Templar's Quest

59

Mont de la Lune, The Languedoc

2315 hours

I’ve just found the Lapis Exillis! The Stone in Exile.

The Grail!

Astounded, Cædmon stared at the gold pyramid-shaped object cached inside the limestone aumbry.

‘First an Isis idol and now this,’ he marvelled, flabbergasted that the Grail of legend was actually the Benben stone, one of ancient Egypt’s most sacred relics. To have unearthed the artefact in Egypt would have been noteworthy. To find it in the south of France was mind-boggling.

Bending at the waist, he peered more closely, able to see that there were hieroglyphs carved around the base of the stone.

‘ “I come from the Earth to meet the star,” ’ he translated, the ‘star’ in question undoubtedly Sirius, the celestial abode of Isis.

Bracing both hands around the pyramidal stone, Cædmon carefully removed it from the niche and placed it on the altar. Roughly the size of a kettle, it was surprisingly heavy, weighing at least seven pounds.

‘Yellow, glittering, precious gold.’

But unlike the gilded Isis figurine, the Grail wasn’t fashioned from thinly hammered gold applied to bronze. Instead, the pyramidal stone had actually been electroplated ! A technology that supposedly didn’t exist prior to the year 1800 when Alessandro Volta engineered the first electric cell battery.

And because it was gold-plated, he had no idea what comprised the core substance. Was it a stone? A crystal? A fallen meteorite? Whatever it was, the very fact that it had been electroplated proved that the Egyptians knew how to produce electricity.

What else did they know how to do? he wondered as he stared contemplatively at the Grail, still in a state of confused awe.

My God! It’s the bloody Benben stone!

Shrouded in mystery, Egyptologists were divided over the precise meaning of the Benben stone. Some claimed it symbolized the first lump of earth enlivened by the blessed rays of the sun. A few thought it was a perch for the Bennu bird, the mythological Phoenix that engendered the creative process. Then there were those who claimed the pyramidal stone symbolized a drop of semen that fell from the god Atum’s penis when he masturbated the world into existence. Indeed, the Coffin Texts intimated that the Benben stone had magical powers, although he suspected that the ancient object had more to do with technology than the occult.

A key to unlock scientific knowledge that had been lost eons ago.

Whatever it was, the Benben stone had supposedly been smuggled into Syria in the twelfth century BC during a popular uprising against the Pharaoh Merenptah. Where it promptly disappeared in the desert sands.

Could that be the reason why the Cathars referred to the pyramidal stone as the Lapis Exillis, the Stone in Exile? The same appellation used by Wolfram von Eschenbach to describe the Grail.

Overwhelmed with tantalizing questions for which he had few answers, Cædmon lifted the golden stone from the altar and deposited it in his rucksack. Unfortunately, he couldn’t take both the Isis idol and the Grail. It would be difficult enough worming his back through the tunnel with just the one relic. The Grail was the prize. He could retrieve the Isis figurine at a later date.

As he turned his back on the altar, Cædmon was guiltily put in mind of Prometheus forced to steal fire from the gods. An act for which the mighty Zeus had Prometheus tethered to a rock while an eagle dined on his liver. Day after agonizing day.

Penance for his sins.