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Citing a desire for more legroom, Bones opted to ride in the backseat of Slava’s Mercedes. Maddock suspected that was only one of his reasons why. Corey, almost guiltily, told Maddock he also wanted to ride with the others, “so I can get started downloading all this footage from the GoPros.” All of which meant that Maddock had the little Fiat all to himself on the drive back to Sofia. The peace and quiet was a welcome relief. He didn’t think he could handle half an hour of Bones speculating wildly about psychics, vampires and extraterrestrials.
Yet, despite his dismissal of the notion that the remote viewers had tuned in to something that had brought them within a stone’s throw of an actual hidden treasure, Maddock was troubled by the coincidence. His father, who had spent years searching for the gold of Captain Kidd, once told him, “Someone will find it when it’s ready to be found.”
Sometimes, that was exactly what happened. Somebody would stumble across a valuable artifact in an attic, or find a cache of buried coins while excavating for the foundation of a house. But to find this particular treasure where they had, the way they had, almost demanded that he be open to unconventional ideas.
Usually, finding the treasure was the end of the mystery, but not this time. There were so many unanswered questions. Who hid the treasure in that remote cave? How did they get it there? When had they concealed it, and why?
He was looking forward to going back into the Tsarichina Hole and exploring the cave system which intersected it. Perhaps they would discover the answers to those questions, but he doubted they would ever have a satisfactory solution to the puzzle of why the Tsarichina Hole had been excavated in the first place.
These thoughts kept him occupied during the relatively short drive back to Sofia. The landscape, mostly farm country, was pleasant if unremarkable, and gradually became more suburban as they neared the capital city. Slava navigated onto a narrow two-lane highway that seemed to skirt this divide for a while before finally plunging into the city proper. The drive ended on a wooded hilltop that seemed to float like an island amid the urban sea. Maddock parked the Fiat and went to join the others as they made their way up the long brick path that led to the National Historical Museum.
“That is one fugly museum,” Bones remarked.
Slava cocked her head to one side. “I do not know this word.”
Maddock sighed. Bones wasn’t wrong about the museum. There was nothing visually appealing about the squat, rectangular structure that looked more like a post office or military command center than a museum. Even the sturdy-looking gate through which they had to pass to enter felt more like a defensive barrier than a crowd control measure.
“He just means it’s got some interesting architecture,” Maddock said quickly, hoping that Bones would get the hint.
“Right,” Bones said, nodding slowly. “Interesting. That’s the word for it. Kind of like when the best thing you can say about a chick is that she’s got a great personality.”
“This used to be the official residence of Chairman Zhivkov, the ruler of Bulgaria under Communist regime,” Slava said.
“That explains why it looks so...” Maddock struggled to come up with a word.
“Fugly?” suggested Bones.
“The real treasures are inside,” Slava promised. “Literally. Bulgaria has a long and very rich history.”
They were met at the front entrance by a short, middle-aged woman wearing a white lab coat. She had close-cropped, steel-gray hair and a dour expression. Maddock didn’t like to judge people too quickly, but his first impression of this woman was that she was not happy to see them. Her judgmental gaze seemed to linger on the duffel bag slung over Riddle’s shoulder, as if she could see right through the nylon fabric.
Slava, switching between English and Bulgarian, took care of the introductions. The woman was Dr. Lyudmila Ivanova, head of the conservation and restoration department.
“Ask her if it’s okay to record her,” Riddle said to Slava.
“I wonder if the camera has a filter to reduce resting bitch face,” Bones muttered.
“I speak English,” Ivanova said, albeit with a thick accent. “I learned in high school.”
Maddock winced, hoping that she hadn’t heard Bones’ comment.
“Great,” Riddle replied, affably. “So can we?”
The woman’s expression did not change appreciably. She turned to the attendant at the entrance desk and after a brief exchange, turned back and handed them all lanyards attached to plastic badges with Cyrillic writing. “You have permission to use your cameras, but you must wear these and keep them visible at all times.”
When they had all looped the lanyards around their necks, Ivanova indicated that they should follow her, and then set off into the museum. Corey, outfitted with a head-mounted GoPro, followed their progress through the museum, mostly focusing his attention on Riddle as the latter attempted to make small talk with their guide.
As Slava had indicated, the museum’s brutalist façade concealed a lavish interior. Even without the displays—thousands of artifacts from more than seven millennia of the region’s history—the marble and oak appointments made the building feel like a palace, which Maddock supposed it had been during the years when it had been occupied by Bulgaria’s former dictator. As was too often the case in the Eastern bloc, the Communist leaders hid their own hypocritical bourgeoise excesses behind closed doors and bleak, constructivist walls.
But the real beauty was inside the glass display cases. Golden jewelry from the regions original Thracian inhabitants, Roman and Byzantine sculpture, manuscripts and icons from the Imperial periods. Maddock wished there had been time to explore the collection at length, but Ivanova set a brisk pace that did not allow time for sightseeing. Soon, they arrived an at unmarked door, which Ivanova opened holding her ID badge to the proximity card reader on the wall, and led them into a part of the museum that was off the public route.
The conservation laboratory was surprisingly bright and welcoming, with large windows that looked out on the park. Ivanova cleared a table and gestured to it. “So, let’s see what you have brought me.”
Riddle placed the duffel bag on the table and unzipped it, pulling it down to fully reveal the artifact inside. Ivanova drew in a sharp breath of surprise when she saw it, but then her face returned to its state of stern reserve. “I hope you did not touch it with bare hands,” she said, taking a pair of white cotton gloves from the pocket of her lab coat.
“Sorry,” Maddock said. “We weren’t expecting to find anything.”
“Is this the legendary cup of Khan Krum?” Riddle asked, clearly playing to the camera.
“It is too soon to tell,” Ivanova replied, guardedly. She pulled on the gloves and then lifted the cup, turning it over in her hands. “We will have to run many tests. But it is very interesting piece. Where did you find it?”
“We are not ready to reveal that just yet,” Slava said. “But I assure you, as soon as it is authenticated, we will turn everything over to the proper authorities.”
Ivanova seemed less than happy with that response, but did not press the matter. Instead, she bent down close to the cup and began scrutinizing it millimeter by millimeter.
“I’d like to follow you through the authentication process,” Riddle said. “What’s your schedule look like?”
Ivanova sucked in a breath and stood up abruptly. “This is not right. There is writing here.” She pointed to the cup’s interior. The letters were barely visible in the tarnished metal, and Maddock had to strain his eyes to see them, but they were definitely there.
“It is Bulgarian,” Ivanova added.
“Imagine that,” Bones remarked.
Ivanova shook her head. “The language of Bulgaria... the written language... was created by Saints Cyril and Methodius in the mid-Ninth Century, and first used in Bulgaria. The reign of Khan Krum ended in AD 814, eighty years before the Cyrillic alphabet was first used. That original language was called Old Bulgarian, or sometimes, Old Church Slavonic. It was not the language of Krum the Bulgar.”
“I think I get it,” Maddock said. “It’s like reading Chaucer in the original Middle English. It’s English, but it’s almost unintelligible.”
Ivanova nodded again, which Maddock had to remind himself meant the opposite of what he thought it did. “Modern Bulgarian—the form we use today—was introduced in the Sixteenth Century. That is what is written here. This engraving cannot be from the time of Krum. I would say, at the earliest, it is only five hundred years old. But probably much more recent than that.”
“What does it say?” Bones asked.
Ivanova turned her irritated gaze on him for a moment, then returned her attention to the cup. “It says, ‘Namerete istinski bogat·stva, kŭdeto Bog vi nablyudava.’”
“Look for treasure where God watches over you,” said Slava, translating.
“Something like that,” Ivanova said, and then, added almost dismissively, “it is common Christian sentiment. Wealth cannot bring salvation. Only the blood of Christ can do that, so it is the real treasure. But Khan Krum was not Christian.”
“That doesn’t necessarily mean it isn’t Krum’s cup,” Riddle said, sounding a little defensive. “Couldn’t somebody have added the inscription later?”
“It is possible,” she admitted, but with more than a little skepticism. “We will know more when we have completed tests. If there is a skull under the silver, we can carbon date it. Possibly even extract enough DNA to determine ethnicity. Until we can do the tests, there really isn’t anything more I can tell you.”
There was a note of finality in her reply, and Maddock sensed that any further inquiries would put a strain on their working relationship with the scientist. Before Riddle could repeat his request for access to the authentication process, Maddock spoke up. “We should let you get to it then.” He turned to Riddle. “I don’t know about you, but I could stand a hot shower, a change of clothes, and something to eat.”
Slava shook her head. “Yes, that is what we should do. I will take you to your hotel so you can get cleaned up, and then I will take you all out to dinner. I know the perfect place.”
“As long as there’s beer,” Bones said, “I’m in.”
Riddle looked like he was about to protest, but Ivanova seized control of the moment. “Good. I will contact you when I have more information.”
She hurried them back to the entrance where they surrendered their visitor’s passes. A few minutes later, they were back in their respective vehicles. Maddock once more flew solo in the Fiat, following Slava’s M-Class through the city on a busy expressway.
Judging from what he saw passing by his windows, Sofia appeared to be a modern city, but Maddock knew that the view, like the expressway, was just the latest layer of a history going back several millennia.
He was a little surprised at the prevalence of English on the signage he passed—yet another indicator of Sofia’s emergence into the Twenty-First Century and the global market. The hotel Slava led him to was an international chain; its familiar logo was in English, as was the name of the adjoining business—Princess Casino.
Bones will love that, he thought.
Sure enough, as Maddock approached the reception desk at the hotel, Bones’ voice boomed across the lobby. “Yo, dude. Can you believe this place? There are like fifteen casinos, just in Sofia. Why didn’t we come here sooner?”
“Maybe because we like keeping our hard-earned cash?” Maddock retorted.
Bones rolled his eyes. “Maybe you like keeping it. I like doubling it.”
“You sound like your uncle,” Maddock said. Bones’ uncle, “Crazy” Charlie Bonebrake, owned several casinos.
Slava, who had just finished checking them in, approached them and handed each man an envelope containing a room key card. “Your friend Corey is helping Max unload the equipment,” she said, and then turned to Maddock. “I take it you are not a gambler, Mr. Maddock?”
“I’ll play nickel slots once in a while, but no, not like him.” He nodded his head in Bones’ direction.
“I would have thought that treasure hunting and gambling have a lot in common.”
“Maybe for some,” Maddock admitted. “But I’m not chasing the big jackpot. I’ve always been more interested in exploring the past and solving old mysteries.”
She smiled, but somehow it didn’t quite reach her eyes. “Maybe you will get lucky and solve the mystery of the Tsarichina Hole.”
“I’ll certainly give it my best shot,” Maddock answered, but in that moment, the mystery that he was most curious about was the abrupt change in Slava’s demeanor. It was almost as if she didn’t want him to make good on that promise.