I didn’t dare try anything else with Desmond Locke, for fear of their lives more than mine. I raised my hands, slow, until I stood there like Marshall was.
“Fine,” I said, not able to hide all of the bitter anger behind the word. “You want to talk? Talk.”
Desmond Locke shook his head, looking around at the destruction in both the art studio and library halves of the entire floor.
“Not here,” he said, cocking back the top part of his gun, something within it clicking. “Whatever did this might return.”
“So where, then?” I asked, desperately hoping that the “whatever” that did all this would show his ass now.
“Come with me,” he said, falling in behind Marshall, the gun pressed close to my friend’s back. “And trust me, you don’t want to find out what happens if you don’t.”
“Do we have a choice?” I asked, starting to pick my way toward the stairs leading down through the building, but Mr. Locke didn’t respond, simply driving us down through the old building and out onto the street.
Hopefully, he wasn’t leading us all to our death.
Ten
Alexandra
I never liked being down in the Wall Street area in the evenings. Once the suits and market makers had left, the neighborhood always became a bit of a ghost town. That night, however, it was a shame because as Desmond Locke’s driver pulled up in front of an abandoned and dilapidated church that sat in the shadow of Trinity Church on Trinity Place, I would have loved there to be a crowd around so that the three of us might stand a chance of escaping into it.
Instead, Desmond Locke stepped out of the car first, then gestured us out of it with the business end of his gun.
I stared up at the old church in front of us, the building one of my great-great-grandfather’s, but one that was relatively unfamiliar to me. It was more garish than his usual design, lacking the Gothic integrity of most of Alexander’s work in Manhattan, which I suppose made it no surprise that the building looked completely abandoned.
Its heavy wooden doors were boarded over with a mishmash of slats and boards, but despite their appearance, Locke guided us toward them. Once in the shadowy arch of the cruciform base of the church, he moved to the boards blocking the door. He grabbed at one of the solid beams, then easily lifted it on a hidden pivot point, which allowed him to swing open the mass of boards, revealing a cleverly disguised entrance into the building behind them. They swung away as one, and Locke, again gesturing with the gun in his hand, forced us in through them.
Once inside, he secured the door before he turned and motioned us forward through the entryway into the church proper.
I pushed through the inner doors, but what greeted me was nothing like what I expected. The large open nave I thought would be filled with rows and rows of pews and kneelers was instead bustling with activity that gave it more of an office-warehouse vibe. The left side of the enormous area was filled with office space and cubicles behind a half wall, and people working in there. The other side was stacked high with caged-off shelves crammed with boxes, books, and sundry other items I couldn’t identify from where I stood.
I stepped into the space of the main aisle down the middle of the room, taking it all in as the four of us walked along.
“This doesn’t exactly scream church to me,” I said.
“Nor should it,” he said, continuing on. “Let’s just call this a different affiliation of mine.”
I threw him a suspicious look. “I take it my father isn’t part of this particular religious affiliation?”
Desmond Locke shook his head.
“I should say not,” he said. “And I wouldn’t exactly call the Libra Concordia a religious endeavor, although its roots can be traced back through various denominations of Christianity.”
I stopped walking. “Libra Concordia?”
“Balance,” said Marshall, stepping forward. “With one heart.”
“Very good, Mr. Blackmoore,” Locke said. “You know your Latin.”
Marshall shrugged. “Dead languages and gaming go hand in hand.”
Locke laughed at that. “Apparently, they do.”
“What is this place?” I asked.
Rory stepped over to one of the open gates of the caged-off area and reached through it for one of the boxes on the shelves. “What is all this?”
Locke reached for her hand to stop her, but Rory’s reflexes were quicker, and she pulled away before he could grab her.
“We call it the Hall of Mysteries,” he said, “for lack of anything more imaginative, and it is just that.”
“How did you accumulate it?” I asked.
“We’ve amassed a great many findings over the years, things the Church might look upon as . . . miracles.”
“Or damnation,” Marshall added. “If any part of this is what I think it is . . .”
Desmond Locke folded his hands together, the gun still in his right one, but lowered now. “And what do you think this is, Mr. Blackmoore?”
“I think you have a whole lot of what you say . . . mysteries. But if the Church caught wind of this collection of yours, it could go one of two ways.”
“And those would be . . . ?” Locke smiled.
“If I go by history,” Marshall continued, “one perception would be that anything of power could be seen to be tools of the Devil by your Church, the types of things that got people burned at the stake or flayed alive.”
“What other way would the Church react?” Rory asked. “Going with that strategy seemed to get them through the Salem witch trials just fine.”
Marshall stepped to the restricted area, raised his hands, and looped his fingers through the gate itself, eyes looking at the contents behind it. “Well, some might see all this and reckon it as definitive proof of God. Technically, everything ‘magic’ here is a miracle. Either way, I’m pretty sure the Church wouldn’t want the world to know about any of this.”
“Marsh, you’re sounding conspiracy-crazy,” Rory said. “Like tinfoil-hat territory.”
Was it, though? I turned my attention back to Desmond Locke, who was standing there looking like he was almost enjoying all of this.
“Who are your people?” I asked. “What is a Libra Concordia?”
“We are the Libra Concordia,” he said, gesturing to indicate the entirety of the activity within the church. “Long ago, the Church decided in its wisdom that while much of its trade was invested in the idea of ‘miracles,’ there was much in the world that didn’t fit with the Church itself that could also be called ‘miraculous.’”
“Magic,” I said.
“As clever as your friend here,” Locke said with a nod. “So while some thought it best to burn witches and warlocks—their books, charms—there were also those in the fold who thought it best to keep track of such things instead of destroying them. Thus was the Libra Concordia born.”
Rory laughed, but there was bitterness in it. “And the powers that be are just fine with all this? Doesn’t it amount to blasphemy in their eyes?”
Desmond Locke gave a tight smile. “Let’s just say that the ideology of some of our members does not fall in line with many of the current administrations; I hear we are quite unpopular in Vatican City.”
“So you’re outlaws,” I said. “Tsk, tsk, Mr. Locke.”
“Such an ugly word,” he said. “The early members of the Libra Concordia set about going underground centuries ago, men and women with a more . . . long-term view of what may or may not be gained by having such arcane knowledge.”