The Milestone Protocol, Ernest Dempsey [100 best novels of all time txt] 📗

conspiracy theories before, but that one is bigger than anything reasonably possible.”

Sean tilted his head to the side as if almost agreeing. “Perhaps. I’ve seen some pretty weird things since I started working for Tommy. I’ve seen a golden helmet in India that makes people kill each other. I’ve seen pyramids in places no one ever thought they could be. Prophets’ cloaks of power, priestly vestments that can predict the future, even an ancient Greek device that—at first glance—appears to only be a navigational tool and then turns out to be a window into things yet to come. I’ve come to appreciate that things we considered impossible are quite the contrary. But think about this. If the human population continues to grow unchecked, how are we going to feed everyone? Where will everyone live? How will we sustain this way of life we’ve established?”

Kevin assumed the question was rhetorical, so he didn’t respond.

“The answer is we can’t.”

“All of this from a passage on an ancient Mongolian tablet?”

Sean shrugged. “And the fact four guys tracked you from Russia to Bulgaria and tried to kill you. Then there’s the little problem of their tattoos.”

“The ankh?”

“Don’t think that I missed that symbol along the bottom edge of the tablet.”

Kevin blushed. “I was wondering if you saw that.”

“Of course I saw it. Hard to slip anything past me. Everything is in Classical Mongolian except that symbol.”

“So, you think that the men who tried to kill me are somehow connected to the Golden Horde?”

“I don’t know,” Sean confessed. “But I intend to find out.”

“And just how are you going to do that?”

Sean pointed at the tablet. “That message is a code, a clue for us to follow. The questions are, where does it lead, and do we want to go there?”

Kevin stared at him, a million thoughts running through his head. “You’re saying that we should try to figure out what this message means and find this saint or the rose stone? I have to be honest, Sean, I don’t really like the idea of putting myself back in harm’s way again. We were lucky to get away alive last night.”

“We weren’t lucky.”

“Fine. Whatever. I know that you and Tommy do things like this all the time. You see hidden messages and then hunt down some lost treasure.”

“Artifacts,” Sean corrected.

“Either way, I want no part of this. I just want to go home to my study, drink some scotch, and figure out what to do next.” His face paled as thoughts of his research team returned to his mind. “I have to honor the others somehow. I think bringing this tablet to a museum, putting it out there that we discovered it, would be the best way to remember them.”

“That would be a mistake,” Sean said. “You might as well fire a flare that explodes into seven different colors. They will find you, and they will kill you. Your best chance of survival is with me.”

Kevin pulled his head back, drawing his chin flush against his neck. “And what, your plan is to unravel some mystery left behind by Jani Beg Khan? It’s a wild goose chase, Sean. Not every symbol or message is a treasure map.”

“That’s true. But it seems to have worked out pretty well so far,” Sean’s Southern drawl came through along with a trademark wink.

Kevin stared blankly at Sean for three breaths. “Is this what Tommy deals with all the time?”

“Nope. It’s usually him doing the roping.”

Sean already knew he was hooked, but he decided to drop one more chunk of bait in the water. “Kevin, have you ever been on an adventure? I mean a real historical adventure where you’re afraid for your life and your survival depends on solving a bunch of ancient, sometimes nonsensical clues?”

“No.”

“Well, it’s terrifying.” Sean paused. Then his lips creased, and he laughed. “But when you find something that’s been hidden so long ago, something that a person from another time purposely hid, it’s an amazing feeling. And it puts us in touch with our past in a way we might have easily missed. Know what I’m saying?”

Kevin pressed his lips together. He reluctantly blew air out through his nostrils. “You’re saying we have an obligation to humanity to make sure every piece of history we can find should be brought to the public eye, so that we can learn more about who we are and where we came from.”

Sean’s eyes darted around the room. “You actually put that way better than I could. I was just trying to tell you it’s a rush.”

The ice melted from Kevin’s face, and he started to laugh. Sean laughed with him for twenty seconds.

When the laughter died, Kevin set his jaw. His eyes drifted to the window, and he looked out over the city as Sean had been doing. “So many people. You really believe something bad might be coming?”

“I hope not. But I think we are in a position to, at the very least, see what we can find out.”

Kevin hesitated, still gazing out over the city. When he spoke, it was full of reluctance. “Fine, Sean,” he surrendered. “Where do we start?”

Sean’s grin nearly touched the tips of his ears. “I thought you’d never ask.”

“So, where are we going?”

“First place we need to make a stop is to see an old friend. In Sweden.”

9 Stockholm

Tommy scanned through the latest news on his phone as he waited behind a light-blue curtain. The speaker was going through a series of announcements and updates to some of the policies that had recently been changed at the museum, most of which revolved around the safety of museum visitors.

The first article Tommy noted was one from Prague where a well-known billionaire had apparently been involved in a gruesome murder/suicide. Reports suggested that the man had gone to visit his mistress, and that there had been some kind of disagreement. It was unclear—from the report—as to whether the man committed the murder or the mistress, though investigators believed he had