Until Moshe Benaroya valiantly defied the patriarch and transcribed the key in the Luminarium.
Part 2 of his courageous manuscript, titled “The Key,” contained a detailed formulary for the Emerald Tablet. A sequential equation, which if correctly applied, would alter the vibrational energy of the universe. But the undertaking wasn’t for the fainthearted. It had taken Mercurius years to master the correct tone for each letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Years of laborious practice before he could move effortlessly through the Otiyot Yesod.
Opening a door at the end of the hallway, Mercurius entered a windowless room. Ten cubits by ten cubits. A faithful re-creation of the Holy of Holies, the Kodesh Kodashim. Painted gold, the letters of the Hebrew alphabet were stenciled on the wall. Here, each morning, he practiced the sacred chant. Over and over.
Barukh hamelamed et yadi lesapper et ha’otiyot.
“Blessed is the One who has taught my hand to scribe the letters!” he softly murmured.
Removing his red babouche slippers, he seated himself on the room’s only piece of furniture, a hardback chair, bare feet firmly planted on the floor. As he stared at the twenty-two stenciled letters, he tightened his abdomen muscles, preparing his diaphragm. He breathed deeply, filling his lungs with air before pushing the inhalation through his nostrils. Controlled breathing was vital to the correct execution of the chant.
In Part 3 of the Luminarium, titled “The Deception,” Moshe Benaroya revealed how the patriarch Moses profaned and corrupted the sacred knowledge, using the Divine Harmonic to commit heinous acts of unimaginable brutality. The dark energy created during Moses’s bloodthirsty rule had yet to dissipate. That dark energy was a curse suffered anew by each generation of innocent victims. This was the reason why Moshe Benaroya violated the ancient restriction.
That long-ago day when the Greek crone unexpectedly gave him the Luminarium, Mercurius had an epiphany. After nearly seven decades, he finally knew his life’s purpose. Moshe Benaroya had written a magnificent sacred text but had been killed before he could use the ancient knowledge for the greater good.
His life purpose, his mission, was to find the Emerald Tablet and use the encryption key to extinguish the dark fire that permeated the earth.
Like his forebears, Mercurius was fearless.
He’d lived long enough to know that evil could not be contained; it had to be destroyed. Only then could the Bringer of the Light illuminate the way back to the Lost Heaven where all souls originated and where we all yearned to return. That luminous place where the Light dwelled.
Where there was no hatred or brutality.
Where children weren’t raped or women murdered.
Where no one had to live in dread fear of being dragged away in the middle of the night. Of having a gun put to his head. Or a noose slipped around the neck.
If he had the Emerald Tablet, he could activate the harmonic sequence that would end all suffering. For all time.
That was the message that Osman de Léon and his milk brother, Moshe Beneroya, had imparted to him before the SS officer forcibly led them to the train station on that fateful night in 1943.
You must always remember, little one, that you were named for the Bringer of the Light.
Do not fear the Light, Merkür. For it will lead you to your life’s purpose.
About to begin the sacred ritual, Mercurius stopped in mid-breath, his reveries disturbed by a ringing telephone. Given the early hour, it could only be one person calling—his amoretto, Saviour.
Hurriedly, he padded barefoot to the nearest telephone, the one on the hallway credenza.
Moments later, he listened intently as Saviour, in a highly agitated state, briefed him about what had transpired in the last few hours.
The well-laid plan that they concocted the previous night had only been partially successful.
“A moment, please,” he told his amoretto, his heart painfully thumping against his chest. He placed the phone on the credenza.
Bending at the waist, he placed his hands on his thighs, gripped with a sudden case of vertigo. He closed his eyes. Took several deep breaths. Dear Lord. He could hear the pain-racked screams of all the victims. Too innumerable to count.
The shrieks. The sobs. The agonized bellows. A hideous cacophony of suffering.
The persecuted masses.
Oh, the horror of it!
Mercurius put his hands over his ears, trying to block out the anguished dissonance. To no avail. The screams and shrieks only got that much louder.
Building toward an unbearable crescendo.
Deliver us from evil!
“Yes! Yes! I intend to do just that,” he gasped aloud. To deliver the world from the evil energy that was all-pervasive. To shepherd the pain-racked souls of mankind home to the Lost Heaven.
It had been done once before. In Atlantis millennia ago. It could be done again. It had to be done again.
Yes! Fearless.
Determined to fulfill his sacred purpose, the Light Bringer grabbed the cordless phone.
CHAPTER 64
“I deserved that.”
Edie stared at the red imprint of her hand on Caedmon’s left cheek. “You deserve a lot worse than that. An innocent man is dead because—” Choking back a sob, she placed her hand over her mouth. A few feet away, firefighters decked out in maroon and yellow held a long hose as they blasted the exterior of Woolf’s Antiquarian Books with water.
“I’m sorry, love.” Caedmon put a comforting hand on her shoulder.
“Not good enough. You should have warned Rubin that there’s a killer on the loose who will do anything to get his hands on the Emerald Tablet.” Shaking her head, she gasped. Still horrified by what she’d seen in Rubin’s boudoir. “God! Why didn’t you tell him about Rico Suave?”
“I had no way of knowing that the bastard followed us to London. So, yes, mea maxima culpa.”
Hearing his apology—in Latin!— made her livid. “Go to hell!” she retorted, shrugging off his hand.
“At the moment, neither of us is going anywhere.” Caedmon jutted his chin at the quartet of police officers who were busy cordoning off the area near the bookshop. “No doubt, the quiz masters at the London Fire Brigade and Scotland Yard will want to thoroughly interrogate us.” Taking her by the elbow, he steered her away from the frantic flow of pedestrians and first responders.
Edie stooped to pick up the shoulder bag that she’d earlier flung to the ground. “Any idea what we should tell the authorities?”
“As little as possible.” Caedmon shepherded her into the doorway of a print and map shop. Closed for business on account of it being a Sunday. “Best to keep answers to a minimum. We were visiting an old friend. Yes, he had many valuable books on the premises. Since we barely survived the inferno, there should be no finger-pointing in our direction.”
“What if we’re grilled?” She stopped herself from saying “over the fire.”
“My old group leader at MI5 will see to it that we’re cleared in short order.”
Friends in high places. Must be nice.