Page 104 of The Sinner and the Priest: Part Two

It had a shape once. A color, maybe. Copper. Or blue. A husky laugh that dared me to be worse. To live. A temperature. A feeling, perhaps.

But the shape will not hold, because something else is there now. It belongs to the buzzing voice, to something patient and candlestick pale.

To something finally, finally pleased.

Something . . .

Once.

Thirty-Seven

Mercy

It doesn’t take me long to get back to the osteria. The abandoned storage building they kept me in was only a few streets away. I should be happy. Should feel positive. But when I’m close, only a few rounded cobblestone corners away, I feel the wrongness in every cell of my body.

The sun is high. There should be people everywhere. This is peak tourism season, but the restaurants are empty. No one is in the ateliers. The corner stores are abandoned.

It’s like a ghost town.

At first, I fear the worst. Cisco’s dark side has taken over and devoured the city. But everywhere I look, I find no bodies. No death. Just emptiness.

Evacuated.

Steeling my resolve, I tighten my grip on the sword and break into a barefoot jog. The osteria will have clues for me to follow.

I turn down a street and the sun disappears behind a cloud. I glance up, and my heart leaps into my throat. The sky is darkening rapidly by the second, but it’s not a storm cloud gathering force. I think . . . I think it’s flies.

No.

“Please be okay,” I mutter and break into a full-pelt run. “Please don’t be too late.”

Voices. Shouting. There—a flash of clergy red by the basilica steps at the entry to the piazza. A cardinal with a bald head and light brown skin is speaking to someone out of view. As I near, I glimpse a flash of purple on another male in a cassock, but that’s all I have time to register because I’m almost at the end of the street. The piazza comes into full view, and the scene is apocalyptic.

“Holy mother of fuck,” I whisper as I grind to a halt.

The sky above the massive courtyard is a swarming mass of darkness. I can’t see the buildings and structures on the other side. Wind gusts against my face every so often, but I think it’s actually the result of trillions of tiny beating wings. A grating, buzzing roar accompanies the swarming mass as it rises and falls like a stormy sea.

“Suora!”

I spin toward the basilica steps and find Bianchi, the man in the cassock, standing with the unknown cardinal. He is wearing a purple exorcist’s stole around his neck and holds a small book in his hand. Fear has warped his friendly face into something that chills me.

“Padre,” I return and pad up the steps to meet them.

The cardinal’s eyes widen upon seeing me, and then narrow as they take in the sword at my side. I wait for his rebuke, an attempt to take the divine relic, or even a comment. The red he wears makes me think of Valerio and his friends from the steam room.

Reacting to my distrust, the sword responds with a show of strength. A roaring whoosh fills the air as light flares along the blade and fire coats its length, competing with the buzzing swarm.

I twirl my wrist and deftly demonstrate I know exactly how to wield the weapon.

The cardinal’s lips flatten, but Bianchi, the beautiful man, grins at me with such joy I’d be mistaken in thinking we were on the brink of a biblical apocalypse. More than that, he clutches his heart and exclaims in broken English, “Mercy. God bless you. We are saved.”

“Cisco . . .” His name falls from my lips as I scour the darkness at the center of the piazza. It’s almost like a tornado where the obelisk monument stands. I point there with the sword and switch to Italian for their ease. “Are they in there?”

Surely Hannah is there with Cisco. The demonic flies appear more often when the two are close to each other.

“Yes,” Bianchi answers. “We believe so.” He then introduces me to the cardinal. “Mercy is one of the blessed Sinners. Saint Mary’s chosen.”

Saint Mary?