The Spirit Banner (16 page)

The door opened up into some kind of antechamber, complete with benches around the perimeter and niches in the wall for storing items.
There was a door directly across from the one they'd entered and even in the dim light of their flashlights they could see that it led down a short tunnel and opened into a large space just beyond. A sconce holding a torch hung on either side of the door and they paused a moment to light them, noting from the dust and cobwebs that neither torch had been lit in many years, ages even.
The torchlight flickered off the stone and sent their shadows chasing after them as they continued. Their footfalls sounded louder than normal in the narrow confines and deep silence of the place. Annja felt the thrill of discovery coursing through her. It was what she loved about archaeology—the suspense, the anticipation, the wonder, of what they might find and what they might learn.
Satisfied that there wasn't anything immediately threatening inside the chamber, Mason called out to Davenport and had him join them. After all, this was his expedition. Jeffries and Nambai came in, as well, leaving Williams and Vale to guard the entrance and to watch for any sign that Ransom might be on to them again.
Once the others were inside, Annja and Mason continued on. They quickly found that the short hallway opened into another room, though this one was much larger than the first; they could see darkness pooling out beyond the edge of their torchlight, indicating there was more to uncover. But they barely paid any attention to that fact as soon they got a glimpse of what had been drawn across the floor in the center of the room.
It was a map.
It had been painted on the floor and was partially obscured by years of dust and dirt, but it was clearly recognizable as such. With specific instructions from Annja, everyone got down on their hands and knees and gently brushed the loose debris off the painting, exposing it all for perhaps the first time in centuries. Once they were finished, they stood back to examine what they had uncovered.
Not the handiest thing to use in finding your way around, was Annja's first thought. Maps needed to be portable in order to be useful and this was anything but. Still, you didn't create a map of this size and then hide it away from the rest of the world if there wasn't a point to it. There was a reason it was here and she just had to discover what that was.
Like many ancient maps, this one was more a general representation of the surrounding area than a scale drawing. In some ways, that made it easier to read. The blue line that split in three and stretched down toward the bottom of the map obviously represented the three rivers. The round circle with the three squiggles running out of it near the source of the river must represent the voice in the earth. And the tall peak rising above the others could only be Burkhan Khaldun—God Mountain.
The entire map had been produced at a huge scale, so that you literally had to walk from one side of the chamber to the other in order to see it all.
Annja was still doing just that, working her way slowly from the lower section of the map, which represented the area they had traveled through the day before, toward the summit of God Mountain, the most likely place for Genghis Khan's tomb to be located. She was determined not to miss anything significant.
There was a shout of excitement from the far side of the room.
"Annja!" Davenport yelled. "Come quickly!"
He was standing roughly two thirds of the way up the slope of the large black triangle that represented Burkhan Khaldun and waving to her frantically.
So much for meticulousness, she thought and headed over to see what the commotion was about.
A symbol had been drawn on the map—a crude sketch of a woman riding a horse—and next to it were words in a fine flowing script that looked to be Mongolian. Annja couldn't decipher it, but it turned out Nambai could.
"The sixty…I think that translates as brides…rode sixty horses and now sleep under the, um, not sure what that word is…eyes of those who came before," he said.
Before he could move on to the second set of verses, both Annja and Mason spoke up, translating it from memory. "'In their arms is the truth you seek, the way to all that was and more.'"
It was an exact match to the hidden message Annja had uncovered in Curran's journal!
Nambai looked at the script, then nodded. "That's right. How did you know?"
"It's a long story," Mason replied and went on to explain about the message hidden in Curran's journal.
While he did that, Annja squatted down, letting her fingers trace the outline of the symbol on the map, wonder running through her veins as she realized that they were one step closer to their goal. The symbol put the Tomb of the Virgins on the south slope of Burkhan Khaldun, which couldn't be more than a day's hike north of their current position. They were so close!
Her musings were interrupted by Mason. "You'd have to ask Annja," he said.
She looked up at him. "Ask me what?"
"Nambai wants to know what the whole 'brides and steeds' thing means."
"Right."
The playful gleam in Mason's eyes told her that he wanted to know, as well, but he wasn't going to admit that when he had someone else to play the innocent. She threw him a blatantly fake smile, to let him know that he wasn't fooling anyone, least of all her.
"Well, the theory I'm running with at the moment ties the riddle back to the things we know about the Khan's burial." She stood, brushed off her hands on the legs of her jeans. "When Genghis died, he was in China with his army. Not wanting to bury his body among his enemies, his generals had it transported back to his homeland with an honor guard of sixty warriors. The guard traveled ahead of the funeral train, so in essence they could be said to have 'come before' Genghis. Once the procession reached the place in the Great Taboo where they intended to bury him, the entire honor guard was slaughtered down to the last man."
"That's what they get for volunteering," Mason remarked, but Annja ignored him. She noted that she had Davenport's and Jeffries's attention now, as well.
"Along with the honor guard, sixty virgins and sixty of the finest horses were sacrificed to provide the Khan with a harem and a herd for all eternity. Legend states that they were all buried together in a magnificent tomb, commonly referred to as the Tomb of the Virgins, but its exact location has always been a mystery because those who did the burying were themselves slaughtered to keep the secret safe."
"If I'm right, the phrase 'the way to all that was and more' means that we'll find the next clue inside that tomb."
She pointed to the symbol of the woman on horseback that graced the map at Davenport's feet. "And that tells us where to find it. Come on, I'll show you."
She led them all back outside and pointed up at the looming peak of Burkhan Khaldun. The mountain was far higher than the rest of those around it, making it easy to locate, and even from here they could see the deep snow that covered most of its face.
"That's where we'll find the Tomb of the Virgins, and, ultimately, where we'll find Genghis Khan's final resting place."

The horseman hidden in the trees higher on the ridgeline above the river watched the intruders enter the Chamber of the Winds and felt anger grow in his heart. The chamber was sacred; how dare they defile it with their presence!
He'd been following the group ever since they'd entered the Ikh Khorig, just as he'd been ordered to do, but this was the first time since they'd come into the forbidden territory that they'd done something so unexpected that he wasn't certain how to respond. He'd been told to watch, but not interfere; yet surely that didn't include sitting back and allowing them to do this, did it?
He wasn't certain and it was that uncertainty that stayed his hand. That and the guns the intruders carried openly.
He chose to wait and watch, to see if he could determine what they wanted, so that when he reported back he wouldn't look like a fool.
The watcher was still there when the intruders emerged from the chamber almost an hour later and pointed north, toward the looming peak of Burkhan Khaldun.
That decided it for him.
It was time to tell the Voice of the Wolf.

Darkness came early, thanks to the looming cliff face at their backs and the high trees surrounding them, so while there were a few hours of daylight left, it was all but useless as night began to settle in around them. Rather than try and blunder about in the dark, the decision was made to stay right where they were and use the antechamber for that night's camp. This had the added benefit of keeping them under cover should Ransom use that chopper of his to do a night flyover in search of their position, something Mason saw as fairly likely.
The extra meat they'd cooked the previous night was passed around and eaten cold, but no one complained. They were happy to be out of the tents for a change, and the closeness of the rock around them locked in their body heat, creating a comfortable, if cramped, little haven for the evening.
A watch was set up, with Mason, Williams, Jeffries, and Vale taking three-hour shifts, in that order. Each man was to position himself a short distance downriver in the hope that the extra time they would gain with an advance warning might be enough for the others to escape into the nearby woods if it became necessary.
After dinner, Annja wandered over to where Mason was setting up his bedroll, getting everything ready before he went on watch.
"Do you think Ransom is still looking for us?" she asked.
Mason nodded. "Without a doubt. He's like a dog with a bone. The guy never gives up. He either gets what he wants or he destroys it so no one else can have it."
The stench of burning flesh rose in her memory and she shook it off with an effort. Ransom had certainly shown he was willing to destroy things to keep Davenport from finding the tomb before he did. It made her uneasy to think Ransom was out there somewhere, plotting how to get back into the game.
"Do you think we've lost him?"
Mason must have heard something in her voice, for he stopped what he was doing and looked over at her, studying her face as if trying to memorize it. "Do you know something I don't?" he asked.
She shook her head. She didn't know anything; she just had an uneasy feeling that something wasn't right. They'd missed something and she wasn't sure what. The feeling nagged at her, but she couldn't put her finger on it.
"We've lost him for the time being, but I don't expect for it to stay that way for long. He'll find us again eventually. Best I can do at this point is keep us moving at a steady pace and hope we get there before he does."
He looked around at the rest of his charges as they prepared to bed down for the night, and then looked back at Annja. "I think we're okay for tonight. Why don't you get some rest and we can talk about it later?"
"All right." She began to lay out her own bedroll, all the while wondering what it was they were missing.

* * *

T
HE INFORMANT WAITED
an hour into his turn at watch before deciding the time was right. He moved off into the shadow of a large outcropping of rock and took the satellite phone from the concealed pocket inside his jacket. He dialed Ransom's number and waited for the other man to answer.
He didn't wait long.
"Where the hell have you been?" Ransom nearly shouted after answering the call.
The informant wasn't intimidated in the slightest. "I'm right where I'm supposed to be. Stuck like glue on your target, the one you seem to be having trouble dealing with." He'd worked with Ransom too long to be worried about the man's threats. He knew he was the megalomaniac's only hope of tracking down the tomb before Davenport did, and that was a far more important task than teaching him a lesson. Still, he'd have to watch his back later and he made a mental note to be sure to do so. Once his usefulness ended, he'd become excess baggage, and Ransom would try and get rid of him as expeditiously as possible.
There was a pause and then the other man said, "What do you have for me?"
The informant took out a pocket GPS device and honed in on their exact position. He relayed the coordinates to Ransom and then filled him in on what they had uncovered in the map chamber earlier that afternoon.
Ransom listened patiently, asked a few questions that the informant answered the best he could, and then dropped the bomb the man on-site wasn't expecting. "It's time to use the package."
Tactically, it wasn't the best move, the informant thought, but he wasn't the one calling the shots. If he had been, then things would have gone very differently. If the boss wanted him to use the package, he'd use the package. It would be up to the boss to figure out what to do from there.
"Use the package? If that's what you want," he said.
"You still have it with you, correct?"
The informant didn't grace that comment with an answer. Of course he still had it with him; he hadn't let it out of his sight since the night he'd received it.
Ransom continued. "Use it tonight. Get it in the water, then call us in the morning and we'll bring the chopper in."
"Very well. In the water it is, then."
With that the informant hung up, slipped the phone back in his jacket and returned to his position on the rock overlooking the lower section of the river.
Sitting there, he idly fingered the smooth packet of powder that he carried in the same pocket as his phone. Just a pinch in each water jug would be enough. With everyone carrying their own water supply, now that they had left the trucks behind, actually pulling it off was going to take some planning.
No matter, he'd get it done. After all, that's what they paid him for, wasn't it?

* * *

A
NNJA'S HEARING HAD ALWAYS
been good and in the silent surroundings it was even better. Hidden as she was among the thick vegetation that surrounded the rocky outcropping they had selected as their watch station, she was able to hear most of the conversation going on above her. Or, at least, this end of the conversation and she could guess at some of the rest of it due to the responses she was hearing. The longer she listened, the more incensed she got. She wanted to eliminate the threat to the group right then and there, had gone so far as to draw her sword and begin to edge her way around the rock, looking for a way up, when the comments about the package and water stopped her.
Something told her to watch and wait, to catch him in the act so that it wouldn't be his word against hers.
Maybe then the others would believe her.
She released her sword and quietly made her way back upriver to their camp.
Along the way, one thought kept playing over and over again in her mind.
Of all people, why did it have to be him?