A Temptation of Angels (16 page)

“These ones are.” Anna’s voice was solemn.

“What do you mean?”

“The Keepers have been hunted on and off throughout history. This threat is new, and in truth, the closest someone has ever come to extinguishing your kind. But you have always been in danger.” Anna lifted the silver tray from the counter. “Get the door for me, will you?”

Helen held open the door. “May I help?”

“It’s quite all right. I’m used to bringing tea to Father while he works.”

Helen followed Anna through the parlor to the staircase, marveling at the steadiness of the other girl’s hands. The cups, bowl, plate, and spoons made not a clink as she began descending the stairs with Helen at her heels.

“I don’t understand.” Helen picked up the thread of their conversation as they reached the bottom of the staircase. “Other than the Syndicate, who would want to harm us?”

“Who wouldn’t?” Anna said softly. Their footsteps echoed across the stone walls of the tunnel as they made their way toward the faint blue light of the Orb in the distance. “One of you has always held the key to the records. To the past, present,
and future. There have always been those with enough power—or simply ambition—to attempt a coup.”

“Then why the alarm this time?” Helen asked.

She saw the worry in Anna’s soft brown eyes. “Because no one has ever some so close to rendering the Keepers extinct.”

T
hey entered the large open room Helen remembered from two nights before. The Orb spun laboriously through the air, the blue sea of the Atlantic rippling as it turned past. Darius and Griffin were observing Galizur as he worked with various instruments and tools atop a long work-table. Oddly, a row of melons were lined neatly along one edge.

Galizur turned at the sound of their footsteps. “Ah! There you are. You’re just in time for the demonstration.”

“What demonstration?” Helen asked as Anna busied herself pouring tea.

“I’ve been working on a solution to the size of the glaive.” Galizur’s eyes dropped to the stafflike weapons hanging from the brothers’ belts. He held out a hand. “May I?”

Darius turned his gaze to Griffin, who sighed and reached
for his glaive. With a brief glare at his brother, he handed it over to Galizur.

Galizur turned it over in his hand. “It will have to be retrofitted.” He set it on his worktable, reaching for a short, slim rod sitting on its surface. “Try this one.”

It was significantly shorter than the glaive Griffin had handed to Galizur.

“I’m not sure how this will help me defend myself,” Griffin said, taking it.

“Will it to open with your mind,” Galizur said, “the same way you will the glaive’s blades to engage.”

Griffin stared at it a moment more before holding it away from his body. His face went very still, the pendant glowing at his shirt collar. A second later, the rod in his hand elongated until it became the same size as the glaive Griffin had brought with him from the house. Griffin’s eyes lit up in wonder as he lifted it, inspecting its tip, pointed and sharp.

Darius took the glaive from his brother, running his hand along its shaft before turning to Galizur. “How did you do it?”

A smile touched the older man’s lips. “I created interlocking pieces to the outer skin and mechanized it so your power would cause it to open, just as your power now causes the glaive’s inner blades to deploy.”

“What about the inner blades?” Darius asked.

Galizur reached for a melon on the table behind him. He set it on the floor, taking the new glaive from Darius’s hands and lifting a hand in warning.

“Stand back.”

They were taking their second step back when Galizur plunged the tip of the glaive into the melon. A second later, it burst into pieces, juicy orange shrapnel hitting the walls and floor.

Griffin tore his eyes from the spectacle, looking at Galizur with reverence. “Incredible! It activates the inner blades on its own?”

“It’s pressure sensitive,” Galizur explained. “Once embedded in the flesh of your enemy, the blades will engage on their own.”

“Wait a minute.” Helen was still staring at the melon, now dripping down the wall. “Do you mean to say that this is what will happen to someone if you use the glaive against them? They will be… torn apart?” She turned her eyes on Griffin.

His expression, once full of awe, softened. “It must seem barbaric, but short of total destruction of the body, the glaive is the only thing that can kill those of the Alliance or the Legion.”

“What about the wraiths on the street last night? You killed them without it.”

Galizur raised his eyebrows at the mention of the wraiths.

“They’re not dead. We wore them down with the sickle. They were sent back where they came from, but they could appear again at any time.”

“And they’ll keep coming back until they’re dispatched for good with the glaive,” Darius added. “Don’t waste time feeling sorry for them. They would do the same to you in a heartbeat.” He turned away, walking toward the Orb. “You would do well to remember that, Princess.”

Delivered as it was with Darius’s sarcasm, the term was not one of endearment. Anger unfurled inside her, and she advanced on him, coming to a stop only once she was in his path. She put her fingertips on his chest.

He looked down at her hand, a mixture of surprise and growing fury clouding his eyes. But she couldn’t stop. Not now. She had too much in front of her.

“I may not be familiar with a sickle and a glaive. I may not have been forced to defend myself until now. But I’m not as sheltered or weak as you would like to assume.” She glared up at him. “I’m no princess. And maybe
you
should try to come up with a wittier insult, if that’s how you want to play.”

The room had grown quiet. Too quiet. Somewhere beyond Darius’s shoulders, Griffin stood with Anna and Galizur, but they might as well not have been there at all. Darius stared at her, his eyes darkening gradually. She wanted to look away, but she knew doing so would mean defeat.

It took only a moment for a laugh to burst from Darius’s throat. Unlike Griffin’s soft, knowing chuckle, Darius’s laughter was loud and admiring.

“Good,” he finally said. “There’s some spirit in you, after all. You’re going to need it.”

He stepped around her, taking a cup of tea from Anna’s outstretched hand. His fingers lingered on Anna’s a few seconds longer than necessary.

Anna handed the rest of them tea, and Galizur lowered himself to a chair in front of a large black box.

“I understand we have some research to do,” he said.

Helen nodded. “We found—well, Griffin and Darius found it, actually—a piece of parchment at the Baranova’s old key factory. The paper had an unusual logo with the initials VA. I think it refers to Victor Alsorta.”

“So the boys tell me.” Galizur met her eyes. “They also tell me you are acquainted with Baranova’s son, Raum.”

Helen flushed, thinking of Raum’s proximity to her in the
ruins of her childhood home. But of course, that was not to what Galizur was referring.

“I don’t know if acquainted is the right word.” She tried to keep her voice level. “I knew him as a child.”

“And you didn’t remember this before last night?”

She shook her head. “I thought I had imagined him. That is, I had a vague recollection of playing with him in the garden. My mother always told me he was imaginary. It wasn’t difficult to believe. She said it was a common phenomenon in only children. I think I was only four or five when he stopped coming around.”

Galizur sighed, leaning back in his chair. “It’s understandable that your parents would seek to distance you—and themselves—from the Baranovas even before their betrayal. Their alliances outside the Dictata were… questionable for some years before it was proven that they’d provided the Syndicate with keys to our most sacred locations and treasures. Your parents were not the only ones among the Alliance who thought it wise to cut ties with the family.”

“So Raum and his family were isolated before his parents were actually caught and tried as traitors?” Griffin spoke from the sofa.

“That would be an accurate assessment,” Galizur confirmed.

“Which means he’s probably bitter. And angry,” Darius said.

A harsh laugh escaped Helen’s lips. “I should think that would be obvious.”

She was surprised when Darius shot her an annoyed glance without the cutting comment that would usually accompany it. She busied herself squeezing more lemon into her tea, oddly uncomfortable in the conversation. Her fury toward Raum was dulled by a traitorous sympathy.

She didn’t like it. Not one bit.

Galizur straightened in his chair. “Yes, well, it’s apparent that there is some kind of connection between Raum and Victor Alsorta. Let’s see what we can find.”

He reached toward the black box, turning a couple of the knobs that marched along the bottom until a hum emerged from within the box’s interior. A moment later, there was a visible shimmer on the surface just before a vaguely familiar, multifaceted object made up of interlocking circles took shape on the screen before them.

Incredulous, she leaned toward the machine. “What is it?”

“It’s a simple delivery system for data,” Galizur said. “The Dictata put information in, and this device keeps track of it so that I may call upon it later. A visual library, if you will.”

Helen’s eyes were drawn to the symbol on the screen. It
twisted and turned, morphing into a figure eight, a long, interlocking strand, a hexagon, a multifaceted cube, and finally, a doorway.

“And what is that?” she asked.

“It’s the Flower of Life,” Galizur explained.

“It’s… It’s beautiful.” She said it because it was true and because the symbol both moved and frightened her in a way that she could not explain. “I think I’ve seen it before.”

“You probably have. It’s a geometrical figure said to hold within it all of the mysteries of mankind. It’s also the symbol of the Alliance. Of our connectivity to the mortal world we are tasked to protect,” Galizur said, leaning forward to place his hands over a rectangle covered with alphabetized buttons. The Flower disappeared as Galizur’s hands flew across the keys. “Let me see what we know about the Syndicate.”

Helen was transfixed as a series of letters and numbers spilled across the screen, too fast for her to properly register any of it.

“Here we are.” Galizur, oblivious to her awe, leaned back in his chair. He lifted some spectacles from his pocket and placed them on his face. “Victor Alsorta. Head of the Syndicate, a partnership between four of the world’s most powerful business owners.”

Galizur pushed a button, and the grainy image of an older
man, gray at the temples, emerged on the screen. It was the same man Helen had seen in the newspaper. Even through the screen, Helen could sense his royal bearing, feel the intensity in his gaze. As if he were, even now, looking at her from some far-off place. She would not have been surprised if his eyes were an icy blue, though she could not make out their color on the screen.

“Born in Romania, Victor is fifty-four years old and has no living family. At least, that’s what we’re led to believe,” Galizur added.

“What do you mean by that?” Darius asked.

“All the information I was able to find on Victor was from secondhand sources. Press releases, company biographies, news articles. That kind of thing.”

Helen turned to Galizur. “Where does your… information usually come from?”

“Typically we can find birth records, death records, marriage certificates. Sources of a more official nature,” he said. “But Victor Alsorta may as well be a ghost. The only facts we can find could easily have been manipulated. And were it not for his association with the Syndicate and the volumes that have been written on them across the world, there would likely be far less.”

Helen could see from the pained expression on Galizur’s face that he was unused to such a lack of results. She stared at the image on the screen, contemplating what little they knew about Victor Alsorta and how they might use it to further their quest for information.

“What of his involvement with the Syndicate?” she asked Galizur. “Could that have something to do with the executions and Raum?”

“We do know something about the other members of the Syndicate.” Galizur tapped away at the buttons, the image of Victor replaced by one of a younger man, his hair as black as ebony. “This is Clarence Thurston, head of a multinational technology corporation holding more than two hundred patents on the most advanced technological developments of our time.”

“Wasn’t he involved in a treason scandal a while back?” Griffin asked. “Accused of selling our enemies technology that was developed exclusively for use by Britain’s military?”

Galizur nodded. “That he was.”

Helen wanted to ask about the scandal. About what kind of power would allow a man to commit treason and walk free rather than go to prison. But Galizur had already moved on.

The image of a strong-faced woman appeared on the screen.
She looked to be the age of Helen’s own mother, though the steel in her eyes hinted at none of the warmth that had been in Eleanor Cartwright’s.

“Margaret Latimor,” Galizur intoned. “She heads up the Finance Council as well as the largest bank in the world, Western United.” He pushed a few more buttons. “Lastly, we have William Reinmann, Speaker for the Symposium on Multinational Security that meets once a year. He owns a consulting firm that specializes in advising political figures on damage control.”

Helen tore her eyes away from the screen, looking at Galizur. “Damage control?”

But it was Griffin who answered. “Scandal, personal and professional. People like this cheat and steal and lie. When they get caught, they need someone to come in and tell them how to behave. How to manipulate the public so it doesn’t ruin their careers.”

Galizur nodded. “Griffin is right. And because of Mr. Reinmann’s vocation of choice and his position with the Symposium, it’s believed that he’s owed more favors from politicians the world over than any other person in the world.”