“It appears our friend’s not upset that the Americans and Danes have the missiles.”
“He does not know,” she said lowly. “He would not get that close. Not with all of them monitoring communications.”
Dimitri knew that it would only take a single word spoken over a phone to put the authorities on their trail, and now, they were looking. “Will I meet this man?”
“No. Never. And neither will I.”
Somewhere over England
Their secure location was about twenty thousand feet above sea level. The jet was heading south. That’s all Olivia knew. Landing anywhere didn’t make a difference unless they knew where the second half was hidden. The pressure was on her.
She stared at the toes of her boots as she paced in the jet’s short corridor. Her leather pants swished annoyingly, but she couldn’t sit still. Nevolin was ahead of them, and she still couldn’t believe the woman had left the minisub in those temperatures, even in a dry suit. One crazy woman, she thought, something niggling in the back of her mind. She’d been trying to drag it forward for the last hour, then rubbed her forehead and threw in the towel. Recalling the hours on the Northern Lion was a little more traumatic than she expected and when she looked around the cabin, five faces smiled back at her. She smiled back. The four Ice Harvest Marines were in civilian clothes and sitting in various seats, plowing through mounds of delicious looking baked goods like they hadn’t eaten in a while.
“Better than Icelandic dried fish, ma’am,” Recker managed between bites. And lots of lamb, she thought. Icelandic cuisine wasn’t one of her favorites. Her gaze swung to Max sitting outside the cockpit. Despite the two computers built into the wall, his attention was locked on his TDS Recon. The little computer was slightly larger and thicker than a Blackberry, coated in black rubber and with a glow-in-the-dark keypad. He chomped into a muffin without taking his eyes off the screen.
Her gaze slid to Sebastian. He was tucked in the opposite wall, stretched out in the rust colored sofa, his boots hanging off the edge. His eyes closed, he listened to whatever was coming through his headphones. The cord stretched across the aisle to the computers. She envied their calm when she felt hyped. Nevolin was ahead of them by several hours at least. What does she know that I don’t?
She grabbed the stacks of papers near his feet and thumbed through the first few. She’d read them twice already. They were copies of what Noble recalled from Gregor’s notes. Nevolin shared because she wanted Noble’s help, but he wasn’t getting out alive after that. Not if she caught on that he’d done a damn fine job of leading her astray.
She felt watched, like a stroke down her body, and knew it was Sebastian. She looked in his direction. His lips curved with tender humor and it was all she needed for last night to flood back with amazing clarity. She hoped her blush didn’t give her away, then gave up any pretense and shooed his feet off. He sat up, propping his arm on the back of the sofa.
She wiggled into the crook of his arm, leaned her head on his shoulder. “Do you believe in magic?” He blinked, looking confused. “On the Northern Lion, Nevolin showed off her lab, and a pile of fabric she said wrapped the jade. I got a brief look, and it was definitely wool, but I think it was more than just to protect it. I think it was to protect anyone who handled it.” Sebastian’s frown deepened. “I think the princess put a spell on it.”
All attention was suddenly on her, the cabin gone silent. Even Max stopped eating. “Seriously? What made you think that?”
“The fabrics were embroidered with symbols and crisscrossed three times in three places. With chains, silver maybe. It’s the rule of three.”
They frowned at her, but Max spoke up. “Odd numbers are more powerful than even, to witches, at least, and let’s face it, the Maguire’s princess was one, in spades.” He winked at her.
“Imagine knowing her, huh? She cut the jade in half, for pity’s sake,” Olivia said, thinking of the odds she was facing then. She was a witch who loved a man accused of murdering his future brides. “But the wrappings coincide with the monk’s interpretation of her. But it’s breaking the spell that really concerns me. In place for almost nine hundred years and suddenly ripped off? That can’t be good.”
“So you do believe in magic?” Sebastian said, his lips quirking.
She met his gaze. “With the Odd Squad, I’ve learned anything is possible, and after reading the monk’s diary, yes, I do. The jade is a powerful object, we know that. I saw its results in Kolbash, and that was just half of it.” She shook her head, still stunned by his transformation and the speed of it. “The protection the princess put on it is broken.” In a big way, she thought, remembering how carelessly the wrappings were removed. “Whether Nevolin did it or her father, there’s no way to tell, but Cruz said the vibrations inside Ice Harvest stopped when the Northern Lion left the area. That makes a good argument for the jade radiating something.”
Max leaned back, swallowed. “You’re thinking we could track the jade itself?” She nodded. “Electromagnetic pulse readings might get you something. Provided it’s actually putting out something that can be tracked in the first place.”
“Doesn’t matter until we figure out where the Viking stashed it,” Sebastian said.
Olivia sighed, settling into the sofa cushions. “Okay…Gregor was in Morocco. Nevolin said he’d made the trips more than once, and found it in Benzù. Soil samples from the ship confirm that. He planned on revealing the jade to his daughter when he returned from his last mission.” She shrugged, unsympathetic that he didn’t have the chance. If Gregor had succeeded, America would be a war zone. “The trade ports were numerous then. The Viking traded furs for sheep. Gregor found that out in Portuguese archives.” From a fragment, but clear enough to see the last two items in Portuguese, and the Viking’s mark. “I still don’t get why Jal didn’t hide it in the first place he could. The coastlines were overrun with Crusaders, and that area was Muslim ruled. It would have been dangerous and crowded.”
“You’re forgetting he was a warrior first.” Sebastian leaned forward, picking up his coffee mug. She frowned. “And to a Viking, the jade was a weapon. A feared weapon. Wars were fought over it.”
She understood his train of thought. “The monk wrote that the princess accepted it at Jal’s encouraging. She’d refused it at first.” Cat, as she thought of the princess, must have felt so alone to reveal the story to a Christian, let alone a monk. The Irish were probably fine with her pagan practices, but under English rule, even a hint of witchcraft meant her death.
“He’d hide it where he could retrieve it again,” Sebastian said. “He’d want to be able to get it back and use it for his people.” He shrugged. “I would.”
The Marines agreed. Max swung the chair around and keyed up a map of the south of Spain. “Then it would have to be somewhere he could access without being seen in a very crowded place.”
“And where he knew no one else would trespass either and find it too easily,” Sebastian added.
A needle in a haystack, she thought. “Jal promised to hide it and tell no one. Maybe he took that to the extreme, and didn’t even tell Zhu.” She looked at the screen, impatient for Noble’s help. She tried to make a mental list of everything pulled from the Viking ship and the most significant came to mind first. The sword, his Runic name beautifully engraved at the hilt, the jar, the embroidered stole on Zhu, the scrap of a Corrigan tartan. Suddenly, she looked up. “The coins, in his purse. It was lashed around his neck and beneath his armor breastplate and about five layers of leather, padding, and furs. That says to me he didn’t share that with anyone.”
“And they bathed so often then,” Max said sourly, offering her a hunk of doughy bread spread with cream cheese. Right to my hips, she thought, taking a bite.
“You mean the collection of coins?”
She heard Noble’s voice and turned. She touched his image on the screen, smiling so hard her cheeks hurt. Max got up and she took his seat. “Hi. Yes, there wer
e several. A gold dinar, dirmahs, and three Roman coins. The area was Arab, Muslim ruled till the thirteen hundreds. Almohad somebody.”
“Almohad, Sultan Abd al-Mu’min. He built the Tower of Homage.”
It was still standing, she thought. “There was a piece of glass in the coin purse, Noble. Did you see it?”
His features tightened. “I was just looking at it. Dana’s here and she’s restored it. I just sent you the jpegs.”
She scooted to the second computer and typed. The document file came up and she spread out the images. The glass was dull, the lines a dirty white. “The scratches aren’t the least bit uniform, narrow and all short strokes.”
Noble nodded approvingly. “They’re too crude to be something etched into the glass. Not by a sculptor. It’s not an imprint. Dana says it doesn’t go deep enough into the surface to be part of a mold. Glass was very expensive then, owned by the aristocracy, and this is a fragment with worn edges. That leads me to believe it was a memento.”
She agreed. “The scratches look like tally marks.” She tipped her head, envisioning something in the two lines that formed a crooked V. “Or a bowl.”
“A map?” Sebastian said, and she flinched as he leaned over the desk, pointing. “Hey, Noble. It’s lopsided, depending on how you look at it.”
“There is no up or down.” She enlarged a portion, then reset it, frustrated. “Has the botanist learned anything on the plant?”
“He says it’s a flowering plant, candytuft, and the soil analysis test results say it was from North Africa, some from southern Spain.”
“So we have a location,” she said. Sebastian left the chair and stuck his head in the cockpit for a minute. She felt the bank of the aircraft as she looked back to the photo of the piece on a lighted counter. “The marks were made from a knife, a narrow point. It had to be scraped several times to make a line.” Two vertical lines, each with a flat top and bottom. Then beside it, a badly made triangle open at the bottom, and three horseshoe-shaped half circles filled the lower spaces. Two lines, she thought. Two. Lines. She inhaled.
“Two pillars.” She looked at Noble. “It’s two Greek pillars.”
“Hercules?” Noble said, scowling down at his papers.
Sebastian glanced between the screen image of the glass and her. “I see it.”
“Well, I don’t,” Recker said and she twisted to look at him.
“Two pillars is the Roman symbol for Hercules,” Olivia said. “And he, or more precisely the fabled pillars, guard the entrance of the Mediterranean Sea. One pillar is Jebel Musa in North Africa. Near Benzù.”
“Right where Gregor found it. In the old water system, I think.”
The Viking and Gregor would have had to go cave diving to get in the water storage tunnels and they went on for miles. Jal would do it, she thought, not knowing why she was so certain. She looked down at the line drawing, and squinted, trying to see the shape without distraction. She flipped the image upside down, and leaned back in the chair. Her breath caught and she scooted over to look at Noble.
“I know where to look. The second pillar of Hercules.”
“That’s an awfully large area.”
“You’re going to love this,” she said as she traced the shape of the etched lines to a sheet of paper, then faced the Marines. She held the paper up. “What’s that look like to you?”
“Prudential Life,” Max said, dusting his fingertips over a plate. “The insurance company logo.”
“Yes,” Sebastian said. “But the second pillar of Hercules is the Rock of Gibraltar.”
She smiled, high-fiving him, then sat back, thinking Gibraltar was massive and they had to narrow down possible locations. Then she felt the blood drain from her face as that distant memory jumped to life. On the Northern Lion, the maps and diagrams. The two pillars.
Her gaze jerked to Sebastian’s. “Nevolin. She knows it, too.”
NINETEEN
Malaga, Spain
Veta pushed her hair off her shoulder, the dark shade startling her for a moment. She’d done everything she could to change her appearance and match it to the forged passport. Apprehension skated through her as she approached the customs agent. She was not here out of choice, but Gibraltar Airport was operated by the British military, and there were no nearby private airstrips to land their plane. Time was crucial. While a commercial flight was out of the question, the path here had been paved with bribes, she told herself as she stopped the tall desk.
The agent on the other side matched her prearranged description. He nodded ever so slightly, his hand out. She gave over the documents with a one-hundred-pound note tucked inside. Dimitri and Stefan went to different lines, and she made a casual glance, noticing large groups of travelers gathered around the television screens tuned to the BBC news channel.
The mood in the terminal was bleak and she focused on a screen. Her own face filled one side of the image, a photo she didn’t remember on placards as people marched through the streets of Moscow. Another film showed a fiery ball hurled at the FSB headquarters in Lubyanka Square. It crashed through a lower window and ignited the drapes. Police formed a line, pushing protesters farther back. The mass of people had already stormed the barricades and she was surprised the police hadn’t fired into the crowds, yet felt strangely proud and empowered by the people chanting her name.
The agent cleared his throat and she looked at him, took back her passport, then walked briskly toward the exit. She glimpsed Dimitri at another counter, waiting till his documents were stamped. Stefan wasn’t far behind them and, spread apart, they walked quickly out of the terminal. Once outdoors, she breathed relief.
“It’s good that your benefactor’s clout has not run out.”
“It will.” She looked back at the terminal, thinking that was easier than she expected. Especially with her face in the news. She followed Dimitri as he crossed to the parking lot, staring down at a paper, then searching the rows of cars. He spied what he wanted and they rushed to the car. Behind her, Stefan walked more slowly and scanned the crowds of people, the cars, and the police checking everyone who exited.
Dimitri opened the door of a large sedan, and once inside, he lifted his pant leg to remove the relic strapped to his calf. Since she’d laid it beside him in the infirmary on the Northern Lion, he’d never let it out if his sight. Veta studied him, how he clutched the velvet sack and treated it like a favored pet. He insisted on carrying it. She did not care. She’d searched for it for him. He thought her obsession was to fill her father’s quest, but all had been to save Dimitri. She loved him beyond all things and his cancer was taking him from her. The relic brought him back, and while his body healed, his features were changing. She couldn’t say for certain with this skin growing tighter by the day—even his scars were fading—but his forehead seemed to be taller. Or was his hairline receding?
He laid it on the console between them, then started the engine, leaving the lot and stopping only to pay the fee. When she grasped the relic to store it safely, she instantly felt a humming sensation travel up her arm.
“Leave it alone.”
“It must be concealed.”
“Leave it!” he snapped, slapping his hand over it and drawing it closer.
She frowned at him, and the dark look he sent her gave her no comfort. Her gaze moved between him and the relic.
“I will die without it,” he said and she believed him.
Then she noticed the hair on his hand that was not there two days ago before she faced front, vigilantly watching for a tail, for the police.
“You’re certain where to find the rest?”
She nodded, touching it, then drawing her hand back and rubbing the tingling sensation. “Father found that in Benzú at the foot of the pillar of Hercules. Logic says the second pillar holds the second half.”
“It’s a big rock with tunnels. Be more specific.”
“The tunnels, but I’ll know more when I read the rest of his research notes.”
>
“Then do it! We have authorities looking for us all. Our troops are dead. How long do you think your benefactor will help you? You lost his missiles.”
“His crews did. He cannot blame me.”
“After giving you twenty million? He will.” She stared, wondering what was happening to him. He never spoke to her so harshly. “Now, Veta!” he barked and she flinched. His gaze slid to hers and she recoiled from it. Savage, she thought, and when he made a turn, his hand pawing the steering wheel, she heard it crack.
She felt the need to take it from him, to touch it and feel its energy. Her hand slid closer, but she didn’t need to hold it. Energy practically arced into her hand. Then she closed her palm over it and felt the sudden rush of warmth slide through her body, into her blood. She felt it flowing though her veins, pumping through her heart.
Awareness of her surroundings amplified. Not like the scent of the air but its movement against her skin. Not the speed of the car but the wheels on the road.
She turned her gaze on Dimitri.
He didn’t look at her when he said, “You feel it, da? Now see it.”
He flipped down the passenger visor. She stared in shock at her reflection. Her skin was smooth and bright as it was before her father’s death, before her life turned to vengeance. Capturing the second piece would renew more than their bodies. It would wipe away an ugly past and give her and Dimitri a chance for a new life.
RAF, Gibraltar
Sebastian smiled widely as he crossed the flight deck, his hand out to greet an old friend. Edward Granlen was a Royal Marine who’d dragged his ass out of a couple firefights. “Christ, it’s a sin to look that young when I know you’re old.”
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