Free The Last Days of Magic by Mark Tompkins Page B

would subjugate any existing Christian groups and convert the indigenous pagan population, byforce if necessary, before bringing in Roman priests. All this was conducted at the direction of the head of the VRS, Cardinal Orsini, making him the second most powerful man in the Roman Church.
    Jordan was hired as part of a small force charged with fighting these unholy creatures, which he knew to be Nephilim, though that information was not disclosed by their commander. The rest of the men were content to follow orders and collect their pay without questions. Jordan quickly saw that the beings they were tasked with eradicating were not animals; many looked almost human, and they had intelligence and individuality. While his new grimoires were difficult to understand—and one was in Aramaic, a language he had not learned yet—he gleaned that these beings, most of whom had some form of magical ability, were more prevalent in the world than he had ever suspected.
    One of the candles on his desk sputtered out, and he replaced it. He reinserted the bookmark and closed the volume before turning his attention to a tattered grimoire, his favorite, Marija’s personal journal of enchantments and counterspells. The witch had recorded them in a clear and formulaic fashion, and he had set himself to memorizing them.
    During his most recent mission for the Vatican, Jordan had decided to test one of Marija’s enchantments on his commander, one that would prohibit the man from seeing whatever Jordan specified, in this case the clan of Norwegian Trolls they were after. To Jordan’s astonishment the spell worked so well that the commander had literally bumped into the Troll who killed him. Then Jordan took over as commander and led the condottieri in slaughtering the entire clan.
    That troubled him. Whenever he killed a man he felt a bit more alive, as if once again he had challenged death and come out the victor. But when he killed the Trolls—who had been hiding away from people and were relatively harmless unless attacked—he felt less alive somehow, as if he lost a bit of vitality with each drop of Nephilim blood that was shed.
    However, killing was what he did, what he would continue to do, so he had holed up in this cheap inn looking for an answer in hisgrimoires. The Vatican paid him well, something he was not about to give up, so he needed to find a way to kill these beings without being affected, some way to harden his soul even more.
    The clock tower’s bell struck 1:00 A.M., yet sleep still held no appeal. He was scheduled to sail on the morning tide. A summons from the Vatican lay on the floor where he had flung it yesterday; he hated being summoned. While he could not ignore the order, he had been taken aback to read that he was to present himself in Venice, not Rome, which could be good or bad, very bad.
    A deep tremor of sound rolled through the room from somewhere outside. Jordan opened the shutter and peered out. The wind had died down. Under the stars, green ribbons of northern lights danced, showering their faint light on the city, though not enough for him to see clearly. The sound, low-pitched and guttural, repeated. This time he detected a tone of distress. Too tired to read more, too awake to sleep, he strapped on his sword belt and went into the night.
    Jordan strode along the wharf, bypassing the occasional patch of ice, until it opened onto a small torchlit square where two richly cloaked and hooded women stood. He could not see their faces. A priest, the long cowl of his black robe marking him as one of Orsini’s exorcists, approached the women. This could be interesting, thought Jordan as he moved into the shadows beside a tall stack of crates, close enough to hear.
    “Thank you for accepting Orsini’s invitation to meet and discuss a truce, Grande Sorcière,” the exorcist said without a bow.
    Jordan recognized the title. In addition to ruling over the most powerful coven of witches in Europe, the High Coven,