Casca 2: God of Death Read Online Free Page A

his father killed, was the power of the Aztecs used. They promptly drove the Spaniards from the Aztec capital city, Tenochtitlan. Though many Spaniards escaped, not all did, and for the next several weeks the terrible gods of the Aztecs fed on the blood and beating hearts of Europeans.
    But the Aztec triumph was short-lived. The gold of Moctezuma was an irresistible lure, and the doom of the proud Aztec nation was inevitable. Greed – coupled with the religious fanaticism of the Spanish Jesuits, those devoted followers of the Inquisition as ordained by the pious Torquemada conquered. Goldman pondered the paradox of the Jesuits. Here were men who felt themselves to be soldiers of their crucified God, Jesus, and in His name, and in the name of pity and love and mercy, they did not hesitate in their holy duty. In a religious fervor that approached ecstasy they were able to burn thousands of heathen sinners alive at the stake. This was done, of course, in order to save the heathens' immortal souls – to open the way to the glories of heaven for these heathen. By no means did the Jesuits consider their acts to be acts of cruelty. On the contrary, what they did was done from love. Ironic, Goldman thought, that the Spaniards considered themselves so different from the Aztecs. For, of course, the heathen Indians had sent their sacrificial victims to their gods in order to deliver their prayers....
    And while the priests of the gentle Jesus had burned the unredeemed alive, the soldiers of Cortez had raped and looted – and destroyed the remnants of a great people, all in the name of glory: glory and loot for themselves and for the King of Spain. The story was an old one, and a common one, and for a moment Goldman, thinking of it, lost the sense of mystery that had engulfed him in the museum. He turned away from Quetzalcoatl and walked past other relics and art objects, and then he saw the one for whom he had cancelled his day's appointments and had rushed through the packed, horn-honking, morning traffic of Boston.
    The man's back was to Goldman, and he was leaning over a glass display case, but there was no mistaking who it was. The back was broad, and the muscles beneath the conservatively cut suit seemed almost ready to burst through.
    Making his way past several other display cases and standing slightly behind the man, Goldman started to clear his throat in order to announce his presence, but, before he could, the man at the display case spoke, his voice deep and steady:
    "Welcome, Dr. Goldman. It is good of you to come at such short notice." And with that he straightened from the display case and turned to face Goldman.
    Goldman was speechless.
    The stocky man locked his gray-blue eyes on Goldman and scanned the doctor up and down. "You're looking well, Doctor," he said. "The years have obviously been good to you. I'm glad you were able to come. For some reason we seem to have our lives involved with each other – ever since that night in the Eighth Field Hospital in Nha Trang."
    Goldman's mind did a quick retake, an instant replay of that astounding night in the hospital ward, when, after removing a piece of shrapnel from the brain of the man now confronting him, an unbelievable, story had unfolded – unbelievable except for the living proof of it, which was a man known then as Sgt. Casey Romain. At least that was what his dogtags and personnel records said he was called....
    "Casca," Goldman said. "Is that what I should call you?" He shifted uncomfortably, but the steel- colored eyes of the man he called Casca held an amused glint.
    "It's good enough, Doctor. I will answer to that – or to any one of a number of others." Extending his right hand to the doctor, he said easily, "Here. This is for your collection. I should have left it with you when last we met, but after carrying it around in my leg for the last two thousand years I grew kind of attached to it." He dropped into Goldman's palm a shining bronze arrowhead. "You