October by Gabrielle Lord Read Free Book Online

become null and void and revert in entirety to, the Crown (See Westminster 1285 ‘De Donis Conditionalibus’)
    ‘Translation, please?’ I asked, putting the page down. ‘Boges? Winter? Anybody?’
    ‘There’s a double solar eclipse this year!’ said Boges, nodding. ‘Dude, everything points to this year! He’s talking about this year!’
    ‘The crazy guy you met on New Year’s Eve was right,’ Winter added. ‘The paperwork you found ages ago at Oriana’s was right. It’s all counting down to December 31st. This December 31st.’ She shifted up onto her knees and leaned over to read through the will again. ‘So the OrmondSingularity can be handed down in a wi11, like it’s something physical.’
    ‘Exactly,’ said Boges. ‘Then if the person who inherits it is unable to claim what it offers—unable to work out the mystery of what the Ormond Singularity actually is, in their time—they have to hand it down to the next generation, to the next firstborn male.’
    ‘Just like the family tree indicated,’ I added. ‘So all of my predecessors have failed to claim it, and now it’s up to me. I have until December 31st to figure it all out. And then what? What happens at the end of the year?’
    ‘Here, check this out,’ said Winter.
    Clause 8: J further direct my executor to, inform such beneficiary of the Grmond Singularity as may be, that should no, daimant for the singularity arise by the stroke of midnight on December 31st, in the year of the double eclipses, then the benefits thereof, wheresoever and howsoever situale, revert in entirety to, the Crown in the person of Kind George Vor his descendants as ordered by the Monarch in the 1559 codicil added to, ‘De Donis Conditionalibus,’ dated 1285, the Grmond Singularity.
     
    Piers, Grmond, September 1914.
    ‘If you don’t uncover what it is,’ said Winter, ‘it’s up to the Crown to work out. And if they don’t know what they’re searching for, it could all just crumble away.’
    I stood up, frustrated. ‘We still don’t know what the Ormond Singularity means. What are we trying to uncover? What if we go to all this trouble only to find out it’s nothing valuable, just some old piece of writing?’
    ‘Don’t be so impatient!’ Winter said. ‘Property and money—that’s what wills are all about. My parents,’ she paused, her voice wavering, ‘left all their property and most of their money to Vulkan Sligo. On the proviso that he look after me.’
    ‘She’s right,’ said Boges. ‘Property and money. “Lands and deeds, entitlements, patents of nobility, gifts and treasures, and sundries”,’ he quoted. ‘Your dad did say to you in his letter that you might have to get used to the idea of being seriously rich.’
    I nodded to my friends. ‘But we only have a couple more months to work it all out. Or we lose the lot. It goes to “the Crown”. This is our last chance to keep it in the Ormond family. We have to get the Riddle and the Jewel back. We have to get into Zürich Bank.’ I looked to Boges, hopefully.
    ‘The print is almost ready,’ he said, pausing to yawn. ‘Give me another couple of days.’

17 OCTOBER

    76 days to go …

    Sheldrake Rathbone was out of the way, so we’d been focusing all of our energy on Oriana and our bank bust. This morning Boges had called to tell me he’d perfected the fingerprint, which was awesome news, but we still had a lot to work out before we could try using it. We still needed to successfully make it in and out. And, above all, we needed Oriana’s PIN.
    Winter and I were sharing surveillance shifts. Yesterday, Winter had posted herself at the bank, watching how people went in and out. If a client wanted to access the bank vaults, she watched how they paused at the scanner, pressing their fingerprint, waiting the few seconds until the physical barrier—two strong steel doors—released and they were allowed through.
    It was during my surveillance shift that thedark blue Mercedes