In any case, he had said, these wise men made sure that nature was shown the proper respect. Above all, however, they never separated science and belief, which is why they were at least partially successful in governing matter with their spirit. Was Adam’s vision just a part of this gift?
She stood up and continued on. The walk had calmed her down.
* * *
THE MAGDALENSBERG – MARCH 16, EVENING
Cassidy lit a cigarette. How many was that now? He furiously threw the lighter against the windshield of the small van. He had been waiting for hours, not only for reinforcements from the Vatican police and the archaeological specialists in Rome, but also for the reinforcements Salvoni had promised from the Austrian secret service, which, to his surprise, had not shown up yet. Two buses in Rome had been set up with the best equipment to retrieve the artifacts as quickly as possible. All he needed were the Vatican diplomats and he would have no problems managing even without foreign assistance.
Cassidy grabbed his cell phone and called Salvoni, who had insisted on overseeing the operation personally.
“Patience, Cassidy. We need another two hours or so. It wasn’t exactly a walk in the park organizing everything here. Were you able to follow MacClary’s friends?”
“Yes, of course, and I can tell you now that we’re too late. They’ve found the cave and have probably already broken in. I only have two men here. What should I do?”
“That is unfortunate, very unfortunate, but the cardinal state secretary takes a different view of the situation. Stay hidden and try to get closer as carefully as you can. But don’t make a move before I get there.”
“Understood. I’ll stay hidden and hang back,” Cassidy said, like the loyal subordinate he was. He had long ago given up contradicting his superiors.
THE MAGDALENSBERG – NIGHT
Ryan had been shoveling for nearly three hours now. It had gotten dark and the trees in front of the entrance to the cave stood like mystical guards in the soft, thick fog. Adam and Deborah hadn’t seen anyone who might unexpectedly interfere with their work, so they came back after a while to join Ryan.
Just as Adam was getting ready to help, there was a crash underneath the earth. The ground gave way. Adam leaned against a tree, grabbing Ryan’s hand at the last second; otherwise he would have been pulled down into the cave-in.
After Adam helped Ryan regain his footing, there was absolute silence. Deborah came over, shaking her head in frustration. “That’s it, then. We’re not going to get through there, at least not tonight anyhow.” Resigned, she sat down on the damp ground, cleaning her fogged-up glasses with her handkerchief.
“Nonsense,” Ryan said, laughing as he slid down into the hole that had just been created. “Give me the shovel and a flashlight.”
Moments later, Ryan’s flashlight lit up a hole, about ten feet down and three feet wide. The ground gave way a little more, and Ryan, shoveling like a madman, cleared enough so that he could slip inside.
Ryan had slid down a few steps into the lower chamber, but he couldn’t see anything at first since the collapse had caused so much sand to rain down. He looked skeptically up at the cave ceiling, but then the first artifacts grabbed his attention. A moment later he was close to tears. In front of him was a gleaming bronze shield engraved with what were clearly Celtic symbols. Above the shield, the builders had carved the Wheel of Being into the stone. It symbolized the four points of the compass united by a central circle. It also stood for the universe, which consists of four elements—earth, air, water, and fire—and a fifth element that holds everything together.
Ryan knelt down, as if in prayer. MacClary hadn’t been exaggerating. The thought that he might be standing in front of the last remnant of his ancestors left him awestruck. His mother had told him that his family, just before they escaped to Ireland, had been very influential at the emperor’s court. What would be waiting for him here?
He used the flashlight to look around a little bit more before he discovered another opening about fifteen to twenty feet farther back. Adam, who had been standing behind him, walked forward and went through by himself.
For a few moments it was deathly quiet in the cave, and then Ryan heard Adam breathlessly calling, “Thomas, Deborah, I can’t believe this.”
Ryan set up a larger light so they could view the entire scope of the cave. They found themselves standing in front of what appeared to be a hundred chests each covered with a layer of wax. Next to them, they could see more shields made of precious metals, swords, countless stone tablets decorated with runes, and even more through another opening. Adam stood there unable to move. In the meantime Ryan had stretched a tarp over the opening, both to keep light from escaping and to keep the outside dampness from penetrating into the cave.
“OK, Deborah,” Ryan said when he was finished, “let’s open a few chests very carefully. Then we’ll know if this was worth all the time and effort.”
Adam came up next to him. “You mean these stones, these shields, all the decorations and the weapons, they’re not actually worth anything?”
“Of course they are. For the museums in Europe, they would be a priceless treasure. But not for me.”
“The stone tablets don’t have any information about the purpose of the library,” Deborah said nervously. “They’re just gravestones of kings or other important figures.”
“What we’re looking for are the scrolls that MacClary’s father discovered back then,” Ryan explained.
Then he opened the first chest and sank, frustrated and despairing, to his knees.
Everything was as good as destroyed, although some of the scrolls might offer up a secret or two if they were subjected to computer tomography.
* * *
Shane tore down an old tarp that had the insignia of the British army and went into a second room. Stunned and deeply moved, he stood stock still.
The almost circular room was a good eight hundred and fifty square feet. Man-made chambers had been carved into the volcanic rock, about half the size of a coffin. In these chambers were parchment scrolls, many of which looked, at first glance, to be in good shape, and there were also countless more decorative pieces, bracelets, and smaller stones with engraved symbols. In the middle of the room was a round, polished stone, about ten feet in diameter with an engraved spiral. Shane recognized the symbol: the spiral of life.
He was irresistibly drawn into the center of the stone. At the end of the engraved line, he sat down and looked around in confusion. The impressions that were streaming over him were almost too much for him. He was standing on a spot where the energy of an ancient culture was concentrated. A breath from the past? No, it didn’t feel past at all. It was a breath from a culture that he was longing for. Could it really be that the downfall of the Druids and their legacy were manifested here? It seemed pointless to want to turn back the wheel of time, as MacClary was doing. The question of how the development of humankind could have been different was an important one, but Shane felt that this day had more to do with the present and the future than with the past. The opening of this library—there was no other term you could use for the mass of relics left here—would trigger something larger, larger than they could even imagine right now. Of that he was certain.
He looked around again. The room had an almost archaic aesthetic and simplicity that took his breath away. He found himself irresistibly drawn into another passageway. He had to go about fifteen feet through the narrow corridor until it opened up into another, even bigger room, which left him completely dumbstruck.
“Thomas, Deborah, come here, and hurry. I think you’re about to find everything you’re looking for.”
The room was much more chaotic than the other two. Lying all over the place were wooden beams, blank parchment, chests, candles, weapons, pitchers, and more. Then Shane saw something that made his blood run cold. In another hollow of the cave, there was an enormous table. Underneath it were drawers filled with more parchment. On the table
there were countless cups and sticks that looked like writing quills. A chair was next to the table and under the tattered remnants of cloth he saw a skeleton whose skull, decomposed by the passage of time, had fallen onto the table and another parchment.
“Adam?”
“Back here! You have to go through the nearest passageway,” Shane called back, his voice choked with tears.
* * *
Ryan’s frustration gave way to a wave of euphoria when he saw the parchment in the second room. Deborah found the nearest passageway and continued on into the third room, from where Adam had called them.
“Thomas?”
“Wait, I’m coming, I have to look at this room first,” Ryan said, gradually realizing that he didn’t know where to start. Without giving it too much thought, he went into one of the chambers and carefully lifted out some of the parchment scrolls. They really were in amazing condition. Would it be too risky to open them and put them straight into his collection box?
As he picked up the first scroll, he realized that this was a sacred moment. Here stood three Irish folk with Celtic roots, and in this moment they had become responsible for helping their ancestral culture regain its place in the world, whether they wanted this responsibility or not.
Just the sight of the writing made him nervous. “Deborah, I need you here,” he called in hushed tones.
Deborah squeezed back into the chamber.
“Can you translate this?” Ryan said, showing Deborah the scroll he was holding.
“They’re in perfect condition! Are you crazy, opening them up here?”
“Trust me. We don’t have much time, and we have to take advantage of this opportunity.”
This seemed to convince Deborah, who began to study the scroll. “I can’t believe it! It’s—there...do you see the numbers? It was written in 315 by a...a Druid, who—”
Deborah hesitated a minute in disbelief. “...who’s describing an evening where he, and perhaps another Druid at Constantine’s court, was acting as a fortune-teller. He describes a conversation that he overheard, a discussion between Constantine and a bishop. Constantine said that he was ready to help the Christians, since he recognized in their god an important revelation. But their writings were not convincing enough to lead an army. In order to win over people to this faith, it needed more...I can’t read the rest. I need something to help me enlarge it. And time, Thomas, I just need more time.”
Ryan could see that Deborah was so tense that her right eyelid had started to twitch. But Ryan had heard enough for now. This evidence was worth more than all the gold in the cave. It would prepare the way for a new era if it were to be recognized. At last, they had irrefutable proof of Constantine’s true motives.
“That’s perfectly fine, Deborah. We’ll take this scroll with us. And what about this one?”
In the meantime, Adam had come back to the room with an engraved stone. “Hey, what are you two doing? You need to see what I’ve found.”
Ryan didn’t move immediately, but he finally relented when Deborah called him over. He stood at the entrance to the third room and gave a heavy nod, as if he had been expecting this. “This is it, then. I mean...yes, now we’ve really found it.”
“What have we found?” Adam asked in astonishment, looking from one to the other.
Deborah’s only answer was to look at Ryan. “Tell him, Thomas.” He sighed and sat down at the table where the skeleton lay. “And you should probably sit down on the floor, Adam.”
Ryan pulled himself together. “OK, it probably is the right time for this. Adam...I’m a direct descendant of the last Celtic Druid. I have a family tree that stretches back into the fourth century, back to the time when those Druids who could escape Rome’s henchmen and who didn’t submit themselves to Christendom fled to Ireland and Scotland. According to what is told in my family, in the spring of 331, a group of Druids, including Rodanicas, the Roman Datanos, and six students, arrived in Britain at what is now Dover to make their way to Ireland.”
* * *
“The gods were with us,” Datanos said.
“I can only guess how many of our tribe they have killed,” Rodanicas murmured. They had seen horrible things on their journey. Many of his students and other leaders of the secret schools had lost their lives. He sat down on a stone. The journey had been difficult and dangerous. Just before their arrival, a storm had nearly capsized their ship. Coughing, he looked up at Datanos, who was opening up the sack with the parchment that Aregetorix had entrusted them with. On one of the first pieces of parchment he found instructions for Rodanicas.
“What is that?” Datanos asked in astonishment.
Rodanicas stood up wearily and looked at the parchment.
“These are the records of our ancestors, for every one of us. Aregetorix is the only Druid who was also known and respected by the Island Celts. The honor he is accorded will make it possible for us to get our footing here and start anew,” he said. “You, Datanos, you are a Roman. Yet you may come with me. I will offer you the same protection that I am given.”
“You know that I will follow you wherever you go.”
Datanos took out additional parchment and gave them to Rodanicas. He stood up and turned to the young Druids. “I am giving each one of you your own family tree. Each one of you must seek out a place to live, where you can, in secret, pass on everything that we have taught you. So will we outlast the time of darkness. Only two of us will pass on the knowledge of the place where Aregetorix is guarding the true testimony. And so it will be—until one day when people go in search of their true heritage.”
He ceremoniously handed over the scrolls and then turned to one of the men. “You, Uratorix, you are the other who will guard the place where your father, Aregetorix, has remained.” He gave the Druid the last parchment. “We leave at the rift of this time and shall return at the rift of another. And now, leave.”
Their faces set, the men embraced each other and went their separate ways, without once turning around to look back.
* * *
“The man you see in front of you is Aregetorix.” Ryan suddenly broke off, his breath catching in his throat. How long had he been carrying around this knowledge and all of these questions? “Until now it was nothing more than a legend, but now we’re standing in front of the proof. The stories told of one Druid who was left behind to guard everything, as long as he lived. This is the man you see before you now.” Ryan sat down, spent, on the ground.
“And you really believe that this is the place?” Adam said, awe evident in his voice.
Deborah had opened another parchment and was studying it carefully. “Frankly, the question has, I think, already been resolved.”
Ryan tried to get a better glimpse of what Deborah was holding. “What did you find?”
“Here another Druid, named Cetanorad, is writing a warning to all the Druids and the Celts. It’s difficult to translate, dreadfully bad Latin, but I understand at least this much: some of the Druids knew what was going on in Rome. He’s writing about falsifications and that knowing this will cost them their lives if they don’t escape. And here, oh no...” Deborah fell silent.
“What! Tell us!” Ryan said.
“He attributes a declaration to a bishop, whose name I can’t decipher. This declaration was shared with the emperor as a condition for a contract: ‘He who would conquer the pagans must destroy the Druids.’”
“And?”
“The bishop demanded that the emperor...wait a minute, the parchment isn’t from Constantine’s era, though. I don’t understand...”
“Oh, that doesn’t mean anything. It was mainly Emperor Theodosius I who supported the Church Father Ambrosius in his desire to wipe out anything that smacked of paganism. It was only during his reign that Christianity definitively became a state religion, even though Constantine often gets credit for it. The complete extermination of everyone with different beliefs was, from the very beginning, the declared goal of Theodosius’s regency.�
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Deborah stared around the room. “But then that also means that this library wasn’t constructed in just a short period.”
“Shouldn’t we be calling MacClary sometime soon?” Adam asked.
“Later, Adam,” Ryan said. “First we should look around a bit more, so that we can make an intelligent decision about what we should take with us and what we have to leave behind.”
He turned in a full circle, gesturing helplessly at the sheer volume of relics.
* * *
THE MAGDALENSBERG – NIGHT
Cassidy was still waiting for Salvoni, contenting himself with the analysis of the conversations one of his coworkers had been able to intercept right before the three Irish interlopers had gone into the cave. Since then, the thickness of the earth had made reception impossible. Just as he was about to dig into the provisions he had brought with him, his cell phone rang. The display read Salvoni.
“Yes.”
“Cassidy, we’ll be there in ten minutes. What’s the situation?”
“There’s nothing going on here,” Cassidy said, almost bored. “They’re still in the cave, but what we were able to hear didn’t suggest a huge find. Even if the three do discover something in the cave, they won’t be able to transport much in the little van they brought.”
The Celtic Conspiracy Page 10
