Alex Lukeman - The Cup

"Forensics is coming. They'll bring a vehicle for us. Until then, we're stuck here."

"I want to take another look around," Nick said. "Why was someone here? He must've been guarding something and it wasn't Andersson's car."

"Whoever it was, he didn't want to get caught." Selena brushed dirt off her jacket sleeve.

"Let's start with the barn," Forsberg said.

The barn revealed nothing except a patch of oil under Andersson's car.

The door of the house was open. Wide spaced footprints in the snow showed where the driver of the Volvo had run from the house to the car. They went inside and began going from room to room, opening cupboards, looking in closets. There was furniture in every room but it was obvious that the house had not been lived in for years. On the second floor they found a sagging bed, a chair, and a dresser with a cracked mirror. The bed had been slept in. There was a Koran on the dresser.

Forsberg held up the book. "Why does this not surprise me?"

The first and second floors gave up nothing else of interest.

"Is there a root cellar?" Selena asked. "Wouldn't there be something like that on one of these old farms?"

"There should be. The entrance is usually off the kitchen," Forsberg said.

"I didn't see one," Ronnie said.

They went back to the kitchen. Ronnie was right. There was no obvious door or entrance to a cellar.

An enormous china cupboard was pushed up against one wall.

"If I were a door, where would I be?" Nick said. "What's behind that big cupboard?"

"Let's find out," Ronnie said.

Selena pointed at the stone floor. "There are old scratches. Someone's moved it before."

Ronnie and Nick moved the cupboard away from the wall. Behind it was a wooden door painted green. Nick pulled it open, took out a pocket flashlight and shone light through the opening. A short flight of wooden steps led into darkness. He climbed down, followed by Lamont.

"Creepy down here," Lamont said.

The floor was dirt, littered with old rat droppings. They had to stoop under a low, beamed ceiling covered with spider webs. Open wooden bins took up much of the confined space. The bins were empty. There was nothing at all to indicate that anyone had been in the cellar for a long time.

Back upstairs, Nick brushed fragments of cobwebs from his jacket.

"There's still that stone building," Ronnie said.

The building wasn't locked. The windows were broken. It was one large room and it was empty.

They went back outside.

"There has to be something here," Nick said.

"Maybe he was squatting," Selena said.

"Sure, but why steal the car? How much trouble could someone get in for sleeping in an abandoned house? It's overkill. I keep thinking about that fancy padlock on the barn. We should take another look."

"We've been in there twice already," Forsberg said.

"Not like we've got something better to do," Lamont said. "We're not going anywhere until someone comes to take us back to town."

The barn looked the same as it had an hour before. Selena wandered over to the stalls. The dirt floors still had old straw on them. She started into the middle stall to look at an old piece of leather tack hung on the weathered boards and stumbled against something. She kicked the straw away, exposing an iron ring in the floor.

"Over here."

The ring was set in a wooden trapdoor. Nick bent down and pulled on it. The door came up easily on oiled hinges.

A wooden ladder dropped straight down into whatever lay below.

He handed Selena his flashlight. "Hold the light for me."

The bottom of the hidden room was ten feet below the stable floor. The room was about twenty feet square but it wasn't old, like the rest of the farm. The boards forming the walls were clean and fresh, the nails holding them together still bright.

"Better come down here," Nick called.

Forsberg came down the ladder, followed by Selena. She played the light around the room. Four long crates stamped with Swedish markings were stacked against a wall. There were boxes at the end of the room.

Nick pointed the light at the nearest crate. "What does that say in Swedish?"

"Shit," Forsberg said.

"It says shit?"

"Those are military markings."

He walked over to the crate. The lid was loose. He lifted it up.

"Assault rifles. AK5Cs. They're issued to the home guard."

"That explains the lock," Nick said, "and why they left someone behind."

"Bring the light over here," Selena said.

She stood at the back of the room, looking down at the contents of an open crate. It was filled with artifacts packed in straw. It was easy to see that the objects were old. Selena picked up a statue of a goddess, about eight inches tall.

"This is Babylonian. It's a statue of Astarte. Probably looted from Iraq."

"ISIS,"Nick said.

"Has to be."

Nick turned to Forsberg. "After finding this, I don't think you have to worry much about what happened at the refugee center."

Selena lifted the top off another crate.

"Wow," she said.

The gold gleamed in the light of her torch. The crate was filled with objects stolen from Christian churches. There was a gold chalice and two gold candlesticks. With the chalice and candlesticks was a silver Orthodox crucifix set with precious stones.

There was a silver box, about a foot long and eight inches across. Words in Latin were scribed on the surface of the lid.

Liber Simon

Selena opened it. Inside were two ancient scrolls of vellum.

If she hadn't opened that box, everything would have been different.

Selena took the box with her when they climbed out of the hidden room. Back in the house, they sat down at a wooden table in the kitchen and waited for Forsberg's people to arrive.

Nick looked at the silver container. "What does the Latin say?"

"It says, 'The Book of Simon.'"

Selena lifted one of the scrolls from the box.

"It's still flexible. I think I can open it."

She laid it on the table. With great care, she unrolled it.

"This is written in biblical Aramaic."

Selena scanned the scroll.

"I don't believe this. If this is real… "

"Well?" Lamont said. "What does it say?"

"It's a description of the crucifixion, written by Simon of Cyrene."

Nick looked at her. "Who was Simon?"

"He's the one who helped Christ carry the cross. If this is authentic, it's an amazing find."

Forsberg said. "I'm surprised those barbarians didn't melt the box down and throw that scroll in the trash."

"They may be barbarians, but their leaders aren't stupid," Nick said. "They need money for weapons. Looted antiquities are a big source of income for them, right after oil. The black market for artifacts is huge. There are plenty of people who don't care how something was obtained. One of those little statues like Selena held up is worth thousands to a collector."

"Your man Andersson must have discovered what they were doing," Ronnie said.

Nick turned to Forsberg. "Everything points back to that refugee center. Are you going to raid it?"

Forsberg sighed. "The government is reluctant to do anything that involves Muslim immigrants. They're afraid of being criticized at the UN."

"I was them, I'd be more afraid of the terrorists," Lamont said. "Whoever hid those guns wasn't planning on hunting reindeer."

"We don't have reindeer down here," Forsberg said.

"Whatever."

"I'll have to go to the Minister with this. I can make a good case for a raid, but I can't do it without permission."

"What if you can't get it?" Nick asked.

Forsberg smiled. "Even a politician can be persuaded to do the right thing once in a while. They'll give it to me. There's an election coming up. Finding and eliminating an ISIS terror cell would look good in the papers. Not everyone in our government is afraid to do what needs to be done."