The Minoan Cipher

CHAPTER SEVENTY-ONE

Lily had staggered out of Genovese Park onto the street and called the limousine waiting around the corner. She was coughing from the dust in her lungs when the Mercedes pulled up to the curb within thirty seconds, but she still managed to bark out an order.

“Take me to the Auroch building. Quickly.”

The chauffeur mashed the gas pedal. Lily raged as the big car sped across the city, running stop signs and cutting off other vehicles.

This was not supposed to be this way, Hawkins should be lying in the park with the life’s blood flowing from his dying body.

The scroll and translator device should be in her hands. It was obvious the helicopter’s arrival above her head was no coincidence, but she couldn’t understand it. How had anyone known where she and Hawkins would be?

Lily was the classic psychopath. Charming and manipulative. But behind her brilliant smile was a cold-blooded being who was incapable of empathy. Adding to her murderous genetic heritage, the tutelage under the High Priestess, the drug-induced hallucinations at dozens of bloody rituals, her fealty to the Mother Goddess, and her immersion in the perverted religion that underpinned the Way of the Axe had drained every last human emotion from her body.

Amid all this, she had retained her outward appearance of sanity. Until now. Forces beyond her control seemed to be battling for command of her mind and body. Voices clamored in her head. She was confused at first until it dawned on her what the cacophony was about. All the priestesses who’d ever lived were calling out from across the eons, the chorus of the dead telling her that soon she, too, would be one with the Mother Goddess. When Hawkins slipped from her grasp her fevered mind concluded that his impossible escape could only have been the will of the Mother Goddess. She was telling Lily that Hawkins was a worthless diversion. The only one the goddess truly wanted was Kalliste, descendant of King Minos.

The Mercedes plunged into the garage under the Auroch tower. The elevator sped Lily to the roof. She got into the waiting helicopter, which lifted off and flew across the city to the airport. A company jet sat on the tarmac warming its engines. As soon as she was in her seat, the jet sped down the runway, quickly reached its cruising altitude and headed for La Mancha at more than six hundred miles an hour.

Hawkins and Calvin were still floating down the river at around five knots when Lily’s plane landed on the airstrip near the castle. A waiting SUV driven by one of the crone’s guards transported her along the old road and through the main gate of the castle to the torch-lit courtyard. She stepped out of the SUV and walked across toward the Tripartite Shrine. She noticed a commotion in front of the entrance where her assistant priestesses were gathered around the Prior known as North.

She stepped up to the senior priestess. “Why aren’t you preparing the Greek woman for the ceremony?” she demanded.

The priestess reacted with a horrified expression.

“We can’t,” she sobbed. “She’s dead.”

A thunder cloud passed over Lily’s brow. She reached out and her long fingernails dug like talons into the young woman’s throat. The priestess tried to speak, but her face turned purple. She could barely breathe and would have died if not for the Prior.

“She told me that the Daemons killed someone in the Maze,” he said. “I was about to investigate.”

Lily released her grip. “Show me,” she said.

Clutching her bleeding throat, the priestess led the way through the shrine entrance and down the stairway into the Maze, with Lily and the Prior close behind. They followed a convoluted route that took them to a tunnel near the king’s apartment where Kalliste had been held.

The body of a woman lay on its side, face turned against a wall. The torso was a mass of shredded cloth and flesh. Having eaten their fill, the Daemons were curled up asleep near the body. In the dim light the woman’s hair looked a deep brown, the same shade as Kalliste’s. Lily knelt by the body and saw that the hair had been darkened by the blood pooling on the floor.

“Turn her over,” Lily said.

The Prior rolled the body onto its back. Lily stared at a face frozen in a mask of terror. “This is not the Greek. It is her attendant.”

“I don’t understand,” the Prior said. “The hounds would not attack someone wearing the medallion.”

“Look closer, Prior. Do you see the axe medallion?”

The Prior got down on one knee. The woman’s throat was a mass of bloody flesh, but it was obvious the medallion was missing. He glanced at the Daemons. “Maybe it was torn off and swallowed.”

“Very creative, Prior. But as you said, they would not attack, which means she was not wearing the protective pendant. The medallion was taken from her and she foolishly decided to leave the apartment without it. The Greek is still in the Maze. I want all exits guarded. Go through the tunnels one by one.”

The Prior pulled a hand radio from his belt and barked a series of orders.

“The Shrine portal is under guard,” he said. “A crew will move from one side of the Maze to the other. We’re checking security cameras as well. We’ll catch her.”

Lily turned to the priestess. “Tell my lovely flowers to be ready in the sanctuary in one hour. Go!”

Still mute from her damaged vocal cords, the priestess nodded, then she and the Prior disappeared down a tunnel leaving Lily alone. She was already enjoying the power that would soon be in her hands. The voices she’d been hearing had quieted except for the harsh cackle of the crone.

Remember the prophecy.

She is near. She must die.