The Fountain of Youth (Order of the Black Sun Book 15) Read online

  Order of the Black Sun - Book 15

  THE FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH

  Preston William Child

  © 2016 by Preston William Child

  Edited (USA) by Usnea Lebendig

  Prologue

  Latvia – 1938

  Shimmering stars from fresh droplets of rain beautified the otherwise vile streets of Riga. It was late, late in so many ways. The war was looming and for the company it was too late to turn back. Even Ami knew it, and she’d been so obsessed with her performance career that not even World War II had been deemed reason enough to take a break. And why should it? At sixteen years of age she was in the prime of her youth and the world awaited her, but even she admitted to feeling somewhat apprehensive about what was coming.

  The reality pressed upon them all, but Ami vowed to do everything in her power to keep the minds of her colleagues off the dangers of touring Europe. In the imminent shadow nearing her Baltic home, they could all feel the hellish breath of the volatile dragon that crawled at the feet of the SS in Germany.

  Ami stared out over the almost deathly silent streets, playing witness only to half-hearted solicitations by drunken men and desperate women in the shelter of the night below the Orfeju Opera House. Her ankles ached under her slender frame, something that came only with overexertion or sickness. Either way, it was her secret to keep. Through tear-riddled blue eyes she gazed into the cold night, counting the steeples between her and the shoreline where the ocean lapped gently in invitation.

  “Ami, are you coming, dear?” she heard Lamma’s soothing voice from behind her. “You cannot occupy the change rooms all night, you know.” He neared her in a humorous rendition of some humpback creature, reaching out to capture her, making his voice quiver in mock warning. “You do know that the opera house is dreadfully haunted, don’t you? It’s not safe for pretty ballerinas to be locked in here at night just because they missed the call time for closing.”

  “Oh, can it, Lamma,” Ami snickered. She adored the fifty-five-year-old company director and his silly attempt at cheering up his troop of young aspiring professionals. “You don’t scare me.”

  He shed his momentary show and stood next to her in his full tallness. “What is so fascinating that you would risk getting locked in here?”

  “Honestly, I lost track of the time. There was nothing out there keeping my attention other than the ocean air and thinking about the future of the company,” she admitted. “Let me get my coat. I’ve already changed out of my pointes, see?”

  “Well done,” he replied dryly. With folded arms he waited for his last performer to finish changing and join the rest of the company downstairs before heading to the lodge.

  “I’m going to miss this place. It’s quite beautiful,” she mused while running a brush through her lavish, long, blond locks. Rapid scoop-like movements swept her lengthy tresses into a neat bun. She buttoned up her coat as Lamma opened the door for her. It was his subtle way of rushing people along when he was getting impatient.

  “It’s wonderful, but we can’t stay. In two days we dance for the German devils in Denmark. They’ve taken up residence near the Kongelige Theatre and wish us to entertain them for three nights in a row,” Lamma informed her as she passed him.

  “You don’t sound pleased. They must be paying handsomely, no?” she asked as they ascended the dark wooden staircase that reeked of dust and mold.

  “Indeed,” he sighed. “And that’s the only reason I agreed to the invitation, Ami. To get meals and accommodation free of charge these days is unheard of, as you know.”

  “Especially for a ballet company like Diaghilev's Ballets Russes,” Ami agreed.

  “What I fear more is the prospect of having to repeat this performance – and I mean that in more than just metaphor – in Berlin once these tyrants have ignited what we all hope will blow over,” he lamented. “But it’s the only way for us to make a name and a profit at the same time.”

  Lamma shrugged as he opened the external door at the landing of the ground floor, letting in the light from the pallid streetlamp. Ami could see the lines on his face more deeply than usual. The director was gravely concerned, but Ami maintained her light-heartedness to relieve the stress of the weighty decisions Lamma has had to make for the good of the troop. Out of courtesy to him she said nothing more on the subject and only replied with a smile and a suggestion.

  “Shall we accost the baker tomorrow for those cinnamon rolls you love so much?”

  Oslo – early 1945

  After two nights of exceptional skill on stage and equally grand relations with the high officers of the SS present at the banquet, the Ballets Russes Company excelled yet again on the third night. It was an evening arranged especially for the Führer, accompanied by four of his high commissioners in charge of various progressive Nazi endeavors. On short notice, considering the political climate and transport systems, the SS had changed the location of the performances to the Oslo Drama House. It was the pride of the local business chamber organization, which was striving to establish a solid arts program. They wanted to garner support from bigger establishments in and around Scandinavia. Inadvertently, however, it had garnered Nazi support instead.

  “By now you should be used to it,” Claire told Ami as they peeked from the dark security of the wing drapes of the theatre.

  “Four months in allied countries and now we’re right in the middle of Hitler country?” Ami replied. “No, I can’t seem to shake this bad feeling.”

  “Relax. We’re dancers—performers, not soldiers. They have no tangle with us. They’re just men in scary uniforms,” Claire told the nervous principal dancer she’d befriended months before.

  “Men in scary uniforms who kill thousands of innocent people – women and children even – as easily as if taking a shit, Claire. They’re evil. Just look at them!” Ami insisted. “Is that Hitler?”

  Lamma perked up behind the two ballerinas. “That’s him. Monster. I wish I could burn this place down during intermission while that son of a whore takes a piss in the men’s room.”

  Ami had never heard Lamma say anything hostile in her life, and she could see that Claire was as surprised as she was. But under the circumstances such utterings were hardly surprising anymore. “Just deliver the same brilliant performance you always do, my darlings. Pretend you are dancing for the gods in some celestial palace,” he gestured dreamily. “And once you’re done devastating the eyes and hearts of your onlookers with dashing beauty, we’ll be out of this city and on our way to Karlstad. Safe.”

  Claire stared at the SS officers laughing and sipping wine. “Nowhere is safe.”

  Ami tried her best to un-hear those words, because she absolutely concurred with them. But for now she had to do her best work, not for Hitler, but for Lamma. He had been her mentor and much like a father. He’d trained her to be her best at an early age. Then, he’d taken the company on tour to advance the fame and reputation of his excellent female dancers, herself among them.

  “The piano work is a good edge, Lamma,” the owner of the building told the director as the ballerinas took the stage in bright competence and astounding flair. “Better than the strings, I think.”

  “Thank you,” Lamma answered, keeping his eyes straight ahead on the ladies on the stage. “We’ve had to make special considerations for the performances since the war began. All of our male performers have been conscripted, but I couldn’t let an already planned tour fall to ruin just because of the German threat to the world, so,” he shrugged proudly, “we rewrote the pieces to omit male dancers entirely.”

  “Not an altogether unpleasant
notion to my mind, for one,” the landlord said, smiling as he marveled at the graceful beauty on stage. “But while you were in Britain, you must have had some immense discomfort performing with the Blitz on and all.”

  “You have no idea, my friend,” Lammas sighed, finally facing the Norwegian man he’d once shared a library office with. In London they’d studied Art and Literature together, moonlighting as librarians to supplement their income. “Some nights we’d be getting ready for a performance and just wait for the alarms, positively anticipating the shattering of windows and dying a slow death trapped under a burning beam. It’s funny, actually. Here we are behind enemy lines in the very presence of the biggest wolves among them…and it’s the safest place in the world!”

  Ami’s solo piece was due. Lamma was elated to see her flourish flawlessly, as he knew she would. What both disturbed and intrigued him was the way in which Adolf Hitler and his men regarded her. It wasn’t so much a look of lust, but their blackened eyes appeared to be savoring her every move, the lines of her body, and how she used it to a point of irresistible allure. They sat just in front of the stage, their banquet table dotted with half-finished dishes on elaborate porcelain plates lined with bottles of the best liquor. Their heads were tilted back in frozen admiration of the stunning young woman adorned in virgin white feather and lace.

  For a moment Lamma’s eyes met Ami’s as she executed a perfect leap, her body in a smooth arch, her front leg kicking upward with astonishing dexterity. Like a swan landing from flight she touched down with little more impact than a feather. With a swift wink at Lamma, Ami prepared for her grand finale, complete with a marvelous set of thirteen fouettés she had mastered months before.

  “My God, she is amazing,” the landlord smiled again.

  “Wait, watch this final spin and tell me she isn’t destined for greatness. Without even breaking a sweat Ami executes moves other ballerinas only wish they could.” Lamma was boasting like a proud father.

  “Are you sure?” the building owner asked, somewhat dampened in his enthusiasm. “She just winced like she is in pain or…uncomfortable?”

  “I doubt that,” Lamma snapped. His faith in Ami’s abilities was unshakable. But that faith was tested a moment later when Ami’s ankle gave way during her sixth fouette and snapped like a twig under her meager weight. With the force of her spin her body propelled forward, sending her plummeting from the edge of the stage. Lamma watched as his principal dancer crashed into the glass bottles and plates on the table of the Nazi High Command with an ungodly din that had him certain she’d be executed for it.

  The officers jumped up amongst laughter, panic, and sympathy. Collecting the unfortunate Ami’s unconscious body, some of the subordinates of the visiting SS called for medics to attend to the injured ballerina.

  “Get some proper medical help in here!” Hitler shouted, sending soldiers hastening in all directions. The Nazi leader and two of his men gathered around the girl.

  “Fallen swan,” one of them said as Lamma rushed to her side. He wasn’t sure if it had been said, in fact, by the demonic leader himself, but at that moment he couldn’t care less. All he cared about was Ami.

  Her ankle joint had broken off completely inside her flesh, leaving her foot dangling on purple, swollen tissue. From her fall, her body had sustained severe lacerations and she’d bled her white raiment to crimson.

  “The glass has ravaged her body, but her face seems to be unscathed, no?” Lamma said to nobody in particular, wondering if cruel men even heard the words of a good man. “Right?”

  The tyrant with the toothbrush moustache stepped in front of Lamma, barring him from the wounded ballerina. Laying his hand on Lamma’s shoulder, he looked him straight in the eye and said, “She will stay beautiful. Of that I will make sure.”

  Chapter 1

  Nina took a deep breath, drawing the soothing nicotine from her cigarette down her throat, where it burned delightfully into her chest. She held it there for a moment, before blowing out the weak tuft that remained. On her lips a naughty smile appeared, and her dark eyes stared into space as she partook in her vile rebellion against the spreading cancer that slept in her cells like the secret she had made of it. It wasn’t a secret borne out of some hopeful notion that she might defeat the illness without having to burden her friends with the awful truth, nor was it kept from them out of some noble self-pity. Nina merely didn’t care anymore.

  She still resented Purdue, even though he’d been doing everything in his power to accommodate her need for space from him. She appreciated it to an extent, but she couldn’t help but feel that it was his fault that she’d fallen prey to the radiation of Chernobyl’s Reactor 4. Apart from this, she’d been gradually growing indignant with his constant excursions, especially his masterful manipulation of Sam and herself to assist in his dangerous pursuits. This just happened to be the last straw. She’d had countless fallings out with Purdue before over always putting her life in danger, but now it was literally causing her a slow death.

  The search for the Amber Room had indirectly been to blame for her radiation sickness and subsequent cancer. And the search for the Amber Room was yet another of Purdue’s happy perils, in her opinion. As a result, he was at fault for it all.

  Sam had no idea that she was sicker than the radiation poisoning, since her cancer exhibited similar signs. He thought she was on the mend, as did Purdue, and she intended to keep them in the dark. Subsequently, she’d become quite indifferent to her condition and elected to carry on as best she could in the same way she always had. After all, there was no need to wither. Her life had been a strong and adventurous journey, and she had attained most of her goals, casting aside those aims that had become redundant, such as being a tenured professor in Edinburgh.

  That dream was meaningless now, because Nina had learned so much about the practical application of her knowledge. She realized early on that her knowledge would feel wasted in the dusty lecture halls of small institutions. The notion of wasted knowledge in musty classrooms faded as she extinguished the butt just short of a pile of papers. Nina sighed. Two towers of paper, folders, and cardboard drowned her small frame, flanking her workspace where she was marking term papers.

  “Phase two,” she groaned as she discarded the dead fag in the tainted glass ashtray. “Let’s see if any of you can cogently explain implications of the First World War hell syndrome on the social structure of welfare systems.”

  Nina was working under a weak bulb crowned by an old iron cover that was suspended from the ceiling. The beam of light fell almost exclusively on her and her desk, giving the effect of some divine light illuminating Nina’s head like a halo. Around her the dark swallowed up everything else, save for the floating dust particles lit up by the bulb.

  “Almost done, I see,” a female voice chimed from somewhere ahead in the dark. “Good God Dr. Gould! You look like the subject of a military interrogation in here.”

  “Gertrud!” Nina said quickly, but it was too late. The friendly assistant switched on the overhead lights, practically blinding Nina while the pain in her ocular cavities devastated her. “Jesus! What did I tell you about the lights?” Instantly Gertrud killed the lights, having forgotten the special circumstances of the visiting fellow.

  “Oh my God, I’m so sorry!” she exclaimed, her right hand barely keeping even enough not to spill the coffee from the cup she was holding.

  Nina exhaled and slammed her red biro down on the papers under her hands. “No, Gertie, I am sorry. I didn’t mean to shout. The light just stings like hell.”

  “Oh, I’m sure. Of course it does. I feel like a right idiot,” the forty-year-old assistant apologized. “But here is a nice cuppa for you, if that could in any way afford me forgiveness.”

  “Blessings!” Nina replied with a smile, thankful that she had something to wash down the awful dryness in her throat.

  She was sitting in the small office adjacent to the library archives of St. Vincent’s Academy of Hist
ory and Science in Hook, Hampshire. It was a modest institution – one of those she’d sworn she would not revert to – in the Hart district, where an old colleague used to teach in the late 90s. When the board of directors decided to change the nature of the establishment a few months before, they’d restructured the faculty to only three permanent lecturers. These they incorporated with several visiting professors and teachers to bring the college more diverse and interesting tutors.

  Under the main library building, the Scottish history expert decided to make her home in the deserted chamber of dust and darkness. Not only were her eyes deteriorating and sharp light was out of the question, but she also enjoyed the absolute privacy of the location. It was a welcome change out of the harsh spotlight, not to mention a well-earned break from being in hazardous situations.

  “So, how are they doing?” Gertrud asked as her eyes combed the scribbled writing and typed submissions in front of the visiting lecturer.

  “Not bad, actually,” Nina replied, sipping her coffee. “I think they grasp most of the subject in context, but some of them are entirely too preoccupied with politics in their theses.”

  “I suppose it’s all about influence.” Gertrud pursed her lips and shrugged.

  “How do you mean?” Nina asked.

  “Surprisingly, most of the students at this institution are not from here. In fact, they come from all over England. Many of them are sent here by their families, and those families all have one thing in common…more than just being wealthy land owners, that is.”

  “Do tell,” Nina implored, minding her lips on the scalding beverage.

  “Well, I’ve just always found it peculiar how a lot of them happen to be of German origin – I mean, contemporary German origin. At least as far as the students studying sciences here are concerned. It’s not so true of the history students. Why would they bother sending them to a little, godforsaken school in the English countryside if they could be educated by the most prominent universities in Europe, right?”