The Adept Book 3 The Templar Treasure (27 page)

“You’d better bring those,” he instructed, pointing. “I don’t like despoiling the dead, but I don’t think the Brethren will mind—and the weapons may offer you some slight protection if the demons are allowed to get loose.”

Wordlessly Peregrine gathered the two swords in his arms, wide-eyed.

“Now back to the car as fast as we can make it,” Adam said. “And from there, on to Temple.”

Chapter Twenty-Six

THE TINY VILLAGE
of Temple had only one main street. The tidy rows of stone-built cottages flanking it stood blind and deaf as gravestones in the dead of this rainy September night, when all decent folk could be expected to be in their beds—and were, in Temple. In a wide field behind one of the rows of cottages, accessible only via an unpaved lane, the area’s sole reminder of former Templar eminence stood alone and aloof just behind the local primary school—a round-topped stone archway, dog-toothed and ancient, said to be all that remained of the former preceptory of Balantrodoch. Beyond the arch, between Gerard and a rectangular depression now occupied by the school’s playground, a slight mound marked the probable foundations of some of the structures formerly standing there. Stark as a cenotaph, the arch itself glimmered in the fitful moonlight like tarnished silver, casting faint shadows across the tall grass.

Henri Gerard was scarcely aware of these niceties of his surroundings. As he stood in the moonlight beneath the tall horseshoe sweep of the arch, oblivious to the lightly falling rain, he felt as if he had somehow stepped outside of time. His link with his own psychic past had never seemed more vivid to him than it did at this moment—as if only the thinnest of temporal membranes separated him now from that greater self, Guillaume de Nogaret. He could almost taste the moment—so exquisitely imminent now—when at last he would come into possession of the wealth and power that had so long been denied him.

Half-intoxicated with anticipation, he drew himself up to his full height, the Sceptre gripped in his right hand, the Seal cradled in his left. Oblivious to Logan, hunkered down in the shadows over his canvas tool-bag, he basked in the light of the moon while bright fantasies of triumphs yet to come paraded themselves before his mind’s eye.

But these glorious visions faded prematurely before the brief, intrusive image of Nathan Fiennes. The elderly Jewish scholar presented himself on his knees, hands clasped before him in mute appeal, as if imploring Gerard to turn back . . .

A cold thrill of fear touched the back of Gerard’s neck. Rather than yield to it, he banished the vision with a jarring bark of a laugh and a wave of the Sceptre in his hand, at the same time hugging the Seal closer to his breast. Then, eyes feverishly bright in his thin face, he took a firmer grip on the Seal he was holding in his left hand as, with his right, he brandished the Sceptre defiantly over his head and pronounced the potent opening words of an incantation as ancient as the rod itself.

The star of interlocking triangles at the head of the Sceptre began to glow. As the glow brightened, the star became a blur of golden flame. Gerard’s voice rose in crescendo until, with a sudden hoarse outcry, he swung the Sceptre downward to smite the ground in front of the arch with a final, raw Word of command.

Fire flared up and scorched the grass in a golden line running away from Gerard, accompanied by a faint subterranean rumble as of distant thunder. As Logan gaped in astonishment, a crack opened up along the scorch line on the far side of the arch, yawning and widening to disclose a dark passageway into which descended a massive flight of stone steps.

Elated, himself hardly able to believe what he had done, Gerard replaced the Seal in his belt pouch, then thrust the Sceptre through his belt like a sword before half turning to beckon to Logan. Setting his jaw, the thief picked up his tool-bag and moved to join the Frenchman at the top of the stair. Gerard had told him to have the big electric lantern ready—ridiculous in the moon-drenched field, Logan had thought at the time—but now it was evident why. Refusing to let himself be unnerved, Logan switched on the lantern and shone it down the stairs, following somewhat hesitantly at the Frenchman’s impatient gesture.

The stairs led down under the mound. At the bottom, a stone passageway led off to the right, with doorways opening from the left side. Gerard caught his breath as, peering ahead by the light of Logan’s lantern, he recognized the corridor he had seen while scrying with the aid of his crystal ball. Heart pounding, he quickened his pace to a trot, outstripping his accomplice.

The doors to the side chambers sagged drunkenly on rusty hinges, revealing chill cavities of darkness beyond, but true to Gerard’s vision, the last one on the left had been filled in with stones and mortar. Beckoning Logan closer with the lantern, the Frenchman ran his hands over the stonework, brushing aside dust and cobwebs like heavy gauze until, at eye level, he uncovered a lozenge of mortar that bore the stamped impression of a six—pointed star surrounded hv a wreath of Hebrew characters.

Quite involuntarily, Gerard let out a little cry of joyful anticipation. Removing the Seal itself from its waist pouch, he applied it firmly over the imprint. When there was no response, he put the Seal away again and turned to Logan with a look of wild-eyed impatience.

“A pickax,
here!”
he ordered. “Explosives could bring everything down.”

Logan’s thin lips tightened resentfully at his employer’s imperious tone of voice, but he thrust the lantern into Gerard’s hands and opened his tool-bag without comment, lifting out a short-handled pick.

“Keep the light on where I’m working,” he said, as he limbered up his shoulders in preparation to begin. “And give me plenty of room if you don’t want to get hit.”

Gerard gave him a gimlet look from under scowling brows, then backed away to the opposite wall. Setting his teeth, Logan hefted the pick and let swing the first blow. Shards of stone and ancient mortar flew back in a growing cloud of dust as he fell to his task. He would have stopped when he had cleared a hole large enough to admit them, but Gerard made him keep working until most of the original doorway was open. After nearly fifteen minutes, the Frenchman pronounced himself satisfied.

Logan fell back to wipe the sweat from his face. Time enough to exact his revenge for being treated like a serf by this oaf of a Frenchman. Gerard, meanwhile, had shouldered his way past the other man and darted through the opening, his pale face ablaze with anticipation.

Once inside, he stumbled to an abrupt halt, eyes wide with greedy awe. For set in the center of the round vaulted room, glitteringly revealed in the garish glare of the lantern, was a golden ark-shaped casket, sealed shut with a wafer of gold that bore the imprint of Solomon’s Seal. The lid of the casket was surmounted by four winged creatures facing outward toward the four quarters in unsleeping vigilance. Flanking the casket on either side was a pair of stout wooden carrying poles, once again recalling Gerard’s scrying vision.

As he continued to feast his gaze on the prize, one hand pressed to the Seal at his waist, the other caressing the star on the Sceptre, he became belatedly aware of other shapes in the room. Tearing his gaze away, he swung the beam of his lantern around and saw that this chamber had been left better guarded than the last he had violated.

These were no painted sentinels. Around the circular perimeter of the vault had been placed thirteen tall, straight-backed chairs with arms. Twelve of the thirteen chairs were occupied by the mummified remains of as many white-mantled Templar warriors. The guardians sat with their mail-coifed heads bowed low over gauntleted hands that clasped the quillons of their standing swords. The thirteenth seat, directly opposite the casket, stood vacant.

Entering behind the Frenchman, still carrying his pickax, Logan took a long, uneasy look around him and muttered a wondering imprecation.

“Jesus, Gerard, these people must have been as crazy as you are!”

Gerard rounded on him with a fierce contempt that made the thief recoil.

“Ah, que vous etes betes!”
he spat. “Having eyes, can you see nothing beyond the base material world? Even these accursed heretics knew that this life is merely a shadowy adjunct to the realms of the higher powers.”

He indicated the quiet forms of the dead Templars. Meeting the Frenchman’s hollow, burning gaze, Logan threw up his free hand in an ironic gesture of disclaimer.

“Okay, you can have your higher powers,” he allowed. “Forget I said anything. All I’m interested in is that box over there.”

He took a step toward the casket, but Gerard made a noise between his teeth and put himself squarely in the thief’s way.

“Fool!” he whispered. “You will get nothing from that casket without first reckoning with those higher powers you are so disposed to mock! Now, hold the light and be silent while I do what must be done to ensure our safety.”

Logan thought about bashing the Frenchman in the head then and there, but his memory of how the ground had opened to admit them where they now stood made him give a grudging nod instead, as he took the lantern and backed off a few paces. Satisfied, Gerard turned his back on the thief, and so missed seeing the way the other man surreptitiously tested the weight of his pickax. Oblivious to the dangerous gleam in his accomplice’s eyes, the Frenchman approached the casket with the reverent attitude of a priest entering a sanctuary. After carefully shifting aside the wooden staves, he reached into the breast pocket of his black jacket and took out a stick of compressed charcoal wrapped in a twist of thin white paper.

There were Hebraic symbols inscribed on the paper. Dropping down on one knee, Gerard raised both hands above his head and bowed his head. His lips moved, framing words whose echoes seemed to Logan to be too guttural to be either French or English. Having uttered them, the Frenchman took the charcoal stick and began to draw lines on the floor.

Curious in spite of himself, Logan edged closer in order to see better, following as Gerard’s sketching gradually went farther afield. By degrees, the Frenchman’s charcoal marks took the form of a double circle enclosing the casket, augmented by a running scrawl of writing between the two lines that the thief suspected might be Hebrew. His patience wearing thin, Logan overstepped the unfinished circle and stared down at the back of the other man’s bent head. His hand tightened on the pickax as he debated whether to strike now or after the casket was open.

Gerard seemed suddenly to become aware of him and turned sharply around. Standing his ground, Logan demanded, “How much longer is this going to take?”

“As long as is necessary,” Gerard snapped. “Now be silent!”

Another minute saw the circle closed off around them with an elaborate knot-flourish. Rocking back on his heels, Gerard took out the Seal and raised it above his head while he spoke more of the language he had uttered before. Then, getting to his feet, he slipped the Sceptre from his belt and raised it above his head, at the same time extending the Seal as he leaned forward and fitted it to its golden imprint on the casket.

For a moment nothing happened. Then the casket lid clicked upward a fraction with a slight, metallic ping. The ping was followed by a thin plume of sulphurous smoke. Then came the sound of a sibilant, long-drawn sigh.

A look of uncertainty crossed Gerard’s taut face, and he hugged the Seal to his breast as he considered what to do next. Lowering the Sceptre, he used the tip of it to prod the casket lid open a fraction farther. Very softly, something inside gave a chitter of malevolent laughter. Then, all at once, the lid slammed back as a sudden blast of noisome vapor rocketed upward out of the box.

Gerard recoiled with a strangled cry. Above his head the expanding vapor cloud writhed and began to separate into two loathly humanoid shapes . . .

* * *

As Adam and his associates raced toward Temple, an unquestioning Donald Cochrane at the wheel, Adam lowered his head and pressed his sapphire ring lightly to his forehead, letting McLeod and Peregrine navigate while he tried to regain the psychic equilibrium that the too-quick awakening in the burial vault at Rosslyn had cost him. For the next few minutes, he was only dimly conscious of the big estate car’s rushing momentum. But as they bore down on the outskirts of Temple, to McLeod’s low-voiced directions, he became aware of a building disturbance in the atmosphere overhanging the village. Ripples of dark energy battered past him like psychic shock waves, leaving few doubts as to their source.

Huddled contritely in the backseat with the Templar swords braced with one hand between him and McLeod, Peregrine was likewise aware of the rising storm of rebellious powers. Leaning forward in his seat, he asked in a subdued voice, “Adam, are we too late?”

“Yes and no,” Adam replied grimly, opening his eyes. “I very much fear that the genies are out of the bottle, but we may well be in time to put them back in. It will be at a cost, though.”

Dragging his medical bag up onto his knees, he took out the Crown, then slipped a couple of pre-loaded syringes into an outer pocket of his waxed jacket.

“What are those for?” Peregrine asked.

“Sedatives,” Adam said with bleak candor. “Even if, by some miracle, Gerard and his partner manage to survive tonight’ s ill-judged venture, I wouldn’t want to vouch for their state of mind.”