LITMIR.BIZ

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reached into the otherwhere, summoning her sword to hand. It slid smoothly into existence, appearing with the speed of thought, fully formed and ready for use, the hilt fitting her palm as if it had been made for her and her alone.

      Sometimes she even thought that it had.

      Her life hadn’t been the same since that fateful day when she’d brought the broken, scattered pieces of the sword together again for the first time since their original owner, Joan of Arc, had been burned at the stake centuries earlier. The sword had miraculously reformed in a flash of power right before her very eyes and, in some strange way she still didn’t quite understand, had chosen her to be its next bearer.

      The role came with its own unique set of responsibilities, protecting the innocent seemingly first and foremost among them. Her own innate sense of justice seemed amplified when she carried the sword and she’d found herself forced into any number of situations that others would have simply walked away from as a result. Numbers didn’t matter, nor did the odds, only that she acted whenever possible to defend those who couldn’t defend themselves.

      Like now.

      Craig’s death made the intentions of the intruders quite clear. There was no way they were going to let the other dig workers live after witnessing Craig being killed in cold blood. That meant it was up to Annja to get them out of this alive.

      Despite knowing that they would never get there in time, Annja pulled out her BlackBerry with her free hand and placed an emergency call to the regional police. She told the sergeant who answered her name and that the archaeological dig just north of Arkholme was under attack by armed insurgents. When he began to ask questions she hung up. She didn’t have time to sit there and chat with him; people’s lives hung in the balance.

      As she slipped the phone back into her pocket, her fingers touched the torc. Something told her that it wouldn’t be safe there; if she was caught, her captors would find it in seconds. She took it out of her pocket and slipped it inside her sports bra instead. That way, at least it would pass a casual search.

      Then she took a moment to consider her next move.

      Clearly she couldn’t take them all on at once. But if she could even up the odds a bit, she’d have a better chance of succeeding in the end.

      With that in mind, she faded back into the shadows, waiting for her chance at vengeance.

      8

      The gunman ordered his men to herd the rest of the dig workers into the mess tent behind them, and as they began doing so, Annja slipped around behind it and found a place to crouch down out of sight near one of the windows. From this position she could see and hear most of what was going on inside the tent, while potentially being ready to do something to help if an opportunity presented herself.

      The lead mercenary stood facing the group, his gun still in hand.

      “Where is Professor Novick?” he asked.

      No one would look at one another, for fear of giving Novick away. They had seen what had happened to Dr. Stevens; it didn’t take too much imagination to figure out what was likely to happen to Paolo.

      For a moment, Annja didn’t see him and she began to hope that he had slipped away in the initial confusion, but it was not to be.

      “I am Novick,” a man said from the back of the crowd and Annja watched as Paolo stepped forward.

      “You,” the man said, pointing at Novick, “come with me.” He turned and faced the two guards who had entered the tent with him. “If they try to escape,” he said, nodding back over his shoulder at the prisoners, “kill them.”

      Paolo and the mercenary leader walked out of the tent, leaving the entire workforce guarded by only two men.

      This was her chance.

      Annja slipped over to the corner of the tent and peered around it. From where she crouched she could see other guards moving around the camp, hunting through the tents, apparently searching for the torc. She thanked her intuition for making her grab it at the last moment; at least that would keep it out of their hands for now.

      If she didn’t call undue attention to herself, she should be able to make it to the entrance and slip inside the tent without anyone on the outside being any wiser.

      Taking a deep breath to calm herself, she released her sword back into the otherwhere and did just that.

      The guards had their backs to her as she strode inside. They were having too much fun terrorizing the dig crew, particularly the female students, and Annja was able to cross most of the distance to them before one of her fellow coworkers called out her name in surprise upon seeing her approach.

      “Annja!”

      The guards whirled around, reaching for the guns they’d let hang free on the straps around their necks, but Annja was much too fast for them.

      Her right leg was already coming up in a perfectly executed crescent kick that caught the first guard across the side of the head, driving him to the floor.

      She didn’t let that stop her, though, using the momentum of the kick to spin herself around one hundred and eighty degrees, delivering a stunning hammer fist to the other guard’s face and then, when the blow momentarily stunned him, grabbed either side of his head in her hands and pulled it down toward her rapidly rising knee.

      As he fell Annja was already turning back in the other direction. She’d seen the first guard trying to get back on his feet and she lashed out with a powerful side kick that knocked him into unconsciousness like his partner.

      The whole thing had taken less than ten seconds.

      Annja didn’t give the others time to think about what had just happened.

      “Quickly, this way,” she said, rushing over to the rear wall of the tent. She snatched a knife off a nearby table and thrust it through the canvas, ripping downward with all her strength as she did so to create a big gash in the fabric.

      “Run for the woods and get as far away as you can,” she said to the others.

      “What about Dr. Novick?” one of the men asked.

      “I’ll get him. Right now you have to get as far away from here as you possibly can. When you’re free, call the territorial police. Hurry now!”

      As they began to file out one at a time into the growing darkness at the rear of the tent, Annja headed in the opposite direction. If they were going to have any chance of getting away, she had to create a diversion, something to keep the gunmen occupied. And she knew just how she was going to do it. She summoned her sword.

      As she drew closer to the entrance to the tent, the flap was suddenly pulled back and Annja found herself staring down the barrel of the gun held in the lead mercenary’s hand.

      She didn’t stop to think, didn’t look where she was going or what she might land on, just reacted on instinct and threw herself to the side.

      He pulled the trigger.

      The bullet that should have killed her merely grazed her instead.

      It was enough to save her life, but not enough to keep her conscious.

      The darkness claimed her before she even hit the ground.

      9

      Trevor Jackson was furious.

      They’d been searching the camp for over fifteen minutes and still hadn’t located the necklace that he’d been sent to find. Perhaps he’d been a little too hasty in dealing with the prisoners, especially their inside guy, Novick.

      The professor had led them to the tent containing the bog mummy and the artifacts that had been found alongside it, but the torc wasn’t there. Novick had sputtered in surprise, putting on a good act, but Jackson hadn’t believed a word he’d said. When the man wouldn’t reveal the location of the necklace, Jackson had grown impatient and put

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