The Doomsday Key
Шрифт:
Ivar forgot about the coin in his pocket and reached to the small of her back. He pulled her closer. He recognized that she was seducing him, and he suspected that she knew he wasn't fooled. But neither of them pulled away.
They both knew what was at risk, what waited to be won.
The future of mankind.
And the power to control that fate.
SECOND
FIRE AND ICE
Chapter 12
October 12, 10:12 A.M.
Hawkshead, England
It seemed impossible that murder could be traced back to such an idyllic countryside.
Gray drove down the winding road framed by rolling hills. With each passing mile the lane grew narrower until it was barely wide enough to accommodate the rented Land Rover. A patch of hardwood forest overhung the road, creating a tangled tunnel of woven branches. Once clear of the woods, the vistas opened again and revealed the rounded peaks of the surrounding fells, or what passed for mountains here in England. Snow already covered the crags in a white blanket since an early winter storm had blown across the district the night before.
Closer at hand, meadows and hedge-lined farm tracts cut the landscape into a quilt of brown grasses and fallow fields. Streams and creeks sparkled among mirror-smooth lakes and smaller highland tarns. Ice rimed the edges of all the waterways, and windblown snow frosted the entire landscape.
The natural beauty struck one to silence.
Or almost everyone.
"You're lost, aren't you?" Kowalski accused from the backseat.
"I'm not lost," Gray lied.
Rachel rattled her road map and eyed Gray doubtfully.
Okay, maybe they were a little off course...
They had left Liverpool two hours ago and followed the directions easily enough up into the Lake District of northern England. The highways were well marked, but once Gray exited the major thoroughfares, he ended up in a countryside of meandering lanes, unmarked roads, and a broken landscape of hills, forests, and lakes.
Even GPS proved to be no help. None of the roads matched its software. They might as well have been driving through open country.
Their destination was the town of Hawkshead, one of the many honeypot villages that nestled within the natural wonderland of the English Lake District. They were to meet a colleague of Father Giovanni, a historian from the University of Edinburgh named Dr. Wallace Boyle. Boyle had organized the dig out in a remote section of the central fells and still oversaw the site. He had agreed to meet them at a hotel pub in Hawkshead.
But first Gray had to find the place.
Rachel studied the map and searched out the window for any landmarks. Behind Rachel, Seichan sat next to Kowalski and stared sullenly out at the rolling hills and dales. She had barely spoken a word since leaving Italy and continued to hover at the edge of their group, maintaining a wary distance.
"If we don't get somewhere pretty damn quick," Kowalski continued, "you're going to have to stop at the next tree or bush. My back molars are floating."
Gray sped up the next hill. "If you hadn't downed those four pints of beer back in Liverpool-"
"Not my fault. All those cockamamie names. Blackwater Brewery's Buccaneer. Cains Double Bock. Boddington's Bitters. Tetley's Cask. Guy can't tell what he's getting 'til he tastes it. Took a while to find a good one."
"But you drank them all down."
"Of course I did. It would've been rude not to."
Rachel folded her map and gave up. "It can't be much farther," she said with little conviction. "Maybe we should stop and ask for directions."
Moments later, it proved unnecessary. With a final rattling push, the Land Rover topped the next rise, and a small village appeared, spread across the valley ahead.
Gray looked over at Rachel. The relief on her face answered his question. It had to be Hawkshead. Cobblestone lanes crisscrossed past fenced gardens and squat timbered homes. Snow mantled the village's slate roofs, and thin trails of smoke rose from the chimneys. Across the way, an old stone church crouched atop a hill and overlooked the village, like a grim gray deacon scowling down at the town below.
As they wound down toward the village, stacked-stone walls rose alongside the road. The Land Rover rumbled over an arched granite bridge to enter the outskirts of town. The buildings and homes were of wattle-and-daub construction with exposed timbers, traditional for an English Tudor town. Small front gardens and window boxes hinted at the splendor that must be spring and summer here, but after the storm last night, snow piled atop boxes and across yards, creating a wintry Christmas scene.
Gray slowed the Land Rover to a crawl as his tires crunched over icy cobbles. He headed toward the main square, where their meeting place-the Kings Arms Hotel-was located. They were already twenty minutes late. Reaching the square, Gray slid the SUV into a small parking lot.
As they exited the vehicle, the cold bit into any exposed skin. The dampness of Liverpool and the long heated drive had not prepared them for the icy chill of the Lakeland elevations. Wood smoke scented each cold breath. Bundling tighter into their thick coats, they set off.
The Kings Arms Hotel lay on the far side of the main square. The squat, slate-roofed building had greeted travelers for five hundred years, stretching back to the Elizabethan era. A low stone wall cordoned off a beer garden in front, its tables and chairs currently covered in a thin coat of fresh snow, but the fiery glow from the inn's lower windows promised steaming warmth and hot drinks. They hurried toward it.
Kowalski trailed them. "Hey, lookit all the bears..." His voice had a wistful note to it, a tone as incongruous as a bull suddenly singing an aria.