_______
9:25 p.m.
Howard’s driver pulled up in front of a luxurious home. Separated with a low fence from the houses on both sides, the uniqueness of the structure made it stand out. Howard hesitated at the door, still not sure if he was at the right address, but the bold 56 engraved on the side of the wall tallied with the digits written by the old man.
A slim woman in dark-green drapery that accentuated her curves came out smiling at Howard. For a 58-year-old, her looks were unbelievable. Without saying a word to each other, she went back inside while Howard followed behind and closed the door after him.
Natalie Ulic had been Howard’s private consultant since she was 19. Back when Howard had just migrated into the country with issues of a quick temper, an unstable mind, and the nightmare occurrences that those close to him usually complained about. Natalie had helped him “find myself,” as he had put it in the letter he wrote to his uncle in Moscow.
“I see your taste in log houses hasn’t changed,” Howard said, taking a look at the roof of the building.
Natalie didn’t respond. She brought a kettle from the kitchen and handed Howard a small cup as she poured him some tea.
“This must have cost a fortune,” Howard continued.
“Alright, Howard,” Natalie finally said as she sat on a cushion. “Go on and spill it. What brings you by?”
“What brings me by? There are very few consultants in this city with your unique skills.”
“I’m flattered.”
“You know it’s true.” He paced around, taking a view of the paintings on the walls until he stopped behind Natalie. “After many decades, one would say we are as close as family, aren’t we?”
“I don’t need families that call after five long years. I’m expecting a guest in five minutes, so make it count, Hedeon.”
“Oh, we are calling each other by old names now? Okay, I just felt I should tell you the good news. I finally figured out where the rest of the deities are. With luck, I should be able to turn the myth into a reality very soon.”
Natalie looked surprised. “How did you manage that?”
Howard brought out the parchment and dropped it on her shoulder. She took it and keenly examined the writings on it as Howard took a seat.
Natalie sobbed quietly after reading the deciphered page. She looked up and said, “Thomas was a good man. You didn’t have to kill him.”
“Is that all you perceived from the parchment?” Howard sounded stern. He got up and snatched the parchment from the side table where Natalie had dropped it. “He was an old man, and all I did was put him to sleep. We will talk about the parchment when you’ve got your shit together.”
As Howard got to the door, he heard Natalie say, “You’re becoming him, you know.” He banged the door behind him. He paused to think of the statement. The him she was referring to was the same man in his dreams many years ago. The king killed his son in his rage. The one that people called Ivan the Terrible.
Chapter Seven
Boston, MA
May 2014
Eva Grant, a 38-year-old woman and the wife of Howard Grant, stood at the porch. She rested her hands on the low demarcation overlooking the swimming pool on the ground floor. For some reason that only her intricate mind could envisage, she stood poised in her wedding gown, giving away her warm smile at the large expanse of sapphire-blue water that stretched as long as fifty meters. Their wedding anniversary was six weeks ago. And even then, no one remembered it. No one cared. It was her wedding gown, and she could wear it any day she liked.
Whenever she would lean into the iron demarcation, a young lady behind her would jerk forward as if she could catch her if the demarcation failed. Lydia was a private doctor, and since her job required that she live in the Howard residence, babysitting—or, in this case, wife-sitting—was automatically added to her list of job specifications.
“Can we try this one more time, Mrs. Grant?”
“Unless it’s the good stuff, I’m good.”
“This is the fourth day in a row that you’re refusing your meds, Mrs. Grant. Are you trying to annoy Mr. Grant again?”
“Silly,” Eva scoffed. “How can he be annoyed when he and Josh are having a nice time in the pool?”
“No one is in the pool, Mrs. Grant. You are having another episode again. You have to take your meds, or I’m calling your husband to inform him.”
Eva turned from looking at the pool. She turned slowly toward the young doctor, dejectedly. Lydia had gotten used to plucking off the characters from her periodic hallucinations. She was sanest when Lydia offered her a few millimeters of concentrated crack. But those were only for helpless situations, and sometimes when Howard wanted to keep his guests from her scenery. Lydia was Howard’s option after Eva had vehemently refused to be institutionalized.
“Going somewhere? You seem overly dressed just to give me a dose of your vile potions,” Eva said, noticing Lydia’s beautiful satin dress for the first time.
“Yeah, I’m going on a date, and I’ll tell you about it if you just take some tablets. Don’t worry, they’re not much. And maybe, if you behave yourself, you might earn some of the good stuff too.”
Eva smiled like a little child. She walked up to Lydia and collected the tablets from her. She dropped eight tablets in her mouth and headed for the stairs. Lydia followed her closely as they walked down and toward the kitchen. Eva opened the fridge and took out a bottle of red wine to down the drugs that still lodged in her mouth.
Among the pills were some soporific drugs that put her to sleep within minutes. Lydia tiptoed out of the bedroom afterward and left the house for her date night.
_______
Contrary to Howard’s expectation, he heard the sound of a helicopter hover above the roof of the building. If he had anticipated such an entrance, he wouldn’t have had his chauffeur waiting at the airport. At least everyone had kept to the 10 a.m. schedule they’d planned the previous night. Four guests were already waiting in the basement. From the youngest to the oldest, the Rusev brothers had been that way for decades, sticking to time, keeping their business from the media. That’s how they’d survived the rivalry that had almost tainted their long, peaceful history.
The house seemed quiet as usual. Eva and Lydia were, of course, unaware of the meeting in the basement. For all they knew, that part of the house that Howard had restricted from every member of the family served as a cellar for the most priced collection of vintage wines. As long as the fridge was constantly refilled, no one bothered their heads with what they could find in the basement.
The Rusev brothers watched the camera feeds on the screen as Howard received the Russian diplomat. Howard buttoned his dark-green cotton jacket, waiting at the rooftop as the tall diplomat ducked under the helicopter blades.
“Hope I didn’t miss much,” the diplomat said, trying to raise his voice above the noise of the rotor.
“No. You’re just in time, my friend.” They shook hands as Howard led the way to the door of a lift. They descended into the basement within seconds and were in front of a cellar with several decks of wine. Howard walked through it and pushed a button that rolled away from the wall, revealing a dimly lit inner chamber. The Rusev brothers were up on their feet the moment the door rolled open.
“Va-si-ly,” the diplomat stressed the name of the 63-year-old man, the oldest of the Rusev brothers, as they embraced. He moved over to the second person after exchanging pleasantries with Vasily.
“Romanov...Petrov...and, of course…” he said with a big smile on his face as he finally got to the youngest and the most notorious of them all. “…Boris!”
“As I said in the short clip I sent to all of you here,” Howard began as he sat at the end of the oval table, “I think I’ve figured a way to bring back Russia’s lost glory. Wait…” He raised his hand. “Yes, this is as political as it gets. And I’m taking us as far back as World War 1, before the war of the allies, the American poetic justi
ce on communist strongholds and other conspiracies.” Howard stood up and turned on a large screen in front of them.
“I’ve taken the liberty of making the copy as legible as possible.” He pressed the next function on his remote, and the screen flickered, unveiling the letter from Gaza.
“Gentlemen, I’m sure you’re all familiar with the quote, ‘The reality of the physical realm—’”
“Emanated from the spiritual realm,” the 55-year-old diplomat, and Vasily, the oldest of the Rusev brothers, chorused the rest of it.
Howard nodded. He brought their attention back to the screen and said, “There’s the letter from Vladimir Ulyanov to some army lieutenants on the original relics that bound the Soviet Union. In the second paragraph were his promises of retainers, until Stalin went against this traditional precept.”
“Hold on,” the diplomat interrupted. “So you’re saying that this letter was from Lenin himself?”
Howard dropped the original copy on the table for them. He turned on the fluorescent light, illuminating the entire room.
“This is in Slavic language,” the diplomat said, holding the letter.
“Yes, it is. And I think Lenin was assassinated for this,” Vasily said.
“The articles say he died of hemorrhage,” Petrov added.
“Well, a little toxin in the blood vessel can point the autopsy in that direction,” Howard added. “But we are not here to discuss Lenin or his death. If you look at the third paragraph”—he zoomed in on the screen and placed the English interpretation of the words on the letter by the side—“the relics were meant to be guarded by the servicemen until they went to the war that killed them. And the location of these four relics...” The screen flickered again, showing a grid map with bright red, blue, and yellow lines on a black background.
Howard stood up and went close to the screen. He pointed at various intersections on the grid lines. “I believe the relics are within these locations. They call it Mezhgorye, a cave buried underground that has been inaccessible to many explorers for decades. The Russian government had tried to carry out a series of explorations within the area, but on various occasions when it looked like they were making headway, something would happen, and the cave would collapse, burying those who tried. The Russian Intelligence has since built a wall around the region, preventing further interest from local or foreign miners. Close to this region is another restricted facility called—”
“Mount Yamantaw,” Vasily cut in. “But, why us? Why did you come to us? We know you have close associates with the Russian military and the general in charge of the facility.”
“That’s a good question. I would have gladly answered that question, but it’s privileged. If you did the kind of business I do, you’d understand.”
The Rusev brothers murmured amongst themselves.
Howard quickly tried to win their trust. “I work with a lot of foreign agencies whose interest I am bound to protect.” He walked back to the chair, leaned forward, and looked them in the eyes. “I believe in Petrov’s political dream. I think he can bring back the Soviet power that had been relinquished to history books, war stories, and political theories. Do you want your people to take your aspirations seriously? This is how you do it; uniting the Soviet back to its former glory. I believe in your campaigns and in your stand against the men that had made the Slavic people so vulnerable for so long. But you see, I’m just one person, and it’s your call to make.”
The brothers communicated quietly in the Bulgarian language while Howard and the diplomat waited patiently.
“We’ve heard your proposal,” Petrov, one of the brothers, said to Howard. “Give us more time to deliberate on the matter. It’s a matter of national interest. We don’t want to rush to any conclusions yet.”
Howard nodded. He tried to hide his disappointment as the brothers left the basement and out to the front yard, where their vehicles were parked. The diplomat had to leave later on since the meeting didn’t go as planned. Howard took the parchments and other items in the plastic bag to another secret room behind the screen. He noticed that things weren’t as he had left them earlier in the day. The relics he had acquired from some black market traders in Kyiv had gone missing. He quickly went to his CCTV monitor and rewound the timeline for three hours. He noticed that as he left to receive the Russian diplomat, Boris sneaked into the secret room and rejoined his brothers before he returned.
These relics had been kept in the secret room for more than fifteen years, and there was only one way the Bulgarians could have gotten the information. The same day he acquired the relics, he was so excited that the first place he went to was to a log home down south, near the seaport.
Howard drove himself to Back Bay. Natalie had seen him pull up by the house from her window. Howard almost knocked her down while he was entering the house. She didn’t need to be in her psychic space to tell how mad Howard was.
“It makes sense now. If not, how else could you have afforded such a luxury home? Huh? If you wanted a house so bad, you could have come to me. What else did they offer you? Huh? A political appointment? A car? Answer me!”
As was her custom, Natalie had walked to the kitchen for her kettle. When she walked back, Howard snatched the kettle and smashed it to the floor.
“Answer my question, bitch. How much did you tell them?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Natalie answered as calmly as possible. “This is my house, and I will not tolerate—”
“Tolerate what?” Howard put his hand on her throat. He dragged her to the wall and pinned her there while he repeatedly asked, “What else did you tell them?”
When he eventually let go, Natalie took a deep breath. But Howard had more coming. He dragged her upstairs to her room while she struggled to break free. He shoved her to her bed as she whimpered.
“I don’t know who you’re talking about, but I can see from your eyes that my end is near. If you want to reclaim triune deities, you're going about it wrongly.”
“Oh, yeah? How should I go about it then?”
“The place where they are is impregnable. Not even the Bulgarians can get to them. You got demi models by trickery, remember? And only a trickster can get to it.”
“A trickster, huh?”
“You don’t believe me?”
“Excuse me, but at this point, I believe no one.” Howard pinned her down with a pillow. She wriggled her body, threw her fists aimlessly until she gave up.
Howard dialed his driver and gave him the address to the house as he drove back home.
_____
Five Years Later: Five Years Later: Moscow, RussiaMoscow, Russia
March 2019
The Rusev family have been thriving in their businesses and had dwelt peacefully in Southern Russia and Moscow until ten years ago.
Petrov was a businessman, and lately, he had made certain decisions that seemed more political than entrepreneurial. He had been criticized for making statements that were on the bad side of the Sorokov movement that emphasized the motto orthodoxy or death.
Being a foreign investor in Southern Russia, he had often maintained a neutral perspective whenever the media flung questions that related to Russian politics or religion until he questioned the building of churches in certain areas that were delineated for business and recreational centers.
A few weeks later, after his statement went viral, Petrov’s daughter went hitchhiking and didn’t come back. A lot of rumors stemmed from the incident. Some media pundits associated her disappearance with that of Zina Kolmagorova of the Dyatlov Pass incident, but the Rusev brothers believed his daughter was kidnapped.
They lost friends and business partners who were too afraid to speak up. Their latest enemy, Howard Grant, had taken it upon himself to eliminate the Bulgarians and stay in favor with his cohorts in the Russian front.
What was even more painful was the discovery of a test result at a medical center that showed that the girl was a few months
pregnant before her disappearance. Private detectives were hired to investigate every contact she had made in the week of her disappearance.
Vasily, a retired police officer, died in the course of trying to once again restore the joy that was stolen from them. He died in the mountains, and according to the two autopsy reports conducted, a residue of amobarbital was found in him. The results threw open the possibility that he died during interrogation.
Five days ago, Petrov was also found hanging on a hook attached to the ceiling in his room. Romanov was the one that found him. The relics they stole from Howard were replaced by fakes. Five years ago, when the brothers stole those relics, they never had any use of them. The decoy helped them steal what they needed in their quest to pursue a lead on Petrov's daughter's disappearance.
When Boris, the youngest who worked for the Bulgarian government, heard the news, he vowed to finish what Vasily had started.
Chapter Eight
Brooklyn Detention Complex
New York
March 2019
Someone coughed sporadically, and some inmates laughed. The coughing continued for thirty seconds before another inmate gave him a hard slap on his back, and he toppled over to the amusement of the other prisoners.
“You may want to head over to that corner by the window where the air is fresh unless you want your lungs roasted by all the second-hand smoke,” Miles advised.
The inmate gave Miles a defiant look. His eyes were watery from all the smoke in the room, and he found it difficult to breathe. But he would rather endure the discomfort than face the taunting of his cellmates. It was bad enough that he was the only non-smoker in his cell.
Miles shrugged his shoulders and returned his attention to his group.
Hunt for the Lost Sanctum Page 6