The Sacred Blood

gunmen.

“Close the doors!” Cohen ordered.

He stopped along the ornate railing bordering the Foundation Stone. The emotions that came over him were overwhelming as he laid eyes upon the most sanctified ground on Earth.

Here God had made Adam and all creation. Here was the exact spot Abraham had come to sacrifice Isaac. And here, as told in Genesis 28, God promised Jacob the land of Israel . . .

A stairway was set on the ground with its top reaching heaven, and God’s angels were going up and down it. The Lord was standing there above it, saying, “I am the Lord, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. I will give you and your offspring the land that you are now sleeping on. Your offspring will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out toward the west, the east, the north, and the south. All the peoples on earth will be blessed

through you and your offspring. I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go. I will bring you back to this land, for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.

When Jacob awoke from his sleep, he said, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it.” He was afraid and said, “What an awesome place this is! This is none other than the house of God. This is the gate of Heaven.”

Now his legs could barely keep him standing, and the rabbi struggled desperately to overcome his elation. Upon this rock the Holy of Holies had been erected by King Solomon’s masons for one purpose: to permanently house the Ark of the Covenant. And now it would stand here again.

The gate of heaven would open once more.

81

******

At the top of the water passage, Enoch turned onto his back and grabbed at the grate with his shaky blue fingers. Then he gave the thing a good shove.

Nothing happened.

He fought the desperation. It’s not like they used screws in the old days, he reminded himself. It simply had to be rusted or stuck.

Another shove. Then some intense pounding with fists. The warm air blowing down from above was making his thawing skin itchy.

Come on! Damn it!

He wasn’t about to go back into that cistern.

Grunting, he tried a bench-press motion—steady, even pressure.

Something on the right side let out a gritty snap and the grate popped up lopsidedly.

“Hah!” Enoch jubilantly yelled out.

The rest of the job was much easier as he bent back the rusty hinges on the grate’s opposite side.

One threat gone, another taking its place.

He remained perfectly still and listened. Nothing.

Cautiously, Enoch poked his head up from the hole, praying that a bullet wouldn’t split his noggin. That’s when he saw that he was in a long tunnel that was easily wide enough to drive a truck through.

Enoch felt completely disoriented as he pulled himself up and out of the hole.

In one direction, the overhead string of work lights led far off to what appeared to be a dead end. There were seven or eight bodies intermittently strewn along the passage in thick puddles of blood. But behind him, only a few meters back, was the flaming rubble where the Western Wall Tunnel had collapsed.

That’s when it hit him.

Cohen had dug his way beneath the Temple Mount to access this ancient tunnel. And the water passage Enoch had just crawled up had most likely been intended as one of its sewer drains.

It didn’t take a map for Enoch to realize that this tunnel made a beeline beneath the Dome of the Rock. “M- m-my G-G-God,” he said with trembling lips, teeth clicking like a keyboard.

The air was cool, but it was a huge improvement over the water. And from the far end of the passage, a subtle breeze was wafting over his dripping face.

Keep moving.

He began with a fast, sloppy trot that forced blood back to his legs. Then he quickened the pace, his bare feet slapping rhythmically along the ancient paving stones. As he passed the downed men wearing blue jumpsuits, he snatched up three abandoned machine guns to replace his waterlogged Jericho.

Within two minutes, he’d reached the spot where the breeze was blowing strongest—a staircase leading up to a swath of night sky.

82

******

Charlotte watched the robed priests set down the box dead center on the huge, flat stone that was the shrine’s focal point. The carrying poles were slid out from the box’s corner loops and set aside. While they stripped off the animal furs laid over its blue veil, Cohen stood close to them, praying intently. When only the blue shroud remained—the final protective layer—the Ark’s sharp contours and double-humped lid were more pronounced.

Cohen stretched his hands to heaven and pronounced Isaiah’s prophecy: “ ‘And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. And many people shall go and say, come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of His ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.’ ”

Four priests surrounded the Ark, each claiming a corner of the shroud. They took much care not to come into contact with what lay beneath it. With hands outstretched, Cohen signaled for them to proceed. Pulling the sides up