by Layton Green
Jake took the letterbox out of his backpack and set it on the bed, face-down. We crowded around. “Each map section takes up roughly the same amount of space, and the map is running in a snake-like pattern from the bottom left to the upper right corner. There appear to be six sections, and we’re here, at the third, right now.”
I stated the obvious. “Halfway.”
As we all stared at the map, I knew the others were thinking the same thing I was: after what we had been through on the first half of the journey, I didn’t even want to think about what might happen on the second.
Later that night, as I lay in bed with Asha still and quiet in my arms, trying to find solace in sleep, I again felt as if I were under some sort of spell. I tried to tell myself we would be more careful, that justice would be served and secrets revealed. Instead I could think only of Asha’s hands passing through those of her brother, of running headlong through Pere Lachaise cemetery, of the shrouded figure in the tomb, and of the man in the wicker cage, screaming as the flames consumed him.
Per the doctor’s orders, we holed up inside the hotel for two days while Asha convalesced, putting off Mr. Sofistere’s questions by claiming she had a nasty flu. Lou and I scoured the news for reports of a man burned to death near the Czech border—surely there would be something—but no word came through. We filed a police report that turned into an interrogation. After admitting we never saw a corpse and could not ID anyone involved, the Czech police asked us if we had been taking drugs and all but shoved us out the door. If the bus driver was still around, we knew he would lie to save his job.
Fear was a miserable manner of existence. Asha walked around the hotel in a trance, eyes red-rimmed and haunted, gazing out of windows with listless eyes. I began looking over my shoulder with every step, imagining a flash of white around a corner or down a darkened hallway.
When Asha removed her bandage on the morning of the third day, the wound was still red around the stitches. Keeping a furtive lookout for the Druids, we passed through Prague’s Old Town on the way to the train terminal for Kostel Utes. The morning sun illuminated the fairytale architecture hovering with ethereal splendor above the maze of cobblestone streets. Despite the threat we knew awaited, the beauty of Prague still took my breath away. We walked past the magnificent Charles Bridge on our way to the terminal, and soon we were paralleling the Vltava for the thirty-minute ride to Jake’s church.
Fall had arrived in earnest. Prague was on a geographic par with southern Canada, and a distinct chill permeated the air when we stepped off the train at Kostel Utes. At once we saw the rotunda sitting proudly on a cliff face marked by hundreds of small, triangular rock formations jutting out as if in bas-relief. Jake was right—it was a distinct geological feature.
Once again, the scene depicted on the letterbox map had come to life.
“Where’s the steeple?” Asha asked. A white cross atop the roof gave the only indication that the edifice was a church.
Jake frowned. “Good question.”
A paved road ran through a cluster of provincial homes and shops set along the bank, crossing the river via a narrow bridge. There was no taxi in sight, so we nervously crossed the bridge on foot, then followed the road up the hill.
“I hate climbing,” Lou said, as we hiked up the cliff. “We need an Internet quest.”
“Shut your pie-hole,” Jake said.
“You need to learn to appreciate the finer things in life,” Lou wheezed. “Like complaining. It’s liberating.”
“I never wanted a sister,” Jake muttered.
Although short, the climb was steep, and Lou still favored his injured ankle. The road led to an empty church parking lot.
After scouring the grounds and the road below for signs of the Druids, we stepped into a plain gray narthex. Open double doors led to a sanctuary of equal thrift. The only two items in view were a chest-high wooden table to the left of the chapel doors, and a lower table to the right. A padlocked glass case dominated the higher table, an array of church literature was spread out on the lower.
Jake crossed himself and stepped to the glass case. Beneath a plaque engraved in Czech, the case housed a Bible, rosary beads, a crucifix, a clay bowl, and a strip of tattered white cloth blotted with dark stains.
Lou peered down at the reliquary. “Ridiculous.”
Jake cut off his retort as a tall, middle-aged priest with an angular forehead emerged from a side corridor.
“Can I help you?” he asked, in perfect English. “I’m Father Novak.”
Silver hairs graced his temples, and his face possessed a magnetic calm.
“Father, I’m Jake Fleniken, a Catholic scholar. We were traveling in the area, and I thought I’d drop in for a look.”
“A scholar?” he said brightly. “What a privilege. Sadly, our church used to be much more interesting. During the Occupation, the Soviets turned the church into a military outpost. Many of our historic items were spirited away to other churches. We’ve been pushing to have these returned, but so far we’ve only managed to bring back this reliquary.”
I exchanged a glance with Jake.
“I’m sure this church with its rich history,” I said, “once contained some fascinating Catholic relics.”
The priest smiled, wistful. “I’ve only seen pictures. In fact, I have a book memorializing that very subject. Would you care to take a look?”
“If you have the time,” Jake said.
“It’s been a slow day.” He gave a rueful grin. “Actually, it’s been a slow year. And I’ve neglected my priestly duties. Would any of you like to give confession before we begin?”
Asha and Lou and I declined. Jake shuffled his feet and looked down. “Father, I . . . no, not today.”
I wondered how long it had been since Jake’s last confession.
Father Novak left the room and returned with a thin hardback tome. It was difficult to stay focused as he flipped through the book and translated the tedious story of Kostel Utes. Lou’s eyes glossed over, Asha maintained a distracted smile, and even Jake was losing patience.
The priest droned on. “This ancient cross is one of two objects found at the original site which, curiously enough, are Celtic in origin.” He flipped the page. “The next item—”
“Father,” I said. From Jake’s raised eyebrows, I noticed he had caught the same thing. “Sorry to interrupt, but can we go back to that page?”
Father Novak looked surprised at our interest. “Of course.” He flipped the page, and we took a good look at the picture. It depicted a solid iron cross with a circle surrounding the intersection of the two halves of the crucifix.
“How interesting,” Asha said sweetly, catching on. “I didn’t realize the Celts were in Bohemia.”
“Oh, yes, for quite some time.”
“What about the other Celtic object that was mentioned?” Jake asked. “I’m curious about that.”
The priest ran his eyes down the page. “Let me check the index.” He flipped to the back of the book. “Celtic Cross and . . . Celtic Triquetra. Or triad. Page one hundred and twelve. Let’s see.”
The priest flipped through the book again, stopping at an illustration of a large bronze medallion with an unusual shape: a tripartite symbol composed of three interlocking compressed circles. The intertwined circles, each of which reminded me of the Christian fish symbol without the tail, created a space in the middle that looked like the bottom half of a heart.
Unlike the rest of the solid medallion, bronze bars ran both horizontally and vertically across the open space in the center, creating a design remarkably similar to the chessboard window at Castello di Selva.
-40-
Father Novak continued to read, oblivious to our barely restrained elation. “Although originally pagan icons, both the Celtic Cross and the Triquetra evolved into symbols of Christianity.”
“Father, does the text state where these two relics were taken?” Jake asked. “We wouldn’t mind checking them out if we get the chance.”
The priest turned to a previous page. “The cross was sent to a museum in Cesky Krumlov, and the triad was sent to Kostnice Chapel. Kostnice is in Kutna Hora, a small town less than an hour from Prague by train.”
He closed the book and gave us directions. We thanked him for his time and hurried down the cliff.
By the time we returned to Prague, the sun had started to descend. To avoid traveling at night, we packed up the next morning and took the first train out.
Kutna Hora was a typical Bavarian town: sloping red-tiled roofs, constricted cobblestoned streets, spires rising above the town like gigantic black needles. I had only visited this part of Europe in the crowded summer months, and the lack of tourists lent the town an isolated feel. The quiet Gothic center was unsettling, as if the buildings themselves lorded over the town.
We found a decent hotel tucked safely into the center of town, dropped our bags, and asked for directions to the chapel. We found Kostnice standing off by itself, atop a low hill littered with weathered tombstones. The cemetery was unkempt, full of weeds and moss-covered grave markers.
“There aren’t a lot of people around,” Asha said nervously. “What if—”
“It’s the middle of the day in a town,” Jake said. “Not to mention it’s a chapel.”
“I don’t know what that’s got to do with anything,” Lou said, “but at least there’s a guard at the door.”
The chapel’s massive stone center tapered to a severe arch at the entrance, reminding me of the neck of a dragon. When Jake opened the imposing wooden door, I took a step back, and Asha inhaled sharply beside me.
Just past the entrance, a flight of steps led downward, and a large cross hung on the cracked stone wall of the stairwell. What shocked me was not the crucifix, but the architect’s choice of materials.
The cross was fashioned out of human bones.
Femurs, ulnas, and tibias had been strung together to form the two sections of the cross, and human skulls capped the four ends. We descended to find ourselves in a low-ceilinged antechamber that opened into a much larger room. Candles placed throughout the chapel illuminated walls with the same rough, pitted surface as the stairwell.
There were bones everywhere: draping the walls, framing the archways, hanging from the ceiling, adorning the furnishings, comprising the furnishings. Statues of bones, candelabras of bones, portraits of bone, Catholic accoutrements carved from bone.
“Oh my,” Asha murmured.
Lou arched his eyebrows, and even Jake looked taken aback. I could only stare in macabre fascination.
“I’ve heard of ossuaries being made into functional structures before,” Lou said, “but never a church.”
Jake nodded. “I’ve seen plenty, but nothing like this.”
“Ossuary?” I asked.
“A place for storing human bones.”
“Who would want to do that?” Asha said, peering upward at the centerpiece of the room, an enormous chandelier dripping strands of bones.
We split up and searched for the Triquetra. The staircase was the only exit, and a vaulted ceiling capped the large room. Four archways signaled alcoves in each corner, and when I drew closer to one, I saw that the alcove concealed a fat, dusty pyramid of bones that rose high above my head. The bone tower interlocked without any discernible support or pattern, and a man-size opening led into the darkened center. I peered nervously inside. It was empty.
Asha walked over. “Any luck?”
“Not yet,” I said.
She shuddered. “This place creeps me out. At least in Pere Lachaise the bones weren’t visible.”
We kept searching. Fronting an alcove near the rear of the chapel was a wooden Christ figure hanging on a cross. Human skulls, situated at the foot of the effigy and tilted upwards in silent regard, mocked the figure as they mocked everything else in the church, screaming with throatless voices: Believe in what you will, but you will be as us one day.
An old woman knelt in front of the Christ figure. It was hard to believe this was a functioning place of worship, and even harder to believe someone would choose to utilize it.
I walked behind the Christ figure. Set into the rear wall of the alcove, behind a waist-high rope, was a two-tiered glass case with an array of objects inside. I didn’t recognize any of the other pieces, but sitting on the upper shelf was a three-pointed bronze medallion with a curiously patterned center.
The Triquetra.
Asha squeezed my arm, and I waved the others over. Jake and Lou joined us behind the rope. “That’s it, all right,” Jake said. “Locked up tight.”
“What does it represent?” I asked, gazing at the wizened relic.
“It’s a little unclear,” Jake said, “but the Celts believed in the power of threes, including the three personifications of the mother goddess. At some point, it became a symbol of the Holy Trinity.”
Lou threw his hands up. “How do you know all of this and still believe in Christianity?”
“The Holy Trinity is just an adaptive theological doctrine, Commie. Part of the early Church’s attempt to understand God and the Resurrection, with the language that they knew. Once you figure out a better way, be sure to let me know. I’ll give the Pope a call.”
Lou snorted and shook his head.
“So what do we do?” Asha asked.
“Right now, nothing,” Jake said. “I need to think, and I’ve had about enough of this dungeon.”
“I second that,” Asha said.
As we left the chapel, a man loitering on the street sidled up in threadbare brown overalls. He had the worn look of someone aged prematurely by hard labor, and he wheezed like a lifelong smoker. “Vould you like tour of city?”
We tried to walk away, but he followed us, regaling us with the magnificent places in Kutna Hora only he could show us. Finally Asha stopped, handed him a few bills with a kind smile, and pointed at the ossuary. “Tell us about this place.”
The man straightened, pleased to have an audience.
“You stand in front Kostnice Ossuary,” he said in tourist English marked by the Slavic lack of articles. “Built in fourteenth century after Abbot of Sedlec bring back dirt,” he reached down to grab a handful of earth, “from Golgotha. Where Christ vas crucified. Abbot sprinkle dirt on ground, and Kostnice become holy ground.”
“But why all the bones?” Asha asked.
“Plague bring too many dead bodies to cemetery. There vas half-blind monk looking after chapel. He vas mad.” He cackled as he said this, as if conjuring an image of the disturbed architect of Kostnice.
“Monk take bones from cemetery and carry them inside, make room for new corpses. Everyone too concerned with plague to notice. Monk make things inside, all from human bones. Forty thousand bones inside Kostnice.”
Asha forced a smile. “You know your church.”
“I am night vatchman. I give tours during day, in church and in town.”
Jake gave me a sly glance. “I’m a photographer. I don’t want a tour, but I’ll tell you what I do want. And I’ll pay you for it.”
The man leaned forward at the mention of payment.
“That church would make a great addition to my work,” Jake continued. “I took some photos, but I want one of the Christ figure in candlelight. Artistic touch and all that. Being the caretaker, I’m sure you have the keys to the place. Let me inside one night, just for a few minutes, and I’ll make it worth your while.”
The man looked around. “I no think I can—”
Jake pulled out a hundred-note euro, and the man’s eyes widened. Jake started to slide the bill back into his wallet.
“Vait—” the man said. “How much time you need?”
“Fifteen minutes.”
“For one hundred euro?”
“That’s right,” Jake said, keeping the bill exposed.
The caretaker flexed his hands. “No one can see you.”
“Don’t you worry,” Jake said. “When do we meet?”
“Sa
turday night is best, ten o’clock. Ve meet here. Fifteen minutes, no more. I vill light candles.”
“What’s your name?” Jake asked.
“Josef.”
“Joe, you made a wise decision.”
Asha exploded as soon as the man walked off. “We promised we weren’t going anywhere else at night!”
“We’re not,” Lou said. “Or at least I’m not.”
I didn’t say anything. I knew Jake was going in with or without us.
Jake shrugged. “The opportunity was too good to pass up. It’s Saturday night, there’ll be plenty of people out and about. Especially as early as ten. Don’t worry, I plan on going by myself. I just need a few minutes.”
Asha shook her head, and I knew what she was going to say before she said it.
“I don’t like this at all,” she said, “but we stay together. And if there aren’t lots of people out, or there’s a sign that something isn’t right, we find another way.”
Jake just grinned.
-41-
Two days of isolation in the hotel, waiting for the next piece of the puzzle while our fears metastasized into tangible things: shadows that slinked around corners, nameless things lurking behind closed doors, a dead current of air drifting into a courtyard.
After dinner in the hotel on the first night, I got a call from Bobby Gravois, my private investigator. I slipped into the lobby to take it.
“You found something?” I asked.
“It’s what I didn’t find that interests me.” His rich Cajun twang sounded incongruous in the middle of Central Europe. “And what I didn’t find was a birth certificate.”
“Sorry?” I said. “Everyone has a birth certificate.”
“I hear ya, podna. But our guy’s been scrubbed.”
“How do you know?”
“It’s got that feel. CIA or witness protection or something. Lucius Sofistere—at least the one living in New Orleans—shouldn’t exist. But he does, so that means a false identity. Not sure how far you want to go with this, but—”
“Far.”