Map of Bones (39 page)

“Don’t press your hand,” Raoul growled. “I’d hate to have to chop it off, like your friend’s. We’ll continue this conversation when you’re here.”

The connection ended.

Gray lowered the phone.
So Raoul was in Lausanne
.

He waited for the train. It was the last train heading out. The deck was sparsely crowded. He studied his fellow travelers. No sign of Seichan. Were any spies for the Court here?

Finally the train arrived, clattering up the track. It glided to a stop with a piercing sigh of air. Gray climbed into the middle car, then hurriedly moved between cars toward the rear, hoping to shake any tail.

In the gap between the last two cars, Seichan waited.

She did not acknowledge him, except to hand him a long leather duster. She turned and shouldered out an emergency exit that opened on the opposite side of the track, away from the deck.

He followed, dropping down. He tugged on the jacket and pulled up the collar.

Seichan hurried across another track and up onto a neighboring deck. They left the station, and Gray found himself at the edge of a parking lot.

A BMW motorcycle, black and yellow, stood a step away.

“Climb on,” Seichan said. “You’ll have to drive. My shoulder…” She had abandoned the sling to ride here from the rental office, but it was another fifty miles to Lausanne.

Gray hopped in front, kicking back the tail of his jacket. The bike was still warm.

She climbed behind him and put her good arm around his waist.

Gray gunned the engine. He had already memorized the roads from here to Lausanne. He raced out of the parking lot and throttled up once out on the street. He zipped toward the highway that led out of Geneva and into the mountains.

His headlights speared ahead.

He chased the light, faster and faster, winds whipping his jacket edge. Seichan leaned tighter against him, arm around him, hand under his jacket. Fingers clutched his belt.

He resisted the urge to force her arm away. Wise or not, he had made this bed. He blasted up the narrow highway. They needed to reach Lausanne a half hour ahead of the train. Would it be enough time?

As he wound up into the heights that bordered the lake, Gray’s mind drifted back to his conversation with Monk. What had Monk been trying to tell him?
They let me go
. That was plain enough. But what had Monk been implying?

He considered his earlier assessment, back in Egypt. He had known the Court would let Monk go. The release was done to ensure and lure Gray’s cooperation. And Raoul still had Rachel as a bargaining chip.

They let me go
.

Was there more to his release? The Court was ruthless. They were not known to give away potential assets. They had used Monk’s torture to ply Rachel into talking. Would they give up such an asset so readily? Monk was right. Not unless the Court had an even better hold on Rachel.

But what?

2:02
A
.
M
.
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND

R
ACHEL SAT
in her cell, numb and exhausted.

Any time she closed her eyes, she again relived the horror. She saw the ax swinging down. Monk’s body jerking up. His chopped hand flopping across the deck like a landed fish. Blood spraying.

Alberto had yelled at Raoul for his action—not for his brutality, but because he wanted the man still alive. Raoul had waved away his concern. A tourniquet had been applied. Alberto had Raoul’s men drag Monk down to the ship’s galley.

Later, she had been informed by one of the Guild women that he still lived. Two hours later, the hydrofoil had sailed up to an island in the Mediterranean. They were transferred to a small private jet.

Rachel had spotted Monk, groggy, his severed wrist bandaged to the elbow, strapped to a stretcher. She was then locked in a back compartment. Alone. No windows. Over the course of another five hours, they landed twice. She was finally let out.

Monk was gone.

Raoul had blindfolded and gagged her. She was transferred from plane to truck. Another half hour of twisty driving and they arrived at their final destination. She heard the wheels bumping over wooden planks. A bridge. The truck braked to a stop.

Dragged out, she heard a cacophony of growling and barking, loud, angry, large. A kennel of some sort.

She was led by the elbow through an opening and down steps. A door closed behind her, shutting off the barking. She smelled cold stone and dampness. She had also felt the pressure elevation as the truck drove up here.

Mountains.

Finally she was shoved forward and tripped over a sill. She landed hard on hands and knees.

Raoul grabbed her rear with both hands and laughed. “Already begging for it.”

Rachel leapt away and crashed her shoulder into something solid. Her soggy gag and hood were pulled off. Rubbing her shoulder, she stared around the small stone cell. Again no windows. Her sense of time was beginning to slip. The only furniture in the cell was a steel cot. A thin mattress rolled up on one end. A pillow rested on top. No sheets.

The cell had no bars. One wall was a solid sheet of glass, except for a rubber-sealed door and fist-sized ventilation holes. But even the holes had tiny lids that could be swung over the openings, for soundproofing or a way to slowly suffocate the prisoner.

She had been left down here for over an hour.

Not even any guards. Though she did hear voices down the hall, probably posted at the stairwell.

A commotion sounded. She lifted her face and stood. She heard Raoul’s coarse voice, orders barked. She backed from the glass wall. Her clothes had been returned to her on the boat, but she had no weapons.

Raoul appeared, flanked by two men.

He did not look happy.

“Get her out of there,” he spat.

A key opened the door. She was dragged out.

“This way,” Raoul said. He led her down the hallway.

She spotted other cells, some sealed like hers, others open and stacked with wine bottles.

Raoul marched her to the stairs and up to a dark moonlit courtyard. Stone walls towered on all sides. An archway, sealed by a portcullis, led out to a narrow bridge that spanned a gorge.

She was in a castle.

A row of trucks lined the wall nearest the gateway.

Along a neighboring wall, a long row of twenty chain-link cages stretched. Low grumbles rose from that corner. Large shadows shifted, muscular, powerful.

Raoul must have noted her attention. “Perro de Presa Canario,” he said with a note of savage pride. “Fighting dogs, an ancestral line from the 1800s. Perfection of breeding. Pure pit fighter. All muscle, jaws, and teeth.”

Rachel wondered if he was also describing himself.

Raoul led her away from the gate and toward the central keep. Two tiers of stairs led up to a thick oak door. It was brightly lit by sconces, almost inviting. But they didn’t go that way. A side door led to a level beneath the stairs.

Using a touchpad, he unlocked the lower door.

As the door swung open, Rachel caught a whiff of antiseptic and something darker, more fetid. She was forced into a square room, brightly lit with fluorescent bulbs. Stone walls, linoleum floor. A single guard stood before the one door that led away.

Raoul crossed and opened it.

Beyond stretched a long, sterile hallway. A series of rooms opened off it. She glanced into a few as she was marched down the passage. Stainless-steel cages filled one. Banks of computers tied to rows of plates occupied another. Electromagnets, she guessed, used to experiment with the m-state compounds. A third chamber held a single steel table, shaped in a rough X. Leather straps indicated that the table was meant to hold a man or woman spread-eagled. A surgical lamp hung above it.

The sight chilled her to the bone.

Another six rooms stretched beyond. She had seen enough and was happy to stop alongside a door on the opposite wall.

Raoul knocked and pushed inside.

Rachel was surprised by the contrast. It was like stepping into the turn-of-the-century parlor of a distinguished Royal Society scholar. The room here was all polished mahogany and walnut. Underfoot spread a thick Turkish rug patterned in crimson and emerald.

Bookshelves and display cabinets lined all the walls, filled with neatly arranged texts. Behind glass, she noted first-edition copies of
Principia
by Sir Isaac Newton, and beside it, Darwin’s
Origin of Species
. There was also an illuminated Egyptian manuscript spread open in one case. Rachel wondered if it was the one that had been stolen from the Cairo museum, the forged text with the encrypted stanzas that had started this whole murderous adventure.

Everywhere she looked there was artwork. Etruscan and Roman statuary decorated the shelves, including a two-foot-tall Persian horse, the head broken off, a masterpiece stolen from Iran a decade ago, supposedly representing Alexander the Great’s famous horse, Bucephalus. Paintings stood above cabinets. She knew one was a Rembrandt, another a Raphael.

But resting in the center of the room was a massive carved mahogany desk. It rested near a stacked-stone, floor-to-ceiling fireplace. Small flames flickered in the hearth.

“
Professore
!” Raoul called, closing the door behind them.

Through a back door leading to other private rooms, Dr. Alberto Menardi entered. He wore a black smoking jacket trimmed in crimson. He had the gall to be still wearing his clerical Roman collar above a black shirt.

He carried a book under one arm and shook a finger at Rachel. “You haven’t been totally honest with us.”

Rachel felt her heart stop beating, her breath became trapped.

Alberto turned to Raoul. “And if you hadn’t distracted me with the need to mend that American’s wrist, I would’ve discovered this sooner. Both of you, come here.”

They were waved to the cluttered desk.

Rachel noted her map of the Mediterranean spread out on the top. New lines had been added, circles, meridians, degree marks. Tiny arcane numbers were inscribed along one edge of the map. A compass and T square rested beside it, along with a sextant. Plainly, Alberto had been working on this puzzle, either not trusting Rachel or figuring she and her uncle were too obtuse.

The prefect tapped the map. “Rome is
not
the next place.”

Rachel forced herself not to flinch.

Alberto continued, “All the subtext to this geometric design signifies forward motion in time. Even this hourglass, it segments time, marching forward one grain at a time, to the inevitable end. For this reason, the symbol of the hourglass has always represented death, the end of time. To have an hourglass show up here can only mean one thing.”

Raoul’s frown deepened, indicating his lack of understanding.

Alberto sighed. “Obviously, it signifies the end of this journey. I’m sure that wherever this clue points, it marks the last stop.”

Rachel felt Raoul stir beside her. They were close to their end goal. But they didn’t have the gold key, and for all Alberto’s intelligence, he hadn’t solved the complete riddle yet. But he would.

“It can’t be Rome,” Alberto said. “That’s moving backward, not forward. There is another mystery to solve here.”

Rachel shook her head, feigning exhausted disinterest. “That’s all we could calculate before we were attacked.” She waved around his room. “We didn’t have your resources.”

Alberto studied her as she spoke. She stared, unflinching.

“I…I believe you,” he said slowly. “Monsignor Vigor is quite sharp, but this riddle is layered in mystery.”

Rachel kept her features dull, allowing some fear to show, acting cowed. Alberto worked alone. He’d plainly ensconced himself in here to solve the Court’s mysteries. Trusting no one else, conceited in his own superiority. He would not understand the value of the wider perspective, a diversification of viewpoint. It had taken the entire team’s expertise to piece the mystery together, not the work of one man.

But the prefect was no fool. “Still,” he said, “we should be sure. You kept hidden the discovery of the gold key. Maybe there’s more you kept hidden.”

Fear edged higher. “I’ve told you everything,” she swore with mustered conviction. Would they believe her? Would they torture her?

She swallowed hard, trying to hide it. She would never talk. Too much was at stake. She had seen the power displayed in Rome and Alexandria. The Dragon Court must never possess it.

Even Monk’s life would be forfeit from here. They were both soldiers. Back on the hydrofoil, she had given the information about the gold key not only to spare Monk, but also to engage Gray, to give him a chance to do something. It had seemed a reasonable risk. Like now, the Court had still been missing a vital piece of the puzzle. She had to hold on to the discovery of Avignon and the French papacy.

Or all would be lost.

Alberto shrugged. “There’s only one way to find out if you know more. It’s time we ensured the complete truth from you. Take her next door. We should be ready.”

Rachel’s breathing grew quicker, but she could not seem to get enough air. She was manhandled by Raoul back out the door. Alberto followed, shedding his jacket, ready to get down to work.

Rachel pictured again Monk’s hand flopping on the ship’s deck. She had to gird herself for worse. They must not know. Not ever. No reason would be good enough for her to reveal the truth.

As Rachel stepped out into the hall, she saw that the far room, the one that held the strange X-shaped table, was lit up much brighter. Someone had turned on the overhead surgical lamp.

Raoul partially blocked the view. She spotted an IV bottle on a stand. A tray of long surgical instruments, sharp-edged, corkscrewed, and razor-toothed. A figure was strapped to the table.

Oh God…Monk…?

“We can stretch this interrogation all night long,” Alberto promised, stepping past to enter the room first. He crossed and donned a pair of sterile latex gloves.

Raoul finally dragged her forward into the suite of surgical horrors.

Rachel finally saw who was strapped to the table, pinioned, limbs stretched and tied, nose already dripping blood.