The Library of Forbidden Books

Chapter 20

Jaap Roodt inhaled deeply. He wanted to smile, but instead he just kept his content to himself. Venice was rife with tourists from all corners of the planet, it seemed, and the place bustled with posing lovers, spoiled children with tantrums, and the odd photographer with proper equipment aiming at the Basilica’s rounded crowns, spires, and domes. The day was beautiful. The piazza smelled of Italian cuisine and flowers where the light breeze carried it across the channels from side to side. Gardens were hardly ever in dearth for the blessing of the warmer temperate weather and the skilled hands of their keepers who delighted in beauty, as much as Italy reveled in its art.

Upon the water from the Adriatic, the cooler squalls persisted and to the trained eye this was a sign of impending rain. Jaap traversed Piazza San Marco leisurely, looking at all the people minding their own business, each blissfully unaware of what he was planning for them. At his age there was much reason to contemplate the condition the world had been dumped into, and on those odd occasions when his conscience threatened, all he had to do was walk among the population of the cities he visited. Soon it reminded him how a supreme cleansing was the only logical advancement of the human race, or those left to survive it.

He sat down and waited for his companion to show up. With fingers like talons betraying his age, regardless of the speed and agility with which he moved, Jaap Roodt pulled out his buzzing cell phone.

“Roodt,” he said sternly, perfectly aware by the caller ID display that it was his young wife calling. As he listened to her, his colleague finally showed up. He motioned for the sullen man to sit down across from him while he completed the call. The wind picked up and stirred his guest’s hair, giving him an appearance of feral fury. His eyes were bloodshot and it was abundantly clear that he had not been sleeping.

When Jaap hung up the phone, he gave Dave Purdue a long, serious look.

“My God, boy! You are a mess,” he told Purdue and offered him a donut, which was gracefully refused. “For the fate you escaped, my friend, you should be grateful for what you still have. And considering the position you have been awarded after betraying us, it is nothing short of a miracle. So chin up.”

Purdue’s expression was static and all he heard from Roodt’s words were the steely disrespect for his plight. Yes, he was rescued from an awful send-off, courtesy of the council and the Black Sun’s respective factions, but that did not absolve them from what they had done to him. Still, Roodt made it sound like Purdue was a stray dog put to good use for the privilege of scraps. Perhaps that was exactly what he was these days, but he knew what he was getting into. His wealth, like it did most fools, blinded him to his vulnerability for long past the point of peril. Now all that was left was to stop antagonizing the organization and do as he was told, at least until things settled and he could assess his position.

“How is the project coming on?” Jaap Roodt asked, breaking off a piece of the confectionary with his sunspot-riddled hands.

Dave Purdue looked up at the clear sky and the sea birds floating above all the human misery below. “Apart from a few details, it is on schedule. I need the materials I requested urgently, but I have had no success in obtaining them yet. Are you sure we are in the right place?”

“David, I would bet my life on it. For centuries it has been a well-kept secret in our ranks that the Library of Forbidden Books was located here in Venice. How you discover it is your own charge. As long as the Longinus is ready by deadline and the ARK is sufficiently populated… ” Jaap looked at Purdue with a smug amusement that proved him to be more callous than judged before, “and Purdue, make sure you make the ferry, old boy. We would not want the Renatus, the great architect of the New World Order, to be late for his own Armageddon.”

Fuck you, you should make sure you don’t kick it before then, Purdue thought with not a second consideration. In fact, he could hear Nina’s voice saying it for him. Nina. His chest ached as he kept his composure and nodded at Roodt’s conceited warning.

“My wife is becoming a serious thorn in my side. I tell you, I have doubts on taking her with me to ARK,” Roodt chuckled dryly, looking down at the paving under his polished shoes. He was quite serious. “In fact, most of the women we drag on our arms are not worthy of the ARK’s refuge. Fortunately being a member of the council means that we carve our own niches. So should you.”

“I intend to,” Purdue spoke, his tone not as guarded as he had hoped. He had nothing left to lose, and even with all his properties, luxuries, and status in the world he felt barren. Nothing was left of the cheerful tycoon with his whimsical sense of adventure and eternal optimism. All that was left was a sense of loss and the desire to equalize the cheating he endured by any means necessary. “I shall find the Library of Forbidden Books soon, I hope. My scouts have found nothing, so it looks like something I have to undertake myself. However, I will need the help of one of the council’s… ” He sought the right word—“prisoner, hostage, and captive” were a bit too rich to use during a demand of this sort.

“The council’s what, Purdue?” Roodt asked, chewing in haste with ill manners that sickened Purdue.

“Advisor, I think. She is currently in service of Izaak Geldenhuys, I believe. With her knowledge of books, mostly so the more arcane ones, she would prove invaluable to my mission,” Purdue said as nonchalantly as he could.

“Really?” Roodt replied with brute sarcasm. “I did not think she’d be much use to anyone anymore. She is lucky to be drawing breath, poor thing. You do know that she is one of our bargaining chips to keep you loyal. If we gave her to you, for whatever time, we risk your flight, you understand.”

“I do. But I think it would be absolutely idiotic to flee from the position of power you and the council have presented me with, not to mention surviving Final Solution 2. If you do not trust me yet, you never will. Have I not served your agenda well thus far, Jaap? Come now,” Purdue’s mouth curled in a smirk.

Roodt looked at his puppet. Dave Purdue was the most powerful double agent in the Black Sun organization, utilizing the power of brain capacity, the knowledge of technology, and just enough subversion to make him mutable. Depending on what he offered Purdue, the genius billionaire would oblige. Especially since he was Renatus of the Order of the Black Sun now, even by the design of Jaap Roodt to overthrow his own brethren and make the democracy an autocracy, Purdue would not hesitate to fulfill Roodt’s wishes. They had a nice, cushy mutual understanding.

“All right, I’ll arrange for her to be brought to you. But you have two weeks to find the library, Purdue, or else I turn her into a permanent fixture of Venice’s channels,” Roodt threatened.

“No need for threats, Mr. Roodt. You’ll get what you fish for, and I’ll get my work done sooner. When can I expect her?” Purdue asked.

“Within the day, Purdue. Just out of curiosity, what is it exactly you need from the Library of Forbidden Books?” he asked, stuffing his mouth with the last chunk of sweet bread. “Provided it contains what you need, how would it benefit your work on the Longinus and the ARK?”

Purdue did not want to disclose too much, but he would need to tell at least half-truths, just in case his tracks were trailed and found to be deceitful. He had to share information with Roodt, but only as much as needed for him to be able to claim no knowledge if the rest of the details came to light. In other words, Purdue needed to be able to play dumb should his agenda be discovered.

“The so-called heretics of the past two or three centuries had written secret books that would be burned, banned, or worse done to the authors, if the contents would ever be discovered by the church,” Purdue related, taking great care to make it all sound less potent than it really was.

“Why? We all know the earth is round — we’ve known now for some time,” Roodt shrugged.

“Oh, yes, but that was not the kind of heresy these books contained. They spoke of old gods, superior beings, who used to rule the Earth — godless cruel creatures of unsurpassed intelligence who would challenge the concept of God as the Vatican portrays him at every end,” Purdue explained. “But that aside, these beings were reputed to have taught humankind things we were not supposed to know.”

“Like what?” Roodt frowned, but his face was riddled with eager intrigue. He shifted in his place to better hear Purdue’s account in the annoying rush of the wind on the open expanse of the piazza.

“Um, I don’t know. Let me see,” Purdue feigned contemplation to win time enough to sift his facts before delivery. “Scientific knowledge and alchemy, I suppose. Things the church deemed sacrilegious as the undermining of God’s work and so on.”

Jaap Roodt nodded in thought and agreement. He did not utter a word. It did make him awfully curious what these books held other than things previously forbidden. Had they not held more ludicrous or arcane things than mere science, would they not have been released to the world yet? After all, what was miracle was now science, what was alchemy was now metallurgy and its mutable properties, and demonic possession was now psychology. What more could this chaotic, super-informed world still conjure that was not already knowledge in some form by some cultures already?

Finally he sighed and patted a steady old hand on Purdue’s knee, “I must get some rest. I suggest you do the same, Purdue. I shall send her to you by tonight, but I expect some clear progress from the Black Sun’s scientists within the next two weeks. Don’t force the council to depose you, eh, Purdue?” He smiled as if in jest, but Purdue knew there was no mistake that Roodt would do just that. And Purdue knew that for him to be deposed would mean certain death, not mere dismissal, and that alone was incentive for him to hasten.

“I will. I’m over the shock now. Time to carry on with my work,” he told Roodt plainly.

“Ja. That is the spirit. Good man,” Jaap Roodt nodded and rose to leave. “I will be at ARK tonight to oversee the progress there and then,” he sighed laboriously, “it is back to Rotterdam until the implementation of Final Solution 2. Make me proud.”

With a youthful cadence in his stride, the old council member walked off toward St Mark’s Campanile. The gigantic square tower of dark tan brick and spires above its bell tower lurched overhead, silently standing guard over the grave secrets of Lady Venice and her people. Purdue looked up at the steeples of the Basilica, the Campanile, and the Doge Palace, calculating with eyes narrowed in concentration. They formed a pattern of markers he mentally mapped. From his pocket he took his little black tablet and began to connect the dots, feeding it into the small hard drive to be deciphered once he had returned to the old barracks the Order of the Black Sun had converted into luxurious chambers for prestige members.

And all he was waiting for was her.