The History Thief: Ten Days Lost (The Sterling Novels)

by Joseph Nagle

  Michael didn’t hesitate and did as he was told.

  Pick only those battles you know you can win.

  The other half of the medallion instantly shot a beam of light toward the east wall; it splashed across the top of the door that had been painted on the right side of the wall.

  Gerald smiled and then threw a black zip-tie at Michael’s feet. “Put it on your wrists and tighten!”

  Again, Michael complied and used his teeth to tighten casually the zip-tie. His wrists were now bound in front of him. He turned to face the armed man and said, “You might want to wipe that spit from your mouth; you look like shit.”

  Gerald laughed at the boldness of his adversary, but he wiped the spit with the backside of his hand anyway. The moment he finished, and without warning, he swung the pistol at the right side of Michael’s face. Michael stumbled to his left a few steps but didn’t fall.

  “I guess that’s payback, huh?” Michael asked rhetorically but painfully, as he rubbed his face with the backside of his bound hands.

  Gerald hit him again; this time, Michael fell heavily to the tile floor with a grunt.

  From where he fell, Michael first spit a bit of blood from his mouth and then interrogated, “Why does the Order want the body of Sebastian so badly?”

  Gerald moved closer to Michael, but was careful to stay out of his reach. He had learned firsthand that Michael certainly lived up to his reputation. “Sebastian? You think all of this has been to just bring back the missing bones of our dead master? Let me guess—you think that the crown and the shroud were stolen just to link them with Sebastian, to prove that he was a descendent of Christ?”

  Michael was confused, but he replied, “Isn’t that what you morons of the Order are always trying to do: to create some kind of leverage over the church by proving Christ lived as any other man would have, that he wasn’t the messiah?”

  Gerald walked to the east wall and inspected the spot where the refracted light met with the wall. He said, “Dr. Sterling, I will admit, I thought the same thing at first: I thought my bosses were trying to prove that Christ had children, and the DNA on the crown and shroud would suggest as much.”

  Inspecting the wall, Gerald scratched at the spot where the light bathed it.

  With a smile on his face that quickly turned into one of pure hatred, he bellowed at Michael, “But no matter how many bits of evidence we would show the world, it wouldn’t matter—would it? What was the word you used? Credulous, wasn’t it? That’s what the majority of the world is: a bunch of Bible or Koran or some holy-book thumping, believe-anything, Jesus-Allah-Buddha- insert-your-god-here freaks. No, Dr. Sterling, proving to the world that Christ lived and sired a lineage is not what we want to do. We tried that once—it didn’t work: remember? What we are doing, however, is reclaiming what rightfully belongs to us!”

  “Of course you are,” muttered Michael as he ignored everything the man just said and pushed himself into a seated position.

  Gerald brushed off the sarcasm and continued his explanation, “To that end you are somewhat correct in our motives; DNA has been found on both the Crown of Thorns and the Shroud of Turin; the DNA suggests a family relationship. The bones of Sebastian will be tested for that same DNA string, for a match. But there’s more, much more to it than just having scientific evidence of such a claim.”

  Michael’s memory was racing as he tried to remember the legend of Sebastian. He remembered that the young king had gone missing and that his body was never recovered. King Sebastian had been the master of the Order of Christ. The master had one very important responsibility: to guard what was rumored to be an immense treasury.

  Michael rolled to his knees and stood.

  Gerald saw him stand and re-aimed his weapon. “Easy, Dr. Sterling. Don’t go gettin’ all hero on me. I will kill you.”

  Michael knew it was best to pay heed to the threat and stayed his distance, but he asked, “The church kidnapped and tortured Sebastian, didn’t they? They erased ten days in 1578 from history to cover up the time they tortured him. They wanted the treasure that the master of the Order of Christ guarded. Sebastian must have given it to them. That’s what you’re after!”

  Gerald angrily shouted, “Those filthy charlatans have spat orders and doctrine to their flock for centuries. They pretend to be passing on the word of God, but the truth is that they are just another name for politician or emperor. They want power, wealth, and control and have done anything to get them!”

  Michael watched Gerald carefully and repeated: “It’s Sebastian’s treasury, isn’t it?”

  Gerald offered Michael a crooked smile and a sarcastic nod of the head. “Very good, Dr. Sterling, I supposed it wouldn’t hurt for you to know. What they stole from us has conveyed more wealth and power to the church than you can possibly imagine. Sebastian was just the beginning, nothing more. In there,” Gerald tapped the wall with his weapon, “the king will point us in the right direction.”

  Gerald took a few steps away from the wall and barked, “Open it!”

  Michael shuffled toward the fresco; Gerald tossed the medallion half to the floor and sidestepped out of Michael’s reach. He kept the weapon aimed at him.

  Michael reached down with his bound hands and picked up the medallion. The beam of light was fading, but Michael didn’t need it. It was obvious what to do next. The door had a keyhole painted into it. Michael shoved his index finger into it and was half-surprised that bits of darkened mortar crumbled away, falling to the floor in pieces of varying sizes.

  The more he dug, the more came out. Soon, the clear outline of a real keyhole emerged.

  The medallion is the key. Michael reminded himself of the colonel’s last words.

  Michael turned the medallion over in his hand; he studied its shape. His eyes flashed from the keyhole and back to the medallion. One of its ornamented protrusions held his attention. He placed it next to the wall. It matched the shape of newly made keyhole. Sticking it in, it mated smoothly. With a twist, difficult at first, the medallion slowly moved clockwise.

  But it was only the smallest fraction of distance.

  Michael took a breath and clasped the medallion with both hands to make it turn; with a grunt, he strained.

  Muffled sounds of grating metal could be heard. A series of ancient tumblers, which had sat unmoved for over four centuries, slowly gave in to the force applied.

  The twisting continued and grew easier with each new part of a revolution gained. The metallic grating grew louder, until a very obvious and prolonged dull thud signaled the end.

  For a moment there was nothing.

  Neither man spoke.

  Michael took a few steps backward, unsure of what to do or to expect next.

  A faint, odd sound caught Michael’s attention, and he leaned in toward the wall to listen. It grew louder. At first, he didn’t recognize the sound, but as its decibel level rose, it became apparent what it was.

  Michael moved backward a bit more, faster this time; the sound grew louder.

  “What is that?” Gerald asked nervously.

  “Water,” responded Michael, “I think.” He wasn’t so sure.

  Inside of the wall, an old mechanism had been activated upon the last turn of the medallion. The thud they had heard was from a still-sharpened hammer that struck one of a series of chambers; each was filled with fluid, which set once-idle gears into motion. The pressure of the water forced each gear to turn against another. The torque and speed and force of every movement increased, until more than four dozen flattened bits of iron hammered in a rhythmic fashion against thick pieces of rock, which were chiseled into pointed arrow-like heads; rock that had been placed strategically around the frescoed edges of the door, on the inside of the wall.

  It was an archaic form of primer chord.

  The sound of the moving water amplified into a torrent. The repetitive hammering of the flattened iron increased, until the entire room felt as if it were vibrating. The outline of the fresc
oed door unexpectedly exploded dust and mortar outward, as the unseen chiseled rock struck the outline of the door in rapid fashion.

  And then it was over.

  The sound of the water was gone.

  The two men stared without speaking.

  A slight, but prolonged creak split the silence.

  The door cut away from the wall and fell in its entirety to the floor, where it shattered loudly, causing both men to startle. Water spilled out from the hold, rushing dramatically across the tile floor of the room.

  Michael held his arms to his mouth to cover it from the settling dust and moved closer; Gerald was right behind him.

  The dust dissipated, and a shape appeared.

  At first it seemed too small, but as the room cleared, it was obvious upon what they stared.

  In the newly opened chasm was a skeleton. Slumped from time and its corporeal parts long since gone, its clothing was in fragments and nearly decayed. What was just as odd was that the skeleton’s right hand was anchored to the wall and balled into a fist except for its right finger, which was pointing.

  There was something else.

  Inside the vertical tomb, its inhabitant was void of color from its time behind the frescoed wall; a bit of dulled metal wrapped around the skeleton’s finger stood apart from the scene.

  Michael reached forward carefully and pulled it from the index finger of the skeleton. He rubbed the caked layers of dirt, ash, and cobweb from its surface, which crumbled away easily, revealing a small octagonal pendant. When the face of the pendant was apparent enough, he looked at it and read aloud the words etched onto its surface: “Archivum Secretum Apostolicum Vaticanum.”

  Gerald translated, “The Apostolic Secret Archives of the Vatican.”

  Michael repeated under his breath the words that Gerald had said a few minutes ago: “The king will point us in the right direction.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-SIX

  DEBTS & DEMOTIC

  THE SECRET ARCHIVES

  “Let’s move, Dr. Sterling!” ordered Gerald.

  “You’re kidding, right?” Michael replied. “Just how do you think an armed man and his bound prisoner are going to sneak into one of the most guarded places on the planet? The Secret Archives are monitored and guarded around the clock by teams of Swiss Guard! Most cardinals aren’t even allowed inside the archives. Shit, even the pope has to get permission! It’s impossible!”

  Gerald reached out and spun Michael around and pushed him toward the door. “The colonel isn’t the only one with help on the inside. Now get walkin’!”

  Through the door of the Tower of Winds and down the narrow staircase the two men walked. Michael led the way, not by choice. He looked at the exposed elevator around which the circular staircase wrapped and thought, the best way into the archives is through that elevator’s shaft.

  Michael didn’t share his thoughts with Gerald.

  The two men stood in the emptied old study room of the library. There were twelve rows of chairs which were separated by an aisle; there were three chairs on one side, two on the other. Each chair was pushed in uniformly in front of drab tables. A small reading lamp with a flexible arm accompanied each chair. All were meticulously organized, including the curvature of the flexible arms of each lamp, which was identical from one to the next. The old study room was a picture of symmetry and painstaking, fastidious care. At the far end of the room from where the two men stood, a door led to the cortile of the library.

  Michael stopped in his tracks.

  In front of the door stood stoic a plain-clothed and very capable-looking member of the Swiss Guard. His neatly cut black suit clung to his extremely well-proportioned frame. Michael could see the distinct bulge of his weapon push through his suit coat underneath his left arm.

  A small, coiled cord started from his ear and fell down his back; it was his radio.

  The guard’s face was chiseled and his square chin firm. His stare was with only one emotion. He shot an angry glare at the men. For a moment he looked ready to react to their presence. However, after a few, long moments, he crossed his arms and slowly turned around, showing his back to the men. Once he was turned fully around, he reached up and removed the radio from his ear, allowing it to dangle in front of him before crossing his arms once more.

  Gerald whispered condescendingly into Michael’s ear, “Like I said, the colonel isn’t the only one with help on the inside.”

  But it wasn’t through the guarded door that the men would walk.

  Gerald roughly grabbed Michael by his collar and tossed him toward a door much nearer to where they stood—the one that led directly in the Secret Archives.

  Down two flights they descended.

  The air was growing palpably cooler and slightly more humid.

  They were subterranean and in the place that the younger priests jokingly called the Bunker. There they were greeted by nearly twenty-seven miles of shelving; each was lined ceiling-high with cream-colored, vellum-bound books from centuries past.

  Gerald moved fast, causing Michael to stumble somewhat. “Keep your feet under you, Dr. Sterling!”

  Michael asked, “Where are we going?” But he knew rather well where they were heading; he was trying to get his captor to speak.

  Michael wasn’t looking for information; he knew more about where they were than most men on the planet. To the contrary, it was information that he didn’t need. Instead, what he sought was an opening; a slight moment when his captor would let his attention slip, a moment where he could gain an advantage.

  Making the man speak might give him that moment of lost attention.

  It didn’t take long.

  About a dozen rows ahead, Michael saw that one of the archives’ books was sticking out a bit further on the shelf than those that straddled it. He began to purposely pick up and slow down his pace in an erratic fashion as he walked in front of Gerald.

  Instead of protesting, Gerald showed his frustration by kicking his heavy boot into Michael’s back. It was all that Michael needed. His body flung forward, and he aimed for the shelf with the errant, odd-shaped book. Catching himself dramatically on it, he shielded the protruding book with his body and firmly clamped onto the heavily bound volume.

  The title caught his eye: Borghese, Michael read silently while thinking, how I would love to read this book. What a shame.

  Gerald shouted at Michael, “Knock off your fucking tactics, Sterling,” but that’s as far as he got with his ire.

  In a blur, Michael yanked the book from the shelf and wildly swung it across Gerald’s face. A loud crack signaled one less tooth in Gerald’s mouth.

  Returning the book in the opposite direction, Michael landed a vicious hit on Gerald’s temple. He fell awkwardly backward, but had enough balance to aim his weapon.

  Michael spun around and ran deeper into the archives.

  The shots from the weapon echoed loudly in the Bunker as some of the bullets ricocheted off the stone walls; others were embedded in the leather and parchment of irreplaceable volumes of Roman history. Bits of penetrated parchment sprayed confetti-like in little explosions as Michael ran.

  He counted the shots.

  Nine.

  They stopped.

  Gerald had used three bullets in the tower and nine more chasing him. Michael knew that the weapon had been emptied. Gerald was either reloading it, or the playing field had been equalized.

  Michael hoped for the latter.

  Darting left and down one of the rows, Michael stopped at its end and placed the black plastic of the zip-tie on the metal end of the shelf. He feverishly rubbed it up and down on the metal until the plastic was weak enough that he could yank his hands apart.

  He was freed.

  For a moment he stood perfectly still, listening for anything that didn’t belong. But Gerald was too well trained. As a Green Beret, he would know full well the need to be invisible, to be silent.

  It was the hunter and the hunted.

  Michael didn
’t know which one he was.

  But he did know where the man would go.

  With extreme care, Michael stealthily made his way toward the acclimatized rooms that housed under special conditions the rarest and most valuable of papal documents.

  The minutes ticked by as Michael made his way; soon he could see the rows of armored doors behind which he was sure he would find what the Order so badly wanted.

  Michael studied them: there were a half-dozen three-pronged, black handles. Each handle was about a foot in length. They looked no different than the handles used on the doors leading into a bank’s vault.

  There was also a biometric scanner. Shit, thought Michael, this is going to be a bit harder than I had hoped.

  Instinctively, Michael grabbed onto one of the large handles and spun it counter-clockwise. He was surprised that they moved easily. He was even more surprised that when he moved one handle, all of the handles turned in a synchronous fashion with his.

  Michael had to leverage his body weight to pull the thick and heavy steel door open. It didn’t budge. Not that it mattered; it was precisely the opportunity that the stalking ex-Green Beret had needed.

  Gerald sprang at Michael at the perfect moment, when he had been most off balance. A crushing forearm smashed down from above and across Michael’s arms.

  He had gotten there first; he had been waiting.

  Gerald let out a curdling scream as he landed a second blow into Michael’s body followed by a kick to his ankles. Michael hit the floor hard. The man had been both quick and flawless in his attack. Michael was able to mount very little of a counter.

  The ex-Green Beret was strong—very strong—and was soon on top of Michael.

  Michael couldn’t move; a flash of silver swept across his face from right to left.

  Gerald had him pinned and was desperately pushing a long-bladed knife toward Michael’s heart. It was all that Michael could do to keep the knife from plunging through his ribcage.

  “Time to die, Sterling!” growled Gerald.

  Michael had no strength to match that of his attacker’s. Gerald mashed his teeth firmly together as he pushed the knife with more force toward Michael’s chest.