9- Ultrax Lamina

When they returned, they found Mikhaïl and Kurtis sitting in the small living room, visibly enjoying a break. The adventuress was seized by the ambient heat, which was in stark contrast to the cold outside. The last rays of sunlight had already disappeared and the flat was dark, which gave the atmosphere an oppressive feel.

'Great, you've come back in one piece,' Kurtis said, his mocking gaze fixed on her.

'Did you doubt me, Trent?'

The adventurers exchanged a steady gaze.

'And what about you? Anything new?' the Englishwoman asked.

The two men nodded their heads in the same movement. They looked exhausted, but rather satisfied with themselves.

'We've moved much faster than expected,' Kurtis replied, finally relieved. 'To tell you the truth, I never thought we would come to this at the end of the day.'

'Now we just have to dig a little deeper into some things and others, and check some translations,' Mikhaïl added.

'You have worked like crazy on it,' noted Lara, who put her jacket on a chair. 'Do you think I can have a look at it?'

Kurtis looked at her questioningly.

'We're not quite finished yet, there will probably be some elements missing...'

'That's OK, I'll take over for tonight and have a look at what you've already translated.'

Mikhaïl didn't flinch. He even seemed to be quite willing.

'At this stage an outside look is not a bad idea.'

The man got up from his armchair and disappeared into the corridor leading to the bedrooms. In the distance, they heard some rustling of papers, then the footsteps came back, and the Russian appeared again with quite a lot of sheets and a small notebook in his hands.

'Some of the translations are probably approximate, but I think we have the general idea.'

'Thank you Mikhaïl. No problem for me.'

She gave Kurtis a quick wink and got back to her room.

—

It was already late, but she couldn't get out of Kurtis' notes. She delicately leafed through the little book, taking her time as she turned its pages, devouring each of its lines. She followed with fascination the notes elegantly traced in pencil by the mercenary, lulled by his fluid and strangely soft writing. From time to time, she glanced at the original scrolls lying next to her, yellowed and faded by time.

Sketches followed condensed notes and mathematical formulas. All the knowledge of the Lux Veritatis and its fight for the Good against Evil over the last centuries was there, in her hands. Infinite possibilities about life, death, resurrection, physics, about the balance of the world and mankind... It was all so fascinating, yet so terrifying at the same time.

However, everything was quite confused. There was no real chronology in what she was reading: everything was punctuated by elements completely dissociated from one another, and not directly linked, as if the knights of the Lux Veritatis had never really taken the time to construct linear and logical notes, as if the scrolls had simply passed from hand to hand over the centuries without anyone ever putting their content in order or correcting it.

Lara discovered, however, that a major part of the Lux Veritatis' battle was based on Eckhardt: between the lines, she found references to Nicolas Flamel and Count Vlad III the Impaler, which Kurtis had mentioned previously in their conversation. She also found some annotations on the Kriegler Castle and the prison it had become.

She paused, looking up from Kurtis' notebook. She tilted her head back, her eyes glued to the ceiling. She took a deep breath. Her head was buzzing.

When she finally straightened up, her gaze fell on the original manuscripts spread out on her covers and legs. An element caught her attention on one of them: a diagram, or rather in the drawing of what she understood to be the shape of the door that sealed Echkardt's cell, caught her attention. She visualised the heavy, open door they had discovered when they arrived in the basement of the castle. The young woman looked carefully at the original drawing on the old, weathered paper and was amazed by the details that the artist of the time had given to this element. Between two arabesques, her eyes fell on a sentence, which resembled a psalm.

Cast from darkness and formed of night fears, the horror approaches

Expelled from heaven the Watchers walked amongst men,

And upon the Earth bred a curse, an abomination of shadow.

She shivered. She couldn't help but think back to the night before. A sharp pain pierced her side, as if to remind her of the trauma of how she had felt, and she suddenly felt oppressed.

They have always been there. Since the dawn of time.

Trying to take her mind off it, she resumed her reading as best she could. A little further on in the American's notebook, another sentence in Latin caught her attention.

Faber in lacrimas et sanguinem

Unum telum contra fata hominum

Ultrax telum ascendit et ferit in tenebris

She read this passage several times. With a distracted hand, she scribbled some ideas on a piece of paper, trying to translate this mysterious phrase. She had to go over it several times before finding a version that was more or less legible, and above all understandable. After a long time, she put down her pencil and read again what she had just translated, not quite satisfied with herself however.

Forged in tears and blood,

A vengeresse weaponry for Human destiny

In the moolinght rises up

And on the darknesses falls

She read her notes again. Then once more. After a while, however, she had to face the fact that her brain could no longer think. She could see nothing more than the words on the paper. Her eyes were burning from concentrating on the thick paper manuscripts.

Damnit

She put the documents away, among other notes full of handwritings, and stood up. She stretched her whole body, trying to release the pressure that had got to her shoulders and her back.

I need a break

She let out a loud sigh, and headed to the bathroom. She pushed the door open and for a moment, she thought her heart was about to stop when, taken by surprise, she came face to face with Kurtis. He came out of the shower, shirtless, wrapped in a towel. His hair was in a mess and his skin was still wet. His perfume filled the room. He was bent over the sink, twisting to shave. Lara's gaze couldn't resist the mercenary's bare torso and arms. She discovered with surprise that the young man's body was partially covered with many tattoos: several small elements like crosses, pentacles, and a few short texts which she identified as psalms written in Latin, dotted his ribs, one of his shoulders and one of his hips. A larger one covered most of his back, down to his left shoulder.

The young man turned his head abruptly and looked at her with his chin raised as he slid his electric shaving machine over it. Lara looked away, embarrassed.

'Sorry... Didn't hear you were in the bathroom...'

She was about to close the door when the young man addressed her.

'Don't be sorry, please do. Won't be long.'

'Maybe you needed some privacy...'

'Um, don't worry, I get used to the lack of privacy very quickly...'

He smiled at her, which the adventuress preferred to ignore. With her eyes downcast, she walked over to the small sink and took her toothbrush. The mercenary resumed shaving, concentrated.

'How was your city walk with Roman?'

'Couldn't find nothing interesting...the rare works dealing with the end of the Prussian reign are rather incomplete, so it is quite complicated... I only know a few about this historical period, it's a bit hazy for me...'

Kurtis observed her with his azure eyes. He tilted his head to one side and attacked his cheek with the machine.

'And I thought you were a master of the history of St Petersburg between 1740 and 1948...'

Lara rinsed her mouth and stood up, one hand on the sink, the other on her hip. She gave him a disapproval look.

'I have a good general knowledge, Trent.'

'I know you do. But you have no sense of humour. How's your reading going?' he kept going, before the young woman could reply.

She sighed, obviously tired.

'I don't know... there are too many things, too many elements... it's difficult to sort through all the information these scrolls contain...'

'They undoubtedly did it on purpose to cover their tracks, especially if they fell into the hands of the Eckhardt or the Nephili themselves...' Kurtis replied, looking at the young woman out of the corner of his eye.

He passed his machine under water, before wiping his face with a small towel. He breathed a sigh of relief. Lara watched him for a short while.

'You look much less...'sloppy'' she teased him.

'Does it make its effect on you?' he asked, drying up his hair with the towel.

'Not really...' responded Lara in amusement.

'Come on, I saw you watching me...'

Kurtis' lips parted in a smirk.

'Don't take it personally...' she replied in the same smile.

They exchanged a knowing smile. The English woman suddenly frowned and shook her head, thinking.

'And what about the sanglyph we were supposed to find in Kriegler Castle?'

'For the moment I'm guessing it is supposed to be an access key to one of the Nephili base, and which will serve to resurrect them of course, as you've seen yourself in the Strahov. But I'm guessing this part is detailed in the scrolls Karel has in his possession, again...'

Lara sighed.

'Anyway, we can't do anything more about that for the moment, I guess we should concentrate on the rest,' she added, looking serious. 'But I may have discovered something interesting.'

She disappeared for a short while in her room, before coming back with the piece of paper she had scribbled on. The young man grasped it delicately and observed what the young woman had written on it. It took him a few moments to understand what she was getting at.

'A single weapon for Human destiny'

'If I am not mistaken,' the young woman continued, 'the LV evokes something in the scrolls. An object to fight the Nephili, but which did not immediately appear in your fight against them visibly. An object that could correspond to this quotation, I imagine.'

'A weapon.'

'That's what I'm guessing too. Have you ever heard about it?'

The young man nodded, intrigued.

'Unfortunately no, my father has never mentioned such a thing before. And, as I told you, we translated roughly for the moment. It's not impossible that my Latin is a bit rusty and that the term Telum, or lamina, may be associated with something else'.

Lara retrieved the piece of paper from the mercenary's hands, disappointed.

'You're right. I may have been a bit hasty.'

'But I think you might be right, we'll just have to confirm. Maybe we'll be able to make it clear when having a deeper look at it tomorrow.'

Kurtis watched her with his piercing eyes. The young woman took a few steps back towards her room.

'I'll let you finish in peace. Get some rest, you look terrible.'

He pouted, half amused, half offended.

'Thanks for the compliment. G'night. And get some rest too.'

The American winked mysteriously at him before disappearing into his room. She turned around and slipped into her own room. She retrieved the few notes lying on the floor before returning to her bed. Something had been running through her head since earlier. Her eyes fell back on the quote that had been calling out to her earlier.

Ultrax Telum

She frowned. Her fingers tapped nervously on the paper.

Suddenly she put the documents aside, jumped out of bed and hurried to the door. She walked through the small bathroom and stormed into the mercenary's room. Already lying in his bed, she saw him jump.

'You never knock before going in, Croft?'

The young woman walked to the edge of the bed. The young man got up somehow, already half asleep.

'You said Lamina, didn't you?'

The mercenary frowned. He didn't answer right away, not sure about what she meant exactly.

'About the weapon...'

'Yes. That's the recurring term, Telum or Lamina...'

The young woman leaned forward, her hands resting on the wooden frame of the bed. Kurtis watched her without a word, waiting for the end of her thought. Suddenly she looked up at him.

'It's a sword.'

The American leaned towards her.

'...Telum is a weapon in general, as you sensed, but Lamina is a sword,' she continued with a triumphant gleam in her eyes.

'Well done, Croft.'

She gave him a satisfied smile. A glimmer of hope pointed deep inside her.

'You've got the brawn, and I've got the brains, that's how it works.'

'Isn't this remark a bit sexist?' the American said ironically.

Kurtis pushed back his blankets and got out of bed in a hurry. Lara followed him in his footsteps.

—

Quietly settled in his bed, Mikhaïl was enjoying his novel. He took advantage of this moment of calm to rest his mind as long as he could. He was pleased with their progress that day, but he knew that he would not get anything more out of them without a little rest.

The door to his room suddenly opened wide. He literally jumped on his mattress, unable to control himself.

'What the...'

He saw Kurtis coming towards him, his eyes tired and yet completely awake with excitement. Behind him came the young Englishwoman.

'It's a sword!' said the mercenary.

The old man's heart was pounding. With one hand on his chest, he put his glasses back on the bedside table, before turning to his hosts. At first, he was taken aback by this impromptu arrival, and looked at a shirtless Kurtis, with only his pants on, and a Lara in a simple tank top and shorty, from top to bottom.

'You don't knock before going in either...' Lara discreetly whispered to him.

Kurtis intercepted the mocking smile of his companion.

'The weapon... it's a sword...' he kept going, to the incredulous look of the Russian who still didn't seem to understand what was going on.

Mikhaïl hurriedly pushed the blankets away from his bed and approached two young people.

'How did you guess? What have you found?'

'In the translations, we used both Telum and Lamina without really making any difference ...' the mercenary explained.

'... they are both words for weapon, but Lamina is a blade weapon...' Lara added.

'... Ultrax Lamina... a destructive blade,' concluded the American.

'Forged in tears and blood... of course... It can be the metal of a sword... Clever girl.'

A smile finally appeared on the old man's face. Lara returned a knowing smile.

'It all makes sense,' whispered the Russian more to himself, before continuing aloud. 'A much bigger and more powerful weapon than the shards themselves...'

'A sword forged by the Lux Veritatis to defeat the Nephili...' completed Kurtis.

'I thought only periapt shards could destroy them?' Lara asked.

'Indeed. But not if it's a weapon carved in the same stone, or made of it... the shards are made from a black, unic stone... ' added the mercenary.

'... A stone whose origin still remains unknown to this day, but reputed to be lunar...' said Mikhaïl.

'...In the moonlight rises up... ' they said in unison.

The two men looked at each other, just like two children excited by their discovery.

'I thought this stone was untraceable...' the adventuress said.

'Not for a powerful family, which has control over a large part of Europe' the American noticed.

'That makes totally sense,' Mikhaïl said. 'The Prussian realised the alchemist used them, and that they would never get what was promised to them, so they allied themselves with the Lux Veritatis and helped them forge a weapon that would defeat Eckhardt and his monsters.'

'And they kept it hidden at the request of the Lux Veritatis, moving it from place to place for safety,' Kurtis added.

'What's going on in here?'

The three of them turned around, taken by surprise. At the doorway stood Sasha, trapped in a short nightgown. She glanced suspiciously at them, watching them in turn, amazed.

'We've made some discoveries,' Kurtis told her.

In a few words, he summed it up for the young woman. Her face remained closed, focused on the mercenary's words. When he finished, she remained silent, but her face lit up with determination and hope.

'It may make sense, indeed,' the young woman concluded. 'But do you have any idea where it might be?'

'Maybe,' cut Kurtis.

He suddenly disappeared from the room, without a glance at anyone. Lara, Sasha and Mikhaïl watched each other in silence, surprised by the American's reaction. The American finally stormed back into the room with his notebook in his hands, which he leafed through at great speed.

'According to the readings, the Lux Veritatis was for a long time unable to find its trace, but I know one of our disciples went looking for it. He evokes his research in a precise passage of the manuscripts...'

Lara raised her eyes towards the mercenary, staring at him intensely.

'Your father...'

The mercenary looked up too, his crystal eyes met Lara big brown eyes. He let silence hover. Lara bounced back from what he had just told her.

'From memory, the last Prussian emperors found refuge in Russia ...'

The mercenary continued to stare at her with his piercing gaze.

'It's here, isn't it?' she concluded, the adrenaline returning to her.

'It looks like so' replied Mikhaïl with a slight smile of hope.

In turn, the Russian turned his back and walked towards the small desk stuck in a corner of the room. Among a pile of files and loose sheets gathered in an impressive heap on the small piece of furniture, he released a worn and dusty card. He unfolded it on his bed: it was a map of the city.

'Many tsars and other great names from Russia, and even from all over Europe, came here as refugees in troubled times. Civil wars, rebellions... revolutions... and so on. St. Petersburg is famous for having served as a refuge for royal families in perdition.'

'A safe and strategically well-placed place in Europe to find refuge...' Lara added.

'... and to keep an eye on what's going on there while protecting any valuables,' Kurtis echoed.

'OK...' intervened Sasha, who seemed to be thinking fast. 'But where here? It could be anywhere... a lot of monuments could have served as a refuge... I'm also thinking about the hundred of churches we have here, the undergrounds of which would be a good hiding place...'

'I don't think Eckhardt or even the Lux Veritatis are very religious...' Lara interrupted.

'Wouldn't it be the best way to conceal an object than to put it where you don't expect it to be?' Kurtis replied.

'Or in a museum, with other objects so that it would go unnoticed...' added the Russian woman.

'By putting it in everyone's plain view?' Lara retorted.

'This could be a strategy...' Sasha replied dryly.

Mikhaïl, silent, became agitated. He remained for a moment leaning over the map, thinking.

'I agree with Lara about this,' intervened the Russian. 'I don't think they would have chosen a church in this case. In fact, I can only see a few places that would fit.'

He pointed to several specific points in a peripheral area of the city, and then a little more in the centre. Sasha leaned forward to see what his father was looking at.

'The Royal Palaces...' he breathed.

'It will take us weeks... there are too many of them...' Lara intervened, looking worried.

A heavy silence fell around the table. Kurtis bit his lower lips, thinking hard too.

'Not necessarily...' Sasha continued. 'Most of them, like the Marble Palace, the Mikhailovsky or the Stroganov, are much too new, and are all mansions or simple flat houses. They have no historical interest. Catherine's Palace was looted and emptied during the revolution of 17...'

'...There are only two left now, which could have housed the treasures of the surviving families,' Mikhaïl added.

'The Hermitage?' asked Lara.

'Yes, and the Peterhof Palace in the southwest of the city,' added Sasha, who stared at her with her bright eyes.

The four of them leaned over the map and finally released the pressure, as if they were catching their breath again for the first time within the last twenty-four hours.

'I think we can start with this,' concluded the Russian.

'I hope we can find something...' Sasha said ironically, not convinced at all.

'We don't have the choice anyway,' his father replied coldly. 'We have to start somewhere.'

Kurtis intervened to calm the tension.

'Okay, then why don't we split into two groups?'

Sasha nodded, analysing the proposal inwardly.

'I have some contacts at the Peterhof,' she said. 'It will be easy for me to find my way around and access the archives. I know people who can help me there, it will be settled quickly I think.'

'Ok, then we can go and have a look into the Hermitage with Lara,' added the mercenary.

'It might be a bit more complicated...' Mikhaïl cut off, pensively.

'But it's a public museum, isn't it? Why don't we just go in as tourists?' asked Lara.

Mikhaïl shook his head.

'Um, it won't be so easy, Lara... you will be able to get in without any problem, but you won't have access to all the departments, some of them are undergoing restoration, and others are closed to the public, if you start to get 'lost' you might be quickly spotted...'

The adventuress was suddenly caught by a revelation.

'There's an evening party in two days, I think? An event that is taking place at the Hermitage precisely? I saw it with Roman earlier, in the Palace Square.'

The old Russian frowned.

'Yes, there's an opening party in two days' time... ' Sasha completed, arms folded against her chest. 'There will be a lot of people, and many more halls will be open. It could be feasible.'

'What are you talking about?' Mikhaïl interrupted.

'The big opening night for the new art collection, dad. Everyone in town has been talking about it for months.'

'We needed an alibi, luck's with us...' said Kurtis, who smiled at the adventuress.

'You will need invitations to access the building, but that can be arranged. I'll ask Roman, he'll find a solution without any problem. However, it might be a good idea for me to accompany Kurtis instead,' Sasha said.

'I'm guessing that if you want to get spotted Sasha, yes, that's a very good idea indeed. A former Russian agent who knows half of the administrative staff in the museum, and who, on top of that, will have already raided the Peterhof just before, will attract suspicion, you can be sure of that. Lara and Kurtis have the advantage of being foreigners, rich European strangers often attend this kind of event'.

The young Russian woman was obviously offended.

'Let's do it this way then,' intervened Kurtis. 'Sasha and Roman on the Peterhof tomorrow, and Lara and I for the Hermitage party. As you said, we have to start somewhere anyway.'

'I hope Gunderson and his men won't be waiting for us...' Lara whispered.

'Fingers crossed,' replied Kurtis as he exchange a meaningful glance with the young woman.