The Flames of Time (Flames of Time Series Book 1) (18 page)

After years of travelling, and losing all he had, he’d become what must’ve been a gaunt and ragged figure, subsisting by trading what he could hunt for food and shelter. Eventually, almost dead from exhaustion he’d found his way to the temple in Africa, where he studied and regained his health before taking the tests and winning the prize.

Upon returning to his home, he took the tablets with him and placed them in a sacred grove on the side of the great mountain overlooking his home. Here, unable to live amongst his own people after his many years of travelling, he chose to once again live by his hunting as a hermit, before moving on to take up his true life.

CHAPTER 13 - DEPARTURES

The clues pointing at Caesarea and Mount Erciyes looked promising, and after throwing the options around between us for a while, we decided to try and follow the route Harry and Marlow had identified overland from Byblos.

After the problems we’d had on our last excursion we decided to travel by car the whole way. This would allow us to retrace the route contained in the scroll precisely, hopefully confirming the landmarks and features described in the scroll as we went, while at the same time giving us a better understanding of the distances, and difficulties presented by the different terrain. It also promised to be a more comfortable journey, with less dependence on the vagaries of the local transport systems.

In actuality, while there may have been less packing and unpacking of equipment travelling by car, with all the stopping to examine landmarks and views along the way it still took us four days to cross the plains of northern Syria and reach the border with Turkey. On the up side, with every mile we travelled, the evidence for Harry and Marlow’s interpretation was building, with many of the subtle nuances mentioned in the scroll being credibly and often obviously located along the route. The rivers, mountains, woods and plains also seemed to be roughly in the right place, or certainly close enough to have been so all those years before. We still had no luck finding the elusive ‘City of the White Rock’, but there were noticeable limestone outcroppings across the entire Syrian plain, which could potentially have supplied just such a distinctive building material.

But it was once we got into the mountains of ancient Anatolia in north-western Turkey, that the description in the scroll really came into its own. Here the terrain had obviously changed less over the years, and we were easily able to identify the route described in the scroll as leading to Mount Erciyes and ancient Caesarea. Here though, we seemed to run into a problem, while the mountain was an unmistakable feature clearly described in the scroll, the modern-day city of Kayseri, which supposedly stood upon the site of ancient Caesarea, was just too close.

As we’d travelled we’d developed a good idea of how far it would have been possible for a person to walk or ride over the different types of terrain, and Kayseri was only a day’s walk at best from the mountain, across a gently undulating and easily traversed plain. According to the scroll it should have been at least two. But there was nothing else for it, the city couldn’t have moved, and if another had once stood nearby there was no sign of it now. In any event it was the mountain we were interested in, and after establishing ourselves at a hotel in the city centre, we proceeded to try and find some local information to help narrow the search.

Unfortunately, while there were any number of people who professed to know the mountain well, after a while it became clear the city residents were a little too far away to visit the mountain regularly. It was only as we got closer to the mountain itself, travelling through the small towns and villages which surrounded it that Androus managed to find an old man who used to regularly go hunting on it’s slopes. He told of an old path, part way up the mountainside where some of the stones had been carved or inscribed with markings since before his grandfather was a boy.

It was exactly this kind of information we’d been looking for. The old man was too old to act as a guide himself, but his intimate knowledge of the slopes and the details he provided about them was almost as good. The weather was still very mild, though winter couldn’t be far off, so after retrieving our equipment we drove out the way the old man had directed until we could take the cars no further, and then began making our way up the lower slopes of Erciyes on foot.

Even now in late summer the mountain was high enough for its peak to still have a snowy cap and white patches visible on the upper slopes. We all knew it wouldn’t be long before those patches started to enlarge and extend again, until they reached right down to the plains. Just a few more weeks and we might’ve had to wait until next spring before we could’ve attempted this search.

Strangely though, seeing where the snow and ice extended to, even in summer helped us to narrow the area of our search. There was no way anyone, including our adventurous Arathes, could live for several years amongst the permanent snow and ice on the upper slopes of this mountain. That narrowed the area down to the lower slopes, probably within a day’s climb from the plain.

We’d brought enough food and equipment with us to spend a few nights on the mountain, provided the weather didn’t get too bad. Carrying it all would make the climb a bit more arduous, but we’d only have to do it once, and then we could focus on the search without having to worry about getting back.

If anything, as we climbed it was a little too warm to begin with, but after a couple of hours the temperature seemed to drop to a more bearable level. It was a lovely day, and I could easily have been tempted to pitch camp in one of the small meadows along the way and enjoy the views. But every now and again we’d come across some carved or worn stone or step indicating we might be on some kind of trail, so we kept pushing on.

I was expecting Androus to struggle a bit with the exertion, but not only did he manage to make the climb, he also managed to maintain a lively discussion with Harry about the various small features we encountered along the way.

‘Ah yes,’ I could hear Harry enthuse, ‘more carved steps if I am not mistaken Chuk.’

‘Yes, yes Harrison, and they are still carved into the resident stone, rather than being built of already carved blocks.’ Androus enthused back, ‘but impossible to date. These could have been carved anywhere from a few hundred to a thousand or more years ago.’

We’d been climbing for about six hours and the temperature was still dropping with the altitude, so we decided to pitch our camp where it would still be comfortably warm, and to use that as a base from which to do further exploration.

We were quite high up now, and the view out over the Kayseri plain and the lower mountains and valleys beyond was quite spectacular in the crisp and clear Anatolian air. We selected a lightly wooded area that bordered onto a reasonably level mountain meadow with a small stream running through it. The lower reaches of the snowline were probably another day’s climb further, so we couldn’t go that much further before we’d be getting beyond the area that could reasonably be described as permanently inhabitable.

The old man in the village had directed us well, and after a sound nights sleep, it seemed we’d no sooner started our search the following day when we found what must have been the stones he had told us about. Peter and Luke had gone a little further up the mountain and moved across toward the west and a dark rocky outcropping that ran like a spine up the side of the mountain into the snowline. As they moved along toward the base of this feature they’d found an obviously shaped stone lying in the grass at an angle suggesting it may have fallen from above and planted itself in the soft ground. Further along they’d come across some more that may have been part of the same block, including a couple that had what could’ve been part of the same symbol we’d found in Uruk carved deeply into their surface.

It was enough of a lead for us to abandon our other search areas and concentrate our efforts. Peter and Luke would move further up the mountain to see if they could locate the site from which this rock might have fallen. Marlow and I would move further down the slope to see if anything might have fallen further, while Harry, Androus and Jean would make a more detailed examination of the area surrounding the rocks that had already been found.

It was a laborious task, and after a couple of hours of scrutinising and examining every odd shaped rock and boulder amongst a field of rocks and boulders, I couldn’t help but smile to myself at the apparent hopelessness of our task.

Marlow must have seen the expression on my face.

‘It’s like looking for a needle in a haystack, is it not George?’ he joked.

I couldn’t help but smile in return at his ability to read my mind. ‘I was thinking more like a needle on a haystack,’ I suggested.

‘And is that perhaps what you still think about this entire venture, as well?’ he asked with a slightly more earnest tone to his voice.

I stopped and looked up the slight slope we were on, towards him. It was strange, but as we looked at one another I was reminded of that first time we’d met, on the veranda of the hunting lodge in Africa. On that occasion we’d been bathed in the flame like shades of an African sunset, whereas now we were surrounded by the crisp alpine light of the Anatolian afternoon. There remained that dark stillness that I’d noticed growing within him since this all began, but somehow here, looking out over hundreds of miles toward the distant horizons it seemed more natural, and I felt comfortable returning his gaze and talking.

‘Yes, or more precisely that’s how it should be,’ I replied, ‘but I think this particular needle wants to be found, and is perhaps even drawing us toward it. Whether we like it or not; whether we’re ready or not; and whether we understand what it will mean once we have it.

‘Somehow,’ I continued, feeling a sudden urge to see how he’d react. ‘Somehow, I know we will find it Rob… I’m just not sure we’ll all still be friends when we do.’

He seemed to think about this for a moment before responding. ‘Perhaps, but I hope you’re wrong about that last part George.’

We continued our search for a few more hours, talking of other things, The growing unrest in Europe, especially Spain and Germany, as well as the turmoil within the Soviet Union and East Asia. Before eventually we were summoned back up the mountain by a call from the others.

We arrived back to find everyone a bit further up the mountainside toward where Peter and Luke had gone to search. There was another meadow up there with some stunted and ancient looking oak trees around a small chilly looking pool. Hidden toward the back of the meadow, behind a dense thicket of young trees, Peter had found a carved rock face beneath a natural overhang, and nearby the remains of a stone slab similar to the one we’d excavated in Uruk, in which the nine lapis tablets had been housed.

‘We found another section of this stone block further down the slope,’ Harry explained, by way of a recap. ‘It seems the tablets that were brought back by Arathes, were placed in this block in a similar configuration to what we saw in Uruk, but then, rather than burying it, it was located vertically in this carved alcove beneath the overhang. Another, larger block, was then placed in front of this one and carved with the same nine point clock symbol we saw before.

‘Sadly,’ continued Harry, ‘the tablets seem long gone. They must’ve been removed deliberately, and then the site destroyed afterward, with the ruined stone cast down the mountainside.’

‘You refer to the fact that these substantial stones were deliberately thrown down the slope?’ Jean asked.

‘Yes,’ responded Harry, ‘while part of the housing stone was found here, next to the alcove, the cover stone would have required a considerable amount of either time or effort to move across this clearing. I don’t think it likely this happened naturally, either by the ice and snow which covers these slopes in winter, or as a consequence of some rock fall, subsidence or tremor. It’s just too far across this meadow to the edge.’

‘It seems our journey has been wasted then,’ chipped in Luke with a tone of resignation in his voice. ‘the tablets have been taken, probably some hundreds, if not tens of hundreds of years ago. Either that or they too were precipitated down this slope to their destruction.’

‘No,’ interjected Marlow thoughtfully, looking around the group, ‘This journey has told us a great deal. Some of these tablets may have been found or destroyed by others who came before us. But to see such consistency in the way they were concealed and preserved, that tells us there will be others out there still hidden away and protected, just waiting to be found.’

‘Has this journey not also given us a better understanding,’ contributed Jean, ‘of what we can and cannot expect to deduce from the descriptions and directions contained within the stories and accounts of these ancient and heroic individuals?’

For a moment I thought I saw a cloud pass across Luke’s eyes, some dark thought, or resentment at the response he’d received, but a moment later it was gone and his natural good humour seemed to return to him.

Despite what we’d said to Luke, it was still an anti-climax to find this ancient site, with its tantalising evidence of what might have been. But the afternoon was getting on, and as a suggestion of cooler air had started to creep down the mountainside toward us, we were all motivated to move on. Perhaps it was only the first hint of Autumn coming to the region and making a tentative grasp at the high ground, but it spurred us on. There was the usual documentation of the scene to go through, but with sketches and drawings complete, we made our retreat down to the camp in the rich evening light, before heading back down the mountain the following day.

We’d been fortunate with the weather on this occasion, but as we headed back to Jerusalem, even though we were travelling toward warmer climes, it was obvious the seasons were now changing everywhere.

A few days later and we were back in Jerusalem and re-installed in the hotel which I was almost beginning to think of as my home. It was a pleasant routine to fall into for a while, but as the weeks turned into months without another breakthrough on the scroll, the routine began to feel more like a rut.