“Can I help you?” the man said. His offer sounded insincere.
“I’m looking for Father Hagen.”
The man looked Mace up and down. “You know him?”
“We’ve met.” Mace gestured with the business card Father Hagen had given him.
The custodian nodded to the open doorway behind him. “Down that hall. First door on your right.”
“Thanks.” Mace walked down the hall and knocked on the open office door.
Sitting at his desk, Father Hagen raised his eyes from an accounting ledger. He stood with his right hand extended. “Captain …?”
“Mace.” They shook hands.
“Please come in. Let me offer you a seat.” He motioned to the chair perpendicular to his desk. “I’m afraid my office is no more opulent than yours.”
Mace smiled as he settled into the chair. “We’re both only middlemen.”
“Indeed. Have you come with news about the sword?”
“The Blade of Salvation? Yes.” Mace took satisfaction in the priest’s change in expression. “Don’t look so surprised. There’s a drawing with a description of the sword in Glenzer’s last book. You’d have known that if you’d really been negotiating with him on your own behalf. We have the sword in our custody. Now please tell me who really wanted it.”
Father Hagen stood and closed the door. Sitting back down, he said, “I came to you on behalf of a monsignor in the Vatican who is a renowned historian in Europe. Mr. Glenzer contacted him regarding the sword, which he believed to be the Blade. Naturally the Blade would be of interest to a man like the monsignor, who expressed interest in obtaining this artifact but was unable to verify its authenticity. The monsignor asked me to communicate with Mr. Glenzer, which I did by way of the letters I showed you.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this when you came to see me?”
“Forgive me. I only wished to simplify matters and to keep the monsignor’s name out of your investigation. His interest in the sword really was personal, and he didn’t wish his inquiries to reflect on the church one way or the other.”
“Father, that sword was used to execute people accused of being werewolves during the Inquisition. Professor Glenzer was murdered for it or for something he knew about it. Six more people were murdered by a killer who wants the world to believe he’s a werewolf. Who else knew that Glenzer had the sword?”
Father Hagen shook his head. “I have no idea.”
“Did you discuss it with anyone?”
“No one but the monsignor.”
“I’d like this monsignor’s name and contact information.”
Father Hagen hesitated.
“If you don’t give it to me, I’ll have to charge you with obstruction of justice.”
Father Hagen turned to the computer before him, then copied information on the back of a business card. “Of course I want to help you however I can.”
He handed the card to Mace, who studied the name and telephone number. The Vatican, he thought. “You heard about yesterday’s murder?” “Yes, I did.”
“I was there. I saw it happen. I saw … it.”
Father Hagen’s expression tightened. “That must have been terrible.” He behaved as if he had missed Mace’s intonation.
“It wasn’t human. It wasn’t any animal I’d ever seen before. For lack of a better word, I would call it a werewolf. I believe it killed Professor Glenzer and every one of the victims that followed.”
“That’s difficult to accept secondhand,” Father Hagen said in a diplomatic tone.
“I was hoping you could provide me with more insight than that. As it turns out, no one in my department believes me, which means more people are going to die.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t know anything that could possibly help you.” Mace believed him. And yet he felt the priest was holding something back. Rising, he said, “I’m sorry to hear that. I need all the help I can get. If you think of anything—anything at all—call my cell phone. I won’t be back at my office.”
The priest stood and they shook hands. “Good luck,” Father Hagen said.
As Mace stepped into the hall, he saw that the custodian had moved his mop bucket closer to the door and had been within listening distance the whole time.
Janus Farel spent the afternoon at Central Park. His right ankle and the knife wound in his side had healed overnight, and now he had to prepare for his appointment. The Indian had surprised him, and he respected him for that. But whenever his thoughts turned to the bitch who had led him into the trap, he burned with anger. He knew from watching the television news programs that she had vanished, but he vowed to find her before the police did. He also discovered the name of the cop who had aimed his gun at him: Captain Anthony Mace. He promised to locate him as well.
Wearing a backpack for hiking, he circumnavigated the park, which occupied eight hundred and forty-three acres of space in the heart of the city, a rectangle more than two and a half miles long and half a mile wide. While the park appeared natural to most Men, it was obvious to Janus that it had been entirely landscaped, from the ponds and lakes to the strategically placed rocks and trees. All an illusion.
He started his trek on West Fifty-ninth Street, then walked along Fifth Avenue to West 110th Street, crossed over to Eighth Avenue, and went back downtown. Along the way, he hid eight small black plastic bags, each one containing a pair of matching black sneakers, sweatpants, and a T-shirt, in remote areas where he believed they would not be discovered. He had done this before, but he had never had to plan for an area as large as the park.
Sitting on a bench, licking an ice cream cone as he observed ducks in a pond, he smiled at a little blonde-haired girl who stared at him, then waited for the sun to set.
“I cooked dinner,” Mace told Cheryl when she came home from work. “Well, boiled it, really.” He wore an apron splattered with tomato sauce stains.
“Spaghetti and meatballs,” she said, hanging her coat in the closet. “I won’t complain. At least I don’t have to cook.” She took off her shoes and melted beside him on the sofa. “How many nights will you be cooking?”
“That’s hard to say.” He elected not to mention that he’d been ordered to undergo a psychiatric evaluation. “It turns out you can fight city hall but not One PP.”
She propped her legs across his. “You should just quit.”
He smiled. “I’m not going to resign when I have only four years left until my twenty. Besides, do you have any idea how much college tuition costs these days?”
“I know better than you do. Screw your pension. We can make it on my salary.”
“No, we can’t. Not in this city. I’m a police, good or bad.”
Closing her eyes, Cheryl sighed. “What else did you do today?”
“I finally had time to go to the gym. Hey, I still have the Impala. Maybe we’ll go away this weekend.”
She squeezed his arm and smiled. “That would be nice.”
Looking out the window, he watched the sun dip below the horizon and hoped she didn’t feel his body tensing up.
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
Eight years earlier
On the day he chose his new name, Janus glimpsed a framed oil painting on the living room wall of the cell’s country manor and moved close to it. The canvas showed many signs of wear and tear, but through the cracked and peeling paint he had little trouble making out the image of a terrified werewolf clothed in medieval rags, hunched over a chopping block, while a human executioner, standing before three robed priests, held a sword poised to decapitate the beast.
“The Catholic church calls this weapon the Blade of Salvation,” Arsen said. “We call it the Blade of Destruction. It was used to execute hundreds, possibly thousands, of our species during the Spanish Inquisition. To face it is to face certain death.”
“The painting,” Janus said. “I’ve never seen anything like it. In the States, we accept that there can be no art, literature, or records related to our culture.”
“Then you have no culture.”
“It’s for our survival …”
“The American Wolves are already dead. They’ve voluntarily killed themselves. They just don’t know it. Come into the diningroom.” Arsen showed him another oil painting, larger than the first, with a thick frame that appeared to be made of tarnished gold.
Squinting at the painting, Janus’s heart beat faster. It was the mirror opposite of the first painting, depicting a naked man on his knees, pleading for his life in a court of medieval Wolves garbed in human clothing. A regal Wolf sitting on an ornate throne looked down on the man with dispassionate eyes. Around them stood Wolves in suits of armor, armed with swords and spears.
“Did such a kingdom ever exist?” Janus said.
“Follow me.”
In the basement, amidst cabinets and trunks and boxes, Arsen gestured to a single piece of furniture: a tall wooden throne, identical to the one Janus had just seen in the painting depicting the medieval Wolves.
Stepping forward, Arsen spotlighted the ornate carvings on its frame—one wolf head after another. “Our treasures are spread throughout Europe. Our history, our religion. You must learn them.”
“I will,” Janus said.
Five years earlier
Janus was kneeling in the basement worship room when Elias found him. “You look troubled, brother.”
Janus’s eyes remained closed. “I am.”
Elias crossed his legs on the floor. “Tell me.”
Opening his eyes and sitting back on his heels, Janus groped for words. “For the first time since I came here, I feel conflicted.”
“Because?”
“I’ve come to accept the Great Wolf spirit.”
“That’s a good thing.”
“It is. But his spirit tells me that what we’re doing is wrong.”
Elias brought his eyebrows together. “How so?”
“He tells us that killing is wrong, and we’ve killed so many Men.”
“But Man is a different species than we are.”
“That doesn’t matter. If killing is wrong, then all killing is wrong. Whatever the reason. I came here with vengeance in my heart, but the irony is that your teachings have lifted that burden from my shoulders.”
Elias clasped Janus’s shoulder. “Come to my room in half an hour. I have some of the answers you seek.”
Janus knocked on the bedroom door.
A moment later Elias opened it. “Come in. I’m all ready for you.”
Janus entered the sparse bedroom that also served as Elias’s office.
“Have a seat,” Elias said, gesturing to the chair beside his desk. Then he sat down at the desk. A folder rested on the desk’s corner at an angle. “I want you to look inside this folder.”
Janus’s gaze flicked to the folder, which he picked up and opened.
“Do you recognize those photos?”
Janus turned the folder sideways so he didn’t have to look at the photos from an awkward angle. His heartbeat quickened as he flipped through the glossy eight-by-ten black-and-white photos, which showed thick black smoke billowing out of one side of a hotel.
“This is the casino hotel in Atlantic City,” he said, “where my parents were killed in a terrorist attack. What are you doing with these?”
Elias held his gaze. “Your parents were killed by terrorists, all right. Just not the kind you think. Your parents were murdered by agents of the Brotherhood of Torquemada, who set off a bomb that killed eight other human beings just so they could conceal what your parents were and how they really died.”
Tears filled Janus’s eyes. His face turned bright red, and he fisted his hands. “How long have you known the truth?”
“Since you came here looking for us.”
Beading his eyes closed, Janus tried to control his rage.
“What do you want to do?”
“I want to kill the Men who did this.”
Two years earlier
Janus hurled his backpack onto his bed. His temples throbbed and his heart raced. Elias entered the bedroom without knocking. Janus stood facing the window, his back to the cell’s leader.
“Why are you so upset? The mission was a success. Six assassins from the Brotherhood of Torquemada are dead. We have cause to celebrate.”
“The rest of the world will believe those men died in a boating accident,” Janus said, unable to contain his contempt.
“That was our plan.”
Janus whirled on him. “What good will that do? It’s the same thing every time. Months of preparation, followed by success with no satisfaction.”
“Six men who would kill us are dead. What other satisfaction would you have, brother?”
Janus stepped closer to Elias. “I would taste their blood, brother. I would tear them limb from limb. And I would leave their filthy corpses for the rest of the world to see. I would strike fear in the heart of every Man on this planet!”
“That isn’t our way. It isn’t our purpose. Our goal is to eliminate the worst of our enemies without other Men learning of our existence in the process. We operate in secret, as we always have.”
“We’re no better than them, using the same tactics. We act like jackals, not Wolves.”
“Our success rate—”
“To hell with your success rate! We’re not some corporation.”
Janus expanded the irises in his eyes and flexed his teeth. Calm yourself. You don’t want to fight with Elias. He’s on your side.
“We’ve had this conversation before.”
“And nothing ever changes.”
Elias’s eyes grew heavy with sadness. “You’ve been a good soldier, Janus. You’ve killed many Men. But your methods are too extreme, your thirst for revenge greater than your hunger for balance.”
“Isn’t that what you wanted? Isn’t that why you told me the truth about my parents?”
Elias remained calm. “You’ve been a good and loyal friend, but I think the time has come for you to leave us.”
Janus’s chest rose and fell in anger, but he realized Elias was right. “I’ve been alone since Brooke was murdered. Thank you for your guidance and wisdom. I’ve learned much here, and I’ve fought side by side with my brothers. But you’re right: I’m a rogue Wolf. It’s time for me to fight alone.”
“Where will you go?”
Janus didn’t even have to think about his answer. “Back to America, where I belong.”
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
Father Hagen parked his Cadillac on Fifth Avenue near Sixty-fifth Street. Dressed in black slacks and a shirt with a clerical collar, he turned to his companion. “Eight thirty. Half an hour early.”
Scanning the granite wall along Central Park, Pedro nodded. “Good. We have time to pray again.”
So they did.
Fifteen minutes later they stepped out of the car, and Pedro plied the meter with more quarters. Then Father Hagen opened the trunk, and they removed their equipment. They crossed Fifth Avenue to Sixty-fifth Street, where they located the entrance to the Central Park Zoo, which had closed for the day. Vines crept up the sides of the brick-trimmed granite buildings, and lamplight outlined the wrought-iron bars of the gates that sealed off the entrances for the night. Thick clouds obscured the three-quarter moon. They found a spot one hundred yards away from the zoo that afforded them a view of the surrounding park and waited. Animal odors lingered in the air.
Francis Hagen had been raised in Beloit, Wisconsin, the fourth and final son born to married college professors. He had been ordainedat a young age and had performed missionary work in Nicaragua and South Africa. During his travels, his views of the world and world religions evolved. While he never doubted his faith, he grew to believe that a greater darkness occupied the world. It was while in Rome, before his return to the States, that he had sought an audience at the Vatican with Desmond Lamont, a legendary priest who served as the church’s premier exorcist. The two men enjoyed a pleasant dinner together, and L
amont listened to Hagen’s tales of his adventures.
It was Lamont who referred Hagen to another priest John Tudoro, who in turn introduced him to Monsignor Delacarte. Thus began years of correspondence with Delacarte. Hagen was fascinated by the Brotherhood of Torquemada but declined Delacarte’s offer to join. He pledged his silence and volunteered to assist the Brotherhood’s cause—which he didn’t fully believe in—if ever the need arose. As a result, he now found himself chauffeuring a man he believed to be an enforcer, if not an outright assassin, for the monsignor around New York City.
The park darkened and crickets chirped.
“He’s late,” Father Hagen said, the relief in his voice unmistakable.
“No,” Pedro said. “He’s been watching us for several minutes. Here he is now.”
Father Hagen saw a figure appear in the distance, walking along a path illuminated by lampposts. His eyesight remained strong at the age of forty-seven. The figure approaching them stood six feet tall and wore dark clothing that matched his hair. His face appeared ghostly white in the lamplight. A minute passed before Father Hagen was able to discern the man’s features. He appeared normal, though his tight mouth and serious eyes conveyed haughty amusement. Pedro’s instincts were correct: this was their target. Or were they his targets?
Surely werewolves had never existed and were merely the creation of storytellers with fantastic imaginations. But Father Hagen supported recovering the Blade of Salvation, if for no other reason than its historical value. He had to wonder, though, if he would havesuffered Terrence Glenzer’s fate had he been permitted to physically obtain the Blade for Delacarte. Father Tudoro had insisted on sending Pedro to execute the transfer of ownership, which Father Hagen now appreciated. In the week since Pedro’s arrival, the murders in Lower Manhattan, all seemingly connected to Glenzer’s, had made him increasingly frightened of the possibility that the monsters hunted by the Brotherhood were literal rather than metaphorical. He thought of his meeting with Mace earlier in the day and wished the policeman stood here with them now.
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