They drove along the harbor toward the Old City. The medieval town of Rhodes was surrounded and defined by a triple circuit of walls, which looked to Midas to be in very good condition. The fortress city seemed to have it all: moats, towers, bridges, and seven gates.
Vadim pulled the limousine up to the security checkpoint at the Eleftherias Gate, or the Gate of Liberty. Only permanent residents of the Old City were allowed to drive on the narrow cobblestone streets. But today dignitaries were allowed through with a police escort.
They followed the stone-paved streets past the third-century temple of Aphrodite and turned onto the main drag, the Odos Ippoton, or the Street of Knights, named for the Knights of St. John, who had established themselves on the island in the fourteenth century and who Midas was convinced must have been a front for the Alignment at one point. At the entrance was the fifteenth-century Knights Hospital, and at the end of the street, opposite the Church of St. John, stood the imposing Palace of the Grandmaster with its spherical towers.
They drove past the massive round towers flanking the main entrance to the palace—where Greek Evzones in uniform stood on either side of the sharp arch—and went around to the west entrance by the square tower, where a Greek cultural attaché welcomed Midas and the Aphrodite mask into the grand reception hall. This was the regal backdrop where the opening and closing ceremonies were staged for the cameras, while the sessions and breakout panels took place in the ballrooms, conference centers, and suites at the Rodos Palace hotel and international convention center ten minutes away.
“On behalf of the people of Greece, I thank you for returning to us the Aphrodite head from the British Museum,” the attaché said.
“It is my pleasure,” Midas said. “And I was told I could spend a moment alone with my dear Aphrodite before I handed it over.”
“Yes,” said the attaché. An armed Greek Evzone with an earpiece appeared and led Midas past a Medusa mosaic down a large vaulted corridor. There were 158 rooms in the palace, all bedecked with antique furniture, exquisite polychrome marbles, sculptures, and icons. Only twenty-four of those rooms were open to the public on any given day.
But the room to which Midas was escorted wasn’t in any of the tourist guides or public blueprints registered with Greece; it was even closed to the VIPs of the summit. It was a chamber constructed beneath the palace. Closed to all but members of the Alignment, it was known as the Hall of Knights council room.
Midas entered the hall and waited for his escort to leave. Then a door slid open, and he walked into the adjoining chamber with the Aphrodite mask, prepared to hand the Flammenschwert to Uriel.
But Uriel wasn’t there—only a single copper globe, split open, resting on a stand on top of a large round table. Inside the globe was an envelope, and next to the round table was a fireplace with a fire burning.
No surprise here, really. Midas had known the identity of Uriel, and vice versa, all along. They weren’t supposed to be seen together in public, a rule Midas had violated at the disastrous Bilderberg party. But as this handoff was private, he hadn’t been sure what to expect.
He looked at the globe. It was the first time he had seen one of them.
So this is the delivery device.
Not a missile. Not a warplane. But this old globe.
If it had been his choice, Midas would have held on to the Flammenschwert until its detonation. He certainly wouldn’t have left it alone here. But the holier-than-thou Uriel didn’t want to see the Flammenschwert, much less touch it. And Uriel was the only one who could get it into position and leave the dirty work of pulling the trigger to Midas.
He opened the envelope, read the handwritten note, tossed it into the fireplace, and watched it burn to ashes.
He removed the plaster back of the bronze Aphrodite mask and tossed it into the fireplace, too. Then he put his hand behind the sphere containing the Flammenschwert and turned the mask over until the sphere rested heavily in his hand. He lifted the mask with the other hand and placed it on the table. With both hands, he carefully placed the sphere containing the Flammenschwert inside the globe, where it fit snugly. He sealed the globe shut like a skin over the warhead sphere. The seam along the 40th parallel seemed to disappear.
The door on the other side of the chamber magically opened. He picked up Aphrodite’s head, brushed it off, and walked out.
35
U.S. NAVAL SUPPORT BASE
SOUDA BAY, CRETE
Conrad watched another F-16 take off from the tarmac and walked back up the rear ramp of the C-17 to Packard’s office inside the “silver bullet.” Packard had been on the phone ever since they’d landed on Crete. The Greek air base was home to the Hellenic Air Force’s 115th Combat Wing, but the U.S. Naval Support Activity Souda Bay occupied over a hundred acres on the north side to support Sixth Fleet operations in the eastern Mediterranean and Middle East. Conrad was waiting to hear if he would get any of that support now.
Packard, still on the phone, frowned at him and slid across his desk the leather binder containing Conrad’s hastily prepared but well-documented report on the Three Globes Society and their relationship to the Freemasons of colonial America, the Nazis, and the contemporary Alignment. Conrad picked up the binder and saw Packard’s notations in the margins. The most frequent words were “insane,” “crazy,” “speculation,” and “aha.” There were no comments on Conrad’s outline of possible origins of the globes and whether they were originally housed in King Solomon’s Temple, or perhaps some place older still.
Packard hung up the phone and looked at him. “It’s going to take a few hours, but I think we can clear you with Interpol so that police everywhere will stop shooting at you on sight.”
“You can’t do that,” Conrad said. “Midas would know that Serena lied to him about my demise. That alone would put her loyalty in doubt with the Alignment. I need an alias with ID to get me through all zones of security.”
Packard sighed. “That’s going to make it easier to nab the globes?”
“I don’t need to steal anything. That’s the beauty of it. I just need to see the three globes for myself. In and out.”
“Because you think they’ll reveal where and possibly when the Alignment will detonate the Flammenschwert?” Packard asked skeptically. “I’m not sure I’m ready to make that assumption.”
Conrad said, “I think the leadership of the Alignment will use the message of the globes as some sort of mystical directive for their mystical weapon, even if they manipulate the meaning to suit their ends. So that message is invaluable regardless.”
“Serena’s whip-smart, son. What makes you think she can’t figure it out for herself?”
“Not on the spot, she can’t. She hasn’t had the time I’ve had with both globes. And she’s a linguist, not an astro-archaeologist. She won’t be able to figure out the celestial-terrestrial alignments between the globes, let alone translate them to real-world coordinates. Even if she could, you know they’re not going to let her leave Rhodes alive once she’s delivered the only leverage she’s ever had with the Alignment.”
Packard licked a finger and flipped through the report again, clearly still agitated with himself and his analysts for having missed the possibility of the existence of a third globe. “So let me get this straight: You think all three used to be in Solomon’s Temple and were later buried beneath the Temple Mount when the Babylonians destroyed the First Temple. Furthermore, you think they may have been the Holy Grail that the Knights Templar were after when they started digging up the Temple Mount looking for Solomon’s treasures during the Crusades.”
“I think they worked to pinpoint a location of some great treasure, but it may not have been gold.”
“Then what the hell else could it have been? And don’t tell me the Ark of the Covenant.”
“Obviously, something of great value. In ancient Egypt and Tiahuanaco and Atlantis, that meant the secrets of First Time or the End Times.”
“The Alignment alr
eady has the secret of the End Times, son, and it’s called the Flammenschwert. That’s how they’re going to end things for all of us. And that’s why we need to find that weapon.” Packard’s face reddened, and he threw the report down. “I traded the globe for you and got nothing.”
There was something just a little too forced in Packard’s voice, and Conrad suddenly understood.
“You bastard,” he said. “You weren’t that desperate to get me. You just wanted to give Serena the globe and make her think she worked for it. What did you do to it?”
Packard sighed. “It’s got a tracker.”
Conrad slapped his hand on the table, furious. “Like the Alignment’s not going to find it and kill her? Then they’ll have the globes as well as the Flammenschwert, and you’ll still have nothing.”
“I told you, son, she’s our girl at this EU summit. Both she and Midas are invited. You and Uncle Sam aren’t. Security is going to be extremely tight, and the Alignment is supposed to think you’re dead. Anybody recognizes you, she’s dead.”
“She’s dead already.”
Packard seemed to be going back and forth in his head, weighing the risks and rewards. “Well, I can’t send U.S. troops, even Randolph, into this theater,” he said, as if thinking aloud. “And when it comes to European summits, trust me, it’s always theater.”
“So I’m in.”
“Hey, it’s your head and hers,” Packard said. “This doesn’t come back to Uncle Sam. Just stay out of sight, if that’s possible, and report as soon as you know anything.”
“I told you, I can do this without being seen, even by Serena. But I’ll be watching her.”
“As will everybody else. So watch yourself.”
Ten minutes later, the twin engines and four blades of the Super Puma Eurocopter were winding up for takeoff as Wanda Randolph walked Conrad across the tarmac and gave him his identification badges.
“Your name is Firat Kayda, a military liaison with us in Turkey, and you’re working the EU summit for the delegation from Ankara. It’ll take you about an hour in the air from here to there.”
Conrad looked at the four Greek airmen in the chopper. They already seemed to be glaring at him, the Turk. “Packard is truly determined to make everybody in this world hate me, isn’t he?”
“Well, he tries,” said Wanda. “At least this way, the Greeks won’t be asking you too many questions on the way over.”
36
Serena stepped off her seaplane in Mandraki Harbor at Rhodes and felt like she had stepped back in time to the Crusades. The Palace of the Grandmaster, the fifteenth-century Tower of St. Nicholas, and the Mosque of Sultan completely overwhelmed the contemporary seaside cafés, chic shops, and sleek yachts lining the harbor.
Brother Lorenzo of the Dei, his mouth agape in astonishment, was waiting for her by a silver Mercedes-Benz G55 AMG sport-utility vehicle as she walked toward him, holding the celestial globe from the Americans against her belly and looking like a pregnant woman about to give birth.
She felt naked without the full escort of Swiss Guards she normally had at her disposal. But this was not official Vatican business, and if any agents of the Alignment were watching from rooftops through scopes, it was probably for her protection until she delivered the globes. There was no reason for any sort of smash-and-grab attack.
“The genuine celestial globe,” Lorenzo said reverently as he helped her load it into the back. He had no clue where she had gone between Paris and Rhodes and was clearly impressed with her acquisition. “But how?”
She certainly wasn’t going to tell him. “Where’s Benito?”
“At the convention center with the terrestrial globe and the fake celestial globe.”
“Let’s go, then.”
The Rodos Palace hotel and convention center sat on a hill overlooking Ialyssos Bay and billed itself as Greece’s finest and largest convention resort, specially built to host the European heads of state. Serena could see from all the armored vehicles and police outside that this was certainly the case today. Some twenty-seven ministers of the European nations and all their security had descended on the peace summit to discuss and possibly reach some sort of international resolution on the fate of Jerusalem, which they had deemed the key to establishing an independent Palestinian state and peace in the Middle East.
Lorenzo bypassed the main entrance to the complex on Trianton Avenue and rounded the corner to the vehicle inspection point in front of the drop-off lane at the VIP entrance. He popped the rear hatch, lowered his window, and handed to a police officer his license and registration, along with their summit ID badges. Serena watched the officer slide the badges through a card reader while four soldiers surrounded the SUV and passed mirrors under the chassis in search of explosives.
A couple of the soldiers had gathered around the globe and asked that she and Lorenzo step out and explain while the interior cabin of the SUV could be examined.
“It’s part of the art for one of the exhibitions at the summit,” she said. “We’re not even taking it inside. We’re picking up another globe at the loading dock outside the Jupiter Ballroom and then taking both of them to the Palace of the Grandmaster for viewing.”
“Of course, Sister Serghetti,” the officer said. “I am sorry for the inconvenience.”
She climbed back inside the SUV, and Lorenzo got behind the wheel and started it up again. Then he drove them all of fifty yards down to the loading entrance outside the Jupiter Ballroom.
In the ballroom, Serena found the EU heads of state seated in front of their national flags around a pentagon of tables beneath Murano crystal chandeliers. Around the leaders was a much larger ring of tables packed with diplomatic staff, international press, and banks of equipment for audiovisual and simultaneous interpretation.
She made her way behind the press area, glancing up now and then to see the image of a talking head flash across the large screen over the stage. She could only guess how many of those faces belonged to the Thirty. Whoever her counterparts of the Alignment turned out to be, Serena was convinced that the message of the Templar globes and this EU summit were connected symbiotically. The origins of the globes had been traced to King Solomon’s Temple in Jerusalem, after all, and it was the future of that city under discussion in this ballroom.
She found Benito backstage with the globes, which were disregarded by all the technical people moving to and fro as mere set pieces and part of the show, somebody else’s responsibility.
Midas was there, too, and he wasted no time. “You have something for me?”
Serena removed the Shekel of Tyre from her pocket and handed it to him.
He didn’t take her word for it and took out some sort of pocket-sized device to shine an infrared light on it. “The ancients used some kind of polymer material on the coins. The effect is like an invisible UV stamp. See?” he said. He showed her the coin under the light, and to her amazement, she saw four arrowlike markers emblazoned at the cardinal points around the bust of Baal. They made a cross, and she recognized it as the adopted flag of the island’s Knights of St. John.
Midas held up his infrared device and said accusingly, “I used this on your celestial globe here, too. It’s a fake.”
“I have the real one in my car outside. You were to give me further instructions?”
Midas seemed pleased. “You are to take the globes to the west entrance of the Palace of the Grandmaster at three o’clock, where you will be met by a nameless Greek attaché and directed to a chamber where you will present the globes to Uriel,” he told her. “You have ten minutes.”
She left Lorenzo and the faux celestial globe at the convention center and climbed into the back of the SUV with the two genuine globes. Benito pulled onto the access drive, and the police waved them through the exit gate.
Uriel, she thought. Serena had never heard that name among the Thirty. But she knew that Uriel was the name of the angel in Genesis who guarded the gate to the Garden of Eden with a flaming sw
ord after God kicked Adam and Eve out of paradise. Conrad’s information about the Flammenschwert weapon was beginning to make sense, and she was eager to find out who this Uriel could be.
As they drove toward the Palace of the Grandmaster, she could tell Benito was impressed with her acquisition of the genuine celestial globe but concerned all the same.
“And Signor Yeats?” he asked, glancing at her in the rearview mirror.
“With the Americans,” she answered.
Benito bit his tongue, but Serena could read his eyes: That man will hate you for the rest of your life, you cold, heartless bitch. Well, he wouldn’t say that. Benito didn’t swear, and he knew more than anybody else what was necessary. He seemed sad all the same, though.
But she had come to Rhodes to unmask the Alignment. In a few minutes she would deliver the globes, as promised. In a few hours she would attend tonight’s Council Meeting of the Thirty. Then everything she had worked for and sacrificed—including a life with Conrad—would pay off once and for all.
37
The Greek pilot brought the Super Puma Eurocopter over Rhodes at nine hundred feet, steering clear of the EU summit’s security red zones below and following an alternative glide path to the airstrip. The skies were clear and offered Conrad a spectacular view of the island below.
“Security zones?” Conrad asked in broken English with the best Turkish accent he could make up. His attempt was so bad it actually worked, cracking up one of the Greeks. Another, named Koulos, decided to help the confused Turk get a lay of the land.
“The red inner-security zones are around the Palace of the Grandmaster in the Old Town down there, and the Rodos Palace hotel and convention center are in New Town over there,” Koulos shouted in English above the whir of the rotor blades. “They are linked by the harbor drive. Only authorized personnel or security assigned to those zones can pass through the checkpoints.”
The Atlantis Revelation Page 15