The Judas Strain - James Rollins [71]
From out the leafy bower, they swarmed with teeth bared like wild animals. Others carried severed arms and legs. God protect me even now, many of those limbs were gnawed.
A chill washed over Vigor, despite the growing heat of the morning. He read with numbing horror as Marco described how his party fled deeper into the city to seek refuge from the ravening army. The Venetian described in great detail the slaughter and cannibalism. As twilight fell, Marco’s party retreated to one of the tall buildings, carved with twisting snakes and long-dead kings. The group set up a final stand, sure their small party would be overwhelmed as more and more of the diseased cannibals entered the city.
Gray mumbled under his breath, no words audible, but his disbelief was plain.
Now as the sun sank, so did all our hopes. Each in his own way cast prayers to the heavens. Kaan’s men burned bits of wood and smeared the ashes on their faces. I had only my confessor. Friar Agreer knelt with me and offered our souls to God through whispered prayers. He clutched his crucifix and daubed my forehead with Christ’s suffering cross. He used the same ashes as the Kaan’s men. I looked upon the other men’s marked faces and wondered: in such trial, were we all the same? Pagan and Christian. And in the end, whose prayer was it that was finally answered? Whose prayer brought the Virtue against this pestilence into our midst; a dark Virtue that saved us all.
The story stopped there.
Gray flipped the paper over, looking for more.
Kowalski leaned back and made his only contribution to the historical discussion. “Not enough sex,” he mumbled, and attempted to hold back a burp with a fist and failed.
Frowning, Gray tapped a name on the last page. “Here…this mention of Friar Agreer.”
Vigor nodded, having spotted the same glaring error. Surely this text was false. “No clergymen accompanied the Polos to the Orient,” he stated aloud. “According to Vatican texts, two Dominican friars left with the Polos, to represent the Holy See, but the pair turned back after the first few days.”
Seichan collected the first page and refolded it. “Like this secret chapter, Marco edited the friar out of his chronicles. Three Dominicans actually left with the Polos. One for each traveler, as was custom for the time.”
Vigor realized she was right. It was indeed the custom.
“Only two of the friars fled back,” Seichan said. “The presence of the third was kept hidden…until now.”
Gray shifted back and tugged at his neck. He pulled free a silver crucifix and placed it on the table. “And you claim this is actually Friar Agreer’s cross? The one mentioned in the story.”
Seichan’s firm stare answered his question.
Shocked into silence at the sudden revelation, Vigor studied the crucifix. It was unadorned, with the barest representation of a crucified figure. Vigor could tell it was old. Could it be true? He gently collected it from the table and examined it. If true, its very weight gave substance to Marco’s harrowing words.
Vigor finally found his voice. “But I don’t understand. Why was Friar Agreer cut out of the story?”
Seichan reached over and collected the scattered papers. “We don’t know,” she said simply. “The remaining pages of the book were ripped out and replaced with a false page, stitched into the binding, but the quality and age of the new page dated it centuries later than the original binding.”
Vigor frowned at such strangeness. “What was on the new page?”
“I was never able to see it myself, but I was told what it said. It contained a rambling rave, full of references to angels and biblical quotations. The writer clearly feared Marco’s story. But more importantly, the page spoke at length of a map included in the book, one drawn by Marco himself. A map they deemed to be evil.”
“So what happened to