Elisabeta had made him
Jordan passed the heavy leaden block to Erin’s outstretched hands. She polished away more of the soot with a grimy tablecloth.
“I don’t see any seams.” She hefted it. “And it feels solid. It looks more like a sculpture than a box.”
Rhun longed to take it from her and test the truth for himself, but he kept still.
“I bet the Germans believed there was something in there.” Jordan tapped the blast marks. “It looks like they tried to blast it again and again. That’s why the sensor readings are so high.”
Grigori jostled against Rhun, wanting to examine the object himself. If the book was still encased within this block of lead, Grigori must not have it. He placed himself between Grigori and Erin.
“Have no fear, Rhun,” Grigori said. “I have no illusion that I am part of the prophecy.”
Only now did Rhun even remember the prophecy. He had never truly believed its words, especially after Elisabeta. Yet now …
“All three of you touch it,” Grigori said. “See if it reveals itself to you.”
“Could it be that simple?” Jordan put a palm on the block.
Erin rested her smaller hand next to his.
Rhun hesitated, loath to attempt such an act in front of Grigori.
As if reading his thoughts, Grigori beckoned with one hand. His dark followers crowded into the room. Their threat made real.
Rhun placed his hand next to Jordan’s and Erin’s.
Erin stood, afraid to move.
The cold of Rhun’s hand chilled one side of her hand; the warmth of Jordan’s bathed the other. She couldn’t believe that she, who had devoted her life to science, was standing with her hand on a block of lead expecting miracles. What had happened to her over the last day and a half? If Jordan and Rhun hadn’t been standing next to her, she would have taken her hand off the block and jammed it into her pocket.
But they were there, so she stayed put, trying to convince herself that she was just humoring them, even though she knew better.
As she waited, icy cold seeped into her palm. It felt dead, like a corpse. The irrational thought would not leave her mind. The book was
She remembered the Cardinal’s words:
“Well, that was disappointing,” Jordan said, taking his hand back, the first to break the circle and admit defeat.
Rhun followed suit, and Erin hefted the block back against her chest. Would something miraculous have happened if she had only had faith?
She shook her head.
“I figured it wouldn’t be that easy,” Jordan said.
“Indeed.” Rasputin gave his personal assistant, Sergei, a meaningful look and the young acolyte backed out the door.
Erin didn’t like to think where he might be going.
“Let’s gather up the stone pieces,” Rhun said. “And be on our way.”
“Where does your
“Do you mean to break your word, Grigori? Steal the book and kill us?”
Rasputin’s feet stayed planted. “If God chose you, there is nothing I could do to stop him.”
“Great!” Jordan stepped close. “Thank you for your help and—”
Five acolytes glided up swiftly and surrounded him.
“Don’t be a fool,” Rhun warned Rasputin, his tone as calm as if they were discussing travel arrangements. “You must know that you do not have the resources here to open the Gospel.”
“I do realize that, my dear Rhun.” Rasputin smiled. A chill ran up Erin’s back that had nothing to do with the Russian weather. “Larger forces are at play than you or I.”
Sergei returned to the room.
A massive beast padded in after him, the dead come back to life.
The grimwolf growled, its ears flattened menacingly, its hackles spiked along his back.
Here was a twin to the one they had killed in the desert.
From behind the wolf, a woman stepped forward, running her fingers possessively along the flank of the monster. She tossed aside a mane of fiery hair to reveal a pale and familiar face—the woman from the forest in Germany.
The one who shot Rhun.
52
As Rhun stared, fire lanced through his chest, igniting with the memory of the silver rounds exploding into him. The woman looked so much like his Elisabeta—the silvery-gray eyes, the high cheekbones, the perfect skin, the same tilt to her chin, even the knowing smile.
But it could not be her. Rhun closed his eyes, listened to her heart. Each beat told him that this woman was not his Elisabeta, could not be her.
Rage replaced remorse. She had used her resemblance to his beloved to trick him, to try to murder him. Her forces had killed Emmanuel, had almost killed them all.
Jordan spoke, but Rhun caught only the end of the sentence. “… the visitor who pulled you away from the church earlier today?”
“I am ever a polite host,” Rasputin said.
Rhun opened his eyes and studied the impostor. The resemblance was uncanny, but false. Like everything in Rasputin’s realm, the fair face hid an evil core.
Rasputin’s followers seemed frightened of her. They crowded against the walls, leaving a circle around her, as if they did not dare to touch her.
“I see that you are quite restored, Father Korza.” The redhead smiled coldly.
Her icy eyes flicked over Erin and lingered on Jordan. Rhun heard his heartbeat quicken under her gaze.
The grimwolf at her heels snarled, its red eyes fixed on Rhun with deep hatred. It looked enough like the one in the desert of Masada to be its littermate. If so, did it know that he had killed its brother?
The woman with the wolf must have been there, too, Rhun realized. She had more than Emmanuel’s blood on her fair hands.
As if reading his thoughts, she nodded. “This sudden restoration of health. Was it perhaps the blood of your companions that fortified you so?”
“I drink only the blood of Christ.”
“Not always,” she said. “Long ago, you defiled one of my ancestors.”
“I’ve heard our guest’s story,” Rasputin said, shaking a finger at Rhun. “She has good reason to be angry at you. Since your tragic mistake with Elisabeta, one woman of each generation of the Bathory line is cursed to a lifetime of pain and servitude. Each must bear a mark to prove it.”
The stranger bared her long throat, revealing a black handprint.
Still, Rhun searched for some trickery here. Did this woman truly come from the line of Bathory? Was she a descendant of the first woman believed to be the Woman of Learning?
Reading portents of that time, Cardinal Bernard had thought Elisabeta was the prophesied Woman of
