Inside Straight

“Sekhmet says John will not go, you mean. How about the Big Shlep? The Hike Through Hell? Give me a little love here, I need something memorable, something crunchy that the blogosphere will chow down on.”

“The Exodus.”

“Been done. Ten plagues, ten commandments, a golden calf. The chariot race was cool. Yul Brynner as Moses. Or was it Telly Savalas? All bald guys look alike. Charlton Heston was Pharoah, I remember that much. ‘So let it be written, so let it be done.’ Maybe Terrible Trek deserves a second look.”

“The Second

Exodus.”

“Not bad.” Jonathan’s wasps began to buzz more loudly. They did that when he got excited. “Not great, but maybe if I tweak it… Exodus II, the Sequel. Give the knight a sausage. Hey, did you bring back any food? Anything but lentils. Bearing witness for the world is hungry work, I could use—”

The tent filled with sunlight.

Klaus threw up an arm to shield his eyes. For half a heartbeat he was blind, and when his sight came back to him there was a man standing over Jonathan Hive with a scimitar in his fist. Bugsy must have seen the menace there, because he raised his hands to protect himself. The intruder sliced them off.

Blood fiuntained from the sudden stumps, brighter than Klaus would ever have believed. Red fire

, he had time to think, but even as the words were forming the red was going green. The scimitar reversed its arc and came back in a golden blur to bury itself in Jonathan’s skull. “Nein!” Klaus cried, moving at last, too slow, too late, but instead of the meaty thunk he feared there was only a furious buzzing as the blade split apart a ball of insects and ripped through an American Hero shirt and a picture of King Cobalt in his wrestling mask. Wasps exploded in all directions and fled headlong from the tent, and Lohengrin summoned up his ghost steel.

The stranger turned. He was a head shorter than Lohengrin, but his arms were lean and corded, his stomach flat, his chest broad. His pants were desert camouflage, his vest Kevlar. Over it he wore a shining cloak of cloth-of-gold, fastened at his throat with interlocking green jade crescents. His skin was dark as oiled bronze, his beard red-gold. A keffiyeh concealed his hair. “You are the Crusader.”

“I am Lohengrin. And you are Bahir.” The beating of his heart had slowed and steadied. “The Sword of Allah.”

“You know of me. I am flattered.”

“I know you are a coward and a killer, a teleport who strikes down unarmed men from behind.”

“Now I am less flattered. You talk too much. Killing should be a silent business.” Bahir leapt forward.

He moved like a panther, his golden scimitar flashing. It slashed and spun and slashed again, quick as lightning. The first cut would have opened Klaus from groin to navel and the second would have taken off his head, but his armor turned both blows.

“You cannot do me harm,” Klaus said. He raised his own sword and stepped forward, putting all his weight and strength behind his swing. Bahir vanished with a soft pop, and Klaus went stumbling, thrown off balance. Before he could recover, the Arab was behind him, hacking at his head, once, twice, thrice. As the third cut landed, Klaus was whirling, his own blade lashing out.

Bahir leapt backwards, but not before the tip of Lohengrin’s sword sliced through his kevlar vest as if it had been made of gauzy silk, leaving a long thin slash that soon turned red. “You are quicker than you look,” the assassin said.

“Ja.” Klaus thrust. Bahir vanished and reappeared to his right, delivering a blow that would have taken off his sword arm at the elbow if he had not been armored. Klaus turned, and Bahir jumped again, slashed at a hamstring, and found armor there as well. Klaus swiveled. “Stand and fight,” he boomed. “Take off that coward’s armor,” Bahir threw back.

Lohengrin chopped down with his broadsword. This time Bahir raised his scimitar in a parry. The white blade met the golden one, sheared through it like a guillotine through butter, and bit through cloth and Kevlar into the flesh of Bahir’s shoulder. A little harder and I would have his arm off. Blood welled as Klaus slid free his sword, but his finishing stroke met only empty air.

And suddenly the tent was dimmer, as if the sun had gone behind a cloud. This time the Arab did not reappear. Some spots of blood and half a scimitar remained beside the clothing Jonathan had left behind, socks and shoes and T-shirt, cut-off blue jeans, and a pair of crusty undershorts. Klaus looked for his friend’s hands, but those had disappeared as well. Could Bahir have taken them with him as a trophy? He made one last circuit of the tent to make certain the assassin was not lurking in some shadow, but found only a scorpion and a few stray wasps of Bugsy’s. Finally Klaus exhaled, and let his sword and armor melt away.