CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

 

 

 

Saint Petersburg, Russia

 

 

Ivan Volkov knew next to nothing about world history. Not because he wasn’t intelligent, but because the ancient past bored him to tears.

Even as a child in school, he had despised academics. He had done just enough to pass his classes in order to stay out of trouble, while spending most of his time after school causing it. Despite his small and wiry frame, he had been the most feared kid on the playground, using his ferocity and rage to scare boys who were twice his age and size.

Where he grew up, everyone called him the wolf.

Partially because of his surname.

But mostly because he was an animal.

He had used that reputation to work his way through the ranks of the Russian underworld until he had enough cash and contacts to launch his own empire, and he had announced his arrival in a sea of blood and carnage, killing multiple crime lords in a single night.

Ever since then, he had been feared by everyone.

His men, his rivals, even the Russian police.

No one was willing to tangle with Ivan Volkov.

That is, until the incident in Malta.

Although word of the shootout hadn’t reached Russia and probably never would since all of those henchmen were dead—including his driver, who Volkov had killed upon their arrival in Moscow—he wasn’t willing to take any chances. He needed to take care of the Finn and his American friends before the news of their victory could possibly spread, while also claiming the treasure that he assumed they were searching for.

Unfortunately, Volkov had no idea where to start.

On his flight home, he had browsed through most of the documents that he had stolen from the Finn’s yacht, but he couldn’t make sense of them. He wasn’t familiar with the Knights of Malta or the history of Valletta. And even though he had heard of Catherine the Great, he knew nothing about her son Paul I or his dealings with the Order.

Eventually Volkov had realized that he needed an expert, someone who could take the historical collection in his possession and turn it into actual gold, but since neither King Midas nor Rumpelstiltskin was available, he decided to journey north to Saint Petersburg in order to visit the State Hermitage Museum.

According to his phone, it was the second-largest museum in the world (behind only the Louvre in Paris) and was founded by Catherine the Great after she had acquired an impressive cache of paintings from a Prussian merchant named Johann Ernst Gotzkowsky. Volkov didn’t care about the Prussian or his stupid paintings, but he figured a museum that was built by the empress was bound to have an expert or two on the lives of her family.

Unwilling to risk boredom by going inside an actual museum, Volkov sent in a few new henchmen to find someone who had knowledge of the subject matter. Thirty minutes later, they brought out a curator named Boris Artamonov, who looked almost as old as the museum itself.

Dressed in a rumpled sport coat with patches on the elbows and brown tweed pants, he showed no fear as he slowly shuffled along between the goons toward the idling limousine, as if this type of thing happened every day. Of course, growing up in the Soviet Union, he had lived through many things far worse than a stroll along the Neva River. When a tour boat near the quay passed him by, he waved to the people in the late-afternoon sun.

Volkov didn’t know whether to be offended or impressed.

The old bastard wasn’t the least bit scared.

He was just happy to still be alive.

The bigger of the two goons opened the limousine door while the other helped Artamonov inside. Instead of showing any fear, he actually smiled at Volkov.

“Hello,” he said in Russian. “My name is Boris. What’s your name?”

Volkov nodded to the henchman, who shut the door from the outside, leaving the two alone. “My name is Volkov. Ivan Volkov. Does that name mean anything to you?”

Artamonov shook his head. “Not at all. Are you famous?”

“More like infamous.”

“Sorry, Ivan. I don’t follow the news. I prefer to spend my time in the past.”

“I’m curious. What did my men tell you about my situation?”

“They said you needed my help. So I’m here to help.”

“Just like that?”

Artamonov shrugged. “I used to work as a full-time curator, but now I’m just a part-time volunteer. Honestly, I’ve got nothing better to do.”

Volkov smiled an actual smile. For him, this was a refreshing change of pace—particularly after the debacle in Valletta. “If I may be so bold, what is your specialty at the museum?”

“Over the years, I have worked in just about every building and every department imaginable. I started at the Small Hermitage, which housed the original collection, but then I moved to the Old Hermitage, then the New Hermitage, and the Hermitage Theatre, followed by the Winter Palace. That’s my personal favorite. It’s where Catherine the Great used to live.”

“So I read,” Volkov said as he leaned forward with excitement. “And what if I told you that I recently discovered a number of ancient documents about Empress Catherine and her family? Would you be willing to explain their significance to me?”

Artamonov glanced at his watch. “That depends. Will you buy me dinner?”

Volkov grinned. “I think that could be arranged.”

“Dessert, too?”

“If you’d like.”

Artamonov shrugged. “In that case, why not?”

 

◊                      ◊                      ◊

 

Payne and Jones had seen a similar twinkle in Ulster’s eyes on previous occasions, and it usually meant one of two things: either a meal was about to be served, or he was about to blow their minds with a historical fact that would undoubtedly help their cause. Jones obviously hoped for the latter, but Payne would have been fine with either result.

No matter the time of day, he was always willing to eat.

Ulster started with a question. “When Marissa told you about the Great Siege of Malta, did she talk about the cannon placement of the Ottomans?”

Payne answered. “Yeah, she said they positioned them on top of Mount, um…” He glanced at Marissa for help. “How do you pronounce it again?”

“Mount Sciberras,” she replied.

Payne nodded. “They put them on Mount Sciberras and then bombarded Birgu with over a hundred thousand cannonballs. And just so you know, we actually visited the Upper Barrakka Gardens and watched the saluting battery before the library. Very cool stuff.”

“Indeed!” Ulster said with a grin. Since everyone in the group had already been there, it would make what he was about to reveal even easier to explain. “After the Order’s miraculous victory, Grand Master Jean de Valette realized that Birgu was far too vulnerable along the harbor to be able to protect it. He also realized that money would come pouring in from Europe once word spread about his victory over the dreaded Turks. Looking to put his own personal stamp on the region, he selected the Sciberras Peninsula as the site of his new city, laying the foundation stone himself in March of 1566 AD.”

Payne pointed at Marissa. “We actually know all of this. Your former intern did a wonderful job filling us in on the basics. You should offer her a permanent job.”

Ulster smiled at her. “If she wants one, she can have it. I’ve been trying to lure her back to the Archives for years, but she’s been too busy shooting up libraries.”

Marissa laughed. “Once I’m out of bullets, I’ll give you a call.”

“Excellent!” Ulster said. “In the meantime, would you mind terribly if I highlighted a few pertinent items from your lecture about Valletta? I think perhaps I can shine a light on a shadow or two that you might have overlooked.”

“It would be my honor. You know how much I love listening to you talk.”

“Which,” he joked, “is one of my favorite things about you!”

She laughed and squeezed his arm tight.

“David!” Ulster said out of nowhere.

Jones was listening but snapped to attention. “What’d I do?”

“Don’t worry. You’re not in trouble. I was just hoping you could help our discussion. Being a former soldier and a history buff, I’d like your thoughts on the following: What would have been your first priority if you were building Valletta in 1566 AD?”

“Whores. You can never have enough whores.”

Jarkko laughed. “David’s right. They keep the knights happy.”

“Boooo!” Marissa said as she elbowed Ulster.

“Boo is right,” Ulster said with a grin. “Boooo!”

Payne glared at Jones. “Come on, man. Be serious.”

Jones frowned. “Sorry. My bad. Just trying to keep things loose.”

“Just like the whores,” Jarkko whispered to him.

Jones fought hard not to smile. “Considering their recent battle with the Ottomans and their ongoing fight with the Barbary pirates, I would think the fortification of the city would be high on my list. You just said the main reason that they moved from Birgu was because they were looking for somewhere more secure, so I’m assuming that’s what Valette did.”

Ulster nodded. “You are correct. He built bastions as high as forty-seven meters, which is approximately one-hundred-fifty feet tall to you and Jonathon.”

Payne chimed in. “We saw the bastions when we sailed in and out of the harbor. We also saw them from the overlook in Sliema on our first night here. They’re impressive.”

“Maybe so,” Ulster said, “but they’re also a problem. If you build a medieval city on top of a bluff and your enemy surrounds you down below, how do you get supplies? Back then, there were no planes or drones to drop things from the sky, so what were the knights to do? And if you don’t know, think back to our first adventure together. What did they do in Orvieto?”

“A well!” Jones said, remembering Pozzo di San Patrizio, a historic well that was commissioned by Pope Clement VII, who had taken refuge in Orvieto during the sack of Rome in 1527. “They dug nearly fifty feet into the plateau until they hit water.”

“And the Knights did something similar, digging deep into the soft limestone of the Sciberras Peninsula in order to build a system of cisterns and sewers. But while they were down there, they also did something else. They built hundreds of chambers, some of them small but many as tall as three stories high, from one end of the city to the other. They did this to store their most precious supplies in case of a siege, whether that be food, weapons, or—”

“Treasure!” Jarkko shouted.

Ulster grinned. “To reach these chambers, they also built an intricate network of tunnels, some of which were so top secret that only the grand master himself knew where they went. Which got me thinking. If the Knights of Malta did, in fact, have a secret treasure, there’s only one place they would have kept it—and that’s underneath the city of Valletta!”