The Man From Rome

by Dylan James Quarles

  The whine of police sirens flared, and a new train of cruisers descended to join the melee. Perplexed by the swiftness of the response, by its magnitude, and veracity, Hannity swore. Hadn’t Bruno paid good money to purchase Savino’s cooperation? What the hell had changed?

  The brothers grouped around him, firing in both directions. Effective as they were, Hannity knew it was only a matter of time until sheer numbers overcame them. The police weren’t going to stop, and the fighting was only going to get dirtier.

  “All right that’s enough!” He shouted. “It’s time to go. Throw more smoke, make a wall!”

  In unison, the brothers cut off and began pitching smoke grenades up and down the block. Blanketed by whiteness, the street soon became all but lost in the rolling clouds. Hannity turned and pointed north.

  “We’ll hug that row of cars,” he said. “Use them as cover. Make for the end of the building—we’re heading right at the corner. Cato went that way.”

  He rose to leave, but Zephyrus caught his hand and stopped him with a strange look.

  “What?” Asked Hannity. “What’s wrong?”

  Zephyrus tipped his head to the strobes of blue and red, and the sound of men running in the smoke. As if inferring something from this gesture that Hannity did not, the other brothers nodded in agreement. Almost ceremoniously, Notus un-shouldered his SAW and handed the weapon to Zephyrus. Following suit, Eurus took a pistol, a knife, and a MAC 10 from the nylon bag and laid them on the ground.

  Understanding at last, Hannity frowned.

  “Are you sure?”

  Zephyrus nodded again and climbed stiffly to his feet. Still bound around his injured knee, Hannity’s keffiyeh did little to offset the damage. The boy was hobbled and he knew it—a weak link.

  Feeling something like melancholy swell within him, Mr. Hannity bit it back and focused on the task at hand.

  “Okay,” he said, turning his back on Zephyrus. “Let’s get moving.”

  …

  Watching his brothers vanish one by one into white nothingness, Zephyrus discarded his tattered Armani jacket and bloodstained shirt. Naked, plated, and peppered with scattershot, he stripped to his purest form—primal. He had entered this world, fighting, and killing for joy. Thus, it seemed right that he should leave it the same way. Stowing the pistols and knife, he picked up the SAW and turned toward the sounds of men. With cold determination, he mastered his crippling limp and walked into the haze.

  Ahead, dark figures gathered to pacify him.

  “Mani in alto!” Shouted a voice from their ranks.

  Zephyrus lifted the SAW and fired without hesitation. In answer, the others fired back, their bullets whizzing past him into the dissipating smoke. Tracing his barrel along their line, he blew them apart like tufts of dandelion down. On his right, five men tried to route him by skimming a row of parked cars. Pivoting, he set the entire area alight with a wash of blood and torn metal. The SAW spat its final link and clicked. Letting it fall, Zephyrus drew his MAC10 and charged. Several Carabiniere rushed forward to challenge him. He sprayed them with bullets, then went to work with his knife. Leaping among the wounded men, he slashed and stabbed until the ground was slick and coppery.

  Up the street, more polizia and Carabinieri assembled before a wall of lighted cruisers. They leveled shots at Zephyrus that drove him back into the cover of the smoke. As he retreated, a round caught him, compressing flatly against his armor. He stumbled on his bad leg and fell behind smoldering van. Shots rained, pinning him down. The line began to move, coming closer as it kept up fire. Crackling from their radios, a chorus of disembodied voices betrayed the immanent arrival of reinforcements.

  Zephyrus ejected the MAC10’s magazine and found it empty. He tossed the weapon away and took out his pistol. Almost upon him, the blaze of gunfire was relentless. There was no escape. Unblinking amid the sting of ricochets and shrapnel, Zephyrus steadied himself. Though the end was nigh, he would not suffer it alone. Shifting his weight to his good knee, he waited for a break in the fire.

  A cry arose from the men, then several screams. Suddenly, the shooting slackened and became sporadic. Puzzled, Zephyerus stole a glance into the mist. Something was happening, something violent. The body of a policeman soared through the air, and landed, broken, upon the pavement. Standing, Zephyrus cocked his head and came out into the open.

  Whipped by strange winds, the lingering smoke curled and gave way to a scene of chaotic confusion. Carabinieri and polizia dashed to and fro, shouting in frantic voices. Moving among them like a curse, something dark and nightmarish struck out with crippling force. Hurled into parked cars or sent flailing to the ground, the men reacted in terror and attempted to flee. Picking them off one by one, the vaporous wraith ended such hopes with brutal efficiency.

  Zephyrus recognized his enemy and raised his pistol. In another instant, the weapon was torn from his hands. Jumping back, he pulled his knife and slashed at nothing. Clear of the bite, the shadow settled into a defined figure and became a tall man with eyes of Aztec gold. He smiled and wagged a finger.

  “You’ve had a fine teacher,” he said. “Yet, you are but a boy.”

  Senses peaked, world on fire, Zephyrus flipped his knife blade-down and raised his hands in a fighting stance. Watching him do this, the Man—quello Vecchio smiled wider. Zephyrus rushed forward, hitting high with his fist while aiming to disembowel with the knife. Infinitely faster than he, the Vecchio slid clear of the attack and gripped him by the wrist. He twisted up and the knife came loose.

  “Stop wasting time,” he said. “Where is Cato, does he live? I know your kind possess no flare for speech—you need only nod and I will understand your meaning.”

  Zephyrus struggled to free his arm, struggled to kick and fight. He punched the Vecchio with his free hand, and heard the Man’s aquiline nose break beneath his fist. Wiping away a thin trickle of blood, the Old One sighed tiredly, then struck Zephyrus with an open palm. Dazed, the boy felt a jarring release of pressure before skidding to the ground. Like an earthquake, pain split him wide, reducing his wits to rubble. Convulsing, he reached up to touch the epicenter of the injury, his shoulder, but found only jagged bone and hissing gore. Ripped clean from its socket, the rest of his arm hung in the Vecchio’s grasp.

  “Cato,” said the Man again. “Does he live? Tell me what I want to know, and I will give you a warrior’s death. Defy me again, and I will leave you to bleed out like an animal in the street.”

  Blinded by the sight of his own blood, gushing in torrents, Zephyrus began to tremble. Towering over him, the Vecchio let his arm drop with a splash.

  “Well?”

  Zephyrus looked up into the face of his destroyer, the face of his God, and gave a jerky nod. Tipping his head in thanks, the Vecchio uttered a few strange words, then drove his foot down with skull-crushing force.

  …

  Entering the hotel, the Man sniffed the smoky air and picked up on the cloying odors of burnt propellant, and fresh blood. He followed the trail of the latter, navigating through half-hidden columns and bits of debris. When he reached the source, a dark slick at the foot of a pillar, he crouched.

  “Hello Niccolò.”

  Bone-white, and drained of life, Niccolò Anastasi lifted his heavy eyelids. As soon as he perceived the Man’s face, a surge of strength coursed through him and he tried to sit up.

  “They’ve come for her,” he rasped. “They know what she is—who she is!”

  “No,” the Man assured him. “They weren’t here for Louisa. They want Cato.”

  Niccolò worked to keep his vision focused, but his eyes were clouding over.

  “W—why?” He struggled. “Is—is he a Demigod too?”

  “No,” said the Man again.

  “Then why do they want him?”

  “It is a different they.”

  Heaving a laborious sigh, Niccolò leaned back against the column.

  “Thank God. I thought they’d discovered her—thought they�
��d come back to finish what they started with Ferro…and her mother.”

  Despite all that was happening, despite the danger Cato was in, and the urgent press of time, the Man drew nearer.

  “Who is Louisa’s mother, Niccolò?” He asked. “Her name is missing from my records.”

  Niccolò chuckled and shook his head.

  “If you want to know that, you’ll have to save Louisa from this mess and ask her yourself.”

  The Man smiled thinly.

  “Fair enough,” he said. “Where have they gone?”

  With a weak wave, Niccolò gestured toward the north.

  “She spoke of a church last night. I imagine they’ve gone there to find you. I’ve heard you’re fast—I hope it’s true.”

  Standing, the Man turned to leave, but hesitated.

  “You should not have hidden the truth about Louisa from me, Niccolò. I could have protected her. Hopefully, I still can.”

  Niccolò features grew bitter.

  “Her mother was right about,” he muttered. “She said you’d get us all killed one day—said you were the Devil himself.”

  “The Devil is a lie,” said the Man. “Fear what is real.”

  With that, he pulled away and was gone.

  XLIII

  Splintered from its iron hinges, the door to the Man’s vault of records clattered onto the cold flagstones. Stepping over it, her leg freshly mended, Artemis strode into the inky room and smiled. Like the Old One, she too needed no aid to see in the dark, yet Popi, who whimpered at her heels, did. She held a hand up, activating a pattern of bioluminescence with the electrical currents of her nervous system. Becoming bright, her palm and fingers began to glow around the shadow of bone. Accordingly, the room revealed itself in washes of faint pink light. Arranged upon countless rows of deep shelves, the Man’s dossiers winked in the gloom.

  “Which one is it?” She demanded, turning on Popi.

  The tortured Greek shrank back from her and wined tremulously.

  “I don’t know!” He babbled. “Please—I’ve done enough—I’ve shown you what you asked. He’ll kill me! No more—no more.”

  Artemis sighed with disgust waved the cowering Greek away. Needing no further encouragement, Popi leaped to his feet and ran for his life. Artemis raised her hand higher, and moved off down the first wall of shelves. Somewhere, hidden among these legions of mortals and lesser beings, her brother’s dossier lay waiting. Though it pained her to imagine him tucked away with such detritus, Artemis reminded herself that a far greater crime was in need of rectification. However, before she could right that wrong, she needed first to find Apollo’s file, and within it, the location of his unmarked grave in Rome.

  Passing a gap in the row of binders, she paused to look closer. Directly beside the empty slot, Cato Fin’s dossier told her who the missing file had belonged to—Leta, his twin sister.

  The Goddess closed her eyes and concentrated on Cato, searching for his distinctive note among the symphony of all living things known to her. When she found it, she hissed under her breath. Only Cato, a lowly human, could upset her plans now. He must die, but not by her hand. Vengeance would not allow it. Concentrating deeper, Artemis whispered her mind away from Cato’s shade and tapped into Hannity’s instead. Ever the faithful hunter, he was on the move again, searching blindly for the prey that had managed to evade him. With an unconscious smile, Artemis reopened her starry eyes. Vengeance may not permit her to kill Cato, but it said nothing about assisting in the chase.

  Raising her other hand, she flexed her fingers in a series of calculated symbols. As if plucking at the strings of some unseen instrument, she repeated the sequence over and over until the very air began to warp in on itself. With a hollow pop, a small yellow finch appeared from nothingness. Artemis snatched the bird up, and brought it to her lips. Filling it with a whisper, imbuing it with divine purpose, she let the finch go. It looped once through the chamber, then darted out the open door.

  XLIV

  Cato and Louisa reached Niccolò’s cruiser just as a fresh eruption of gunfire echoed from the block behind them. In the skirmish, police sirens wailed and bright explosions of light projected themselves high upon the surrounding buildings. Louisa unlocked the Alpha Romeo’s passenger-side door and helped Cato in—his left pants’ leg wet with blood.

  “Thanks,” he grunted, one hand clamped over the wound.

  She tossed him the gun bag, then ran around to the other side of the car. About to key the lock, she stopped and looked up as more shots rang out from the direction of the hotel. Niccolò was back there, hurt and alone. Putting a hand on the Kimber, Louisa thought of returning for him, thought of shooting her way in to protect her zio when he needed it most. And yet, he had told her to go, begged her.

  Louisa wavered, trapped by an impossible decision. Breaking the tenuous spell, Cato rapped on the window and pointed toward something in the rearview mirror. With some difficulty, Louisa forced herself back to the moment and followed his line of sight. Advancing from the end of the block, the first tendrils of smoke were just beginning to appear in the air. Hannity and his men wouldn’t be far behind. Reluctantly, Louisa let her hand fall from the butt of the .45 and opened her door. Casting one final look back at the hotel, she climbed in and started the engine.

  “Shit, my leg hurts,” said Cato. “How far back is Niccolò? I need a first aid kit.”

  Louisa shifted into gear and leaped away from the curb.

  “Hey!” Cato cried. “We can’t leave him!”

  A line of Carabinieri vans sped by in the opposite direction, their sirens drowning out everything but Louisa’s guilt.

  “He’s not coming,” she said when they had gone. “He—he got hit in the stomaco—ah the stomach. He’s waiting for an ambulance.”

  Cato swore and looked away.

  “Shit, Louisa. I’m sorry—I didn’t even notice in all the confusion. Do you think he’ll be okay? Should we try to go back for him—”

  “No,” said Louisa, cutting him off. “He told me to run, so that’s what I’m doing. How bad is your leg?”

  “I—I can’t tell,” Cato faltered. “It’s hard to see.”

  “Take off your pants.”

  Doing a double take, Cato blinked.

  “What?”

  “Take off your pants,” said Louisa again. “So you can see the wound better.”

  Cato cleared his throat awkwardly and began to unbuckle. Averting her eyes, Louisa pulled the car out onto the Via Ottaviano and wove into heavy traffic.

  “Ah,” Cato grimaced. “It’s—it’s not that deep. I need to stop the bleeding though.”

  Louisa tripped the glove compartment, spilling a first aid kit onto Cato’s knees.

  “Thanks,” he muttered.

  Unpacking the kit, he got out the gauze and started wiping tentatively at the knife wound. Ahead, traffic slowed almost to a standstill, rows of polizia and Carabinieri cutting laterally through the intersections and blocking them up. Still within earshot, the dry cackle of gunfire carried on the wind.

  Louisa ground her teeth and glanced in the rearview mirror. Hannity and his Spartoi were tearing her city apart, shooting their way toward them like a brushfire in the streets. The Man had said Cato was important, crucial even. He had spoken of him like some kind of secret weapon. Given everything Artemis had just thrown at them, Louisa guessed the secret was out. Now, the only way stop the madness, and honor Niccolò’s sacrifice, was to get Cato to safety.

  “We can’t sit here like ducks,” Louisa blurted, cutting the wheel hard to the left. “This traffic is going to get us fucking killed!”

  Scraping bumpers with the other cars, she forced the Alpha Romeo across two lanes of traffic and up a side-street. Blaring after them, horns and curses were all that followed.

  “How far away is the church?” Asked Cato, shakily adding butterfly bandages to the wound.

  “It’s clear across the river,” said Louisa. “But I can get us there on b
ackstreets.”

  Cato tied his thigh in tight bandages; tape stippling the skin above and below the line.

  “Good,” he winced. “Hopefully the Benefactor is already there—I’ve got a few choice words for him about this morning’s royal fuck-up.”

  “Amen,” echoed Louisa. “So do I.”

  XLV

  Breaking clear from a blanket of moving smoke, Hannity, and the remaining brothers rounded the northern corner of the hotel, and came face-to-face with the very same group of Carabinieri that Cato and Louisa had seen only moments before. Caught in the middle of suiting-up, the officers hastened to retrieve their weapons. Attacking as one, the brothers slaughtered them indiscriminately.

  Wishing Zephyrus could have been there to join in the fun, Hannity aimed his 1911 at a retreating Carabiniere and sprayed brains and bits of tactical helmet all over the pavement. When the shooting died down, and the last of the men had been mopped up, he stood among the bodies, reveling in the palpable current of their violent deaths. Unfortunately, his joy was short lived. Cato Fin had all but vanished, and the polizia were closing in. In a few minutes there would be no way out.

  Spitting in frustration, Hannity studied the length of the empty street. He hated that he had been outmaneuvered, hated that a mere boy had cut his confidence so deeply. What would Artemis make of his failure? What possible place could there be for him at her side if he wasn’t even capable of killing a lowly brat like Cato?

  Something yellow darted past Hannity’s face, causing him to blink in surprise. He looked down and saw a small yellow finch, picking at a bit of gore on the ground. Remembering Cosimo Bruno’s private garden, Hannity sucked in a sharp breath. The finch glanced up at him, its brilliant green eyes sparkling with an impenetrable well of intelligent thought.