David Carter held the three cubes of sugar in his fingers hovering over the top of the steaming mug of Earl Grey tea with a mischievous smile. Better not, he decided and dropped them back into the white Silver Spoon-brand box. Dean Lercher had proved a complete pain in the arse since arriving back at the Templar vault tucked away deep within the granite rock of Mont St-Michel. Carter couldn’t tell if it was his own little joke in spiking his friend’s tea on the flight over or whether the man was still furious at having his car keys taken by Alex, but either way he continued to blow up at any chance offered to him.
‘Is that my tea?’ Doggie asked, appearing around the corner of the nearest walkway.
‘Certainly is,’ Carter replied, nudging the hot beverage towards him, ‘completely free of sugar, as promised.’
Doggie picked up the mug and sniffed it warily. ‘Mmmm,’ he grunted and then took a sip.
‘So, did you find anything?’
‘Not really,’ Doggie replied, placing the mug back down onto the lacquered Cherrywood desk that Carter was sitting at, ‘although I did find a reference to an exorcism that went wrong – horribly wrong in much the same way as this Father Davies’s.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes, there’s a record of a similar occurrence back in the sixteenth century when a Catholic priest performed an exorcism on a young girl in France, and soon afterwards he himself became possessed.’
This titbit of information piqued Carter’s interest right away. ‘What happened?’
‘The report was rather lax in detail but essentially the girl never recovered from her ordeal and was burned as a witch.’
‘Charming.’ Carter grimaced at the thought of such a horrendous death, ‘And the priest?’
‘Doesn’t say, except that he disappeared into the night, still foaming at the mouth.’
‘Sounds like rabies.’
‘Impossible to say but I’m going to keep looking. Perhaps there’s another entry somewhere which records the poor man’s fate.’ Doggie picked his mug of tea back up, then stopped himself from taking another sip. ‘There’s definitely no sugar in this?’
Carter looked insulted by the accusation. ‘Hey, what kind of person do you think I am? I promised you, didn’t I, and besides can you taste any sugar?’
Doggie continued to stare at him mistrustfully. ‘No, but I do have a cold.’
‘Such a doubting Thomas.’
‘Well, my name actually is Tom,’ Doggie said before finally taking a sip. ‘So, did you find anything?’
‘I did, but it’s more on the satanic side of things.’ Carter began and pulling towards him a large leather-bound book, its cover cracked from age and with a thick, frayed binding. ‘It’s remarkable how much information the Templars recorded over the centuries,’ he said and as if marvelling at the thought. ‘It will take a lifetime to go through it all.’
‘Just the facts, David, if you please. Just the facts,’ Doggie replied dismissively and took another sip.
As Carter began heaving open the thick outer cover, his iPhone suddenly began to vibrate on the table beneath him. ‘Number not recognised so it has to be Alex. He’s the only one except yourself that has my number at the moment,’ he informed Doggie, picking up the mobile.
‘Well, then, “Billy no mates”, tell him he stills owes me for that car keys debacle.’
‘Yeah, yeah,’ Carter groaned as he slid the green answer button across with his finger. ‘Alex, is that you? How’s it going at your end?’
‘Yes, it’s me and so far it’s not your average trip abroad.’ Harker was only just audible over the poor connection, ‘I’m on a plane to Paris to do some fact checking… Can you hear me OK?’
The reception was awful and Carter pulled the mobile from his ear and pressed the speaker symbol. ‘Just about. You’re now on loudspeaker and I’ve got Doggie here with me. So, you’re coming to our neck of the woods, then?’
‘Only a couple of hundred miles away yes, but I can still feel Tom’s eyes burning into the back of my head even from here, so can I first offer, once again, my apologies for the keys, Tom.’ This received little more than a silent shrug from the Dean, ‘OK, with that out of the way, tell me, what did you find out?’
‘The list you sent me was a bit vague but I did uncover a lot of information on satanic rituals such as the ones you described, including one pertaining to your own personal marriage ceremony.’
‘Alex got married!’ Doggie exclaimed with a look of astonishment.’
‘Yeah,’ Carter chuckled, ‘to another man.’
‘Really, Alex, I didn’t know your bread was buttered on that side!’ Doggie joked but still looking surprised. ‘Does Chloe know?’
‘Ha, ha, Tom, it wasn’t like that.’
‘Huh, shame,’ Doggie replied before expelling a loud chortle. ‘You’d have made an excellent bride.’
‘I appreciate that, Tom, but can we now get to what you’ve found out please?’
‘Of course,’ Carter said and he began to flick through the old book before settling on a single page with a green cardboard bookmark protruding from it. ‘There’s an entry here pertaining to a ceremony called “the joining of the light”, but there was nothing satanic about it. It was a Druidic ritual, for men only, that signified self-dedication to the gods or perhaps to the earth itself – that part’s a bit unclear, I’m afraid. What’s interesting, though, is that one of the symbols used was a swastika, which really stands out because I can’t find any other connection between Druids and that sign elsewhere. Furthermore, there was another ritual linked to it, but I’ve not yet managed to unearth it.’
‘Thanks David. Can you keep looking then, and there’s something else I need you to look for.’ Harker was now almost shouting to be heard above the static. ‘See if it’s linked to any objects or specific runes.’
‘Objects? Such as?’ Doggie wanted to get involved in the conversation.
‘Like an oval crystal that pulsates with red light.’
Harker’s description had Carter and Doggie staring at each other blankly.
‘I’ve never come across anything like that, Alex,’ Carter finally replied, frankly dumbfounded.
‘I’m going to send you a picture of this thing. It’s really weird, emitting a red light, and has swastikas and other such markings engraved in to it. I’ve never seen anything quite like it.’
‘OK,’ Carter was looking puzzled, ‘send it over and I’ll see what I can come up with but, for the record, I have never even heard about a runestone displaying those kinds of properties – or anything even close. It sounds like something from Close Encounters of the Third Kind or something.’
‘Tell me about it,’ Harker replied, as the line began to worsen. ‘Just see what you can find… and, David, I’m sending you two numbers. One is the mobile I’ll be using from now on, and the other is for Stefani Mitchell.’
‘Ahhh, that lady Templar you told me about?’
‘Yes, we’ve gone our separate ways for the time being, but I want you to bring her up to speed with anything you do find as well, OK.’
‘Leave it with me,’ Doggie declared firmly and he raised his left eyebrow as if to lay down his authority in this matter, but the gesture was met instead with an embarrassed shaking of Carter’s head.
‘Don’t worry Alex, we’ll keep her in the loop,’ Carter assured.
‘Thanks, I’ll be in tou—’
The line abruptly cut out and Doggie began to head back down the walkway without saying a word.
‘Hey, Tom,’ Carter called out after him and the Dean stopped and swivelled on his heel to face him. ‘Don’t forget who’s in charge here,’ Carter continued as he opened up his jacket and pointed to the shiny metal badge that Brulet had bestowed upon him.
Doggie stared at the trinket for a few seconds without any expression, then he slowly began to clap. ‘Yes David, you have a little badge. Good for you.’ He gave a sarcastic smile then turned around a full 180 degrees and continued striding till he had disappeared down one of the walkways.
Carter huffed loudly, then he grasped the badge, opened up the work-desk drawer and dropped it inside. He next took a sip of his tea and let out a disgruntled sigh.
‘Twat!’