“Professor,” Harris whispered beside him, seizing their moment alone. “Please understand—Captain Janáček already knew the lab’s location. He was baiting you into an obstruction charge. I disclosed the location of the lab so Captain Janáček could not claim you impeded his investigation. You would have been arrested immediately.”

  Thank you…I guess?

  “Dost řečí!” Janáček shouted, ending his call and marching across the lobby to Langdon. “Enough talking! We’re leaving!”

  Langdon dutifully followed Janáček and Harris out of the hotel into the light flurry of snow. Dawn came late in February, but the sun was finally up, spreading a grayish glow across the city. As they walked to the curb, Harris glanced up from his phone and said, “Captain, I’ve involved the ambassador.”

  “Madam ambassador herself?” Janáček chided. “You don’t trust your own judgment?”

  “It’s your judgment I don’t trust,” Harris replied, unflinching. “Considering the seriousness of your accusation and the prominence of the individuals accused, I have a duty to involve the embassy at the highest level.”

  “Do as you will.” Janáček smirked, waving his hand dismissively. “I’m sure Mr. Langdon and I will be fine without you.”

  “Wrong,” Harris countered. “I will be taking Mr. Langdon to the embassy with me. He can wait more comfortably there while you collect Dr. Solomon.”

  Langdon had no intention of leaving Katherine alone with Janáček and was about to protest, when the captain laughed out loud. “Mr. Harris, you may leave, of course, but my suspect Mr. Langdon is coming with me to the lab.”

  “Suspect?” Harris challenged. “You haven’t charged him with anything, and he has every right—”

  “I will be happy to charge him, if you prefer. It would not be difficult considering he evacuated one of Prague’s finest hotels, and his excuse is some fantastical dream.”

  Harris fell silent, weighing his options. After a moment, Harris turned to Langdon, looking gravely concerned. “Professor, I’ve requested an emergency meeting with the ambassador. Are you okay on your own for about half an hour?”

  “Absolutely,” Langdon said.

  “Good. I’ll brief the ambassador and then join you at the lab—perhaps with the ambassador herself.”

  “Thank you,” Langdon said. “I’m sure we’ll sort this out as soon as we speak with Katherine.”

  Harris turned back to Janáček, who had lit another cigarette. “Captain, be aware that the embassy is watching you. We cannot stop you from being impolite, but if you dare cross any ethical or legal—”

  “Got it,” Janáček snapped, cigarette dangling from his thin lips. He turned away and signaled to a nearby car, which roared to life and sped toward the group, skidding to a stop only inches from them.

  Langdon jumped backward. Look out!

  The black Škoda sedan was emblazoned with the ÚZSI logo on both sides. Janáček opened the back door and motioned for Langdon to get into the car.

  As Langdon climbed inside, Janáček turned to Harris. “Fair warning, Attaché. You should hurry. I have no intention of delaying my interrogation of Ms. Solomon.”

  Michael Harris’s taxi pulled out of the Four Seasons. The cabbie signaled a right-hand turn, indicating that he had mistaken Harris for an unsuspecting American tourist with no idea how to get to the U.S. embassy—a perfect target for an inflated fare.

  “Jeďte přes Mánesův most, sakra!” Harris shouted in profanity-laced Czech. “Spěchám!”

  The driver’s eyes went wide, and he swerved to the left. Locals were always startled when an American spoke fluent Czech—especially when the American happened to be a six-two Black man in a tailored suit.

  Michael Okhu Harris had grown up in a wealthy Philadelphia household, raised primarily by his nanny, an immigrant from Brno. At his parents’ suggestion, the nanny spoke only Czech to the boy, and by the age of fifteen, Michael was entirely bilingual. After UCLA law school, Harris had decided to put his language expertise to work by pursuing a post at the U.S. embassy in Prague—an exotic city with sophisticated food, beautiful women, and stimulating work.

  In recent weeks, however, that work had become far more interesting than he had wanted. And this morning had taken “interesting” to an entirely new level.

  The incident on Charles Bridge remained incomprehensible to Harris. Janáček’s claim that it was a publicity stunt for Katherine Solomon’s upcoming book seemed preposterous, and yet Harris had to acknowledge there was a strange logic to it; he was always astonished by the risks successful people took in an attempt to advance their own careers.

  Myself included, Harris reminded himself.

  For several months now, Harris had been performing some “off the book” work for the ambassador, and while the work was technically legal, it was on the edges…and decidedly distasteful. Even so, the under-the-table financial remuneration, along with the ambassador’s personal leverage over him, had been impossible for Harris to decline. I hope it doesn’t come back to haunt me, Harris thought.

  But he had an uneasy feeling it would.

  CHAPTER 14

  In Old Town, The Golěm wound his way out of the cramped labyrinth of alleyways surrounding his flat. The obscure warren of passages, some only two meters wide, twisted through the ancient neighborhood like the tendrils of a vine.

  As he moved, The Golěm inhaled deeply, forcing the cold air to the bottom of his lungs, trying to retune his mind. Encounters with the Ether always untethered him from physical reality, but they also roused his senses.

  You must stay alert. There is work to do.

  The Golěm’s plan for retribution required a specific piece of information that he did not yet possess. He needed to proceed with extreme caution; if he left any trace whatsoever of what he was searching for, he risked giving himself away. For this reason, he had chosen his next destination carefully—a quiet place where he could obtain answers anonymously.

  This morning, he was dressed plainly—pants, shirt, parka, a pleated newsboy hat, and dark sunglasses covering most of his face. This attire was far more common for him than his costume, although he savored the hours he could walk the streets as The Golěm, his outward appearance reflecting his inner soul—a powerful protector from another realm.

  The costume had an earthly benefit too. Prague was a city of surveillance, and cameras with facial recognition software were ubiquitous in public places. It was often said that Prague’s passion for costumes and masks was simply its citizens attempting to enjoy a fleeting anonymous moment. So when The Golěm required true anonymity, he found it beneath a thick layer of clay, which afforded him the luxury of moving freely through the physical world.

  Last night, he had dressed as The Golěm not to obscure his appearance, but rather to hide his face from Dr. Gessner. And to terrify her. The shock of his appearance had no doubt helped convince her to reveal her deepest secrets; The Golěm was still processing all the information he had learned from her.

  The atrocity they had built underground…

  The identities of her partners…

  And unwittingly…the ingenious way he could bring it all crashing down around them.

  The Golěm merged now into a larger alley known as Melantrichova. Still too narrow for even a single car, the alley was dotted with a few stores and cafés, just now starting to open. A smattering of tourists had begun to wander the maze, sipping coffees and taking photos of the uniquely labyrinthine passages.

  Turning right, The Golěm passed the Sex Machines Museum with its display of contraptions designed to pleasure the human body. It held no allure for him; the Ether provided a climax far more fulfilling than physical gratification.

  Even so, the lurid images in the museum windows conjured in his mind images of her…lying in the arms of her lover. The thought made him ill. The Golěm had already decided the kindest thing he could do for her would be to remove this man as quickly as possible. His death would sadden her, of course, but The Golěm would fully absorb her pain and help her forget.

  The role of a golem is to bear the burden of a weaker soul.

  When he reached the town square, the fragrance of roasting chestnuts filled the air along with the strains of a bock—a small Bohemian bagpipe that was a favorite of street musicians here. The slushy expanse of cobblestones was already dotted with larger groups of morning tourists, some of whom had gathered beneath the astronomical clock to watch the 8 a.m. perambulation of saints.

  Nearby, several costumed characters posed for photos in exchange for tips. The men wore long dark robes, top hats, and dramatic harlequin makeup—faces painted entirely white except for their blackened eye sockets.

  Opportunists, he thought, doubting these men were truly members of Prague’s infamous Církev satanova—Church of Satan. Ever since the Daily Mail had run an article titled “Inside Prague’s ‘Dark Harlequin’ Satanic Ritual,” complete with undercover photographs, it seemed tourists in Prague would pay handsomely for a photo of a real Satanist.

  Religion and the occult were woven into the fabric of this city, and visitors found no shortage of angels, saints, devils, and ancient mythological characters wandering the streets. An actress dressed as a black angel often stood in the square, spreading her dark wings in front of the Hotel U Prince and ushering guests inside to the hotel’s famous basement grotto—Black Angel’s Bar.

  At this hour, the winged angel had gone home to bed, and the elegant entryway of the hotel was deserted, just as he had expected. The Golěm slipped inside and descended the winding staircase toward the bar. He planned to find his answers there.

  Black Angel’s was housed in a twelfth-century Gothic stone cavern several stories beneath the hotel. According to lore, during a restoration, workers stumbled into a secret chamber containing a treasure chest of ancient diaries belonging to a man named Alois Krcha. The diaries included recipes for exotic cocktails and mystical elixirs from days gone by, some rumored to have magical qualities. Tourists frequented Black Angel’s Bar in hopes there was some truth in the bar’s famous motto: HERE IS IMPOSSIBLE POSSIBLE.

  May that indeed be so, The Golěm hoped. If all went to plan, the information he required to achieve the impossible would be found in this basement.

  Courtesy of the angel of death, he thought.

  CHAPTER 15

  Jonas Faukman stood alone at his twenty-third floor office window, staring blankly at the 2 a.m. lights of Manhattan. The city that never sleeps, the editor thought, knowing it would be a long time before he slept if he couldn’t locate his author’s prized manuscript.

  He still hoped the tech would call at any moment to say the “hack” had been nothing but a digital glitch, but Faukman sensed something darker was indeed going on.

  No other partition was affected.

  Only Katherine’s…

  He picked up his office phone to call Katherine in Prague, but after holding the receiver a moment, he set it back in its cradle. It was still early morning in Central Europe, and the news would no doubt be devastating to her. Katherine had placed her trust in Faukman, and he felt a deep moral obligation to make this right…especially after convincing her to work securely on the corporate server.

  So who stole her manuscript?

  Will it appear on the black market in the next few hours?

  Faukman forced himself to take a deep breath and exhale. He reminded himself that one thing had gone his way tonight…a little bit of good fortune…and he would need to act carefully and immediately.

  Faukman walked across his office and closed the door, quietly turning the dead bolt. He then went to his bookshelf, which was packed with publishing memorabilia—marketing placards, die-print plates, literary awards, framed bestseller lists, and limited-run advance reading copies. From the top shelf, he lifted down one of his most cherished possessions…a personalized coffee mug.

  The mug bore the symbols of a chalice, a triangle, and a rose. It had been a gift from Robert Langdon after their first publication together two decades ago—Symbols of the Lost Sacred Feminine—a book that had sold enough copies for Langdon to buy Faukman this mug…and not much else. Over the years, the mug had become a symbol of Langdon’s enduring friendship as well as their ongoing professional collaboration.

  From inside the mug, Faukman extracted a single key. Then he returned to his desk and used it to unlock the bottom desk drawer.

  There, safely ensconced in the drawer, sat a thick bundle of printed pages—481, double-spaced—neatly stacked and bound with two rubber bands. Faukman lifted the manuscript out of the drawer and placed it on his large wooden desk.

  The title page contained only two lines.

  UNTITLED

  BY KATHERINE SOLOMON

  Thank God I still edit off paper, he thought, breathing a sigh of relief to know at least he still had one copy. By habit, Faukman had printed his editorial copy immediately after Katherine had given him access to the manuscript several hours earlier.

  Most editors used word processors and the “Track Changes” feature to enter their edits directly into digital manuscripts, but Faukman still preferred a stack of paper and a traditional blue pen. For once, being old-school just paid off.

  There had been a time in publishing, not so long ago, when it was common to have only one copy of a manuscript. Authors would write in longhand, put their manuscripts into a box, and deliver them to the publisher’s office. Wuthering Heights, The Brothers Karamazov, and For Whom the Bell Tolls had each begun its life as a single, original, paper manuscript.

  Relax, he told himself. If Maxwell Perkins was able to remain calm while handling manuscripts by Hemingway and Fitzgerald, then certainly I can do the same with Katherine Solomon.

  That said, the very first thing he intended to do was to make a digital backup file. The process had once required retyping an entire manuscript into a word processor. Nowadays, optical character recognition scanners took a matter of minutes.

  A little insurance while PRH sorts out what happened here.

  But as Faukman considered the plan, he was struck by an unsettling realization. The publisher’s OCR scanners and photocopiers were all connected to the company’s network; if a hacker had gained access to PRH’s most secure database, then the networked OCRs and copy machines could hardly be considered secure. With everything that had happened tonight, Faukman was not about to take any chances.

  He checked his watch: 2:09 a.m. If he slipped into the nearby twenty-four-hour FedEx Office Print & Ship, he could use their OCR and copy machines, which would be anonymous and untraceable—certainly much safer than using the publisher’s networked device.

  Confident in his plan, Faukman quickly wrapped the manuscript in a padded envelope and sealed it, slipping the package into his backpack. After lacing up his black running sneakers and donning his vintage gray wool peacoat, Faukman hoisted the backpack onto his shoulders and left his office, locking the door behind him. Thirty seconds later, he was riding the elevator down to the ground level.

  As he stepped off the elevator, Faukman gave a wave to the night watchman who sat behind the security counter in the cavernous lobby. “See you tomorrow, Mark.”

  “Thanks, Mr. Faukman. Have a wonderful night.”

  A little late for that, Faukman thought.

  As he hurried toward the exit, he passed between the lobby’s two walls of soaring bookcases, which proudly displayed Random House classics dating back to the early 1900s, when cofounders Bennett Cerf and Donald S. Klopfer founded this company as a small reprint publisher. The founders’ literary tastes were so varied and diverse as to seem almost “random,” and they named their publishing venture accordingly.

  A handful of Faukman’s books sat on these hallowed shelves, and until tonight he had felt confident that a first edition of Katherine’s book would one day be here too.

  You have one job now, he reminded himself as he pushed through the large revolving glass doors and onto the street. Protect this manuscript.

  The night was frigid, and the sidewalks were deserted at this hour. Faukman turned right on Broadway and strode briskly southward toward Fifty-Fifth Street, the icy wind blowing up the flaps of his coat.

  As he crossed the avenue, he was too preoccupied to notice a black van following him a full block behind.

  PRH Data Security is located on the fourth floor of Random House Tower and consists of six secure terminals located deep within a maze of humming server racks. The compact facility was responsible for maintaining an impenetrable firewall around the publisher’s internal servers.

  Security technician Alex Conan was now typing feverishly at his terminal, having confirmed that every last trace of Katherine Solomon’s manuscript and research folders were gone—zeroed out, scrubbed, and irretrievable.

  This is no longer a rescue mission, Alex thought. There are no survivors.

  Disturbingly, the system’s intrusion detection/prevention system had flagged no traces of exploited vulnerabilities—no unusual registry entries, modified files, altered system configurations, or suspicious packet captures. Clearly, the hackers possessed unique skills.

  Who the hell are these guys?!

  Eager to update Jonas Faukman, Alex dialed his office but got no answer. Odd.

  He called down to the night watchman in the lobby. “Mark, it’s Alex Conan in Systems. Would you page Jonas Faukman to the security center for me right away? It’s important.”

  “He won’t hear me,” the guard replied in his usual jovial tone. “He just walked out of the building.”

  Faukman left?! We’ve been hacked…because of his book!

  Alex assumed Faukman had just stepped out for some air and would be coming right back. He wondered if he should alert the PRH corporate brass, but there was nothing anyone could do at the moment, and they would probably fire him on the spot for letting it happen on his watch.