Oracle (11 page)

Professor grinned.
“But you’re so good at it.”

San Jose, Costa Rica

Jade stared at
the enormous stone sphere and felt the memories of the underground ordeal come flooding back.

After nearly three days, her recollection of the events of that night had mostly faded to something like the memory of a bad dream. What most occupied her thoughts and filled her with anxiety was not the terror she had experienced when the bomb had detonated, killing Acosta and Sanchez, or the ball court, or
hours spent making their way back to freedom, but rather the lingering uncertainty that surrounded the attempt on their lives. Why had Hodges turned on them? Who was he working for, and perhaps more importantly, working with? Until they knew that, they had to let the world believe that they were dead.

They had emerged from the labyrinthine cave system about an hour before dawn. After surviving the ball court, the rest of the journey was almost anticlimactic. They found another passage leading away and soon Professor reported that they were ascending. As before, the tunnel was wide and easy to negotiate. More than once, the way forward was blocked by cave-ins, but the knowledge that they were getting closer to escape supplied them with the energy to dig their way out. As they broke through one collapsed section of tunnel, Jade felt cool air rush in, and knew they were nearly free. A few minutes later, they wriggled through the opening and found themselves on the lower flanks of a stone pyramid—the Pyramid of the Moon. Their long undulating journey through the Underworld had brought them back to the surface a mere stone
’s throw from where it had begun.

The exit hole let out almost directly above the Plaza of the Moon, where the ancient inhabitants of the city had made sacrifices to the Great Goddess. The altar to the Great Goddess had, it seemed, been a literal passage to the Underworld.
Whether the entrance had been sealed by the original inhabitants as a way of protecting the power within, or by future inhabitants, was a question that would have to wait for another day. Jade and the others had carefully concealed evidence of their escape route before sneaking away from the archaeological preserve.

The site was swarming with activity—military vehicle
s and patrols—but there was no way to determine whether it was a search-and-rescue effort or a sweep to ensure that no one had survived the explosion. Inasmuch as the bomb had almost certainly been military ordnance, they had to assume the latter, and furthermore, that Hodges had the support of the Mexican Army or someone with influence over the government.

She and Dorion had spent a frustrating day sequestered away while Professor somehow procured fake passports and funds for travel.
“I know a guy who knows a guy. It’s a SEAL thing,” he had explained when she had asked, as if that answered everything. By afternoon of the following day, the trio that had escaped the Underworld realm of the Great Goddess were fifteen hundred miles away in Costa Rica.

Now however, as Jade stared at the enormous stone ball, she couldn
’t help but think about the strange discovery that had lit the fuse on this entire nightmare. Yet, this enormous sphere, which adorned a rooftop courtyard at the
Museo Nacional de Costa Rica
—one of more than three hundred such spheres, ranging in size from about two feet in diameter to well over six, uncovered in an overgrown river delta near the Pacific Coast over the course of the last century—was the reason they had come to the Central American country.

A walk through the museum had supplemented Jade
’s prior knowledge of the pre-Columbian history of Costa Rica. Because of its remote location and rugged terrain, the narrow isthmus had not supported the rise of advanced organized societies like its neighbors to the north, and so had remained outside Jade’s area of academic interest. For the most part, the physical remains of ancient cultures that had made the narrow strip of land between two oceans their home had been swallowed up by the jungle. One notable exception was a culture known as the Diquis, which had flourished from about the year 700 C.E. only to be wiped out completely, shortly after contact with European explorers in the sixteenth century. The Diquis were best known as the artisans who had created—probably, at least—the enormous stone spheres.

Little was actually known about the spheres, which had first been discovered in the 1930s by workers clearing the jungle to make room for banana plantations. They did not appear in the historical record, apparently forgotten by the last of the Diquis and overgrown by the rain forest long before the arrival of the Spanish colonists. The only way to estimate their age was by dating the soil horizons in which they had been found—a fairly reliable technique known as stratigraphy. It was believed that the earliest spheres had been carved about 600 C.E. but many of them had been disturbed or even destroyed by workmen and treasure hunters. What stratigraphy could not reveal was the reason why the primitive Diquis had made the enormous stone sculptures that were very nearly perfect spheres.

It was certainly possible that the orbs beneath the pyramids of Teotihuacan had no connection whatsoever to the Diquis spheres, but Jade wasn’t a believer in coincidence. This wasn’t as simple as disparate cultures discovering pyramidal architecture thousands of miles and hundreds of years apart; spheres were extremely rare in the ancient world. Unfortunately, trying to prove—or for that matter disprove—a connection was proving to be a tough nut to crack, especially since so little was known about what the locals called “Las Bolas.”

Jade reached out cautiously, placed her palm against the sphere, and closed her eyes.

“Well?” asked Professor.

She smiled without humor and drew back her hand.
“As they say around here, nada.”

“
So what’s the next move?”

“
There are several active archaeological sites in the south where the spheres were discovered. Most of them are in the Oso region, close to the town of Palmar Sur. I say we head there and look for anything that might indicate a connection to Teotihuacan: trade goods, artwork…” She glanced over at Dorion. “Maybe catch some WIMP vibes.”

She expected the physicist to correct the mischaracterization, but he surprised her by letting it pass.
“It may be that something about the shape of a sphere facilitates the collection of dark matter. We may very well experience more space-time distortions, particularly if a sphere has been undisturbed for a long period of time.”

From their tour of the museum, they had learned that nearly all of the spheres had been discovered in the valley of the Rio Grande de Terraba, just a few miles inland from the Pacific Ocean. Hundreds of them had already been removed and relocated so that they were now scattered all across the country, adorning parks and private gardens. Some had been destroyed, either because they were seen as an impediment to agricultural pursuits or because of an unfounded rumor that the spheres concealed golden treasure. Nevertheless, new sphere discoveries were happening all the time in the surrounding area and four archaeological sites in the Diquis Delta had been granted UNESCO World Heritage status. Jade hoped that, by viewing some of the spheres
in situ
, and relatively undisturbed, she might be able to formulate an answer to the riddle of the Teotihuacan spheres.

But secretly, she was also hoping for another glimpse of the future.

She did not pretend to understand Dorion’s explanation for the strange effect, but if it was true—if the phenomenon could be reproduced—it would open up a whole new understanding of ancient belief systems.

Maybe that was why Brian Hodges had tried to kill them.

They made their way back through the museum, a converted military fort located in the bustling downtown section of the capital city, and headed for their hotel just a few blocks away. As soon as they were on the steps outside, Professor begged off.

“
Hey, you two go on ahead. I’ll catch up.”

Jade raised a suspicious eyebrow.
“More SEAL stuff?”

Professor laughed easily.
“I could tell you, but…you know.” He drew a finger across his throat and made a gagging sound. “Don’t worry. I’ll be back in time for happy hour.”

Without further explanation, he headed back up the steps and vanished behind a gaggle of tourists. Jade felt a twinge of irritation, mostly because he hadn
’t deigned to consult with her before running off, but she shrugged it off. She had Dorion to keep her company, and now that she knew him a little better, and understood the reason for his awkwardness during their initial meeting, she almost found him charming, in a brainy nerd sort of way. Jade had decided to forego company in favor of a little indulgent luxury. She hadn’t even had a proper shower since their escape from the Teotihuacan Underworld.

Their hotel, the New Balmoral, was just a few blocks from the museum, walking distance along an avenue crowded with pedestrian traffic and street merchants hawking everything from handmade decorative ribbons to bootleg DVDs. San Jose was a pretty typical example of an old New World colonial capital. The architecture was like a mosaic of the city
’s history, from the 1850s to the 1950s, strongly influenced by the Spanish presence, but in between old churches and historic buildings, were the ever-present signs of twenty-first century encroachment: advertisements for Pizza Hut, McDonalds and the like.

Once back in her room, Jade started running a bath, but while she waited for the tub to fill up with hot water, she decided to have a look at the leather bound journal they had taken from the mummified remains of the Spanish explorer. Professor had entrusted it to her back in Mexico, but she had postponed reading it in the vain hopes that she might be able to do so in a climate controlled restoration laboratory. Since that wasn
’t an option, her air-conditioned hotel room would have to do.

The book seemed to have held up well despite the passage of centuries, probably because no one had touched it in all that time. She opened to the first page and started reading, translating as she went along.

23rd October, Anno Domini 1593

I am going to die here, and there will be no one to grant me absolution. I pray, let this serve as my final confession. May the Lord, in His mercy, grant me entry into the Kingdom of
Heaven.

I have not lived a virtuous life, yet in the days that have passed since my last confession, I have endeavored to carry out the will of God on Earth. If I have sinned, then my sin is Pride. Have I done these things for God’s glory, or my own? I think that if I had His blessing, this Fate would not have befallen me.

Four years ago, with my companion Alvaro Diego Menendez Castillo, I went forth on a mission to defeat the Heretic Queen’s conjurer, whose eyes see all
…

Jade flipped through the book until she found the last page, which included a signature: Gil Perez.

She thought the name sounded familiar, but since it was about as generic as John Smith, odds were good that she was merely confusing the author of this record with someone else. She flipped back to the front and found the words that had immediately aroused her interest.

The Heretic Queen’s conjurer whose eyes see all.

In 1593, or rather 1589 when the Spaniard had embarked on his mission, only one person would have been described as the Heretic Queen: Queen Elizabeth of England. England and Spain had been in a state of undeclared war for years, with English privateers raiding treasure galleons on the Spanish Main. The hostilities had reached a boiling point in 1588 when Spain sent an armada of ships to attack the British Isles, but in one of the greatest upsets in military history, English forces had devastated the Spanish Armada.

Historians had written volumes on the subject of the defeat of the Spanish Armada, analyzing the strategic situation and the military tactics employed, but one undisputed contributing factor had been the weather. A southwesterly wind had driven the Spanish ships into the stormy North Atlantic where nearly a third of them had been wrecked. King Phillip II had blamed the defeat of his forces on a “Protestant Wind.”

What very few legitimate historians mentioned was the role played by Dr. John Dee, alchemist, court astrologer and adviser to Queen Elizabeth in all matters relating to science and the occult, which in the sixteenth century, were effectively indistinguishable. According to some contemporary sources, Dee had predicted the coming of the decisive wind, and had used that foreknowledge to plan the English defenses.

Gil Perez had evidently bought into the hype, believing that Dee had not merely made a fortuitous meteorological prediction but actually employed uncanny power to give the English a strategic advantage. His mission to “defeat the Heretic Queen’s conjurer” had been the start of a journey that had ended three hundred feet below the Pyramid of the Sun, surrounded by orbs that imparted the ability to see the future, just as Dee had claimed to do. That cast everything Jade thought she knew about John Dee, not to mention science and the occult, in a new light.

With the book still in hand, she went to the tub, turned off the spigot, and let the water drain out. She could soak in a hot bath anytime; right now, she needed to know how Gil Perez had wound up in Mexico.