Chapter Eighteen
TALIK
Talik followed Khalida up the stairs, ignoring the sway of her hips as she stalked toward the door. One, two...four knives he had counted so far on Khalida. If he turned his head slightly, he could see the telltale hint of small blades in her boots.
Five and six. There were more. He just had to find them.
They stood outside the faded green door of the Biblioteca Angelica.
The plain building was camouflaged within the alleyway, but only a stone’s throw from the main piazzas of Rome—he could have strolled past the library a million times over the centuries with no awareness of its historical significance as one of Europe’s oldest libraries.
Nor would he have cared. Ancient books and artifacts were not his preferred pastimes.
He was far more interested in the region’s bars and eateries.
The door opened slowly as a woman with wine-colored hair walked out wearing dark business attire. She nodded politely to them, her eyes hidden by her tinted glasses as she passed them. “Ciao.”
A feeling of déjà vu surrounded him. As if he had met her centuries before.
Despite her appearance, there was something not quite human or Atlantean to the edge of her scent.
He glanced at Khalida, hoping to get some sort of recognition, but instead she glanced at him blankly, ignoring the stranger.
Maybe adrenaline was starting to make him hallucinate.
The scent of old books and musty air hit him as they walked into the older part of the library. He scrunched up his nose, wishing for once he did not have heightened senses.
“The closed off entrance to the catacombs is within the main reading room of the old library,” Khalida said as she headed toward the brightly lit room at the end of the corridor. The well-worn strip of red carpet was a stark contrast to the plain blue-gray tiles next to it.
Entering the library, Talik was taken back to the days when he had been tutored in all things Atlantean, under the oversight of House Azaes’s most notable scholars.
More than three levels of shelves of archaic dusty books surrounded them.
In the center of the room, under the highest part of the ornate ceiling, were a handful of wooden tables and uncomfortable-looking chairs.
On the far side, under the large window, stood Dante and a very animated Rieka.
He could sense her excitement from where he stood, almost contagious in its intensity.
No one else was left in the library. Talik was impressed at how quickly Dante could convince the Italian government to loan the building to them, but then money and connections talked, and Dante had an abundance of both.
As they neared, Rieka tapped the ground with her boot. The thin red carpet did not mute the sound, instead it made it louder. “The entrance to the catacombs is beneath the library. Beneath the thick concrete floor.”
Talik winced as the sound echoed through the room.
Dante didn’t even blink. “The library was built on top of the entrance.”
“Why?” Rieka asked. “What were they trying to keep out of the catacombs?”
“Or in?” Khalida finished as they approached. “From the records I have been able to access, the hunters sealed it before the Augustinian monastery built the library on the proviso. Nothing below ground was disturbed.”
Rieka straightened. “Why didn’t the hunters just buy the land?”
Khalida glanced back at the library entrance before she turned her attention to Rieka. “The hunter class may not own properties or accumulate wealth.”
“They likely didn’t want to draw attention to House Mneseus and instead helped set up the library as one of their early patronages,” Talik interjected.
Few outside of the Atlantean aristocracy and the hunters themselves were aware of the archaic law.
The aristocrats had implemented it to ensure the hunters could not rise up against them.
They had not wanted a repeat of the praetorian guard and their uprising against the Roman Emperors.
“How do you propose we access the entrance?”
Dante nodded at Khalida.
Underneath the windows, the sunlight filtered through, giving her a silver halo as her eyes sparkled with a hint of amusement.
The sight almost knocked the breath out of him as a tinge of jealousy coiled itself within his stomach.
He glanced at the bookshelf and reminded himself he needed to concentrate and remember why he was there.
“I called in some favors. Frankie’s family is more than happy to help us with this endeavor.”
“Which side of the family?” Talik asked, distracting himself from other non-helpful thoughts.
“The thieves guild. Although I do have some of her Interpol contacts.”
“And there isn’t any other way?” Rieka asked.
“No. From the schematics, all entrances were cordoned off and filled in when they began the construction of the library. Someone wanted to erase all existence of the tunnel from the history books.” Talik walked over to where Khalida was standing and kneeled before he tapped the floor, hoping there may already be a door or something they could leverage to use to enter the catacombs.
Cutting a hole in concrete that would need to be fixed was not a quick turnaround.
And he didn’t think Dante’s bargaining powers had extended to permanent, irreplaceable damage to the floor.
“We need to follow the same route Dante and Idris took all those years ago if this is going to work. Otherwise, we risk spending precious hours looking in the wrong spot.”
“Talik is right.”
He looked up, surprised Khalida had voluntarily said those words out loud and in front of witnesses.
Rieka looked between him and Khalida. For a split second, he could see the wheels in her mind turning. A regal look flashed across her face, a reminder that the blood of royalty ran though her veins. “How do you know the Anki won’t try to influence your minds? Like it did with Idris?”
“We don’t. For Idris, it could have been instant, or it could have taken decades for the connection to be established.
” Talik glanced at Khalida. On the plane Khalida had been adamant that there was nothing that they both wanted, but it would be foolish to think they were entirely immune to the Anki.
“Sypha believes the consort mark will make it harder to influence us.”
“But not impossible.” Rieka looked between Talik and Khalida, her brow furrowed as she chewed her lower lip. “There is potentially a god in the tunnel who has been trapped for centuries.”
It was the question that kept playing on repeat in Talik’s mind. What exactly was down there?
“If you pierce the skin of the Anki with iron, it will weaken them.” Dante glanced up from his phone. “Just as it did for the wayfarers and Idris.”
“Chaucer wasn’t lying.” Talik shook his head before he turned to face Dante. “Kade verified the information?”
“Yes. It took him longer to get access to the archives than expected,” Dante said. “The information about the Anki is limited, written in an ancient dialect. But it appears they don’t like iron.”
“Iron in any type of composition? Or are our weapons useless?” Khalida asked.
“The purer the metal, the better,” Dante clarified. “I am expecting a weapons delivery for you within the hour. It will have manacles and a rope, in case you come across something down there, and it needs to be contained.”
Talik nodded. Manacles meant he or Khalida needed to be within touching distance to whatever was down there to put them on.
If iron weakened them, it still put them within attacking range, and he was not a huge fan, but, in the end, they only had to contain them long enough for Khalida and him to make their way back to the library and to reinforcements. “How long do we have the library for?”
“Three days in total, but you only have six hours in the tunnel, any longer and there is too much of a risk that you will be influenced. We need time to refurbish anything that is damaged,” Dante answered.
“Kade has identified another potential entrance underneath the Vatican. It was closed off a century earlier, but he believes he can access it.”
Good. Knowing the hunter was in the catacombs and could act as backup was an added bonus.
“We are going to do this the old-fashioned way,” Talik said. “Brute force,” he nodded to Khalida and added, “and with my charm.”
“I am the brute force?” Khalida repeated as she put her hands on her hips.
“Yes.”
Khalida opened her mouth but stopped as she slipped a knife into her palm and pivoted.
He heard it then, light footsteps.
At least three people near the entrance. Clearly, they did not want to be heard. In his periphery, Dante moved closer to Rieka, who appeared oblivious to the newcomers’ presence, her heightened senses too new to her to actually be of use.
The thieves guild?
The door slowly opened as a male strolled into the room.
He casually surveyed the room as he held out his hands, demonstrating he had no weapons.
His bright blue eyes twinkled in the light as he slowly turned around, flashing a million-dollar smile at them.
His perfectly coiffed dark blond hair brushed his shoulders in loose curls.
He looked like an Adonis come to life. The pale pink suit would have been laughable on anyone else, but against his lightly golden skin, it just highlighted his ethereal looks.
Was this newcomer Atlantean? The other two humans wisely stayed on the other side of the door.
“Signorina, you are clearly the brute force!” His voice was low and lyrical, the Italian accent subtle when he spoke English. “I am Damiano, Frankie’s cousin.” He turned to face them. “And I know you are Dante and Talik. But you.” He looked at Rieka slowly. “I do not know.”
“Rieka Sinha.” She moved around Dante, holding out her hand. “Pleased to meet you.”
“Only the three of you?” Talik interrupted. How much had the thieves heard? They may be human, but the thieves guild had survived centuries because of their cunning and wily nature.
“Sì. Frankie said you wanted us to be discreet,” Damiano answered. He didn’t appear surprised that they knew how many people he had with him. He slowly strode farther into the library, carefully surveying the room.
Casing the room if Talik didn’t know better.
“This isn’t an opportunity for you to acquire any of the items from the library,” Khalida said bluntly.
Damiano smiled, his eyes twinkled. “Future opportunities. What do you need us to do?”
“Access to the catacombs.”
Damiano glanced around the library. “Beneath the library. They haven’t been accessed in hundreds of years. There is nothing down there but musty old bones. Anything of note was taken when they erected the library.”
“Anything of note to the thieves guild,” Dante answered coolly. He hadn’t moved from Rieka’s side. “Can you do it?”
Damiano stared at him like he had asked a rhetorical question.
“Yes. We are experts in pulling off the impossible. Ask Frankie about where the original Mona Lisa is housed.” He moved past Dante and Rieka toward the center of the space until he stood directly beneath the oversized window.
Damiano tapped his watch and scrolled through until he found what he was looking for.
“We can do this old school. It appears my ancestors were hedging their bets and ensured we could access the catacombs if the need arose. Let me bring up the schematics.”
A bright light flickered before a hologram took shape in front of them of a pixelated, hand-drawn blueprint of the building. “The guild had the foresight to digitize the older blueprints. We never know when they will come in handy.”
Khalida moved toward the schematic, as Damiano stepped closer to her, before she enlarged the main library. “How do we use it?”
“See here.” Damiano pointed to a dark shape on the hologram, brushing up against her. “When they covered the door, they placed a symbol to let us find where the original opening was.”
“Convenient,” Rieka muttered loudly.
Damiano hit the floor face-first with a loud thud, Khalida pressing a knee between his shoulder blades. She twisted his arm at an awkward angle—he winced, but to his credit, he didn’t yell as she pulled, twisting it farther. Any more pressure and it would snap with a pop.
A small silver knife lay in his palm.
“Don’t touch my knives.” Khalida let him go, and Damiano collapsed. She quickly retrieved the knife before replacing it on her belt.
Damiano didn’t look ashamed. He smiled brightly as he slowly stood up, wiping the dust from his suit before he rubbed his wrist. “Once a thief.”
“Try that again on any of us, and I will conveniently forget you are Frankie’s cousin.”
“Favorite cousin,” Damiano added. “I wanted to see if you were as good as they said. I am not disappointed.”
Talik took a step forward before he stopped himself, gritting his teeth.
“Do I need to renegotiate with your matriarch?” Dante asked, breaking the silence. “It has been a few decades since we last saw each other, and we would have much to discuss.”
Damiano flinched at the threat. “No need to bring her into it.” He turned back to Khalida as if he had never tried to steal from her.
“We can use a diamond-core drill. It will easily go through the floor. At this time of day, the drilling will not be an issue and will not take long.” Damiano whistled before he glanced at Dante. “Repairing it is another matter.”
“Are you not up to the task?” Talik asked as he walked over to Khalida. At least someone had the foresight to mark the entrance of the catacombs with a giant X. How appropriate and helpful.
“We are.” He turned to face Dante. “Would you mind donating a new carpet? It will be easier to mask the repair if we can cover the entire floor.”
Dante slowly nodded, his gaze never leaving Rieka.
Khalida enlarged the schematic even more. “How long do you need before we get access?”
Damiano looked at the hologram and then at the library floor. He tapped his watch, and the image dissolved. “Two hours. I need to source the drill first, but it will not take long once we have it. I will have my people here shortly. Is there anything else we need to know?”
“No,” Khalida answered.
“We don’t need to know what you are looking for.” Damiano nodded and swaggered toward the door. He half turned at the door, smiling, but his gaze was serious. “It is far easier for us to deny our cooperation if this is ever released or leaked to the public.”
They watched him walk out in silence.
“Do you trust him?” Rieka asked no one in particular.
They had no choice. Even Dante’s contacts couldn’t get the equipment they needed within their tight time frame.
Talik knew Damiano’s kind. He had been exactly like him once upon a time. “No.”