The Voynich Cypher (7 page)

But he wasn’t sure exactly what the Order expected him to do about it now.

Synthe glanced at his watch once again.

He was early for the meet.

As Deputy Grand Commander to the
Pauperes
Commilitones
Christi
Templique
Solomonici
– the Knights Templar – Diego Luca was the last in a long line of men who bore their hidden duty throughout their life, serving silently and with unquestioning loyalty. As the second most powerful officer in that shadow organization, he was responsible for the administration of a group which, supposedly, had expired centuries before; he was a ghost, a rumor in the hushed halls of the Church, a murmur at the highest levels of the Masonic order. It was common knowledge that the Knights Templar had met with extinction in the Middle Ages, and Luca was chartered with ensuring that history was never disturbed with even a hint of their continued operation.

The Templars had existed in secret after their public dismantling and persecution in 1312, when the few surviving members loyal to Pope Clement V agreed to become the clandestine arm of the Church. The order had aroused considerable resentment because of its power and financial success, so this newly created group would remain hidden, carrying out its duties in obscurity rather than in the public’s eye. Rumors would occasionally circulate of Templars in action, but they were always quickly hushed-up by the Church – which got to write the history books. Within a hundred years the Templars became nothing more than a legend, and from that point to the present, they would remain a shadow group that answered only to the Pope.

Beyond coordinating their affairs, Luca’s duties also included working in tandem with the Order of the Holy Relic, which, as tradition demanded, had to be afforded the greatest respect and reverence. Why, Luca could not really say – but that had been the multi-century edict handed down to those who had risen to the ultimate levels of authority. It had been that way forever, and there were some tenets one never questioned.

But centuries of calm had been overturned during the last few days. The Chamber Room at the Abbey had been breached and the Scroll had been stolen. The perpetrators remained unknown, although just today, the name of Professor Winston Twain had surfaced through the repentant, albeit forced, confession of a wayward member of the Order. That would have ordinarily been sufficient for Luca to mobilize resources; however, almost as soon as they’d discovered the professor’s identity, they’d been alerted that he was dead.

That brought them to a standstill – impotent – during the greatest crisis the Order had ever encountered. Which was why Luca was now in a car on his way to a meeting with Colonel Gabriel Synthe, a man who he disliked on principle. Synthe was an atheist and believed in nothing, as far as Luca could tell. That absence of faith made him a loose cannon. If you believed in nothing, then you were the center of the universe in your own mind – a state of affairs that was anathema to the beliefs Luca had devoted his life to protecting and nurturing.

A man without belief in God, or conviction in a supernatural realm outside of his own scope of understanding, was a danger. A man who operated on rogue solipsism, who negotiated through life as a virtual narcissist, could therefore only be motivated by the coarsest of principles.

Diego Luca sighed as he sat in the back of his limousine. His driver, Brother Misto, navigated silently to the meeting destination. The phone in the center console of the back seat warbled.

Luca picked it up. “Yes, sir,” he said in a voice barely above a whisper.

The voice that responded was deep; soothing, but forceful. Luca recognized it as the Religious Protector, His Beatitude Metropolitan Justinian – the head of the Knights Templar worldwide.

“I assume we have little progress,” the Religious Protector stated without rancor.

“That is correct, sir. The traitor wasn’t in good health, and he didn’t provide any real information before he slipped into a coma, beyond his interaction with Professor Twain.”

“I understand from the transcript that he did have some things to say – they just didn’t make any sense,” His Beatitude observed.

“Yes. If you’ve read it, you know all about the gibberish. ‘Eyes are upon you’ and ‘beware Rosenkreuz and Loyola’. I think the poor man was trying to throw out anything he could think of to shield himself from blame. I can’t see how the Rosicrucians have any hand in this, nor the Jesuits.”

There was a beat as the voice on the other end of the line made a humming sound.

“Perhaps. I’m calling to underscore that it’s critical that you and Colonel Synthe cooperate completely with each other, my son. You are aware of the importance of the Scroll, but you do not know its full significance.”

“Your eminence has never seen fit to include me in this confidentiality,” Luca said.

“Not you, nor others of your rank and stature before you – you shouldn’t take it personally,” the voice said consolingly. “But the Scroll
must
be recovered, and obstacles to that recovery must be surmounted at all costs.”

“Understood. I’ll work with Colonel Synthe closely until the matter is resolved,” Luca said – perhaps too forcefully, he thought.

“Keep me advised.”

That was the second telephone conversation that the Religious Protector and Luca had conducted in the past few days.
It was unprecedented.

Luca knew precious little about the Holy Scroll, even after the briefing that followed his promotion to his rank in the Templars. The sum of his knowledge could fit in a thimble – that it was sacred, that the Order was to protect it at all costs, and that it was part and parcel to the Voynich Manuscript. He was also aware that the language of the Voynich was regarded as an important and yet unsolved puzzle at the highest level of the Church, but he didn’t know why.

Regardless, he had his marching orders, and he would do what needed to be done. Luca was sixty years old, possessed of piercing blue eyes and a powerful build running to fat. He considered himself a principled individual, erring towards pragmatism.

As they approached their venue, Luca stared ahead at the car Synthe had arrived in and prepared himself for the dialogue to come.

“This is fine, Brother,” Luca said to his driver.

The limousine came to a halt. Luca got out. Synthe was smoking a cigarette and lounging against his own vehicle, his expression wary as he watched Luca approach him.
Perhaps he, too, is leery of this meeting
, Luca thought.

The Grand Commander stopped a few feet in front of Synthe, and both men sized each other up.

“Good to see you again, Colonel,” Luca said.

“Yes, you too,” Synthe said.

A moment of silence hung in the air before Luca spoke again.

“Have you been apprised of the nature of this meeting, Colonel?” Luca asked.

“Other than the loss of the relic, not a thing,” Synthe said, tossing his cigarette away and standing to his full height of over six feet, no longer lounging. “I assume I’m here to kill someone.”

Israeli humor
, Luca surmised.

“Not exactly,” Luca said. “I’ll bring you up to date on what’s transpired so far.”

Luca relayed briefly what they’d gleaned about the theft of the Scroll and the ongoing investigation of possible perpetrators, including the recently deceased professor.

“Then it’s worse than expected. We don’t have much to go on,” Synthe said. “Was Twain murdered, or was his death coincidental to these events?”

“Unknown at this time,” Luca admitted. “We do know that he has a daughter, but where she might be…” Luca shrugged. “We’re trying to find her.”

Synthe considered this. “And the purpose for my presence here is?”

“To alert you that, as of now, every waking moment needs to be directed to recovering the Scroll. This unfortunate event took place on your watch. It’s time to earn the substantial pay you’ve been collecting. You have a suitable background for this sort of investigation – I don’t. But hopefully, together we can figure out who has the Scroll and recover it before any damage can be done,” Luca concluded.

Synthe stood in silence, wondering what had been set in motion.

“I’ll be available twenty-four-seven to assist in whatever way you need.”

“Perfect. I’ll brief you on the steps we’re taking now that we know Twain is dead. Time is of the essence on this,” Luca advised and motioned for Synthe to join him in the limousine.

The unlikely pair entered the car and shut the door, their conversation shielded from interruption. A jet roared overhead, its cargo of passengers blissfully unaware of the chaos that had been unleashed by a seemingly inconsequential theft of an obscure ancient parchment.

Steven Cross secured the door to his flat and set out on his daily walk to his company’s offices. It was a gorgeous early summer morning in Florence; the streets were abuzz with pedestrians hurrying to work. Motor scooters roared down the narrow streets, their angry whining combining with the shouts of laborers unloading delivery vans double-parked with cheerful illegality along the sidewalks.

Steven had sold the converted farmhouse in Greve after Antonia’s accident – every moment there was too painful a reminder of a life cut disastrously short by an ugly trick of fate. After three months sitting virtually immobile in the living room, staring at his books and the stack of ancient parchments that were the only reason he hadn’t been in the car with Antonia, he’d decided to move somewhere new, where her ghost didn’t come to visit every morning and stay till he dozed off late at night. So he packed up his valuables and located a flat in downtown Florence that was sufficient to his needs, and listed the country home with a realtor. An American couple had jumped at the asking price, and soon the house was just a memory. Like so much of his life.

He stopped at his favorite bakery and bought two baguettes of rustic peasant bread, then moved down the block to the café that was his regular morning haunt while he scanned the paper. His Italian was excellent after five years in Italy, and he diligently practiced speaking and reading it at every opportunity. Languages had always come easily to him, although as he’d got older everything became a little harder.

Steven paid his bill and grabbed a second cup of coffee to go, then stepped out onto the sidewalk to continue his trek towards the office.

Only something wasn’t right. He wasn’t sure what it was, but he was getting the tingle at the back of his neck that was a sixth sense he’d developed while in the military – and it was rarely wrong. Impulsively, he turned a corner on a street that led away from his office and circled the block, adding five minutes to his journey. Well worth the extra time because his vague uneasiness had become a certainty.

Steven’s survival instincts were sounding an unmistakable alarm. He’d picked up a tail, a gray sedan shadowing him. He’d confirmed his suspicions through rudimentary tradecraft he’d picked up from films and books – he stopped at a shop window, ostensibly to study the merchandise on display, and watched in the reflection as the vehicle came to a stop fifty yards down the street. Why he was under surveillance by parties unknown was a mystery, but from past experience he knew this sort of thing was never good. Steven resumed his walk and the sedan followed at a discreet distance.

Whatever this was, Steven was now in full alert mode. In his past life he’d made powerful enemies, on Wall Street as well as with organized criminal elements, and while it was unlikely that after this many years he would have resumed being an active target, the possibility never entirely disappeared. He’d resigned himself long ago to the idea that there was always that chance.

This morning, as he walked from his apartment to his office, the notion that a vindictive foe from a past life was stalking him seemed remote, yet the vision of the stealthy vehicle told him he wasn’t being paranoid. Still, any kind of attack on him seemed unlikely. Not in the open like this, in a district filled with witnesses, and with too many variables that could compromise the success of a hit. The bad guys generally came after you when there was nobody around. He didn’t think things had changed much since his last adventure – his bullet scar was painful evidence that he had some small familiarity with how these things played out.

The street traffic thinned as he entered the less commercial section of Florence his offices occupied, and he abruptly turned into an alley on his right – a shortcut – glancing behind to see if the car was still dogging him. It wasn’t until he’d already committed to that course that he saw the far end of the alley was blocked by a low-slung delivery truck with its emergency blinkers on.

The mouth of the thoroughfare was suddenly filled by the sedan, which came to a halt after it turned the corner when the driver realized there was insufficient space to continue, owing to the way the street narrowed. Steven stopped and turned towards the darkened windshield – he couldn’t make anything out but the pale oval of the driver’s head. The car and Steven faced each other in a silent standoff.

Another moment passed. A kit of pigeons flapped up from behind four recycling crates and soared past the hood and then above it, disappearing into the sky. Feathers and dander created motes of dust in the morning sunlight that flooded into the mouth of the alley, casting a surreal, hazy effect around the stationary car. Trapped and unable to move forward any further, but lacking sufficient width for anyone to get out, the vehicle reversed until it reached a point where the doors had reasonable clearance. After a few moments, the front passenger door of the car swung open.

Here it comes
, Steven thought.

To his surprise, the figure that exited the car was a woman. She didn’t bother closing the door – Steven could hear the dim beeping emanating from the vehicle. The sunbeams slanting down momentarily blurred most detail except her silhouette, but as she moved into the alley, he registered that she was young, with jet-black hair spiked in a euro-punk style. As she approached him, with a steady, measured gait reminiscent of a gymnast or a dancer, Steven could make out her face in more detail. She was strikingly beautiful. The glinting of her nose-piercing and the small tattoo of a broken heart below her left ear lent an air of the exotic – the pseudo-goth look definitely gave her an aura of freaky danger, which he supposed was the intent. She looked Slavic, with high, pronounced cheekbones. But perhaps her most striking feature was her eyes, which were a stunning violet. He’d never seen anyone with eyes that color, and he vaguely wondered if she was wearing contact lenses.