THE PHOENIX CODEX (Knights of Manus Sancti Book 1)

by Bryn Donovan

  The library was already crowded, some people in their seats, and others standing in little groups. The sight of the gathering brought Michael’s memorial rushing back to him, blurring his consciousness. He closed his hand around Cassie’s to guide her to the front. The contact brought immediate comfort to his battered heart.

  Samir sat next to Lucia’s parents. As they approached, Samir turned around and stood up. Jonathan made the symbol of respect to the dead and then hugged Samir, willing the Knight more strength. He asked in a low voice, “How are you holding up?”

  Samir looked about ten years older than when they’d seen him last, teasing Lucia at the gym. “I’m not,” he said bluntly.

  The answer didn’t surprise Jonathan. “She was lucky to have you, Samir. You made her happy.”

  Samir closed his eyes briefly and nodded.

  Jonathan shook hands with Lucia’s father and mother, saying, “It was my honor to work with Lucia. She was brilliant and very brave.” Next to him, Cassie squirmed. The day before, she’d told him that she was afraid they’d blame her for the codex that had gotten Lucia killed.

  “I’m Cassie,” she said to them, her voice pitched higher than usual. “I’m new here. I didn’t know Lucia long, but I really liked her. I’m so sorry.” She choked on the last word. Jonathan’s chest ached with love and tenderness for her.

  Lucia’s dad pressed her hand, nodding.

  As they took their seats a few rows back, she murmured to Jonathan, “That was nice, what you said to Samir. About him making Lucia happy.”

  “People want to know that they did well.” At Michael’s service, he’d wanted someone to tell him he was a good brother. When he’d told Cassie the story of Michael’s death, it had been almost her first response. He knew she didn’t think of herself as someone who said the right things, but when it really mattered, she did.

  Afterward, when people were milling around and talking, Samir approached them, touching Cassie’s shoulder. “I understand I’m going to be training you.”

  She blinked. Jonathan doubted she’d expected to discuss this now. “I’ll try to do a good job.”

  “So will I,” Samir said.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Lucia’s death delayed Cassie’s initiation into Manus Sancti. Samir went on leave from El Dédalo to spend time with his sister and her family. Because he would be Cassie’s mentor, he would play a role in the ceremony.

  She was glad he could get away for a little bit and be with people who loved him. Without asking, she knew Jonathan hadn’t gone anywhere after Michael’s death. His best support would have been here.

  A few times, she went to the gym with Jonathan, who showed her a little about weight training. She’d never taken an interest before, but he’d told her that working with Samir would include becoming physically stronger. They went to the shooting range a couple of times, where Jonathan continued to practice shooting left-handed. Cassie focused on simulations that featured evil spirits and demons, and ones that posed the challenge of telling the good guys from the bad.

  One night, she watched a movie in Jonathan’s quarters with him, Val, and a Knight Cassie had seen around named Tristan Münter. It was a tight squeeze with Jonathan wedged between Val and Cassie on the bed, while Tristan, a big, quiet guy with a dark beard, sat on the floor basically at Cassie’s feet. She was growing accustomed to the fact that no one at El Dédalo had much of a sense of personal space.

  Jonathan and Val enjoyed the film more than Tristan and Cassie did because it was in Arabic with no subtitles.

  “I thought everyone in Manus Sancti spoke Arabic,” Cassie murmured to Tristan.

  “No, we all speak Spanish and English. Some people speak Maghrebi—Moroccan Arabic—and some speak Egyptian Arabic like this.” He pointed at the screen.

  “But you all have a few Arabic words you use,” Cassie pressed. “And sayings.”

  “Yes. And Latin.”

  Cassie glanced over at Jonathan and Val. They didn’t seem to mind that she and Tristan were talking through the movie, but she lowered her voice again anyway. “I get why you all speak Spanish. You started in Spain. But why do you speak English?”

  He raised his eyebrows, which were thick and angled, one with a bare patch in the middle from a scar. “Why does everybody speak English?”

  Not quite deterred, she asked, “Why did the headquarters move here?” She’d intended to ask Lucia when she got back from Italy.

  “It’s a big country. Nobody pays attention. And you leave people with guns alone.”

  It didn’t sound particularly complimentary. Cassie doubted he’d been raised in the States. “Do you speak anything besides English and Spanish?”

  “German and Maori.” At her confused look, he explained what Maori was, with considerable grace, considering he was part Maori.

  Ordinary life at El Dédalo was kind of like living at a college dorm full of much more grownup international students and nobody puking in the hallway. Cassie was beginning to feel at home there.

  While Samir was still away, Capitán Renaud assigned Jonathan and Gabi on a short mission, Jonathan’s first since Cassie had arrived. Nic, the mission runner, debriefed them over breakfast at the cantina while she listened, not feeling like a hanger-on because she was supposed to be learning about how things worked now.

  “Basic ghost banishing in Amarillo,” Nic said. “The American Quarter Horse Hall of Fame and Museum.”

  “There’s a horse museum?” Cassie was sick with jealousy.

  “Tell me the ghost isn’t a horse,” Gabi said.

  “No. Supposed suicide, but pretty clearly a murder victim. Three people injured so far, no casualties.”

  “What do you need both of us for?” she asked. “It’s four hours away.”

  Nic shrugged. “It does seem like an easy one, but we always send two for ghosts. You remember what happened in Sligo.”

  Gabi half closed her eyes in annoyance. “You may as well send Cassie. A child could do this job.”

  “Hey,” Cassie objected half-heartedly.

  “You’ve done enough dangerous missions for two careers,” Jonathan said to Gabi. He’d told Cassie before that Gabi was way past her twenty-year obligation and lucky to still be alive and whole. Now he paused, taking a bite of his huevos rancheros. “Maybe you should quit while you’re ahead. Marc and Luis are growing up, they might have kids before long—”

  “Before long?” she snapped.

  “A long time from now,” Jonathan amended.

  “You think I’m too old?” she pressed him. “I’m as good as I ever was.”

  Jonathan glanced up at the ceiling. “You know I know that.”

  “You’ll have plenty to handle soon enough,” Nic told Gabi. “Capitán wants you for a comandante.”

  Jonathan’s and Gabi’s heads swiveled to look at him.

  She demanded, “What makes you think that?”

  Nic shrugged. “It’s obvious. Taveres in Athens told a few people he was stepping down within the year. Capitán sent you there to command the Furies mission last year, when Taveres was getting treatment. And he encouraged Marc to go to Athens instead of Sao Paolo.” Jonathan gave a huge grin.

  Gabi’s eyes narrowed at Nic. “You think you know everything that goes on.”

  “There’s a good reason why I think that.”

  Cassie asked Jonathan, “Do you want to be a comandante someday?”

  Nic and Gabi both stiffened. Apparently, it was a tactless question, but Jonathan was probably getting used to those from her. “No. I mean—as long as we’re together, I couldn’t.”

  She would hold him back somehow? She didn’t like the sound of that. “Why not?”

  He spread his hands as if this were obvious. “Because I can’t give you orders.”

  “Yes you can!” she snapped. Nic and Gabi exchanged an amused look. “Work is work,” she clarified. “Unless they have rules against it.” Maybe they did. At Mission Minerals, a person co
uldn’t date a direct report.

  “We don’t,” Gabi said.

  Jonathan folded his arms. “Still not an option.” He had thought about this before. The realization humbled Cassie. His father was a comandante, and he’d probably at least imagined following in his footsteps.

  Nic said to Cassie, “Yeah, it would never work. He couldn’t risk you. You’d have missions to, I don’t know, go find Girl Scout cookies.”

  She grinned. “Hopefully, they’ll cover that in my training.”

  Gabi said dryly, “Well, it wouldn’t be much more dangerous at the horse museum.”

  Nic pushed the black file folder toward Gabi. “Cheer up. Maybe something will go horribly wrong.”

  “It’s been known to happen,” Jonathan said, more grim.

  Sometime after midnight, Jonathan texted Cassie to let her know they’d persuaded the ghost to move on. It had been just as much of a milk run as Gabi had expected, but still worth doing, since malevolent ghost activity tended to escalate. It satisfied Jonathan to accomplish a simple mission again, even if it felt a little strange that Cassie was at El Dédalo without him. He and Gabi returned late the next night, as did Samir. The day after that, Cassie and Jonathan met with Samir and Val in her office to discuss the ceremony.

  Samir wore jeans and a white T-shirt damp at the collar from his wet hair, as though he’d just taken a shower. The light had gone out of his eyes. Lucia’s emerald ring hung on a chain around his neck, and Jonathan felt a stab of sorrow at the sight of it. “The initiation is much different from full Knighthood,” Samir told Cassie. “Right now, you’re only indicating your intention to begin training.”

  “I’m not promising to complete it?”

  He shook his head. “For all we know, you may not be able to.”

  Cassie’s jaw set, the expression on her face saying, the hell I won’t. Jonathan doubted there was any chance she wouldn’t complete it…assuming she made it through the initiation. Every time he thought about it, his gut twisted. If she didn’t complete the ordeal, she’d be crushed. Either way, it was going to be brutal.

  Samir went on to say, “You’ll promise to never betray Manus Sancti, and that pledge holds for life. And as long as you’re an initiate, you’re expected to obey orders—from Capitán Renaud, from me, and from any other Knight if you shadow them on a mission. But you can choose to end your training at any time.”

  “Fair enough,” Cassie said.

  “The ceremony is old-fashioned,” Val told her. “It may seem strange to you as a sonámbula.”

  Cassie sighed. “Are people going to call me that forever?”

  “Not after this,” Samir said.

  “I’m a little nervous.”

  “I’m nervous, too,” Val said. “I haven’t overseen a ceremony before. I’m surprised Capitán asked me to do it.”

  Jonathan’s pulse sped up, although he kept his face neutral. Nervous hardly captured what Val was feeling. The night before he’d left for the mission in Amarillo. Val had sought him out, breaking down into tears.

  Should he tell Cassie what to expect? It might make it easier on Val, too. But if he broke his vows like that, he had almost no chance of getting away with it. Val wasn’t the only empath, and someone might notice that Cassie reacted like someone who expected an ordeal. Any one of a couple dozen people in El Dédalo could Read him and prove he’d warned Cassie ahead of time. People who grew up in Manus Sancti knew about the rituals, but outsiders needed to prove themselves. This rule went back a few centuries. Breaking the silence could lead to a long sentence at Solemore, Manus Sancti’s only prison. That might make Cassie lose control of her animal spell, and what would happen to her then?

  The ordeal served other purposes beyond a test of courage and determination. It gave initiates more confidence in their own strength and more commitment to Manus Sancti, and it gave their new Manus Sancti brothers and sisters loyalty to them in return. But none of that seemed worth it when he thought about Cassie being in pain.

  Maybe she wouldn’t withstand it, and Jonathan would never have to worry about her launching herself into danger again and again as a Knight. But he couldn’t bring himself to hope for her failure. Maybe she’d refuse to do it completely. Probably, she should.

  “You’ll do great,” Cassie told Val. Her kindness and obliviousness tore at his heart. “Do you have to memorize anything?”

  “Yes, and so do you.” Val gave her a couple pieces of paper.

  Cassie took a deep breath. “That’s going to be hard.”

  Samir gave Jonathan a grim look. The grieving warrior wasn’t taking Cassie’s initiation lightly, which Jonathan deeply appreciated.

  “What?” Cassie said.

  “It’ll be a challenge,” Val told Cassie. “But I know you can do it.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  A week later, Cassie stood outside the auditorium on level seven. She’d thought she wouldn’t be scared.

  She walked alone into the huge space filled with people wearing scarlet robes. Ordinarily, El Dédalo was high-tech, all sleek surfaces and white-noise hum. Here, only the flames of dozens of torches, burning in sconces along the walls, lit the large unfamiliar space. Everything flickered.

  “Old-fashioned,” Val had said. It looked like a graduation ceremony in hell. Panic washed over her. What the fuck am I doing?

  Then she saw the faces of familiar people—friends. Val and Samir, standing on the dais at the front of the room. Gabi, the warrior she’d come to like and respect, with her husband near the front of the crowd. Jonathan stood next to her, his beautiful face solemn. His eyes met Cassie’s, and the love in them went straight to her soul and propped up her confidence. Lengths of black braid draped at the front of both Jonathan’s and Samir’s robes. Because they were mourning, Cassie guessed: one for a brother, and one for a lover. These were good people at Manus Sancti, who’d risk anything to protect the world from the evil it didn’t even recognize. And she was going to join them.

  She wore a white robe that reminded her of being a child and playing the angel in a Christmas pageant. Her feet were bare. She reached the dais and stood in front of Val. On a side table, next to a carved stone box, lay a bundle of red fabric, the robe they’d soon drape over her.

  Val said in a voice loud enough to carry, “We are here to witness the initiation of Cassandra Rios, descendant of the scholar Rodrigo De La Garza, descendant of the freedom fighter Jacinta Canul, brave ally to our Knights, and heir to ancient magic.”

  Well. That sounded a lot more impressive than Cassie believed herself to be. The brave ally part particularly surprised her. Val said a few sentences in Latin, which everyone but Cassie seemed to understand, and then switched in English to say, “Let the initiate come forward, discarding her old life and preparing herself for the new.”

  Now Cassie was supposed to take off her white robe, a symbol of her pre-Initiate life and the innocence it entailed. Val had told her that for most initiates who’d grown up in Manus Sancti, this part of the ritual signified a coming of age rather than a transition into a whole new life. All of them had been initiates, in a matter of speaking, for their whole lives. None of them had been raised unaware of the supernatural evils that plagued the world.

  For an outsider initiate like Cassie, however, it resonated more powerfully, not the least because she still had her conventional shyness about her body. Nonetheless, she unfastened the two hooks holding the front of the robe together, slipped out of it, and let it fall to the ground.

  She was standing naked in front of hundreds of people. Hadn’t she had nightmares like this? But fine. It was done. As Val said more in Latin, the mortification of it burned away. Everyone had a body. There was no shame in that.

  Val switched to English again to say, “The Initiate will speak her vows.”

  Though Cassie didn’t have much practice at memorizing things—the Gettysburg address in grade school, a Shakespearean sonnet in high school—she’d been over her oath so man
y times that she didn’t even worry about screwing up. She kneeled and raised her left hand, palm out, as she’d been instructed. She thought this was weird, since most people were right-handed like she was, but Val had been clear on this point. There were no microphones, and Cassie spoke as loudly as she could without actually yelling. Val had asked her before she’d learned the vow about her religious beliefs, because Manus Sancti had alternate wordings for certain faiths and for atheists, but the standard one was fine with Cassie.

  “By the Divine, who goes by a thousand names,

  by my own highest principles,

  by my soul, and the souls of those I love the most

  in this world and the next,

  I offer my open hand.

  Fill it with knowledge, virtue, and power,

  so that it may be sanctified.

  I pledge my loyalty and discretion,

  upon the loss of my life.”

  She let her hand fall to her side again. With a shake of his head, Samir reached down and lifted it back into position again. Oops. She expected him to give her a reassuring smile, the way a priest at a wedding would if the best man fumbled with the ring. But Samir looked somber.

  While Val asked the whole crowd ritual questions about guiding her, she held her hand there in the same outstretched position. They answered in unison, and she felt humbled and vulnerable, hearing people promise to look after her while she kneeled naked. No doubt this was the intended effect.

  Val said, “Now I will explain and administer the initiation ordeal.”

  This wasn’t part of the script as she knew it. Only pride kept her from whipping her head around to look at Jonathan. Instead, she glanced up at Samir, who gave an almost imperceptible nod.

  Val looked different from any time she’d ever seen her before, her pretty round face pale and hard. Cassie’s hand trembled because she’d been holding it out for so long, and she anchored her elbow against her side.

  Val said, “Cassandra Rios, coal is a symbol of hidden knowledge, and a burning coal symbolizes this wisdom being revealed.” She didn’t sound like herself. Her soothing voice, to which Cassie had become so accustomed, had been replaced by something almost robotic. “In this part of the rite, you will show yourself willing and able to accept this knowledge, and the sacrifices that come along with it.”