Devil's Lair (34 page)

“We did not come to
bargain,” Marco said.

“You came to die. I give you
another option.”

“If the Grail stays, the
world will die.”

“Then dying let it die.”

Giovanni said, “God would
never let that happen.”

“It is happening. God is
all-powerful. Whatever happens is the will of God. Are you more powerful than
your Creator?”

“Are you?”

“I serve God now as I did
then.”

“You cannot serve God and
destroy His creation.”

“That is how I serve,” said
Lucifer. “The world stands between me and God. Before the world began, I was in
Paradise. When the world ends, I shall return.”

He blames us for his fall,
Giovanni thought,
as we blame him for ours.
If God was all-powerful, if His love was infinite,
then it must extend to the nadir. Had Lucifer lost the love of God? Was that
even possible?
Can the Devil be redeemed?
What was Lucifer’s crime?
William had said it:
“Lucifer rebelled against God. He refused to bow down
to man.”

And then Giovanni
understood:
That’s why we’re here.

“God sent us,” he said.

Lucifer laughed. “Is that
what the girl told you?”

Nadja lowered her eyes and
said nothing.

“I brought you here,”
Lucifer said. “Isn’t that right, Nadja? I sent you those visions. I opened the
gate. I let you pass where no man comes alive.”

Lucifer leaned forward,
towering over them. His face was lit from below by the Grail and the Lance.
“You were not sent. You were summoned.”

“Liar,” Giovanni said.

“Ask the girl.”

Nadja looked crestfallen.

Giovanni thought,
She
believes him.

“Your demons fought us,” he
said.

“That is their nature.”

“If you summoned us, why
didn’t they let us pass?”

“Some did.”

“Not Medusa. Not the furies,
the centaurs, Geryon....”

Lucifer shrugged. “My demons
are unruly. This is the realm of rebellion. If you want obedience, try
Paradise.”

Nadja said quietly, “Not all
the demons attacked us.”

Giovanni said, “The Devil
lies, Nadja. That’s what he does. That’s who he is. Why would the Devil bring
us here?”

“For the Lance,” said
Lucifer.

“You cannot have it,” Marco
said. “It belongs to God.”

“It belongs to me! And I
will have it. If I cannot have God, I will have the light of God. If I cannot
have love, I will have the light of love. That is my right. That is my reward.
I am Lucifer! The morning star! God’s greatest angel! I loved Him more than the
others ever could. I loved Him with all that I was, with all that I am. I loved
him completely, sparing none for his creation. Is that a crime? Is that a sin?
To love the Artist, not the art? Humanity was God’s mistake: corrupting spirit
with clay. Abomination. Unholy horror. Me bow down to
that
? Never. For this, I am banished. Twisted.
Forsaken. Yet I love Him still. How can I not? How not, when every dark moment
brings the memory of His light? You cannot hope to understand. How can the art
perceive the Artist?”

Giovanni said, “Your love is
a perversion.”

“What do you know of love?”
Lucifer demanded. “What do you know of loss?”

“I loved a woman, and she
died.”

“There is no love but the
love of God. You say you loved a woman, yet with every word you flaunt your
ignorance.”

Giovanni thought, ‘
regnum Dei intra vos est.
’ Jesus had spoken these words to His enemies. Was
there a divine spark in every soul? Plato thought so. Augustine confirmed it.
William believed it. Could it be true? And if true, what did it mean?

Giovanni said, “We brought
God with us.”

“You bring nothing but your
fears.”

“He is here in my heart.”

“And in mine,” said Nadja.

“And mine,” said Marco.

Giovanni stepped forward,
bolder now. “The kingdom of God is within us. We brought God to the heart of
Hell. God is here and you see Him not.”

“I see everything,” said
Lucifer. “Everything but your future, which does not exist.”

Giovanni pressed his
argument. “We are God’s reflections.”

“You are His mistakes.”

“God does not make mistakes.
He brought us here.”

“Then you are His
sacrifice.”

“This is your chance,
Lucifer, a second chance to obey God, to bow down to His creation, to the very
image of Himself.”

“I bow to no man.”

“Look at us, Lucifer. We are your only
hope. Look at us and see our Maker. If you would love God, love us. If you
would honor God, honor us.
If you would obey God,
obey us. Give us back the Grail.”

“
Never!
”

Hell trembled at the word.

Marco stepped forward and
stabbed the Holy Lance into the glowing ice that encased the cup. The tip of
the Lance burned white hot. The ice melted.

Lucifer roared with anger.
His wings beat harder, kicking up the wind. His body strained against the ice
that fettered him. “Demons! Furies! Denizens of Hell!
To me! To me!
”

Marco chipped at ice that
sparkled with the Grail’s radiance. He bent to retrieve the cup.

The lord of all darkness
called out to him, “We had a deal, Marco da Roma.”

The knight hesitated. “What
deal?”

“You remember.”

“No.”

Lucifer said, “
Remember.
”

And he did. Marco remembered
it all: his first meeting with Guillaume de Nogaret, his infiltration of the
Knights Templar, his rise to power in the brotherhood, his first glimpse of the
Grail, his betrayal of the Templars, of Nogaret, and finally of himself. He
remembered the journey down into darkness, lit by the light of the relic. He
was old man then, enfeebled by pain, his every breath an effort, his every step
a mortal danger. At last he reached the bottom of the abyss and held out the
Holy Grail in his decrepit hands.

He stood before the
fountainhead of evil and asked, “What will you give me for the cup of Christ?”

“Ask,” said Lucifer, “and it
will be given.”

“I want to be young. I want
to live forever.”

“So be it.”

At these words Marco felt
his heart grow stronger. His lungs breathed easier. The skin of his hands
unshriveled. Marveling at the miracle, he set the Holy Grail on the ice.

“The cup is yours,” he said.

“And you are mine.”

Lucifer’s laughter echoed in
the abyss. The Holy Grail melted the berg and sank in a pool of slush. Lucifer
beat his wings, chilling the air, trapping the relic in ice.

Nadja saw Marco step back
from the Grail. “Marco, the Grail. Hurry.”

“I’m not the man you think I
am.”

“You are Marco da Roma. My
champion. My friend. This is your redemption. Your penance. You promised to
protect me from the Devil himself.”

“I have no such power.”

“You have the Lance. Hurry,
Marco. The land is dying. The people are dying. The Fourth Horseman rides the
Earth.”

“No,” Marco said, looking at
her with anguish in his eyes. “I am the Fourth Horseman.”

Marco saw no way out. He had
made a deal with the Devil: the Grail for immortality. If he took the cup, his
life would be forfeit. He might die instantly of old age. What then? Would his
soul rise to Purgatory, leaving the Grail behind, his friends unprotected?
My
redemption is their doom.

What if Nadja or Giovanni
took the Grail?
It doesn’t matter.
If Marco helped them escape with the relic, the Devil would claim Marco’s life
and recapture the Grail. He could see no solution.

Lucifer had summoned his
minions.

They were coming.

If the old friar were here,
he would know what to do. Marco closed his eyes.
Help me, William. Please.

The answer came to him like
the whisper of an angel.

Marco did not hesitate. He
reversed his grip on the Holy Lance, aimed the point at his own chest, and
plunged it straight through to his heart.

Lucifer cried out, “No!”

Nadja ran to the knight and
knelt beside him. She was shocked to find him withering. He aged rapidly before
her eyes, years passing in moments. She did not understand. It frightened her.
“Marco?”

He gripped her sleeve with
trembling fingers.

“I am home.”

The old knight said no more.
Death rattled in his throat. His hand relaxed its grip and fell to the ice.

Giovanni heard demons howl,
coming closer.

A wind rose from Lucifer’s
wings. His voice boomed. “You will not leave here alive.”

Giovanni saw the Holy Grail
in a pool of melted ice, but the wind from the Devil’s wings cooled it and the
water began to freeze around the chalice. Giovanni pulled the relic from the
ice. The cup thrummed in his hands. He felt a surge of energy. It warmed his
heart and vanquished his fear.

“The Lance,” he said to
Nadja, who still wept for the knight. “Get the Lance.”

Nadja nodded and struggled
to pull the Lance from Marco’s body, but could not wrench it free.

“Turn and pull,” he said.

Giovanni saw a young shade
rise from the old corpse. Marco’s soul was not luminous, as William’s had been,
but pale and sorrowful like the knights in the pool of blood. Startled, Nadja
stepped back from the body, slipped on the ice, and fell onto her skirts.
Marco’s shade stepped out of its frame, gripped the Holy Lance, and pulled it
free.

Marco said, “Run.”

“Where?” Nadja asked.

Giovanni recalled how Dante
had escaped. “There’s a gap in ice where it holds the Devil. We have to climb
down his body. It’s the only way.”

Nadja turned back to Marco.
“What about you?”

“I will go to the wood,”
said the shade, “but first they must capture me.”

Lucifer said, “The Lance is
mine.”

“Yes,” Marco answered. “You
shall have it.”

He ran at Lucifer with the
Holy Lance and stabbed the Devil in the side. What issued from the wound was
neither blood nor ichor, but black shadow. It oozed and fell upon the ice,
flowing like a river of darkness. Lucifer grimaced with agony and ecstasy. The
fallen angel did not try to dislodge the Lance, but opened his arms wide. Raising
his hands, he tilted his head back, gazing Heavenward. His three faces were
twisted in torturous rapture.

Giovanni wondered at it,
then understood: this was the first moment, since falling into time, that
Lucifer had felt the touch of God.

CHAPTER 33

Nadja chased Giovanni to the
center of the universe. Cries of countless demons urged her on. In that Hellish
din she heard a voice she knew. The voice of a dead man.

“Run, Nadja! Run!”

She did not look at Marco.
She did not look at Lucifer. She kept her gaze on Giovanni and followed his
lead. He was lit by the Holy Grail in his hands. Nadja saw him in silhouette,
surrounded by an aura. Inky shadow spilled from the Devil’s wound and smudged
the ice all around, but the black ooze parted like the Red Sea before the power
of the Grail.

When Giovanni reached
Lucifer’s flank, he emptied his satchel, stuffed the Grail inside, and grabbed
one of the Devil’s thick hairs.

“Down here,” he said.

Nadja saw that the hairs,
protruding like great branches, created spaces where the ice did not meet the
Devil’s body. Some of the gaps were large enough to slip through. Nadja watched
Giovanni climb down into the ice. When he was gone, she could still see a glow
rising from the relic.

Before she descended, Nadja
glanced back at Marco. He was standing on the ice, brandishing the Lance,
surrounded by armies of evil: demons, harpies, hellhounds, centaurs, and
Nephilim. He fended them off. One by one, he vanquished Lucifer’s minions. When
the Lance struck, they fell or fled or vaporized. But for each demon
demolished, another took its place. The Knight Templar fought on as if he were
the world’s last hope.

Nadja turned and made her
escape.

As Giovanni climbed down
Lucifer’s hip, he felt a sense of weightlessness and knew he had reached the
center of the universe, the place to which all weight was drawn. He turned his
body around and climbed up toward Lucifer’s feet.