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A cool jug of water…why did that sound so familiar?
“Yes, I suppose that would be a good idea.” She had survived a blood spell; she was lucky to be alive. So that was why. There was no other reason she would feel so odd.
Was there?
She looked down at her belly, at her pale white legs, and in a flash saw a river of blood, saw a baby’s head crown, but the memory went as quickly as it came—and she did not understand, did not know what it meant. What baby? What was all that blood?
But something in her soul grieved, something in her soul died that day.…
Tomasia would live the rest of that cycle with Andreas in Florence, never knowing that she’d had a child, or that the child had been stolen from her. And Andreas and Ludivivo would never know that Patrizio had betrayed them, that instead of destroying the babe, Patrizio had raised the girl as his own; had killed his own daughter so that Lucifer’s spirit could remain on earth. The girl was known as Giulia de Medici, child of Duc Patrizio de Medici. When she was sixteen, she tried to kill herself, as she would attempt to do in every cycle of her immortal life.
In the White Darkness, Allegra and Charles sat together at the piano in the Cotton Club. 1923.
“So that is how you hid her from me,” Allegra said. “And that is how I betrayed you. I knew. I always knew. The guilt and the shame at my betrayal has haunted me for centuries. As has my anger toward you for what you did to my daughter.”
“I failed you, Allegra.”
“No, Charles, we failed each other. Because Florence was merely a consequence of a decision you made long ago. This is not where it began, our estrangement. Not here.”
“Yes,” Charles said. “You were never able to forgive me for it. Look at that sculpture you made.”
Allegra stared at the sculpture on the table in Florence so long ago. A sculpture that harkened back even further in their history. A woman on the ground. Two men above her. One with a sword to the other’s throat.
“This all started in Rome.”
FORTY-FIVE
Bliss
ow fitting that Caligula had hidden the path in a theater—his entire life had been a charade. Perhaps that was the idea—that Lucifer was laughing at them as he worked toward their destruction. Bliss forged ahead, not quite sure what she would find, or what they would do when they did find the blockage.
“Bliss?” Malcolm said. “I feel kinda weird.”
“Weird how? Like, it’s-dark-and-you’re-freaked-out weird, or like, the-passages-are-closer weird?”
“Passages weird,” he whispered.
“Well, at least we know we’re in the right place,” she said. “What do we do now?”
“It gets worse the closer I get to the passages,” he said. “We need to keep going.”
They walked toward the center of the courtyard. In the faint light of her phone, Bliss could see Malcolm’s face turning green. “Looks like we’re on the right track,” she said. “I’m sorry you have to go through this.” Malcom’s stomach was sensitive to the slightest evil. In the past, his sickness warned the pack of an imminent attack by Hellhounds.
He waved her off. “It’s what I signed up for. I’m fine.”
He didn’t look fine, though. She hoped they found something quickly. At least they had time to explore—it had only taken them minutes to get to the center, where Malcolm quietly turned and threw up. “This is it,” he said. “It’s right here.”
“What’s here?”
“An open passage, which is why I feel so terrible.”
“Lawson’s the only one who can open a portal,” said Bliss. But as they walked closer, she saw that Malcom was right. The air before them shimmered, and finally a light began to shine, brighter and brighter, until a tunnel stood before them.
“I’m going in,” Bliss said.
“Not by yourself you’re not,” Malcolm said.
“I have to. You have to let them know we’re here.”
