Tree of Life Read online

  “Ambulaveris in igne non conbureris et flamma non ardebit. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze.”

  Guram repeated the familiar words along with them and slowed his steps. His reward would be greater the more he demonstrated his faith.

  Each of the Brothers wore a forest green robe woven through with thorns to remind them of the violence of Nature, each movement bringing a prick, a cut, a slice of pain so they would never forget the true nature of Eden. Five men were chosen from each generation to become Warriors of the Ignis Flammae, to carry one of the flaming swords after which they were named. There were other lay Brothers out in the cities, those who lived closer to the Worldly so they might see yet not be seen, and shape those unknowing by means of enterprise, but Guram’s destiny was amongst the Warriors.

  He fixed his gaze on the Abbot at the end of the burning trench and took another step. The old man was shrunken in stature, but his aged body still stood upright and strong. None of the Brothers would dare challenge him in combat, and he still joined them in training, wielding his own sword with deadly skill. He held that weapon in front of him now, the blade alive with blue fire.

  If Guram could reach it and grasp the burning weapon, the Brotherhood would welcome him. He gulped down his pain and took one more step. The brief moment his foot was aloft allowed a whisper of cool air to touch the blistered skin. He wanted to howl, to scream, to run from this place and soothe his agony, but he had come so far. This was the final stage, the last few moments before his life of service truly began.

  He gazed beyond the Abbot to the ancient door carved with hooked vines and voracious flowers. If he could make it to the end, he would finally see the Garden. The pain would be worth it. Guram bit down hard on his lip and looked again at the Abbot, the man’s dark eyes reflecting the flames from the sword. He took another step.

  The Abbot was Yazidi just as Guram was, although many races were represented amongst the Brothers. Men of faith from throughout the known world called to fight against the insatiable appetite of Nature. Guram felt a kinship with the old man, an understanding of persecution and what it took to survive.

  The Yazidis had faced extinction many times over millennia, an ancient race that dwelled in what was once Mesopotamia, now the disputed territories of Northern Iraq. Their belief system was ancient, one God who had entrusted the care of the world to seven holy beings, with the Peacock Angel their most precious. But Guram found that the mission to protect Eden transcended the faith of his people, and even though he still carried a peacock’s feather, he would lay it down to take up the flaming sword.

  The Catholic Church had disavowed the Order of the Ignis Flammae early in the Reformation period, as Europe emerged from the darkness of the Middle Ages. The Pope and his well-meaning Cardinals had disbanded the Ignis Flammae, commanding them to join other Orders, preferring to believe that Eden was no longer a threat, and the Garden faded into history. But the Ignis Flammae knew the truth. They had gone underground, the monks more aware than ever of the danger that humanity faced from Mother Nature, the sworn enemy of civilization.

  The chanting of the Brothers rose in volume as Guram reached the end of the burning channel and stood before the Abbot. The old man stared down at him, a challenge in his eyes. If there was any sign of weakness, of desperation to escape the burning torture, Guram would be cast out. He had seen many novices leave here broken in body and spirit when they failed the test of fire. But he would not falter.

  He stood his ground, his feet searing on the coals, pain lancing up his legs. He stared up into the Abbot’s eyes, biting his lip again until the metallic taste of blood flooded his mouth.

  A few more seconds.

  Just when the screaming in Guram’s head reached a crescendo, the Abbot thrust the flaming sword out in front of him. “Take it, Brother. Step into your new life.”

  Blue flames licked the folded steel, the mottled effect like ripples on the surface of a deep pool. The sharp blade reflected the hooded Brothers around him and Guram could see his own face there too, his brown skin covered in sweat and his crooked nose, broken in an Iraqi dungeon. But there was a new pride in his eyes as he reached for the blade with his left hand.

  His fingers closed around the sword and he let the flame lick his skin. The hot metal cut into his palm and blood bubbled up around the wound.

  The Abbot nodded and reached for his other hand. “Rise, Brother. You are now a Warrior of the Ignis Flammae. Welcome to the Garden.”

  The Brothers rushed forward and pulled Guram from the fiery pit. He tumbled into their arms, blinking back tears — not from the pain, but from a sense of being uplifted, finally blessed and accepted into this holy place.

  The Abbot knelt by him as the Brothers tended to his wounds. “Let us heal you, my son.”

  One monk applied a cool balm and fresh bandages around Guram’s burned feet, another dabbed salve on his palm and wrapped it with linen. The Abbot himself lifted a cup to Guram’s lips. “Drink this down. The Garden’s poison can also be its cure.”

  Guram took a sip and almost gagged on the bitter juice, but as it trickled down his throat, a fire ignited inside. He gulped it down and his pain melted away even as the cavern grew hazy around him and his mind lifted away from his wounded body. Smoke from the fire merged with incense and whirled into shapes of skeletal figures, dead Brothers come to honor the new member of their ranks. He nodded to them and they parted before the ancient wooden door.

  Its carvings writhed and looping vines with hooked claws squirmed over the wood, as if to escape their prison. The flowers bloomed into gaping maws, sharp spines emerging like tiny teeth ready to shred any prey that came near.

  The Abbot bent close. “You see it, don’t you, Brother. The truth of the Garden is right there on the door, but only the chosen see Eden as She really is. The most dangerous foe mankind can ever face, never resting in Her desire to take back the land that once belonged only to Nature. We perish and die in ever greater numbers to hold Her back and yet our blood only nourishes and strengthens Her.”

  He reached inside his robes to grasp a silver pendant that hung around his neck. He tightened his fist around it as if gaining strength from the metal talisman. He sighed before speaking once more. “The Lord placed an angel with a flaming sword east of Eden to stop mankind finding it again. We are the last in that line of defense. Now you are one of us, it is time for you to see what we protect the world from.”

  The Abbot stood and beckoned two of the Brothers over. They laid a woven green blanket on the ground and helped Guram onto it, then lifted him as if in a cradle. The Abbot slowly walked to the ancient door, his footsteps slowing as he approached as if a great weight settled over him.

  When they reached the door, he turned to face the Brothers. “Hide your eyes, lest you be taken in by Her treachery.”

  The two Brothers laid Guram down and pulled green rags from their robes, tying them around their heads so they could no longer see. Guram’s heart beat faster as he considered what might lie behind the door. What could be so terrifying that Brothers who had been inside themselves must not witness what lay beyond?

  The Abbot faced the door once again and turned the huge key in its ancient lock. A click and it swung open with ease. The smell of wet earth and pungent flowers wafted from inside. It was dark at first, but the light from the fire pit cast a beam that illuminated the thick trunk of a gigantic tree in the depths of the Garden.

  A writhing vine shot out the door and wrapped itself around the Abbot’s foot.

  He slashed down with his flaming sword and the plant jerked back inside, leaving a piece of itself on the stone. The Abbot crushed it with his heel, grinding it to a pulp, his face contorted with hatred.

  “Now we go in, Brother, and I will stand beside you as you face Her.”

  The Abbot walked inside, his flaming sword held high as he advanced. The two blindfolded Brothers picked up the blanket again and wa
lked after him. Guram clutched the edge of the material, his knuckles white with terror as they entered the Garden, blood seeping from his wounds as he readied himself to face what lay ahead.

  The Brothers placed Guram on a patch of earth and retreated out of the door quickly, closing it behind them. The click of the key resounded ominously in the cave, and terror rose in Guram’s chest at the thought of being trapped here.

  The Abbot stood next to him, flaming sword held high, eyes fixed on the darkness beyond. “Whatever you see, Brother, hold steady.”

  His voice wavered as if they faced some terrifying foe, but only the gentle sound of rain came from further back in the cave, a peaceful note of water refreshing the soil. Guram remembered sitting with his mother on their verandah during monsoon season, watching raindrops ripple in the puddles, listening to her prayers of thanks to God for sending much-needed water. The memory filled him with a calm peace, and he wondered how the Garden could be considered so terrifying.

  He turned his face up to the roof, seeking drops of rain to cool his burned skin, but nothing came except the sound in the distance and the smell of damp earth.

  A tendril of vine slowly emerged beside him, a tiny green shoot, a symbol of hope in every culture. Guram watched as it pushed out of the ground and fragmented the surface of the soil. It seemed harmless, perfect in its creation. He frowned in confusion. Was the Garden actually a sanctuary?

  The sound of rain intensified.

  Guram glanced up. The Abbot clutched his flaming sword more tightly as he stood in a fighting stance and faced the darkness beyond.

  A roll of thunder and then a flash of lightning illuminated the cave. Guram gasped to see its true expanse, an underground rainforest with green of every shade and flowers of every hue. A gigantic tree rose in the center, its branches spreading out like the heavens, and somehow, it maintained its own weather system deep underground.

  He felt a tightening around his wrists and looked down to see the tiny vine was now as thick as his palm was wide. It wrapped around his limbs and pulled him tight against the earth, oozing poisonous sap onto his skin.

  “Help!” Guram screamed, but the Abbot could only slash at the ferocious vines attacking his own legs, the fire of his sword fading as the heavy rain reached them and hammered down from above.

  The Abbot fell to the ground as the vines wound up his frame faster than he could cut them away. The rain soon extinguished the fire on his sword and they lay at the mercy of the Garden.

  The storm descended with fury, and Guram could only surrender to the cacophony. In the howling of the wind and the hammering of the rain, he heard the agony of those drowned in Her floods and ocean rage, whose bodies were smashed apart by tornadoes or crushed by earthquakes, who convulsed as they ate Her poisonous plants. He listened as She burned humanity in wild fires and volcanic ash and even with the rays of the blistering sun. She released noxious fumes to suffocate Her enemies, plagues to decimate the population, and starved the rest when She withheld her bounty. Ultimately, She consumed their flesh and bones, devouring life and using it to grow more of Herself. Guram screamed as the truth of the Garden was revealed to his fragmented mind, and he wept at the futility of fighting such a powerful foe.

  The pungent stench of rotting vegetation filled his senses as a gigantic corpse flower descended, its petals unfurling as it sank its hood over his face. Maggots erupted from the earth, their squirming white bodies surging over Guram’s skin. Their tiny mouths latched onto his skin as the blind creatures tried to burrow into his flesh.

  He flailed under the lattice of vines, desperately trying to escape his bonds, sobbing and screaming even as thick green stems forced their way into his mouth. They silenced him as they twisted down his throat, choking and strangling as they overcame his final ounce of strength. The vines began to drag his body toward the great Tree.

  As Guram’s vision faded to black, the ancient door burst open, and the Brotherhood stormed in, swords aflame. As he sank into darkness, he knew that he would do anything to stop Nature from taking back the world She once ruled.

  Guram woke in the infirmary to the smell of fresh coffee, clean sheets and the antiseptic sting of dressings on his many wounds. Every inch of his body ached, but he sighed in pleasure at being back in civilization once more. He thanked the Lord that Nature was tamed and controlled within the walls of the monastery. The cave below the ground seemed but a nightmare, amplified by his drugged state after the trial by fire. Yet he couldn’t deny the proof on his skin, the raised welts around his wrists from the poisonous vines, the ache in his throat from the violation of its thorny stems.

  The Abbot came into the room and limped over slowly, every step clearly an effort. He sat on the side of the bed, his face gaunt, his flesh covered with tiny cuts.

  “You did well, my son. You faced Her, and emerged with knowledge that few possess. Only Warriors may enter the Garden, and most in the Order do not even know the location of the sanctuary.”

  He reached for Guram’s sword hand and took it in his gnarled palm. “We are all in danger in these modern times. I fear discovery of the Garden and the release of Her power by those who don’t understand what it means.” He shook his head. “But I cannot face Her again. She grows stronger, and those who seek Her out will release Her power into the world if they can.”

  The Abbot clutched at the silver pendant around his neck. “The Tree of Life was never meant for us, as the Lord Himself said in Genesis. We were expelled from the Garden for our own good.” His piercing gaze looked deep into Guram’s soul. “Recover quickly, my son, then ready yourself to go into the world and stop those who seek to restore Eden.”

  5

  Morgan breathed in the tropical air of Macau, an island city in the Pearl River Delta across the bay from Hong Kong and Shenzhen, a region of China that had expanded rapidly in the last decade of staggering economic growth.

  It was good to be out in the open air after fifteen hours flying on a cargo plane. She had slept easily, a trick picked up during her years in the Israel Defense Force, but Morgan was grateful that the journey was quicker than the many months of open sea that the Portuguese traders would have faced.

  Portugal had leased Macau for hundreds of years, establishing it as a trading post in 1557 before finally transferring it back to China in 1999 when it became a Special Administrative Region. Gambling was forbidden on the mainland but encouraged on Macau so the island became a resort destination, the Las Vegas of the East, every square inch packed with elaborate hotels offering every kind of hedonistic pleasure.

  As they walked out of the terminal, Morgan’s phone rang. Director Marietti’s name came up on the screen and she answered right away, putting him on speaker so Jake could hear too.

  “I have bad news,” Marietti said, his tone somber. “Ines is dead. She was tortured and murdered, her neck burned to the bone with a lump of coal. One of our Portuguese agents found her just a few hours ago when she didn’t turn up for a meeting.”

  Morgan could hardly breathe as his words echoed in her mind. The thought of the lively young woman with flowers in her braid suffering and dying because of their visit to Lisbon was too much. Even though they had met only briefly, she had seen so much of her own youthful optimism in Ines. Morgan thought of Father Ben and how he too had died because of an ARKANE mission. How many lives must they lose? Was it all worth the cost?

  She handed the phone to Jake and walked away, leaving him to find out any other details.

  Morgan looked out to sea and brushed a tear from her cheek, feeling the sting of cool air on her skin. A sensation that Ines would never experience again. She clenched her fists. She would find whoever was responsible and she would finish them.

  A gentle touch on her shoulder. “Are you OK?”

  Morgan turned and leaned into Jake’s arms. He embraced her, and she buried her head against his muscled chest. He smelled of shaded pine forests, and his heartbeat was strong and regular. Morgan allowed the sou
nd to anchor her and after a moment, she drew back.

  His gaze was concerned, but they both knew each other so well now, there was no need to talk. Jake knew intimately of loss, and Morgan knew that he still grieved for Naomi Locasto, in particular, the agent lost on their last mission. But they both believed in something more than this physical world, although perhaps neither of them really knew what that meant. She hoped they would be together until at least one of them figured it out.

  Morgan took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “We’ll honor Ines by finding the fragments of the map.”

  Jake nodded, the muscles around his jaw tight with tension. “And whoever was responsible.”

  They walked to the gate and jumped in a taxi for the historic district.

  Morgan gazed out the window as they drove from the airport, every block revealing another surprise. Ostentatious wealth in the supercars that whizzed past. Futurist extravagant architecture of hotels like the Morpheus in the City of Dreams, designed by architect Zaha Hadid. The metallic multi-hued blocks of the MGM Cotai reflecting the early morning light, their Chinese jewelry box aesthetic blending the ancient and modern. They passed the Eiffel Tower, half the height of the Parisian original and built to withstand a typhoon, certainly more impressive than the Las Vegas copy.

  Much of this land had been reclaimed from the sea, drained and built upon, creating space for consumption and expansion at the expense of the natural environment. But beneath the affluence, there were clues to the hidden side of Macau, those who lived in poverty and spent their lives servicing the rich.

  An older woman in a hotel uniform sat by the side of the road, oblivious to the traffic. She rested her head in her hands and her shoulders shook as if she sobbed. Morgan glimpsed a life lived on a knife-edge, perhaps the end of a job that was her only income, or grief for a life ended. Another person chewed up by the voracious city as it serviced those who could afford luxury but cast out the poor.