CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
A t some point between the Vatican necropolis and her rooms, Selene kicked off her heels. In truth, it was muscle memory that got her there at all, her bare feet slapping against the floor just as they had when she was a child. She felt no more capable now—more helpless than ever for the sword clutched in her hand and nobody to use it on.
Pain resonated from inside her ribs, making her lungs constrict so every breath felt like an impossibility. By the time she arrived at her rooms, she was gasping, dragging at the bodice of her dress as she tried to get enough air.
There’d been so much blood. Gold blood and red blood and the beautiful, terrible face of God impassive above it all. And Jules … Fear spiked through her and her fingers curled, wanting to grasp his shirt or touch his face. He was really all right, wasn’t he? Why hadn’t she checked his pulse one more time before she left?
She ripped the room apart, searching for something for him to wear before finally spotting another white shirt and vest hanging on the doorknob. She reached for it and saw her bloody hands. Stained with Jules’s blood. Stained with God’s blood.
‘No …’ she whimpered, sliding to the floor in a puddle of midnight silk. ‘Not again.’
Stories about the Deathless God were as common as the rats in Rome’s gutters. But Selene had known from the first moment she laid eyes on Him when she was a little girl, when she had followed her father into that sacred chamber, that none of them did the awful truth any justice at all.
The truth was simple: their once-absent God had stepped forward as Rome’s shield and sword against the demons who wanted only destruction.
After a battle of many days and nights—nights lit bright as dawn from demon fire—God had defeated the most powerful of the demons as Rome burned around them. But not before He was impaled on her great spear. The colossal battle had crushed part of the Vatican, and God’s body had been pinned to an immense beam at the heart of the ancient building, neither dead nor fully alive. So they had rebuilt around Him.
As a child of eleven, she had been unprepared for the reality. The memory played through her mind with perfect clarity, even seven years on.
She had edged around the sleeping guards. No longer tempted to call for her father, she bit her lip. Buried deep in the confines of her ribcage thrummed a dreadful realization: her father was doing something terrible. She shoved down her pain until it smouldered inside her.
There was a pale glimmer at the far end of the shadowed Cor Cordium .
As her eyes landed on His face, a gasp had been torn out of her as she flung up a hand in front of her eyes. Too slow . She saw Him before her hand blocked the sight. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she blinked the after-image away. The Cor Cordium was dark, with only a few guttering candles lighting the corners, yet the curve of His neck, the gilded softness of His hair and the jut of His cheekbones amid the shadows were enough to burn her eyes.
When she touched her cheeks, her tears were running red.
Careful not to look directly at God again, she used the shadows to steal closer.
The chamber was so large it almost made God look small, but when she saw her father standing at His feet, she could see that the Deathless God must be eight feet tall from the crown of His head to the tips of His toes. Metallic gold pooled beneath His feet, dripping down the dais steps.
Her father gave this pool a wide berth, gazing up at the God with no hesitation in his eyes. They burned with a feverish light that Selene had never before seen. After circling the shallow pool once, Matteo Alleva splashed through it, grasping the haft of the spear with one large hand. He stilled, candlelight painting his face in stark relief.
For a moment the scene looked as though he had just plunged the spear deep into an enemy’s chest. Her breath caught and she was unable to make a sound. It was magnificent. Even her heart seemed to slow its hurried beat to a steady thrum. Fresh tears dampened her lashes at the sight.
Her father drew the spear from the Deathless God’s chest, splattering the wall opposite with the aureate gore. Blood . The pool was fresh blood. Selene cried out wordlessly.
Her father turned and his expression twisted with horror. ‘Selene, you can’t be here. Run! ’
Behind him, the Deathless God twitched. His great head lolled an inch to the side, and as blood ran down her cheeks, she met His terrible gaze as one eye opened, peering at her through the fall of His hair.
Green eyes, she remembered now.
A wave of energy so intense it might have stripped the skin from her bones slammed her back against the wall, but her father’s body sheltered her as he held her against himself. His leg snapped like a twig against one of the columns that circled the chamber.
Selene was tossed away, limp as a rag doll.
Something clattered across the floor toward her, stopping shy of the pool of blood.
Whimpering in pain, Selene dragged herself toward it. She took the heavy wooden spear haft in both hands, her fingers were barely able to grasp it. The sharp obsidian point dragged on the ground as she approached the stirring God.
His long elegant fingers twitched.
Selene knew what she had to do. He was the Deathless God, neither living nor dead, and her father had committed a sin. She had to fix it.
Her entire life was an exercise in patience as she waited. Waiting to be big enough to hold a blade in one hand. Waiting to be strong enough to swing it.
Waiting to be old enough to take the vow.
But now her father had ruined everything. If she couldn’t fix this, her waiting would never end. She’d never be an exorcist. She’d just be dead with the rest of her family.
She thought of her twin and their mother.
If she fixed this, maybe she could beg the Vatican to overlook her father’s crime. She hadn’t even finished the thought before her mind shut it down. Even as a child, she was not that na?ve. Her father was dead . All she could do now was beg for her family.
With a primal scream of rage and agony, Selene swung the spear with both hands.
The muscles in her arms strained as she used momentum to swing it around and up and slammed it back into the Deathless God. Her vision wavered as agony like none she had ever known tore through her. It burned up her legs from her bare feet, puddled in God’s blood. It was as though something hotter and whiter than fire ignited in her middle. She was dying .
A wash of hot liquid soaked her hands as she sagged against the spear. It was all that held her up, anchored between God’s ribs. She hoped He’d be the last thing she’d see, not her father with blood haloing his head. The Deathless God’s blood burned her hands and feet, and down the column of her throat. She could feel it scouring her out of existence. On her lips, on her tongue .
Selene pushed herself up and washed her hands, turning them under the gushing water until they were spotless. She carefully collected the fresh shirt and vest and walked to the door. Catching her reflection, she ripped out the dozens of diamond-tipped pins from her hair and let it fall around her face.
Yanking the door open, Selene bit back a gasp of surprise. Cesare Alleva looked down at her, bemused. ‘You’re still here?’
‘We’re just on our way out.’ Selene tried to relax her grip on the shirt. ‘Of course he forgot his shirt.’
‘ Of course … ’
‘And of course he had to train, right before the masquerade.’ She forced a wry smile, rolling her eyes. ‘Men.’
‘We’re a curse,’ he replied, watching her closely. ‘Are you all right, Selene?’
‘Quite. You know I hate being late. And I don’t suffer fools.’
Cesare smirked slightly at that. ‘I noticed. Eliot will be on the couch tonight, I presume?’
Selene pressed her lips into a tight smile. ‘I have to go.’
‘Yes, you do.’ He glanced at his watch, raising one brow. ‘Don’t be late. If you are, I’ll be convinced Eliot is a bad influence on you. I cannot afford for you to lose your edge.’
She nodded, almost running away from him. Turning the corner, she glanced back.
Cesare’s gaze was directed at her bare feet, his dark brows pulled together in thought.
Jules lifted his head when he heard footsteps. He’d lost track of how long he had been inside the Vatican necropolis, though it was long enough for the chill to have slid into his bones.
Selene crouched beside him, smoothing his hair from his brow. He leaned into her hand. ‘It’s funny …’
‘What is?’ she asked, concern in her eyes.
‘In Ostrava the cold didn’t bother me. But now I feel like I might die of it.’
She moved closer, rubbing his shoulder with her hand. ‘It’s the shock. We need to get you moving.’ She swallowed. ‘And we need to go.’
He met her gaze. ‘The masquerade?’
She nodded, still rubbing his shoulder. Her hair fluttered in a draught from within the necropolis.
A hint of foul blood.
Jules covered his nose. ‘What’s that smell?’
He could practically see her patience fray at his repeated mention of something she couldn’t sense.
‘I don’t know .’
But he did, he realized. It was the carrion scent of their captive God. The scent of His torment.
‘You don’t know ? Is it just me who has to put up with this stench?’
Selene almost looked afraid. Concern warred in her expression with confusion. It made him angrier. He closed the distance between them so he could take the shirt roughly from her hands. As he pulled it on, he caught her looking at the scar around his bicep again, her expression drawn.
‘You’re staring.’
‘Did you do that?’
‘No.’
‘Tell me what it is,’ she demanded, her voice tightly controlled.
‘I told you, it’s just a birthmark—’
‘ Liar .’
Jules tried to ignore the barb, but it hooked itself right into the fabric of his raw emotions.
‘Who are you to say that? You lie as easily as breathe.’ He spread his hands, looking around. ‘Not that I can blame you, raised in this twisted place. It’s rotten , Selene.’ He leaned close to breathe against her neck. ‘This place reeks of corruption.’
She barked a laugh, although her cheeks had gone blotchy with anger. Her reaction reminded him of the first night on the train from Nice when she was all razor edges. He’d hit a nerve.
He already regretted the words, turning to pace away.
‘Oh, I’m sorry. Do you miss the glory of the trenches?’
The trenches . Everything darkened. He prowled closer, getting into her space. ‘ Don’t .’
Selene snarled wordlessly against his face, teeth bared.
He laughed, trying to cover a sliver of genuine fear. ‘You look half feral.’
‘At least it’s only half. Dio , I pity your poor Sergeant Bachelet. I couldn’t stand to have you on my team for longer than five minutes. Insubordinate. You skated by on raw talent alone, and not an ounce of discipline.’
A fist closed around his heart and he took a quick pull of air, jerking back from her.
Selene’s eyes were glassy with anger. ‘You must’ve been a nightmare. Always sure you knew best. Always blaming yourself for every death. It was a war . You didn’t have to take personal responsibility for every casualty. But you did .’
Jules shook his head.
These were things Selene couldn’t know, and it broke his heart that she was paraphrasing things Farah had said. ‘Did she say that?’
Selene must have heard something hollow in his voice, because for the first time she faltered in her tirade.
Her eyes flicked up to his and held. ‘Say what ?’
‘Farah …’ he said listlessly. ‘Did she say I was a nightmare?’
‘No, I—’
‘Just you then?’
‘Jules …’
His expression twisted and he held up a hand. When she ignored him, he pushed her back a step, his hand nestled above her collarbone.
He needed space. When her lovely lips parted to say more, he pressed a finger against them, perhaps pressing harder than he should.
He couldn’t think . All he could do was lean closer until they were separated by an inch that felt like a mile. A thousand miles. More distance than he could fathom as he stood once more on the battlefield in Ostrava and she stood here, now, in the Vatican.
‘Farah died. She’s dead . Don’t ever quote her words again, Selene, or I swear to that thing you call God, I’ll deliver you to hell myself.’
Her lashes trembled and he saw a flicker in the tight line of her jaw where she ground her teeth when she was cross, but Jules still couldn’t feel a thing. A distant part of him screamed that none of this was right, but he could barely hear it. Everything that had coursed through him from Dieu Immortel had left him feeling frayed and not quite himself. It was as though the magnitude of that being, and His mind, had displaced something of Jules when it broke through.
And Selene saw that.
Jules tried to bite back his rage, but it snarled to be released like a dog from its chains.
‘I don’t know what’s wrong with me, Selene. I acknowledge there’s something. But you— all of you —are twisted too.’ He glanced at the pale skin of his inner arms. ‘With your captive God and your tainted magic. You reek of corruption.’
Pain lanced through him at the cruel words because they weren’t exactly true. He remembered the morning in Rome when he’d woken to her hair in his face. She had smelled of sun-warmed sheets and star jasmine, something citrusy and, yes … demon blood , but mostly she smelled sweet to him.
Her eyes widened. After the moment of surprise, they darkened with anger and hurt.
But it was nothing compared to his rage, which was just hitting its stride. ‘I can’t help what I am. But you … you chose to become this.’ Contempt dripped from his words.
He dropped his hand, then dreamily lifted it again to brush his thumb over her lips. They were red, as though kissed, and he feared for a moment that he’d bruised her with his roughness. Stumbling away from her, he collided with the ironwork gate and gripped the freezing metal in his fingers. ‘Everyone here chose to become what they are. Tell me, Selene, who within your Vatican knows how to summon demons?’
Her eyes shuttered.
He couldn’t fight a small, bitter smile. ‘You aren’t only the protectors you claim to be. And your blood doesn’t smell like it should. It burns my nose, acrid and—’
‘You’re boring me . If you don’t move— now —Cesare will send you away.’ Her words were razor sharp, and if a tone could cut, he’d be bleeding. ‘No more access. No more chances to figure you out. It’ll all be over.’
She cocked her head. ‘So are you coming with me or not?’
A dark veil crossed her heart as Jules handed her into a waiting town car. Her teeth ached, and she consciously tried to relax the muscles in her jaw. Leaning her scabbarded blade against the door, Selene wished she was going anywhere else. Somewhere she could actually use it, perhaps. Anything to burn away this feeling . This dawning dread as she realized she had entirely lost her objectivity. Jules was neither merely an asset, nor even a dangerous unknown; somewhere along the way she’d grown complacent. Not something an exorcist could afford.
Worse, in her carelessness, she’d started to care what he thought of her.
Rome whispering her name wasn’t enough to disturb her sleep … but the thought of Jules learning what she’d done to her family terrified her. Jules, who had never had a family, wouldn’t understand the decision to destroy her own.
He’d never look at her the same way again.
She propped her cheek on her hand, gazing out of the window. The atmosphere in the car was thick and she could feel Jules’s eyes on her. He fidgeted in her peripheral vision.
A part of her wanted to reach out and still his hands.
The fight had affected him worse than it had her. That was no surprise. After all, he hid an incredible softness somewhere beneath the rest. She’d witnessed it the night they’d met, when he’d tried to save a child with no reasonable expectation of surviving himself. She’d seen it again when he’d cried for the Deathless God.
The words that had spilled out of them both in the necropolis haunted her. Guilt twisted in her gut like a knife. She regretted saying what she’d said. To a point .
There had been a moment when he’d looked at her with such anguish, as though afraid he’d hurt her. But he hadn’t. Scowling, she wiped smudged lipstick off her mouth. Even at the height of the argument, those powerful hands had been so gentle against her lips. Even with the blood of a thousand scars drying on his skin and the trauma of battle fighting for space inside his head, he’d touched her like she was breakable.
That man would blame himself for every life lost in a war he didn’t start.
Silk swirled around her legs as she pulled one knee onto the seat so she could face him. The taut tug of her brows loosened as she took in his expression. He was shaken. She could see that so clearly now. Even though his long limbs were loose where he draped himself in the seat, his knuckles were white where he gripped the door handle. And his high cheekbones were pale beneath the gold lights of passing Rome.
She remained utterly still, only moving to adjust her dress strap when it slipped down her bicep. In the window’s reflection, his eyes followed her fingers as though captivated. Even furious as she was, she realized with a terrible urgency that she wanted to protect him.
Selene bit her lip to hide her pain.
In the Cor Cordium , he had burned as though his veins were on fire. The memory of terror seemed to bubble in her chest, refusing to make room for oxygen or pumping blood. Did he burn because he was a disgrace before God?
She pushed the thought away, unable to wholly consider it.
Instead, she thought about her father. He had tried to pull the spear from God’s body—betraying the Vatican in the process. But why? Her father was an exorcist and had faith—had taught her his faith.
‘Tell me what really happened just now,’ she said.
‘Do you mean … the fight? Or before that?’
Her sense prevailed and she flicked a glance toward the driver and shook her head minutely. They couldn’t talk here. But when they were alone, she wouldn’t lie to him. She’d furnish him with every gruesome detail of how he’d gone limp and insensible in her arms, and how she’d had to drag him like a corpse through the elegant halls of St Peter’s Basilica before he … before he returned to himself.
The truth she’d tried to ignore was burying its teeth so deep she could no longer fool herself.
She’d seen Jules’s veins burning with holy light, as though God Himself was rejecting him. And she’d seen the briar scar, binding Jules tight since birth.
Dio … She raised a shaking hand to her temple.
Jules had cut through all her defensive layers as though they never existed. When she thought he was going to die, it was worse than any fear she’d ever known.
Greater even than the fear of death.
If he walked away now, it would break her. The beaded strap slipped down her arm again and Jules slid it back into place, thumb stroking her collarbone gently.
She’d been raised in the Vatican where shades of grey existed between the pillars of light. There were immoral men and women here, and she was one of them. Raised to serve humanity. To kill in order to save.
She had one enemy.
The thought settled heavy, like a stone in her mind, an uncomfortable weight that hadn’t been there before.
One thing she knew for sure— Jules was no shade of grey. He was a light so bright it could blind.
And he was a demon.