by James, Aiden
“Nah, it’s just nice to know I can go back to that here, if I’d like. Provided I don’t have to take any bullshit from you or Roderick about it.” He laughed.
“I think we can all be happy here,” I said, chuckling along with him. “Happier here than anywhere else, I believe.”
My words proved prophetic. For the next two months, more and more fortuitous moments happened—enough to where even Amy and Alistair grew grateful for the decision to come to Sedona. They quickly fell in love with the place. In fact, they were the ones who discovered a small ranch just outside of town that we purchased in September. Amy had long been fond of horses, and in many ways, the ranch seemed to be a dream come true for her. A fulfillment of her parents’ ambitions, as she revealed to us. Meanwhile, Alistair’s lone desire was to be happy with Amy. The ranch potentially took care of one-third of our group’s contentment.
Roderick and I liked the thirty-two acres of seclusion, realistically hoping to avoid mortal nuisances like our CIA cronies, whom we’d just as soon never see or hear from again. Beatrice loved the late-nineteenth century craftsmanship that went into the construction of the main house on the property, which likely ensured her continued happiness. She had spent a great deal of time studying up on the history of Alistair’s condo in D.C., and the ranch’s history gave her something to look forward to each day.
That left Cedric, who might’ve missed his big city life. However, once he was introduced to the mystic circuit in the city, he launched himself into a tour of checking out as many mediums, psychics, and Tarot card readers as he could fit into each week from the thousands who came to Sedona to strut their stuff. His was the most worrisome situation among us, as obviously he still struggled in coming to terms with what he experienced in Bolivia.
Having witnessed the violent overthrow of a nation that had survived for many hundreds—if not thousands—of years, did he suffer from a malady akin to post war traumatic syndrome? I worried he did, wondering if someday he’d prove to be a liability when our inevitable face-to-face confrontation with Lazarevic took place.
“Leave him to the soothsayers and witches, Judas,” Roderick told me one afternoon, as we watched him leave by taxi for his latest foray into understanding the unknown. “Perhaps there will be enough time for his perspective to click back in place.”
“You think it will be that simple?”
“Maybe.”
“You know what it could mean if he cracks and we’re in a heated confrontation with the Hungarian?”
Roderick chuckled, but it wasn’t from amusement. “Let’s pray it doesn’t come to that.”
It did seem best to focus on the things we could control, though I worried a confrontation between us and Cedric was on the horizon. Admittedly, Sedona seemed to have an inordinate amount of self-described mystics. Whereas Cedric approached the scene as a prospector panning for gold, Roderick believed the ‘new thinking trends’ were horseshit and magnets for all kinds of skullduggery.
It brought to mind a recent conversation I had with Cedric, where I pressed him for details concerning the terrible fall of Patiti. “You don’t want to know, William,” he advised, the light in his eyes dimming. “Lebanon, Croatia, Afghanistan… were nothing compared to watching hordes of demons—creatures all of us would deem as pure fantasy—tear human beings from limb to limb, and devour them like you and I once tore through a double order of crab legs at Joe’s back in the day. Even seeing the agency photographs of Darfur can’t compare to seeing a city of millions decimated so brutally. Harvested like cattle moving through a slaughterhouse.”
He didn’t need to go on to make his point, and I nodded thoughtfully while watching him blow imaginary smoke rings above our heads. Having given up his beloved slim cigars for nearly a year, could this latest crisis be the incident to break his resolve?
I should’ve known then my own illusions of escaping recent horrors I witnessed were just as foolhardy. Roderick and I were forced to watch Dracul’s bloodlust, leaving fresh images to compound similar events we experienced down through the centuries. Dracul was dead, but the animator behind this monster was alive and well, and biding his time.
When it finally happened, I was surprised by how it hit me. The prolonged tension didn’t resolve itself in a sense of relief. Rather, when the familiar token from Krontos Lazaveric appeared on the rustic living room mantel one evening, it brought a feeling of condemnation. Like the final lost appeal of a death row inmate, the mood was somber as Roderick stepped up to the mantel and lifted the object from its perch. A rose, clandestinely delivered exactly ten days before Halloween.
“Hmmm… purple this time,” he said softly. “A tribute to his delusion as the sovereign ruler of the physical world?”
“More like arrogant prick!” Alistair seethed. His bravado quickly became muted, and he warily looked around the room while pulling Amy closer.
“Arrogant? Maybe. But that’s not the message,” I said, moving to Roderick’s side to take a closer look. “Purple roses primarily stand for enchantment and the fulfillment of wishes. If I were to hazard a guess, this signals Krontos’ determination to obtain the Dragon Coin—what he considers to be his prized possession. He will seek to claim it in person soon.”
“I can buy that,” Roderick agreed, looking around the room. “Is this it?”
“What? You looking for a note this time?” Cedric seemed annoyed. He had joined us moments before the discovery of the rose, having returned from his latest ‘reading’.
“We haven’t received any notes as of late,” I said, carefully taking the rose from Roderick. “I think we’ll remain confined to the same tiresome guessing game. Obviously—”
“Wait! What in the hell?!...” Standing behind the sofa with Amy, Beatrice reached behind her back, as if something had suddenly fallen across her shoulders. She picked up whatever it was from the floor. “Oh, my God—it’s from him!”
Her hands shook as she held out the aged parchment note enclosed with a wax seal for either Roderick or me to take from her. He beat me to it. After removing the seal he hastily opened the note, while I scanned the ceiling and nearby windows for signs of entry. As usual, there weren’t any.
“What’s it say?” Amy asked worriedly, while the rest of us gathered around Roderick, jockeying for the best view. He shook his head after unfurling the paper and scanning its content. The rest of us soon mimicked his reaction, with Alistair wearing the biggest frown.
To Judas, Roderick, and those you hold dear,
It is time.
Details pertaining to your fate will arrive in the morning. Make sure all of you are present to receive the next instructions. All prior terms remain in effect.
Cordially,
Krontos Lazarevic
Chapter Two
None of us slept worth a damn that night. But after delivering what little comfort Beatrice would accept, as she lay wide awake in our bedroom worrying about the ‘fate’ to be delivered by Lazarevic sometime after daybreak, Roderick and I stoked a fire in the living room.
The stacked stone fireplace dominated one wall, and sat opposite an enormous picture window facing a colorful view of red sand bluffs to the east. Our latest refuge was built in 1894, in the style of the old mountain lodges scattered throughout the region. Enormous split beams made from solid pine crisscrossed the tall ceiling and were supported by four forty-foot pine pillars. A second floor open veranda surrounded the living room, and at the moment, a thin stream of light from the lamp on Beatrice’s nightstand crept into the darkness outside our upstairs bedroom.
I hoped to rejoin my wife soon, with the intent of trying again to lift the worry from her heart, so she could rest her weary mind. Meanwhile, Roderick and I debated whether or not our nemesis truly wanted the Dragon Coin, or would Krontos demand something else instead? There was enough uncertainty to where I found myself playing the devil’s advocate, looking for logical objections as to why he wouldn’t want the coin—despite his longstanding f
amiliarity with this particular shekel.
“What good could it possibly do him?” I asked quietly, in hopes Beatrice would either not hear our conversation or choose to ignore us altogether. “Suppose his magic has developed to where he no longer needs any coin to keep it going?”
“What… and that he’s been playing us all along?” Roderick’s expression revealed the idea was a novel one, and something he hadn’t previously considered.
“Well, you must admit it wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility for someone like him. Someone who can sway dimensional reality to fit his whims. Right?”
The volatile swirl of tiny golden flakes within his sky blue irises sped up. That, more than his deepening frown, told me this latest idea could threaten any chance of my rejoining Beatrice in our bed. Since neither Roderick nor I require steady sleep, and we often go days on end without such rest during times of crisis, adding any more fuel to our debate seemed unwise. And I had just done that.
“Not necessarily—and, I’m addressing your latest thought,” he said. My turn to frown, since I had let down my mental guard while worrying about the effect of my words. “I had considered Krontos no longer needed anything from anyone to fulfill his wicked schemes. If it’s true, then all of us—including the rest of mankind—are completely screwed!”
“Ah, so it would seem,” I agreed. “But, the fact he is worried about little ole you and me hiding out in this quaint Arizona town tells me he’s not godlike just yet.”
Roderick shook his head disgustedly and started to say something, but caught himself.
“What is it, Rod? You’ve been acting like you want to tell me something important for days—long before this latest incident.”
True. Actually, I noticed the silent burden he carried nearly a week ago. I had hoped he would reveal his secret naturally, and decided to wait it out. If not for the dreaded token from Lazarevic, I had already planned to broach the matter by this coming weekend.
“I know if pressed to do so, you would relinquish Dracul’s coin to his master,” he said, shifting in his seat to better regard me. “It may come to that, old friend. I pray it does not, but there are no guarantees of success in protecting all of us from harm, as you know. What are you planning to do if Krontos demands this coin?”
“To save you, my beloved family, and Cedric? I would give him what he wants,” I said. “But, what would such a move cost me personally? Since I’ve never been in a situation like this before, that answer is unknown. You and I will be traveling through uncharted territory. Yet, having said that, reintroducing my cured coins into the world would certainly spell untold disaster. My gut tells me the consequences and curses would be much more severe the next go round.”
“So, you’d rather not give your coins in exchange for others. Correct?”
“Yes… but why does any of this matter right now? My brother, I know you so well. Tell me what’s up.”
I could have, and perhaps should have, made him blurt out the piece he was hiding from me days ago. I prayed my perturbed expression would be enough to get him to come clean.
“I heard from Jeffrey the other day. Jeffrey Holmes? You remember him, don’t you?”
“The kid from Buffalo, New York?”
“Yes. But he’s not a kid anymore, having recently celebrated his forty-first birthday,” Roderick advised. “Though it was unfortunate he learned your identity from Michael some years back, he has proven to be a good ‘silent’ fan of yours, Judas. Remember, he’s the one who tracked down the Damascus coin before it suddenly disappeared again.”
“What a surprise,” I deadpanned.
“I’m serious, man!”
We had been sitting at a small dinette near the fireplace, and Roderick stood to tend to the dying flames.
“What if I were to tell you that Jeffrey has found links to a black market deal coming up soon for another coin of yours both of us assumed might never see the light of day for centuries?”
“I’d say better get the damned thing before you blink, or ‘poof’ it’ll be gone!”
“Very funny, smartass,” he said, scowling at me as he laid a medium sized log on top of the hearth. A bed of fiery coals from the previous log ignited the new offering. Roderick brushed off his hands and returned to me. “The coin is quite unique and is said to have more mystical properties than your Dragon Coin. It remained for centuries in the possession of a wealthy Jewish family in Poland. No one has seen it since World War II.”
“Wait a moment… you can’t be serious?” I couldn’t believe my ears, and felt like an idiot for playing him as I had. Then again, he didn’t need to be so coy. “The Stutthof-Auschwitz coin?”
“Yes, the very one that began the legend of healing among the condemned Jews in the Stutthof concentration camp. It later caused much more excitement—enough to where the coin was eventually discovered in Auschwitz, and then confiscated by the Nazis,” Roderick confirmed. He smiled, obviously pleased by my response. “If you’ll recall our previous conversation on the subject—and granted it’s been some years, now—unlike the other coins, this coin came to Stutthof from a Polish Jewish clan. The Nazis somehow missed it. The coin kept this family safe from harm’s way for nearly three months, until the evil of Hitler’s Final Solution was too much to defeat.
“The family was separated, and the parents were sent with the oldest brother to Auschwitz. The son, named Simon Lieberman, carried the coin. Legend has it the Nazis missed it again—despite thorough searches and nary a place to hide a coin. Perhaps it was stored in an orifice… in the mouth or anus seems most likely. Anyway, the coin carried mysterious healing powers, as you know. A handful of survivors from these horrific death camps spoke of a magical coin that could heal, somehow feed, and protect dozens from the beatings, random shootings, fateful trips to the gas chambers, etc. They all say it glowed with a blue sheen—the same thing you and I can see in the other coins.”
I clearly pictured the excitement I felt about this coin, back when the Second World War ravished Europe and raged through the Pacific islands. Not much reached the United States from our European brothers and sisters until we were fully engaged in war as a nation. Secrets withheld from the general populace, along with whispers of atrocities that scarcely seemed real to those who had never seen such events firsthand, began seeping into America’s awareness. Of course, for me it was maddening, as I had known what was happening since September 1939. I desperately wanted to return to Europe in hopes I could save as many of my Jewish brethren as possible. I knew it would be a small amount in comparison to the eventual hundreds of thousands being put to death each month in 1943 and beyond. But it wasn’t until I feared the extinction of the bloodlines rooted in Israel that I took matters into my own hands.
This resolve initially hit me full force in the spring of 1944. The other thing to sway me was the rumor of a blood coin in its active state—a true rarity in the twentieth century, since most often I found them in moments of dormancy. Not to mention, the coin that had circulated through two Polish concentration camps was creating hope for the Jewish nation, instead of the usual calamities my coins bring.
Getting an officer commission wasn’t as easy for me as some might think. This was before the formation of the CIA, which didn’t become active until 1947. I was working in the higher circles of the FBI at the time, and was viewed as a curious dinosaur who somehow looked much younger than I was. After all, the BOI had been absorbed by the newly formed FBI in 1933.
I won’t bore everyone with the details. Suffice it to say it took me calling in a favor with Virginia Senator W. Chapman Revercomb to obtain a European field commission. I was stationed in France as a US Army captain by the fall of 1944, and had hoped to slip away to Poland long enough to find my coin and save as many prisoners as possible. But getting away from France proved arduous at best, once the fortunes of the war swung in favor of the allied forces. As the intelligence photographs from the death camps began to reach my contacts in Washingto
n the following January, I realized it was too late for me to do anything.
The greatest atrocity known to modern man was nearing its conclusion and would soon be revealed for the diabolical horror it was. And the coin? The Nazis had recovered it by then. My same contacts in Washington talked about some excitement over a recently discovered small item that was hailed as “the greatest occult relic in possession of the Third Reich.” I clearly recall how my heart froze upon hearing this news. It was never The Almighty’s plan for the Germans to possess this coin.
“Judas. Judas…. Hey, man are you all right?”
“Huh? Oh, shit. Sorry about that, Rod.” I must’ve looked like a total ass, staring out into space while missing nearly everything Roderick said. “I got caught up in a moment of nostalgia.”
“And you missed every damned word I said!” he chided. “Tell you what…. Let’s talk about this more when the sun comes up and we can work on a plan of attack as a group.”
“Attack? I’m not liking the sound of that word,” I said, although the prospects of me holding my wife close in the hours before dawn suddenly improved. “Why don’t we do the corporate thing and label it as a ‘call to action meeting’ instead?”
“Semantics.”
“Hey, I’m a little sensitive right now.”
I winked and he chuckled, shaking his head.
“Sleep on it… if you can, Judas.” Roderick stood, dampened the fire, and made his way toward the lone bedroom on the main floor, which belonged to him.
I waited until he disappeared down the hall before I headed upstairs. Convinced nearly everyone else remained awake, I removed my shoes and consciously pulled my aura in, praying if anyone sensed my approach, it would only be Beatrice.
Fantasies entered my thoughts of what passion could bring if my cherished wife was game for something beyond mere comfort. But as I quietly pushed open our bedroom door, her soft snores confirmed this was neither the time nor place for lovemaking.