Odion did not reply, seemingly heart-broken to have lost his Honey Bee.
The clock, however, had not struck midnight in Hollywood...and Marie Negre watched the screen at esoterika.biz while she packed her suitcase for a flight leaving the next morn.
"What is Old Lone Star saying? Hmm...Odion...why is that ringing a bell?"
"Of course!" the Black Popess exulted after she had turned to the date July 22nd in her 1879 copy of a rare Book of Days. "1279...the year the mystic Prince of Salerno discovered the tomb of Maria Magdalena in Sainte Baume...moved from its alabaster sepulchre December 16, AD 700, when Odion was King...discovered with two books I might add...two tablets?" she gasped. "Oh my gods - he's telling me everything...I see it now, the trail of the Emerald Tablets! The sign of the Aude region - of the Langue d'oc - of..." her voice trailed off into a whisper, "...the Dove."
Later, as the Black Popess delved into her books regarding an ancient kingdom named Septi-mania, she was able to see the gnostic parallels existing between the 7th Roman legion who had founded the domain, the Isis dog-star Sept, the terminology used to denote Celtic clans - and ultimately with a young Egyptian sybil who would one day become Queen of the dispossessed Romani. By the time her own clock struck the Witching Hour, 22 was happily spent.
"Dearest Olivia," she began, her fingers trembling on the keyboard as she typed, "do you not find it odd that the Prince who discovered Maria Magdalena's tomb in 1279 happened to be born of a mother named Beatrice Berenger, daughter of the last Comte de Provence, wife to Charles of Anjou, himself son of Eleanor of Acquitaine's granddaughter Blanche of Castille...what was Sauniere's middle name, pray tell?
And Miss Olivia smiled the secret smile of Sekhmet the next day...certain that those who strayed from Ra's Truth most certainly would meet that sun god's avenger...much sooner than any of them expected.
