Ancient Deceptions

Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Michael headed for the Pushka Inn, a boutique hotel on the Moika River a few blocks from what had once been the Winter Palace of the Romanov Tsars, and which now housed the world-renowned Hermitage museum. The afternoon’s strange occurrence at St. Peter and Paul’s Cathedral had proven what he’d begun to suspect after his first few days in St. Petersburg: that what seemed to be real was bogus; and what seemed to be impossible was not.

Michael was quite sure all this difficulty in finding Irina had to do with his father, William Claude Rempart. Michael and his father had never gotten along and had never been close. Even as a small child, Michael had feared the man. After Michael’s mother’s death, he felt completely alone in the world, despite the wealth and riches of the Rempart family.

But all the money in the world couldn’t buy William Claude the one thing he wanted—immortality. Only alchemy could grant him that. Michael’s father had devoted most of his life to finding a way to become immortal, yet so far, he had failed. The quest had driven him into the world of the demonic, and in turn, it rendered him all but mad.

William Claude’s last hope was to control the philosopher’s stone, the prime agent needed for alchemical transformations, that was believed to be the most powerful ever created.

It was so powerful it had taken down an ancient Chinese Empire because within it dwelled three demons. The master of the stone controlled, to an extent, those demons, although no one could ever completely control a demon.

More than anything, William Claude wanted that stone, which was known as “the red pearl.” And Michael possessed it. The two had a vicious encounter over it, and afterward William Claude’s home, a mansion on Cape Cod, caught fire. Michael had believed his father died a horrible death in the fire, but he then learned no body had been found.

Because of that, he had his assistant, Li Jianjun, a whiz at Internet searching and hacking, scour the world for William Claude.

Eventually, Jianjun picked up evidence that William Claude was in St. Petersburg, Russia. He hired a private investigator to follow the leads, and the investigator had been successful. Jianjun had sent Michael a picture of his father seated at an outdoor café in front of the Kazan Cathedral on Nevsky Prospect. But Jianjun hadn’t realized that Michael knew the person sitting with William Claude in the photo–Irina Petrescu. She was the woman Michael had spent a good part of his life in love with and searching for, until he’d been told she was dead.

Seeing her alive in that photo had made Michael’s world tilt, and he had immediately left for St. Petersburg.

But now, Michael began to wonder if his father had wanted to draw Michael to the city by adding the image of someone who resembled Irina to the photo. His father had significant powers derived from alchemy and knew a number of dangerous men—men who could assist him anywhere in the world. Such men could even have threatened Jianjun’s private investigator and forced him to modify the photo. Jianjun did say the investigator had left St. Petersburg shortly after sending the photo.

Michael suspected his father had assumed he would bring the red pearl with him to St. Petersburg, since the one time he’d left it out of reach hadn’t turned out well. Michael could easily imagine his father sending out men to search Michael’s room and possessions to look for the red pearl whenever Michael was out trying to locate Irina.

Or, if that didn’t work, William Claude likely hoped that he could get close enough to his son to read Michael’s mind.

The man not only was an excellent mind reader, but once inside a person’s head, he had the power to “encourage” certain behaviors.

Michael remembered the last time he saw his father at Wintersgate. There, he would get severe headaches from William Claude’s attacks on his thoughts–-trying to discover the red pearl’s hiding place—until he learned how to block them from his mind.

He wondered if William Claude had realized he couldn’t get through to Michael’s thoughts even though they were both in St. Petersburg, and for that reason he caused Michael to see someone who might be Irina. A distraction, a way to assure Michael would lose focus.

He stopped at an outdoor café, took a seat, and ordered an espresso. Scarcely paying attention to the waiter or anything else around him, so lost was he in his own thoughts.

Just what, he wondered, was William Claude up to?

He should know Michael would never give him the pearl.

The waiter handed him the coffee. He added two packets of sugar, drank it down, and then took out his cell phone and called Jianjun, who was home in Vancouver, Canada. Jianjun was still attempting to locate Irina or William Claude. A week earlier, his private investigator had found them both in St. Petersburg, but now that Michael was there, both were gone—and so was the P. I. “Are you having any luck?” Michael asked.

“Nothing, boss,” Jianjun said. “I can’t come up with even a trace. I’ve run out of options.”

“I saw another Irina today,” Michael said.

“Could it have really been her?”

Michael hated Jianjun’s question. Three times now he thought he’d seen her. One time, as a car sped by, its passenger had made a point of staring at him. He was almost certain it was her.

Another time, he saw her step into an elevator. She faced him just as the doors shut.

And then, today at the Cathedral.

“Who knows? I watched her turn into a room, but when I got there, she was gone. It made me question if she was ever real, if she was alive, or if she had died the way my father had once told me. It could be I’m seeing some projection—that my father is somehow tapping into my hopes. I wouldn’t put anything past him and his abilities.”

“I’m sorry, Michael,” Jianjun whispered.

“William Claude knew the hope of finding her could easily get me to travel halfway around the world. And he was right.” Michael drew in his breath. “He would know the only reason I’d leave my home, leave Ceinwen, would be to see and confront Irina. To ask her to explain certain things that simply never made sense to me, yet have preyed on me all these years.”

Michael had tried not to think about Ceinwen, the woman he’d only recently begun living with, because he knew he’d hurt her.

His last argument with her, always in the back of his mind, flashed before him once more.

“It’s been nearly seventeen years since you last saw her, Michael!” Ceinwen Davies had said to him when he told her he was going to St. Petersburg. “She’s no longer the sweet young girl you once knew. People change in that much time. You’ve changed.”

Michael gazed at her, his heart heavy. Ceinwen was a Welsh woman he had met in Japan a year earlier and had fallen hard for. In all the years since losing Irina, he’d never felt as deeply about another woman as he did about Ceinwen. By trade, she was a hard-nosed, cynical, realistic journalist. But Michael had decided she must be every bit as crazy as he was because despite everything they had gone through in Japan, and all the insane, unbelievable things she had witnessed there, she wanted to stay with him and had even agreed to move with him to a house he rented in Idaho. He had to admit that he didn’t understand her, and each morning was surprised to find her still in his bed. If she had any sense, she would have left long ago and run back to Wales. Amazingly, she hadn’t.

But on that day, he had turned his back on her and continued to pack. “I know all that,” he told her. “But I have questions about things I’ve never told you.”

“And why would you believe any answers she might give you?” Ceinwen demanded. “What is she doing in St. Petersburg with Claude? The man is a danger to you. That alone tells me you can’t trust her! Or is it that… you still love her, Michael?”

He stopped what he was doing then and placed his hands on her shoulders. “No. Believe me, Ceinwen, that ended years ago when she walked away from me. It’s you that I… I care about.”

He should have told her then that he’d fallen in love with her, but for whatever reason, the words wouldn’t come. She waited… one beat… two… then she folded her arms.

“Go then,” she said. “Clearly, I can’t stop you.”

She even drove him to the airport.

“On the other hand,” Jianjun said, bringing Michael back to their conversation, “what if your father doesn’t know my private eye caught him and Irina together? What if he doesn’t know you’re in St. Petersburg? He could have moved on and now is somewhere else in the world.”

“There’s little he doesn’t know,” Michael said.

“But if he staged the whole thing with Irina,” Jianjun said, “why would he lure you to St. Petersburg and then not face you? It doesn’t make sense!”

Michael had pondered that question many times. “He may have thought I’d bring the red pearl with me, not trusting it out of my sight. He might have spent time trying to find it and couldn’t.”

“I wish I knew,” Jianjun said.

“So do I. Anyway, I’ll stay here searching for two or three more days, and if neither I nor the three private eyes I’ve hired can find Irina, I’m coming home. I’m tired of playing games.”

“That sounds good.”

“Besides, I’ve got a lot of fence-mending to do with Ceinwen. I was worried about leaving her alone and told her to go back to Wales and stay there until I returned. She didn’t like that at all.”

“Oh! Not good, boss! Did she go?”

“I hope so, but I’m not sure. Once, on the phone, I asked if she was in Wales or still in Idaho. She said, ‘Why do you want to know? Are you afraid I’ll disappear like your old girlfriend did?’”

“Ouch!” Jianjun said.

“No kidding. We talked once more when I told her your private eye had disappeared and the ones I hired were having no luck. She said not to bother to call her with updates, but only to tell her when I was coming home—if ever. Then she hung up and hasn’t answered my calls since.”

“Well, you’ve always known she has a temper.”

“Yes, but it’s been a while since she’s directed it at me.”

“Did you leave her a message?”

“No.”

There was a long pause, then Jianjun said, “I’m sure you two will work it out once you’re home.”

“I hope so.” Michael vowed to do whatever it took to get her back. But first he had business here he needed to finish. And it was about more than Irina, although she was a big part of it. Being here now made him feel… hope… that he was close to finding answers to questions that had plagued him for years.

“I’ll be glad when you’re home, boss,” Jianjun said.

“Me, too.”

He hung up and then walked across the massive plaza on the south side of the Winter Palace. The square was the site of what was known as “Bloody Sunday” when, in 1905, a group of workers, their wives, and children went to the Winter Palace to petition the Tsar. But instead of meeting, the Tsar had his soldiers fire on them, killing hundreds–some say thousands. That was often considered the spark that lit the Russian Revolution. From that same square, the Bolsheviks stormed the Winter Palace to take over the government in October 1917.

From the Plaza, Michael soon reached the Moika River. A tourist boat with a bunch of revelers sailed by, and people waved at him, including men holding up open bottles of vodka in gestures of good cheer. He couldn’t help but smile and wave back.

As he watched the boat turn down a canal leading to the much larger Neva River and disappear from sight, Michael again had the nagging idea that when William Claude realized the red pearl wasn’t in St. Petersburg, and that he couldn’t penetrate Michael’s thoughts, he might have gone to Idaho, to Michael’s home, to try to find it.

But surely he would realize that Michael wouldn’t leave it in his house.

And always, when he thought of home, he thought of Ceinwen. He hated the way he had brought danger into her life—although when she talked about her work as a journalist, she was no stranger to it.

Once again, he hoped she was safely back in Wales, although William Claude had to know Michael would never endanger her by telling her where he had hidden the pearl. She should be safe from him.

And yet, the more he thought about her, the more worried he became. William Claude had once threatened to hurt or even kill her if Michael didn’t give him the red pearl. That hadn’t turned out well for him, but was he insane enough to try again?

With that thought, Michael phoned Ceinwen. Yes, she had a temper, but she wasn’t one to hold a grudge. This time, he hoped, she would answer his call.

She didn’t.

He reached his hotel. In his room, he stood at the window with its view of the Moika and the buildings across the street. The city was lovely, but its sad history weighed heavily upon him. What, he asked himself, was he still doing here?

He phoned again and when Ceinwen still didn’t answer, he left a message. “I’m sorry about the way I’ve been acting. I’m tired and angry with myself. Nothing has turned out the way I expected, and…” He wanted to say something about his feelings for her, but the words wouldn’t come. Finally, he simply said, “I’ll be home soon, and I hope to see you. Let me know where you are and how you’re doing. Call me, Ceinwen. Please.”

He hung up, feeling disappointed in his inability to be open with her. Years earlier, he had given up on love, on ever finding anyone who could deal with him, his strange ways, and his even stranger family and lonely, troubled upbringing. But then Ceinwen had burst into his life. She would “brook no nonsense” from him, in her words. And he found himself completely captivated by her.

But he never told her any of that. It wasn’t the kind of idealistic, love-on-a-pedestal emotion he had once felt with Irina. He guessed there was always something magical and forever-lasting about one’s first love. But with Ceinwen, he felt the closeness, a oneness, as if he was attuned to her the way he had never been with anyone else, and he was sure she felt the same about him. It was ironic, but every word she had said to him during their argument before he left for St. Petersburg–-that he and Irina had both changed and that she might be a tool of his father—he had worried about as well. He shook his head. This was getting him nowhere.

A couple of hours later, he tried her number again. And did the same two hours after that. By then it was night, and he decided not to wait there for three more days. He was going back to Idaho immediately, and somehow hoped to get her to answer his calls. To let him know she was safe.