C. Palov - Templar's Quest

Hearing that, Finn was taken aback. ‘Are you saying that you’ll actually share the dossiers with me?’

‘Yes, of course. Why else would I request them?’ Aisquith snapped irritably. ‘Ah! Our order has arrived.’

Their unsmiling waiter plunked three cups of cappuccino and a wire basket of croissants on the table.

‘At this point we should mention that Finn and I don’t know if there’s a connection between the Black Sun tattoo and the Montségur Medallion,’ Kate remarked as she unwrapped a sugar cube.

In the process of stirring his cappuccino, Aisquith let go of the spoon. ‘Good God! That’s what all this murder and mayhem is about, the Montségur Medallion?’

Kate’s eyes opened wide. ‘You’ve actually heard of it?’

‘There are few medievalists who’ve not heard the rumours about the doomed Cathars and their fabled gold medallion. Their days numbered, the Pope’s army having laid siege to their last bastion at Montségur, the Cathars supposedly smuggled a treasure out of their mountaintop stronghold.’

Having just snatched a croissant from the basket, Finn glanced up. ‘You’re talking about the medallion, right?’

‘No. The medallion is simply an encrypted map that reveals the location of the treasure. And before you enquire, no one knows what comprised the fabled treasure. Some claim it’s a sacred text, others a biblical relic.’ Aisquith dunked a croissant into his cappuccino. ‘Truly one of the great mysteries of the Middle Ages.’

‘Then we have to assume that the Seven Research Foundation wants the medallion so they can find the Cathar treasure trove.’

Still in the process of dunking, Aisquith nodded. ‘Jutier’s tattoo suggests that the Seven Research Foundation is somehow connected to the Ahnenerbe. Who, I might add, were obsessed with the Cathars. No doubt the Ahnenerbe also searched for the Montségur Medallion. The Nazis were quite intent on finding ancient relics.’

‘Speaking of Jutier’s tattoo, I asked the Dark Angel about the Black Sun and the Vril force.’ Kate raised her cup. Before taking a sip, she said, ‘Although Angelika gave a vague reply, she clearly knew what I was talking about.’

‘Mmmm … interesting. More than a few historians have speculated that Adolf Hitler decided not to destroy Paris because there was something in the city that he very much wanted.’

‘I take it it wasn’t the Eiffel Tower.’ Holding a half-eaten croissant in his hand, Finn glanced at his crumb-littered chest. Not exactly the breakfast of champions.

‘While I have no proof, I suspect the Führer was very keen to generate the elusive Vril force.’

‘To power his flying saucers?’ Finn couldn’t help but snicker.

‘Fighter planes and Panzer divisions more than likely,’ Aisquith replied, refusing to pick up the gauntlet.

‘I’m confused, Cædmon. What does the city of Paris have to do with the Vril force?’

The Brit smiled fondly at Kate. ‘More than meets the eye. In that it’s invisible to the naked eye. But the best way to explain the connection is to show rather than tell. Assuming, of course, that I’m not keeping you from a prior engagement.’

‘Do we have time, Finn?’ Kate peered anxiously at him.

Figuring he needed to play along in order to get Aisquith to share the dossiers with him, Finn shrugged and said, ‘Yeah, why not? I’ve never seen a flying saucer.’

29

Tipping her head, Angelika Schwärz slowly blew a smoke ring, the diaphanous spiral floating towards the coffered ceiling. Somewhat moodily she stood at the open French doors that led to a small Juliet balcony. Below her the Seine flowed past the Île St Louis, the posh island enclave where she maintained an apartment.

Like her alter ego, she’d managed to fly away at the last moment. Or, in this case, swim away.

The Dark Angel.

A play on her birth name, the nom de guerre suited her. For she was the bringer of death and destruction. The one who liberated man’s soul from his physical body. Life or death. Good or evil. Sacred or profane. She could be any or all of them. Today, she’d been good. Merciful, even. She could easily have pulled the trigger and ended it at the quay. But instead she’d decided to play with Finnegan McGuire. Taunt him with innuendo. Mystify him with shadowy allusion.

She already looked forward to the next bout.

Suddenly losing her taste for the Lucky Strike, Angelika smashed it into a crystal ashtray. As she did, a man approached from behind. Wordlessly, he pulled aside the right lapel of her red silk kimono and cupped her bare breast in his hand. Several passengers sitting on the upper deck of a bateau-mouche , one of the many tourist boats that routinely cruised the Seine, stared in slack-jawed amazement. One or two turned away, overcome with Puritanical outrage. A few pointed excitedly to the French doors where she stood, two storeys above them. Someone else aimed a video camera.

Well aware of the effect that her beauty had on men and women alike, Angelika graced them with a smile.

‘You’re quite the exhibitionist, aren’t you?’ the man whispered in her ear, tweaking her nipple between his fingers.

Thinking the answer rather obvious, she arched into his calloused hand. ‘Ah, Finnegan, a little harder.’

‘I told you, my name is Ryan,’ he whined petulantly, even as he twisted her turgid nipple that much harder.

‘Umm …’ She luxuriated in the pain, feeling every agonized jolt. ‘No. Today your name is Finnegan.’

The young man knew better than to argue. He was an American in Paris. A polite way of saying that he was a male escort, a gigolo who plied his trade to bored upper-class women with money to spend. Without being told, she knew that he was an exchange student at the Sorbonne who turned tricks to pay the rent. Not that she cared about the particulars of his life. She’d picked him because he bore a striking resemblance to Finnegan McGuire. While the accent wasn’t quite right, the colouring – brown hair, brown eyes, bronzed skin – was identical. All in all, a good match.

Finnegan McGuire .

An uncommon name for an uncommon man. When she and Finnegan had faced one another on the quay, she’d found herself sexually aroused by his rugged features and cocky self-assurance. So rough around the muscular edges.

The gigolo raised a hand to the still wet hair that was twisted in a chignon at the back of her head. Realizing he was about to remove the etched silver hair pin, she pulled away from him.

‘I just wanted to –’

‘I have paid you a generous sum of money to tend to my wants,’ she interrupted, annoyed with his presumption.

He threw up his hands in a show of surrender. ‘Hey, no problem. Like you said, you’re calling the shots.’

Actually, when she went for the kill, she preferred more silent methods. But she doubted that her paid paramour would be especially interested in the dark particulars of her life.

‘Are you thirsty?’

‘For you, baby. I’m thirsty for you.’

Angelika resisted the urge to laugh at his sophomoric repartee. Instead, she shoved him aside. ‘I was asking if you’d like a drink,’ she said over her shoulder as she strolled across to the bar.

Like a lost puppy, the gigolo trailed on her heels. ‘A drink. Yeah, sure. What have you got?’

‘ La Fée Verte ,’ she said, lifting a bottle for his inspection.

His brow wrinkled. ‘The green fairy?’ He took the proffered bottle and read the label. A moment later, a look of near-comical shock on his face, he said, ‘Absinthe! Is this shit even legal?’

‘More or less,’ she equivocated. French distilleries still brewed the mythical green liquor despite the fact that the original 1915 ban on absinthe had yet to be revoked.