He struggled to keep up, but his legs felt like stone. "Wait," he begged. "Please…"

High atop the steps of the Pyramid of Giza a young woman laughed and called down to him. "Robert, hurry up! I knew I should have married a younger man!" Her smile was magic.

As he climbed, his vision began to blur. There was a thundering in his ears. I must reach her! But when he looked up again, the woman had disappeared. In her place stood an old man with rotting teeth. The man stared down, curling his lips into a lonely grimace. Then he let out a scream of anguish that resounded across the desert.

Robert Langdon awoke with a start from his nightmare. The phone beside his bed was ringing. Dazed, he picked up the receiver.

"Hello?"

"I'm looking for Robert Langdon," a man's voice said.

"I must see you immediately."

Langdon sat up in his empty bed and tried to clear his mind. "This… is Robert Langdon." He squinted at his digital clock. It was 5:18A. M.

"Who is this?"

"My name is Maximilian Kohler. I'm a discrete particle physicist."

"You're a professor of religious iconology at Harvard University. You've written three books on symbology and --"

"A what?" Langdon could barely focus. "Are you sure you've got the right Langdon?"

"Do you know what time it is?"

"How did you get my number?" Langdon tried to be polite, despite the hour.

"I apologize. I have something you need to see. I can't discuss it on the phone."

A knowing groan escaped Langdon's lips. This had happened before. One of the perils of writing books about religious symbology was the calls from religious zealots who wanted him to confirm their latest sign from God. Last month a stripper from Oklahoma had promised Langdon the best sex of his life if he would fly down and verify the authenticity of a cruciform that had magically appeared on her bed sheets. The Shroud of Tulsa, Langdon had called it.

Langdon frowned. He was damn sure his book's site did not include his home phone number. The man was obviously lying.

"On the Worldwide Web. The site for your book."

"I need to see you," the caller insisted. "I'll pay you well."

"If you leave immediately, you can be here by --"

"I'm not going anywhere! It's five o'clock in the morning!" Langdon hung up and collapsed back in bed. He closed his eyes and tried to fall back asleep. It was no use. The dream was emblazoned in his mind. Reluctantly, he put on his robe and went downstairs.

Robert Langdon wandered barefoot through his deserted Massachusetts Victorian home and nursed his ritual insomnia remedy -- a mug of steaming Nestlé's Quik. The April moon filtered through the bay windows and played on the oriental carpets. Langdon's colleagues often joked that his place looked more like an anthropology museum than a home. His shelves were packed with religious artifacts from around the world -- anekuaba from Ghana, a gold cross from Spain, a cycladic idol from the Aegean, and even a rare wovenboccus from Borneo, a young warrior's symbol of perpetual youth.

Now Langdon was getting mad. "I'm sorry, but I really --"

As Langdon sat on his brass Maharishi's chest and savored the warmth of the chocolate, the bay window caught his reflection. The image was distorted and pale… like a ghost. An aging ghost, he thought, cruelly reminded that his youthful spirit was living in a mortal shell.

Langdon's friends had always viewed him as a bit of an enigma -- a man caught between centuries. On weekends he could be seen lounging on the quad in blue jeans, discussing computer graphics or religious history with students; other times he could be spotted in his Harris tweed and paisley vest, photographed in the pages of upscale art magazines at museum openings where he had been asked to lecture.

Although not overly handsome in a classical sense, the forty-five-year-old Langdon had what his female colleagues referred to as an "erudite" appeal -- wisps of gray in his thick brown hair, probing blue eyes, an arrestingly deep voice, and the strong, carefree smile of a collegiate athlete. A varsity diver in prep school and college, Langdon still had the body of a swimmer, a toned, six-foot physique that he vigilantly maintained with fifty laps a day in the university pool.

Although a tough teacher and strict disciplinarian, Langdon was the first to embrace what he hailed as the "lost art of good clean fun." He relished recreation with an infectious fanaticism that had earned him a fraternal acceptance among his students. His campus nickname -- "The Dolphin" -- was a reference both to his affable nature and his legendary ability to dive into a pool and outmaneuver the entire opposing squad in a water polo match.

Sighing, he scooped up the paper and looked at it.

The image on the page was that of a human corpse. The body had been stripped naked, and its head had been twisted, facing completely backward. On the victim's chest was a terrible burn. The man had been branded… imprinted with a single word. It was a word Langdon knew well. Very well. He stared at the ornate lettering in disbelief.

As Langdon sat alone, absently gazing into the darkness, the silence of his home was shattered again, this time by the ring of his fax machine. Too exhausted to be annoyed, Langdon forced a tired chuckle.

Instantly, a wave of nausea hit him.

"Illuminati," he stammered, his heart pounding. It can't be…

In slow motion, afraid of what he was about to witness, Langdon rotated the fax 180 degrees. He looked at the word upside down.

Wearily, he returned his empty mug to the kitchen and walked slowly to his oak-paneled study. The incoming fax lay in the tray.

God's people, he thought. Two thousand years of waiting for their Messiah, and they're still persistent as hell.

"Illuminati," he whispered.

Then, trembling, he picked up the receiver.

Stunned, Langdon collapsed in a chair. He sat a moment in utter bewilderment. Gradually, his eyes were drawn to the blinking red light on his fax machine. Whoever had sent this fax was still on the line… waiting to talk. Langdon gazed at the blinking light a long time.

Instantly, the breath went out of him. It was like he had been hit by a truck. Barely able to believe his eyes, he rotated the fax again, reading the brand right-side up and then upside down.