Page 53 of Skotos (Of Shadows & Secrets #6)

Thomas

T he Vatican’s corridors felt different, charged with an electric tension that made the marble walls seem to pulse with hidden energy.

Swiss Guards stood at every intersection, hard-eyed soldiers whose hands never strayed far from their weapons.

The usual quiet dignity of the Apostolic Palace had been replaced by the controlled urgency of a military command center.

Pope Pius XII stepped ahead of us with surprising speed, his white cassock billowing behind him, the wake of a majestic ship cutting through troubled waters. Monsignor Rinaldi flanked him on one side, while Will and I followed close behind.

We passed through halls I’d never seen, not the public corridors where tourists and dignitaries were received, but the private arteries of Vatican power.

Frescoed ceilings soared overhead, their painted saints and angels watching our passage with eyes that seemed to follow our movement.

Tapestries older than most nations hung from the walls, their rich colors muted by age but still magnificent in the soft light of crystal chandeliers.

“This way,” the Pope said, turning down a narrow passage that felt more intimate than the grand thoroughfares we left behind. “We will speak in my private library. It is one of the few rooms in the Vatican I can guarantee has not been compromised.”

The door he led us to was modest, with dark oak panels set with iron fittings that looked medieval in their simplicity. When it swung open, I felt my breath catch.

The Pope’s private library wasn’t an anteroom filled with books, a cathedral of knowledge.

The chamber rose three stories above us, its walls lined floor-to-ceiling with tomes whose leather spines glowed like jewels in the warm light of reading lamps scattered throughout the space.

Rolling ladders on brass tracks provided access to the highest shelves, where volumes bound in red Morocco leather and gold leaf stood like soldiers in perfect formation.

The air was thick with the scent of old parchment and vellum, that distinctive perfume of centuries-old knowledge that made my scholar’s heart race despite everything else happening around us.

Ancient globes stood sentinel in the corners.

They were not painted with the familiar maps of our modern world, rather representations of how medieval cartographers had imagined the Earth, complete with sea monsters and uncharted territories.

One unusual sphere’s stylized script read, “Here Be Dragons,” on a landmass I felt certain was either Iceland or Greenland.

Given the poor representation versus modern knowledge, it was hard to tell.

Between each towering bookcase, marble busts of long-dead popes gazed down with expressions of marble serenity, their stone eyes holding secrets that would never be spoken aloud.

At the heart of the room sat a massive mahogany desk that looked like it had been carved from a single enormous tree.

Its surface was polished to a mirror shine, covered with neat stacks of correspondence, official documents bearing papal seals, and what appeared to be intelligence reports marked with the distinctive stamps of various European agencies.

Behind the desk, tall windows draped in crimson velvet looked out over the Vatican gardens.

“Please, sit,” the Pope said, gesturing toward a cluster of leather armchairs arranged near a marble fireplace where logs lay unlit. “We have much to discuss, and very little time to discuss it.”

Will and I settled into chairs that were probably worth more than most people’s houses, while Rinaldi moved to close and lock the library door behind us. The Pope took the chair across from us, and we watched as the weight of his office seemed to settle around him like a mantle.

“First,” he said, “let me apologize for the drama at the police station. Under normal circumstances, I would have worked through diplomatic channels and never left the safety of these walls, but these are far from normal circumstances.”

“Thank you for coming to get me,” Will said, his Midwestern humility oozing through his words.

“It is my purpose to serve.” Pius smiled as though blessing a small child.

“What exactly happened on that balcony?” I asked, unable to wait for permission to speak.

The Pope’s face darkened, and he was quiet for a long moment. “Cardinal Francesco Torretti was shot and killed. He stood to my left on the balcony,” he said, his voice heavy with grief. “My medical team claims he died instantly. I pray it was so.”

“And Severan?” Will asked.

“As I told you at the police station, Cardinal Severan was wounded in the shoulder.” The Pope’s eyes met mine, and I saw something there that chilled me.

It wasn’t simply sorrow, but a deep suspicion that spoke of betrayals discovered—and others still hidden.

“The question is whether that was intentional or merely unfortunate timing.”

“I don’t follow,” Will said.

Rinaldi spoke from his position near the door, his voice tight with barely controlled anger. “Cardinal Severan was standing directly beside His Holiness when the shooting began. He was struck by what we believe was the second shot. The first killed Cardinal Torretti.”

“You think the shooter was aiming for the you, Your Holiness?” I asked.

“We believe the first shot was meant for me,” the Pope said. “But the second . . . we believe that may have been a decoy, an attempt to throw us off any investigation that would surely follow. The knife Cardinal Severan dropped when he was wounded lends credibility to this theory.”

The Pope reached into his cassock and withdrew a cloth-wrapped object, setting it carefully on the small table between our chairs. He opened the wrapping to reveal the dagger Severan had dropped.

“The Order of Longinus,” Will breathed.

“Yes.” The Pope’s voice was flat, emotionless.

“Cardinal Severan was carrying this when he was shot. In the confusion of the moment, and likely the pain of taking a bullet to the shoulder, he dropped it. The medical and security teams whisked us from the balcony, so he never had time to retrieve it.”

The implications hit me like a physical blow. “He was going to kill you himself?”

“As a backup plan, the Swiss Guard believes. If the sniper missed or if the shot wasn’t immediately fatal, Severan was positioned to finish the task.

” The Pope’s hands clenched into fists on the arms of his chair.

“Standing close enough to embrace me in my final moments, to offer last rites while driving a blade into my heart.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” I said. “He would never be able to escape if he murdered you. The guards would be all over him. If he really is the leader of the Order . . .”

The Pope shrugged and splayed his hands. “I only know what I saw . . . and what was left behind.”

“But the shooter hit him instead,” Will said, pieces clicking together. “Was that by accident or—”

“We do not know,” Rinaldi interrupted. “But the wound forced him to reveal himself. He could not complete his mission, and he could not maintain his cover.”

“Where is he now?” Will asked.

“We still do not know.” The words fell from the Pope’s lips like a stone into still water.

“As I told you before, he vanished from the Vatican infirmary shortly after our doctors tended to his wound. There was so much hysteria within the Palace that no one paid any mind to a cardinal storming out of the building.”

“What about the shooter?” I asked.

“He is dead,” Rinaldi said as the Pope moved to retrieve a manila folder from his desk, returning with photographs that made my stomach turn .

Pius opened the folder and held it out for us to examine. “Italian police found his body in an alley behind the building where he took his shots. He had been hit multiple times by police marksmen on a neighboring rooftop.”

The photographs showed a man in dark clothing, his face destroyed by gunfire and a collision with cobblestones, lying crumpled against a brick wall.

The first image was gruesome, but it was the second photo that made my heart leap into my throat.

It was a close-up of the man’s neck, where a tattoo was clearly visible despite the blood.

The spear.

The same one from the dagger.

The same symbol we’d been chasing across Europe.

“He bore no identification,” Rinaldi said. “Nothing to indicate who he was or who sent him. But that tattoo—”

“Proves he was part of the Order,” I finished.

“It also adds credibility to Cardinal Severan’s involvement,” the Pope said, settling back into his chair. “Was he working with the shooter? Was this a coordinated attack where both men knew their roles? Or was Severan acting independently, planning to take advantage of the chaos?”

“Either way, he’s one of them,” Will said grimly.

“Yes.” The Pope’s eyes moved to the painted ceiling above us, where saints and martyrs looked down with expressions of eternal serenity.

“After so many years of friendship, of shared purpose . . .” The Pope’s eyes filled and shimmered before he drew in a deep breath and steeled himself.

“All of this means the conspiracy reaches into the highest levels of the Church hierarchy.”

“How deep do you think this goes?” I asked. “How many others might be involved?”

“That, my son, is a question that terrifies me.” The Pope looked back at us, and I saw fear flickering behind his papal composure.

“Cardinals have access to everything: my schedule, my private meetings, the security arrangements for papal appearances. If Severan was feeding information to the Order, they already know far more than anyone outside the walls ever should.”

A compromised cardinal could have been providing intelligence for months, maybe years.

“Your Holiness,” Will said carefully, “have there been other incidents? Other attempts or suspicious activities that might be connected?”

“Nothing as overt as today.” The Pope paused, seeming to weigh his words. “Cardinal Severan made several unrecorded trips, disappearing for days at a time without explanation. When questioned, he claimed they were personal retreats, time for prayer and contemplation.”

“You didn’t believe him? ”

“A cardinal’s schedule is rarely his own,” Rinaldi said.

“Every movement, every meeting, every public appearance is coordinated through official channels, especially for a cardinal so well respected and highly placed as Severan. For him to simply vanish without explanation was . . . highly irregular.”

“Do you know where he was going?” I asked.

“No,” the Pope said. “But now, with him gone and his quarters searched clean, his trail has become sand in the wind.” Pius leaned forward, his pale eyes intense.

“All of which suggests this conspiracy has been planned with extraordinary care. He left no loose threads, no incriminating evidence, only the dagger.”

The fireplace sat cold and dark in the sea of brightness that was the library. A chill crept through me, and I briefly wished the logs were ablaze.

“What do you need from us?” I asked after a moment.

“Find them,” the Pope said simply. “Find whoever is really behind this before they regroup and try again. Whether they come after me or another, they will come again. Severan is a zealot. I believed his faith wed him to the Church, to our tenets, but he clearly believed in darker paths.”

“And is willing to act on them,” Will said.

I added, “What happened today—the precision, the coordination, the backup plans—it wasn’t the work of amateurs. The shooter was nearly three hundred yards away. He was an expert shot, probably former military.”

“From whose military?” Will asked.

I shrugged. “Good question for your friends back at the police station.”

“And Severan?” Rinaldi asked.

“He is wounded and on the run, but still dangerous.” The Pope’s voice hardened.

“He knows our security procedures, our protocols, our weaknesses. We will change our routines, alter our schedules, and conduct a thorough review of all security protocols, but until he is captured or killed, I remain a target, as do many presidents and prime ministers.”

I exchanged a glance with Will. The hunt for the Order of Saint Longinus had just become intensely personal.

“Your Holiness,” I said, “we will need access to Severan’s records, his travel itineraries, anything that might give us a lead on where he’s gone.”

“You will have whatever you need,” the Pope replied. “But be warned, if the Order was willing to sacrifice a cardinal to get close to me, there is no telling what they will do to protect their secrets.”

And somewhere in the shadows of Rome, the Order and a wounded cardinal were planning their next move.