Charles Brokaw - The Lucifer Code

The Joy Scroll has, like the writing that has led you here and given you these secrets been written in another language. Four keys to this language have been hidden in the places in the mosaics. Together, they will give you enough information to decipher the Joy Scroll.

Now, please forgive me for I am very weary and wish only to see my Master in all his Glory. God be with you and reward you with his mercies.

Lourds looked up from the scroll. ‘That’s all there is. Except for the second scroll.’

The second scroll had been wrapped in the first. True to John of Patmos’s words, Lourds hadn’t been able to read the second scroll.

Joachim looked at the wall behind Lourds. ‘These places then.’

Lourds looked at the mosaics as well. ‘These places. And with everyone pursuing us.’

With a smile, Joachim turned to him. ‘Now you will find your faith, Professor Lourds. With all that is arrayed against us, I think we can agree that we will not get through this alone.’

I don’t know if we’re going to get through this alive, much less alone, Lourds thought.

Basilica Cistern

Hagia Sophia Underground

Istanbul, Turkey

25 March 2010

‘How are we supposed to get the Medusa head to turn over?’ Cleena asked.

They stood once more in the huge room filled with stone columns. Every sound they made echoed throughout the building.

‘With this,’ Lourds said. He held up the first scroll and showed them the end. He had been puzzling over it since he’d first seen it. Now he felt certain that it was a key. But where was the keyhole?

‘Here,’ Olympia called. She’d evidently deduced what the rod was going to be used for as well.

Lourds walked round to her on the other side of the Medusa head. She aimed her light at a crevice between a pair of snakes sprouting from the Medusa’s head. Sliding the rod into the crevice, Lourds felt the channel bottom out. He turned the rod and heard tumblers click. The Medusa head vibrated as mechanisms inside slid into place. Four snakes elongated and became a pedestal. Stone ground against stone as the snake legs took the weight of the head and allowed it to flip upside down.

Lourds watched in amazement. A moment later, what had been a seamless forehead split open and revealed a gap that held a gold ring with a four-inch span. As the noise died away, Lourds reached for the ring and removed it from its hiding place. He felt the inscriptions on the inside of the ring before he saw them. They were etched fine and sharp, looking as though it had been only days instead of two thousand years since they’d been made.

‘What is it?’ Joachim asked as he joined Lourds.

Lourds fingered the notches cut into the ring. ‘Part of a device that, hopefully, will prove to be a Rosetta Stone.’

‘Are you certain?’ Olympia asked.

‘I am,’ Lourds said, ‘unless John of Patmos intended to have a final joke at the expense of this world.’ He put the ring carefully in a protective pouch inside his backpack. Then he took the rod from the Medusa head. Another series of grinding noises took place in the Medusa head as it once more turned upside down and locked into place beneath the stone column above it.

‘Do you think Constantine knew about the Medusa’s head?’ Olympia asked.

‘I do,’ Lourds answered. ‘His hand has been in everything we’ve touched so far.’

‘He kept his secrets very well.’

Lourds silently agreed. Then he shouldered his backpack and headed out.

‘Getting across the borders while we’re being hunted isn’t going to be easy,’ Joachim said.

‘Really?’ Lourds acted surprised. ‘Then isn’t it lucky that we have a professional smuggler with a network of travel coordinators for contraband along with us?’

Cleena didn’t turn round and didn’t say anything, but Lourds could tell she was smiling.

Olympia scowled. ‘Don’t act like you planned this, Thomas,’ she said quietly. ‘I know very well why you allowed that young woman to come with us.’

‘Well, she is quite handy with weapons.’

Olympia said something completely unladylike.

Arch of the Four Winds

Villa Doria Pamphili

Rome, Italy

3 April 2010

‘Thomas! Over here!’

Feeling beat up from the last few days of travel and all the stress he’d been under since they’d left Istanbul, Lourds didn’t see his old friend and mentor for a moment. He stopped and stood still, looking for any unfriendly movement around him.

‘You’re clear, Professor.’ Cleena’s voice echoed in Lourds’ ear canal.

Although he’d worn the earwig for the last week or so, he still wasn’t used to the device or the need for it.

Father Gabriel Madeiro sat on a bench in the shade of a copse of trees. He was a short man, but filled with boundless energy. He was almost as wide as he was tall and his hair and beard had gone snow white so that they stood out against his dark skin. He closed the fat book he was reading and used a thick forefinger to mark his place. Lourds knew without seeing the cover that it would be a thriller. Father Gabriel had introduced Lourds to James Bond and Jason Bourne at the same time he was instructing him in the intricacies of Latin. It had been Father Gabriel’s love of language, of old, dead books as well as potboilers, that had ignited the same passion within Lourds.

When he got close enough, Father Gabriel grabbed Lourds in a powerful bear hug for a moment and lifted him clear off his feet. In his sixties, Father Gabriel remained a powerful man.

‘It’s so good to see you,’ Father Gabriel said when he released Lourds. ‘I miss having you underfoot.’

‘Hopefully these days I wouldn’t be underfoot so much,’ Lourds said.

‘I don’t think you would.’ Father Gabriel waved Lourds to the bench. ‘You’re having quite the career these days. Atlantis?’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘Now that must have been exciting.’

‘It was.’

‘I read your book. Very enjoyable.’

‘I’m glad you thought so. I would have much rather told you the story in person.’

‘I would have much rather heard it in person.’ Father Gabriel lifted his shoulders and let them drop. ‘Unfortunately, I was doing some work in Rio de Janeiro.’

‘And avoiding the winter, as I recall.’ Lourds smiled, and for a moment the visit almost seemed casual. Except that he had the four rings he’d collected from Cordoba, outside Moscow, Jerusalem and Istanbul.

‘I missed winter, but not too terribly much.’ Father Gabriel’s dark eyes regarded Lourds speculatively. ‘I wouldn’t have guessed you would turn out to be a criminal, though. I thought I’d mentored you better than that.’

‘A criminal?’ That surprised Lourds.

Father Gabriel nodded. ‘The word I have is that you absconded from Istanbul with some very important religious artefacts.’

‘Do you believe that?’

‘Not for a minute.’

Lourds grinned. ‘Well, actually, that part is true.’

‘Really?’ Father Gabriel gave him a look of mock shock.

‘I seem to recall a certain Roman Catholic priest-’

‘Who shall remain nameless.’

‘Who might prefer to remain nameless,’ Lourds went on, ‘who wasn’t above a bit of skulduggery now and again.’

‘Perhaps a toe over the line here and there.’ Father Gabriel grinned in delight.

‘You shouldn’t have taken me along. You corrupted me.’

‘I didn’t corrupt you. You were sixteen-’

‘I was twelve,’ Lourds objected.

‘And your babysitter’

‘Au pair.’

‘Had already corrupted you.’ Father Gabriel tugged at his beard. ‘Or perhaps you corrupted her. I forget how that went exactly.’