Tyranny of Coins (The Judas Chronicles) (Volume 5) Paperback (10 page)

“If it turns out we get nothing, in terms of impressions or the tingling that can sometimes reach my left arm from half the world away, then we’ll head back to Berlin tomorrow night and see if we can reschedule our flight back to the States a day early,” I replied to Alistair, looking toward Stutthof’s main entrance as Cedric parked our rental. “You really need to lighten up on the stress, Ali. Seriously, son.”

I heard his familiar ‘humpf’ from the backseat he shared with Amy, thinking it sounded more endearing when he was a soon to be retired college professor. Beatrice and I occupied the middle bench of the minivan, and Roderick kept Cedric company in the front. My wife rolled her eyes, and at first I thought she was ready to chide me. But then she cut a scornful glance at
our boy.

“Krontos breached the fortress easily the first time,” added Roderick, adjusting his coat and fedora. Cedric unlocked the doors and we gathered our cameras and notepads. Roderick made the brilliant suggestion for us all to take pictures and notes—to not just rely on the paranormally gifted in our midst. “You might be right that he won’t return there. However, since he has invaded our lives effortlessly on a whim, wouldn’t it be nice if we had a few less questions about the coin’s whereabouts the next time he comes to call?”

“Only if you find the damned thing before we return home on Monday,” replied Alistair. “Otherwise, all you’re doing is wasting precious time.”

Everyone exited the van, with Roderick pausing to make sure the guns he and Cedric procured while I entertained my family at their breakfast meal in the hotel’s main dining room were still camouflaged by a blanket in the very back. Unless someone with prior knowledge alerted the authorities, I didn’t expect any police interference. Roderick acted as if he wasn’t so sure, carefully scanning the area around us. The parking area was packed with tourists, likely hoping to beat the wintry weather reportedly on the way by the weekend.

“Remember what we discussed on the way here,” Roderick said. “William needs to be the first one inside the camp exhibit, followed by me. Then Beatrice, Ali, and Amy. Cedric will pull up the rear, keeping an eye out just in case.”

I gave my wife a loving kiss and moved ahead of everyone else. Roderick adjusted his sunglasses as he kept pace behind me. I had thought there wouldn’t be a need for us to be so organized until inside the encampment, but a powerful feeling of déjà vu swept over me as we made our way to the main entrance. Yes, the place had an outdoor museum feel to it, but for the most part it felt as it did when I visited the grounds in late spring, 1945.

“This place is swarming with energy,” said Roderick, reverently, behind me.

I had instinctively picked up my pace, and he stayed with me stride for stride. I could hear the others murmuring further behind us about ‘what’s the big hurry?’ I couldn’t fight the urge to quickly get beyond the memorial entrance, as if the barracks, towers, and barbwire fences called to me, like long lost friends.

“It’s a vortex from hell,” I told him, briefly glancing over a shoulder. “Maybe we shouldn’t have done this.”

“Just be glad you are only feeling the energy pull. Would you rather see and hear the imprints assaulting my mind?”

Very good point. The oppressive sadness that had forever imprinted itself upon this hallowed ground might well overwhelm me before our afternoon visit concluded. However, it was nothing compared to the visual images of unspeakable suffering and cruelty being presented to Roderick’s mind in vibrant images. Images in living color, along with the scents and auditory imprints from those events. Olfactory assaults of blood, sweat, human waste, and the terrible stench of burning flesh from the four crematoriums on the property—all serenaded by the screams of agony and cries for mercy from a multitude of victims derided by zealous insults and rebukes from a host of inhuman SS guards.

“Sorry, Rod. We can abort this idea,” I told him, as my heart was overwhelmed with compassion for him and the tens of thousands who suffered so horribly, and lost their lives in this place. “I doubt I’ll pick up anything about the coin with such a barrage going on.”

“We need to try anyway.” His voice cracked, and I stopped to let him catch up. He wiped his fingers beneath his glasses that had fogged up. “Keep moving Judas. Like you, I haven’t been here in decades… but I feel compelled to do this. If you are reluctant to do it for your coin, then please do it for me.”

I nodded and resumed my pace, ignoring Alistair’s pleas for me to wait up. Other tourists around us gave Roderick and I strange looks as we hurried to the entrance. Although they had no clue as to why we were in a rush, their somber expressions confirmed they felt the oppressiveness.

“Are you going to be all right, Roderick?” asked Amy, once we began our official tour of the premises. Her eyes were tearing as she studied him. To his credit, he kept himself emotionally together to nod in response. “Are you sure?”

“It’s probably best to let him work through this, my dear,” I told her gently. “On the way to Krakow, we can discuss what he’s picked up on.” I offered a compassionate smile that defied the dread threatening to overwhelm me. It wouldn’t be long before both Roderick and I would be rendered mute.

The deepening coldness crept into my bones—and surely it sought to invade everyone else. The sound of coats and hoods zipped tightly resounded around us, surely fed by siphoned energy feeding hundreds of souls that never moved on. Not completely unlike my long sentence to roam the earth, those who died in bitter sorrow found it difficult to leave. My eyes began to mist, and I braced my heart for the emotional onslaught about to come.

Beatrice came up to me, wrapping her arms around my waist. Her warmth was most welcome, and the love radiating from her spirit to mine warmed me to the core. But a look from Roderick reminded me of our purpose here. I needed to move to the front of our little group and lead the way.

“I love you.”

Her words touched me deeper than her embrace, and I tried to respond in kind. But my voice was just as lost as Roderick’s. I nodded and turned away, hoping she never forgot how deeply I cherished her and our incorrigible son.

“Follow me,” I whispered.

There were professionally guided tours going on around us. Of course, we didn’t participate, instead following the energy flow of the death camp now largely covered in grass and concrete. I had no doubt Roderick would glean important images and messages from imprinted events dating from the internment camp’s change to a labor education camp in late 1941, until the Allies’ liberation in May, 1945. But I worried I wouldn’t pick up anything dealing with my legendary coin.

But I was wrong.

Though I didn’t actually find anything tangible, I glimpsed a bluish glow inside one barrack, and again, near where a barrack building had once stood, not far from a guard tower and conveniently close to a gas chamber built when the Final Solution included the Jews housed at Stutthof.

“You see it, don’t you?” said Roderick from behind me. He sounded calmer than earlier—a sure sign he had managed to get the psychic assault under control. “If only you could see the joy and hope that existed in this barrack. It was one the Nazis loathed the most…. I see their fear and hatred of the building. They learned to avoid it, which was bad for the camp’s other inmates…. They took out their fear on the others.”

I turned to see his grimacing expression. I wanted to stop him, especially when he announced some of the bloodier atrocities that took place in the barrack still standing next to where the unusual one he alluded to once stood. Beatrice and Amy grimaced worse than him, and even Alistair and Cedric looked like they wished Roderick would shut the hell up about it all. But, he was now a channel for the horrific memories stored here, and the unfortunate commentary from spirits all too eager to share what they endured more than seventy years ago.

“I see the glow,” I confessed. “But, it’s just a phantom. Obviously, the coin is long since removed from this place. Its essence remains, but is weak.”

“The hope of redemption and demonstration of power gave hope to hundreds,” said Roderick. “And they’re telling me the coin brought death to a few of the guards…. Yes, it did. After the third ‘heart attack’, the other SS men became superstitious. Conditions remained bad here, but the inmates were no longer called out in the bitter cold.”

Roderick’s serious expression suddenly morphed into a giddy smile.

“What’s up, man?” asked Cedric, from the rear. Watchful eyes and his hand secured to a Baretta inside his coat pocket, he brought his gaze back to meet Roderick’s when he didn’t respond right away. “Well?”

“The miracles inside the barrack… they
really
happened!” Roderick enthused. “Bread and fish… I see it appear in between the bunks, and the men and women covering the children’s mouths to keep them from crying out in surprise. The coin brought warmth and peace, too. Incredible, since none of your other coins have been like this, William. Correct?”

“As far as I’ve known they have always brought sorrow and suffering. Nothing more,” I said.

Roderick motioned for me to move out further from the barrack no longer there. I approached the barbed wire fence, but felt nothing. Same for the crematorium next to the gas chamber. He was shaking his head as I returned to where he and everyone else stood, near the markers for the barrack’s eroded foundation stones.

“Such joy for a moment, and hope that lasted weeks, months… until resentment slipped in here,” continued Roderick. His smile faded. “They could’ve gone many more months, perhaps even years. If not for a jealous young woman and her father… they told the guards about the coin.”

“So, the coin was cursed after all,” noted Alistair. “What else do you pick up?”

“The Nazis here could never find it, this mystical coin,” said Roderick, staggering a moment as he moved into the middle of where the building had stood long ago. “The girl and old man were beaten to death, and once that happened, something changed. The coin no longer produced any supernatural effect. It’s as if betrayal sucked the life out of it.”

“The guards could tell something had changed, I’d be willing to bet,” said Alistair. For the moment, his cynical side appeared subdued. Like the rest of us, tears welled in his eyes. Without a better explanation, it seemed we were all somehow tapped into the same energy stream feeding Roderick’s vision and my oppression. “What happened after that? Can you tell?”

Hard to say, but the look on Roderick’s face told me what happened next was worse than anything he had touched on earlier. This time, he refused to comment on it, stating only that the coin and its owners were removed from the camp—likely related to the earlier accusations. The Nazis were steeped into the occult like no other nation in modern history, and it wouldn’t be farfetched to say Stutthof’s commandant shipped the burdensome owners of a relic—one that could vanish and reappear in the camp, and definitely hostile to Nazi handlers—someplace else.

To Auschwitz.

Chapter Ten

We didn’t arrive in Krakow until almost midnight that evening. Mortals and immortals alike were emotionally drained after our Stutthof visit. Not to mention, the long drive from Germany to Stutthof had made for a very long day. Despite only visiting the camp museum for half an hour, it was almost four o’clock when we arrived. Afterward, Cedric’s lead foot couldn’t overcome the stops for food and gas as we barreled south toward Auschwitz. Visiting our second camp first thing on the morning of the 30
th
seemed increasingly unlikely.

After settling for modest accommodations at a small inn just outside the city, we reached a compromise on when to get going in the morning. We agreed to all meet for breakfast at the inn’s restaurant at 8:30 a.m. Beatrice and I hardly spoke due to how exhausted she was. She climbed into bed and by the time I joined her, she was fast asleep. A good thing, since I needed a restful night’s sleep, as well.

The snowstorm we hoped to avoid reached Krakow overnight, and we hurried through flurries to get the minivan loaded up with our belongings after breakfast. We would arrive at Auschwitz within the hour, around ten-thirty, provided the weather didn’t get much worse.

“I spoke to Benevento early this morning,” Roderick announced, once everyone was settled and we began our trek.

“Oh? Did he give you any new information on Krontos and my coin?” I asked.

Our seating arrangements were slightly different from yesterday, as Beatrice and Amy elected to sit together. That left Alistair and me to a potential ‘father-son chat, part two’ episode. We let the ladies occupy the middle seat, leaving us in the very back of the vehicle. Not the most conducive arrangement for Roderick’s update, since it left him no choice but to allow his preternatural voice to fill the van.

“Nothing new,” said Roderick, turning around in the passenger seat to face me, while Cedric pulled onto the main highway heading west from Krakow. “However, when I told him we had visited Stutthof yesterday afternoon, and were set to visit Auschwitz this morning, he pointed out a few things connected to the coin, Krontos, and these two terrible centers of death.”

I nodded for him to go on. He had everyone’s attention, including Cedric’s.

“Although none of us can prove Krontos has the coin in his possession—or in his thugs’ possession—Benevento is certain Krontos is up to his neck in this shit. In fact, Krontos is up to his neck in everything we’re dealing with—including the terrible tragedy that created the environment enabling the Stutthof-Auschwitz coin to play such a unique role in 1944.”