Exerpt from Forgotten Queen
Prologue
Vardzia Cave Monastery
Kingdom of Georgia, 1616
A lone purple wildflower swayed in the cool mountain breeze, dew glistening on its petals. High above, a lone hawk circled beneath drifting clouds.
The flower clung to the steep slope overlooking the mighty mountain peaks. As dawn broke, the Caucasus transformed into a crown of light, its snow-capped summits shimmering in the morning glow.
A loud, echoing bell tone suddenly shattered the silence, its sonorous ringing reverberating through the valley. There, perched impossibly on a sheer cliff, stood an awe-inspiring monastery complex carved directly into the mountainside rock.
Innumerable chambers and halls formed an entire city carved into the cliff face. Multi-leveled quarters housed generations of monks, their winding corridors linking sanctuaries, libraries, kitchens, wine cellars, and frescoed chapels. Small gardens clung to the terraces, growing grapes and vegetables along the cliffside.
At the far corner towered an imposing bell tower from which the mournful alarm rang without pause. For centuries, this remote sanctuary had sheltered holy men while guarding sacred treasures locked within its vaults. The granite walls had watched empires rise and fall, yet still endured.
Atop the tower, Nino pulled on the massive rope, swinging the colossal bell’s heavy clapper. Each powerful peal echoed through the stone with bone-shaking force. Drenched in sweat, the teenage apprentice pulled with all his strength.
The alarm echoed across the valley floor below, where remote mountain hamlets nestled among the slopes. Those who heard recognized the warning and quickly gathered their loved ones, rushing toward the safety of the forests.
And just in time. From the valley emerged a fearsome legion of warriors draped in strange flowing garments. Persian riders on exotic mounts led columns of mail-clad infantry, their swords still wet from the conquest of the towns they had crossed.
The last mournful knell faded to silence, leaving only Nino’s frantic heartbeat. The exhausted boy slumped against the pillar. As he caught his breath, he pulled a small bronze key from around his neck, tied to a rough goat-hair string, reminding him that the task the elder had given him was not yet complete.
He stared at the key in his palm as memories from moments earlier flooded back.
The venerable elder had roused him urgently before dawn.
“Wake, Nino. I have an important task for you.”
With wizened hands, the archimandrite pressed the bronze key into the boy’s palm.
“This key unlocks the Sakhli, where an ebony chest lies guarded by angels. It’s worth more than gold. But first you must go to the bell tower. Warn the faithful so they may save their children from the ones who now enter the valley.”
Nino looked up with worried eyes.
“The Sakhli? The sacred vault?”
“Nino, I entrust you to be the protector of the box. Guard it with your life.”
“I understand, Father. I… I will not fail you,” Nino stammered.
“You will know it when you see it, child. Trust in Tamar’s tears.”
The elder blessed him and turned toward the main hall in the lower levels, where the monks were gathering to receive the invaders.
The haunting words echoed in Nino’s mind as the bell’s final reverberations faded across the peaks. With renewed determination, he tucked the key beneath his habit and raced down the worn spiral stairs.
Breathing hard, Nino emerged into the corridor beside the dining hall on the second level. Risking a glance from the balcony above, he saw the monks kneeling silently in a circle in the center of the great hall.
The invaders shouted in a strange language, but the monks answered with silence.
Suddenly the general stepped forward and cut down the archimandrite with a single sweep of his scimitar.
Nino’s breath caught.
The old man who had raised him collapsed at the general’s feet.
The other monks fell next beneath the warriors’ blades. Blood splashed across the ancient frescoes, staining the painted saints as his brothers collapsed one by one.
He stumbled backward in horror, knocking over a bronze pitcher that clattered loudly across the stone floor.
Nino froze.
The noise had given him away.
Cruel shouts echoed up the stairwell as soldiers rushed upward to investigate.
Trembling, Nino pressed himself into the shadows of an alcove as the soldiers marched past, their scimitars still dripping with blood. He forced himself not to breathe.
Finding no one in the dining hall, the soldiers continued deeper into the corridors.
When the danger passed, Nino sagged with relief and drew a deep breath. Moving silently, he crept through seldom-used tunnels toward the Church of Dormition.
Nino slipped inside the candlelit sanctuary. His footsteps echoed softly across the worn stone floor as he passed walls covered in centuries-old frescoes. The musty air still carried the faint sweetness of old incense, calming his racing heart.
He paused before a fresco of the legendary Queen Tamar. In the painting, she held an ebony box before her.
The distant clatter of boots echoed through the corridors.
Nino rushed behind the iconostasis, the sacred screen of icons reserved for the elders. Desperately he searched for any sign of the hidden entrance to the chamber below.
Nothing.
“Blessed Mother, help me,” Nino prayed, grasping at the last strands of hope.
Almost in response, a faint glint on the floor caught his eye.
A bronze coin had been nailed into the stone.
Turning it on its pivot revealed a concealed keyhole.
Nino inserted the key.
A wooden hatch swung open silently, revealing descending steps that vanished into blackness.
At that very moment the church doors burst open.
A soldier charged inside with a drawn blade.
Nino slipped through the hatch and pulled it closed just as the warrior entered the chamber.
In darkness, Nino crept down the ancient steps until his boots reached level ground. Feeling along the wall, he found a torch and lit it.
The cavern that emerged from the shadows stole his breath.
An immense chamber stretched through the mountain, its natural stone walls shaped into pillars and alcoves filled with relics and ancient treasures.
The Sakhli.
Chapels, tombs of kings, and sacred relics lined the cavern walls. One chapel was adorned with paintings of angels. There sat an unassuming blackwood chest no larger than a bread box.
The ebony box.
Just as Nino reached for it, a sound broke the silence.
The echo of approaching voices made him turn toward the entrance.
Soldiers appeared at the bottom of the stairs.
They froze when they saw him.
A young boy stood alone in the cavern, clutching a golden candlestick nearly half his height.
The warriors grinned.
The foolish boy had cornered himself while leading them straight to the treasure.
Slowly they drew their scimitars and began advancing down the steps.
Suddenly Nino charged.
With a desperate cry he swung the candlestick at the archway’s keystone.
The blow hurled him backward.
For one silent moment nothing happened.
Then came the crack.
Ancient stone fractured with a thunderous roar. The archway collapsed in a violent cascade of rock and dust, burying the advancing warriors beneath an avalanche of rubble.
Silence returned to the cavern.
Dust hung thick in the air.
Nino opened his eyes, dazed and covered in powdery stone. Slowly he rose to his feet and staggered toward the entrance.
The passage was gone. Massive boulders sealed the opening completely.
The blocked entrance crushed the last breath of hope from his chest.
He was trapped.
Entombed forever within the sacred cavern.
His throat dry, he listened.
A faint dripping sound echoed through the darkness.
Nino followed it deeper into the cavern until he reached its farthest edge. There he found a still underground pool that perfectly mirrored the vast chamber above.
From a carved marble relief, Queen Tamar’s serene face gazed down as crystal droplets fell endlessly from her eyes into the water below.
“Trust in Tamar’s tears.”
The words echoed in his mind.
Nino held the ebony box tightly to his chest and stepped into the dark water.
The cold seized his breath.
The icy water closed over him as he vanished into the mountain’s depths.
The Package
The National Archives
Lisbon, Portugal
Present Day
Soft fluorescent light washed over the basement of Lisbon’s Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, humming faintly above pale concrete and endless rows of shelving. The air was cool and dry, far removed from the city above where traffic and voices faded into distance.
Several floors below the streets, history waited.
Cyrus Oliveira sat alone at his workstation, no older than twenty-five, hood pulled low, noise-cancelling headphones sealing him inside a pocket of quiet. The chair fit him too well, as if he had been sitting there for years. Months without sunlight had faded the tan from his skin.
Lines of emerald code streamed across his monitor, the soft clack of keys the only sound he allowed himself. His fingers moved quickly and confidently. When he struck the final command, the screen refreshed, processes branching outward into the archive’s servers.
Cyrus leaned back, a small, private satisfaction warming his chest. With his new code, the system would run his work for hours without intervention.
He turned to his own laptop, its fan whispering softly as the screen brightened. A paused game waited there, frozen mid-motion.
Down here, he ruled his quiet digital kingdom.
No crowds.
No open spaces.
No heights.
“Still haunting the catacombs, Cy?”
A female voice cut through the quiet behind him.
Cyrus jolted and spun halfway around, his heart hammering.
Paula Rosa stood behind him, arms loosely crossed, red hair catching the fluorescent light. She leaned against the edge of his desk with practiced ease.
He reached up automatically and tugged his headphones down, gaze dropping as an old habit asserted itself. His fingers drifted toward the scar on his lip before he caught himself.
“Paula! I—I was just firewalling the data servers.”
Paula’s mouth curved faintly. “Seems like the archives are well protected.”
Cyrus turned back to his screen, minimizing the game to reveal his wallpaper: a sultry image of Cortana from the Halo video game.
Paula glanced once, then rolled her eyes.
“For someone who dislikes people,” she said mildly, “you do enjoy a lot of imaginary company.”
Heat crept up his neck.
“It’s just a game,” he muttered, embarrassed.
Paula’s quiet amusement faded as she reached into her bag and placed a small package on his desk. The cardboard thudded softly against the wood.
“This came for me today,” she said. “No return address.”
The shift in her tone settled heavily between them.
Cyrus straightened. Packages arrived often. Anonymous shipments from remote digs, discretion a professional courtesy. But Paula hadn’t sat down.
This was serious.
He lifted the lid carefully.
Inside lay a crucifix of tarnished silver, cool and weighty in his palm. Its arms slanted downward at an unfamiliar angle, twisted golden vines coiling along its surface. Strange curved etchings caught the light unevenly, refusing to resolve into anything familiar.
“It’s… unusual,” Cyrus murmured. “I’ve never seen a cross like this.”
He raised his phone and snapped a few photographs. The screens around them shifted as the images populated his workstation, database queries unfurling quietly in the background.
“Some of these markings resemble early Georgian script,” he said, frowning. “Possibly fifth century. Somewhere in the Caucasus.”
Paula nodded once.
“There was something else.”
She slid a postcard toward him.
The image showed a monastery carved into a towering rock face, severe and isolated.
On the reverse was a geometric symbol drawn with careful precision. Beneath it was a single word:
Gativanda.
Below that, a string of numbers. And two initials.
“A.R.?” Cyrus said softly. “Your father?”
Paula’s jaw tightened.
“I know his handwriting.”
The hum of the servers seemed louder suddenly.
Professor Álvaro Rosa—curator, scholar, and restless wanderer—had vanished three months earlier during an expedition. No calls. No messages. Nothing that pointed anywhere.
“We should notify the authorities,” Cyrus said at last, though the words felt thin even as he spoke them.
Paula’s eyes hardened.
“And assume they aren’t already involved?”
Cyrus looked down as his fingers laced together on the desk. The fluorescent light etched shallow shadows beneath his eyes.
“You think this was meant to avoid them.”
“I know it was,” she said. “Why else send it to me like this?”
A moment passed.
“We should do something, Paula.” he said.
She studied him carefully.
“Are you really offering to help me find my father? You understand there could be consequences.”
“I know that I’m not reckless,” Cyrus said.
Then, after a beat, “But I am loyal.”
Something in Paula’s posture softened.
“Four months ago,” he continued quietly, “your father found someone sitting by the fountain in Rossio with a laptop and nowhere else to be. He gave me this job. He didn’t ask where I came from. He gave me a chance.”
His fingers brushed his lip without thinking.
“He gave me purpose when I didn’t have one,” Cyrus said. “I won’t abandon him.”
The air between them felt charged, as if the basement itself were listening.
Paula exhaled slowly.
“He saw something in you. You’re different.” she said. “I see it too.”
Cyrus nodded once and turned back to his screen.
“Let’s start with the word.”
“Gativanda.”
“I’m not finding it anything,” he said after a moment. “But the crucifix—there’s a match. Not the object. The image.”
A tiled crucifix appeared on the screen, rendered in blue and white ceramic.
“It’s an azulejo,” Paula said, leaning closer. “Like the painted ceramic tiles decorating buildings all over Portugal.”
“Archived after the 1755 earthquake,” Cyrus replied. “It’s in the Convent of Grace.”
Paula straightened.
“The Convento da Graça? The one here in Lisbon?”
She didn’t wait for confirmation.
“Well? What are we waiting for? Let’s go check it out.”
She was already moving toward the exit, slipping the crucifix back into her bag.
Cyrus hesitated, the chair creaking softly as he stood.
“We?” he said. “Out there? There’s traffic and viruses, and people…”
She paused at the door.
“Fine. You stay here alone with Cortana then,” Paula said, glancing again at the female image on his wallpaper.
Then she was gone, but leaving the door ajar.
Cyrus sat for a moment, staring at the postcard Paula had intentionally left on his desk.
He didn’t need to go. He was fine right here with his computers and gadgets. Paula, on the other hand, would stop at nothing once she set her mind on something.
And there was something ominous about the message.
The heavy doors of the archive opened onto blinding daylight. Cyrus squinted as warmth and noise rushed toward him, the city pressing in after hours underground.
Across the plaza, Paula stood beside her small red car, watching for him.
Cyrus stopped at the curb. Behind him, the archive loomed.
Ahead lay traffic, heat, and questions without answers.
After a long moment, Cyrus stepped off the curb and crossed the street.
Inside the car, the seatbelt clicked into place with a finality that surprised him. His hands trembled as he rested them on his knees.
“All right,” he said quietly. “Let’s do this.”
As they pulled away, neither noticed the two black-clad figures watching from the curb.
One of them lifted a phone.
A message sent.
A reply received.
Engines growled softly as the motorcycles rolled into motion, following at a distance.
The Girl from Reno
Nevada, USA
Two weeks earlier
The streetlamp outside Kara Blake’s apartment flickered, its light slipping through the blinds and creeping slowly across the far wall. Somewhere nearby, cars trapped in traffic honked impatiently.
Kara sat on the edge of her bed, shoulders rounded, elbows resting on her thighs. The fabric beneath her fingers was thin and worn smooth, its pattern long faded by years of washing. She rubbed it absently, as if testing whether it might finally give way.
The apartment was quiet in a way that felt cold rather than peaceful. Unopened bills lay scattered across the small table, corners curling. An empty bottle rested near the sink, its glass dull with dust. The air smelled faintly stale, as though the room had stopped expecting company.
She didn’t turn on the light.
Her phone lay beside her on the mattress. When it vibrated, the sound was small but sharp in the silence.
Kara glanced at the screen without touching it. The glow faded, leaving the room dim again.
A second vibration followed, as if the phone were insisting on being noticed.
She sighed and reached for it, thumb already sliding toward dismissal. But her movement slowed when she saw the message.
The words were simple.
“You are not alone. Even in darkness, there is always light.”
Kara frowned. The glow from the screen caught the edge of her face, leaving the rest in shadow. She remembered the woman from the club. Not her name at first, only the tone of her voice. Calm. As though she weren’t asking for anything.
Kara had given her number without thinking. Just a small, careless kindness. She had assumed it would disappear on its own.
She read the message again, as if expecting the words to disappear.
There was no urgency in it. No question. It didn’t ask her to explain herself or account for the mess she’d made. It simply waited.
Her first instinct was to delete it. The familiar tightening in her chest followed, reflexive and practiced. She locked the screen and set the phone back down, face-first against the mattress.
The room settled again. The streetlamp hummed faintly outside.
After a moment, Kara picked the phone up.
Before she could argue with herself, she opened the group chat.
The screen shifted, filling with names she didn’t recognize. Messages appeared almost immediately, stacking one after another.
“Welcome, Kara.”
“We’re so glad you’re here.”
Her shoulders tensed. She waited for the catch.
There’s always a catch.
None came.
The conversation continued without her. Short messages. Reassurances. People speaking slowly, deliberately, as though they weren’t afraid of silence.
One name appeared more than the others. The one she recognized from the club.
Isla: “Lost in the darkness? I was too, once.”
Kara’s fingers hovered above the screen. The phone felt warm in her hand now.
Kara: “And then?”
The pause stretched just long enough to make her wonder if she had said too much.
Then the reply appeared.
Isla: “Then I found Him.”
Kara’s breath caught.
“Him?”
Kara: “Who?”
Isla: “Luminous.”
The name lingered on the screen longer than it should have.
Kara leaned back, the mattress dipping beneath her weight. The room felt smaller somehow, the flickering light from the window pressing closer.
Luminous.
She had heard the name before, whispered in certain wealthy circles.
Over the next few nights, she returned to the chat without noticing when it had become a habit. She read more than she spoke. The conversations unfolded slowly, without urgency. No one told anyone else what to do. They spoke about clarity. About relief. They spoke openly, as if nothing held them back.
Kara often caught herself holding her breath as she read.
No one asked her to be better.
No one asked her to explain.
That unsettled her more than anything.
People usually wanted something.
One evening, as the hum of traffic outside settled into a distant, uneven rhythm, a private message appeared.
Isla: “Kara, may I invite you somewhere?”
Kara straightened slightly, the sheet whispering beneath her hands.
Kara: “What kind of somewhere?”
The response came after a brief pause.
Isla: “A retreat. Far from here. A place to rest. To renew.”
Kara let out a soft, humorless breath.
Kara: “I’m already behind on rent. I can’t afford to travel.”
She waited, the phone cool against her palm.
Isla: “You wouldn’t need to pay. I’d be with you the entire time.”
Another message followed.
Isla: “Trust me. He changed everything for me.”
Kara stared at the screen. Her pulse thudded softly in her ears.
She locked the phone and stood, pacing the short length of the room. The floor was cold beneath her bare feet.
She stopped in front of the bathroom mirror.
Her reflection stared back without judgment.
Tired eyes.
Unkempt hair.
Did she even recognize the woman staring back?
She imagined waking up the next day to the same thankless routine.
Or…
Kara turned back, picked up her phone, and unlocked the screen.
Her fingers hesitated once more.
Then she typed.
Kara: “So… when do we leave?”
The Azulejo
Lisbon, Portugal
Present day
The afternoon sun pressed down on Lisbon as Paula’s small electric car climbed the hill, slipping past faded yellow trams and tightly packed buildings that leaned inward as if conspiring against gravity. The air through the open window smelled of hot stone and old metal.
Cyrus sat rigid in the passenger seat, one hand locked around the seatbelt, the other braced against the door. Each turn narrowed the street. The incline grew steeper, the engine’s soft electric whine rising just enough for him to notice.
“You know,” Paula said, eyes fixed on the road, “this is the highest point in the city.”
Cyrus swallowed. His mouth had gone dry. “Of course it is.”
She smiled briefly. “The view’s worth it, especially from the church terrace.”
“I’ll trust you on that,” he said, staring straight ahead as the street dropped away beside the car.
The convent revealed itself gradually—whitewashed walls catching the sun, terracotta roofs stacked tightly beneath the bell tower rising above them. When Paula eased into a narrow parking space beside the church, Cyrus let out a breath that tasted of dust and relief.
The courtyard was blinding. Light bounced off pale stone, forcing him to blink hard as his eyes adjusted. The cobbles underfoot were warm and uneven, their texture sharp through the thin soles of his shoes.
“We should come here more often,” Paula said as she stepped out of the car.
“Only if you’re not driving,” he muttered.
He wondered if he had ever mentioned that he was terrified of heights.
At the entrance, an elderly priest greeted them, his voice soft and melodic, carrying the faint scent of incense clinging to his robes.
“Bom dia, I’m Padre José.”
Paula explained their interest in the azulejo panel. The priest listened patiently, fingers folded, then nodded with gentle curiosity.
“Of course. Come.”
Inside, the temperature dropped immediately. The brightness fell away, replaced by cool shadow and the muffled quiet of thick stone. Sound behaved differently here. Footsteps softened. Voices seemed to settle rather than echo.
They followed Father José through heavy wooden doors, past chapels dense with gold leaf and candle wax, into the cloister. Paula’s boots clicked against the twelfth-century stone, each step crisp and deliberate.
He stopped beneath an archway.
“The Chapter Room.”
The corridor beyond stretched long and narrow, its walls entirely clad in blue and white azulejos. Tube lights between the arches cast a pale glow that flattened shadows and made the tiles gleam faintly. Biblical scenes flowed uninterrupted from panel to panel, saints and martyrs frozen mid-gesture. Beneath their feet, the marble floor was patterned with interlocking triangles, worn shallow by centuries of passage.
Paula tilted her head back, her neck already protesting.
“This could take all day.”
“Maybe not,” Cyrus said quietly.
He set his bag down. The zipper sounded too loud in the stillness.
He opened his laptop without explaining. His fingers moved quickly across the keys, the faint clack sounding almost intrusive in the quiet corridor. Images began to populate the screen—tourists’ snapshots, angled selfies, fragments of the same space captured from different moments and distances.
Paula leaned closer, lowering her voice instinctively.
“That feels… invasive. Do you ever wonder if you could get in real trouble?”
“I already got in real trouble once,” Cyrus said quietly.
“Really? How deep were you in?”
He hesitated, eyes still on the screen.
“Let’s just say I opened a door that was never meant to be opened.”
Paula watched him for a moment.
“Don’t worry,” he added. “This is safe. We’re only seeing what’s already there.”
He uploaded the image of the azulejo.
The screen refreshed, revealing the entire fresco.
“There,” he said.
They walked slowly, guided by the laptop, until the fresco rose before them.
Three scenes.
On the left, a woman knelt before a monk, the crucifix clasped tightly in her hands in confession.
At the center, she writhed in agony. Men wrenched at her flesh with iron tongs while others forced her still, a bowstring sawing into her throat. A brazier of flaming coals blazed at her feet.
To the right, the same monk bore what remained of her in a box.
The air felt colder here. Cyrus became acutely aware of it against his forearms.
Paula leaned closer, fingers hovering just short of the tile. Her voice dropped as she translated.
“The Venerable Gativanda, Queen, Sister, and Spiritual Daughter of the Order of St. Augustine.”
She paused, her breath catching.
“Tortured to death in Persia, in the city of Shiraz. September 22, 1624.”
Cyrus pulled out the postcard. The paper felt thin and fragile in his hand.
“Gativanda,” he murmured.
Father José exhaled softly behind them.
“These tiles are all that remain,” he said. “Memories carved in stone.”
“Who made them?” Paula asked, not taking her eyes off the panel.
The priest’s tone shifted, becoming reverent.
“Many believe they were made by the same man. O Mouro Cristão.”
“The Christian Moor,” Paula repeated.
“Yes. His origins are uncertain.”
They followed him away from the corridor and up a narrow staircase where the air grew cooler and stale. The passage opened into a small museum room lit by a single diffuse lamp. The smell here was different—dust, old wood, and something faintly metallic in the air.
Inside a glass case lay a fragment of a gravestone carved with the face of a dark-skinned man, strong features rendered with care. Beside it rested a palm-sized, semi-translucent white disc encircled by tarnished metal. Its surface caught the light unevenly, refusing to reflect it cleanly.
“This was recovered from his sarcophagus,” Father José said softly. “Nothing else. Not even his true name.”
Footsteps echoed faintly in the corridor outside.
“More visitors. Take your time.” Father José smiled gently.
He turned toward the door.
Then suddenly stopped.
For a moment he remained standing, eyes wide with surprise. Red bloomed across the white of his collar.
His body folded to the stone floor with a dull thud, as two figures stepped over him.
Both wore black riding leathers, their helmets hiding their faces behind mirrored visors that reflected the dim light in warped fragments. The broader figure moved to the door and slid the bolt home.
The click echoed loudly.
Locked.
The second figure, a woman, stepped forward slowly. Each movement was deliberate.
“Where is the cross?” she asked.
Paula’s breath came shallow.
“Father José! You killed him!”
Steel flashed.
A spiral dagger appeared in the woman’s hand.
“The cross,” the assassin said calmly. “The one your father sent you.”
The room felt suddenly smaller.
Paula’s voice trembled. “Wait… what do you know about my father?”
“First,” the assassin replied, “the cross.”
“Paula,” Cyrus whispered urgently.
Paula held her ground. “Let me hear my father’s voice.”
A pause.
Then the assassin raised a small device.
“Bring the Professor.”
Static hissed softly.
Then a voice.
“Paula? Meu Anjinho…”
The assassin cut the call abruptly.
Paula gasped, her hand flying to her mouth.
“The cross, please, Miss Rosa,” the assassin said calmly. “You have my word. We will not harm you.”
Paula hesitated.
Then slowly reached into her satchel.
The crucifix felt heavy as she placed it on the table, the metal tapping softly against the wood.
The female assassin pocketed it, then nodded at her partner.
On cue, the male assassin raised his pistol.
Cyrus watched as the gun barrel leveled at his chest.
His heartbeat hammered once… twice….