Prologue

Alexander Stuart put up no resistance as the two men bundled him bound and gagged from the black Land Rover. He couldn't have even if he had wanted to, he would be sixty-six on his next birthday, a birthday he would probably never reach, and his arthritis riddled joints were far too weak to protest and so he allowed himself to be dragged across the uneven field towards a grassy mound in the distance. To anybody this hummock wouldn't have gained a second glance, but Alexander was an archaeologist and he knew exactly what lay beneath. He was on mainland Orkney or 'Meginland' as the Norse settlers would have called it, one of the seventy islands that made up the section at most northerly tip of Scotland where the North Sea and Atlantic Ocean meet. The island was originally referred to as 'Hrossey' the Horse Island but when the Vikings left so did the name only to be discovered later in the ancient maps of the Norsemen. Ahead of him, silhouetted in the winter sun was MaesHowe the largest and most impressive cairn in the whole of the British Isles if not the world. The tomb dated back from about 2700BC and despite it not being accessible to the public it had been visited many times by Alexander, he had been intrigued ever since he had been a twenty-two year old student archaeologist, standing inside the tomb for the first time. Back then he had been young, an adventurer on a quest for knowledge but it had done him no good, it was ironic that the place that had made Alexander love life was also to be the place that it would be snatched from him. Yet even in his last moments the archaeologist couldn't help but think about the wonders the tomb held, the ancient runes and famous Maeshowe dragon left by Vikings.

The fact that the cairn in front of him, the cairn people walked past each day without realising what it was, is actually older than the Great Pyramid of Giza, the gigantic stone structure near the ancient city of Memphis, which serves as a tomb for the Egyptian Pharaoh Khufu, one of the Seven Wonders of the World.

The questions hidden inside the stone structure that could never be answered for certain;

How had the Neolithic people created such an awe-inspiring tomb? With its large ceiling of steps leading directly to heaven, or as some argued the sun. The Neolithic people had built the tomb as a tribute to sun. As the dying light of the sun around the midwinter solstice slips below the horizon, the last rays of light would shine directly through Maeshowe's entrance passage to strike the rear wall of the central chamber.

What had the three cells, I set into each, wall apart from the one with the entrance tunnel, been used for? Had it been to store the bodies or bones of their dead ancestors? If so why did they have huge stones that would take the power of four men to lift? Stones that fitted perfectly into the entrance of the cells and could only be removed from the outside? If the people were dead why would they need to be locked in? It's highly unlikely that in Neolithic times people would believe in zombies. It posed the question that maybe the bodies kept in the tomb were not dead. Maybe human sacrifices to the pagan Gods.

Why, if the purpose of the tomb was the storage of dead bodies, had no remains been found? Even though Vikings had invaded the tomb later why would they have stolen bones, they would be of no value to them and they would not have the carted them far even if they had been moved. They would have been found when archaeologists had excavated the site. What if Maeshowe had not been meant as a final resting place, but more of just a temporary burial site?

Alexander would have pondered for longer if he had been prodded roughly in the back and ordered to move forward. They were about to enter the entrance tunnel that separated the chamber from the outside world. Again many theories had been thought of as to why the tunnel had been built so low. Was it to make the tomb less accessible by those outside; both physically and visually? Is it to make you bow down to the Gods, excepting that you as a mere mortal were of a lower status then them? Or were the builders smarter than we credit them for, were you made to practically crawl along on your knees in the semi-darkness as a defence system? The endless current of questions raging like a rapid through Alexander's mind at least served one good purpose, they acted as a distraction. The old man knew his time was almost up and allowed himself to be pushed onto his hands and knees as the men set about removing the heavy stone from where it had been wedged into the main wall sealing the cell.

Only one man stayed watching over their prisoner and although he kept his gun, an AK-47, trained on him he wasn't really paying attention. He was an old man for God's sake! What was he going to do? Both his hands and feet were tied and he hadn't put up any resistance since they had taken him. Instead he stood, studying the famous runes that had been carved onto the walls by Vikings when they had invaded the cairn. He didn't notice as Alexander closed his fist around one of the stones that littered the sandy floor. He was careful as he chose his stone making sure not to pick sandstone, then sorting through the rocks as best he could without attracting any attention he found the sharpest stone there was. He did not need it as a weapon; he had long ago resigned himself to death. He had another use in mind for his stone.

The men had finally dislodged the heavy boulder from its place, and were carefully lowering it the eighty centimetres onto the floor. As they crossed over towards Alexander he knew what was coming next. Two of the men hauled him roughly onto his feet as the other two stripped him of his final piece of dignity. Naked and cold, Alexander Stuart allowed himself to be pushed forcefully into main cell, feeling strangely peaceful as the wedge was replaced into the wall. He was trapped now with no food or water, it was winter and if it had been light enough he would have seen his breath cloud in front of him. But he couldn't. He had bee plunged into a pitch blackness so deep that even when he held his hand centimetres from his eyes he could not see it. However, the darkness didn't bother Alexander. He could still feel the rock sticking into his tightly clasped hands, now the stone was all that mattered!

It was funny he thought how as a child, and even as a man, Alexander had feared death. Unlike most people he had not feared the pain often associated with death but the loss. The loss of life meant a lot more than just the physical aspects, he would lose his family, his friends, his freedom. He could no longer walk along his path of knowledge; no more would he be able to ponder the endless questions of the universe. But now as he sat in the darkness, he heard the Lord calling him, beckoning to follow him into the next world, he knew that he would have all the time in the world to think and learn and yet he could not let go of life yet. He had something to do first. He rubbed his hand across the rough surface of his stone.

Alexander Stuart was going to leave his mark!

A/N Thank you for reading! This is my first Dan Brown story and was inspired by my recent holiday to Orkney. Please review it as it would be useful to get some feedback and I am a review addict. Thanks again.

Hope.