The Oracle Code (Thomas Lourds, Book 4)
Page 8
Boris felt certain the writing went back to first century AD. And it gave him hope that he might uncover something extraordinary. As to the identity of the foreigner, the text had said that the man was from the country of tall people.
Macedon was an abridgement of the Greek word makednos and the Indo-European root mak. Both of those, as Lourds had explained, confirming what Boris already knew, meant tall, long, slender, or highlander. Or all of those things.
And now, here he was, at a crossroads.
“Maybe we should go back. Whatever was left here might have gotten taken a long time ago. This thing the delivery guy brought here a couple thousand years ago, it could have been stolen.”
Boris looked at the young man.
Evan folded his arms and looked sullen. “I’m just saying, is all.”
“We’ll go back soon,” Boris said. “We have three passageways ahead of us. The text translation suggests that the cargo was delivered here. Pick one of those passageways, we’ll explore, then we’ll go back to camp.”
“Cool.” Evan pointed. “The one on the right.”
“Of course.” Boris promptly started down the one on the left. Boris had heard so many inaccuracies from the young intern that he’d felt more certain choosing the opposite.
***
A quarter mile farther down the tunnel, the distance measured by the Leica 764558 Laser Distance Meter that Boris had bought when he’d received his new funding and which he used religiously, the tunnel came to an end in a pile of fallen rock.
Boris sighed in frustration. The new passageway had borne tool markings, and he’d grown hopeful that there would be something to show for his time and effort.
Evan summed up their experience in one word. “Bummer.”
Boris turned to shoot the younger man a baleful glare but stopped as something in the ceiling gleamed. He lost the gleam as his flashlight swept the passageway. Slowly, he brought the flashlight back around in what he hoped was the same kind of arc.
Boris’s flashlight beam cut across the bright surface again.
Evan leaned against a wall. His backpack thumped against the stone, and it sounded hollow. He stepped away from the wall in surprise. At the same time, Boris spotted the flash again. He trained his flashlight on the shiny sliver and knelt. His fingers picked at the thin, uneven edge he found there.
Evan knelt beside him. “What is it?”
“It looks like a coin.”
“Someone dropped a penny in the wall?”
“I don’t know.” Boris pulled the messenger bag strap over his head and placed it beside him. Rummaging inside, he took out a small rock pick and banged at the wall around the coin. The stone was surprisingly soft and gave way at once.
A moment later, the silver coin tumbled to the floor.
Awed by what he saw before him, Boris put the pick aside and picked up the coin. The silver coin was about the size of a dime and bore the profile of a man wearing a tight-fitting helm. On the other side, a man seated on a chair held out his hand and clutched a spear in the other.
“What is that?” Evan peered over Boris’s shoulder.
Exasperated, Boris turned on the young man. “If you’re going to create a game that is going to hold the attention of a world of gamers and you’re going to use your knowledge of history to do it, you should know what a drachma is.”
“I know what a drachma is.”
“What?”
“A Greek coin. Percy Jackson uses them to call the Greek gods.”
“What?” Boris couldn’t believe his ears. Then he held up his hands. “Never mind.” He picked up his messenger bag, took out a ziplock baggie, and dropped the coin into it. “For your information, that drachma is a coin minted in the time of Alexander the Great. You do know who that is, don’t you?”
“Of course. King of Macedon.” Evan had slumped back into sullen.
“Stand back over there. Out of the way. And hold that flashlight on this wall.”
Evan moved back and held the flashlight steady.
Excited again, Boris attacked the wall with the pick. “You see, Evan? This isn’t real stone. Under normal circumstances, and by that, I mean torchlight or candlelight from centuries ago, the false nature of this wall would have escaped notice.” He struck the wall hard enough to make his hand ache and his arm vibrate. Stone chips flew, and a few blows later, he broke through.
Breathing hard, pulse thrumming within him, Boris switched the pick for his flashlight. He stared through the fist-sized hole he’d broken through the wall.
“My god.” His voice was a hoarse whisper.
On the other side of the wall was a tomb. And in the tomb was a stone sarcophagus that bore a sword and shield. On the floor in front of it was a chest plate. Spears stood against the wall.
With renewed vigor, Boris put down the flashlight, took a fresh grip on the pick, and attacked the wall.
12
Kabul International Airport
Kabul, Afghanistan
February 13, 2013
Thomas Lourds deplaned in Kabul, made it through customs without a hitch, and started for baggage claim. He hadn’t made it twenty feet past the checkpoint when he spotted Layla standing next to the wall.
She looked a lot different in Afghanistan than she did when they were in London or Rome or New York. They’d arranged to meet in all those places when her work had taken her there and Lourds could get away.
In Afghanistan, Layla observed more of the customs. She wore a black-and-white-print hijab that covered her head and circled her neck. She honored the traditions, but she did so with her own flair at the same time. The loose-fitting jelbab, the outer cloak, offered no hint of the beautiful body that lay beneath it.
Lourds had seen her in a black evening dress, a bikini, and in the altogether. He didn’t care how she was dressed. She was lovely. For a moment, he just stood there—ignoring traffic—and drinking in the sight of her.
Then she glanced in his direction and saw him. She came across the floor to meet him, and he went to her. When he reached her, she turned and headed to baggage claim with him.
Not being able to hug her or kiss her bothered Lourds deeply, but he knew in Afghanistan, such actions could get her killed. Women still lived tightly regimented lives in the country, which was one of the missions Layla had undertaken to change.
But the change had to come gradually.
“Good evening, Thomas.”
Local time was eight thirty-seven.
“Good evening.” Lourds was used to the stiff, formal greeting. It was a learned behavior while they were in country.
“I trust your flight went well?”
“It did. Thank you.”
“I do wish you hadn’t come here unannounced.”
Lourds grinned ruefully at that. “Since you were waiting at the airport for me, I would hardly say my arrival was unannounced.”
“I talked to Tina.”
“How did you manage that?”
“I called your office. She answered. She seems like a delightful girl.”
“Young lady, actually. An adjunct at the university. She’s taking over my classes while I’m visiting you.”
“That’s very nice.”
“It was.”
“About the visit...”
“Yes?”
“I was unprepared for it.”
The flat statement didn’t hurt Lourds’s feelings. One of the things he most treasured about Layla was her ability to say exactly what was on her mind. “I’m sorry.”
“It is not you. It is me. I should have remembered Valentine’s Day and that you might be tempted to do something special.”
Lourds hadn’t even been able to send flowers because of the culture. Neither he nor Layla wanted to run the risk of some kind of retaliation for her behavior. Trying to manage the Islam rules was proving more difficult than he would have thought.
“You’re right, Valentine’s Day is tomorrow. I thought maybe we could g
et away. Maybe to Bucharest or to Istanbul. Either one of those places is less than five hours away by plane.”
“It is a very pleasant thought, but tomorrow is a Thursday. That is a workday for me, and I have booked it solid, I’m afraid. In fact, I had to work hard to get off in time to meet your plane here.”
The drive from Kandahar to Kabul was over three hundred miles. There were no available hotels in Kandahar, and large pockets of the city remained without electricity.
“You didn’t have to do that.”
“Nonsense. I care about you deeply. I didn’t want to leave you unattended and unwelcomed.”
“Well, I thank you for that. Perhaps we could have dinner tomorrow evening.”
Layla looked at him with sad, dark eyes. “I wish I could do so, but I have been booked into a fundraiser.”
Lourds refused to be crushed by the distressing news. “Perhaps I could crash the fundraiser.”
“I do not think that would be a wise idea. You would be a distraction.”
“Surely I’m more than a distraction.”
She smiled at him. “You are more than a distraction. And when I get you to your hotel, I’ll show you how distracting you can be.”
Lourds grinned. “We can skip baggage. I’ll have my luggage delivered.”
“I won’t hear of it. We’ll get your things.”
***
When they arrived at the Kabul Serena Hotel, twenty minutes from the airport, Lourds confirmed his reservation and accepted his room key. Layla stood apart from him and didn’t speak. They took the elevator up to the second floor, then slipped into his room.
Once inside, they didn’t waste time on words. He reached for her, and she was in his arms. He hadn’t seen her since Christmas, and for a moment, he just held her, feeling her warm body against his, smelling the shampoo that filtered through the hijab, and hearing her breathing in his ear.
Then the clothes came off, and Layla became his again.
***
Afterwards in bed, Lourds lay on his back and wondered at how being with her made him feel. There was a completeness that he had never experienced before and a calm that fell over him. He thought about the ring in his pants pocket, but he knew he didn’t want to have that discussion now. Having it on Valentine’s Day was apparently out of the question. With everything Layla had planned, he didn’t want to disrupt everything she was balancing.
She lay at his side with an arm across his chest, holding him tightly.
“I am sorry that I cannot be there for you on Valentine’s Day.” She spoke softly.
“It’ll be all right.”
“Yes, it will. I will have some time this weekend, I think.”
“Good.”
“Tina said you will be returning to the university next week?”
“That’s right.”
Layla sighed. “Timing is such a problem.”
“We knew that going into this. We’re both busy people. A relationship like this, you have to work at it.”
“I know. The fact that you’re willing to do so means a lot to me.”
Lourds kissed her tender lips. “You mean a lot to me.”
She smiled and snuggled against him. “As you do to me.” She yawned. “Excuse me. I have been really tired of late.”
“That long drive probably didn’t help.”
“No, and I have to make it again in the morning.”
“I could drive you. Let you sleep on the way back.”
“No. That would cause complications if we were seen. It would be better if you found something to do until we can be together again. I’m afraid I won’t be able to see you until the weekend.”
“All right.”
“I’m sorry, Thomas, that your Valentine’s Day is not going to be as perfect as you had planned.”
“It’s fine. It’ll be fine. I’m sure I can find something to do. I’m in a city that’s thousands of years old. I’m sure there’s some part of it I haven’t seen.”
“I do wish things were different, but they are not.”
“I understand.” Lourds did understand, but he didn’t like the situation either. Perhaps once they were married, things would be different. He looked forward to that. For a moment, he thought about getting the ring, showing it to her, and asking her to marry him right then and there.
But he didn’t. Instead, he felt her soft breath against his bare chest and knew that she was asleep. He closed his eyes and just held her.
13
Tverskaya Street
Moscow, Russia
Russian Federation
February 13, 2013
“You do not look like you are having a good time.”
Blearily, through a vodka-fueled haze, Colonel Sergay Linko stared at the young woman before him. She was beautiful in the way that young women always were when they took care of themselves. She exercised and kept her body fit, but her hair was too brunette, with a blue and white streak on the right side. The artificial green of her eyes told him she was wearing cosmetic contact lenses. She wore a dark red dress, almost the color of blood. She spoke English with a Russian accent. Evidently, she’d thought he was American.
She believed that because his suit was too good to be a Russian suit. In truth, he had gotten it from a black market dealer. The suit was dark, fashionable. Not like some of the colorful rags other men in the nightclub wore.
The crowd around them moved with the basso beat of the heavy metal rock music thundering through the speakers. Huge wallscreens showed snippets of video footage of the patrons. When the men and women saw themselves on the screens, they waved in triumph, like they had instantly become famous.
It was ludicrous. Linko only came to the bar to pick up women and to hate the New Russians even more than he already did.
“Are you shy?” The young woman smiled at him.
Linko knew he was an attractive man, but at thirty-six, he was almost twice her age. He was dark and virile, and he kept himself in tip-top shape with regular visits to the gym and to martial arts dojos. He was a soldier, but more than that, he was a survivor. He carried scars from Chechnya. He stood a little over six feet tall and was well built. He kept his black hair cut short and had a permanent five o’clock shadow that allowed him to look Middle Eastern when he needed to. As a colonel in the FSB, sometimes missions carried him into the satellite countries that had once been under Russian rule.
“No. I’m not shy.”
The woman came over to him and bit her lower lip. Perhaps she had seen this in an American movie and thought it was sexy. Perhaps she believed all American men loved women who bit their lower lips in such a way.
It was attractive, but Linko was no fool. The woman was here for a reason.
He had left enemies in Chechnya, and there were more in the Middle East and the satellite countries. People who knew him, who knew what he truly did under the cover of the FSB, feared him. He was a ghost, a man who could do the impossible, get into fortified places and kill those marked for death.
In the past eight years, he had slain forty-three targets. He kept count, and he remembered their faces, how they had been afraid and begged for their lives at the end.
Linko knew he’d gotten too good at the killing though. His superiors used him as a small, tactical nuclear device, but they were wary of him at the same time. It was regrettable because he had surely risen as far in rank as he could under the circumstances.
“That’s too bad.” The woman bit her lip again. “I like shy men.”
Scanning the crowd over the woman’s shoulder, Linko spotted the two men watching her. Both of them wore loose clothing and weren’t lost in the bar’s party atmosphere. They were working, hounds preparing to meet the fox.
Linko smiled. They were bearding no fox. They were on the trail of a true Russian bear.
“You have a nice smile. You should smile more often.” Boldly, she seized his glass and drank the rest of his vodka.
“Perhaps I will.”
Linko gave a show of hesitation, but he knew he was going to go. The young woman and her friends were what he had been needing to break the restlessness that gripped him between missions. He was used to being in play, used to chasing or being chased. Downtime did not agree with him.
His cell phone vibrated in his pocket. When he checked the phone, the woman’s smile faltered a little. No doubt, she was thinking she was about to lose her prey. Nervously, she glanced back at the two men. She lacked professionalism, but the men did not appear to notice her. They were holding to their covers.
Linko’s estimation of them went up, and excitement climbed within him. He had thought they were merely street thugs. Evidently, they were more experienced than he’d thought. That was promising.
The caller ID on his phone showed NO DATA. That was curious because no one had this number.
He punched the button and held the phone to his face. “Yes.”
“Colonel Linko?”
“Yes.”
“This is Mikhail Nevsky.”
The world tilted crazily around Linko. In all his years with the FSB, a Russian president had never contacted him. He had acted on their orders several times, to be sure, but never direct contact.
Paranoia gripped him, and he at first believed he was being set up. But that was foolish. There was no reason to do such a thing.
“I trust you know who I am?”
“Yes. Of course.” Linko wasn’t certain if the president was joking or truly making certain that he knew who he was.
“I have a task I need you to perform. One that must be done quickly and quietly.”
“Of course.”
“I have made arrangements for you on a charter plane to Herat, Afghanistan. Once there, I want you to find a man named Boris Glukov. I will send you further instructions at that point.”