The Tomb of the Maharal Part 3

The Templars have been hired to track down a pair of grave robbers before they meet their end. A simple job, more than likely not, nothing is ever simple for the Templars.

(3)

The silver and white Alvis Firebird stopped at the edge of the walkway swirling up the hill to a small house. The two stories house, looking a little too much like a summer home of Dracula, sat alone on top of the hill. No lights burned in the Gothic windows of the house and the fog that rolls in only added to the creepy mystique of the whole place. The house was only a few miles outside the town of Mikulov and was well known among the town folk as a tomb more than a home. No one dare went there unless they wanted to meet death himself.

            And this was the very reason why Richard loaded his pistols with some highly rare and expensive holy bullets while he stood beside the car.

            “I doubted you are going to need those,” Charlotte said, moving beside him. She wore riding pants and boots along with her own pistol on her hip. A weapon she hated having due to the weight and the poor shoot she was when it came down to it, but she had other skills like being able to cast spells and read magical books. She was a true born sorceress.

            (Not a witch, she hated being called a witch, and anyone who would utter that word at her would wake up on the floor.)

            It’s why he called her a witch only when their fights got bad.

             “You said that in Budapest,” Richard remarked. “Plus, I’m sure a vampire lives in there.”

            “No, I said, you need a bigger gun in Budapest,” Charlotte said, crossing her arms, “but you never listen.”

            “Let’s hope we don’t need any guns,” Lord Augustine said while his cane echoed off the stone road. They started the long climb up the walkway to the front door of the house. Augustine’s cane sang out with every step he took, but only a fool would underestimate the man. He was still a skilled warrior, among the best in the world.       

            “Don’t you find it a little odd it was so easy to find the Halos?” Richard asked.

            “You called that easy?” Charlotte asked, glancing at him with Augustine walking between them.

            “I mean,” Richard said with a shrug. Sure, they had to pay a few underworld bosses off for a lead here and there and only had to shoot one man in the leg to find out where the Halos went, but nothing to the degree they normally had to go to find out information, “easier than normal.”

            “I have a feeling Dyson didn’t want to stay hidden,” Augustine said, which they all knew was more than likely the truth. Dyson, along with his lovely daughter were masters at staying hidden in the world when they so wish to be unseen.

            “Which should be a big red flag,” Richard added.

            “It is,” Charlotte said,” it’s why we have the guns.” She smirked over at him.

            “And why did they come here?” Richard asked, waiting for the lightning to flash in the background of the house. It would light up the whole area and send terror through their bones, but the lightning never came, and the house sat in the dark alone like a gravestone. The night around it tried its best to pull back from touching the house, causing the Gothic building to seem darker than everything else.

            Charlotte moaned, and Augustine dropped his head. “Were you not listening to anything Charlotte was saying about this place before?” He asked.

            Richard shrunk back a bit, “Not really, she yells at me so much I tend to tune her out.”

            “I yell at you because you don’t listen,” Charlotte growled.

            “This is why it is a reflex,” Richard told his uncle, pointing over at Charlotte.

            “Why God,” Augustine asked the sky, “what do I to deserve this punishment?”

            “The house once belonged to Judah Loew ben Bezalel,” Charlotte explained again harshly.

            “Who’s that?”

            “He was a scholar of Judaism and a laddering Rabbi in the area,” Charlotte said. “Legend has it he found an old spell to create golems again and was commission by a Lord in this area to build him an army, but Judah refused, fleeing to Prague before his death, which many people believed the Lord had him assassinated.”

            “I know you explained this before now but wh---“

            “A golem is more or less a stone man brought to life,” Charlotte huffed with a roll of her eyes. “They are very strong and almost completely invulnerable.”

            “So, if there is one of these golems in the house, then how do we, you know, kill it?” Richard asked before all three of them stopped at the front door.

            Charlotte shrugged with a grin, “I have no idea.”

            “Great, that sounds like it’s going to be painfully for me,” Richard huffed, watching Augustine pushed the door open slowly with his cane. The door cried from years without oil to the deep darkness of the house. The night seemed to breathe at the sight of them, making Richard and Charlotte glance at each other.

            “You feel anything?” Augustine asked Charlotte. She could always feel magic in the air when they were near it, not so much the magic itself but the manna leftover from creation, which was used to cast spells by the magic users of the world. She shook her head no as Richard stepped into the house before he knew if there was magic there or not.

            He already had one of his pistols pulled free and at his side with him, slowly moving into the main room of the small house. Time had plagued the house with each step from Richard’s heavy boots; it reminded him no one had been in the place for years. The layers of dust blanketing everything was another clear sign, not a soul had been in here.

            “Are you sure they came here?” Richard asked, turning back to Augustine, who had stepped into the doorway.

            “Very sure,” he said, pointing with his cane at the footprints in the dust. Richard followed the cane and then started to follow the footsteps into the other room as he pulled back the hammer of his pistol readying it to let loose.

Author's Note

I have a deep love for pulp stories which I hope comes off in this short story. If I have failed in driving home the pulp feels of the Templars than maybe my next story coming after them will do a better job. But you didn’t come here to listen to me sell you on the next story to come, you came here for the Templars. Let me tell you a little about them or better yet, how I came up with the trio. Well, it was simple if you truly want to know …

I started with their names and the title of the story. After I got those things down, everything came to life afterward. I had been for some time just gathering information on cool things in the world and history. It came about after I watched Joe Rogan talked to Graham Hancock and Randall Carlson, both men were talking about history that may or may not be true but are not in the books. All of this alternative history is fuel for any writers. After every little bit of cool info, I would tell myself “that would be a fun story,” and boom! off to the races I went. It is how this story came around.

Anyways, I will let you go so you can enjoy the story of Templars, and I hope you stay around for more to come.

- Chase