The wife also tried to abort the child, and even the church got involved because of all the political unrest the baby would cause.

Despite everything everyone did, the baby went to term. When Sir Richard got home, knowing that he wasn't the father – can you imagine how pissed this guy was, out risking his life, and his wife's shacking up? – he probably had to be restrained from killing the baby and his wife.

The church, trying to cover its own ass, told Richard that a demon had fathered the child. They arranged for the baby girl, when she got to be fourteen, to go to the Silent Rain monastery. Can you say cop-out?

"Annja?"

Startled, she looked up and saw Roux standing there. "What?"

"Would you like something to eat?"

"Whatever you want to nuke in the microwave will be fine."

"No nuking," Roux responded. "There's a full galley."

"Do you think it's safe?" she asked. "I mean, he could poison the food."

Roux smiled gently at her. "I'll make sure that doesn't happen."

"All right."

"What would you like?"

"Surprise me."

Roux nodded. He started to turn away.

"Hey," Annja said.

The old man turned back around to her. "What?"

"You've really lived over five hundred years?"

He smiled and shook his head. "My dear girl, I've lived far longer than you can even imagine."

Whatever, Annja thought, thinking the comment was sheer braggadocio. "Did you know a knight named Sir Richard of Kirkland?"

"An English knight?"

Annja nodded.

"I knew of such a man, but I never knew him personally. He was – "

"English. I know. I got it. English was bad back then."

"Yes." Roux's blue eyes twinkled. "He was a tournament champion all over Europe. And he fought in a few skirmishes. There was something about a child that besmirched his reputation. A child born out of wedlock, I believe."

"A child the church contended was spawn of the devil," Annja said. "And she was locked up in the Silent Rain monastery."

"Truly?" Roux seemed amazed.

"Yes."

"Why wasn't she taken to an abbey? Several of the female children born in brothels were taken there."

"I don't know."

"If you find out—"

Annja nodded. She returned to her reading.

"I'll go and attend to our lunch," Roux said. "Then, at some point, you and I need to discuss what's going to happen with the sword."

Three spam entries followed the one by Researchferret. Then Zoodio had posted again.

I missed that one. Good catch.

Interesting. I looked at the data you sent to support what you posted, Researchferret. And I found something you missed.

According to the journals of Sister Mary Elizabeth of a local London abbey, the sisters took in a fourteen-year-old girl early in 1764.

Sir Richard's name isn't mentioned. Neither is the girl's. But it does say she's the illegitimate child of a tournament hero and thought to be the daughter of the devil.

Sounds familiar, huh?

Annja silently agreed.

Also truly weird are the murders that occurred in the abbey in 1764.

That instantly caught Annja's attention.

Early in 1764, January and February, two nuns, then a third, were beaten to death in the basement of the main building. The rumor was that an insane man had broken into the building and killed the nuns while looking for church silver or donations to pilfer.

However, Sister Mary Elizabeth notes that the strange girl the abbey had taken in murdered the nuns. According to her entries during those days and the days that followed, the girl had been restrained in the basement, had gotten loose, and had beaten the nuns to death with her bare hands.

Yikes!

This story gets creepier and stranger the more I look into it. More later.

Of course, that entry started a flurry of postings that included Jack the Ripper theories and led to the Loch Ness Monster before taking a detour through the twilight zone.

Chapter 25

ROUX BROUGHT ANNJA a plate while she was still sorting through the entries.

Reluctantly, Annja pushed the computer off to the side and flipped out the tray built into the seat. She surveyed the plate for the first time while she was spreading a linen napkin across her lap.

A small steak shared space with a baked potato and a salad. The steak was grilled.

"No poison, I assure you." Roux sat in the seat next to her and set up his own plate. He tucked a napkin into his shirt collar. "I trust you like steak?"

"Yes." Annja cut the meat and found it sliced easily.

"From the last time we shared a meal, I knew you had a robust appetite. Judging from the way most young people your age eat, missing meals when you get busy and such, I thought a solid meal was called for."

"This steak is grilled," Annja said in amazement. She'd never had a steak actually grilled in midflight.

"Garin has always been one for whatever is new and flashy," Roux admitted. "I found his galley is equipped with all manner of culinary accoutrements."

"And it has a grill, too." Annja poked fun at the old man's verbosity.

Roux got the joke and smiled. "Although not my native language, I find that English does have its charm. So does French."

That surprised Annja. "French isn't your native language?"

"No. Why? Do I sound like a native when I speak it?"

"Yes."

Knife and fork in hand, Roux attacked his steak. "What have you discovered about the charm?"

Briefly, Annja brought him up-to-date.

"What are you going to do?" Roux asked when she was finished.

"Find out the truth about what happened all those years ago," Annja said. "Discover who the prisoner was in the monastery and what happened to her. Why the monastery was destroyed. Why the monastery still exists even though it's been destroyed. Why the monks of that monastery want the charm. Why Corvin Lesauvage wants the charm."

"Don't forget, you want to save this young man, as well."

"Avery Moreau. I haven't forgotten."

"Quite a shopping list." Roux abandoned his plate and leaned back to digest his meal.

"It is," Annja admitted. "But it's what I do."

"Look for truths in the past?"

Put that simply, Annja had to admit her job sounded too altruistic. "I love learning about the people who lived in the past. Who they were. What they did. Why they did it. Where they lived. How they saw the world and their places in it."

"You only left out 'when.' "

Despite her tension, Annja smiled. " 'When' is sometimes part of the mystery, too. Carbon dating is pretty exact, but you don't always have it, and the results can be off enough to seriously screw with a theory."

"You're a classically trained archaeologist?"

"I am, but I've also got degrees in anthropology and ethnography."

"Good. I know it's hard for a traditional archaeologist to find work inside the United States and in most parts of the world these days. The focus tends to be on culture rather than things."

"You know about archaeology?" Annja was surprised.

"I know a lot about a great many things. I was with Dr. Howard Carter while he was doing his exploration of the Valley of the Kings in Egypt."

"That was in the early 1900s." Annja still couldn't believe they were talking about a period a hundred years ago, or that Roux might actually have seen it.