The Dragon Queens (The Mystique Trilogy) Read online

  To all the wonderful women in my life. You are all Dragon Queens to me.

  Table of Contents

  Cover Page

  Dedication

  List of Characters

  A Note From the Author, Mia Montrose

  Prologue

  Part 1 The Search for Ur

  Revelation 1 Genesis

  Revelation 2 The Name of the Father? The Name of the Son

  Revelation 3 The Fertile Crescent

  Revelation 4 The Great Ziggurat

  Revelation 5 The King of Persia

  Revelation 6 Curse of the Ringstone

  Revelation 7 The Betraying Word of Shadows

  Part 2 The Search for Levi

  Revelation 8 The Adulteress

  Revelation 9 The Tablets of Thoth

  Revelation 10 Light

  Revelation 11 Ta-She-Ra El Amun

  Revelation 12 The Destructor

  Revelation 13 The Sleepers of Mamer

  Revelation 14 The Thirteenth Pillar

  Revelation 15 Harmonic Activation

  Part 3 The Search for Amenti

  Revelation 16 The Halls of Amenti

  Revelation 17 The Great Evolutionary Divide

  Revelation 18 Angels

  Revelation 19 Architects of Evolution

  Revelation 20 Amazons

  Revelation 21 Poseidonis

  Revelation 22 Transformation

  Revelation 23 The Silent Watcher

  Revelation 24 The Dark Half

  Revelation 25 The Flame-Bearers

  Revelation 26 Akasha

  Revelation 27 Time Pirates

  Revelation 28 Dragon Queens Awake

  Revelation 29 The Hall of Records

  Revelation 30 The Hall of Time Codes

  Revelation 31 I AM

  Glossary

  Bibliography

  Acknowledgements

  A sneak preview

  A Note From the Author, Mia Devere

  Signet Station 12 Triogenes—Montsègur

  About the Author

  Books By Traci Harding

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  LIST OF CHARACTERS

  19th Century

  Ashlee Granville, the Honourable Miss Granville Heroine

  Lord Thomas Granville, Baron of Suffolk Ashlee’s Father

  Lady Granville, Baroness of Suffolk (Margaret) Ashlee’s Mother

  Lord Eric Cavandish Earl of Derby

  Lady Vanessa Cavandish Countess of Derby

  Susan, The Honourable Miss Cavandish The Earl of Derby’s daughter

  Lord Simon Cavandish The Earl of Derby’s son

  Sir Damian Cavandish The Earl of Derby’s brother

  Mrs Beatrice Winston (Beat) Ashlee’s nanny

  Dr Rosen Psychiatrist

  Lady Charlotte, Dowager Countess Cavandish Ashlee’s Governess

  Lord James Devere The Earl of Oxford

  Mr Earnest Devere The Earl of Oxford’s younger brother

  Miss Catherine Devere The Earl of Oxford’s sister

  Lord Douglas Hamilton Viscount of Herefordshire

  Clarissa Hamilton The Viscount of Herefordshire’s deceased wife

  Mr Frederick Hamilton The Viscount of Herefordshire’s cousin

  Albray Devere Spirit of the Red Gnome

  Chiara Dead gypsy witch

  Christian Molier Curator, Arsenal Library, Paris

  Cingar Choron Gypsy outlaw

  Chavi Choron Chiara’s granddaughter

  Rumer Choron Cingar’s sister

  Gasgon de Guise Duke of Orleans

  Jessenia Gypsy bride

  Danior Terkari Masked bandit

  Falcone Bellacino (Captain Falco) Italian mariner

  Lord Malory Grand Master of the Sangreal knighthood

  Mr Banks English Consul in Alexandria

  21st Century

  Mia Montrose Archaeologist/Ancient Languages

  Andre Pierre French Archaeologist

  James Conally (JC) and Christian Molier C & N Excavation

  Tusca Resi Molier’s secretary

  Akbar Guide in the Sinai

  Kadar Akbar’s subordinate

  Kamali Akbar’s subordinate

  Marty Chopper pilot

  13th Century

  Lilitu du Lac Lillet’s sister

  Lillet du Lac Guardian of the Keys

  Pierre-Roger Mirepoix Lord of Montsègur

  Guillaume de Lahille First Knight

  Bernard de Saint-Martin First Knight

  Guillaume de Balaguire First Knight

  Jean Ray Courier

  Hugues de Archis King’s man

  Pierre Amiel, Archbishop of Narbonne Inquisition Representative

  Marie de Saint-Clair Grand Master of Sion

  Pierre de Saint-Martin Credenti guardian

  Albray Devere Sion Knight

  Christian Molier Sion Knight

  A NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR, MIA MONTROSE

  I cannot claim to be truly the author of this book, even though it is the second I have been commissioned to write in this trilogy. For the most part, I am the compiler and editor of information obtained from the journals of my foremothers, who in turn inspired me to continue the family tradition of chronicling—an obsession that I have passed to my daughter, Tamar, whose first hand-written journal has also contributed greatly to this work.

  I have disguised these interconnected autobiographies as fantasy fiction for the lives of the members of my family line are the source of all the human legends and earthly mysteries that underpin this genre.

  At the time I began chronicling my personal exploration into the bloodline of the Grail, it was not with the intent to be published. Yet as so many fascinating insights have been revealed to me since that time, I have been compelled to try to get this information out to the general public for consideration. Even in the guise of a fantasy novel, some of this information will offer insight to others who might have had similar experiences, for I feel sure that I am not the only one who has seen a ghost, realised my own psychic potential or found a few supernatural skeletons hidden in the family closet.

  During the course of the account to follow, you may wonder why, as a mother, I was not more concerned about my daughter’s role in these affairs. The truth is that before my little girl was even born I was forewarned of certain life-altering events that would come to pass once she reached womanhood. I had thought the prophecy concerning my daughter rather exaggerated at the time, but I see now that the predictions regarding her destiny were no understatement. As a mother is usually the last to know when some major occurrence is taking place in the life of her teenage daughter, on my daughter’s thirteenth birthday I presented her with her first hardcover, lock-up journal—something she was very excited about as paper and pen are so rare and expensive these days. I hoped that if she did not tell me of the extraordinary events unfolding in her life, she might at least confide in her journal, and thankfully I was not proven wrong. It is true that when my daughter began her account, she hoped to see some of it published, but by the time she handed her journal over to me, it was not her personal ego that was her motivation for sharing. She felt that the revelations she had stumbled upon would be food for thought for my readers. Like myself, she has no desire to attract fame and attention at this time, for she is preoccupied in far more mysterious work; by the time this book comes to publication, that work will be completed.

  It was her reading of the journal of her foremother, Lady Ashlee Granville-Devere, that led my daughter to the realisation of her destiny, just as I suspected it would. The journal of inspiration was Lady Ashlee’s account of her explorations in Persia an
d Egypt beginning in the year 1856, many, many years after her Sinai adventure as documented in the first book of this trilogy. I have read to my daughter from many of the journals of our foremothers, but this particular volume I purposely set aside, knowing that the discoveries contained therein pertaining to the Staff of Amenti and the Dragon Queens of ancient myth would awaken dormant memories and powers in my child, and my young, innocent, bright-eyed daughter would be gone forever.

  PROLOGUE

  FROM THE JOURNAL OF TAMAR DEVERE

  Finally I have you, the journal that will become the basis of my first family chronicle. Yet the moment of your bestowment was not at all as I imagined it would be, as my perfect parents were having their first full-blown argument in living memory.

  Why did Dad’s little surprise for my mother have to be let out of the bag on the morning of my thirteenth birthday? Although it wasn’t really his fault that it wasn’t as well received as expected. Still, I had envisioned being doted upon all day by my adoring parents and being showered with gifts and other surprises. As it was, I only had the opportunity to open my first present (this lock-up journal) when the phone rang and threw my special day into complete chaos!

  If I’d had to choose only one gift to receive today, however, this journal would have been my pick. I have been waiting for it since I was old enough to comprehend the purpose of a journal. I have kept diaries in the past in preparation for this moment—mainly electronic palm journals—however, the typed word has proved less durable than the good old-fashioned written word. Convenient little electronic pocket devices have a way of getting lost or stolen, and they tend to stop working once they’ve been left in a pocket and put through the wash cycle. And, as the intention behind the penning of this journal is to pass information on to my descendants, I am aware that an electronic device will never stand the test of time. Technology moves so fast, parts fail, and one can never rely on finding the right-sized battery in the next decade, let alone a century or a millennium from now! Paper is so expensive in this year of 2017 that a penned manuscript is something altogether rare and precious, much as it was long ago.

  The women of my family have been chronicling their life and times for centuries now. In our home library cum study, we have journals dating back as far as the twelfth century. Admittedly, there is a large gap in the family history until early in the nineteenth century, when my great foremother, the Baroness Lady Ashlee Granville-Devere, began recording the events of her lifetime. No ordinary Victorian woman, Lady Ashlee was a famed psychic who had links with many secret societies and was involved in some covert investigations carried out during this pious age of Church rule—investigations concerning the bloodline that was the basis of Grail and Fairy Lore. My mother has not allowed me to read the journals of Lady Granville-Devere, myself, but she has read to me from them. I suspect they contain sexual references that Mum feels she must censor—as if I don’t know what sex entails!

  What I like most about Lady Ashlee’s tales is that they feature the ghost of a Crusader knight named Albray Devere. This is my father’s name and, as he is also brave, dark and handsome, I have always imagined him to be the knight in the tales. My parents have never discouraged this belief; in fact, they perpetuate my little fantasy! Mum often refers to Dad as her knight, and my father unashamedly claims that he was brought back to life by the mystical Ladies of the Elohim because of his love for my mother. I used to believe their romantic fairytales as a child, and even though I am now a teenager, I still enjoy my parents’ yarns.

  The reason my father is so good at playing the role of a twelfth-century Crusader knight is due to the fact that he lectures on the Crusades, having earned degrees in early European and Eastern History, and he has written numerous books on the period. Mum’s doctorate is in ancient languages, and during the course of her work on several archaeological explorations she’s also developed an interest in the scientific know-how of the ancients—as hinted at in many of the ancient texts she hasdeciphered and the investigations of Lady Ashlee, her peers and family. Thanks to these rare sources and insights, Mother realised that she was being awarded a unique opportunity to do what none of our foremothers was capable of: to seek an explanation of the ancient mysteries through the lens of the modern scientific microscope. Consequently, my mother has spent the last twelve years researching and chronicling information pertaining to the ancient enigmas surrounding our family’s bloodline.

  Recently, taking a page from Lady Ashlee’s book, my mother merged her research and family histories with the fairytale romance she and Dad have been spinning me all these years to create a rather fantastic piece of fiction. For Mum, this sideline endeavour was never meant to be anything more than a hobby. The purpose of the text in her eyes was to make her own contribution to our family’s chronicles, every one of which mingles an element of fantasy with history to create a thoughtprovoking read. This style of writing follows the tradition of the folklore and legends that sprang up to preserve the old culture of my bloodline after the church rose to power in the eighth century—stories of valiant princes turned into frogs and princesses put to sleep for a hundred years, trapped in towers or turned into swans. Yet interwoven within these fairytales are allegories and symbology pertaining to the pre-Christian world order. Due to the mix of fiction and fact in our family chronicles, one never really knows where the facts stop and the fantasy starts, leaving it to the reader to discover how much of the text is true. Personally, I cannot wait to have a crack at writing such a tale about my life!

  One part of the family chronicles that is absolutely true is the hereditary birthmark of those who belong to the Grail bloodline. It takes the form of a small cross—known as the mark of Cain—and my mother has it between her breasts, as does my father, whereas mine is on my back, between my shoulder blades.

  But to get back to why my parents were arguing on the morning of my thirteenth birthday…

  My father, after reading Mum’s recently completed manuscript, took it upon himself to secretly run a copy by his publisher for an opinion. This morning the publisher rang Mum to tell her how enraptured she was by the tale and how extremely eager she was to buy it for publication. Most people would be thrilled to get such a call—I know I would! But not my mother.

  ‘I thought you’d be excited to learn that your work has merit.’ Dad was reasoning with Mum in the kitchen, and although they were keeping their voices low, my hearing is very acute. ‘This woman reads manuscripts all the time and she claims she hasn’t been so excited by a first novel in ages!’

  ‘That’s because she can see how controversial it is!’ Mum didn’t sound very excited, more like petrified! ‘It’s not the theories it contains, but the questions they raise, Albray. We’ve been through this.’

  ‘The truth is a good thing.’

  ‘Not for us!’ Mum said.

  ‘Well, you don’t have to name names,’ Dad pointed out. ‘And as far as anyone knows, it is a fantasy novel.’

  ‘That’s worse than if I’d written a textbook!’ Mum retorted. ‘I don’t want any of my professional associates finding out that I’ve written a fairytale! I’ll lose all credibility, and I don’t want my field work to suffer because of my hobby!’

  ‘Then we’ll tell them no, that you’re not interested in being published,’ Dad said firmly, trying to end the dispute.

  ‘But part of me does want to be published.’

  Ah, Mum’s ego kicked in.

  ‘It’s a great story,’ Dad said encouragingly.

  ‘You would think so, you’re the hero,’ Mum snapped.

  ‘That’s not the reason I want to see it published,’ replied Dad in his ‘you should know better’ tone. ‘The publication of these tales was predicted. Or have you forgotten why you started writing them?’

  ‘This could backfire on us badly.’ Mum’s voice dropped to a whisper.

  ‘Or it could be a saving grace,’ suggested Dad.

  All went quiet. I imagined they were probably
kissing—my parents smooch a lot! Either that or they’d dropped their voices so that I couldn’t eavesdrop.

  ‘Come on, it’s our daughter’s thirteenth birthday, we can discuss this later.’

  Good old Dad, finally someone remembered I’m alive!

  ‘You’re right.’ Mum forced a laugh. ‘All her presents are still sitting on the table, poor kid.’

  ‘Except her new journal,’ Dad observed. ‘I’ll warrant that’s what’s keeping her so quiet in there.’

  ‘What do you think she’s writing about?’

  As I figured it wouldn’t take Mum long to work out the answer to that question, I quickly ended my first entry and locked up my journal.

  I was having such a great time that I didn’t have the opportunity to get back to my new journal for two days! Needless to say, my birthday turned out to be better than expected. Still, I shan’t bore my descendants with the details of how I spent it. I feel you would all much rather know what my mother has decided to do about the publication offer on her book.

  Mia—that’s my mum—is warming to the idea of being a published author. She’s always aspired to publish, only she imagined that her first published work would be about the Semitic language or her startling translation of some ancient text. But Mum has been unfortunate in that the finds worth writing about have been too controversial, or, as she’s often in the employ of someone else, much of her best work has been attributed to the discoverer and not the translator.

  The one thing she has decided is that if she does publish, she’ll do so under an assumed name—no big surprise there. She hasn’t decided what her alias will be; actually, the manuscript itself doesn’t even have a title yet! I suggested ‘Mystique’ and both Mum and Dad seemed well disposed towards it, although they may have just been humouring me on my birthday.