Lupi 08 - Death Magic

to do so.”
    “I don’t know.” Lines grooved his face as if he’d aged a decade since he arrived. “The method the Church used back then isn’t one we’d want to repeat. I don’t want to see a second Purge.”

THIRTY-FOUR
     

     
    LILY rubbed her face and thought wistfully about coffee. “For a while there, I thought you were going to tie him up.”
    It was after ten. She, Rule, and Cullen were seated around the table once more. Father Michaels had just headed upstairs to the bedroom Cullen wasn’t using. Rule had been utterly insistent that the priest was in danger and should stay with them. At first Father Michaels had refused, but he had agreed to call Father Moretti from their house. That way they could answer questions—some of them, at least—and between Rule’s presence and Cullen’s debugging spell, they could be sure no one listened in on the call.
    Father Moretti had spoken with Cullen and Rule, but hadn’t asked to talk to Lily. Quel surprise —there was sexism in the biggest, oldest boys’ club in the world. He’d then spoken privately with Father Michaels for nearly an hour.
    The upshot of all that talking was that Father Michaels would stay with them, after all—and the Jesuits were sending specially trained priests to D.C. Lily hoped they were trained in something other than killing all the Gifted they could find. The first Purge hadn’t worked out well.
    Not that Cullen had any doubts how to handle it. Mage fire, he’d pointed out, had destroyed an ancient staff created by an Old One. It could burn up some dead elf’s trinket, too.
    Cullen had been known to be overconfident, but Lily was betting with him this time. At least on that score. On another subject, he was becoming a real pain.
    “I’m not buying it,” Cullen said for the fifth time. “The Purge did not take place because some renegade German spellcasters managed to cobble together an evil, death-eating dopplegänger that the Church didn’t know how to deal with. I don’t care how good the Church was at hushing things up back then. There would have been rumors, speculation—something about it would have reached the magical community.”
    “History is written by the winners,” Rule said. “The magical community lost that round in a big way. And Father Michaels didn’t claim that the Purge was caused only by the advent of these nex in vita. They might have been the deciding factor for the Pope, but God knows secular authorities were behind it, too.”
    The priest believes what he said , a crisp mental voice announced.
    Lily jolted. “Mika? You’ve been listening?”
    Did you think my only function was to act as your personal e-mail service?
    Rule raised his eyebrows at Lily. “I thought you knew. Mika chimed in with a suggestion about the wording when Father Michaels asked us for that promise.”
    She grimaced. “He must have just spoken to you.”
    Sam says that Arcan in Rome says that some priests there believe as this one does. Mostly the ones in the red robes.
    “The cardinals?” The ones high enough up in the hierarchy that they were privy to most of the secrets.
    In English they are so called. Were they named after the birds, or were the birds named for them?
    “The birds were named for the red-robed priests,” Cullen said, still peevish. “People thought one gaudy creature resembled the other.”
    English is a flexible language. Often confusing, but flexibility can be an advantage. Cullen Seabourne would do well to remember this.
    Rule gave Cullen an amused glance. “That’s telling you.”
    “Never mind about the Purge,” Lily said. “If the rest of what Father Michaels told us is true, our enemies have the ability to make dopplegängers that can last a hell of a lot longer than the two we know about did. Dopplegängers that want to kill so they can eat death magic and stay . . . I guess alive isn’t the right word. So they can continue. And they can’t be killed.”
    A puff of feeling arrived, almost like a contemptuous mental snort. The priest is not right about everything. In the past it has taken an Old One to create any form of the undying. I do not believe abysmally ignorant spellcasters of a backwater realm succeeded in doing so.
    “That’s telling all of us,” Lily said dryly. “I’m not about to get a big head now. But these dopplegängers may be hard to kill.”
    Possibly. If so, Sam suggests you obtain possession of the focus.
    “You’ve told all this to Sam and the