Children of the Knight, Michael J. Bowler [classic book list txt] 📗

effect. All units were on high alert, and extra patrol cars had been sent to cruise the most likely neighborhoods for retaliation.

Gibson strode to Ryan’s desk and tossed down the morning paper. “Hey, Ry, looks like we missed a chance to nab our king.”

Ryan was on his computer, triangulating possible retaliation sites for patrol when the paper landed atop his keyboard.

“Check it out.”

Ryan stared at the Los Angeles Times with its above-the-fold headline: “King Arthur Leads Prayer Vigil Over Drive-by Victim.”

“Hellfire! He was there all night and nobody called us?”

Gibson shrugged. “I guess nobody wanted to. If you read the story, they all think he performed some kind of miracle. Docs said that girl was a goner till this guy and his kids showed up.”

“Damn it!” Ryan threw down the paper and snatched up another pencil, which he began gnawing. “He was with them gangbangers, so we know what kind a trash he’s recruiting. Question is, why? What are they up to? Any sign of payback for that little girl?”

“No.”

“There will be.” Ryan was sure of that. These gangbangers were nothing if not predictable.

“I wonder.”

Ryan eyed him like he was crazy, then snapped his pencil and threw the pieces onto the newspaper.

A very tired, but enthusiastic, group followed Arthur back through the tunnels to The Hub, not speaking much, each entangled within his own thoughts about what they had witnessed during the night. Darnell had left to go on home, but the rest filed in quietly, almost with reverence. As they entered The Hub, Esteban spotted Reyna sitting against the wall of one of the tunnels and scowled.

She looked up and saw him mad-dogging her, and leapt to her feet. “Este, what—”

But he didn’t wait for her to finish. He disappeared down another tunnel to change his clothes.

Arthur walked to his throne and sat, exhausted from the night’s exertions.

Lance stepped into the tunnel to face Reyna. She looked tired and drawn, her makeup fading, her hair drooping. She must’ve been awake all night, he decided.

“What you still doing here?”

She shrugged, fiddling with her luxurious ponytail, the unraveling strands giving her a frizzled look. “Wanted to find out what happened, I guess,” she said, trying to sound disinterested, but failing. Her well-trimmed, pencil-thin eyebrows rose questioningly. “Well?”

Lance pushed his own draping hair out of his eyes. Man, was he tired! “The girl’s okay,” he said, smiling, but feeling bewildered. “I don’ know what happened, really. She was like, dying, and then Arthur prayed over her all night. I mean, we all, like, formed a prayer circle, but it was Arthur who did it, Reyna. I don’ know. It was… it was like a miracle or something.”

“Wow,” she whispered. “I never saw a real miracle before.”

“Me, either.” He eyed her appraisingly. “So, why didn’t you go?”

She mimicked shivering and shook her head. “Me? Down there with all those people.”

“What people?”

Reyna looked at him like he was stupid. “You know, poor people.”

Lance looked her right in the eye, not easy with a girl that intimidating. “You mean people like me?”

Reyna’s mouth became an O, and she protested, “No, you’re not like them.”

Lance almost laughed. “Reyna, I practically grew up in that place. It was like going home.”

Her face fell. “Sorry, I didn’t know.”

Lance gazed at her, his eyes searching her very soul. “I thought you said you didn’t wanna be like your parents, you didn’t wanna be a hater.”

“I don’t,” she protested, and fell silent. Just then her cell beeped, and she used the distraction to break eye contact with him.

She glanced at the screen.

Lance noted her expression as she read the text. “Problem?”

Reyna shook her head in consternation. “It’s just Salma wanting to know where I am. She never leaves me alone.”

“Who’s Salma?” Lance asked. “That actress chick?” He smiled to let her know he was joking.

“No, fool, Salma is my housekeeper,” Reyna responded with annoyance, flicking a few loose strands of hair off her face. “God, she thinks she’s my mother or something.”

“How long she worked there?”

“My whole life. Seriously, since I was a baby.”

Lance eyed her in wonder. Such lavish lifestyles were beyond his ability to comprehend. “She got kids of her own?”

Reyna considered a moment. “No, she’s live-in. She doesn’t have any kids except—” Then she stopped, and her soft brown eyes opened wide. “Except me.”

Lance smiled. “Then maybe she is mom. Sounds like she’s just worried ’bout you, that’s all. Wish I had somebody like that growing up.”

He meant it too. He’d have done almost anything to have had a mother who loved him and cared what happened to him, instead of one who’d sold him for drugs. He shoved that memory down his throat and focused on the girl before him.

Reyna gazed at him in astonishment, and then she grinned, lighting up her beautiful face. “You know what I hate even more than a boy younger and prettier who can shoot better than me?”

Lance laughed. “No, what?”

“A boy who’s younger, prettier, and smarter than me.”

Lance reddened with embarrassment, and she kissed him on the lips.

He felt a distinct tingle of pleasure suffuse his entire body, and knew he’d turned even redder in the face, and then she pulled back.

“Wow” was all he could utter, not sure what he was feeling, but blushing all the same.

She tossed her head back with that causal laugh of hers. “Thank you, Lance. You’re too young and pretty for me, but one of these days some girl’s gonna snatch you up.”

Lance dropped his gaze. “I hope so. I’m just not, you know, ready yet.” He looked shyly back up to find her still smiling.

Then her smile faded, and her gaze locked on something behind him. Lance turned to find Esteban, back in his regular street clothes, watching them, his expression unreadable.

“Like I said,” Reyna went on, and Lance turned his face back to her. “You’re smarter than me.” She squeezed his arms gently, then released him and stepped to Esteban.

He gazed at her in silence, his eyes smoldering.

“Este,” she began haltingly. “I’m, like, I’m sorry I didn’t go with you last night. Like Lance said, I’m becoming my parents, and I sure as hell don’t wanna be them!”

Esteban glanced over at Lance—who pretended to be unclasping his leather jerkin—and then back at Reyna. “Whatever. I gotta get home, check on my moms and lil’ sis.”

He turned and started down the tunnel.

“Este?” she called after him.

He turned, annoyance creasing his young, hard face.

“Maybe someday I could meet ’em? Your mom and sister?”

Esteban tossed her a slight smile. “Sure. Someday.” Then he disappeared into the darkness.

Reyna turned to Lance, who grinned at her. She pantomimed punching him, and he laughed.

After Lance went off to find Arthur, Reyna pulled out her cell phone and thumbed in the following message: Sorry to worry u, Salma. Fell asleep friends house. On way hme. Thnx for caring.

Feeling as though she’d crossed a major threshold, but not quite sure what it was, she slipped the phone back into her pocket and set off for home.

As Lance wandered about The Hub, he observed various boys practicing with weapons or lifting the weights Jack had found tossed in a dumpster. That reminded him about Jack offering to teach him muscle-building techniques, and he vowed to remind the older boy of his promise. Maybe that would make things better between them. Just thinking about Jack brought Reyna’s kiss back into his mind. He trembled, and a chill ran up his back.

Afraid to even wonder why he’d put those two images together, he shook off the confusion and stopped to observe a few boys practicing the art of courtliness by pretending one was a lady and having the other bow to her. They laughed and playfully punched each other every time.

Arthur sat on his throne wearily watching Enrique put the finishing touches on a large banner. It depicted the A symbol with a dragon brandishing Excalibur in the background.

Lance stepped to Arthur’s side, and the king smiled warmly at him. “I thank you, my Lance, for thy prayers last night.”

“Arthur, do you think that was a miracle when that girl didn’t die?”

“Perhaps,” replied the king thoughtfully. “But perhaps the true miracle was the joining together of sworn enemies to preserve the life of one lowly child.”

Lance considered those words, and grinned.

The next day, Jenny trudged across campus, exhausted and carrying more books from the library to her room.

Her mind was on the story she’d seen on the news yesterday, about Arthur’s “miracle” with the little girl. The man confounded her, and she considered herself a good judge of people. But this guy was an enigma. She had to find out more about him. Lance was the key, but he hadn’t been to school in forever. With summer break mere days away, she doubted she’d see him again.

Wending her away in and around the caution tape, dodging milling students, she nearly collided with Karla, a fellow English teacher, one of the few instructors around here she really liked.

Jenny looked up, startled, and almost dropped her books. “Oh, sorry, Karla, I didn’t see you.”

Karla just laughed. “No wonder, girl, with that pile of books blocking your eyes. Let me help.”

She grabbed the top four books, leaving Jenny with the bottom four. Thanks, Karla.”

As she walked beside Jenny toward Building Eight, Karla asked, “Hey, Jen, you ever see Lance again?” She wouldn’t know—she only taught seniors.

Jenny shook her head. “No. And there hasn’t been anything new on King Arthur since that gang shooting, either.”

They stopped at Jenny’s door, and she fumbled with her keys while balancing the books.

“What’s that got to do with Lance?” Karla asked.

“A lot, I think,” Jenny replied, pulling open the door. As usual, it screamed on its hinges like a banshee. “He’s been hanging out with that guy, and I think our missing students, the gang kids, are with him too.”

Karla deposited the books onto a student desk and turned to face Jenny, one hand to her hip in consternation. “Honey, I don’t care if they’re hangin’ with the Pied Piper, long as I don’t have ’em in my classes.”

Jenny set down her own load and frowned at Karla. “But they should be in school.”

“What for?”

“Karla, you’re a teacher!”

“Honey, I’m a realist. Those kids aren’t learnin’ anything here. Maybe this guy’ll teach ’em somethin’ we can’t, somethin’ useful.”

Jenny wanted to argue, but found she had nothing to say. Maybe Karla was right. She needed to find Lance.

Within The Hub, lunch was coming to a close, and the clean-up began. Since they did not want to pollute the environment where they lived and trained, nor, Arthur reminded them, did they want to make the city at large even dirtier, a group of boys always collected all of the garbage into large leaf bags and tied them off. The bottles and cans were gathered for recycling, since money could be made there.

Every few days, groups of boys would load trash bags onto Radio Flyer wagons they’d brought from home, or shopping carts they’d found abandoned, and take everything to the nearest city dump. Arthur and Lance had it very well organized, and Arthur had put Mark and Jack in charge of making sure the operation was carried out.

Observing the clean-up, Arthur felt good about this campaign, this crusade. Thus far, there were no