The tunnels of Tábor were well documented, by others besides Gutenberg, but had remained essentially unseen for hundreds of years. They were just too dangerous. Most areas threatened collapse, the result of years of erosion and careless design. The main sections of the tunnel were solid enough, but its expansion had been spoiled by hasty and makeshift construction. Secret storehouses and worse (it was said that cantankerous women were often imprisoned in some of the more hidden corners) spiderwebbed beneath the city.

Xandria didn’t care about the risk. She had a treasure to find.

“Where do we get into these tunnels again?” Agent Terrence Barber asked, one of the five people of the entourage stuffed into the rental van.

“ Square,” Xandria said. “It’s named after the man who founded the city.”

“It feels like we’ve gone back in time,” Barber replied, noting the ancient beauty of the buildings and houses they passed.

“Nothing’s changed here for over five hundred years,” Xandria explained. “Only the Hussite army lived here, and they set up the city to be an eternal stronghold. Tábor means ‘camp.’”

“It’s the nicest camp I’ve ever seen,” Barber said, placing his trademark aviator shades over his dark brown eyes. “Better than anything the FBI has!”

The two other agents chuckled.

“Shut up,” Cornelius said from the front seat. He had been silent since they disembarked from the plane.

The agents glared at each other.

The van exited the corridor and entered a large town square buzzing with people. This was clearly the most active part of the city—its beating heart—as alive now as it ever had been.

“Look!” Agent Clyde Wynant said, pointing his bony finger out the window.

Ten eyes gazed across the square at a tall limestone statue. It was , armed for war, in eternal watch over his troops. He wore a thick coat, lined at the edges with lamb’s wool. His face was sturdy and strong and singularly his, cut with a broad mustache and his legendary patch, which made his good eye—the one peering out from beneath his bell-shaped helmet—even more penetrating. In his left hand he held a broadsword, its point stuck next to his armored feet. And in his right hand, a scepter, which appeared to be aiming at a point in the ground about twenty yards away from the statue.

“That’s where we’re headed,” Xandria said, waving toward the scepter’s mark.

The van drove across the square and everyone unloaded, immediately plunging into the roles they’d been assigned. The three agents in the group—who were all wearing hard hats and one-piece gray jumpsuits—began setting up orange cones around the area. Restricted Access, read the tape barricade they set up around the perimeter of the cones.