Jonathan Maberry - Assassin's code

They stopped in the archway, both of them bathed in purple shadows. Sir Guy’s heart was swelling with love and gratitude. He took the priest’s hand, bent and kissed the blood red ruby of his ring.

“Thank you,” he said. “I thank you with all my heart, Father Nicodemus.”

The Hangar

Floyd Bennett Field, Brooklyn

June 15, 2:50 a.m. EST

Aunt Sallie and Church were still in his office when the phone rang with an overseas call. “Well, well,” he said and showed the display to Aunt Sallie.

Auntie smiled like a happy cat in a canary store. “This should be interesting as all hell.”

Church activated the scrambler and speaker.

Without preamble, Lilith demanded, “Have you talked to your agent, Ledger, today?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know that he met with Jalil Rasouli?”

“Yes.”

“Is he on or off the leash?”

“He has my trust.”

“Okay. Good to know, I suppose,” she said. Her tone was icy and scalpel sharp. “Word is that Rasouli gave something to Ledger. Care to tell me what it was?”

“Why do you need to know?”

“Because I think Rasouli is playing a game.”

“And that would be different from his normal behavior in what way?”

“Don’t try to be cute,” Lilith said tersely. “Do you know that the new Scriptor of the Red Order is trying to recruit Rasouli as the new Murshid of the Tariqa?”

Church cocked an eyebrow at Aunt Sallie. She shook her head and began tapping keys on the MindReader interface.

“I was not aware of that,” admitted Church. “Until today the Order has been off the radar since Baghdad. I am rather surprised to learn that they are active again.”

“They never really stopped. The new Scriptor-Charles, the last of the LaRoques-took over after we took his father off the board.”

“So that was you.”

Lilith ignored that. “The Order slowed down for a bit until they could build a list of candidates for a new Murshid. Rasouli’s been on the top of that list for a couple of years now.”

Aunt Sallie signaled to Church to look at the information on her monitor. Church nodded.

“It’s my understanding that Charles LaRoque has been treated for a variety of personality disorders since boyhood,” said Church. “Paranoid schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, psychosis. A handful of others. How is he able to run an organization as sophisticated as the Order?”

“The priest.”

“Priest?”

“The priest,” she said again, emphasizing the word.

“Lilith, you never mentioned a priest to me. Let’s remember that I’ve asked you many times for a complete history of the Red Order and each time you’ve refused. Actually, each time you never responded at all. So, again I ask, which priest? Who is he?”

There was a pause and when Lilith spoke again her tone changed. Less harsh, more cautious. “When Sir Guy LaRoque founded the Red Order he did so with the blessing of a priest from the Knights Hospitaller. Ever since then, each Scriptor has had a priest as his spiritual advisor.”

“And the current priest is part of the Order? And he is managing Charles LaRoque even though the young man is mentally unstable? That suggests that it is the priest who is the de facto head of the Red Order.”

“Yes.”

“Who is this priest?”

“Arklight has been trying to figure that out for a long time,” said Lilith. “There are some anomalies in his file.”

“Such as?”

“Such as the fact that when we compare a four-month-old surveillance photo of him it is a perfect match to a photo from 1936 that was part of some church records recovered after the Second World War.”

“There are a number of ways to doctor a-”

“And both photos match paintings hanging in churches in northern Italy. One from 1897 and one from 1633.”

Aunt Sallie mouthed the words “Oh shit.”

“We also have reliable visual confirmation from an agent in Baghdad that the current priest died in the bombing along with Charles’s grandfather and the Tariqa council.”

“What are you saying?”

“I’m not saying anything, St. Germaine.”

“I prefer ‘Church’ these days. Or ‘Deacon,’ that still works. I don’t really have a connection to ‘St. Germaine’ anymore. I’m sure we’re both adult enough to understand why.”

“Why not for once simply use your real name?” groused Lilith.

Church’s voice was very cold. “Do you really want to open that door? There are other skeletons in the same closet.”

Eventually Lilith said, “No.”

“Will you give me the name of the current priest? And the names of any of the others you know to have been associated with the Red Order?”

“You still don’t get it,” said Lilith. “There is only one name.”

“They… all adopt the same name?”

“That’s one theory.”

Church cocked his eyebrow at Aunt Sallie, who parked a haunch on the edge of the table and stared at him over the lenses of her granny glasses.

“Give me the name.”

Lilith said, “Father Nicodemus.”

On the Streets

Tehran, Iran

June 15, 11:22 a.m.

Ghost and I walked quickly through five or six streets lined with houses that had been left to crumble beneath the relentless Iranian sun. I saw a single sign with a notice about rezoning and impending construction, but it was at least five years old. The only life we encountered there were starving dogs who fled from Ghost’s warning growls, and a single vulture who sat on a telephone pole that had long ago been stripped of its wires. The vulture’s ugly, naked head swiveled slowly on its scrawny neck, watching us as we walked past.

“Don’t get any ideas,” I warned the scavenger, and gave him an evil squint that entirely failed to impress him.

A few blocks later we reentered a residential quarter where people still lived, though even here there was a sense of life fading to dust. I knew from my travels that the typical meal in an Iranian home was unleavened bread and lentils. That’s it. Animal protein was a rarity. I wanted to sneer about it and speculate on how often the ayatollahs had lamb or chicken; but I’m from Baltimore. I’ve seen American poverty at its worst, and as the richest nation on earth we’re the last ones who should throw stones about allowing poverty and starvation within our own borders.

There were a handful of cars, mostly junkers that were held together by rust and need. But one car caught my eye. It was also beat up but it didn’t labor to make it down the block; and I saw it three times. Twice on streets that paralleled the one I was on, and once idling at a light a block ahead. My route may have been random, but I paid close attention to cars and people; and one of the tricks is looking down a cross street when you reach a corner to see what cars are moving along at your pace a block or two over.

Spotting the same car three times could have been a coincidence. Kim Kardashian’s boobs could be real, too, and that’s about as likely.

When I got to the next block, I cut through an alley, running only as fast as Ghost could manage. At the end of the alley, I went through a couple of backyards and then a side yard which took me back to the street just as the little sedan drove past. I was in deep shadows and the driver was looking slowly side to side to check the faces of pedestrians on a moderately busy market street.

The driver was a woman.

I could not tell much because she wore a chador, but her eyes were intelligent, intense and, except for heavy makeup, they did not look even remotely Middle Eastern. Northern Italian at best.

“Violin,” I said, and I knew that I was right. My own Sniping Beauty. And as I murmured her name she turned in my direction, but I was in shadows and the traffic gave her no room to stop.