“Did you find what you were looking for?” the librarian asked with a raised eyebrow.
“I don’t know,” Athanasius said. “There are so many volumes. As you suggested, I’ll probably have to come back tomorrow to finish the rest.”
“But, of course,” the librarian said. “I’ll have them put in back now, and when you return we’ll bring them out for you again.”
“Thank you,” said Athanasius.
On his way out he passed the man who had glanced at him and was still buried in the single scroll that had occupied him during Athanasius’s entire visit.
The Artemis Wine Bar was just across the street from the library. It was an open-fronted building with outdoor dining under its wide canopy. Athanasius sat down on a straw chair at one of the small, round tables, ordered a cup of the Cappadocian special, and watched the entrance of the library.
It was almost an hour of observing patrons enter and exit the library before Athanasius saw him: the man who had been glancing at him when he first went inside. Now he was walking quickly away with his hands stuffed in the folds of his tunic, his head looking this way and that. Then a hand came out of a fold for a moment, red with the dye that Cleo had given him to pen the bogus letter he left behind. Now he knew whom the local church leaders in Ephesus had sent for the pickup, and he could follow him to John’s man and avoid wasting time and risking detection at some inn overnight.
He left a tip on the table and quickly walked out of the bar onto the street and started to follow the man with the red hands. He looked like Jesus with the nail marks in his hands, Athanasius thought as he blinked in the harsh glare of the noonday sun. The light was bouncing off the whitewashed walls and surfaces of the streets. For a moment he feared he had lost the man but then saw him glancing back his way, spotting him, then starting to run.
Athanasius ran after him, trying not to cause any more of a scene, until he almost fell upon him at a corner, where the man suddenly stopped and turned.
“Relax,” Athanasius told him, grabbing him at the shoulders. “Let’s just walk along to whomever you are walking along to and everything will—”
Before Athanasius could finish his sentence, he heard a whoosh from overhead, and an arrow suddenly struck the man in the chest and he cried out. Athanasius let go, and the man fell to the street, dead.
Athanasius looked over his shoulder in time to see a Roman with a shield strapped to his back tackle him to the ground. A rain of arrows began to fall, bouncing off the shield—or the Roman.
“You follow me if you want to live, Chiron,” the Roman said gruffly, pulling him up to his feet.
Athanasius got up and over the Roman’s head saw the archers on the rooftops. He stared. There on the roof was none other than the monster who had murdered his mother and niece back in Corinth! The scar down his face was unmistakable, and so was the recognition in his eyes as he reloaded.
“Quick!” shouted the Roman who tackled him, and now Athanasius saw armored chariots barreling down the street from both directions. “We cut through to the alley!”
Athanasius felt the Roman shove him into a rug shop, pushing him past the various rolls and stacks of carpets. The rumble of boots and chariots stopped outside.
“This way,” he said, pushing Athanasius out back into the alley.
There was a grating in the pavement, garbage strewn everywhere. The Roman pulled up the grating and barked, “Jump!”
Athanasius peered into the dark. “How far down?”
“Far enough.”
Athanasius could hear the shouts, “The alley!”
They threw themselves into the open sewer and held onto the stone rim with their fingers. The Roman had just enough time to reach out with a free hand to pull the grating back over them before a legion of troops crashed out the back door of the rug shop into the alley and fanned out.
Hanging onto the grating by his fingertips, Athanasius looked over at the Roman and suddenly saw something between his breastplate and shoulder straps—the tattoo of the Dei stamped under his right arm.
“Who are you?” he said as the rumble of chariots came barreling down the alley above.
“My name is Virtus,” the Dei man said as his legs swung up and kicked Athanasius in the stomach, causing him to lose his grip and plunge into the darkness below until he hit the bottom and blacked out.
VIII
When Athanasius opened his eyes, he found himself lying in a dank cell. Hunched over him was the man who had knocked him out. He remembered the attack on the streets above: the confrontation with the man with the stained hands, the rain of arrows from Roman snipers on the rooftops, the escape with the help of this man into these tunnels, and the Dei tattoo under his arm.
“Where am I?” Athanasius asked, sitting up.
“Where I was only weeks ago, in the tunnels beneath Ephesus,” the man who called himself Virtus said.
“You,” Athanasius said, touching the lump on his head. “You’re Dei.”
“Maybe,” the man said.
“So Rome wants me dead, but the Dei wants me alive?” Athanasius said. “Why?”
“That is a mystery to me too. I simply follow orders, Athanasius.”
“So you know who I am?”
“I’ve seen your plays in Rome,” Virtus told him. “But I missed the one here before it was shut down after Caelus died.”
That’s right, Athanasius thought. In one way he had already arrived at the source of the recent troubles. “You know how he died exactly?”
“I killed him.”
“You?”
“Not exactly. I was his bodyguard, and I failed to protect him from the Dei.”
“I thought you were Dei.”
“Now I am. I wasn’t before. I was Praetorian. Third Cohort. Then Caelus and I were captured down here.”
“Why didn’t they kill you too?”
“I was of better use to them alive,” Virtus said. “They knew I was a dead man if I showed my face to Rome after losing Caesar’s chief astrologer. So they set me up here as a Watchman in the city. When the local governor and legions got secret communications that you had escaped Rome and killed the garrison commander on Patmos, they were ordered to drag you in, kill you without question and send your head to Caesar. Nobody was to know you were alive. The Dei intercepted the orders and sent me to protect you.”
“Protect me, Virtus?” Athanasius asked. “Or to intercept me before I made contact with local church authorities?”
Virtus’s face clouded. “What are you talking about? We are the local church authorities. The man who died, I knew him from The Way here. He was a good man. You should not have involved him.”
Athanasius was confused by what Virtus was saying, or rather by Virtus’s confusion. He actually still believed the Dei and the Church were on the same side against Rome.
“Me involve him?” Athanasius said. “Listen here, Dei Praetorian. I’m the one who never should have been involved. And from what you are telling me, neither should you.”
“Then why have you brought your troubles to Ephesus, Athanasius?”
“I have a vital revelation from Rome for the bishop Timothy here and all the churches in Asia Minor.”
“A revelation you say, Clement of Rome?” Virtus said in a mocking tone. He had read the name Athanasius was using in Ephesus from the papers in his pouch, which was in the corner with his belt and daggers. “And what revelation is that?”
Athanasius told him. “The Dei is an imperial organization, run by Domitian in order to play Rome and the Church against each other in a forever war while he eliminates enemies on both sides and consolidates power.”
“Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on us!” Virtus cried out, making some movements with his hand that looked like the cross sign of the letter Chi.