The Templar's Legacy (Ancient Enemy) Read Free Page A

are a lot of these mounds here?”
    I nodded. “And lots of Native American artifacts. What about yours, the cross you wear around your neck?”
    She looked down at the two-inch, ornate, silver cross hanging below the hollow of her throat and reflexively touched it. “This was given to me by my Mémèr. It was given to her by her Mémèr, and so on. It is very old.”
    “Cool.” I would have asked to see it if I hadn’t just rebuffed her request. Instead, I switched the subject to the old things I liked to collect. We went off into a conversation about the rich artifact hunting in the Ohio Valley. I’m good at finding things, and I have an extensive collection. I promised I would bring in some of the arrowheads and other things I had found. I probably would have promised to give her my whole collection if she’d asked.
    From our first conversation, I could tell that Colette was incredibly worldly and had traveled everywhere, yet she seemed genuinely interested in my life—even if I could only tell her about the boring, non-weird stuff. All in all, it was a very successful first date, even if it wasn’t really a date per se.
    After that first day, we made it a semi-regular event. Sometimes my friends or others from the clinic joined us, but my favorite times were when it was only the two of us.
    Colette was more physically demonstrative than anyone I knew. She didn’t shy from hugs or kisses. I thought it was enchanting, but I just put it down to her being French. She was 8 years older than me, so I didn’t let myself think there might be something more between us, but hey, I never claimed to be quick on my feet.
    I’m pleased to report that I nailed the whole double kiss thing. I can be taught—even if it doesn’t always stick.
    Colette made the whole working with shadows thing more bearable, and gave me something better to dream about at night than headless bodies and dead friends.

Shady Business
    I was able to ward off one or more of the shadows when I was only ten, but none of my “students” at Shady Oak’s ever had any success. As you could see with Janice, it wasn’t for lack of trying. With each failure, Dr. Anderson leaned on me harder to try the direct approach again. The pressure on me peaked when, weeks later, Dr. Anderson called me at home at seven in the morning. My eyes kept crossing with the effort to keep them open when I took the call.
    “Finn, I need you here. Mr. Johnson is slipping away quickly. He’ll die soon if we can’t do something for him. The only thing that might help him is to have you pull the shadow off of him.”
    Ah, crap . Johnson was a thin, graying, sixty-ish shadow-ridden patient who’d been fighting pneumonia for the last several weeks. I didn’t really know him, but I had looked in on him a couple of times.
    A while back, Anderson had asked me to check and see if the shadow on him was somehow making Mr. Johnson’s pneumonia worse. All I could tell through my second sight, without actually touching him, was that a largish shadow rode him, and its oily darkness covered most of his pale blue aura. Just looking at it, I nearly peed my pants.
    Now, I stood with the phone to my ear trying to think of a way out. The doc didn’t have to spell out the options to me. I could try to take the shadow off of Mr. Johnson before he died, I could wait for him to die and deal with it then, or I could try to teach meditation to the next person it infested.
    While I contemplated what Anderson was asking, Spring had her own strong opinions. I know it’s bogus, but everything dies , Finn. Life doesn’t come with guarantees, and you are not responsible for saving everyone.
    I know , Spring, but I just keep thinking about what one of these things did to Holly. What if Johnson’s shadow finds another little girl when he dies?
    Dude, look on the bright side, it might attach itself to a little boy or an old man instead.
    Ha, ha, you very funny dryad. You know what I mean.
    Yeah, but you