Alex Van Helsing The Triumph of Death - By Jason Henderson Page 0,35
Don’t be blissfully unaware?”
“And, of course, there’s the altered color itself,” Astrid said. “From red, a color of passion, to blue, a color of…what? Cold? Death?”
“We don’t need an alteration to remind us to think about death,” Alex said. “It’s called The Triumph of Death.”
“No, the alteration has to be a pointer to something beyond the painting. Something we would miss otherwise. Someone made this alteration in the last fifty years and someone else marked it for us today. Whoever they are, they are leading us to something.” Sangster sat down, running his fingers through his hair. “Everybody get reading. We’ll break for lunch in an hour.”
They dug into everything they could find on The Triumph of Death. Essays, articles, poems, tribute paintings by modern artists. Alex knew what they were doing—they were swimming through details deliberately, waiting for something to pop. Outside, Alex was aware of the ebb and flow of traffic, bursts of people followed by near-desertion of the streets. By noon the plaza below was filled with people.
Just as Alex felt his brain turning to Jell-O, he heard a knock at the door and Vienna ushered in a full meal, a paella of rice, scallops, chicken, and shrimp, with red wine for the agents. “Take a break,” Sangster ordered.
Alex wolfed down his paella, suddenly aware of his hunger, as Astrid and Vienna chatted.
Astrid asked Vienna a thousand questions, drawing out the girl’s history and her time at Glenarvon-LaLaurie and even a hint of her dark adventure with the vampires. When Vienna grew uncomfortable, Alex saw that Astrid expertly charmed her, touching her shoulder and turning her attention to the pensione. Vienna had a great deal of art of her own, but Alex recalled that Vienna was a writer—or at least had been producing manga with Minhi back at school before her sudden departure.
“What do you write now?” Astrid asked. They had risen and wandered about the room, and Alex joined them.
“What does everyone write?” Vienna’s eyes crinkled. “Some poetry. I’m trying to understand short stories but they’re maddening. It’s a curse that there are so many great Spanish short story writers to contend with.”
Vienna stopped at the window, looking down at the flower vendors on the streets below. “The first time I found out about your strange double life,” she said suddenly, cocking her head at Alex, “we were standing at a window like this.”
Alex did remember. “Yeah, Elle was below, waiting.” It seemed like a long time ago.
Vienna shivered. “I think we need a fire to warm things up in here.”
At one stucco wall next to a case of crystal, a low fireplace sat with a redbrick stoop, the entire fire and chimney recessed behind the stucco. Vienna dropped primly onto a settee by the fireplace. She turned a gas key in the wall and a pilot light ignited a small stack of wood. She stoked the flames lightly.
Astrid looked up at a high-pitched cheeping sound from the chimney. “What is that?”
“Birds—chimney swifts.” Vienna adjusted the logs on the fire. “They’re dear little things.”
Alex joined Vienna by the fire and rubbed his face.
“Your friend follows you everywhere,” Vienna whispered. Alex looked back and saw that indeed Astrid had moved a few steps in his direction.
Alex glanced sideways at Vienna’s scarf and whispered, “So how have you been? Is that thing still…”
Vienna’s eyes reflected the fire, but she didn’t look at him as she smiled. “Alive? Yes. But it no longer holds my head on.”
“Well, that’s a relief.” Alex rubbed his hands before the fire. “I didn’t get a chance to say good-bye. I’m sorry for what happened at the ball. I’m sorry our date got all…screwed up.”
Vienna stood straighter and turned to him, leaning in closer. “We both know I was not the one you wanted to be going with.”
The sound of cheeping chimney swifts above them grew and dropped rhythmically. Alex wondered how birds could comfortably live among the smoke. He shook his head. There wasn’t time for this. They would be living among darkness and vampires soon. He looked back to Sangster. “We have six days. And now we’re wondering about, what—”
Sangster summed it up. “A running conspiracy to alter a sixteenth-century Flemish painting in order to record clues about stopping the catastrophe the painting represents.”
Alex shook his head in frustration. “But where does that leave us? Bruegel the painter is not connected to us. But the custodian, who is also not connected to us, is guiding us to clues about a catastrophe that