Quest for the Ark

by Taggart Rehnn

  “Imagine if Haim or David made jokes about priests raping children every so often, how pleasant it would be for you to work with them,” retorted Conrad.

  “It’s not the same,” protested Tony, “although David complained about stereotyping.”

  “Take him at his word. Rapey’s a stereotype anti-Catholics love,” Conrad asserted.

  “Will do. Thanks for the advice,” Tony grumbled.

  “It’s just a suggestion. On another note, we should now go back to the dining room and join the others. They are dying to know what is it we talked about,” said Conrad, grinning.

  “One doesn’t need to be a vampire to figure out that much!” chuckled Tony, as the two of them strutted back towards the hubbub radiating from the living room.

  “So it seems!” Conrad admitted, shrugging. “Being undead is not a party, trust me!”

  “In what sense?” Tony asked, briefly stopping on his tracks.

  “There are vampire hunters, far less enlightened that you. Also, after reading the mind of a woman as fascinating as the Countess, I will have to pass up such a splendid lady. Loneliness is the ransom of eternity—and if one refuses to pay it, eternity becomes an endless collection of heartbreaks. That’s in part why I wouldn’t recommend being undead to anyone alive.

  In any case, I see David rushing towards us, desperate to know what we were talking about.”

  22—This Is My Blood, and yet Not of my Blood

  Intercepting him, as Conrad—oblivious of what looked almost like a missed rugby tackle—continued towards the living room, David had tried to talk to Tony, in private as well. Unlike Conrad, Tony was quite brash: “No. He didn’t try to brainwash me,” he blurted out. “If you need to know, he asked me to stop treating you like a non-American American, to be fair, to keep the group in harmony—and also, so that you and Haim would not be tempted to tell me that all of ‘my people’ are a bunch of rapey incels.”

  “I never thought that way about priests!” protested David.

  “Of course not,” replied Tony, smirking, while still walking towards the dining room, “but others do. Stereotypes. So he suggested I don’t do unto others…”

  “So, you wanted to talk to him in private about my being pissed off about the ‘Jewish fifth column’ BS? Is that what you want me to believe?” asked David.

  “No, David. I’ve known you for a few days. I know you’re eager to help, and also want to get fast to Venezuela, to save the world. That is brave, unselfish, and admirable.

  But, what I wanted to discuss with Conrad in private, is, by definition, private. Haim and I have been friends for years and you don’t see him accosting me with questions. He knows me well enough not to go there. I would recommend you learn from him,” retorted Tony, continuing his stroll towards the dining room—which he soon after reached, followed by a rather miffed and utterly disconcerted David.

  In the midst of an animated discussion, they found there the Countess, blushing as she asked Conrad more questions, now about Geoffroy.

  “But isn’t your child in the blood,” asked the Countess, “if all the vampire lore and novels I’ve read count for anything, supposed to be linked to your mind, to obey you when you command him, unless you free him, unless you specifically release him?”

  “You are right on that account, Votre Grâce” replied Conrad, “but, as I said, before he left for ‘the Orient’, my child asked me indeed to break his bonds, since he said he could not endure that savagery inflicted on the Templars anymore, and he wanted to be free to wander the world, find his own way, and, perhaps, rediscover some inner peace, somehow.

  Out of love for my first-born in the blood, I did it. Perhaps that was a mistake. Perhaps I should have followed along, guided him some more. It’s dark always after sunset. The historian is a prophet looking backwards…”

  “Schlegel, isn’t it?” asked the Countess. “‘Clauses and artificial transitions, in the end, only pervert the intellect and inhibit any bolder swing of the imagination’, nicht wahr?”

  “Such a rare pleasure to talk with someone as refined and intelligent as you, Votre Grâce…” said Conrad, bowing to her.

  “Chloé, s’il vous plaît, Conrad, sinon je vous appelle Votre Majesté,” the Countess said, blushing.

  “Chloé, then,”replied Conrad, smiling. Sól cleared her throat, the Countess glared at her, and Conrad picked up where he had left off. “Seems Geoffroy did also find a new master, a powerful new master, who can enslave tortured souls. Since now they can’t make Clement V, or Philippe le Bel, or Hitler, or Antonescu—or even all the Nazis who escaped and lived with utter impunity during the days of Adenauer—pay for their sins, they seem instead ready to make the entire Humankind pay for present and past horrors, by unleashing Hell.

  The entire human race will be made to stand trial by the One Judge—that is probably what my blood-son believes. And a convinced fanatic often overdoes his inspiration, like an etiolated sapling stretching desperately to grow beyond the shadow of its rank parent.

  Humans can easily believe we, the undead, follow the Devil. How could anyone, otherwise, become a human predator?

  Tigers, lions, bears, wolves, sharks, they are stupid, creatures of instinct, soul-less beings. Humans can kill whales, dolphins, rhinos, zebras, or elephants, peaceful creatures, intelligent—and also capable of rape, and murder, like humans themselves. Humans can eat humans ‘to take in their spirits’—but those are ‘savages’ or deranged.

  Civilized humans can bomb half a million people out of existence to force them to accept their Emperor is not divine, although their leaders knew full well they were otherwise ready to surrender. That is civilized. Or they can do it slowly: people at The Polygon, in Kazakhstan experienced that sort of slow death from the 1950s until 1989, did they not? Humans who consider other humans less than human, prove without a doubt to be less than human themselves—the Geneva Convention be damned.

  So, the debate is not whether humans should answer for their savagery—but, rather, when and how, and to whom—or, rather to Whom? One needs not be a brilliant prosecutor to know that, if humans were tried at times where evil prevails—such as nowadays—they would be found guilty. The few who do something to prevent evil might be spared; and those who espouse it out of profit, cowardice, or willful ignorance, will instead be forced to relive their Auschwitz a thousand fold, forever. Now, what about those in neither group?

  Are humans still learning, like a curious child, who breaks toys discovering the world? Should we, who have for centuries seen this child fumble and destroy, unable to learn the basics of decency, compassion and honesty, be the ones who decide when enough is enough? Or should we leave it to a Higher Power? But then, who are we to decide for how long should those creatures be spared and when time’s up for them to answer for their sins?

  When compared to many other species, humans are young. In my opinion, twelve million years have led to much horror, but also shown much wonderful human progress.

  Of course, cynics might say humans are also our prey, our nourishment—hence any vampire magnanimity, in that sense, is suspect. But we could just as easily derive sustenance from other species—a minor inconvenience in exchange for keeping this world you brutishly pollute habitable, and being spared the annoyance of obstreperous humans.

  In any case, such decision is not up to any of us. If the Mother, much older than your oldest humanoid ancestors has not made that call, neither should we—not Severian, not I, not my blood-son.”

  “At the risk of you saying you are on ‘your side’, not ours, I would like to thank you,” said Haim. “Now, if we are to stop your blood child, should we clarify who shall do what, when, where, how, and, if possible, why?”

  “Milady Sól has understood how. We shall use lasers to scale-up the shape of that sword tip to any size fitting the death camp’s size and shape. For kidinnu to serve as protection for humans, the spell usually begins “sitting on my door”. My best educated guess, because we
are dealing with some sort of reverse kidinnu, the stones should be collected outside the door of the extermination chambers, as close to them as possible—but not inside the gas chambers or the furnaces or the shooting areas. Other than that, it would have to be done in a pattern shaped exactly like the tip of that sword.

  That we can do, in probably from one to three nights, near the date of the Chaldean Kidinnu’s death. Severian, Mircea and I would each get a stone, and two of my other blood children would stand guard while we do this. We shall minimize human casualties by glamorizing guards and taking every reasonable precaution possible. Tony should hopefully be able to scramble their security systems while we do all of this, I believe?” explained Conrad, pointing to Tony.

  “I gladly shall!” Tony confirmed, still a bit confused about their prior discussion concerning ‘kidinnus’. “I’ve been discretely gathering all available information concerning electronic surveillance and vulnerabilities in those places. Amazing how many people are almost religiously devoted to hacking elections and very few trying to stop them—but that, on the other hand, makes buying election hacking technology on the dark web quite easy. And it can be used to take down surveillance systems unnoticed in those places as well.”

  “We will have to be discreet, indeed,” agreed Conrad, “But there is still one important thing left to do: since my first blood-son might be behind this, it will be necessary to block the minds of every human at the castle who may witness our discussions.

  This, Severian or I can easily do. The older the one who does it, the safer the blockage would be. The simplest method would be a tad uncomfortable, but it should protect every human in this room and all the house servants at the same time, preserving the secrecy our plan requires. It would be quite draining for whoever does it and there would be ‘side effects’, headaches and hangovers among you, but they shall pass, after a day or two.

  If we do this, were my blood-son to drop by uninvited and try to force himself into any of your minds, I would immediately notice—and, equally fast, come back to your rescue.

  For the time being, I am not ready to go one step further and teach you how to destroy our kindred. But this blockage should probably be enough” added Conrad. Severian nodded.

  “Seems reasonable,” commented Sól. “As for the Ark, we should also discuss what to do once all the stones have been collected, shouldn’t we?”

  “Have you thought who shall sew the stones onto the tallit—and, equally important, how? If I’m not mistaken, all four threads at the tzitziot have to be equally distributed at both sides, giving the appearance of eight threads of the same length, and they must be kept clean; so I take one probably cannot sew it with any thread or in any whichever way,” said tentatively the Countess.

  “Very good,” said Haim. “This endeavor, I shall think much about. We’re far beyond kosher or pasul, no matter how many times I might say ‘ishem mizvat tzitziot’ during the sewing, this is beyond pasul. I don’t know if after doing this I should recuse myself from the temple, if I would become unworthy…”

  “Then I have one solution,” said David. “Let me do the sewing. If we prevail, when this is over and we go back, you shall decide if I am allowed to be a member of your congregation. In fact, even so, we won’t need not tell anyone about this…irregularity?”

  “Are you kidding me? If we tell anyone about this, we will be locked in an asylum!” admitted Haim.

  “Well, we soon will be within the timeframe Sól has established. And we know how to collect the stones. Now, has anyone any idea whether exactly when we do it does, or not, matter—as long as it is around that date? Do we even know what precisely will happen on the anniversary of Kidinnu’s death, 2349 years ago?” asked Siegfried.

  “Were I in my youthful kabalistic days,” admitted the Countess, blushing a bit, “I would say the 2 over 3 equals many times the Devil’s number; and 4 over 9 is many times the four fours, the number which in Chinese is seen as Death, and the number of tzizit in each of the four corners of your tallit, divided by the number of arms of the Hanukkah menorah, the hannukiah. Could it be that, if we do not do this before the anniversary of Kidinnu’s assassination, whatever Votre Majesté’s blood-child might want to achieve, would indeed come to pass?” said the Countess, looking at Conrad, and blushing again.

  “This was my fear,” admitted Sól. “But I didn’t want to create more concern than necessary, at least until I could be sure.”

  “Well, in that case, let’s ready the lasers. You can call Mircea, Severian. He went scouting, surveying the castle’s surroundings for unwanted visitors—and also to feed. By now, he should be satiated and nearby,” said Conrad.

  “In the meantime, let me go read again a few lines on the gold plate,” exclaimed Sól, waving her index. “I have an idea. Sieg, can you help me? We might be able to start even tonight, but I’m not totally sure. In the meantime, any ideas on how to get to the Ark?”

  “While Sól and Siegfried check the plate and the cylinder, and Severian gets a hold of Mircea, and Tony prepares the hacking of all those surveillance systems, is there anything else we can do to advance our preparations to recover the Ark?” asked the Countess.

  “Well,” said Conrad. “You helped your late husband, and your son, and even your father prepare for all sorts of digs, didn’t you, Votre Grâce?”

  “Of course,” replied the Countess. “But I am a diplomat, not an archaeologist.”

  “Indeed. However, you have also have visited Chartres many, many times—haven’t you?” asked Conrad, a little mischievous smile dancing in his lips.

  “Yes, indeed I have! I am very devout of the Holy Virgin Mary. So, what can I do to help?” admitted the Countess, pouring herself a flute of pastis, the Provençale anise liqueur par excellence, on the rocks.

  “I believe it’s now time we discuss my plan. I was withholding this, because the least you all know, the lesser the chance my misguided blood-son could ‘bludgeon’ your minds trying to extract knowledge from them, in ways that might cause irreversible damage, but…like you say in French, soit!” agreed Conrad.

  “If you need to discuss Chartres,” added the Countess, “perhaps…there is someone at the castle whom I’ve kept away from our guests for a few days—not so much because of her being a bit of a nymphomaniac, but because of her insolence—yet, someone who can help.

  One our maids —Irène— is originally from Chartres. She’s extremely professional as a maid, impeccably honest as regards never taking a toothpick that isn’t hers, and she was once a tour guide…”

  “Well, you could call her a few times to replenish the water in my glass. Water I can drink in rather substantial amounts—no lemon juice, no lemon wedges, just cold water please,” agreed Conrad. “While we talk, if her mind springs better ideas I would read them, then clear her memories at the end of our conversation. That way, we can see if we could find something useful…discretely.”

  “Then, I will. I hope Votre Majesté doesn’t mind me saying this…but…because she’s so constantly horny, and since you are not exactly ugly, she might unashamedly ogle your nether regions. Please don’t be offended,” warned the Countess.

  Conrad could not contain a stentorious belly laugh. Turning red as well-done lobster, Countess Chloé started laughing as well. Then the whole room was a concert of laughs and repressed laughs for a little while. Only once that storm passed did the Countess call Pierre, and gossiped something to his ear. Moments later, the mise-en-scène was ready and the play began.

  As soon as they were within Irène’s earshot, the conversation started: “Since it is buried near rue Muret, under the Palais de Justice, the most direct approach would be through the Parc André Gagnon,” Conrad began as Irène poured him a large tapered glass of cold water, zeroing on his crotch. “However, there is no place there where such an excavation could be carried out inconspicuously.

  However, there is another way. Thibault le Tricheur built a castle, first of wood, then a kee
p of stone, square—a keep rarely used by Thibault’s descendants.”

  “Yes!” jumped Irène, “It was a square tower, three stories high, with terraced gardens…”

  “Merci, Irène. C’est tout pour l’instant!” said the Countess dryly, dismissing her.

  “Thibault de Blois,” continued Conrad impassibly, “became count of Blois in 960, and, soon after, added Chartres and Châteaudun to his lands. The title of Count of Blois stayed in the family until 1286, when it all became part of the Domaine Royale.”

  “Yes,” added the Countess. “In 1528 it became a duchy and in 1661 the dukes become princes of the House of Orléans. In the meantime, the keep deteriorated and was partly demolished in 1587…”

  “Correct,” agreed Conrad. “And in the XVIII century, the municipality of Chartres became owner of the building. During the French Revolution it became a prison, then an abattoir, a prison again; and, in 1836, the last traces of the building disappeared.”

  “Exactly. The keep was situated where the Place Billard is now…” added the Countess.

  “Another site where inconspicuous excavation is not an option. But…”

  “But…?”

  “But there is a tunnel under the city, deep under Chartres, below some of the Gallic ruins the Chartrains are constantly digging up. In fact, there are two tunnels: one goes from the old Porte Saint-Jean-en-Vallée, under the Cathédrale de Notre Dame, to the base of the keep; and from there, to the Abbey of Saint–Pierre; and, from there, to the proximity of the Pont Saint-Père. The idea had been to continue to the Porte Morand—but there were leaks from the Eure, which in hot summers can be very low, but almost doubles its flow from August to February. So, the tunnel slopes towards the bridge enough to prevent flooding.”

  “Pardon, Votre Majesté,” interrupted the Countess, “do you know who built those tunnels and what for?”

  “Some tunnels were built so people taking shelter in the keep could escape the city in extremis, providing two alternative routes to do so. The Templars used them to hide some treasure, and part of that treasure, is…” he stopped, sensing Irène coming to refill his glass. He blinked to the Countess.