by Lynn Sholes
“The famous Oak Island Money Pit?” Wyatt said. “I thought it was believed to have been dug by pirates to hide their treasure. From what I’ve read, the whole thing is booby-trapped. Every time someone attempts to dig it up, the shaft floods.”
“It’s a distracter,” John said. “Gunn and the lot dug the money pit in case anyone suspected what they were up to. They put all kinds of diabolical barriers and obstacles inside the shaft to keep the interest of whoever investigated the pit. The tablet was hidden elsewhere on the island.”
“I assume the tablet was recovered,” Wyatt said.
“Yes,” the pope answered. “It was brought to the Vatican. We’re told that the inscription on this tablet was written in an ancient language called Enochian—what some consider to be the tongue of the angels, the language that everyone spoke before Babel—and, because of her heritage, a language Cotten Stone knows. Like the other tablets, it gave instructions on preparing for the Great Flood. But there was a second portion. Although the Vatican linguists were able to translate, what it said made no sense to them. At best, they guessed it might be a scientific formula. What it actually said remains a mystery. That’s because, in 1878, the tablet and all records, sketches, documents, and translations relating to it were stolen.” The pope opened the red folder and withdrew a single sheet of paper, yellowed and fragile. “Thomas, like Cotten Stone, you too have a special legacy. It is the crux of why we selected you to become a Venatori.”
“Legacy? Well, I assure you my father was no angel.”
“No, he was not,” the pope said, “nor was your father’s great-great-grandfather. But he was a thief.” The pope extended the sheet of paper to Wyatt. “This is what he left behind after stealing the crystal tablet.”
The Sizzle
Cotten couldn’t believe what she had heard, couldn’t make sense of it. Her thoughts shattered into a million shards ricocheting inside her head. Mariah Hapsburg said she’d never heard of the crystal tablet.
What tablet? The fucking crystal tablet, that’s what tablet, Cotten thought. What was going on? Edelman said he called the Hapsburgs on the SAT phone. He’d been specific enough to request experts in the new scientific domain researching khipu as a language, not just an accounting mechanism, to take a look at the tablet. He’d talked to Richard about the impossibility of the technology to make the inscription.
Cotten sat like a rock, unmoving and unblinking, and searched through her memories of Peru, her conversations with Edelman, and her thoughts.
A few moments later, though she fought to push the notion out of reach, she couldn’t. This was their work. It had to be. She wasn’t crazy. The creation fossil and everything from that point on had been crafted by the Fallen, the Nephilim. John had agreed with her. They’d capitalized on her ego with the creation fossil, setting her up in order to humiliate and discredit her. Then on to the mountains of Peru. They hadn’t gotten her charged with a crime, but they had planted seeds in the minds of her peers and the world—enough damage that no respectable news organization would ever listen to or believe what she said—and they did this with a purpose in mind. From this bottomless place, she couldn’t combat them.
Who would heed anything she said or claimed? And as far as the tablet was concerned, they had destroyed everyone who could corroborate the existence of the tablet. And look at the toxic-dump story. That should be headlines, but it was dismissed. Why? Because she was attached to it.
“Oh, man,” she said, leaning back on the couch.
Deep inside, Cotten reckoned with why this was happening. Led by the daughter of an angel. Something on the tablet was about her, the daughter of Furmiel, the only one. They didn’t want her or anyone else to know what it said.
She had to come face to face with the Hapsburgs.
Cotten raked her hair back, drawing it into a thick cord at the nape of her neck. She would ask them about the tablet and what it said. She’d look hard into their eyes. What would it be like to peer into the windows of Hell?
* * *
The following day, Cotten tried to reach the Hapsburgs again to set up a date and time to meet, but to no avail. They ignored her calls, identifying her on caller ID, she supposed. She slung the throw pillow over the coffee table and onto the floor. “Somebody give me a break.”
She rested her chin on the back of the couch and looked out her window through the narrow slit between the blind slats. The neighborhood pulsed with traffic and pedestrians in swimsuits. Where was the no-name, not-renting-by-the-month guy? He must have found a job or a better neighborhood, she thought. Good for him.
Well, if the Hapsburgs were not going to answer the phone, then she was going to take the plunge and show up on their doorstep. She could probably get one of those no-frills flights to New York and take the train to Connecticut. It would put a dent in her overextended credit card, but she had to confront them.
The folks at Yale should know how to get in touch with them, she decided.
It wasn’t as easy as she first thought. It took a number of calls to find someone at the university willing to help her, so she resorted to a bit of deception.
“Dr. Hapsburg is in the field,” the woman said.
“He and his wife are going to be so pleased that I have talked to you,” Cotten said. “I’ve been trying to reach them with recent information about the grant they applied for. It’s wonderful news. Do you have contact information?”
At the news of a grant acceptance, the woman was more than happy to tell her the Hapsburgs were in New Mexico at a newly discovered archaeological site.
“Shit,” Cotten said after hanging up the phone. Booking a cheap flight to New York was one thing, but New Mexico was a different story. It wasn’t even worth checking the fares; she already knew she couldn’t afford it.
So it was back to selling a story first. Cotten couldn’t even get a bite on the toxic-dump piece, but Tempest Star could get headlines.
Suddenly, she had an idea. Cotten remembered the other tabloid that was always sitting right beside Tempest Star’s National Courier—the Galaxy Gazette. “If you can’t beat ’em,” she said. She was going to go head-to-head with Tempy baby.
* * *
Cotten pulled her carry-on bag through the Four Corners Regional Airport. Her laptop and purse were slung over opposite shoulders. Tempest Star and the National Courier didn’t know what they were in for. With Cotten’s name and story idea, it hadn’t taken an instant for the Galaxy Gazette, the National Courier’s main competition, to bite. In the world of tabloids, the Galaxy Gazette was like Avis in the rental car business: they weren’t number one, but they tried harder. Cotten Stone was pretty much a household name—good or bad didn’t matter, she could attract a huge audience. And the editor-in-chief of the Galaxy Gazette couldn’t wait to sign her up. He told her that she would add a new level of class and sophistication to the Gazette that he had never been able to achieve with his current no-name staff. Building on her reputation in religious and spiritual themes, he wanted her to focus on stories that took the reader deep into the mysteries of life—the myths, legends, and unsolved disappearances. Cotten knew exactly what to propose. Since returning from Peru, she had spent considerable time pondering all that Dr. Edelman had said about ancient cultures and how many had vanished into thin air. Cotten suggested that her trip to New Mexico be the first in a series covering the seemingly overnight disappearance of ancient civilizations. The editor was thrilled. By the end of the conversation, Cotten had her ticket to New Mexico and a small but welcome advance.
In addition to the airfare, she had motel and rental-car charges and meals. It wasn’t just the headlines they were selling. The editor knew it, and Cotten knew it. They were selling the sizzle and the steak.
Cotten stopped at the rental-car desk and filled out the forms. The clerk handed her keys to a Dodge Neon. The Gazette had sprung for the compact instead of t
he economy. Be thankful for small perks, she thought.
Cotten took the keys and picked up her baggage. As she hoisted the laptop strap over her shoulder, she caught sight of a man off to her right, standing just beyond the exit doors of the airport. He slowly turned and walked away.
She froze, and the strap slipped down her arm.
The clerk stared at her. “You all right, lady?”
Cotten ran toward the doors. “Hey, you!” she shouted. “Stop!”
The man paused and faced her.
Only inches away from the no-name, not-renting-by-the-month guy, she said, “Who the hell are you, and why are you following me?”
A voice behind her said, “Cotten Stone?”
She spun around to see a tall man in faded jeans and a navy Nautica long-sleeved shirt a few feet away. Dark hair and a tiny sprinkling of silver at the temples. In his hand, he held a ringing cell phone. Handing it to her, he said, “It’s for you.”
Demons
Cotten hesitated before taking the cell phone. She looked away from the stranger just long enough to push the talk button before bringing the phone to her ear.
“Hello,” she said.
“Cotten.”
Even through the digitized, long-distance static, the voice had an instant calming effect on her.
“What’s going on here, John?” she asked. “Who are these men?”
“Friends, Cotten,” John Tyler said. “Special friends who are there at my request. The man who gave you the phone is a member of Vatican security. The other is with our diplomatic corps. He’s been on special assignment—looking out for you. I don’t want to explain over an open phone line, but believe me when I say that you can trust them just as you trust me. You do trust me, don’t you?”
Cotten felt a smile form. “With my life and my soul. But you already know that.”
“Yes,” John said, followed by a pause, as if he was thinking of saying something else.
Cotten wanted to say more, too. That no one else knew her as he did. That she missed him.
Finally, John spoke again. “They will explain everything to you. I’ll be here if you need me.”
She needed him with her now, she realized as she pushed the button to end the call and handed the phone back to the stranger.
He slipped it into his pocket before extending his hand. “Cotten, I’m Thomas Wyatt. This is Monsignor Philip Duchamp, assistant to Archbishop Felipe Montiagro, the Vatican apostolic nuncio. Do you need help with your bags?”
* * *
Mariah Hapsburg stood at the base of the cliff, staring up at the Indian ruins. The setting sun bathed the towering rock walls, plateaus, and mesas in hauntingly beautiful purple and gold light. A wind whipped up the canyon and tossed her hair into her face—she smelled the sharp, arid desert air. Her pulse quickened as she realized she would be the first person to walk among the ancient buildings in perhaps thousands of years. She wondered what it was like the moment the inhabitants of this remote place had followed the instructions on their crystal tablet.
“What are you thinking, my love?” Richard Hapsburg said as he came from behind and stood next to his wife.
The reality of the situation and why they were there shook Mariah from her musing. It also reminded her of their ultimate goal: preventing anyone from ever learning the secret of the tablet.
“I was only trying to picture what it must have been like to live here so long ago.” She touched Richard’s arm. “Let’s go,” she said, leading the way up over the landslide debris to the entrance of the ruins.
She and Richard seemed alone in this desolate place as sunset gave way to dusk. During their long Land Rover ride through the canyons and washes to the remote location, she saw no one—another example of Eli Luddington’s power. He had the ability to keep the press, academics, and curiosity seekers away. Power excited her, both mentally and physically. And she was surrounded by power. Mariah considered herself the luckiest woman on earth. For so many reasons.
They moved past the first of the structures that Richard speculated were constructed by Chacoans or descendants of one of the other Pueblo cultures, such as the Mogollon or the Hohokam. The area had been inhabited on and off for thousands of years until literally overnight everyone seemed to have disappeared. It was an ongoing mystery to the archaeologists and anthropologists who studied the Four Corners area. A mystery to everyone. But not to Richard. Not to Eli. And not to Mariah.
The walls, doorways, and windows were well preserved, sheltered from the elements for centuries. In an outcrop of rock near the base of a wall, Mariah noticed a strange, rust-colored tube shape about the thickness of her thumb that appeared embedded in the sandstone. “What is that?”
“Fossilized shrimp burrows,” Richard said.
“Shrimp in New Mexico?”
“This was once part of the coastline of a shallow inland sea. It’s not unusual to find sharks’ teeth and clamshells in the local sandstone, too.”
Mariah shook her head in amazement, trying to imagine an ocean covering this barren, dry place.
What seemed to be left of a narrow road led past small apartments—the walls built thick with precise masonry. All that was needed, Mariah thought as she shone her light into each doorway, was furniture. She could almost hear the shuffle of sandaled feet along the dusty paths.
“Probably the elite lived in these,” Richard said, aiming his lantern into a large room. “Some areas were for living, others for working. These people were highly sophisticated and well organized.”
“So what are we looking for?” Mariah asked.
“A special place,” Richard said. “What they considered a holy place.”
“How will you know it?”
“I will know.”
* * *
Cotten Stone sat across from Thomas Wyatt and Monsignor Duchamp in a booth at the rear of the Farmington IHOP on East Main. She sipped hot green tea and glanced from time to time out the window. In the dim twilight of sunset, she could see her Dodge Neon parked beside Wyatt’s SUV, a Chevy Tahoe.
“Venatori?” she said, looking back at Wyatt. “Interesting name. What does it mean?”
“Hunter,” he said.
“When I was with SNN, I heard the name once. A story about a member of the Swiss Guard who murdered a Venatori agent at the Vatican and then committed suicide. Very little info came out. You guys play it close to the vest, don’t you?”
“It’s the nature of their business,” Duchamp said.
“And what business is that?” Cotten asked.
“Intelligence analysis,” Wyatt said.
“Sort of like the sacred CIA?” she said.
Wyatt smiled. “Sort of.”
“I still don’t see why I need your help. I’m here to do a story for the Galaxy Gazette.”
“And you want to know about the crystal tablet,” Wyatt said.
Cotten placed her cup on the table. “John told you?”
“He said you had seen the one found in Peru,” Wyatt said.
Sitting up straight, she said, “You make it sound like there are others.”
“In all, we believe there were twelve,” Wyatt said.
Maybe these two men could help her after all, she thought. If they assisted in proving the existence of the Peruvian tablet, she might be one step closer to getting her credibility and life back. And most importantly, they might help her find out more about what the inscriptions meant for her. “Why twelve?” she asked.
“We’re not sure,” Duchamp said. “Twelve plays an important role in history—twelve months in a year, twelve tribes of Israel, twelve Apostles, twelve signs of the zodiac. And in Revelation, chapter twelve, verse one, tells of a woman who appears during the End Days clothed with the sun, the moon under her feet, and a crown of twelve stars.”
“And the twelve
days of Christmas,” Cotten added with a nervous laugh.
Duchamp ran his palm down his chest. “For that matter, there are twelve pairs of human ribs, twelve major joints in the body.”
“And twelve orders of angels,” Wyatt said.
A wave of anxiety crashed inside her.
“We have found references to twelve tablets in several ancient documents,” Duchamp said. “The point is, we believe God gave a tablet to Noah and eleven other spiritual leaders of different civilizations throughout the world to help them save their faithful from the first cleansing—the Great Flood. We also believe that there are references on each tablet predicting a future cleansing and how to prepare. And we think one of those tablets is in this new archeological site.”
“But if the prediction of a future cleansing was on the tablet given to Noah way back when,” Cotten said, “what’s the rush? How do you know it’s not referring to something that will happen a hundred or even a thousand years from now?”
“Because of you, Cotten,” Wyatt said.
Duchamp nodded. “Because of you.”
* * *
Richard Hapsburg paused and flooded the narrow path ahead with light from his lantern. A few yards ahead was a structure unlike the others. This one was circular—a kiva.
“Is this it?” Mariah asked. She set her lantern on the ground and took the flashlight from her backpack. Sweeping her beam across the surface of the high brick wall, she heard Richard’s response.
“Yes,” he said.
Richard led the way through a tall doorway into a room about fifteen feet in diameter. A fire pit made from smooth stones formed a circle in the middle of the floor. A large black smudge still marked the spot where a thousand fires had once burned brightly. Along the far wall, opposite the door, sat a rectangular stone box appearing to be about three feet high and four feet wide, open at the top. It was made from bricks similar to those in the walls of the buildings. Mariah and Richard looked inside the box.
“There’s nothing there,” Mariah said. “Just dirt.”
