everything up.”
“Because you’re not seeing the full picture.”
“But the above and below puzzle at the door, it doesn’t make sense. The letters don’t match. They’re not mirror images, and it’s not even like the lower one is the reverse of the top. The letters don’t move, they’re not on blocks, you can’t-”
“Just settle down, kid.” Montross worked faster now, rearranging pegs, moving from top to bottom, then to the middle, setting them into different holes. Occasionally glancing back to the other side.
“Why are you-Oh! Wait.” Alexander looked at the left wall, then back to the right. Then back to the door, pointing to the letters. He blinked, the room’s colors shifted, and for a moment, he saw it. In his mind he saw lines of light stretching from the letters to the shelves: the above left letter, Theta, with a line angled down, concurrently with the bottom shelf on the right wall; the above right letter, Delta, highlighting a trail to the bottom shelf on the left wall. Then the lower letters doing the reverse.
“But what about the ones in the center?”
Montross turned to him, smiling. “Ah, welcome aboard. You’re close now. So close. See, isn’t it great figuring things out intuitively?” He set the last peg in place. “Course, it helps if you can cheat. Although, eight years of trying to remote view this thing I’d hardly call an easy cheat.”
“But the middle ones!” Forgetting all about the danger, Alexander ran to Montross. “I get it. Above and Below are maintained, but in the whole system, the whole room, not just the letters at the door. The Delta letter, top right, lines up with the bottom left shelf, so that’s why you put the peg in the… Hold on! The seventh hole?”
“Egyptian, boy. Think like an Egyptian. They wrote-”
“Right to left!” Alexander smacked his own head. “I would’ve gotten myself killed.”
“You can thank me later.”
“It’s the fourth letter in the Greek alphabet, so the peg goes in the fourth hole from the right.” Alexander moved closer, looking in the dim light. “And the top shelf on the left, matches up with the letter Theta on the right-most letter on the floor. The eighth letter in the alphabet, so you’ve got it.” He counted off the peg holes. “Eight holes from the right.”
“Yeah, okay, you’ve got it, kid. And I did the same on the right wall. Omega for the first hole and Theta again for the eighth.” Montross approached the door, smoothing his sweaty hands on his pants as he reached for the great bronze handle.
“But the center ones, I don’t understand those. Omega on the top.. Why’d you match that up to the right wall, and Delta went to the left? I don’t see any signs, anything that could Montross stopped, hand inches from the door.
“Oh no,” Alexander said, looking at the back of Montross’s head. “You don’t know, do you?”
“You should go back up the stairs, Alexander. In case I’m wrong.”
“You guessed?”
Montross gave him a steady look. “I guessed.” He turned his head slightly just as his hand settled on the handle. “I spent months trying to view which way was correct, but I never saw it, never asked the right questions, maybe. But what I do know is that I saw myself-visions of myself-after this moment. So I know, I just know whatever I choose, it won’t get me killed.”
Alexander frowned, taking a step back. “That’s a little sketchy. Thought you said not to trust Fate, or your visions.”
“Touche. Call it a hunch, then. I trust those. But as I said, get on upstairs if you don’t believe me and don’t want to risk being squished flat or sliced into cubes. But I’m going in or dying a horrible death, with or without you.”
Alexander frowned, looking again at the letters above the door, then at the position of the pegs. He sighed, then stepped closer, right behind Montross.
“So you believe me?”
“It was a good hunch,” Alexander said, pointing. “The only one where you wind up with both Deltas on one side and both Omegas on the other. So if you orient the room on its side instead, you’d have the same arrangement. One Theta on top and bottom, and then two like symbols. It’s the only way that works.”
Montross smiled and rubbed his hands together. “See, you figured it out after all. Now, let’s go. Do you want to do the honors, or shall I?”
5
“No broken bones, just two sprained ribs and some nasty bruises. And some frostbite on your neck and fingers.” The medic, a middle-aged woman whose skin seemed far too tan to be in this climate, looked him over again, shaking her head. “Lucky.”
“Yeah,” Caleb said, holding his side. “What do they say, better to be lucky than smart? I should have seen this, should have known it was a trap.”
“How could you?” the medic asked, and Phoebe, standing beside her brother, coughed into her hand. “Just trust us, he should have seen it.”
“We all should have,” Orlando Natch said. “And I’m a bonehead for missing it. Got too damn excited about a match on the freakin’ head. Rookie mistake that almost got us killed. Sorry boss.”
“It’s not your fault,” Caleb said. “And I’m not your boss.” Then, lower, “Nina. She’s alive.”
“I know,” Phoebe said. “Seems like a nasty bitch. Had it in for you.” She gave him a sly look. “What, did you sleep with her and not call her back?”
Orlando choked on a sip of hot chocolate. The medic raised her hands. “Sounds like a family moment. I’ve got a report to make, and my boss will want to debrief you before you leave, especially about Colonel Hiltmeyer’s actions.”
“Have you been able to contact him?” Phoebe asked.
“No, nothing.” She looked down. “Apparently he’s gone rogue. And again, I’m sorry.”
“Got to get back home. Fast. And,” Caleb added to the departing medic, “we need a phone. Please.” He turned to meet Phoebe’s look of concern. “Alexander and Lydia are in danger. This was all a diversion. They’re going for the tablet.”
Montross had a moment of fear as something hissed and huge metal bolts pulled backwards from holding the great silver vault door in place. The door opened. Reflexively, he held back an arm to shield Alexander in case something deadly came flying out of the darkness. Shame, he thought, actually starting to like the kid.
A moment later, the door opened all the way. Motionless now, Montross took a deep breath. “Inside,” he whispered, nudging the boy forward into the darkness that glimmered as oil lamps around a circular room ignited, triggered by the door’s opening.
“You first,” Alexander said, trying to twist away but held fast. He stumbled forward into the vault-at last! He was finally here, inside after all that time, wondering and dreaming about it. Reading, studying, listening to his father’s stories.
He was here.
But then he froze, staring first at the beautiful zodiac images painted on the ceiling, and then at the lone pedestal basking in the glow of four lamps, and the single object resting at its apex:
The Emerald Tablet.
“There’s a note beside it,” Alexander said, his voice cracking.
“A note?” Montross took another step in, hesitantly still, as if expecting a rack of stainless steel, poisoned-tip spikes to come plunging down through the ceiling and skewer him at any moment. “I didn’t see a note.”
“Maybe,” said Alexander, picking up the loose-leaf piece of white paper with a jagged left edge, “Dad only left it for me recently.”
“What does it say?” He glanced at the paper, frowned, then checked out the ceiling. “Looks Greek to
