by Briana Snow
“The people upstairs… Do you mean…” Penelope looked up a little reverently. Somehow it hadn’t actually occurred to her that heaven might exist, despite the fact that the hells very clearly did.
“Oh, I wouldn’t sweat it, darling,” Dante muttered. “It’s not as if they are interested in much of anything despite keeping the gates to hell locked anyway!”
Well, he clearly has an axe to grind, Penelope thought, as Verity hissed at her apprentice.
“Yes, of course there is a heaven. Or other planes, as the Sisterhood likes to call them. They’re not exactly ‘heaven’ as you might think of it, or in his lurid and over-excited account. But there are planes above us, just as there are planes below us. Sadly, what he says might even be true about them.” Verity shook her head. “But anyway. Dante has been trading on his infamy and his contacts from that cosmic day trip ever since. He’s been collecting magical artifacts for the cultists, and trading souls to the demons and spirits.”
“Playing both sides off against each other,” Penelope said.
“I like to call it using sound market strategy,” Dante offered.
“Shut up,” said Verity. “So, Dante, before an Archon gets here and makes life very difficult for all of us, I need some information. You’re still connected, Dante, you must be. An event like this doesn’t just happen out of nowhere. What’s going on? Who’s been sniffing around for the Luminaire? What’s happening in the hells below?” Verity leaned forward and put her hands and white gloves on the counter table, forcing Dante to lean back. “Where are the others?”
“The others… The other parts to the grimoire?” Dante started shaking his head. “You don’t think that someone like me would know that—and if I did, why on earth would I be here?”
“You might not want them,” Penelope said, something niggling at her mind, but she wasn’t quite sure what. “You want them because they’re valuable, but you wouldn’t ever dare sell them,” Penelope reasoned, as both Dante and Verity looked at her. “Because as soon as that happens, then that’s it. Your entire business is over.”
Verity nodded, turning to look back at Dante. “Exactly. As much as I hate to say this, Dante, but you’re like me on this one. It pays to know where the books are, but never, ever to go near them.”
Penelope could see Dante’s face scrunch and twist in indecision, before his resolve broke. “Okay, okay. What’s the point anyway—now that a friggin Archon is on its way here?” He gave the grimoire a vengeful glance. “There has been a lot of activity. A lot. Possessions, hauntings, teenagers with Ouija boards turning up dead, housewives attacking their cheating husbands with kitchen knives, a spate of black cat births everywhere... A lot of signs of demonic activity,” Dante said.
“Yeah, I could read the National Enquirer for that. You know what I want Dante,” Verity said, pressing closer. “Come on, before it’s too late for you.”
“Aww!” Dante almost howled with impotent rage. “Is this all I get? Threatened by a couple of book-loving dames to not have my liver ripped out through my nose?” To Penelope’s eyes he looked almost pleading as he said it, as if all that he knew how to do now was to bargain for information, and lever for advantage.
“Here,” Penelope nodded towards her jacket pocket. “I’ve got twenty dollars in my purse. It could buy you a cab out of town, maybe.”
“Penelope, don’t…” Verity said warningly, but already Dante’s small, rat-like face was lighting up with apparent joy at the prospect.
“Nah, I don’t need money, Miss Penelope, I don’t need any of that,” he said. “But uh,” his magnified eyes through his spectacles traced up and down Penelope’s form, in a way that wasn’t sexual at all, but instead felt to Penelope what it must feel like if she were a car and was being valued at an auction. “Your keyfob,” he breathed.
“What!?” Penelope recoiled. “How…?”
“You don’t have to do it, Penelope,” Verity said, before turning back to the man behind the counter. “Quit it, Dante. The Archon’s on its way here right now, and will probably kill us all. So come on, out with the information. Where are the other books?”
But Dante’s eyes were fixed, glittering on Penelope as he repeated in a tense voice, “The keyfob. I’ll trade you your keyfob for the information—and I don’t even want to look at the Luminaire!”
Penelope frowned to herself and bit her lip. “I guess…”
“No!” Verity cut in quickly. “Dante…” she growled at him.
“Look, if I have to give something up because of this Archon, then so do you!” the magic-dealer hissed back. “The Archon will kill us all as far as I can see! Now, the keyfob, or you are on your own!”
Penelope shook her head resignedly, and said. “Look, it’s fine Verity. It’s only a picture. You can have it, it’s in my left jacket pocket.”
“Only if you are sure, Penelope. You don’t know what someone like him can do with things like that—” Verity was saying, but Penelope cut her off with a curt nod.
“Look, it’s only a very old picture of two people who are dead anyway. If he wants it so much, then let him have it.”
“Ahh, music to my ears, Miss Penelope,” Dante said as a blissful smile appeared for a moment on his face.
“Okay, Penelope, but don’t say I didn’t warn you,” Verity said sadly, sticking a hand in her accomplice’s jacket pocket and drawing out a large bunch of keys, at the end of which hung a cheap red plastic key-fob, the sort which are designed to hold a small thumbnail picture. As Verity palmed it over to Dante, she whispered fiercely at the small man, “You keep this safe, Dante Alighieri. We’ll be coming back for it when this is over, and if you haven’t got it…”
“Oh, I count on you coming back.” Dante smile grew wide and vicious as he pocketed the only surviving picture of Penelope Harp’s parents. “Now, information, was it? Well… I told you that there had been a lot of demonic activity recently, and that’s not all. The armies have been mobilizing. The armies of hell,” he said dramatically.
Verity slammed a fist on the table. “Enough with the dime-store theatrics, Dante! Of course, the armies of hell are mobilizing! The armies of hell are always mobilizing—and one of their top generals is now up here and ploughing through downtown New York City. Tell me something I don’t know.”
“Okay, okay,” Dante said quickly, beads of perspiration appearing on his brow. “There is something that I heard recently from one of my contacts, but you won’t like it. It’s not even local,” Dante said heavily. “It was about the Knights.”
“The Knights…” Penelope repeated.
“What are they up to now?” Verity said. “And to be honest, I wouldn’t particularly be surprised if they were up to something.”
“Well, word was, that they were indeed up to something recently. Something important,” Dante said. “A squad were traveling from London, England, all the way to Rome when they were ambushed and attacked, and only one of them survived.” Dante raised his eyebrows. “Imagine that, a full squad of Knights Templar, eviscerated. You don’t make a move on the Knights unless you have a lot of friends on your side.”
“The Knights Templar?” Penelope parroted. “Don’t tell me they exist as well, do they. And do they go around employing masochistic albinos?”
“You should stop watching too many movies,” Verity said. “No, the Knights Templar are who you think they are, but they are bad, bad news. A religious-military order who have just about sewn up every lodge, magician, mystic, and bit of magic in western Europe. They run it like a big, puritanical mafia.” She shuddered, before turning back to Dante. “Okay, so something big wants to start a war with the Knights. What else?”
“Well, the story was,” Dante whispered, “that the Knights had been trying to transport something important from London to Rome, when they got iced.”
“Something important enough to go to war for,” Verity mused. “And to Rome as well.”
“What’s so special about Rome?”
Penelope asked.
“Knights Templar HQ,” Verity said. “They keep all of their most treasured and heretical objects down in the Vatican Vaults, which was actually, coincidentally where that very book used to be kept—before it was sent to Florence, that is.”
“But what makes you think that it is another Luminaire?” Penelope asked Dante.
Dante shrugged, and it was easy to see just how pleased he was with himself at the information, and that he wanted to drag it out. “I didn’t think anything of it at the time. Oh, clearly it must be one of the important artifacts. The Thirteen Treasures of Prydain perhaps, or the Spear of Longinius. At the time, I think that I even remember thinking that the Knights must have found the original Necrominicon or something.” He cackled like that was a very funny joke. “You see, the rumor that reached me was that a whole squad of Knights Templar had left the British Library and were on route to Vatican City, Rome, when they got turned into chop-suey. Now it seems unusual, given the fact that another very important book has turned up, and is at the center of the biggest crap-hunt that the world is ever going to see.”
“How did I not hear about this!” Verity said to herself. “I was in London a week ago.”
“Well love, all I can say is that my contacts are a bit more financially minded than yours must be,” Dante chuckled. “You have to admit though, it’s a bit curious, huh? Two of the world’s finest libraries?”
“But if they were carrying one of the other volumes of the Luminaire, then why didn’t it get opened?” Verity pondered.
“Only one of the Knights survived, remember?” Dante Alighieri said. “That was the rumor, and, I guess that if they didn’t make it all the way to the Vatican City, then maybe it only makes sense that they returned to the place where they started from. The British Library.”
“And that would fit in with the terrible curse laid on all of the grimoires.” Verity nodded. “Anyone who touches it is supposed to die.”
“Great. Thanks for reminding me.” Penelope rolled her eyes.
“Oh no, not you,” Verity said, as Dante chuckled to himself.
“No, I’m sure that Miss Penelope is a latent psychic, right, Verity Vorja?” Dante accused the woman.
“Yes, I think so,” Verity said, a little defensively.
“Oh, I’m sure she is, isn’t that right, Vorja? Have you told her yet? About what happens to psychics around you? What happened to psychics who got too close to you?” Dante said once more.
“Enough. We’ve got what we came for. Come on, Penelope. I hope that you’ve got an up-to-date passport, because we’re catching the next flight to London.” Verity was already turning around and starting to backtrack their steps to the entrance again, but Dante, instead of being eager to see them leave, appeared to be gloating as if he had won a small but valuable victory.
“When are you going to tell her, Vorja? When it’s all over? Are you going to tell her then?”
“Shut up, Dante. Good luck with the rest of your life!” Vorja said, as Penelope started following her out of the shop. “Just ignore him, Penelope. The guy’s a heel.”
But Dante didn’t stop shouting as they marched out of his shop. His whiny voice followed them to the jangling bell of the door, and stuck in Penelope’s ears. “Why do you think it’s you, Miss Penelope? Why do you think you’re the one with your hands on the grimoire? You can’t trust her, Miss Penelope! You can’t trust Verity Vorja!”
Thunk! The door slammed behind them.
Chapter XI
Penelope found herself standing outside in the New York street, her eyes warily raising to the nearest junction, half expecting the thing that was wearing the form of Leonidas to suddenly turn the corner at any moment. Verity was already performing her same trick as before: standing out in the middle of the road and pointing at the nearest yellow taxi, demanding that it stop for her.
I suppose that this is just about the easiest way to get anywhere in the city. Penelope thought as she clutched the grimoire to her chest. The words of the little man inside the pawn shop behind them echoed in her mind, however. Could she really trust Verity Vorja? Did she really know Verity at all?
She had saved my life, sort of, Penelope considered, as a squeal of brakes in front of them indicated that her partner had been successful in her quest for transportation. I mean, if I hadn’t met Verity then I might never have gotten out of the New York Library, and the way that Leonidas looks… That might have been me! She shivered in horror at the thought, before something else occurred to her.
Do I actually know that the Archon is going to kill me when it finds me? What if it doesn’t at all?
“Penelope?” Verity had the door to the halted taxi cab already open, and was looking at her in a slightly annoyed fashion.
How much do I really know this woman? How do I know that what she is saying is true? “Ah, Verity?” she started to say.
“Penelope—come on, the Archon might be here at any moment!” Verity said urgently. “We have to get to the airport, get to London, remember?”
“Yeah, yes, of course. But—but I have a cat. Blake. Named after the poet.” Penelope thought wildly, I have to buy myself some more time.
Verity opened and closed her mouth. “Ah, okay. Right, well, can a neighbor look after it?” The woman looked exasperated.
Penelope thought of the nice woman next door, old Mrs Jarnuski, who would just jump at the chance to look after the enormous black housecat named Blake that she had owned for a few years now. “Yes, I guess. But, if we’re traveling to the UK, I am sure that I could do with a change of clothes…”
“A change of clothes!?” Verity looked shocked. “What? To mop up the blood with?”
At her side, the seated taxi driver was starting to look increasingly worried about how this conversation was going.
“Verity, really!” Penelope tried to put her foot down, in the way that she had remembered her late mother doing. Her impression must have carried some weight behind it, as she saw the taxi driver gulp and hunker down in his seat. “I am going home to my cat and my wardrobe, and I am going to do that before I do anything else with you!”
Verity Vorja, senior Sister of the Ancient and Erudite Order of St. Agnesia, nodded slowly to herself. “Fine. Just so long as we’re moving.”
Feeling like she had won some minor victory at least, Penelope walked to the taxi and got in. As she gave the driver the address of her apartment, and they sped off into traffic, Penelope wondered if she could get to her phone in all of this. I could phone the police, or the F.B.I. Surely they’ll be able to sort this mess out… The seed of doubt that Dante Alighieri had planted in the librarian’s mind was unfurling and sprouting, sending its roots through everything that Penelope heard, saw, and thought.
Chapter XII
The Special Agent stood with one hand inside the deep pocket of his black trench coat, reassuringly holding the grip of his ceramic Glock pistol. In front of him, the small and dumpy librarian whose name he really couldn’t remember blubbed once again, getting through the second tissue that he had given her.
For god’s sake, he thought to himself. It’s only a light massacre—it’s not even like this woman could have seen much happening through the smoke.
But the woman had seen enough it seemed, to at least have shaken her desperate and fast-slipping grip on reality. “And then, and then all the lights flickered, and the room was full of this red, powdery smoke…”
“Chemical Dye Pack,” the F.B.I. agent supplied, along with another tissue to the woman. Special Agent Maximus was indeed, a member of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He was big built, and others thought that he might even have played a bit of amateur American Football. He had the sort of frame that others called ‘brick-like’ with shoulders that he was more than proud of, and a neck that was almost non-existent, on top of which sat a square-jawed head, with a crewcut of pepper and brown hair. He wore a pair of glasses, but they were only the cheap sort from dime store chemists,
with Perspex instead of glass, and did absolutely nothing for his vision other than keep the rain off his eyes. It was his notional attempt at a disguise, knowing that other people remembered such details as ‘glasses’ much more than they did eye or hair color.
“No, it was red smoke,” said the librarian, herself only half cleaned from the red powder, and looking like she had just walked through a chemical factory. “The books… All that red, it’ll take years to restore them.”
“Well, I am sure that if anywhere can do it, it will be the New York Public Library,” Special Agent Maximus said heavily. He was tired, and he knew almost precisely just what was going on, but he had to at least pretend to interview the witnesses otherwise his cover would be blown. “It was a red chemical dye pack that the suspect let off, the same sort that banks use on their money bags. It acts like smoke when first released.”
“Now,” Maximus continued, “I don’t suppose you could recognize the women involved from a few photos that I have here?” He started to pull out the small black flip-book he carried, in which he had cello-taped the photo of the woman he thought was responsible.
“Oh, I could, I suppose, but…” the dumpy, red-tinted librarian woman looked around them both, at the mayhem on the floor where at least a dozen white covers had been placed over the bodies (not all of them full-sized, as some indicated where a body part had been neatly wrenched from its joint in the attack). But even then, there were still others in black body bags which had already been taken away. The floor all around was wet and sticky with the blood of the victims, and the halls of the Library itself echoed with the sound of people sobbing.
“Ah, of course,” Maximus tried to keep the annoyance out of his voice, as he led the librarian further away from the terrible scene, and out the front door to where the entire plaza had been cordoned off by a line of police. Already there were crowds gathering, and cameras snapping photos of the scene.
Great. I’ll have to get Head Office to go to work on Twitter and the rest, Maximus sighed. In his line of work, it was always best if no trace of him appeared in the news or social media.