Fallen Stars, Bitter Waters Read online

  FALLEN STARS,

  BITTER WATERS

  ALSO BY

  GILBERT, LYNN, AND ALAN MORRIS

  The Beginning of Sorrows (Book 1 in the Omega Trilogy)

  FALLEN STARS,

  BITTER WATERS

  AMERICA HAS FALLEN, THE ANTICHRIST REIGNS . . .

  AND GOD’S REMNANT IS SEALED

  GILBERT MORRIS, LYNN MORRIS, ALAN MORRIS

  Copyright © 2000 by Gilbert, Lynn, and Alan Morris

  All rights reserved. Written permission must be secured from the publisher to use or reproduce any part of this book, except for brief quotations in critical reviews or articles.

  Published in Nashville, Tennessee, by Thomas Nelson, Inc.

  Published in association with the literary agency of Alive Communications, Inc., 7680 Goddard Street, Suite 200, Colorado Springs, CO 80920.

  Scripture quotations are from the KING JAMES VERSION of the Bible.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Morris, Gilbert.

  Fallen stars, bitter waters : America has fallen, the Antichrist reigns ... and

  God’s remnant is sealed / Gilbert Morris, Lynn Morris, and Alan Morris.

  p. cm. — (The omega trilogy)

  ISBN 0-7852-7001-9

  1. Antichrist—Fiction. I. Morris, Lynn. II. Morris, Alan, 1959-III. Title.

  PS3563.O8742 F35 2000

  813’. 54—dc21

  00-028070 CIP

  Printed in the United States of America

  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 — 05 04 03 02 01 00

  To Brother and Sister Mitchell

  In loving memory

  of how you enriched our lives

  and our walk with Him.

  Angels are bright still, though the brightest fell.Though all things foul would wear the brows of grace, Yet grace must still look so.

  —MALCOLM, FROM MACBETH BY WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  PART I THE VALLEY OF DECISION

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  PART II COCKATRICE’ S EGGS AND SPIDER’S WEB

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  PART III REDE EMING THE TIME

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  PART IV THE DAUGHTER OF ZION

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  PART V THE OLD PATHS

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  EPILOGUE

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS

  PROLOGUE

  EXACTLY AT MIDNIGHT, the eighteenth-century beechwood longcase clock in one of the fortified towers of Halle Eisenhalt began to sound its long notes of doom as it had done without fail each hour for the past three hundred years. Count Tor von Eisenhalt stood at an arched casement, the leaded window swung aside, looking out into a frozen, impenetrable night. To any other man, it would be like staring at a blank wall, for no earthly feature of sky or mountain or star was visible. There was only a simple, cold blackness.

  But Count Tor von Eisenhalt was not any man. Indeed, he wondered fleetingly if he was still a man at all. Instantly he dismissed the speculation as one evidence of his unwelcome humanity: the thought itself was wishful thinking. He was, regrettably, still a man.

  He was a very special man, however, the only one of his kind who had ever lived. He would never die. It gave him satisfaction to know that, and he gathered his senses to concentrate and to focus his inner eye.

  Tor was Nordic in feature, with the bone structure and sweeping jawline of his Viking fathers. His deep-set eyes, piercing and direct, had the intensity of a fierce bird of prey. People under his authority swore that those eyes could penetrate right into the heart—and most solemn secrets—of a man. Inexplicably the wings of pure silver at the temples of his raven-black hair gave him a more youthful appearance. Though his complexion was fair, a touch of ruddy color in his high cheekbones accented his intense vigor. His 180 pounds were perfectly distributed over a six-foot frame, and his strength and agility were proverbial.

  He gazed westward, and shapes began to take form, much as a photograph comes to life in developing solution. He glimpsed Brussels; Paris; turned aside to glance at Greenwich, the longitudinal center of the world; faster and over the ocean, ignoring the ruins of the eastern seaboard of America, the empty heartland, over the white-topped sheer falls of the Rockies, the cat . . .

  “Cat?” Tor said, visibly startled. The grimace that crossed the handsome planes of his face was forbidding. Tor disliked cats; and even more, he disliked these sudden jags, these jarring interruptions of the reaching out of his mind. And cats . . . ? A cat? Like— spotted . . . wildcat? Or was it two—small—half-grown kittens?

  Kittens! Why in the world was his mind touching on such vermin as kittens? He struggled to know, to see, what had crossed his line of sight, but it was gone, dissipated like a tendril of mist rising into cold air. It was unsettling. Or even worse, Tor felt his all-too-human heart beat a little faster with fear; he wasn’t supposed to be subject to such weakness of will.

  Finally, with rigid determination and an incomprehensible oath under his breath, Tor again turned his eyes to the West.

  Cheyenne Mountain was unremarkable, a bleak granite rise of only seven thousand feet, much overpowered by the sensational Garden of the Gods and Pikes Peak to its north. But inside Cheyenne Mountain was a quite remarkable hollowed-out warren where the rats were hiding. NORAD—the North American Air Defense Command—was still the brain of America’s military defense. Though Tor had all but annihilated the physical body, he had left the brain alone. But he had been watching the soldiers ceaselessly.

  “They’ll be coming out soon,” Tor said expressionlessly.

  In his vigilance, with his newfound knowledge and understanding, he knew they wouldn’t just open the twenty-five-foot-thick blast doors to the central tunnel and come staggering out into the sunlight. Oh, no. Tor knew—could already see—that soon three groups of Marine Raiders would crawl out of the air ducts, the secret lifelines that ranged from thirty to fifty miles away from the heart of the mountain. With his supernatural perception, he’d already found the openings, and now he watched them, stared at them, his eyes never blinking, his pupils dilated to cover the irises completely, dead black unblinking eyes that never closed . . .

  And he waited.

  Zoan started, jerked, his eyes wild, his face contorted with fear. Though he hadn’t felt a human touch that startled him, he had sensed something that was much, much worse.

  “It’s that man—that Wolf-Man,” he whispered to Cat, the North American jaguar that was his sometime companion. “He’s looking, he’s trying to find me, I think . . .”

  Chaco Canyon was about four hundred miles from NORAD, but Zoan, being the kind of man he was, felt cold dread, for Tor von Eisenhalt’s malevolent gaze was almost a physical sensation to him. Zoan didn’t know it exactly, as a person knows facts or has perceptions of emotions or reactions. It was pure instinct or unearthly insight that warned him when the Wolf-Man’s eyes turned his way. It made Zoan feel cold, his flesh rising in prickly goose bumps, and he always had slight vertigo, a feeling as if he were about to fall down.

  “He can see in the dark, like me,” he whispered forlornly.

  Cat growled deep in her throat, a rumble of distress with an edge of fear. The hackles rose slightly along her back, and she lithely jumped up and paced restlessly in
Zoan’s stone room. She had a wondrous beauty, while Zoan was so unremarkable as to be almost invisible. He was small of stature, his hair an indifferent brown, his features plain—except for his deep eyes, all pupil, with no colored iris to be seen at night.

  Zoan was suddenly worried about his friends. What if the Wolf-Man could see them? What if he was looking for them, too? Zoan knew that his friends had even less protection from the Devourer than he did. For Zoan knew God, and God knew Zoan. To Zoan, God was exactly like a veil over his face and all-seeing eyes when he was afraid—God hid him and kept the Bad Things hidden from him. This man, this ravening Wolf-Man, could see his friends clearly if he looked, for they had no veil; and if they saw the Wolf-Man and what he was, they would be so frightened, they might go mad.

  Zoan ran, with Cat striding along silently at his side.

  As he had known they would be, the members of Fire Team Eclipse (Zoan simply thought of them as his soldier friends) were all together in the central community room of the small enclosed village where they’d chosen to live. Sergeant Rio Valdosta was, as always, polishing a gun. Captain Con Slaughter was feeding small mesquite sticks into the fire on the clay-lined center hearth and kicking the larger logs with satisfaction, making them spark and roar. He was smiling and shaking his head as he listened to Ric Darmstedt, Deacon Fong, and David Mitchell talking about Custer’s Last Stand (Zoan thought his name was Custard, and with his somewhat limited intellectual powers decided they were talking about the last roadside stand where he sold his custard) and arguing about the military strategies, both Custer’s and the Indians’.

  Zoan stopped and did a quick assessment of the others in the room. Hs best friend, Cody Bent Knife, was sitting cross-legged on the floor by the fire, talking quietly to Rio Valdosta. Little Bird and Benewah Two Color, Zoan’s two second-best Indian friends, were sitting behind Cody, watching and listening with barely contained amusement to the heated discussion of the soldiers. Ric Darmstedt was insisting loudly that the “Injuns had ’em dead to rights because Custer’s tactics were as dumb as dirt . . .”

  Gildan Ives was not exactly Zoan’s friend, but Zoan worried about her just the same. She simpered and tried to stay in Ric’s line of vision, but he appeared not to be able to see her at all. At least, he never looked at her, though she flitted close around him, as annoying as a gnat.

  No one saw him except David Mitchell, Zoan’s very special friend. David was the only other Christian in Chaco Canyon. David had his back to the door, but he turned and saw Zoan, smiled, and started to call out to him. But Zoan, who had no social understanding or skills, returned his gaze for a moment and then hurried back outside.

  He saw the two special ones, the New Zionists they called themselves. Darkon Ben-ammi and Vashti Nicanor were sitting on a high promontory of rock just ahead of him. Black outlines against the blood-red of the rock, they had their backs to the setting sun, looking longingly to the east, to their homeland. For a moment Zoan was anxious, for they were looking right in the Wolf ’s direction. But then again, that made no sense, and he knew it. It didn’t matter whether you were looking in the Wolf ’s direction or not; he could see you if he wanted to, and hiding your eyes made no difference. Somehow, Zoan felt easier in his mind as he recalled that these two, the special ones, were God’s chosen people. From the beginning of the world until the end, He would keep a special watch on them, the Israelites, the apple of His eye.

  Though there were twenty-nine other Indians in the canyon, Zoan wasn’t worried about them—not because he didn’t care about them, even love them, but because he knew that Cody Bent Knife was the key to his people, and whatever state Cody was in, so were his followers. At the moment, Cody and the soldiers seemed to be unaware of the danger and immune to the fear. Zoan thought that must be a good sign. Sometimes—as he knew all too well—ignorance was bliss.

  But there was one last friend that Zoan had to see, to know that he was all right, that he wasn’t afraid—or even worse, maybe looking back at the Wolf-Man, wondering about him, thinking about him, considering him and his power.

  Dr. Niklas Kesteven was sitting alone by an open window in his solitary cabin. A single candle burned on the crude table in front of him. He looked up without surprise as Zoan soundlessly materialized at the door. “Hello, Zoan,” he said in a helpless and weary tone. It was an odd contrast to his powerful frame, strong features, and thick, virile beard.

  “Hello,” Zoan said uncertainly. He wasn’t a very good communicator, so he simply stared at Dr. Kesteven, his unusual eyes, liquid, full of light in spite of the pupils that grew to twice their diameter in nighttime, raking over him scrupulously.

  “What’s the matter?” Dr. Kesteven asked.

  “Nothing,” Zoan said helplessly. He was incapable of telling anyone how he felt, what he knew.

  Impatiently Niklas demanded, “Zoan, what do you want?”

  Zoan frowned a little. “What are you thinking about, Dr.

  Kesteven?”

  Niklas sighed. Such a conversation with a normal person would be ludicrous, but it was typical with Zoan. His thick shoulders sagged a little, and Niklas turned to look out into the gathering darkness. “I was just thinking . . . wondering . . . about Alia. You remember, Zoan? My friend, my lady friend, Alia Silverthorne . . .”

  Alia Silverthorne, chief commissar of the Sixth Directorate of the Man and Biosphere Project Executive Council, and personal bodyguard to the president of the United States of America, stared at her friend in dismay. Minden Lauer, the lovely Lady of Light, was slowly descending into madness before Alia’s eyes, and there was nothing that anyone could do about it.

  Of course, the entire world’s gone barking mad, Alia mused. She wondered if maybe she were the last sane person on earth. In her extreme weariness and the beginnings of delusions and even visual hallucinations from what must be akin to combat fatigue, Alia grew vaguely amused that she thought she was the only sane person left on earth. She was the classic crazy person who didn’t know she was insane.

  “. . . Tor is watching over us. I can feel him. I know when he’s near,” Minden was saying. Her calm demeanor and lovely, ethereal appearance created an unnerving contrast to the demented words. “Our destiny is with him, and he will not leave us to die here.”

  The president of the United States, Luca Therion, listened with what seemed to Alia to be besotted rapture. “But, Minden, my love,” he said in a low, troubled voice, “there are such forces arrayed against us, and we—”

  “No!” Minden almost shrieked. “No! We are the forces, the elemental forces, the powers, Luca! You must understand this! Tor will triumph, now and forever!” She swallowed, then reduced her voice to its hypnotic thrum. “He is more powerful than that inconsequential rabble,” she said with delicate disdain, pointing toward the window. Though it was thick bulletproof glass, they could hear the indistinct growl of the angry mob outside. “He is more powerful than you can imagine. This world, this whole earth, is his . . .”

  Sky Rock, a flat promontory that overhung a hill in the pastoral woods of Arkansas, didn’t belong to Tor von Eisenhalt and never would, for Jesse Mitchell, a strong man of God and a prophet, stood upon it by night.

  Jesse didn’t look much like a holy man. He was eighty-eight years old, slight of frame, with shoulders bent from years but not with weariness, and ever-twinkling blue eyes. His white hair and mustache gleamed cleanly in the gathering darkness.

  Tenderly his wife of sixty years, Noemi, thought that he could still be considered a handsome man. At least, he was to her. Frowning a little as he coughed, she asked, “Jess, you’re not thinking of building up the signal fire again? You’ve only been out of your sickbed these two days.”

  “No,” he said with a touch of sadness. “The fire was a promise, God’s promise to them.” He pointed down the mountain, to the south. “But a wicked and perverse generation seeketh after a sign. The Lord’s told me that they must come on in faith now, Noe.”

  She n
odded uncertainly. Sometimes she didn’t quite comprehend Jesse’s intimate conversations with God, but that didn’t worry her. It wasn’t her business; it was her husband’s business. Jesse’s total dedication to the business of the Lord had been, all their long lives, both their greatest joy and their greatest hardship. And somehow Noe knew that the worst trial Jesse had ever experienced faced him, and she knew that she must be extravigilant to take care of him, for that was her calling. She sighed heavily. She wasn’t as strong as Jess, and she dreaded the coming darkness. It would be a heavy burden on him and also on her.

  She stole a glance at him as he stood still at her side. His face was oddly unlined for a man of his age, and right now no fear or trouble marked it. Jesse Mitchell was a man at peace, and with satisfaction Noemi knew that she was a pillar upholding Jesse’s peace.

  For his part, Jesse was deep into the consideration of the nature of prophecy inspired by God as opposed to the mockery of it that the old devil had made: It’s not telling the future, or those awful personal psychic people that prey on the lost and the ignorant, telling them of their dirty little secrets . . . A true prophet exhorts the church, inspires people with the Word of God . . . It always must be true and agree with Scripture in every jot and tittle . . . has nothing to do with telling the future . . .

  “That little lady’s looking up here at us right now,” he said suddenly, pointing toward Hot Springs, unaware of the strangeness of his words. “Say a prayer for her, Noe. That little girl’s got some hard and dangerous tasks facing her . . .” His voice trailed off. Jesse couldn’t pronounce Xanthe St. Dymion’s name, but Noemi understood that he was talking about her. She obediently bowed her head and closed her eyes, her lips moving a little.

  Jesse continued his musings. Fortune-telling, divination, soothsaying . . . all perversions of a great gift that God bestows upon His children. And that old Wolf, that old red-eyed demon, he’s using all those deceptions and more. The magicians of Egypt were powerful, Lord, and I’m no Moses . . . What on this blessed earth do You expect me to do?