Christian touched his pectoral cross and whispered, “Go get ’em, tiger.”
Then he ushered Sister Margaret out from behind the card catalog toward the table where Erin had left her backpack and notebook. She stared at the backpack, hating to leave it behind. Inside, sealed in a special case, was a tome more precious than all the multitudes of ancient volumes secured in the Vatican’s secret archives.
It held the Blood Gospel.
The book of prophecies had been written by Christ, inscribed in His holy blood. Only a few pages of that book had revealed themselves. She pictured those fiery lines scribing to life across those ancient blank pages. They were stanzas of cryptic prophecies. Some had already been deciphered; others still remained a mystery yet to be solved. But even more intriguing were the hundreds of blank pages that had still not revealed their hidden contents. It was rumored that those lost secrets might contain all the knowledge of the universe, of God, of the meaning of existence, and what lay beyond.
Erin found her mouth going dry even now at the thought of leaving behind such a font of knowledge. Pride also prickled through her, knowing such knowledge was meant for her. Back in the deserts of Egypt, the book had been bound to her. Its words could only be read if she held the book in her hands. So, up until this moment, she had carried it everywhere, never letting it out of her sight.
But now she must.
Nuns didn’t carry backpacks, so for her disguise to work, she would have to leave the precious tome in Christian’s capable care.
And the sooner I get this done, the sooner I can be back.
That knowledge drove her to her feet. She had a lot of ground to cover, and if she didn’t return by evening when the library closed, they would all be caught. Pushing that thought out of her head, she kept her back bowed so that no one could see her face. She took a deep breath and stepped out from behind the catalog into the quiet murmur of the library.
No one seemed to pay her any special notice as she walked slowly toward the front door. She willed herself to remain calm. Sanguinists had senses so acute that they could hear a human heartbeat. They might wonder why a nun walking through the tranquil library had a galloping heartbeat.
She passed rows of shelves and scholars seated at polished wooden tables next to stacks of books. Many of these scholars had waited years to come to this place. They were bent reverently over their tasks, as devout as any priest. She had once been no different from them — until she’d discovered an alternate, deeper vein of history. Well-known texts and familiar paths no longer contented her.
That was just as well. Such ordinary scholarly ways were no longer open to her. She had recently been dismissed from her post at Stanford University following the death of a student on a dig in Israel. She knew that she should be preparing for her future, worrying about her long-term career, but none of that mattered. If she and the others didn’t succeed, no one would have a future to worry about.
She pushed open the heavy library door and stepped out into a bright Italian afternoon. The spring sunshine felt good against her face, but she didn’t have time to linger and enjoy it. She quickened her pace, hurrying through the Holy City toward St. Peter’s Basilica. Tourists were all around, consulting maps and pointing.
They slowed her down, but eventually she reached the grand and imposing basilica. The building symbolized papal power, and no one looking upon it could fail to recognize its strength and grandeur. Even knowing its stern purpose, the beauty of its façade and its massive domes always filled her with awe.
She made straight for the giant doors and passed unchallenged between marble columns so tall that they spanned two floors. As she strode through the atrium and into the nave of the massive basilica itself, she cast a glance at Michelangelo’s Pietà on her right, a sorrowful sculpture of Mary cradling her son’s dead body. It served as a reminder and quickened Erin’s steps.
Many more mothers will be mourning their lost children if I fail.
Still, she had no idea what she was doing. For the past two months she had scoured the Vatican Library, searching for the truth behind the Blood Gospel’s last prophecy: Together, the trio must face their final quest. The shackles of Lucifer have been loosened, and his Chalice remains lost. It will take the light of all three to forge the Chalice anew and banish him again to his eternal darkness.
The skeptical part of her — that part that still struggled with the truth about strigoi and angels and miracles unfolding before her eyes — wondered if the task was even possible.
To reforge some ancient chalice before Lucifer broke free of Hell?
It sounded more like an ancient myth than an act to be performed in modern times.
But she was a member of the prophetic trio referenced in the Blood Gospel. The three individuals consisted of the Knight of Christ, the Warrior of Man, and the Woman of Learning. And as that learned woman, it was Erin’s supposed duty to discover the truth behind those cryptic words.
The other two members of the trio awaited her solution, keeping busy with their own tasks while she worked at the Vatican libraries, trying to find answers. Neither of them was in Rome at the moment, and she missed them both, wanting them by her side, if only as a sounding board for her multitude of theories.
Of course, it was more than that with Sergeant Jordan Stone — the Warrior of Man. In the few short months since they had first met, she had fallen for the tough and handsome soldier, with his piercing blue eyes, his easygoing humor, and his steadfast sense of duty. He could make her laugh in the most stressful moments, had saved her life countless other times.
So what was there not to love?
I don’t love that you’re not here.
It was a selfish thought, but it was also true.
During the last few weeks, he had begun to drift away from her and everything else. At first she thought that he might be upset because he had been taken away from his regular job with the army and assigned to the Sanguinists against his will. But lately she’d begun to suspect that his remoteness came from something deeper, and that she was losing him.
Doubts plagued her.
Maybe he doesn’t want the same kind of relationship that I do…
Maybe I’m not the right woman for him…
She hated even to think about that.
The third member of the trio, Father Rhun Korza, was even more problematic. The Knight of Christ was a Sanguinist. She had come to respect his strong moral code, his incredible fighting skills, and his dedication to the Church, but she also feared him. Shortly after they had met, he had drunk her blood in a moment of dire need, almost killing her in the dark tunnels under Rome. Even now, walking through St. Peter’s, she could easily recall his sharp teeth piercing her throat, the strange ecstasy of that moment, sealing forever the act as both erotic and disturbing. The memory frightened and fascinated her in equal measure.
So for now, the two remained close colleagues, though a wariness stood between them, as if both knew that the line that had been crossed in those tunnels could never be fully erased.
Maybe that’s why Rhun vanished out of Rome these past months.
She sighed, again wishing the two men were here, but knowing the task before her was hers alone. And it was a tall order. If the trio must reforge something called Lucifer’s Chalice, she must discover some clue as to the nature of that prophetic cup. She had searched the Vatican’s archives: from its subterranean crypts moldering with age to shelves high up in the Torre dei Venti, the Tower of Winds, whose very steps Galileo himself had once tread. But for all of her study, so far she had come up empty-handed. There was only one last library left for her to explore, a collection forbidden to anyone with a beating heart.