Mighty and Strong (The Righteous) Read online

  Clarence took a step back. “What did you say?”

  “Fear-Not. Is that your name? The secret name you've taken for the conspiracy you lead?”

  In a sudden move, Clarence swung his rifle off his shoulder and pointed it at Jacob's chest. “I knew it. I knew you were one of them.”

  “Brother,” the prophet said. “What are you doing?”

  “This man is an agent of Satan,” Clarence said.

  “Ask him about Fear-Not,” Jacob said. “And an oath he took to force the government to attack Zarahemla. Ask him about the FBI agent he kidnapped.”

  “You're damning yourself with your words,” Clarence said. “How would you know any of this, if you weren't conspiring with our enemies?”

  It was a risk Jacob was taking, that Brother Timothy would not be in on the conspiracy. If he were, Jacob was a dead man.

  He summoned righteous anger. “An angel told me in a dream. Yes, I was awakened a few minutes before the enemy attacked. 'Jacob,' said the angel, 'there is a wolf in sheep's clothing in Zarahemla. An evil man, who calls himself Fear-Not. He kidnapped an FBI agent and brought her here. Conspired with the enemy to attack the Lord's people. Thou must stop him.'” Jacob nodded. “That's why I was the first one out of bed tonight when they came.”

  Brother Timothy looked at Clarence with a puzzled expression. “You kidnapped an FBI agent? Is that true?”

  “You liar,” Clarence snarled. “There was no angel. You didn't have any dream. You made that up. I know, because the Lord is directing my actions. Not yours.”

  But two could play that game and Jacob had worked himself up by now. He raised his right arm to the square and said in a commanding voice, “In the name of Jesus Christ, I condemn thee, Brother Clarence, and denounce thee as a servant of Lucifer.”

  Gasps from the onlookers, of which there were now many. Clarence shrank back with a horrified expression. Brother Timothy's eyes widened.

  Clarence shook his head and the stunned look passed. “No, no, you can't do that. You have no authority.” He turned to Brother Timothy. “This man is an imposter. He's been here a few days and he comes—”

  Brother Timothy grabbed the end of Clarence's rifle and pushed it away. And as soon as the prophet moved, it was as if the others snapped out of a trance. Two men grabbed Clarence by his arms, while the prophet wrestled away his gun and handed it to someone else.

  “You can't do that. No, listen to me.”

  “Now here's what we're going to do,” Brother Timothy said. He spoke over the top of Brother Clarence's protests.

  The stuporous cloud over the prophet's features cleared quickly now, and he looked around as if just now waking up, seeing the gravity of the situation. A stirring of whispers, urgent, excited, like an electric current, passed through the crowd. They pushed against Brother Timothy where he stood near the arcade.

  Jacob scanned the crowd and his growing relief almost exploded as he saw Fernie with Nephi in her arms. Sister Devorah had found her and now led her toward Jacob. He tried to go to meet her, but the crowd pressed him too close and he couldn't move.

  “Tell us!” someone cried.

  “What is the will of the Lord?”

  Brother Timothy stood on one of the picnic tables. He looked over the crowd with a light gleaming in his eyes and Jacob found himself swept along. The prophet had remembered his place, and would now lead his people to safety.

  “My dear brothers and sisters,” he began.

  “Brother Timothy!” a man called, his voice breaking with emotion. “Behold! The prophet of the Lord!” More shouts from the crowd, and others, both men and women, weeping openly.

  Timothy lifted his hands. “My brothers and sisters,” he repeated after the commotion died down. “The way is clear. We have only one choice, and it won't be easy.”

  The tension stretched to the breaking point. Would he order a fight to the death? A standoff with negotiations? A quick, full surrender? Jacob would never find out.

  “Nobody move!” a voice shouted from above. Beams of light cut down on them. “FBI! Put down your weapons!”

  They were all along the roof, maybe eight or ten strong. There was a chaotic jumble at the far side of the courtyard, people screaming, maybe more FBI agents pouring in. The group near the prophet broke in every direction. He saw Fernie and Devorah pushed back.

  “No, wait!” Brother Timothy cried. “Everybody, listen—”

  A shot rang out. A shout from the roof. Answering gunfire from above.

  It was Brother Clarence. He had pulled free during the commotion, regained his weapon, and now pointed it at the roof. He re-chambered the rifle and squeezed off another shot. FBI Agents dropped to their bellies and fired down. Other men from the church scrambled for their weapons and returned fire.

  “Stop!” the prophet shouted. But nobody was looking at him.

  Jacob ducked low, grabbed people, threw them behind him with shouts to get under the tables or beneath the arcade. He saw Fernie, still struggling toward him with the baby in her arms and Devorah by her side, wild-eyed and screaming for her grammie. A bullet slammed into the group and they went down.

  “Fernie!” he shouted. He pushed people aside, terrified, imagining his wife on the ground, bleeding, trying to protect the baby as people trampled over the top of them.

  People screamed, gunfire flashed back and forth between the roof and men in the courtyard. Jacob reached his wife. She lay on the ground, Devorah on top of her. There was blood.

  Something crashed into the side of his head. A flash in his skull and he almost fell over. He turned to see Brother Clarence with a grim smile. He'd smashed Jacob in the head with the rifle butt. He turned the gun around.

  “I should have known,” Clarence said. “Your appearance was so convenient. Like a servant of the Devil. Or the anti-Christ.”

  “Out of my way.”

  “No, not this time.” Clarence lowered the gun. “This time you die.”

  Chapter Thirty:

  There could be no rushing the search. They had to move methodically door to door. Keep formation, every agent in his or her AOC. Krantz knew any mistake would be fatal.

  But precious time ticked off the clock. There were still people in a few rooms, mostly children separated from parents, but also women. He didn't have time to send them to the rear, so he and the other agents performed a quick search, then moved on.

  They were halfway through the second largest of the courtyards when he heard a woman screaming in the third door down, but there had been plenty of screaming women already and he couldn't afford to leave the first two rooms unsearched to his rear. Not when he was short two agents.

  The first room was empty. He turned over the bed and opened the closet. The second room was harder to enter. None of the doors had locks, but someone had barricaded this one with a dresser. It took three men to force the door wide enough to open. There was a staircase at the back, leading to more rooms on the upper level. Krantz led the men in snake formation up the stairs. They found two boys armed with deer rifles in the last room, maybe ten and thirteen years old. They'd tipped over another dresser and used it as a shield.

  Krantz ducked back into the hall. “FBI! Put down the guns!” he shouted. “Put them down!”

  “Leave us alone!” one of the boys cried in a high-pitched voice.

  “Put down the guns or you will die!”

  For one terrible second he thought the boys would fight it out. The instant they started shooting, the agents would return fire and there would be no doubt how the battle would end. Seconds later, two young boys would be dead on the floor.

  God, no.

  But he couldn't leave them be. There was a closet behind them—maybe even another door that he hadn't seen in his first glimpse—and he had to make sure the boys weren't guarding some terrible secret.

  But then the boys were crying, “We put them down, we put them down. Don't shoot, we put them down.”

  He poked his head around the
corner and saw the two boys with their hands in the air. A rough, fruitless search ensued, and moments later they were backing out of the room and hurrying down the stairs. They took the guns and a couple of boxes of .30.06 ammo, but left the boys.

  The next door. The woman had stopped screaming.

  Krantz leaned his shoulder on the door and pushed. It swung open. Two agents took positions to each side.

  Two people struggled on the floor. It was a man and a bound woman. The man had his pants down and was trying to force himself on her. The woman kicked and thrashed. Her underwear was around her ankles, but she kept her knees locked together. Blood flowed down her forehead and a handgun lay discarded a few feet away.

  Krantz took a step forward and grabbed the man by the hair. A single jerk and he had the man off his feet and flying across the room.

  The man hit the ground rolling. He took a glimpse at the FBI agents pouring into the room and scrambled on all fours for the gun. Fayer reached it first. She picked it up with her bound hands. The man hesitated, then came for her. In that moment, the terror and rage on Fayer's face disappeared and a look of dark triumph took its place. She fired. The man slumped to the ground in front of her.

  For a moment there was silence. Krantz scanned the room. It was clear. The agents turned over the bed mattress, threw open the closet door.

  Fayer thumbed the safety and deliberately set the gun to one side. “Maybe I shouldn't have done that.”

  “Self-defense,” he said in a matter-of-fact voice.

  “But he was unarmed, you could have easily—”

  “Shut the hell up. Not another word. I saw everything, it was self-defense.”

  Krantz rolled the body over. Dead, bullet through the forehead.

  He turned back to Fayer. “You all right?”

  “You took your time.” She glared at the others. “Will someone cut me loose and get my clothes. Crispin, have the decency to look away, you jerk.”

  The fact she was snarling and not sobbing uncontrollably was a good sign.

  Something crackled in his ear. He spoke into the headset. “Chambers?” Nothing came back but shouting and gunfire.

  A calm woman's voice came over the radio. DeWinters, in headquarters. “Chambers is under fire, requesting immediate assistance.”

  #

  Jacob lifted his hands as Clarence pointed the deer rifle at him. He calculated the distance he'd have to cover. At this range, a high-velocity rifle shot would punch through him, whether it hit bone or not. It would leave a wide path of cavitory trauma, as the bullet transferred kinetic energy into his surrounding organs, rippling damage along its way.

  And then pictured himself on the ground, his lung collapsing, aorta punctured. Quick, at least.

  All this passed through his head in an instant as people screamed around him, gunshots fired, people ran, fell, cowered. Clarence sighted the rifle, hesitated for what seemed like forever.

  “Jacob!” a woman screamed. She grabbed hold of him, tried to pull him away.

  Clarence fired his gun. Jacob flew to the ground under the impact. But even as he did, he realized that he hadn't taken the bullet.

  It was Sister Devorah. She fell on top of him, crying, moaning. Behind, he heard Brother Clarence snarl something, re-chamber his gun. Jacob struggled to free himself. He could hear a baby screaming now, close. Nephi. And there was Fernie, on her feet, trying to reach him. She was bleeding from her shoulder.

  No, Fernie! Stay back.

  As he pulled free of Devorah, he could see the entrance wound in her chest. It was above the heart, and on the right side, a ragged, bloody perforation that opened her dress high on the breast. Her eyes glazed in shock.

  Jacob's hand found his pocket, and the Beretta that Sister Miriam had given him. He drew it, flipped off the safety.

  Fernie held the screaming baby under her injured arm and wrestled with the barrel of Clarence's rifle with her free hand. He twisted it free, then swung the rifle butt and bashed her in the head. She went down hard, on top of the baby.

  Clarence turned the rifle with a look of righteous triumph as Jacob gained his knees. Jacob steadied his hand, pointed it at the man's chest and fired. Clarence's rifle went off.

  But he was already falling backward from the force of Jacob's shot when it did. The bullet flew over his head. Jacob sat, momentarily stunned. Clarence went down and didn't move.

  He went to Fernie, first. He rolled her over and Nephi sucked in a long, shuddering breath, then screamed. Fernie groaned, tried to get up, but he held her down.

  “No, don't move.”

  The wound at her shoulder was superficial. He quickly scanned her and the baby for other injuries, saw none. “No matter what, stay down!”

  Sister Devorah was in worse shape. She gasped for air, her face pale with shock. He rolled her onto her side and felt the blood drain out of his own face. The exit wound came out at an angle that most likely took it behind the superior vena cava and the right atrium. He rolled her back and pushed his hand into the entrance wound to block air from seeping in and collapsing her lung.

  Not that it would matter. With damage to the heart, she would die without immediate surgical intervention.

  A great wail went up from the crowd in the courtyard. He lifted his head.

  Church members threw down their weapons, people fell to the ground. The prophet sprawled across the flagstones. A child lay nearby, together with one of the prophet's wives. Another woman cradled Timothy's head in her lap.

  The SWAT team streamed into the courtyard. They threw men to the ground, seized weapons, shot at a man who continued firing from the far side of the courtyard before he turned and fled.

  Jacob kicked the handgun away. He turned his body so the agents could see he was doing nothing more than trying to help this injured woman. Fernie crawled over with the baby, whose screams turned to shuddering sobs.

  “Sister Devorah,” he said. He put his blood-soaked hands on her head. She stared up, still gasping, not seeming to hear him, but he wasn't sure. “The Lord will protect you, sister. He loves you and will always walk beside you. Today you will kneel at His feet in the Celestial Kingdom and He will lift you and embrace you and say, 'Well done, thou good and faithful servant.'”

  If only he could believe it, could cling to some small scrap of faith.

  Chapter Thirty-one:

  The prophet was dead.

  Only an autopsy could tell for sure, but Jacob's first guess was a wound from a deer rifle. A stray shot by one of his own brothers. By the time Jacob reached his side, his eyes already fixed in a glassy stare as blood pooled around him. Jacob pushed aside the gathered, wailing church members, but when he bent for closer examination, it only confirmed what he'd already known. Nothing could be done.

  That didn't stop people from grabbing his arm and begging him to save Brother Timothy. He tried to explain that the bullet had likely ruptured the prophet's aorta and that he had already bled out, heart stopped, blood pressure reduced to negligible levels, etc., but nobody listened.

  “Give him a blessing!” one of Timothy's wives cried, a young and pregnant woman. “Hurry!”

  Others took up the cry. Reluctantly, he grabbed an elderly man nearby and the two of them put their hands on the man's rapidly cooling head. He knew what they wanted; they wanted him to use the priesthood to raise Brother Timothy from the dead.

  Maybe if he'd been someone else he would have tried. But Jacob knew all too well the violent struggle of a dying body, what kind of effort it would take from surgeon, knife, and machine to hold death at bay. It would take a miracle beyond Jacob's ability.

  And you didn't need medical training to see it. Look at his eyes, for God's sake, he wanted to tell them. If Timothy had a soul, it had departed to the other side.

  And so instead, he did what he'd done with Sister Devorah. A blessing of comfort rather than healing, only not for the prophet, but to help the stricken church members gathered around them. Nobody argued with him
afterward or accused him of doing too little. Instead they buried faces in hands or reached to touch the prophet's hair. One woman picked up a child's blanket lying nearby and tucked it under the man's head.

  Not knowing what else to do, Jacob turned his attention to the wounded. There were several, some with grave wounds. Besides Brother Clarence and Brother Timothy, he found two others, one a boy of no more than twelve years. The child had fallen on his deer rifle.

  The FBI agents left Jacob alone. They gathered weapons, cuffed most of the men and several women as well. Any time someone argued or got in their way, the FBI shoved that person against the wall and added them to the crowd secured with plastic cuffs in the corner of the square.

  Eventually, one of the SWAT team members came striding over to where Jacob bandaged a man's leg with a strip of cloth. “You, what's your name?”

  “Leave him alone,” called a second man. The strongly-built form of Agent Krantz and the deep voice gave him away in spite of the full SWAT gear. “He's not a threat.”

  Krantz and another man dragged a young man who bled from one ear, his hands cuffed behind him, and threw him into the corner. The young man looked back at the agents with venom.

  Sister Miriam came with the children a minute later, who rushed to their mother's side. Fernie embraced them in a fierce hug, then sent them to Jacob, who did the same.

  “Thank you,” Jacob said to Miriam.

  But Miriam had already discovered Brother Timothy and pushed through the crowd to kneel at his side.

  The stricken look on her face erased any doubts Jacob might have had about her true feelings. Miriam embraced the young pregnant woman at the prophet's side and the two of them wept over the dead man's body.

  Jacob turned to see Fernie watching him. “I'm so sorry,” she said. “I never should have come. You were right all along.”

  He hugged Fernie and the baby, with Daniel and Leah clinging to their legs and waist. All around the plaza, others formed knots of families and friends.

  “I'm so sorry,” she said again.

  “Perhaps it was the will of the Lord.”