Rise of the Nephilim Page 14

  “Let’s keep going,” prodded Eric in a quiet voice.

  “They tracked us to the hotel, didn’t they?” Jude asked, although he already knew the answer.

  Eric nodded, maintaining his sotto voce, “We were stationary for too long. I had a feeling it was only a matter of time before they came for us. I bet that damn fool at the desk called them in. Okay…,” he looked around furtively. “We need to change up our route a little. Go right at this intersection.”

  Eric took the lead, as he and Jude travelled parallel to the Via Salaria. Eric continued to point at things they passed and make small talk, as if they weren’t running just steps ahead of the authorities. They took a few turns at random in an effort to confuse their trail before cutting through a small parking lot to arrive across from the park.

  The two looked around, saw no one, and briskly darted across the small two-lane street. They followed the narrow sidewalk that ran along the tall wall surrounding the park for a few blocks, until they reached one of the myriad entrances. Jude pushed on the green wrought-iron gate and peered in at the straw-lined pathway that meandered under a patch of laurels. He took a deep breath and tread over the cobblestone entranceway into the shadow of the small forest.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Cardinal Savelli sat stone-faced at his immense desk, as Father Gallo threw open the double doors of his office and lead a cadre of Italian military personnel down the velvet carpet. “May I help you, Antonio?” Savelli questioned the priest non-chalantly and motioned to the chairs in front of him. “Would you like some tea for your friends? Perhaps some wine? I’ve been keeping apprised of your tribulations in the past few days.”

  Gallo sat down and smirked, as his entourage fanned out behind him. “Tribulations, indeed. Good friends betray us and the entire world seems to be falling apart.” He waved a hand in an arc around him, “I’ve even had to resort to a personal bodyguard just to feel safe, although they have helped me immensely in my investigations.”

  “Investigations?” Savelli queried with morbid curiosity.

  “Have you not heard?” Gallo asked. “My familiarity with Mister Sullivan has helped me become of the foremost authorities into his possible behavior and hiding places.”

  “Then we must pray and have faith,” the old Cardinal intoned, “that the Lord God and all of his angels will guide our path and show us the truth.”

  Gallo suppressed a quick laugh. “Sure. And who guides Jude’s path, I wonder?”

  Savelli shifted nervously. For the first time since the intrusion, he worried about Gallo’s presence in his sanctuary. “Who are we to conjecture?” he countered. “I only hope he doesn’t do anything to make matters worse.”

  Gallo leaned over the desk. “It’s too late for that. I’ve been told that he’s been traced to a hotel right here in Rome. The authorities should have him in custody in a matter of hours.”

  The taste of bile rose in the Vicar General’s mouth. “Bravo for the men and women working on such an arduous task. Surely there is a good explanation for what transpired. I know you did your best to relay to the authorities exactly what happened.”

  “As best a man of my position could,” Gallo answered with a gracious bow of his head. “Here is another story. Once the Agenzia Informazioni e Sicurezza Interna determined Jude and his accomplice were in Rome, they placed a tap on the phones of all possible contacts with whom they might attempt to seek refuge. Imagine our surprise when a call from Mister Sullivan was intercepted on your own private line and traced to a hotel not far from here.”

  The Vicar General knew there was no denying his contact with Jude. Someone in the Italian intelligence agency had other nces. Lying would only draw him further into whatever trap the diavolo inhabiting Gallo’s mind was trying to set. Only the Internal Security Information Agency could have been able to infer the origin of that call. Gallo didn’t seem to be bluffing, either. Savelli tensed in anticipation before relenting to his accuser’s suspicions.

  “Yes, he did contact me,” Savelli confirmed cautiously. “He wanted to meet with me, and I informed him that would be impossible, considering he is a wanted man. That was the extent of our conversation, I’m sorry to say.”

  Gallo slammed his palm down on the desk in a melodramatic display of frustration. “You didn’t think it prudent to inform the proper authorities? Mister Sullivan may be one of the most infamous men of our age, and you merely hang up the phone and go back to work?” He laughed as he stood up and hissed, “I think you know where he is or where he is headed, Your Eminence. Your interference with the capture of a dangerous criminal is a breach of international law, and I am placing you under arrest.” His personal guard unslung their sub-machine guns from their shoulders and pointed them at the Vicar General in response to Gallo’s accusation.

  The Cardinal bowed submissively and emerged from behind his desk to be taken away. As one of the military men pulled his hands behind his back to place them in handcuffs, Gallo leaned in close. “Which will fail first, I wonder?” he whispered conspiratorially. “Will it be your mind or your body?”

  “I will never let your kind take control, Azazel,” Savelli responded defiantly. “My mind is my own.”

  “A challenge worthy of testing…,”the Nephilim said with dark glee, as he followed the party out of the room.

  * * *

  Rays of light from the evening sun filtered down through the tall canopy created by the umbrella pines native to the Mediterranean. The illumination speckled the simple dirt path running through the park, while the singing of starlings in the upper boughs twittered in welcome juxtaposition to the muted notes of the busy cityscape surrounding the reserve.

  Jude and Eric’s escape deeper into the cultivated wood was beginning to make him feel just as detached from their current situation as the interior of the Villa Ada was from the rest of Rome. As they walked, the crunch of pine straw beneath his feet reminded Jude of autumns in rural Georgia. He had spent many nights in his teens traversing similar terrain in search of haunted places and dark thrills. His teenage self harbored no inkling that his weekend passions would turn eventually turn into a career that took him to every corner of the globe.

  Now he was being hunted by the very things he had sought.

  He and Eric were headed for a clearing next to the lone pond near the center of the park’s four hundred fifty acres. It was marked on the park map as a picnic and recreation area for visitors, but Jude hoped that the crowd would be at a minimum at this time of day. They stumbled upon a larger, debris-free dirt path that must have been one of the primary trails through the area and followed it further inward until they reached a fork in the trail. They stopped to get their bearings.

  “Okay,” said Eric, as he leaned in to examine another map posted along the pathway. “If we go straight, we’ll reach the pond, so we want to take this way off to the left to get to the clearing.” He looked down at his watch. “It’s getting close to seven, so let’s hurry up. I’m ready to get to ground.”

  Jude nodded in agreement, as the two travelled in the desired direction. “Yeah, I’m dying to kick back and drink a beer or something.”

  A few minutes later, they emerged from the wooded path onto a large, well-manicured lawn. A few park-goers were still relaxing under the reddening sky, as the men wandered out onto the grass. Jude scanned the area for a good place to be seen by Vicar General’s contacts. He spied a bench already shaded from the setting sun and pointed toward it.

  “Let’s sit there,” he suggested. “If we’re approached, surely it would only be by Savelli’s people.”

  “Sounds good,” Eric said. “We can see anyone coming long before they can reach us, at least.”

  The two men sat down and waited for their rescuers to arrive. They watched the passers-by for a few minutes and tried to scout out whom they may be meeting. After about twenty minutes, a couple in their early sixties approached them from the opposite side of the lawn. The woman wore a smart wool jack
et and a bright yellow silk scarf, while the man was in khakis with a blue blazer and a white button-down shirt.

  “Bounasera,” the man greeted Jude with a slight bow that indicated a man of culture. “I couldn’t help but admire your Football Italia jersey. This year’s design truly is spectacular. Do you watch much?”

  “Si,” Jude responded carefully, “I try to catch it when I can.”

  “Magnifico!” the man exclaimed with the look of an avid fan. “Tell me, what are your thoughts on Pirlo’s performance last weekend? His goal in extra time was quite fantastic!”

  Jude smirked, as he played the role given to him. “I wouldn’t know. When Pirlo plays for Roma, then I will care enough to comment positively on his technical prowess.”

  The man laid the back of his hand across his forehead in mock forlorn before extending it out. “It’s a pleasure to meet you both, Mister Sullivan and Mister Strauss. I am Leo, and this is my wife Eva. I’m sorry to cut our greetings short, but time is of the essence.”

  Jude and Eric fell in line behind Eva and Leo, as the pair led them up the path to one of the northwest corners of the park. Eva conversed with them as they walked. “Your disguises are impressive. I almost didn’t recognize you from your pictures on television. Facial recognition software won’t be so easy to fool, though.”

  Eric nodded in agreement and added, “Especially since the police found our hotel. We were lucky enough to get out of there before they found us, but I’m afraid we wouldn’t be able to evade them for long on our own.”

  “Thank you for helping us, by the way,” interjected Jude. “I don’t know what Cardinal Savelli told you about us, but I’m glad he has friends he can trust.”

  “He told us what we needed to know,” Eva mused. “My Leo is especially interested in your situation.”

  “Interested because we have been falsely accused of a terrorist act, I hope,” Jude commented absently.

  “Partially,” Leo responded, as he turned to face at Jude. “It’s mostly because, for the first time in centuries, the Grigori are willing to act.”

  Eric started at the surprise acknowledgement. Jude stared agape at the older man. “Wh-what are you talking about?”

  “It’s okay, Jude,” Leo shot him a quick smile and spun back around to continue their trek to safety. “You don’t have to pretend to hide it from me. After all, I used to be one of them.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Jude was brimming with questions that Leo was refusing to answer until they arrived at their sanctuary somewhere north of the Roman metro area. They had walked a short way through the forest of the Villa Ada, where they eventually reached a small parking lot connected to a road bisecting the ecological preserve. Leo had ushered them into the back of an E-class Mercedes with tinted windows and drove them out of Rome via the A1 roadway, the backbone of Italy’s highway network, without incident.

  “Where are we headed?” was the only question Jude had asked that elicted a response from the couple. They were en route to a small villa located just off Lake Bolsena about two hours north of Rome. He still could not get any information about their ultimate destination from there, however.

  Eric fell asleep a few minutes outside of the city, and Jude felt himself dozing into the same state. Now that his fate was in the hands of someone else for a change, he could feel all of the tension he had been living with these past two days slowly slip away. The Italian countryside started to wink in and out as he fought slumber, but soon, Leo and Eva could hear him also gently snoring into the rear window.

  * * *

  He awoke to Eric shaking his shoulder to rouse him from the now-motionless automobile. He looked around to gauge his surroundings and saw they were parked in front of a modest, whitewashed home perched on a scrub-covered cliff overlooking what he assumed was Lake Bolsena.

  “Where are Leo and Eva?” he asked groggily, as he pulled himself from the car.

  “They just went inside,” Eric answered, as they started walking toward the door. “Come on.”

  Jude followed Eric over the threshold into the foyer. The Spanish floor tile and stained stucco walls exuded an old-world sensibility that was obviously a reflection of its owners. Knick-knacks and trophies from the couple’s travels around the world adorned the walls and bookcases of the home.

  Leo shouted at them from down the hall, as soon as he heard the ornate cedar door shut behind them. “Come in, gentlemen. Feel free to join us in the kitchen. I’m sure you are hungry after your ordeal.”

  Jude realized he hadn’t eaten in almost two days, and his stomach ached in anticipation. He hurried into the kitchen and took a seat in a little breakfast nook off to the side. Eva was laying out bread and cheese to eat, while Leo uncorked a bottle of wine.

  “I apologize for the lack of decent drinks,” he said, as he filled the four glasses he had set out on the counter-top. “This was all quite sudden, after all, so a young Barbera will have to do.”

  “No apologies necessary,” Jude assured him, taking the offered glass. “I’ve always been partial to the Piedmonts, regardless of their age.”

  “Then your luck has begun to turn around, I think,” joked Leo poorly. “Now, please…eat.”

  The four nibbled on their repast for a few minutes, before Jude gathered up the courage to continue his questioning. “So… about what you said earlier…”

  “About my knowledge of the Nephilim?” Leo asked, pretending he could guess where Jude’s line of questioning was leading.

  “About how you’re one of them!” Eric interjected through a mouthful of brie.

  “Ah, yes… that…” Leo mused as he unbuttoned his jacket and settled back in his chair. “I was once a Grigori, the same as my brothers. I took interest in the Roman and Greek area of the Mediterranean and helped cultivate it in the arts and sciences. Unfortunately, I saw my work undone time and again either by a rogue Nephilim trying to be some sort of god or by mankind’s own destructive nature. I was getting “burned out”, as you say these days. Luckily, true science and technology finally found their roots and, by the early nineteen hundreds, humanity progressed far enough that I found I could live in relative comfort, if I desired to live as a mortal.

  “Don’t worry, though,” Leo stated to stem the coming tide of questions. “I never subscribed to the practice of domination over other sentient beings, so I tested my desire with coma patients. They had no competing consciousness, so I was able to stay in their bodies longer than normal before feeling the effects of entanglement. This still only meant I had a little over a year, maybe two at best. I found this body in an ICU recovering from a car accident. His flesh was healing, but the damage to his brain had erased all but the smallest remnants of his personality.”

  Leo continued, “I found that inhabiting these bodies still left me with some memories of their life, which made it easier to blend in. This host had also retained some of its memories, like his childhood and love life, specifically, his new fiancée.”

  Eva put her arms around his neck, as he rubbed them affectionately. “I knew he was different when he woke up,” she said, “even if he could tell me key things about his past and mine. I thought it might be due to the accident, but still he seemed wiser… older…”

  Leo continued, “I put on a good act for a while, but it was difficult, given the circumstances. I know I could have simply left her, but I fell madly in love after only a few days with her. We were together five years, however, before finally I confessed the truth to her.”

  Eva broke in, “I thought he was mad at first. Imagine my surprise when he levitated me off the ground!”

  “Weren’t you afraid?” Eric asked in an attempt to reconcile her experience to his. “That’s pretty heavy stuff coming from someone you have known for years.”

  “I was for a time,” Eva admitted. “I thought about it, however, and realized that he is the man I married and love. The old Leo died long ago. As long as he keeps his promise, though, I’m fine with hi
m the way he is.”

  “What promise is that?” asked Jude

  Leo answered, “I promised to grow old and die with her… to never leave her side.” He placed his hand on her knee and looked her in the eye. “I haven’t left this body in thirty years, so she’s stuck with me at this point anyway. Lucky for the both of us, I have a little forward knowledge about which technologies are worthy of investment. I can say one thing for the rise of the corporation on Earth… it’s much easier to influence research with money than by trying to hand someone an epiphany in a dream.”

  Jude laughed, “I would imagine so. How did you get to know the Vicar? Does he even know you’re a…” His voice trailed off as he tried to find the correct word.

  “Nephilim? Grigori?” Leo offered with subtle contempt. “I don’t subscribe to such titles any more. I have no need for power or control, nor am I content to merely watch and not act. No, eternity has become too long for me. I want to live my life comfortably and die as all men do.

  As for our relationship with the Vicar, we were benefactors at his diocese long before he reached his current position. After he had gained some power in the church, we helped him smuggle political and religious refugees to sanctuary around the world, with great discretion of course. That’s why he called us to help with your situation. Now, I need some answers from you.”

  “Ask away,” Jude offered.

  “Lorenzo mentioned you had a female companion with you when you visited him. He told me she could perform miracles, but he said he could not elaborate more over the phone. My first guess would have been that she was a Nephilim, but meeting with the Vatican so openly and treating for peace is too selfless for their kind. Was she truly one of the Watchers? What was her name?”