Death Masks

"They’ve tried," Forthill said.

"He’s gotten away?"

Forthill’s eyes and voice stayed steady. "He’s killed them. He’s killed all of them. More than a hundred Knights. More than a thousand priests, nuns, monks. Three thousand men, women, children. And those are only the ones listed in the pages recovered from the destroyed archives. Only two Knights have ever faced him and survived."

I had a flash of insight. "Shiro is one of them. That’s why Nicodemus was willing to trade me for him."

Forthill nodded and closed his eyes for a moment. "Likely. Though the Denarians grow in power by inflicting pain and suffering on others. They become better able to use the strength the Fallen give them. And they gain the most from hurting those meant to counter them."

"He’s torturing Shiro," I said.

Forthill put his hand on mine for a moment, his voice quiet, calming. "We must have faith. We may be in time to help him."

"I thought the whole point of the Knights was to deal out justice," I said. "The Fists of God and all that. So why is it that Nicodemus can slaughter them wholesale?"

"For much the same reason any man can kill another," Forthill said. "He is intelligent. Cautious. Skilled. Ruthless. Like his patron fallen angel."

I guessed at the name. "Badassiel?"

Forthill almost smiled. "Anduriel. He was a captain of Lucifer’s, after the Fall. Anduriel leads the thirty Fallen who inhabit the coins. Nicodemus wasn’t seduced into Anduriel’s domination. It’s a partnership. Nicodemus works with Fallen as a near-equal and of his free will. No one of the priesthood, of any of the Knightly Orders, of the Knights of the Cross, has so much as scratched him."

"The noose," I guessed. "The rope. It’s like the Shroud, isn’t it? It has power."

Forthill nodded. "We think so, yes. The same rope the betrayer used in Jerusalem."

"How many Denarians are working with him? I take it that they probably don’t get along with each other."

"You are correct, thank God. Nicodemus rarely has more than five or six other Denarians working with him, according to our information. Usually, he keeps three others nearby."

"Snakeboy, demon-girl, and Ursiel."

"Yes."

"How many coins are running around the world?"

"Only nine are accounted for at this time. Ten, with Ursiel’s coin."

"So Nicodemus could theoretically have nineteen other Fallen working with him. Plus a side order of goons."

"Goons?"

"Goons. Normal hired hands, they looked like."

"Ah. They aren’t normal," Forthill said. "From what we have been able to tell, they are almost a small nation unto themselves. Fanatics. Their service is hereditary, passed on from father to son, mother to daughter."

"This gets better and better," I said.

"Harry," Forthill said. "I know of no tactful way to ask this, so I will simply ask. Did he give you one of the coins?"

"He tried," I said. "I turned him down."

Forthill’s eyes stayed on my face for a moment before he let out a breath. "I see. Do you remember the sigil upon it?"

I grunted in affirmation, picked up a chocolate-covered jelly, and drew the symbol in the chocolate with a forefinger.

Forthill tilted his head, frowning. "Lasciel," he murmured.

"Lasciel?" I said. It came out muffled, since I was licking chocolate off my finger.

"The Seducer," Forthill murmured. He smeared his finger over the chocolate, erasing the sigil. "Lasciel is also called the Webweaver and the Temptress," he said, between licks. "Though it seems odd that Nicodemus would want to free her. Typically, she does not follow Anduriel’s lead."

"A rebel angel among rebel angels?"

"Perhaps," Forthill said. "It is something better not discussed, for now."

Susan stepped out of the little office, a wireless phone to her ear. "All right," she said to the phone, and walked past us, jerking one hand at us to tell us to follow her. Father Forthill lifted his eyebrows, and we went out to the Carpenter family’s living room.

It was a fairly huge room divided into several clumps of furniture. The television was in the smallest clump, and still looked about three sizes too small. Susan marched over to it, flicked it on, and flipped through stations.

She stopped on a local station, a news report, that showed a helicopter angle of a building being consumed by a raging fire. About a dozen yellow-and-red fire trucks circled around it, but it was obvious that they were only containing the fire. The building was lost.

"What’s this?" Forthill asked.

"Dammit," I snarled, and turned away from the television, pacing.

"It’s the building Shiro took us to last night," Susan said. "The Denarians were in some tunnels beneath it."

"Not anymore," I snapped. "They’ve left and covered their tracks. Hell, they’ve had what? Six hours? They could be a couple of states away by now."

"Nicodemus," Forthill said. "It’s his style."

"We’ll find them," Susan said quietly.

"How?" I asked.

She pressed her lips together and turned away from me. She spoke quietly into the phone. I couldn’t hear what she said, but it had that end-of-conversation tone to it. She turned the handset off a moment later. "What can we do?"

"I can go to the underworld," I said. "Call up some answers from there. But I can’t do it until the sun sets."

Forthill said quietly, "You mustn’t do that. It’s far too dangerous. None of the Knights would want-"

I slashed my hand through the air, cutting him off. "We need information or Shiro is going to die. Not only that, but if we don’t run down Nicodemus, he gets to do whatever badness he’s getting ready to do with the Shroud. If I have to go to Downbelow for answers, then that’s where I go."

"What about Michael?" Susan asked. "Couldn’t he find Shiro the way Shiro found Harry?"

Forthill shook his head. "Not necessarily. It isn’t something he can control. At times, the Knights are given that kind of discernment, but they can’t call it up at will."

I checked my watch, figuring up distances. "Michael and Sanya should be back here in what? An hour or so?"

"Barring further difficulties," Forthill said.

"Fine. We’ll see if the side of the angels wants to pitch in. If they don’t, I’m calling Chauncy up as soon as the sun goes down." I took the phone from Susan and walked out of the room.