by carl ashmore
The Time Hunters
And The
Lost City
Carl Ashmore
For Lisa and Alice
For Kath, Caitlin and Eleanor
For Athina
For Keith and Barbara
For Ju Stacey
In memory of Bernard Ashmore and Ted Murphy
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Aunty Anne and Uncle John, Mache and Gabe, Aud and Rob, Gingerlily, Liz and Isla, Sean and Jen, Sara Foley, Ben Peyton, Max and Poppy, Emma Sly, Hayden and Harley Fryer, Mason and Ella Pickering, William and Edward Mcpherson, Kathryn Marriott, Mike Eldred, Brooke Shenton, Dawny Hills and bump, Ashleigh Baddeley, Ann Astrop, Sophie and Rebecca Turnbull, Ju Stacey and Peter, Frenchie and Kids, Davey ,Jasmyn, Stephanie and Daryl Ball, Ruby, Joe and William Goldstraw, Phil Jones, Angela Waters, Jen and Grady Adams, Stacy, Derek and William, Mia Fisher, Hollythefoodcritic, David and Keira Dawson, Kira and Wendi Pirraglia Morris, Lord Awar, Richard Litherland, Cindy Corsiglia, Tre Furnival, Nikki Stark Shrimpton, Jenna and Matthew Thompson, Jeni Rowe, Darren TA Bradnick, Kassandra K. Sanford, Austin Taylor, Beth and Daniel Drage, Caralyn and Mike Beattie, Sally Parsons and Eddie, Eric B. Thomasma , Journey Wingert-Reily and Dwight L Wingert, Charlotte Trevena and Kierän Trevena, Maylin Brislen, Cheryl-Ann and her grandkids, Austin, Wyatt, and Dakota Fogle, Niamh Bird and Zak Bird, Laura Antrobus, Peter John Dungate. Andy Taylor, Isabelle and Zac, Rosie and Alex.
Thanks to Sean Cusack for help with the PB cover.
Thanks to Kath Middleton – editor, pedant and true gem.
CHAPTERS
Chapter 1: Heads and Tales
Chapter 2: Le Tresor Maudit
Chapter 3: Penny for the Guy
Chapter 4: Secrets and Lies
Chapter 5: A Matter of Life and Death
Chapter 6: Love Will Tear Him Apart
Chapter 7: Percy Island
Chapter 8: A Whale of a Time
Chapter 9: The Sacred Chalice
Chapter 10: Back to Balestrino
Chapter 11: Kenneth
Chapter 12: Jacobean Tales
Chapter 13: Free Falling
Chapter 14: Lady Bess
Chapter 15: Raleigh's Riddle
Chapter 16: Grave Answers
Chapter 17: The Trail of Francisco Vasquez de Coronado
Chapter 18: The Fitting Room
Chapter 19: The Good the Bad and the Kenneth
Chapter 20: Break Out
Chapter 21: The German Dutchman
Chapter 22: Mine Hunt
Chapter 23: Danger in the Dark
Chapter 24: Midnight in the Morning Room
Chapter 25: Uberbringer des Todes
Chapter 26: Bess is Back
Chapter 27: The Lost City
Chapter 28: Down the Valley of the Shadow
Chapter 29: Return of the King
Chapter 30: Rosebud House
Chapter 31: The Giant's Dance
Chapter 32: Operation Amicitia
Chapter 33: The Becoming
Chapter 34: Goodbye
Chapter 35: Hello
Chapter 36: A Night to Remember
Chapter 1
Heads and Tales
The Palace of Westminster, London. October 29th 1618.
Lady Elizabeth Raleigh’s cloak billowed in the icy wind as she marched at pace across the Old Palace Yard. She pulled her hood tight around her face, veiling her eyes from plain sight, not because of the cold, but because she couldn’t afford to be recognised. A hundred or so Londoners had already gathered, their grimy faces twisted with hateful glee at the prospect of the spectacle to come; the execution of her husband.
The beheading of Sir Walter Raleigh.
Lady Raleigh ignored the wild, ugly cackles of the swelling crowd, the nauseating smell of excrement, sour ale and foul body odour that poisoned the air, and focussed on what was to come. By afternoon, her husband would be dead, unfairly condemned as a traitor to the crown by King James I. Furthermore, she would lose her one true love, and be compelled to launch a solitary fight to restore his good name as the proud Englishman he had always been.
But all of that was in the future. For the moment, she had to support her beloved Walt in his final hours, help him deal with what was to come with the same strength of character that came naturally to him.
At that moment, Lady Raleigh saw the straw coated wooden scaffold raised at the far end of the yard. A sick feeling churned her stomach. The cutting block was already there, smooth and glistening from a fresh coat of wax. Unable to look, she fixed her gaze on Westminster Abbey and quickened her pace. Turning down a narrow lane, she approached the Abbey Gatehouse, where a huge guard stood beside the dungeon’s entrance, his callused fingers curled round a shimmering halberd. She came to a halt and removed her hood.
‘Lady Raleigh,’ the guard said. ‘Your husband is robed for the occasion and awaits you.’ He stood aside.
‘I thank ye.’ Lady Raleigh entered the doorway. A flaming torch spat and crackled, revealing steps that led to the dungeon below. As she descended her feet clacked against stone. Looking ahead, she saw a ringlet of smoke and a flash of orange light, which illuminated a bearded face.
Sir Walter Raleigh lowered his pipe. Wearing a satin doublet, embroidered waistcoat, and black velvet cloak, he stared at his wife as if seeing her for the first time. ‘My darling Bess … I thank the Lord ye are here.’
Lady Raleigh raced over to him, fed her hand through the bars and clasped his hand tightly. ‘Where else would I be, my beloved?’ Staring into her husband’s weary face, her resolve broke. She began to cry.
‘Please don’t weep, darling Bess,’ Sir Walter said. ‘The executioner’s blade can only shorten my body and my time on this earth; it cannot sever the eternity we shall surely share in the next world.’ He smiled. ‘Forsooth, ye know of my thirst for travel …I am merely undertaking the most predestined voyage any man can make.’
Just then a noise sounded from behind, a noise that resembled footsteps.
Lady Raleigh spun round, fully expecting someone to be standing there, but the stairs were deserted. Confused, she waited a moment longer but heard nothing more. Then she turned back to her husband. ‘But my heart bleeds at the thought of our goodbye, Walter.’
‘Tush, Bess. It could ne’er be goodbye. We shall meet again in that righteous place above.’ Sir Walter hesitated. ‘But there are matters I must explain before my time hath passed.’ His voice teemed with urgency. ‘You must heed these words, Bess. There are things I would have you do.’
Lady Raleigh wiped her eyes. ‘I would do anything for you, my husband.’
Rummaging in his cloak pocket, Sir Walter withdrew an envelope sealed with a blood red wax stamp. ‘A day will come, and I know not when that day will be, that you must present this letter to a stranger.’
‘A stranger?’
‘A stranger even to me,’ Sir Walter replied.
Confused, Lady Raleigh took the letter. ‘A stranger even to you? I don’t understand.’
‘And that is how I wish it to be. To know more could put you in mortal peril. And I cannot have that. However, dearest Bess, I must confess in these hours before I meet my creator, there are matters about my life I have not told you. Nay, ‘tis a poorer show than that … matters I have deceived you about. Matters that involve our beloved son, Watt … matters about the School of Night.’
Lady Raleigh shook her head. ‘I care not, Walter.’
‘But you must care on this,’ Si
r Walter urged. ‘Please … hear my admission.’ His voice dropped to a whisper. ‘I found it, Bess. I found Manõa, the City of Gold …I found El Dorado.’
Lady Raleigh was at a loss for words. ‘You … you did?’
‘I did.’
‘Then we must inform the King,’ Lady Raleigh said quickly. ‘He will pardon the false allegations levelled at you … he will spare your life. Oh, Walt, this is the most merry news.’
Sir Walter gave a sour chuckle. ‘My life matters not.’
‘Truly, it does. You can take to the seas again and fetch testimony for the King of your discovery. You will be in favour once more.’
‘But King James must never learn of El Dorado. He is truly the wisest fool in Christendom and a blustering clown. He is a scrophulous flap dragon, whose actions be guided more by avarice than the pursuit of wisdom or the reverence of his God. And truth is, Bess, El Dorado is a Godly place… a perilous place, no doubt, sated with such danger I barely escaped with my life… but ‘tis still the divinest site on this accursed earth. ‘Tis a haven of true wonder and lavish spectacle – a refuge that should not be pillaged for its golden riches, or raped for its secrets by an avaricious King.’ His voice lowered. ‘‘Tis a city sculpted by God’s own hand.’
Hope drained from Lady Raleigh’s face. ‘You would sacrifice your life for a city, even one paved with gold?’
‘‘Tis not merely a city, Bess,’ Sir Walter replied. ‘‘Tis heaven on earth. And I would gladly give such a trifling gift as my life to keep it from the King’s hand.’
Lady Raleigh nodded at the letter. ‘Then what is in this?’
‘Merely words to aid our righteous stranger find the Lost City.’
Lady Raleigh looked more confused than ever. ‘You would rather offer El Dorado to a stranger, a man you have never met, than to a King who may spare your life?’
‘A thousand times, yes,’ Sir Walter replied. ‘In my years I have engaged in many strange encounters, but none more so than with a portly traveller I first chanced upon in The Old Queen’s Head Inn, Islington days before my arrest. Truly, this Keith Pickleton was an irregular soul, but he intrigued me. I met him on three occasions, and soon he revealed effects to me, Bess - effects of such miraculous account I dare not describe for fear you would think me insane. And he said somehow El Dorado, and more significantly an artefact held within its walls, could determine the outcome of a great war ‘twixt good and evil, a war that would govern the future of all God’s creatures on earth. As a Christian man, I was obliged to listen…’
‘And you believed this traveller?’
‘With every ounce of my soul,’ Sir Walter replied. ‘And he stated that one day I should be visited by another man, that this man was a force for good and I should reveal all I know about El Dorado. I should pass on such secrets that I hold so dear to myself they are like a second skin. But by that final time he was worried. He claimed he was being pursued by an enemy that could not allow him to live. And he left before he finished his tale and never returned.’
Lady Raleigh didn’t know what to think. ‘Are you certain it wasn’t a ruse … a jape with you as the buffoon?’
‘Nay,’ Sir Walter replied. ‘He showed me apparatus far beyond this time, far beyond any of Da Vinci’s manufactures.’ He leaned in, awe in his voice. ‘He claimed to be from the future, Bess …’
Lady Raleigh looked dumbfounded. ‘The future?’
‘Yea,’ Sir Walter replied. ‘And I believe it to be so. Truly, I do.’
Lady Raleigh gulped. ‘I have never questioned your judgement before, my husband, and I shall not now. And if you believe this adventurer, that a Holy War is pending, what would you have me do?’
Sir Walter hesitated before saying, ‘When the executioner hath sung his song, when his blade hath met its mark, I wish you to retrieve my head … and embalm it.’
‘Y-your head?’
‘Yea … my head,’ Sir Walter replied. ‘And I wish you keep it with you at all times, as safe as you would your bridal ring.’
‘Keep your head?’
‘Aye, sweet Bess. I am sorry to deliver you such a saturnine task, but I beg you grant my request.’
Lady Raleigh didn’t waver. ‘Of course, my husband.’
‘Gramercy, Bess,’ Sir Walter sighed. ‘And when this righteous stranger appears, then you must give him both the letter and my head.’
Lady Raleigh fell silent. ‘And does this stranger have a name?’
‘Yea.’ Sir Walter nodded. ‘He is named Percy Halifax…’
Chapter 2
Le Trésor Maudit
Rennes le Château, Southern France, 1891
In an explosion of light, two men appeared on a corkscrew path leading to a small hilltop village. On one hand they couldn’t have looked more different. Although each wore a tailored black suit and tie, one was simply enormous, with tightly shorn blond hair and a face many would consider handsome except for the lack of humanity in his eyes. The second man was shorter and considerably leaner, a walking skeleton. His black hair was smoothed back with wax, which accentuated his crow-like features.
The shorter man turned to face the newly risen sun. He looked at the snow-capped peaks of the distant Pyrenees, and inhaled the lilac tinged air. The sweet scent triggered no reaction in him, whatsoever. He was far too preoccupied with the relic he would soon acquire to notice anything so trivial.
‘So here we are, Otto,’ Emerson Drake said, surveying the village. ‘Rennes le Château. It’s quite charming if you like that sort of thing, don’t you think?’
Otto Kruger shrugged, but didn’t reply.
‘Coming from the era you did,’ Drake continued, ‘I don’t suppose you know about the mystery that will come to define this village over the next century, do you?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Why would you? The alleged mystery of Rennes le Château was never revealed to the world until a 1970s television documentary. It was all utter nonsense, of course, but an intriguing tale nevertheless, with everything a good yarn should contain – romance, intrigue, deceit, and buried treasure.’ An unpleasant smile arched his lips. ‘Of course, when I first saw the programme as a boy I had no idea it would all be a grand deception of my own devising …’
He nodded at the leather briefcase in Kruger’s hand. ‘And it just so happens the contents of that case lie at the very core of this tale.’
‘Then I look forward to finding out more, sir.’
Drake and Kruger began to walk. Passing a medieval chateau, a boulangerie, a crumbling fountain and several stone houses with zodiacal signs above their front doors, they turned down a lane, at the end of which was a cemetery and a tiny dilapidated church. The Church of Saint Mary Magdalene.
Drake approached the church door. ‘Do you know, Otto, I’ve only felt nervous five, possibly six times in my whole life, but I do believe this could be one of those occasions. It’s a curious feeling.’
‘And quite understandable, sir.’
Drake pushed at the door. As it groaned open, he and Kruger entered. Inside, the church resembled a construction site, the air misted with dust, lumps of rubble peppering the floor. The church’s altar had been dismantled and one of its supporting pillars, embellished in elaborate patterns, lay on its side, exposing a wide cavity at the top.
‘The Visigoth pillar,’ Drake said.
Just then, another voice merged with his. ‘Who is there?’ A tall, broad-shouldered priest with black hair emerged from the shadows, his long black robe covered in earth.
‘Abbé Bérenger Saunière?’ Drake said.
‘Oui, Monsieur. And who may you be?’
‘That is of no consequence,’ Drake replied. ‘You’ve had a busy night, have you not?’
Saunière didn’t respond. ‘Again I ask you, Monsieur, who are you? And what are you doing in my church?’
‘I have come for what you’ve found in the Visigoth pillar,’ Drake said. ‘The stone tablet … have you got it?’
Saunière looked stunned. ‘H-how? What do you know of a stone tablet?’
‘I know you found it only a few minutes ago,’ Drake said. ‘And I know more about it than any man alive, possibly dead for that matter.’
‘Will you please leave?’ Saunière insisted.
Drake gave a cold laugh. ‘Abbé Saunière. As you seem to think it so important, let me explain who we are. My name is Emerson Drake and I’m a time traveller. In your time line, I won’t be born for another seventy years.’ He nodded at Kruger. ‘And this is my Associate, Mister Kruger, and he works for me – primarily as an executioner. I believe it’s a vocation he enjoys - is that correct, Mister Kruger?’
‘Very much, sir.’
‘For instance,’ Drake continued. ‘We’ve just travelled back from October 31st 1897, a mere six years into the future, where we visited a charming little village called Coustaussa – a place you’re most familiar with, are you not?’
Saunière looked like he was struggling to grasp any of this. ‘Oui.’
‘And I believe you know the priest there … Abbé Antoine Gélis. He was your mentor, wasn’t he?’
Saunière nodded.
Drake shook his head with feigned sorrow. ‘I’m afraid Mister Kruger bludgeoned him to death with a candelabrum less than an hour ago. It was a very messy affair. And sadly the authorities will never find the culprit …’ He chuckled sourly. ‘How could they? And in case you don’t believe me.’ He pulled a newspaper from his inside pocket. ‘Here’s a copy of Le Petit Journal dated 2nd November 1897. Take a look at the headline.’ He threw the newspaper to Saunière who caught it.
His head reeling, Saunière stared with horror at the front page – a hand drawn image of a balding priest beneath a banner that read, ‘Prêtre catholique, Abbé Antoine Gélis, trouvé assassiné.’
‘The thing was,’ Drake said casually, ‘Abbé Gélis was uncooperative. He had in his possession a certain parchment I needed, but he wouldn’t give it to me. He really left me with no choice. His blood is on his own hands. Still, I know that won’t happen here, because you’ll give me what I need and carry out my instructions to the letter, won’t you?’
