Sanctus and The Key: 2 Bestselling Thrillers

‘Of what did you speak?’

Her antennae continued to bristle. This new guy just didn’t sound like a cop, at least not any she knew. Maybe they bred them differently over there.

A loud announcement echoed through the terminal, calling her flight. She squinted up at the departures board. Her flight was now boarding at gate 78, about as far away as it was possible to get without leaving the state.

‘Listen,’ she said, heaving herself wearily to her feet and grabbing her holdall, ‘I’ve had virtually no sleep, I’ve drunk about a gallon of coffee, and I’ve just had some really bad news, so I’m really not in the most sociable of moods. If you want to be briefed on my earlier conversation, ask Arkadian. I’m sure his memory is every bit as good as mine, probably a damn sight better right at this moment.’

She hung up and hit the ‘off’ button before it had a chance to ring again.

38

As soon as Liv hung up, the Abbot ordered Athanasius to fetch Brother Samuel’s personal file from the library. He’d also asked him to bring the files of each current member of the Carmina as a plan formed in his mind.

Bad news, she had told him. Some really bad news … And Arkadian had taken the trouble to call her …

It wasn’t possible. No one could enter the Citadel if they had any living relatives. The absence of family ties meant there would be no emotional pull away from their work inside the holy mountain and no desire to communicate with the outside world. The security of the Citadel and the preservation of its secrets were absolutely reliant on this rule never being broken, and the background checks for any new applicant were exacting, rigorously carried out and always erred on the side of caution. If someone’s family records had been destroyed in a fire, they were rejected. If they had one distant cousin, whom they’d never met and believed to be dead but couldn’t trace, they were rejected.

The files arrived within five minutes. Athanasius placed them wordlessly on the Abbot’s desk then vanished from the room.

Like all inhabitants of the Citadel, Brother Samuel’s file was thorough and detailed and comprised copies, and even some originals, of every significant document tracing the story of his life: school reports, work history from his social security number, even police arrest sheets – everything.

The Abbot scanned the documents for all references to family. He found death certificates; his mother had died when he was just a few days old, and his father perished in a car accident when Samuel was eighteen. Both sets of grandparents had long since passed on. His father had been an only child, and his mother’s only brother had died of leukaemia aged eleven. There were no uncles, no aunts, no cousins, no brothers, no sisters. All was as it should be.

A gentle tap dragged his attention from the file. He looked up as the door opened far enough to allow Athanasius to slip back into the room.

‘Forgive the intrusion, Brother Abbot,’ he said, ‘but the Prelate has just sent word that he is feeling well enough to see you. You are to go to his quarters half an hour before Vespers.’

The Abbot glanced at the clock. Vespers was two hours hence. The delay was probably to give the vampires who kept the Prelate alive enough time to pump some fresh blood into him. He had hoped to have more comforting news to impart by the time he had his audience. He glanced across at the large stack of red files containing the personal details of the Carmina. Maybe he would.

‘Very well,’ he said, closing Brother Samuel’s file and placing it to one side. ‘But I need you to do something for me beforehand. I want you to contact the source that provided us with the police file. I believe the inspector on the case has since spoken with a woman. I want to know who she is, I want to know what was said, and most of all – I want to know where she is.’

‘Of course,’ Athanasius said. ‘I will find out all I can and brief you before your meeting.’

The Abbot nodded and watched him bow and back out of the room before returning his attention to the tower of files before him.

There were sixty-two in total, each containing the detailed history of a Carmina, the red cloaks, the guild of guards who protected the passageways to the forbidden sections of the mountain; men who had proved themselves fit for these martial tasks both in their previous lives and in their subsequent devotion to the Citadel. As members of the Carmina they were also possible future Sancti, though as yet they knew nothing of the true nature of the Sacrament, so could, if necessary, be sent back into the world without compromising its security.

He slid the first folder from the top of the pile and opened it, shuffling aside the usual collection of medical records and school admission reports in search of other documents – military service histories, arrest reports, prison records – that would tell him if this man was the one he was looking for.

39

Kathryn Mann sat in the privacy of her apartment, studying the contents of the stolen file on her laptop. Because she’d received it more than an hour after the Citadel got their copy, hers was slightly more up to date and contained a rough transcript of Arkadian’s conversation with Liv. It also had a link to her profile page at the American newspaper she worked at. She speed-read the case notes then grabbed her phone and pressed the redial button.

‘I’ve got it,’ she said as soon as her father answered.

‘And?’

‘Definitely a Sanctus,’ she said, reviewing the stark images from the post-mortem showing the familiar latticework of ceremonial scars on the monk’s body.

‘Interesting,’ Oscar said. ‘And there still appears to be no official word from the Citadel claiming him. They’re frightened of something.’

‘Maybe, but there’s something else in the file, something … unbelievable.’ She looked at the photograph of the pretty young journalist staring out at her from the browser window. ‘He has a sister.’

She heard her father catch his breath.

‘That can’t be,’ he said. ‘If he had a sister, he can’t have been a Sanctus. He can’t even have come from inside the Citadel.’

‘But he has the scars,’ she said. ‘He was definitely fully ordained. He’s been branded with the Tau. So he must have come from inside the Citadel and he must have seen the Sacrament.’

‘Then find the sister,’ Oscar said. ‘Find her and protect her with everything we have. And I mean everything.’

The line went quiet. Both of them knew what he meant.

‘I understand,’ Kathryn said finally.

‘I know it’s dangerous,’ Oscar said, ‘but this girl will have no idea what’s coming at her. We have to protect her. It’s our duty.’

‘I know.’

‘And one other thing …’

‘Yes?’

‘Make up the spare room and get some good scotch in,’ he said, the warmth returning to his voice. ‘I think it’s time I came home.’

40

The Abbot swept through the dark stone corridors of the mountain on his way to the Prelate, troubled by the lack of comforting news he carried with him. It was bad enough that for the first time in nearly ninety years someone had almost escaped from the Citadel. That he had perished in the process was the only bright spot on the horizon. The fact that he now appeared to have a living relative made it possibly the worst breach of Citadel security in the last two hundred years – perhaps even longer. There was also no getting away from the fact that it was ultimately his responsibility.

Nothing short of rapid and successful containment of the situation would be expected, and in order for that to happen he needed to be given a free hand to act as decisively as he saw fit – not only inside the Citadel, but outside as well – and for that he would need the Prelate’s blessing.

He nodded to the guard permanently stationed by the Prelate’s private quarters. Traditionally the Citadel guards would have been skilled with crossbow, sword and dagger, but times had changed. Now a wrist holster containing a Beretta 92 double-action pistol with a full clip loaded with parabellums nestled within the loose sleeves of their russet red cassocks. The guard heaved open the door to let him pass. He wasn’t one of the men he’d picked from the stack of files.

The door banged shut behind him, echoing briefly in the cavernous hallway. The Abbot strode towards the elegant stairway leading up to the Prelate’s stateroom. He heard the hiss of a ventilator somewhere in the darkness ahead, rhythmically forcing oxygen into its occupant’s ancient lungs.

The chamber was even darker than the hallway and the Abbot had to slow as he entered it, unsure of what lay in his path. A meagre fire crackled in the grate, sucking air from the room in exchange for a little illumination and a dry, smothering heat. The only other light came from the bank of electronic machines that worked round the clock, oxygenating the Prelate’s blood, removing his waste, keeping him alive.

The Abbot moved tentatively towards the huge four-poster bed dominating the space and began to make out the gaunt shape, white and insubstantial, lying in the middle of it. In the dim glow it looked as though the Prelate was trapped in the centre of a web of tubes and wires like a cave-dwelling spider. Only his eyes appeared to have any substance. They were dark and alert and watched his visitor make his approach.

The Abbot reached across the acres of linen to take the Prelate’s claw-like hand. Despite the stifling heat in the room, it was as cold as the mountain. He lowered his head and kissed the ring hanging loosely on the third finger which bore the seal of his exalted office.

‘Leave us,’ the Prelate said, in a voice both dry and laboured.

Two Apothecaria in white cassocks rose from their seats like phantoms. The Abbot had not even noticed them in the shadows. Each checked and adjusted something on one of the many machines, turning up the alarm volumes so they could hear them from the stairs, then silently glided from the room. The Abbot turned back to his master and found the bright eyes burning into him.

‘Tell me … everything …’ the Prelate whispered.

The Abbot outlined the sequence of the morning’s events, leaving nothing out, while the Prelate continued to skewer him with his needle eyes. Everything sounded worse spoken out loud than it had when rehearsed in his head on the way over. He also knew from experience that the Prelate was not a man given to leniency. He had been Abbot himself the last time a novice had betrayed them, during the time of the First Great War, and his ruthlessness in clearing up that potential mess had ultimately provided his ticket to the Prelature. The Abbot secretly hoped that a successful containment operation now might do the same for him.