Free The Blood Gospel by James Rollins, Rebecca Cantrell Page A

underground storage chamber.” Erin turned the rover around to get a look at the empty room. No broken canisters yet.
    Focusing on his corporal, Jordan asked, “How are the readings?”
    Sanderson hunched over a neighboring monitor. He might have trouble piloting the ROV, but the kid knew his instrumentation. “Plenty of secondary breakdown products. No active agent. Still, these are by far the hottest spikes I’ve seen here. I’d say that chamber is the source of the gas.”
    A camera angled up to display an arched ceiling.
    “That looks like a church,” Sanderson said.
    Erin shook her head. “More likely a subterranean temple or tomb. The building style is ancient.” She touched the screen, as if that would help her feel the stone.
    “What is that box?” Jordan asked.
    “I think it’s a sarcophagus, but I can’t be certain until I get closer. The light doesn’t go that far.”
    She sent the ROV forward, but it stopped. She pushed on both joysticks, then let go with an impatient sigh.
    “Stuck again?” Jordan asked. They were so close.
    “End of the line,” she said. “Literally. That’s as far as the ROV’s tether can reach.”
    She left the camera pointed at the sarcophagus. “Definitely appears to be a burial container. If so, somebody important must be interred there.”
    “Important enough to booby-trap the chamber?” That might explain it.
    “It’s possible, but Egyptians—not Jews—were notorious for engineering elaborate traps.” She rubbed her lower lip. “It doesn’t make sense.”
    “Nothing does here.” Sanderson snorted. “Like cinnamon-scented nerve gas.”
    She swiveled her chair around. “What?”
    Jordan scowled at Sanderson, then admitted what they’d found. “One of the anomalies about this gas. We’ve detected traces of cinnamon in it.”
    “Well, that makes some sense with the tomb.”
    “How so?” It didn’t make any sense to Jordan.
    “Cinnamon was a rare spice during ancient times,” she lectured. “For the rich, it was burned in funeral rites as a scent favored by God. It’s mentioned multiple times in the Bible. Moses was commanded to use it when preparing an anointing oil.”
    “So the cinnamon is probably a contaminant?” Jordan was grateful for the information. All he knew about cinnamon was that he liked it on French toast.
    “The concentration is too high in the gas residue to be just a contaminant,” Sanderson piped up.
    “What else can you tell me about the ancient uses for cinnamon?” Jordan asked.
    “If I’d known there would be a quiz, I’d have studied.” Erin offered a soft smile; its warmth caught him off guard. “Let’s see, they used it as a digestive aid. Stopping colds. As a mosquito repellent.”
    “Research it,” Jordan ordered. He strode to stand behind Sanderson, as jazzed as if he’d downed a triple espresso.
    Sanderson’s fingers flew across the keyboard. “On it.”
    “What?” she asked. “What did I do?”
    “Maybe solved part of my problem,” Jordan said. “Most mosquito repellents are around two chemical bonds away from nerve gas. The first nerve gas—”
    The ground gave a violent shake. Erin’s chair rolled backward, threatening to topple. Jordan held it steady as the canvas lean-to swayed, and the metal of the scaffolding creaked in protest.
    She tensed as if to jump out of her seat, but he pressed her back in place. “Safer if you ride the aftershock out here,” Jordan said.
    He didn’t add that there was no safe place on the damaged plateau. It wouldn’t take much shaking to split the entire mesa in half. The shock died away. “All right, the time for window shopping is over.” He turned to Sanderson. “Are you sure there’s no active gas in that chamber?”
    Sanderson bent over his console, and after a moment straightened. “None, sir. Not a single molecule.”
    “Good. Fetch Cooper and McKay and alert Perlman. We gear up and head down in five.”
    The doctor rose as if she expected to