ECTAndes Mountains, EcuadorAnother loud chime reverberated across the crystalline chamber, reminding Gray that he was running out of time. He studied the star-shaped pattern formed of thumb-sized spheres of black metal and white crystal, reviewing all his options.I have to get this right the first time.While he concentrated, Roland paced one side of the golden skeleton. On the other, Lena stood with her arms nervously crossed. Seichan merely waited on the far side of the waist-high pillar that supported this mysterious pattern.“Having second thoughts?” she asked.“I think I’m on my hundredth,” he answered, offering her a tired smile.“Then hopefully the hundred and first will be the charm.”He hoped so, too, but he knew it would take more than charm to solve this.Over the past few minutes, he had turned the pattern over and over again in his head. He had asked twice to see Father Kircher’s old journal, which Roland carried in a waterproof sleeve. He spent time studying the Jesuit priest’s calculations, knowing the man’s particular fascination with numerology, both the pure mathematics of prime numbers and the cabalistic mysticism of gematria.Gray ran through the multitudes of opposites inherent in the puzzle.Bright and dark . . .Heavy and light . . .Black and white . . .Metal and crystal . . .Fundamentally he kept circling to the same conclusion.They’re all mirrors of each other.“That has to be it,”
