Comes a Horseman (56 page)

“Aspirin?”

Alicia jumped. She snapped her head toward the voice. The man who had addressed her at the airport—

Alicia, Alicia, it's nice to meet cha.

—was sitting on a cot, watching her.

She sat up. The movement brought a fresh bolt of pain to her head. She closed her eyes, felt her own cot spinning beneath her. She took a deep breath. Her mouth was dry and metallic tasting. She opened one eye, then the other.

The man was perched on the edge of the cot, not three feet from her. He held out a hand, palm up, offering three white pills. In his other hand was a plastic bottle. He nodded at the pills.

“They're aspirin. Really. If I wanted to give you any thing else, I already would have.” His smile was confident and at the same time disarming.

She took the pills. He handed her the bottle. It was springwater, unopened. She drank half of it, then squinted at him.

“You're Luco Scaramuzzi.”

“You're Alicia Wagner.”

She surveyed her surroundings. An eight-foot-square room. Stone walls on three sides. Iron bars on the fourth. A door, composed entirely of bars as well, stood open. Eight feet beyond the bars was another wall. Dark openings left and right, as though the corridor was U-shaped with this single cell at the nadir.

“Where am I?” she said, eyeing the open door.

“My home away from home,” Scaramuzzi said pleasantly. “We're among a mind-achingly complex labyrinth of tunnels. If somehow you were to get out of this little suite I've set up for you, the chances of finding your way out are zilch, particularly now. I'm having a little get-together. Lots of my friends milling around, just looking for ways to impress me. Dragging your corpse to me would do that.”

He said it as nonchalantly as a bored waiter reciting the day's specials.

“So why haven't you killed me yet?” She glared at him, defiant.

“Your partner hasn't delivered Pip's file.”

“Pip who? What file?”

Scaramuzzi's smile did not falter, but she saw a ripple of puzzlement cross his face.

“Pippino Farago. Of course, he would have used a different name, if any at all.”

“To do what?”

“To contact you. To offer you the ammunition you needed to come after me. I'm not surprised
you
thought it would work, though Pip's naïveté is startling.”

She stared at him, uncomprehending.

“And Brady is supposed to get this file for you?” she asked.

“In exchange for your life. Who said heroism was dead?”

She sized him up. Athletic build. Broad shoulders, narrow waist. His short sleeves showed off toned arm muscles. He outweighed her by eighty, a hundred pounds, all of it muscle. Still, if he was like most workout freaks, his build was all form, no function. Did he practice martial arts? Was he adept at hand-to-hand combat? What she knew about him didn't cover his fighting skills. But Ambrosi had said he had prepared for years to step into the role of Antichrist. In his place, she would have trained to handle physical as well as intellectual threats. She should assume he knew how to defend himself and attack an enemy.

“Too bad you did not include information about your contact with him in your notes,” he continued. “It would have saved me a lot of trouble.” He clicked his nails against something on the cot beside him.

She saw he was resting a hand on her laptop. Her heart bounced into her throat. What had he found out? She had typed up everything Ambrosi had told them. Had she exposed Father Randall as the inadvertent mole he was? If he was helping Scaramuzzi, did she care? Certainly, losing that link to the inner machinations of Scaramuzzi's circle would be a devastating blow to Ambrosi. Worse, her notes gave

Scaramuzzi plenty of reasons to go after Ambrosi, either out of revenge or to eliminate a foe with too much knowledge.

“Ah, well,” he said, lifting the computer, tucking it under his arm as he rose. “Maybe it's here somewhere, yes? I had only a little time to browse in the car on the way here.”

“Where is here?”

“Under Jerusalem, the Christian quarter.” He glanced up and around, as though at the splendor of a cathedral. “A fine place to die, really.” He stepped out of the cell, swung the door closed. It clanged loudly and echoed. She heard an electronic beep.

She got to her feet. The floor tilted under her, and she sat again. Her head had taken on the weight of an anvil. She lowered it into her hand, then propped her arm on her thigh.

“Why us?” she said without looking.

“Agent Moore asked the same thing,” he said. He sounded amused.

“What did you tell him?”

“That the two of you showed up.”

She lifted her head to see him. “What does that mean?”

He watched her through the bars a long moment. Then he glanced around furtively, as though contemplating or listening. He touched a keypad that was apparently set into the front of the door. Metal and stone were still as impenetrable as they were a millennia ago; not so for ancient locking mechanisms. It beeped three times, then the bolt within thunked. Scaramuzzi came back in and took his place on the cot opposite hers. He leaned over, closing the gap between them.

“From your notes, I gather you understand the somewhat fragile nature of my relationship with the Watchers.” His voice was low, conspiratorial.

She nodded.

“Even among the Council, I have enemies, those who expend considerable resources and energy to discredit me.” He shrugged. “I appreciate that their efforts are part of a process designed to ensure that only the rightful heir claims the inheritance with which the Watchers have been entrusted. But I think the safeguards have been refined over the centuries to the point where not even the one whose rise to power was foretold could get past them.”

“And you are that one?” she said. She managed to keep her cynicism out of her tone.

His eyebrows went up. “Of course. Jesus Christ was who He said He was, as well, but nobody believed Him either. At least not enough to save Him from crucifixion. Don't you think if He had tried a little harder, He could have convinced more people, the people who mattered?”

“The Pharisees?”

“The Pharisees,” he agreed. “The ones who were supposed to be watching for the Messiah. And they blew it. They didn't recognize Him.” He shrugged. “Naturally, I don't want the same thing to happen to me.”

“You being Antichrist?”

He gave her a small bow.

“So you're trying to convince them. How?”

“By bringing them evidence. Some prophecy previously overlooked that I fulfilled. Just as Jesus fulfilled prophecy and performed miracles to prove who He was.”

She was finding it harder to remain composed. “What miracles have
you
performed?”

He appeared disappointed, a teacher whose student wasn't getting it.

“None . . . yet. Are you familiar with Antichrist prophecy?”

“I'm learning.”

“‘And he performed great and miraculous signs, even causing fire to come down from heaven to earth in full view of men.' Revelation 13. That's me, my future. I can't wait.”

He's serious,
she realized. It was in his eyes. He wasn't acting or lying.

“What does that have to do with us, Brady and me?”

“Where Jesus went wrong was always having an audience. No one ever stumbled onto Him in a field alone levitating sheep.” He shook his head. “Uh-uh, He had to feed the five thousand and raise Lazarus with a mob of mourners outside the tomb.”

When he didn't continue, she said, “And . . . ?”

“And because He always had an audience, His miracles looked planned. Staged with the intention of impressing the crowd. That's what the Pharisees thought, I'm sure. I have the same problem. I need to convince my Council, but the very act of my bringing them evidence undermines that evidence.”

“They need to find their own proof,” Alicia said, summarizing.

“Exactly. Either of my being who I say I am—which is not such an easy task, since almost all the prophecy is already on the table and everyone knows about it—or of my
sincerity
.”

“They have to know you're not scamming them.”

“I knew you were smart, coming as close to finding me as you did.”

She risked voicing her thoughts: “So being insane is better than being a con artist?”

Didn't faze him. “An insane person couldn't function under the intense scrutiny I'm under.”

“An insane person could function better. No pressure.”

“Then we should all be insane. Barring that, proof of my sincerity would go a long way toward securing my colleagues' confidence.”

“Okay.”

“What better way to do that than their finding out I acted on a prophecy for my own selfish motives? Not for show, because it was hidden from them.”

She shook her head.

“I have a marvelous theologian who finds prophecy that fits my life. He also works with the Council's theologians. He gets a peek at what they're working on. A few months ago, he came to me with a prophecy they'd stumbled onto. From the prophetess Priscilla, I believe: ‘The one who carries the flames of the pit shall lay down the man of sin.' Apparently, in Priscilla's time—the first century—‘carry' was a euphemism for memory or ‘having seen.' ‘Lay down' means kill. Of course, the pit is hell, and I . . . well, I am the man of sin.”

He smiled at Alicia's skewed expression. “Prophecy is like that. Exegesis. Every word analyzed—by itself, in textual context, in historic context, in relation to other known prophecies. It's a wonder anyone understands anything about it or that theologians ever reach a consensus. For the Priscilla prophecy, the Council's theologians are in the process of trying to find corroboration in prophetic writings and analyses—from Montanus and Tertullian, for example—and the symbolic language of Daniel or John. As it stands, the prophecy can be translated as: ‘Antichrist will be killed by someone who has seen hell.'”

“Hell? How can—” Then she got it. At least a part of it. “Hellish near-death experiences,” she said. “You're killing people who claimed to have seen hell in a near-death experience. Because of a prophecy no one is sure about.”

“The prophecy will be confirmed. They nearly all are, those that have reached this level of investigation. But even if it is not,” he said, “it will have suited my purpose.”

“I don't understand,” she said.

“The Council needs only to think that
I
believed it and that I attempted to act on it covertly, without their knowledge. They would logically assume that my action was not predicated on impressing them, but on protecting myself from a prophesied threat. Therefore, I must truly be who I say I am. Or at minimum believe it myself.”

“Making you either Antichrist or insane, but not a con artist.”

“I can't tell you how much easier my job will be once
that
is out of the way.”

She tried to follow the scheme from beginning to end. As she encountered obstacles, she slowly articulated them.

“But the plan would require their finding out what you're doing, without you bringing it to their attention—even while you try to conceal it from them.”

Scaramuzzi nodded. He watched her working it out.

“A lot of attention, media attention,” she said.

His lips stretched wolfishly.

She said, “Which even serial killings don't guarantee anymore. But which the killing of the FBI agents investigating the case would.” Her eyes snapped to his for verification.

He faked a shiver and said, “Oooh . . . smart. I had to attack quickly, before your team caught my man in the field.”

“Your killer.” Her voice was hard, sharp.

“The sensational murders of two FBI agents would concentrate unprecedented attention of the case they were working, the serial killings. The NDE link would come out.”

“Do your Council members know about the prophecy yet?”

“No, their theologians only bring them new prophecies when they've been confirmed, or when my theologian presents something they need to independently corroborate. And that adds to the appearance of my trying to operate under their radar.”

“But one of the theologians would undoubtedly hear about the murders of endears and—”

“Of who?”

He didn't know the term. He had not spoken to Father McAfee the way she had. He had only used him to develop a hit list.

“Endears,” she said. “N-D-E-ers. One of the theologians would hear of their murders and report the ‘coincidence' to the Council, who would investigate and find you.”

“That's one line of communication. Redundancy improves the probability of success. I also made sure to use your country's Office of Contingency Planning. The OCP was founded by one of the Watchers' forebears. We enjoy a very . . .
symbiotic
relationship. They, too, would contact the Council about the deaths of two agents they recently assisted in locating. The Council would, as you said, find me behind the killings and determine that I must be genuine if I am attempting to destroy the one prophesied to destroy me.”

“And doing it covertly,” she added, still trying to comprehend the complexity of Scaramuzzi's plan—and its sheer wickedness.

“They, of course, would talk me out of continuing such a blind assault on so many people. When King Herod heard that magi had come to honor the birth of the prophesied Messiah, he ordered the death of all boys two and younger in Bethlehem and its vicinity. An atrocious slaughter, and for nothing; Joseph and Mary fled to Egypt with the baby Jesus, and Herod missed his target. The wise way of handling this newly revealed prophecy about me is to wait until enemies show themselves, then find out which one or ones died and were resuscitated.”

He's talking as if it were true
, Alicia thought.