The Waters of Eternity by Howard Andrew Jones Read Free Book Online Page B

market.”
    Dabir struggled against the stone arms; Acteon laughed. He sneezed, then laughed once more. Never had I been less pleased to see a Greek, although I noted with some satisfaction a dirty bandage wrapping his forehead. The armored Greeks, meanwhile, filled the mouth of the cave. Azzam and his daughter hastily moved behind them.
    “Throw down your swords,” Acteon commanded, then sneezed again. “You heard me. Your master can be crushed in a moment.”
    I cursed. “Throw down your blades.” I dropped mine at my feet. I heard Nawaf’s and Musa’s clang on the cave floor.
    Acteon then turned his large, round eyes upon Azzam. “So you are he.” He then considered the golem’s prisoner. “Have the thing release the great Dabir ibn Khalil,” he finished, with gloating sarcasm.
    Azzam looked to his daughter, and the golem lowered his hands. Dabir faced the Greek, glowering.
    “Is that the best fire you can manage?” Acteon asked Dabir.
    My friend did not reply.
    Acteon grinned. “You are doubtless wondering how I followed so readily.”
    “Nay,” Dabir answered. “There is no mystery. You and the scholar traded notes via the golem, who led you on through the mud and twisting roads.”
    Acteon frowned. “Wise men should practice silence,” he said.
    I could not help myself. “Yet your tongue wags ever on,” I said. “How is your head?”
    “You…” Acteon pointed his knife at me. “Dabir will be prized when I return with him. But you? Feh. Show me your golem’s power, Azzam. Have it kill his mongrel servant.”
    Azzam obediently looked at his daughter. Rabi, though, looked at me.
    “The golem is tired,” she said to Acteon.
    Her father cuffed her cheek. “Do as he bids!”
    The golem stirred. The Greeks, who doubtless had seen more of the thing than we if it had led them here, stepped back.
    “Is this what you wish, Rabi?” Dabir said quickly. “Are you a murderess?”
    “Silence!” Acteon cried. “Have the thing kill Asim!”
    The golem’s head turned and seemed to stare at the girl. I watched it, wondering if I might fling myself at Acteon as it attacked.
    “Inshallah!” Azzam slapped her cheek so hard it jerked her head back. “Do as the Greek bids!”
    The girl cried out. The golem shifted, but did not move against me.
    Acteon scowled. “Very well,” he said, and came at me with his knife.
    The golem flung up both hands and stepped in front of me. Acteon leapt back, his guards rushed to his side…
    And I praised God and stopped to grab my blade.
    “Stop him! Stop him!” I heard Azzam crying.
    But the golem did not stop: it waded into the Greeks, its stone arms lashing out like clubs. Armored men were cast from him like cloth dolls to lie crushed and moaning along the slope. In a moment I was at its side, my heart leaping with joy.
    Nawaf and Musa fell in behind me with glad shouts.
    “Acteon!” I called.
    A wide-shouldered Greek unknown to me, with gray in his beard, stood ground. He parried my first strike, then my second, then he fell as I struck through his helmet and half his face in a spray of blood. I meant to have Acteon, who was backing away just beyond.
    Acteon stumbled backwards, lost his footing, and rolled down the slope into the darkness. An armored Greek dodged beyond my strike, then slipped in the mud along the cave. As he struggled for balance, the golem’s stone arm swung out and caught him in the chest. He folded around the arm until momentum flung him clear. He arced high in the air, landed in the distance with a crunching noise, and did not rise.
    Only two Greeks survived to flee. From somewhere in the darkness Acteon cursed us. I was about to ask the golem to seek him, but it turned and stomped to the right, crushing the pelvis of a prone Greek body. Azzam was shaking his daughter by the shoulders, shrieking unpardonable names at her. Dabir was trying to force them apart.
    It was Dabir’s gaze, lifted up toward the oncoming golem, that drew Azzam’s