Map of Bones

1 BEHIND THE EIGHT BALL

THE SABOTEUR had arrived.

Grayson Pierce edged his motorcycle between the dark buildings that made up the heart of Fort Detrick. He kept the bike idling. Its electric engine purred no louder than a refrigerator’s motor. The black gloves he wore matched the bike’s paint, a nickel-phosphorous compound called NPL Super Black. It absorbed more visible light, making ordinary black seem positively shiny. His cloth body suit and rigid helmet were equally shaded.

Hunched over the bike, he neared the end of the alley. A courtyard opened ahead, a dark chasm framed by the brick-and-mortar buildings that composed the National Cancer Institute, an adjunct to USAMRIID, the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases. Here the country’s war on bioterrorism was waged across sixty thousand square feet of maximum-containment labs.

Gray cut the engine but stayed seated. His left knee rested against the satchel. It held the seventy thousand dollars. He remained in the alley, avoiding the open courtyard. He preferred the dark. The moon had long set, and the sun would not rise for another twenty-two minutes. Even the stars remained clouded by the shredding tail of last night’s summer storm.

Would his ruse hold?

He subvocalized into his throat mike. “Mule to Eagle, I’ve reached the rendezvous. Proceeding on foot.”

“Roger that. We’ve got you on satellite.”

Gray resisted the urge to look up and wave. He hated to be watched, scrutinized, but the deal here was too big. He did manage to gain a concession: to take the meeting alone. His contact was skittish. It had taken six months to groom this contact, brokering connections in Libya and the Sudan. It hadn’t been easy. Money did not buy much trust. Especially in this business.

He reached down to the satchel and shouldered the money bag. Wary, he walked his bike over to a shadowed alcove, parked it, and hooked a leg over the seat.

He crossed down the alley.

There were few eyes awake at this hour, and most of those were only electronic. All of his identification had passed inspection at the Old Farm Gate, the service entrance to the base. And now he had to trust that his subterfuge held out long enough to evade electronic surveillance.

He glanced to the glowing dial on his Breitling diver’s watch: 4:45. The meeting was set for fifteen minutes from now. So much depended on his success here.

Gray reached his destination. Building 470. It was deserted at this hour, due for demolition next month. Poorly secured, the building was perfect for the rendezvous, yet the choice of venue was also oddly ironic. In the sixties, spores of anthrax had been brewed inside the building, in giant vats and tanks, fermenting strains of bacterial death, until the toxic brewery had been decommissioned back in 1971. Since then, the building had been left fallow, becoming a giant storage closet for the National Cancer Institute.

But once again, the business of anthrax would be conducted under this roof. He glanced up. The windows were all dark. He was to meet the seller on the fourth floor.

Reaching the side door, he swiped the lock with an electronic keycard supplied by his contact at the base. He carried the second half of the man’s payment over his shoulder, having wired the first half a month before. Gray also bore a foot-long plastic, carbonized dagger in a concealed wrist sheath.

His only weapon.

He couldn’t risk bringing anything else through the security gate.

Gray closed the door and crossed to the stairwell on the right. The only light on the stairs came from the red EXIT sign. He reached to his motorcycle helmet and toggled on the night-vision mode. The world brightened in tones of green and silver. He mounted the stairs and climbed quickly to the fourth floor.

At the top, he pushed through the landing’s door.

He had no idea where he was supposed to meet his contact. Only that he was to await the man’s signal. He paused for a breath at the door, surveying the space before him. He didn’t like it.

The stairwell opened at the corner of the building. One corridor stretched straight ahead; the other ran to the left. Frosted glass office doors lined the inner walls; windows slitted the other. He proceeded directly ahead at a slow pace, alert for any sign of movement.

A flood of light swept through one of the windows, washing over him.

Dazzled through his night-vision, he rolled against one wall, back into darkness. Had he been spotted? The sweep of light pierced the other windows, one after the other, passing down the hall ahead of him.

Leaning out, he peered through one of the windows. It faced the wide courtyard that fronted the building. Across the way, he watched a Humvee trundle slowly down the street. Its searchlight swept through the courtyard.

A patrol.

Would the attention spook his contact?

Cursing silently, Gray waited for the truck to finish its round. The patrol vanished momentarily, crossing behind a hulking structure that rose from the middle of the courtyard below. It looked like some rusting spaceship, but was in fact a million-liter steel containment sphere, three stories tall, mounted on a dozen pedestal legs. Ladders and scaffolding surrounded the structure as it underwent a renovation, an attempt to return it to its former glory when it was a Cold War research facility. Even the steel catwalk that had once circumnavigated the globe’s equator had been replaced.

Gray knew the giant globe’s nickname at the base.

The Eight Ball.

A humorless smile creased his lips as he realized his unlucky position.

Trapped behind the eight ball…

The patrol finally reappeared beyond the structure, slowly crossed the front of the courtyard, and rolled away.

Satisfied, Gray continued to the end of the corridor. A set of swinging double doors blocked the passage, but their narrow windows revealed a larger room beyond. He spotted a few tall, slender metal and glass tanks. One of the old labs. Windowless and dark.

His approach must have been noted.

A new light flared inside, incandescent, bright enough to require Gray to flick off his night-vision. A flashlight. It blinked three times.

A signal.

He stepped to the door and used a toe to push open one of the swinging sides. He slid through the narrow opening.

“Over here,” a voice said calmly. It was the first time Gray had heard his contact’s voice. Prior to this moment, it had always been electronically muffled, a paranoid level of anonymity.

It was a woman’s voice. The revelation piqued his wariness. He didn’t like surprises.

He followed through a maze of tables with chairs stacked on top. She sat at one of the tables. Its other chairs were still stacked atop it. Except for one. On the opposite side of the table. It shifted as she kicked one of the legs.

“Sit.”

Gray had expected to find a nervous scientist, someone out for an extra paycheck. Treason for hire was becoming more and more commonplace among the top research facilities.

USAMRIID was no exception…only a thousandfold more deadly. Each vial for sale had the capability, if properly aerosolized in a subway or bus station, to kill thousands.

And she was selling fifteen of them.

He settled into his seat, placing the satchel of money on the table.

The woman was Asian…no, Eurasian. Her eyes were more open, her skin deeply tanned to a handsome bronze. She wore a black turtlenecked bodysuit, not unlike the one he wore, hugging a slim, lithe frame. A silver pendant dangled from her neck, bright against her suit, bearing a tiny curled-dragon charm. Gray studied her. The Dragon Lady’s features, rather than taut and wary like his own, appeared bored.

Of course, the 9mm Sig Sauer pointed at his chest and equipped with a silencer might be the source of her confidence. But it was her next words that truly iced his blood.

“Good evening, Commander Pierce.”

He was startled to hear his name.

If she knew that…

He was already moving…and already too late.

The gun fired at near-point-blank range.

The impact kicked his body backward, taking the chair with him. He landed on his back, tangled in the chair legs. Pain flattened his chest, making it impossible to breathe. He tasted blood on his tongue.

Betrayed…

She stepped around the table and leaned over his sprawled form, gun still pointing, taking no chances. The silver dragon pendant dangled and flashed brightly. “I suspect you’re recording all this through your helmet, Commander Pierce. Perhaps even transmitting to Washington…to Sigma. You won’t mind if I borrow a little airtime, will you?”

He was in no position to object.

The woman leaned closer over him. “In the next ten minutes, the Guild will shut down all of Fort Detrick. Contaminate the entire base with anthrax. Payback for Sigma’s interference with our operation in Oman. But I owe your director, Painter Crowe, something more. Something personal. This is for my sister in the field, Cassandra Sanchez.”

The gun shifted to his faceplate.

“Blood for blood.”

She pulled the trigger.

FORTY-TWO MILES away, the satellite feed went dead.

“Where’s his backup?” Painter Crowe kept his voice firm, biting back a litany of curses. Panic would not serve them.

“Still ten minutes out.”

“Can you re-establish the link?”

The technician shook his head. “We’ve lost main feed from his helmet cam. But we still have the bird’s-eye of the base from the NRO sat.” The young man indicated another monitor. It showed a black-and-white overshot of Fort Detrick, centered on a courtyard of buildings.

Painter paced before the array of monitors. It had all been a trap, one directed at Sigma and aimed at him personally. “Alert Fort Detrick’s security.”

“Sir?” The question rose from his second-in-command, Logan Gregory.

Painter understood Logan’s hesitation. Only a handful of those in power knew of Sigma and the agents it employed: the President, the Joint Chiefs, and his immediate supervisors over at DARPA. After last year’s shake-up among the top brass, the organization was under intense scrutiny.

Mistakes would not be tolerated.

“I won’t risk an agent,” Painter said. “Call them in.”

“Yes, sir.” Logan crossed to a phone. The man appeared more a California surfer than a leading strategist: blond hair, tanned, fit but going a bit soft in the belly. Painter was his darker shadow, half Native American, black hair, blue eyes. But he had no tan. He didn’t know the last time he had seen the sun.

Painter wanted to sit down, lower his head to his knees. He had assumed control of the organization only eight months ago. And most of that time had been spent restructuring and shoring up security after the infiltration of the group by an international cartel known as the Guild. There had been no telling what information had been gleaned, sold, or spread during this time, so everything had to be purged and rebuilt from scratch. Even their central command had been pulled out of Arlington and moved to a subterranean warren here in Washington.

In fact, Painter had come in early this morning to unpack boxes in his new office when he had received the emergency call from satellite recon.

He studied the monitor from the NRO satellite.

A trap.

He knew what the Guild was doing. Four weeks ago, Painter had begun to put operatives into the field again, the first in more than a year. It was a tentative test. Two teams. One over in Los Alamos investigating the loss of a nuclear database…and the other in his own backyard, over at Fort Detrick, only one hour from Washington.

The Guild’s attack sought to shake Sigma and its leader. To prove that the Guild still had knowledge to undermine Sigma. It was a feint to force Sigma to pull back again, to regroup, possibly to disband. As long as Painter’s group was out of commission, the Guild had a greater chance to operate with impunity.

That must not happen.

Painter stopped his pacing and turned to his second, the question plain on his face.

“I keep getting cut off,” Logan said, nodding to the earpiece. “They’re having intermittent communication blackouts throughout the base.”

Certainly the handiwork of the Guild too…

Frustrated, Painter leaned on the console and stared at the mission’s dossier. Imprinted atop the manila file was a single Greek letter.

In mathematics, the letter, sigma represented “the sum of all parts,”, the unification of disparate sets into a whole. It was also emblematic of the organization Painter directed: Sigma Force.

Operating under the auspices of DARPA — the Department of Defense’s research and development wing — Sigma served as the agency’s covert arm out in the world, sent forth to safeguard, acquire, or neutralize technologies vital to U.S. security. Its team members were an ultrasecret cadre of ex — Special Forces soldiers who had been handpicked and placed into rigorous fast-track doctoral programs, covering a wide range of scientific disciplines, forming a militarized team of technically trained operatives.

Or in plainer language, killer scientists.

Painter opened the dossier before him. The team leader’s file fronted the record.

Dr. and Commander Grayson Pierce.

The agent’s photograph stared up at him from the upper right corner. It was the man’s mug shot from his year of incarceration at Leavenworth. Dark hair shaved to a stubble, blue eyes still angry. His Welsh heritage was evident in the sharp cheekbones, wide eyes, and strong jaw. But his ruddy complexion was all Texan, burnt by the sun over the dry hills of Brown County.

Painter didn’t bother glancing over the inch-thick file. He knew the details. Gray Pierce had joined the Army at eighteen, the Rangers at twenty-one, and served to distinction off and on the field. Then, at twenty-three, he was court-martialed for striking a superior officer. Painter knew the details and the back history of the two in Bosnia. And considering the events, Painter might have done the same. Still, rules were codified in granite among the armed forces. The decorated soldier spent one year in Leavenworth.

But Gray Pierce was too valuable to be cast aside forever.

His training and skill could not be wasted.

Sigma had recruited him three years ago, right out of prison.

Now Gray was a pawn between the Guild and Sigma.

One about to be crushed.

“I’ve got base security!” Logan said, relief ringing in his voice.

“Get them over—”

“Sir!” The technician leapt to his feet, still tethered to his console by the headset’s cord. He glanced to Painter. “Director Crowe, I’m picking up a trace audio feed.”

“What—?” Painter stepped closer to the technician. He raised a hand to hold off Logan.

The technician turned up the feed on the speakers.

A tinny voice reached them though the video feed remained fritzed.

One word formed.

“Goddamnmotherfuckingpieceofshit…”

GRAY KICKED out a heel, catching the woman in the midriff. He felt a satisfying thud of flesh, but heard nothing. His ears rang from the concussion of the slug against his Kevlar helmet. The shot had spider-webbed his faceshield. His left ear burned as the electronic bay shorted with a burst of static.

He ignored it all.

Rolling to his feet, he slipped the carbonized dagger from its wrist sheath and dove under a neighboring row of tables. Another shot, sounding like a loud cough, penetrated the ring of his ears. Wood splintered from the edge of the table.

He cleared the far side and kept a wary crouch while searching the room. His kick had caused the woman to drop her flashlight, which rolled on the floor, skittering shadows everywhere. He fingered his chest. The body blow of the assassin’s first shot still burned and ached.

But no blood.

The woman called to him from the shadows. “Liquid body armor.”

Gray dropped lower, attempting to pinpoint the woman’s location. The dive under the table had jarred his helmet’s internal heads-up display. Its holographic images flickered incoherently across the inside of his faceshield, interfering with his sightlines, but he dared not abandon the helmet. It offered the best protection against the weapon still in the woman’s hand.

That and his body suit.

The assassin was right. Liquid body armor. Developed by U.S. Army Research Laboratory in 2003. The fabric of his body suit had been soaked with a shear-thickening fluid — hard microparticles of silica suspended in a polyethylene glycol solution. During normal movement, it acted like a liquid, but once a bullet struck, the material solidified into a rigid shield, preventing penetration. The suit had just saved his life.

At least for now.

The woman spoke again, coldly calm, as she slowly circled toward the door. “I rigged the building with C4 and TNT. Easy enough since the structure’s already scheduled for demolition. The Army was nice enough to have it all prewired. It just took a minor detonator modification to change the building’s implosion to one that will cause an explosive updraft.”

Gray pictured the resulting plume of smoke and debris riding high into the early morning sky. “The vials of anthrax…” he mumbled, but it was loud enough to be heard.

“It seemed fitting to use the base’s own demolition as a toxic delivery system.”

Christ, she had turned the entire building into a biological bomb.

With the strong winds, it was not only the base at risk, but the entire town of nearby Frederick.

Gray moved. She had to be stopped. But where was she?

He edged toward the door himself now, wary of her gun, but he couldn’t let that stop him. Too much was at stake. He tried flicking on his night-vision mode, but all he earned was another snap of flame by his ear. The heads-up display continued its erratic flashing, dazzling and confusing to the eye.

Screw it.

He thumbed the catch and yanked the helmet off.

The fresh wash of air smelled moldy and antiseptic at the same time. Staying low, he carried the helmet in one hand, the dagger in the other. He reached the back wall and hurried toward the door. He could see well enough to tell the swinging door hadn’t moved. The assassin was still in the room.

But where?

And what could he do to stop her? He squeezed the handle of his knife. Gun against dagger. Not good odds.

With his helmet off, he spotted a shift of shadows near the door. He stopped, going dead still. She was crouched three feet from the door, shielded by a table.

Watery light filtered from the hallway, glowing through the windows of the swinging doors. Dawn neared, brightening the passage beyond. The assassin would have to expose herself to make her escape. For the moment, she clung to the shadows of the windowless lab, unsure if her opponent was armed or not.

Gray had to stop playing this Dragon Lady’s game.

With a roundhouse swing, he threw his helmet toward the opposite side of the lab. It landed with a crash and tinkle of glass, shattering one of the old tanks.

He ran toward her position. He only had seconds.

She popped from her hiding place, swiveling to lay down fire in the direction of the noise. At the same time, she leaped gracefully toward the door, seeming to use the recoil from her gun to propel her.

Gray could not help but be impressed — but not enough to slow him.

With his arm already cocked, he whipped his dagger through the air. Weighted and balanced to perfection, the carbonized blade flew with unerring accuracy.

It struck the woman square in the hollow of her throat.

Gray continued his headlong rush.

Only then did he realize his mistake.

The dagger bounced harmlessly away and clattered to the floor.

Liquid body armor.

No wonder the Dragon Lady knew about his body suit. She was wearing the same.

The attack, though, threw off her leap. She landed in a half crash, plainly turning a knee. But ever the skilled assassin, she never lost sight of her target.

From a step away, she aimed the Sig Sauer at Gray’s face.

And this time, he had no helmet.

WE’VE LOST all contact again,” the technician said needlessly.

Painter had heard the loud crash a moment before, then all went deadly silent on the satellite feed.

“I still have base security,” his second said by the phone.

Painter tried to piece together the cacophony he had heard over the line. “He tossed his helmet.”

The other two men stared at him.

Painter studied the open dossier in front of him. Grayson Pierce was no fool. Besides his military expertise, the man had first come to Sigma’s attention because of his aptitude and intelligence tests. He was certainly above the norm, well above, but there were soldiers with even higher scores. What had been the final factor in the decision to recruit him had been his odd behavior while incarcerated at Leavenworth. Despite the hard labor of the camp, Grayson had taken up a rigorous regimen of study: in both advanced chemistry and Taoism. This disparity in his choice of study had intrigued Painter and Sigma’s former director, Dr. Sean McKnight.

In many ways, he proved to be a walking contradiction: a Welshman living in Texas, a student of Taoism who still carried a rosary, a soldier who studied chemistry in prison. It was this very uniqueness of his mind that had won him membership into Sigma.

But such distinctiveness came with a price.

Grayson Pierce did not play well with others. He had a profound distaste for working with a team.

Like now. Going in alone. Against protocol.

“Sir?” his second persisted.

Painter took a deep breath. “Two more minutes.”

THE FIRST shot whistled past his ear.

Gray was lucky. The assassin had shot too fast, before being properly set. Gray, still in motion from his lunge, just managed to duck out of the way. A head shot was not as easy as the movies made it seem.

He tackled the woman and pinned her gun between them. Even if she fired, he would still have a good chance of surviving.

Only it would hurt like hell.

She fired, proving this last point.

The slug slammed into his left thigh. It felt like a hammer blow, bruising to the marrow. He screamed. And why the hell not? It stung like a motherfucker. But he didn’t let go. He used his anger to slam an elbow into her throat. But her body armor stiffened, protecting her.

Damn it.

She pulled the trigger again. He outweighed her, outmuscled her, but she didn’t need the strength of fist and knee. She had the might of modern artillery at her disposal. The slug sucker-punched into his gut. Pounded all the way to his spine, his breath blew out of him. She was slowly maneuvering her gun upward.

The Sig Sauer had a fifteen-round magazine. How many shots had she fired? Surely she still had enough to pound him into a pulp.

He needed to end this.

He lifted his head back and slammed his forehead into her face. But she was no novice to brawling. She turned her head, taking the blow to the side of her skull. Still, it bought him enough time to kick out at a cord trailing from the nearby table. The library lamp attached to it came crashing to the floor. Its green glass shade shattered.

Bear-hugging the woman, he rolled her over the lamp. It was too much to hope that the glass would penetrate her body suit. But that wasn’t his goal.

He heard the pop of the lamp’s bulb under their combined weight.

Good enough.

Frogging his legs under him, Gray leaped outward. It was a gamble. He flew toward the light switch beside the swinging door.

A cough of a pistol accompanied a slam into his lower back.

His neck whiplashed. His body struck the wall. As he bounded off, his hand palmed the electrical box and flipped the switch. Lights flickered across the lab, unsteady. Bad wiring.

He fell back toward the assassin.

He couldn’t hope to electrocute his nemesis. That only happened in the movies, too. That wasn’t his goal. Instead, he hoped whoever had last used the desk had left the lamp switched on.

Keeping his feet, he pivoted around.

The Dragon Lady sat atop the broken lamp, arm outstretched toward him, gun pointing. She pulled the trigger, but her aim was off. One of the windows in the swinging door shattered.

Gray stepped around to the side, moving farther out of range. The woman could not track him. She was frozen rigidly in place, unable to move.

“Liquid body armor,” he said, repeating her earlier words. “The liquid does make for a flexible suit, but it also has a disadvantage.” He stalked up to her side and relieved her of her gun. “Propylene glycol is an alcohol, a good conductor of electricity. Even a small charge, like from a broken lightbulb, will flow over a suit in seconds. And as with any assault, the suit reacts.”

He kicked her in the shin. The suit was as hard as a rock.

“Goes rigid on you.”

Her own suit had become her prison.

He searched her rapidly as she strained to move. With effort, she could make slow progress, but no more than the rusted Tin Man from The Wizard of Oz.

She gave up. Her face reddened from her strain. “You won’t find any detonator. It’s all on a timer. Set for—” Her eyes glanced down to a wristwatch. “Two minutes from now. You’ll never deactivate all the charges.”

Gray noted the number on her watch drop below 02:00.

Her life was tied to that number, too. He saw the flicker of fear in her eyes — assassin or not, she was still human, afraid of her own mortality — but the rest of her face only hardened to match her rigid suit.

“Where did you stash the vials?”

He knew she wouldn’t tell him. But he watched her eyes. For a moment, the pupils shifted slightly up, then centered on him.

The roof.

It made sense. He needed no other confirmation. Anthrax—Bacillus anthracis—was sensitive to heat. If she wanted the bloom of toxic spores to spread outward from the blast, the vials would have to be up high, caught in the initial concussive blast and jettisoned skyward. She couldn’t risk the heat of the explosion incinerating the weaponized bacterium.

Before he could move, she spat at him, hitting him on the cheek.

He didn’t bother wiping it off.

He didn’t have the time.

01:48.

He straightened and ran for the door.

“You’ll never make it!” she called after him. Somehow she knew he was going for the bio-bomb, not fleeing for his own life. And for some reason, that pissed him off. Like she knew him well enough to make that assumption.

He ran down the outer corridor and skidded into the stairwell. He pounded up the two flights to reach the roof door. The exit had been modified to meet OSHA standards. A panic bar gated the door, made for quick evacuation in case of a fire.

Panic pretty much defined this moment.

He struck the bar, initiating an alarm Klaxon, and pushed out into the dark gray of early dawn. The roof was tar and paper. Sand crunched underfoot. He scanned the area. There were too many places to hide the vials: air vents, exhaust pipes, satellite dishes.

Where?

He was running out of time.

"HE’S ON the roof!” the technician said, jabbing a finger at the monitor from the NRO satellite.

Painter leaned closer and spotted a tiny figure stepping into view. What was Grayson doing on the roof? Painter searched the immediate area. “Any sign of pursuit?”

“None that I can detect, sir.”

Logan spoke from the phone. “Base security reports a fire alarm going off in Building 470.”

“Must’ve tripped the exit alarm,” the tech interjected.

“Can you get us any closer?” Painter asked.

The technician nodded and toggled a switch. The image zoomed down atop Grayson Pierce. His helmet was gone. His left ear appeared stained, bloody. He continued to stand by the doorway.

“What is he doing?” the tech asked.

“Base security is responding,” Logan reported.

Painter shook his head, but a cold certainty iced through him. “Tell base security to stay away. Have them evacuate anyone near that building.”

“Sir?”

“Do it.”

GRAY SCANNED the roof one more time. The emergency Klaxon continued to wail. He ignored it, drawing inward. He had to think like his quarry.

He crouched low. It had rained last night. He imagined the woman had only planted the vials recently, after the downpour. He looked carefully and noted where the sand washed smooth by the rain had been disturbed. It wasn’t too difficult, as he knew she had to have passed through this door. It was the only roof access.

He trailed her steps.

They led across the roof to a hooded exhaust vent.

Of course.

The exhaust flume would serve as the perfect chimney to expel the spores as the lower levels of the building imploded, creating a toxic blowgun.

Kneeling, he spotted where she had tampered with the hood, disturbing an old layer of rust. He didn’t have the time to check for booby traps. He yanked the vent off with a grunt.

The bomb rested inside the duct. The fifteen glass vials were arrayed in a starburst around a central pellet of C4, just enough to shatter the containers. He stared at the white powder filling each tube. Biting his lower lip, he reached down and carefully lifted the bomb out of the duct’s throat. A timer counted down.

00:54.

00:53.

00:52.

Free of the ductwork, Gray straightened. He did a fast check of the bomb. It was rigged against tampering. He had no time to decipher the wires and electronics. The bomb was going to go off. He had to get it away from the building, away from the blast zone, preferably away from him.

00:41.

Only one chance.

He tucked the bomb into a nylon ditty pouch over one shoulder and stalked to the front of the building. Headlights aimed toward the building, drawn by the alarm. Base security would never reach here in time.

He had no choice.

He had to get clear…no matter his own life.

Retreating several steps from roof’s edge, he took a deep breath, then sprinted back toward the front of the building. Reaching the roof’s edge, he bounded up and leaped over the brick parapet.

He sailed out over the six-story drop.

CHRIST ALMIGHTY!” Logan exclaimed as Grayson made the leap off the roof.

“He’s numb-nuts crazy,” the tech appended, jerking to his feet.

Painter simply watched the man’s suicidal ploy. “He’s doing what he must.”

GRAY KEPT his legs under him, arms out for balance. He plummeted earthward. He prayed the laws of physics, velocity, trajectory, and vector analysis didn’t betray him.

He readied for the impact.

Two stories below and twenty yards out, the spherical roof of the Eight Ball rose up to meet him. The million-liter steel containment globe glistened with morning dew.

He twisted in midair, struggling to keep his plunge feet-first.

Then time sped up. Or he did.

His booted feet hit the surface of the sphere. The liquid body armor cemented around his ankles, protecting against a break. Momentum slammed him forward, facedown, spread-eagled. But he had not reached the center of the sphere’s roof, only the curved shell closest to Building 470.

Fingers scrabbled, but there was no grip, no traction.

His body slid down the dew-slick steel, twisting slightly askew. He spread his legs, toes dragging for friction. Then he was past the point of no return, free-falling down the sheer side.

With his cheek pressed to the steel, he didn’t see the catwalk until he struck it. His left leg hit, then his body tumbled after it. He landed on hands and knees atop the metal scaffolding that had been built around the equator of the steel globe. He shoved to his feet, legs wobbling from the strain and the terror.

He couldn’t believe he was still alive.

He searched the curve of the sphere while freeing the bio-bomb from his ditty bag. The surface of the containment globe was pocked with portholes, once used by scientists to observe their biological experiments inside. In all the years of its regular use, no pathogen had ever escaped.

Gray prayed the same held true this morning.

He glanced to the bomb in his hand: 00:18.

With no time to curse, he ran along the exterior catwalk, searching for an entry hatch. He found it half a hemisphere away. A steel door with a porthole. He sprinted to it, grabbed the handle, and tugged.

It refused to budge.

Locked.

PAINTER WATCHED Grayson tug at the hatch on the giant sphere. He noted the frantic strain, recognized and understood the urgency. Painter had seen the explosive device retrieved from the exhaust duct. He knew the mission objective of Grayson’s team: to lure out a suspected trafficker in weaponized pathogens.

Painter had no doubt what form of death lay inside the bomb.

Anthrax.

Plainly, Grayson could not defuse the device and sought to safely dispose of it.

He was having no luck.

How much time did he have?

00:18

Grayson ran again. Maybe there was another hatch. He clomped around the catwalk. He felt like he was running in ski boots, his ankles still cemented in his body suit.

He circled another half a hemisphere.

Another hatch appeared ahead.

“YOU! HOLD RIGHT THERE!”

Base security.

The fierceness and boom of the bullhorn almost made him obey.

Almost.

He kept running. A spotlight splayed over him.

“STOP OR WE’LL FIRE!”

He had no time to negotiate.

A deafening rattle of gunfire pelted the side of the sphere, a few rounds pinging off the catwalk. None were near. Warning shots.

He reached the second hatch, grabbed the handle, twisted, and tugged.

It stuck for a breath, then popped open. A sob of relief escaped him.

He pitched the device into the hollow interior of the sphere, slammed the door secure, and leaned his back against it. He slumped to his seat.

“YOU THERE! STAY WHERE YOU ARE!”

He had no intention of going anywhere. He was happy right where he was. He felt a small jolt on his back. The sphere rang like a struck bell. The device had blown inside, safely contained.

But it was only the primer cord of greater things to come.

Like the clash of titanic gods, a series of jarring explosions rocked the ground.

Boom…boom…boom…

Sequential, timed, engineered.

It was the wired demolitions of Building 470.

Even insulated on the far side of the sphere, Gray felt the slight suck of air, then a mighty whoosh of displacement as the building took its last deep breath and expelled it. A dense wall of dust and debris washed outward as the building collapsed. Gray glanced up in time to see a mighty plume of smoke and dust bloom upward, seeding high and spreading out with the wind.

But no death rode this breeze.

A final explosion thundered from the dying building. A rumble of brick and rock sounded, a stony avalanche. The ground bumped under him — then he heard a new sound.

The screech of metal.

Shoved by the explosion, its foundations shaken, two of the Eight Ball’s support legs popped and bent, as if the sphere were attempting to kneel. The whole structure tilted away from the building, toward the street.

More legs popped.

And once started, there was no stopping it.

The million-liter containment sphere toppled toward the line of security trucks.

With Gray directly under it.

He shoved up and scrabbled along the tilting catwalk, struggling to get clear of the impact. He ran several steps, but the way quickly grew too steep as the sphere continued its plummet. Catwalk became ladder. He dug his fingers into the metal framework, kicked his legs at the support struts of the railings. He fought to get out from beneath the shadow of the crushing weight of the globe.

He made one final desperate lunge, grabbing a handhold and digging in his toes.

The Eight Ball struck the front lawn of the courtyard and pounded into the rain-soaked loam. The impact traveled up the catwalk, slamming Gray from his perch. He flew several yards and landed on his back on the soft lawn. He had only been a few yards from the ground.

Sitting up, he leaned on one elbow.

The line of security trucks had retreated as the ball fell toward them.

But they would not stay gone. And he must not get caught.

Gray gained his feet with a groan and stumbled back into the pall of smoke from the collapsed building. Only now did he hear the alarms ringing throughout the base. He shed out of his body suit as he moved, transferring his identification tags to his civilian clothes beneath. He hurried to the far side of the courtyard, to the next building, to where he had left his motorcycle.

He found it intact.

Throwing a leg over the seat, he keyed the ignition. The engine purred happily to life. He reached for the throttle, then paused. Something had been hooked around his handlebar. He freed it, stared at it for a moment, then shoved it in a pocket.

Damn…

He throttled up and edged his bike to a neighboring alleyway. The path appeared clear for the moment. He hunched down, gunned the engine, and shot between the dark buildings. Reaching Porter Street, he made a sharp left turn, coming around fast, leaning out his left knee for balance. Only a couple cars shared the street. None of them appeared to be MP vehicles.

He zigzagged around them and sped off toward the more rural section of the base that surrounded Nallin Pond, a parkland region of gently rolling hills and patches of hardwood forest.

He would wait out the worst of the commotion, then slip away. For now, he was safe. Still, he felt the weight of the object in his pocket, left as decoration on his bike.

A silver chain…with a dangling dragon pendant.

PAINTER STEPPED back from the satellite console. The technician had caught Grayson’s escape by motorcycle as he appeared out of the cloud of smoke and dust. Logan was still on the phone, passing information down a series of covert channels, sounding the all-clear. Whitewashed from on high, the trouble at the base would be blamed on miscommunication, faulty wiring, decomposing munitions.

Sigma Force would never be mentioned.

The satellite tech held his earpiece in place. “Sir, I have a telephone call from the director of DARPA.” “Switch it over here.” Painter plucked up another receiver. He listened as the scrambled communication was routed.

The tech nodded to him as the dead air over the line seemed to breathe to life. Though no one spoke, Painter could almost sense his mentor and commander. “Director McKnight?” he said, suspecting the man was calling to get a mission debrief.

His suspicion proved wrong.

He heard the stress in the other’s voice. “Painter, I just received some intel out of Germany. Strange deaths at a cathedral. We need a team on the ground there by nightfall.”

“So soon?”

“Details will follow within the quarter hour. But we’re going to need your best agent to head this team.”

Painter stared over at the satellite monitor. He watched the motorcycle skim through the hills, flickering through the sparse canopy of trees.

“I may have just the man. But may I ask what the urgency is?”

“A call came in early this morning, requesting Sigma to investigate the matter in Germany. Your group has been specifically summoned.”

“Summoned? By whom?”

To have Dr. McKnight this rattled, it had to be someone as high up as the President. But once again, Painter’s supposition proved wrong.

The director explained, “By the Vatican.”

2 THE ETERNAL CITY

SO MUCH for making her lunch date.

Lieutenant Rachel Verona climbed down the narrow stairs that led deep under the Basilica of San Clemente. The excavation below the church had been under way for two months, overseen by a small team of archaeologists from the University of Naples.

“Lasciate ogni speranza…”Rachel muttered.

Her guide, Professor Lena Giovanna, the project leader, glanced back at her. She was a tall woman, mid-fifties, but the permanent crook in her back made her seem older and shorter. She offered Rachel a tired smile. “So you know your Dante Alighieri. And in the original Latin no less. Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch’entrate! Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.”

Rachel felt a twinge of embarrassment. According to Dante, those words were written on the gates of Hell. She had not meant her words to be heard, but the acoustics here left little privacy. “No offense intended, Professore.”

A chuckle answered her. “None taken, Lieutenant. I was just surprised to find someone in the military police with such fluency in Latin. Even someone working for the Carabinieri Tutela Patrimonio Culturale.”

Rachel understood the misconception. It was fairly typical to paint all the Carabinieri Corps with the same brush. Most civilians only saw the uniformed men and women guarding streets and buildings, armed with rifles. But she had entered the Corps not as a military soldier, but with a graduate degree in psychology and art history. She had been recruited into the Carabinieri Corps right out of the university, spending an additional two years at the officers’ training college studying international law. She had been handpicked by General Rende, who ran the special unit involved with the investigation of art and antiquity thefts, the Tutela Patrimonio Culturale.

Reaching the bottom of the stairs, Rachel stepped into a pool of dank water. The storm of the past few days had flooded the subterranean level. She glanced down sourly. At least it was only ankle-deep.

She wore a borrowed set of rubber boots that were too large, meant for a man. She carried her new Ferragamo pumps in her left hand, a birthday gift from her mother. She dared not leave them on the stairs. Thieves were always about. If she lost her shoes or got them soiled, she’d never hear the end of it from her mother.

Professor Giovanna, on the other hand, wore a utilitarian coverall, an attire more fitting for exploring waterlogged ruins than Rachel’s navy slacks and silk flowered blouse. But when Rachel’s pager had gone off a quarter hour ago, she had been heading over to a lunch date with her mother and sister. She’d had no time to return to her apartment and change into her carabiniere uniform. Not if she was going to have any chance of still making that lunch.

So she had come directly here, meeting up with a pair of local carabinieri. Rachel had left the military policemen up in the basilica while she performed the initial investigation into the theft.

In some regards, Rachel was glad for the temporary reprieve. She had put off for too long letting her mother know that she and Gino had broken up. In fact, her ex-boyfriend had moved out more than a month ago. Rachel could already picture the knowing disappointment in her mother’s eyes, accompanied by the usual noises that implied I told you so without coming out and actually saying it aloud. And her older sister, three years married, would be pointedly twisting that diamond wedding band on her finger and nodding her head sagely.

Neither had been pleased with Rachel’s choice of profession.

“How are you to keep a husband, you crazy girl?” her mother had intoned, throwing her arms toward heaven. “You cut your beautiful hair so short. You sleep with a gun. No man can compete with that.”

As a consequence, Rachel rarely left Rome to visit her family in rural Castel Gandolfo, where their family had settled after World War II, in the shadow of the pope’s summer residence. Only her grandmother understood her. The two had shared a love of antiquities and firearms. While growing up, Rachel had listened avidly to her stories of the war: gruesome tales laced with graveyard humor. Her nonna even kept a Nazi P-08 Luger in her bedside table, oiled and polished, a relic stolen from a border guard during her family’s flight. There was no knitting booties for that old woman.

“It’s just up ahead,” the professor said. She splashed forward toward a glowing doorway. “My students are keeping watch on the site.”

Rachel proceeded after her guide, reached the low doorway, and ducked through. She straightened into a cavelike room. Illuminated by carbide lanterns and flashlights, the vault of the roof arched overhead, constructed of hewn blocks of volcanic tufa sealed crudely with plaster. A man-made grotto. Plainly a Roman temple.

As Rachel waded into the room, she was all too conscious of the weight of the basilica overhead. Dedicated to Saint Clement in the twelfth century, the church had been built over an earlier basilica, one constructed back in the fourth century. But even this ancient church hid a deeper mystery: the ruins of a first-century courtyard of Roman buildings, including this pagan temple. Such overbuilding was not uncommon, one religion burying another, a stratification of Roman history.

Rachel felt a familiar thrill course through her, sensing the press of time as solidly as the weight of stone. Though one century buried another, it was still here. Mankind’s earliest history preserved in stone and silence. Here was a cathedral as rich as the one above.

“These are my two students from the university,” the professor said. “Tia and Roberto.”

In the semidarkness, Rachel followed the professor’s gaze and looked down, discovering the crouching forms of the young man and woman, both dark haired and similarly attired in soiled coveralls. They had been tagging bits of broken pottery and now rose to greet them. Still grasping her shoes in one hand, Rachel shook their hands. While of university age, the two appeared no older than fifteen. Then again, maybe it was because she’d just celebrated her thirtieth birthday, and everyone seemed to be growing younger except her.

“Over here,” the professor said, and led Rachel to an alcove in the far wall. “The thieves must have struck during last night’s storm.”

Professor Giovanna pointed her flashlight at a marble figure standing in a far niche. It stood a meter tall — or would have if the head weren’t missing. All that remained was a torso, legs, and a protruding stone phallus. A Roman fertility god.

The professor shook her head. “A tragedy. It was the only piece of intact statuary discovered here.”

Rachel understood the woman’s frustration. Reaching out, she ran her free hand over the stump of the statue’s neck. Her fingers felt a familiar roughness. “Hacksaw,” she mumbled.

It was the tool of the modern-day graverobber, easy to conceal and wield. With just such a simple instrument, thieves had stolen, damaged, and vandalized artwork across Rome. It took only moments for the theft to occur, done many times in plain sight, often while a curator’s back was turned. And the reward was well worth the risk. Trafficking in stolen antiquities had proved a lucrative business, surpassed only by narcotics, money laundering, and arms dealing. As such, the military had formed the Comando Carabinieri Tutela Patrimonio Culturale, the Cultural Heritage Police, back in 1992. Working alongside Interpol, they sought to stem this tide.

Rachel crouched before the statue and felt a familiar burn in the pit of her stomach. By bits and pieces, Roman history was being erased. It was a crime against time itself.

“Ars longa, vita brevis,” she whispered, a quote from Hippocrates. One of her favorites. Life is short, art eternal.

“Indeed,” the professor said in a pained voice. “It was a magnificent find. The chisel work, the fine detail, the work of a master artisan. To mar it so savagely…”

“Why didn’t the bastards just steal the whole statue?” asked Tia. “At least it would’ve been preserved intact.”

Rachel tapped the statue’s phallic protuberance with one of her shoes. “Despite the convenient handle here, the artifact is too large. The thief must already have an international buyer. The bust alone would be easier to smuggle across the border.”

“Is there any hope of recovery?” Professor Giovanna asked.

Rachel did not offer any false promises. Of the six thousand pieces of antiquity stolen last year, only a handful had been recovered. “I’ll need photographs of the intact statue to post with Interpol, preferably concentrating on the bust.”

“We have a digital database,” Professor Giovanna said. “I can forward pictures by e-mail.”

Rachel nodded and kept her focus on the beheaded statue. “Or Roberto over there could just tell us what he did with the head.”

The professor’s eyes darted to the young man.

Roberto took a step back. “Wh-what?” His gaze traveled around the room, settling again on his teacher. “Professore…truly, I know nothing. This is crazy.”

Rachel kept staring at the beheaded statue — and at the one clue available to her. She had weighed the odds of playing her hand now or back at the station. But that would’ve meant interviewing everyone, taking statements, a mountain of paperwork. She closed her eyes, thinking of the lunch to which she was already late. Besides, if she had any hope of recovering the piece, speed could prove essential.

Opening her eyes, she spoke to the statue. “Did you know that sixty-four percent of archaeological thefts are abetted by workers at the site?” She turned to the trio.

Professor Giovanna frowned. “Truly you don’t think Roberto—”

“When did you discover the statue?” Rachel asked.

“T-two days ago. But I posted our discovery on the University of Naples website. Many people knew.”

“But how many people knew the site would be unguarded during last night’s storm?” Rachel kept her focus on one person. “Roberto, do you have anything to say?”

His face was a frozen mask of disbelief. “I…no…I had nothing to do with this.”

Rachel unsnapped her radio from her belt. “Then you won’t mind if we search your garret. Perhaps to turn up a hacksaw, something with enough trace marble in its teeth to match the statue here.”

A familiar wild look entered his eyes. “I…I…”

“The minimum penalty is five years in prison,” she pressed. “Obbligatorio.”

In the lamplight, he visibly paled.

“That is, unless you cooperate. Leniency can be arranged.”

He shook his head, but it was unclear what he was denying.

“You had your chance.” She raised her radio to her lips. The squawk of static echoed loudly in the arched space as she pressed the button.

“No!” Roberto raised his hand, stopping her as she suspected he would. His gaze dropped to the floor.

A long silence stretched. Rachel did not break it. She let the weight build.

Roberto finally let out a soft sob. “I…had debts…gambling debts. I had no choice.”

“Dio mio,” the professor swore, raising a hand to her forehead. “Oh Roberto, how could you?”

The student had no answer.

Rachel knew the pressure placed on the boy. It was not unusual. He was only a tiny tendril in a much larger organization, so widely spread and embedded that it could never be fully rooted out. The best Rachel could hope was to keep picking at the weeds.

She lifted the radio to her lips. “Carabiniere Gerard, I’m heading up with someone who has additional information.”

“—capitò, Tenente—”

She clicked the radio off. Roberto stood with his hands over his face, his career ruined.

“How did you know?” the professor asked.

Rachel did not bother explaining that it was not uncommon for members of organized crime to ply, petition, or coerce cooperation among site workers. Such corruption was rampant, catching up the unsuspecting, the naive.

She turned away from Roberto. It was often only a matter of discerning who in the research team was the weak spot. With the young man, she had made an educated guess, then applied pressure to see if she was correct. It had been a risk playing her hand too soon. What if it had been Tia instead? By the time Rachel was done chasing the wrong lead, Tia could have passed a warning on to her buyers. Or what if it had been Professor Giovanna, padding her university salary by selling her own discovery? There were so many ways it could’ve all gone sour. But Rachel had learned it took risk to win reward.

Professor Giovanna continued staring at her, the same question in her eyes. How had she known to accuse Roberto?

Rachel glanced to the statue’s stone phallus. It had taken only one clue — but a prominent one at that. “It’s not only the top head that sells well on the black market. There’s a huge demand for ancient art of the erotic nature. It outsells more conservative pieces almost fourfold. I suspect neither of you two women would’ve had any problem sawing off that prominent appendage, but for some reason, men are reluctant. They take it so personally.”

Rachel shook her head and crossed to the stairs leading up to the basilica. “They won’t even neuter their own dogs.”

STILL SO very, very late…

Checking her watch, Rachel hurried across the stone piazza in front of the San Clemente Basilica. She stumbled on a loose cobble, bobbled a few steps, but managed to keep her feet. She glanced back at the stone, as if it were at fault — then down to her toes.

Merda!

A wide scuff marred the outer edge of her shoe.

Rolling her eyes heavenward, she wondered which saint she had offended. By now, they must be lining up to take a number.

She continued across the plaza, avoiding a covey of bicyclists that scattered around her like frightened pigeons. She moved more cautiously, reminding herself of the wise words of Emperor Augustus.

Festina lente. Make haste slowly.

Then again, Emperor Augustus didn’t have a mother who could nag the hide off a horse.

She finally reached her Mini Cooper parked at the edge of the plaza. The midday sun cast it in blinding silver. A smile formed, the first of the day. The car was another birthday present. One to herself. You only turned thirty once in your life. It was a bit extravagant, especially upgrading to leather and opting for the S-convertible model.

But it was the joy of her life.

That might be one of the reasons Gino left her a month ago. The car inspired her far more than the man sharing her bed. It had been a good trade. The car was more emotionally available.

And then again…it was a convertible. She was a woman who appreciated flexibility — if she couldn’t get it from her man, she’d get it from her car.

Though today it was too hot to go topless.

A shame.

She unlocked the door, but before she climbed inside, her cell phone chimed at her belt.

Now what?

It was probably Carabiniere Gerard, into whose care she had just left Roberto. The student was on his way to be interrogated at Parioli Station. She squinted at the incoming phone number. She recognized the international telephone prefix—39–06—but not the number.

Why was someone from the Vatican calling her?

Rachel flipped her cell phone to her ear. “Lieutenant Verona here.”

A familiar voice answered. “How is my favorite niece doing today…besides aggravating her mother?”

“Uncle Vigor?” A smile formed. Her uncle, better known as Monsignor Vigor Verona, headed the Pontifical Institute of Christian Archaeology. But he was not calling from his university office.

“I called your mother, thinking you were with her. But it seems a carabiniere’s work follows no clock. A fact, I think, that your dear mother does not appreciate.”

“I’m on my way to the restaurant right now.”

“Or you would be…if not for my call.”

Rachel leaned a hand against her car. “Uncle Vigor, what are you—”

“I’ve already passed on your regrets to your mother. She and your sister will see you for an early dinner instead. At Il Matriciano. You’ll be paying, of course, due to the inconvenience.”

No doubt Rachel would pay — and in more ways than just in euros. “What’s this all about, Uncle?”

“I need you to join me here at the Vatican. Immediately. I’ll have a pass waiting for you at the St. Anne’s Gate.”

She checked her watch. She would have to cross half of Rome. “I’m supposed to meet with General Rende back at my station to follow up on an open investigation.”

“I’ve already spoken with your commander. He’s approved your excursion here. In fact, I have you for a full week.”

“A week?”

“Or more. I’ll explain all when you get here.” He gave her directions to where he wanted to meet. Her brow crinkled, but before she could ask more, her uncle signed off.

“Ciao, my bambina.”

Shaking her head, she climbed into her car.

A week or more?

It seemed when the Vatican spoke, even the military listened. Then again, General Rende was a family friend, going back two generations. He and Uncle Vigor were as close as brothers. It wasn’t pure chance that Rachel had been brought to the general’s attention and recruited from the University of Rome. Her uncle had been watching over her since her father had died in a bus accident fifteen years before.

Under his tutelage, she had spent many summers exploring Rome’s museums, staying with the nuns of Saint Brigida, not far from the Gregorian University, better known as il Greg, where Uncle Vigor had studied and still taught. And while her uncle might have preferred she had entered the convent and followed in his footsteps, he had recognized she was too much of a hellion for such a pious profession and encouraged her to pursue her passion. He had also instilled in her one other gift during those long summers: the respect and love of history and art, where the greatest expressions of mankind were cemented in marble and granite, oil and canvas, glass and bronze.

And now it seemed her uncle was not done with her yet.

Slipping on a pair of blue-tinted Revo sunglasses, she pulled out onto Via Labicano and headed toward the massive Coliseum. Traffic congested around the landmark, but she crisscrossed through some backstreets, narrow and lined with crookedly parked vehicles. She zipped, slipping between the gears with the skill of a Grand Prix racer. She downshifted as she approached the entrance to a roundabout where five streets converged into a mad circle. Visitors considered Roman drivers ill-tempered, short of patience, and heavy of foot. Rachel found them sluggish.

She lunged between an overloaded flatbed and a boxy Mercedes G500 utility vehicle. Her Mini Cooper appeared to be no more than a sparrow flitting between two elephants. She flicked around the Mercedes, filled the tiny space in front of it, earned the blare of a car horn, but she was already gone. She whisked off the roundabout and onto the main thoroughfare that headed toward the Tiber River.

As she raced down the wide street, she kept an eye fixed to the flow of traffic on all sides. To move safely through Roman streets required not so much caution as it did strategic planning. As a result of such particular attention, Rachel noted her tail.

The black BMW sedan swung into position, five cars back.

Who was following her — and why?

FIFTEEN MINUTES later, Rachel pulled into the entrance of an underground parking garage just outside the walls of the Vatican. As she descended, she searched the street behind her. The black BMW had vanished shortly after she had crossed the Tiber River. There was still no sign of it.

“Thank you,” she said into her cell phone. “The car is gone.”

“Are you secure?” It was the warrant officer from her station house. She had called in the tail and kept the line open.

“It appears to be.”

“Do you want a patrol sent out?”

“No need. There are carabinieri on guard on the Square. I’ll be fine from here. Ciao.”

She felt no embarrassment for calling in the false alarm. She would earn no ridicule. The Carabinieri Corps fostered a certain level of healthy paranoia among its men and women.

She found a parking space, climbed out, and locked her car. Still, she kept her cell phone in hand. She would’ve preferred her 9mm.

At the top of the ramp, she stepped out of the car park and crossed toward St. Peter’s Square. Though she approached one of the architectural masterpieces of the world, she kept a watch on the nearby streets and alleys.

There continued to be no sign of the BMW.

The car’s occupants had probably just been tourists, surveying the city’s landmarks in air-conditioned luxury rather than on foot in the blaze of the midday heat. Summer was high season, and all visitors eventually headed to the Vatican. It was most likely the very reason she thought she was being followed. Was it not said that all roads lead to Rome?

Or at least in this case, all traffic.

Satisfied, she pocketed her cell phone and crossed St. Peter’s Square, heading toward the far side.

As usual, her eyes were drawn down the length of the piazza. Across the travertine square rose St. Peter’s Basilica, built over the tomb of the martyred saint. Its dome, designed by Michelangelo, was the highest point in all of Rome. To either side, Bernini’s double colonnade swept out in two wide arcs, framing the keyhole-shaped plaza between. According to Bernini, the colonnade was supposed to represent the arms of Saint Peter reaching out to embrace the faithful into the fold. Atop these arms, one hundred and forty stone saints perched and stared down upon the spectacle below.

And a spectacle it was.

What had once been Nero’s circus continued to be a circus.

All around, voices babbled in French, Arabic, Polish, Hebrew, Dutch, Chinese. Tour groups congregated in islands around guides; sightseers stood with arms around shoulders, wearing false grins as photographs were taken; a few pious stood in the sun, Bibles open in hands, heads bowed in prayers. A tiny cluster of Korean supplicants knelt on the stones, all dressed in yellow. Throughout the square, vendors worked the crowd, selling papal coins, scented rosaries, and blessed crucifixes.

She gratefully reached the far side of the square and approached one of the five entrances to the main complex. Porta Sant’Anna. The gate nearest to her destination.

She stepped to one of the Swiss Guards. As was traditional for this gate, he was dressed in a uniform of dark blue with a white collar, topped by a black beret. He took her name, checked her identification, and glanced up and down her slender frame as if disbelieving she was a Carabinieri lieutenant. Once satisfied, he perfunctorily directed her off to the side, to one of the Vigilanza, the Vatican Police, where a laminated pass was handed to her.

“Keep it with you at all times,” the policeman warned.

Armed with her pass, she followed the line of visitors through the gate and down Via del Pellegrino.

Most of the city-state was off-limits. The only public spaces were St. Peter’s Basilica, the Vatican Museums, and the Gardens. The rest of the hundred acres were restricted without special permission.

But one section was truly forbidden territory to all but a few.

The Apostolic Palace, the home of the pope.

Her destination.

Rachel marched between the yellow-brick barracks of the Swiss Guard and the gray cliffs of St. Anne Church. Here was none of the majesty of the holiest of the holy states, just a crowded sidewalk and a congested line of cars, a gridlock inside Vatican City. Passing the papal printing office and post office, she crossed toward the entrance to the Apostolic Palace.

As she approached, she studied the gray-brick structure. It appeared more a utilitarian government building than the seat of the Holy See. But its looks were deceptive. Even the roof. It appeared drab and flat, unremarkable. But she knew atop the Apostolic Palace lay a hidden garden, with fountains, trellis-lined paths, and neatly manicured shrubs. All was masked behind a false roof, sheltering His Holiness from the casual eye below and from any assassin’s high-powered scope out in the city.

To her, it represented the Vatican at large: mysterious, secret, even slightly paranoid, but at its heart, a place of simple beauty and piety.

And perhaps the same could be said of her. While she was mostly a lapsed Catholic, only attending mass on holidays, she still had a core of faith that remained true.

Reaching the security station before the palace, Rachel showed her pass three more times to the Swiss Guards. As she did, she wondered if this was some nod back to Peter’s thrice denial of Christ before the cock crowed.

At last, she gained admission to the palace proper. A guide awaited her, an American seminary student named Jacob. He was a wiry man in his mid-twenties, his blond hair already balding, dressed in black linen slacks and a white shirt, buttoned to the top.

“If you’ll follow me, I’ve been directed to take you to Monsignor Verona.” He did a comical double take at her visitor’s pass and stuttered with surprise. “Lieutenant Verona? Are…are you related to the monsignor?”

“He’s my uncle.”

A rapid nod as he collected himself. “I’m sorry. I was only told to expect a Carabinieri officer.” He waved her to follow him. “I am a student and aide for Monsignor Verona at the Greg.”

She nodded. Most of her uncle’s students revered the man. He was deeply devoted to the Church but still maintained a strong scientific outlook. He even had a placard on the door to his university office, bearing the same inscription that once graced Plato’s door: Let no one enter who does not know geometry.

Rachel was led through the entrance to the palace. She quickly lost her way. She had only been here once before, when her uncle was being promoted to the head of the Pontifical Institute of Christian Archaeology. She had attended the private papal audience. But the place was gigantic, with fifteen hundred rooms, a thousand staircases, and twenty courtyards. Even now, rather than heading up toward the pope’s residence on the top floor, they were headed down.

She did not understand why her uncle asked her to meet him here, rather than at his university office. Had there been a theft? If so, why not tell her on the phone? Then again, she was well aware of the Vatican’s strict Code of Silence. It was written into canon law. The Holy See knew how to keep its secrets.

At last they reached a small, nondescript door.

Jacob opened it for her.

Rachel stepped through into an odd Kafkaesque chamber. Sterilely lit, the chamber was long and narrow, but its ceilings were high. Against the walls, gray steel filing cabinets and drawers climbed from floor to ceiling. A tall library ladder leaned against one wall, necessary to reach the highest drawers. Though spotlessly clean, the space smelled dusty and old.

“Rachel!” her uncle called from a corner. He stood with a priest at a desk in a corner. She was waved over. “You made good time, my dear. Then again, I’ve driven with you before. Any casualties?”

She smiled at him and crossed to the desk. She noted that her uncle was not wearing his usual outfit of jeans, T-shirt, and cardigan, but was dressed more formally, suiting his station, in a black cassock with purple piping and buttons. He’d even oiled the curls of his salt-and-pepper hair and trimmed his goatee tight to his face.

“This is Father Torres,” her uncle introduced. “Official keeper of the bones.”

The elderly man stood. He was short and stocky, dressed all in black with a Roman collar. A hint of smile ghosted his face. “I prefer the title ‘rector of the reliquiae.’”

Rachel studied the towering wall of file cabinets. She had heard of this place, the Vatican’s relic depository, but she had never been here before. She fought back a chill of revulsion. Catalogued and stored in all the drawers and shelves were bits and pieces of saints and martyrs: finger bones, snips of hair, vials of ash, scraps of garments, mummified skin, nail clippings, blood. Few people know that, by canon law, each and every Catholic altar must contain a holy relic. And with new churches or chapels being erected worldwide regularly, this priest’s job was to box and FedEx bits of bone or other earthly remains of various saints.

Rachel had never understood the Church’s obsession with relics. It simply gave her the creeps. But Rome was chock-full of them. Some of the most spectacular and unusual were found here: Mary Magdalene’s foot, the vocal cords of Saint Anthony, the tongue of Saint John Nepomucene, the gallstones of Saint Clare. Even the entire body of Pope Saint Pius X lay up in St. Peter’s, encased in bronze. The most disturbing, though, was a relic preserved in a shrine in Calcata: the supposed foreskin of Jesus Christ.

She found her voice. “Was…was something stolen here?”

Uncle Vigor lifted an arm to his student. “Jacob, perhaps you could fetch us some cappuccinos.”

“Certainly, Monsignor.”

Uncle Vigor waited until Jacob left, closing the door. His eyes then settled to Rachel. “Have you heard of the massacre in Cologne?”

Rachel was taken off guard by his question. She had been running all day long and had had little chance to watch the news, but there had been no way to avoid hearing about the midnight murders up in Germany last night. The details remained sketchy.

“Only what’s been reported on the radio,” she answered.

He nodded. “The Curia here has been receiving intelligence in advance of what’s being broadcasted. Eighty-four people were killed, including the Archbishop of Cologne. But it is the manner of their deaths that is being kept from the public for the moment.”

“What do you mean?”

“A handful were shot, but the greater majority seemed to have been electrocuted.”

“Electrocuted?”

“That is the tentative analysis. Autopsy reports are still pending. Some of the bodies were still smoking when authorities arrived.”

“Dear God. How…?”

“That answer may have to wait. The cathedral is swarming with investigators of every ilk: criminologists, detectives, forensic scientists, even electricians. There are teams with the German BKA, terrorist experts from Interpol, and agents with Europol. But as the crime took place in a Roman Catholic cathedral, sanctified territory, the Vatican has invoked its Omerta.”

“Its Code of Silence.”

He grunted the affirmative. “The Church is cooperating with German authorities, but it is also limiting access, trying to keep the scene from becoming a circus.”

Rachel shook her head. “But what does all this have to do with you calling me here?”

“From the initial investigation, there seems to be only one motive. The golden reliquary at the cathedral was broken into.”

“They stole the reliquary.”

“No, that’s just it. They left behind the solid gold box. A priceless artifact. They only stole its contents. Its relics.”

Father Torres interjected, “And not just any relics, but the bones of the biblical Magi.”

“Magi…as in the Three Wise Men from the Bible?” Rachel couldn’t keep the incredulity out of her voice. “They steal the bones, but leave the gold box. Surely the reliquary would fetch a better price on the black market than the bones.”

Uncle Vigor sighed. “At the secretary of state’s request, I came down here to evaluate the provenance of those relics. They have an illustrious past. The bones came to Europe through the relic-collecting verve of Saint Helena, the mother of Emperor Constantine. As the first Christian emperor, Constantine had sent his mother on pilgrimages to collect holy relics. The most famous being, of course, the True Cross of Christ.”

Rachel had visited the Basilica of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme, out on Lateran Hill. In a back room, behind glass, were the most famous relics collected by Saint Helena: a beam of the True Cross, a nail used to crucify Christ, and two thorns from his painful crown. There persisted much controversy as to the authenticity of these relics. Most believed Saint Helena had been duped.

Her uncle continued, “But it is not as well known that Queen Helena traveled further than Jerusalem, returning under mysterious circumstances with a large stone sarcophagus, claiming to have recovered the bodies of the Three Kings. The relics were kept in a church in Constantinople, but following the death of Constantine, they were transferred to Milan and interred in a basilica.”

“But I thought you said Germany—”

Uncle Vigor held up a hand. “In the twelfth century, Emperor Frederick Barbarossa of Germany plundered Milan and stole the relics. The circumstances surrounding this are clouded with a mix of rumors. But all stories end with the relics in Cologne.”

“Until last night,” Rachel added.

Uncle Vigor nodded.

Rachel closed her eyes. No one spoke, leaving her to think. She heard the door open to the depository. She kept her eyes closed, not wanting to lose her train of thought.

“And the murders?” she said. “Why not steal the bones when the church was empty? The act must have been meant also as a direct attack upon the Church. The violence against the congregation suggests a secondary motive of revenge — not just thievery.”

“Very good.” A new voice spoke from the doorway.

Startled, Rachel opened her eyes. She immediately recognized the robes worn by the newcomer: the black cassock with shoulder cape, the wide sash worn high around the hips, scarlet to match the skullcap. She also recognized the man inside the clothes. “Cardinal Spera,” she said, offering a bow of her head.

He waved her up, his gold ring flashing. The ring marked him as a cardinal, but he also wore a second ring, a twin of the first, on his other hand, representative of his station as the Vatican’s secretary of state. He was Sicilian, dark haired and complexioned. He was also young for such an esteemed position, not yet fifty years old.

He offered a warm smile. “I see, Monsignor Verona, that you were not wrong about your niece.”

“It would’ve been improper of me to lie to a cardinal, especially one who happens to be the pope’s right-hand man.” Her uncle crossed over, and rather than chastely kissing either of the man’s two rings, he gave him a firm hug. “How is His Holiness handling the news?”

The cardinal’s face tightened with a shake of his head. “After we met this morning, I contacted His Eminence in St. Petersburg. He will be flying back tomorrow morning.”

After we met…Rachel now understood her uncle’s formal attire. Hehad been in consultation with the secretary of state.

Cardinal Spera continued, “I’ll be arranging for his official papal response with the Synod of Bishops and the College of Cardinals. Then I have to prepare for tomorrow’s memorial service. It’s to be held at sundown.”

Rachel felt overwhelmed. While the pope was the head of the Vatican, its absolute monarch, the true power of the state rested with this one man, its official prime minister. She noted the weary glaze to his eyes, the way he held his shoulders too tightly. He was plainly exhausted.

“And has your research turned up anything here?” the cardinal asked.

“It has,” Uncle Vigor said dourly. “The thieves don’t possess all the bones.”

Rachel stirred. “There are more?”

Her uncle turned to her. “That’s what we came down here to ascertain. It seems the city of Milan, after the bones were plundered by Barbarossa, spent the past centuries clamoring for their return. To finally settle the matter, a few of the Magi bones were sent back to Milan in 1906, back to the Basilica of Saint Eustorgio.”

“Thank the Lord,” Cardinal Spera said. “So they aren’t entirely lost.”

Father Torres spoke up. “We should arrange for them to be sent here immediately. Safeguarded at the depository.”

“Until that can be arranged, I’ll have security tightened at the basilica,” the cardinal said. He motioned to Uncle Vigor. “On your return trip from Cologne, I’ll have you stop off and collect the bones in Milan.”

Uncle Vigor nodded.

“Oh, I was also able to arrange an earlier flight,” the cardinal continued. “The helicopter will take you both to the airfield in three hours.”

Both?

“All the better.” Uncle Vigor turned to Rachel. “It looks like we must disappoint your mother once again. No family dinner, it seems.”

“I’m…we’re going to Cologne?”

“As Vatican nuncios,” her uncle said.

Rachel tried to keep pace in her head. Nuncios were the Vatican’s ambassadors abroad.

“Emergency nuncios,” Cardinal Spera corrected. “Temporary, covering this particular tragedy. You are being presented as passive observers, to represent Vatican interests and report back. I need keen eyes out there. Someone familiar with thefts of antiquities.” A nod to Rachel. “And someone with a vast knowledge of those antiquities.”

“That is our cover, anyway,” Uncle Vigor said.

“Cover?”

Cardinal Spera frowned, a warning tone entering his voice. “Vigor…”

Her uncle turned to the secretary of state. “She has a right to know. I thought that had already been decided.”

“You decided.”

The two men stared each other down. Finally, Cardinal Spera sighed with a wave of an arm, relenting.

Uncle Vigor turned back to Rachel. “The nuncio assignation is just a smoke screen.”

“Then what are we—?”

He told her.

STILL STUNNED, Rachel waited for her uncle to finish a few private words with Cardinal Spera outside the doorway. Off to the side, Father Torres busied himself with shelving various volumes that had been piled on his desk.

Finally, her uncle returned. “I had hoped to grab a brioche with you, but with the timetable accelerated, we must both get ready. You should grab an overnight bag, your passport, and whatever else you might need for a day or two abroad.”

Rachel stood her ground. “Vatican spies? We’re going in as Vatican spies?”

Uncle Vigor lifted his brows. “Are you really that surprised? The Vatican, a sovereign country, has always had an intelligence service, with full-time employees and operatives. They’ve been used to infiltrate hate groups, secret societies, hostile countries, wherever the concerns of the Vatican are threatened. Walter Ciszek, a priest operating under the alias Vladimir Lipinski, played a cat-and-mouse game with the KGB for years, before being captured and spending over two decades in a Soviet prison.”

“And we’ve just been recruited into this service?”

“You’ve been recruited. I’ve worked with the intelligence service for over fifteen years.”

“What?” Rachel almost choked on the word.

“What better cover for an operative than as a well-respected and knowledgeable archaeologist in humble service to the Vatican?” Her uncle waved her out the door. “Come. Let’s see about getting everything in order.”

Rachel stumbled after her uncle, trying to see him with new eyes.

“We’ll be meeting up with a party of American scientists. Like us, they’ll be investigating the attack in secret, concentrating more on the deaths, leaving us to handle the theft of the relics.”

“I don’t understand.” That was a vast understatement. “Why all this subterfuge?”

Her uncle stopped and pulled her into a small side chapel. It was no larger than a closet, the air stagnant with old incense.

“Only a handful of people know this,” he said. “But there was a survivor to the attack. A boy. He is still in shock, but slowly recovering. He is at a hospital in Cologne, under guard.”

“He witnessed the attack?”

A nod answered her. “What he described sounded like madness, but it could not be ignored. All the deaths — or rather those that succumbed to the electrocution — occurred in a single moment. The dying collapsed where they sat or knelt. The boy had no explanation for how it occurred, but he was adamant about the who.”

“Who killed the parishioners?”

“No, who succumbed, which members of the congregation died so horribly.”

Rachel waited for an answer.

“The ones who were electrocuted, for lack of a better word, were only those who took the Holy Eucharist during the Communion service.”

“What?”

“It was the Communion host that killed them.”

A chill passed through her. If word spread that the Communion wafers were somehow to blame, it could have repercussions around the world. The entire holy sacrament could be in jeopardy. “Were the wafers poisoned, tainted somehow?”

“That’s still unknown. But the Vatican wants answers immediately. And the Holy See wants them first. And without the resources necessary for this level of clandestine investigation, especially on foreign soil, I’ve called in a chit owed to me by a friend deep within U.S. military intelligence, someone I trust fully. He will have a team on site by tonight.”

Rachel could only nod, struck dumb by the last hour’s revelations.

“I think you were right, Rachel,” Uncle Vigor said. “The murders in Cologne were a direct attack against the Church. But I believe this is just an opening gambit in a much larger game. But what game is being played?”

Rachel nodded. “And what do the bones of the Magi have to do with any of this?”

“Exactly. While you collect your things, I’m going off to the libraries and archives. I already have a team of scholars sifting through all references to the Three Kings. By the time the helicopter lifts off, I’ll have a full dossier on the Magi.” Uncle Vigor reached to her, hugged her tight, and whispered in her ear. “You can still refuse. I would think no less of you.”

Rachel shook her head, pulling back. “As the saying goes, fortes fortuna adiuvat.”

“Fortune does indeed favor the brave.” He kissed her gently on her cheek. “If I had a daughter like you—”

“You’d be excommunicated.” She kissed his other cheek. “Now let’s go.”

Her uncle led her out of the Apostolic Palace, then they parted ways, he toward the Libraries, she toward St. Anne’s Gate.

Before long and with barely any note of the passage of time, Rachel reached her parked car and climbed into the Mini Cooper. She sped out of the underground car park and squealed around a tight corner into traffic. She ticked off all she would need, while trying to keep any speculation to a minimum.

She raced over the Tiber River and headed toward the center of town. With her mind on autopilot, she failed to note when she had regained her tail. Only that it was back there again.

Her heartbeat quickened.

The black BMW kept five car lengths behind her, matching her every move around slower cars and even-slower pedestrians. She made a couple of fast turns, not enough to alert her tail that he had been spotted, just her usual controlled recklessness. She needed to know for sure.

The BMW kept pace.

Now she knew.

Damn.

She fought her way into the narrower byways and alleys. The roads were congested. It became a slow-motion car chase.

She pulled up on a sidewalk to squeeze past a stall of traffic. Edging to the next cross street, a pedestrian alley, she turned into it. Startled strollers leaped out of her way. Shopping carts spilled. Obscenities flew. A loaf of bread hit her back window, thrown by a particularly irate matron.

At the next thoroughfare, she punched into second and sped a block, then made another turn, then another. This section of Rome was a maze of alleyways. There was no way for her tail to keep up with her.

Streaming out Via Aldrovandi, she raced around the edge of the Giardino Zoological Park. She kept a watch on her rearview mirrors. She had escaped her pursuit…at least for now.

Able to free up a hand, she snatched her cell phone. She hit the speed dial for Parioli Station. She needed backup.

As the connection dialed through, she left the main thoroughfare and ducked into the backstreets again, not taking any chances. Who had she pissed off? As a member of the Cultural Heritage Police, she had a number of enemies among the organized-crime families who trafficked in stolen antiquities.

The phone line clicked, buzzed, then all she heard was dead air. She checked the phone’s screen. She had hit a patch of poor reception. The seven hills of Rome and its marble-and-brick canyons wreaked havoc on signal strength.

She hit the Redial button.

As she prayed to the patron saint of cell reception, she used the time to debate returning home and decided against it.

She would be safer at the Vatican until she left for Germany.

Merging onto Via Salaria, the old Salt Road, a main artery through Rome, she finally heard the line connect.

“Central desk.”

Before she could respond, Rachel spotted a blur of black.

The BMW whipped up alongside her Mini Cooper.

A second car appeared on her other side.

Identical, except this one was white.

She’d had not the one tail…but two. Fixed on the conspicuous black car, she had failed to spot the white one. A fatal mistake.

The two cars slammed into her, pinning her between them with a screech of metal and paint. Their back windows were already lowered. The blunt noses of submachine guns poked out.

She slammed on her brakes, metal screamed, but she was wedged tight. There was no escape.

3 SECRETS

HE HAD to get out of here.

In the gym locker room, Grayson Pierce pulled on a pair of black biker’s shorts, then slipped a loose-fitting nylon soccer jersey over his head. He sat on the bench and tied on a pair of sneakers.

Behind him, the locker room door swung open. He glanced back as Monk Kokkalis entered, a basketball under one arm and a baseball cap on backward. Standing only three inches over five feet, Monk looked like a pit bull wearing sweats. Still, he proved to be a fierce and agile ballplayer. Most people underestimated him, but he had an uncanny talent to read an opponent, to outfox any guard, and few of his layups ever missed.

Monk tossed the basketball into the equipment bin — again making a perfect shot — then crossed to his locker. He stripped off his sweatshirt, balled it up, and shoved it inside.

He eyeballed Gray. “That’s what you’re wearing to meet Commander Crowe?”

Gray stood. “I’m heading over to my folks’.”

“I thought the ops manager told us to stick to campus?”

“Screw that.”

Monk raised an eyebrow. The bushy brows were the only hair on his shaved head. He preferred to stick to the look drilled into him by the Green Berets. The man carried other physical attributes from his former military life: puckered bullet wound scars, three of them, shoulder, upper leg, and chest. He had been the only one of his team to survive an ambush in Afghanistan. During his recovery Stateside, Sigma had recruited him because of his genius-level IQ and retrained him through a doctoral program in forensic medicine.

“Have you already been cleared by medical?” Monk asked.

“Just contusions and a couple bruised ribs.” Along with a wounded ego, he added silently, fingering the tender spot below his seventh rib.

Gray had already given his videotaped debriefing. He had secured the bomb but not the Dragon Lady. The one lead into a major pipeline of bioweapons trafficking had escaped. He had sent her dragon-charm pendant down to forensics for any trace or fingerprint evidence. He didn’t expect anything to be found.

He grabbed his backpack from the bench. “I’ll have my beeper with me. I’m only fifteen minutes away by Metro.”

“And you’re going to leave the director waiting?”

Gray shrugged. He’d had enough: the postmission debriefing, the in depth medical exam, and now this mysterious summons by Director Crowe. He knew he was due for a dressing-down. He shouldn’t have gone in alone to Fort Detrick. It had been a bad call. He knew it.

But still riding the adrenaline surge from this morning’s near disaster, Gray couldn’t sit idle and simply wait. Director Crowe had gone off to a meeting over at DARPA headquarters in Arlington. There was no telling when he’d be back. In the meantime, Gray needed to move, to let off some steam.

He pulled on his small riding backpack.

“Have you heard who else has been summoned to the meeting with the director?” Monk asked.

“Who?”

“Kat Bryant.”

“Really?”

A nod.

Captain Kathryn Bryant had entered Sigma only ten months ago, but she had already completed a fast-track program in geology. There were rumors that she was also completing an engineering discipline. She would be only the second operative with a dual degree. Grayson was the first.

“Then it can’t be a mission assignation,” Gray said. “They wouldn’t send someone so green out into the field.”

“None of us is that green.” Monk grabbed a towel and headed for the showers. “She did come out of the intelligence branch of the Navy. Black ops, they say.”

“They say a lot of things,” Gray mumbled and crossed to the exit.

Despite the number of high IQs, Sigma was no less a rumor mill than any corporation. Even this morning’s summons had followed a flurry of memos and a recall of operatives. Of course, some of this activity was the direct result of Gray’s mission. The Guild had attacked one of their members. Speculation abounded. Was there a new leak, or had the ambush been planned based on old intel, prior to Sigma’s move to Washington from DARPA’s headquarters in Arlington and the purging of its operations there?

Either way, another rumor persisted in the halls of Sigma: a new mission was being planned, one commanded high up the chain, one of vital national interest. But nothing else was known.

Gray refused to play the rumor game. He would wait to hear from the commander himself. Besides, it’s not like he would be going anywhere soon. He’d be warming the bench for some time.

So he might as well meet his other obligations.

Crossing out of the gym, Gray strode through the labyrinth of hallways toward the elevator bay. The space still smelled of fresh paint and old cement.

The subterranean stronghold of Sigma central command was once an underground bunker and a fallout shelter. It had been a place to secure an important think tank during World War II, but it had long been abandoned and closed off. Few knew of its existence, buried beneath the mecca of Washington’s scientific community: the campus of museums and laboratories that made up the Smithsonian Institution.

Now the underground warren had new tenants. To the world at large, it was just another think tank. Many of its members worked at laboratories throughout the Smithsonian, doing research and utilizing the resources at hand. The new site for Sigma had been chosen because of its proximity to all the research labs, covering a wide range of disciplines. It would have been too expensive to duplicate all the varied facilities. So Sigma had been buried at the heart of Washington’s scientific community. The Smithsonian Institution became both a resource and a cover.

Gray pressed his hand on the elevator door’s security pad. A blue line scanned his palm print. The doors whooshed open. He climbed inside and pressed the top button, marked LOBBY. The cage rose silently, climbing up from the fourth level.

He sensed more than felt the scan over his body, a proprietary search for hidden electronic data. It helped aid in the prevention of information being stolen out of the command center. It had its drawbacks. During the first week here, Monk had set off a system-wide alert after absentmindedly carrying in an unauthorized MP3 digital player after an afternoon run.

The doors opened into an ordinary-looking reception area, manned by two armed guards and a female receptionist. It could pass as a bank lobby. But the amount of surveillance and state-of-the-art countermeasures rivaled those at Fort Knox. A second entrance to the bunker, a large service access, equally guarded, lay hidden in a private garage complex, half a mile away. His motorcycle was over there, being repaired. So he was hoofing it to the Metro station where he had a mountain bike stored for emergencies.

“Good morning, Dr. Pierce,” the receptionist said.

“Hello, Melody.”

The young woman was unaware of what truly lay below, believing the fabricated story of the think tank, also named Sigma. Only the guards knew the truth. They nodded to Gray.

“Are you leaving for the day?” Melody asked.

“Only for an hour or so.” He slid his holographic ID card into the reader by the desk, then pressed his thumb on the screen, signing out of the command center. He had always thought the security countermeasures here were overkill. Not any longer.

The outer door’s lock unhitched.

One of the guards opened the door, stepped out, and held it open for Gray. “Good day, sir,” the guard said as Gray exited.

Good hardly described his day so far.

A long paneled corridor stretched ahead, followed by a single flight of stairs that led up into the public regions of the building. Entering a large hall, he passed a touring group of Japanese visitors led by a translator and guide. No one gave him a second glance.

Talk about hiding in plain sight.

As he crossed the tiled floor, he heard the tour leader’s speech, spoken in rote, given a thousand times. “The Smithsonian Castle was completed in 1855, with the cornerstone being laid by President James Polk. It is the largest and oldest of the Institution’s structures and once housed the original science museum and research laboratories, but now it serves as the administrative office and Information Center for the Institution’s fifteen museums, the National Zoo, and many research sites and galleries. If you’ll follow me, next…”

Gray reached the outer doors, a side exit to the Smithsonian Castle, and pushed to freedom. He squinted at the bright sun, shielding his eyes. As he lifted his arm, he felt a twinge of protest from his ribs. The Tylenol with codeine must be wearing off.

Reaching the edge of the manicured gardens, he glanced back to the Castle. Nicknamed for its red-brick parapets, turrets, spires, and towers, it was considered one of the finest Gothic Revival structures in the United States and formed the heart of the Smithsonian Institution. The bunker had been tunneled out beneath it, built when the southwest tower had burned to the ground in 1866, requiring it to be rebuilt from the ground up. The secret labyrinth had been incorporated in the renovation, eventually becoming the subterranean fallout shelter, meant to protect the brightest minds of its generation…or at least those in Washington, D.C.

Now it hid Sigma’s central command.

With a final glance at the U.S. flag flying over the highest tower, Gray headed across the Mall, aiming for the Metro station.

He had other responsibilities besides keeping America safe.

Something he had neglected for too long.

THE TWO BMWs continued to pin the Mini Cooper. No matter how Rachel struggled, she could not pull free.

The guns in the back seats swung forward.

Before the assailants could open fire, Rachel shoved the car into park and yanked her emergency brake. The car jolted with a scream of tearing metal. Her rearview mirror shattered. The effort threw off the gunmen’s aim, but it was not enough to free her trapped car.

The BMWs continued to drag her car forward.

With her Mini Cooper now dead weight, Rachel dove for the car’s floor well, gouging her left side on the gearshift knob. A spate of gunfire shattered through the driver’s-side window, passing through where she had been sitting.

She wouldn’t be so lucky a second time.

As their speed slowed, Rachel hit the controls to her convertible roof. The windows began to lower and the cloth roof folded back. Wind whistled inside.

She prayed the momentary distraction would buy her the time she needed. Bunching her legs under her, she leaped off the center console and used the lip of the passenger door to hurdle herself through the half-open roof. The white sedan was still crammed against the passenger side. She landed atop its roof and rolled into a half crouch.

By now, their speed had slowed to less than thirty kilometers per hour.

Bullets blasted from below.

She threw herself off the roof and flew toward a line of cars parked at the edge of the road. She struck the long roof of a Jaguar and slid belly-first off its edge and landed in a teeth-jarring tumble on the far side.

Dazed, she lay still. The bulk of parked cars shielded her from the open road. Half a block away, unable to brake fast enough, the BMWs suddenly roared and, with a squeal of tires, sped off.

In the distance, Rachel heard the wha-wha of police sirens.

Rolling onto her back, she searched her belt for her cell phone. The holster was empty. She had been making a call when the attackers swiped into her.

Oh God…

She struggled up. She had no fear that the assassins would return. Already multiple cars were stopping, blocked by her Mini Cooper stalled in the road.

Rachel had a larger concern. Unlike the first time, she had caught a glimpse of the black BMW’s license plate.

SCV 03681.

She didn’t need a registration search to know where the car had originated. The special plates were only issued by one agency.

SCV stood for Stato della Città del Vaticano.

Vatican City.

Rachel struggled up, head aching. She tasted blood from a split lip. It didn’t matter. If she was attacked by someone with connections to the Vatican…

She gained her feet with her heart pounding. A driving fear fueled her strength. Another target was surely in danger.

“Uncle Vigor…”

GRAY! IS that you?”

Grayson Pierce hitched his bike over one shoulder and climbed the steps of the porch of his parents’ home, a bungalow with a wooden porch and a wide overhanging gable.

He called through the open screen door. “Yeah, Mom!”

He leaned the bike against the porch railing, earning a protest from his ribs. He had phoned the house from the Metro station, giving his mother fair warning of his arrival. He kept a Trek mountain bike locked up at the local station here for times like this.

“I have lunch almost ready.”

“What? You’re cooking?” He swung open the screen door with a pained cry of its spring hinges. It snapped closed behind him. “Will wonders never cease?”

“Don’t give me any of your lip, young man. I’m fully capable of making sandwiches. Ham and cheese.”

He crossed through the living room with its oak Craftsman furniture, a tasteful mix of modern and antique. He did not fail to note the fine coating of dust. His mother had never been much of a homemaker, spending most of her time teaching, first at a Jesuit high school back in Texas and now as an associate dean of biological sciences at George Washington University. His parents had moved out here three years ago, into the quiet historical district of Takoma Park, with its quaint Victorian homes and older shingle cottages. Gray had an apartment a couple of miles away, on Piney Branch Road. He had wanted to be close to his parents, to help out where he could.

Especially now.

“Where’s Dad?” he asked as he entered the kitchen, seeing his father was not present.

His mother closed the refrigerator door, a gallon of milk in hand. “Out in the garage. Working on another birdhouse.”

“Not another one?”

She frowned at him. “He likes it. Keeps him out of trouble. His therapist says it’s good for him to have a hobby.” She crossed with two plates of sandwiches.

His mother had come straight from her university office. She still wore her blue blazer over a white blouse, her blond-gray hair pulled back and bobby-pinned. Neat, professorial. But Gray noted the haggard edge to her eyes. She looked more drawn, thinner.

Gray took the plates. “Dad’s woodworking may help him, but does it always have to be birdhouses? There are only so many birds in Maryland.”

She smiled. “Eat your sandwiches. Do you want any pickles?”

“No.” It was the way they always were. Small talk to avoid the larger matters. But some things couldn’t be put off forever. “Where did they find him?”

“Over by the 7-Eleven on Cedar. He got confused. Ended up heading the wrong way. He had enough presence of mind to call John and Suz.”

The neighbors must have then telephoned Gray’s mother, and she in turn had called Gray, worried, half-panicked. But five minutes later, she had called again. His father was home and fine. Still, Gray knew he had better stop by for a short visit.

“Is he still taking his Aricept?” he asked.

“Of course. I make sure he does every morning.”

His father had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, the very early stages, shortly after his parents had moved out here. It had started with small bouts of forgetfulness: where he had placed his keys, telephone numbers, the names of neighbors. The doctors said the move from Texas might have brought forth symptoms that had been latent. His mind had a difficult time cataloging all the new information after the cross-country move. But stubborn and determined, he had refused to go back. Eventually along with the forgetfulness came spats of frustrated anger. Not that such a line was ever hard for his father to cross.

“Why don’t you take his plate out to him?” his mother asked. “I have to call in to the office.”

Gray reached and took the sandwiches, letting his hand rest atop hers for a moment. “Maybe we need to talk about that live-in nurse.”

She shook her head — not denying the need so much as simply refusing to discuss it. She pulled her hand from his. Gray had hit this wall before. His father would not allow it, and his mother felt it was her responsibility to care for him. But it was wearing on the household, on his mother, on their entire family.

“When was the last time Kenny came by?” he asked. His younger brother ran a computer start-up just across the border in Virginia, following in his father’s footsteps as an engineer — electrical, though, not petroleum.

“You know Kenny…” his mother said. “Let me get you a pickle for your father.”

Gray shook his head. Lately Kenny had been talking of moving to Cupertino, California. He had excuses for why the move was necessary, but beneath it all, Gray knew the truth. His brother merely wanted to escape, to get away. At least Gray understood that sentiment. He had done that himself, joining the Army. It must be a Pierce family trait.

His mother passed him the pickle jar to open. “How is everything at the lab?”

“Going fine,” he said. He cracked the lid, fished out a dill, and placed it on the plate.

“I was reading about a bunch of budget cuts over at DARPA.”

“My job’s not at risk,” he assured her. Neither of his folks knew of his role with Sigma. They thought he simply did low-level research for the military. They did not have the security clearance for the truth.

With the plate in hand, Gray headed for the back door.

His mother watched him. “He’ll be glad to see you.”

If only I could say the same….

Gray headed for the garage out back. He heard the twangs of a country music station flowing from the open door. It brought back memories of line dancing at Muleshoes. And other less pleasant recollections.

He stood at the entrance of the garage. His father crouched over a vise-gripped piece of wood, hand-planing an edge.

“Pop,” he said.

His dad straightened and turned. He was as tall as Grayson, but built stocky, wider shoulders, broader back. He had worked the oil fields while putting himself through college, earning a good practical degree in petroleum engineering. He had done well until an industrial accident at a well sheared away his left leg at the knee. The settlement and disability allowed him to retire at forty-seven.

That had been fifteen years ago.

Half of Grayson’s life. The bad half.

His father turned toward him. “Gray?” He wiped the sweat from his brow, smearing sawdust. A scowl formed. “There was no need to come all the way out here.”

“How else would these sandwiches get to you?” He lifted the plate.

“Your mother made those?”

“You know Mom. She tried her best.”

“Then I’d better eat them. Can’t discourage the habit.”

He pushed away from the workbench and hobbled stiff-legged on his prosthesis to a small fridge in the back. “Beer?”

“I have to go back to work in a bit.”

“One beer won’t kill you. I’ve some of that Sam Adams swill you like.”

His father was more of a Budweiser-and-Coors man. But the fact that he stocked his fridge with Sam Adams was about the equivalent of a pat on the back. Maybe even a hug.

He couldn’t refuse.

Gray took the bottle and used the opener built into the edge of the worktable to pop it open. His father sidled over and leaned a hip on a stool. He lifted his own bottle, a Budweiser, in salute. “It sucks to get old…but there’s always beer.”

“So true.” Gray drank deeply. He wasn’t sure he should be mixing codeine and alcohol — then again, it had been a long, long morning.

His father stared at him. The silence threatened to become quickly awkward.

“So,” Gray said, “can’t find your way home any longer.”

“Fuck you,” he responded with false anger, weakened by a grin and a shake of his head. His father appreciated honest talk. Straight shooting, as he used to say. “At least I was no goddamn felon.”

“You can’t let go of my stint in Leavenworth. That you keep remembering!”

His father tipped his beer bottle at Gray. “I will as long as I damn can.”

Their eyes met. He saw something glint behind his father’s banter, something he had seldom seen before. Fear.

The two had never had an easy relationship. His father had taken to heavy drinking after the accident, accompanied by severe bouts of depression. It was hard for a Texas oilman to suddenly become a housewife, raising two boys while his spouse went to work. To compensate, he had run the household like a boot camp. And Gray had always pushed the envelope, a born rebel.

Until at last, at eighteen, Gray had simply packed his bags and joined the Army, leaving in the middle of the night.

Afterward the two did not speak for a full two years.

Slowly his mother had brought them back together. Still, it had remained an uncomfortable détente. She had once said, “You two are more alike than you are different.” Grayson had not heard scarier words.

“This goddamn sucks…” his father said softly, breaking the silence.

“Budweiser certainly does.” Grayson lifted his beer bottle. “That’s why I only drink Sam Adams.”

His father grinned. “You’re an asshole.”

“You raised me.”

“And I suppose it takes one to know one.”

“I never said that.”

His father rolled his eyes. “Why do you even bother coming over?”

Because I don’t know how long you’ll remember me, he thought, but dared not say it aloud. There remained a tight spot behind his sternum, an old resentment that he could not completely let go. There were words he wanted to say, wanted to hear…and a part of him knew he was running out of time.

“Where did you get these sandwiches?” his father asked, taking a bite and speaking around the mouthful. “They’re pretty good.”

Gray kept his face passive. “Mom made ’em.”

A flicker of confusion followed. “Oh…yeah.”

Their eyes met again. Fear flared brighter in his father’s gaze…and shame. He had lost a part of his manhood fifteen years ago and now he faced losing his humanity.

“Pop…I…”

“Drink your beer.” He heard an edge of familiar anger, and Gray reflexively shied from it.

He drank his beer, sitting silently, neither able to speak. Maybe his mother was right. They were too much alike.

His beeper finally went off at his waist. Gray grabbed it too quickly. He saw the Sigma number.

“That’s the office,” Gray mumbled. “I…I have an afternoon meeting.”

His father nodded. “I should get back to this damn birdhouse.”

They shook hands, two uneasy adversaries conceding no contest.

Gray returned to the house, said his good-byes to his mother, and collected up his bike. He mounted it and quickly pedaled toward the Metro station. The phone number on his beeper had been followed by an alphanumeric code.

911.

An emergency.

Thank God.

THE SEARCH for the truth behind the Three Magi had turned into a painstaking archaeological dig — but instead of hauling dirt and rock, Monsignor Vigor Verona and his crew of archivists were digging through crumbling books and parchments. The crew of scrittori had done the initial spadework in the main Vatican Library; now Vigor sifted for clues about the Magi in one of the most guarded areas of the Holy See: the Archivio Segretto Vaticano, the infamous Secret Archives of the Vatican.

Vigor strode down the long subterranean hall. Each lamp clicked on as he approached and switched off as he left it behind, maintaining a pool of illumination around him and his young student, Jacob. They crossed the length of the main Manuscript Depository, nicknamed the carbonile, or bunker. Built in 1980, the concrete hall rose two stories high, each level separated by a mesh metal floor, connected by steep stairs. On one side, miles of steel shelves contained various archival regestra: bound reams of parchments and papers. On the opposite wall stood the same metal shelves, only sealed and locked behind wire doors, protecting more-sensitive material.

There was a saying about the Holy See: the Vatican had too many secrets…and not enough. Vigor doubted the latter as he strode through the vast depository. It kept too many secrets, even from itself.

Jacob carried a laptop, maintaining a database on their subject. “So there were not just three Magi?” he said as they headed toward the exit to the bunker.

They had come down here to digitize a photograph of a vase currently residing at the Kircher Museum. It had depicted not three kings, but eight. But even that number varied. A painting in the cemetery of Saint Peter showed two, and one at a crypt in Domitilla illustrated four.

“The Gospels were never specific on the number of Magi,” Vigor said, feeling the exhaustion of the long day setting in. He found it useful to talk through much of his thoughts, a firm believer in the Socratic method. “Only the Gospel of Matthew directly refers to them, and even then only vaguely. The common assumption of three comes from the number of gifts borne by the Magi: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. In fact, they might not even have been kings. The word magi comes from the Greek word magoi, or ‘magician.’”

“They were magicians?”

“Not as we might think. The connotation of magoi does not imply sorcery, but rather practitioners of hidden wisdom. Hence the ‘wise men’ reference. Most biblical scholars now believe they were Zoroastrian astrologers out of Persia or Babylon. They interpreted the stars and foresaw the coming of a king to the west, portended by a single celestial rising.”

“The Star of Bethlehem.”

He nodded. “Despite all the paintings, the star was not a particularly dramatic event. According to the Bible, no one in Jerusalem even noted it. Not until the Magi came to King Herod and brought it to his attention. The Magi had figured a newborn king, as heralded by the stars, must be born to royalty. But King Herod was shocked to hear of this news and asked them when they saw the star rise. He then used Hebrew holy books of prophecy to point out where this king might’ve been born. He directed the Magi to Bethlehem.”

“So Herod told them where to go.”

“He did, sending them as spies. Only on the way to Bethlehem, according to Matthew, the star reappeared and guided the Magi to the child. Afterward, warned by an angel, they left without telling Herod who or where the child was. Thence began the slaughter of the innocents.”

Jacob hurried to keep pace. “But Mary, Joseph, and the newborn child had already fled to Egypt, warned by an angel as well. So what became of the Magi?”

“What indeed?” Vigor had spent most of the last hour chasing down Gnostic and Apocryphal texts with references to the Magi, from the Protevangelium of James to the Book of Seth. If the bones were stolen, was there motivation beyond pure profit? Knowledge could prove their best weapon in that case.

Vigor checked his watch. He was running out of time, but the Prefect of the Archives would continue the search, building the database with Jacob, who would forward their findings via e-mail.

“What about the historical names of the Magi?” Jacob said. “Gaspar, Melchior, and Balthazar?”

“Supposition only. The names first appeared in Excerpta Latina Barbari in the sixth century. Further references follow that one, but I think they’re more fairy tales than factual accounts; still, they may be worth following. I’ll leave that for you and the Preffeto Alberto to research.”

“I’ll do my best.”

Vigor frowned. It was a daunting task. Then again, did any of this really matter? Why steal the Magi bones?

The answer eluded him. And Vigor was unsure if the truth would be found among the thirty miles of shelves that made up the Secret Archives. But one consensus had begun to form from all the clues. Factual or not, the stories of the Magi hinted at some vast wealth of hidden knowledge, known only to a certain sect of magi.

But who were they really?

Magicians, astrologers, or priests?

Vigor passed the Parchment Room, catching a fresh whiff of insecticide and fungicide. The caretakers must have just sprayed. Vigor knew that some of the rare documents in the Parchment Room were turning purple, succumbing to a resistant violet fungus and leaving them in grave danger of being lost forever.

So much else here was also threatened…and not just from fire, fungus, or neglect, but from sheer volume. Only half of the material stored here had ever been indexed. And more was added each year, flooding in from Vatican ambassadors, metropolitan sees, and individual parishes.

It was impossible to keep up.

The Secret Archives themselves had spread like a malignant cancer, metastasizing out from its original rooms into old attics, underground crypts, and empty tower cells. Vigor had spent half a year researching the files of past Vatican spies, those who came before him, agents placed in government positions around the world, many written in code, reporting on political intrigue spanning a thousand years.

Vigor knew that the Vatican was as much a political entity as a spiritual one. And enemies of both sought to undermine the Holy See. Even today. It was priests like Vigor who stood between the Vatican and the world. Warriors in secret, holding the line. And while Vigor might not agree with everything done in the past or even the present, his faith remained solid…like the Vatican itself.

He was proud of his service to the papacy.

Empires might rise and fall. Philosophies might come and go. But in the end, the Vatican persisted, abided, remained stolid and steadfast. It was history, time, and faith all preserved in stone.

Even here, many of the greatest treasures of the world were protected in the Archive’s locked vaults, safes, closets, and dark wooden cabinets called armadi. In one drawer was a letter from Mary Stuart on the day before she was beheaded; in another, the love letters between King Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn. There were documents pertaining to the Inquisition, to witch trials, to the Crusades, to letters from a khan of Persia and a Ming empress.

But what Vigor sought now was not so guarded.

It required only a long climb.

He had one more clue he wanted to investigate before he left for Germany with Rachel.

Vigor reached the small elevator to the upper rooms of the Archives, called the piani nobli, or the noble floors. He held the door for Jacob, closed it, and punched the button. With a shudder and bounce, the small cage rose.

“Where are we headed now?” Jacob asked.

“To the Torre dei Venti.”

“The Tower of the Winds? Why?”

“There is an ancient document kept up there. A copy of the Description of the World from the sixteenth century.”

“Marco Polo’s book?”

He nodded as the elevator shuddered to a stop. They exited down a long corridor.

Jacob hurried to keep up. “What do Marco Polo’s adventures have to do with the Magi?”

“In that book, he relates myths out of ancient Persia, concerning the Magi and what became of them. It all centers on a gift given to them by the Christ child. A stone of great power. Upon that stone, the Magi supposedly founded a mystical fraternity of arcane wisdom. I’d like to trace that myth.”

The corridor ended at the Tower of the Winds. The empty rooms of this tower had become incorporated into the Secret Archives. Unfortunately, the room Vigor sought was at its very top. He cursed the lack of elevator and entered the dark stair.

He abandoned further lecturing, saving his breath for the long climb. The spiral stair wound round and round. They continued in silence until at last the stairs emptied into one of the Vatican’s most unique and historic chambers.

The Meridian Room.

Jacob craned at the frescoes adorning the circular walls and ceilings, depicting scenes from the Bible with cherubs and clouds above. A single spear of light, admitted through a quarter-sized hole in the wall, pierced the dusty air and spiked down atop the room’s marble slab floor, which was carved with the signs of the zodiac. A line marking the meridian cut across the floor. The room was the sixteenth-century solar observatory used to establish the Gregorian calendar and where Galileo had attempted to prove his case that the Earth revolved around the sun.

Unfortunately he had failed — certainly a low point between the Catholic Church and the scientific community. Ever since, the Church had been trying to make up for its shortsightedness.

Vigor took a moment to slow his breathing after the long climb. He wiped sweat from his brow and directed Jacob to a neighboring chamber off the Meridian Room. A massive bookshelf covered its back wall, crammed with books and bound regestra.

“According to the master index, the book we seek should be on the third shelf.”

Jacob stepped through, tripping the wire that ran across the threshold.

Vigor heard the twang. No time for warning.

The incendiary device exploded, blowing Jacob’s body out the doorway and into Vigor.

They fell backward as a wall of flames roared outward, rolling over them, like the brimstone breath of a dragon.

4 DUST TO DUST

THE MISSION had been assigned crimson priority, black assignation, and silver security protocols. Director Painter Crowe shook his head at the color-coding. Some bureaucrat had visited a Sherwin-Williams store one too many times.

All the designations boiled down to one bottom line: Do not fail. When matters of national security were involved, there was no second place, no silver medal, no runner-up.

Painter sat at his desk and reviewed his ops manager’s report. All seemed in order. Credentials established, safe-house codes updated, equipment checks completed, satellite schedules coordinated, and a thousand other details arranged. Painter ran a finger down the projected cost analysis. He had a budget meeting next week with the Joint Chiefs.

He rubbed his eyes. This had become his life: paperwork, spreadsheets, and stress. It had been a grueling day. First the Guild ambush, now an international operation to launch. Still, a part of him thrilled at the new challenges and responsibilities. He had inherited Sigma from its founder, Sean McKnight, now director of all of DARPA. Painter refused to disappoint his mentor. All morning, the two had discussed the ambush at Fort Detrick and the upcoming mission, strategizing like old times. Sean had been surprised by Painter’s choice of team leader, but it was ultimately his decision.

So the mission was a go.

All that was left was to brief the operatives. Flight time was set for 0200. There was not much time. A private jet was already being fueled and loaded at Dulles, courtesy of Kensington Oil, a perfect cover. Painter had arranged this last himself, calling on a favor from Lady Kara Kensington. She had been amused to be helping Sigma again. “Can’t you Americans do anything by yourselves?” she had chided him.

The intercom buzzed on his desk.

He hit the button. “Go ahead.”

“Director Crowe, I have Drs. Kokkalis and Bryant here.”

“Send them in.”

A chime sounded at the door as the lock released. Monk Kokkalis pushed in first, but he held the door for Kathryn Bryant. The woman stood a head taller than the stocky former Green Beret. She moved with a leonine grace of constrained power. Her auburn hair, straight to the shoulder, was braided and as conservative as her attire: navy blue suit, white blouse, leather pumps. Her only flash of color was a jeweled pin on her lapel, a tiny frog. Gold enameled in emerald. A match to the flash of her green eyes.

Painter knew why she wore the golden pin. The frog had been a gift from an amphibious team she had once joined during a marine recon operation for naval intelligence. She had saved two men, proving her prowess with a dagger. But one teammate never came back. She wore the pin in his memory. Painter believed there was more to the story, but her files did not elaborate further.

“Please take a seat,” Painter said, acknowledging them both with a nod. “Where’s Commander Pierce?”

Monk shifted in his seat. “Gray…Commander Pierce had a family emergency. He just arrived back. He’ll be up in a moment.”

Covering for him, Painter thought. Good. It was one of the reasons he had chosen Monk Kokkalis for this mission, pairing him up with Grayson Pierce. They complemented each other’s skills — but more importantly, they suited each other’s personalities. Monk could be a tad staid, by-the-book, while Grayson was more reactionary. Still, Grayson listened to Monk, more so than any other member of Sigma. He tempered the steel in Gray. Monk had a way of joking and humoring that proved as convincing as any well-debated argument. They made a good pair.

On the other hand…

Painter noted how stiffly Kat Bryant sat, still at attention. She was not nervous, more wary with an edge of excitement. She exuded confidence. Maybe too much. He had decided to include her on this mission due to her intelligence background, more than her current study of engineering. She was experienced with protocols in the EU, especially around the Mediterranean. She knew microelectronic surveillance and counterintelligence. But more importantly, she had dealings with one of the Vatican operatives who would be jointly overseeing this investigation, Monsignor Verona. The two had worked together on an international art theft ring.

“We might as well get the paperwork out of the way while we await Commander Pierce.” Painter passed out two thick dossiers in black file jackets, one each to Bryant and Kokkalis. A third waited for Pierce.

Monk glanced at the silver? emblazoned on the folder.

“That’ll fill in all the finer details for this op.” Painter tapped the touch screen built into his desktop. The three Sony flat-panel screens — one behind his shoulder, one to the left, and one to the right — changed from panoramic views of mountain landscapes rendered in high definition to the same silver?. “I’ll be doing the mission briefing myself, rather than the usual ops manager.”

“Compartmentalizing the intel,” Kat said softly, her Southern accent softening the edges of her consonants. Painter knew she could make all trace of her accent disappear when she needed too. “Due to the ambush.”

Painter nodded. “Information is being restricted in advance of a system-wide check of our security protocols.”

“Yet we’re still going ahead with a new mission?” Monk asked.

“We have no choice. Word from—”

The buzz of the intercom interrupted. Painter hit the button.

“Director Crowe,” his secretary announced, “Dr. Pierce has arrived.”

“Send him in.”

The door chimed open, and Grayson Pierce strode inside. He wore black Levi’s dressed up with black leather shoes and a starched white shirt. His hair was slicked down, still wet from a shower.

“Sorry,” Grayson said, stopping between the two other agents. A certain hardness in his eyes belied any real sorrow. He kept a stiff posture, ready for reprimand.

And he deserved it. After the security breach, now was not the time to be thumbing his nose at command. However, a certain modicum of insubordination had always been tolerated at Sigma command. These men and women were the best of the best. You couldn’t ask them to act independently out in the field, then expect them to bend to totalitarian authority here. It required a deft hand to balance the two.

Painter stared at Grayson. With the increased security, Painter was well aware the man had received an urgent call from his mother and had checked out of the command center. Behind the stolid stare of the other, Painter noted a glassy-eyed fatigue. Was it from the ambush or his home situation? Was he even fit for this new assignment?

Grayson did not break eye contact. He simply waited.

The meeting had a purpose beyond just a briefing. It was also a test.

Painter waved to a seat. “Family is important,” he said, releasing the man. “Just don’t let your tardiness become a habit.”

“No, sir.” Grayson crossed and sat, but his eyes flicked from the emblazoned flat-screen monitors to the dossiers on his fellow agents’ laps. A crease formed between his brows. The lack of reprimand had unsettled him. Good.

Painter slid the third folder toward Grayson. “We were just starting the mission briefing.”

He took the folder. A look of wary bewilderment narrowed his eyes, but he kept silent.

Painter leaned back and tapped the screen on his desk. A Gothic cathedral appeared on the left screen, an exterior shot. An interior view appeared on the right. Bodies lay sprawled everywhere. Behind his shoulder, he knew a picture of a chalked outline marked off an altar, still bloodstained, outlining the sprawl of a murdered priest. Father Georg Breitman.

Painter watched the agents’ gazes travel over the images.

“The massacre in Cologne,” Kat Bryant said.

Painter nodded. “It occurred near the end of a midnight mass celebrating the feast day of the biblical Wise Men. Eighty-five people were killed. The motive appears to be simple robbery. The cathedral’s priceless reliquary was broken into.” Painter flicked through additional images of the golden sarcophagus and the shattered remains of its security cage. “The only items stolen were the shrine’s contents. The supposed bones of the biblical Magi.”

“Bones?” Monk asked. “They leave behind a crate of solid gold and take a bunch of bones? Who would do that?”

“That remains unknown. There was only one survivor of the massacre.” Painter brought up an image of a young man being carried out in a stretcher, another of the same man in a hospital bed, eyes open but glazed with shock. “Jason Pendleton. American. Age twenty-one. He was found hiding in a confessional booth. He was barely coherent when first discovered, but after a regimen of sedatives, he was able to give a tentative report. The party involved were robed and cloaked as monks. No faces were ID’d. They stormed the cathedral. Armed with rifles. Several people were shot, including the priest and archbishop.”

More pictures flashed across the screens: bullet wounds, more chalked outlines, a web of red yarns marking the trajectory of shots. It looked like a typical crime scene, just with an unusual backdrop.

“And how does this involve Sigma?” Kat asked.

“There were other deaths. Inexplicable deaths. To break into the security vault, the assailants employed some device that not only shattered the metal and bulletproof cage, but also, at least according to the survivor, triggered a wave of death across the cathedral.”

Painter reached out and hit a key. Across all three screens, views of various corpses appeared. The agents’ expressions remained passive. They had all seen their share of death. The bodies were contorted, heads thrown back. One image was a close-up of one of the faces. Eyes were open, corneas gone opaque, while black trails of bloody tears leached from the corners. Lips were stretched back, frozen in a rictus of agony, teeth bared, gums bleeding. The tongue was swollen, cracked, blackened at the edges.

Monk, with his medical and forensic training, shifted straighter, eyes pinched. He might play the absentminded clown, but he was a keen observer, his strongest suit.

“Full autopsy reports are in your folders,” Painter said. “The initial conclusion from the coroners is that the deaths were due to some manifestation of an epileptiform seizure. An extreme convulsive event coupled with severe hyperthermia, spiking core temperature and resulting in the complete liquefaction of the outer surfaces of the brain. All died with their hearts in a contracted state, so intensely squeezed that no blood could be found in the chambers. One man’s pacemaker had exploded in his chest. A woman with a metal pin in a femur was found with her leg still on fire, hours later, smoldering from the inside out.”

The agents kept their faces stoic, but Monk narrowed one eye and Kat’s complexion seemed to have blanched to a pale white. Even Grayson stared a bit too fixedly at the images, unblinking.

But Gray was the first to speak. “And we’re sure the deaths are connected to the device employed by the thieves.”

“As sure as we can be. The survivor reported feeling an intense pressure in his head as the device was turned on. He described it like descending in an airplane. Felt in the ears. The deaths occurred at this time.”

“But Jason lived,” Kat said, taking a deep breath.

“Some others did, too. But the unaffected were subsequently shot by the perpetrators. Slaughtered in cold blood.”

Monk stirred. “So some people succumbed, others did not. Why? Was there any commonality between the victims of the seizures?”

“Only one. A fact even noted by Jason Pendleton. The only ones to suffer the seizures appear to be those who had partaken of the Communion service.”

Monk blinked.

“It is for this reason that the Vatican made contact with U.S. authorities. And the chain of command dropped this into our laps.”

“The Vatican,” Kat said.

Painter read the understanding in her eyes. She now understood why she had been handpicked for this mission, interrupting her doctoral program in engineering.

Painter continued, “The Vatican fears repercussions if it becomes widely known that some group may be targeting the Communion service. Possibly poisoning its wafers. They want answers as soon as possible, even if it means bending international law. Your team will be working with two intelligence agents in association with the Holy See. They’ll be targeting why all this death seemed aimed to cover the theft of the bones of the Magi. Was it purely a symbolic gesture? Or was there more to the theft?”

“And our end goal?” Kat asked.

“To find out who perpetrated the crime and what device they employed. If it could kill in such a specific and targeted manner, we need to know what we’re dealing with and who controls it.”

Grayson had remained quiet, staring at the gruesome images with more of a clinical stare. “Binary poison,” he finally mumbled.

Painter glanced to the man. Their eyes matched, mirroring each other, both a stormy blue.

“What was that?” Monk asked.

“The deaths,” Grayson said, turning to him. “They were not triggered by a single event. The cause had to be twofold, requiring an intrinsic and extrinsic factor. The device — the extrinsic factor — triggered the mass seizure. But only those who had participated in the Communion service responded. So there must be an intrinsic factor as yet unknown.”

Grayson turned back to Painter. “Was any wine passed out during the service?”

“Only to a handful of the parishioners. But they also consumed the Communion bread.” Painter waited, watching the strange gears shift in the man’s head, seeing him come to a conclusion that had taken experts even longer to reach. There was a reason beyond brawn and reflex for why Grayson had caught Painter’s eye.

“The Communion bread must have been poisoned,” Grayson said. “There is no other explanation. Something was intrinsically seeded into the victims through the consumption of the hosts. Once contaminated, they were susceptible to whatever force was generated by the device.” Grayson’s eyes met Painter’s again. “Were the host wafers examined for any contamination?”

“There was not enough left in the victims’ stomach contents to analyze properly, but there were wafers left over from the service. They were sent to labs throughout the EU.”

“And?”

By now, the glassy fatigue had vanished from the man’s eyes, replaced by a laser-focused attention. He was plainly still competent for duty. But the test was not over.

“Nothing was found,” Painter continued. “All analyses showed nothing but wheat flour, water, and the usual bakery ingredients for making unleavened bread wafers.”

The crease deepened between Grayson’s brows. “That’s impossible.”

Painter heard the stubborn edge to his voice, almost belligerent. The man remained firmly confident in his assessment.

“There must be something,” Grayson pressed.

“Labs at DARPA were also consulted. Their results were the same.”

“They were wrong.”

Monk reached out a restraining arm.

Kat crossed her arms, settled on the matter. “Then there must be another explanation for—”

“Bullshit,” Grayson said, cutting her off. “The labs were all wrong.”

Painter restrained a smile. Here was the leader waiting to come out in the man: sharp of mind, doggedly confident, willing to listen but not easily swayed once his mind was set.

“You’re right,” Painter finally said.

While Monk’s and Kat’s eyes widened in surprise, Grayson merely leaned back in his seat.

“Our labs here did find something.”

“What?”

“They carbonized the sample down to its component parts and separated out all the organic components. They then removed each trace element as the mass spectrometer measured it. But after everything was stripped away, they still had a quarter of the dry weight of the host remaining on their scales. A dry whitish powder.”

“I don’t understand,” Monk said.

Grayson explained. “The remaining powder couldn’t be detected by the analyzing equipment.”

“It was sitting on the scales, but the machines were telling the technicians nothing was there.”

“That’s impossible,” Monk said. “We have the best equipment in the world here.”

“But still they couldn’t detect it.”

“The powdery substance must be totally inert,” Grayson said.

Painter nodded. “So the lab boys here tested it further. They heated it to its melting point, 1,160 degrees. It melted and formed a clear liquid that, when the temperature dropped, hardened to form a clear amber glass. If you ground the glass in a mortar and pestle, it again formed the white powder. But in every stage it remained inert, undetectable by modern equipment.”

“What can do that?” Kat asked.

“Something we all know, but in a state that was only discovered in the last couple decades.” Painter flicked to the next picture. It showed a carbon electrode in an inert gas chamber. “One of the technicians worked at Cornell University, where this test was developed. They performed a fractional vaporization of the powder coupled with emission spectroscopy. Using an electroplating technique, they were able to get the powder to anneal back to its more common state.”

He tapped up the last picture. It was a close-up of the black electrode, only it was no longer black. “They were able to get the converted substance to adhere to the carbon rod.”

The black electrode, plated now, shone under the lamp, brilliant and unmistakable.

Grayson leaned forward in his seat. “Gold.”

THE CAR’S siren wailed in Rachel’s ears. She sat in the passenger seat of the Carabinieri patrol, bruised, aching, head throbbing. But all she could feel was an icy certainty that Uncle Vigor was dead. Fear threatened to strangle her, shortening her breath and narrowing her vision.

Rachel half-heard the patrolman speaking into his radio. His vehicle had been the first on the scene of her ambush on the streets. She had refused medical care and used her authority as a lieutenant to order the man to take her to the Vatican.

The car reached the bridge spanning the Tiber River. Rachel continued to stare toward her destination. Across the channel, the shining dome of St. Peter’s appeared, rising above all else. The setting sun cast it in hues of silver and gold. But what she saw rising behind the basilica lifted her from her seat. Her hands grabbed the edge of the dashboard.

A sooty column of black smoke coiled into the indigo sky.

“Uncle Vigor…”

Rachel heard the sounds of additional sirens echoing up the river. Fire engines and other emergency vehicles.

She grabbed the patrolman’s arm. She itched to shove the man out of the way and drive herself. But she was still shaken up. “Can you go any faster?”

Carabiniere Norre nodded. He was young, new to the force. He wore the black uniform with the red stripe down the legs and silver sash across his chest. He twisted the wheel and rode up onto a sidewalk to clear past a knot of traffic. The closer they got to the Vatican, the worse the congestion became. The convergence of emergency vehicles had snarled all traffic in the area.

“Aim for St. Anne’s Gate,” she ordered.

He wheeled around and managed to cut down an alley to get them within three blocks of Porta Sant’ Anna. Directly ahead, the source of the fire became clear. Beyond the walls of Vatican City, the Tower of the Winds was the second-highest point of all of Vatican City. Its top floors blazed with flames, becoming a stone torch.

Oh no…

The tower housed a part of the Vatican Archives. She knew her uncle had been searching the libraries of the Holy See. After her attack, the fire couldn’t be a mere accident.

The car suddenly braked sharply, throwing Rachel forward in her seat restraints. Her eyes were torn away from the blazing tower.

All traffic forward was blocked.

Rachel could not wait any longer. She yanked on the door handle and began to roll out.

Fingers gripped her shoulder, restraining her. “Tenente Verona,” Carabiniere Norre said. “Here. You may need this.”

Rachel stared down at the black pistol, a Beretta 92, the man’s service weapon. She took it with a nod of thanks. “Alert the station. Let General Rende of the TPC know that I’ve returned to the Vatican. He can reach me through the Secretariat’s Office.”

He nodded. “Be careful, Tenente.”

With sirens wailing from every direction, Rachel set off on foot. She shoved the pistol into the waistband of her belt and tugged her blouse free so it hung over and hid the Beretta. Out of uniform, it would not be good to be seen running toward an emergency situation with an exposed weapon.

Crowds filled the sidewalks. Rachel took to shimmying between the cars stalled in the streets, and even slid across the hood of one to continue forward. Ahead she spotted a red municipal fire engine edging through St. Anne’s Gate. It was a narrow fit. A contingent of Swiss Guards formed a barricade to either side, on high alert. No ceremonial halberds here. Each man had an assault rifle in hand.

Rachel pushed toward the guard line.

“Lieutenant Verona with the Carabinieri Corps!” she yelled, arms up, ID in hand. “I must reach Cardinal Spera!”

Expressions remained hard, unbending. Clearly they had been ordered to block all entrance to the Holy See, closing it off to all but emergency personnel. A Carabinieri lieutenant had no authority over the Swiss Guards.

But from the back of the line, a single guard pushed forward, dressed in midnight blue. Rachel recognized him as the same guard to whom she had spoken earlier. He shoved through the line and met her.

“Lieutenant Verona,” he said. “I’ve been ordered to escort you inside. Come with me.”

He turned on a heel and led her away.

She hurried to keep up as they crossed through the gate. “My uncle…Monsignor Verona…”

“I know nothing except to escort you to the eliport.” He directed her to an electric groundskeeper’s cart parked just past the gate. “Orders from Cardinal Spera.”

Rachel climbed inside. The lumbering fire engine rolled ahead of them and entered the wide yard that fronted the Vatican Museums. It joined the other emergency vehicles, including a pair of military vehicles mounted with submachine guns.

With clearance now, the guardsman turned their cart to the right, skirting the emergency traffic jam in front of the museums. Overhead, the tower continued to blaze. From somewhere on the far side, a jet of water exploded upward, trying to reach the fiery top levels. Flames lapped from windows of the top three floors. Clouds of black smoke billowed and churned. The tower was a tinderbox, stoked with masses of books, parchments, and scrolls.

It was a disaster of vast scale. What fire didn’t destroy, water and smoke would ruin. Centuries of archives, mapping Western history, gone.

Still, Rachel found all her fears centered on one concern.

Uncle Vigor.

The cart zipped past the city’s garage and continued down a paved road. It paralleled the Leonine Wall, the stone-and-mortar cliff that enclosed Vatican City. They circled the museum complex and reached the vast gardens covering the back half of the city-state. Fountains danced in the distance. The world was painted in shades of green. It seemed too pastoral for the hellish landscape behind them of smoke, fire, and siren wails.

They continued in silence to the very back of the grounds.

Their destination appeared ahead. Tucked into a walled alcove was the Vatican heliport. Converted from old tennis courts, the airfield was little more than a vast acre of concrete and some outbuildings.

On the tarmac, a single helicopter rested on its skids, isolated from the tumult. Its blades were slowly beginning to spin, gaining speed. The engine whined. Rachel knew the solid white aircraft. It was the pope’s private helicopter, nicknamed the “Holycopter.”

She also recognized the black robe and red sash of Cardinal Spera. He stood at the open door to the passenger compartment, ducked slightly from the spinning blades. One hand held his scarlet skullcap in place.

He turned, drawn by the motion of the cart, and lifted an arm in greeting. The motor cart braked a short distance away. Rachel hardly waited for it to stop and leapt out. She hurried toward the cardinal.

If anyone knew the fate of her uncle, it would be the cardinal.

Or one other…

From the back of the helicopter, a figure stepped out and hurried toward her. She rushed to meet him and hugged him tight under the whirling blades of the helicopter.

“Uncle Vigor…” Tears ran down her face, hot, melting through the ice around her heart.

He pulled back. “You’re late, child.”

“I was distracted,” she answered.

“So I heard. General Rende passed on word of your attack.”

Rachel glanced back to the flaming tower. She smelled the smoke in his hair. His eyebrows were singed. “It seems I wasn’t the only one attacked. Thank God you’re okay.”

Her uncle’s face darkened, his voice tightened. “Unfortunately, not all were so blessed.”

She met his eyes.

“Jacob was killed in the blast. His body shielded mine, saved me.” She heard the anguish in his words, even over the roar of the helicopter. “Come, we must get away.”

He directed her to the helicopter.

Cardinal Spera nodded to her uncle. “They must be stopped,” he said cryptically.

Rachel followed her uncle into the helicopter. They strapped themselves in as the door was shoved closed. The thick insulation muffled a good portion of the engine noise, but Rachel heard the helicopter rev up. It immediately lifted from its skids and rose smoothly into the air.

Uncle Vigor settled against his seatback, head bowed, eyes closed. His lips trembled, speaking a silent prayer. For Jacob…perhaps for themselves.

Rachel waited until he opened his eyes. By then, they were winging away from the Vatican and out over the Tiber. “The attackers,” Rachel began, “…they were driving vehicles with Vatican license plates.”

Her uncle nodded, unsurprised. “It seems that the Vatican not only has spies abroad, but is also spied against within its own midst.”

“Who—?”

With a groan, Uncle Vigor cut her off. He sat straighter, reached into his jacket, and removed a folded slip of paper. He passed it to her. “The survivor of the Cologne massacre described this for a sketch artist. He saw it embroidered on the chest of one of the attackers.”

Rachel unfolded the slip of paper. Drawn in surprising detail was the coiled figure of a red dragon, wings blazed out, tail twisted and serpentine, wrapped around its own neck.

She lowered the drawing and glanced to her uncle.

“An ancient symbol,” her uncle said. “Dating back to the fourteenth century.”

“Symbol of what?”

“The Dragon Court.”

Rachel shook her head, not recognizing the name.

“They are a medieval alchemical cult created by a schism in the early Church, the same schism that saw the rise of popes and antipopes.”

Rachel was familiar with the reign of Vatican antipopes, men who sat as head of the Catholic Church but whose election was later declared uncanonical. They arose for a variety of reasons, the most common being the usurpation and exile of the legitimately elected pope, usually by a militant faction backed by a king or emperor. From the third to fifteenth century, forty antipopes had risen to sit on the papal throne. The most tumultuous era, though, was during the fourteenth century, when the legitimate papacy was driven out of Rome and into France. For seventy years, popes reigned in exile, while Rome was governed by a series of corrupt antipopes.

“What does such an ancient cult have to do with the situation now?” she asked.

“The Dragon Court is still active today. Its sovereignty is even recognized by the EU, similar to the Knights of Malta, who hold observer status at the United Nations. The shadowy Dragon Court has been linked to the European Council of Princes, the Knights Templar, and the Rosicrucians. The Dragon Court also openly admits to having members within the Catholic Church. Even here in the Vatican.”

“Here?” Rachel could not keep the shock from her voice. She and her uncle had been targeted. By someone inside the Vatican.

“A few years back, there was quite a scandal,” Uncle Vigor continued. “A former Jesuit priest, Father Malachi Martin, wrote of a ‘secret church’ within the Church. He was a scholar who spoke seventeen languages, authored many scholarly texts, and was a close associate of Pope John XXIII. He worked here in the Vatican for twenty years. His last book, written just before he died, spoke of an alchemical cult within the Vatican itself, performing rites in secret.”

Rachel felt a sickening lurch in her stomach that had nothing to do with the helicopter banking in the direction of the international airport in nearby Fiumicino. “A secret church within the Church. This is who may have been involved in the Cologne massacre? Why? What’s their purpose?”

“For stealing the bones of the Magi? I have no clue.”

Rachel allowed this revelation to filter through her mind. To catch a criminal required first knowing them. Ascertaining motive often proved more informative than physical evidence.

“What else do you know about the Court?” she asked.

“Despite their long history, not much. Back in the eighth century, Emperor Charlemagne conquered ancient Europe in the name of the Holy Church, smashing pagan nature-cult religions and replacing their beliefs with Catholicism.”

Rachel nodded, well acquainted with the brutal tactics of Charlemagne.

“But tides turn,” Uncle Vigor continued. “What was once unfashionable becomes fashionable again. By the twelfth century, a resurgence in Gnostic or mystical belief began to arise, taken up in secret by the same emperors who had once beaten it down. A schism slowly formed as the Church moved toward the Catholicism we know today, while the emperors continued their Gnostic practices. The schism came to a head during the end of the fourteenth century. The exiled papacy in France had just returned. To make peace, Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund of Luxembourg backed the Vatican politically, even outwardly abolishing Gnostic practices among the lower classes.”

“Only the lower classes?”

“The aristocracy was spared. While the emperor beat down mystical beliefs among commoners, he created a secret society among the royal families of Europe, one dedicated to alchemical and mystical pursuits. The Ordinis Draconis. The Imperial Royal Dragon Court. It continues to this day. But there are many sects in different countries; some are benign, merely ceremonial or fraternal, but others have sprouted up that are led by vitriolic leaders. I would wager if the Dragon Court is involved, it is one of these rabid subsects.”

Rachel slipped instinctually into interrogation mode. Know your enemy. “And what’s the goal of these nastier sects?”

“As a cult of aristocracy, these extreme leaders believe they and their members are the rightful and chosen rulers of mankind. That they were born to rule by the purity of their blood.”

“Hitler’s master-race syndrome.”

A nod. “But they seek more. Not just kingship. They seek all forms of ancient knowledge to further their cause of domination and apocalypse.”

“To tread where even Hitler feared to go,” Rachel mumbled.

“Mostly they’ve maintained an austere air of superiority while manipulating politics behind a screen of secrecy and ritual, working with such elite groups as Skull and Bones in America and the Bilderburg think tank in Europe. But now someone is showing their hand, brazenly, bloodily.”

“What does it mean?”

Uncle Vigor shook his head. “I fear this sect has discovered something of major importance, something that draws them out of hiding and into the open.”

“And the deaths?”

“A warning to the Church. Like the attacks upon ourselves. The simultaneous murder attempts today couldn’t be coincidence. They had to have been ordered by the Dragon Court, to slow us, to scare us. It couldn’t be coincidence. This particular Court is flexing its muscles, growling for the Church to back off, shedding the skin it’s worn for centuries.”

“But to what end?”

Uncle Vigor leaned back with a sigh. “To achieve the goal of all madmen.”

Rachel continued to stare at him.

He answered with one word. “Armageddon.”

GRAY SHOOK his tumbler, clinking the ice.

Kat Bryant glanced from her seat across the plush cabin of the private jet. She didn’t say anything, but her furrowed brow spoke volumes. She had been concentrating on the mission dossier — for the second time. Gray had already read it from cover to cover. He saw no need to peruse it again. Instead, he had been studying the gray-blue slate of the Atlantic Ocean, trying to figure out why he had been pegged as mission leader. At forty-five thousand feet, he still had no answer.

Swiveling his chair, he stood and crossed to the antique mahogany bar at the back of the cabin. He shook his head again at the opulence here: Waterford crystal, burled walnut, leather seating. It looked like an upscale English pub.

But at least he knew the bartender.

“Another Coke?” Monk asked.

Gray placed his glass on the bar. “I think I’ve reached my limit.”

“Lightweight,” his friend mumbled.

Gray turned and faced the cabin. His father had once told him that acting the part was halfway to becoming that part. Of course, he had been referring to Gray’s stint as a rig hand at an oil field, one overseen by his engineer father. He had been only sixteen, spending a summer in the hot sun of East Texas. It had been brutal work, when other of his high school friends had been summering on the beaches of South Padre Island. His father’s admonishment still rang in his head. To be a man, you first have to act like one.

Perhaps the same could be said for being a leader.

“Okay, enough with hitting the books,” he said, drawing Kat’s eyes. He glanced to Monk. “And I think you’ve explored the depth of this flying liquor cabinet long enough.”

Monk shrugged and came around into the main cabin area.

“We have less than four hours of flight time,” Gray said. With their jet, a custom Citation X, traveling just under sonic speeds, they would be landing at two A.M. German time, the dead of night. “I suggest we all try to get some sleep. We’ll be hitting the ground running once we’re there.”

Monk yawned. “You don’t have to tell me twice, Commander.”

“But first let’s compare notes. We’ve had a lot thrown at us.”

Gray pointed to the seats. Monk dropped into one. Gray joined them, facing Kat across a table.

While Gray had known Monk since joining Sigma, Captain Kathryn Bryant remained a relative unknown. She was so steeped in study that few at Sigma knew her well. She was mostly defined by her reputation since being recruited. One operative described her as a walking computer. But her reputation was also clouded by her former role as an intelligence operative. Overseeing black ops, it was rumored. But no one knew for sure. Her past was beyond the classification of even her fellow Sigma members. Such secrecy only isolated her further from men and women who had risen through the ranks in units, teams, and platoons.

Gray had his own problems with her past. He had personal reasons for disliking those in the intelligence field. They operated aloof, far from the battlefield, farther than even bomber pilots, but more deadly. Gray bore blood on his hands because of poor intel. Innocent blood. He could not shake a certain level of distrust.

He stared at Kat. Her green eyes were hard. Her whole body seemed starched. He pushed aside her past. She was his teammate now.

He took a deep breath. He was her leader.

Act the part…

He cleared his throat. Time to get to business. He lifted one finger. “Okay, first, what do we know?”

Monk answered, his face dead serious. “Not much.”

Kat maintained a fixed expression. “We know the perpetrators are somehow involved with the cult society known as the Royal Dragon Court.”

“That’s as good as saying they’re involved with Hari Krishnas,” Monk countered. “The group is as shadowy and weedy as crabgrass. We don’t have a clue who is truly behind all this.”

Gray nodded. They had been faxed this information while en route. But more disturbingly, news had reached them of an attack upon their counterparts in the Vatican. It had to be the work of the Dragon Court again. But why? What sort of clandestine war zone were they flying into? He needed answers.

“Let’s break this down then,” Gray said, realizing he sounded like Director Crowe. The other two looked at him expectantly. He cleared his throat. “Back to the basics. Means, motive, and opportunity.”

“They had plenty of opportunity,” Monk said. “Striking after midnight. When the streets were mostly empty. But why not wait until the cathedral was empty, too?”

“To send a message,” Kat answered. “A blow against the Catholic Church.”

“We can’t make that assumption,” Monk said. “Look at it more broadly. Maybe it was all sleight of hand. Meant to misdirect. To commit a crime so bloody that all attention would be pulled from the rather insignificant theft of some dusty bones.”

Kat didn’t look convinced, but she was difficult to read, playing her cards close to the chest. Like she had been trained.

Gray settled the matter. “Either way, for now, exploring opportunity offers no inroads into who perpetrated the massacre. Let’s move on to motive.”

“Why steal bones?” Monk said with a shake of his head and sat back. “Maybe they mean to ransom them back to the Catholic Church.”

Kat shook her head. “If it was only money, they would’ve stolen the golden reliquary. So it must be something else about the bones. Something we have no clue about. So maybe it’s best we leave that thread to our Vatican contacts.”

Gray frowned. He was still uncomfortable working jointly with an organization like the Vatican, an establishment built on secrets and religious dogma. He had been raised Roman Catholic, and while he still felt strong stirrings of faith, he had also studied other religions and philosophies: Buddhism, Taoism, Judaism. He had learned much, but he never could answer one question from his studies: What was he seeking?

Gray shook his head. “For now, we’ll mark the motivation for this crime with another big question mark. We’ll pursue that in more depth when we meet with the others. That leaves only means to discuss.”

“Which goes back to the whole financial discussion,” Monk said. “This operation was well planned and swiftly executed. From the manpower alone, this was an expensive operation. Money backed this theft.”

“Money and a level of technology that we don’t understand,” Kat said.

Monk nodded. “But what about that weird gold in the Communion bread?”

“Monatomic gold,” Kat mumbled, creasing lines around her lips.

Gray pictured the gold-plated electrode. They had been given reams of data in their dossier on this strange gold, culled from labs around the world: British Aerospace, Argonne National Laboratories, Boeing Labs in Seattle, the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen.

The powder had not been ordinary gold dust, the flaky form of metallic gold. It had been an entirely new elemental state of gold, classified as m-state. Rather than its usual metallic matrix, the white powder was gold broken down into individual atoms. Monatomic, or m-state. Until recently, scientists had no idea that gold could transmute, both naturally and artificially, into an inert white powder form.

But what did it all mean?

“Okay,” Gray said, “we’ve all read the files. Let’s round-robin that topic. See if it leads anywhere.”

Monk spoke up. “First, it’s not just gold that does this. We should keep that in mind. It seems any of the transitional metals on the periodic table — platinum, rhodium, iridium, and others — can also dissolve into a powder.”

“Not dissolve,” Kat said. She glanced down to the dossier with its photocopied articles from Platinum Metals Review, Scientific American, even Jane’s Defense Weekly, the journal of the UK’s Ministry of Defense. It appeared as if she itched to open the folder.

“The term is disaggregate,” she continued. “These m-state metals break down into both individual atoms and microclusters. From a physics standpoint, this state arises when time-forward and time-reverse electrons fuse around the nucleus of the atom, causing each atom to lose its chemical reactivity to its neighbor.”

“You mean they stop sticking to each other.” Monk’s eyes danced a bit with amusement.

“To put it crudely,” Kat said with a sigh. “It’s this lack of chemical reactivity that makes the metal lose its metallic appearance and disaggregate into a powder. A powder undetectable to ordinary lab equipment.”

“Ah…” Monk muttered.

Gray frowned at Monk. He shrugged. Gray knew his friend was playing dumb.

“I think,” Kat went on, oblivious of the exchange, “that the perpetrators knew about this lack of chemical reactivity and trusted the gold powder would never be discovered. It was their second mistake.”

“Their second?” Monk asked.

“They left alive a witness. The young man. Jason Pendleton.” Kat opened her dossier folder. It seemed she couldn’t resist the temptation after all. “Back to the matter of the gold. What about this one paper on superconductivity?”

Gray nodded. He had to give Kat credit. She had zeroed in on the most intriguing aspect of these m-state metals. Even Monk sat straighter now.

Kat continued, “While the powder appears inert to analyzing equipment, the atomic state is far from low-energy. It was as if each atom took all the energy it used to react to its neighbor and turned it inward on itself. The energy deformed the atom’s nucleus, stretching it out to an elongated shape, known as…” She searched the article at her fingertips. Gray noted it had been marked up with a yellow highlighter.

“An asymmetrical high-spin state,” she said. “Physicists have known that such high-spin atoms can pass energy from one atom to the next with no net energy loss.”

“Superconductivity,” Monk said with no dissembling.

“Energy passed into a superconductor would continue to flow through the material with no loss of power. A perfect superconductor would allow this energy to flow infinitely, until the end of time itself.”

Silence settled over them as they all pondered the many perplexities here.

Monk finally stretched. “Great. We’ve ground the mystery down to the level of the atomic nucleus. Let’s pull back. What does any of this have to do with the murders at the cathedral? Why poison the wafers with this weird gold powder? How did the powder kill?”

They were all good questions. Kat closed her dossier, conceding that no answers would be found there.

Gray was beginning to understand why the director had given him these two partners. It went beyond their backgrounds as an intelligence specialist and a forensics expert. Kat had a focused ability to concentrate on minutiae, to pick out details others might miss. But Monk, no less sharp, was better at looking at the bigger picture, spotting trends across a broader landscape.

But where did that leave him?

“It seems we still have much to investigate,” he finished lamely.

Monk lifted one eyebrow. “As I said from the start, we don’t have a lot to go on.”

“That’s why we’ve been called in. To solve the impossible.” Gray checked his watch, stifling a yawn. “And to do that, we should grab as much downtime as we can until we land in Germany.”

The other two nodded. Gray stood and crossed to a seat a short distance away. Monk grabbed pillows and blankets. Kat closed the shades on the windows, dimming the cabin. Gray watched them.

His team. His responsibility.

To be a man, you first have to act like one.

Gray accepted his own pillow and sat down. He did not recline his seat. Despite his exhaustion, he did not expect to get much sleep. Monk toggled down the overhead lights. Darkness descended.

“Good night, Commander,” Kat said from across the cabin.

As the others settled, Gray sat in the darkness, wondering how he got here. Time stretched. The engines rumbled white noise. Still, any semblance of sleep escaped him.

In the privacy of the moment, Gray reached into the pocket of his jeans. He slipped out a rosary, gripping the crucifix at the end, hard enough to hurt his palm. It was a graduation gift from his grandfather, who had died only two months after that. Gray had been in boot camp. He hadn’t been able to attend the funeral. He leaned back. After today’s briefing, he had called his folks, lying about a last-minute business trip to cover his absence.

Running again…

Fingers traveled down the hard beads of his rosary.

He said no prayers.

CHÂTEAU SAUVAGE crouched in the mountain pass of the Savoy Alps like a stone giant. Its battlements were ten feet thick. Its single foursquare tower crested its walls. The only access to its gates was over a stone bridge spanning the pass. While it was not the largest castle of the Swiss canton, it was certainly one of the oldest, constructed during the twelfth century. Its roots were even older. Its battlements were built on the ruins of a Roman castra, an ancient military fortification from the first century.

It was also one of the oldest privately owned castles, belonging to the Sauvage family since the fifteenth century, when the Bernese army wrested control of Lausanne from the decadent bishops during the Reformation. Its parapets overlooked Lake Geneva far below and the handsome cliff-side city of Lausanne, once a fishing village, now a cosmopolitan town of lakeside parks, museums, resorts, clubs, and cafés.

The castle’s current master, Baron Raoul de Sauvage, ignored the lamp-lit view of the dark city and descended the stairs that led below the castle. He had been summoned. Behind him, a huge wooly dog, weighing a massive seventy kilos, followed his steps. The Bernese mountain dog’s black-and-brown shaggy coat brushed the ancient stone steps.

Raoul also had a kennel of pit-fighting dogs, massive hundred-kilo brutes from Gran Canaria, short-haired, thick-necked, tortured to a savage edge. He bred champions of the blood sport.

But right now, Raoul had matters even bloodier to settle.

He passed the dungeon level of the castle with its stone caves. The cells now housed his extensive wine collection, a perfect cellar, but one section harkened back to the old days. Four stone cells had been updated with stainless steel gates, electronic locks, and video surveillance. Near the cells, one large room still housed ancient torture devices…and a few modern ones. His family had helped several Nazi leaders escape out of Austria after World War II, families with ties to the Hapsburgs. They had been hidden down here. As payment, Raoul’s grandfather had taken his share, his “toll” as he called it, which had helped keep the castle within the family.

But now, at the age of thirty-three, Raoul would surpass his grandfather. Raoul, born a bastard to his father, had been given title to both estate and heritage at the age of sixteen, when his father died. He was the only living male offspring. And among the Sauvage family, genetic ties were given precedence over those of marriage. Even his birth had been conceived by arrangement.

Another of Grandfather’s tolls.

The Baron of Sauvage climbed down even deeper into the mountainside, hunching away from the roof, followed by his dog. A string of bare electrical lights illuminated his way.

The stone steps became natural hewn rock. Here Roman legionnaires had tread in ancient times, often leading a sacrificial bull or goat down to the cave below. The chamber had been converted into a mithraeumby the Romans, a temple to the god Mithra, a sun god imported from Iran and taken to heart by the empire’s soldiers. Mithraism predated Christianity yet bore uncanny similarities. Mithra’s birthday was celebrated on December 25. The god’s worship involved baptism and the consumption of a sacred meal of bread and wine. Mithra also had twelve disciples, held Sunday sacred, and described a heaven and a hell. Upon his death, Mithra was also buried in a tomb, only to rise again in three days.

From this, some scholars claimed Christianity had incorporated Mithraic mythology into its own ritual. It was not unlike the castle here, the new standing on the shoulders of the old, the strong surpassing the weak. Raoul saw nothing wrong with this, even respected it.

It was the natural order.

Raoul descended the last steps and entered the wide subterranean grotto. The roof of the cave was a natural stone dome, crudely carved with stars and a stylized sun. An old Mithraic altar, where young bulls had been sacrificed, stood on the far side. Beyond it ran a deep cold spring, a small river. Raoul imagined the sacrificed bodies had been dumped into it to be carried away. He had disposed of a few of his own that way, too…those not fed to his dogs.

At the entrance, Raoul shed his leather duster. Beneath the coat, he wore an old rough-spun shirt embroidered with the coiled dragon, the symbol of the Ordinis Draconis, his birthright going back generations.

“Stay, Drakko,” he ordered the dog.

The Bernese mountain dog dropped to its haunches. It knew better than to disobey.

As did the dog’s owner…

Raoul acknowledged the cave’s occupant with a half bow, then proceeded forward.

The Sovereign Grand Imperator of the Court waited for him before the altar, dressed in the black leathers of a motorcycle outfit. Though he was two decades older than Raoul, the man matched his height and breadth of shoulder. He showed no withering of age, but remained stolid and firm of muscle. He kept his helmet in place, visor down.

The leader had entered through the secret back entrance to the Grotto…along with a stranger.

It was forbidden for anyone outside the Court to view the Imperator’s face. The stranger had been blindfolded as an extra precaution.

Raoul also noted the five bodyguards at the back of the cavern, all armed with automatic weapons, the elite guard of the Imperator.

Raoul strode forward, right arm across his chest. He dropped to a knee before the Imperator. Raoul was head of the Court’s infamous adepti exempti, the military order, an honor going back to Vlad the Impaler, an ancient ancestor of the Sauvage family. But all bowed to the Imperator. A mantle Raoul hoped to one day assume for himself.

“Stand,” he was ordered.

Raoul gained his feet.

“The Americans are already under way,” the Imperator said. His voice, muffled by the helmet, was still heavy with command. “Are your men ready?”

“Yes, sir. I handpicked a dozen men. We only await your order.”

“Very good. Our allies have lent us someone to assist on this operation. Someone who knows these American agents.”

Raoul grimaced. He did not need help.

“Do you have a problem with this?”

“No, sir.”

“A plane awaits you and your men at the Yverdon airfield. Failure will not be tolerated a second time.”

Raoul cringed inwardly. He had led the mission to steal the bones in Cologne, but he had failed to purge the sanctuary. There had been one survivor. One who had pointed in their direction. Raoul had been disgraced.

“I will not fail,” he assured his leader.

The Imperator stared at him, an unnerving gaze felt through the lowered visor. “You know your duty.”

A final nod.

The Imperator strode forward, passing Raoul, accompanied by his bodyguards. He was headed for the castle, taking over the chateau here until the end game was completed. But first Raoul had to finish clearing the mess he had left behind.

It meant another trip to Germany.

He waited for the Imperator to leave. Drakko trotted after the men, as if the dog scented the true power here. Then again, the leader had visited the castle often during the last ten years, when the keys to damnation and salvation had fallen into their laps.

All due to a fortuitous discovery at the Cairo Museum…

Now they were so close.

With his leader gone, Raoul finally faced the stranger. What he saw, he found lacking, and he let his scowl show it. But at least the stranger’s garb, all black, was fitting.

As was the bit of silver decoration.

From the woman’s pendant, a silver dragon dangled.