“The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.
An evil soul producing holy witness
Is like a villain with a smiling cheek,
A goodly apple rotten at the heart.
O, what a goodly outside falsehood hath!”
William Shakespeare, 'The Merchant of Venice'
The architect of the building was either clueless or negligent about the acoustics of the building that he had designed. That, and the stairs were a little too steep.
Those were the two observations that an old priest made during his ascent towards the third floor of the building; a somewhat run-down palace in one of the side-streets around Vatican City. His every step was accompanied by a loud and long echo, which resounded throughout the stairwell and the hallways.
Moving around the building silently was completely impossible, the traitorous echoes bouncing off the walls and marble floors, and alerting everyone inside the building. The priest wondered for a moment if perhaps the building had been designed that way on purpose, so as to alert its staff of any intruders. Knowing that he would never know the answer, he made a small mental shrug and decided not to entertain the thought any more.
He was quite old, with numerous wrinkles and a small hunch, yet he retained a youthful spirit and had a surprisingly good endurance for someone of his age and stature; the long and arduous ascent to the top floor of the building failed to take any noticeable strain on the man.
Hurrying up the stairs and down the poorly-lit hallway to the right on his target floor, he found himself in front of his destination in no time.
'Director' – stated a small brass plate on the door.
The priest straightened the small black cap on the back of his head, pushed his round spectacles higher, to the bridge of his nose, and knocked politely a couple of times.
He waited to be invited in, but there was no answer. Not discouraged by this, he just knocked again, this time a little louder. Again, no one replied from the inside or opened the door, to which the priest narrowed his eyes a little; he was certain that the person he was looking for was inside the room, so the lack of reply came as a little bit of an annoyance. He decided to try once more, knocking on the heavy wood three times, slowly and loudly. And again – silence.
Tired of knocking and waiting in vain, he grabbed the doorknob and tried turning it. With a silent creak of the hinges the door swung open sluggishly, but still more easily than one might expect considering their size. The priest entered the room without further hesitation.
The first thing he noticed was how stuffy the office was, his lungs reflexively gasping for air within a few seconds. The second was how dark it was in there; the three large windows, which spanned almost the full width and height of the wall opposite the door, had been almost completely covered by the curtains, leaving only narrow cracks open for the few rays of sunshine to get through. In its path the weak light revealed an entire cloud of dust, which seemed to perpetually hang in the air; neither swirling around nor showing any sings of subsiding, either.
The priest's eyes were instantly drawn to a large mahogany desk that lay in front of the middle window, but that wasn't due to its massive size nor its central location in the room - what caught the old man's attention were the contents of the desk.
All the usual things - books, files, stationary, and various accessories - had been removed from the desk and placed rather carelessly into several heaps to the both sides of it. Its place had been taken by a huge, and rising, house of cards. Its bottom layer covered the entirety of the desktop. The pyramid of the cards rose over three feet in height, and there were only three or four rows remaining for it to be completed.
One after another, pairs of cards were added atop the existing rows, slowly but steadily. The builder of this imposing structure was almost completely hidden behind their creation, but the priest managed to catch a glimpse of messy, silvery hair behind the top layer of the cards.
“Hello, Narbareck,” he greeted the person, his lips curling into a small and kind smile.
There was no reply from behind the rising mountain of cards.
The old priest sighed, as if to say ‘this is so like you’. He dragged one of the chairs from the corner by the door across the room and to the desk, and started observing the meticulously built house of cards as it grew taller and taller. He was restless, though, and grew bored of watching Narbareck put cards together into triangles within less than a minute.
He stood up and proceeded to stroll around Narbareck’s office aimlessly.
Loud creaks from the ancient wooden floor accompanied his every step. He passed sluggishly by the tall bookshelves that lined the wall to the right of Narbareck’s desk, running his fingers across the spines of the books, and finally stopped in front of the window.
Even though the curtains had been drawn over it so that natural light could only come through a tiny crack in the middle, it was obvious that the sun was high and shining brightly. Without even thinking, the priest raised his hand to spread the curtains.
He was stopped in his tracks, though, when Narbareck suddenly spoke:
“Stop right there or it will be the last thing you'll do.”
The order was effective; Narbareck’s voice was low, menacing, and ice-cold. However, while one might have expected the priest to freeze in terror – as most people would – he just chuckled childishly and slowly backed away from the window, turning towards Narbareck.
“One might start thinking that you’re a vampire, the way you’ve secluded yourself in here...,” he said, his lips curling into a mischievous grin.
A few seconds passed in silence before Narbareck replied:
“If you break my concentration and I make a mistake, I promise I will kill you.”
“You’re as harsh as usual,” the priest said with a sigh and sat down in his chair again.
He started tapping on the small part of the desk that wasn’t occupied by the house of cards with his index finger, but a chilling glare from Narbareck quickly made him opt for twirling his thumbs in his lap instead.
Finally, after a very long minute of silence, Narbareck declared:
“Done!”
“Finally.”
“Patience is a virtue, Merem.”
“My. Never thought I’d hear that from you.”
“Spare me your wit,” Narbareck said and finally emerged from behind a mountain of cards.
Her silvery hair was uncombed, and strands of it covered the right half of her face. A single emerald eye was locked with Merem’s.
“Why are you here?” she asked.
“Business, I’m afraid.”
“Ah. ‘Business’.”
She turned away from the priest and walked over to the window, her hands behind her back. Merem couldn’t help but notice that her figure, albeit partially obfuscated by her baggy black and white habit, seemed somewhat thinner than the last time he saw her. And he had utmost confidence in his memory.
“Stop staring at my arse,” Narbareck suddenly said.
“How did you...”
“I can feel your stare,” she said, shooting him a cold look over her shoulder.
“Sorry,” he replied, chuckling, “You do seem awfully thin, though. Are you eating properly?”
”What are you, my mother?”
“Of course not. Your mother is dead.”
“Do you have a major in stating the obvious or something? It was a rhetorical question.”
Another chuckle came from Merem, before he spoke again:
”So...?”
“I’m doing just fine,” Narbareck said, cutting him short, “I’m working out regularly.”
”You don’t look all that healthy, though.”
”Of course not. They’ve been keeping me locked up in here since last year. I mostly just sit here all day, except when I’m sleeping. Oh, and there’s also the gym. Such fun.”
“I knew that they kept an eye on you, but I didn’t know it was that bad.”
“It’s bad. The building is also under constant watch; I figure that the Vatican would be under red alert if I suddenly went out for a walk or something. Seriously, those guys are incredibly paranoid. I’ve had to dismantle surveillance cameras and mikes throughout the building twice in the last year.”
“They do seem pretty jumpy around you. Maybe...”
“Maybe they should just fuck off. I’m telling you – if I just left for the nearest grocery store or restaurant, there would probably be a dozen Executors breathing down my neck in a second, and the Pope would be declaring apocalypse!”
Merem waited for a few seconds for Narbareck to calm down after this outburst of frustration. There was still a buzz in the old man’s ears, as Narbareck didn’t seem to possess the ability to control the loudness of her voice.
“Are you okay now?”
”What a stupid question,” she said and turned back to the window.
In one fell swoop she spread the curtains apart, and opened the window.
A stream of bright light and fresh air suddenly filled the room, and Merem had to squint in response. Warmth of the stale air tapered off, and the gloomy darkness that permeated the room was dispelled in a blink of an eye by a powerful and blinding torrent of warm June sun. Narbareck took the strand of hair that covered her right eye and tucked it nonchalantly behind her ear. She stood silently in front of the window for a while, observing the scenery below.
The city was bustling with activity - a group of tourists were insecurely making their way across the small piazza below the window of her office, on their way to the nearby Via della Conciliazione, and then, of course, to the Vatican.
Muffled noise of thousands of cars and mopeds permeated the air, mixed with the clicking of the tourists’ cameras and shouts in some incomprehensible Asian language. However, the bustle and charm of the streets of Rome failed to leave an impression on Narbareck; she neither scowled nor smiled, and just kept looking at the rooftops and the alleys with an expressionless look on her face.
“Lovely weather, isn’t it?” Merem said, trying to reignite the conversation.
“Sure,” she replied, and then promptly returned to her desk, disappearing behind the tower of cards again.
“What are you going to do with this?”
“I don’t know. I thought about setting it on fire or something.”
“It’d be a waste – this looks like a very fine desk. It would be such a shame to damage it.”
Merem’s feigned concern for her furniture didn’t trick Narbareck, who only replied with a snicker.
Then, just as quickly and unexpectedly as she had pulled the curtains apart, she toppled the cards.
She swept the bottom layer completely, after which the upper layers came tumbling down, and rather loudly at that. The whole process was surprisingly short, Merem observed, considering the sheer size of the structure. Within only a few seconds a huge house of cards that Narbareck had spent God knows how many hours meticulously and painstakingly building, was gone.
Narbareck’s impulsive action and the momentous collapse of the card tower left both her and Merem in the state of mild shock for a while; they just sat in silence again, staring at the heap of cards on the desk. It was again Merem who broke the silence:
”Dammit!” he said, looking visibly disappointed.
“What’s wrong, old man? Feel sorry that it’s gone?”
“No. It’s just that I had this brilliant plan about feigning a sneeze – which by the way I'd have no problem justifying with all the dust around here; you should really open that window more often. And then the sneeze would have toppled the tower. But now my plan is ruined, thanks to you.”
Narbareck stared at the old priest, wide-eyed and seemingly at a loss for words. His fast-paced babbling and the nonchalant tone of his voice left her stunned.
”Say – are you senile or childish? I can’t tell.”
”I’d say that there’s not much difference,” he said with a chuckle.
“I guess you’re right. But still – thinking of destroying this without my permission? Do you crave death so much?”
“Now, now. Is that a way to treat an old friend? To kill me over such a trifle?”
”I’ve killed people for less,” she said, in a flat voice, took out a small dagger from one of the drawers in her desk, and started clearing her overgrown fingernails.
“So, what is this ‘business’ that you have with me?”
“Right!” the priest exclaimed, suddenly energised again. “I’ve got some news for you which I think you’ll be pleased to hear.”
”You seem quite impatient. Come on, tell me.”
“It’s about Gransurg Blackmore.”
Narbareck’s mouth widened into a grin. Her emerald eyes were suddenly alight with excitement.
“Do go on.”
“Our informant told me via my... helpers, that Blackmore has left his mansion in Prague yesterday evening, and has headed for his old castle. He’s taken most of his coven with him.”
“Has our operation been discovered?”
”I don’t think so – apparently he left because the Association had started to tighten their grip in Prague. The word is that a special team of Enforcers was sent from the Clock Tower.”
”Are you sure about that?”
”Pretty sure. I’m still in contact with out friend in Blackmore’s coven.”
“But... wait – isn’t Blackmore supposed to be cooperating with the Association?”
”Heh. ‘Cooperating’ might be stretching it a little. Anyways, yes, he does, usually; but apparently he got into a conflict with some of those stuck up Clock Tower lords, and now he’s sort of fallen out of favour.”
“I see. So, Blackmore is back to his castle?”
”It seems so.”
”Well, that makes things simpler.”
”I... don’t see how it-”
“It’s time for action, Merem. At last!”
”You can’t just storm Gransurg’s castle without a plan. That’s... suicidal."
”I’m afraid there’s no time to waste,” Narbareck said, rising to her feet. She hid the dagger with which she was playing inside a compartment in her right boot, and headed towards the door, “It’s a race against time now that those magi got involved. We can’t afford to wait, so I’ll just make some sort of plan as I go.”
Despite her words of concern about the agents of the Association, Merem got the impression that she wasn’t at all disturbed by the turn of events. On the contrary; having been left with a narrow window of opportunity seemed to have made her terribly excited. Her grin was positively disturbing.
“Narbareck, don’t be reckless!” Merem pleaded, but he had already resigned to the fact that there was no negotiating with his Captain once she had come upon a scent of prey.
Narbareck had set her sights on Blackmore a year ago, and her patience - if she ever had any real patience – was running short.
“You know you’re asking the impossible, Merem,” she said with a chuckle, “I could never forgive myself if I let this chance slip; or worse; if the Association’s dogs beat me to it.”
The two stared into each others’ eyes for a few more seconds, before Merem finally gave up:
”I guess it’s meaningless to implore you to come up with a new strategy and bide for time.”
”It is.”
“Well, since that’s the case, I’ll just leave the necessary documents here,” he said, taking out a large brown folder and placing it on the desk, “These are maps, blueprints, escape plans, and everything else you’ll need.”
”Are you going somewhere already?”
”Yes. Otherwise I would stay and maybe even plan this out with you, but since you’re so determined to take immediate action, I better adapt. My little friends will keep an eye on Blackmore’s castle, and I’ll stay in touch with you to let you know if anything happens.”
”Good. And do try to reestablish contact with our guy there. So that he’s ready when the time comes.”
”Of course.”
”Good. Well, that’s it then,” Narbareck said, barely suppressing her excitement. A familiar spark had already appeared in her eyes, Merem noted – a spark of an insatiable murderous impulse. Even an Ancestor like himself couldn’t help but feel nervous at the sight of it.
“Well, Merem,” she said, opening the doors and stepping outside, “It’s hunting time.”
***
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Author's notes:
- Well, even though the judging for the contest isn't over yet, people have started posting their fics here so I might as well do the same.
- This is an edited version of my contest entry, with improved spelling/grammar, some improvements in the style ( hopefully! 
), and also some noticable additions later on in the story.
Hope you enjoy it!
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