Jack Templar and the Last Battle by Jeff Gunhus
Even so, Jack must find the courage to lead his friends into battle. Either they collect the Stones in time to defeat Ren Lucre or die trying. It’s "Do your duty, come what may" no matter the cost. The fate of the world hangs in the balance.
EXCERPT
The old hag, because that’s what she was now, laughed in a low chugging sound that rattled around in her chest. She held out a hand toward me, clenched into a fist. Slowly, she opened it with her palm up. Resting in her hand was the Jerusalem Stone I’d left her.
“You tried to use it,” I said. “You promised you wouldn’t.”
“And
I lied,” the witch hissed. “What? Did you think only the Black Guard
could tell lies? Only hunters were allowed to break their vows?”
The
fire in the hearth blazed higher as if feeding off her bitterness and
anger. In the light, I saw that the hand holding the Stone was curled
into a claw. Worse, it was blackened. No, worse than blackened. It was
charred as if the Stone had caught fire but she’d refused to let it go.
“What
did you try to make it do?” I asked. In my heart, I knew the answer,
yet I had to ask. Everything that had happened since walking into the
cottage somehow felt out of my control. Like I was on a path I couldn’t
get off. And I had a bad feeling the path was leading me somewhere I
didn’t want to go.
“Why is it that I’m made to suffer?” she
asked, ignoring my question. She took a hobbling step closer. “I was the
one who was wronged. You see that, don’t you? Anyone can see that.”
I
remembered the dozens of Talib, the small-bodied creatures that had
been everywhere the last time we were there. Each one had an identical
head grown in the witch’s cauldron. All of them made to look like her
murdered son.
“Where are the Talib?” I asked.
She
clutched the Jerusalem Stone in her hand, and smoke rose from her fist.
The air reeked with a burning smell. “I just wanted … I wanted …,” she
whimpered. “I just wanted to take back what those monsters stole from
me.”
As she said the words, I looked past her to the wall
where the firewood was stacked from floor to ceiling. Only now, I
realized it wasn’t firewood at all. It was all the heads of the Talib,
rows and rows of bodiless heads, piled up ten or twelve high across the
length of the wall, their eyes all open and staring at me.
She noticed me staring and turned toward the heads.
“I
tried to bring him back,” she said. “You can see how hard I tried. But
the Stone refused to work for me. I knew I should wait until I had
three, but I was impatient. I thought one might do it. I thought that
one might be enough.”
My body tensed. What she was saying
wasn’t far off from my own thoughts. I hoped the reunited Jerusalem
Stones would be enough to turn both Eva and Daniel back into their human
forms. Shakra, the Lord of the Vampires, had told me it could be done,
that she knew the Stones had performed this transformation before. But
bringing someone back from the dead? That was entirely different.
“But what happened? Why are they all …all …?”
“Why
are all my children without bodies?” the witch asked. “Because the
second I tried to use the Stone, somehow all the magic I’d used to bring
them alive was gone. The heads just rolled off onto the ground. The
bodies, the ones I’d spent so many years gathering, all fell to the
ground. Worthless.” She turned as she spoke and stared into the fire,
losing herself in the flames. “I should have waited,” she mumbled.
“Should have waited to get the other Stones.”
Her hand with
the Jerusalem Stone in it fell open again. That terrible smoke stopped.
Somehow, I had to get that Stone and get out of there. I was starting to
regret coming by myself. “Bella,” I said. “You and I made a pact. You
swore on your son’s name that you would return that Stone to me if I was
able to get the Stone from the Lord of the Demons. I’m going to unite
the five and defeat Ren Lucre for good. Give it to me so that I can
continue my quest and make him finally pay for what he did to your son.”
She
continued to stare into the fire, but she must have heard me because
she answered in a whisper. “But you’ll fail. Just like your father
before you. Just like your mother. Traitors, the both of them. In their
own way.”
I took a step forward, fighting down an impulse to
pull my sword. “Why do you say that? What do you know about them?” The
Lord of the Demons had said something similar to me. Said I was a pawn
in a game I didn’t even know I was playing. Even Aquinas had hinted
there was part of the story about my parents that I didn’t know. I was
starting to get a little tired of it all. I wanted answers.
The
witch only smiled, pleased that I was upset. “A trade, perhaps? The
other Jerusalem Stone for the truth about your parents. About Aquinas.
About this fool’s quest you’re on. Give me the Stone and I’ll tell you
everything.”
“Whatever you tell me will be lies,” I said.
She
lunged toward me, moving faster than I imagined she could. One second
she was by the fire, the next she was right in front of me, her face a
grotesque sneer. “I might be the only one willing to tell you the
truth,” she rasped. “Give me the Stone. Give it to me now.”
I
took a quick step back and pulled my sword. “No, you give me the one I
left with you,” I said. “Look at the way it’s burned your hand. Look at
what trying to use it has done to you. It won’t bring your son back. I’m
sorry.”
She jerked back sharply as if I’d slapped her. “You’re sorry?” she asked. “Did you say you’re sorry?”
“Give me the Stone. Please,” I said. “I don’t want to fight you.”
“You
don’t have to fight me, Jack,” the witch said, clenching the Stone in
her fist again. Black smoke rose from it immediately. She raised both
hands over her head as if she was about to throw something at me. “All
you have to do is die.”
Author Jeff Gunhus
Jeff Gunhus is the USA TODAY bestselling author of thriller and horror novels for adults and the middle grade/YA series, The Templar Chronicles. The first book, Jack Templar Monster Hunter, was written in an effort to get his reluctant reader eleven-year-old son excited about reading. It worked and a new series was born. His books for adults have reached the Top 30 on Amazon, have been recognized as Foreword Reviews Book of the Year Finalists and reached the USA TODAY bestseller list.After his experience with his son, he is passionate about helping parents reach young reluctant readers and is active in child literacy issues. As a father of five, he leads an active life in Maryland with his wife Nicole by trying to constantly keep up with their kids. In rare moments of quiet, he can be found in the back of the City Dock Cafe in Annapolis working on his next novel or on JeffGunhus.com.
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