Innocent Blood by James Rollins, Rebecca Cantrell Page B

wretched, and the damned . While others might take such a title as an insult, Judas wore it with pride.
    Christ had given it to him.
    Judas shifted a chair behind his desk, returning to his workspace, and sat. He kept the monk waiting as he focused his attention back on his earlier project. With deft and practiced skill, he unclipped the forewing he had ripped earlier and dropped it onto the floor. He opened his specimen drawer and removed another luna moth. He detached its forewing and used it to replace the one he had damaged, returning his creation to flawless perfection.
    Now he must repair something else that was broken.
    “I have a new mission for you, Brother Leopold.”
    The monk stood silent in front of him, with the stillness that only Sanguinists could attain. “Yes?”
    “As I understand it, your order is certain that Father Korza is the prophesied Knight of Christ and that this American soldier, Jordan Stone, is the Warrior of Man . But there remains doubt as to the identity of the third figure mentioned in the Blood Gospel’s prophecy. The Woman of Learning . Am I to understand that it is not Professor Erin Granger, as you originally surmised during the quest for Christ’s lost Gospel?”
    Leopold bowed his head in apology. “I have heard such doubts, and I believe that they may be true.”
    “If so, then we must find the true Woman of Learning.”
    “It will be done.”
    Judas pulled a silver razor from another drawer and sliced the tip of his finger. He held it over the moth he had constructed of metal and gossamer wings. A single shiny drop of blood fell onto the back of his creation, seeping through holes along the thorax and vanishing away.
    The monk stepped back.
    “You fear my blood.”
    All strigoi did.
    Centuries ago, Judas had learned that a single drop of his blood was deadly to any of these damned creatures, even those few who had converted to serve the Church as Sanguines.
    “Blood holds great power, does it not, Brother Leopold?”
    “It does.” The monk’s eyes darted from side to side. It must trouble him to be close to something that could put an end to his immortal life.
    Judas envied him his fear. Cursed by Christ with immortality, he would have sacrificed much to have the choice to die.
    “Then why did you not tell me that the trio is now bonded by blood?”
    Judas slid careful fingers under his creation. It shook itself to life in his palm, powered by his own blood. The whirring of tiny gears vibrated, barely audible under the fountain. The wings rose up and came together on its back, then extended out straight.
    The monk trembled.
    “Such a beautiful creature of the night, the simple moth,” Judas said.
    The automaton flapped its wings and lifted from the bed of his palm. It slowly circled his desk, its wings catching every mote of light and casting it back with every beat.
    Leopold followed its path, plainly wanting to flee but knowing better.
    Judas lifted his hand, and the moth came again to light atop Judas’s outstretched fingertip. Its metal legs brushed light as spider silk against his skin.
    “So very delicate, yet of immense power.”
    The monk’s eyes fixed on the bright wings, his voice trembling. “I’m sorry. I did not think it mattered that Rhun had fed upon the archaeologist. I . . . I thought that she was not the true Woman of Learning.”
    “Yet, her blood flows in Rhun Korza’s veins and—thanks to your ill-advised blood transfusion—the blood of Sergeant Stone now flows in hers. Do you not find such happenstance strange? Perhaps even significant?”
    Obeying his will, the moth rose again from Judas’s finger and flitted around the office. It danced across the currents of air just as Judas had once danced around the ballrooms of the world.
    The monk swallowed his terror.
    “Perhaps,” Judas said. “Perhaps this archaeologist is the Woman of Learning after all.”
    “I am sorry—”
    The moth descended out of the air and settled to the