Ancient Echoes (39 page)

He couldn't think of that now. Instead, he did his best to
concentrate on the silence all around. Still, his mind wouldn’t allow such
peace.

The scent of the forest changed from that of firs and brush
to one much more floral and aromatic. He knew what was coming.

His body tensed, torn between the need to see her, and
wanting to run from what was unnatural and wrong. He turned to force himself
back to the stables.

“Michael.”

He froze. It was a voice, but not a voice. The sound came
from inside his head.

He shut his eyes.
This is madness.
When he opened
them again, she stood before him.

Was this insanity, or was he seeing more of the reality and
complexity of the world than he ever thought possible?

She stood in front of a shimmering garden of white and rose
pink peonies. She wore a simple, long-sleeved dress, the color of the sea, with
a Chinese collar and frog fasteners across the bodice and down one side. The
thick braid of her hair hung to her waist, a plain style for a woman of her
position, yet on her it looked regal and elegant.

“Lady Hsieh.”

She glided toward him. “I could not stay away and leave you
to this danger.”

Joy along with sadness filled him. “I'm glad you didn't.”

Her eyes traced his face. “You must free the men trapped
here by the gold and the book. You must destroy all this. In doing so, you will
free yourself.”

“What about you?” He stepped closer. “If this is gone, will
I ever see you again?”

She shook her head.
“No, but there is no
other way.”

“Then I can’t do what you ask.”

“You must. It’s not your fault. It’s mine.” She took his
hand and led him away from the stables toward the fence that circled the
village. He followed in silence until she stopped. She dropped his hand and
kept her back to him. Head bowed, she began to speak. “After I performed my
magic, using the ancient practice my grandmother taught, I achieved what I
thought I wanted.” She shuddered. “But I learned that immortality only means
great loneliness...eternal loneliness, not heaven or hell, but nothing.
A vast, empty wasteland.
Only when I was freed from the
alchemical spell could I go on to the true afterlife, a place that’s home,
that’s a comfort to the soul. But I left it to return here.
To
warn you.”

She faced him then, her eyes like black pools. “You can't
allow this world to continue or the evil here to spread. You must stop it.”

“How can I do that?” He caught her hands in his and held
them to his chest.

She shut her eyes as a tremor rippled through her. “All I
know is that you will understand when the time comes. You will do what’s right.
It's the only way. You're a good man, Michael. There is much for you to do in
your life. Follow your instincts, trust them, for only in them will you find
the fulfillment you crave.”

“And you will come with me?” he asked.

She looked toward the heavens. The moon appeared as a narrow
sliver in the dark sky. “I cannot.”

“I won’t leave you.” He clasped her arms.

She shook her head. “I’m not the one you want. I wish I was.
I wish I had known you when I was a part of the world, your world. But the one
you love…her life is not what you imagine. Find her.”

He shook his head. “She’s nothing to me.”

“She did not betray you.”

He winced, surprised the memory still hurt. He didn’t want
to open that wound ever again. He had learned that lesson well. “Whatever did
or did not happen, it ended long ago. She has a husband and a child now. She
was part of my past. But you are my present, and I want you to be in my future.
I’ve never felt the connection with anyone else that I do with you.”

“Because with me there is no pretense.
It is pure…what?
Feeling?
Intuition?”
She smiled at him. “My dear Michael, for you this is not enough. You have a
generous heart, one that should know true love one day, and I hope and pray
that you will. But first, you still have much to do, beginning with finding a
way to leave this place, and then to destroy it.”

“Destroy it?” He cupped her face. She took his breath way.
“How can I, when you’re here?”

Tears filled her eyes as she looked at him. “You must do it
before it kills you. If you hesitate, you will die. There are forces that will
try to stop you and make it impossible for you to escape. You must not let them
win!”

“I’ll be all right,” he whispered, as he wiped a tear from
her cheek.

“I'm breaking so many rules, so many laws to have spent
these few minutes with you.”

“Don't say that!”

She began to walk away, but he spun her around so they were
face-to-face.

Instead of fighting him, a haunted look came over her and
threw
herself
into his arms. “My name is Lin,” she
whispered, holding him close.

“Lin.” He molded her to him. She was so real, in every way,
it hurt his heart to think she would ever leave him. “Stay with me. Find a
way.”

She tilted back her head to look up at him. Her fingers
lightly touched his scratchy beard, his eyes, his brows, as if she wanted to
memorize not only his look, but how he felt, everything about him. “It is
impossible, Michael. I should not even be here now. But for one moment I wanted
joy. I wanted to know how it felt to look at a man and to know passion, to know
love.”

She lifted her arms to circle his neck. She stood on her
toes as he bent his head and their lips met. He lifted her, holding her, as she
kissed him the way she had never kissed a man before, feeling passion, desire,
and joy.

Breathless, she drew back, breaking his hold. Her gaze never
leaving him, she stepped backwards, once, twice. “Now, I do.”

“No, wait,” he said as he reached for her.

Her gaze filled with despair and longing.

And then she was gone.

New York City

JIANJUN PACED BACK and forth in his
bedroom. He was quickly running out of time and patience, but didn’t know what
to do next. He checked on the spy monitor to see if Vandenburg made or received
any interesting calls. He was stunned to see that she had phoned Calvin Phaylor
the day before. They talked for three minutes. Next, she made and accepted no
calls for over an hour, followed by a five-minute call to Milton Zonovich at
6:30 p.m. He wondered what had happened in that interval.

He used his laptop to access Calvin Phaylor’s phone log and
saw that Zonovich called Phaylor at 6:35 p.m., right after he talked to
Vandenburg. Jianjun wondered if Zonovich called to report on Vandenburg.

It didn’t take long for him to tap into Zonovich’s phone
records, to see who else the man talked to. He never expected what he found.

If the calls meant what he thought, he needed to quickly set
several complex steps in motion.

He worked on his plan for the next two hours, careful to
cover his trail. If he was wrong, his actions would leave a lot of people
plenty pissed off.

Then he left the house.

He went to the Starbucks next door to Vandenburg’s apartment
building, and with a grande breve in front of him, he set up his laptop. Using
the spy monitor to clone Vandenburg’s phone, he synced it to her computer via
Wi-Fi. As he suspected, she hadn’t bothered to password protect it.

Such a trusting soul, he thought, and proceeded to download
her computer files to his hard drive. Most of her files, including emails, were
remarkably short. He opened the files, one by one,
then
scratched his head.

What had happened to all the information that should have
been there?
All the stuff about Idaho and alchemy?

Some information was there, but not in nearly enough detail.
He missed something important. Could she have a second computer? One his cell
phone couldn’t locate?

He needed to go to her home, scout around, tap into her
personal home wireless system and see everything she had available.

He gulped down the rest of his breve and went into the men’s
room of the coffee shop. He was thin enough that he could fit through the
window. He found himself in an alley behind Vandenburg’s apartment building,
the exit for its parking garage. He waited until someone drove out of the garage
distracted. An older woman on a cell phone provided his opportunity. As the
garage door opened for her, he snuck past her into the parking facility,
then
got on an elevator with another patron. She started to
complain, but he smiled, bowed, and acted very foreign. That went a long way
with certain overly politically correct types who tried hard not to offend.

He got off on Vandenburg’s floor and rang the doorbell. She
would be upset that he had gotten past the doorman, but he had a speech ready.

No answer.

He rang again. From what he’d read, her daughter had a
full-time nurse. Someone should be home.

After another ring and a longer wait, he took out his
lockset and picked the front door lock. The deadbolt wasn’t on, and neither was
the alarm system.

He told himself he shouldn’t be nervous about it. He could
search for another computer, go through her files, do whatever it took to
discover how much she knew, then leave.

He walked into the plush living room and froze.

There, on the floor, lay Jennifer Vandenburg. The marks on
her throat, bulging of her eyes, and still-wet foam on her lips told him she
had been strangled…and not very long ago.

He backed away, ready to turn and run. But before he could,
he felt something hard jab into his back. He didn’t need to see it to know it
was a gun.

CHARLOTTE LISTENED WITH amazement
as Melisse relayed her strange experience with Thaddeus Kohler and the glowing
red stone he wore.

Charlotte put the description of the stone together with the
manuscript Will Durham had given her. Then she went to Kohler.

“We need the philosopher’s stone,” Charlotte said. At his
startled look, she continued. “I’m sure you have found the six stones that were
left here by the men of the Secret Expedition. I need them.
Now.”

“How do you know about such things?” he asked.

“I read about it before coming here, and put it together
with an interesting tale from Melisse.”

Kohler’s jaw stiffened while Will Durham gave her a slight nod
to show gratitude she hadn’t spoken of his role in this.

“What makes you think a philosopher’s stone would do you any
good, if such a thing existed?” Kohler asked. “Or that you would know how to
use one?”

“Everything in alchemy starts with the stone.
The Book
states
that. Lionel and I can spend years trying to make one, just as Nicolas Flamel
and his wife did, or we can start with one that already exists. I suggest the
latter.”

Kohler nodded. “What would you do with them?”

“Take them to the pillars. We would put them together,
touching each
other,
The Book
indicates that if
we heat the philosopher’s stone, a special gas will be released. Lionel and I
have collected some cinnabar, which can be found throughout this area. We will
mix it with the stone, and see what happens.”

“You have cinnabar?” he asked, both skeptical and surprised.

“Yes.” She knew Jake and others could find her some red
rocks. “Give us the stones, and we’ll do the rest.” She held out her hand.

His gaze hardened. By now, the other villagers were
listening, and all appeared equally reluctant to part with their precious
stones. “We’ll go with you,” Kohler said. “So we can see this for ourselves.”

o0o

“Only five men have gone with Charlotte and Lionel to the
pillars,” Michael said. “I didn’t see Arnie Tieg with them.”

“He’s probably in the guard tower,” Jake said. “And most
likely will be watching us.”

“We have to do something about that,” Michael said.

It took some convincing, but they got Brandi to go alone to
the guard tower. She stood at the bottom and called up to Arnie. “Hello?”

“What do you want, girl?”

“Nothing.”

“Then don’t bother me! You’ve got work to do.
Two plump rabbits to prepare for our dinner, and meat to dry for
the winter.
Get busy! They’ll be hungry when they get home.”

“But…I can’t. I mean, I can, but…it’s too much for me to do
alone! I don’t want to skin them, or touch all that inside stuff,” she wailed.
“It’s too disgusting!”

“What do you mean alone? Everyone is in the community
house.”

“Not anymore. They went into the tunnel, and told me I’m too
much trouble to go with them!” She began to sob loudly. “They said I should
stay and cook. But I can’t!”

“The tunnel!”
He ran down the
stairs. “Those bloody—”

As he reached the bottom of the stairs, and turned to run
toward the tunnels, Michael stepped out from the side of the community house.
Tieg noticed the movement, and spun toward him just as Michael swung a thick
piece of firewood against the side of his head.

He dropped like a stone. Jake helped Michael bind and gag
him.

“I did
good
, didn’t I?” Brandi all
but danced with excitement. “I always wanted to be an actress.”

“You did just great,” Michael said, causing her to beam with
pride.

“Take the kids,” Jake said to Quade and Melisse who had been
watching from the community house. “We’ve got to find those weapons, but if we
can’t, at least you’ll have a good head start.”

“We’ll go, as we agreed,” Quade said.

“If you find a Beretta,” Melisse said. “It’s mine. Those
bastards took it from me.”