The giant stone block in the middle becomes increasingly visible. Fashioned out of polished sandstone, it is at least five metres high and three metres wide. On two sides are shelves filled with maps and scrolls. The other two are divided into what look like dozens of small ovens filled with rubble.
Gideon is amazed. He approaches it like a cat stalking a bird.
The young archaeologist is almost too afraid to touch anything. It is a library. A museum. A time capsule filled with ancient scripts, artefacts, carvings and tools.
‘How far back does this go?’ he asks.
‘Right to the beginning.’ The Master points to the top of the cube. ‘Up there you will find original carvings. The first plans for the Sanctuary and Stonehenge. Over there in the largest coffins you see the remains of the first sacrifices, those who completed the Sanctuary and the henge.’
‘The builders were sacrificed?’
‘It was their will. They knew that in offering themselves to the Sacreds, they ensured blessings for their children and the generations to follow.’
Gideon stands in awe. Around him is an archaeologist’s dream. An Aladdin’s Cave of ancient history and civilisation. The discovery of a lifetime. His pulse races. ‘I never read anything about any of this. In all the diaries I found, there was no mention of this place or anything in it.’
‘Nor should there have been. Speaking of it, or writing about it, is forbidden.’ The Master moves closer to him, smiles again. ‘Nathaniel knew of this chamber. He did much work in here. Among the parchments and documents in the archive, you will find his own labours, contributions to the star maps and charts that all Masters are obliged to complete.’
So much history in one space. So much knowledge. So many secrets. The Master breaks the spell by motioning to the door. ‘We must go. I have more to show you and very little time in which to do it.’
Reluctantly, Gideon leaves the chamber and the Master extinguishes all the lights, relocks the door. They walk to the end of the passage and begin a steep and precarious climb up a seemingly endless flight of open-sided stone steps. They cling like ivy to the outer wall of the Sanctuary. No safety panels or guard rails. A sheer brutal drop beside them.
‘Take care,’ says the Master. ‘You may still be a little weak from the initiation.’
It’s good advice. After more than a hundred steps, Gideon finds himself sweating and struggling for breath. The man in front pushes on like a mountain goat, taking each stone slab with a powerful and confident stride.
Gideon keeps one palm on the wall. He notices the intricate carvings in the stone. Ancient art depicting farmers working fields, women carrying babies, herds of cattle gathering by streams. Across the walls he sees other scenes. Workers raising giant blocks of stone, the first outlines of the henge being formed. People at burial mounds, their heads hung low. Scenes showing the orbit of the sun, the constellations of the stars and the phases of the moon. Up above, there is a more frightening depiction.
Men in robes are gathered around a bound figure over the Slaughter Stone, the hammer of the Master is raised. It reminds him that the young American woman, the one from the news, is immured somewhere below them.
He sways on the steps.
A hand grabs a clump of his robing. The Henge Master pulls him tight to the wall. ‘Be careful.’
He steadies himself and breathes slowly. ‘I’m okay.’
‘Good. Then we go on.’
Within a few steps, they reach the top. Gideon sees now that there is another set of stone stairs descending on the other side, running straight down towards the chambers and the Great Room.
The Master again uses the key from around his neck.
The area that Gideon steps into is a world removed from the archive chamber and in its own way even more surprising.
The first thing that strikes him is the light. The bright white fuzz of fluorescent tubes, flickering and buzzing like trapped and angry ghosts. The floor and the walls are grey. But not stone. Concrete. Plaster. It is as though he has walked into a giant modern warehouse or garage.
In front of him is what he guesses is an acre of sealed concrete. Hundreds of metres of plastered walls. The Master walks forwards on to a slatted steel gantry some ten metres above the floor. Gideon follows. There are vehicles parked at the far end. Chunky 4×4s and something distinctly familiar. Draco’s white builder’s van.
The place is more than a garage. He can feel it in his gut, long before his eye roams over the vast greyness. The space is divided into other distinct areas. There are dozens of metal lockers; clusters of changing benches, tables and chairs. A kitchen section with rows of sinks; endless worktops to cut and prepare food on; lines of tall refrigerators and freezers; microwaves, stoves, ovens and pans.
Enough room and equipment in here to feed an army.
‘It’s our operational centre,’ says the Master casually. ‘Below ground we respect our traditions in the way our ancestors did. Above the surface, we are an elite force. Tomorrow you will come here and work. You will play your part in the preparations for the great day.’
132
Dawn sleepily pulls at the dark curtains of the sky like a red-faced toddler tugging blankets at the foot of its parents’ bed. Lookers surround the dew-soaked fields of Stonehenge. They stand in the empty car park. No tourists have been allowed to book any early visits to the site.
The Henge Master walks the public footpath trodden by millions, steps across the newly cut grass. Enters the iconic circle. Today will last sixteen hours, thirty-seven minutes and five seconds. The altitude of the sun is 61.9 degrees.
Tomorrow it will make its first major shift for ten days and drop to 61.8. He looks to the ever-changing sky as he enters the horseshoe of trilithons.
Moonset was more than an hour ago. There is no sign of the lady in white. She dances in the unseen darkness almost a quarter of a million miles away. At nine tonight she will return and she will appear in 98 per cent of her full virgin glory.
Almost ready.
A gentle wind blows across the open fields. The Master stretches out his arms to feel the energy of the Sacreds. Everything that happens from now on is about precision. Precision, alignment and the final will of the gods.
133
Caitlyn has never prayed. Her father comes from lapsed Jewish stock and her mother from a brand of Protestantism so casual she might as well have been an atheist.
The only things her family have ever believed in are fairness, goodness and kindness. Do unto others as you’d have them do unto you. Not the kind of upbringing that prepares you for being held hostage, immured in stone and starved to death. That’s where she has been since she injured herself and they moved her. In a tiny immurement cavity stuffed with memory foam. She can feel it against most of her front and back. Like being sandwiched between mattresses.
Caitlyn closes her eyes and tries to pray. Her mind is such a spiky jumble of fear that she can’t even focus a single silent plea to any or all spiritual saviours. For the first time since they locked her up, she starts to cry.
134
It is exactly eight a.m. when Megan follows her DCI into Barney Gibson’s makeshift office. She last saw him and his operational sidekick Stewart Willis six days ago, but the two men look ten years older. Endless shifts, sleepless nights and the stress of the inquiry are breaking their health.