Until he could escape.
10
December 19, 7:13 A.M. CET
Rome, Italy
The hunter had become the hunted.
Elizabeth sensed the pack trailing her across the dark narrow streets and alleys, growing ever larger in her wake. For now, they remained back, perhaps wanting strength in numbers. These were no human curs, no brigands or thieves seeking the soft target of a lone woman on these predawn streets. They were strigoi, like her.
Had she intruded upon their hunting grounds? Broken some rule of etiquette in her feeding? This age held many pitfalls for her.
She glanced to the east, sensing the winter sun was close to rising. Fear trickled through her. She wanted to return to her loft, to escape the burning day, but she dared not lead this pack to her home.
So, as the day threatened, she continued down a narrow street, her shoulder close to the cold stucco wall, ancient cobblestones uneven under the soles of her boots.
The hours before the dawn had grown to be her favorite in this modern city. At this early time, the growling automobiles fell mostly silent, their breath no longer fouling the air. She took care to study the men and women of the night, recognizing how, in many ways, little had changed from her century, easily spotting harlots, gamblers, and thieves.
She understood the night—and she had thought she owned it alone.
Until this morning.
In the corners of her eyes, shadowy wraiths shifted. They numbered more than a dozen, she knew, but how many more she could not say. Without heartbeats or breaths, she could not be confident until they were upon her.
Which would not be long.
The beasts circled, drawing their net ever tighter.
It seemed they believed that she had not marked them. She allowed them this belief. Deception might yet save her, as it had so often in the past. She drew them onward, toward her own choice of battleground.
Her destination was far. Fearing they might attack before she reached it, she quickened her steps, but only a little, for she did not want them to know that she had sensed their presence.
She needed an open area. Trapped in these narrow alleys, it was too easy for the pack to fall upon her, to overwhelm her.
At last, her boots drew her toward the Pantheon at the Piazza della Rotonda. The square was the closest patch of free ground. The gray light of the pearling sun lightened the shadows on the Pantheon’s rounded dome. The open eye of the oculum on top waited for the new day, blind in the dark.
Not like her. Not like them.
The Pantheon was once the home of many gods, but it was now a Catholic Church dedicated to only one. She avoided that sanctuary. The holy ground inside would weaken her—likewise those that hunted her—but after being reborn to this new strength, she refused to forsake it.
Instead, she kept to the open square in front.
On one side, a row of empty booths waited for daylight to transform them into a bustling Christmas marketplace. Their festive golden lights had been turned off, and large white canvas umbrellas dusted with frost protected empty tables. Elsewhere, restaurants stood lightless and shuttered, their diners long abed.
Behind her, shadows shifted at the edges of the square.
Knowing her time ran short, she hurried to the fountain in the center of the square. She rested her palms on the basin’s gray stone. Near at hand, a carved stone fish spat water into the pool below. In the center rose a slim obelisk. Its red granite had been quarried under the merciless Egyptian sun only to be dragged here by conquerors. Hieroglyphs had been cut in its four sides and reached to its conical tip: moons, birds, a sitting man. The language was old gibberish, as meaningless to her as the modern world. But the images, carved by long dead stonemasons, might yet save her this night.
Her gaze rose to the very top, to where the Church had mounted a cross to claim the power of these ancient gods.
Behind her came the squeak of leather, the scrape of cloth against cloth, the soft fall of hair from a turned head.
At last, the pack closed in.
Before any of them could reach her, she vaulted over the side of the basin and onto the obelisk, clinging like a cat. Her strong fingers found purchase in those ancient carvings: a palm, a moon, a feather, a falcon. She clambered upward, but as the pedestal grew thinner, the climbing grew harder. Fear pushed her to the very top.
Perched there, she braced herself against the searing pain and grabbed the cross with one hand. She spared a quick glance downward.
Shadows boiled up the obelisk like ants, befouling every inch of granite. Their clothes were tatters, their limbs skeletal, their hair matted and grimed. One beast tumbled back into the fountain with a splash, but others poured into the space it left.
Turning away, she glanced at the nearest house across the plaza and gathered her strength around her like a cloak.