Carpathian: An Event Group Thriller (Event Group Thrillers)

by David L. Golemon

  “She didn’t deserve to be murdered,” Jason said as he finally sat down at the large table as Collins went back to the door and tried the lock. It wouldn’t move. Sarah for her part walked over and placed a hand on Jason’s shoulder.

  “Calm down, Mr. Ryan,” Jack said. “It was me who got Ms. Louvinski in trouble, not you.” He turned and faced Jason. “I think we may want to find a way out of here. Zallas said he won’t kill us, he’s lying. We’re a backup plan if the questioning of Marko Korvesky doesn’t go as planned.”

  “Plan for what?” Pete asked.

  “I have a sneaking suspicion that they’re going to try to take the temple built inside the mountain.”

  As Sarah turned and looked out the large plate glass window she saw the swirling colors of blue and purple as they played off the stone of Dracula’s Castle.

  “Alice’s little adventure has suddenly taken a turn for the surreal,” Sarah said as she watched the swirling spotlights that illuminated the castle.

  They all heard Ryan chuckle. It was almost a sad sound, especially coming from a man who never had a bad word to say about anyone.

  “When has one of our missions not turned out to be surreal?”

  Jack chuckled as well, a sound that made them all nervous.

  “But then again, that’s what we do, people. Now let’s start thinking about how to get the hell out of here and up to that mountain.”

  16

  PATINAS

  Carl sat with Will Mendenhall and Anya inside the relative calm of her grandmother’s front yard. The small picket fence wasn’t much of a defense against the onslaught of well-wishers and anyone else who just wanted to smile at Anya and say hello, but the villagers seemed to be respecting the separation of the small wooden pickets.

  As the hour grew late the men and women of Patinas and the other six villages of the mountain started gathering their sleeping children, who were long since worn down from the excitement that so seldom came to Patinas. The children had gone to sleep knowing that things would be better now that brother and sister were together again.

  Anya waved good night to several of the families and then smiled at Carl, who sat on the small one-step stoop of the cottage. A fire slowly burned behind them in the fireplace and warmed their backs. Mendenhall slowly stood and stretched and then nodded his head at Everett and then Anya.

  “Well, we better get the shelter up or we’ll be swimming in dew by morning. I guess we’ll see if these Airborne boys know how to set up a camp.”

  “I’ll be along as soon as the director and the others return,” Carl said as he stood.

  “If you place your camp closest to the barn you will find that the morning sun will wake you.” Anya looked from Mendenhall to Everett and smiled. “One of the more pleasant experiences about living in Patinas.”

  “Will do, ma’am, and good night, Captain.” Mendenhall gave Carl a two-fingered salute and slowly moved off while refusing more food from one of the older women who waited just outside the gate.

  “You and he are close?” Anya asked as Carl watched Mendenhall smile, nod, and refuse yet more food from yet more women.

  “Yes, the lieutenant and I are very close. That kid has worked his way out of some tough times to make something out of himself,” Everett said as he slowly sat back down on the small stoop next to Anya. Carl stretched his legs and then looked up at the stars that seemed far closer than he had ever seen them. “Talk about a place getting a bum rap from Hollywood, this is it. I’ve never seen such a beautiful spot.” He looked over at Anya, who watched Carl as he spoke.

  “You are troubled about me,” Anya said, looking away as Everett turned again to face her as he realized it was a statement and not a question.

  “From Patinas to the Mossad, that’s quite a stretch. And also quite industrious on your part, to spy on an organization that prides itself on never having an agent penetrate their organization.”

  Anya shook her head. “My grandmother set me on my odyssey. She has not, and never will, tell me everything. I made connections inside the Mossad that I should not have been able to make. I was noticed in training by all the right people, chosen for just the right assignments to move up in rank. No, very little about my Mossad history was brought on by me. My grandmother needs to tell me the truth of what she is doing.”

  “I don’t mind saying you have totally lost me,” Everett said, shaking his head and looking away.

  Anya reached out and placed a hand on his shoulder and closed her eyes. Everett felt her touch and for the first time in a while felt as if a flock of birds was let loose inside his stomach.

  “May I see your hand?”

  “Are you going to tell my fortune?” he asked and then immediately regretted it.

  “That is not a politically correct thing to say.” She cocked her head to the right. “I believe you are laughing at us Gypsies, Captain,” she said as she pulled her hand away from Everett’s in a mockingly insulted way.

  The blond American kept his hand in place. Anya again took his and turned the palm up.

  “Besides, I don’t tell fortunes, Mr. Everett, that’s my grandmother.” She smiled and then closed Carl’s hand and wrapped her small fingers around his. “I will look into your past.”

  “My past?” Everett said as he was tempted to pull his hand away.

  “Yes, all of us Gypsies are strange like that.”

  “You mean all you Jeddah?” Carl asked, watching her closely.

  Instead of answering Anya closed her hand more tightly around Everett’s. “I don’t actually tell you anything about the past, you tell me and I don’t hear, I see. The mind is powerful as I am sure you have learned in your many travels. But two minds linked is something that is powerful beyond description.”

  “I’m not a big believer in prophecy or the foretelling of bad things.”

  “You Americans are always so narcissistic. You only believe in yourselves and in nothing else. The world has many things to offer, and the ancient world has even more than the heavens could ever supply in words and stories. I want to show you what the world, my world can offer you.”

  Carl felt the heat of her touch and he closed his eyes as he kept her face etched in his mind. He felt Anya raise his closed fist to her lips and then he felt the warmth of her soft breath as she blew on his hand. He felt as if water was oozing though his clenched fingers and the sensation made him chill with excitement. He felt himself floating for a moment.

  “Open your hand,” Anya said as she released him.

  Everett opened his eyes and looked at the raven-haired beauty as she smiled at him. She was backlit by the fire and Carl could swear she was aglow with a heat that only he could feel. He lowered his eyes and then slowly opened his fist. He felt his mouth open as he gazed upon the image that seemed to be written in bloodred ink. It was an exact likeness of the woman he had been secretly engaged to seven years before. He had lost her in a desert mission that seemed long ago, but the memory of her death was as if it occurred only weeks before. The smiling face of Lisa Willing stared back at him from his own palm. Everett raised his other hand and rubbed at the image.

  “Minuscule blood vessels have burst just under the epidural layer. The blood vessels were guided by your own brain power and memory. As I said, there are powers that the world has never understood.”

  Again Everett rubbed at the image as if he could erase it.

  Anya reached out and placed a hand on Everett’s cheek and he looked at her and she saw the pain at his loss from so long ago. She smiled softly and then pulled his hand to her mouth and once more enclosed Carl’s large hand and then kissed it. She shut her eyes and as she did Carl felt his heart flutter. He also shut his eyes as he felt his heart come into his throat. He felt Anya lower his hand and remove her own from his. He slowly opened his eyes and the image of Lisa was gone. The pain he had always felt and the sense of loss he had every day seemed to vanish from his mind and heart. He slowly stood from the stoop and wal
ked into the small yard. He felt Anya watching him and so he turned to face her. She sat on the stoop and then raised her hands to her mouth as she seemed to come to a realization. She stood and waited.

  Captain Carl Everett saw Anya Korvesky and nothing else.

  * * *

  Later that morning Carl stood with Anya just outside the gate to Patinas. He glanced up at the darkened mountain as he placed his arm around the woman he had been doing battle with not two days before in Rome. Everett didn’t try to analyze what it was he was feeling so he just attempted to let his mind and his heart wander free of his common sense. He turned and looked at her and was about to speak when she held a hand up and cocked her head.

  “Someone is out there,” she said as she slid from Carl’s arm and looked into the woods and then up the side of the craggy mountain. They heard the snap of a twig and they both turned to see one of the village elders that had accompanied Madam Korvesky and the others into the temple. He stepped up to Carl and Anya, looking from the woman to the large American.

  “Your grandmother wishes to see you inside the temple. You are to bring this man with you,” he said and then dipped his head and doffed the small black hat he wore and then moved off toward his home.

  Anya watched him leave and then took Carl’s hand. She smiled up at him and that look told Everett all he needed to know about how she felt. It was the same gut-wrenching feeling he was having.

  As she pulled Everett toward the trail and the temple higher up, she turned and looked into the woods knowing that the person that had been watching them was still there. She turned away and held Carl’s hand that much tighter.

  * * *

  Marko stepped out of the tree line and onto the trail as Anya vanished with the American naval officer around the bend in the trail. His eyes narrowed at the memory of his sister coming from his grandmother’s home with this man close beside her. He didn’t need his vivid imagination to know that his sister had been compromised by this man. Where that would lead him he knew not. But one thing he did know, he could never allow his little sister to control his people, which would only lead to more of the same for them.

  For over three thousand years they had done the bidding of tribes they no longer knew nor loved. The days of slavery and bondage to Pharaoh had never really ended for the Jeddah; it had just changed from one cruel and uncaring hand to the next. The time for the Jeddah to break away clean had come and they would all reap the reward of thousands of years of bondage that was once called freedom, and what Marko and most Jeddah called the biggest lie. The treasure was there for them to use and the Jeddah would start to flood the world with their artifacts.

  * * *

  Carl could not believe what he was seeing as they descended the long and wide staircase that had been carved from solid rock 3,500 years before Everett was born. As he looked down he could see the worn areas that told a tale of millions of pairs of feet over the ages treading this way. As they entered the temple’s main gallery, Everett had to stop and take in the carved magnificence of the Temple of Moses.

  “I don’t believe it, it’s actually here,” Carl said under his breath.

  “Yes it is, but before you get to impressed just remember it took the Jeddah two thousand years to get this temple built, and all at, or just below your minimum wage,” she teased as she stepped past Carl and into the temple.

  “I take it you’re not as impressed with your Jeddah’s achievements as outsiders are,” he said as he caught up with Anya. His eyes roamed to the three pyramids that made up the backdrop of the temple. The columns and the obelisks lined every nook and cranny of the magnificent structure.

  “My people have been a slave to this menagerie for far too long, my brother is right about that. A palace built to honor the Exodus from Pharaoh, it is nothing but trouble and should have been buried long ago.” She looked around at the illuminated temple and sighed. “I’m as tired as the people are of maintaining this museum of our history and I just can’t do this anymore.” She looked at Carl. “I’m with Marko on that one point.”

  “Why don’t you come over here and explain to me what you can and cannot do, granddaughter.”

  Anya turned and saw her grandmother as she sat next to the dais where Mikla was still lying and breathing hard.

  “I was explaining how a backward people need to embrace those that they fear the most.”

  “As we are the backward people you speak of, the people we fear must mean the rest of the world, is that what I understand, girl-child?”

  Carl saw the uncomfortable way that Anya shifted from foot to foot as she faced the queen of the Gypsies. He looked over at Niles and Alice, who were watching the small power play without comment. Charlie and Denise were there also but they had their attention on something behind Carl and Anya.

  “I didn’t mean—”

  “Yes, child, you did mean. Marko has done a horrible thing and now it must be corrected, so I guess you will get your wish sooner rather than later. This life we have on the mountain is coming to an end. Just what that particular end will be for our people remains to be seen.” Madam Korvesky then nodded to a place behind the newly arrived pair.

  Everett and Anya slowly turned. Sitting on his haunches and up about six wide steps from the temple floor was Stanus. The beast was growling and staring at Everett. The yellow eyes were intent and the captain could see the giant wolf curl a black lip over gleaming white teeth. Anya took Everett’s arm and then took a step in front of him.

  “Grandmamma, why is Stanus here?” she said as she placed her back against Carl’s front and watched the dangerous beast before them.

  “He awaits you and your Man from the Sea. I have a task for both.”

  Carl managed to turn his eyes away from the giant sitting menacingly before them. He then noticed Niles standing not far away with the others. He only shrugged, indicating he had no idea what the old woman had planned.

  “They have work to do just as you and I have with Mikla this night. We must work soon as the sun is only three hours distant.”

  Anya swallowed and saw that Stanus was listening to every word that Madam Korvesky was saying. Its eyes would flick from the two in front of him to her grandmother, all the while the low growl emanating from his throat.

  “The work with Mikla must be completed before the first birdsong of the new morning, or he will not survive.” Madam Korvesky laughed and patted Mikla’s sleeping form. “By the bones of Joseph, I may not survive it.” She waved Carl over to her side. Stanus continued to stare from his sitting position on the staircase, its glowing eyes following Everett’s every move. “Stanus isn’t going to care for this all that much,” she said as she took Everett’s large hand into her own.

  “Grandmother, what are planning?” Anya asked, worried.

  “Your Man from the Sea will walk with the werewolf tonight, and now you must prepare him for the journey.”

  “You can’t, Stanus would kill him.” Anya turned and faced Carl. “He could never control him, the beast will out. You remember that saying, Grandmamma? The beast will out. The captain cannot control him.”

  “He needs not control, just influence. I need to know the disposition of this man’s friends.”

  The old woman smiled and then squeezed Carl’s hand tighter as she looked up and into his eyes.

  “Move and prepare your Mr. Captain for his walk. Then we will send him and Stanus on their way and we can get down to the business of spelling Mikla.”

  Anya Korvesky closed her eyes and then blindly held out a hand toward Carl, who broke his hold with Madam Korvesky and went to her. She linked her fingers through his.

  “I am sorry, I didn’t mean for this to happen to you.”

  “If it’s to help my friends down below at the resort, I don’t have a choice but to listen to your grandmother. Whatever it is she wants me to.”

  “Didn’t you hear a word she said, you are to walk with Stanus tonight.”

  Everett looked over at t
he spot where Stanus was sitting. The giant wolf never allowed its eyes to leave the form of the big American. It just sat and stared.

  “Well, if I’m walking him, I hope you have one hell of a big damn leash.”

  “She means something else, Carl,” Alice said as she pushed Charlie Ellenshaw toward the couple in order for him to assist Anya and Everett. Carl looked from Alice to Anya, who looked away and then pulled him toward a small stone enclosure that had no windows or openings save one. Charlie, with an uneasy yet excited look back at Niles, soon joined them.

  As for Niles Compton, he and Alice turned away and watched as Madam Korvesky became still and silent. He watched her hand run through Mikla’s fur and the giant wolf whined in its uncomfortable sleep. Alice nudged Niles in the side and they both saw the Gypsy’s eyes rolling underneath the lids.

  “It’s as if she’s in a deep sleep and rapid eye movement has started.”

  “Look,” Niles said, pointing to Mikla. The wolf was still asleep, but its eyes were working rapidly underneath the lids. Mikla was also starting to dream.

  Across the way Carl allowed Anya to pull him inside the small rock-hewn house.

  “What does that mean?” Everett asked as Charlie Ellenshaw winced at the answer he knew was coming.

  “She means you are to become one with Stanus. My grandmother obviously has a concern for your friends down below. I believe she thinks if anything happens to them even more attention will be cast toward the Jeddah. She can be very selfish.”

  “And to become one with Stanus means?”

  “Tonight you are going to learn what it’s like to be in an old horror movie.”

  “And just what in the hell does that mean?” Everett asked as she took his hand and pulled him inside the torch lit room.

  “Tonight you will become a werewolf.”

  * * *

  Inside the small stone-carved room Ellenshaw watched as Carl lay down upon an old Russian-made army cot. Charlie’s eyes roamed the room and that was when he saw the deeply gouged claw marks that were sunk deep into the stone walls. Large swipes had been battered through pure stone from something that looked as if it hadn’t liked being in here.