Valley of Dry Bones

by J. F. Penn

  Horace led them to the main door and propped up his broom next to it. “This was once part of the Odd Fellows Cemetery with over 167 acres for burials and later a crematorium, but after the city prohibited burials and then cremation, they established the cemetery in Colma.”

  Jake started in recognition. “Didn’t the Odd Fellows have a cemetery in New Orleans as well?”

  Horace nodded, his enthusiasm evident for historical places. “Oh yes, it’s mostly closed to the public now, but you can still get in there if you know the password.” He tapped the side of his nose and laughed, a deep belly sound that made Morgan smile with his contagious joy. This man had clearly made peace with death, and that gave her hope.

  He pushed the door open, and they went inside. The entrance hall was low and dark, but then the circular space opened out into a spacious central hall with three gallery levels filled with glass-fronted niches, each with an urn or casket inside holding the remains of a life. Decorative columns stretched up to a pink and blue ornate dome with an oculus window through which the late sunlight filtered down, casting shadows across the marble floor. Stained glass windows around the sides let in more light and the place smelled of fresh flowers and furniture polish.

  Horace pulled a chamois cloth from his belt to wipe a speck of dust from one of the glass panels. Morgan hoped that when he passed, someone would tend to his grave as carefully as he did for others.

  “There are 8500 niches in here,” Horace explained. “There’s still some space if you’re interested.” He laughed again. “Your Woodberrys are up in Argo on the second level. You can go that way.” He pointed to a small staircase. “I’ll leave you awhile. Just holler if you need anything.”

  He walked back out again, adjusting a vase of flowers on the way, so they were perfectly symmetrical.

  Morgan turned to take in the expanse of the levels, noting the classical symbolism that dominated the design. Rooms on the ground floor were named after the winds: Zephyrus, Olympias, Auster. On the upper levels, Sothis, an Egyptian goddess associated with Sirius, the brightest star in the sky, sat next to Argo, the mythological ship that Jason used to find the Golden Fleece. It was a classical history in architecture, such a surprising place to discover in the heart of what had become almost a futurist city.

  Shadows faded and the chamber darkened. Clouds thickened above the oculus as the bright day faded into the beginnings of an evening storm. Jake checked his watch and frowned. “Let’s have a look at that niche.”

  They walked up to the second level and into the Argo section. Each wall held a series of niches, some just big enough to fit a funeral urn carved with the family name. Others were more ostentatious, a double or even triple size niche with a bigger casket. Many of the names were European in origin: Davenport, Schierholtz, Franklin. Some had pictures of the deceased, others held statuettes of angels or saints. One niche even had a Star of David carved into it. The Columbarium did not discriminate.

  “Here it is.” Jake stood in front of the Woodberry niche, a simple bronze urn behind a glass panel screwed into a wooden frame. He ran his fingers around the outside. “This looks simple enough to get off.”

  Morgan rifled through her pack and pulled out a multi-tool. Jake unscrewed the frame and placed it carefully on the floor. They reached in together to lift the giant urn down, heavy with the weight of ashes encased in thick metal. Morgan opened the lid and looked inside.

  The thick grey powder of a human body reduced to dust half-filled the urn. A small chestnut-brown leather pouch etched with the cross and swirling wind rested on top.

  “This has to be it! They interred his relic with him.” Morgan reached in and carefully grasped the pouch. It was hard, and crackled as she lifted it out, tapping it gently against the edge of the urn to shake off the remaining ashes that clung to its base. She laid it on the top of her pack and began to pull on the ties that cinched the top.

  Footsteps came from the entrance to the Columbarium.

  Swiftly and silently, they lifted the urn back into the niche together. Jake held the glass up to the wooden panel, resting his head against it as if in mourning.

  Morgan walked to the parapet, half-shielding him from view as Horace walked into the circular hall below.

  “You folks alright up there? Need anything?”

  Morgan waved and smiled. “We’re fine, thanks.” She glanced back at Jake and shrugged. “He’s just a little overcome by the weight of history. We won’t be too much longer.”

  Horace nodded, a sage expression on his old face. “You take your time now. I’ll wait outside.” He walked back out again.

  “Some help here,” Jake said through gritted teeth, his muscles straining with the weight of the glass. Morgan helped to support it as he stretched his arms out, then together, they screwed the pane back on again. The niche looked exactly as it always had.

  Morgan knelt next to her pack and eased open the top of the pouch, Jake looking on with expectation as she revealed what was inside. A finger bone with the distinctive red seal.

  Jake sighed with relief. “The last relic. That’s all of them.” He looked at his watch. “Just in time. We need to get ready for Alcatraz.”

  23

  Morgan and Jake stood on the end of Pier 39 looking out toward Alcatraz. Lights still burned from the military fortification, a beacon in the dark bay. Behind them, the sound of tourists enjoying a night out, the roar of spectators watching football, and the buzz and ding of gaming machines. The smell of frying fish and the sweet scent of hot sugared doughnuts wafted on the breeze.

  A sea lion barked from the floating platforms anchored in the protected bay nearby. Others joined in, their calls a warning in the night. Nature lived in uneasy partnership with humans here, their presence a draw for families while the wildlife was kept just far enough away so that the stink of their raft blew out to sea most days.

  “The island is only two kilometers away,” Jake said, “but we should probably leave soon.” He reached for her hand. “I need to tell you something before we go.”

  Morgan turned to face him, the angles of his jawline lit by the strobe lights from one of the bars. His expression was somber, his eyes dark with intensity.

  “Marietti wants the relics. We can’t leave there without them.”

  “What about Naomi?”

  “Well, obviously, we want her too. All three of us, plus the Hand of Ezekiel, motoring back off Alcatraz in the early hours of the morning. That’s the plan.”

  Morgan turned back to look out to sea. “What do you think the relics really are? If Marietti wants them that much, there must be something to the myth. Could they really raise the dead somehow?”

  She thought of Ben in his grave, his body now becoming one with the earth, the creatures of the dirt crawling between his ribs, eating away the flesh that had been his shell for a short blink of time. The thought of someone opening his grave, pulling out his corpse and trying to make it live again was a sick perversion of the monk’s belief in resurrection.

  Jake leaned on the wooden ledge of the pier, his muscular forearms bronzed from the day’s sun under his rolled-up shirt sleeves. “We’ve seen enough over the years to consider that anything is possible and certainly the Brotherhood have done a decent job of hiding the Hand of Ezekiel for generations. They must believe it has power.” He shook his head. “I don’t know. But aren’t the relics better off in the ARKANE vault, safe from crazy billionaires who want to conquer death?”

  “Perhaps.” Morgan hefted her pack over her shoulder, the remaining finger bones safely stowed inside. “Let’s go bring Naomi home.”

  They walked along the side of the pier down to the moorings. Masts creaked in the wind, the metallic clatter of rigging on the yachts and the slap of water on the side of the wharf welcoming them onto the dock. They searched for the launch Martin had arranged for them to use.

  “There it is.” Jake pointed at a Sea Ray Sundancer moored at the end of the row. As they climbed aboard,
Morgan noted the name of the boat.

  “Boreas. Seriously? The god of the north wind who brings the winter. Couldn’t we have got something with a more triumphant name?”

  Jake stowed the gear, fitting their packs under removable panels in the seats. He opened up a waterproof bag that had been left for them. “This might help you feel better.”

  Morgan bent to look inside, noting her favorite SP-21 Barak pistol next to a selection of other weapons. She nodded, then looked up at the busy pier above them, noting the tourists that wandered with carefree nonchalance along the walkway. “I’ll check it all once we get underway.”

  She untied the main line from the back, and Jake eased the powerboat into the channel, chugging slowly until they reached the entrance to the small harbor.

  “Hold on,” he called back to Morgan and then powered into the bay, turning the boat into a wide arc, heading north-west toward Alcatraz. Above them in the night sky, the clouds darkened to shades of mulberry shot through with inky black, heavy with rain as the storm approached.

  The wind whipped through Morgan’s hair, and she relished the sting of salt spray on her skin as they sped away from the city toward the forbidding island. She felt the edge of adrenalin rise as they skimmed the waves, the twin poles of apprehension and excitement. The throb of her burns seemed to lessen as she focused on the task. This was where she was meant to be – out on a mission, her partner by her side, set against the enemy together. She couldn’t help the smile that curved over her face and she knew that Father Ben would have approved of her choice to rejoin the fray.

  The lighthouse blinked from the center of the island and the white blocks of the prison loomed above as they drew closer. Jake slowed the boat as they approached the shore, idling the engine as they both checked their weapons and hid backups. Morgan tucked a ceramic blade into a compartment in the base of her hiking boots.

  Jake looked at his watch, the minutes ticking toward midnight. “Ready?”

  Morgan nodded. “As I’ll ever be.”

  They moored the boat around the coastline from the pier, tying up to a small jetty at the base of the Agave Trail, a walkway through sharp spiky succulents that wound up to the prison beyond. The lone cry of a Western Gull rang through the air like a desperate call for help. It circled above, beady eyes fixed on the intruders as it hovered in the rising wind.

  Morgan and Jake grabbed their packs and clambered onto the island, creeping up the flagstone steps to the ruins of the parade ground. They emerged behind a pile of rubble, woven through with weeds and scrub grass, nature claiming back the concrete inch by inch. They looked up toward the prison on the cell-house slope above, the burned-out ruins of the Warden’s residence visible next to the lighthouse.

  “Where are we meant to do the exchange?” Morgan said softly.

  Jake pointed to the side of the rocky outcrop where a long ramp led into the shadows. “There’s a morgue on the north-western side near the water tower. We meet there.”

  As they walked with quiet steps around the edge of the abandoned parade ground, Morgan looked up at the prison, trying to imagine what it must have been like to be incarcerated here surrounded by the stark waters of the bay. It had been a military prison since 1828 and a federal prison from the 1930s until 1963, later becoming a historical landmark visited by tourists fascinated by the lore of the inescapable rock.

  But it wasn’t only history that made this place so forbidding. As Morgan gazed at the stone walls, she felt a chill that went beyond history. The Native Americans called this place an evil island, and the violent inmates had certainly brought more brutality with them. The earth had soaked up the blood and tears of those within, and the air seemed to resonate with the frustrated screams of those trapped here until death, and the echoes of those they had wronged.

  Aware of the silence around them, Morgan and Jake walked up the slope to the tiny morgue. It was little more than a concrete bunker with a thick door, rusting on its hinges with a glass panel allowing a view inside. Morgan rubbed away a layer of dirt and peered in, her flashlight illuminating a ruined interior. The faded white brickwork was layered with dust and peeled off the walls revealing bricks beneath. A single wooden table, the length of a man, stood off-center, grooves still visible where liquids from the corpse would have pooled. Broken pipes and crumpled plumbing lay in the corner.

  The sound of hydraulics suddenly came from within, the whirr of a turbine, the clatter of a chain.

  A door opened at the back of the morgue, brightly lit from within, and Morgan recognized the muscle-bound frame of the Latino military man she’d first seen in Toledo. A semi-automatic hung around one broad shoulder. He held the barrel toward them as he pressed a button and the morgue door clicked and swung open.

  “Leave your weapons here.” His voice was curt, his expression stony.

  Morgan and Jake stepped into the morgue and laid their guns on the table.

  “And the rest.” The man’s tone was clear, so Morgan and Jake both pulled their backup guns from ankle holsters and laid them next to the others.

  “In the elevator, face the back wall. Hands where I can see them.”

  They did as he said. The elevator was pristine, sparkling clean with chrome surfaces so shiny that Morgan could see the man’s reflection. As the door shut, he pressed another button to descend, keeping the gun on them at all times.

  Morgan turned her head slightly toward Jake, catching his eye. They exchanged a silent gaze, both understanding that they would wait to see how to proceed further. There had been no underground part of the prison on Martin’s maps, but somehow it didn’t seem surprising that there was a hidden place of secrets under this highly protected site.

  The elevator descended, halting with a bump at the bottom. The chrome door slid open with a whoosh. The Latino guard stepped out first, backing away, his gun trained on them the whole time. “Out. Turn around slowly.”

  They turned, and Morgan couldn’t help but gasp at what lay in front of them.

  24

  Morgan had expected some kind of historic dungeon, but this was a state-of-the-art medical research lab. They had known of Luis Rey’s ties to the military but what he did here must be directly under the auspices of government, and only a stone’s throw from the Silicon Valley billionaires who chased immortality at any price.

  The lab was compact, the ceiling low and hung with silver ventilation ducts and metallic pipes. Morgan didn’t know what most of the medical equipment was for, but that wasn’t what caught her eye.

  On one side of the room, a row of four bodies lay on metal gurneys, three male, one female, all young, all strapped down and all showing signs of violent death. They had been shot in the head recently. Powerful vents whooshed as they conditioned the air but the room still smelled of a hint of smoke and underneath it, a note of decay. Morgan noticed that the gunshot wounds had not bled and two of the bodies showed signs of decomposition. It looked like they had been shot after death – but surely, that couldn’t be right.

  Behind the gurneys, a barred door led into a darkened cell. On the other side of the room, screened off from the dead by a green surgical curtain, a Creole scientist with blue beads in her hair stood tapping on a computer tablet, checking readings on a monitor. In front of her, a young girl lay in a hospital bed, her body twisted, her face pale and sweating with pain even though she was under sedation. The regular beep of the machine traced the pulse of the girl’s life.

  “You took Naomi from the bayou.” Jake started toward the woman, fists clenched. “Lashonda, right?”

  At the sound of his voice, a rattling came from the cell beyond, and a face appeared. Naomi stood there, hands around the metal bars. She wore a white hospital gown as if prepped for an operation. Her skin was sallow, her wrists raw from the shackles but her eyes were still bright with curiosity.

  “Jake? You’re really here!”

  “Naomi!” Jake stepped forward, heading toward the cell.

  The bodyguard
stopped him with a sharp dig in the ribs with his gun. “No further.”

  Lashonda regarded the newcomers with calculated interest. “Did you bring the relics?” She pointed at the girl in the bed. “Elena doesn’t have much time.” She looked over at the bodyguard. “Julio, take the bag.”

  “It’s OK, I’ll do it.” Morgan shrugged off her pack, her hands in clear view so Julio wouldn’t get trigger-happy.

  She pushed it gently with her foot, sliding it forward. Lashonda walked over, bent to pick it up, and carried it over to one of the metal tables. She ran a detection wand over it with a light beeping noise. “It’s clear.”

  “Of course it is,” Morgan said. “There are only bones in there. Now let Naomi out of the cell and let us leave.”

  Something about the place made her skin crawl, and she had a dark sense of foreboding. They needed to get off this forsaken island of violence and death. Let Marietti return for the relics himself. It would be a win if they could just get themselves out alive tonight.

  “But surely you must want to know what the Hand of Ezekiel can do.” The voice came from a doorway behind Elena’s hospital bed.

  A Hispanic man stood curved over an ebony walking cane, twisted fingers grasping the bone handle. His face was scored with deep wrinkles, aged before his time by the disease that ravaged his body but there was a core of steel beneath. From the research Martin had provided, Morgan realized that this must be Luis Rey, the billionaire who would try to conquer even death to save his daughter.

  “I know what you do at ARKANE,” he said. “So you must be curious. Can the relics really turn dry bone to living flesh once more?” The beep of Elena’s machine filled the brief silence, the blip of an erratic heartbeat as Luis looked down upon her prone body.

  He pointed over to the dead lying on the gurneys beyond. “We’ve tried so many variations of the powder but there has always been something missing. Something that perhaps the relics will provide. Something that will bring Elena back.”