The Apocalypse Fire (Ava Curzon Trilogy Book 2)

by Dominic Selwood

  Ramos did not fancy the woman’s chances with al-Irlandi if it turned out she had been lying. But that was none of his business. It should be easy enough to check her out. And if that was what it was going to take to keep the jihadi happy, then so be it.

  Ramos turned and headed back to the steps down to the lower wards.

  Bien.

  They had a deal.

  Chapter 39

  The Vatican Apostolic Library

  The Vatican Palace

  Cortile del Belvedere

  Vatican City

  EXITING THE PALAZZO Malta, Ava looked for Mary, but could not see her anywhere.

  She hailed a cab, then opened up her phone and found the number Mary had called from the previous evening.

  It took Mary a while to pick up. “Did you find anything?” she asked Ava. “What was Durov doing there?”

  “He’s after an icon,” Ava answered. “The Order of Malta’s holiest and most famous relic.” Ava checked her watch. “I need to check a few things. Can you get me into the Vatican Library?”

  “The Secret Library?”

  “Just the regular one,” Ava replied. “I need general materials, not the private affairs of the popes.”

  “No problem,” Mary confirmed. “There’ll be a pass ready for you at Reception.”

  “Great.” Ava gazed out of the car’s window at Rome passing by. “Let’s meet outside the library at five o’clock.”

  The taxi took her over the Ponte Cavour, around the great Roman fortress of the Castel Sant’Angelo, and dropped her at the top of the Via della Conciliazone. From there, she entered Vatican City on foot.

  It was as breathtaking as ever.

  The piazza’s quadruple rows of Tuscan columns encircled her like welcoming arms, drawing her toward the immensity of Saint Peter’s Basilica. Above the colonnades, one hundred and forty stone saints looked benignly down.

  She headed through Saint Peter’s Square, then across into the Belvedere Courtyard, where she picked up her reader’s pass, and entered the Vatican Apostolic Library.

  Once in its grand reading room, the air heavy with the smell of book leather and wood polish, she headed straight for the catalogues. As she found her way around the indexing system, she began searching for anything she could find on the icon of Our Lady of Philermos and the history of the Knights of Saint John.

  She was not disappointed.

  There were hundreds of works on the enigmatic crusaders.

  Once she had placed her orders, there was nothing to do but wait for the books to be delivered.

  With time to kill, she looked about the extraordinary reading room, with its long rows of desks and ornately frescoed vaulted ceiling. It was dazzling – emblazoned with golden paintings bathing the whole space in a warm glow.

  She found it hard to imagine that there had been a papal manuscript collection since the 300s, making it probably the world’s oldest continuously functioning archive. It was enormous, with millions of ancient manuscripts and printed books, covering every subject imaginable, from the dawn of time up to the modern day. All the manuscripts and books were there to be consulted, although – as a result of centuries of thefts – there was only one reader in the world actually allowed to take books out.

  Behind her, on display stands, was a temporary exhibition on the library’s seventeen love letters from King Henry VIII of England to his mistress, Anne Boleyn.

  While she was waiting, Ava read a couple of the panels.

  Apparently no one knew how the Vatican Library came to have the letters, but the suspicion was that they had been acquired as ammunition in the battle over England’s religion in the 1500s.

  Large facsimiles of Henry’s billets-doux were pinned to the exhibition boards, and as Ava skimmed them, she learned to her amusement that part of his royal seduction technique had involved assuring Anne that he hoped he would soon be able to ‘kysse’ her ‘pretty Duckys’.

  Ava shook her head at the pointlessness of it all, recalling that within three years of finally marrying Anne, Henry had grown bored of her, and arranged for her to be beheaded on trumped-up charges of adultery and conspiring to have him killed.

  She wandered over to one of the reference stacks lining the long wall. She had a dozen questions about the letter from Thomas Cromwell to Thomas Wriothesley she had found at Professor Hamidou’s flat, and hoped she could use the time to fill in some of the background.

  Without too much difficulty, she found a handful of reference books on the dissolution of the English monasteries, and took them back to her desk, where she started to go through them.

  After an hour or so, one of the librarians wheeled over a trolley, and delivered a dozen volumes to Ava’s desk.

  She began leafing through them, becoming increasingly absorbed by the history of the Knights of Saint John, and how the Order had survived for almost a thousand years. The books set out in amazing detail how a group of monks tending the sick in Jerusalem had evolved into an Order of crusading knights, finally becoming the modern world’s only ‘sovereign military and hospitaller’ country. As she leafed through the ancient and modern volumes, she failed to notice lunchtime coming and going, until she was disturbed by a cough beside her, and looked up to see Mary.

  To her surprise, Ferguson was standing beside her.

  “Have you found anything?” Mary asked, looking at the large pile of open books on the desk.

  Ava turned from Mary to Ferguson, her mind going blank for a moment.

  “The icon…” she began, momentarily lost for words. “It’s…”

  “It’s what?” Mary was frowning.

  “It’s…” Ava started again, the sentence dying in her throat.

  Ferguson shifted from one foot to the other.

  Mary looked across at him, then laid her hand lightly on his arm.

  The moment of disorientation Ava was feeling suddenly passed, as the confusion lifted.

  She stared at them in disbelief.

  They were sleeping together.

  Her stomach lurched.

  That’s where they had been all day.

  Ferguson jumped in to fill the lengthening silence. “Five-O-Four saw Durov enter the Russian embassy after he left the Palazzo Malta. He’s still there.”

  Ava was vaguely aware of Mary confirming that some of her team were staking out the embassy.

  She found herself just nodding, not really hearing a word Mary was saying.

  She suddenly felt alone – for the first time in a long time – and also confused that what Ferguson did was having such an effect on her. She had no claim on him. She had turned down his advances in the past.

  “So, shall we get the Vatican Gendarmerie Corps to invite Torquemada in for questioning?” Mary continued.

  “Yes.” Ava nodded mechanically.

  “Seriously?” Mary’s eyebrows lifted in surprise. “You think we’ll get away with it?”

  “What?” Ava realized she had answered without listening to the question.

  “Shall we have Grand Master Torquemada brought in and interviewed?” Mary repeated.

  Ava blinked hard, and looked down at the image of the icon, her thoughts coming into focus once more.

  She did not have time to indulge herself emotionally.

  She needed to concentrate.

  Durov was one step ahead of her. He had made the connection to the Knights of Saint John – and to their icon – before she had. She had no idea what lay at the end of the trail, but from the way Durov was pursuing it, she felt sure something highly significant depended on it.

  “No,” she answered, snapping back into the moment. “Torquemada won’t tell us anything, and we’ll only antagonize him. It’s Durov we need to watch now. And we need to find the original icon of Our Lady of Philermos before he does.”

  “Doesn’t the Order know where it is?” Ferguson asked.

  She shook her head. “The Knights of Saint John have moved their HQ frequently. From Jerusalem to Acre,
Cyprus, Rhodes, Malta, and Rome – with short stints in Messina, Catania, and Ferrara, too. There have been times when their lives were chaos, especially after Napoleon conquered Malta. A lot of things have gone missing over the years.”

  “That sounds pretty hopeless.” Mary looked dismayed. “The icon could be anywhere, then.”

  Ava shook her head. “Actually, I know exactly where it went.”

  Mary and Ferguson both stared at her.

  “Before settling back in Rome, the Order briefly set up somewhere rather unusual.”

  Ava flicked to a page of the book showing a man wearing an ermine cloak over a red tunic emblazed with the Maltese cross. He was holding a royal sceptre, and wearing a bulbous golden crown on his head.

  “Russia,” she announced, pointing to the picture. “It turns out that after Napoleon conquered Malta, the Romanovs and another noble family ran the Order from Saint Petersburg for five years. And afterwards they kept hold of the knights’ most sacred relics, including Our Lady of Philermos.”

  “But weren’t the tsars Russian Orthodox?” Mary chipped in. “How did that work?”

  “Bizarrely, it didn’t seem to be an issue.” Ava had also been surprised. It did sound highly improbable. “The knights hoped the tsar’s prestige would help them get back on their feet again, but it didn’t work out.” She flicked to a picture of the icon. “By then, the Romanovs had care of the relics, and they stayed in Russia. Now scroll forward a hundred years, and things become messy again when St Petersburg went up in flames in the 1917 Bolshevik revolution.”

  “Religion was banned.” Ferguson nodded.

  “The official record says that the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna smuggled the knights’ relics out of Saint Petersburg and back to her native Denmark. They were then apparently moved to Berlin and Belgrade, where they were entrusted to Alexander I of Yugoslavia. However, when the threat of a Nazi invasion became too strong, the relics were sent to safety in the countryside, to the monastery of Ostrog in Montenegro.”

  “Quite a trip.” Mary looked impressed.

  “And then they were lost.” Ava paused. “Until the icon was found in 1997 in the National Museum of Montenegro.”

  Ava pulled another book from the pile, and opened it where she had marked a page with a slip of paper.

  It showed a photograph of an icon, hanging alone on a wall, lit by a strong blue light in an all-blue room. The caption underneath the image stated that the photograph was from the National Museum of Montenegro, in Cetinje.

  “So is that the real one?” Mary asked with a hint of excitement.

  Ava shook her head. “Tsar Paul I had many copies made. One is in Assisi. The version I saw today in the Palazzo Malta is almost certainly another.”

  “How can you be so sure the Cetinje one is a copy?” Ferguson was peering at the image.

  Ava began closing the books and stacking them into a pile on the desk. “If you were Grand Master of the Order of Malta, would you leave your most precious relic in an out-of-the-way museum? And besides, Rasputin died in 1916, and I bet any money he saw the original icon in Russia, then left clues in his notebook to indicate where it was taken.”

  “Well, go on then.” Ferguson was hanging on her words.

  Ava looked up at him, feeling a mounting sense of triumph. “Jerusalem,” she smiled. “Where else?”

  Chapter 40

  Russian Embassy

  Via Gaeta 5

  Rione XVIII (Castro Pretorio)

  Rome

  The Republic of Italy

  TWO AND A half miles away, Durov was finding it hard to breathe.

  He clenched the slender crystal glass tightly in his hand, feeling the anger surging in him.

  What was that woman doing in the Order of Malta’s palace?

  He stared at the meticulously furnished ambassadorial room around him.

  What did she know?

  The glass shattered, cutting the skin of his hand.

  He continued staring at the floor, the anger raw.

  And she had escaped again.

  He tried to think of something else.

  Something soothing.

  Aside from her, everything was perfect.

  He now knew where the icon was.

  When he had been inside the Order of Malta’s palace, he had worked it all out. He had been through all the options, and he was certain he now had the answer.

  He would find the icon, and it would give him the sign.

  He was sure of it.

  But now there was the problem of the woman.

  He felt his anger rising again, and forced himself to calm down.

  It would be fine.

  The Holy Mother was merely testing him.

  His mind again moved to his flock, and to his epiphany at how they would find eternal glory and their place in the Kingdom.

  His breathing slowed as he let his mind rove over the scene, playing out all the details.

  It would be traditional – the way that throughout history sinners had prepared themselves for the next world. Sometimes voluntarily. Sometimes with the guidance of others.

  It would be clean and pure.

  He allowed himself to feel tantalized by the idea.

  The solution was clear.

  It was unavoidable.

  They had to burn.

  The idea filled him with joy.

  The fire would be like the flames of Pentecost that came down and blessed the apostles. In the tongues of golden fire, the martyrs would be joined with the Holy Spirit, who would become one with their very beings, sanctifying them.

  There, in the white-hot brazier, they would encounter I-am-who-I-am, the God of Moses, who had appeared as a burning bush, cloaking his searing splendour.

  In the blessing of the fiery furnace, they would meet their God.

  Chapter 41

  Cortile del Belvedere

  Vatican City

  AVA WAS STANDING outside the library, in the Belvedere courtyard.

  Her recent thoughts of Jerusalem took her back to the call she had received the previous day from Uri.

  She was still not clear how he had known exactly what she was doing.

  Which department in Mossad had handed her file to him?

  Why were they taking an interest in her?

  She had not been back to the Middle East in a while, and struggled to see why the Institute would have an active file on her.

  Uri had warned her to stay away from Durov. That sounded like Mossad were protecting him.

  But why?

  There was clearly an element to all this that she was unaware of.

  Uri had even known about the hit outside her house.

  Was it a coincidence that both Swinton and Uri were warning her to steer clear of Durov?

  The similarity made her uncomfortable.

  Was there a connection?

  She pulled out her phone, opened the RedPhone encryption app, and called Swinton.

  He answered almost immediately. “Where are you?”

  “Rome,” she answered. There was no harm telling him. He would be able to trace her phone anyway. “But not for much longer.”

  “How can I help?” he asked.

  “There’s someone I know who works for Mossad,” she began, keen not to give too much away.

  “Go on.”

  “He called me yesterday,” she continued, “and seemed to know a lot about what I’m doing. He explicitly warned me to steer clear of Durov.”

  “As did I.” Swinton’s tone was suddenly harder. “I hope you’re following instructions.”

  “I’m not especially keen to meet Durov again, either.” She side-stepped the question, putting her hand up to her ear, feeling the tender skin where the knife had cut. “But I’ve got a good lead on why he was after the Shroud, and what the Rasputin cryptographs represent.” She paused. “I need to visit Jerusalem.”

  There was silence on the other end of the line before Swinton answered. “And I presume you�
�re not keen on your Israeli friend finding out you’ll be visiting?”

  If it was not for her reservations about Swinton, Ava realized, she would enjoy working with him. He had good intuition.

  “I’d rather steer clear of him,” she confirmed. “It’s only going to complicate things if the Institute gets involved.”

  There was more silence on the other end of the line.

  “My passport’s got more Arab stamps in it than the Cairo post office,” Ava added. “There’s a real chance they won’t let me in.”

  “I’m sure they’re going to regret every minute you’re there,” Swinton responded. “Fine. I can’t guarantee that the Institute won’t find you, but I’ll have clean passports and travel documents couriered round for you and Major Ferguson immediately. Give the courier your real ones. We’ll keep them safe for you. Husband and wife?”

  For a second, Ava’s mind flashed to the memory of Mary’s hand on Ferguson’s arm, and the pang of resentment she had felt.

  “No,” she answered quickly. “Business colleagues is fine.”

  “Done,” Swinton replied, and the line went dead.

  DAY SIX

  Chapter 42

  Commercial aircraft

  Greek airspace

  ON THE PLANE, Ava and Ferguson had been sitting side by side in silence.

  Mary had taken an earlier flight, while they waited for Swinton’s people to deliver the fresh travel documents.

  “Everything okay?” Ferguson asked, breaking the silence.

  She nodded absent-mindedly. This was not a conversation she particularly wanted to have. She needed to be thinking about Rasputin’s cryptographs and the icon of Our Lady of Philermos.

  “You’ve been very quiet.” He frowned slightly.

  “I’m fine,” she answered, feeling a flash of irritation.

  Why wouldn’t she be okay?

  “Has something happened?” he persisted.

  Before she could stop herself, it started to come out. “I met Durov and his bodyguards yesterday. It wasn’t a particularly friendly chat.”

  He frowned. “You didn’t mention anything.”

  “It’s really not that important,” she answered flatly.