The Book With No Name

by AnonYMous

  Although Dante showed very little interest in the room, Kacy was awestruck by the magnificence of it. Two entire walls were covered from ceiling to floor with thick hardback books set on dozens of oak shelves. This was how she imagined the world’s most exclusive library would look. The other two walls were panelled in a dark shiny wood and adorned with a collection of large paintings. All of the paintings were very dark. There did not appear to be a light colour in any of them. If it hadn’t been for the snug warmth provided by the inner-wall heating, and the light blazing from a magnificent chandelier, it might have been a very scary and intimidating room to be sitting in, she thought.

  Cromwell finally made himself comfortable after shifting around for a few seconds, making squeaking noises as his suit rubbed against the chair’s leather covering. He placed his hands together and drummed the fingertips of each hand against each other for a few moments, then smiled at each of them in turn. First at Dante, then at Kacy. Since neither of them seemed to appreciate that his time was fairly valuable, he chose to speak first rather than wait for one of them to initiate any conversation.

  ‘Right then, Dante, may I see this item you have that is so precious?’

  Kacy waited for Dante to give his approval, which he duly did with a nod. She then took the necklace off from around her neck, lifting the blue stone out from under her top to reveal it for the first time. Cromwell held out his hand across the desk and she dropped the necklace into his grasp. For a few seconds he remained motionless, merely staring at what she had placed in his outstretched hand. From the expression on his face it seemed as though he knew something about what he was holding. His eyes lit up, and for a moment his face had the look of an excited child at Christmas. Eventually, having stared at it for long enough to make it obvious that he was impressed by it, he drew it close to his face and took a long hard look at it.

  ‘What do you think?’ Kacy asked him.

  Cromwell ignored her and pulled open a drawer in the desk with his left hand. He fumbled around in the drawer, obviously trying to locate something, but at no point did his gaze shift from the stone. After a few seconds of bustling around in the drawer he pulled out a very small magnifying glass and held it up to his eye. For the next thirty seconds he studied the stone from every possible angle, holding it under the glass in his right hand.

  ‘Well?’ asked Kacy, now a little embarrassed that he hadn’t answered her first question.

  Cromwell put the necklace and the magnifying glass down on the desk and took a deep breath through his nose.

  ‘It’s precious, all right,’ he muttered, almost to himself.

  ‘How much do you think it’s worth?’ asked Dante. The Professor’s slightly strange behaviour had raised his hopes.

  Cromwell swivelled his chair to the left and stood up. He then stepped out from behind the desk and walked over to the book-covered wall on his left. He ran his fingers along the spines of the books on one of the shelves just below eye level. After touching eight or nine books, his hand stopped on a thick hardback volume with a black binding. He pulled it out and returned to his chair, gently placing the book down on the desk.

  ‘That blue stone could just be the most valuable stone in the world,’ he said, looking at Dante then Kacy to see if they understood the significance of what he was saying.

  ‘Great,’ said Dante. ‘Where can we sell it?’

  Cromwell let out a deep sigh. ‘I’m not sure you can,’ he said gently.

  Dante couldn’t prevent himself from voicing his severe disappointment loud. ‘Huh! Typical. Why not?’

  ‘Let me just check this book. There’s something about that stone in here that you really should read before you decide what you wish to do with it.’

  ‘Okay.’

  Dante and Kacy exchanged excited looks while Cromwell flicked through the pages of the book. Kacy grabbed Dante’s hand and clenched it tightly to help keep her excitement in check.

  ‘What’s that book called?’ she asked Cromwell.

  ‘It’s The Book of Lunar Mythology.’

  ‘Oh. Right.’ This answer meant nothing to Kacy, and made her wish she hadn’t asked. She wasn’t alone. Dante had no idea what lunar mythology was, either.

  After about a minute of flicking pages and scanning text, and a good deal of ‘umming’ and ‘aahing’, Cromwell finally located the page he had been looking for and started to read to himself. From where he was sitting, Dante could see a colour illustration on the page of a blue stone not dissimilar to the one they had handed to Cromwell. The stone in the picture was not held on a silver chain like the one Kacy had been wearing, but it still looked very like the one now sitting on the desk in front of him.

  After reading for a minute or two Cromwell looked up at his visitors and turned the book around to face them. They both looked at the two pages in front of them, expecting to see something thrilling jump out at them, such as a sum of money indicating how much the stone was worth. They saw nothing of the sort, so were soon reduced to looking back up at Cromwell, silently waiting for him to explain what they should be seeing.

  ‘Young lady, that blue stone you have been wearing around your neck is known to historians as the Eye of the Moon.’

  ‘Wow!’

  Kacy was impressed. The Eye of the Moon seemed quite a glamorous title, and she had never been so fortunate as to own a piece of jewellery that had its own unique name.

  ‘So how much is it worth?’ asked Dante again.

  ‘That, young Dante, is not a question you should be asking me. It is a question you should be asking yourself’, Cromwell warned. He continued sombrely, ‘Is that stone worth risking your life for?’

  ‘Oh God, not you as well?’ said Dante, thinking back to the gloom-monger that was the Mystic Lady. For some reason Cromwell didn’t pick up on this and carried on speaking regardless.

  ‘The Eye of the Moon has no book value, Dante. Its value is in the eye of the beholder. There are people who will stop at nothing to get their hands on that stone. And it is not for financial gain that they want it, either.’

  ‘So why do they want it?’

  ‘Is it because it’s so pretty?’ Kacy chipped in. This time Cromwell chose to answer her.

  ‘No. It is pretty, I’ll give you that, but the reason it is so valuable is because, according to legend, and indeed this book, the Eye of the Moon is a stone with incredible power. A kind of magical stone, if you will.’

  ‘Say again?’ said Dante, now very confused.

  He knew Bertram Cromwell well enough to know that he wasn’t a fool. He was a man of intelligence, and not one to talk nonsense. If he said the stone had some sort of magical power there was every reason to believe he might be telling the truth, no matter how absurd that truth might seem.

  ‘There are,’ the older man went on, ‘a number of differing stories about what the Eye of the Moon is capable of. Some say that any man who wears it – on a chain around his neck, say – or even carries it, becomes immortal.’

  ‘Immortal? As in … can’t be killed? Lives for ever?’ gasped Kacy.

  ‘Yes, but there are also others who say that it steals the soul of whoever wears it.’

  Dante smiled.

  ‘People believe that shit?’

  ‘Oh, certainly.’

  ‘You believe that shit, Bertie?’

  ‘I reserve judgement.’

  ‘So what should we do with it?’

  ‘Well,’ said the professor, standing up again. ‘You could always test the theory that it has healing powers.’

  Dante was intrigued. ‘What do you mean?’

  Bertram Cromwell picked the necklace up from the desk and tossed it to Dante, who caught it in both hands.

  ‘Put the necklace on and I’ll cut your arm a little, just enough to draw blood. If the stone has these powers, then the wound should heal up and you’ll feel no pain.’

  Dante glanced sideways to check Kacy’s opinion of this idea. She looked keen for him to try it
out, so reluctantly (because he didn’t believe in witchcraft and all that nonsense; he didn’t believe in pain, either) he slipped the necklace over his head and let it fall around his neck. Then he rolled up the shirt sleeve on his right arm and held it out. Cromwell took hold of his arm with his left hand, and with his right pulled a flick-knife from the inside pocket of his jacket. He flicked the blade out and held it up in front of Dante, who was, frankly, extremely surprised to find a professor who walked around with a flick-knife about his person.

  ‘Okay,’ said Dante staring hard at the sharp blade in Cromwell’s hand. ‘Do your worst.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ Cromwell asked.

  ‘Yeah, go on. Do it quick though, ‘fore I change my mind.’

  Bertram Cromwell took a deep breath and then forcibly thrust the point of the knife into the inside of Dante’s forearm. Two things happened almost simultaneously. The blade went in a full two inches, and Dante let out an almighty shriek.

  ‘OW! … FUCK! … What the fuck? … OW! You fucking bastard! Oh my God you fucking stabbed me! SHIT! You – you cunt!’

  ‘Does it hurt?’ Kacy asked. Not one of her brighter remarks.

  ‘OF COURSE IT FUCKING HURTS! I’VE BEEN FUCKING STABBED!’

  Dante was holding his arm, desperately trying to stem the flow of blood, which was impressive. Cromwell had picked a soft paper tissue from his pocket and was wiping clean the blade of his knife.

  ‘Can you feel the wound beginning to heal yet, Dante?’ he asked calmly.

  ‘Are you shitting me? You nearly cut my fucking arm off. Of course it’s not fucking healing. This will take fucking weeks to heal. I could need stitches. For Chrissakes, man, what the fuck were you thinking? I thought you were just going to scratch me, not cut my fucking arm off, for fuck’s sake!’

  ‘I’m sorry Dante. I just wanted to make sure it was a significant enough cut to be certain we could tell whether the stone worked or not.’

  ‘It fucking worked all right, if the aim was to scar me for fucking life!’

  Cromwell pulled a clean white handkerchief from the breast pocket of his suit and handed it to Kacy.

  ‘Here, Kacy. Wrap Dante’s wound up tightly with this. It’ll stem the flow of blood.’

  Kacy took the handkerchief and grabbed hold of Dante’s arm. She wrapped it around the wound and tied the ends in a tight knot. ‘How’s that, baby?’ she asked.

  Dante’s expression changed from one of severe pain and outrage to one of surprise.

  ‘Whoa, hold on a minute. I think the wound has healed,’ he exclaimed.

  ‘Really?’ asked Cromwell, clearly excited.

  ‘No, you fucking moron! Of course it hasn’t healed! You stabbed me in the arm, remember? Jeezus, and you’re a professor!’ With his good arm he took off the necklace and handed it to Kacy. ‘Here, take this piece of shit and smack him round the head with it, will you?’

  ‘Dante, I’m sorry, really I am,’ said Cromwell, sitting back down behind his desk. ‘Look, I’ll make it up to you, I promise. I’ll get you your old job back, if you want.’

  Dante was calming down. In fact, he was actually beginning to feel slightly guilty for having sworn at the Professor, particularly the part where he’d called him a cunt.

  ‘Oh, forget about it Prof,’ he said graciously. ‘I’ll live. I’ve suffered worse than this before,’ he shrugged.

  ‘Nevertheless, Dante, if there’s anything I can do …’

  ‘Sure there is,’ said Dante. ‘Just tell me where I can sell this goddam necklace for the most money.’

  Cromwell shook his head.

  ‘Don’t sell it, Dante. Just get rid of it, my friend. It will bring you even more pain and suffering if you keep it.’

  ‘Can’t be any worse than what I’ve just been through, can it?’

  ‘Actually, yes it can,’ said Cromwell, his voice grave. ‘There’s something else.’

  ‘What?’ Dante asked, squeezing his arm and still wincing with pain.

  ‘There is a solar eclipse tomorrow, at midday. Do not have that stone with you when it happens.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because it would be bad. That stone belongs to the monks of Hubal. They will be looking for it, and they will stop at nothing – nothing – to return it to its rightful place. Your life expectancy gets shorter and shorter with every second you keep that stone.’

  ‘That so? Why’s it so important to these monk guys?’

  ‘Because, my friend, ridiculous though it may seem to you and me, the monks believe that this small blue stone controls the movement of the moon. If it falls into the wrong hands, it could be used to stop the moon from orbiting the earth.’

  ‘Is that bad?’ asked Kacy. She knew it was a stupid thing to say, but the Professor, even the museum itself, made her nervous. When Kacy was nervous she babbled, and when she babbled she said stupid things. That’s why she loved to be with Dante. He was stupid, but it didn’t bother him because he was confident. She on the other hand was clever, but often came across as dumb because, although she was physically brave, she couldn’t control her nerves around important people and in unfamiliar surroundings, especially those as impressive as the museum.

  Fortunately, Cromwell didn’t judge people on their intelligence, for the simple reason that most people appeared stupid in comparison with him. So he answered Kacy’s question without the slightest hint of self-importance.

  ‘Yes, it is bad. For a start, the moon controls the tides, but more importantly, and far more significant at the present time, is the fact that a total solar eclipse takes place at noon tomorrow. Now if the rumours are true, and the holder of that stone can control the orbit of the moon, then what do you suppose such a person might be planning for tomorrow?’

  Dante didn’t want to look stupid, but he really didn’t know the answer to the question. It was probably obvious to most people, but he had no idea, and it didn’t look as though Kacy knew, either. In consequence, after a few seconds’ silence Cromwell answered his own question.

  ‘If the holder of the stone utilizes its power during an eclipse there is every possibility that he or she could be seeking to make the eclipse permanent. Although I won’t bore you with all the technical details of how this might be brought about, I can assure you that there is a very good chance that the holder of the stone could keep the moon permanently aligned with the sun, in order to block the light out of Santa Mondega. In other words, the city would be in total darkness for all three hundred and sixty-five days of the year. And that, my friends, is not a great way to attract sunseekers. Indeed, all it would attract is weirdos.’

  ‘Fuck.’ Dante blurted out the first thing that came into his head.

  ‘That’s not quite how I’d put it.’

  ‘Who would want that to happen, though? You said people would want to get hold of the stone, but surely none of them would want to block out the sun. That would be stupid,’ Dante reasoned. He couldn’t think of a single benefit to anyone through doing something so irrational, other than maybe for money.

  ‘I quite agree, my friend, but again according to legend, there really are people who would want that to happen.’

  ‘Like who?’

  ‘I don’t know. Devil worshippers, maybe? People who are allergic to the sun, or worried about skin cancer? Your guess is as good as mine, frankly. But the fact is, Dante, that the Eye of the Moon has turned up in Santa Mondega just before a solar eclipse is due here, and consequently you have to wonder whether somebody brought it here with that in mind.’

  Kacy felt the paranoia growing inside her like a malignant tumour. Devil worshippers? There were three things she knew about Devil worshippers:

  One – They worshipped the Devil. Obviously.

  Two – They were the sort of people who enjoyed sacrificing other human beings. Probably.

  Three – When they weren’t dressed up and carrying out satanic rituals, they looked just like anyone else.

  Twenty-Nine


  It wasn’t even midday yet, and already the Tapioca was packed with strangers. Normally Sanchez would have been going nuts by now, but he afforded a certain degree of tolerance towards this particular occasion. The city’s great Lunar Festival was now in full swing, and that always brought a number of tourists in from out of town.

  There was another reason for his toleration this time. He had been checking each and every one of his customers to see whether any of them was wearing a necklace bearing a blue stone around their neck. None of them was, not in the Tapioca, but Sanchez was heading out for the day, so he would get an opportunity to check out a whole load more people.

  The Lunar Festival was only ever held when there was an eclipse. It would have been an infrequent event had it been held anywhere else in the world, but Santa Mondega, the lost city, underwent a total solar eclipse every five years. No one actually knew why this was, but all the locals were glad of it because when the festival was on, there was nowhere in the world they would rather be. The celebration had long been a part of Santa Mondega’s culture, for it dated back centuries, almost to the days when a handful of Spanish adventurers had established the original settlement on the site where the city now stood.

  Sanchez’s favourite thing about it was the fancy dress. Everyone in town made a real effort to dress up, which made for a great atmosphere, lively and good-humoured. With everyone in a happy and friendly mood – despite the consumption of heroic quantities of alcohol – there was a lot less chance of fights breaking out, which made his job a little easier, and the Tapioca’s customers, furniture and fittings a little safer.

  The fairground was his other favourite attraction. A travelling fair had arrived in town a while back, as it did for every Lunar Festival, and had been in full swing for almost a week now. With only a day left before the eclipse, Sanchez had finally found the time to pay it a visit.

  Leaving Mukka in charge of the Tapioca and the strangers who were filling it, he headed off to the fair on his own. His main reason for going was to gamble. There were all kinds of ways of investing your hard-earned cash at the fair. Sanchez had heard that there was a casino in one of the tents, and a miniature racing track for rats in another. Best of all, though, were the rumours he’d heard of a prize-fighting ring. One that had been packed out every day. It was one of those rings where any old joe from the street could challenge the fairground boxer to a fight, the aim generally being for the challenger to last three rounds without being knocked out.