“The ones who placed the treasure here. You called them the Minoans,” Iker replied calmly.
“OK, that’s not freaky,” Cassie said.
Unperturbed, Iker continued. “I overheard you say that you saw them in your vision. Their priestess saw you as well. She knew you would come. Unfortunately, she did not know how many centuries would pass before you appeared. Ever since the Minoans placed their treasure here, there has been a sentinel to guard it until the day you arrived.”
“Is that what you are?” the pythia asked. “A sentinel?”
Iker nodded. “That duty has passed from generation to generation.”
“So why isn’t the treasure here?” Erik asked testily. “Wasn’t that supposed to be your job—to guard it?”
The sentinel gave a bitter laugh. “For over two thousand years, we did our job well. Until the year 1610.”
“What happened in 1610?” Cassie was mystified.
“Ah, I understand.” Ortzi nodded sagely. “It was because of Zugarramurdi.”
“Yes,” Iker agreed. “Because of Zugarramurdi.”
The Arkana team stared quizzically at the two men.
“Would either of you care to explain yourselves?” Griffin finally prompted.
“We must start at the beginning,” Ortzi said. Addressing the Arkana team, he asked, “You remember the stories the etxekoandre told you about Mari?”
They nodded in agreement.
“You must understand that Mari is not the only supernatural being who lives among the Basques. There are many, many others. For example, there are the lamiak—beautiful women with golden hair. They like to live by rivers, and that is why they have ducks’ feet. They will help a person with his work if they are given presents. If a farmer leaves some food by the riverbank overnight, the food will be gone in the morning, and his field will be plowed.”
The Arkana team smiled at the fanciful notion.
“Among the many creatures of Basque legend, the most important for the purposes of our explanation are the sorginak,” Ortzi added.
“You mean witches?” Cassie translated the Basque word.
The trove keeper shrugged expressively. “That is one name for them. Some people would call them priestesses—women skilled in magic and medicine. Mari is served by a court of sorginak. They like to meet at her sacred places, mainly caves.”
“Did they ever exist?” Cassie persisted.
“They existed both in legend and in fact. They would gather together on Friday nights for the akelarre.”
“I imagine an akelarre would be a kind of witches’ sabbath,” Griffin speculated.
“Yes,” Ortzi agreed. “And that is where our troubles began in 1610.”
The two Basque men exchanged a dark look. Iker took up the narrative. “The Catholic Church in Spain was eager to root out heretics. Anyone who venerated the deities of the old times would have been considered a heretic—especially the women who still performed the rituals of worship. The Church called them witches. The Basque country had long been considered as the center of witchcraft in Spain, so the Inquisition was sent here.”
“Yet another depressing example of overlord religious genocide,” Griffin muttered under his breath.
“Hold on! You mean the Spanish Inquisition?” Cassie couldn’t believe her ears. “Torquemada and racks and burning at the stake?”
“1610 would have been long after the death of Tomas de Torquemada.” Griffin corrected her. “He was the first Grand Inquisitor. However, the stake and the rack would have been standard practice even as late as the seventeenth century.”
Iker continued. “There is a very large cave at Zugarramurdi near the French border which was a known meeting place of the sorginak. That is where the Inquisition concentrated its persecution.”
“A tribunal was set up at Logrono,” Ortzi said. “For two years, thousands of confessions were extorted from the people, mainly women and children. Some were burned at the stake while others died under torture.”
“Yikes,” Cassie shuddered involuntarily. “The Inquisition might have considered me a witch since I can see things nobody else can.”
“Very likely,” Griffin agreed.
“Long after the persecution ended, the memory of it remained,” the trove keeper observed. “To this day in Zugarramurdi, there is a huge bonfire in the cave on midsummer’s eve in honor of the day of the witch.”
“So now you understand why caves were no longer safe,” Iker concluded. “The Inquisitors scoured the countryside trying to find all the places where the witches might hold an akelarre. Because the sorginak were so closely tied to the worship of Mari, it was only a matter of time before the Church would seek out the holiest of all mountains associated with the goddess.”
“Anboto,” Cassie murmured. “You couldn’t leave the artifact here. They might have found it.”
Iker nodded somberly. “That is so. An ancestor of mine was the sentinel at the time. Though it was painful to leave his homeland, he knew he had to move the treasure somewhere the Inquisitors would never find it. He could not return because it was his duty to keep watch over the treasure wherever it might be. So, he taught his son a message and his son taught that message to his daughter. And she taught it to the next sentinel and so on until today.”
“What was the message?” Griffin asked simply.
“My ancestor said he would carry the treasure to the new world.”
“The new world!” Griffin exclaimed in shock. “Good grief, man. By 1610, the Spanish had already invaded both North and South America. We can’t simply comb through two continents. Surely you have something more helpful to offer than that.”
“There is more to the message,” Iker replied calmly. “My ancestor also said he would keep true to the dragon’s wing.”
Griffin stared at Iker in blank exasperation. “You’ll forgive me when I say that we don’t find that additional bit of information remotely helpful.”
Iker gave him an unaccountable smile. “Maybe not today, but you will.”
“Why would you think that?” the pythia asked, mirroring Griffin’s feelings of hopelessness.
“Because you are meant to find it,” the sentinel replied. “The old woman knew you would come here. And so you have. Time did not stop you and distance did not stop you. You found your way here all the same. You will find the treasure too. It is a matter of destiny.”
