Caleb’s voice pitched excitedly. “Ceremonial only, built in 1954 in Erdos City, now part of China, as a place for Chinese and Mongolians alike to honor their national hero.” He lowered his head. “And now I’m thinking when Montross said we’d meet again at the mausoleum, he might not have meant this, Mausolus’s ancient Wonder of the World. He may have been referring to another tomb — the tomb of Genghis Khan.”
“Or,” Renée said sarcastically, “maybe some other mausoleum? One of the Roman emperors? Or hell, Grant’s tomb?”
Caleb gave her a look. “I thought you were a believer.”
Renée blinked at him, then looked away. “This is too much. We’ve got nothing to go on, and meanwhile your son’s in danger. Let’s do this my way.”
“Hang on,” Orlando chimed in, excitement in his voice. “That symbol, I traced some more references and found that somebody’s still using it. One group of people, actually.”
“Using it how?”
“As body art.”
Renée frowned. “Who?”
“They’re called the Darkhad. And their function, get this, is to conduct the ceremonies and rites around honoring the great Khan, and also to protect his mausoleum.”
“I remember now,” Caleb said. “That force of loyal soldiers who waited for the Khan’s body to return? They were from the clan known as the Darkhads.”
“Yeah,” Orlando continued tersely, taking back the spotlight. It sounded like he was reading again. “Originally there were eight mausoleums, then more, set up in portable white tents that moved around the Mongolian steppes. Some actually held relics like his saddle or his sword, but they were chiefly designed to inspire the continued worship and adoration of old Genghis. The Darkhad families, descendents of his two favorite generals, were given special privileges by Temujin — freedom from any other civil duties, freedom from taxes, the right to raise money on their lands — all so they could care for the mausoleums. Originally there were over five hundred Darkhad, and that number swelled to the thousands in later centuries. But during the 1950s the Communist government abolished the roving mausoleums and allowed just one, which housed all the relics. And the Darkhad dropped in number to only eight. And then during the Cultural Revolution, the Commies cracked down even more on any worship of their non-Communist past. All the cherished cultural elements were destroyed, the mausoleum sacked by angry punks, and the Khan’s relics were broken or burned. Only recently did the Darkhad rebuild the mausoleum and create replicas of the more significant artifacts.”
“Thanks for the history lesson,” Caleb said. “But that only strengthens my theory that this assassin, if he was one of these Darkhad, was guarding the key. Mausolus’s key. A key that could open one of the locks guarding the Books of Thoth. Why would he be guarding that unless—”
“—unless,” came Phoebe’s voice, “he knows where there’s another one, because he’s been sworn to protect it. Genghis must have found one, or both. Maybe he was the one who looted Alexander’s grave?”
“And maybe,” said Orlando, “he wanted to leave this one here as bait, to see who came looking.”
Caleb nodded. “I think we can safely guess that if Montross has this key, then he’s off to find the others.”
“But,” said Renée, “if all the Khan’s relics were destroyed and his body isn’t even at that mausoleum in Erdos City, then what?”
“Then,” Caleb said solemnly, “it looks like we’ve found our next RV target. One that will provide our greatest test since the Pharos.” He took a breath. “If we succeed, it’ll make us the envy of archaeologists everywhere, and quite possibly the enemy of billions of people who might not want to have their demigod dug up.”
He sighed and met Renée’s stare before giving a nervous smile.
“We need to find the tomb of Genghis Khan.”
BOOK TWO
THE SEARCH FOR GENGHIS KHAN
1
Alexander sat alone in the center of the middle row seat of their rented black Jeep Commander. In the large cargo space behind him they had stuffed most of their gear, including tents and tarps, chests of food and water, blankets and sleeping bags. Three plastic chests were tethered to the roof rack. It looked like they were going on a long camping trip, the kind he wished he could have taken with his dad and Aunt Phoebe sometime, maybe in the Adirondacks.
In the front seat, Xavier Montross sat next to their guide, a man they had met outside the airport. Alexander thought he looked like one of those actors in kung-fu movies, a man with a strong build, long braided hair, weather-worn face and penetrating eyes. The capital city itself was congested and noisy, the sights and sounds overwhelming. As they left the airport, Montross had left his window open, and the reek of diesel fumes from the hundreds of buses and taxis mingled with the smell of street vendors roasting some kind of meat, likely marmot, which Alexander had learned from their guide was a kind of dog. The thought of actually eating a dog almost made him sick.
He didn’t want anything to do with this place or this search, this quest of Montross’s. He just wanted to wake up back home in his room surrounded by all his books, even those comics and graphic novels his mom frowned on despite Dad’s insistence that they contained some basic literary merit. A boy needed his heroes.
Alexander even wished he could be back in Egypt, in Alexandria at the huge library where he got such a thrill every day being able to sneak into that private elevator with his mother and go all the way down to the secret bottom level. It had all been so exciting, the most perfect life a little boy with a curious mind could ask for. To be loved by two equally interesting and mysterious parents, spending time with each at their exotic homes, and sometimes, most happily, at holidays or on his birthday, together. But, in just one day, it had all been stolen from him.
The reality hadn’t yet sunk in. Instead, he felt that at thousands of miles away he was suddenly too far removed to feel anything. To grieve for his mom, for the life he had. To do anything but try to cling to memories he already felt were fading away. The touch of her, the way she smelled, her giggling laughter when she let him tickle her feet.
Something settled in the cargo area behind him under all their gear, and Alexander sat up and was about to look when Montross barked at him to turn around and buckle up. They were leaving the city, heading off-road into the steppes.
Alexander looked out in awe of the vastness of this terrain, the open grasslands, the few lakes and rivers and the rolling hills stretching far to the north, where the white-capped peaks bordering Siberia glittered pristinely under a fiercely blue sky. It wasn’t hard to imagine what he’d been told by the guide, that in another two months this would all be covered with snow and ice and they’d have no chance to make this trip.
They made a slight turn and there was a hill, steeper than the others, with an enormous likeness of a man’s face upon it.
“There he is,” Montross said, pointing. “Genghis Khan.”
“His portrait,” said the guide, “laid out in white stones for all of Ulaan Baatar, and Mongolia’s visitors, such as yourselves, to see.”
Alexander blinked, keeping an eye on the image of Mongolia’s national hero as long as it was visible, until they left the main road and started on the bumpy trail northeast.
Toward Burkhan Khaldun, the Sacred Mountain.
Lulled by the jarring, bumpy ride, and exhausted from fitful naps on the plane, Alexander thought briefly about the mysterious woman who had come with them. Nina. He hadn’t seen her since the airport, but knew she was up to something, doing her own recon maybe with those military men who had left the sub with them.