In less than thirty minutes the far-off land of Transylvania was about to be invaded by the new and vastly improved Hebrew army.
PATINAS
The expanse of the City of Moses was the most impressive sight any of them had ever laid eyes on. As they examined the city they saw the young Golia playing in the massive temple structure that was the actual vault of secrets for the Hebrew tribe. Golia were everywhere and they cared not one ounce that the City of Moses had come alive with light and the strange voices of men.
Anya took Carl’s hand and started down the steep ramp that led into the city. Everywhere they looked steam vents of massive proportions were spread throughout the buildings. Everett squeezed Anya’s hand as they neared the bottom of the ramp and for the first time the Americans stepped out and back into history. The city could have been a miniature version of Luxor. The lions with the heads of long-lost bearded men and the statues of Anubis that they now knew had nothing at all to do with the furry little creatures thought to have been Jackals—they now knew they were the Golia. And everywhere there were the Golia pups. Everett lost track at trying to count them.
As they approached the many columned temple Alice realized that the first temple was nothing more than a ruse to keep trespassers at bay just in case someone found their way in. Security for the complex was as straightforward as a sword point. They knew who kept watch on this place and they were running and playing around them right at that moment. Anya started to climb the stone steps.
Niles walked next to Alice, who was in between him and Charlie. Will Mendenhall brought up the back and kept his eyes on the ramp behind them. Will was starting to feel that something wasn’t right.
“Wait, stop!” Mendenhall said as he raised a hand and then looked around him. “Do you feel that?” he asked as his hand and arm slowly lowered.
They all did. As they walked the steps leading to the temple the entire city wavered and shook. The sensation of movement ceased but it worried them nonetheless.
“I have never felt that before,” Anya said as she squeezed Everett’s hand tighter. She shook her head and then smiled at Carl, who could not take his eyes off the woman with the raven hair and the blue head scarf. She finally turned and walked to the giant bronze doors and stood waiting.
Alice was in her element. After all the years of waiting, searching, and arguing with Garrison Lee over the temple and the very tribe’s existence was almost too much for her. She was nearly stomping her feet in her effort to see the actual treasure of the Exodus spread out before her eyes.
“King Tut ain’t got nothin’ on this,” Charlie said as the double bronze doors were opened wide.
“The true treasure of the Exodus,” Anya said as she stepped aside and allowed the Americans to pass into history.
The sight that met them was one they would never forget.
* * *
The fissure in the mountain wall behind Dracula’s Castle was a tight fit, but Jack thought if the wolf could make it through they could too. A mile in he thought he had figured wrong.
“Jack, this crack in the world is a little too straight to be a natural phenomenon. It’s tight, but look at its lines. This fissure was excavated.”
The fit was so tight Collins couldn’t turn his body to respond.
“Your point, Lieutenant?” he asked in frustration.
Before he could get an answer in the darkness around them he felt the grip as it wrapped around his throat and he was pulled forward and thrown into open space.
“Colonel?” he heard Ryan say as if from a great distance.
Collins shook his head as something heavy landed next to him. He felt around and then discovered someone had thrown an unlit torch onto the floor. He heard the others as they squeezed through the last large crack and into the open space. A hard breeze took Sarah’s hair and pulled it back toward the tunnel.
“There’s quite a draft in here,” she said as she placed her arms out in front of her to keep from bashing into a wall.
“No one move—not one inch,” they heard Collins say as a brilliant flash of light illuminated the small cave they were in. The torch caught and then Jack fanned out the entire book of matches he had used to start the flame burning. As he brought the torch around it almost came into contact with a solid object that stood directly in front of him.
“Oh, crap, he’s big,” Ryan said in amazement.
Stanus stood in front of Jack and the giant Golia was sniffing at him as if the smell of Jack was a reminder to the beast that the man he had traveling with him earlier was close to this human. It sniffed the air and Stanus knew this to be true about all four of the humans inside the cavern. The animal went to all fours with an audible adjustment to its skeletal frame and confidently strolled over to Ellenshaw, Sarah, and Ryan. The beast was eye-level with the Navy man and taller than Sarah. Charlie was the only one tall enough to see over the wolf’s shoulders. Sarah slowly brought her hand up so Stanus could sniff her. Jack froze, wondering if she had lost her mind.
Instead of sniffing at Sarah’s hand, Stanus sat hard on his haunches and then brought his right front paw up and then the fingers unfolded before her eyes. The fingers reached out and the large humanlike hand stroked Sarah’s face as gently as any lover could have. Then the Golia blinked and walked to something the torchlight had failed to show them a moment before. Stanus jumped eight feet from his sitting position and landed on something round and black. Jack’s eyes widened as he stepped forward with the torch flickering and sputtering.
“Oh, my God,” Sarah said as she recognized what it was that Stanus was pacing alongside of as the Golia watched the four humans below. The earth had been taken from around the structure leaving it totally exposed to the air. The giant steel anchor pin was one of sixteen that secured the foundation of the castle to the rock strata of the mountain. The giant anchor pin ended with a drill bit that had dug its way into the almost solid stone of the pass. Steam vents had weakened the area around the pin and it had been easy to dig out the rest.
“What is it?” Pete asked as he placed his hand on the cold steel.
“It’s one of the sixteen anchor pins used to secure the castle to the mountain. If the other fifteen are like this we have just discovered where that strange vibration was coming from. It’s not the steam or the natural hot springs bringing this seismic activity, it’s them,” she said as she pointed upward in the darkness.
Above them and joining Stanus on the top of the steel anchor pin was the remainder of the Golia adults. Even Mikla was there sitting on his haunches looking at the visitors.
“I think this big guy is trying to tell us something,” Jack said as he placed the torch next to the area of the cave where the pin had penetrated. “Look at this, short stuff; it’s just like you described when you saw the engineering specs and the geology report.”
Sarah placed a hand on the pin and felt it not only moving up and down but it actually felt as if the steel was attempting to back out of the hole that it had forced open in the mountain like a knife wound.
“These thermal vents have weakened the strata of the mountain, making it almost porous. Thus it’s very weak and any geologist worth his salt would have seen that on his initial survey.”
“Unless that geologist had access to Zallas and his millions.”
Sarah had to admit that Jack was right. Through bribery this mad Russian had doomed at least part of the mountain, namely the pass at Patinas.
“I’m not following,” Pete said as he too saw the giant cracks in the rock as the pin passed through.
“Look, Pete,” Sarah started to explain as she removed the torch from Jack’s hand and then placed it by the pin and lowered it to the bottom where fresh dirt had been piled along the fissures floor. “The pin has nothing to bind itself to. It’s like shoving a sharpened knife through a cracker, no matter how sharp that knife is it will eventually compromise that cracker and it will break. The same thing here,” she said as she ran the torch along
the lines of the pin. “The constant pressure of the castle being secured by these pins to the facing of the mountain wall is bringing too much pressure to bear on the sixteen anchor pins holding the building in place. And now our little amazing animals here have been undermining the locations where the pins were most secure.”
“What are you saying?” Pete asked as his mind started to grasp what the Golia’s plan was.
“They’re bringing Dracula’s Castle down, and possibly the entire resort below it.”
“No animal could possibly figure out the displacement dynamics involved,” Pete said, envious of the computing power that the brain that thought that scenario up had inside. He shook his head in wonder.
“Maybe for the Golia alone, but I suspect that the first strike of the wolves against their intruders to the mountain was thought up by something other than a smart wolf.”
“Madam Korvesky?” Sarah asked.
“That would be my guess, as I don’t think that Marko character had it in him to think this up.”
“On the other hand, I never thought it took too much explanation for the reasons why a dog digs,” Ryan said as the simple truth of the matter always hit him in the most easily describable ways. “Maybe the Golia just didn’t like these ugly steel pins in their mountain and they are trying to dig them out. I would rather believe that than think that a rather large timber wolf could outthink me on a battlefield.”
Jack smiled and looked at the young Navy man. “From what I’ve heard from Alice, these damn wolves seemed to have amassed a reputation for being just that, great warriors and tacticians. I’m leaning toward collaboration between the Jeddah and the Golia to stop this encroachment by destroying the only thing they can.”
“But an engineering failure on that scale would bring far too much attention to this area of the world for the Jeddah to cover up,” Sarah reminded Jack.
“Not if their plan was to destroy the entire pass,” Jack said as he realized the Jeddah and the Golia may be giving up their home of over thirty-five hundred years. The end for both may be near.
Above them they heard the Golia move off with the clicking of their claws on the steel pin. Jack took the torch from Sarah and then pointed it down the long anchor pin and saw that the dirt and rocks had been moved away from the steel by at least five feet in all directions. The anchor pin was basically suspended in midair with no support. And as they watched, the massive steel pin moved up and then down a good five feet. The movement of the pin was getting worse and to Jack’s horror he saw that the pin had backed out of the mountain by at least three inches since they had been standing there.
“Let’s get to Patinas and get everyone the hell off this mountain.”
They all followed Jack as he squeezed past the opening between the exposed anchor pin and the side of the mountain. Now it was a long clear run to the pass.
As they ran the mountain shook beneath them as the anchor pin in another area slid further away from its support. The mountain was now dying from a knife wound through its heart.
PATINAS PASS
Sergeant Jimmy Forester watched the line of vehicles approaching and was wondering what fools would brave that horrible dirt track at night and in the middle of the storm of the century. He leaned forward and pushed open the wooden shutters of Madam Korvesky’s house. As he watched the line of cars approach the village he was wondering where the Army officer was. For whatever reason the engineer felt better when the officer was giving orders. And that was hard to admit for an Airborne soldier such as himself. But still, this mountain was not conducive to positive thinking.
Suddenly bells were heard clanging from every corner of Patinas. Lights were coming on in every home as doors flew open and men, women, and children started streaming forth in various stages of undress. Men were carrying shotguns and the women their children. They were running toward the gate and the mountain beyond. The sergeant ran to the door and opened it just as one of the Patinas village elders stepped onto the small porch.
“We must go to the temple, immediately, bring what weapons you have and that shotgun over the mantel. I believe the queen has shells in her kitchen,” the white-bearded man said as he pulled on the camouflage jacket of the American. “Bring your people, now!” the man said in very bad English as he turned and ran.
“Jeez, I don’t know about you, Sarge, but when the local populace starts heading for the hills and until we know who these assholes are it might be wise to do the same. From the frightened looks on the faces of those men and women I would bet they’re not very welcome here, whoever they are.”
The sergeant knew his man was right. He looked down at the two nearly empty Uzis and knew they had not much firepower to make a stand there.
“Right, let’s boogie,” the sergeant said as the sixteen men of the 82nd gathered up their equipment. The lone shotgun and its shells was packed and even a large meat cleaver and butcher knife from the old Gypsy’s kitchen. The men retreated from the shelter of the small cottage and joined the exodus out of Patinas just as the first cars made the village.
* * *
Colonel Ally Ben-Nevin stepped from the large Toyota four-by-four and examined the small village of Patinas. He watched as his men fanned out around the town. The men were each heavily armed with a brand-new AK-47 supplied by Zallas and his people in Bucharest where the men were hired.
“Check every house. Bring along whoever you find. They may make our task easier if we have them.”
He looked up at the swirling night sky and the almost constant streaks of lightning that crisscrossed the heavens. He was feeling better than he had at any time in the past few years. The storm was so bad not even the great General Shamni could get a relief force in here. He knew he would have the run of the mountain for the next few critical hours until he gathered the proof his superiors needed for their fundamentalist movement. No, there would be no cavalry riding over the hill to save the day. Not this time.
FLIGHT 262, HEAVY COMMERCIAL AIRCRAFT, SQUAWKING FRIENDLY OVER ROMANIAN AIRSPACE
“That’s it, Major, we’ve been made,” the pilot said as he struggled with the yoke as the Hercules jumped a hundred feet into the roiling storm.
“What’s up?” Major Donny Mendohlson asked as he came forward.
“We have two F-16s out of the Ploesti region and they are heading right for us. They’re not buying the navigation screwup any longer. We have to exit out of Romanian airspace ASAP before they get a visual on us. They won’t take too kindly at seeing an Israeli air force Hercules instead of the Airbus they were expecting.”
“Yeah, I can see where that would be kind of bad.”
The major turned and went to the communication shack just aft of the cockpit. He nodded at the operator as he gestured down to his men by waving his right hand in a circular motion. The silent team of professionals went about finalizing their jump preparations. The radio operator, who also served as their jump master, handed Mendohlson a pair of earphones.
“The signal is secure through our satellite,” the operator said as the major nodded.
“Seti, this is Broadsword, do you read? Over.”
“Broadsword, this is Seti the Great, read you five by five,” came the clear and encrypted voice of General Shamni.
“Seti, it is time to play or get out of the park, some rather nasty-looking local bullies have arrived by air,” the major said as he told Shamni that the Romanian air force had decided to pay them a visit. He spoke cryptically out of habit and he knew the general would do the same. Nothing is ever secure enough for the elite forces of the state.
The general knew that no matter what occurred down in Patinas he had to have eyes on the ground and a decision had to be made whether to jump. To him that was the simplest thing in the world and an order he wanted to give since learning about this nightmare as a child.
“Understood, Broadsword, you are clear to commence Operation Ramesses, I repeat, you are clear to launch operation Ramesses. Over.”
> Mendohlson swallowed and then without turning from the radio raised his right arm into the air and his thumb went high. The men below moved like lightning as the go order was now official.
“Roger, Seti the Great, Broadsword confirms, Operation Ramesses is a go.”
“Good luck, Broadsword, end this thing,” came the weary voice of General Shamni.
Sounding through the cavernous aircraft was a loud warning bell and the lights inside switched to dull red in preparation of the ramp being opened to the harsh elements outside. Each man had a full face mask and supply of oxygen. Each was also equipped with 190 pounds of extra gear, but mostly killing tools of the trade. They never jumped into a situation they felt they had no hope of escaping, it may be delusional but psychologically it was helpful.
In exactly two minutes the sovereign state of Romania, America’s newest NATO partner, was about to be invaded by a friendly nation and they were coming to kill a legend.
The ancient City of Moses had an hour to live.
PATINAS PASS
The giant room that was illuminated with a thousand oil lamps was brightly inlaid with gold leaf on the walls instead of the normal paint used on most of the statuary. The ancient story the hieroglyphs told was related in stark gold relief and the highlights trimmed in emeralds, rubies, and diamonds. The depictions of the Exodus were there.
The treasure room was just that. It was what Alice Hamilton always envisioned. With one altering factor—there was no treasure. The room was completely empty with the only exception being three wooden boxes the size of coffins that sat on carved stone pedestals.
Niles looked at Alice, who had a look of confusion on her face. She looked at Anya, who was whispering something to Carl Everett.
“Anya said she is ashamed and embarrassed. She knew you would be disappointed,” Carl said for the woman who had wandered away and sat next to the center stone. She took a deep breath and waited for the laughter at what a foolish people she lived among.
“Disappointed?” Alice asked. She separated herself from Niles and walked up to Anya and stood before her. “My dear, what in the world do you think we came to see? We’re here because of the mystery of your people and a story that must be documented, but written so the truth of your kind can be placed beside those of the rest of civilization. Not for any treasure.”
Carpathian: An Event Group Thriller (Event Group Thrillers) Page 56