The Judas Strain - James Rollins [119]
“Kokejin, the Blue Princess.”
“It was purely a commercial arrangement. In fact, the Persian king to whom she was betrothed died while Marco and Kokejin were en route. She ended up marrying the man’s son. But again it was a marriage of convenience. She ended up dying only three years later. Some say at her own hand, some say because she was pining for another love.”
Gray turned. “You don’t mean—”
“Even Marco did not marry until after Kokejin was dead. And when Marco did die, he had two treasures in his room. The gold paitzu that Kublai Khan had given to him. But also a golden headpiece, encrusted with jewels.” Vigor stared pointedly at him. “A princess’s headpiece.”
Gray straightened, imagining Marco’s long two-year voyage, traveling and exploring exotic lands. Marco was still relatively young when he left Kublai Khan’s palace, in his midthirties. Kokejin was seventeen when she left China, nineteen when she reached Persia. It was not impossible to imagine them falling in love, a love that could never last beyond Hormuz.
Gray rubbed at the headache he’d been fighting. He remembered the brick back at Hagia Sophia, the interior glazed in royal blue, a secret hidden in stone. But could the brick also represent Marco’s heart, symbolic of his secret love for Kokejin?
“Then we’ve forgotten another clue left to us,” Vigor continued. He lifted the scroll. “The story was embroidered on silk. Why silk?”
Gray shrugged. “It’s a material from the Far East, where Marco had traveled.”
“Yes, but could it signify something more?”
Gray remembered Vigor bent over the scripture, even examining it with a loupe. “What did you discover?” he asked.
The monsignor lifted the scroll. “This silk was not new when it was embroidered with the text. The silk was worn thin and uneven. I found oils and old stains.”
“So it was a used piece of silk.”
“But what was it used for?” Vigor asked. “One of the most common uses for silk—due to its expense and rarity—was as shrouds, burial shrouds of royalty.”
Vigor waited, staring at Gray. He slowly understood, picturing a hollow blue brick. Amazement crept into his voice. “You think it might be Kokejin’s burial shroud.”
“Possibly. But if I’m right, then I know what we must search for within that old castle.”
Gray knew, too. “Kokejin’s tomb.”
4:56 P.M.
SEATED IN THE copilot’s seat, Seichan had an expansive view of the island as the seaplane dove toward a sheltered bay. It was not a large island, no more than four miles across. Its center was rocky and hilly, with sparse veins of green. Most of its coastlines were cliffs and isolated jagged bays, home to many smugglers’ coves. But to the north, the higher slopes fell more gently toward the sea. Here, the land turned greener with date palms and tilled fields, nestling a small township of thatched huts.
From the air, evidence of an older, more extensive city could be spotted: massive foundations, the stones quarried from the island’s rock-salt hills; a few crumbled homes, looking more like rubble piles; and a single tall minaret, once used as a lighthouse by the Portuguese.
But none of this was their destination.
The seaplane tipped on a wing and banked over the isthmus that extended north from the old city. Upon the spit of land rested the remains of the old castle. It had once been separated from the ancient city by a wide moat, but it was now silted up, marked only by a sunken line drawn from east to west.
As the plane crossed over the ruins, Seichan studied their target. The massive fort was surrounded by tall seawalls, but the western side had long ago lost its battle with those seas, undermined and toppled by battering waves. The eastern side, sheltered by a gentle bay, had fared better.
The plane angled for a landing in this bay, diving low, then skimming the water. Seichan caught a glimpse of rusty iron cannons on the roof of the fort, and six more on the beach of the bay,