The kukri returned to the scabbards and Elisa settled down amongst the other passengers, who were watching her with quizzical expressions. She responded with nothing more than a friendly smile.
Her phone buzzed against her leg and Elisa took it from her pocket. “Laki?”
“Are you okay? What happened?”
“Long story, I’ll be happy to tell you all about it once we meet back at your place. Have you heard from Asami?”
“Last I spoke to her, she was still following up on some leads in the States.”
“Tell her to get her ass on the next plane to London.”
“London? Why?”
“Just do it. We’ve got a situation.” Elisa ended the call and looked at the photo she’d received. A sigh escaped her lips. “Max, just what the hell did I get you mixed up in this time?”
CHAPTER 3
The door opened and a young, Indian woman with short, black hair and glasses stood on the other side. Lakita Rai’s expression was one of concern and confusion. Elisa walked past her and once inside, removed her belt with the pouches and kukri scabbards attached to it. She laid it on the table and walked over to the couch, plopping down on it. A whistling sound came from the kitchen.
“I was just about to make some tea,” said Laki. “Would you like—”
“Do you have anything stronger?”
“I’ll get the whiskey,” she said, as if a glass of whiskey at ten in the morning was the most normal thing in the world.
Laki disappeared into the kitchen and the whistling stopped. A few minutes later, she emerged and approached the couch. In one hand, she held a steaming mug with the string of a teabag hanging over the edge. The other passed a tumbler half-filled with whiskey to Elisa.
The myth hunter sat up and sipped the gold liquid with a contented sigh. Laki sat on the couch adjacent to Elisa and took a few careful drinks of her tea after blowing over the surface to cool it.
“What’s going on? Vijay provide you with anything?” asked Laki.
“Ambushed me, tied me up, threatened to kill me.”
“So the usual?”
Elisa scoffed. “Yeah, the usual.” After another sip of her whiskey, she sat forward. “I got free, took down Vijay and his guys, and then the building I was being held in was surrounded. At first I thought they were part of his gang, but now I’m not so sure. The weapons and tactics seemed far more sophisticated than Vijay’s typical MO.”
“You think it was the Order?”
Elisa nodded. “Could be. Although why they’d care that much about a low-level smuggler is beyond me. That’s why I think it’s connected to this.”
After setting down the glass on the table, Elisa reached into her pocket, drew out her phone, and tossed it to Laki. The young academic caught the phone and looked at the screen. Her jaw dropped and before she could realize what she was doing, she’d poured hot tea onto her leg. Laki squealed and jumped, putting her mug on the table and rubbing at her jeans.
“You okay?” asked Elisa.
Laki threw her hands up in frustration. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just clumsy.” She sat on a dry part of the couch and looked at the picture again. “Do you know what this is? It can’t be real, can it?”
“I have no idea. Max sent it to me, with the coordinates and a message that he needs help. Do you think it can be the real thing?”
“All the myth hunter journals I’ve researched, nothing has ever suggested anyone’s discovered something that could have been an angel. But then again…”
“No one thought Lemuria was real.” A nod of understanding accompanied Elisa’s sentence.
“Did you see where these coordinates lead to?”
“I did. It’s in the Atlantic, some miles off the coast of Morocco.”
“I don’t get it.” Laki passed the phone back to Elisa. “You said you wanted Asami to get on a plane to London?”
“That’s where Max was supposed to be. He was doing a lecture tour and I asked him if he could look into the Theosophical Society while he was there.”
“That have anything to do with the Spear of Destiny case?”
“Sure does.” Elisa picked up her glass and drank a little more of the whiskey. “A lot of their beliefs influenced the Thule Society. And given that the Thules and the Order have been at war for centuries in various forms, seems like a good avenue to explore.”
“What does Shroud have to say?”
Laki appeared a little nervous asking that question, and Elisa could understand why. She’d never met Jason Shroud in person and she wasn’t very trustful of an organization as secretive as the Freemasons. Elisa knew Laki didn’t really approve of her association with the ancient brotherhood, but they’d provided a lot of support for Elisa over the past few missions. And Shroud at the very least could be trusted.
“He’s been making inquiries. Although seems more reluctant to meet in person these days.”
“Why’s that?”
“Probably because he’s afraid Asami will be with me.”
“The two of them get into a fight or something?” Laki punctuated her question by sipping what remained of her tea.
“No, they slept together.”
The shock of that statement caused Laki to spit out her tea. “What?”
***
“Okay fine, I got it. I’ll be on the first plane to London.” Asami ended the call and put the phone in the pocket of her pinstripe suit jacket. She took her fedora off the table and gave her host a half-smile. “Thanks for the info. I’ll tell Elisa you said hi.”
Jackson King—the man who sat in the chair across from her in the large library sipping coffee—studied Asami’s face with curiosity. He was a tall man with a bald head and a thin beard on his dark face.
“What’s this about London?”
“Seems Max has gone missing. Elisa wants me to pick up what he was checking out in London. Something about the Theosophical Society.”
“Missing?” Jackson set the coffee down on the table and stood. He and Max were old friends from way back. “What’s going on?”
“Has to do with the Thules, I guess. Elisa thinks they might have a connection to the Theosophists and needs someone to look into it.”
“And Max? What about him?”
Asami told Jackson everything Laki had communicated over the phone. About Max’s last known location, the photograph, and Elisa’s run-in with the Order in India.
“It’s all tied together,” said Jackson.
“That’s what she said, too. Bet you anything the Order’s behind Max.”
“I’ll look into things on my end.” Jackson turned away from Asami and walked over to one of the shelves, running his fingers along the spines. “Tell Elisa she can count on me.”
Asami folded her arms. “Way I understand it, two of you aren’t exactly close.”
Jackson spun on his heel. “Max is my friend. If he’s missing, I’m going to do whatever I can to help.”
“Thanks, Jax.” Asami turned around and walked towards the door. She heard him shout, “Don’t call me that!” and it made her smile.
Once outside Jackson’s mansion, Asami descended the steps down to the roundabout driveway and hopped into her black Stingray convertible. Just as she turned over the engine, her phone rang. Asami took it from her pocket and looked at the name on the screen.
JASON SHROUD.
“Sorry, not today.” She hit the ignore button and secured the phone into its car-mount, then piped her music library through the Stingray’s speakers. Asami shifted the car into gear and sped off from Jackson’s home.
CHAPTER 4
Max Finch opened his eyes and found his arms and legs bound to a chair. He strained against the bonds, but it was useless. He looked around the room and saw it was a well-lit room without much in the way of furnishings. Against one wall was the skeleton Russ had found. Max looked from it and saw Seth leaning against a different wall, arms folded over his chest, his sword in a scabbard that hung from his
waist.
“How did you survive?” asked Max. “Elisa said she cut off your head.”
Seth grumbled and tugged at the collar of his shirt. Max could see a scar stretching horizontally around the assassin’s neck. He relaxed his neck and returned to his earlier pose but said nothing more.
“So you’re back,” Max continued. “What’s this all about? What does that skeleton mean to you?”
“To me? Nothing,” said Seth.
“Then why?”
The door opened and another man entered the room. He was a good deal shorter than Seth and large, wearing a Hawaiian shirt and a fisherman’s hat, which he took off once he entered. His skin was so pale, it was almost blinding, and he gave Max a broad smile.
“Professor Finch! So nice to see you again!”
“Wade.” Max’s tone indicated he felt differently about laying eyes on this man again.
“Right back to the way we found you,” said Wade.
Max cast his eyes in Seth’s direction. “I seem to recall that there’s not a lot of lost love between the two of you. What changed?”
Wade walked over to Seth and slapped a hand on his shoulder. Seth’s expression showed he didn’t feel as affectionate towards his employer.
“Seth’s not a bad sort, he was just a little misguided,” said Wade. “Fortunately, his resurrection has made him a bit more…agreeable, shall we say.”
“A resurrection spell,” said Max.
“He’s one of the deadliest myth hunters in the world. You don’t know how many of my men he killed over the years. Plus, he’s got a healthy dose of dislike for a certain kukri-wielding pain in my ass. So I got to thinking, why not put him through some re-education?” Wade stepped closer to Max. “The spell keeps him under the Order’s control.”
“And he’s okay with that?” Max’s eyes never left Seth’s face, continuously studying his features.
“Probably not. But he can’t really do much about it.” Wade glanced over his shoulder. “Can you, Seth?”
“No.” Seth’s response was a grumble.
“What do you want, Wade?” asked Max.
Wade stepped back and leaned against the wall. “What do you know about the history of the Order?”
“Elisa filled me in on what you told her. You’re descendants of the Naa’cal, dedicated to restoring Lemuria to its former glory.”
“Correct. And she told you about the Aryans and Atlantis?”
Max nodded. “Two ancient civilizations locked in perpetual warfare.”
“Before Lemuria, we lived in Atlantis,” said Wade. “The Naa’cal were the offspring of Aryan and animal blood, given life through Atlantean black magic.”
“The Aryans created the Naa’cal, but why?” asked Max.
“Because like most ancient civilizations, Atlantis was built on the backs of slaves. The Naa’cal were created to serve the Aryans. But over time, our intelligence grew. There was a rebellion, the first great war seen by this world. The Atlantean technology and magic was too powerful for us, though. So our ancestors fled, eventually settling on a continent in the Pacific.”
“And that’s how Lemuria was formed.”
“Over time, a new race appeared—mankind. They were primitive, yet possessed of incredible potential. And both Atlantis and Lemuria had an interest in controlling the fate of this new species. We helped them establish early civilizations all over the world. They looked to us as their gods.”
“Until you discovered that real gods existed,” said Max.
“Yes.” Wade hissed through gritted teeth. “We knew there were aspects of the world that couldn’t be explained by our sciences. But up until the gods showed themselves to us, we were more concerned with our proxy wars.”
“Why did they reveal themselves?”
“Our wars were our obsession. Both Atlantis and Lemuria desired nothing more than to see the other exterminated. And that obsession led us to create weapons of mass destruction, threatening the very planet itself. That was when the gods decided they’d had enough.”
Wade stuffed his hands in his pockets and looked down at the floor.
“A union of deities like that was never seen before, and has never been seen since. They brought the full wrath of their power down upon us. Storms, floods, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions. They hit us with everything, going so far as to erase our homelands from the face of the Earth.”
“Shifting Lemuria out of sync with this dimension, and I assume they did the same with Atlantis,” said Max.
Wade nodded and continued. “After the fall, our numbers were few—mostly limited to those that had either left the society or were governing colonies. One of these is what you know as the Lost Tribe of the Naa’cal. A collection of mystics and warriors, an ancient order, if you will.”
“So the Order is what remains of the Lost Tribe, just as the Thule Society was all that was left of the Aryans.” Max cast his eyes to the skeleton. “What does this have to do with your war?”
“Ah yes, that.” Wade moved from the wall, Seth’s eyes following him as he walked over to the skeleton. The Order’s leader looked at the fossil with a look of disdain. “Elisa told you about the statues she found on Lemuria, didn’t she?”
“She said they looked reptilian.”
“Demonic is the word some would use. Sharp contrast to the Aryans, who were beautiful—angelic, even.” Wade’s eyes drifted back to the fossil.
“Elisa mentioned you told her the same thing, that legends of angels and demons came from ancient accounts of Aryans and the Naa’cal. But this…you’re telling me the Aryans were winged creatures?”
Wade clicked his tongue. “Bingo.” He stepped away from the skeleton, staring at Max. “After the Fall, an oracle within the Lost Tribe had a prophecy. ‘When the keystone is restored, the oceans tremble. When the records are unsealed, the devout will return. Gods shall fall and the old world rises once more.’ I’ve cleaned up the translation a bit, stripped out a lot of the purple prose so we could get to the point—the events of the past few years have all been leading to this. The restoration of Atlantis. You and Elisa and…” he jerked his thumb in Seth’s direction, “…dinkus here have kickstarted the apocalypse. As soon as they placed that keystone, it was all over. What’s happened since is a chain of events all leading to the return of Atlantis. And the gods are not happy about it. They even tried to stop it on a few occasions.”
“The Dragon Kings…” whispered Max.
“The gods are pissed, Professor. When Atlantis rises, so too will the Aryans. The spell used to bring back Seth? Imagine that on a wide scale.”
“And this skeleton will help you stop it?”
“If it can be stopped, yes.” Wade knelt down in front of Max. “We need your help. The Order has done some questionable things, it’s true. But we did what we felt was necessary to preserve these secrets. Because the more this knowledge is exposed to the world, the greater the risk of the gods intervening once more. They’re already not happy with what they’ve seen the human race accomplish.”
“Why me?” asked Max.
Wade stood. “You’re the only person Elisa Hill will listen to, and I don’t think the Freemasons can be trusted. It’s a miracle she convinced them to destroy the Spear of Destiny, but now they have Mjolnir. A weapon of the gods in the hands of man is one of those warning signs.”
“How will Atlantis rise and what can this skeleton tell you?”
“There’s an Atlantean library, the only remnant of its existence, and it holds the Akashic Records.”
Max knew the name. He’d been tangentially involved when Elisa encountered the Akashic Records. Except from what she said, it didn’t seem like they could possibly be physical.
“I know what you’re thinking and you’re right, the Akashic Records can be accessed after a fashion by people with certain abilities,” said Wade. “These records are charged with powerful Atlantean magicks. The gods bound them and sealed the library, but they’re so powerful
that bits of them have leaked out into the astral plane.”
“Why do you want to find the Akashic Records? If what you say is true, wouldn’t it be better to simply leave them dormant?”
“We would, if not for the fact that someone else is after them.” Wade took a deep breath. “Someone is searching for the records, and they’re close. If they can find the spell that opens those locks, they can access the Akashic Records. And then…”
“Game over,” Max concluded.
“We need your help, Max. We need Elisa’s help.” Wade folded his arms. “So what do you say? Partners?”
CHAPTER 5
Jason Shroud pulled the phone away from his ear and looked at the screen. Asami still wasn’t answering. She probably assumed he was only interested in talking to her about their brief tryst in Corbaton a few months back, but in truth, that night was the last thing on his mind.
“Agent Shroud…?”
Jason looked up from the phone at the old man who addressed him, a man they knew only as the Curator. He dropped the phone back in the inside pocket of his leather jacket.
“I’m sorry, just distracted.” Jason could tell the Curator was studying his face but fortunately, didn’t ask any questions. The Freemason stuffed his hands into his pockets and approached the Curator. “You said you had something for me?”
“Yes, follow me.” The Curator turned on his heel and led Jason through the Freemason library.
One of many across the world, this library—and the Freemason base as a whole—was unique in that it served as the headquarters of their myth hunting operation. Also unique because of its location, hidden within Mount Rushmore.
The Curator stopped at a door and placed his hand against the pad. A retinal scanner cast a light over his eye and the door opened. Inside was a laboratory of sorts with scanners neatly arranged along the walls. In the center of the room was a table and resting on top of it an ancient hammer with a short handle, covered in runes—Mjolnir. The hammer of Thor, discovered in Corbaton.
Atlantis Rising (The Myth Hunter Book 6) Page 2
