The Blood Gospel

“I came here often during the siege of Leningrad,” Rasputin said, resting his hands on the wooden edge of the tabernacle. His sleeves rode up, displaying thick black hair on his wrists and lower arms. “The church was deconsecrated. The holiness stolen back by Rome. But the building was good enough for the dead. They used this nave as a morgue in winter. Piled bodies against the walls.”

Erin shivered, imagining frozen corpses stacked like carcasses in a slaughterhouse, awaiting a spring burial.

“As the siege stretched and the hunger grew worse, the bodies were brought here by wooden carts pulled by living men. The horses had been eaten by then. The dead came as they were born: naked. Every scrap of cloth had to be saved to warm the living.” Rasputin’s voice sank to a hoarse whisper. “I lived in the crypt. No one thought to check the dead. There were too many. Nights I came up, and I counted. Do you know how many children died in the siege? Not just from the cold, although it was bitter and claimed its share. Not just from the hunger, although it drove many to their death. Not even from the Nazis and the death they rained from the sky and the land all around. No, not even them.”

Erin’s throat closed. “Strigoi?”

“They came like a plague of locusts, devouring the weak and starving souls huddled here. I escaped to Rome and begged for help.” Rasputin turned to Rhun, who lowered his eyes. “The Church was neutral in the war, but never had Sanguinists forsaken their war against strigoi. Until then.”

Erin hugged her chest. Strigoi would have found easy prey in the besieged city.

“So I came back alone from Rome. I fought through troops until I was back inside the charnel house that the city I loved had become. And when I came upon dying children, I saved them, brought them into my fold. With my own blood, I built an army to protect my people from the curse.”

Rasputin gestured to those acolytes nearby with one black-clad arm. “You see before you only a few of the lost children of Leningrad. Angels who did not die in filth.”

They shifted their feet, pale eyes fixed on him, in worship.

“Do you know how many people died here, Doctor?”

Erin shook her head.

“Two million. Two million souls in a city that once housed three and a half million people.”

Erin had never confronted someone who had seen the suffering, counted the Russian dead. “I’m sorry.”

“I could not stand aside.” Rasputin clenched his powerful hands into fists. “For that, I was shunned. A fate harsher than excommunication. For saving children. Tell me, Doctor, what would you have done in my stead?”

“You did not save them,” Rhun said. “You turned them into monsters. Better to let them go to God.”

Rasputin ignored him, deep-set blue eyes focused on Erin’s. “Can you look into the eyes of a dying child and listen to a heartbeat fade and do nothing? Why did God give me these powers, if not to use them saving the innocent?”

Erin remembered watching her sister’s heartbeat slow and stop. How she had begged her father to let them go to a hospital, how she had prayed for God to save her. But her father and God chose to let an innocent baby die instead. Her own failure to save her sister had haunted her entire life.

She slipped her hand into her pocket and touched the scrap of quilt. What if she’d had Rasputin’s courage? What if she had used her anger to defy her father, renounced his interpretation of God’s will? Her sister might still be alive. Could she fault Rasputin for doing something she wished she had done herself?

“You corrupted them.” Rhun touched her sleeve, as if he sensed her sorrow. Rasputin’s eyes dropped to follow his hand. “You did not save those children. You kept them from finding eternal peace at God’s side.”

“Are you so sure of this, my friend?” Rasputin asked. He turned from the tabernacle to face Rhun. “Have you found any peace in your service to the Church? When you stand before God, who will have a cleaner soul? He who saved children or he who created a monster out of the woman he loved?”

Rasputin’s eyes fell upon Erin at that moment.

She shivered at the warning in that dark gaze.

50

October 27, 6:22 P.M., MST

St. Petersburg, Russia

Before Rhun could respond to Grigori’s contempt, they were interrupted. All eyes—except for Erin’s and Jordan’s—swung toward the entrance to the ornate church. Again Rhun’s senses were assaulted by the reflection of flickering candlelight off millions of tiles, patterned marble, and gilt surfaces.

Past it all, he heard a heartbeat approach the outer door. The rhythm sounded familiar—why?—but between Erin’s and Jordan’s own throbbing life and the head-swimming sensory overload, he could not discern what set his teeth on edge.

Then a knock.

Now Erin and Jordan turned, too, hearing the strong, demanding strike of knuckle on wood.

Grigori raised his hand. “Ah, it seems I have more visitors to attend to. If you’ll excuse me.”