Father Farrell leaned over the polished bonsai-wood table. “And there is no chance that de Soya or any of the others survived?”

Admiral Wu shrugged. “It was a near-orbit battle,” she said. “We let Raphael get within cislunar distance before springing our trap. Thousands of pieces of debris—mostly from our unfortunate ships—entered the atmosphere. None of our people appear to have survived—at least no beacons have been detected. If any of de Soya’s people escaped, the chances are that their pods came down in the poisonous oceans.”

“Still…” began Archbishop Breque. He was a quiet man, cerebral and cautious.

Wu looked exhausted and irritated. “Your Eminence,” she said briskly, addressing Breque but looking at Mustafa, “we can decide the issue one way or the other if you allow us to send dropships, skimmers, and EMV’s into the atmosphere.”

Breque blinked. Cardinal Mustafa shook his head. “No,” he said, “our orders are not to show a military presence until the Vatican commands the final step in our seizure of the girl.”

Wu smiled with apparent bitterness. “Last night’s battle just above the atmosphere must have made that order somewhat obsolete,” she said softly. “Our military presence must have been rather impressive.”

“It was,” said Father LeBlanc. “I have never seen anything like it.”

Admiral Wu spoke to Mustafa. “Your Excellency, the people on this world have no energy weapons, no Hawking-drive detectors, no orbital defenses, no gravitonic detectors… hell, they don’t have radar or a communications system as far as we can tell. We can send dropships or fighter aircraft into the atmosphere to search for survivors without them ever knowing. It has to be a lot less intrusive than last night’s firefight and…”

“No,” said Cardinal Mustafa and there was no doubting the finality of his decision. The Grand Inquisitor pushed back his robe to glance at his chronometer. “The Vatican courier drone should arrive any moment with final orders for the arrest of the contagion vector named Aenea. Nothing must complicate that.”

Father Farrell rubbed his lean cheeks. “Regent Tokra called me this morning on the communicator channel we allocated him. It seems that their precious and precocious little Dalai Lama has gone missing…”

Breque and LeBlanc looked up in surprise.

“It doesn’t matter,” said Cardinal Mustafa, obviously aware of the news. “Nothing matters right now except receiving final go-ahead on this mission and arresting Aenea.” He looked at Admiral Wu. “And you must tell your Swiss Guard and Marine officers that no harm can come to the young woman.” Wu nodded wearily. She had been briefed and rebriefed for months. “When do you think that the orders will come?” she asked the Cardinal.

Rhadamanth Nemes and her two siblings stood and walked toward the door. “The time for waiting is over,” said Nemes with a thin-lipped smile. “We will bring Aenea’s head back to you.”

Cardinal Mustafa and the others were on their feet in an instant. “Sit down!” bellowed the Grand Inquisitor. “You have not been ordered to move.”

Nemes smiled and turned toward the door. All of the clerics in the room were shouting. Archbishop Jean Daniel Breque crossed himself. Admiral Wu went for the flechette pistol in her holster.

Things then happened too quickly to perceive. The air seemed to blur. One instant, Nemes, Scylla, and Briareus were at the doorway eight meters away, the next instant they were gone and three shimmering chrome shapes stood among the black- and red-robed figures at the table. Scylla intercepted Admiral Marget Wu before the woman could raise her flechette pistol.

A chrome arm blurred. Wu’s head tumbled across the polished tabletop. The headless body stood a few seconds, some random nerve impulse ordered the fingers of the right hand to close, and the flechette pistol fired, blowing apart the legs of the heavy table and splintering the stone floor in ten thousand places.

Father LeBlanc leaped between Briareus and Archbishop Breque. The blurred, silver shape disemboweled LeBlanc. Breque dropped his glasses and ran into the adjoining room. Suddenly Briareus was gone—leaving nothing but a soft implosion of air where the blurred shape had stood a second before. There was a short scream from the other room, cut off almost before it began.

Cardinal Mustafa backed away from Rhadamanth Nemes. She took one step forward for every step he took backward. The blurred field around her had dropped away, but she looked no more human or less menacing.

“Damn you for the foul thing you are,” the Cardinal said softly. “Come ahead, I’m not afraid to die.”

Nemes raised one eyebrow. “Of course not, Your Excellency. But would it change your mind if I tell you that we’re throwing these bodies… and that head”—she gestured to where Marget Wu’s eyes had just stopped blinking and now stared blindly—“far out into the acid ocean, so that no resurrection will be possible?”

Cardinal Mustafa reached the wall and stopped. Nemes was only two paces in front of him.

“Why are you doing this?” he said, his voice firm.

Nemes shrugged. “Our priorities diverge for the time being,” she said. “Are you ready, Grand Inquisitor?”

Cardinal Mustafa crossed himself and said a hurried Act of Contrition.

Nemes smiled again, her right arm and right leg became shimmering silver things, and she stepped forward.

Mustafa watched in amazement. She did not kill him. With motions too quick to detect, she broke his left arm, shattered his right arm, kicked his legs out from under him—splintering both of them—and blinded him with two fingers that stopped just short of jabbing into his brain.

The roar of pain was without precedent for the Grand Inquisitor. Through it, he could hear her voice, still flat and lifeless. “I know your doc-in-the-box in the dropship or on the Jibril will fix you up,” she said. “We’ve buzzed them. They’ll be here in a few minutes. When you see the Pope and his parasites, tell them that those to whom I must report did not want the girl alive. Our apologies, but her death is necessary. And tell them to be careful in the future not to act without the consent of all elements of the Core. Good-bye, Your Excellency. I hope that the doc on the Jibril can grow you new eyes. What we are about to do will be worth seeing.”

Mustafa heard footsteps, the door sliding, and then silence except for the sound of someone screaming in terrible pain. It took him several minutes to realize that it was he who was screaming.

When I returned to the Temple Hanging in Air, first light was seeping through the fog but the morning remained dark, drizzly, and cold. I had finally sobered up enough from my distraught and distracted state to take greater care while rappelling down the fixed lines, and it was good that I had—several times the brakes on the rappel gear slipped on the ice-shrouded rope and I would have fallen to my death if the safety lines had not arrested me.

Aenea was awake, dressed, and ready to leave when I arrived. She had on her thermal anorak, climbing harness, and climbing boots.

A. Bettik and Lhomo Dondrub were dressed similarly, and both men carried long, heavy-looking, nylon-wrapped packages over their shoulders. They were going with us. Others were there to say good-bye—Theo, Rachel, the Dorje Phamo, the Dalai Lama, George Tsarong, Jigme Norbu—and they seemed sad and anxious. Aenea looked tired; I was sure that she had not slept either. We made a tired-looking pair of adventurers. Lhomo walked over and handed me one of the long, nylon-wrapped bundles. It was heavy, but I shouldered it without question or complaint. I grabbed the rest of my own gear, answered Lhomo’s questions about the condition of the ropes to the ridgeline—everyone evidently thought that I had unselfishly reconnoitered our route—and stepped back to look at my friend and beloved. When she gave me a searching look, I answered with a nod. It’s all right. I’m all right. I’m ready to go. We’ll talk about it later.