James Rollins - Blood Infernal

“Because of the wheels and the stars on the ceiling. They’re Buddhist symbols. Of all the cultures depicted above, they’re the most numerously represented.” Erin talked quickly now, certain of what she was saying. “That wagon wheel over there is Buddha’s wheel of transformation. The rim is limitation, the hub represents the world, and the eight spokes are the Noble Eightfold Path, which is what you need to tread to end suffering.”

Erin turned to Hugh, challenging him. “That’s where you learned your meditation techniques, wasn’t it? You went east, during your travels before you settled in France. You learned these techniques from Buddhists monks.”

Hugh bowed his head in acknowledgment.

Rhun frowned. “But how could Buddhists help you deal with your cursed nature?”

“Because the monks were strigoi themselves.”

Shock rang through the Sanguinists’ faces, even Elizabeth’s, but hers settled into a look more curious than horrified.

Hugh looked up at the lit windows. “After I left the Church, I wandered for many years, trying to make sense of what I was. I followed legends of eternal monks rumored to reside in the Far East, immortals like ourselves. I endured great hardship to find them, but always I was directed onward, until eventually I reached a valley between three peaks where I would learn much about my nature and the nature of the world.”

Into the stunned silence that followed, Elizabeth spoke. “And you left a record of that, didn’t you?”

Hugh lifted his brows in surprise, likely a rare expression for the man. “I did.”

Elizabeth turned to Erin, as if she should know this, too.

Then she did.

Three peaks .

Everything fell into place in her head.

“What is Elizabeth talking about?” Jordan asked Erin, noting a familiar expression dawning over her features, one of understanding. She had figured something out.

She took the phone from his fingers. “You have copies of my photos on here, don’t you? From back in Venice.”

“Yeah…”

She flipped through the files, pausing at one recent picture that showed her half-naked, stepping from the bathroom. He had secretly snapped it when they were at Castel Gandolfo. He couldn’t resist taking it.

I mean, look at that body .

She glanced over to him, giving him a quick smile, but that wasn’t the picture she was looking for. Finally, she found it and lifted the phone. “There were three peaks painted on Edward Kelly’s wall. At the time, it reminded me of something Elizabeth had shown us in Venice, but then things got a little crazy in Prague.”

Erin faced Hugh. “There’s a famous mosaic at the cathedral in Venice, which I understand from your history was your favorite city in Italy. You spent a lot of time there.”

“How could I not?” he admitted. “It is a rare city, one blended into the sea itself. It speaks to the dichotomy of man’s relationship with the natural world. Venice is an example of man’s struggle to both circumvent nature and be a part of it.”

“And the basilica there,” Erin continued. “St. Mark’s. Elizabeth said that this particular mosaic was commissioned by alchemists in Prague, the very men to whom you gave your green diamond.”

Erin showed everyone a picture of one of the basilica’s mosaics. It showed a triptych of a black devil confronting Christ in three different ways.

Jordan remembered it himself now. “The Temptations of Christ.”

“You were behind this commission, weren’t you?” Erin said. “The three peaks of that valley of the monks, that’s what Kelly had painted on his wall, something you must have shared with those alchemists when you gave them that diamond, something you also had represented in a mosaic of a timeless city, in a basilica that would stand for centuries. You made a record of that valley in the gold glass tiles.”

Jordan still didn’t understand what she meant.

Erin zoomed in on the third temptation— it’s always the number three —and expanded the view under Christ’s sandals. He was standing on a set of mountains, with a snow-globe-shaped bubble under his feet, like he was walking on water.

“You are correct,” Hugh said. “Such knowledge could not be lost to time. It is too important.”

“What’s so important about it?” Jordan asked Hugh.

Erin answered instead. “That dome of watery light under Christ’s legs, it holds three chalices.” She stared hard at Hugh. “Those three chalices represent the three stones, don’t they?”

“They do,” said Hugh.

“That’s where you first saw them,” Erin said, “where you found them. Arbor, Aqua , and Sanguis . The gems of Garden, Water, and Blood.”

“It is indeed. In that most holy valley, one of divine enlightenment.”

“Enough riddles,” said Rhun. “Where are these mountains?”

Hugh ignored him. “You have proven yourself adept enough, Woman of Learning. Those mountains surround a place known as the Holy Hidden Valley of Happiness.”

Erin closed her eyes and gave an amused shake of her head.

“Do you know this place?” Sophia asked.

“Only by reputation. I wish I could say that such knowledge came to me from study and research, but it actually came from reading an article in a travel magazine. A pure coincidence.”

“No,” Hugh said. “There are no such coincidences .”

“So what then?” Erin asked disdainfully. “My coming upon this article was fate?”

“No. There is no such thing as fate . We are masters of our own destinies.” Hugh waved to encompass the shadowy audience, stirring the raven still perched on his shoulder to an irritated ruffle. “It was your awareness and inquisitive nature that made you see and read that article, when others might have skipped it. It was your mindfulness that made you remember it. You have always been that way, Erin Granger. I suspect that was what drove you to abandon your family, to take a path away from one of blind obedience to the father’s faith, to discover your own road to knowledge and wisdom. Fate, luck, coincidence … none of these matter. You are simply a Woman of Learning. That is your true nature. That is what brought you to me.”

Erin had shifted closer to Jordan during this revelation, plainly shaken not only by this man’s knowledge of her past, but also by how quickly he exposed the essential core of her being.

Jordan pulled her closer, feeling her tremble, beginning to understand how even monsters and beasts could bow down to this guy.

“Where is this valley?” Rhun pressed.

Erin answered, “Tsum Valley in Nepal. It was only recently opened to tourists due to its sacred history. It is said to be the home of Shambhala, a legendary Buddhist kingdom. Or as it is more commonly called in Western culture: Shangri La .”

Jordan knew that story, but only from movies. “That’s supposed to be a place lost in time, where no one ages or dies.”

This made him wonder: were these strigoi monks the basis for that legend?

“But there’s a more important story about Shambhala that bears more directly on our situation,” Erin said. “I read that the second Buddha, Padmasambhava, blessed the valley as a place that would be rediscovered when the earth was nearing it destruction, when the world grew too corrupted to survive.”