The 34th Degree

2

Philip looked at Lloyd, well bred and impatient. He is as I once was, he thought, and decided to be gentle but firm. “Even if there ever were such a text, Commander, what makes British Intelligence believe it has survived the ages?”

Lloyd had a ready answer. “When Arab Muslims besieged Constantinople in the eighth century, the Byzantine Greeks defending the city were able to save themselves with a miraculous and secret weapon. A compound that burned when it came into contact with water. A substance that became known as Greek Fire. Now, the exact formula used by the Greeks remains a mystery, but we know it included the compound naphthalene palmitate. Better known as napalm.”

“Which is hardly a secret anymore,” Philip observed, “as napalm is commonplace in your bombs and flamethrowers.”

“But the Byzantine Greeks deployed it in a different and, in some ways, more potent form twelve hundred years ago.”

Philip shrugged. “I hardly see what Greek Fire has to do with the Maranatha text.”

“The defenders of Constantinople used Greek Fire aboard their war vessels as a missile to be hurled from a catapult. By destroying the wooden fleets of the Muslim Arabs, Greek Fire blocked the spread of Islam into Europe. Rumors swirled among the ranks of the retreating Muslims that the Byzantine Greeks discovered the formula for their infernal fire encoded in the contents of the legendary Maranatha text. That is why, seven centuries later, when Constantinople finally fell to the Turks in the fifteenth century, bands of Muslim invaders turned over every stone in the city to find it.”

“But the text, I take it, was not to be found,” Philip said guardedly.

“No. During the siege, the Greeks had no choice but to turn to the Knights Templar to smuggle it out of the city to Rome, where it would be safely beyond the reach of the Ottoman Empire. But it never reached Rome. Instead, it ended up with the Freemasons at their Three Globes Lodge in Germany, founded to protect three golden globes from King Solomon’s temple. Two of those globes ended up with the American Freemasons, who buried them beneath Washington, D.C., at the founding of the United States of America. The third remained in Germany until Greece finally won its war of independence from Turkey in 1830 after four hundred years. The third globe, with the Maranatha text inside, was returned to its original home, a secret monastic order descended from the original Thessalonian church, whose members can trace their ancestry through the laying on of hands to the apostle Paul himself.”

“An interesting tale, Commander.”

“Yes, and I have another one for you,” Lloyd said. “This one took place a century later, during the Greco-Turkish war in Asia Minor in 1922. An aide-de-camp to Kemal-the great warrior Hadji Azrael, the Angel of Death-shocked the empire by laying down his sword, renouncing Islam, and embracing the Christian faith of his enemies.”

Philip’s heart skipped a beat. Unconsciously, he placed his left hand over the large, ornate cross that hung from his neck.

Lloyd continued, “There was a secret ceremony with the patriarch of the Eastern Church himself, the laying on of hands, and a new name for this once sworn enemy of Greeks, this killer of Christians. Ultimately, his orders sent him to the monastic order that guarded the legendary Maranatha text he once sought to destroy. He became its protector and wore a gold cross with a sapphire omega set in the center. The very one you seem to be wearing, Philip. Or should I say, Hadji Azrael?”