The Edge of Temptation: Gods of the Undead 2 A Post-Apocalyptic Epic

by Peter Meredith

  “I guess this answers the question: what do you give a man who has everything?” Cyn chuckled, looking in the box on the drive back to the jet. Jack laughed, though he was the only one who did. Cyn’s joke had been exceedingly English. The fake Lance of Longinus constituted Jack’s sole property. He didn’t have a home or a TV or a mantle to put the spear on. He technically didn’t even own the clothes on his back. The government provided his clothes and his sword and his armor.

  He owned nothing…nothing except an old spear and a nail, and for some reason this struck him as hilarious.

  Chapter 29

  Rome, Italy

  Cynthia Childs

  Armenia came and went in a blur. The jet sped them southeast and once again Jack slept through the niceties of private jet travel. He unstrapped his sword, placed the fancy box holding his thousand-year old fake Lance of Longinus between his feet, tilted his chair back and slept through both takeoff and landing and everything in between.

  Cyn stayed awake long enough to ask for a blanket for both her and Jack and then she too was gone. The last thing she remembered was Captain Vance once again swearing into his phone.

  Then they were landing and being shaken awake with the historic city of Vagharshapat outside the little porthole of a window next to her seat. The sun had been up for an hour and the new morning didn’t do much to bring any charm to the Armenian city. Aside from a number of beautiful churches, the city possessed little charm. It had been redesigned and rebuilt fifty years earlier by the Soviets with the concept of utility being of greater importance than aesthetics. It consisted mostly of block after block of dreary, two story rectangles.

  “How do you like our fair city?” asked the interpreter for the Mayor. Both men were so alike they could be brothers. They were both fiftyish with deep, coarse black hair that was beginning to grey at the temples, and both had webs of wrinkles at the corner of their eyes.

  “It’s great,” Jack lied through his teeth, saving Cyn from having to. They were traveling in the back of a Soviet-era army truck, the only vehicle large enough to fit them all. To their entourage was added a deputy US ambassador, who was clearly afraid of Jack and did everything possible to keep from touching him, a local holy man, whose religion was never established, and a number of armed guards all of whom looked as though they felt that the threat lay inside the truck rather than outside of it.

  It made for an uncomfortable ride. Thankfully, it was a short ride to the Manoogian Museum where their version of the lance had been housed for the last three-hundred and fifty years. Jack took one look at the spear head and his jaw grew tight and his smile fixed in place. Cyn understood. This wasn’t the spear that had pierced Christ’s side, either.

  To start with, it wasn’t even a real spear, not a military one, at least. The head of it was wide and flat, not sharp in the least and shaped like a diamond from a deck of cards. No soldier would carry such a thing, except, maybe in a ceremonial situation. To make matters worse, there were four holes in the flat head that had been purposefully placed so as to simulate a cross which was most certainly not a Roman symbol used in the first century when Jesus had lived.

  “Hmmm, okay…yes,” Jack said, acting as though he was considering the thing’s potential. Without asking, he touched the metal. The mayor and the guards and the museum’s bespectacled curator all watched with anticipation stamped on their faces. Jack screwed up his eyes and gritted his teeth and then sighed, looking sad.

  “I am sorry to have to tell you this, but this isn’t the real Lance of Longinus.” At this proclamation, the holy man grew angry and the mayor showed disappointment and the curator turned snooty. The guards at least relaxed.

  There was quite of bit of talk flying around the room, all in Armenian, and during the spittle-inducing arguments, Cyn secretly touched the metal and found that Jack was right, there was nothing to the thing.

  “They say you are wrong,” the interpreter said. “They say that this has been a relic of the Armenian people for the last two-thousand years, ever since Thaddeus, the apostle of Christ brought it to us. There is no doubt that this is the singular spear.”

  Jack shrugged and said: “If it is then double…no triple the guard on it. Or send it into hiding with only one man keeping the secret of where it’s hidden, and then pray that my cousin doesn’t find that one man. I wish I could advise you further, but we have to be going. We’ll see ourselves out.”

  Total time in the presence of the fake spear: two minutes. They left the curator and the holy man deep in another argument, boarded the truck and were soon back at the jet where they found that the engines had never ceased. They were wheels up four minutes after that.

  Except for affording them a night’s sleep, the trip had been a waste of time. Jack cranked at everyone, until Cyn begged the stewardess for any sort of breakfast. When it came, he ate ravenously, scarfing down two plates of eggs and sausage. From then on, he was as chipper as he could be.

  Cyn ate like a mouse. She was nervous about going to Rome. Although she went to mass every Sunday and tried her level best not to sin, she was still in fact a necromancer, and that meant she was inherently evil. What would the Pope see when he looked in her eyes? A shudder ran across her shoulders.

  No one saw. Jack’s chipper mood had given way to a food coma and he was snoring next to her, while Captain Vance was again on the phone: this time updating his superiors on the useless trip to Armenia.

  And it wasn’t just the idea of meeting the Pope that had her afraid. If there was a real Lance of Longinus and Robert didn’t have it already, they all figured it had to be in Rome and that meant a showdown with Robert. It meant that the end of their long running battle could be only hours away.

  And she didn’t think she was prepared. She had her shotgun and her imp-like smirk and an evil power that she refused to use. When she added those three things up it didn’t amount to much. What about your soul? a voice in her mind asked. What about giving your soul to Jack? He might need it.

  Yes, that should have been part of the equation, except for one thing: the spell that Jack was carrying around inside of him had been meant for her. The Mother of Demons had made it for Cyn and it called to her wordlessly. A connection with Jack’s soul now could be catastrophic for both of them. She could picture the spell igniting spontaneously the moment their souls joined and she could picture herself willing the Mother of Demons through the gate.

  No, they couldn’t join souls. In fact, what made the most sense was for Cyn not to even be in the fight or anywhere near it. She knew that Jack would spend far too much of his energy trying to keep her safe. She knew it and she was sure Robert knew it as well. He would target her with every demon and spell he possessed.

  All the more reason to bow out of this one, the voice in her mind said in what sounded like a perfectly reasonable manner, one that was certainly far too rational and logical to argue with, except…except she knew she couldn’t leave Jack alone to face whatever nightmare Robert was cooking up.

  And she was sure he was cooking up something.

  She stood and went forward to where Vance was hissing into the phone about the absolute necessity of clearing landing zones at the cemeteries in the greater Rome area. “Yes, I understand that some of these cemeteries interred bodies that are thousands of years old; however, I’m more concerned with the fact that there are three Children’s hospitals in Rome and that there are a thousand schools and five-hundred thousand children who attend those schools. You saw the footage from Tours.”

  He covered the phone and looked up at her. “I’ll be just a minute. These cemetery guys aren’t listening to the ambassador or her staff. I keep telling them that if there’s an incident, we’re going to raise the bodies one way or another. And if they…Yes, I’m still here. No, I don’t speak Italian. Yes, I can understand you. Okay, now that’s settled, I want you to pay attention to me. In thirty minutes there will be a squad of soldiers at your gates. If you don’t let them in they�
�re going to blow up…you know, explode? Yes. They will explode those gates. So I suggest you do what they say. Ciao.”

  He punched the button and then stared out the window of the jet for a few seconds before turning back to Cyn. “What can I do for you?”

  “I think I need a better weapon. The shotgun is pretty good, but…but I worry that it won’t be good enough. Do you know what I mean?”

  He laughed, but not cruelly. “I know exactly what you mean. Against the ghouls the shotgun is great, and a single demon isn’t that much harder to put down, but against the heavy weights, it’s just a toy. Trust me, all the Raiders feel the same way. The trouble is it’s all we have. Sure we can get a missile launcher, but they’re too bulky and slow to fire.”

  “What about grenades? Do you have any of them?”

  “Sure. I might even be able to scare up a grenade launcher. You’ve just got to be mighty careful what you’re shooting at, especially what is down range of your target. If you miss you could hit a school bus and you wouldn’t want that.”

  It was his third mention of schools in a minute. “Do you have children?” she asked.

  “Three girls all back home,” he said and then looked out the window, sighing. “Well, what passes for home these days. We had a house in eastern Pennsylvania, but it was too close to the action. The dead got to within twenty-two miles before they turned back.”

  Cyn felt her stomach cinch with guilt. “Oh, that was close.”

  “Ever since then jobs have been drying up and property values crashed. We had to abandon the house six months ago. That really sucked. The bank foreclosed on a house that no one would ever want and we had to file bankruptcy. It’s the reason I joined the Raiders. Better pay. I had to try and get my family in the red again.”

  “But you could die,” Cyn said, aghast.

  He shrugged. “That’s what life insurance is for. I’m worth more dead than alive. Hey, why don’t you go rest and I’ll see about the launcher.”

  She had been effectively dismissed though she didn’t mind. Vance’s face had taken on a melancholy cast and she feared saying anything more concerning his family. Melancholy wasn’t the best frame of mind to be in right before what could be their biggest fight yet.

  “Unless we’re just wasting our time,” she mused, sitting back down next to Jack. “If the spear in Rome turns out to be fake, what does that mean? And what should we do?”

  No clear answer came to her, although she mused on the subject all through the flight. They landed at noon and stepped out onto the airstrip into a sweltering Italian day. The sun blazed down and the sky around it had the appearance of steel. They barely had time to sweat before three black limousines pulled up, each bearing a small flag: yellow and white with what looked like crossed keys on the white half—it was the flag of Vatican City, the smallest country in the world.

  The entire city sat on only one-hundred and nine acres and had an official population of eight hundred and fifty-one people.

  From the limousines came a dozen Swiss guards, who frisked them and relieved them of their weapons. They were tall and stern and utterly uncompromising, not that anyone, including Jack, raised a fuss. Strangely, Jack seemed completely at his ease among the guards and when he climbed into the back of the middle limo, he immediately started poking about, opening the tiny drawers that were embedded in the wall of the vehicle and sniffing at the various decanters.

  “I think this is either cognac or brandy. Is there even a difference?” he asked Vance, who only scowled at him while the two Swiss guards who sat in the back with them didn’t bat an eye or make any noise at all.

  “There’s a difference,” Cyn answered. “But I don’t care for either. Do they have any vodka and maybe some pineapple juice?” She felt like she needed a drink and wondered why she hadn’t taken advantage of the alcohol on the jet when she had the chance.

  Jack checked in what was a very mini minibar. “Everything’s in Italian. Ah! This is probably vodka and this carton has a picture of an orange. Will a screw-driver do?” When she eagerly agreed, he eyed her. “Are you nervous about meeting the Pope?”

  A half-shrug accompanied her answer: “Yes, I suppose. We did help kill the old Pope.”

  “We did no such thing,” Jack snapped. His scowl equaled Captain Vance’s as he threw ice, orange juice and vodka in a glass. “Here, drink this. It might straighten your thinking out. We were innocent pawns and we did try to stop him.”

  He made a drink of his own and Cyn saw that the proportion of vodka to orange juice was two to one. She asked: “What about you? Are you nervous?”

  “Now’s not a good time to lie, so I’ll go with a non-answer,” he said with a grin and then took a swig of his drink and looked out the window. “My, Rome sure is pretty, but who knew it would be this hot?”

  “Everyone,” Cyn replied and then took her own drink—and then made a face. “That’s not vodka. Ugh!”

  Jack laughed and then took another drink. “I think it’s some sort of Italian tequila, but we’re beggars and so we can’t be choosers.”

  When Jack finished off his drink and also made a face, Captain Vance remarked: “You look more like thieves. No one said you could drink any of that.”

  This struck Jack as funny. “Lighten up! This is a limo. You are supposed to be able to relax in a limo. If they didn’t want us to have a drink they would have sent a bus or a truck. You really should have a drink and lighten up.”

  “I’ll lighten up when we get Robert,” Vance said. “Until then I want you on your best behavior, Jack. We need the Church’s cooperation.”

  “The way I see it, they need me much more than I need them. If Robert summons a million ghoul army, there aren’t enough priests in the world to deal with it and who are they going to call? Me. And who is going to have to put his life on the line? Me.”

  Vance waited until Jack’s diatribe was over before he asked: “And what will happen if you start acting like a prima donna and offend the Pope? Robert will take advantage of our division and kill untold thousands. So to keep that from happening, you are going to be on your best behavior. You will call any cardinal you meet your eminence, bishops will be your excellency and if we do meet the Pope you will kneel and you will kiss his ring if he offers it, and you will refer to him as your holiness. Got it?”

  “I’ve got it,” Jack said, as he made himself another drink and then polished it off in a single long pull.

  By the time they drove up to the gates of Vatican City, Cyn was ready for a second drink as well, only there wasn’t time. The roads had been cleared for them and they whooshed along, crossing a bridge, heading for St. Peter’s Basilica, its great dome easily visible, dominating the skyline.

  Although it was still early afternoon and thus prime time for tourists and the faithful who make pilgrimages from all over the world, St. Peter’s Square, the tremendous open area just before the basilica, was completely empty save for a few clergymen going quickly about their business. As they entered the square, the lead and trail limos peeled away leaving their limo alone as they pulled right up to the front steps where a cadre of men, sweating in their heavy garb, greeted them.

  “Ciao!” a man in a red cassock said. Though he spoke the word with enthusiasm, his eyes were sharp on Jack’s face and he seemed as edgy as a cat. “My name es Tarisio Onisto, Cardinal-priest of Santi Simone.” He paused, giving them a chance to bow at the waist, which they did, though somewhat stiffly. He then added: “I am Secretary of the State of The Vatican. I give you welcome. Let me introduce his Eminence, Cardinal…”

  He went on to name the other seven men in the delegation, all of whom possessed long Italian names and even longer titles. Cyn was quite lost after the second name and by the time the last man was introduced, she had already forgotten the Secretary of State’s name and was glad she could get away with just calling him your eminence.

  They bowed to each man as they were introduced, but no hands were shaken and no rings kissed
. The situation felt awkward and forced and it didn’t help that after being introduced, each of the dignitaries would smile perfunctorily and then take their turn giving Jack a closer look, usually through half-lidded and suspicious eyes.

  Jack did not bear the scrutiny well. His bows grew briefer with each person introduced, so that the last man: Pietro Cesarini, the arch-priest of the basilica received only a nod, a slight dipping of his head.

  “This way,” Cardinal Onisto said, holding a hand out, suggesting that Cyn and Jack walk beside him up the stairs. “His Holiness, Pope Romanus the Second, is waiting inside. He understands that time may be an issue and so he has gone for the spear, personally. You should be honored at his attention.”

  Captain Vance was quick to agree that they were. Cyn nodded along; however, her mind was mostly taken up by the basilica. She was in awe and gaped like a tourist, her eyes darting everywhere. The building was massive, over two football fields in length, supported by tremendous columns that stretched up to the ceiling, which was hundreds of feet over their heads. Cyn felt altogether tiny, as if she was nothing more than an ant.

  Jack let out a low whistle of appreciation as he spun around in a slow circle, not once but three times. There was so much to see that it would take a person years to take in every wonderful detail.

  “This is some cathedral,” he said. “It makes St Patrick’s Cathedral back in New York look like a shack.”

  “And yet, this is not a cathedral,” Cardinal Onisto explained. “It is but a church. It is not the seat of the Diocese of Rome, that distinction goes to the Arch-basilica of St John Lateran. But yes, this is very nice as well, grazie.”

  They walked through the empty building, the ceiling and walls too far away for their steps to echo back to them. It wasn’t until they entered a staircase going down that the concept of proportion came back into being, and yet the stairs were as grand as everything else. Rails of finely worked brass, marble steps, pictures and paintings and carved reliefs everywhere.