Lothar stepped away from the shack and started up the pier. He walked hunched over, his head nicked forward, one hand shielding his eyes against the rain. Parle’s words rang in his ears -- what if he stepped off the pier and fell into the water. When another streetlamp went out, he realized it no longer a remote possibility.
He moved cautiously, placing one foot slowly in front of the other, tapping it on the wooden planking, toes sweeping back and forth while skimming along the surface before entrusting the wood with his weight.
When a flash of lightening lit the sky, he stopped, breathed easier, and swept his eyes across the pier to establish his bearing. Minutes later, when he thought he reached the end, he stopped, crouched down and debated about returning.
A fishing boat slammed against the pier with a bone-jarring crack, rose up as if to land on him, then crashed back down into the sea, broke apart and sank.
“Jean-Paul, you bastard!” he roared, giving vent to his anger and frustration. If Jean-Paul answered, he did not hear it.
The wind strengthened, pelting him with rain that stung like needles of ice pricking his skin. Determined to finish the search, he pressed forward, low crawling on knees and elbows while using his sword as a feeler, prodding it in front of him until it hit something soft.
He lay flat to prevent the wind or sea from having their way with him. His free hand, waving blindly in front of him, touched an arm, ran down to the fingers and back up to the shoulder.
Somebody. Who? He released the sword, felt with both hands. A baldhead and a long beard. A Templar.
“Jean-Paul,” he shouted. No one answered. Nothing moved.
His fingers felt along the face, across the eyes and the once broken nose, traced the scar along the forehead. Jean-Paul’s scar. In the sixteen months they served together he had come to know the man, as with most of his men, almost intimately.
Slowly, he moved his fingers down to the neck, felt for a pulse. The moment they slid into the deep, gory wound, he knew someone had cut Jean-Paul’s throat.
*
Lothar wedged his sword between two loose planks, and then kicked off his sandals. He grabbed hold of the dead man’s shoulders and dragged the corpse backwards while shimmying on his belly like a caterpillar. He repeated the process, gaining inches at a time, fighting to return his comrade for a decent Christian burial despite placing his own life at risk.
The storm would have none of it. Gale force winds whipped him. Waves smashed against the pier, rocking it to and fro, threatening to rip it from its pilings. The closer Lothar inched to the safety of the dock master’s shack, the angrier the storm lashed out at him, until the waves washed over the pier and wrestled him for Jean-Paul’s body.
Before he could reach the end, one large, massive wave reared up and barreled towards him. Fearing for his life, he released Jean-Paul and lay spread-eagle, dug his fingernails into the soaked wood and prayed with all his might that this monstrous thing would do him no harm.
No one heard his prayers.
The wave slammed down atop him, pressed the air out of his lungs and filled his mouth, nose and ears with salt water. Before retreating, it plucked Jean-Paul’s body from the pier and carried it away.
Lothar did not wait for the next one. He cursed, spit, turned and, empty-handed, half-ran, half-crawled to safety as lightening lit up the sky in acknowledgement of nature’s small victory.
At the shack, Lothar threw himself up against the wall and, fighting for breath, slumped to the ground. Again he had cheated death. Before he could give it anymore thought he realized Parle had gone missing.
“Parle,” he shouted, fearing the man abandoned his post in exchange for shelter in the monastery.
The wind banged the shack’s door to and fro. Lothar crawled over, pushed it open and, in the last bit of light Kato Zaksos offered, looked down at Parle’s lifeless body.
“Mother-of-God,” he mumbled, making the sign of the cross.
Parle, stripped naked, lay on his back with feet pointing to the door. His head, severed, sat on his chest, the lifeless eyes staring at Lothar as though asking why, what happened.