Scott Mariani - The Lost Relic

AVON

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

Copyright © Scott Mariani 2011

Cover design by Henry Steadman © HarperCollins Publishers 2016

Cover photographs © onairda / Shutterstock.com(background scene); Rafal Gadomski / Shutterstock.com(cathedral); Henry Steadman (figure)

Scott Mariani asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9781847561978

Ebook Edition © 2010 ISBN: 9780007342778

Version: 2019-12-11

To Noah Lukeman

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Six

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty-One

Chapter Forty-Two

Chapter Forty-Three

Chapter Forty-Four

Chapter Forty-Five

Chapter Forty-Six

Chapter Forty-Seven

Chapter Forty-Eight

Chapter Forty-Nine

Chapter Fifty

Chapter Fifty-One

Chapter Fifty-Two

Chapter Fifty-Three

Chapter Fifty-Four

Chapter Fifty-Five

Chapter Fifty-Six

Chapter Fifty-Seven

Chapter Fifty-Eight

Chapter Fifty-Nine

Chapter Sixty

Chapter Sixty-One

Chapter Sixty-Two

Chapter Sixty-Three

Chapter Sixty-Four

Chapter Sixty-Five

Chapter Sixty-Six

Chapter Sixty-Seven

Chapter Sixty-Eight

Chapter Sixty-Nine

Chapter Seventy

Chapter Seventy-One

Chapter Seventy-Two

Chapter Seventy-Three

Chapter Seventy-Four

Chapter Seventy-Five

Chapter Seventy-Six

Epilogue

The Ben Hope series

Keep Reading …

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Also by Scott Mariani

About the Publisher

Italy

October 1986

The old woman was alone that night, just as she had lived alone in her rambling country house near Cesena for many years. She’d spent the evening in her studio, as she did most evenings, surrounded by her precious paintings and her beautiful things, putting the final touches to a piece of artwork she believed to be the finest she had produced in a long while.

The work that was to be her last.

It was just after ten, and the old woman was thinking about going to bed,when she heard the crash of breaking glass and the six armed men stormed into her home. They grabbed her roughly, forced her down into a chair, held guns to her head. Their leader was a big, burly man with a nose that had been broken more than once. He wore a suit and his greying hair was cropped like a brush.

The last time she had heard an accent like his had been a lifetime ago. She’d been young and beautiful then.

‘Where is it?’ he shouted at her, over and over, with his face so close to hers she could feel the heat of his fury when she said she didn’t know, that she didn’t have it. She’d never had it, never even laid eyes on it.

They let her go then, and she collapsed gasping to the floor. As she lay there shuddering with terror and clutching her racing heart, the six men tore apart her home with a violence she hadn’t seen in all her seventy-eight years.

By the time the men had realised they wouldn’t find what they’d come so far to obtain, the old woman’s heart had given out and she was dead.

What they found instead was a cracked old diary that she had kept close to her for over six decades. The leader of the men flipped hungrily through its pages, running his eye down the faded lines of the old woman’s elegant handwriting.

His long search was only just beginning.

Western Georgia

250 kilometres from the Russian border

The present day

A warm September breeze rippled softly through the conifers in the mountain ravine. The air was sweet with the scent of pine, and the late morning sunlight twinkled off the faraway snowy peaks. The mother lynx had come padding down from the forest to quench her thirst from a stream, keeping a watchful eye on her cubs as they played and wrestled in the long grass by the bank.

As she bent to lap at the cool water, her body went suddenly rigid, her acute senses alerting her to an alien presence. Her tufted ears pricked up at the unrecognisable sound that was coming out of nowhere and rising alarmingly fast. She quickly drew away from the water’s edge while her cubs, sensing their mother’s apprehension, grouped together and scampered behind her.

The terrifying noise was on them in moments, blasting, roaring, filling their ears. The cats bolted for the safety of the forest as two huge black shapes streaked violently overhead, shattering the tranquillity of the ravine. Then, as suddenly as they’d come hurtling over, the monsters were gone.

More dangerous predators than big cats were out hunting today.

Four kilometres across the forest, standing alone on a rocky knoll, was a craggy old stone shack. A century ago, maybe two, it might have been the humble home of a peasant farmer or shepherd. But those days were history, and nobody had lived there for a long time. It had been years since anyone had even set foot in there, until that morning.

It was cool and shady inside the windowless building. The only furnishings within its walls, spaced out in a row and crudely but securely nailed down to the floorboards, were three wooden chairs. The three occupants of the chairs sat quietly, breathing softly, tuned into their shared silence. They knew each other well, but it was some time since they’d all run out of things to say – and in any case there seemed little point in conversation. Even if they’d been able to free themselves from the ropes that bound each of them tightly to his seat, and remove the hoods that their captors had placed over their heads, they knew that the door was heavily chained. Nobody was going anywhere.