Jon Tracy - The Rome Prophecy

In less than two minutes they establish that the vast church floor and its side rooms and upper galleries are clear.

Lorenzo scratches his stubbly silver-grey hair and watches feeds from helmet cameras as his team enters the crypt. If anyone is still hiding, this is the place they’ll be.

The church lights are cut.

Soldiers slip on night-sight goggles and slide unseen into what they call the black zone.

Lorenzo knows the crypt well; it’s a riot of rich colours from ceiling to floor, with spectacular statues and innumerable marble pillars that create an amazing array of painted arches.

But none of this shows on his infra-red camera feeds.

Just the odd glowing movement of soldiers and blurred backgrounds.

He crosses himself and prays that a gun battle doesn’t break out down there. The crossfire would be horrendous.

The ROS veteran glances at his watch. Three more minutes have passed.

His radio feed crackles. ‘Clear!’ shouts one of his men.

‘Clear!’ confirms another.

‘Clear!’ The final confirmation rolls into Lorenzo’s earpiece.

They’ve all drawn blanks.

Every nook, niche, corner and confessional has been searched and they’ve found no one.

Lorenzo sits back from the monitors and stretches his long legs.

Where the hell did the bad guys go?

He has to see for himself.

He steps from the warmth of his ops vehicle and walks through the wind and rain of the piazza.

He enters the church courtyard, questioning whether the operation was necessary.

Maybe it was a bad case of crowd hysteria.

Perhaps the congregation heard a nearby delivery truck backfire and panicked.

Then he dismisses the notion.

It wouldn’t explain the stabbing, nor the eye-witness accounts of hearing shooting in the church and a woman identifying herself as a police officer.

But he’s still not satisfied.

Neither the Carabinieri nor the Polizia have been able to confirm that they had any officers in the church or even on duty anywhere near the building.

Was the woman one of the criminals?

Lorenzo doesn’t rule it out.

Crooks have long known that pretending to be a police officer is a good way of emptying a building. The public see a gun and they’re relieved to learn it’s being held by an officer of the law so they do whatever they’re told.

The major makes the sign of the cross as he enters the centre aisle and bows his head.

He has worshipped in this church.

He’s sat and knelt in here with his wife and children and he’s furious that he’s been forced to return in full combat gear with a gun dangling from his hip.

On the left-hand side of the church, a third of the way from the main entrance, he notices the pews have been disturbed.

Two of them are splayed open into a big V.

Between them is a pool of blood.

The furthermost pew is stained red.

He’s seen people faint in church – it isn’t that uncommon – but light-headed fallers get away with a bruise and a bump. They don’t bleed like a haemophiliac in a razor-blade factory.

Lorenzo’s radio crackles again.

He answers it, looking apologetically towards the altar. ‘Silvestri.’

His lieutenant comes online and has to shout over loud crowd noise and honking car horns behind him. ‘Major, we have a man outside who seems to have an explanation for all the trouble.’

Lorenzo looks to the giant crucifix over the altar. ‘Thank you, Lord, I was beginning to believe you had deserted me.’

They cover Valentina’s eyes.

Not in any sophisticated way. They don’t use a hood or a blindfold. They just throw a coat over her head and tie a belt around her neck to keep it there.

For a professional like Valentina, it’s the kind of action that gives away a lot of clues.

For a start, they seem more bothered about her not seeing where they’re going than the fact that she’s already had a good look at all their faces and can identify them.

She’s not sure if this is a good thing or not.

It’s good if they’re as disorganised as she hopes they are. If they’re simply coping with things as they blunder their way along.

But it’s bad – very bad – if they’re not so amateur. If they’re thinking that once they’ve questioned her about where Anna is, they’re going to kill her rather than let her go.

A sobering thought.

Only one thing brings Valentina some comfort. For now they want her alive.

She has time on her side.

Not much. But time enough.

Time to think. Time to bluff. Time to escape.

The coat over her head is doing a good job of stopping her seeing, but all her other senses are working overtime.

They’ve walked her downstairs, into the crypt, then walked her some more. Made her stand still. Turned her sideways on and then pushed her through a doorway.

Valentina’s memorised it all.

She can retrace her steps, follow her senses, if she has to. If she gets the chance to.

Now the air is colder.

It smells different too. Not of candle wax and church polish; of something earthier, something much baser.

Damp.

It has the metallic smell of damp and animal droppings, probably from mice or rats.

Someone grabs her shoulders, turns her round and holds her as she walks forward.

She’s guided down three or four wide steps.

They turn her left for a few steps and then right again before straightening her up.

They let go of her shoulders and allow her to walk along the flat again.

The twisting and turning has made her a little unsteady. She puts her hand out to avoid falling over.

It touches stone.

She’s sure it’s stone.

It’s rough, hard and lumpy. Totally unlike the plaster or marble of a church.

She rubs her thumb across her two fingers.

Wet and slimy.

The walls are damp.

She guesses she’s in some kind of underground passageway. Perhaps an ancient bolt-hole for priests or nuns at the nearby convent, a place they would hide from persecutors.

Or perhaps it’s something else.

Tom’s comments spring to mind. Pre-Christian cults, castrated followers of Cybele and Attis, ceremonies and rituals involving human sacrifices.

Is she in the midst of all that?

She remembers too the writing on the walls of the Sacro Cuore del Suffragio – DOMINA. DOMINUS. TEMPLUM. LIBERA NOS A MALO. Mistress. Master. Temple. Deliver us from evil.

Is that where she’s being taken? To the temple?

Valentina realises that she’s not gagged.

She wishes she was.

It’s not a good sign that they’re not afraid of her screaming or shouting for help.

Maybe it’s because the gun is still on her. Occasionally jabbing into her flesh and often accompanied by a command for her to hurry up. Or is it because they’re now so far underground that she could scream herself hoarse and no one would hear her?

She thinks it’s the latter.

She knows they’re already a very long way below and beyond Santa Cecilia, where her fellow soldiers are now no doubt swarming all over the church.

But that’s where her knowledge stops.

And that’s what frightens her most.

Lorenzo Silvestri lights Federico’s cigarette for him.

He has to.

The lieutenant’s hand is shaking too much for him to be able to do it himself.

Federico hasn’t been scared by the gunfire, the stabbing, the sudden influx of Carabinieri troops or even the fact that he now has to explain what he and Valentina were doing at the church.

He’s frightened that Valentina is dead.

He’s scared stiff that he misunderstood what she’d asked him to do and as a result she’s been killed.