by Brett King
And what if she’s waiting outside the elevator?
The elevator hummed to a stop. The doors parted.
She peeked out. Dark down here.
She switched on the penlight, then searched the observation room. Perez slouched in his chair, sleeping with a newspaper on his lap. Sneaking around him, she moved to the window. Wurm’s room was dark too. She debated bringing up the lights, but didn’t want to wake Perez. She slipped on something wet. Catching herself, she glanced down, shining the light on her bare foot. Blood dripped off her toes. She shined the flashlight on Perez’s face. His head was almost severed from his neck. She cupped her mouth, stifling the urge to vomit.
Looking to wipe blood from her foot, she spied hospital uniforms hanging inside a closet. After cleaning up, she traded her bloody pajamas for blue scrubs, then slid on Reese’s coat. She pushed open the door, then rushed down the stairs. Only half of Wurm’s book maze stood upright after Perez’s rampage last night. She hurried around the books to the exit.
She raised Mack’s card, ready to swipe it.
A gun barrel nuzzled the back of her head.
“Step away from the door,” a cool voice ordered from behind.
She froze, not recognizing the man.
“Do it,” he barked.
Cori took a step back.
“Who are you?” he demanded.
“A psychiatrist,” she answered, borrowing Adriana’s lie. “Dr. Elizabeth Reese.” She sighed, thinking she’d messed up. What if the guy was security? He’d know the staff.
“Turn around.”
She moved slowly. Her hand was shaking.
The man’s dark features framed piercing eyes. Dressed in a long black coat, he didn’t look like security. Is this guy a Borgia? Was he the one talking to Adriana outside my bedroom?
“All the docs go barefoot around here?” the man asked.
“Didn’t get a chance to grab my shoes. While I was on break, a patient escaped.”
“The patient who stays down here?”
“Yeah.”
“What happened?” he asked. “Place is torn apart. And you have a dead man up in that observation room.”
She stayed with the bluff. “It’s been a long night. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to notify the police.” She started to turn, keeping it tough. “I’m sure they’ll want to question you. I’d advise you to stay here.”
“You’re not going anywhere.” He pointed a handgun at her forehead.
She swallowed hard, losing her composure. Her mother’s book dropped and hit the floor.
“Move to the wall.”
She didn’t argue.
The man picked up the book. Turning it over, he studied the jacket photograph. He made the connection. “Guess what, Dr. Reese? This book says your name is Cori Cassidy.” The business card peeked out from the book. He glanced at it, then flipped it over. He examined the back of the card. “What does this number sequence mean?”
“Swear I don’t know.”
“Where’d you get this card?” he asked with blazing eyes. “I’m not in a good mood. Tell the truth this time.”
“A man named Edgar Wurm gave it to me. Told me to contact the guy on the card.”
“John Brynstone?” he asked, reading it again.
“Yeah.”
“What did Wurm want you to tell Brynstone?”
She didn’t answer.
“Tell me,” he snarled.
“It didn’t make sense.”
“Tell me anyway.”
Cori considered what had happened to Mack Shaw and Perez. And she remembered Edgar Wurm’s warning. Something clicked for her.
“Forget it,” she said, surprised by her own defiance. “I’ll only talk to Brynstone.”
“Then you better start talking.” The dark-haired man brought out his ID card. “Because I’m John Brynstone.”
Chapter Eighteen
Baltimore
2:27 A.M.
Surprise played on the woman’s face. Brynstone sensed fear in her voice.
“You know Edgar Wurm?” Cori Cassidy asked.
“I worked with him before he lost his mind.” He glanced at Wurm’s ravaged hospital ward. “I haven’t seen Edgar in eighteen months. We stayed in touch while he was in this place.”
“Can you get me out? Please?”
He thought it over. “Are you a patient?”
“No,” she answered. “Actually, yes. But not really.”
He arched a dark eyebrow.
“Edgar Wurm warned me about the Borgias. That Adriana chick killed Mack. She nearly killed me.”
He believed her. The last time Brynstone confronted the Borgias, he’d barely escaped with his life. This girl wouldn’t stand a chance. “Why didn’t Adriana Borgia kill you?”
“She ran off when a guy said they captured Wurm.” Cori met his eyes. “Get me out and I’ll tell you where they took him.” She jumped as elevator doors opened in the observation booth. “Someone’s coming,” she warned. “Stop wasting—”
He clamped his hand over her mouth. A peculiarlooking man peered down from the booth’s window. Not Wurm or a Borgia. The guy didn’t see them.
“Know him?” Brynstone whispered, taking away his hand.
She nodded. “A psychiatrist. His name’s Dr. Usher.”
Brynstone didn’t want the staff seeing him, but he wasn’t sure what to do with this girl. Maybe she could help find Wurm. Usher pushed a dimmer switch.
The ward brightened as waves of light moved closer.
Gotta get out of here.
Brynstone grabbed her hand, swiping the card across the reader. The door unlocked.
He holstered his gun while escorting Cori into a tunnel beneath the hospital. A service door led outside to the snowy hospital grounds. He wrapped his coat around her. Glancing at her bare feet, he offered to carry her. She accepted. That surprised him.
She tightened her arms around his neck as they hurried to the street.
A Cadillac Escalade hybrid blazed across the lot. Headlights flashed over them as the SUV swerved to a stop. Jordan Rayne leaned over, opening the passenger door. Brynstone dipped Cori into the front. She curled up, basking on the heated leather seats. He climbed in behind with Banshee. As he petted the cat, her tail twisted into a question-mark shape.
“Let’s go,” he told Jordan.
Cori turned to her. “Who are you?”
“Don’t ask,” Jordan advised as she drove away from the hospital.
“She’s right, Cori,” he said, leaning between the seats. “Don’t ask questions. I kept my end of the deal. You’re out of the hospital. Now, tell me where the Borgias took Wurm.”
“Adriana mentioned a slaughterhouse. Hartlove Slaughterhouse.”
“Think you can find it?” he asked Jordan.
“I’ll drop you at your vehicle, then I’ll get on it.”
Cori’s hands clenched. “I need to call about Mack Shaw. You should have seen what they did to him.”
“I know how the Borgias operate,” Brynstone said. “I’ve seen their work.”
“I hate leaving Mack.”
Jordan looked over. “Nothing you could do.”
“You said Wurm had a message.” Intensity flickered in his eyes. “What did he say?”
“It was strange,” she started. “Leonardo—excuse me, Wurm—said to tell you the Tree of Life can kill as well as heal.”
That puzzled Brynstone.
“Look, while Jordan searches for Wurm, I’ll take you home. Where do you live?”
Cori gave directions to her home in the north Baltimore neighborhood of Hampden. She added that Wurm was interested in Ariel Cassidy’s research. “My mother was a medieval-history professor at Princeton. I didn’t get a chance to tell him about a notebook my mom gave me, but it might help. It’s at my place.”
“Here we are,” Jordan said, pulling behind a parked black Escalade. “I’ll deliver the mummy tissue sample to Nosaka and track down Wurm.�
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“I appreciate you sticking out your neck for me.”
“I’ll do whatever it takes to help you, John.”
With his cat tucked under his arm, Brynstone and Cori hurried to the SUV. In the distance, Jordan’s vehicle disappeared around the corner, driving at high speed.
“She’s in a hurry,” Cori said, climbing inside the SUV.
Brynstone slid his key into the ignition, but didn’t start the engine. Banshee hopped onto Cori’s lap. He took advantage of the distraction to check his stitches.
She scratched the cat behind her ears. Banshee pressed her head against Cori’s arm.
“What happened to her eye?”
“A bullet grazed her eye. She saved my life, so I adopted her. Truth is, she adopted me.”
“What a funny kitten you are,” she said, rubbing Banshee’s neck. “All the cats I know attack the pedals when you put them in a car.”
“She’s a good traveler. Better than most kids. Probably better than most adults.”
“Thanks for getting me out of that hospital. You said you knew Edgar Wurm before he lost his mind?”
He nodded. “He’s a cryptanalyst. He tried to break code on something called the Voynich manuscript. It pushed him over the edge. He became paranoid. Wurm claimed he was getting messages from Leonardo da Vinci.”
Cori made a face. “What sort of messages?”
“He had human skulls from an anatomy lab in his basement. He’d chiseled the base of each to widen the opening. Edgar painted da Vinci’s messages inside each skull.”
“What kind of messages?”
“Some strange code. Couldn’t decipher it. Later, Wurm claimed he was da Vinci. He knew too much and was too valuable to lose, so they hospitalized him at Amherst. The whole time, Edgar believed people were out to get him.”
“That’s not a paranoid delusion. The Borgias kidnapped him tonight.”
“What else did he say at the hospital?”
“When we met, Wurm said, ‘The Tree of Life blossoms in the Land of the Dead.’” She coughed. “Mom studied the Tree of Life. That ‘Land of the Dead’ quote? It’s in her book about alchemy. It’s an early form of chemistry. Know about it?”
“The alchemists were guys in the Middle Ages who tried to transform lead into gold.”
“That’s a cover-up. It wasn’t about making gold. Some kings executed alchemists if they couldn’t change base metals into precious ones. Driven by fear, some looked for a formula for gold. Greed motivated others, but that’s like saying all lawyers are ambulance chasers.”
“If alchemists weren’t converting lead into gold, what were they looking for?”
“A secret medicine. They tried to find a universal cure for disease. The ‘elixir of life’ was a life-prolonging medicine that could heal and transform people.”
“Transform them?” he repeated. “How?”
“Make them immortal. If you knew the formula, you could do more than cure a person. You could give them eternal life. That’s why Mom called her book The Perfect Medicine.”
“I want to talk to your mom,” he said, starting the engine.
“So did Wurm.” Cori rubbed her crossed arms. “She died earlier this year. Leukemia.”
“Sorry to hear that.” He glanced at her. “What did she write about the Tree of Life?”
She brightened. “A root from this mythical tree grew until two thousand years ago. Then it vanished. Alchemists called it the Radix ipsius, meaning ‘root of itself.’ It was independent of any other class of plants. Separate even from God.”
“You know about the Radix?”
“It goes by many names. The Healing Root. The Prime Material. The Hidden Treasure. The Secret of Secrets. An alchemist named Paracelsus called it the increatum. That means ‘uncreated.’ He thought it was uncreated, like a deity. The Radix was said to be equal to God.”
He had heard that last part, but the stuff about alchemy was new.
“Ever hear of the philosopher’s stone?” she asked. “It’s an alchemical code name for a substance that could transform anything—including people—into a more perfect creation.”
“Is the Radix the same as the philosopher’s stone?”
“The Radix is the Prime Material,” she said, looking down at Banshee, who napped on her lap. “The main ingredient used to create the philosopher’s stone or the elixir of life.”
“So, if someone found the Radix—”
“Finding the Radix wouldn’t be enough. You’d need the Scintilla.”
She explained that scintilla came from a word meaning “spark.” In alchemical circles, it was a recipe or formula used to create the elixir of life. Alone, the Radix could heal, but to maximize its effects and potential, you needed a spark to ignite the transformation.
You needed the Scintilla.
“Why’d the alchemists use obscure names like Scintilla and philosopher’s stone?”
“They wanted to keep their work secret, so they invented codes and cover names to disguise their ideas. They did it for security. Or maybe it was flat-out paranoia. ” Her eyes narrowed. “You can still see their work today, but you have to know where to look. Of course, there’s a familiar symbol for the Radix. One that’s in every pharmacy in the country.”
“The Rx symbol?”
She nodded. “Even many pharmacists don’t realize that Rx is an abbreviation based on the first and last letters of Radix.”
They drove down Hampden’s Thirty-fourth Street, passing town houses adorned with holiday decorations. Twinkling green and red lights splashed across the windshield.
“Talking with you reminds me of conversations I had with Mom when I helped with her book. Too bad it’s all just a legend,” Cori said. “Here we go. Turn on this street.”
“Let’s say someone found the Radix. Sounds like it would be the most powerful medicine of all time.”
“Don’t take this stuff seriously, Dr. Brynstone. The Radix legend is a fairy tale for historians and archeologists.”
“Yeah? Did your mom believe in it?”
“There’s my house. The one with the lopsided Christmas lights hanging off the roof.”
He parked the Escalade beside the snowy sidewalk. “Sounds like your mother did a lot of work on the Radix. It’s a weird circumstance, but my father also studied it.”
“Maybe, like Wurm said, it’s synchronicity.”
“What’s that?”
“In Jungian psychology, synchronicity is a meaningful coincidence between two things that aren’t linked in a causal way. Like when you pick up the phone to call a friend and she’s already on the line. Or when you dream about someone dying and that person passes away.”
“You experienced that with your mom, didn’t you?”
She smiled. “You’re a good psychologist, Dr. Brynstone.”
“So are you. Not many people can reach Wurm. Sounds like you managed to do that.”
“Back to your question,” she said. “Mom believed in the Radix. She talked about writing a book on it, but never had the chance. There was a time when I wanted to believe. If I’d had the Radix, I could’ve saved her. Too bad it’s all a myth.”
“Cori,” he said, staring into her blue eyes, “it’s not a myth.”
Cori wondered if the guy was crazy. Or was he serious? “Let me understand,” she said, studying this man she barely knew. “You think the Radix ipsius is more than a myth?”
“I’m a skeptic by nature,” Brynstone said. “In the case of the Radix, I’m a believer.”
She shook her head. “Even if it existed, the plant disappeared two thousand years ago.”
“One root survived,” he said. “In 1502, a man named Raphael della Rovere concealed it inside a mummy. No one has laid eyes on the Radix until last night. That’s when I found it.”
She shot him a look. He wasn’t joking. “Where’d you find it?”
“Can’t tell you.”
“Show it to me.”
“Can’t do
that.”
“Okay, let’s say you did find the Radix. If Mom was right, it couldn’t achieve its full power without the Scintilla. You’d need other ingredients to create the perfect medicine.” She stared into his eyes. “I remember Wurm mentioned something in his book maze. He said Carl Jung was at the heart of understanding the puzzle.”
“The psychiatrist?” he asked. “That Carl Jung?”
“Wurm mentioned him. Something about learning Jung’s secrets.” She tickled Banshee’s ear. “My mother found a link between Jung and the Scintilla. She had boxes of notes that were never published. After her passing, Princeton stored the archives. A fire burned part of Dickinson Hall. All that’s left is the one notebook in my house. I’ll show you.”
She climbed down from the SUV. Walking barefoot up her slick driveway, she noticed her Volkswagen bug hiding beneath snow. She pulled a key from a hiding spot on the porch.
“Three in the morning,” he said, noticing a light in her town house. “Someone’s awake?”
“My roommate, Tessa. Nocturnal grad student.”
She unlocked the door, then rubbed her cold feet on the carpet. Cori stiffened. Her living room was trashed. An overturned lamp rested beside the coffee table. Papers were strewn across the room. The Christmas tree had been knocked over. Shattered ornaments cluttered the floor.
“Oh, God,” she said in a small voice. “What happened?”
“Borgias,” Brynstone whispered, moving around her. He handed over his keys and brought out a handgun. “Wait in the Escalade. It’s not safe here.”
He ducked into the kitchen. After taking a quick look at the first floor, he moved upstairs. She followed up the stairs toward her bedroom. Keeping a safe distance, she waited until he checked it. He moved down the hallway. She peeked in her room.
He turned. “Why are you here? Get out.”
“I need the notebook.” She moved into her bedroom and stepped over books. Her Mac was smashed, inside the closet. Every drawer had been pulled out. She checked the desk.
“Mom’s notebook. It’s gone.”
“Stay here. I’ll clear the other rooms.” He disappeared down the hallway.
She stared at the chaos, then changed into low-slung jeans and a sweater. She slid on running shoes, then grabbed her phone and a navy peacoat. She noticed a golden necklace trapped beneath a spill of DVDs. A gift from her late mother. She wrapped the locket around her hand, then darted into the hallway. Brynstone stood in Tessa’s doorway.