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and crushed a soldier beneath, breaking leg and pelvis. The poor man’s scream christened the air.

Franz hurried, dropping from his saddle. He joined the men in attempting to lift the stone crate off the soldier…and more importantly back into the wagon.

The sarcophagus was lifted, the man dragged free, but the crate was too heavy to raise to the wagon’s height.

“Ropes!” Franz yelled. “We need ropes!”

One of the bearers slipped. The sarcophagus fell again, on its side. Its stone lid fell open.

The sound of hoofbeats rose behind them. On the trail. Coming fast. Joachim turned, knowing what he’d find. Horses, lathered and shining in the sun, bore down on them. Though a quarter league off, it was plain all the riders were dressed in black. More of the Saracen’s men. It was a second ambush.

Joachim merely sat his horse. There would be no escape.

Franz gasped—not at their predicament, but at the contents of the spilled sarcophagus. Or rather the lack thereof.

“Empty!” the young friar exclaimed. “It’s empty.”

Shock drove Franz back to his feet. He climbed atop the wagon’s bed and stared into the crate shattered by the Saracen’s arrow.

“Nothing again,” Franz said, falling to his knees. “The relics? What ruin is this?” The young friar found Joachim’s eyes and read the lack of surprise. “You knew.”

Joachim stared back at the rushing horses. Their caravan had all been a ruse, a ploy to draw off the black pope’s men. The true courier had left a day ahead, with a mule team, bearing the true relics wrapped in rough-spun cloth and hidden inside a hay bundle.

Joachim turned to stare across the vale at Fierabras. The Saracen might have his blood this day, but the black pope would never have the relics.

Never.

PRESENT DAY

JULY 22, 11:46 P.M.

COLOGNE, GERMANY

AS MIDNIGHT approached, Jason passed his iPod to Mandy. “Listen. It’s Godsmack’s new single. It’s not even released in the States yet. How cool is that?”

The reaction was less than Jason hoped. Mandy shrugged, expressionless, but she still took the proffered earphones. She brushed back the pink-dyed tips of her black hair and settled the phones to her ears. The movement opened her jacket enough to reveal the press of her applesized breasts against her black Pixies T-shirt.

Jason stared.

“I don’t hear anything,” Mandy said with a tired sigh, arching an eyebrow at him.

Oh. Jason turned his attention back to his iPod and pressed Play.

He leaned back on his hands. The two were seated on a thin grass sward that framed the open pedestrian plaza, called the Domvorplatz. It surrounded the massive gothic cathedral, the Kölner Dom. Perched on Cathedral Hill, it commanded a view over the entire city.

Jason gazed up the length of the twin spires, decorated with stone figures, carved in tiers of marble reliefs that ranged from the religious to the arcane. Now, lit up at night, it held an eerie sense of something ancient risen from deep underground, something not of this world.

Listening to the music leaking from the iPod, Jason watched Mandy. Both were on summer holiday from Boston College, backpacking through Germany and Austria. They were traveling with two other friends, Brenda and Karl, but the other two were more interested in the local pubs than attending tonight’s midnight mass. Mandy, though, had been raised Roman Catholic. Midnight masses at the cathedral were limited to a few select holidays, each attended by the Archbishop of Cologne himself, like tonight’s Feast of the Three Kings. Mandy had not wanted to miss it.

And while Jason was Protestant, he had agreed to accompany her.

As they waited for the approach of midnight, Mandy’s head bopped slightly to the music. Jason liked the way her bangs swept back and forth, the way her lower lip pouted out as she concentrated on the music. Suddenly he felt a touch on his hand. Mandy had shifted her arm closer, brushing her hand atop his. Her eyes, though, remained fixed on the cathedral.

Jason held his breath.

For the past ten days, the two had found themselves thrown together more and more often. Before the trip, they had been no more than acquaintances. Mandy had been Brenda’s best friend since high school, and Karl was Jason’s roommate. Their two respective friends, new lovers, hadn’t wanted to travel alone, in case their budding relationship soured while traveling.

It hadn’t.

So Jason and Mandy often ended up sightseeing alone.

Not that Jason minded. He had been studying art history back at college. Mandy was majoring in European studies. Here their dry academic textbooks were given flesh and girth,