Order of the Black Sun Box Set 6

by Preston William Child

  Everywhere in Antwerp and Belgium, flood alarm was rife after the past few days. All along the coastline, from Le Havre and Dieppe in France across to Terneuzen in the Netherlands, homes were being evacuated as the sea level rose without cause. With Antwerp sandwiched in the middle, the already flooded landmass of the Drowned Land of Saeftinghe had been lost under the tides already. The rest of the towns, like Goes, Vlissingen, and Middelburg were beneath the waves, all the way north to The Hague.

  Raya smiled, the only master of the mystery weather channels and authorities could not unravel as he passed people in frantic conversation, speculating and terrified of the still rising ocean soon to flood Alkmaar and the rest of Northern Holland within the next day.

  “God is punishing us,” he heard a middle-aged woman say to her husband outside a coffee shop. “This is why this is happening. This is a wrath of deities.”

  Her husband looked as shaken as she, but he tried to find some solace in reasoning. “Matilda, calm down. Maybe it is just a natural phenomenon the weather people could not pick up on those radar things,” he implored.

  “But why?” she persisted. “Natural phenomena are caused by the Will of God, Martin. This is divine punishment.”

  “Or divine evil,” her husband muttered, to his religious wife’s horror.

  “How can you say that?” she shrieked, just as Raya walked by. “What reason would there be for God to send evil upon us?”

  “Oh, I cannot resist that one,” Abdul Raya exclaimed aloud. He turned in his steps to join the woman and her husband. They were dumbstruck by his peculiar look, his claw-like hands, his sharp, bony face and sunken eyes. “Madam, the beauty of evil is in that, unlike good things, evil needs no reason to sow destruction. It is in the very essence of evil to willfully destroy for the sheer thrill of it. Good day.”

  As he sauntered off, the man and his wife stood frozen in shock, mostly at his revelation, but definitely much for his appearance. On television channels everywhere warnings were sent out, while reports of flood deaths joined company with reports from the Mediterranean basin, the Australian, Southern African and South-American reports of threatening floods. Japan suffered half of its population while a myriad of islands were sinking under the sea.

  “Oh, wait, my darlings,” Raya sang merrily as he approached the home of Hannes Wetter, “it is a curse of water. Water is found everywhere, not just in the sea. Wait, the fallen Kunospaston is the water demon. You could drown in your own bath tubs!”

  This was the latest star to fall, as observed by Ofar after Penekal heard of the rising sea levels in Egypt, but Raya knew what was to come, since he was the architect of this chaos. The emaciated Magician sought only to remind mankind of their insignificance in the eyes of the Universe, the uncountable eyes that glinted down upon them every night. And for good measure, he enjoyed the power of destruction he controlled and the juvenile thrill of being the only one who knew why.

  Of course, the latter was but his opinion of matters. The last time he imparted knowledge on mankind, the Industrial Revolution came of it. He did not have to do much after that. Men discovered science in a new light, engines replaced most transport and machinery needed the blood of the Earth to keep running efficiently in the race to destroy other countries in competition for power, money and evolution. As he had expected, people used knowledge to destroy – a delightful wink at evil incarnate. But Raya became bored with the repetition of wars and monotonous greed, so he decided to do something more…final…to dominate the world.

  “Mr. Raya, so nice to see you. Hannes Wetter, at your service,” the antique dealer smiled as the odd character walked up the steps to his front door.

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Wetter,” Raya greeted gracefully and shook the man’s hand. “I look forward to obtaining my prize.”

  “Of course, come in,” Hannes grinned from ear to ear. “My shop is in the basement. Here you go.” He gestured for Raya to lead the way down a very posh staircase, adorned with beautiful and expensive ornaments on stands that lead down along the banister. Above them, some woven items glittered in the mild breeze of a small fan Hannes kept the place cool with.

  “This is an interesting little place. Where are your customers?” Raya asked. The question perplexed Hannes slightly, but he assumed the Egyptian was just more inclined to do things the old way.

  “My customers usually order online and we send out the items to them,” Hannes explained.

  “They trust you?” the thin Magician scowled in sincere surprise. “How do they pay you? And how do they know you will keep to your word?”

  A befuddled chuckle escaped the seller. “Over here, Mr. Raya. In my office. I decided to keep the piece you asked for in there. It has a provenance, so you are assured of the authenticity of your purchase,” Hannes smiled courteously. “And here is my laptop.”

  “Your what?” the suave, dark Magician asked coolly.

  “My laptop?” Hannes repeated, pointing at the computer. “Where you can transfer the funds from your account to pay for the item?”

  “Oh!” Raya realized. “Of course, yes. I’m sorry, I had a long night.”

  “Women or wine?” the jovial Hannes chuckled.

  “Walking, I’m afraid. It is more exhausting now that I am older, you see,” Raya remarked.

  “I know. I know that all too well,” Hannes said. “I used to run marathons as a young man, and now I can hardly make it up the steps without catching my breath. Where did you go walking?”

  “Ghent. I could not sleep, so I started walking to come and see you,” Raya explained matter-of-factly, as he scrutinized the office with wonderment.

  “Excuse me?” Hannes gasped. “You walked from Ghent to Antwerp? Fifty odd kilometers?”

  “Yes.”

  Hannes Wetter was floored, but he could not discount the customer’s appearance as being someone rather eccentric, someone who did not seem fazed by most things.

  “That is impressive. Would you like some tea?” Hannes asked.

  “I would like to see the effigy,” Raya said firmly.

  “Oh, of course,” Hannes said, and went to the wall safe to retrieve the twelve inch statuette. When he walked back, Raya’s black eyes immediately identified the six uniform diamonds lodged in the sea of gems that made up the exterior of the statuette. It was a hideous looking imp, jagged teeth in snarl and long black hair on its main head. Carved from black ivory, the thing branded two faces on each side of its main face, although it only had one body. Upon the forehead of each face, a diamond was set.

  “Like myself, this imp is uglier in real life,” Raya charmed with a morbid smile as he took the statuette from a laughing Hannes. The seller was not about to argue his buyer’s point, as it was pretty much true. But his propriety was saved the awkwardness by Raya’s curiosity. “Why does it have five faces? One would be enough to scare off intruders.”

  “Ah, that,” Hannes said, eager to describe the origin. “According to the provenance, it has had only two owners before. A king from Sudan owned it in the Second Century, but he claimed that it was cursed, so he donated it to a church in Spain during a campaign in the Alboran Sea, near Gibraltar.”

  Raya looked up at the rambling man with a confused expression. “That is why he has five faces?”

  “No, no, no,” Hannes laughed. “I am still getting to that. This piece was modelled on the Indian god of evil, Ravana, but Ravana had ten heads, so this probably was an inaccurate ode to the god-king.”

  “Or it is not the god-king at all,” Raya smiled, counting the remaining diamonds as the six of the Seven Sisters, demonesses from the Testament of King Solomon.

  “How do you mean?” Hannes asked.

  Raya rose to his feet, still smiling. In a soft, educational tone he said, “Watch.”

  One by one, to the fierce objection of the antique dealer, Raya used his pocket knife to extricate each diamond until they counted six in his palm. Hannes did not know why, but he was too terrified of the vis
itor to do anything to stop him. A creeping fear overtook him, as if the devil himself stood in his presence and he decided to do nothing, to watch, as his visitor insisted. The tall Egyptian collected the diamonds in his palm. Like a parlor magician at a cheap party he showed the stones to Hannes. “See that?”

  “Y-yes,” Hannes affirmed, his brow wet with perspiration.

  “These are six of the Seven Sisters, demons bound by King Solomon to build his temple,” Raya said with an informative quality reminiscent of a showman. “They were responsible for digging the foundations of the Temple of Jerusalem.”

  “Interesting,” Hannes forced, trying to sound even, not to panic. What his customer told him was both preposterous and scary, deeming him insane in Hannes’ eyes anyway. This gave him cause to think that Raya might be dangerous, so he played along for now. By now, he had realized that he was probably not going to get paid for the artifact.

  “Yes, it is very interesting, Mr. Wetter, but do you know what is really fascinating?” Raya asked, while Hannes stared unresponsively. Raya pulled the Celeste from his pocket with is other hand. The smooth, gliding movements of his elongated hands were quite beautiful to behold, like the form of a ballet dancer.

  But Raya’s eyes darkened as he brought his two hands together. “Now you are going to see something truly interesting. Call it alchemy; alchemy of Grand Design, the transmutation of the gods!” Raya cried above the ensuing rumbling that came from all round. Inside his claws a reddish gleam poured through between his thin fingers and the creases in his hands. He raised his hands, proudly exhibiting the power of his strange alchemy to Hannes, who was grasping his chest in horror.

  “Put that heart attack on hold, Mr. Wetter, until you have beheld the foundations of your own temple,” Raya requested cheerfully. “Look!”

  That dreaded command to watch, to look, was too much for Hannes Wetter and he sank to the floor, clutching his compressing chest. Above him, the evil Magician was in awe of the crimson glow in his hands as the Celeste met with the six sister diamonds, causing their charge. Under them, the ground shook, the tremors dislodging the support posts of the building Hannes lived in. He could hear the windows shattering under the growing earthquake as the floor fell away in large chunks of concrete and steel rods.

  Outside, the seismic activity increased six-fold, shaking the whole of Antwerp as ground zero, and then crawling along the earth’s surface in all directions. Soon it would arrive in Germany, the Netherlands and aggravate the ocean floor of the North Sea. Raya got what he needed for Hannes, leaving the dying man under the debris of his house. The Magician had to make haste to Austria, to see a man in the Salzkammergut region, claiming to have the most sought after stone after the Celeste.

  “See you soon, Mr. Karsten.”

  26

  Releasing the Scorpion onto the Snake

  Nina passed along the last of the beer before the Hercules started to circle above the makeshift landing strip just off the health clinic of Dansha, in the Tigray region. It was, as they had planned, early evening. By means of his administrational assistants, Purdue had recently procured a permit to use the abandoned airstrip after he and Patrick discussed strategy. Patrick took the liberty to inform Col. Yimenu, as he was obliged to do according to the deal Purdue’s litigation team struck with the Ethiopian government and its representatives.

  “Drink up, lads,” she said. “We are now behind enemy lines…” she glanced at Purdue, “…again.” She sat down as they all opened their last cold beer before the task of returning the Holy Box to Aksum. “So, just to be clear, Paddy, why are we not landing at the perfectly good airport in Aksum, then?”

  “Because that is what they, whoever they might be, expect,” Sam winked. “There is nothing like an impulsive diversion of plans to keep the hostile on their toes.”

  “But you told Yimenu,” she reasoned.

  “Yes, Nina, but the majority of civilians and archaeological experts fuming at us will not be notified soon enough to travel all the way here,” Patrick explained. “By the time they get here on word of mouth, we will be en route to the Yeha Mountain where Purdue discovered the Holy Box. We will be traveling in an unmarked ‘Deuce and a half’ cargo truck with no noticeable colors or emblems, making us practically invisible to Ethiopian nationals.”

  He exchanged a heavy leer with Purdue for a moment.

  “Grand,” she replied. “But why here, if it matters to ask?” she persisted in her curiosity as to the seemingly random location Patrick marked on the map.

  “Well,” Patrick pointed to the map under the pale light fixed to the roof of the craft, “you will see that Dansha is roughly center, halfway between Aksum, here,” he pointed to the name of the town and slid the tip of his index finger across the paper towards the left and down. “And your destination of Lake Tana, lies here, southwest of Aksum.”

  “So, we are doubling back once we dropped the box?” Sam asked before Nina could question Patrick’s use of the word ‘your’ instead of ‘our’.

  “No, Sam,” Purdue smiled, “our beloved Nina will be joining you on the journey to Tana Qirkos, the island where the diamonds are. In the meantime, Patrick, Adjo and I will be traveling to Aksum with the Holy Box, keeping up appearances for the Ethiopian government and Yimenu’s people.”

  “Wait, what?” Nina gasped, grasping Sam’s thigh as she leaned forward, frowning. “Sam and I are going alone to steal the bloody diamonds?”

  Sam smiled, “I love it.”

  “Oh, fuck off,” she moaned, falling back against the side of the plane’s belly as it rattled into a roll, preparing to land.

  “Come on, Dr. Gould, it would not only save us time to get the stones to the Egyptian stargazers, but it will be the perfect cover,” Purdue coaxed.

  “And next thing you know, I will be arrested and become Oban’s most infamous resident again,” she scowled, putting her full lips to the neck of the bottle.

  “You’re from Oban?” the pilot asked Nina, not looking back as he checked the controls in front of him.

  “Aye,” she answered.

  “Terrible about those people from your town, hey? Such a shame,” the pilot said.

  Purdue and Sam also perked up with Nina, both as oblivious as she. “What people?” she asked. “What happened?”

  “Oh, I saw it in the paper up in Edinburgh about three days ago, maybe longer,” the pilot reported. “A doctor and his wife died in a car crash. Drowned in Loch Lomond after their car ran into the water or something.”

  “Oh Jesus!” she exclaimed, looking horrified. “Did you get the name?”

  “Yes, let me think,” he shouted over the roar of the engines. “We were still saying how his name has something to do with water, you know? The irony of them drowning, you know? Uh…”

  “Beach?” she forced out, desperately wanting to know, but dreading any affirmation.

  “That’s it! Yes, Beach, that’s it. Dr. Beach and his wife,” he clicked his thumb and third finger, before he realized the worst. “Oh my God, I hope they weren’t friends of yours.”

  “Oh, Jesus,” Nina wailed into her palms.

  “I am so sorry, Dr.Gould,” the pilot apologized as he took the turn to prepare for landing in the dense darkness that was rife all over Northern Africa lately. “I had no idea you hadn’t heard.”

  “It’s alright,” she panted in devastated emotion and shock. “Of course you had no way of knowing that I knew them. It’s okay. It’s…okay.”

  Nina was not weeping, but her hands did tremor and her eyes froze in sorrow. Purdue put his arm around her. “You know, they would not have been dead now if I had not fucked off to Canada and caused the whole identity fuck up that caused her abduction,” she ranted, clenching her teeth at the guilt that rode her heart.

  “Bullshit, Nina,” Sam protested gently. “You know that is shite, right? That Nazi bastard would still have killed anyone in his way to…” Sam stopped short of stating the terrible obvious, but Purdue fini
shed the damning blame for him. Patrick was speechless and elected to remain so for the moment.

  “On his way to destroy me,” Purdue murmured with dread in his admission. “It was not your fault, my dear Nina. As always, your involvement with me had made you an innocent target and Dr. Beach’s involvement in my rescue drew a bullseye on his family. Jesus Christ! I am just a walking death omen, am I not?” he said, more with introspection that self-pity.

  He let go of Nina’s shivering frame, and for a moment, she wanted to pull him back, but she liberated him to his thoughts. Sam could read very well what was respectively taxing both his friends. He looked at Adjo, across from him as the plane’s wheels thrust the Hercules’ weight onto the cracked, somewhat overgrown tarmac of the old airstrip. The Egyptian blinked very slowly, his way of gesturing for Sam to relax and not react readily.

  Sam nodded imperceptibly and mentally prepared for the forthcoming undertaking to Lake Tana. Within a few seconds, the Super Hercules came to a gradual halt, and Sam could see Purdue staring at the Holy Box relic. The white haired billionaire explorer was no more his jovial self, but instead sat lamenting his obsession with historical artifacts with his locked hands hanging loosely between his thighs.

  Sam took a deep breath. It was the worst time for mundane inquiry, but it was also very important information he needed. With as much tactful timing as he could, Sam briefly glanced at a silent Patrick, and asked Purdue, “Do Nina and I have a vehicle to get to Lake Tana, Purdue?”

  “You do. It is an inconspicuous little Volkswagen. Hope you don’t mind,” Purdue said listlessly. Nina’s wet eyes rolled back and fluttered as she tried to make the tears stop before stepping out of the massive aircraft. She took Purdue’s hand and squeezed it. Her voice cracked as she whispered to him, but her words were far less upsetting. “All we can do now is to make sure that two-faced motherfucker gets his come-uppens, Purdue. People associate with you because you because you are enthusiastic about existence, and curious about beautiful things. You lead the way to better the standard of life with your genius, your inventions.”