Authors: Danielle Trussoni
“I have to admit, this is the first time a foreign angel hunter has assisted me with a hunt,” she said, blowing the smoke from her cigarette away from Bruno.
“Your team isn’t very large, is it?” Bruno asked.
“It’s become more active in the past five years, but that is only because the oil companies have brought a lot of action back to this part of the world. Old Nephilim families—families that left Russia after the revolution—are building mansions and setting up corporations here. The new oligarchs have worked in tandem with the Grigori family to create massive wealth. Before this rush of new blood, it was just me, the occasional lost Anakim angel, and Siberia’s godforsaken winters.” Yana threw her cigarette onto the metal floor of the train car, its embers melting a nebula into the frost. “All this is to say that if you’re looking for Nephilim in western Siberia, I know how to find them. I have files on every creature that has passed through here in the last fifty years.”
“You have an enormous field to cover,” Bruno said, marveling at her ability to manage such a large operation.
“I’ve heard about the methods you have in Paris. They are nothing like the way we do things here. Eno was special. I can’t afford to expend that kind of effort on all the creatures. Most of the time my concern is getting them to the prison. Once they’re there, I’m out of the picture. I can’t imagine spending time in the panopticon itself.”
“Panopticon?”
“The prison is modeled on Jeremy Bentham’s panopticon,” Yana said. “It has the classic circular structure of the original, which allows the guards to monitor each angelic creature. That said, the prison has, out of necessity, been adapted to meet our particular needs.”
Bruno tried to imagine such a place, its purpose and size. He felt a sense of professional jealousy rising at the thought of the number of angels that were kept there. “Can you get me inside?”
“We certainly can’t just show up,” Yana said. “This prison is the biggest, and most strongly guarded, angelological holding area ever built. It is also located in Chelyabinsk, a nuclear waste area that has the distinction of being the most polluted patch of land on the planet. Russian angelologists and the military are on every inch of the grounds. Although I’m on the payroll, and have limited access to the prison, my clearance has been invalid since the beginning of perestroika. To access the interior circles of the prison, you’d have to get help from someone else.”
Bruno studied her, trying to gauge whether her ignorance was genuine. “Merlin Godwin is at this prison?” he asked. It was a long shot, he knew, but since Godwin was the one person from Angela’s film who remained unaccounted for, he needed to give it a try.
“Of course,” Yana said. “He’s been the director of the Siberia Project for more than twenty years.”
Bruno considered his options: He could keep everything that he’d seen in Angela Valko’s film and everything he’d learned in the Hermitage a secret. Or he could trust Yana and ask for her help. “Have you heard of something called the Angelopolis?”
Yana’s face froze and drained of color. “Where did you hear that word?”
“It’s something more than just a legend, I see,” Bruno said, his curiosity rising.
“Quite a bit more than that,” she said, taking a deep breath to steady herself before speaking. “The Angelopolis is a mystery for all of us who haven’t been given security clearance to the interior realms of the prison. It is the subject of much gossip—that the prison is the site of a massive experiment, that it is a sort of sci-fi genetics laboratory, that Godwin is cloning lower angelic life-forms to be used as servants for the Nephilim. There is no way to know for certain what is going on inside. As I said, security around the perimeter is intense, and that’s putting it lightly. I’ve been working here for two decades, and I’ve never even made it past the first checkpoint.” Yana lit another cigarette as she considered her thoughts. “What do you know about it?”
“Not much,” Bruno admitted. “I know that Dr. Merlin Godwin was working with the Grigoris at some point, and may still be, but that’s about as far as it goes.”
“Have you looked up his profile?” Yana asked
“No, unfortunately, I haven’t,” Bruno replied.
Yana rolled her eyes, as if to say that there was no point in going any further without doing what every angel hunter knew to be the first step.
“Honestly,” Bruno said, feeling his skin burn. “I haven’t had the chance.”
Yana pulled a laptop from her backpack and opened it on the floor in the corridor.
“Our network isn’t as high-tech as the one you have, I’m sure, but I have access to it. If there’s anything here about Godwin, we’ll know.”
Bruno watched as Yana logged into the Russian society’s network and began searching through an angelological database that seemed to spit out everything from enemy profiles to security events to society personnel.
Yana played around for a few minutes. Then, after a flurry of typing, a profile for Merlin Branwell Godwin appeared on the screen, as clear and concise as Eno’s profile had been on his smartphone. “Here we go.”
“Found something?”
“Read it for yourself,” she said, holding out the laptop for him. “You can choose to read it in French, English, or Russian, take your pick.”
Bruno clicked on the profile and read the report in English. Born in Newcastle in 1950, Godwin had taken a degree in chemistry from Cambridge University and, in 1982, come to the academy where he worked closely on a number of classified projects. He’d received prestigious awards and distinctions. But the strings of biographical information didn’t catch Bruno’s attention nearly so much as the picture that appeared alongside the text. Godwin was a thin man with bright red hair, a long sharp nose, and piercing black eyes.
“It isn’t much,” Bruno said at last.
“There’s never anything meaty in the general files,” Yana said, giving him a sly look. “Almost anyone can access this kind of information.”
She resumed her typing until various windows began flashing by in such rapid succession that Bruno could hardly keep up with them as they appeared and disappeared on the screen. Suddenly she stopped. “It’s weird. Another piece on Merlin Godwin does exist, a classified dossier created in 1984, but it has been deleted.”
“How is that possible?”
“Someone with clearance went in and erased it,” Yana said.
“Erasing a classified file isn’t exactly easy to do.”
“Clearly someone went through a lot of trouble.”
“Could there be another way to access it?”
“Nothing is ever completely lost on this network,” Yana said. “This document was probably stored inside the classified archive, and it was most likely encrypted, which would mean that there’s a trace somewhere.” Yana turned back to the laptop. “Let’s see what I can do.”
With a click, the streams of Cyrillic gave way to legions of binary numbers falling across the screen. A report appeared; he made out the name Angela Valko written at the top. As he watched Yana begin to read, he knew that she had found something of interest. He could only hope that it would be extraordinary.
Smolyan, Rhodope Mountains, Bulgaria
I
t seemed to Azov that they had risen high above the inhabited world to a remote and hidden place where, with one step, he would disappear into a mountain pass, never to be seen again. Everywhere they turned, they found silence. He looked over his shoulder, watching the street with wary attention. He’d monitored the road and was certain that they had been alone the entire drive, and yet he couldn’t help but feel that someone was watching them, that they were surrounded by danger at every moment.
The moon shone against the stark stone walkways. Shuttered shops and cafés sat in pools of darkness, their awnings drawn. Ancient buildings rose from rough jags of hewn stone. As he led Vera and Sveti away from the square, it seemed to Azov as though the entire foundation of the village had been carved directly from the rock, each building retaining the swirls of mineral in the marble. Looking over the village, he saw gorges and valleys falling away in tiers, each new depth like a sheet of linen absorbing the inky night.
They moved through a warren of streets, each one twisting as it rose. At a dead end, Azov stopped, looked behind, and turned back. He had been to the house before, but in daylight; the labyrinthine structure of dark narrow streets had temporarily confused him. Within steps, however, he found his bearings. “Here it is,” he said, stopping abruptly before a tall and narrow black door framed by a crumbling stucco façade. The house was one of a row of village houses, three stories high, with pale blue shutters closed to the street. Azov picked up a brass knocker and brought it down upon a sheet of metal.
“Identify yourself.”
The voice, familiar as it was, startled him from his thoughts. He looked up to find a man with glasses and long white hair wearing what seemed, from the shadowy street, to be a military greatcoat. He held a gun in his hand.
“Tell me exactly what in the hell you’re doing outside my door at three thirty in the morning,” the man said.
“Dr. Valko,” Azov said, his voice calm. “It is Hristo Azov, from the angelological outpost on St. Ivan Island. Forgive me for coming to you like this without warning, but we need to speak with you. It’s urgent.”
Raphael Valko squinted, as if trying to make out the faces of each member of the group. He paused as he saw Azov, his expression softening as he recognized his colleague. “Azov,” he said. “My friend, what are you doing here?”
“I think we’d better speak inside,” Azov said, looking over his shoulder as a cat ran from the shadows.
“I’ve been hoping you would return,” Valko said. “But I expected some warning—a letter, perhaps, or a messenger. It isn’t wise to come here so openly. You’re risking your life, but also mine.” He lowered the gun and said, “Come with me. It’s best to get out of the street. Anyone, or anything, could be watching.”
They followed Valko into a pinched cobblestone passageway. He stopped, unlatched an iron door, and led them into an immense, flowering courtyard. The dimensions of the courtyard were the exact inverse of the narrow alley: It was an enormous square filled with lanterns and lined with high stone walls, creating a veil of privacy. If Azov had not visited Valko’s home before, he would never have been able to guess that such a marvelous private courtyard existed inside. Every inch of the garden was filled with greenery. Fruit trees grew along the wall, their branches heavy; flowers of every variety and color bloomed in earthenware pots; vines slithered along trellises, tendrils curling in the pale moonlight. The fragrance of gardenias and roses and lavender filled the air. A stone fountain gurgled at the center of the courtyard and, as they stepped deeper and deeper into the paradise of colors and scents, Azov felt utterly at ease. Here, in this secret garden, in the midst of an unnatural fecundity, he was among friends.
Even from a distance Azov could make out plants in what appeared to be a greenhouse at the far end of the courtyard. An ironwork frame held sheets of glass that rose, as they gained height and volume, into an elaborate Victorian cupola. The structure cut upward in lapidary panels, sharp and crystalline against the night sky. To Azov’s surprise, a bank of solar panels had been installed beyond the greenhouse, angling toward the south. The interior lights were hazy, as if a mist of water swirled through the warm air. As they walked closer he saw leaves pressed against the glass, and his mind turned to the thousands of seeds he had collected and preserved. St. Ivan Island, and the work he did there, seemed a million miles away.
Valko unlocked the door to the greenhouse and they stepped inside. The cool mountain air transformed into a blanket of humidity filled with the scent of flowers. UV lights burned from bulbs overhead. A dull hum radiated from a solar-powered generator.
The tables were filled with every variety of plant. A forest of fruit trees grew in fat ceramic pots. Azov paused to examine a tree and saw a fruit that had the shape of a pear but the deep purplish red of a cluster of grapes. He leaned close and inhaled, smelling the fruit as if it were the trumpet of a lily. The scent was spicy and full, more like the aroma of a tea composed of cinnamon and cardamom than a piece of fruit. “Smell this,” he said, calling Vera over. As she took in the aroma, her gaze fell upon a strange-looking tree. “What is this?” she asked.
Valko smiled, clearly pleased to have captured their attention. “Everything you see in this greenhouse is a plant that has not existed for thousands of years. The flowers blooming on that table, the vegetables growing at the far end of the greenhouse, the fruit you have just smelled—none of these things have blossomed since the time of the Flood. In my original plans, the greenhouse alone was to be vast, with over two thousand varieties of antediluvian seeds.”
As Azov looked more closely, he saw that the plants were both familiar and strange, retaining the basic qualities of the flora one saw every day, and yet—as he touched the leaves—he knew that he hadn’t seen these particular varieties before. The leaves were glossier, the fruit more fragrant. Apples hung from the branches, each one perfectly round, with skin that shone brilliant pink. Valko plucked an apple from the tree and gave it to Azov. “Taste it,” he said.
Azov turned the apple in his hand. Up close the skin was solid pink, flawless and shiny as a rubber ball. The stem was an iridescent blue.
“Don’t worry,” said Valko, “it’s too late to get thrown out of Eden.”
Azov took a bite. The taste was startling and strange. He had expected a burst of sweetness, something approximating the many varieties of apple he had eaten in the past. Instead his mouth was filled with a strange and unpleasant taste, a medicinal, herbal astringency that reminded him of spiced liquor. He almost dropped the apple but caught sight of the flesh: It was the same glowing blue as the stem, phosphorescent, as if lit from within.
Valko took the apple from Azov’s hands and placed it on the table. Removing a Swiss army knife from his pocket, he cut the apple in half, the juice streaking the blade. He carved the apple into slices and handed Vera and Sveti a crescent. Azov watched as the others tasted it, detecting the same reaction as he’d had seconds before—unequivocal repulsion.