The Key of Knowledge

by Michael Lackey

  "Yeah, where to go. HA!" scoffed James.

  Micah kicked him under the table. "Good try, kid. Can't feel anything there, remember? Just chair."

  "Why did it work with me and not James? Or any of you?" questioned Lucy.

  "The voice called you a chosen. It spoke about a long mountain in Colorado. We will have to search the archives to figure out which mountain that is," James said. "There are a lot of mountain areas there. We have our work cut out for us."

  Stan added, "It said once there, the one woman will see by moonlight. I'm sure the one woman is you, and by moonlight, you will see the key."

  "I can't wait to leave!" James said in a more excited tone that he had ever used. "I haven't felt this close in years!"

  "Do we wait for Gerard to get back on his feet?" Micah asked.

  Stan shook her head, "No, I will explain everything to Jaso, and he will come. Gerard should stay here. He will need all the rest he can get." She clasped her hands in front of her, "Besides, we still need to figure out exactly where we are going."

  James picked up both stones again. "Lucy, see if they have anything else to say." He handed them to her and everyone held their breath.

  Lucy held them in her hands, giving them a little shake. When nothing happened, she tried to ease the tension. "Sorry. Maybe they are just starter stones?" she said with a chuckle.

  THE NEXT MORNING STAN went to check on Gerard. "I can't stand to see you lying there like that. You were always the strong one. You have to get better." Tears streamed down her face, dropping onto the dark gray blanket covering Gerard. "You need to get better not just for me, but for our son as well."

  She heard a creak in the floor behind her in the doorway. Stan spun around to see Jaso staring at her. "Our son?" he asked. "My mother was killed along with my sister by the Countess. What, did you and my father have an affair?"

  Stan walked closer to him. Jaso held up his hands to stop her. "Just answer the question."

  "No, we did not have an affair. Gerard loved Alyssa more than life itself, he still does. She and Emily were his world," she told him. "When he lost them, he was devastated. It drove him mad in his pursuit of the Countess. You were the result of a love he was afraid to share. He felt it disrespected the memory of what he and Alyssa had. He pushed me away."

  "That doesn't explain how I was told I was her child and not yours. Who else knows this?" he asked.

  Stan wiped her tears again. "No one knew except for Conrad. It was even before James came into the Synod. Everyone else that was here at the time is gone. We felt it would be better for you. He felt that way. His love for Alyssa was greater than anything I could ever give him until I gave him you. I love your father, and for one night, he loved me."

  Jaso walked past her to his father's bedside. He took his hand. "Why didn't you tell me this? Why keep me in the dark?" he asked.

  Stan placed her hand on his shoulder, "He didn't want you to be disappointed in him."

  Jaso turned to face her, his face riddled with confusion and anger. "So, he rather I live in a lie, and think that my mother is dead to protect his image?"

  Stan tried to respond, but he pushed past her, leaving her to watch him storm out.

  LUCY WAS BACK IN HER room listening to Conrad’s heavy-metal music on the iHome device. She looked at herself in the mirror. "The stones called me a chosen. Chosen by whom?" she thought. She looked to her elbow and ran her finger across the bandage.

  A knock at her door had her jumping. "It's open!" she shouted.

  Micah came in with a plate in one hand and two sodas in the other. "What's this?" she asked.

  "Grilled cheese. I thought we could share one and talk," Micah said with a smile.

  They sat down at a rickety little table. Each had a half of sandwich and a soda.

  "Flo makes the best grilled cheese."

  "Actually, I made this one," he said. As she snickered, he added, "What? I got skills!"

  They laughed and toasted each other with the sandwich halves.

  "I wanted to talk about Stone Mountain," he said with a sly smile.

  Lucy felt her breath leave her as the memory of their connection flooded her mind.

  "I don't think there's anyone here that can't tell that I like you, Lucy. I like you a lot," he told her as he took her hand. "I came here looking for something, and now I believe I've found it, in you."

  "I like you too, Micah, but there is something you need to know about..."

  Micah cut her off, placing a finger on her lips. "You just told me everything I need to know." He wrapped his hand around the back of her neck and pulled her to him, into the kiss they both had been thinking about since Georgia. She opened her eyes to see him smiling. "I had to do that before we head out. Jaso found something in the Language Arts Wing. I'll be waiting with the others at the ship when you're ready." Micah picked up the rest of his sandwich, and walked out the door.

  Lucy tried to speak, but she seemed to have lost her voice. She touched her lips as her fingers were still quivering. "I'll... be right up?" she said even though he had been gone for a good five minutes. She composed herself and grabbed her bag before heading to the Silvertooth. Lucy was walking through Gallery 305 toward the elevator when Walter approached her.

  "Miss Ducit, if I may borrow a moment of your time, please."

  "Make it fast, Walter. I have to meet the others," she said.

  The odd little bot produced a small, folded piece of paper. "I found this laying on the floor outside the workshop. My optical scanners believe this to be the writing of Mr. Otto."

  Lucy took the paper. It was a page from the diary that had been ripped out. She immediately dropped her backpack and searched for the diary. Scanning the pages, she found where it came from. "Someone took pages from the diary!” She ran for the elevator in a rush to speak with Stan. “Thank you, Walter!" she called over her shoulder.

  Lucy reached the roof and saw James and Stan going over a supply list.

  "We've got trouble, guys!" she shouted. She came to a sliding stop in front of them.

  "Whoa! Calm down, kiddo. What's the problem?" asked Stan.

  Lucy held the page out for them to see. "This is a page from Gramps's diary that was ripped out. I have always had the diary either on me or in my room . So, it’s one of us... Who would tear pages out and why?" she asked.

  James took the paper and looked it over. "Do you know what this section talked about? Have you read it?" he asked.

  Lucy shrugged her shoulders. "Not sure. It's from the back, and I haven't gotten that far." She took the journal and flipped to the back where the pages came from. "It was the last entry, '15 January, 2058; I don't know how long I can hide Lucy from the Countess now, my cover has been blown. I know they will be coming for me and when they do, they will find her. I'm too old to fight, and my machines are not as efficient as they once were. I have finally found the riddle Dadeag told me all those years ago. I need to get the information to Gerard and the others in case something happens to me. The eyes of Lee are Gateway Stones. Where they lead, I'm still foggy on that. I think I went to find out, but my mind goes blank, almost like it was erased. The most disturbing thing I found out was that the Countess has a...' The page ended." she read aloud to them.

  Tears stained Lucy's face. She looked to Stan and James to try to make sense of things, "This is just days before he died. Do you think the Countess killed him for this? He wrote that she found out who he was and would be after him."

  "I don't think that's what happened, dear," Stan said. "What concerns me more is the last line. The Countess has a what?"

  James asked, "What does the torn-out page say?"

  Lucy handed it to Stan who unfolded it and began to read aloud. "This is not an official entry, I know, but I have figured out the keys! It was right in front of us this whole time. The priests that were present at the resurrection of Lazarus are not the keys. Azrael placed a curse on Caiaphas and his family, the five brothers of Ananus. I need to get t
his back to the Synod, but I must be careful. I know I’m being watched closely. Hopefully, with me staying on the run, it won't lead back to Lucy. The first key is the key of knowledge, find it and it will reveal the others. I am placing this journal inside one of my Enigma Boxes and sending it to the Met with a trusted friend in a steamer cab. I hope it's not too late." Stan started to cry and slowly shook her head. "He should have just come to us. We could have protected him."

  "That's not what he wanted. He tried to draw their attention away from you... and me," Lucy said with her head hung low. "That's why he sent the box here and stayed in the open. He came to me the week he died, and it felt like he was saying good-bye forever, but I just thought he was going on some trip. Gramps was always going to different places." Lucy stopped and could see the last puzzle piece fall into place. "He didn't travel for fun, did he? It was always for the Synod." She searched their faces waiting for an answer. "Wasn't it?" Tears burned her eyes as she clenched her hands into fists. "He gave his life to protect you and this group. We better make damn sure we get that key before the Countess does." She placed her hands on her grandfather's pistols that were now strapped to her thighs in their holsters. "And if I find out that the pages were torn out by a traitor in this group, I will personally kill them."

  Stan and James watched in silence as Lucy stormed up the ramp and onto the ship.

  Micah and Jaso arrived in time to hear the shouts and see Lucy exit. "Everything okay?" Micah asked.

  "Yes," Stan told him. "We will explain later. Did you guys find out anything about this long mountain?"

  "We think we know where it is. In the 1800’s Colorado was home to the Arapaho tribe. We believe that was their language, the language the stones were using at first," Jaso told them. "We found some mentions of the long mountain in the museum scrolls."

  Micah added, "We did some cross-referencing, comparing old and new maps, and we believe we know what mountain the stones were talking about."

  "Well, do you want us to guess?" James said holding his arms up and tapping his watch.

  "It's Pike's Peak," Jaso said. "And that's not all. According to the archives, almost exactly two hundred years ago Julia Holmes became the first woman to climb to the top of Pike's Peak. This cannot be a coincidence."

  Stan's brow furrowed. "Do we think this Julia Holmes was a Reaper?"

  "It sounds like it to me, but can’t be sure," Jaso answered. "We will go further in detail on board."

  "This is starting to sound crazy, guys," Micah added. "Wait until you see the paperwork."

  13 Julia Holmes

  Jaso was convinced Julia Holmes was the last chosen that the stones spoke of.

  "We don't know what we are going to face on that mountain-top. What I do know is that we must reach it before the Countess does," Jaso said.

  "Yeah, that's what that scene was that you just saw. Lucy found some of the pages from Conrad's journal had been ripped out," Stan told them. "So Ruina may have someone on the inside, some kind of mole."

  “That can’t be possible, can it?” Jaso asked.

  Stan shrugged her shoulders. “I hope not. I feel sorry for them if Lucy finds them if it is.”

  James looked at the materials and maps brought up by Micah and Jaso. "So, do we think this Julia Holmes was a Reaper? I mean, am I the only one that finds it odd that we are taking Lucy up almost exactly two hundred years from then?"

  Micah flipped through some papers. "Here is something I found. It's a letter Julia wrote to her mother from the top of the mountain." He pushed the paper to the center of the table for all to see. "If you just read the words, it's just sentiment to her mother. Now, if you look harder, I believe she is telling her what actually happened."

  Jaso read the letter read aloud,

  "Aug, 5th, 1858.

  Nearly everyone tried to discourage me from attempting it, but I believed that I should succeed; and now here I am. I feel that I would not have missed this glorious sight for anything at all."

  James had a very confused look on his face. You could almost see his brain working with his eyes squinted, and head tilted to one side. "That says nothing about the key," he said. "What she did or had to do or anything. Am I missing something?" he asked.

  Jaso laughed and took a small bottle of nitrous air from his pouch. "The first Reapers were not stupid. They had some pretty cool tricks up their sleeve. She wrote this on the top of Pike's Peak, where it's cold." He sprayed a light dusting of the frigid air across the letter. Soon, other lines and symbols appeared. "They couldn't risk just anyone reading this," he said with a wink.

  They examined the letter once more,

  "Nearly everyone tried to discourage me from facing the challenge of the first key, from attempting it, but I believed that I should succeed and end this torment at the hands of Satan's Captain; and here I am, by the grace of God, that I would not have missed this glorious battle and sight for anything at all."

  Stan read this new version out loud then placed the letter back on the table. "She mentions Satan's Captain, could that be Ruina? I know she's immortal, but we have no records of her or her minions before she took office."

  "Communications and records were not reliable then," James said. "The Countess could have been learning her power and it was passed off as folklore." He tapped his forehead with his finger trying to recall a story. "I remember hearing about a novel written in the late seventeen hundreds called The Tale of the Black Forest. It spoke of necromancy. It could have been her."

  Jaso started to pace back and forth, rubbing the stubble on his chin, "Okay, this Julia Holmes went to find the first key. The Key of Knowledge. So, what happened? What went wrong? What happened to her after the climb?"

  Micah shuffled the papers, "Hmm. There's nothing much about her after that. Her timeline just skips forward and speaks about her work with the National Women's Suffrage Movement, the New York Herald Tribune, and the Bureau of Education in Washington D.C. It's like it was a nice mountain hike and that's it."

  Tapping her fingers on the table, Stan asked, "Why does the letter end that way? She mentions the battle but nothing afterward."

  "I think she wrote this before the battle," Micah chimed in. "The question is what happened afterward? If she lost the battle, or whatever it was she engaged in, why did she not write it down for future reference?"

  "It's almost as if her time as a Reaper was erased from that point forward," Jaso said to them.

  "Well, we can't let that discourage us," Stan said. "We have to finish what she started."

  They hear a loud boom as Lucy throws a cannister piston cleaner against a wall.

  "We need to get this ship in the air before Lucy blows a gyro gasket up there," James told them. "She seemed pretty mad."

  They gathered everything they thought would be needed and boarded the Silvertooth. Fire blazed in the furnaces and the balloon filled; they were soon airborne. It was nearly 1700 miles from the Met in New York to Pike's Peak in Colorado. A long journey was ahead of them, and they needed to be ready. Jaso paced back and forth across the deck. "We have a while before we get to the mountain, everyone needs to get some rest to be ready."

  James set the ship to autopilot and everyone headed to their rooms, leaving just Stan and Jaso. James looked to Jaso. "I'll be back in few minutes to take watch. I won't be far, I just don't like my ship to fly without me."

  Jaso gave him a nod and watched him descend into the cabin area.

  "Jaso, sweetie, since we have some time do you want to talk?" she asked him. "I'd be more than happy to listen."

  "There's nothing to talk about. I suggest we stay focused on the mission," he insisted.

  "Well, just know that anytime you feel you're ready, I'll be here for you," Stan replied. She watched him walk away and disappear into the shadows of the hallway where the galley was located. She wiped a tear from her cheek, "One day. And when that day comes, I’ll be ready."

  They had been flying for what seemed to be forever whe
n a whistle could be heard throughout the ship, followed by James's voice. "Pike's Peak straight ahead! Everyone needs to be top-side!"

  The large, looming mountain-top was slowly coming into view. Snow covered peaks stretched upward, trying to reach heaven itself. The Silvertooth made its way toward the peak. "It's too quiet," Stan said. "I was expecting the Countess's foot soldiers."

  Lucy shrugged her shoulders, "Maybe we beat them here. If we hurry, we might be gone before they even arrive."

  "No, they're close," James said. "I can smell the stink of death."

  "Do we even know where to go or what to do?" asked Micah.

  "We need to have Lucy on the top of the peak when the moon reaches its highest," Stan said. "That is when the stones said she would see all." Stan curled her finger making air quotes when she said that.

  James looked to the sky and checked his compass. "Well, that gives us about three hours to reach the top, get set up, and be ready for whatever we have coming our way. I'm ready to get this done and get back home. I hate the cold air."

  "Why are we making a camp if we are trying to hurry?" Lucy asked.

  "It's better to be prepared rather than caught by surprise in haste," James told her.

  "Wow, that was pretty insightful, James," Micah said with eyes widened. He wasn't used to hearing that kind of motivation coming from the head tinker.

  James just shifted his eyes. "That's what Conrad always told me."

  The ship touched down on the snow-covered mountain as close to the top as they could get. There wasn't much room for the ship on the peak, but they found a flat area surrounded by beautiful red rock formations. The group filed out down the ramp. The ground crunched under Lucy's boots, uncovering a sign that read 'Pikes Peak Summit House'. She shivered in the chill of the night.

  Micah came up behind her and placed his arms around her. "A little colder here than we expected."

  "I don't feel the cold; I feel something else. I'm not sure what just yet."

  "I estimate it will take an hour and a half to reach the peak," Jaso told them. "That will give us plenty of time to set up and prepare... for whatever."