Praise for the Work of Robert J. MrazekAmazing...literate, exciting, poignant, and engrossing.Nelson DeMilleA rattling good adventure story.James M. McPherson, Pulitzer Prize-winning author ofWar on the WatersA fast-paced thriller laced with violence and filled with unexpected twists that keep the reader guessing to the last page.Rennie Airth, author ofRiver of DarknessA first-rate World War II adventure.Susan Isaacs, New York Times bestselling author ofGoldberg VariationsSuspense and intrigue woven into the fabric of...history.The Atlanta Journal-ConstitutionA superb piece of literature, rich in texture and of surpassing literary merit.Robert K. Krick, author of Stonewall Jackson at Cedar MountainandLees ColonelAbout the AuthorRobert J. Mrazekis the author of the novelsThe Deadly Embrace, which won the W.Y. Boyd Prize for Excellence in Military Fiction from the American Library Association, Unholy Fire,andStonewalls Gold, winner of the Michael Shaara Prize for Best Civil War Novel of 1999. He is also the author of two works of nonfiction,To Kingdom Come and A Dawn Like Thunder.Excerpt. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.Praise for Robert J. Mrazek and His NovelsSIGNETPROEMHe could no longer endure the agonizing cold.The eternal darkness.The ever-howling wind.He was the last one left.Ice particles peppered his cheeks as his bruised and aching fingers labored at their final task. He imagined the rest of them celebrating with bowls of honey-soaked mead in the halls of Valhalla. Where he would soon join them.The rescue party would come in the spring. They would see what he had done in these last hours of mortal life. They would bring the tale back home and share it with the others. Grindl would learn of what he had done. She would always be proud.And they would know of the hallowed place.And go there.THE RUNES OF THE GODSONE8 November Helheim Glacier Greenland Ice CapA toast to the crew of March Hare, John Lee Hancock shouted above the shrieking wind as he raised his pewter Air Force Academy goblet and downed three inches of vintage 1942 Dom Prignon champagne. Tonight we will unearth her secrets.Hap Arnold, Hancocks one-hundred-twenty-pound white Alsatian, stirred at his masters feet as the twelve other men in the expedition joined him in the toast. Outside the operations tent, the wind was blowing forty miles an hour and the unfastened flaps were making snapping sounds like pistol shots.Steve and I will be the only ones going into the ship, but youll be able to see everything we do on the television monitors up here, said John Lee.In December 1942, March Hare, a newly christened B-17 Flying Fortress with a ten-man crew, had been flying from Goose Bay, Labrador, to join the Eighth Air Force Bomber Command in England when it had disappeared in a blizzard over the Greenland ice cap.Due to Greenlands violent weather patterns, dozens of warplanes had gone down there during the war, but March Hare was unique. Instead of bombs, it had been carrying ten wooden crates of Christmas gifts from President Franklin D. Roosevelt to his European admirers, including King George VI, British prime minister Winston Churchill, the exiled monarchs of Europe, and the top Allied war commanders.The manifest included personally inscribed books and handwritten letters from the president, a slew of commemorative gold coins and stamps from his personal collection, New Deal oil paintings by Thomas Hart Benton and Grant Wood, ancient Navajo turquoise jewelry, hand-carved wooden puzzles, and a dozen cases of Old Forester Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whisky.March Hare captured Hancocks interest and he immediately committed five hundred thousand dollars to locate the lost war bird. The founder of Anschutz International, a technology pioneer in the field of oil and gas exploration, Hancock was reputed to be the eighty-second richest man in the world. He found his personal pleasure in the pursuit of high adventure.In the planes last radio transmission, its radio operator had reported severe blizzard conditions and that the pilot was attempting to land somewhere along Greenlands rugged and unforgiving eastern coast.His message had been picked up by a weather-monitoring station near Kulusuk. Based on the strength and direction of the signal, a search party set out from Comanche Bay to an area near the coastal settlement of Angmagssalik. Battling hundred-mile-per-hour winds, they discovered no trace of March Hare or its ten-man crew. The plane was never found.Hancocks expedition team needed just four days to locate it.Knowing the aircrafts original flight plan, as well as the strength and direction of the radio operators last transmission, they decided to start the hunt for the plane on the Helheim Glacier, to the west of Angmagssalik.Hancocks expedition was equipped with two Bell 206L4 LongRanger IV jet helicopters, and they began the search patterns along twenty-kilometer parallel lines at one-kilometer intervals. After completing a search pattern, the birds would then fly the same grid quadrants perpendicular to the first one.A QUESTON (V) ice-penetrating radar system was deployed under each helicopter, its antenna clusters capable of sending and receiving an ultrawide spectrum of RF energy pulses through more than a thousand feet of glacial ice, and producing clear virtual imagery.Four days into the search, recognition signals on one of the helicopters began registering a target in the glacier. It was less than ten miles from the coast. The second helicopter converged on the location and both landed on the ice cap to take more definitive readings.The virtual images revealed that March Hares pilot had made an almost miraculous landing between two jagged peaks. The Fortress was sitting primly on its wheel struts where it had rolled to a stop, but it was now encased in a solid tomb of ice one hundred forty feet beneath the surface of the cap.Were going down after her, said Hancock to his expedition leaders.TWO9 November Helheim Glacier Greenland Ice CapIt was a calculated risk to attempt the recovery in November, but Hancock had spent his life taking risks, from the air battles he had fought as a fighter pilot in Desert Storm to the founding of Anschutz International with fifty thousand dollars he had won in a Kilgore, Texas, poker game.They were down to six hours of sunlight each day. By November 22, it would be only three hours. By December 1, the cap would be cloaked in total darkness, and the sun would not appear again for forty-five days.Hancock wasnt about to wait six months to recover the plane. His men and equipment were ready to go. Worst case, they would have to abandon the recovery effort and return in the spring. He told Steve Macaulay, his second-in-command, to do whatever it took, regardless of the cost.A day later, Base Hancock One took shape on the ice.Two de Havilland DHC-6 Twin Otters had been modified to carry freight, and they began flying in supplies and equipment the following day, including two thermal meltdown generators, pumps, drilling equipment, diesel generators, spare parts, a satellite communications system, a fully equipped camp kitchen, two bulldozers, and storage containers crammed with meat, vegetables, and other food supplies.The men quickly constructed a small complex of insulated arctic tents in a rough circle around the proposed drilling site. A helicopter pad was laid out with landing lights. A thousand-gallon tank of diesel fuel was flown in from Kulusuk, and fuel lines were run to all the tents and the modular washroom/latrine.The effort to recover March Hare began the second day. A steel platform rig was set down over the site of the drilling shaft, followed by a thermal meltdown generator. Nicknamed the BADGER, it was twelve feet in diameter, and would melt a circular shaft until they reached the plane. At a melting rate of two feet per hour, the team members extrapolated they would reach March Hare in about three days.Heavy snow and driving winds from the Arctic Circle hit them hard as soon as they were under way. The tents were nearly buried in the first blizzard, but the snow provided good insulation, and the expeditions bulldozers kept the pathways open between the complex and the helicopter pad.The temperature fell to well below zero degrees Fahrenheit and stayed there. Off duty, the men wriggled into their arctic mummy bags to keep warm. Four days after they commenced drilling, the BADGER reached the targeted depth of one hundred forty feet.Hancock and Macaulay made plans to enter March Hare through the underbelly hatch in the forward compartment. Knowing that human remains might still be on the plane, Macaulay had arranged to have an honor guard flown up from the Mortuary Affairs Center at Dover Air Force Base to accompany the bodies home.The BADGER was removed from the shaft and replaced with a steel elevator cage operated by a power hoist. Two men equipped with high-pressure steam hoses were lowered down the shaft. At the bottom, they began burrowing toward the forward hatch, melting a tunnel as they went.As soon as they reached the Fortress, the men were brought back to the surface, where Hancock and Macaulay, both wearing waterproof thermal suits and insulated rubber boots, were waiting to go down.Macaulay planned to operate a lightweight, high-definition color zoom camera designed for use in confined spaces. Hancock carried a portable floodlight. Two transceivers with voice-activated microphones were incorporated into their headgear.Hey... take a look at this, shouted one of the engineers at the entrance to the platform rig.Outside, the snow had stopped and the dark sky was filled with pulsating ripples of violet, red, and brilliant green.The goddess Aurora is trying to tell us something, Macaulay said with a laugh.In Desert Storm, Macaulay had been Hancocks air squadron commander. Now their roles were reversed. In some ways, they couldnt have been more different. Quick to laugh, Macaulay was tall and slender with an easygoing personality. Hancock was short, stocky, and intense.Lets get going, said Hancock.When they reached the bottom of the shaft, he led the way into the tunnel to March Hare. A steady drip of melting ice wept from the frozen concave roof above them. When they reached the polished steel hatch beneath the forward compartment, Hancock reached up to turn its handle.Okay... were going in, Hancock radioed to the surface.THREE13 November Helheim Glacier Greenland Ice CapHancocks breath condensed like cigarette smoke in the frigid air as he directed the floodlights toward the bombardiers station in the nose of the plane. Macaulay followed the lights with his camera. The compartment was empty. The bombardiers leather data case rested against one of the anchored legs of his chair. A Red Sox baseball cap hung from the bombsight harness.No bombsight, said Hancock.The Norden was top secret back then, said Macaulay. The bombardier wouldnt have been assigned one until they got to England.The planes navigator had also worked in the forward compartment, and his metal desk was covered by a topographical map of Greenland. He had penciled in the planes route all the way from Goose Bay. The line ended over Greenland.There was no corrosion anywhere, no decay of any kind. The machine guns lying on the deck were oiled and ready to fire, along with the bright copper casings of ammunition.They climbed up to the cockpit, where the pilot and copilot had commanded the plane. It was empty too. Maybe they had all gotten out, Macaulay thought. But where could they have gone?Macaulay eased himself into the pilots seat. An open pack of Lucky Strike cigarettes rested on the edge of the console by the throttle controls. The instrument gauges looked like they were waiting to be turned on. It struck him that the restoration team back in Lubbock wouldnt have much work to do on this plane.He and Hancock headed aft past the top-turret machine gun to the bomb bay compartment. Aside from the scrape of their ice cleats on the steel deck, it was as silent as a tomb.The bomb bay was crammed with unmarked wooden crates still strapped into position with thick cordage. Inside were President Roosevelts Christmas presents to the European elite. Hancock pointed to another stack at the rear of the compartment. Each crate was labeled Old Forester Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whisky. One of them had been cracked open.The radio compartment was next and it was as empty as the others. The aircrafts BC-348 radio receiver was mounted to the tabletop. A Dick Tracy comic book sat on top of it. The BC-375 transmitter on the opposite bulkhead was turned to the ON position.In the waist gunners compartment, they found the answer to the riddle.The crew hadnt gotten out after all. Nine of them lay sprawled out in the compartment, which had clearly been organized as a last redoubt against the agonizing cold.The men had sealed the hatches of the waist guns and gathered all their clothing and blankets together to stay warm. Most were wearing their sheepskin-lined flying suits with lined bunny boots. They had all frozen to death.Hancock directed the lights at their faces one by one, and Macaulay recorded them on his video camera. Their faces reflected a mixture of sadness, resignation, perplexity, and despair.Not the worst way to go, Steve.Buried alive wouldnt be my choice.Dick Slezak, the turret gunner, looked impossibly young for a man who would now be approaching ninety if he had survived the war. He would always be eighteen.Ted Morgan is missing, said Macaulay after they examined the nine bodies.Morgan was the pilot who had made the miraculous landing in the middle of the blizzard. He had been twenty-three years old and hailed from Macaulays hometown of Lexington, Virginia.Shortly after Pearl Harbor, Morgan had married an army nurse named Cherie Carter. A year later, she had given birth to a baby girl. Cherie was still alive, now a ninety-year-old grandmother. She had remarried seven years after Ted had disappeared.They found him in the tail gunners compartment. He was lying on his back and staring up toward the surface of the ice cap as if visually attempting to escape from their tomb.Macaulay remembered his face from Morgans personnel file. It had reminded Macaulay of himself, lean and square-jawed, with a hint of cockiness. A hot flier who had wanted to be a fighter pilot and had instead been assigned to bombers.The cockiness was gone now.The opened bottle of Old Forester stood next to him on the floor of the compartment. Three inches remained in the bottom. Near his outstretched hand was a leather-bound diary. Macaulay unzipped it and thumbed through the last few pages. Morgan had survived almost two weeks. He had been the last to die.28 December 42. Did a good job landing the plane in snow and darkness. Everyone safe. Radio not working, but Jeff hopes to fix it soon and send out our approximate position. Cant be more than ten miles from the coast.5 January 43. Snow hasnt stopped since we landed. Slezak dug his way up from the waist door and broke through the snow layer about eight feet above the top turret. Men now take turns going up with a flare gun. If one hears an airplane, he is to shoot off a flare. Brutal up there. No one can stay outside more than thirty minutes.8 January 43. Jacobs fired all our flares off when he said he heard aircraft.Morgans handwriting began to deteriorate.9 January 43. Can no longer get to the surface. Slezak tried to break through but gave up at twenty-five feet. We are trapped.... Emergency food gone. No gas left in tanks. Flashlights dead. Total darkness.The heat from the floodlight Hancock was holding began to melt the patina of ice on Morgans face. Some of it pooled in the corners of his eyes, and he looked as if he were crying.11 January 43. Last one left. If anyone ever finds us, please contact Cherie and tell her I loved her to the end. Forgive me.Macaulay handed the diary to Hancock.Poor bastard, he said after reading the last entries.Morgan had shot himself in the heart with his army-issue.45.Macaulay lifted up the opened bottle of Old Forester, took a long swig, and passed it to Hancock.Like you said up top, J.L.... to the crew of March Hare.They finished the bottle.FOUR14 November Helheim Glacier Greenland Ice CapAfter March Hares crew members were brought to the surface, their bodies were temporarily interred in an ice cairn, and the expedition team gathered for a brief memorial service.Macaulay couldnt help wondering how Ted Morgans wife would react after gazing down again at his twenty-three-year-old face. He had already relayed the names to the Mortuary Affairs Center at Dover Air Force Base. They would be sending an honor guard to escort them home.I need Melissa, Hancock said to Macaulay when it was over.Sure, J.L., he replied with a grin.An hour later, a slim, busty young woman wearing a jaunty ski cap, gold-trimmed sunglasses, and a form-fitting ski suit arrived on the Bell helicopter from the airfield at Kulusuk. Macaulay met her at the edge of the landing zone. She was fuming.Ive been living for a week in a tar paper shack back at what they call an airport in this godforsaken country, she pouted.A Dallas Cowboys cheerleader, she was one of John Lees flavors of the month. As he had for the others, he had bought her a new Porsche 911 Carrera. The dealership in Fort Worth now gave him a fleet rate. He let each girl pick her own color. Melissas was neon pink.From those to whom much is given, much is expected, Macaulay said to her with a straight face.Whats thats supposed to mean? she demanded.The parable of the faithful servant, Melissa, he said. Luke 12:48.She looked at him as if he had lost his mind.Where is he? she demanded.Macaulay pointed to Hancocks sleeping tent, and she headed over to it, carrying a small leather briefcase. A few moments after she entered the tent, Hap Arnold, Hancocks white Alsatian, came lumbering out.An hour later, Melissa reemerged, got back aboard the helicopter, and flew off. When she was gone, Hap stuck his head back inside Hancocks tent to see if he was welcome, and joined his master inside.Over the next two days, men using steam hoses melted a massive cavern above and around the fortress. One of the teams mechanics concluded that if March Hare had been on the surface, they would have only had to replace the batteries and add fuel to the tanks to fly it off the cap. Instead, the bomber would have to be brought up in sections.Macaulay was in the operations tent, going over the logistical plan to fly out the components, when Noah Hastings, one of the helicopter pilots, came inside with a puzzled look on his face.Steve, I happened to turn on the QUESTON (V) in the bird this morning and its really weird.... We have another strong metallic signal below March Hare.How far below it? asked Macaulay.Im not sure. George is doing an equipment recalibration of the radar equipment to make sure I wasnt seeing things. He ought to have pictures soon.George Cabot was a former air force intelligence officer and the teams technical expert. He arrived a few minutes later with the virtual scans, his carrot red hair standing straight up. Hancock joined them.This is definitely interesting, he said.Could it be an ore deposit? asked Hancock.Too small, said Cabot. And theres a pattern to it.He laid the scans on the table.Look here. You see these dots? Theyre almost exactly a foot apart from one another and run in almost straight lines.... These four intersect.So what could that mean? asked Hancock.If I had to make a wild guess, Id say it looks like four long rows of iron rivets, said Cabot.A ship? asked Macaulay.Possibly... Whatever it is, the thing is nearly a hundred feet long and fifteen feet wide at the center. The rivets look like they taper at each end. These ones down the center line could be a keel, these others the ribs and thwarts.Macaulay stared down at the images.Incidentally, added Cabot, theres another metallic pulse coming from the bedrock underneath that thing.... No idea what it could be.What would a ship be doing this far from the coast? asked Macaulay.Who knows? Theyve recorded two-hundred-foot seas in the North Atlantic... or maybe it was portaged there. All I know is that its sitting on original bedrock, so its been down there a long time.How far? asked Hancock.Cabot looked at the second scan.More than five hundred feet, he said.Thats three times the depth of March Hare, said Macaulay.Yeah, too far, agreed Cabot.Hancock was still gazing at the possible rivet lines.Well, were already down a hundred forty, he said, and it will take us at least four more days to bring up March Hare and get it shipped out of here. The BADGER is definitely too slow. Lets put the WEASEL to work.Youre going after it? asked Cabot, scratching his red hair.Were here anyway.... Hell, it could be fun, said Hancock.The WEASEL was the smaller of the two thermal meltdown units designed and built by his engineers. Only three feet in diameter, it could melt ice at five feet per hour, almost triple the rate of the BADGER. Another three hundred sixty feet would only take about three days.An hour later, it was operational.FIVE16 November Helheim Glacier Greenland Ice CapThey were down to little more than three hours of watery sunlight each day, or at least on those days the sun actually emerged through the leaden clouds. In two weeks, they would be in total darkness.One of the recovery teams, equipped with acetylene torches, began cutting March Hare into sections that would fit into the twelve-foot shaft. A second team loaded the retrieved components into the de Havilland Twin Otters, which flew them to a former United States Air Force base at Narsassuaq. A third team drilled the WEASEL ever deeper toward the mysterious target.When an air force honor guard arrived to remove the bodies of March Hares crew, work was briefly suspended while the expedition team stood in falling snow to participate in a flag service.A day later, the last sections of March Hare were brought to the surface. Another winter storm struck without warning that afternoon. Six feet of dense snow buried the tent complex, and flights in and out had to be canceled while the airstrip was cleared with the bulldozer.Shortly after midnight, Macaulay was napping on his cot in the operations tent, when an engineer woke him to say that the WEASEL had reached bedrock more than five hundred feet beneath the ice cap.Lets go, said Macaulay, heading over to wake Hancock.George Cabot was waiting for them at the edge of the new shaft a hundred forty feet below the surface. A power winch had been rigged to allow one man at a time to stand on stirrups attached to a steel cable and ride slowly to the bottom.I sent two men down there with the steam hoses an hour ago, said Cabot.You still dont want to go, George? said Macaulay, smiling.I may be small, but Im not stupid, Steve, said Cabot, puffing on his meerschaum pipe. I dont fancy climbing down a fifty-story building inside a three-foot sewer line.You dont have to climb down, George, Hancock added. Just close your eyes and the power hoist will have you at the bottom in twenty minutes. Besides, its only about forty stories more. Were already fourteen down.No, thanks, said Cabot. Ill stick to the instrument readings.Macaulay stared down into the hole. It was no larger than a manhole cover.No lights along the way? asked Hancock.With the steam hoses, there isnt enough room to string floods, said Cabot. Youll have to use flashlights.The radio receivers suddenly crackled.My God, youve got to see this, yelled one of the men at the bottom of the shaft.Cabot turned on the power hoist and Hancock stepped into the stirrups. He was gone a few moments later. Macaulay quickly followed him down the hole. Watching them disappear into the blackness, Cabot crossed himself.Inside the narrow shaft, Macaulay couldnt move his arms without grazing the ice walls. In spite of the thermal suit, he felt a profound coldness penetrating him as they went deeper.It wasnt physical fear. As a child, he had walked away from the horrific automobile accident that had killed his parents. He had also survived a ditching in the Persian Gulf after shooting down his second Iraqi MiG during Desert Storm. This was different. It was something unreasoned. Whatever was down there filled him with dread.Reaching the bottom, they stepped out of the stirrups and turned in the direction of the light. The two other men were shining their powerful flashlights at an object less than twenty feet away.Macaulay almost gasped aloud. The steam hoses had exposed the front section of an ancient ship. The bowsprit swept up and away from the lap-straked hull in an arcing swirl that looked like the coiled head of a sea snake. Intricate carvings of weapons and battle scenes were engraved on the outer gunwales.Stepping onto an ice shelf, Macaulay looked down inside the hull. Nestled in the bow section was a sea chest, studded with what looked like silver or pewter fittings. Three rowing benches were exposed behind it.Ive seen paintings of craft like these that the Phoenicians used about a thousand years ago, he said.The Norsemen adapted their ship-building designs from the Phoenicians, said Hancock. Their ships were propelled by either sail or oars, just like this one.He pulled out his jackknife.Im going to take a wood chip for carbon dating, he said.George said there was another metallic impulse beneath the ship, said Macaulay.The two other men aimed their steam hoses at the ice shelf below it.A few minutes later, a rock-edged wall hole materialized in the bedrock, and then a small black opening. Hancock ordered them to shut off the hoses. He shined his flashlight through the opening.It looks like a cave, he said.Using his gloved hand to expand the hole, Hancock crawled inside. Watching from the ice tunnel, Macaulay could see Hancocks flashlight beam gyrating in all directions. Less than a minute later, he crawled back out.His stunned face said it all.Seal it up again, he ordered. No one comes down here.SIX17 November Ostlund Lake Solem, MinnesotaAlexandra Vaughan had just experienced the most thrilling day of her life.Its genesis was three years earlier when an old farmer plowing a rocky field near Solem discovered a broken axe blade by the marshy headwaters of Ostlund Lake. It had odd carvings along the edges, and the farmer had sent it to the Minnesota Historical Society in St. Paul for analysis.Alexandra had recently completed her doctorate in Norse archaeology at Harvard. Now thirty, she was working in a staff position within the societys archaeological unit. The axe blade ended up on her desk.Simply holding it in her hands had sent a thrill of excitement through her. She had seen identical blades in the collection of Norse weaponry at the Danish National Museum in Copenhagen.Although St. Paul was being battered by a winter gale, she got in her old Land Rover and drove up to Solem. After interviewing the farmer, she was sure he was telling the truth about how and where he had found it. A week later, carbon dating confirmed that the axe blade had been fabricated more than seven hundred years ago.She took her findings to Dr. Benchley, the head of the archaeology unit, and recommended they undertake a comprehensive dig at the Solem site. After briefly reviewing the folder of material, he laughed at her.Lexy, its another Kensington stone, he said, a complete hoax. The Norsemen never reached Minnesota. This farmer probably bought the axe from a cousin in Norway. Hes looking for his fifteen minutes of fame.The jury is still out on the Kensington stone, Lexy replied hotly. And I happen to believe the rune markings on it are genuine. Thats what brought me out here.Fine, he said. Why not go out and find Sasquatch while youre at it.Undeterred, she spent her two-week vacation camping in the fields and rock-strewn slopes near the spot where the farmer had discovered it. The place was very remote and she had to ford two streams in the Land Rover to get there.Her first efforts yielded nothing. It might have been sheer stubbornness, but her instincts told her there was something important to be found there if she searched long and hard enough.Using most of her personal time, Lexy returned to Ostlund Lake six times over the next two years, eventually combing the area with probes and a metal detector. On the sixth trip, she expanded her search to include a nearby rocky slope dotted with aspen trees and thick undergrowth.While crossing a spiny ridge, she noticed a depression in the earth that covered a vein of the rock ledge. Running her metal detector over the ledge, she received a positive hit.She began to dig. When the excavated defile reached a depth of six feet, she was rewarded with the discovery of a cleft in the otherwise solid rock. After removing nearly a foot of soil and detritus from inside it, she uncovered her first find.It was a flattened section of beaded metal, possibly part of a battle shield. She brought the object back to the historical society and subjected it to radioisotope dating. It was seven hundred years old.She was now sure it was a Norse burial site, and that whoever was entombed there had been buried with his weapons for the journey to Valhalla, the mythical home of the Norse gods. She hit pay dirt on her next visit, unearthing another axe blade, and then the hilt of a sword with a cocked-hat-style iron pommel. A Norsemans sword. She had seen one identical to it at the Wikinger Museum in Hedeby, the largest Nordic city during the Viking age.The discovery was why she had taken the job in Minnesota in the first place, passing up prestigious fellowships in London and Istanbul. She was descended from the ancient Norsemen on her mothers side. Some of her earliest memories were the Viking tales told to her by her Norwegian grandparents. The Vikings were in her blood.During her trip back to St. Paul, the Land Rover stalled out in one of the streams, and she had to rig a pulley hoist from a tree on the opposite shore to hand-winch it into the shallows. By then, her boots, corduroys, and anorak were caked in mud.An hour out of St. Paul, the brakes began to fail. As she drove through the gate of the historical society, the brake pedal went all the way to the floor, and she had to use the emergency brake to bring the vehicle to a stop in the employees lot.Grabbing her specimen case, she used her electronic key to enter the labs in the subbasement, taking a shortcut through the suite in which the society was restoring Minnesotas Civil War flags.A tall man was standing in front of the display case holding the battle flag of the 28th Virginia that had been captured during Picketts Charge at Gettysburg. He was unshaven and dressed in rumpled khakis and a navy blazer.Dr. Vaughan? asked Macaulay as she kept walking toward the archaeology lab.This is a restricted area, she said. The public exhibits are upstairs.She looked back and saw that he was following her.What do you want? she said, turning to face him.The girls violet eyes made Macaulay regret he hadnt shaved in three days. She reminded him of his late wife, Diana.... She had the same intelligent good looks and, despite her mud-caked clothes, more than a hint of sexuality.Can we talk for a few minutes? he said.I dont have time right now, she said without slowing down.Dr. Benchley told me he thought you would be able to give me a little time, he said.She paused in her tracks, not wanting to tick off Marvin Benchley any more than she already had.He handed her a card and she glanced down at it. A colorful logo surrounded the words ANSCHUTZ INTERNATIONAL. The name underneath it was BRIG. GENERAL STEVEN MACAULAY, UNITED STATES AIR FORCE (RETIRED).She looked up at him again. His thick brown hair was just beginning to gray, and his face had a square-jawed leanness along with brown eyes and a dimpled chin.You look too young to be a general, she said skeptically.Ive got a painting up in my attic that does all the aging. Have you ever heard of a man named John Lee Hancock?The billionaire oilman whose core philosophy in life is to drill for oil and gas in every wildlife refuge? she said.Lets just say hes a strong advocate for energy independence.Im sure hes for truth, justice, and the American way, but right now Im busy, she said, using her other electronic key to open her lab door.Five minutes, said Macaulay.She thought of Benchley again.Come into the lab, she said.The big high-ceilinged room was antiseptically clean. Wooden cabinets with glass doors lined three of the walls, each holding dozens of objects on the shelves. Lexy placed her specimen case on a square table centered under a bank of surgical lamps, and motioned him over to the chair near her desk.We have made an interesting discovery that would benefit from your knowledge and expertise, he began.Where? she asked.The Greenland ice cap.He saw the first hint of interest in her eyes.We were up there to recover a Second World War bomber. J.L.Mr. Hancockis the founder of the Cactus Legion, which has recovered and preserved rare war birds all over the world.Im glad he believes in preserving something.Macaulay ignored her sarcasm.While we were recovering the plane, we found something else a lot deeper down in the ice. It appears to be a Viking ship.Is it rigged?I dont know, said Macaulay. Most of it is still encased in ice.No one has ever found a fully rigged Viking ship. The Gokstad ship discovered in 1880 was almost intact, but it had only the barest remnants of its sail and rigging. So you may have made a good find.Will you come up and help us determine its significance?Ive recently made my own find, and I believe its of far greater value to archaeological history. It will prove that the Norsemen came to this country two hundred years before Columbus.Only two hundred years? asked Macaulay with mock innocence.Well never know now.We carbon dated a wood chip from the ship yesterday, and the trees that were felled to build it were cut down more than a thousand years ago, he said.Thats not surprising, she said. Erik the Red, Leif Erikssons father, established his first settlement on the southwest coast of Greenland in 982. Your ship might have been part of one of his supply vessels.What if I told you that we made another discovery aside from the ship?What is it?Im afraid I cant tell you that until you get there.Sorry, she said with finality. Is that all?Time is of the essence, Dr. Vaughan. Winter is about to set in up there and the weather is deteriorating. We only have about three hours of sunlight each day.I told you I cant come.Were bringing in three other archaeologists on this, said Macaulay. Maybe youve heard of themProfessor Hjalmar Jensen from Norway, Sir Dorian St. George Bond from England, and Rob Falconer from Berkeley.Sir Dorian wrote the canon on Norse navigation techniques, she said. Jensen is the leading authority on Norse genealogy. Falconer is brilliant if a bit ruthless. Youre in good hands.She didnt mention that Falconer had once been her lover. He had almost cured her of men.We would like you to come too.Why?Professor Finchem, your mentor at Harvard, told me yesterday that when it comes to runology, no one in the field has more instinctive ability to translate early Norse markings than you do. He referred to you as the code breaker.She laughed.Barnaby knows more than Ill ever know about rune markings. You should get him to go.Actually, he was our first choice, said Macaulay. Unfortunately, hes recovering from open-heart surgery and is not up to the rigors of the ice cap. He recommended you.Thats very flattering, but its still no, she said. I have a job here, General Macaulay, and Ive used all my personal and vacation time.Your Dr. Benchley is all for your going, he replied. Hes very grateful for the contribution Mr. Hancock has just made to the historical societys capital fund. I have one other inducement to offer. If you go with me, Ill transfer fifty thousand dollars into account number one-one-four-five-six-three at the Pilot Grove Savings Bank before we leave this room.It was her checking account number.How can you do that?He held up his smart phone.Your bank information is already registered in here.Money had never been important to her. It wasnt now, although the thought of her Land Rover sitting outside with no brakes, along with her graduate school loan payments being six months overdue, made her pause.I have a Learjet waiting for us at the airport, Dr. Vaughan, and Ill have you back here in four days to continue your own work.This is crazy.Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me, he said.So you also have time to read Fitzgerald.Long time ago.She hoped she wouldnt regret her decision.Ill need to go to my apartment, she said, to shower and gather my gear.No problem.My car is not functioning right now.I have a rental right outside.SEVEN18 November Jean Lesage International Airport Quebec City, CanadaHancocks Learjet had barely leveled off at twenty-five thousand feet above St. Paul when a young Eurasian woman dressed in a blue silk wrap arrived at Lexys club chair and handed her a hand-inscribed parchment menu.She remembered that the last thing she had eaten was a cardboard snack pack of cheese and crackers in the back of the Land Rover the previous night. She was suddenly ravenous.After a glass of Pinot Grigio, she savored a plate of sauted sea scallops with shallots in cream sauce, and a side dish of asparagus vinaigrette. Macaulay joined her at the polished teak inlaid table as she was finishing her crme brle. He had shaved and showered after boarding the plane, and changed into jeans and a blue work shirt.Cleaned up, he looked even younger. There were laugh or stress lines etched into the corners of his weary brown eyes. He had nicked himself shaving.How did you get the permission for us to take off? she asked him.The world works in mysterious ways, he said, ordering a dry martini.It had been snowing hard when they arrived at the Minneapolis airport, and the flight manager at the private aviation terminal told Macaulay that all landings and takeoffs had been canceled until visibility improved. Flights werent expected to resume until the following day.The waiting room in the small terminal was packed with newly stranded travelers, all trying to rent cars and find accommodations. Macaulay had told her to wait there until he returned.As the minutes passed, she began to wonder if the whole episode was some kind of ludicrous practical joke. On impulse, she used her cell phone to call her branch of the Pilot Grove Savings Bank in St. Paul. After she provided her personal data, the teller said, Your current checking balance is $50,082.36.Twenty minutes later, Macaulay was back.Lets go, he said.Back to St. Paul?Out to the airplane, he said. I had to make sure it was de-iced before we take off.But the flight manager said all flights were canceled, she began, but he was already leading her outside.The Learjet was airborne less than ten minutes later.Will they come after us? she asked as Macaulay began chewing his first bite of rare prime rib.Who?The sky police... How the hell do I know? You broke the law.All in a good cause, he said.They landed in Quebec to clear customs.What do I say is the purpose of my visit? she whispered as they approached the counter.Pleasure, he said. Pure pleasure.They were back in the air fifteen minutes later. When the plane reached cruising altitude, Macaulay asked the Eurasian girl to bring two snifters of Hancocks hundred-year-old Armagnac. Lexy found the first taste sublime.Im going to make an assumption about why youre bringing me along on this escapade, she said.Go ahead, said Macaulay.In addition to the Viking ship you found up there, Im guessing you found a tablet, or vellum scroll, or something else with rune markings on it.Good assumption, he said, savoring the brandy.So, what do you know about runology? she asked.The same as you probably know about the Eighth Air Force missions to Schweinfurt in 1943, he said with a lazy grin.August and October, she said. Sixty forts were lost on the first one and seventy-seven went down on the second. They creamed the ball bearing works the second time, but Speer had already diversified production.He stared intently at her for several seconds.Will you marry me? he said.She laughed.My grandfather was a B-17 pilot. He was lost over Berlin in 1944. Have you ever heard of the Kensington stone?Your Dr. Benchley told me that its a two-hundred-pound slab of rock covered in alleged Viking markings and that youre fixated on it. He said it was an elaborate hoax and that it would be a big mistake to bring you on our little lark. He volunteered to come himself.Im going to prove its genuine, she said, pulling several sheets of paper out of an old leather satchel case. She laid the first one on the table in front of him.This is the inscription on the Kensington stone, she said.Macaulay gazed down at a mass of odd-looking symbols, letters, characters, and what appeared to be stick figures, all bunched together in what might have been separate lines of possible text. He hadnt slept in two nights and was having difficulty concentrating. His weariness was compounded by the brandy and by this unsettling young woman.It looks a little like hieroglyphics, he said.Very good, General, she said, smiling. The Norsemen used the same principle in creating the runic alphabet. Runic inscriptions date back almost two thousand years, and until Christian monks introduced Latin to Scandinavia in the eleventh century, the runic alphabet was used to record all their important events. Its fairly simple, with these sixteen characters being the most frequently used. Later on, the basic characters were augmented with what are called dotted runes.Macaulay looked up to see the big violet eyes focused on him. In the light from the bulkhead lamp behind her, he could see glints of old gold in her thick auburn mane of hair. She was undeniably attractive, but the last thing he needed at this point in his life was another woman. Not after Diana.Most of the runic stones from the eleventh century are either memorials to the departed, family sagas, or accounts of famous expeditions. They were carved by skilled stonecutters. Two years ago, I translated a rune stone dating from 1050 that was unearthed in Norway. It recounts the discovery of Vinland the Good by Leif Eriksson fifty years earlier.Where is Vinland? asked Macaulay.Theories have ranged from Nova Scotia to Cape Cod, but no one has ever found archaeological evidence to prove it.So what happened to Eriksson?No one knows.She placed another piece of paper in front of him.This is an interlinear transliteration of the rune markings on the Kensington stone, she said excitedly. Would you like me to translate them into English for you?Macaulay looked down at the confusing jumble of letters. It was the last thing he wanted her to do.8: gter: ok: 22: norrmen: po:...o: opagelsefrd: fro:vinland: of: vest: vi:hade: lger: ved: 2: skLr: en:dags: rise: norr: fro: eno: sten:vi: var: ok: fiske: en: dagh: ptir:vi: kom: hem: fan: 10: man: rde:af: blod: og: ded: AVM:frlse: f: ill.How did you get interested in all this? he asked.Im half Norwegian, she said. My maternal grandmother was an amateur archaeologist and my first inspiration.Macaulay couldnt help yawning.Lets get some rest, he said. Well land in Goose Bay in a few hours to refuel, and then its four more to Kulusuk Island on the east coast of Greenland. Fortunately, we wont need to check in with customs there. They assume that if people are crazy enough to want to come, why bother.Sleep would be good right now, she agreed.Youre welcome to J.L.s cabin, he said. It has the most comfortable bed youll ever find at thirty thousand feet.He was right.EIGHT20 November Kulusuk Airfield Ost GreenlandDawn was creeping past the curtains of her compartment porthole when Lexy heard a light knock at the door. It slowly opened, and the Eurasian girls face appeared around the edge.Well be landing in thirty minutes. Do you wish to have breakfast with General Macaulay?She could smell fresh coffee brewing and discovered she was hungry again.Ill be right there.She dressed in the same combination of clothing she always wore in the field, loose-fitting corduroys, a Scotch plaid flannel shirt, and rubber-soled leather hunting boots.Youre going to need to ramp up your winter gear when we get there, said Macaulay when she joined him at the breakfast table. He was enjoying a western omelet with coffee and orange juice, and she ordered the same.Ive checked in by radio with our base camp on the ice cap. Your three colleagues have already arrived, he told her. Its blowing a gale there, but Im hoping we can make it over in one of the team helicopters.***Gazing through the windows at the endless landscape of ice and rock, Lexy felt a deep sense of isolation at the enormity of it all. Some of her ancestors had come here more than a thousand years ago.Macaulay had followed her eyes.In some places the ice is two miles deep, he said. Who knows how many secrets it holds?Toward the horizon, she saw the jagged edge of a gigantic iceberg floating calmly on a slate gray sea. It almost looked big enough to land on. As the Learjet slowly descended toward the desolate coast, they passed over a small Inuit settlement. The simple huts were gaily painted in red, blue, and yellow. Near the settlement, a man was running behind a dogsled.A few minutes later, they landed on a long, ice-bordered runway. how do i make a contact form Valhalla
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. I loved the fast flow of the storyBy Lynn CardiffWOW!!! This book offers so much excitement and adventure it makes one not ever want to finish reading it. I loved the fast flow of the story. No telling of drawn out events, just gets right to the meat of things in a highly moving and thrilling way. This book will not disappoint! It needs to be made into a movie. Maybe it has, I just haven't seen it.From the beginning of seeing an object frozen under the ice to the fast pace discovery of what is still deeper in the earth, The story kept me wanting to flip the pages faster than my eyes could read.. Robert Mrazek is a great writer. so much so, that I am trying to read all his books. I am reading the one about the Civil War now. It is good, but not the cliff hanger that VALHALLA is. With all the snow this winter and having to stay indoors, the book Valhalla, will make the days go swiftly by. The cold weather will even make a reader enjoy and understand the places and events that the books hero's find themselves fighting on the ice pack. I am not a book reviewer. I just know when a book holds my attention for the whole run of a book and leaves me wanting for more, more and more. I have told all those in my family who love reading good books about Robert Mrazek's "VALHALLA". It is such an exciting book. It has it all. What you doing??? Just sample it, buy it, but do READ IT! See you at the book store..........0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Great reading. Second book by author Robert Mrazek that ...By Mike O'HaraGreat reading. Second book by author Robert Mrazek that I have read; this was historical fiction. The other work is A Dawn Like Thunder. My uncle served in the ill fated Torpedo Squadron 8. Found all this out through our genealogy research. Amazing !!0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. EnjoyableBy MatthewThis was a good quick read. However I felt the book left too many loose ends and I did not care for the ending.