Cardinal Bernard had wielded that very sword to take Jerusalem from the Saracens a thousand years before, and she had personally witnessed his skill with it a few months back. While he seemed to prefer to work behind the scenes, he remained a fierce warrior.
Something to keep in mind.
“You must be worn out after your long day of study,” Father Gregory said, returning to the door. “I’ll fetch you some coffee while you wait.”
As soon as he closed the door, she crossed around to the other side of the cardinal’s desk. She studied the papers strewn across the surface, reading rapidly through them. A few months ago she would have balked at invading the cardinal’s privacy, but she had seen enough people die to preserve Bernard’s secrets.
Knowledge was power, and she would not let him hoard it.
The topmost sheet was written in Latin. She skimmed the words, translating as she went. It seemed two strigoi had attacked a nightclub in Rome, killing thirty-four people. Such open attacks were unusual, almost unheard of in modern times. Over the passing centuries, even the strigoi had learned to conceal themselves and hide the bodies of their prey.
But apparently that wasn’t true any longer.
She read through the private report on the massacre and discovered an even more disturbing detail. Among the dead was a trio of Sanguinists. She swallowed at the seeming impossibility of that.
Two strigoi had killed three trained Sanguinists?
She moved the sheet aside and read the next report, this one in English. It described a similar attack on a military base outside of London, twenty-seven armed soldiers killed at their evening mess hall.
Erin shuffled through the remainder of the pages. They documented strange and ferocious attacks across Italy, Austria, and Germany. She became so lost in the horrors of these accounts that she barely noted the office door swinging open.
She raised her head.
Cardinal Bernard entered, dressed in the scarlet robes of his station. With his white hair and calm demeanor, he could easily be mistaken for someone’s kindly grandfather.
He sighed, nodding to his desk. “I see you’ve read my intelligence reports.”
She didn’t bother trying to deny her actions. “They’re light on specifics. Have you learned anything more about these attackers?”
“No,” he said as they exchanged places. He took his desk chair, and she returned to her seat. “We know their tactics are savage, undisciplined, and unpredictable.”
“How about witnesses?”
“So far, they’ve left no survivors. But from this latest attack, at the discotheque, we were able to obtain surveillance footage.”
Erin sat straighter.
“It is quite gruesome,” he warned, tilting his computer monitor toward her.
She leaned forward. “Show me.”
He opened a file, and soon grainy footage showed a handful of dancers moving around on a dark floor. Lights strobed, and though the footage had no audio, she could imagine the heavy bass beat of that music.
“Watch these two,” Bernard said, pointing.
He indicated two men, both dressed in dark clothing, at the edge of the screen. They moved slowly out onto the dance floor. One had white skin, one black. She squinted closer, studying the dark figure. The video quality was too poor to pick out features, but it seemed as if his skin drank in the light. His face looked unnatural somehow, more like a mask than human skin.
As if the dancers sensed the hunters in their midst, the small crowd parted, keeping a ragged circle of free space around the two creatures. They were right to be wary. A moment later, the two strigoi lashed out, moving so quickly that their images blurred on the screen. She had never seen strigoi move at such speeds.
In less than ten seconds, only the two strigoi remained standing. Broken and bloody bodies lay at their feet. Each figure picked up a wounded woman from the floor, slung her over his shoulder, and disappeared out of the frame.
Erin shuddered to think what lay in wait for those poor girls.
The cardinal tapped a key, and the image froze.
Erin swallowed hard, thinking of the pain and fear those people must have felt in their final moments. None of them had stood a chance.
“Are the police looking for these killers?” she asked.
The cardinal moved his monitor back around. “They are searching, but they don’t understand what they’re hunting.”
“What do you mean?”
“The police were never allowed to see this footage. As you know, we cannot allow proof of the existence of strigoi to be revealed to the world at large.”
She sat back in her chair. “Then how can the people protect themselves?”
“We have sent additional teams out. They patrol the city night and day. We’ll find this pair of killers and destroy them. That is our sacred duty.”
Erin wondered how many innocent lives would be claimed before that happened. “Those strigoi were fast, like nothing I’ve seen before.”
The cardinal grimaced. “And they aren’t the only ones. We have similar reports globally. For some reason, the strigoi have begun to change, to grow more powerful.”
“So I’ve heard, but why is this happening? Why now?”
“I don’t know for sure, but I fear that it is related to the prophecy.”
She bunched her brows, guessing what he was referring to. “That Lucifer’s shackles have somehow loosened.”
“And because of that, more evil is entering our world. A fundamental balance has begun to shift, giving additional strength to evil creatures, while sapping holy forces at the same time.”
She stared harder at the cardinal, sizing him up. “Do you feel weaker?”
He clenched one hand atop his desk. “Here, on these blessed grounds, I do not. But we have lost eighteen Sanguinists in the field over the past twelve weeks.”
Eighteen? The order had already begun fading in numbers over the past decades, much like the Catholic priesthood. The Sanguinists could not afford to lose more foot soldiers, especially if a war was coming.
“Do the attacks have any geographic pattern?” she asked. “Perhaps if we knew where all of this started, it could offer us a clue to stopping it.”
His eyes narrowed, studying her. “Dr. Granger, as usual, you always seem to hit the nail on the head.”
She sat straighter. “You figured something out.”
“We’ve been meticulously recording dates and locations of these attacks.”
“To build a database,” she said. “Smart.”
He nodded acknowledgment of her compliment and tilted his monitor toward her again. He quickly brought into view a map of Europe. Small red dots bloomed, marking attack sites. She balked at the sheer number, but she kept her focus.
“If you extrapolate backward,” Bernard said, demonstrating on the map, “it appears these attacks have been expanding outward from a single location.”
He zoomed into the epicenter of the attacks.
She read the name written there, feeling the blood sink into the pit of her gut. “Cumae… that’s where the sibyl’s temple is located.”
And where Jordan is working.
She stared over at Bernard. “Have you heard anything from Jordan and his team? Did they learn anything?”
The cardinal sank heavily into his seat. “That was the other reason I summoned you. I thought you should hear it from me first. There was an attack—”