Then it showed up in his actual life.
I pick up the scroll, eying the two symbols at the top. One, the Vandenberg crest, which belonged first to Dante. The other, the symbol on the locket, which belonged first to Seraphina. It isn’t the mark of the curse. It’s the mark of the one who cast it. And every time it was triggered, she signed her name.
Then he painted me, wearing it …
“The revelation,” I say. Mysterious words written in his own hand, the year of his son’s birth. “What if it’s here?”
Jude flips through the rest of the Bible. He turns over the map. He does the same with the scroll. But there’s nothing else to be found. The mysterious revelation remains frustratingly elusive.
With the table thoroughly searched, he shines his light on the coffin.
It sits in a low stone recess, its surface warped and split with age. We move closer, as though compelled. And I can’t help but think that this coffin doesn’t fit. If someone were entombed inhere, the crypt would have been written about. But I’ve never read anything about a crypt under St. Fortuna’s.
I press my hand along the coffin’s seam and push. The lid groans but doesn’t move. I find a crack near the corner and wedge my fingers beneath it. Jude joins me. We pull and yank, and with a splintering sound, the wood gives way.
Just as I suspected, there are no bones inside.
But there is a jewelry box.
A domed walnut chest.
Slowly, I lift the lid.
And there it is.
Resting in the upper tray on a velvet cushion. The locket. My heart pounds as I pick it up. It’s cold to the touch. Heavy, too. I try to open it, but it’s locked tight. And for just a second, it pulses violently in my palm.
With a gasp, it clatters to the floor.
“Are you okay?” Jude asks.
“I-I’m fine,” I say.
He picks it up, and for one panicked moment, I want to shout at him to stop. Don’t touch it. But he’s too quick. And nothing happens.
The locket is silent and still.
I lift the upper tray to investigate the compartment beneath. And there they are. The two items Rafe has been searching for—the onyx and the pearl.
Not clever facsimiles.
But Seraphina’s amulets.
Empty vessels without any power.
Except to open the tomb.
With Vandenberg blood.
Under the light of Dante’s comet.
Finally, Rafe’s finish line has come into view.
We know exactly what he’s up to.
41
THE QUESTION IS WHY?
