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made it to Smolyan within the next five hours, they would be showing up at the home of an old man in

the middle of the night. “Even if you’re still on good terms with him, he isn’t going to be thrilled to

see us in the middle of the night.”

Azov said, “It’s true that we’ll need to approach Raphael with care. He is enormously protective

of his privacy and his work. Essentially, he cut off all contact with the outside world after Angela

died. We’ll have to convince him to speak to us. But it’s worth the effort.”

“Actually, we have little choice but to try,” Sveti said, taking a swallow of the rakia.

As Vera drove up into the mountains, she was aware that her attitude toward Dr. Raphael Valko

was like any other young angelologist—she was starstruck by the very mention of him. Dr. Valko was

a legend. She had never dreamed that she might meet him in person.

Perhaps sensing that she wanted to know more, Azov said, “Valko lives within spitting distance of

the Devil’s Throat Cavern for a reason.”

“He’s mining Valkine?” Vera asked.

“That would certainly be useful for our purposes,” Sveti said.

“Everyone has their own ideas about what he’s doing up there,” Azov said. “He’s up there with

only the most essential modern conveniences. No telephone line, no electricity. He heats his house

with wood and carries water from a well. He’s nearly impossible to get to. I’m in the same country as

the man, and I’ve been to his fortress—it is the only way to describe what he’s built in Smolyan—

only a handful of times, always to exchange and discuss seeds. By reputation he is an explorer and a

man of science, but in person he’s more like a Bulgarian goat herder—difficult to rile and terrifying

in his vengeance toward those he believes would cross him. He’s tough as nails, even at one hundred

years old.”

Vera looked at Azov, astonished. “He’s one hundred years old?”

“Yes,” Azov said. “The first time I met him, in 1985, he looked every bit like the seventy-six-year-

old man he was. Later, after we began sharing the antediluvian seeds, he had the appearance of a man

no older than fifty. Now he lives with a woman who is forty-five. She became pregnant with his child

ten years ago.”

“He is ninety years older than his daughter?” Sveti said. “It’s completely impossible.”

“Not if he’s been using the seeds for his own purposes,” Azov said.

Vera said, “There were rumors in the nineties that Valko was supplying his second wife Gabriella

with vials of a liquid distillation from the plants in his garden. Well into her eighties she was actively

fighting the Nephilim, going out on missions, enduring the hardships that agents half her age struggled

to endure. She died during a mission. Nobody understood how she had the strength to even

participate. She seemed to defy her body. The seeds you gave Raphael Valko are the only

explanation. He must be growing his own antediluvian garden up there.”

“Whether he is mixing their oils or growing the seeds into plants, it is impossible to say. You

should remember that the seeds Valko has cultivated are the very same ones that Noah grew before

the Flood, and Noah—as you know—lived to be nearly one thousand years old. It is impossible to

know what nutritional substances the plants contained or what their effects would be, but it is obvious

that Valko has used them to his advantage.”

“Have you considered that he may have already found the formula for Noah’s medicine?” Vera

asked.

Azov sighed, as if he had considered the question many times before. “The truth is that any number

of things could be happening in Raphael Valko’s workshops. He is the man who discovered the

location of the Watchers’ prison in 1939. He is also the man who organized and sustained the

society’s resistance during the Second World War. Dr. Raphael Valko is not a man who leaves

anything to chance. I’m certain that whatever he’s doing up there in the Rhodopes, he’s approaching it

with the same single-minded drive that has always allowed him to succeed where many others have

failed.”

“Aren’t you afraid that one of these days you will go up there and find him dead?” Vera asked.

“Not in the least,” Azov said. “But I’m very much concerned that he’ll turn us away when we get

there. There’s no guarantee that he’ll help us with this concoction at all. Although he’s connected to

the society through various unofficial channels—myself included—he left angelology decades ago.