The Belial Ring (The Belial Series 3)

by R. D. Brady

“Because they have no memory of the life they lived before. At least, most of the time they don’t. Every once in a while, though, one does—and he or she begins the next life right where they left off. When that happens, the Fallen begin to group. They begin to find one another; coordinate, organize.”

  Victoria sighed. “We’re in one of those time periods now. I received word a few months ago that there were signs that the Fallen were grouping. I knew that meant that it was time for the Chosen to be called. I hoped that by hiding you away, not only would you be safe, but that maybe you could even avoid this. I was wrong.”

  Laney shook her head. “The Chosen? What, like Buffy the Vampire Slayer? Because I don’t have any powers. I’m not like Henry, not like—” She almost said Jen’s name, but caught herself at the last minute. “I’m not like any of them. I’m just a normal human.”

  Victoria shook her head. “No, Laney, you’re not. You’re the daughter of Enoch. Haven’t you wondered why all these ancient sites are coming to light because of you?”

  Laney flashed on the conversation she’d had with her uncle two months earlier. Two Atlantis-related sites were discovered on two different continents, after being hidden for thousands of years. And you’re the one constant between them.

  Patrick squeezed her hand, and she knew he was recalling the same conversation.

  Laney shook her head. “This is crazy. I can’t bench press a car or outrun a train. I don’t have powers.”

  “No, you don’t have the powers of a Fallen or of a nephilim. Your powers are different. Your powers come from the ring.”

  “The ring?” Laney asked.

  Victoria looked each of them in the eye. “The ring of Solomon.”

  Laney struggled to keep her face blank. Her dream of Menelik and Makeda took center stage in her mind. Makeda had wanted Menelik to get something from Solomon. Was it the ring? She pictured the folio the Fallen had stolen. The images associated with Solomon. Everything seemed to be circling back to him.

  “You are familiar with the tales of the ring, aren’t you?” Victoria asked.

  Laney knew about the ring of Solomon. Her uncle had even taught a course on Solomon at Tel Aviv University one summer, and she’d been his teaching assistant. “During Solomon’s reign, he was said to have come into possession of a ring that allowed him to control demons. He allegedly used the ring to have demons build the First Temple. The ring also allowed him to control the weather and animals.”

  “The folio that was stolen,” Jake said quietly. “It was covered in images associated with Solomon.”

  Patrick frowned. “The seal predates Solomon by thousands of years, so how’s that possible?”

  Laney glanced over. “We think the symbols on the book were associated with Solomon, but that the seal of Solomon was an older creation, one which only later came to be associated with Solomon.”

  “To be honest, I thought the ring of Solomon was a myth,” Jake said.

  Victoria shook her head. “It’s not a myth. It’s very real. And Laney’s right. Solomon wasn’t the first owner. He was, however, the first and only owner whom the ring became associated with.”

  “Okay, but why is it important? Can’t just anybody wear it?” Jake asked.

  “Anybody can wear it—but only one person can wield its power.” Victoria’s eyes flashed back to Laney. “It’s why they weren’t trying to kill you yesterday. They need you alive. They need to test you.”

  “Test me?” Laney asked, hearing the squeak in her voice.

  “To see if you really are the ring bearer,” Victoria said.

  Laney crossed her arms, feeling vulnerable. “Okay, well, let’s just send them a memo detailing the fact that I’m not.”

  Victoria gave a little smile. “I’m afraid it’s not that simple.”

  “Of course it’s not,” Laney mumbled.

  “Do they have the ring?” Patrick asked.

  Victoria shook her head. “No. To the best of my knowledge, it’s still hidden.”

  “So then, why does any of this matter?” Jake asked. “If no one has the ring, it can’t be worn and it can’t be used. End of story.”

  “I wish it were that simple,” Victoria said. “They’re not going to stop just because they don’t have the ring. The only way for them to be sure you and the ring are not a threat is to make sure you are the ring bearer and then . . .” Victoria’s words died away.

  “Kill me,” Laney finished for her.

  Victoria nodded.

  Jake squeezed Laney’s hand. “So where is the ring hidden? And who hid it?” Jake asked.

  “The hiding place was created by one of the previous ring bearers.”

  Laney thought of her dreams. Were they related to this destiny? Were those people previous ring bearers?

  “How many ring bearers have there been?”

  Victoria paused, her words spoken slowly. “There’s a ring bearer in existence at almost every point of humanity’s existence.”

  Laney could feel her jaw drop. There were so many of them.

  Patrick leaned forward. “Are the ring bearers always women?”

  Victoria hesitated. “Since Solomon’s time they have been.”

  “Why?” Jake asked.

  “Solomon made the ring famous. He was not the first to wield its power, but he was the first to abuse it. The power of the ring is intense, consuming. It is given only to people who can handle that power. But with Solomon, it was too much.”

  Patrick nodded. “Solomon was not actually next in line for the throne. In fact, he was fourth in line. Two of his eldest brothers were killed. And his mother, Bathsheba, made Solomon’s father, David, promise to place Solomon on the throne over his older brother, Adonijah. David did.”

  “And if he hadn’t, the ring would have gone to a less powerful man,” Victoria said. “A man who did not have nearly as much power to abuse.”

  Patrick continued. “When Solomon began his reign, he was the best of kings. Wise, compassionate, fair. He’s revered as one of the greatest rulers in Israeli history, if not the greatest. But over time, he was tempted by his own power. Allegedly his wives turned him away from God, and he began to worship their foreign gods, even building temples to them. He was also, according to the tales, guilty of greed and, of course, polygamy.”

  “And he was the last male who was allowed to be a ring bearer,” Victoria said.

  Jake raised an eyebrow. “Because women are less corruptible?”

  Victoria gave a small laugh. “Well, I wouldn’t go that far. I do have a theory, though. Since Solomon’s time, the heads of nations have been almost exclusively males. The ring is incredibly powerful. I think it is simply too much power for a king to have that power as well. So, it has been given only to females, who, by gender, are always less politically powerful. Even the queens that live in infamy have generally been less powerful than their male counterparts.”

  “Like who?” Laney asked.

  “Like Helen,” Victoria replied.

  Laney struggled to keep her face neutral as she remembered her dream from Hershey. “You mean Helen of Troy, the face that launched a thousand ships?”

  Victoria nodded with a smile. “Now be honest: you never really thought thousands of men went to war over a pretty face, did you?”

  CHAPTER 37

  Laney looked at Victoria, trying to understand once again how she knew all of this. “Helen of Troy was one of the ring bearers? So she wasn’t just a woman who cheated on her husband and caused a bloody, decade-long war?”

  Victoria gave Laney a small smile. “History has been very unfair to Helen. Now I ask you, what’s more realistic: that countries went to war over a little bed-hopping, or that Helen was far more important than history acknowledges?”

  Laney had always thought the rationale behind the Trojan War seemed a little far-fetched. But still, Helen was the heir to the Spartan throne. Whoever married her would be king of Sparta.

  The thought brought her up short. A
ctually, that wasn’t true. Helen was already married when she was abducted. The throne wouldn’t have extended to someone who’d kidnapped her or whom she’d run away with, would it?

  And why would all those other men join the fight? Even with the promise of the suitors to help Menelaus maintain his suit, it seemed odd.

  Plus, the abduction had taken place nine years into Helen’s marriage. If someone was going to grab Helen for her throne or for her beauty, wouldn’t they have done it before her marriage, or just after it? Why wait nine years?

  “Helen was the first ring bearer called to war,” Victoria said. “Throughout time, the Fallen have gathered. The ring bearer is responsible for fighting them back. Helen has been unfairly maligned throughout time, by men who knew nothing of her and wrote about her hundreds of years after her death.”

  Laney knew that at least that part of Victoria’s speech was correct. The main source people used when speaking of Helen—Homer’s Iliad—was written at least five hundred years after she lived.

  If, that is, she was an actual person, and not just a literary creation. Many ancient tales were actually oral tales, only written down years later. Who knew how much had been shifted, particularly by men when viewing a powerful woman?

  “Helen is called Helen of Troy,” Victoria continued, “but that’s not who she was. She was Helen of Sparta, heir to the Spartan throne. In Sparta, the royal lineage ran through the daughters, not the sons. And while history has been inaccurately recorded many times, one thing they did get correct was the fighting prowess of the Spartan men. And do you really think that a society that put such an emphasis on the physicality of its men would allow its women to sit around? Spartan women were warriors as much as their men.”

  Patrick nodded, leaning forward. “There were actually warrior cults dedicated to Helen throughout Sparta. Young women trained in the art of war in the image of Helen. In fact, many cultures revered Helen. There were feasts and sacrifices honoring Helen and her brothers for centuries, right up until the end of Roman rule.”

  “That image is pretty hard to reconcile with her image as an adulteress who caused the deaths of thousands,” Henry said.

  “So Helen was alleged to have lived during the Bronze Age, right?” Laney asked. “Around 1,500 or so BC?”

  Clark’s statement about a gathering of the Fallen came back to her. He’d said one of the critical time periods had come during the Trojan War. Laney hadn’t really focused on it at the time; she’d been too wrapped up in his casual reference to Hitler and superhumans.

  Victoria nodded.

  “How exactly were they supposed to fight the Fallen?” Jake interrupted. “Their weapons were axes, shields, spears—not exactly high-tech. They couldn’t fight the Fallen with just that. They’d spring back up like Jack-in-the-boxes every time they were dropped.”

  “Well, they could fight them, they just couldn’t kill them. At least not easily,” Henry said.

  Victoria gave Laney a small smile. “Helen was a brilliant woman. She knew if they couldn’t kill the Fallen, she needed to find a way to contain them. So she created a prison.”

  “A prison? For the Fallen?” Laney asked, shocked. It was a great idea, but what on earth was strong enough to contain fallen angels?

  Victoria nodded.

  “Did it work?” Henry asked.

  “Yes. And the prison is still there. It still exists.”

  Laney struggled to think of any ancient site that would fit the bill. Nothing came to mind. “Where is it?”

  “Egypt.”

  Victoria leaned down and took a sip of water from one of the glasses on the coffee table. Her voice was almost casual. “So, tell me Laney: Have you started having the dreams yet?”

  CHAPTER 38

  “Laney, are you having the dreams?” Victoria asked again, her gaze pinning Laney to her seat.

  Laney thought about hedging, but one look at Victoria’s face and she knew it would be a wasted effort. “I’ve had dreams where I’m a woman or girl from a different time. Helen, Makeda, Joan of Arc, others.”

  Victoria nodded. “The women you mention: they were all previous ring bearers.”

  Laney had known she was going to say that, but it still came as a shock. “Okay, even if they were, it doesn’t mean I am. There have to be some requirements besides the dreams and being the daughter of Enoch.”

  Victoria nodded. “There are three trials. The first is the trial by fire. The second is the trial by greed, and the third is the trial by force. In the first, the ring bearer must save the innocent from fire. In the second, she must defeat the powers of greed and ambition. And in the third, she must overcome overwhelming force to bring the knowledge to light.”

  With each description, Laney felt her dread growing. In Montana, she had defeated a corrupt politician looking to use an Atlantis relic for his own political gain, as well as defeating an angel who was hell-bent on using that same relic for his own power. In other words, she had defeated both greed and ambition. In Ecuador, she had helped save a lost library of Atlantis: the knowledge brought to light.

  But there was one problem, one possible fly in the ointment that left Laney with a small kernel of hope. “It can’t be me. I mean, I give you that the incidents in Montana and Ecuador seem to fit the second two requirements. But I never went through the first, the trial by fire. I haven’t been near a fire any time recently, other than one in a fireplace.”

  “You saved Elena and Eddie from fire in Ecuador,” Henry said.

  Laney felt her jaw pop open. She’d forgotten about that. She looked to Victoria, who shook her head.

  “The trial by fire is the first trial. It has to predate the others.”

  Relief flowed through Laney. It wasn’t her. She wasn’t the ring bearer.

  Patrick’s voice was quiet. “You’ve been through the trial by fire.”

  Laney looked over at him, confused. “What are you talking about? No I haven’t.”

  “Kati and Max,” Patrick said.

  Surprise filtered through Laney, followed by disbelief. “But that was four years ago. Way before any of this began. That can’t be related.”

  “There’s no time limit for when the trials must happen, only that they have to happen in order, and that the ring bearer must succeed,” Victoria said.

  “Why don’t you tell us what happened with Kati and Max? Maybe you’re right, and it doesn’t fit,” Henry said.

  Laney looked around the room. Everyone looked back at her expectantly. “Okay, but I’m telling you, it doesn’t fit.” She took a breath. “It was the day I met Kati. The day Max was born, actually.”

  CHAPTER 39

  Four Years Ago

  Manlius, New York

  Laney headed down Route 92. It was late. The sun had already sunk beyond the horizon. It had been a stressful day. Laney had just completed two finals in graduate school: one in advance criminological theory and one in advanced statistical analysis.

  Both had been mentally exhausting, and Laney, along with every other graduate student, had used all of the allotted four hours for each of the exams. And she’d still been writing when the four hours were up.

  Laney flipped through channels on the radio, looking for something that fit her mood. “I can’t believe I’m still keyed up,” she murmured, finally settling on AC/DC’s “Back in Black.”

  She turned right at the light. How could they expect us to mention everything we learned in a semester in just four hours? It’s not possible.

  But as was often the case in graduate school, the impossible became possible in the fourth and final year of classes. Laney had learned how to cram four months of material into a four-hour exam. It didn’t make the process any less stressful, however.

  So after a grueling day mentally, Laney had felt the need to be physically exhausted as well. To burn off her energy, she had headed to her martial arts school for a long strenuous workout. But it hadn’t worked. She was still keyed up.

  And she
couldn’t shake the edgy feeling. Every time a car’s headlights appeared, she tensed.

  What the heck is wrong with me tonight?

  Headlights flashed over her car from behind, making her jump. Glancing in her rearview mirror, she watched the lights swerve to the right, then jerk back to the left. Then the car jerked even harder to the left, swerving across the median. The driver was moving way too fast for his apparent level of inebriation.

  Oh God. That guy’s going to get someone killed.

  The driver drew closer, and Laney could tell he was going to try to pass her. Praying, Laney started moving as close to the edge of the road as possible. The driver pulled alongside her. Laney slowed, her hands gripping the steering wheel.

  Come on, jerk, just get past, she urged, while hoping no car showed up in the oncoming lane.

  He swerved, slamming into her on the driver’s side.

  Laney’s car jerked to the right. “Shit!” She struggled to control the car, but he must have damaged the wheel. The car refused to go straight.

  The drunk overcompensated, swinging wildly into the oncoming lane and speeding up. A small Subaru wagon came around the bend in the road. The Subaru driver tried to yank his car out of the way, but there wasn’t time.

  The front of the drunk’s car crashed into the side of the wagon. Metal scraped along metal as the drunk’s car continued forward, pushing the wagon over the metal divider and down the cliff below.

  Laney hit her brakes, her heart racing. “Oh my God, oh my God!”

  Scrambling for her cell phone, she struggled out of her seat belt. She vaulted from the car and dialed 911 as she sprinted across the road.

  At the drunk’s car, she slowed, sparing it only a glance. A male in his early fifties lay slumped over the steering wheel. He mumbled, turning his head toward her. The stench of beer drifted through his open window.

  “Asshole.” Laney ignored him. He wasn’t her concern.

  She ran to the divider, following the skid marks on the road. Her stomach clenched as she glanced down the cliff. The station wagon lay about a hundred feet down, right-side up. The driver’s side was completely smashed in. Fire crept slowly across the rear of the car.