EPILOGUE

ADRIANA

November 18, one year later

I glanced at the little biface Iago had carved for me. The ringing sound it made against my car window needlessly reminded me I was going to be late arriving at the MAC. I had an interview in fifteen minutes, and it was almost certain I wasn’t going to make it on time. Once I got there, I did a bad job of parking, because my space was occupied by a mud-caked Harley-Davidson. Then I raced up the stairs as soon as I was sure no one could see me.

The secretary let me know the candidate had already arrived, so I straightened my jacket and walked in. I wanted to make a good impression even though I was now the one responsible for hiring the museum staff. We’d been through a whole cycle—a year, to be clear—since TAF had disintegrated, and Iago had been in charge since then. He was also going to be present at the interview, although he’d been busy with a meeting since early that morning. The candidate was brilliant, a specialist in the Middle Ages, and his work had turned the small world that was European archaeology upside down in the past year. But he was quite elusive, and we’d had a hard time locating him for an interview.

When I walked into my office, the first thing I thought was there’d been some sort of mistake. A young man, tall and very blond with shoulder-length hair and eyes exactly like Iago’s was sitting in an overly relaxed manner on my couch, one leg over the armrest and the other on top of a cushion lying on the floor. Squeezed into a leather jacket and wearing the well-worn boots of a motorcyclist, he sat there looking at me with an insolent smile.

Iago also walked in just then. I heard him behind me, but I couldn’t see his expression when the supposed candidate greeted him in a strong Nordic accent with, “Hi, Dad.”