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Alone in his and Bones’ room at the inn, Maddock hunched over the tiny wooden desk while scribbling notes on a legal pad. A small laptop computer sat next to that, its web browser open to an assortment of sites he had been using to conduct research on Alaric’s treasure. Many of the web pages were full of wacky conspiracy theories. He grinned, thinking of how Bones would really get a kick out of them. After a time Maddock, pushed the pad aside and rubbed his temples. The river, for all its promise, had thus far proven to be a dead end. He strained to think of a new angle somewhere in the mounds of the same information he’d already sifted through more times than he cared to remember.
Maddock stood and began pacing the tiny space while he reflected on what they knew about Alaric’s burial. He ignored the confines of the dingy room he occupied and mentally transported himself to a rectangular vault, buried beneath the river, or allegedly buried there. Buried along with treasures taken from Rome, but surely not everything that had been looted. The Visigoth warriors would have expected their shares, and Alaric’s brother, Athaulf, who took charge of the army, would have been foolish to give it all up. But even so, the grave goods alone would have tremendous value, both monetary and historical, and Maddock would love to find them if for no other reason than to stick it to the priest, Romano, and his cronies.
He reached the closet door again and whirled back around, pausing this time instead of pacing past the beds to the front door. But where to look? The only people who had been privy to the burial secret were Athaulf and his workers, with whom the carefully guarded knowledge seems to have died. Maddock mulled this over for a while longer, and then an idea struck him, one powerful enough that he froze in place, arms frozen as if halted in mid-swing.
No sooner had the thought passed through his mind then the room door opened. The noise startled Maddock and he felt a spike of adrenaline as he realized he was just standing there frozen like an idiot while someone—possibly the polizia with the Ministry of Cultural Heritage official, or who knew...Romano and his henchmen?...barged inside the room.
But it was only Bones, casually ambling inside and swatting the door shut behind him. The grave look on his face did not make Maddock feel much better, however. He’d seen the expression before, and it never spelled good news.
“You all right Maddock? Looking a little jumpy. Maybe you should switched decaf.”
Maddock relaxed his posture. “I’m fine. Just doing a little thinking about Alaric. You look like something’s on your mind, though.”
Bones nodded. He related what he had seen and heard by tailing Bianca on foot to the church, confirming that she was in league with the priest. Upon hearing this, Maddock tossed his head back and stared at the ceiling in frustration. He exhaled heavily.
“That’s not even our biggest problem, though,” Bones added.
Slowly, Maddock looked down from the ceiling and leveled his gaze at Bones. “Great. So what is it?”
Bones made eye contact with Maddock for a moment before answering, as if to steel him for a response that he knew he would not find palatable. “Father Romano is working with some old friends of ours.” He paused for effect and then added, “Heilig Herrschaft.”
There was a long pause while Maddock’s skin paled visibly at the mention of Heilig Herrschaft. “My favorite branch of The Dominion,” Maddock said sarcastically.
“Mine too!” Bones’ frown belied his words. He cracked his knuckles and looked around the room as if searching for something to punch.
Would-be spiritual heirs to the Nazis, as well as being Christian extremists in their own right, Heilig Herrschaft sought to cement their power through the discovery of religious artifacts that could prove the veracity of their claims or, in some cases, that held powers Herrschaft could harness. Maddock and Bones had encountered them more than once over the years, and the resulting mayhem was never heartwarming.
“I guess I shouldn’t even be all that surprised,” Maddock said at length. “The Visigoths were Germanic, so the tomb of Alaric has the potential to bolster Heilig Herrschaft’s particular strain of nationalism. And let’s not forget about the financial aspect.”
“There might be a religious angle, too,” Bones said. “The priest said something about the menorah. Of course, he doesn’t know we already found that thing, and that it wasn’t in Italy.”
Maddock nodded, flashing on a remarkable find he and Bones had made years ago. He grabbed his legal pad and flipped through its rumpled pages. He came to a section he recognized and stabbed a finger down onto the paper with an audible snap. “One of the legends holds that Alaric made off with the menorah during the sack of Rome, and that it was buried with him. I didn’t pay much attention because we already know what happened to it.”
“Maybe there was more than one,” Bones offered.
“Maybe,” Maddock said. “Or maybe the menorah itself is only a clue.” He flipped through more pages of his notebook until he tapped one of the pages again. His heart raced. Could it be?
“I think I’ve got it. I know where we’re going to look next.”