The Medici Letters: The Secret Origins of the Renaissance

by Taylor Buck

  “I am ready,” he said softly.

  A few minutes later, Lorenzo de’Medici died.

  CHAPTER 60

  GENEVA, SWITZERLAND

  SEPTEMBER 11

  BY THE TIME THEY reached Geneva, Jack’s eyesight started to return. Light, shapes and even colors became discernible. He had been instructed by Chester to keep a gauze wrap over his eyes, but he willfully removed it—the scene below was worth the pain.

  The heli sped low over Lake Geneva. The morning sunrise cast a backlight to the snowy Alps around them. The green hillsides were vibrant, almost fluorescent in color. As the sun rose slowly over the east side of the lake, the water changed through hues of sapphire, cobalt and ultramarine. The scenery was absorbing and breathtaking; the quintessence of an imaginative creation. Switzerland certainly held its captivating charm, but Jack couldn’t shake his anxiety. He wanted nothing more at that moment than to have Kat in his arms.

  The heli landed on a pad along the western side of the lake, just up the Route de Ferney. Chester led Jack down from the rooftop through a stairwell and inside the building. As he walked down the hallway he heard voices laughing. Children’s voices. Jack grinned immediately as he knew those giggles well. He entered the room and saw Kat sitting in bed talking to Valerie and Annie on a large TV monitor placed in the middle of the room. “Daddy!” the girls screamed for joy when they saw him standing there. Kathleen jumped up from the bed and wrapped her arms around her husband tightly.

  “Oh, Jack,” she said with tear-filled eyes. She held him close, surveying the cuts and bruises on his body. “Oh my god—are you okay?” She ran her fingers gently across his face, his eyes and the bandage across his forehead. He could see she was shocked by his physical state, but he couldn’t stop smiling and staring at her beautiful face. “You woke up,” he said. “I was… Kat, I was so…”

  “I’m here, Jack,” she said softly. “We’re all okay.”

  The tears flowed freely from both of them. Jack held his wife close. It was a moment he could harness forever. The girls watched from the TV monitor and giggled. “Daddy, you have a beard,” Annie said, referring to the fact that Jack hadn’t shaved since he left Boston.

  “What do you think girls? Should he keep it?” Kat said jokingly.

  “No!” the girls chimed.

  “Beards are for old men. Plus, they’re super itchy,” said Annie.

  Jack laughed. Even though they were nearly 4,000 miles away, he felt like he had his family back together. It almost felt normal again, and normal was an amazing feeling.

  “When are you guys coming home?” Annie asked.

  “How about right now?” Kat said.

  “Yay!” the girls shouted in unison.

  Kat grinned and blew a big kiss to the girls. “We’ll be home when you wake up in the morning. We promise.”

  Jack turned to Kat. “Are you sure you’re okay to leave? What about… your recovery? You should probably take a few days to—”

  “I’m fine,” she said. “The doctor just told me to take it easy. Besides, I’m not spending another minute away from our girls if I don’t have too.”

  Chester Allen walked over to the couple. He casually swept back his blonde hair. Jack couldn’t help but find it very strange to be face to face with the man whose likeness had been portrayed by someone else for the past few days.

  “I’m sorry to interrupt,” he said. “I know you have a lot to talk about.” He turned to Kat. “Kathleen, the arrangements are ready.”

  “Oh right! Thanks Chester,” she said somewhat diffidently, “Go ahead and bring it in.”

  “Arrangements?” Jack turned to Kat with a puzzled look. “What exactly are you up to?”

  “Well,” she said placing her hands in the front pocket of Jack’s sweatshirt and pulling him toward her, “I know how you like surprises.”

  “You mean, you know how I genuinely dislike them?”

  “Exactly, which makes it all the more enjoyable for me,” she said smiling. “Come on. Get ready.”

  Get ready? Get ready for what?

  The lights dimmed and Jack could hear footsteps coming down the hallway. What on earth is going on? Jack watched as Kent Billingsley and a few other TerraTEK team members filed into the room. The fact that Kent was in the room somehow made Jack instantly nervous. The guy is the Commander in Chief’s chess buddy for Pete’s sake. It was like standing next to the director of the CIA. Jack felt his anxiety rising, he had no idea what to expect and Billingsley’s poker face gave nothing away. A moment later, his nerves were put at ease as a 2 foot tall replica of the Florence Cathedral in the form of a birthday cake was wheeled into the room. Clapping resounded throughout the space as Valerie, Annie and Jack’s sister Margaret all joined in by singing Happy Birthday over the television speakers. Jack was emotionally overtaken. He pulled whatever strength he could muster up to choke back the tears and keep from breaking down in front of everyone. Keep it together, Jack. Don’t lose it. He knew he was emotional due to the recent events, understandably so, but he found it so very touching—a breath of fresh air after the traumatic experience his family had just endured. He tried to take it all in. He pulled Kat close by his side. The cake detail was fascinatingly meticulous, all the way down to the gargoyles adorning the steeples and the herringbone pattern along the dome brick exterior. Il Duomo—Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore. Brunelleschi’s legacy. Cosimo de’Medici’s gift to the world.

  “Since we never got to go there together,” Kat said. “These past weeks, it made me think of you every day I drove by it.”

  “It’s… incredible,” Jack said shaking his head, revering the cake’s craftsmanship. “And forget what I said about modern artists. It may be just sugar and flour, but this is proof that there are still some true masters left in the world.”

  Joyous laughter filled the room.

  Kent Billingsley stepped forward and shook Jack’s hand firmly. “We owe you a debt of gratitude, Mr. Cullen. Oleg Chekov has been a target of ours for quite a while. Thanks to you, he’s no longer a threat. Please, accept this as a symbol of our gratitude.”

  “Happy Birthday, honey,” added Kat.

  “Eat it Dad! Eat the cake,” chimed Annie.

  “I don’t know what to say,” Jack said and turned to the gang. “Thanks everybody. I guess let’s eat!”

  CHAPTER 61

  WELLESLEY, MASSACHUSETTS

  THE CULLEN HOUSE

  BRIGHT ORANGE OAK LEAVES fell lazily to the grass in the Cullen backyard. The sun was out and the weather was unusually warm for mid-September. “You actually held it in your hands?” Kat blurted in utter amazement, nearly dropping the glass of iced tea she was sipping on. They were sitting under the shade of the back patio recounting events. “What was it like? To actually hold it…”

  “It was… surreal,” Jack replied “Like being inside a vivid dream and realizing your actually dreaming.”

  “I just… I can’t believe it,” Kat said shaking her head in disbelief. She had the scan from the hillside pulled up on her tablet and she was rotating the 3D bust to see each curve of its intricate form. “And to think that Donatello’s lost sculpture is actually a key to Cosimo de’Medici’s treasure…”

  “Thēsauros,” Jack playfully corrected.

  “Yes, Thēsauros,” Kat said. “King Solomon’s knowledge.” She turned to Jack eagerly. “So what did the book look like?”

  He grinned and shook his head. “You should have seen it, Kat. The binding and construction alone was fascinating.”

  Her eyes grew wider. “And you looked inside it?” she asked, inquiring about the book like an anxious student before an exam.

  “Of course I looked inside it.”

  “And…”

  “Recipes mostly… Matzah ball soup, a tasty knish… Solomon was apparently quite the foodie.”

  Kat rolled her eyes and smiled. “Come on,” she said jabbing him playfully. “I’m serious.”

  Jack looked a
way visualizing the text. “It was coded—well most of it was. Some of it was written in Hebrew… some Aramaic.”

  “Aramaic? So you could read it?”

  “Well, I didn’t exactly have time to pull up a wingback and a cigar if that’s what you mean.”

  “Well, obviously,” Kat said shaking her head. “C’mon, Jack. What did it say? What did he write about?” She was downright beaming with anticipation.

  “Law, technology, finances. At least the few pages that I saw anyway, and I was only referencing Ficino’s translated copy. You should’ve seen how detailed Solomon’s actual notes were. The structure of his writing was enthralling… so foreign.”

  “Foreign?”

  “Yes. Even with everything I’ve learned of ancient language, I couldn’t make anything out.”

  “Why not? Illegible?”

  “No, that’s just it. The condition was astonishing,” Jack said. “It was preserved remarkably well considering its age. Ficino had tended to its conservancy by waxing each and every page by hand. The reason I couldn’t read it was because his script was… nonsensical. Each section was coded in a language that Solomon must have invented—like a hybrid of cuneiform, Hebrew and Aramaic that he coded into a repetitive configuration. It was impossible to comprehend just by reading it in western fashion—left to right, up to down. There was something else too…” Jack paused for a sip of tea. He looked down over the deck railing as the girls played tag in the yard below. “It was written in a cadence or rhythm, almost musical… or Iambic.”

  “Iambic?” Kat asked. “You think that was part of the coding?”

  “Possibly,” Jack said. Plato came to mind. He wrote in a similar cadence, based on a rhythmic, musical scale he developed from studying Pythagoras. Some historians believed he even disguised hidden layers into his writings. Pythia, the Oracle at Delphi, also allegedly communicated using a form of Iambic Pentameter.

  “It was mathematical and very Pythagorean. Solomon’s arithmetical methods were clearly a heavy influence on Pythagorean’s philosophy.”

  “How so?” Kat said.

  “Well… for one, Pythagoras pulled Solomon’s own instruction to develop his Theorem: a2 + b2 = c2. Solomon illustrated it in the book when constructing his temple. I came across it in the first section, one of the only sections that actually wasn’t coded. Pythagoras ripped it off. The whole sequence.”

  “I don’t believe it,” Kat replied. “Was there anything else in there that he copied?”

  “As I said, the rest of the manuscript was meticulously ciphered. It must have taken Ficino years to decrypt what he did. He somehow figured a way to join the correct pieces together in proper repetition. The structure itself was essential… cyclical—like an interwoven thread.”

  “Or a Solomon’s Knot,” Kat said.

  Jack looked up wide-eyed. “You’re absolutely right,” he said realizing how correct she was. A Solomon’s Knot. Each section was written like a formula—problem, solution followed by unified application. Two double-tied circumpherences combined to create a symbol of infinite harmony. The structure was systematic. It wasn’t just a How To, it was a Why, which provided not just a teachable lesson, but also a thorough and comprehensive experience that was human and relatable. This showed not only how wise Solomon was, but also how well he was able to interpret his wisdom into practical application for anyone to discern. It was hard not to be envious, especially coming from a professor. Not only was King Solomon a wise man, it seemed he was a darn good instructor as well.

  “And everything else burned?” Kat asked. “All the other manuscripts?”

  “Unfortunately, yes. Everything,” Jack replied. “Alhazen, Lucretius, Empedocles, Horace… Plato.”

  Kat squirmed. “An absolute travesty. It literally hurts my heart to think of all the knowledge that is forever gone.”

  “Well, gone or not, it all seems trivial now,” Jack said. “If you take Solomon’s book into account and relegate the methods he provided as the principal means of instruction… then the successive authors were simply a byproduct of their predecessor. Copyists. Not that it helps soften the blow.”

  “No… It doesn’t,” Kat responded deep in thought. “But it certainly raises an interesting question. If the book was essentially a tutorial of knowledge, what does that say about Pythagoras? Or Plato for that matter? Or anyone else history records as influential figures. Does this discovery diminish the legacy left behind by the great minds that benefitted from Solomon’s guidance?”

  “I don’t believe so,” said Jack. “As Cosimo Medici said, the book is merely a catalyst, something that can be utilized to accelerate learning. It’s still man’s responsibility to take knowledge and do something good with it.”

  “Or the opposite,” said Kat.

  “Sure. There’s always that side, too. Maybe it’s a good thing it’s been locked away for the past 500 years. Who knows where our society would be if the book hadn’t ended up with the Medici?” Jack pondered the possibilities. It was troubling to think what historical destruction occurred as a result of even some of it falling into the wrong hands. How many prior wars were fought throughout history as a result of men exploiting its secrets? Syracuse, Gaugamela, Metaurus, Tours? And in today’s age? The secrets may be too powerful for men to control, especially having the technology to decipher the book’s meaning in its entirety. It was quite disturbing to think about—horrifying actually.

  “Which begs the real question,” Kat said, “where would we be today if the book’s contents were common knowledge all along? How far advanced would our civilization be? In the past 500 years of the book’s absence, have the brilliant minds been innovative enough to get us to the same technological benchmark without Solomon’s direction?”

  “Or were we provided just enough to get us where we needed to be?” Jack added, realizing the philosophical implication of his wife’s questions. “The knowledge that surfaced during the Renaissance opened up nearly every avenue to explore. The Medici, and ultimately the Anthrópos, distributed the knowledge in the most effective way they knew how—connecting it to the greatest minds they could identify. Brunelleschi, Battista, Da Vinci, Michelangelo... We are where we are because of contributors like them. Knowledge since then has simply evolved, forcing man to think for himself. I don’t think it’s a question of where we would be had the book not been lost. I think the real question is, where would we be had the book not existed at all?”

  Jack thought about the implications of his own statement. It was impossible to determine. That is, unless the book offered some way to simulate a parallel reality and cheat the space-time continuum, there would really be no way of knowing. But something in the back of his mind couldn’t help but question the quantifiable significance of the book. If Solomon was truly the wisest man to live on the earth… if he had all the answers to life, why did he die such a depressed and miserable man? Was his wisdom too vast and therefore immaterial? Was he restrained by technology—trapped in a cage by the lack of advanced resources available in that day? Biblical scripture recorded that he became bitter and unhappy in his late years, finding no pleasure in existence. Vanity and vexation of spirit were the words he used. Supreme emptiness. Eventually dying in apostasy, he evidently turned his back on the God who granted him wisdom. Interesting. It brought to mind the conversation in Cosimo’s vault that Jack had with Valente about his pursuit of perfection. Valente believed a unified physical and mental culmination would allow him to reach perfection. Perficio. But in the end it seemed to simply be a delusion of grandeur derived from an existential ideal. Or if he were right… if he actually reached perfection… it was very short-lived.

  How did Solomon feel in the end? After all, his wisdom was limitless. But obviously wisdom alone wasn’t enough. Renaissance Humanists would say that it was his ego that interrupted his ability to truly reach illumination. Possibly. However, if Solomon’s life proved anything it was that even something as unattainable as infinite wisdom
couldn’t offer perfection. Man is exactly that—man. We are mortal and selfish by nature. Who is to say we are even capable of wielding a divine intellect? If there is one thing that history has shown to be true, it’s the cyclical effects of human nature in regards to technology. Given the answers to everything, we will still find a way to destroy something good. It’s not deliberate or wicked. It usually evolves out of a constructive idea and becomes the derivative nature of an unintended outcome. We create with the best of intentions based upon the need to solve a problem—but the real issue is that we lack the foresight or control to know when a creation has reached a safe apex. We always push it too far. Always. Maybe that is what Solomon was referring to when he determined all things were meaningless—predetermined futility.

  “We don’t know how extensive his wisdom was,” Kathleen said. “The book was only partially deciphered, right? To answer that question, we would need to have full knowledge of the book’s tutelage. How advanced was it truly? Were there formulas and equations that would open our eyes to new theories? New dimensions? Were there medicinal remedies that could offer the cures to life’s most debilitating illnesses? Did Solomon have the cure to cancer coded somewhere deep inside those pages? How could a book so significant survive so long and yet still be something so mysterious that man can’t uncover the full meaning of it?”

  Jack smiled.