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for something?”
    Julian laughed. “It’s a saying. Kill two birds with one stone. The Morgan Library up the street has an awesome vault for Vela. It also happens to have probably the best—and least known—collection of scytale staffs on the East Coast. I’ll bet we can find one that works with this ribbon.”
    â€œI suggest we hit the Morgan Library at eight tomorrow morning,” Terence said.
    â€œDon’t museums usually open later than that?” said Becca.
    â€œYes, but for Dad and me, the Morgan is never closed,” said Julian with a smile that seemed to Lily like the sun breaking out after a long darkness.

CHAPTER EIGHT
    Prague, Czech Republic
    March 18
    9:13 a.m.
    G alina Krause kept her hand inside her coat, where a compact Beretta Storm lay holstered against her ribs. Its barrel, specially filed to obscure its ballistics, was still warm. She would be gone long before the police discovered the body of the Guardian’s courier, Jaroslav Hájek, or the single untraceable bullet in his head.
    She disliked killing old men, but the courier had refused to reveal his Italian contact, although his flat did contain a collection of antique hand clocks, which was likely a clue to how the message had been transferred. In any case, a dead courier working with the Guardians was never a bad thing, and one obstacle less in her overall journey.
    As Galina walked the winding, snow-dusted streets of Prague’s Old Town, she passed through deserted alleys and passages barely wider than a sidewalk. Finally, she entered into the somber “antiquarian district.” This section of Prague deserved its designation. A neighborhood forlorn, yet rich in history and the smell of a past carelessly abandoned by modernity. For that reason alone, she adored it.
    She halted three doors down from a tiny low-awninged shopfront on Bĕlehradská Street. Antikvariát Gerrenhausen appeared as it must have generations ago: crumbling, forever in shadow, hauntingly like those sad, cluttered storefronts in old photographs of a forgotten, bygone era.
    A man entered the street from the far end. He was tall. His close-cropped white hair cut a severe contrast with the stark black of his knee-length leather coat.
    Markus Wolff had recently returned from the United States.
    She moved toward him, though their eyes would not meet until the standard subterfuge was completed. Wolff approached her, passed by, and then, after scanning the street and its neighboring windows for prying eyes, doubled back to her.
    â€œMiss Krause.” He greeted her in a deep baritone, a voice that was, if possible, icier than her own. He unslung a black leather satchel from his shoulder and set it on the sidewalk at her feet. “The remains of the shattered jade scorpion from Mission Dolores. The Madrid servers can perhaps make sense of them.”
    â€œExcellent,” she replied. “Do you have the video I asked you to take in San Francisco?”
    â€œI do.” He pressed the screen of his phone.
    A moment later, a file appeared on hers. She opened it. A boy, seven and three-quarters years of age, ran awkwardly across a field of green grass, kicking a soccer ball. The camera zoomed in on his face. The tender smile, the pink cheeks, the lazy blond curls flying in the wind. She paused it. The boy was oblivious to his own mortality.
    â€œSplendid,” she said sullenly. “Wolff, take note of this street. This shop.”
    â€œI have.”
    â€œYou may be asked to return here in the weeks to come,” she said. “For now, I want you to look into the Somosierra incident. Ease my mind.”
    â€œThe stranded bus driver and student,” he said. “I will search for physical evidence.”
    She felt suddenly nauseated and wanted the conversation to end. “In six days’ time I will be in Istanbul. We will meet there.”
    Markus Wolff nodded once and left.
    Man of few words,