pumped his legs and arms faster, afraid he wouldn’t reach her in time. Afraid she would meet her end in a hideous fashion. Afraid.

He only had a few seconds, the whole of the world reduced to his pounding heart, the rat-a-tat- tat of automatic weapon fire, the roar of the powerful engine.

She was just a few feet away.

He could do this.

He could save –

He was airborne, diving towards her, his arms and legs stretched.

His heart in his throat, C?dmon ploughed into Edie, knocking her off her feet and out of the truck’s path. The laser flew from her hands, its beam frenetically arcing through the night sky before disappearing as it plummeted to earth. Limbs tangled together, the two of them rolled across the rocky terrain, the inhospitable surface providing no leaf or blade of grass to soften the impact.

With no time to inquire about injuries, he rolled to his knees. His finger on the trigger of the Glock, his arms locked in a firing position, he prayed that he had successfully cleared the jam. The truck now moving away from him, he took aim at its rear tyres, permitting himself one deep, calming breath before he fired six shots in quick succession.

His aim true, he hit the new targets, blowing out both rear driver’s-side tyres, the truck abruptly fishtailing, wildly swaying from side to side as Stanford MacFarlane lost control of the mammoth two-and-a-half-ton vehicle, the truck veering towards the cliff overlooking the sea.

The gun hanging limply from his hand, C?dmon stood motionless, watching in disbelief as the truck reached the cliff edge. For the briefest of seconds its red tail lights twinkled eerily in the darkness before disappearing from sight. A sonorous boom! was accompanied by a bright flash illuminating the heavens. A surreal swansong for a madman and the legendary Ark of the Covenant.

‘All was vanity and grasping for the wind.’

Edie ran to him, throwing herself into his arms.

‘Oh God! I can’t believe what I just saw!’

‘Nor I,’ he whispered, holding her tight.

94

As though trapped in a dream from which he could not awake, C?dmon surveyed the wreckage. The explosion having been seen for miles, rescue workers, naval personnel, police and local fishermen had descended in an excited swarm on the rock-strewn beach.

Like many explosion sites he’d seen over the years, this one had the familiar trappings — yellow tape, black smoke, smouldering hunks of twisted metal. At a glance he saw that no man could have survived the blast. Although that didn’t deter the local police divers, who were plopping salmon-like from the starboard side of a nearby vessel, aided in their search by powerful underwater torches that cast an otherworldly glow through the dark sea.

‘He thought he could walk on water,’ Edie, standing beside him, murmured. ‘Boy, was he ever wrong.’

‘It’s over. At least for the moment. Perhaps now the voices of tolerance and compassion can be heard.’

‘Or, put another way, God works in mysterious ways.’

‘Mmmm,’ he grunted, unable to see God’s hand in the violent events that had transpired.

He and Edie had kept very much to the sidelines, two curious but innocent bystanders. To cover themselves they had told the police they were a honeymooning couple who had ‘got the wild notion into our heads to spend a romantic night at the ancient tower’. And while they had heard a thunderous explosion, they ‘had no idea what caused it’. Coitus interruptus and all that. The lie took, the police not favouring them with so much as a second glance.

‘Deheb! Deheb!’ a grizzled fisherman exclaimed as he charged through the surf, excitedly pointing to a rivulet of molten gold visible in the soot-coloured sand.

Staring at the stream, C?dmon felt like a battle-wearied and defeated knight home from the wars.

The Ark of the Covenant had not withstood the blast. He had failed in his quest. What was left of the sacred Ark of the ancient Israelites was slowly being washed out to sea. He contritely glanced heavenwards. I gave it my all. But his all had not been good enough.

Feeling the sting of tears, the crash site turning into a nightmarish blur, he abruptly turned his back on Edie. She’d seen enough. She didn’t need to see him break down and cry. ‘I need to relieve myself,’ he muttered, adding yet another lie to an ever-mounting heap. With a wave of his hand, he headed for the far end of the rocky beach, removing himself from the melee and the contorted scraps of smouldering steel.

His vision still slightly blurred around the edges, he switched on his torch. So I don’t break my bloody neck, he thought irritably as he navigated over and around the tumbled rocks that had over the years flaked away from the imposing cliff. Like so many orphaned children.

Emotionally and physically drained, he seated himself on a flat-topped boulder. Elbows braced on his thighs, head supported between his hands, he stared morosely at the gently rolling waves.

‘How could I have been so arrogant as to think that —’ He stopped in mid-castigation.

He bounded off his perch and scrambled over several large boulders, manoeuvring onto his stomach so he could better see the golden object wedged between two mammoth pieces of limestone.

He shone his torch into the crevice.

His breath caught in his throat.

‘Bloody hell.’

There, upended, was an elaborate golden lid measuring approximately two-and-a-half by four feet.