A Deafening Silence In Heaven

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Authors: Thomas E. Sniegoski
Tags: Remy Chandler
At the back of this room was a nondescript wooden door, and that was where Adolfi stopped. From the waistband of his cassock, he produced a key, inserted it in the lock, and turned it, hearing a muffled click.
    The door swung open, symbols of ancient power carved into the doorframe glowing white in response to Adolfi’s presence. He thought briefly of the recent fate of a reporter who’d been attempting to do an exposé on secret organizations within the Vatican. He had found his way to this very door, managing to pick the lock with great expertise, but the poor inquisitive soul was struck dead by the security spell infused within the frame of the door, his mortal form reduced to ash. Adolfi believed that a votive candle was still lit in Saint Peter’s Basilica in the man’s honor.
    The heavily reinforced door slammed closed with finality behind the Patriarch, and the intensity of the light thrown by the sigils over the door softened but still provided ample light to guide his way.
    He headed toward an elevator at the end of the sharply inclined corridor, feeling another security spell wash over him, before the metal door slid open to grant him access. Stepping inside, he positioned himself in the center of the cab as he always did, and waited for the journey, miles beneath the Vatican Library, to begin. The magick of the place flowed around him, like the electrically charged atmosphere before a summer storm. This was a place of great power, and that was why the Keepers had been assigned to police this great and often forbidden arcanum.
    Every day Adolfi came to the Atheneum to expand his knowledge, lording over tablets, books, and scrolls, collating and translating the ancient writings of some of the world’s most powerful magick users. But today he had another purpose.
    Unification.
    The elevator came to a stop, and he waited for what seemed like an eternity—it always seemed like an eternity—for the door to slide open into what had been his primary domain for nearly sixty years. The light of a Tiffany lamp, a gift from the United States’ ambassador to the Vatican, shone from the desk in his study. Despite his exuberant mood, he felt a sudden spike of anger as he saw an open notebook with a pen resting atop it on his desk. Few members of the Keeper organization were actually allowed access to these archives, and certainly none were welcome at his desk.
    The old priest headed toward the rows of shelving where many of the Atheneum’s special texts were racked. He was going to call out but decided instead to catch the culprit red-handed.
    He heard the sound first, a gentle sigh, filled with the weight of so much sadness. The wave of emotion from this simple exhalation was so great that it threatened to darken Adolfi’s mood, wrapping him in a heavy cloak of malaise and dragging him down into the shadows. He could not imagine who within his Keeper fold could contain such misery.
    The Patriarch rounded the corner of one of the great bookshelves and nearly collided with the mysterious Simeon. He was holding an old volume, one that Adolfi was pretty certain had been bound in the flesh of an infant from the Bon Secours Mother and Baby Home in Tuam, County Galway, Ireland—a recent acquisition that was said to contain the names of all the children murdered at the home and of the Earthbound demons to whom they had been sacrificed.
    The pale, dark-haired figure looked up from the open book, his eyes filled with an anguish as deep as the ocean. Adolfi did not know this man’s story, other than the fact that he had walked the Earth for a very long time.
    “Simeon,” the Patriarch said simply.
    “It’s missing names.” Simeon snapped the book closed, an old and disconcerting smell wafting up from the volume.
    “Missing names? I don’t . . . ,” Adolfi began in confusion.
    “The book,” Simeon said, practically shoving it in the old priest’s face. “It’s missing names of children as well as the demonic.

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