by Nathan Swain
“I also wanted proof when my father first told me about the Flaming Sword,” Sandwith said, walking over to the case. “He showed me this.”
Olivia stood next to Sandwith. Inside the case were two rows of eight scrolls bearing Hebrew script. They appeared to be extremely old. The edges of the paper were frayed, and the ink of writing had all but disappeared in certain places, leaving a faint, chalky outline.
Olivia began reading from the first scroll. “In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim, I, Azariah, journeyed from Babylon and beheld Eden.”
“Azariah?” Olivia asked.
“Azariah was the Hebrew name of Abednego, and this is his testament. It recounts everything I just told you, and more.”
“This is incredible,” Olivia said, squinting at the fading text.
“Indeed.”
“Why isn’t it in a museum?”
“The Flaming Sword would destroy it. They would fake an electrical fire or recruit a suicide bomber. Fire a smart bomb. Whatever it takes. Dozens of Jewish apocrypha writings about Eden have been destroyed under similar circumstances. I assure you, they would not let this document see the light of day.”
“Why not?”
“Because it corroborates the existence of the Garden of Eden, which they are sworn to protect from discovery. They’ve not hesitated in the past to use whatever means necessary to do just that.”
“What do you mean?”
“Assassinations, clandestine acts of terror. They’ve silenced almost everyone who has come close to discovering their secrets. Some of the most infamous acts of murder and destruction in human history have come at the hands of the Flaming Sword. The Bubonic plague. The Crusades. The Six-Day War, to name a more recent event. They manipulate or bribe other groups to take responsibility.”
Olivia sat down with her tea. “How have you managed to stay alive? I imagine you are public enemy number one.”
“Yes, well, now you know why I moved to Iran,” Sandwith said, sitting across the table from Olivia. The Flaming Sword’s influence here is significantly diminished to non-existent. And I receive protection from the government.”
“You’re protected by the government of Iran?”
“The Flaming Sword is known to every governmental intelligence service in the world as a threat to the established order. Whenever Eden is in danger of being discovered the Flaming Sword uses every tool at its disposal to protect it from discovery, including by inciting revolution and civil war. Its aim is to sew chaos and distract public attention. And they’ve succeeded, century after century.”
“How do you know all this? What’s your source?”
“My father was very influential in the group. After I rejected the Flaming Sword, but before he could arrange for his papers and possessions to be sent elsewhere, he died. I inherited everything as a matter of law, including an immense archive of historical material going back centuries. Eventually the United States became unsafe for me. Ironically, evildoers tend to flourish in a free society. So, I moved here. The government provides me security in exchange for intelligence about the Flaming Sword. In the meantime, I’m able to continue my research. Whatever I can’t locate online, the Ministry of Culture is kind enough to obtain for me via inter-library loans or other methods. It’s a lovely arrangement.”
“I hope you don’t mind if I ask?”
Sandwith again read Olivia’s mind. “I don’t know it,” he said abruptly. “Only the ruling council of the Flaming Sword, all of three people, know the exact location of Eden. It is the most closely guarded secret in the world, whispered from the lips of the passing council member to his successor, for him alone to hear it.”
“I don’t suppose your father was on the ruling council?”
“No, unfortunately not. He was one of nine elders from whom the ruling council are chosen. When a member of the council dies, the most senior elder ascends to the council. It is a process that favors good genes and longevity. Unfortunately, father’s race ended just before the finish line.”
“How tragic,” Olivia said, pondering her next move. She tapped her finger nail on the rim of her tea cup. “I’m afraid our tea has gotten cold,” she said, extending her cup.
Ever the proper Englishman, Sandwith sprang from his chair to retrieve more hot water.
Do I tell him about the tablet? Olivia wondered. It wouldn’t put him in any danger. He couldn’t possibly be in any more trouble with the Flaming Sword than he already is. But can I trust him? What if he asks to see the 3D scan, or tries to steal it from me? If he’s familiar with Rich’s journals, he might try to discover the Garden for himself.
After Samir’s betrayal, anything was possible. Sandwith could be one of them, she considered. The Flaming Sword could be using him as a double agent to misinform and misdirect. What if they purposely placed Sandwith’s book in front of Allison’s safe to lead me right here? There were obvious reasons not to trust him, she realized. But fundamentally she saw in Sandwith the soul of a scholar. His absent-minded professor demeanor was genuine, unaffected. He reminded her of Allison. Besides, assuming he was legitimate, he was the only person who could give her a clear sense of what to expect from the Flaming Sword. She needed to trust him.
“There, another piping hot pot of tea,” said Sandwith, this time also bearing a plate of pastries.
“We found a tablet,” Olivia said, freezing Sandwith as he was about to consume a mouthful of croissant. “A very old tablet, which provides a rather more detailed description of the location of the Garden of Eden than Genesis 2.”
“Oh, dear,” Sandwith said.
“It has a symbol at the bottom.”
“What kind of symbol?”
“An infinity symbol, of all things.”
The saucer in Sandwith’s hand began to tremble. “My God, you have the Adam tablet.”
Sandwith stood and walked across the room, looking at the paintings on the wall. He glanced over at the ancient scroll. “Let me try to collect my thoughts,” he said, stabilizing himself by placing a hand on the chest.
Sandwith drew a long breath. “In Flaming Sword lore, Daniel—during his first trip to Eden—discovered a tablet etched by the hand of Adam himself describing the location of Eden. Daniel brought it back to Israel and it was kept safe in the Second Temple in Jerusalem for more than 500 years. It was taken when the Temple was destroyed in the first century by Rome. Of course, the Flaming Sword orchestrated the whole thing, and then the tablet came under its control. I never believed this legend. I’ve never met anyone who has. But you see references to it from time to time in the Flaming Sword’s archives, papers that discuss an ancient tablet distinguished by a unique symbol. A symbol, if Flaming Sword lore is to be believed, carved by Adam himself.”
“That’s absurd,” Olivia said.
“Of course it is. The first homo sapiens had no concept of a written language.”
“Then who does the Flaming Sword think Adam was?”
“My dear, I don’t know,” Sandwith sighed, his eyes sinking below his looming eyebrows. “I only have theories.”
Olivia raised her palms in the air. “Don’t leave me in suspense.”
Sandwith stroked the white curls of his beard again. “Perhaps Adam was a well-educated Sumerian who started his own religious order back in Mesopotamia. Perhaps the tablet describes the origin story for this order, and the symbol is its emblem. Whatever the original purpose of this tablet—and surely, we will never know—it apparently was used by the ancients for their own purposes. The Hebrews most famously integrated it into their own origin story—Genesis 2.”
“Your theory that Adam was a regular Sumerian guy who lived a mere 6,000 years ago would not go over well with the fundamentalists, I assure you.”
“Well, recall, the Bible says Adam lived to be 900 years old, so he might have conceived of the Eden story well before the tablet was etched. And there is some support for the idea of Adam as a writer. As you know, Genesis chapter 5, Verse 1
indicates that Adam wrote everything preceding it.”
“Yes, but Genesis was written in Hebrew. This tablet was written in proto-Sumerian.”
“Perhaps he was multi-lingual,” Sandwith said with a smile, acknowledging the futility of attempting to prove his point. “Of course, I could offer a more informed opinion if I could see the tablet itself.”
Sandwith was too British to ask to see the tablet directly. But Olivia knew what he wanted. And she understood it was unfair to ask him to opine about an artifact he had never seen. But she wasn’t ready to read him into the tablet yet. She had too many doubts, and too many questions. She quickly changed the subject.
“There’s more. The tablet isn’t the only place the symbol appears. It’s also drawn in a journal kept by one Alexander Cyril Rich, with whom I’m sure you’re familiar.”
“Alexander Rich,” Sandwith shouted, slapping the corner of his desk, as if he was answering a question on a game show. “Of course. Reading his journals has been the next thing on my ‘to do’ list for the past twenty years.”
“The tablet was taken from us, and a colleague of mine was killed. We’ve been pursued since then by a member of the Flaming Sword, we believe. Someone named Samir Zana.”
Sandwith shook his head. “The name isn’t familiar, but I’m sure your pursuer is a cherubim. Lucky for you, a particularly ineffective one by the sound of it.”
The steam rising from the tea cups had washed the study in the aroma of pomegranate. Olivia sipped a thimble-worth. It was still too hot to drink.
“Is there anything we can do to stop them?”
Sandwith looked at Olivia like she had just told the most wonderful joke. “Stop the Flaming Sword? Do you know its motto?”—it was a rhetorical question—“His pain is your path; his path is your pain. The ox, the eagle, the lion are unbroken.”
Olivia played dumb. “Interesting. What does it mean?”
“The Flaming Sword wants humanity to accept the story of its sinful fall from grace. The same sinful path followed by Adam is a path all humans must follow. The same pain of exile Adam felt is a pain all humans must endure. None are permitted back into the grace of God while on this Earth. None may return to the Garden. That is their message. They”—Sandwith cleared his throat, dramatically—“the cherubim of the Flaming Sword, are united in preventing anyone from returning to the Garden of Eden. If you want to live, you have only one choice. Use the information you have to find the Garden and share your discovery with the world. That will destroy the Flaming Sword’s reason for being. Anything short of that, I’m sorry to say, and they will never stop hunting you.”
“What if we set up a meeting and hand over our etching of the tablet, hand over Rich’s journal and wash our hands of it?”
“They’d kill you then and there. You know too much.”
Chapter 55
The instant she left Sandwith’s apartment, Olivia felt their trip to Iran had been worth the risk. They now understood the old man’s message to Eastgate at the checkpoint in Iraq. They knew that the tablet had been part of Flaming Sword lore for thousands of years. They also knew what it would take to stop the group’s bloody pursuit: finding the Garden and sharing the discovery with the world.
Olivia knew Sandwith wanted to see the scan of the tablet and her transcription of Rich’s journal. Of course he did. This is his life’s work. But she needed to keep moving, and she wanted to give Sandwith a reason to keep helping. “I’ll come back at the right time,” she told him. “I have more to share with you.”
It was still light out when Olivia left Sandwith’s house. The air was fresh from a brief rain shower, inspiring her to return to the hotel by foot. But then a white van pulled up along the curb beside her. Two hulking men in sport jackets appeared behind her.
“Would you come with us please?”
Olivia didn’t bother maintaining her cover. She responded with derision. She was a professor from the University of Cambridge. She was here to do research. If she was detained, it would become a matter of international importance. All of that was more or less true.
A third man—small and trim—wrenched her forearm behind her back and pushed her into the dark belly of the van.
Chapter 56
Samir sat in a chair across from his father’s desk, which looked as if it had been carved from one of the massive cedar trees from the forest nearby. A rising sun, a Zoroastrian folk symbol, was carved into the outside of the desk, facing all those who entered the room. Scenes of deer frolicking in apple and date groves decorated the desk’s massive legs.
The office looked just as it did the first time Samir sat there—more than twenty years ago, when he was brought to meet Reso, his new father. Rugs depicting the jagged mountains of Kurdistan covered the floor in rectangles of red and gold. Hundreds of books filled shelves on the wall opposite the desk.
Black and white pictures of Reso’s parents and brothers sat atop the credenza behind the desk. Reso never spoke of them, but the photos had maintained their lonely vigil in his office these many years. The eyes of Reso’s brothers, youthful but sad, seemed to fix on Samir whenever he entered the room, wherever he moved. In the past, he was comforted by their presence, in the connection he felt as they watched over him. Today, he felt haunted by them, judged. “You are not worthy of this family’s legacy,” they seemed to whisper to him. Samir looked away.
Tiny paperweights, with etchings like those on the tablet he had taken from Professor Allison, sat atop stacks of paper on Reso’s desk. Maps and photographs that looked like they had been taken from a satellite were piled nearby.
Samir also noticed in the corner of the room a large colorful painting, composed with what appeared to be oil paint and chalk. In the center was a winged, four-faced creature. It was the same creature depicted on the idol that he left in Professor Allison’s safe. Samir was surprised he had never noticed it before. The old saying was true, Samir realized: you can see something a hundred times without really looking at it.
The office had been the scene of many thunderous punishments handed down by his father over the years. Samir shuddered at the memory of them, and the thought of what was to come. For that was the reason, Samir believed, that he was sitting in his father’s office again—to be punished for allowing Olivia and the American to escape.
The American. Samir spent hours each day thinking about him. He was a typical imperialist. Blonde hair, blue eyes. A regular cowboy. Samir despised him. He shamed Samir on the highway outside of Cambridge, shooting out the fender of his car, stranding him on the highway. Samir would have preferred to die than to suffer that dishonor. But having lived, he intended to exact retribution.
He already had come very close. He missed Olivia and the American in London by only a few minutes. The egg rolls they were eating were still warm when he arrived. Samir spent a few minutes indulging in his rage, breaking all of the plates and bowls in the kitchen and taking a piss on the bed where Olivia had slept—she left her lipstick on the side table. Eventually, Samir’s men were able to calm him enough to convince him that the American and Olivia could not have gotten very far and that they should try to find them. They split up, racing to Heathrow Airport and St. Pancras train station in hopes of catching a glimpse of them. But their prey had escaped.
Who had tipped them off? It must have been one of his men, Samir thought. They might have known Olivia from Cambridge or London society. Maybe she had slept with one of them. Or several. It was the danger of working in groups. The mission was always imperiled by the background and bad habits of the weakest links in the team. That’s why he intended to work alone to finish the job. If his father would let him.
“Ah, Samir,” Reso said, arriving at his office at last, sitting down behind his desk.
A woman from the kitchen entered behind him with a tray of breakfast.
“Hello, father,” Samir said.
“Would you like something to eat?” Reso asked.
“No.”
Samir had to restrain a smile. His father ate like a pig. His protruding belly was evidence of that.
“You’ve done well. Let’s see your prize.”
Samir was shocked to receive praise from Reso. Obtaining the tablet had been helpful, he knew, but stopping the unfaithful from locating the holy site was far more important. At that crucial task, he was an utter failure. Samir removed the tablet from his briefcase and placed it on his father’s desk.
His father examined the tablet carefully, running his fingers over the vertical etchings, raising the tablet to eye level to examine certain parts.
Samir watched nervously. Did he notice the coffee spill? Of course he did, he’s Reso Zana.
“It’s remarkable, isn’t it?” Reso said. “One of the earliest examples of writing in the world. It will never leave our family’s possession again, thanks to you.”
“I wish I could have done more. I don’t know how I lost them—”
Reso shook his head. “No, no. That’s not your concern anymore, Samir.”
“What? Why not? I can—”
“They went to Iran of all places,” Reso said, the slit of a devilish smile emerging from between his lips. “It’s better than I could have hoped.”
How had he located them already? Reso was omniscient, or so it seemed.
“They are traveling under fake visas. They’ll be arrested and thrown in prison, Reso said, “thanks to our intervention.”
“How do you know this?”
“That’s not your concern, is it?” Reso said, glaring at Samir.
Samir should have known better than to ask. His father never revealed his methods.
