Solomon's Grave

thousands before him why the master sought it so. Never mind the mindless other rumors or theories held by the Elders and so many of his predecessors. To him, it was simply... perfect.

“Prepare to storm inside as soon as the door is open.” The men drew their swords, expecting a siege of defenders beyond. Everard removed a studded glove from his left hand and inserted fingers into three holes that were angled to make them invisible to the casual observer. He pulled. His hand was damp with sweat. His fingers slipped free and the door crashed closed. He cursed, wiped his hands on his leather wrist shield and tried again. This time he kept his body leaning hard into the gesture. The door opened.

“You,” he indicated the squire, focusing his voice since the lad was beginning to consider their surroundings a bit too hungrily. “Stand here and hold this door open. If anyone other than us comes along, in either direction, cut them down.”

“Sire!” The boy named Marcus leaned against the door. Everard led his men down the long hall, turned the corner. He stopped, knowing what he would see. The others continued past him but soon they, too, froze in their tracks at the realization of what stood before them.

“My God,” one of the men said, and fell to his knees.

Everard shouted, “You shall not utter that name here! Do as I say and the world shall be yours to command!” There was enough controlled cadence in his voice to get their attention. Time was running out. There was no one here. Another, narrower passage opened on their right. It had not been there the last time.

He gestured to two soldiers armed with long, crooked staffs. They believed they were carrying lances. The staffs were actually well-trimmed branches of acacia wood.

Then Everard realized two things simultaneously. The first was that the Ark’s lid was partially open. Someone had defiled it! His blood boiled; his face burned in rage. A moment later, all color drained from the expression.

A fat man—a bishop if his attire was any indication—appeared in the entrance to the side passage. Something was clutched against his chest, glowing softly in the darkness. With his free hand, the bishop gripped a wooden lever beside the doorway.

Something in the fat man’s eyes told the knight he had to run now! Before he could do anything, the bishop pulled down on the lever. The room filled with the sound of grinding stone. The holy man was gone as quickly as he’d appeared. Everard of Dampierre wondered for half a second if the man had escaped down a trap door; then the ceiling crushed down upon him and his men in a deluge of boulders and stone.

When the remaining horde of crusaders charged into the cross-shaped basilica of the Apostles, they found a young squire digging at a mound of rubble filling a doorway. Two of the newcomers eagerly joined him, assuming riches lay beyond. They soon lost interest for easier pickings among the sarcophagi. A moment later, even the squire Marcus stopped digging. He joined the others in search of spoils.

Chapter Seventeen

Nathan gently brushed a gray strand of hair away from Margaret Conan’s forehead. When he finished speaking a prayer to comfort her in her pain, she opened her eyes and smiled. The gesture dropped a decade from her sunken, wrinkled face.

“Thank you, Pastor, and may the Lord bless you and your work as well.”

Nathan sat back in his position at the edge of the bed, careful not to brush against her thin legs under the sheet. As advanced as Mrs. Conan’s diabetes had become, she never complained, but he knew enough about the symptoms to be cautious. As always, she was overjoyed to share prayer and scripture, even asked about his parents. Margaret Conan had once been his neighbor, three doors down from the Dinneck home. She would babysit him as a toddler, and in later years, he’d visit for no other reason than simply to share her company. Her house had the air of freshly baked cookies and spice candies.

Reverend Hayden suggested he visit the nursing home alone, having to make a trip himself to the monastery to make final arrangements for his arrival. On the drive across town, Nathan worried about being too distracted— about running into Elizabeth. Seeing her was inevitable, though. If not today, some day soon. There would be no avoiding it. Whether she would want to speak with him, after such a long time without any communication save secondhand reports from Josh Everson, was another question.

He closed the old woman’s Bible and unconsciously ran his hand across its familiar, threadbare cover. When she had asked him to choose the reading earlier, Nathan picked the opening chapters of Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians. His parents had often read scriptures aloud to him when he was younger, so they never complained when Mrs. Conan did the same when he was in her care. Nathan remembered many afternoons in her living room, eating oatmeal raisin cookies while she occasionally read short passages for the sheer joy of sharing in the Word with such an eager audience of one. When Nathan was old enough to stay home alone while his mother was out, he would still wander up the road now and then to visit. She always seemed pleased to see him, to discuss and debate passages from the same Bible Nathan now held in his hand—less worn and frayed back then, but not by much.

If he was ever asked when his calling to the ministry first occurred, Nathan could think of no stronger moments than those afternoons in Mrs. Conan’s living room, eating cookies.

He felt moved to explain this to her, but she suddenly looked past him toward the door, smiled wider and said, “Looks like you have a caller, Nate.”

Nathan turned, already knowing who was there.

Elizabeth O’Brien looked exactly as he remembered. There was a more determined set to her face, one that came with the level of maturity they both had reached over the past five years. The face still had the round, cherub-like quality which never failed to pull him to her. She wore jeans and sneakers, a blue pullover sweater and a pinned name tag that read “Elizabeth O.” She was tall, not quite his own height, but taller than the average woman, with the slightly-rounded figure of someone always fighting off extra pounds, winning some but never all of the battles. Her blonde hair was as thick and unruly as ever.

The smile on her face filled his heart with an unexpected happiness.

“Hi,” she said, and stuck her hands in her jeans’ pocket. All she would have to do, Nathan thought, would be to lean her shoulder casually against the door frame and she’d look—to use an expression Josh Everson was overly fond of using—way too cool.

“Hi,” he said, knowing it was the lamest response he could have given. Mrs. Conan’s thin hand nudged his arm. He looked back. She nodded in the direction of the door and said with a sly grin, “Bye, Nate.”

Chapter Eighteen

The coffee in the employee break room was surprisingly good. Nathan took another sip as Elizabeth returned from the vending machine with a can of ginger ale. She sat next to him at the small table, not in the seat opposite as he’d expected.

His head was spinning. He wished it would stop.

Nathan wondered if maybe his feelings for this woman were still as strong as ever. The thought brought a jolt of pain, not a physical hurt but a wrenching ache of the heart which revealed itself as a nervous rumble in his belly. He couldn’t love her. He was a minister and she was a self-proclaimed atheist. No, he never truly believed that last part, not with five years to replay that infamous conversation in his mind. She simply did not want to believe.

Don’t press, an inner voice said. It was sage advice, and the thought sobered him.

She said, “I thought Reverend Hayden wasn’t leaving until next week.”

Nathan raised an eyebrow. “You’re right. I think he’s making me try out my sea legs. How did you know when he was leaving?”

Elizabeth smiled. “Mrs. Conan keeps up on all the gossip. She shares it with me whether I want to hear it or not.”

It occurred to him that Mrs. Conan must have known about his episode Sunday. Since the first thing out of Elizabeth’s mouth wasn’t How are you feeling? his old neighbor probably hadn’t mentioned it. God bless that woman.

He asked, “Are you a nurse now?”

She nodded and looked down at her soda can. “I finally went back to school and finished up. Couldn’t let you have more degrees than me.”

Reflexively, Nathan said, “Yeah, but I’m ordained as well. Technically that means I’m one up on you