Sanctus s-1

by Simon Toyne

  It was a stylized drawing of a tree, its thin trunk rising straight up to where two branches, heavy with fruit, spread out on either side, forming the familiar shape of the ‘T’. Winding its way up the trunk was a serpent, and standing either side of it, a man and a woman. She looked across at Oscar, not quite believing what he was suggesting.

  ‘You said the letters were scratched on seeds,’ he said. ‘Do you know what sort of seeds?’

  Liv gazed into his deep black eyes and thought of all the pictures she’d seen in her life depicting Adam and Eve standing in front of the tree of knowledge, one of them always holding the heavy fruit of temptation in their hand.

  ‘Apple,’ she said. ‘They were scratched on apple seeds.’

  Chapter 107

  The vast caves of the library glowed bright and green in the guard’s night vision, making all the details of the room visible. He upped his pace now he could see the way ahead and pulled the Beretta from his sleeve. His head scanned left to right, looking for the hotspots of light that would indicate someone’s presence. He saw none. The only thing that flared in the green was the thin guide lights, stretching ahead like a phosphorescent vapour trail, leading all the way to the forbidden vault.

  It took him less than a minute to get there.

  As he approached the entrance to the final corridor he slowed his pace, dropped to a crouch then stopped. He leaned back against the upright of the carved archway. Ducked his head round the edge. Glanced towards the vault itself.

  The floor lights blazed in his vision, a bright green line pointing towards the end of the corridor. He peered past the glare. Searching for movement in the dark beyond.

  Saw nothing.

  Silently he crabbed his way round the edge of the arch and moved stealthily down the middle of the corridor directly toward the vault. His gun extended in front of him. His head perfectly still, like a cat stalking a mouse.

  Athanasius saw the line of guide lights break barely six feet in front of him. He was tucked into the shelf that had been emptied earlier on Father Thomas’s orders. It was low to the ground, opposite the entrance, facing the vault.

  He watched the patch of darkness slide away from him, along the filament of light, showing someone was in the corridor with him. The position of the shelf meant anyone walking down the corridor towards the vault would not see him; anyone walking back up it, however, would spot him in an instant. He needed to be gone before the guard looked round.

  Slowly he eased his way out, his ears amplifying every tiny sound, his eyes never leaving the small patch of darkness as it continued to slip away from him down the brittle strip of light in the floor.

  He pushed himself to his knees. Then to his feet. He took a step, reaching out into the featureless darkness towards the doorway, lifting and replacing his feet on the floor like a ballet dancer, terrified that the merest scrape of sandal on stone would alert the guard to his presence and bring sudden death.

  His hands continued to reach out, groping through the formless black, feeling for the edge of the archway that would lead him away from this trapped corridor. His eyes never left the patch of darkness sliding away down the corridor.

  He took a second step.

  A third.

  A fourth.

  On the fifth his hand touched the smooth, cold stone of the wall. He nearly gasped with relief when he felt it. Then he froze. The patch of darkness had stopped moving, just short of the end of the lights. Athanasius moved his hand along the cold stone, heard his dry skin rasp across it, unnervingly loud. In his mind he pictured the guard. Standing at the end of the corridor. Gun in hand. Staring into the vault. How long, after seeing no one there, would it take him to turn round? As this question rose in his mind his hand found the edge of the wall. It curled round it, pulled him through the doorway and into the hall of venerated texts.

  Every fibre of his being now screamed at him to run but he knew the hall he stood in was still twenty feet long. Any sound he made here would be heard in the corridor he had just escaped from. He had to stay silent. He put one foot in front of the other, as swiftly and stealthily as he could, in the knowledge that somewhere in the blackness behind him stood a man with a gun who could see in the dark.

  The pounding of his heart sounded the pace as he moved swiftly through the black hall towards the exit, his eyes fixed to the floor lights, so pre-occupied with what lay behind that he did not notice the glow of approaching light until it was nearly upon him.

  He reached the end of the hall and saw it, a faint glow on the floor and in the curve of the archway he was about to duck through. He froze the moment he saw it. Someone was coming. He watched it grow brighter.

  No time to hide.

  No place to hide in.

  All he could do was stand there and watch as the owner of the light rounded the corner, bursting like a supernova into the chamber not ten feet from where he stood. It was Father Malachi, no doubt on his way to check the contents of the forbidden vault.

  Athanasius began to raise his hands in surrender, expecting any moment for the librarian to look up, stop in shock, then shout for the guard. But nothing happened. Malachi continued to stare at the ground, his sharp face stern in thought, his aura of light seeming like a comet to Athanasius’s darkness-soaked eyes. Malachi continued down the hallway until he disappeared into the corridor Athanasius had just escaped from, never even glancing in his direction.

  Athanasius stared after him for a stunned moment, his eyes readjusting to the settling darkness that had just saved his life.

  Then he turned. And started to run.

  Chapter 108

  Liv stared at the stylized drawing of the tree. For long moments the flickering of the TV in the corner was the only movement, the low murmur of the news broadcast the only sound. It was Kathryn who eventually broke the silence.

  ‘We need to get those seeds,’ she said. ‘We must get them and analyse them.’

  Gabriel stood up and stretched, his lithe body preparing once again for action as his mind began calculating logistics. ‘They weren’t mentioned in the case file, so the Citadel might not know about them yet. Gives us a head start at least.’ He stalked over to the window and stared across the low-stacked crates towards the warehouse door. ‘They’ll either be in the evidence lockers or most probably the labs. That’s a bit of a problem. Security is bound to be much tighter following what happened at the morgue.’

  ‘I could get them,’ Liv said. ‘I could call Arkadian. Tell him I think I’ve worked out what the letters mean, but that I need to see the seeds they’re written on. Then, when I get them, I’ll drop them on the floor or distract him somehow and take one, or swap it for another.’ She looked up at Gabriel. ‘You only need one, don’t you?’

  Gabriel stared at her for a moment, his face a mixture of concentration and concern. Then it softened into a smile.

  ‘Yes,’ Oscar answered for him. ‘We only need one. You must become our Eve and grasp the forbidden fruit. And if these seeds prove to be something extraordinary, just imagine what good we could do with them.’

  Liv’s mind raced with the incredible implications of what he had just said and a worrying thought struck her. ‘But if these seeds are really from the fruit of the. .’ she could hardly bring herself to say it ‘. . from the tree of knowledge,’ she managed. ‘Then surely messing with them will be. . a really bad idea.’

  Oscar continued to look at her, his widening smile refusing to die in the face of her concern. ‘Why?’

  ‘Well,’ she said. ‘Look what happened last time.’

  ‘You mean the fall of man? Original sin? Being cast out of the garden of Eden to live a life of perpetual pain and hardship?’

  Liv nodded. ‘That kind of thing, yeah.’

  Oscar’s smile turned into a dry chuckle.

  ‘And where did you read all that?’ he asked.

  Liv thought it through and realized what he meant. Of course. She’d read it in the Bible, something written b
y the men of the mountain, a transcription of source material no one else had ever seen. What better way to stop people seeking knowledge of something than to scare them away from it? Give them an official version of divine teachings, starting with the most terrible tale where eating fruit from a forbidden tree leads mankind to damnation.

  ‘We know there is something in the Citadel,’ Oscar continued. ‘Something — supernatural. Something so strong that even those outside the mountain can feel its healing power. No wonder the monks have guarded it for so long. Being so close must be intoxicating. Must make them feel more like gods than men. But imagine if that pure life force could be freed from the mountain and spread throughout the world. Imagine no longer needing to pour tons of fertilizer into the dry earth,’ he said, gesturing through the office window to the stacks of crates filling the warehouse. ‘Just one seed, planted and tended, could make whole areas as fertile as the shadowy garden at the centre of the Citadel. Deserts could become gardens. Wastelands might become forests. Our slowly dying earth could be reborn.’

  Liv sat stunned in her seat. This was something her brother would have staked his life on. He’d told her the last time they’d met how he thought he’d been spared for a reason. Maybe he had died just to get those five seeds to her. She owed it to him to find out if they were worth it. She slipped her hand into her pocket, searching for her mobile, then remembered where she’d left it. ‘Arkadian’s number was on my phone,’ she said, looking up at Gabriel and discovering he was still gazing at her.

  He smiled a half-shrugged smile, and Liv felt the blush rising again and turned away.

  ‘His details are at the end of the case file,’ Kathryn said, leaning over the desk to open up the relevant document. Liv scanned the office, looking for a phone. Her eyes passed over the TV screen and she froze as she saw the picture of a smiling man hovering behind the shoulder of the newsreader. ‘Hey,’ she said, her voice a mixture of surprise and concern. ‘I know that guy.’

  Then every eye turned and looked at the smiling face of Rawls Baker.

  Chapter 109

  By the time Athanasius reached the Chamber of Philosophy he had stopped running. The moment he entered he saw a dim glow to his left and stopped.

  He stared for a moment at the faint light sketching the outline of a bookshelf, then moved quickly and silently toward it. He reached the edge, took a deep breath and peered round.

  For a moment he could not make out who stood at the centre of the bright circle of light, so accustomed were his eyes to the dark; then — as his eyes adjusted and penetrated the glare — he saw with relief who it was.

  Father Thomas stood halfway down the row next to Ponti, who was hunched over a reading desk deep with abandoned books, his cart parked beside him full of dusters and brushes, carrying on his work, oblivious to the unaccustomed light he was currently bathed in.

  Athanasius moved down the row of shelves towards them, clearing his throat as he went. ‘Brother Ponti! Father Thomas!’ he said in a voice that seemed unnaturally loud after his long enforced silence. ‘I thought I heard something.’

  Ponti looked up, staring straight through him with his blank, white eyes. Thomas glanced across and smiled, the relief of seeing his friend lighting up his face.

  In the control room by the main entrance two dots converged on a computer screen and the program invisibly transposed their identities then deleted itself.

  ‘There’s a security drill underway,’ Thomas said matter-of-factly. He watched Athanasius quietly withdraw four sheets of folded paper from his sleeve. ‘We should probably make our way to the exit, don’t you think?’

  ‘You two go ahead,’ Ponti replied. ‘They don’t even spot me half the time. I’ll move on if somebody makes me. Elsewise I’ll just carry on with my work.’

  Athanasius picked up the largest of the open books on the reading desk, placed the folded sheets of paper inside and gently closed it. ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘Then we won’t mention we saw you.’ They turned to walk away, dragging the light with them as they went.

  ‘Much appreciated, Brother. Much appreciated,’ came the caretaker’s dry voice as his spectral form melted back into the darkness.

  Athanasius glanced down at the cover of the book. It was a copy of Also Sprach Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche, printed in the original German and now containing wax rubbings of most of the contents of the Heretic Bible. The temptation to open it and look at the pages now he had his light back was almost too much to resist. But it was too risky. The guard might return with Father Malachi at any moment. It was best to wait until the alarm was over and the library was re-opened. Then he could read it at his leisure.

  Thomas walked on ahead as agreed, heading for the entrance alone so they would not be seen emerging from the depths of the library together. Athanasius held back, scanning the shelves, looking for somewhere to hide the book. He daren’t risk whoever had been studying Nietszche to return and discover what it now contained. He reached the end of the row and saw a wall of identical books completely filling a low shelf. He lowered his head and looked over the top. There was a gap between them and the back of the shelf. He quickly slid the volume of Nietzsche over them and down into the gap, then leaned back, straightened the volumes on the shelf and read one of the spines. It was the complete works of Soren Kierkegaard. Nietzsche had been totally obscured by his Danish counterpart.

  Satisfied, he stood back up and headed to the exit, cocooned in the darkness by his rapidly brightening circle of light.

  Chapter 110

  The vehicle pulled to a stop just short of the barrier and level with the guardhouse window. The guard looked up from his paper and slid the glass panel to one side. His hat lay on the counter in front of him. An official-looking badge on the front said ‘Airport Security’.

  ‘Can I help you?’ he said, checking out the men inside.

  ‘Has a Gabriel Mann signed in today?’ a voice asked from the passenger seat.

  ‘Maybe. Who’s asking?’

  Arkadian flipped open his leather wallet and leaned across the driver to show him. The guard peered over the edge of the counter and inspected the gold inspector’s badge. He pressed a button underneath the counter and the barrier started to rise. ‘Came in ’bout a half-hour ago with his girlfriend in tow,’ he said.

  Arkadian felt the skin on the back of his neck prickle at the mention of a girl. ‘What did the girlfriend look like?’ he asked, slipping his badge back into his jacket pocket.

  The guard shrugged. ‘Young. Blonde. Pretty.’

  It wasn’t exactly a portrait in words but Arkadian had a fairly good idea who it was. He still hadn’t heard back from Sulley — or from Liv. ‘And where would I find them?’

  ‘Follow the yellow line,’ the guard said, leaning forward and pointing at a line of thick paint on the tarmac that curved away, parallel to the fence. ‘It’ll take you past the warehouses. They’ll be in hangar 12, about three hundred yards on the left. It’s the one with the old tail-gunner cargo plane parked out front.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Arkadian said. ‘And please don’t tell them we’re coming. This is not a social visit.’

  The guard nodded uncertainly. ‘Sure,’ he said.

  The car slipped beneath the barrier, the headlights following the bright yellow line round toward the row of grey, oblong warehouses. Most of them were shuttered up and silent. They slipped past the open windows of the car like headstones.

  Up ahead a squat plane was parked on the concrete, its truncated rear pointing back towards a hangar. On the front of the building a large sliding door stood slightly open, spilling orange light out into the gathering gloom. ‘Kill the lights,’ Arkadian said to the driver, his eyes fixed on the gap, trying to see what lay beyond it. ‘And pull up short, I want to take a look-see.’

  The driver hit a switch and the headlights died, plunging the road ahead into darkness. He slipped the car into neutral and killed the engine. With the headlights gone, Arkadian could see t
he stars starting to shine out of the inky sky beyond the hangar as they glided forward with a hiss of tyres on cooling tarmac.

  When they got within fifty feet Arkadian held up his hand and the driver eased the car to a stop using the handbrake so as not to fire up the brake lights. Arkadian leaned out of his open window listening for voices, or any other noise coming from inside the warehouse. He heard nothing but the distant whine of jet engines and the ticking of the car as it started to cool in the evening chill.

  He unclipped his belt, reached inside his jacket and slipped his gun from its pancake holster. The driver looked across. ‘You want me to come with?’ he asked.

  He was a fresh stripe officer, newly minted. The smell of the street patrolman still clung to him despite the plain clothes. ‘No, I’ll be OK. Let me take a look first. I’ll wave you over if I think I need back-up.’

  Arkadian reached up, flicking the switch on the car’s interior light so it would stay off then popped his door release and slipped into the night.

  Chapter 111

  Kathryn swept the remote off the desk, ramping up the volume on the TV as the newsreader filled in the details.

  ‘. . fire crews have rushed to the home of internationally renowned newspaper editor Rawls Baker and we are receiving reports that his body has been found burned to death at the wheel of his car.’

  ‘Oh my God,’ Liv said. ‘That’s my boss.’

  The picture cut to an exterior of a residential street crammed with firetrucks and ambulances. Yellow police tape fluttered in the foreground keeping everyone back, while in the distance firemen, cops and paramedics gathered round the smoking skeleton of a car.

  ‘Did you phone him?’ Gabriel asked.

  Liv nodded.

  ‘When?’

  She shook her head and tried to remember. ‘Earlier today,’ she said.