“Rayne is a fine writer, a sure-handed plotter, and skilful character builder…” Booklist
“Compelling… gripping and terrifying and covering all human emotions…” Newcastle upon Tyne Journal
The Burning Altar
Ancient demonic laws, macabre rituals, and a secret the Vatican has striven to hide for nearly two thousand years…
Patrick Chance was a notorious Victorian rake whose memoirs of his travels through Tibet caused a sensation at the time. But, having traced his ancestor’s footsteps, Sir Lewis Chance is the only one today who knows the truth. For he has also stumbled on the strange, secret tribe who guard the sinister Stone Tablets in remote Tibet.
A group whose perverted beliefs, blood rituals and horrific customs have tortuous, hellish consequences.
Raffael stared at him. At last, he said, ‘The Tashkara Decalogue. The Ten Satanic Commandments. That’s what you mean, isn’t it?
‘Yes.’
‘That,’ said Cardinal de Migli, ‘is why you’re inside Chance House. Lewis Chance’s ancestor, Patrick, travelled to Tibet in the late 1800s’
‘So?’
‘We think Patrick Chance found the Decalogue,’ said Fleury. ‘The infamous journal published after his death refers to it. We believe that although Patrick was very frank about his travels—’
‘Extremely frank,’ said de Migli, sourly.
‘—he withheld something,’ finished Fleury, smoothly.
‘I’ve never read A Lecher Abroad, but I remember the outcry,’ said Raffael. ‘But if Patrick was even half as promiscuous as he was made out to be—’
Fleury said, ‘Patrick made his journey to Tashkara at the end of the 1880s. About eight years later, Lewis Chance made the same journey.’
‘To look for the Decalogue?’
‘Yes. It’s possible he knew something that wasn’t in the journals. He might have had access to other papers – letters, private diaries.’
‘And that’s why I’m in Chance House? To find out how much Lewis Chance knows?’
‘Exactly. The legend of theDecalogue – of the Ten Satanic Commandments – must never get out.’