by Simon Toyne
The Abbot looked up, suddenly aware of the silence. On the laptop a progress bar edged its way to one hundred percent then vanished. ‘Has it all been wiped away?’
‘Yes,’ the Informer said. ‘It’s gone.’
‘Good,’ the Abbot said, laying both hands on the tightening screw. The Prelate was an issue. He could still ruin everything. ‘Tabula Rasa,’ he whispered. Then he started to turn.
V
Chapter 100
An early spring dusk was already starting to bruise the fringes of the afternoon sky when the bike pulled away from the guardhouse and headed past the row of silent warehouses towards the squat-looking cargo plane by hangar 12.
Gabriel raised his hand and waved back at the guard who’d just let them through. Liv couldn’t believe he’d let her in without any ID. Airport security was no way that relaxed back home — at least, she hoped it wasn’t. Gabriel had told the guard he needed to drop something off at the hangar and introduced her as his girlfriend. She hadn’t contradicted him. In fact she’d kind of liked it.
They coasted under the wing of the plane and in through the open door of the hangar, the sound of the bike’s engine suddenly deafening in the enclosed space. It was stacked high with silver packing cases, the tunnels between them just wide enough for the bike to pass through. They headed down one, towards the back of the building where warm lights burned behind the windows of an office. Gabriel swung the bike to a stop in front of them and killed the engine. ‘End of the line,’ he said.
Liv let go of his waist and slid from the seat. She was just smoothing her wind-whipped hair when the door of the office opened and a beautifully elegant woman stepped out, followed by a sprightly old man in flight overalls. The woman hardly looked at her. Instead she moved to where Gabriel was pulling the bike back on its kickstand. She embraced him, her eyes closed, her silky dark hair bunched against his chest by the tightness of her grip. Liv experienced a sudden tug of confusion and surprising jealousy. She looked away and found herself staring into the attentive face of the old man.
‘My name is Oscar de la Cruz,’ he said, stepping back through the open door of the office, his caramel voice welcoming her. ‘Please, come inside.’
She glanced over once more at the extended hug still binding Gabriel to the elegant woman, then followed him inside. The office was warm after the chilled bike journey and the smell of coffee and comforting low murmur of a TV set made the place feel almost homely.
‘Would you like coffee?’ Oscar asked, his dark eyes twinkling within his deeply tanned face. ‘Or. . maybe something a little stronger.’ He shot a look towards the door. ‘Between you and me, I’ve got a flask of whisky in my jacket.’
‘Coffee’s fine,’ Liv said, sitting on a chair next to a desk containing a stack of paperwork and a computer.
She turned slightly as Gabriel came in. He had his arm round the beautiful woman and his head dipped low. He spoke softly but rapidly, a look of earnest concentration on his face. The woman closed the door as Gabriel finished speaking, then looked up at Liv and moved round the desk to sit down opposite her, a smile softening her face. ‘I’m glad you’re safe here with us,’ she said. ‘I’m Kathryn. I left you the warnings. My son’s just been filling me in on what’s happened.’
Liv’s eyes flicked between her and Gabriel.
Her son?!
Gabriel pulled two chairs over from the far desk and sat on one of them, slipping the black canvas bag to the floor as he settled and opening it up. Seeing them side by side Liv could now see a strong physical similarity between them — though the woman hardly looked old enough to be his mother. Gabriel pulled something from inside the bag and handed it to her. It was her holdall. She smiled, feeling such gratitude for his simple yet thoughtful act. It was like being reunited with a piece of normality. She found the paper envelope in the outside pocket, lifted the flap and looked at the top photo of her and Samuel.
‘I’m very sorry for your loss,’ Kathryn continued. ‘And for the trials you’ve endured since you learnt of your brother’s death. I would not have chosen for you to be caught up in our ancient struggle, but fate had other plans.’
Oscar appeared by her side and placed a mug of black coffee on the desk by Liv before sitting in the last remaining chair. As his face lined up with theirs Liv noticed he too resembled them.
‘Your brother was a member of an ancient brotherhood of monks,’ he said, leaning forward in his chair. ‘Their sole purpose, to guard and protect the Sacrament. We think his death was an act of supreme self-sacrifice to send a message revealing its identity.’ He fixed Liv with his bright eyes, the deep wrinkles surrounding them suggesting a lifetime of laughter. ‘We think he sent that message to you.’
Liv stared at him for a moment then slowly lifted up her notebook and laid it on the desk between them. She looked down and turned to the second page where she had copied the symbols from the seeds.
‘This is what he sent to me,’ she said, sliding the notebook across the desk towards them. ‘I’ve re-arranged them every which way to try and make sense of it. Then I met Dr Anata, and found this on the spot where my brother fell.’ She slipped the card from between the pages and showed them the cryptic message:
T
MALA
MARTYR
‘From that I managed to re-arrange the letters into this — ’ She pointed at the last thing she had written:
T +?
Ask Mala
‘That’s when you arrived,’ she said, glancing up at Gabriel and discovering he was already looking at her. He smiled a small smile that travelled all the way to his eyes. She looked away, feeling the heat of a blush rising beneath her skin. ‘So,’ she said, looking instead at the old man. ‘You’re the Mala. I guess I’m asking you — what is the “T”?’
Oscar looked at her, his eyes suddenly tired and sad. ‘It was ours once,’ he said, ‘and is sometimes referred to as the Mala T. But as to what it is — I’m afraid we don’t know.’
Liv stared at him for a beat, not trusting what she’d heard. ‘But you must,’ she said, ‘my brother staked his life on it. Why would he send me to find you if he didn’t think you’d be able to help?’
Oscar shook his head. ‘Maybe this isn’t the message.’
Liv stared down at the phrase at the bottom of the page. She’d pulled every combination of words she could from the letters. This was the only thing that had made any sense. She reached out for her notebook and flicked to the first page. ‘Look,’ she said, pointing at the rough drawing of her brother’s body where the T was burnt on to his arm. ‘He had the same thing branded on to his body as well as these other scars. Maybe the message is in them!’
A sudden ripping sound made her look up. ‘The scars are not the message,’ Oscar said, pulling open another Velcro fastening on his flight suit, ‘they are merely a badge of office. They are part of the ritual associated with the Sacrament, but they do not reveal what it is.’
He shrugged his arms out of the green one-piece and rolled it down over the white turtleneck sweater he wore underneath, then pulled his shirt up over his head. Liv stared at his body beneath. It was the colour of mahogany and covered with the dark, puckered lines of old scar tissue. Her eyes traced the familiar shapes they made. All of them precise. All deliberate. All of them identical to the scars she had seen on the body of her dead brother.
Chapter 101
The Angelus bell was still echoing softly through the dark corridors of the Citadel as Father Thomas passed through the airlock into the great library. The bell marked the end of Vespers and the start of supper. Most of the mountain’s inhabitants would be heading to the refectories now for their evening meal. He didn’t expect to find many in the library.
The second door slid open, disgorging him into the entrance hall, and he glanced round at the few circles of light bobbing in the darkness with the dark form of a monk at the centre of each, like a tadpole ready to hatch. They were black cloaks mostly, librar
ians come to tidy up after a day of messy scholarship. He spotted Brother Malachi, the head librarian, seated by the entrance to the main chambers. He looked up as Thomas entered and immediately rose from his chair. Thomas had expected him to be here. Nevertheless, seeing him now, walking towards him with his sharp, serious face set wings of fear fluttering against the walls of his chest. Thomas was not used to keeping secrets. It did not suit him.
‘Father Thomas,’ Malachi said, leaning in close and conspiratorial, ‘I have removed those scrolls and tablets from the prehistoric section as requested.’
‘Ah good,’ Thomas replied, aware of the strain in his voice.
‘Might I ask what purpose their removal serves?’
‘Yes, of course,’ Thomas said, fighting to keep his voice low and under control. ‘The sensors have registered some anomalous moisture peaks in that section of the cave. I’ve isolated it to a specific area and need free access to the shelves there to check the tanking and run some diagnostics on the climate-control systems. It’s just a precaution.’
He saw Malachi’s eyes glaze over. The introduction of the printing press was the height of technological sophistication as far as he was concerned. Anything more recent baffled him. ‘I see,’ the librarian said. ‘Let me know when your work is complete and I will arrange for the texts to be re-sited.’
‘Of course,’ Thomas said. ‘Shouldn’t be long. I’m just going to run the diagnostics now.’ He performed a shallow bow then turned and headed, as casually as his racing heart would allow, over to a small door opposite the entrance which he opened and slipped gratefully inside.
Beyond the door was a small room containing a desk, a computer terminal and a man wearing the burnt-earth-coloured cassock of a guard. He looked up.
‘Evening, Brother,’ Thomas said cheerfully, continuing past him towards another door set in the far wall. ‘Any problems?’ The guard shook his head slowly. He was chewing on a piece of bread someone had brought him. ‘Good,’ Thomas said as he arrived at the door and tapped a code into the security lock next to it. ‘I’m just running some checks on the lighting matrix. There’s been a delay in some of the follow lights. Your terminal might go offline briefly,’ he said, pointing at the computer on the monk’s desk. ‘Shouldn’t take long.’ He twisted the door handle and disappeared into the next room before the guard had a chance to reply.
Inside, the air was cool and hummed with the insectile noise of busy electronics. Every wall was filled with racking shelves containing the hardwired brain of the library’s lighting, air-con and security systems. Thomas headed down the corridor of wires and air-cooled circuitry towards the user station set in the middle of the right-hand wall.
He logged on, tapped in an administrator password and a wire-frame floor plan of the library appeared on the flat-screen monitor. Small dots quivered on the screen, floating within the black like bright specks of pollen. Each one represented someone currently inside the library. He moved the mouse arrow over one of the dots, and a window opened next to it identifying it as Brother Barabbas, one of the librarians. He repeated the process, parking the arrow over each quivering dot in turn, until he finally found who he was looking for drifting erratically across the centre of the cave of Roman texts. He glanced nervously at the door, though he knew the guard did not have the code to access the room. Satisfied he was alone, he pressed three keys simultaneously to open a command window and started to run a small program he’d written earlier on a remote terminal. The screen froze briefly as the program initialized, then all the tiny dots jumped back to life, drifting and quivering across the black screen as before.
It was done.
Thomas felt the prickle of sweat on his scalp despite the cooled air inside the machine room. He took a few calming breaths then closed the command module and exited the room.
‘Everything still online?’ he asked, emerging through the door and squinting past the guard at his screen. The guard nodded, his mouth too full of bread and cheese to allow speech. ‘Good,’ Thomas said, turning sharply on his heel and skittering quickly through the room and out to the main entrance hall to avoid further discussion or questions.
He spotted Athanasius standing by the corridor leading to the older texts as he emerged. He was consulting a floor plan fixed to the wall, his finger tracing the maze of chambers, his smooth forehead knitted in concentration. Father Thomas walked up beside him and made a show of consulting the map. ‘He’s in the Roman section,’ he said softly, then turned and drifted away.
Athanasius waited a few seconds then followed him, his eyes fixed on his friend’s circle of light bobbing ahead of him, receding into the vast darkness of the great library of Ruin.
Chapter 102
Liv stared at the network of scars criss-crossing the old man’s dark skin. She looked into his eyes, her brows knitting into a question.
‘I lived in the Citadel for four years,’ Oscar explained. ‘I was scheduled to be ordained as a full Sancti when I was. . discovered.’
Liv shook her head, recalling the background reading she’d done on the plane. ‘But I thought no one had ever come out of the Citadel.’
‘Oh, they have. But never for very long. They are always ruthlessly hunted down and silenced. What you see before you,’ he said, a smile crinkling his face as he carefully folded his shirt in half, ‘is a dead man.’ He laid it gently in his lap and smoothed it down with his hand. ‘You know the story of the Trojan Horse?’ he asked, looking up.
Liv nodded. ‘The classic example of how to break a siege.’
‘Exactly. Just like the frustrated Greeks at the gates of Troy, our people eventually decided to use guile instead of might to try and penetrate the impenetrable and reclaim the divine mandate of the Sacrament. They devised their own Trojan Horse.’
‘You!’
‘Yes. They found me in an orphanage at the turn of the twentieth century. No parents. No siblings. No relatives of any kind; the perfect background to be considered for the brotherhood. I entered the Citadel when I was fourteen on a secret, open-ended mission to discover the identity of the Sacrament and escape the mountain with the knowledge of it.
‘It took me three years to get even close. Most of that time I spent working amongst the vast collection of books they hoard in their library, sorting through the boxes of new acquisitions. One day, a couple of years into my time there, a crate arrived full of relics from an archaeological dig in ancient Nineveh. The documentation with it referred to the contents being part of a forbidden book possibly relating to the Sacrament. Inside were hundreds of slate fragments. I stole one of the larger pieces before the head librarian noticed what the case contained and moved me on to something else. In private I examined the piece, but it was written in a language I had never seen, so I began to learn. I would assist the older monks in the library, picking up the skills and knowledge I hoped would help me decipher it while continuing to scour each new acquisition for anything that might help unlock the secret of the Sacrament. In the end fate guided me along a more direct route. My enthusiasm for learning was noticed by the senior monks and I was singled out to join the novitiate of the highest order within the Citadel — the Sanctus Custodis Deus Specialis, the Keepers of God’s Holy Secret, the only ones who know the identity of the Sacrament.’
Liv looked at his scars, the same ones her brother bore. ‘What caused those marks?’ she asked.
‘Part of the preparation is a ceremony, held every month in an ante-chamber in the restricted upper part of the mountain. Each novice is given a wooden Tau with a sacrificial dagger concealed within it. We were expected to cut deep,’ he said, his eyes looking inward, his finger drawing along the circular line at the top of his left arm as he remembered what had caused it. ‘Deep cuts. Signifying deep commitment. A regular act of faith — always rewarded by a miracle.’ His finger drifted across to the other side of his chest, continuing its slow sweep of remembrance along the lines of his former suffering. ‘For no matter how deeply we slice
d our flesh,’ he said, ‘our wounds healed, almost immediately.’ He looked back up. ‘Closeness to the Sacrament was rewarded with great health and great age. I am nearly one hundred and six years old,’ he said, ‘yet I remain as fit as a man forty years my junior. Had your brother lived, he too would have enjoyed long life, for he was being groomed, as I had been groomed before him.’
He tapped the keyboard on the desk and a familiar image faded up to replace the screensaver. It was one of the photos from the post-mortem showing the raised brand on Samuel’s left arm — the sign of the Tau. ‘Your brother got further than I,’ Oscar said, pointing at the screen. ‘He bears the symbol of the Sacrament. And as you can see,’ he said, turning to reveal his own bare arm, ‘I do not. Only those who were fully ordained received that mark. He knew the secret.’
Liv’s vision started to swim as her eyes filled with tears. ‘So what happened?’ she said. ‘How come you didn’t discover it?’
‘We were not the only ones who had read our history,’ he said, pulling the cotton turtleneck back over his head. ‘The Sancti had placed someone within our organization too and they discovered my existence, though fortunately not my identity.’ He smoothed the shirt down over his arms and adjusted the collar round his neck until all the scars were hidden. ‘There was a witch hunt inside the Citadel to try and find me. Fellow monks began accusing each other, often just to settle old scores. It was unbearable. I knew my time was short so I took risks. Became careless. A fellow novice called Tiberius saw me pocket a fragment of slate. When he turned to leave the library I knew he was out to betray me, even though he was my friend. So I started a fire in the library and used the smoke and chaos to cloak my escape. I ran to the lower section of the mountain, threw a bench through one of the windows and followed it out into the night. I fell more than a hundred feet into the moat and swam for my life. The world was at war back then. It was July 1918. A false trail of my flight was laid all the way to the trenches of Belgium and my identity swapped with some poor unfortunate who’d been torn beyond all recognition by a shell. The knights of the Sacrament — the Carmina — followed the trail, found the broken man and returned, satisfied that I had succeeded only in running from the Citadel and into the arms of death. Meanwhile I was transported to Brazil. I have lived there in secret ever since.’