fifty-db-gain horn that yielded a ten-gigawatt pulse. discharged directly at a laptop, the pulse would fry the computer’s motherboard and instantly erase the hard drive.
«EMP will be useless,» Sato yelled back. «Target is inside a stone building. No sight lines and thick EM shielding. Do you have any indication yet if the video has gone out?»
Nola glanced at a second monitor, which was running a continuous search for breaking news stories about the Masons. «Not yet, ma’am. But if it goes public, we’ll know within seconds.»
«Keep me posted.» Sato signed off.
Langdon held his breath as the helicopter dropped from the sky toward Dupont Circle. A handful of pedestrians scattered as the aircraft descended through an opening in the trees and landed hard on the lawn just south of the famous two-tiered fountain designed by the same two men who created the Lincoln Memorial.
Thirty seconds later, Langdon was riding shotgun in a commandeered Lexus SUV, tearing up New Hampshire Avenue toward the House of the Temple.
Peter Solomon was desperately trying to figure out what to do. All he could see in his mind were the images of Katherine bleeding in the basement. . and of the video he had just witnessed. He turned his head slowly toward the laptop on the pigskin chair several yards away. The progress bar was almost a third of the way filled.
SENDING MESSAGE: 29 % COMPLETE.
The tattooed man was now walking slow circles around the square altar, swinging a lit censer and chanting to himself. Thick puffs of white smoke swirled up toward the skylight. The man’s eyes were wide now, and he seemed to be in a demonic trance. Peter turned his gaze to the ancient knife that sat waiting on the white silk cloth spread across the altar.
Peter Solomon had no doubt that he would die in this temple tonight. The question was how to die. Would he find a way to save his sister and his brotherhood. . or would his death be entirely in vain?
He glanced down at the grid of symbols. When he had first laid eyes on the grid, the shock of the moment had blinded him. . preventing his vision from piercing the veil of chaos. . to glimpse the startling truth. now, however, the real significance of these symbols had become crystal clear to him. he had seen the grid in an entirely new light.
Peter Solomon knew exactly what he needed to do.
Taking a deep breath, he gazed up at the moon through the oculus above. Then he began to speak.
Mal’akh had learned that long ago.
The solution that Peter Solomon was now explaining was so graceful and pure that Mal’akh was sure that it could only be true. Incredibly, the solution to the pyramid’s final code was far simpler than he had ever imagined.
In an instant, a bright ray of light pierced the murkiness of the history and myth surrounding the Lost Word. As promised, the Lost Word was indeed written in an ancient language and bore mystical power in every philosophy, religion, and science ever known to man.
Standing now in this initiation chamber atop the great pyramid of Heredom, Mal’akh gazed upon the treasure he had sought all these years, and he knew he could not have prepared himself more perfectly.
In Kalorama Heights, a lone CIA agent stood amid a sea of garbage that he had dumped out of the trash bins that had been found in the garage.
«Ms. Kaye?» he said, speaking to Sato’s analyst on the phone. «Good thinking to search his garbage. I think I just found something.»
Inside the house, Katherine Solomon was feeling stronger with every passing moment. The infusion of lactated Ringer’s solution had successfully raised her blood pressure and quelled her throbbing headache. She was resting now, seated in the dining room, with explicit instructions to remain still. Her nerves felt frayed, and she was increasingly anxious for news about her brother.
Unable to sit idly, Katherine pulled herself to her feet, teetered, and then inched slowly toward the living room. She found Bellamy in the study. The Architect was standing at an open drawer, his back to her, apparently too engrossed in its contents to hear her enter.
She walked up behind him. «Warren?»
The old man lurched and turned, quickly shutting the drawer with his hip. His face was lined with shock and grief, his cheeks streaked with tears.
«What’s wrong?!» She glanced down at the drawer. «What is it?»
Bellamy seemed unable to speak. He had the look of a man who had just seen something he deeply wished he had not.
«What’s in the drawer?» she demanded.
Bellamy’s tear-filled eyes held hers for a long, sorrowful moment. Finally he spoke. «You and I wondered
Katherine’s brow furrowed. «Yes?»
«Well. .» Bellamy’s voice caught. «I just found the answer.»
CHAPTER 119
In the chamber at the top of the house of the temple, the one who called himself mal’akh stood before the great altar and gently massaged the virgin skin atop his head.
Above the altar, wisps of fragrant smoke now swirled, billowing up from the censer. The suffumigations ascended through the shaft of moonlight, clearing a channel skyward through which a liberated soul could travel freely.
The time had come.
Mal’akh retrieved the vial of Peter’s darkened blood and uncorked it. With his captive looking on, he dipped the nib of the crow’s feather into the crimson tincture and raised it to the sacred circle of flesh atop his head. He paused a moment. . thinking of how long he had waited for this night. His great transformation was finally at hand.
With a steady hand, Mal’akh touched the nib of the feather to his skin. He needed no mirror, no assistance, only his sense of touch, and his mind’s eye. Slowly, meticulously, he began inscribing the Lost Word inside the circular
Peter Solomon looked on with an expression of horror.
When Mal’akh finished, he closed his eyes, set down the feather, and let the air out of his lungs entirely. For the first time in his life, he felt a sensation he had never known.
Mal’akh had worked for years on the artifact that was his body, and now, as he neared his moment of final transformation, he could feel every line that had ever been inscribed on his flesh.
