The Jealous God Read online

  “And how did you know his true identity?” Lucio asked her.

  “Much like I knew yours. I have not spent the last few hundred years sitting idle. I am quite skilled in the Arts, Sir Dambretti. And I have a natural propensity for such things. After all, I am what I am.”

  “Yes, I suppose you are,” he agreed. “So what do you propose?”

  “I would suggest you convince Sir Ramsay to join forces with my brother.” She stood up and came to take his hands in hers, kneeling in front of him. “It would be highly advisable to take the skulls to Wewelsburg before it is too late. They must be put in their proper places. Things are out of balance and must be put aright. If the Ancient Evil is allowed to gain access to them before we can stop him, there will be no awakening. Mankind will not evolve and the next wave will not begin. Mankind will be lost in this system."

  "We will be set back thousands and thousands of years, perhaps millions. This creature has already consumed Sir Ramsay’s grandson and great-granddaughter. It was a terrible mistake for her to confront him alone. Now he commands great power and understanding. He understands the Word and knows what he should not know. He will use what he has stolen to consume more and more. Even now, he is growing in strength of numbers, swaying the ignorant masses to his will. He will set mankind against its own flesh and then watch them consume themselves for his pleasure before he destroys everything.”

  “How can you know all of this?” Lucio was still confused and doubtful. He thought perhaps she had bewitched him.

  “You are wrong, Sir Dambretti.” She smiled at him as he stood up. “I have not bewitched you.”

  “Now you are reading my mind. That could be dangerous.”

  “Perhaps you would like to read mine?” She looked into his eyes and he saw everything just as she had said. After what seemed like a very long time, but was in reality, only a few seconds, she rose up slightly and kissed him on the lips. “There is no need for you to make up your mind immediately,” she told him. “You will be here for a few days, no?”

  “Yes, as long as I can manage it,” he answered and realized he had both hands on her shoulders, gripping her tightly. He let go of her quickly and looked about nervously.

  “I have a gift for Louis Champlain.”

  “Louis? You have a gift for Louis?” Lucio felt disoriented as the information he had learned from her tried to find the proper niches in his mind.

  “Yes, but I will need your dagger.” She nodded toward the golden knife with the stylized form of Horus on the hilt that he wore on his belt. He looked down at the dagger and then his face twisted into a horrified frown. “No. It is nothing like that. I will not be cutting my wrists or anything like that, silly. I could do it with a spoon, but the dagger would make it easier and quicker.” She held out her hand and he laid the dagger in it doubtfully. “Come and help me.”

  He followed her, puzzled, back to the sanctuary and along one wall. She stopped in front of a colorful, stain-glass rendition of the feats of Samson, the Danite hero, slaying the lion with his bare hands and then taking the honey from the carcass in the next frame. All around Samson’s head was a swarm of tiny bees set into the glass and entangled in his long, reddish blonde hair and beard.

  “Help me up.” She raised her bare foot and Lucio boosted her onto the deep window sill. He watched in consternation as she used his dagger to systematically pry the bees from the glass panel. As each one came free, she dropped it into his hands. Soon, his hands were overflowing with the heavy little insects and he began to put them in his pockets. When she had pried the last one loose, she leapt lightly to the floor and replaced the dagger in the sheath on his belt. Looking up into his dark eyes, her own eyes bespoke secrets and mysteries he longed to learn.

  “What have you done?” he asked her instead and stepped back. He held one of the bees up to the light looked at the fancy carving. He had been to the chapel many times and never noticed these before. They were very small, but each one was rendered in detail. Someone had taken a great deal of time to shape and form them with care. Their wings showed intricate vein patterns, each one in a slightly different pose from the next. Each one a unique work of art and not an integral part of the original stained glass. He looked up again and saw many more bees rendered in glass. Engraved stripes were carved on their abdomens. Each had six legs and a recognizable face replete with compound eyes. They looked quite capable of taking flight. “Sir Ramsay will be very upset if he finds you have ruined his window.”

  “I doubt he will and I haven't ruined anything. He put them there for a reason,” she said and led him back to her improvised bedroom. “Put them on the desk.”

  Lucio rounded up all the bees from his pockets and piled them in the middle of her desk.

  “How many are there?” He asked as he examined one of them again in the candlelight. They were incredible.

  “365," she answered as she rummaged again in the basket.

  “You counted them?” He raised both eyebrows.

  “No. There is one for each day of the year.”

  “Ahh,” he nodded, but failed to see the significance of it.

  She poured a bit of the dark red wine in a shallow dish and took the bee he still held in his hand.

  “Watch.” She dropped the bee in the wine and swirled it around. When she picked it up again, she placed it in his hand and closed his fingers over it, wrapping her own fingers over his.

  He pulled his hand away from her and opened his fingers slowly. The bee now glowed warmly in the candlelight. It was no longer gray like the lead lines between the glass pieces in the windows, but gold. Gleaming gold!

  “I don’t understand!” He frowned at her in wonder. “How did you know?”

  “In the days of old, when my forefathers came away from the land of Canaan and crossed the sea, they took many things with them. These bees,” she turned back to the table and began to wash each of the tiny sculptures with gentle care “were a symbol of great power and strength. They were made as a remembrance of the prophecies foretold by Jacob to his sons on his deathbed. Judah is a lion's whelp: from the prey, my son, thou art gone up: he stooped down, he crouched as a lion, and as an old lion; who shall rouse him up? The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be. Dan shall judge his people, as one of the tribes of Israel. Dan shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path, that biteth the horse heels, so that his rider shall fall. Benjamin shall ravin as a wolf: in the morning he shall devour the prey, and at night he shall divide the spoil.”

  She quoted part of Jacob’s words to his sons. “Both the tribes of Benjamin and Dan were driven out of the Promised Land by their brothers for what their brothers considered to be transgressions against Jehovah. Samson’s riddle to the Philistines concerning the honey taken from the carcass of the lion, represented the fall of the Lion of Judah from within. Samson took the honey or the ‘meat’ of the lion and passed it on to his family though they did not know it. In later years, the Benjamites and the Danites came together again in Gaul, more specifically in the Languedoc region and they were united together. When the Magdalene left Jerusalem after the crucifixion of Christ, she brought with her His descendents and converted the Danites and Benjamites to the teachings of Christ and mingled his blood, the Sangreal, with that of the Benjamites. Thus, through this blood, the line of Christ, Shiloh, will return to judge Judah in the end times.”

  “There were no great tribes of Jews in France,” Lucio objected backed away from her. “Those were Visigoths and Cathars. Heretics! The Holy Roman Emperor eventually killed all of them.”

  “No! You are wrong. Who was the first Frankish Holy Roman Emperor?” she asked him and looked up, narrowing her eyes.

  “Uh, well, wait, I know this!” He frowned. “Charlemagne.”

  “Not quite. Charlemagne was Carolingian from the 9th century. The Carolingians were usurpers. King Clovis was the first Frank
to become Holy Roman Emperor,” she corrected him. “And who were these Franks?”

  “Now you ask too much.” He strained his brain for the answer. This was long even before his time. “Wait! He was a King of the Franks, no, just as Charlemagne, no?” He smiled and she nodded.

  “But what line? Clovis was not Carolingian.”

  “Line?” He shook his head. She had him now. His history outside of Italy was rather weak. Yet, in fact he probably knew more about Scotland’s history now than Italy’s.

  “Yes. Bloodline. He was the son of Merovee. The first Merovingian King of the Franks.”

  She dried the little bees on a soft cloth and laid them out on the table in neat lines. “One of my ancestors,” she added.

  “Ahhh. The Merovingians! Yes. I remember now.”

  “The good King Clovis,” she continued. “These bees adorned his royal robe. My brother and I searched endlessly for them, but your Knight of Death had them all along. When they were found in King Clovis’ tomb, they were eventually sewn onto the wedding gown of Napoleon Bonaparte’s bride. His Excellency even tried to usurp the Holy Roman Empire for himself. But that is another story."

  Lucio picked up some of the golden bees and examined them closely.

  "After that, the bees seemed to have disappeared, scattered during the subsequent wars. Mark Ramsay knew the significance of them. How he came to possess all of them is, indeed, an accomplishment of miraculous proportions.”

  “He has always been good at what he does. He probably took them directly off the bride’s gown,” Lucio shrugged and smiled at the thought, hoping someday he might ask the Knight how he had managed it. “But why would you give these to Louis?”

  “You still do not understand the Brotherhood of which you are a part.” She laughed softly as she continued to clean the bees. “Have you never considered who your Brothers are? Take Konrad von Hetz for instance. Have you never wondered why a German would have held such a prominent position in the Council of Twelve? Why would Master d’Brouchart have held a lowly German peasant in such high esteem? Why would Edgard choose such a one for his closest companion and confidante?”

  Lucio frowned. Konrad had been the only German, but he’d never given it much thought. He, himself, had been the only Italian. Everyone else had been French… Frankish or Anglo-Saxon… English… Scottish.

  “So who was he?” Lucio asked her.

  “Conrad II, Emperor of Germany, born 990 of the common era. Died… or so it was said, in 1039. He was the Holy Roman Emperor from 1027 to 1039 and the King of Germany from 1024 until 1039. His father was Henry II, Count of Speyer and his great grandfather was Conrad the Wise, Duke of Lorraine. Ring a bell? Lorraine? Seat of the usurpers of the Merovingian line, home of the Carolingians who murdered the last Merovingian King, Dagobert II and took the throne of the Franks. Conrad or Konrad with a ‘K’ was a Frank who was elected as German King in 1024. Konrad von Hetz was not German at all as you might imagine, but rather just another Frank. Just as Sir Barry of Sussex was not of Sussex, but originally from the Languedoc. Do you begin to see now, my love?” She turned a melting smile on him reminded him very much of her son. “It is all by design. Conrad II did not die; he simply faded away into the Order, forsaking all he was to follow the Rose Cross. As for Louis Champlain, he has the mark of the Merovingian royal line. Between his shoulders. I have seen it. He has always tried to hide it. He was afraid.”

  “Are you telling me Louis Champlain is of the Royal Blood of the Merovingians?” Lucio’s mind was having a hard time assimilating all of this.

  “Yes, I am. He knows it.” She opened the drawer on the desk and took out a small satin bag. “It was very rough in the elder days. The thrones of the Frankish empire were usurped by the Mayors of the Palace who actually governed the kingdoms politically while the King ruled by right of blood."

  "As they played out their treacheries, the kings ascending the thrones became younger and younger and were simply pawns of the Mayors. Eventually, they managed to enroll the Pope in their schemes and by lies and forgery, had themselves proclaimed royalty, thus the Carolingian line of kings occupied the thrones of the empires that eventually became France. The descendents of the true kings were eventually all killed or exiled out of the country entirely."

  "Louis Champlain was taken from his mother and hidden, much as you were taken from the vicinity of the Doge of Venice and hidden for your own protection. That you fell in with Sir Ramsay was the will of God and he became your protector and benefactor unwittingly, at first."

  "Louis Champlain may have been lost to himself, but he was never lost to Edgard d’Brouchart. Louis was a direct descendent of Sigisbert VI, last Merovingian Count of Razes before they were exiled to Brittany and then to England. It was Edgard d’Brouchart who brought Louis from England back to France when he was a young boy, and placed him with the Blanchefort family. From there he went to the Holy Lands when he was old enough and the rest is, as they say, history.”

  She put the last of the bees in the bag and pulled the drawstrings tight before tying them in a knot.

  She dropped the bag in his hands and used one finger to push his chin up. He seemed frozen. Too much information. Too much. She knew everything and then some!

  “Think about what I have said and give these to Louis,” she told him. “He will know what they are.”

  “But how is it the Merovingians became involved with these exiled Benjamites and Danites?” He was still confused.

  “The Benjamites migrated first to Greece, to Arcadia, from there they settled Troy and from there they went into the Germanic peoples and eventually ended up in Gaul coming round over the top of the Italian Peninsula. The Merovingians were Benjamites to begin with.”

  “And the Visigoths and Cathars?” he asked quietly.

  “Danites.”

  “And did the Holy See know this?” he asked with dawning realization.

  “I would assume so. That is why they conspired first to use them and then to annihilate them.”

  “Ahhh.” Lucio nodded. He held the little bag tightly. Louis was not going to like this. Not at all.

  ((((((((((((()))))))))))))

  “Yes! Yes!” Jozsef Daniel scooped up the crystal skull from the gleaming surface of the table in front of him. “You are wonderful, my friend!”

  He was talking to the skull.

  General Schweikert sat in one of the comfortable chairs in the sitting room, staring at his Master doubtfully as he held the Skull of Sidon above his head, twirling around in the center of the room like a dancer in some macabre, silent ballet.

  “They are gathering on the island. The son of Ramsay has taken the skull of Santa Lucia there. We may soon learn exactly where to find the others.”

  “If they are on the island, it should be easy enough to take them,” the General suggested. He had had no luck in locating the skulls so far. The last he had seen them had been in the realm of Ereshkigal and Ramsay had taken them from there. If Jozsef Daniel could use the Skull of Sidon properly, it would act as an amplifier and the skull Luke Ramsay carried would be a homing beacon until it was placed under protective custody by magick. They would simply trace the skull to the point where it no longer sent out its visions and voice and look there.

  “Yes!” Jozsef stopped and smiled at him. “What news from the continent?”

  He was speaking of the American continent. North America to be more specific.

  “Things are going quite well.” Abaddon nodded. “The seeds of insurrection have taken root. The unions are working their own brand of magic. Soon there will be full scale racial uprisings and America will be more than occupied with trying to quell its internal problems. They have been on the brink for years. Black, white and brown. All turning against each other in desperate struggles for power. It was easy enough to tilt the scales."

  "The overall moral conscience in the United States and Canada was always the weak link in the New Order’s chain. The Prophet tried in vain to br
ing them into a higher state of spiritual awareness, to quell their lust for material things, but it was too ingrained in their culture. He never succeeded there. The Hispanic populations consider the whites and blacks completely devoid of devotion to God."

  "The blacks are convinced the whites are conspiring to keep them repressed and are looking for strong black leadership to help them defeat the ‘white devils’. Our Haitian King supplied them with that. The Hispanics are afraid of the African peoples and the white minority of America is so caught up in pleasing themselves, they hardly suspect a thing. They cannot conceive of being ousted by either group because they see themselves as benefactors to the poor, oppressed peoples south of the border and they have always been superior to the African influence because the black majority could never agree internally on anything long enough to unite against them."

  "On the whole, the ruling class of white America is an arrogant lot. They fully believe God is on their side because ‘white is right’,” Schweikert summed up his report with a flourish of one hand.

  Jozsef nodded in approval of his devoted servant. “What of the Danites?”

  “They have troubles of their own.” Schweikert shrugged. “Many of them were put into prison when they refused to accept what they called the ‘mark of the beast’. The population of Utah declined sharply when the IIP was made mandatory. Omar’s remission of the program has only just made it possible for them to return home and they are trying to sort through the ruins, trying to recoup what was lost to them. Their financial structure is destroyed. They have no backing, politically or otherwise.”

  “Will they regroup in time to become a threat?” Jozsef asked as he wrapped the crystal head in a black silk cloth and placed it inside a lead-lined box on the table.

  “I doubt it. Even if they realize what is happening, they have lost too much and they will not have enough time to regain the power and wealth they once had. Besides, they are scattered all across the country and America is huge, if it is anything at all.”