To cooperate.
She also understood why Claude Beaupre had collared her and turned her into his hunting dog. He dared not report what he’d learned from his son to the Guild. The organization could simply let Vennard commit this violent act and turn it to their advantage.
Chaos often equaled opportunity to her former masters. Or they would stamp out Vennard and his cult for their hubris and mutiny. In either scenario, Gabriel Beaupre would likely end up dead.
So Claude had sought help outside of regular channels.
"What about the boy?" Seichan asked, staring over at Renny MacLeod, unable to fit this one jigsaw piece into the puzzle.
"He is your map and guide."
"What does that mean?" Renny must have noted her sudden attention on him and grew visibly paler.
"Search his back," Claude commanded. "Ask him about Jolienne." "Who is Jolienne?" This time the kid flinched, as if punched in the gut.
But rather than going even whiter, his face flushed. He lunged forward, grabbing for the phone.
"What does that bastard know about my Jolie?" Renny cried out.
Seichan easily sidestepped his assault, keeping the phone to her ear and spinning him with one hand.
She tossed him facedown on the bed and held him in place with a knee planted at the base of his spine.
He struggled, swearing angrily.
"Stay still," she said, digging in her knee. "Who is Jolie?" He twisted his head around to glare at her with one eye. "My girlfriend. She disappeared two days ago.
Looking for some group called the Solar Temple. I was in that pub last night trying to drum up a search party among the other cataphiles." She didn’t know what that last word meant. But before inquiring, her attention focused on the kid’s naked back and the sprawl of his tattoo. This was the first chance she’d had to get a good look at it.
In black, yellow, and crimson inks, a strange map had been indelibly etched into his skin-but it was not a chart of streets and avenues. In meticulous detail, the artwork depicted an intricate network of crisscrossing tunnels, widening chambers, and watery pools. It looked like the map for some lost cavern system. It was also clearly an unfinished work: passages faded into obscurity or ended abruptly at the edges of the tattoo.
"What is this?" she asked.
Renny knew what had drawn her attention. "It’s where Jolie disappeared." Claude, still on the phone at her ear, answered her more directly. "It is a map of the Paris catacombs, our city of the dead." Fifteen minutes later, Seichan was gunning the engine of her motorcycle and speeding over the twelve stone arches of the Pont Neuf, the medieval bridge that spanned the River Seine. She wove wildly around slower traffic, crossing toward the Left Bank of Paris and aiming for the city’s Latin Quarter.
Seated behind her, Renny clung to her with both arms. He squeezed tightly as she exited the bridge and made a sharp turn into the maze of streets on the far side. She did not slow down. They were quickly running out of time.
"Take the next right!" Renny yelled in her ear. "Go four blocks. Then we’ll have to continue on foot." Seichan obeyed. She had no other guide.
Moments later, they were both running down the Rue Mouffetard, an ancient pedestrian avenue that cut a narrow, winding swath through the Latin Quarter.
Buildings to either side dated back centuries. The lower levels had been converted into cafes, bakeries, cheese shops, creperies, and a fresh market that spilled out into the street. All around, merchants hawked their goods while patrons noisily bartered.
Seichan shoved through the bustle, noting the chalkboard menus being filled out, the huge loaves of bread being stacked behind windows. Breathless, winded, she drew in the musky headiness wafting from a tiny fromagerie and the fragrant displays of an open-air flower stand.
Still, she remained all too conscious of what lay beneath this lively tumult: a moldering necropolis holding the bones of six million Parisians, three times the population above.
Renny led the way with his long legs. His thin form skirted through the crowds with ease. He kept glancing back, making sure he hadn’t lost her.
