The Brotherhood Conspiracy

by Brennan, Terry

  “I don’t like that idea.” Joe’s dread spiked. “The last thing we should do is split up.”

  “You’re right,” said Bohannon. “It’s probably not a good idea. But time’s running out on us already. We need to move fast.”

  Joe felt waves of anxiety wash over his body. He pushed off the wall and got right in front of Tom’s face. “Wait a minute, Tom. I promised you I would walk with you through this . . . what? . . . assignment? . . . and I’m not going anywhere without you. And you shouldn’t be going anywhere without me. Who’s going to watch your back if I’m not there? No . . . I don’t like the way this is going. We have to stay together.”

  Tom’s hand found Joe’s shoulder and gave it a squeeze. “We haven’t found anything yet and the clock keeps ticking. We have too much ground to cover and not enough time to get it done. You know it doesn’t make a lot of sense for both of us to go to the castle. I’ll be okay. You get to Jerusalem.” Tom moved closer to his brother-in-law and Joe felt the strength of his resolve. “And keep your eyes open.”

  County Meath, Ireland

  It was the four tractors stacked on top of one another, sitting by the side of the road outside the village of Rathbeggan, that yanked Brandon McDonough’s attention from daydreams about the secret of the mezuzah to the traffic on N3. Better keep your mind and eyes on the road. It had been a long flight.

  Brilliant days like this one were rare in Ireland. A scorching blue sky hung over the green landscape, punctuating each color with an exclamation point as McDonough drove from the Dublin airport to Cairn T at Loughcrew. It was the kind of day that made you want to walk barefoot across the patchwork fields of green, feeling the moistness of the ground and the cool caress from each blade of grass.

  But there would be no stops this day. Not to marvel at the four tractors stacked to the sky, nor to take a detour to visit the hill of Tara—one of the seats of power of ancient Ireland—nor to investigate the medieval tower that soared into the blue sky from the winding, history-laden streets of Kells.

  Brandon McDonough was on a mission and neither the glorious weather nor his native curiosity could deter him. There was a legend waiting for him and he would not be late for his appointment with history.

  On the flight from New York, McDonough reviewed the websites claiming that Cairn T—a five-thousand-year-old passage tomb commanding a hilltop in the County Meath countryside—was the burial place of the prophet Jeremiah. Five hundred years older than the pyramids of Egypt, one thousand years older than Stonehenge, Cairn T was one of three passage tombs located on this hill just outside the village of Loughcrew. And it was the most mysterious.

  Not uncommon in Ireland, passage tombs were large mounds of stone and earth, typically erected on the highest hill in a region, containing a long central passage that opened into a cross-shaped burial chamber, off of which were three smaller chambers. The most famous of the ancient Irish passage tombs was Newgrange, a massive, megalithic mound about fifteen kilometers to the east of Loughcrew, a place of legend and fancy.

  Compared to Newgrange, Cairn T in Loughcrew was a historical backwater. Where Newgrange had a visitors’ center, guided tours, and strict rules and supervision, the cairns at Loughcrew were generally ignored and abandoned by both tourists and locals. In fact, in order for McDonough to gain access to Cairn T, all he needed was to arrive at the rustic coffee shop of the nineteenth-century Loughcrew Gardens, surrender his driver’s license as security for the key to the tombs, and let himself in. No guards, no admission fee—no eyes to follow his search.

  One of the websites he studied while on the plane claimed it could prove that Cairn T was the final resting place of the prophet Jeremiah. The cairn was also referred to as the tomb of the Ollamh Fodhla in Irish history, a title that in both Hebrew and Irish means possessor or revealer of hidden knowledge. The website’s author took the Neolithic carvings on several of the stones inside the cairn—particularly those on what he identified as the “journey stone” and the tablet-shaped “end stone” which caught the first rays of the sun on the solstice—and used those images to spin the tale of Jeremiah’s journey from Egypt to Gibraltar and on to Ireland. It was an ingenious interpretation, one that could be filled with fancy or fact. It was McDonough’s mission to find out which. And, if true, to see if Cairn T contained any clue that would connect it to the story of Jeremiah and the Tent of Meeting.

  A mission unlikely to bear fruit. But for a man who spent most of his life buried in a book or wandering the lonely storage caverns of the British Museum, a mission of flesh and blood, of urgency and expectation. And not a mission of detours.

  Driving toward the junction at Oldcastle, McDonough was once again visited by a sense of dread. It happened first on his flight from New York. On the airplane, McDonough couldn’t shake the feeling that eyes were always on him. He chalked it up to residual anxiety brought on by close proximity to Richard Johnson and his colleagues, who appeared to be the targets of a ruthless band of killers. Hearing of their near-death experiences would scare the starch out of any man.

  For the hundredth time in the last hour McDonough looked in his rearview mirror. Is that the same blue car, or is it a different one? McDonough’s glance in the rearview mirror moved from the nondescript blue car to the hazel eyes staring back at him. Fool of a man. Fanciful dreams. Come back to reality, you old coot.

  McDonough pulled into the gravel driveway of the Loughcrew Gardens Coffee Shop, parked under the large red maple tree, and crossed the lot into the cedar-sided building adorned with posters trumpeting the Loughcrew Garden Opera’s upcoming presentation of La Traviata and the Loughcrew Adventure Course (Prior Booking Essential!). He was immediately seduced by the sultry smell of fresh baking and reminded that he overlooked breakfast.

  Fortified by strong tea and a still-warm scone, with the key for the cairn in his pocket, McDonough drove back to the carpark for Cairn T and began the quarter-mile, uphill trek to the mound’s entrance. The walk, and the view, were spectacular. Yellow-blooming Irish gorse bushes lined the walk and dotted the slopes of the hill, leading to a panoramic view of the distant Boyne River Valley. He skirted the stone remnants of two ancient ring forts and approached the gated entrance for Cairn T.

  It didn’t look like much from the outside. Where Newgrange was nearly one hundred yards in diameter and neatly kept, the cairns on the hills of Loughcrew were a rugged and less-pampered bunch. Much smaller, about forty feet in diameter, Cairn T sat at the pinnacle of the hill. Its circumference was created by an interlocking stack of flat-topped, pewter-gray stones. No mortar held them together but they had withstood the wind and rain at the top of this Irish hill for more than five thousand years. About four feet up from the base of the cairn, the circle of stones began the formation of a dome that climaxed at a rounded top about fifteen feet off the ground. Whether purposely, or by the hand of nature, the dome was covered with a grass-covered layer of earth and clay.

  A brisk wind whipped across the plains of Meath, pushing cotton balls of cumulus across the brilliant blue sky, etching spotlights of shade on the valley floor.

  McDonough’s reverent Catholic upbringing, the resting place of long-latent shame, called out in chants of condemnation. He was about to violate a sacred place. Though there was no one within sight, he felt as if he were under the eyes of the law. Whether with anxiety or the climb, his heart rate was accelerated. Cold perspiration chilled his skin and dampened his shirt. “’Tis better to be a coward for a minute than dead the rest of your life,” he said to the wind. This gives me the creeps.

  He hesitated for a long moment, then unlocked the creaky iron gate, turned on the battery-powered torch he received with the key, and ducked his head to enter the low-ceilinged passageway into the tomb.

  The passageway was tight, cold, and smelled as if small animals lived and died here. It was flanked by standing stones festooned with Neolithic carvings. McDonough ducked under a low, stone lintel at the end of the passage and entered t
he cross-shaped burial chamber.

  The burial chamber was a smaller version of the outside of Cairn T—round walls of stacked stone about thirty feet across, and a steep-sided, vaulted ceiling about eight feet high at its apex. McDonough had to stoop at the waist to move about its rim. The wide beam of light not only illuminated the chamber and the richly ornamented stones that occupied its edges—and those that flanked the openings to two smaller chambers at right angles to the entry—but also increased his adrenaline flow as the light fell on the low opening to a larger crypt, opposite the entry passage.

  McDonough peeked into the crypt. His torch illuminated hieroglyphic sun symbols and spirals around the entrance and on the back wall of the crypt, but what captured his attention was an empty sarcophagus tucked snugly into the right side, as if fit for the space.

  A large stone rose from the floor at the portal to the crypt and a low lintel forced McDonough to place the torch on the floor inside the crypt so he could squeeze through. The light was blocked as his body filled the opening. The circular burial chamber behind him collapsed into darkness and rushed in on McDonough, who stumbled, and fell inside onto the floor of the crypt.

  As he picked up the torch, its light flashed across the low ceiling and McDonough halted its arc in amazement. There, a few feet above his head, was something he had never seen in his entire career.

  The symbols were similar to those in the outer chamber, but these looked untouched by the harsh Irish climate. The edges of the stone carvings were clearly defined, not eroded by time. More remarkable was the ocher-colored paint that still vividly adorned each of the carvings. Five thousand years, and these carvings appeared as if they were completed a month ago.

  McDonough studied the symbols closely. There was a six-petaled flower design inside a circle and the common sun symbol in a circle, identical to those elsewhere in the cairn. But others were unique, and stunning.

  On the left was a nine-bar rainbow arching across the sky, painted in sweeping bands of ocher alternating with the gray stone. Above the rainbow, a strange, helix-like circle curving in on itself with a long, curving tail that forked about halfway down its length. A comet? To the right-center, what could only be considered a ten-legged insect with two tentacles extending from the base of its head. And, in the center, a flat-topped symbol with raised arms that looked like a bench . . . or an altar.

  McDonough took a deep breath, ran his eyes once more over the carvings so close to his face, then turned the light on the sarcophagus. It was empty, its lid missing. There was no adornment or carving on any of the sides that he could see.

  Wondering what had become of the sarcophagus’s cover, McDonough moved the beam of light through the crypt opening and back into the burial chamber. On the far side of the chamber, he noticed for the first time that one of the illustrated stones was different from the others. This one was as long as a man’s body. It lay on the floor, flat on the bottom and rounded on the top . . . the capstone of the sarcophagus.

  The capstone called to him. McDonough could feel his years as he squeezed through the tight crypt opening once more. He crossed to the far side of the chamber, stooped like an old man by the low ceiling, and washed his light over the stone.

  The markings on this stone were different from the others . . . long, sweeping lines and curves running along its sides. His breath caught in his throat.

  On top of the capstone were two carvings—one a cartouche enclosing the budding staff, the symbol of the Aaronic priesthood, and three lines of script—hieroglyphics, Aramaic, and Demotic . . . Prophet of God.

  McDonough could feel tingling in the ends of his fingers. He knelt to the floor in the bowels of this ancient burial chamber and reached out a hand, tracing the weathered edges of the second carving. A cool breath of stale air trickled down his spine.

  McDonough knew what the carving was . . . the four symbols were very familiar. But he was clueless as to why they were here, on top of this sarcophagus in an Irish burial ground. Is this your resting place, my elusive friend?

  McDonough nearly had a heart attack when the iron gate at the entrance of the passage tomb slammed shut.

  And footsteps advanced down the passageway.

  Dayr al Qiddis Oasis, Egypt

  In two hours, Richard Johnson and Sammy Rizzo traveled a little more than thirty miles from Ras Zafarana on the Red Sea coast along a ruler-straight desert track that laughingly called itself a road. Thirty miles, and they were in another world. Far from the white sand resorts along the Red Sea, this was the vast Wadi Araba in the eastern Egyptian desert, a lifeless, flat moonscape stretching off into the haze, shimmering heat waves obscuring the mud brown mountains that brooded in the distance. Nothing lived here. Nothing grew here. Except sand and rocks . . . and heat.

  And this fragile little Fiat he was driving into this wasted terrain threatened, with each cough and sputter, to leave them stranded in a dry and desolate no-man’s land.

  “Hey, Lawrence of Arabia,” Sammy said from the passenger seat, “this lush landscape makes me kind of miss Manhattan, you know. Like a food vendor on every corner . . . if they had corners. Are you sure there’s life out here?”

  Doc’s head throbbed with a pain that mirrored the ache in his hands as he gripped the steering wheel with a growing desperation. In spite of years of archaeological digs in the most severe deserts of the world, his tolerance for penetrating heat had disappeared long ago. But it wasn’t only the heat that stirred up his anxiety. He worried that somewhere he had made a mistake. That they might be on the wrong road. That they might be driving south into a wasteland that would swallow them up and hide their bones forever.

  So, when Doc saw the two towers rising ahead of him along the ribbon of road, he pointed into the bug-splattered windshield. “O ye of little faith.”

  As the southern Gaiala Plateau, an escarpment of bare rock that pushed five thousand feet into the blue sky, closed on their left, the shape of St. Anthony’s Monastery rose from the floor of the desert. Two fifty-foot towers crowned with golden crosses flanked the portal that swallowed the desert road. The towers were the same champagne color as the fortress walls that stretched out to either side of the entry—a champagne that was dry, bleached, and gritty.

  “Hallelujah,” screeched Sammy. “I hope they have a Starbucks.”

  “Visigoth,” mumbled Doc.

  St. Anthony’s Monastery, founded in the fourth century, encircled the oasis Dayr al Qiddis. So Doc wasn’t surprised to see palm trees poking up from behind the high walls. But he was shocked by their numbers. As he drove the car through the gate, the vastness of the monastery community struck him. Its buildings and streets stretched into the distance.

  “Not the cave in the rock I was expecting,” said Rizzo, bounding out of the car.

  Every monk in the community looked the same to Richard Johnson: small men, their long black robes scraping the ground. The only things visible from under their embroidered, black hoods were long white beards, hooked noses, and veiled, faraway eyes. Why would he expect different from the monastery’s superior? But Brother Walid, taller and thinner than Johnson, moved with an air of aristocracy that would be comfortable in any European palace or American boardroom. The long beard was there, speckled with gray, but so was a twinkle of expectation.

  “Dr. Johnson, it’s a pleasure to welcome you to St. Anthony’s,” said the superior, his American New England accent as clear as the bell to afternoon prayer. “I’ve read some of your monographs on the dig at Khoum. Very impressive. I’d like to discuss the cult of the Ibis with you if we have the time.”

  Doc’s eyes blinked in disbelief. “What? I’m sorry, I . . .”

  “Oh, forgive me,” Brother Walid said, extending his hand. “It’s so seldom I get to talk about anything other than the status of our crops, the lack of initiates, or the schedule for overnight prayer. In my previous life my name was Lionel Gaul. I was an archaeology student at Stanford when I came to Egypt for a dig in the eastern m
ountains and stumbled upon this monastery. That was thirty-six years ago. I’ve left these walls only once, for my mother’s funeral. But we do receive mail. And old dreams are loath to die.”

  The superior turned away and looked down at Sammy Rizzo. “And this must be Mr. Rizzo?”

  Sammy pushed the brim of his safari hat away from his eyes and tilted his head to the sun to grab a look at the monk. “No, I’m Bear Grylls and I’m here for the Man vs. Wild show. Where’s the alligator pit?”

  “What?”

  “Never mind, padre,” Sammy said, offering his hand to the monk. “Say, how can I get my hands on one of those cool embroidered bonnets?”

  Brother Walid edged back a bit and turned his head to the side, as a scowl creased his forehead. Then he turned back to Johnson. “So, my dear doctor, welcome to our monastery. I hope you will be comfortable during your stay. I’m sorry that we can only offer you some rather rugged cells that were occupied by monks when our ranks were larger. But, I must admit, what I am most curious about is why you are here. What can we poor monks do for you?”

  “Well, I have a story to tell you, and a favor to ask.”

  Stepping forward, Brother Walid took Johnson by the arm. “Wonderful. Sounds like a mystery. Come,” he said, turning Johnson around and nodding his head toward Rizzo. “Let’s get out of this pitiless sun.”

  Palm trees rose high above, shading the men from the sun. Brother Walid sat on one bench, his back resting against a tree trunk. “Wow . . . that is an amazing story,” he said to Doc, seated on another bench across the white pebbled path. “Certainly much more remarkable than mine. But you want to get to the library. Let’s head over there while I tell you more about the monastery.

  “St. Anthony lived here as a hermit. Up there, in a cave on the side of the mountain.” Brother Walid pointed to a platform high up the side of the escarpment, a long, winding staircase leading to it from the wadi floor. “It wasn’t until after he died that his disciples began to build this monastery. This was an excellent location. There were three springs of fresh water then. Even though there is only one now, flowing out of the side of the mountain, it’s more than enough to give us all the water we need for our community, our vegetable gardens, our orchards, our groves of olives and palms.”