The Prophecy

68

Payne couldn’t believe his ears. Dubois had just referred to the secret room where he kept his collection as his lair. It was the same term Nostradamus had used in his quatrain. He claimed the book that belonged to his heir would be ‘Hidden in ink inside his lair’.

That couldn’t be a coincidence, could it?

Even to a realist like Payne, he had to admit too many coincidences in a row meant something else was going on, something beyond his understanding of the world. He still wasn’t ready to believe that Nostradamus had foreseen all the events of the past few days, but he was no longer willing to dismiss things quite as easily.

‘After you,’ Dubois said with a slight bow.

‘Sorry,’ Payne said as he grabbed the box from the crate, ‘my parents warned me about older men and secret rooms. That’s why I wasn’t an altar boy.’

Dubois smirked at the vulgar joke and led the way into the hidden chamber, pausing to flip a switch just inside the entryway. Suddenly the entire room was bathed in soft light. Three of the walls were lined with shelves filled with books about Nostradamus and other famous prophets. Some of the volumes were centuries old, others were more recent. Payne barely noticed them. His gaze was focused on the glass display case that had been mounted along the fourth wall, directly across from the lair’s entrance. He set the puzzle box on a small table in the centre of the room, and then moved towards the case.

‘Please take a closer look,’ Dubois encouraged.

Payne moved forward, searching for anything that resembled the object described in the third line of the quatrain. Of all the items, the most likely candidate seemed to be a leather-bound journal displayed in the very centre of the case. ‘What’s that?’ he asked.

‘That is the crown jewel of my collection. It is the earliest known edition of Les Prophéties, handwritten by Nostradamus himself. The first public instalment was not published until 1555, a full two years after his last entry was dated.’

‘Wow, that must have cost you a lot.’

‘Actually,’ Dubois said as he backed away, ‘it didn’t cost me a cent.’

‘How’d you manage that?’

‘Quite simple, really. I took it.’

‘You took it?’

Dubois pulled a pistol from the small of his back. ‘Allow me to demonstrate.’

Payne turned around slowly. He was fully expecting to see a gun in his rival’s hand. ‘I admire your confidence, but that’s not going to happen you know, considering the circumstances.’

‘The circumstances? I’m not stupid, Mr Payne. I’m fully aware that Mr Jones is lurking in the darkness. Why do you think I pushed for this meeting to be held inside?’

‘I thought maybe you wanted to cuddle.’

Dubois couldn’t help but smile. ‘Hardly. I did it so we could have a conversation without interlopers.’

‘And you think you’re safer in here?’

‘All the windows in my château are bulletproof. They were made by the same company that outfitted the White House. Sniper fire won’t even leave a mark.’

Payne shrugged. ‘Oh well, I guess we’ll have to kill you some other way.’

‘I guess so. In the meantime, tell me about the girl.’

‘Sorry, you’re not her type.’

Dubois ignored him. ‘Why is she involved in this? What’s her significance?’

‘She has no significance,’ Payne lied. ‘The only reason she’s involved is because your men killed her neighbour.’

‘Her neighbour was a thief.’

‘Coming from a thief, is that a compliment or an insult?’

Dubois smirked at the comment. ‘I’m getting tired of your insults.’

‘Then why don’t you come over here and do something about it?’

‘There’s no need, Mr Payne. I can silence you from here.’

A moment later, Dubois lifted his gun and fired.

Jones was on the move long before he heard the gunshot in his earpiece. In fact, he had abandoned his position in the yard as soon as he got off the phone with Butch Reed.

Dubois had burned down his house. The bastard needed to pay.

While hiding his sniper rifle in the undergrowth, Jones told Payne what had happened and told him he was on his way to the château. It was the main reason Payne had been willing to go inside the Dragon’s Lair. He knew his backup would be there soon.

But not soon enough.

The first shot hit Payne squarely in the chest, catching him by surprise and knocking him off balance. But that wasn’t good enough for Dubois, who fired two more times at close range. The second shot struck Payne in his abdomen, and the third tore through his left trapezius, just missing the arteries in his neck. The bullet, after passing through skin and muscle, shattered the display case behind him and imbedded itself in the stone wall.

Payne slumped to the floor, stunned. Blood leaked from his wounds as shards of broken glass fell upon him, cutting his hands and face.

Wasting no time, Dubois reached into his pocket and pulled out a chatellerault — an antique French switchblade with a distinctive S-shaped cross guard. With a skilled hand, Dubois flicked it open and plunged its tip into the bubble wrap that protected the package. Payne, who had been paranoid about leaving it in the library, had been kind enough to carry it inside the lair. Now the last image he would see before he bled to death was his rival opening the box.

Dubois grinned at the thought.

And from the floor, Payne grinned as well.

The instant Dubois cracked the inner seal of the package, a large ball of flame erupted in his face, and his hair, skin, and clothes caught fire. The homemade explosive, which had been rigged by Jones in the back of the van, was their insurance policy in case something happened to them before they confronted Dubois. They figured if they were dead, it was the only way they could stop him from killing Megan and Ulster.

Dubois howled in agony as his skin blistered and bubbled like cheese on a pizza. He tried in vain to smother the flames by dropping to the floor and rolling around, but all that did was spread the fire. In a flash, one of his bookcases ignited, filling the room with thick, noxious smoke that blinded Payne and made it impossible to breathe.

Alive because of his Kevlar vest, Payne reached his right arm over his head and snatched the edition of Les Prophéties from the shattered case. The blood from his wounds stained the book’s cover as he pulled it against his chest and started crawling towards the doorway. Choking on the fumes and coughing loudly, Payne moved closer to the exit he couldn’t see. It was up ahead somewhere — that’s all he knew. And if he didn’t reach it soon, he would be burned inside the Dragon’s Lair.

Suddenly, from the darkness behind him, Payne felt a bony hand brushing against his lower leg. At first it felt like a dog nipping at his heel, but it quickly turned into a hound from hell as Dubois latched onto Payne’s foot with all the strength he could muster. The flammable fluid that had ignited the blaze quickly spread from Dubois to Payne’s clothes. Seconds later, his lower leg was engulfed in flames.

‘Jon!’ Jones screamed as he burst into the library.

‘In here!’

Jones ran towards the sound as Payne rolled over and kicked Dubois several times, trying to free himself.

‘Where are you?’ Jones demanded.

‘He’s got my leg!’

As flames climbed the walls and ignited the ceiling above, Jones dived to the floor and crawled towards the screams of his best friend. He blindly grabbed the first thing he could find, which happened to be Payne’s left arm, and pulled it with all his might. The sudden force freed his foot from Dubois’s grasp. It also saved Payne’s life.

Lightning bolts of pain shot through his ruptured trapezius as Jones dragged him into the fresh air of the library. But Payne’s agony paled in comparison to Dubois’s as the bastard burned to a crisp alongside his prized collection.

Ironically, his search for the future had ended his own.