by Richard Reed
The Count snorted in derision. “You stand there, dagger poised over a half-naked girl, and claim enlightenment? Only we follow the light; you go deep into the dark entrails of the night, Dubois. You seek to revive savage, evil customs. In their day your gods were harsh and cruel; there is no place for them in a civilised world.”
“A civilised world, Monsieur le Comte? When mankind ravages the planet and denies the very existence of a supreme being? Eh bien, we do not have time to debate metaphysics. Do you have the sacrifice? As you can see, I have prepared an alternative lest you have a change of heart, so please, do nothing rash. I wish her no harm.”
“You wish her no harm, yet you would gladly take the life of another?”
“As I explained to your new friends on our previous meeting, it is not something I do gladly, but rather born of necessity. She carries the sins of the Church on her shoulders. All those who have died at the hands of Rome will be avenged. And what greater sign of devotion could we show to the Dark Lord than offering up the Bride of Christ? So now, let us make the exchange – unless you would rather….” he broke off and ran the tip of the dagger blade around Rachel’s throat, leaving a raw scratch.
“Over your dead body, Dubois,” snarled David, breaking free from the group and charging towards the altar.
With a sudden movement, Dubois brought his knife arcing down onto Rachel’s chest, stopping only when its tip had pierced her flesh. Blood oozed over the mirrored steel blade, and she convulsed in terror, too petrified to utter a sound. “Don’t push me,” he growled menacingly, as blood seeped onto the tattered remains of Rachel’s white blouse. “I will carry out my threat.”
David froze in mid-stride, his desperate urge to rip out Dubois’ throat countered only by the imminent threat to Rachel’s life.
Then, with a scream of anger and frustration, Marianne wrenched free from her bodyguards and threw herself at the feet of Dubois, her head bowed.
“Don’t do this,” she said through clenched teeth. “I have kept my side of the bargain.”
Two of the Count’s men leapt forward, but gunshots crashed deafeningly around the cave. The men fell to the ground, one ominously still, the other writhing in pain.
Several seconds passed, the scene frozen like a video on pause, though to David it seemed like an eternity. “Good,” said Dubois after a while. “It seems I finally have your attention.”
He withdrew the knife and turned to the silent figure of Marianne kneeling at his feet. “My lady, forgive my lack of courtesy, but it seems your friends seek to renege on our little arrangement.”
Marianne stood up slowly, threw back the hood of her coat and flung loose her mane of dark hair, staring defiantly at the man before her. “I am the Madeleine,” she said with quiet authority. “Is this what you really want? To kill the last descendant of Christ, the holiest man ever to walk this earth?”
In an unexpected gesture, Dubois bowed deeply and reverently before her. “My lady, you do us a great honour. I have been seeking you for many years, but in my heart, I never dared believe this moment would come. One day, when our souls meet in the afterlife, I hope you can forgive me for what I must now do.”
“There is always room for forgiveness, as Christ forgave those who crucified him,” said Marianne steadily, her eyes fixed on Dubois. “But first there must be repentance.”
She paused, and leaning forward, touched her hand to his face, her eyes probing deeply into his. “You lie, Dubois. I see no sign of regret. Know this: in the afterlife, this moment will haunt you for all eternity. I speak not of Hell, for the master you think to serve has no power over anyone’s eternal soul. I speak of an absence from God; a terrible, inescapable gulf between you and that of which we are all a part. You will not become a part of God; you will be a-part. You will experience an eternity of sorrow and emptiness. Even then, you could repent, and be welcomed back to the most awe-inspiring love you could imagine, but for you there will no turning back, for your soul is irrevocably tainted by hate and a lust for power.”
Dubois coloured, but said nothing, held rigid by her gaze.
“So, now, we come to this,” said Marianne gravely. “Release her.”
She stepped back, and Dubois gave a startled look as he came out of the trance.
“Release her,” repeated Marianne sternly.
Confused and uncertain, Dubois moved to the altar and cut Rachel’s bonds with the bloodstained knife.
“David,” said Marianne commandingly. “Come forward and take her away – just you,” she added quickly. “And don’t try to be a hero.”
David walked forward shakily, and bending over the altar, brushed Rachel’s face with his lips. “Don’t worry, it’s over now,” he whispered softly, then scooping up her quivering body in his arms, he turned and walked back to the Count.
Marianne turned to face Dubois once more. “One last time: do you really wish to follow this through, despite all that I have told you?”
For a moment his eyes flickered with hesitation, then his face hardened. “I have no choice, my lady,” he said stiffly.
“Everyone has a choice,” she said, turning to the altar. She sat on the edge and swung her legs onto the rough-hewn slab. Two cult members moved forward eagerly to tie her, but she turned to them in anger, her eyes ablaze. “Don’t think to touch me!” she said furiously. “Do you doubt the word of the Madeleine?”
The men froze, a startled expression on their faces, and Dubois waved them away angrily, bowing briefly once more to Marianne. “Indeed, I do not,” he said gravely. “Forgive their insolence. And because of my respect for your sacrifice, I will make this as painless as I can.”
Marianne gave him a long, hard look, then slowly lay back on the slab, her arms at her sides, her long black hair cascading over the edge.
Dubois began to chant; a long, slow, guttural ululation. It was a sound that chilled the soul; at first made on his own, then taken up by his followers, gaining in crescendo until it echoed around the chamber like a cacophony from hell.
Dubois moved to the altar, and grasping one of Marianne’s arms, slashed the knife quickly across her wrist. She bit her lip in pain, but made no sound. Dubois picked up her other arm and ripped the blade across that wrist, too. Blood splashed down over the altar as Marianne’s life began to ebb away.
Chapter 49
It came slowly at first; a trickle of water meandering across the floor, mingling with Marianne’s blood to form a tear-shaped pool beneath the altar, as if the very stone itself were weeping. Seconds later a violent cracking shook the ground beneath their feet. The thunder of crashing water reverberated in their ears as a torrent of white foam hurtled into the chamber, knocking everyone off their feet with its ferocity. As the water gained in force and volume with terrifying speed, the Count struggled towards to the altar, where Marianne lay white and unmoving. Ripping off his shirt-sleeves, he tore them into strips and tied tourniquets tightly around her wrists before picking up her limp body and throwing her over his shoulder.
“Let’s go,” he shouted urgently to David, who had struggled across behind him, still clutching Rachel’s limp body.
“We can’t go back that way,” he bellowed back over the noise of the water. “Look!”
The torrent had crashed down from the far end of the cave where the cultists had been mostly gathered, and the sheer force of the water had swept them into the passageway from which the rescue party had emerged. The rescuers, for the most part, had had but seconds to brace themselves against the rock wall behind them before the water struck. One man was knocked off his feet towards the tunnel entrance, but a colleague reached out and grabbed him, at considerable risk to his own life.
“The tunnel will be under water soon,” yelled David. “And there’s no way we would make it past the chimney – it’s certain death. We have to find another way out.”
“But where?”
“There are at least two other exits – we found them during the dig. One com
es out in the crypt, and I’m pretty sure the other comes out under the château.” David looked anxiously at the rapidly rising floodwater. “The Vatican has sealed the crypt door, but we might just make it through to the château. There’s a trapdoor at the end of the passage – we couldn’t open it, but we might be able to shift it with some help. It’s our only chance.”
The Count nodded his assent, and waving his men forward, they waded waist-deep across the flooded chamber, struggling against the raging current. The water was cascading through a gaping maw in the cave wall directly in their path.
“Make for the far wall, and work round from there,” shouted David. “Just watch out for the tombs along the side.” Two of the bodyguards caught up with them, and linking arms, they struggled sideways across the chamber. Once at the wall, they were away from the worst of the current, and were able to start edging towards the passageway that David and Rachel had used on their first exploration. On reaching the entrance the going became easier, but the water level was still rising.
“I’m pretty sure the passage starts to go uphill soon – we should leave this behind,” shouted David, trying to make himself heard above the thundering noise of the water.
“Let’s hope so,” yelled back the Count grimly, shifting his grip on Marianne’s comatose body. One of the bodyguards stepped forward to take her, but he refused to release his burden. Rachel had recovered consciousness, but was weak from shock.
In almost total darkness they slowly felt their way along the narrow passage, and soon came to a fork. “Doesn’t anyone have a torch?” asked David, and after some brief fumbling, a feeble light penetrated the blackness.
“I think we turn right here,” said David, taking stock of their situation. Just a few yards further up, however, they were confronted by a rock-fall. “I remember this,” he muttered. “If we retrace our steps to the fork and keep going, we should come to another fork. I think I can remember the way from there.”
They trudged back to the original passage and pressed on, the floodwater slowly receding as the passageway twisted and turned its way up a slight incline. After another 15 minutes or so, they came to the second fork. “This is it,” said David. “One of these passages leads to the château, the other to the crypt.” He stared at them blankly, desperately trying to remember which one to take. Marianne had lost a lot of blood; they could not afford any delays.
Then he saw it: the thread from Rachel’s jumper, clinging to the wall of the passage. “Ariadne’s thread!” he exclaimed. The Count looked bewildered, but David didn’t have time to explain. “That thread leads back to the crypt – we used it when we were first exploring the place. If we take the other turning, we should come up under the château.”
The new passage appeared to double-back on itself almost immediately, then continued to twist and turn until they lost all sense of direction. Suddenly they rounded a corner and emerged in a small, square chamber carved into the rock. A trap-door was set into the ceiling.
“This is it,” he said confidently. “Recognise this from our illicit expedition, Rachel?” He turned and grinned at her, and was rewarded with a weak but winning smile. He turned to the Count. “There’s something holding that door shut – let’s hope we can make it budge.”
One of the Count’s bodyguards knelt down on the floor to make a platform, while a colleague stood on his back and pushed hard at the small wooden door. It moved a little with each shove, but something heavy was clearly holding it down. “It’s not shifting,” muttered the man to the Count, in Occitan.
“What if we try banging on it?” said David. “It might attract attention.”
“The man who lives here is a recluse,” said the Count. “Only a few rooms in the château are habitable – I doubt he would hear the sound. Still, I suppose we have nothing to lose by trying.” He spoke briefly to the man at the trapdoor, who proceeded to thump on it loudly.
They waited desperately, willing someone to appear, but there was utter silence.
“This is grim,” said the Count, looking anxiously at Marianne’s chalky white face in the torchlight. “I don’t know how much longer she can last.”
“We can try the crypt, but I don’t hold out much hope,” said David. “The cardinal’s men made a pretty good job of sealing it.”
They retraced their steps, and started to follow the woollen thread toward the crypt.
“Wait a minute,” said Rachel, beginning to regain her senses. “That turning back there looks familiar.”
“We came down here on our first visit, Rachel,” said David patiently.
“That’s not what I meant! When I was being dragged from my cell, I tried to get a sense of where I was in the cave system. I could hear water falling into what sounded like a huge reservoir – and the ground underfoot was ankle-deep in mud. When we passed that turning just now, there was enough light to see what looked like thick mud on the floor.”
“Do you know if we can actually get out that way?”
“Well, the men were coming and going quite freely – they sent a doctor to dress my wound.”
David turned to look at the Count. “It’s got to be worth a try.”
“We’ll go faster if I walk,” said Rachel.
David made to protest, but she held up her hand to silence him. “I can manage if I put my arm round your shoulder.”
“OK – let’s go.”
They walked back a few paces to the narrow side-turning they had missed – little more than a large cleft in the rock. The torchlight revealed a narrow passageway hacked into the rock; clearly man-made this time, rather than carved by an underground river. On one side the limestone wall was smooth, apart from encrustations caused by water seeping down from the ceiling, as if part of the foundations of a building. The other was uneven, where picks and shovels had hacked at the rock-face in centuries past.
The ground underfoot was six inches deep in mud, and the rock floor beneath the slime only a foot wide in places. The men slipped and slithered their way along it with difficulty, with the Count reluctantly accepting help as he struggled to carry Marianne.
“This is definitely it,” said Rachel, as they reached a fork. “Down there is the cell where I was being held.”
“OK, let’s keep going and see where it leads,” said David.
They stumbled on for another 100 yards or so, and then the passageway started to become wider and more regular. In a few moments, they emerged into a large stone chamber, the sides of which had been rendered smooth with some type of mortar. In one corner stood an aluminium ladder.
“It’s a cistern,” pronounced the Count, examining the walls with interest. “We have a similar one at the château – we can’t be far from the surface now.” He spoke briefly to one of his men, who quickly disappeared up the ladder, and thence on to the bottom of a spiral stone staircase.
“Il y a une porte extérieure ici!” he exclaimed. “Je peux voir les étoiles!”
“He says he can see the stars!” said the Count, relief flooding over his face. “Try giving the door a shove,” he shouted to the man in Occitan. They heard various banging sounds, then a shouted conversation ensued.
“The door is chained shut, but he says he can see through a crack and the whole thing looks pretty flimsy.” He turned to a burly guard, who with his height and bulk could have been a twin to Pierre, shot so brutally by Dubois. “Henri – go and give him a hand.”
The man shinned up the ladder with surprising speed for his size, and shortly afterwards they could feel the vibrations as his 300lb weight slammed into the thin aluminium door. Twice more Henri attacked the door with all the ferocity of a rugby scrum, and then, suddenly, the door gave way, swaying drunkenly on its chain, the hinges ripped from the frame.
They clambered up the ladder, gently passing up the still unconscious body of Marianne. Elbowing past the metal door, they emerged into the night, one of the château’s ruined towers creating a ghostly silhouette as it loomed high over their head
s.
Chapter 50
“What’s the latest on Marianne?” asked David, walking into the Count’s study.
“Rapidly regaining her strength, thanks to the blood transfusion,” he replied. His face was pale and lined, with dark, heavy rings under his eyes. He seemed to have aged ten years in the 48 hours that had elapsed since their escape from the cult. “They operated this morning, now they’ve stabilised her. They have had to stitch a tendon which was cut in the attack, and that could take months to heal – but it’s her right wrist, thankfully. She will still be able to write with her left hand. She’s under 24-hour surveillance by the police – I’ve pulled quite a few strings to bring down some top guys from Paris – the DCRI, the French equivalent of the FBI, not some bumbling local gendarme.” He paused wearily to wipe his forehead with a handkerchief plucked from his top jacket pocket. “Has the good Doctor Fougère some encouraging news on Rachel?”
It had been a bone of contention that Rachel refused to stay in hospital after her rescue. She had been treated in casualty alongside Marianne, where the doctors told her the bullet-hole in her leg was a clean flesh wound, the slug having passed through the back of her thigh without hitting anything vital. Everyone tried to make her stay in for further checks, but Rachel had point blank refused, insisting on returning to the château with David and the Count. After two attempts on her life, she wanted to be somewhere safe and secure, with people she knew she could trust. She was duly discharged with a course of powerful antibiotics, and instructions for the Count’s personal physician on changing the dressings.
“She’s good, thanks – no sign of a fever, which is the main thing. It will take a few weeks for the wound to completely heal. I think the decision to carry on staying here was the right one, though, Gilles. I know our enemies know we’re here, but at least we’ve got a secure perimeter – no-one’s going to get near this place without us knowing about it.”
