The Last Templar - Страница 17

They had stood back helplessly and watched as the Temple was ransacked. All the grand master could do was hope that the king and his henchmen would fail to grasp the significance of the loot that they carried away, or be so consumed by greed for the gold and jewels they couldn't find that they would fail to notice those seemingly worthless objects that were, in fact, of immeasurable value. Then silence had fallen until slowly and with surprising courtesy, de Molay and his fellow knights were herded into wagons to be carried to their fate.

Now, as de Molay remembered that silence, he realized that this was what was different about today.

It was quiet.

Usually, the dungeon was a noisy place: chains clattering, racks and wheels creaking, braziers hissing, along with the endless screams of the torturers' victims.

Not today, though.

Then the grand master heard a sound. Footsteps, approaching. At first, he thought it was Gaspard 47

Chaix, the chief of the torturers, but that ogre's footsteps were unlike these; his were heavy and menacing. It wasn't anyone of his crew of shambling animals either. No, there were many men coming, moving quickly along the tunnel and then they were in the chamber where de Molay hung in chains. Through swollen, bloodshot eyes, he saw half a dozen brightly dressed men standing before him. And at their center, of all people, was the king himself.

Slender and imposing, King Philip IV stood a full head taller than the group of fawning sycophants clustered around him. In spite of his parlous state, de Molay was as always struck by the outward appearance of the ruler of France. How could a man of such physical grace be so thoroughly evil?

With youthful features belying his forty-six years, Philip the Fair was light skinned and had long blond hair. He looked the very picture of a nobleman, yet for almost a decade, driven by an insatiable greed for wealth and power matched only by his vulgar profligacy, he had wreaked calculated death and destruction, inflicting torment upon all those who stood in his way or even merely displeased him.

The Knights Templar had done more than merely displease him.

De Molay heard more footsteps coming along the tunnel. Hesitant, nervous steps heralded the arrival in the chamber of a slight figure dressed in a cowled gray robe. The man's foot slipped and he stumbled awkwardly on the uneven floor. The cowl fell away and de Molay recognized the pope.

It was a long time since he had seen Clement, and, in the intervening period, the man's face had altered. Deeply etched lines turned down the corners of his mouth as if he suffered some continual internal discomfort, while his eyes had sunk deep into dark hollows.

The king and the pope. Together.

This couldn't be good.

The king's gaze was fixed on de Molay, but the broken man wasn't interested in him right now. His eyes were locked on the diminutive man in the cape who stood there fidgeting nervously, avoiding his look. De Molay wondered at the pope's reticence. Was it because the man's deception and his subtle manipulation of the king had precipitated the fall of the Knights Templar? Or was it that he simply couldn't bear to see the grievously misshapen limbs, the rank open sores, or the unhealed flesh of putrefying wounds?

The king stepped closer. "Nothing?" he snarled at a man hovering beyond the edge of the group.

The man stepped forward, and de Molay saw that it was indeed Gaspard Chaix, the torturer, his eyes downcast, his head shaking from side to side.

"Nothing," the stubbly man replied.

"Damn him to hell," the king burst out with a voice that was filled with the undercurrent of fury that consumed him.

You've already done that, de Molay thought. He saw Gaspard look his way, the eyes, beneath thick brows, dead as the stones that made up the floor. The king moved forward, peering closely at de Molay, a handkerchief held against his nose to protect him from a stench that the grand master knew to be there but had long ago ceased to notice.

The king's whispery voice sliced the stale air. "Talk, damn you. Where is the treasure?"

"There is no treasure," de Molay simply replied, his voice barely audible even to himself.

"Why must you be stubborn?" the king rasped. "What end does it serve? Your brothers have revealed all; your sordid initiation ceremonies, your humble Knights of the Cross denying the divinity of Christ, spitting on the Cross, even urinating on it. They've admitted . . . everything."

Slowly, de Molay licked at his cracked lips with a swollen tongue. "Under torture such as this," he managed, "they would confess to killing God Himself."

Philip inched closer to him. "The Holy Inquisition will prevail," he said indignantly. "That much should be obvious to a man of your intellect. Just give me what I want and I'll spare your life."

"There is no treasure," de Molay repeated with the tone of a man resigned to never convincing those who heard him. For a long time, de Molay had sensed that Gaspard Chaix believed him, even though he had never faltered in his brutal assaults upon his victim's flesh. He also knew that the pope believed him, but the head of the Church wasn't about to let the king in on his little secret. The king, on the other hand, needed the riches he knew the Knights Templar had amassed over the past two hundred years, and his needs overwhelmed the conclusion any sane man would have reached at seeing the broken man hanging from the wall before him.

"It's useless." The king turned away, still angry but now apparendy as resigned as his victim. "The treasure must have been spirited away that first night."

De Molay watched the pope, whose face was still turned away. The man's moves were brilliantly executed, he thought. The grand master felt a perverse satisfaction in knowing it. And it stoked his determination even more, for the wily man's actions only confirmed the nobility of the Templars' goal.

The king looked coldly at the heavyset torturer. "How many of them still live within these walls?"

De Molay's entire body went rigid. For the first time, he was going to learn of the fate of his brothers from the Paris Temple. Gaspard Chaix told the king that, apart from the grand master himself, only his deputy, Geoffroi de Charnay, survived.

The old Templar shut his eyes, his consciousness flooded in a tangle of horrific images. All gone, he thought. And yet we came so close. If only. . . If only word had come, all those years ago, from the Falcon Temple, from Aimard and his men.

But nothing had.

The Falcon Temple—and its precious cargo—had simply vanished.

The king turned and took one final look at the broken man. "End it," he ordered.

The torturer shuffled closer. "When, Your Majesty?"

"Tomorrow morning," the king said, the prospect perversely brightening his spirits.

Hearing the words, de Molay felt something spread over him that he didn't recognize at first. It was a feeling he hadn't experienced in many years.

Relief.

Through hooded eyes, he glanced toward the pope and saw his stifled delight.

"What about their possessions?" the pope asked, his voice quavering. By now, de Molay knew, all that would remain was anything that couldn't be sold to help pay off the king's debts. "The books, papers, artifacts. They belong to the Church."

"Then take them." The king waved a dismissive hand before casting one last seething glance at de Molay and storming out of the chamber, his entourage trailing hurriedly after him.

For the briefest of instants, the eyes of the pope and de Molay met before Clement could turn and rush from the chamber. In that brief space of time, de Molay had read the pope's mind, confirming the small man for what he was: a scheming opportunist who had manipulated the greedy king for his own ends. For the Church's ends.

A scheming manipulator who had bested him.

But de Molay couldn't give him the satisfaction of believing it. He seized the opportunity and rallied himself, summoning all of his strength and channeling it into a glare of confident defiance that he beamed at his nemesis. For a fleeting second, a look of fear crossed the pope's weathered features before he composed his face into a stern gaze and lifted up his cowl.

The grand master's cracked lips curled into what would have once been a smile. He knew he'd succeeded in sowing doubt in the small man's mind.

A victory of sorts.

The pope wouldn't sleep well tonight.

You may have won this battle, de Molay thought. But our war is far from over. And with that thought, he closed his eyes and awaited his approaching death.

Chapter 21

Reilly did his best to avoid appearing conflicted. Much as he was enjoying sitting there with Tess, he couldn't see the relevance of everything she'd just told him. A bunch of selfless knights grow into a medieval superpower only to get their wings clipped and disappear igno-miniously into the annals of history. What did that have to do with a gang of armed robbers trashing a museum seven hundred years later?

"You think the guys at the museum were wearing Templar outfits?" he asked.

"Yes. The Templars wore simple clothing, very different from the gaudy outfits other knights wore back then. Remember, they were religious monks, committed to poverty. The white robes symbolized the purity of life that was expected of them, and the red crosses, the color of blood, advertised their special relationship with the Church."

"Okay, but if you asked me to draw a knight, I'd probably come up with something that looks pretty close to that without consciously thinking about the Templars. It's a pretty iconic look, isn't it?"