Helios (Cerberus Group Book 2) Page 23

  The young woman was surprised at this revelation. “You think I’m a Kohen?”

  “Not necessarily descended from the line of Aaron, but you possess the trait. My guess is that it’s a dominant genetic factor among cultures that held onto the Mother Tongue the longest. That’s why you can use the words. You could teach them to me and I could say them until I was blue in the face, but I would never be able to make a golem.

  “And there’s something else, too. Remember when you tried to clear a path through the shekinahs? You got a shock from it, but I think that shock would have killed anyone else. The point is, I think that’s the reason you had that vision of Raven back at Arkaim. You’re the only one who can use the Ark to shut down the Black Knight.”

  Fiona took this news without comment, and for a fleeting second, Pierce wondered if perhaps he was being a little too cavalier about her abilities. But this close to the prize, there wasn’t time for sweet talk. Right now, he needed Fiona the Kohen, the Baal’Shem, the last speaker of the Siletz tribal language.

  He shone his lamp down the passage, a straight shot angling toward the mountain as far as the light extended. “Nobody has been here in over two thousand years,” he said. “We’re walking in the footsteps of Jeremiah the prophet.”

  Fiona shrugged. “The air’s pretty fresh.”

  She wasn’t wrong about that. Pierce knew from experience that strange things happened to the air in tombs and caverns that were shut off from the outside world for long periods of time. Methane could seep through the rock and collect into deadly clouds. Decaying rock could produce radon and other poisonous gases. Fresh air could mean another entrance, and that was not a notion Pierce found at all comforting.

  Gallo gave his hand a squeeze. She knew how much this meant to him.

  There were no traps or snakes, which was a little disappointing but not surprising. Between the sealed cave entrance and the Ark’s own self-defense mechanism, there was little need for additional protection. The only real surprise was the length of the passage.

  After walking for ten full minutes, Pierce broke the silence. “I thought the Ark would be near the entrance. The location of the Ark’s resting place should have been a function of the same calculation that brought us here. Now, the math is all messed up.”

  “How far do you think we’ve come?” Gallo asked.

  Pierce shrugged. “Half a mile? Less?”

  “How much is that in Sacred cubits?” Fiona remarked.

  Gallo snapped her fingers. “Of course. There was a third number in that account. Solomon had 80,000 stonecutters in the mountains, 70,000 bearers. And 3,600 overseers.”

  “3,600 Sacred cubits,” Pierce said, grasping the significance. “The final distance Jeremiah would have to travel once he reached the entrance to the cave.”

  “That’s about 7,500 feet,” Fiona said, doing the math in her head. “A mile and a half.”

  A mile and a half. Pierce felt even more certain that they were on the right track. He started counting his steps and checking his watch to judge their pace. The passage itself was an anomaly, far too straight to be the work of nature, but he saw no obvious sign of tool marks on the walls that might indicate the handiwork of laborers.

  Ten more minutes passed and Pierce’s eagerness to see the prize at the end of the passage grew to something resembling anxiety. The seconds were stretching out like Silly Putty. He checked his watch, expecting five minutes to have passed, and discovered that only thirty seconds had elapsed since his last check.

  “Do you think the Ark is distorting time?” he said. “Like in that movie where time slows down the closer you get to a black hole?”

  “It only seems to slow down from an outside point of view,” Fiona corrected. “It still feels normal to the person near the black hole.”

  “There’s a name for what you’re experiencing,” Gallo told him. “It’s the watched-pot-never-boils effect.”

  He knew she was right but that didn’t make it any easier.

  Then, with no apparent warning, the passage opened up into a larger lobe-shaped chamber, at least two hundred feet across, and just as abruptly, it ended.

  “It’s a cul-de-sac,” Pierce said, a gnawing feeling growing in his stomach. He ran to the far wall, then began skirting along the wall, making his way back to the mouth of the passage. “This can’t be right. Look around. Maybe there’s a secret door. Or…” He turned to Fiona. “Do you sense anything?”

  She shook her head.

  “George, look up there.” Gallo pointed to the ceiling in the center of the chamber. The beam of light from her headlamp had disappeared into a shadowy recess, a hole about eight feet across, and a good ten feet above their heads. “It’s an oculus. Like in the Pantheon. Could that be where we need to go?”

  Pierce moved to stand under it and shone his light up into the opening. The oculus, a design feature of domed Roman temples from antiquity, was a hole that allowed both sunlight and rain to fall into the interior. This vertical shaft however was dark and without end, but it did underscore a fact that Pierce had not considered. The long passage had gone under the mountain ridge, which meant they were hundreds of feet underground.

  “I don’t know,” he replied. “Everything we’ve found suggests that Jeremiah came in through the same passage we did. I’ll sweep with the GPR. There has to be another way out of here.”

  He started to unsling his backpack, but as he did, he realized there was something different about the floor beneath the opening, right where he was standing.

  “No,” he whispered, dropping to his knees, tracing the carved outline with his fingers. “Oh, no.”

  Gallo and Fiona were at his side a moment later.

  Fiona pointed at the carving. “Is that…?”

  “A Templar Cross,” Gallo supplied. “I’m afraid it is.”

  “The Ark isn’t here,” Pierce said, his voice a whisper. “The Knights Templar took it eight hundred years ago.”

  THIRTY-NINE

  Axum, Ethiopia

  “Abba Paulos tells me that you are interested in the Ark of the Covenant.”

  Carter stared at the man the priest had introduced as Abuna Mateos, the Bishop of Axum. Mateos had a high-pitched voice and spoke with a cadence that sounded almost musical. He was older, with tufts of wispy gray hair protruding out from under the cylindrical gold-colored cap, which matched his long vestments. But his clean-shaven face looked almost youthful, making it impossible to guess his age with certainty.

  “You speak English?” she said.

  Mateos, who had been looking at Lazarus, turned to face her with a perturbed expression. Carter knew that look well: the why are you speaking to me, woman look. She had experienced it many times during her years working with relief agencies. To his credit, Mateos hid his displeasure with a smile. “Yes. Also French, Arabic, Hebrew, and of course, Amharic.”

  Lazarus thumbed a button on his phone, disabling the babelfish. “I’m Erik Lazarus. This is Dr. Felice Carter.” She noted the emphasis on the title, an attempt to elevate her status somewhat in his eyes. “And yes, we’d like to talk about the Ark.”

  Mateos listened, without comment or visible reaction, as they made the connection between the recent earthquakes and solar events with the Ark of the Covenant, and more time trying to establish that they were not kooks or treasure hunters.

  After about five minutes of this, the clergyman raised his hands. “Let me understand. You believe that Ark can be used to stop these earthquakes. That is your only interest in it?”

  “That’s right,” Carter said. “I know it sounds crazy—”

  “Certainly not. God has power over the heavens and Earth. The question before us is whether it is His will to do so. In the Gospels, the Lord warned us that in the Last Days, there would be earthquakes in many places and great signs in Heaven.” His solemn face cracked with a smile. “He also said that we should not be troubled by such things, for the End is not yet come.”

  H
e paused a moment, studying their faces, as if trying to decide whether or not to trust them. “Please, come with me. I want to show you something.”

  He led them outside and around to the south end of the cathedral building. At the end of a sprawling courtyard stood the old cathedral, a more traditional looking structure from the seventeenth century. Silhouetted against the old church, separated from the courtyard by a tall wrought-iron fence, were a pair of smaller cube-shaped chapels, the larger of the two topped with an onion dome and a cross.

  Mateos pointed to one of the smaller structures. “That is the Chapel of the Tablets, where the Ark is kept. When I was a young man, the Ark was kept in the sanctuary of the church, concealed behind a curtain, just as in the Tabernacle that Moses built, but after many years, the heat—” He squeezed his fist, “—of the Glory of God kept cracking the stones of the floor. So, this chapel was built, according to the same specifications that Moses used. The floor stones, they never cracked again.

  “The Glory of God,” he repeated. “It is not for men to see. Only one man, the guardian, a brother of the holy order, who never leaves the chapel, may go before the Ark to offer incense, just as in the days of Moses. I have not seen the Ark. No one but the guardian may see the Ark. Anyone else…” He made a lateral slicing gesture. “Dead. So you see, I cannot help you. The Ark must remain in the Chapel.”

  “What good is having it, if you can’t use it when you need it?” Lazarus said. Carter could tell from his tone that he was holding back his frustration.

  “It is a symbol of God’s presence,” Mateo said, his tone still patient, but with a slight edge. “Not something that we are meant to use.”

  Carter spoke up. “Abuna, has it occurred to you that perhaps this is the reason the Ark was given to your Church? So that it would be available when this time of need arose?”

  Mateo gave her a patronizing smile. “My child, has it occurred to you that God sends these signs, these earthquakes, so that we may demonstrate our faith in Him?” He pressed his hands together as if genuflecting. “I am sorry that you have come all this way, but it is not for nothing. Go, and may God’s peace be upon you.” He bowed his head and then turned away without another word.

  When he was gone, Lazarus sighed. “That went well.”

  “About as well as expected.”

  “Convenient how nobody ever gets to see it. They never have to prove it’s in there.”

  “Still, if it was a fake, you’d think someone would have exposed it by now.”

  Lazarus nodded, staring at the chapel, but he said nothing. She watched him for a few seconds. “What are you thinking?”

  “George sent us here to check it out. Rule it out. That’s what we have to do.”

  “We can’t just force our way in there and take it.” When he didn’t respond, she repeated the statement. “We can’t do that, Erik.”

  “If it’s a fake, we won’t need to take it. I just need a few seconds with it.”

  “How are you going to tell the difference in a few seconds?”

  “Like you said, it’s covered in gold. It will be heavy.”

  “And if it’s real, just touching it might…” She trailed off. “Erik, you’re not… No. You can’t do that.”

  He reached out and pulled her into an embrace that felt almost as indulgent as Mateo’s smile. “Pretty sure I’m the only one who can.”

  FORTY

  Under Mount Nebo, Jordan

  Fiona stared down at the cross carved into the cavern floor. It was symmetrical, all four arms the same length, like a Swiss cross or a plus-sign, with flaring serifs at each end. “Knights Templar,” she echoed. “Crusaders?”

  She knew a little about the Templar Knights, but she also recognized that a lot of her knowledge was suspect. The Templars showed up in a lot places—video games, adventure novels, conspiracy theories—and most of what was said about them was exaggerated, sensationalized, or outright fiction.

  Gallo answered first. “A Christian military order, founded in the twelfth century. They called themselves the Poor Fellow Soldiers of Christ and the Temple of Solomon. Poor, because they took a monastic vow of poverty, but that didn’t last long. They were founded to provide protection for Christian pilgrims in the Holy Land after the First Crusade, but they became very wealthy and influential in the Church. Some scholars have called them the world’s first multinational corporation. Of course, they were also fierce and ruthless fighters.”

  “There have always been rumors that the Templars found the Ark,” Pierce said with a scowl. “Along with the Holy Grail, the True Cross, the bones of Mary Magdalene…you name it, the Templars found it. I guess this is one time that the rumors were right.”

  “Found it how?” Fiona asked. “They didn’t come in the same way we did.” She paused a beat, then added. “Did they?”

  “It’s possible,” Pierce admitted. “Maybe one of them spoke the Mother Tongue as well. Or…” He looked up, shining his light into the opening overhead. “They might have dug straight down.”

  “But how would they have even known where to look? Did they work it out, like we did?”

  Pierce gave a snort of disgust. “Not likely. Not unless someone told them the length of a Sacred cubit.” He stopped, as if the words had triggered a thought cascade. He looked away, as if searching for the answer in the dimensions of the chamber.

  “The Templars were headquartered on the Temple Mount,” Gallo said. “Perhaps they found some ancient scroll—the Copper Scroll, maybe—describing the hiding place of the Ark.”

  Pierce continued to stare at the wall, lost in whatever musings had distracted him. Gallo went on. “When they got here, there were probably all kinds of scrolls and maps that don’t exist today. They must have found something that led them here.”

  “So if they took the Ark, what did they do with it?”

  “By the thirteenth century,” Gallo said, still in history professor mode, “the tide had turned against the Christian crusaders in the Holy Lands. The Templars relocated their headquarters, and the bulk of their treasure, to Cyprus.

  “Like any successful business, they had enemies. King Philip of France owed the Templars a lot of money and resented their influence, which went beyond national boundaries. So in 1307, he conspired with the Church to have the order disbanded and their leadership arrested and charged with crimes against God.

  “Their assets were seized and turned over to a rival order, the Hospitallers of Malta.” Gallo paused and raised a thoughtful eyebrow. “I doubt very much that they, or the Templars for that matter, would have kept the discovery of something as important as the Ark of the Covenant a secret.”

  “Don’t be so sure,” Pierce said, returning his attention to them. “The Ark wasn’t just a treasure or a holy relic. It was a weapon, and if word got out that the Templars had it, it would have been the start of an arms race. Everyone in Christendom would have gone to war to possess it. In fact, that may have been part of King Philip’s motive for trying to overthrow the Templars.

  “There’s another rumor that the Templars were warned of the plot, and that, before their arrest, they spirited their greatest treasures away in a hay wagon. After that…” He shrugged. “It depends on which wild theory you believe. A lot of people believe that the Templars went underground, guarding the treasure, and eventually reformed as the Freemasons. There’s a lot of Templar symbolism in Masonic rites, so maybe there’s some truth to it. And if you follow that thread a little further, it might have been brought to America. Several of the Founding Fathers were Freemasons.”

  “Where do you think it is?”

  “An excellent question.”

  Fiona let out a yelp and whirled in the direction of the new voice, her heart already racing out of control. Pierce and Gallo reacted about the same way, illuminating the face of the newcomer. A young-looking, red-haired Caucasian man stood at the mouth of the tunnel leading back the way they had come. He took a step forward, revealing that he wa
sn’t alone. Two more men followed him out of the passage. Both wore military-style fatigues and carried compact Uzi machine pistols. They held the weapons casually, pointed at the floor, but the very fact of their presence was a tacit threat.

  “So tell us, Dr. Pierce,” the red-haired man said. “Where do you think the Templars took the Ark?”

  FORTY-ONE

  Pierce recognized the voice. “Fallon?”

  “We meet at last,” Fallon said with a chuckle, sounding a little like a cartoon villain. Pierce wondered if that was intentional. He started forward, into the chamber, while the two gunmen remained at the mouth of the passage like a pair of sentries. “I’m sorry, I feel as if I already know you, but we haven’t been properly introduced. Yes, I’m Marcus Fallon. And you are Drs. Pierce and Gallo. I’ve learned so much about you.” He paused, looking at Fiona. “I don’t know who you are, but you seem very intelligent and in such good company, too.”

  Fiona glanced at Pierce, as if looking for guidance. Pierce gave an almost imperceptible shake of the head. The less Fallon knew about her, the better. Fiona, got the message. She nodded her head at the two gunmen. “Sorry, guns make me nervous.”

  Fallon laughed. “Don’t worry about my friends. They’re just here for logistical support. This is a dangerous place, you know. Terrorists and extremists lurking around every corner. By the way, you have got to tell me about that trick with the entrance. Is that an optical illusion of some kind?”

  “Something like that,” Pierce tried to make it sound like a joke, but he felt no humor. Fallon had tracked them here. Spied on them. Watched them enter the tunnel. Followed them with a pair of gunslingers to provide back-up. “So, you just happened to be in the neighborhood?”