FIFTY-FIVE
Jess stepped out of the stone tower and swung her flashlight all around.
There was no sign of the assailant who had attacked Lyle and Marano, but the bodies were everywhere. Each one bound in a blanket, clutching a gold book.
Ironwood was in heaven. “The Mycenaeans had books like this,” he said reverently. “Gold sheets with writing and illustrations hammered in. I think there are exactly two known to exist.” He shone his flashlight over at Jess, kneeling by a body. “Unless your people have more squirreled away.”
“Three or four,” she said, “but nothing like this.”
David knelt beside her, examining one of the books. “The symbols in it, they’re like the ones on the door and the disk. And look at this . . .” He showed her a page with a distinctive pattern. “Recognize it?”
She did. “The Southern Cross.”
“So they’re star maps or astronomy texts.”
“Or navigation charts.” Ironwood sounded struck with wonder. “They sailed the world, and this is how they did it.”
David retrieved the two flashlights Lyle had thrown, then began taking photographs, walking from one body to the next. “Jess, you think they were buried here?”
Other than the blankets, she saw no sign of funerary preparations.
“I think they died here, in place.”
“All of them? At the same time?” Ironwood was intrigued.
Once again Jess wished her family’s longtime rival weren’t here. “I don’t know. Maybe they all drank hemlock. Maybe volcanic fumes filled this cavern. Maybe they all just froze to death.”
David directed one of the recovered flashlights at the stone path that ran through the center of the cavern. It was edged by braziers on either side. “I wonder if these people had anything to do with where this path goes.”
Jess tapped her watch, making the display light up. “We’ve got two hours. Half an hour to get back to the surface with as many of these books as we can carry. An hour to get out of bombing range.”
“That gives us thirty minutes down here,” David said.
“Forty-five if we move it,” Ironwood said.
They began to walk quickly along the path. It followed the curve of the cavern floor, but smoothly. Here the stones were set on the diagonal, though, in a diamond pattern, different from the style used in the corridors above them, and in the temples.
“They must have rolled something along here, a lot,” David said. “Look at all the grooves.”
Jess saw them. “Were there wheeled carts in any of the murals?”
“They’re not wheel tracks,” Ironwood said. “They’re not contiguous. It’s like they dragged something a bit, picked it up, dragged it again.”
Jess thought of the worn paths in the floor stones of the Shrine of Turus. How many generations of defenders had followed that path? Of all those generations, how was it that she became the first defender to follow this path into . . . what?”
“Hold it.” David stopped abruptly. “Lyle said he thought he got the guy.”
Jess and Ironwood converged their flashlight beams on David’s, and Jess saw the drops of fresh blood on the stones.
“Winged him, maybe,” Ironwood said, “but he’s still out there.”
As one, they all switched off their flashlights, listened.
No sound, but ahead of them . . .
“Do you see that?” David whispered. “Something flashing . . .”
“A flashlight?” Ironwood said.
“It’s like someone’s swinging it.”
David switched on his flashlight. “If he’s busy, maybe he won’t notice us.”
Still bodies all around them, they pressed on.
The cavern ended in a solid wall of blank rock, but in its center were set two tall gleaming metal panels, each twelve feet high, eight feet across, flanked by braziers larger than the ones that edged the stone path.
“Can you imagine what this looked like with those things lit?” David said.
Ironwood ran his flashlight over a brazier. “We should take wood or charcoal from them. For carbon dating.”
Jess was searching for any sign of Lyle’s shooter. They’d found more blood on the path, but not enough to think he’d be dropping soon. A few minutes earlier, the odd moving light that might have been a swinging flashlight had stopped.
“Is that what was flashing?” David asked.
Jess saw what he saw, felt her pulse race.
Ironwood recognized it, too. “Your cross again, Jessica.”
Centered low on the two metal panels was the sign of her family, as in the murals in the halls above. Once again it was a simple Tuareg cross. This cross, though, was polished gold, at least a meter high and almost as wide, perfectly symmetrical, mounted on a golden rail that fit into brackets on the metal panels.
Jess felt the power of the moment, but she was tormented by new questions she couldn’t answer. Why was this built? What does that cross mean? Is this where the First Gods arose? Is this the White Island they left us for? She turned from the sign of her family to David beside her. Looked up at his face, glowing gold on one side, deeply shadowed on the other.
Suddenly she saw another face.
The Shrine of Turus. The carved figure of the male. That eerie, skeletal face wasn’t the product of uneven erosion. It was the face of the bodies on the floor here. Dark and narrow, the nose flat, the cheekbones . . .
“David . . .” She reached out to place her fingers lightly on his cheek, in wonder. “You’re not descended from my family.”
He looked at her, confused, but not shying from her touch. “We know that, Jess. You said you got the test results.”
“You’re—”
A harsh voice shouted from the shadows. “Hands high!”
“Perfect,” Merrit said as he limped from behind a towering brazier, his bloodied left hand shoved under his right armpit, his bloodied right hand holding his Browning 9 mm. “You’re all working together now?”
Ironwood stepped forward. “Merrit, you know this isn’t necessary.”
“Don’t tempt me, old man. There’s only one reason why I don’t take care of you right now—that cross.”
“What about it?” Jess said.
“You know how much McCleary and Rodrigues will pay for that? It’s my retirement bonus.”
Jess stared at him. The man who’d killed Florian in Polynesia was now working for Andrew and Su-Lin—for the Family.
“I’ll double the price,” Ironwood said.
“No sale. You cut me off, remember?”
“You left my son for dead.”
“His own damn fault. The only reason the MacCleirighs were in Cornwall was because J.R. told them where to go!”
“That’s a lie!” Ironwood jerked forward, and Merrit raised his gun to point directly at his head.
“Junior’s been in their pocket since he let slip where the Indian temple was.”
Ironwood turned to Jess, his cheeks high with color. “Is that true?”
“I know our security people tried to find sources. I don’t know if your son was one of them.”
“He was.” Merrit’s laugh was short and cruel. “First time was when he got drunk in the wrong bar. After that, he kept telling them whatever they wanted to know because he thought you’d kill him if you found out he was behind you losing control of the site in India.”
“I’d never do that.”
“No argument. That’d be my job.”
Jess saw the look of anguish and betrayal that swept over Ironwood.
“He said you came close to it once,” Merrit added. “After the accident when he killed your wife.”
“It wasn’t his fault! I love my son . . . I’d never kill anyone . . . I never told you to kill anyone!” Ironwood’s voice shook with such indignation that, for the first time ever, Jess believed him. Though she wasn’t sure she could ever forgive him.
“ ‘Do whatever it takes’ is what you
said. So I did.” Merrit wiped his hand across his face; the gesture left a smear of blood.
Jess’s eyes went to his left side, above his waist. Merrit’s white parka was stained there, and there was a bullet hole. Lyle had shot him.
“None of this is worth a life, Merrit.”
“Keep thinking that,” Merrit said. “So you’ll do as I say, and no one will be hurt.”
“What do you want us to do?” Jess heard David quietly ask. Her attention was fixed on Merrit’s hands . . . both of them were bloody. Injured?
“Take down that cross, carry it up top for me, I let you all go.”
“Okay.” David shot a glance at Jess. She understood. If they cooperated, there was at least a chance to get aboveground before the bombing raid began.
Ironwood knew better. “He’ll kill us when we’re finished.”
“I believe he’ll kill us now, if we don’t start,” Jess said.
Hands held high, the three of them approached the cross.
As David and Ironwood began looking for some way to lift the golden sculpture, Jess blanched as a sudden memory flashed into her consciousness. “Don’t touch it!”
They stopped, looked at her, surprised.
“That support beam it’s on, it’s got sharp blades underneath.”
David crouched down, shone his flashlight up, whistled. “How’d you know?”
Jess made a fist, remembering the heavy iron latch on the doors to the shrine. “I’ve seen one just like it.”
“Smart girl.” Merrit was standing beside her, gun in hand.
“You already tried it,” Jess said. “You wanted us to be hurt.” His next words told her she was right.
“More than one way to do that.” Then, before she could react, Merrit slammed his Browning against her face.
Jess had only a glimpse of David as he reacted at once, jumping at Merrit, only to be pistol-whipped himself, thrown back against the metal panels.
She saw Merrit edge back, limping, favoring one foot.
She struggled to regain her footing. His ankle’s sprained. She filed the thought.
Now Ironwood confronted Merrit.
“Go ahead,” Merrit said. “Try something.”
“Not much of a loss for me, you know. I get out of this alive, tomorrow they send me to prison for life.”
“You’re breaking my heart.”
“Just explaining I’ve got nothing to lose down here.”
Merrit gestured with his gun. “Take down that cross or you won’t even see jail.”
David was on his feet again. He looked at Jess, who nodded back at him, her hand going to the cross she’d given him and he’d returned.
“I’ve got a better idea,” David said. He stepped away from the metal panel, and Merrit swung his gun from Ironwood to cover him.
Jess dropped her knife into her hand and charged.
Merrit swung back to her too late. He fired, but his aim was high as she dove in low, slashing upward, her blade tangling in his open parka so her momentum twisted them around and they fell, without her knife making contact.
They rolled from the stone path and hit the side of a brazier. Merrit fought to bring his gun down to her as she fought in turn to raise her knife up to him. Each time David or Ironwood tried to come near, Merrit fired his weapon and they were forced to jump back.
Then . . . Merrit rocked one final time and wrenched her hand to make her drop the knife, and with one more roll he was on top of her shouting at David and Ironwood to stay back as he pressed his gun to her temple.
“Interfere and I’ll shoot her now.”
Jess gasped for breath as Merrit kneeled on top of her, the gun barrel painful, the thought of defeat unbearable.
Merrit grinned at her fiercely. “Give up.”
“Never.”
“Good.” He pulled the trigger and—
Only one thing pierced Jess’s pain and filled her vision: the antique silver Tuareg cross that dangled above her from the chain around Merrit’s neck.
—the gun clicked empty.
Merrit hesitated. Jess didn’t.
Seconds later, David and Ironwood pulled Merrit from Jess, but by then his throat had already yawned open, ripped by the blade she’d pulled from the cross he’d worn.
Florian’s.
Merrit flailed like a swimmer dragged down into a dark and endless sea. He struggled to speak, but whatever words were to be his last were lost. Then he stilled, his hot blood steaming in the cold.
“Good,” Jess said.
There was only one thing left to do.
FIFTY-SIX
Jess took Florian’s cross and chain from Merrit’s body, slipped the blade back into place, then wore it as she was meant to.
David touched her arm. “Jess . . .”
She tapped her watch. “We still don’t know what this place is, why it was important.”
Ironwood gave her a quick look of concerned assessment. “How would we even know where to start to look for answers?”
“We already do,” Jess said. Nothing, and no one, could stop her now from learning what she’d come here for. She was a defender. She’d promised. “These metal panels—they aren’t panels. They’re doors. We need to see what’s on the other side.”
Together, Jess and David and Ironwood, using their parkas as pads, lifted the heavy golden cross from the latch brackets.
The metal doors were much heavier than the ones in the upper corridor. It took the three of them pushing as hard as they could to force one side open enough to squeeze through.
This time no one disputed who should go first.
Once beyond those doors, Jess stood still, letting her flashlight reveal all that was before her as understanding grew within her.
It was a Chamber of Heaven . . . and it was huge.
David eased through after Jess, his flashlight joining hers, and he saw what she saw.
The room was circular, but five times the size of the one in Cornwall, well over a hundred feet across. On the encircling wall was a sculpted relief map, so large it was hard for any of them to comprehend its details, given the small sections each flashlight beam could reveal.
In the center, in place of a table, rose a circular tier of carved stone shelves. Most were empty, but several were still filled with even more gold books, enough that all the people whose bodies lay outside could each have taken one and still left these behind.
Ironwood was awestruck. “It’s some kind of library.”
“David, it’s like the Shop,” Jess said. “A safe place. Perhaps the safest they could find to store all the knowledge they’d accumulated.”
“We still have to get out before we’re sealed in. Or we’ll be like those bodies out there.” David stopped. There was that look on Jess’s face again. The one she’d had just before Merrit had surprised them, when she’d reached out to touch his face and . . . “What did you want to tell me out there, about my not being descended from your family?”
“You’re descended from them,” Jess said. She glanced around for Ironwood, but he’d walked far enough away that he wouldn’t hear what she said next. “The people who died out there, holding books . . .” She shook her head. “Holding books instead of each other because knowledge was the most important thing they had.”
David still didn’t understand.
“Those people out there, they’re the First Gods. They have to be. Their civilization started here. How, I don’t know. Maybe we’ll never know. But they’re the ones who built the ships that crossed the oceans. They built the temples around the world. And wherever they went, they’re the ones who taught the people they found all that they knew.”
She stepped back from him. “That’s how your genetic anomalies appeared in different populations all at the same time around the world. Just like agriculture, and writing, and astronomy.” She shook her head at the thought. “Ironwood was right. There was interbreeding—but not between humans and aliens. Between humans and your famil
y.”
David was startled as Jess then bowed her head and knelt before him. “Child of the First Gods, I am your defender. As predicted by the Traditions, the Promise is fulfilled. You did come back. To me.”
“No, Jess. We’re just you and me.” David took her hands and brought her to her feet, unnerved by the sudden irrational hope that she might be right. Is this the answer to my mystery?
Looking quickly to see if Ironwood had noticed—luckily the man was rapt before the shelves of books—David continued holding Jess’s hands, trying to make her, and himself, see reason. “There’s no way we can know anything like that yet. Even if you’re right and those bodies share my anomalies, we won’t know until we run tests, lots of tests.”
Tests that take time, he thought. Time I don’t have.
David forced himself to go on. “Even if I do have some trace of these people in me . . . it doesn’t make me special. There’s a price.”
He knew it was time she knew the truth about him.
“Jess, in one way I am like those people out there. I’m dying, too. I don’t know why or even how it’ll happen, but I do know when. Those clusters I found, those people whose genes share my nonhuman markers—maybe from the genes of the people out there—none of us has lived to reach twenty-seven. I’m going to hit the threshold age in a few more days and then . . . it’s like a countdown. I won’t make it more than five months.”
Ironwood came back, and David reluctantly let go of Jess. “You two want to know where these books came from? Or where this map came from? This map that doesn’t show any world I happen to know about.”
“It’s upside down,” David said. He looked at Jess, and she was still staring at him. “North’s at the bottom, south’s at the top. Then it makes sense.”
“It’s more than that, Dave! They’ve put Antarctica in the center of the thing, with all the other continents stretched around it.”
At that Jess, as well as David, trained a flashlight on the section of the map that baffled Ironwood.
“What do you call that?” he demanded.
“Antarctica,” Jess said.
“But it’s two islands.”
David stated the obvious. “Antarctica without ice. But that would be . . . Jess? How long ago?”
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