Pandora walked to the edge of the trees, looking back at the house. Several Hessian guards were spaced around the building, but there didn’t seem to be any state of alarm. She returned.

  “It is done.”

  Doc sat up, wondering why he was still here and not sliding back to his own time. “How did you know the Legion was in the chimney?”

  “I didn’t,” Thyia said, “until the last second. Then she told me.”

  “The spirit,” Doc said.

  Thyia nodded. “Yes. She came back.”

  Pandora knelt in front of Doc. “Do you know why hope is a bad thing?”

  Doc shook his head.

  “Most hope is selfish. It is hope based on the way each person who is hoping envisions the future. Not the way the future should be for everyone, but for himself or herself. It is the cornerstone of many religions where people hope there is a heaven, thus focusing on the future. Hope is not grounded in the here and now. All we have is the here and now.”

  Edith had this detail in a footnote about Pandora, which she’d included in the overall mission download, given that Pandora had mentioned this specific thing to Scout just before she came back from her last mission.

  Doc looked Pandora in the eyes. “There are two ways of looking at hope. Yours is one: that it’s a prison, keeping us from achieving what we are capable of. But it also can be a stimulus to rouse us to more than we think we are capable of. It can be a good thing.” He looked past Pandora at the house. “Maybe that’s why her spirit is still here.”

  And then he was gone.

  Mountain Meadows, 11 September 1857 A.D.

  With the coming daylight, Moms knew her disguise wouldn’t bear scrutiny. She moved away from the Mormon militia, staying behind some trees, but she stopped when she heard Haight address his men in a loud, commanding voice.

  “Brothers. We must all make a solemn vow upon our eternal souls, that not one of us will ever speak again of what happens today. It must be bound deep inside us, as we are all bound to each other this day. We must swear it upon our faith to the Lord. Each man must speak for himself, and speak the words.” He held up his right hand. “I swear!”

  One by one, they began to swear to secrecy. Moms didn’t need to hear any more. Unable to locate Turner or Lee, she moved to an overwatch position with good visibility of the Baker-Fancher wagons. She was on a low ridge, a quarter mile from the emigrant position.

  Several men and boys had taken defensive positions in a hastily-dug entrenchment on the outer side of the wagons, their muskets at the ready. But from the way they held the weapons and their overall postures, it was obvious they were done in. Moms wondered if they even had any powder and ball left.

  She heard a bugle blow from where she had just left. It brought an immediate reaction in the camp as men, women, and children crowded forward. The lead element of Haight’s militia rode up out of the draw until they were all in view of the emigrants, then they came to a halt, opposite Moms’s position.

  From the right, Moms finally saw Lee, riding forward with another man. She realized he must have gone to the Paiute camp to give them their instructions. He had a stick with a white piece of cloth tied on it.

  There was no sign of Turner, and Moms hoped he had departed. Lee and the other man rode up to the circled wagons, halting just short. Several of the emigrant party came out to meet them. Haight kept his militia in a holding position, a quarter mile from the wagons.

  The download gave secondhand information about what was going on in the parley, mainly because all accounts came from one side—the surviving side. And they all had an agenda after the fact. The offer was for the emigrants to give up their arms and all they owned, in exchange for safe conduct back to Cedar City. Clearly extortion, but if they were out of supplies, it was an offer they couldn’t refuse.

  Moms knew Roland would call B.S. on that, because the emigrants weren’t taking into account a critical factor: why were the militia even negotiating if they held all the cards?

  Apparently, some in the Baker-Fancher group felt the same way. Lee and the other Mormon were engaged in negotiation for over a half-hour before Lee turned toward Haight and waved them forward.

  The emigrants began to stack their arms.

  Moms noted that two women were arguing vehemently with several men, the ones who’d done the negotiating. Apparently, they were the female version of Roland, but they were protesting in vain as the group finished disarming.

  From her higher position, Moms spotted movement to the right. Thirty-some-odd Native Americans were creeping along a dry creek bed, past the location of the wagons.

  The Mormon militia rode up, and things began to happen quickly. All the weapons were in one pile, a pair of guards placed on them. The circle of wagons was broken, Lee directing several of his militia to drive them. Wounded men and boys unable to walk were loaded into one of them.

  The majority of the militia under Haight’s direct command were separating the members of the emigrant party, escorting the men out of the camp on foot in one direction, while the women and children were directed to go with the wagons.

  Then Moms saw Turner. He rode straight up the valley toward the camp, his musket across his lap, sitting tall in the saddle. She knew right away this wasn’t going to turn out well.

  Moms jumped up, slung her musket over her back, then began running. Turner saw her, but kept riding steadily toward the others.

  Moms reached him. “Stop.”

  Turner looked down at her. “I cannot allow this.”

  Moms walked alongside him. “You can’t stop it.”

  “I can die trying.”

  “Then others will die,” Moms said. She grabbed the bridle, jerking it and stopping his horse.

  “What do you mean?” Turner asked. “You’re a woman. Why are you dressed as a man? It’s forbidden.”

  “That’s the least of your worries right now,” Moms said. “We do have to do something, though. We have to save the young children. Brother Lee is going to help us.”

  Turner looked from her to the wagons forming up in line on the Old Spanish Trail. “Where are they taking the men?”

  A dismounted militia member was next to each man of the Baker-Fancher party, marching them on a diverging path to the right of the trail.

  “To their deaths,” Moms said. “You can’t stop it. But there is something you can do. Something we can do. Let us save the children.”

  Turner jerked the reins, trying to rip Moms’s hand free. “Be gone, woman.”

  Still gripping the bridle, Moms drew the Colt with her other hand, cocking the hammer. “Help me save the children, or I will shoot you dead. I swear it on my very soul.”

  Women and children were crying out from the vicinity of the wagons, calling to their husbands, fathers, brothers. The awareness of something wrong was beginning to seep into the more astute.

  The wagons were moving, pulling away from the camp. The men were in single file, a militiaman next to each, starting to disappear from view into a ravine. Major Haight was on his horse, on top of that ridge between the two groups, waiting, his head turning back and forth, keeping track of both parties.

  Moms slid her finger over the trigger. Turner stared into her eyes, unblinking. “I know you,” he said. He reached down, and Moms took his hand, swinging up behind him on the horse. He spurred it on, and they galloped down the trail toward the oncoming wagons. Moms looked to the side. She couldn’t spot the Native Americans, but she knew they were there.

  Moms felt suspended in time, the horse moving too slowly toward the wagons, the men disappearing one by one into the ravine, only a handful still in sight. Lee was walking next to the second wagon, his musket in the crook his arm. He saw Turner and Moms approaching.

  At that moment, Haight raised his pistol then fired a single shot.

  It echoed into absolute stillness, as if time had frozen, then there was a ragged volley of numerous guns firing in the ravine.

  Some of the women at the wagons began screaming. The Mormon drivers dropped the reins, stood and turned, pistols in hand, then began firing, each shot deliberate, aiming for the wounded men and boys first.

  Moms leapt off the back of the horse, pistol ready, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Lee. He had a crowd of the youngest children behind him, along with three mothers holding infants and two other women with toddlers.

  The driver of the closest wagon, having emptied his revolver into the wounded, drew another gun and turned toward them. Moms fired, the round hitting the crown of his hat and punching it off his head.

  “I will kill you!” Moms yelled. “Not the babies!”

  With a chilling cacophony of howls and whoops, the Indians burst from the creek bed and charged forward, cutting down the rest of the women and older children as they reached them.

  Turner stood next to Moms, musket at the ready. Lee had his to his shoulder.

  “Spread out,” Moms ordered. The three formed a loose circle around the youngest children and mothers.

  An Indian charged toward them, hatchet raised, and Moms aimed for his forehead. No fool, he got the message and turned away for easier game, running down a young girl of perhaps ten, then burying it in the back of her skull.

  “Lord be with us, Lord be with us, Lord be with us.” Turner was chanting the words repetitively. He fired at the feet of a charging brave, then dropped his musket and drew his revolver. Like the other one, the brave went off in a different direction.

  Out of the corner of her eye, Moms saw a boy running up out of the ravine, blood pouring from a wound on the side of his head. Two Mormons were chasing, one pleading the other not to shoot.

  The pleas were in vain as the other put his musket to his shoulder and fired. The minie ball blew a huge exit wound out of the boy’s chest and sent him tumbling to the ground.

  The surviving women and children had scattered at the Indian assault, but they were too slow, run down individually and in small groups. The distinct crunch of skulls being crushed, the cries of mercy, the abbreviated screams of those initially wounded, filled the air.

  “Lord be with us,” Turner kept repeating.

  “Back off!” Lee yelled as the other wagon drivers, having dispatched their cargo, approached, pistols at the ready. “I have it from the Lord himself that the youngsters are to live.”

  Militiamen were coming out of the ravine, most walking slowly, dazed, the shock of what they’d just done leaving them in a daze. A handful came running out toward the wagons, filled with bloodlust, energized by what had just occurred.

  There were always those.

  The drivers had stopped, uncertain how to proceed. Shooting unarmed wounded was one thing. They hadn’t expected a fight.

  Haight rode up. “What are you doing, Brother Lee?” He pushed his horse through the other men to the forefront.

  The horrible noises of death were subsiding as those trying to escape were run down, and those only wounded initially were finished off.

  Moms turned toward Haight, sighting her pistol on him.

  More militia were coming to the wagons, circling the small group. The Indians were scattering, focused on gathering spoils from the camp and running off the livestock.

  It had seemed to take forever, but Moms knew it had only been a minute or so. That unforgiving minute that would haunt all until they died.

  “The Lord told me to save the very young,” Lee answered. “I cannot go against the word of the Lord. No earthly power can force me to. My life on it.”

  Haight turned his head, taking in the condition of his men. Those stunned far outweighed those boiling with bloodlust. Even the major seemed somehow deflated, less than. A killing does that to you, Moms thought, knowing that for many here, this had been their first.

  “They will tell people what has been done today,” Haight said.

  “They’re too young,” Lee argued. “They won’t remember.”

  With a stomach clench as bad as a punch to the gut, Moms knew what was coming.

  “The children might be,” Haight agreed. “On your head be that. But there are others you guard who can tell the tale.” He turned in the saddle, pointing at five militia who had fire in their eyes. “You, you, you, you, and you. Take the women. Finish this.”

  The men pushed forward, past Lee. They grabbed the women by their hair, ignoring their screams, their pleas. Lee reacted instinctively, pulling the baby from one woman’s breast. Turner took the other. Moms holstered the pistol then took the third baby, turning away as the women were dragged thirty feet away and shots rang out.

  Moms focused on the little girl she held, her tears dripping onto the baby’s face and that face was the last thing she saw.

  Teutoberg Forest, Germania, 11 September 9 A.D.

  Roland’s only hope was Jager’s spear. It was on the stream bank. Unfortunately, the beast he needed to use the spear on was between him and it.

  Aglaeca didn’t growl like a Grendel. It roared, the sound a physical blast. Roland took a step back as Aglaeca took one forward. He calculated the angles, the possibility of getting around the beast’s very long arms, and...

  “Here!” Rufus yelled. The Legionnaire lifted a flailing Varus over his head. Rufus’s muscles were straining as he took two steps forward, and then he threw the Roman commander at Aglaeca.

  Roland darted to the left as Aglaeca snatched Varus in mid-air with both clawed hands. It bent the body, the sound of the spine snapping clear in the morning air. Aglaeca didn’t stop with that, continuing to twist as Varus gave a piteous scream, which was cut off as his body was torn in half.

  Roland was past Aglaeca. He dove forward, grabbing the spear, rolling, then coming to his feet, weapon in hand.

  Aglaeca turned, tossing away what remained of Rufus’s diversion, the once-great Publius Quinctilius Varus.

  Aglaeca shuffled forward, boxing Roland in with the stream to his back. Roland’s rear foot was on the bank. He had to make his stand. Black blood oozed from the wound on Aglaeca’s cheek.

  There was a clang as Rufus’s sword bounced off Aglaeca’s back. Another as Severus’s sword hit a leg. It kept coming toward Roland.

  He went low, striking down with the Jager spear, hitting Aglaeca’s knee, penetrating slightly, then he jerked the weapon back, leaping out of range of swiping claws. The tip of one caught his tunic, shearing through but missing flesh by less than an inch.

  Then the tribe attacked, swarming, axes, scythes, swords, spears jabbing and poking.

  Aglaeca turned and swiped, hitting an old man, claws shredding flesh, muscle, and bone, sending his lifeless body flying into the water.

  A young woman ran right up to Aglaeca, swinging a stone hammer against its stomach while she screamed the name of her slaughtered husband. She never made a second blow as the beast slammed a fist down on her head, crushing her.

  Roland struck at the knee, into the same wound, deeper this time, twisting the haft of the spear as he pulled it out.

  Aglaeca’s wounded leg buckled, dropping the monster to its knees.

  Severus led the second charge of the Germanics, going for the mouth with his sword. Aglaeca’s arm was longer than the Roman’s reach. One of the beast’s hands clamped down on the Centurion’s head, squeezing, crushing his skull. Blood and brains oozed through Aglaeca’s claws, then it dropped the corpse.

  Roland used that moment to jam the point of Jager’s spear into the armpit exposed because of Severus’ death. The tip penetrated, and Roland put all his weight into the haft, pushing forward.

  Aglaeca howled and turned on its knees, twisting the spear, but Roland held on. In the midst of the howl, Rufus thrust his sword upward into the monster’s mouth as the tip of Berta’s scythe struck directly into the wound Jager had made on the cheek.

  Aglaeca jaws snapped shut, crunching Rufus’s sword.

  Roland dug his sandals into the ground and kept pushing, then stumbled as the spear punched through and pierced deep inside Aglaeca. It died without another sound, becoming still, then slowly crumbling inward.

  Roland panted, leaning on the spear. There were dead Germanics all about. Varus’s body. Severus’s. He looked at Rufus. The Legionnaire had his priorities down. He went to what remained of the upper half of Varus then sliced the head off with one swipe of Severus’s sword. He held it up.

  “My ticket out of here, eh?” he said to Roland with a smile. “Arminius might even give me some gold for this.”

  Roland tipped the spear in acknowledgment. “To glory and death in the Hunt!”

  And then he was gone.

  Santiago, Chile, 11 September 1973 A.D.

  Pyrrha stepped back. She looked at the blade in her side, then at Dominic, who had scurried away to his mother’s protection. Pyrrha pulled the blade out, then dropped it to the floor. She put her hand over the wound, blood flowing over her fingers. The room rocked as a bomb landed close by, buckling one of the walls and staggering everyone.

  “You should not exist,” Pyrrha said to Dominic.

  He was staring at her, eyes wide, face unemotional.

  Pyrrha took a step forward, Naga at the ready. “This is why he should never have been born.”

  A concussion filled the room, sending Ivar flying. His back slammed against a wall, and he slid to a sitting position, ears ringing. There was blue sky above. He tried to make sense of that, then looked down into what remained of the room. There was no sign of Esmeralda or Dominic, a large beam and pile of rubble sitting where they had been.

  The collapse had narrowly missed Pyrrha. She looked at Ivar. “Another day for you. My job is done here.” A solid black rectangle opened next to her. She stepped into it and was gone, the Gate snapping out of existence.

  Ivar scrambled to his feet. He pulled debris aside, searching for the bodies. He uncovered Esmeralda first. Her lifeless eyes stared up at the sky, then she began to turn to dust. Ivar pulled aside a piece of plaster.

 

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