“The desk must be moved,” the Cardinal said.
“Then move it, priest.”
“It takes at least seven men to—”
Lazarus did not wait. He grabbed the corner of the desk and flung it into the interior of the room. Paper and pens went chaotically flying.
“Open the door now!”
Cesare Farina did not wait. He gently moved the tapestry aside and placed his aged hands on the stone of the wall. The Cardinal closed his eyes and began to whisper words in a language Charles did not know. Long moments passed. Then a soft white light began to expand from his fingertips, growing in intensity even as it spread outward. It glowed faintly, forming the lines of a door. Then a soundless explosion of light became a dim entryway. Lazarus entered, dragging the Cardinal Archivist with him.
Charles gave Berrytrill a curious look before following.
Stale air smelling of parchment met the Heliwr even as tiny orbs of bluish light blossomed in the corners of the room, magic coming alive to illuminate deep shelves lining the walls. Scrolls, parchments, and books sat upon them, carefully organized. That was not all. Power felt only in the world’s more ancient places thrummed within Charles. He shivered from the feeling, having only experienced it a few times during his travels. An entity or object of great influence existed in the confines of the room.
“I will make this easy on you, priest,” Lazarus said, his pale skin tinged blue beneath the orbs. “You know this book. Better than anyone alive due to your position. Show me the book of John.”
Cesare Farina pulled two cotton gloves from his pocket and put them on. He then slowly moved to one of the walls, eyes betraying the anger he felt at the situation, and carefully removed a series of loose pages from a shelf. The Cardinal took his time, unwilling to damage the ancient text, careful in every movement. He extricated one page in particular and placed it upon a metal and glass table that sat in the center of the room, designed specifically so as not to contaminate the documents.
“Be gentle, please,” the Cardinal Archivist said, producing another set of gloves for the vampire. “If I am to make a guess, what you wish to see is halfway down the page.”
Lazarus did not take the offered gloves. He instead carefully touched the page as a lover would his love, as if by doing so lent him an intimacy with the object. He began at the top, eyes skimming, looking for something in particular.
Charles leaned in to look but it was in a language he did not know.
“I cannot read it,” Berrytrill observed, hovering over it.
“Not many can,” Cesare Farina said.
“I have been alive a long time, fairy,” Lazarus said, still skimming. “When you have been alive as long as I have, you learn many languages that exist to eventually die. Of course, this is my native language.”
Charles watched the vampire closely. Something still nagged at the knight. Long moments passed. Lazarus continued with his reading, almost as if he had forgotten the others in the room. The Cardinal Archivist stood nearby, his fear replaced by worry for the priceless document the vampire pored over.
Then Lazarus stopped, his eyes doing a reread of a particular passage.
He closed his eyes, a satisfied smile crossing his lips.
“It is true,” Lazarus breathed. “I am set free.”
“Set free of what?” Berrytrill asked.
“There is much in this life that those such as yourself may never know, little fairy,” Lazarus said. “You live a finite life. As does your Heliwr there. Life holds meaning when it is short. Given a disease that robs a man of his life in a matter of years, that man will travel, see the world, eat and drink things he never would have considered before. He drinks life like a fine wine and becomes more than he was. He dies but he dies happy, knowing he has fulfilled as much of life as he possibly can.
“That does not exist for me,” Lazarus continued. “Life steals from me even as I live forever. I am an abomination. A mistake by the Word.”
“What do you now seek to end that mistake?” Charles questioned.
“The weapon bathed in the blood of Jesus Christ.”
“And what’s that?” Berrytrill asked.
“The Holy Lance,” the Cardinal Archivist answered.
“The priest has the right of it. The Spear of Longinus. It punctured the side of the Christ,” Lazarus said, nodding as if to validate what he had just discovered. “Whether the Word intended it or not, the spear has been endowed with power upon coming in contact with the Christ’s blood. It states it simply here while it has been omitted in all Bibles since the Church took control of its message. Just as the Cup of Christ has the power to grant life—and that particular aspect of the Word’s story has also been stripped out—the spear can undo that life. I require the spear. Nothing more. And the witch who augured its place in this world is certain it is being housed here, in the Vatican.”