Fury and the Power

by Farris, John

  Grayle's legs were stretched out in front of him, feet on a sculpted bronze footstool that, on examination, was the figure of a man in chains, crouched on all fours, jagged gouges where his eyes would have been.

  "What do you think of her?" he asked, after several contented puffs on his cigar.

  Their heads turned to the light sculpture, where a holographic image of Eden/Gwen had appeared, hands clasped at her waist, head slightly bowed.

  "Delightful," one of the elegant women said. She wore a double strand of gray pearls that cost more than a thousand dollars a pearl.

  "Extraordinary" another said. She was the wife of the man with diamonds in his battered nose. Her red coif complemented the brilliant, hectic green of his eyes. "Is she a perfect likeness?"

  "Oh, yes."

  "But how do you know" asked the third woman, who was heiress to a media lord's fortune, "that she is a doppelganger?"

  "I couldn't have known," Grayle said, "if I hadn't met Eden herself in Kenya." He rubbed his wounded shoulder lightly; another day before it would completely heal, leaving no scar. In the meantime it served as a memento of his last night in Africa, his frustrated hunt at Shungwaya. The pain a promise. Someday soon he would have a second opportunity to kill the man who had shot him. But he had more urgent business, in Rome and elsewhere. "You see, Stephane, doppelgangers are mirror images of their homebodies. Our friend Gwen, as you may have observed at dinner, is right-handed."

  "Producing one's doppelganger is a left-handed Art," said one of the men, chairman of Italy's major financial conglomerate.

  "If our dinner guest was a dpg," the green-eyed man asked Grayle, "then where is Eden Waring?"

  "I don't know," Grayle said, comfortable with the admission.

  "The doppelganger, unfortunately, cannot be of value to you, Great One."

  "I wouldn't say that." Grayle almost shrugged, but remembered not to. It hurt to move his shoulder, even though only a small fragment of bullet remained unabsorbed. Peevishly he kicked the footstool with the heel of a shoe. The footstool cried out and writhed in torment, to the amusement of Grayle's Roman coterie.

  "Biologically," the financier said, massaging his forehead as if trying to recall the answer to a difficult exam question, "aren't all doppelgangers sterile?"

  "As long as they remain doppelgangers," Grayle confirmed, thinking of Gwen's pathetic eagerness to claim an identity of her own.

  "Then only Eden herself can provide you with—" said the woman whose lightly flushed, columnar neck rose from a pedestal of pearls. They took on a glow and began to tighten like a hangman's noose, lifting her dimpled chin as she made strangling noises. Her eyes bulged and sought forgiveness for the indiscreet reference to the magician's torn and scattered soul. Forbidden, even among his intimates.

  The sulky chill left Grayle's eyes and she sagged in her chair, coughing up part of her dinner. No one looked at her.

  Grayle nodded, and moved on.

  "For now I need them both. Eden and Gwen."

  "What can Eden Waring's—replica—possibly accomplish for you?" the pragmatic financier asked. "Isn't she completely in control of her homebody?"

  Grayle studied the night sounds of a writhing, assaulted city as if he were a composer alert to nuances in the prelude to a favorite and oft-repeated work. Anticipating the long agony yet to come, that would wither and ultimately crush the sacred heart of the Eternal City.

  "Not any longer," he said.

  The Eden/Gwen image persisted in the light sculpture, downcast like a penitent ghost.

  A replica, yes. But should Eden, growing powerful in ways unknown to him and perhaps now intuitively aware of the hunter and its desires, become too dangerous to approach, the dpg had access to worlds beyond his reach. The illusionist fully understood how to use Gwen, but not how to persuade her to willingly help him.

  That would come. Grayle drew on his cigar, eyes narrowing. He was content, for now.

  Gwen was drowsy, perhaps from the rich food or the glass and a half of Tuscan wine she'd drunk at Il Fiorentino. Or her spell of drowsiness might have been due to the scents permeating the white silk handkerchief Grayle had given her to annul the effect of smoke flowing south and west from bombed buildings, making the streets near the river hazy. Moments into her ride in the black leather compartment of the BMW limo she was nodding off.

  Screech of brakes, a shouted oath from the driver. She was snapped out of her pleasant daze but barely got her chin up before the stunning impact. A van had appeared at great speed from a side street. The crash nearly tore the front end out of the Beamer, lifted and rammed the rest into the steel shutters of a shop across a narrow sidewalk.

  Gwen was thrown across the seat. She hit her head on the smoke-toned armored window on the opposite side. Other windows had been cracked but not shattered. She didn't feel anything for a few seconds; then a sharp pain like a meat skewer through the back of her neck made her scream.

  The van backed up, green fluid spurting from the ruptured radiator. The van's running lights were barely perceptible through the armored windows. Gwen was aware of men outside, quick shadows, doors wrenched open, gunfire. One of the bodyguards in the car was hit; there was a vivid gush of blood as his head rocked backward.

  Then gloved hands seized her by the ankles and she was dragged out of the backseat, lifted off the pavement. An ultraviolet light switched on inches from her eyes.

  Strength was squeezed from her body as if she were an apple in a press; she felt literally flattened, mush inside her skin, straining to breathe, the black light saturating her brain like anesthetic. The continuing pressure caused muscles to spasm in her arms and legs. She couldn't speak; beg for the oppressive light to be turned off.

  "My daughter's name was Edwina," said the man with the ultraviolet light. "She was married at fourteen to a bastard son of Charles the Second, and died of food poisoning not many years after. Now isn't it odd how you can forget a simple thing like that?"

  This while she was being carried to a car behind the van that had destroyed the BMW. She was flung into the backseat and Seth Foxe climbed in after her. Doors slammed shut. Her eyes were tightly closed, but Gwen knew her dress had snagged on wreckage, was torn and riding up over her waist. He pulled the torn dress down to cover her thighs and patted her on the fanny.

  "Do we need any more of the light?" he asked solicitously.

  Gwen shook her head slightly. The light clicked off. The driver gunned a powerful engine, backed up a full block at high speed, and made a sliding turn onto a broader, busier street.

  "What was the light for?" Randy of the velvet suiting said. He was in the front seat with another man, looking back at them.

  "Didn't you know, darling? Ultraviolet saps their strength completely. She's quite helpless now. Only requires a few minutes of the light every hour or so to keep her docile and mum. No need for bonds or an uncomfortable gag."

  "How do you know so much about doppelgangers?" Randy asked.

  Gwen felt one of Seth's gloved hands massaging a still-trembling quadriceps. Helpless didn't adequately describe her physical weakness, the dim sense of alarm that told her she was in big trouble. Again.

  The venerable actor sighed.

  "I have been around for a very long time," he said.

  Chapter 24

  CITTÀ DEL VATICANO

  OCTOBER 21

  11:00 P.M.

  The papal secretary, a brisk young Frenchman from Aix, met Tom Sherard and Bertie Nkambe at a covered entrance to the Gemelli Polyclinic.

  "I'm Laurent Colbert." The monsignor had a quick smile and confident eyes behind Clark Kent glasses. "I was told to expect three visitors."

  "She ought to be here any minute," Tom said, mildly vexed as he looked around. The small lobby they were escorted to was empty except for Vatican cops in plainclothes, the lighting subdued. "Her name is Eve Bell."

  The secretary nodded. "Well, perhaps we should go up. I'll watch for her." He had the peppy stride of a
long-distance runner, leading them to a private elevator.

  The papal apartment was on the eleventh floor of the clinic. There was a river view from the windows of the small living room, and tonight a smoke-shrouded sky across the Tiber, turbulent yellow where the car—or truck—bomb had exploded. "Terrible business," Laurent Colbert said, closing opaque curtains but not the drapes. "The Holy Father is in his chapel; I'll let him know you have arrived. May I bring you something from the kitchen? We have soft drinks. His Holiness is particularly fond of Orangina."

  "Without ice, please," Leoncaro said, coming almost surreptitiously into the small room and smiling slightly, having caught his secretary off-guard. It seemed to be a long-running game of gotcha that amused him. Laurent recovered with a quick bow and made introductions. Tom and the Pontiff shook hands. Leoncaro was dressed casually for their visit, dark gray slacks, a white shirt open at the throat, black leather sandals. Bertie wasn't Catholic but she kneeled and kissed his ring, which pleased him.

  Leoncaro gestured to a small stuffed sofa, then turned and took a couple of steps to a high-backed wooden chair with traces of gold remaining in the deep curlicues of carved wood. The broad seat was heaped with pillows and cushions. There was a Pluto pillow and a Mickey Mouse pillow in the pile, Mickey wearing a baseball cap. Leoncaro arranged the lot to his satisfaction and settled down.

  "My most recent niece and nephew sent these to me," the Pope explained, holding up the cartoon pillows. "I've never been to the Wonderful World of Disney. Wouldn't mind a visit to the one outside Paris. But the way things are going in the real world, I'm advised not to appear as if I'm having fun." His English was excellent; his voice low and with a slight rasp to it. His smile when he looked at Bertie appeared gently mischievous. "Signorina Nkambe. I understand that you are more famous than I am."

  "Just lucky so far, Your Em—I mean, Your Holiness."

  "And very photogenic, I've no doubt, which must have a great deal to do with your secular success." Bertie's impression was that, in spite of his hard line on abortion and disdain of feminist groups, he did like women and didn't consider them bystanders in the human race. "Why don't you call me Sebastiano? In fifteen minutes, twenty at the most, I will fall asleep, whether I am in my bed or still sitting upright in this chair. During this little remnant of my day I am more or less off-duty."

  "Thank you," Bertie said. She glanced at Tom, whose attention was unhappily fixed on his wristwatch.

  Leoncaro spread his hands, smiling indulgently. "Where can she be? This amazing child I have heard so much about. Who knows everyone's fate, including my own."

  "I hope she'll be here soon," Tom said edgily.

  "So do I. I meant what I said about falling asleep." He sipped from a goblet of orange soda. "If this is only about the bloody paw prints on La Scala Santa, I know. I have seen them in a vision of my own, glowing like the coals of hell." He paused, touching the gold of his pectoral cross. "Given that visions are not logical and portents require interpretation, still I would like to hear about this daemon, or were-beast, apparently formidable enough to have injured your arm"—he nodded, acknowledging the blue cast beneath the shirt cuff Tom couldn't button—"then survived two shots from rifles made to bring down a rampaging elephant."

  "They can't be killed," Bertie murmured.

  Leoncaro tapped the rim of his glass against his front teeth.

  "Elephants?"

  Bertie's voice dropped lower, and she squirmed uncomfortably on the sofa beside Tom, who put a hand over hers.

  "Shape-shifters."

  Leoncaro leaned forward. "Removal of the abscess has only marginally improved my hearing," he said, cupping a hand to his right ear.

  Bertie spoke up. "What we saw, and an impression that we have on tape for you to see, was a shape-shifter."

  "Oh. One of those."

  "It was a full-grown tiger with the head of a hyena."

  "The combination," Leoncaro said calmly, "of the tenor and the power, must have been greatly unsettling. Even though you seem to be knowledgeable about matters beyond the visible world."

  "But who knows what form it might take, when it shows up again—"

  "To destroy me? Prince of light, God on this earth? True or not, nonetheless it is one of the strongest covenants our faith provides. If this is the will of the creature that made itself known to you, why should it appear in Africa four nights ago?"

  "It came to Shungwaya looking for Eden. But she... wasn't there just then."

  "Could the shape-shifter have been stalking her? Because of her prescience, her status in the Psi world?"

  "No, Your—Sebastiano. See, I've been thinking about this until my brain feels raw. But I'm convinced that the were-beast has to—it must mate with Eden. It may exist only for that purpose."

  Leoncaro's head moved up and back slightly, as if he'd taken a light jab to the chin, reminiscent of his younger days in the ring. He stared at them and past them, eyes narrowing, a hooded appearance. His eyes were hard, but his lips trembled before he spoke.

  "Morto un papa, se nefa un altro."

  Then his mouth clamped shut; he returned to them with a stiffened jaw and momentary rage in his expression.

  "That obscenity, that abomination, must not occur. The girl must be protected with all of the powers available to us under heaven. Why hasn't she come? Do you know where she is?"

  "She went out to dinner," Tom said with another look at his watch. It was eleven-eighteen. "More than three hours ago. Please let me try to apologize for… Eden's unforgivable rudeness."

  "No, no. There was a car bomb in Montecitorio, which of course you're aware of. It is possible, depending on the location of the restaurant and subsequent traffic conditions, that the bombing has delayed her. Was she with someone you know?"

  "Lincoln Grayle," Bertie said. "Eden met him in Kenya. Actually I introduced them."

  Leoncaro nodded, distance in his eyes again.

  "Oh, yes. I have heard of him. Isn't he a magician? What an interesting profession."

  The papal secretary returned and stood with clasped hands near the door. Leoncaro nodded again and rose slowly as Tom and Bertie sprang to their feet.

  "Thank you for coming to see me," the Pontiff said, taking a hand of each and holding them tightly. "Please have no fear for my life. I'm well protected within the Holy See by the Swiss Guard—not the showy ones with the halberds; I'm speaking of those who are trained by America's Secret Service—and by state security forces in those nations I travel to. But I urge you, when Eden returns, never let her out of your sight again. Eden's life is more important than my own at this critical time. The words I spoke in Italian? It's a saying the pragmatic Romans have. 'When a pope dies, they make another one.'"

  He smiled ironically, let go of their hands, made the sign of the cross over Sherard and Bertie. Turned to go to his bedroom as the papal secretary stepped forward to escort them out.

  "If it would not be a difficulty," Leoncaro said, pausing, "please bring the girl to me. Tomorrow at three-thirty in the papal library. I'm most anxious to see and talk to her. Laurent will make those arrangements. I'm scheduled for an audience with some distinguished members of the American laity, whom I have had cooling their heels for the better part of a week due to my ear problem. Is it who, or whom, in English, Laurent?"

  "I'm not at all certain, Holiness. I'll look it up right away."

  "Don't you ever sleep, Laurent? Do it tomorrow. Has Pasquale remembered that I needed a new toothbrush?"

  Tom and Bertie were in the car taking them back to the Excelsior Hotel when Bertie broke a long brooding silence.

  "His Holiness knows something we don't know," she said. "Tom, do I scare easily?"

  "You're braver than I am."

  "Not now I'm not," she said, clinging to his unbroken arm and huddling close to him. "Tom, please don't make a big scene when we see Gwen."

  "I'm just going to quietly strangle her."

  Leoncaro, on his Swedish orthopedi
c bed, a practical luxury to preserve the structural integrity of his aging lower back, had not been able to fall asleep as promptly as usual. There was an odor in the air of the spartan bedroom (in spite of sealed windows and the additional air purification system installed in the papal suite to screen out the tiniest pathogens that were always kicking around inside hospitals) that had something to do with the cloud of disaster lingering over a wide area of Rome toward the midnight hour, more to do with an unspeakable entity already prospering infernally on earth when Rome was a collection of hovels and sheepcotes.

  His nose wrinkled at this first disagreeable sign of intrusion, which he had the option to forcibly reject if he chose. Still, Leoncaro reflected, perhaps it was time that they meet again.

  He abandoned the effort to sleep, reached for a robe, and sat on the side of the low bed. Yawning from time to time, he read his Bible until church bells announced a new day and, at one minute past midnight, the advent of his longtime adversary.

  "As usual your foulness precedes you," Leoncaro said gruffly, setting his Bible and reading glasses aside. He looked around the small room, which was mirrorless, undecorated except for the large carved ebony crucifix above the bed.

  A coarse smoky image was raveling kinematically while keeping cautious distance from him. An eyespot became visible, expanded from embryonic blandness into a steadfast iris afire with contempt.

  "And—as usual—I find you in reduced circumstances. Millennia of riches and spoils surround you, but you might as well be in that squalid goat-hide tent on the lower steppes—or do I have the place and circumstances of our last meeting wrong?"

  "You know that you do," Leoncaro said, snuffling into a handkerchief, disgust in his eyes.

  "Oh, yes, it's clear to me now," Mordaunt said, even as a second, rudimentary eye and a dark mystical rubbing of a face, satirically like that of the Shroud of Turin, appeared to annoy Leoncaro. "On my last visit you were beset by creditors and largely dismissed by your peers. A routinely ignored voice in the House of Lords. Considered somewhat dangerous for your views. 'Fiel pero desdichado.' Wasn't that the motto on the family coat of arms? Faithful but unfortunate. How appropriate even now, in your present co-opted persona."