by Tom Wilde
She must have felt my reaction, because she then said, “Oh, have no fear. I have long ago been cured. But not before my womb was destroyed. My unborn children were sacrificed for the greater good of my country. Then I met Vanya.”
“That’s when you joined him?”
“Oh, no. At first, he was just another assignment. I was to infiltrate his organization, join his religious movement, and do whatever was necessary to find out if he was involved in the sarin gas attack in Tokyo. So I did. But then, I discovered something wonderful.”
“What?”
Her mood shifted like the wind; now she sounded almost happy as she murmured, “What one man of true vision can do. Vanya is going to change the world, and he has chosen me to make it all possible.”
“How?”
Rhea laid her head down on my shoulder as she said, “Vanya has chosen me to bring the future leader of the world to life. His doctors have already harvested my womb and we have found suitable surrogate mothers to bear my future children. With all the benefits of science at Vanya’s command, I will become the mother of a race of Alexanders. A family of them. And together we will reshape the world.”
With a small sigh, she settled her head against my chest. I was left entwined with a mad, dangerous creature. I slowly turned my head toward the window, catching sight of a silver wedge of the moon as the ship sailed on, and wondered if I’d still be alive come morning.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Corsica
Much to my surprise, I woke up in sunlight.
Rhea was gone, leaving behind only her scent on the sheets and pillows. A quick survey of the room revealed she’d left my lighter on the drink tray, and I slipped it into my pocket. With nothing better to do, I used the shower and bathroom to my advantage. I briefly toyed with the idea of creating some improvised weapons and escape tools from the supplies I found, but decided that even if I wasn’t under constant surveillance, Vanya and Rhea were on to me, and I doubted I’d be allowed to keep anything I could put together. When I emerged, I saw that the trays and cart had been removed and fresh food and drinks provided, including a blessed serving of coffee. I made use of my cushioned captivity by taking my abused body through some slow stretching exercises, probing for the limitations of my injuries. Then I had nothing to do but endure the agony of waiting.
Ultimately, when the sun was once again low on the horizon, I felt the ship’s engines throttled back to a dull mutter, and a young soldier rudely opened my door and waved the barrel of his assault rifle around to indicate I should follow. He prodded me along the circular stairway up two decks, past what looked like a recreation area, until I was outdoors in the Mediterranean wind under a sky lit by a sinking sun that turned the clouds above into glowing embers. Vanya, wearing his white admiral’s clothes, and Rhea, dressed in a form-fitting lightweight black diving suit, were already present on the observation deck, which rocked slightly from the low waves that swelled under the ship. Above and astern I saw the towering radio and radar arrays, while ahead I could see the smooth white roofs of the layered levels below and an arrowhead-shaped open deck area at the bow. That’s where a pair of crewmen were assembling a tripod-mounted, belt-fed machine gun. I nodded down toward the armament preparations and asked, “Expecting company?”
Vanya raised his head from a mounted pair of powerful binoculars. “We have arrived,” he announced. “Now, if you would be so good as to tell me where I can find the tomb?”
I pointed to the binoculars, and Vanya stepped away. I bent down and scanned the eastern horizon and the coastline of Corsica. I could see the raised mountainous terrain, vibrant green with patches of bare, bone-colored rock, and the ivory-and-rust-colored coastal towns, along with the rainbow-hued sails of pleasure boats in the water near the harbor. It took a few minutes to get my bearings, but I finally spotted a separate set of smaller islands bathed in the bloody dying light of the sun almost directly north of us. I zeroed in, getting the rhythm of the movement of the ship as I focused on the largest island and saw the watchtower crowning its crest. Vanya must have seen me smile. “What is it?”
I relinquished the binoculars. “Over there.” I pointed. “The Iles Sanguinaires; the Blood Islands. That’s the place you want.”
Vanya grabbed at the binoculars greedily as I stepped aside. I let him find the view before I said, “So tell me—you’re really going to destroy most of the people in the world?”
Vanya didn’t reply. He just stared through the lenses. Finally, he stood up and turned to me, speaking in a calm and reasonable-sounding voice. “The world is a sick place, Mr. Blake. It’s chaotic, and overcrowded, and filled with conflict and death and suffering. What this planet needs is unification and guidance. Only a true worldwide empire could bring about the peace and prosperity that would take our planet to a utopian future. And only another Alexander can bring the world what it needs and give it peace.”
“Peace? You mean the peace of the grave? You’re planning on wiping out most of the people on the planet.”
“Yes,” he replied calmly. “There must be a cleansing, the slate wiped clean. And out of all the blood and fire will come a world worth living in. When I resurrect the bloodline of Alexander I will create a dynasty that will unite the world as Alexander himself had intended. And I will be the father of that dynasty.”
Vanya was no longer seeing me. He stood before me bathed in the fiery glow of a dying sun and lost in his vision. I had a vision of my own just then as my mind raced through all the ways I could kill Vanya here and now. But it would have been my last act on earth, and if Vanya wasn’t lying about his minions being ready to activate the plague upon his reported death, then I would also become the man who set off the Apocalypse.
My moment passed as Vanya said to the guard behind me, “Take Blake below.”
“When are you going to signal your doctors to give Caitlin the cure?”
“When I have the body of Alexander in my possession. So you better be prepared to do your part. You’ll be going over with Rhea and my men, just in case there’s anything you’ve neglected to tell us about.”
With a dismissive wave from Vanya and a gun-barrel poke in my kidney, I turned and went below to my cabin. Once alone I paced the stateroom, wondering if my cryptic clues about Corsica and watchtowers would be enough for Sam Smith to figure out Vanya’s destination or that he at least had people shadowing the yacht. My one hope was to find a secret welcoming committee waiting for us at the watchtower.
When the last rays of the sun extinguished themselves in the sea, Rhea came to my room. She tossed a black diving suit on the bed. “Here, put this on. We’re leaving now.”
I did as I was told, pulling the suit on over my shirt and shorts. I could feel my lighter snug in my pocket. It was my only remaining tool. With any luck, I thought, I could at least add one more dent in its casing before someone killed me tonight. As I dressed, Rhea said in a wistful tone, “I’m sorry we didn’t take advantage of last night. It could have been beautiful.”
I had a brief, fleeting vision of me and Rhea, holding each other close with our hands wrapped around each other’s throats. “It could have been something,” I agreed.
I finished dressing in the thin, tropical diving suit. It wouldn’t offer much in the way of protection against cold water, but at least I wouldn’t sweat to death while wearing it. I left the black hood of the suit off and followed her out and toward the stern and then over to the starboard covered promenade. I heard the whine of powerful hydraulics and saw the side of the yacht open up like a slow-moving wing of a giant bird. Once Rhea and I made it to the rear, we descended two levels of stairs until we reached the stern boarding platform, where we joined a silent group of men dressed in form-fitting black and bearing packs and slung weapons. While Rhea was donning a pack of her own, I leaned over the rail and saw a small, twin-engine powerboat being lowered into the water from the underside of the ship’s extended wing. Vanya had the ship on running lights only, and
as my eyes adjusted to the starlit darkness, I saw that the stern platform was armed with a tripod-mounted machine gun along with a rack of shoulder-borne, rocket-propelled grenade launchers set up nearby. I heard muted engine sounds, humming low and bubbling in the water as the powerboats were piloted up to the docking ramp. Rhea tapped my shoulder and pointed to the one on the right. I climbed aboard the small seating area at the bow with Rhea and three of her men coming aboard and crowding the boat with me.
Without a signal given, the twin miniature powerboats motored off and curved toward the islands. Above us a sickle of moonlight cut through the inky black clouds that blotted the sky. Ahead toward the island, the lights of Corsica glowed like a bundle of stars had been compressed flat on the horizon, and triple-beat flashes were fired from a lighthouse like silent, rhythmic lightning.
I saw that our pilot, dressed in aquatic ninja wear like the rest of us, wore a pair of night-vision goggles as he steered across the gently rolling sea. Our two-boat flotilla quietly motored past a chain of tall-spined islands jutting out of the water like volcanoes, one of which was crowned by the lighthouse, until I could see a jagged, solid blackness rearing up ahead. We passed a chain of smaller outcroppings and then reached a black mountain washed in dark silver moonlight. The pilot cut the engines and came forward, grabbing a line and jumping into the water. Rhea and I followed suit overboard along with the three other soldiers, and I slogged through the cool, thigh-deep seawater up to the rocky shore.
While the water lapped on the edge of the landfall, I counted the soldiers assembling—there were twelve of us altogether. Rhea tapped my arm, and with the rest of the assault team I climbed up the rough, jagged side of the island. Taken at a glance, we looked like an army of giant black spiders attacking a monstrous anthill. The ragged, broken teeth of stone and clumps of tough vegetation provided hand- and footholds, but it was still a dangerous climb, and I was given sharp, painful reminders from my chest that my ribs hadn’t had a chance to heal from their previous ordeals. I kept my concentration on the terrain, and was surprised when suddenly I found myself standing on a flattened ledge comprised of a man-made concrete walkway. The soldiers were unslinging their weapons and I wasn’t given a chance to catch my breath as Rhea pushed me along the path that took a circular course up the hill.
As we neared the summit, I could see the massive, rounded turret of the watchtower at the apex. Rhea and I continued to walk uphill as Vanya’s soldiers broke off and took up positions in the surrounding area. That’s when I spotted the shadowy outline of a man lurking at the base of the tower. I felt a surge of relief when I heard the well-remembered voice of Sam Smith call out, “Blake? Is that you?”
But my relief was broken into a thousand bitter shards when Rhea replied warmly, “Hello, Sam. I hope we didn’t keep you waiting long.”
I watched with a feeling of numb paralysis as Rhea glided up to Sam Smith and they exchanged a warm embrace. I took a few faltering steps over to the watchtower and let its weathered walls keep me from falling over. Through the darkness I heard Smith say, “You sure took your damn time getting here, Blake.”
“Sorry to inconvenience you, you traitorous bastard.”
“Hey now, that’s mighty rough talk from an admitted thief like you.”
“Besides, Blake,” Rhea said, “you really shouldn’t be surprised. I told you there was a mole in Smith’s agency. Sam was also kind enough to let me know all about that wedding ring locator you had. Now no one knows you’re here but us.”
“Actually,” Smith said, “I prefer the term ‘undercover entrepreneur.’ But credit where credit is due, Blake; we couldn’t have found this place without you.”
My words seemed to boil up out of my burning gut. “Yeah. I led you right to it, didn’t I?”
“Right to it, my ass,” Smith countered. “I bet you thought you were being clever with that ‘All Along the Watchtower’ hint, didn’t you? But did you know how many goddammed watchtowers there are on Corsica? Ninety-one! We had no clue which one was which until just a short time ago.”
“Like I said, sorry for the inconvenience, et cetera.”
“What have you found so far?” Rhea asked Smith.
“Come around the other side and I’ll show you.”
I let the Mediterranean Sea breeze blow away the cold sweat that welled out of me as I pushed off the wall and walked around the rocky ground behind Smith and Rhea. The tower was huge, easily over one hundred feet in circumference, and it loomed almost forty feet high. As I walked around the base of the tower, I was dimly aware of all the young gunmen who surrounded the area like ghosts haunting a castle. On the other side of the watchtower, I could see the mountainous mass of Corsica with its faint girdle of twinkling lights beyond. Smith said, “First of all, where we are right now is actually a peninsula, not an island. I was able to drive here, so we have to be careful not to attract the attention of the local police. But the real problem is this damn tower. Namely, there’s no way to get inside from the ground level.”
Smith shot a narrow flashlight beam over the stone face of the tower, revealing a rectangular doorway cut into the irregular stone mortar nearly twenty feet above our heads. “There must have been a ladder or stairs here once,” Smith explained.
Rhea tilted her head back, examining the tower. “This is where the tomb is? It seems so … so obvious a place. Why wouldn’t it have been discovered before now?”
As lonely as the windswept tower was, Rhea was right. But the words of Lord Byron’s coded letter came back to me: “Blood-Islands-Corsica-Beneath-Watch-Tower.” I said, almost despite myself. “What you’re looking for is underneath the tower.”
Smith looked up at the massive edifice, and then kicked at the rocky ground. “Underneath it? How’re we supposed to get below this thing?”
“I guess we’ll just have to cut through a wall,” Rhea stated in a matter-of-fact tone. “The path may start within the tower.”
I winced at the thought of the destruction of the centuries-old watchtower and said without thinking, “What, no one thought to bring a rope or something?”
I could hear the smile in Rhea’s voice. “Well, it’s a good thing we’ve brought along our very own tomb robber, isn’t it?” She hissed out a command to her men, and as one of the soldiers came running up to her, Smith said to me, “You know what they call this place, don’t you? It’s called the Islands of Bloodthirsty Men. Kind of fits, don’t it?”
“Come a little closer and we’ll see if it’s true.”
Smith laughed quietly, but he did move a few paces away from me as he did so.
One of Rhea’s soldiers did have a rope and grapnel hook arrangement, and for the next few minutes I watched as he tried time and again to throw the hook through the opening above. Finally, the hook held and Rhea said, “I’m going first.” It was disheartening to see how she climbed up the rope with both speed and skill. As soon as she disappeared into the shadowed doorway, I heard her voice call out, “Send Blake.”
I’d learned how to scale walls during my early Argo survival training, and it was a skill I’d employed on several occasions since, but I was painfully reminded how long ago that was. By the time I managed to reach the doorway my arms were burning from the strain and my ribs were splinters of agony, and I was grateful for the hand Rhea offered as I pushed myself over the transom with my trembling legs. I made it through the doorway, which was a short hallway through the six-foot-thick fortress walls, and then rolled out of the way and lay on my back, gasping for breath. In quick succession, four more black-garbed soldiers came through the opening. I was the only one who was breathing hard.
As Rhea and her men spread out, they waved flashlight beams in all directions. The room we were occupying was a rounded chamber with a low stone ceiling. There was a slight breeze that blew through with a low moan, coming from a hemispherical opening in the wall on the seaward side. I peeled myself off the cold stone floor and took a slow walk around the room. Along the wa
ll was a set of stone stairs that twisted up to the next level and down to the floor below. Rhea led the way, sidestepping down the stairs as silently as a cat. A soldier behind me gave me an encouraging shove with a gunstock to let me know I was next in line.
As we descended to the chamber below, the air grew still and was saturated with a musty, graveyard taint. Rhea’s flashlight cut around the room, revealing rounded, featureless stone-and-mortar walls. Her voice was oddly refracted by the room as she said, “If there was anything here once, it’s gone now. So tell me, Blake—has your usefulness come to an end?” She was patently asking if there was any reason to keep me alive any longer. Fortunately for my limited life expectancy, Rhea was right on the mark when she called me a tomb robber. Treasures and secret hiding places went hand in hand all through history, and I’d seen more than a few hidden doors and passageways in my travels.
“Check the along the floor,” I said. “There may be another level beneath this.”
Rhea’s voice dripped with derision. “You mean, you want us to look for a secret passage or something?”
“Secret passages have been around since the time of the ancient pyramids. Hell, in Japan, no one ever built a castle that didn’t have at least one hidden escape route.”
As the rest of Rhea’s men joined us below, their lights found a bathtub-sized hole in the floor, but a quick check showed this led to a sealed chamber below. “A cistern,” I explained. “It’s where they stored their water supply. Keep looking.”
It took less than a minute to see that there was no obvious way down. So I started to look for an unobvious one. I let Rhea and her men tap along the walls, knowing that to be a futile endeavor; no fortification builder would compromise the defensive thickness of the walls just to conceal a passage. The only other shape that intruded into the room was the curved stone stairway. I felt along the time-worn stone and found a rusted iron bar, like an oversized staple anchored to the side. I braced my leg against the wall and pulled, but the only thing that happened was that I felt like I almost popped a rib through my skin. I took a breath and instead gave the bar a shove, and felt a section of the wall as it moved a bit and scraped on the floor.