Paris glimmered beneath a soft spring rain as the Blackwood turboprop touched down at a private airfield outside the city. The team disembarked under the cover of a bland humanitarian manifest; customs officers waved them through with little more than a glance at Alexandra's immaculate paperwork.
Lara inhaled the wet air and smiled faintly. "Paris always smells like secrets."
"Secrets and diesel," Marcus muttered, guiding their cases toward two waiting black sedans.
Theo moved with calm precision, trench coat over a travel suit, black gloves in one hand. He looked less soldier now, more aristocratic scholar, but every movement still efficient. Sophie slid into the front car, laptop balanced on her knees before they'd even left the runway.
"Base is five minutes from the Latin Quarter," she said. "One of your companies leases it as a cultural exchange office. Good cover."
Theo nodded. "Move."
Their Paris base was a converted 18th-century townhouse near the Seine: discreet, high-ceilinged, wired for security. Inside, Marcus swept room to room while Sophie booted a field server. Lara prowled the library shelves, running fingers across old bindings.
"You collect safe houses like other men collect cars," she said.
Theo set his bag down. "Preparation."
"Always preparation."
"It keeps us alive," he replied.
Sophie looked up from her console. "First appointment's in two hours at the École des Chartes. Professor Émile Girard — Nazi looting expert, specialises in missing Prussian archives. He doesn't know who you really are, only that we're funding a restoration grant."
"Veil exposure risk?" Marcus asked.
"Low," Sophie said. "But his network's academic; easy to infiltrate."
Theo checked his watch. "We go armed but discreet. Lara and I will meet Girard. Marcus covers outside. Sophie stays on net."
"Copy," Marcus said.
Later, a discreet Mercedes wound through cobbled streets to a limestone university building wreathed in rain. Theo and Lara stepped out into the grey afternoon like any wealthy patrons meeting a scholar.
Girard awaited in a vaulted reading room stacked high with medieval manuscripts. He was small, sharp-eyed, with a frayed scarf and nicotine-stained fingers.
"Monsieur Blackwood, Dr. Croft," he said, shaking hands. "A pleasure. Your letter mentioned interest in Nazi art convoys?"
Theo gave a polite, cultivated smile — the perfect English nobleman. "Indeed. We're tracing several lost reliquaries that moved east in '43. Any insight is valuable."
Girard's eyes gleamed behind thick glasses. "Ah, the mystery of Königsberg. Many still chase it. Amber Room, gold trains, occult artefacts. Most died with the Reich."
Lara leaned on the table, charming but precise. "But records survived?"
"Some." He slid a folder across. "Convoy manifests from '44. Your 'reliquaries' may have been on Sonderzug Schwarzer Adler — the Black Eagle Train. Departed Paris under SS occult division, vanished near East Prussia."
Theo scanned the brittle papers — memorising serials instantly. The name Sacrum Mens appeared in a margin note. His pulse jumped, though he kept his face composed.
"Have you seen this phrase before?" Theo asked, tapping the words.
Girard frowned. "Rare. Some believe it meant 'Sacred Mind,' a project of Himmler's Ahnenerbe. Experimental — myth, faith manipulation. Fringe nonsense, but the Nazis believed."
Lara met Theo's eyes across the table: confirmation.
Girard kept talking, unaware of the undercurrent. Outside, Marcus's low voice came through Theo's discreet earpiece: "We've got company. Black sedan, tinted, parked across from entrance. Two men inside, not cops."
Theo's tone never changed as he turned another page. "Veil?"
"Not sure," Marcus murmured. "Could be MI6. But they're watching the door."
Theo's jaw tightened just enough for Lara to see. She shifted slightly, hand near her concealed pistol.
Girard rambled on, oblivious to the tension.
"…and here, see? This margin note—transport stopover in Tours before heading east. Some believe the crates carried the last documented fragments of the Amber Room."
Theo nodded with the polished calm of an Oxford don, but his mind was already mapping exit routes. Two men, dark sedan, unknown allegiance. Not amateur tailing.
Lara slid a subtle glance his way — a silent plan? Theo answered with the faintest tilt of his head.
He closed the folder gently. "Professor Girard, your work is invaluable. I'd like to fund a digital restoration of these manifests."
Girard brightened, shaking Theo's hand vigorously. "Wonderful! I'll prepare scans."
"Merci," Lara added with easy charm, then let Theo guide her toward the door.
Street Outside
Rain slicked the cobblestones to mirror grey sky. The dark sedan Marcus had flagged was still across the street, engine idling. Tinted windows, no plates. A man in the passenger seat pretended to check a phone but his posture screamed surveillance.
Marcus's voice came low through comms: "Driver's MI6 if I've ever seen one. Car's too clean. But right-hand man looks… heavier."
Theo didn't look at the car as he walked Lara down the steps. "Copy."
Lara kept her expression relaxed. "Friends of yours?"
"Not the friendly kind," Theo murmured.
"Want me to smile and wave?"
"Not yet."
Marcus pulled their Mercedes curbside like an ordinary chauffeur. Theo opened Lara's door, but didn't climb in; he remained standing, rain beading on his coat. He lifted his gaze just enough to meet the dark sedan's windshield — calm, unreadable. Whoever sat inside would know they'd been seen.
A faint twitch of curtains in an apartment above caught Lara's sharp eyes: second lookout.
"They've layered the watch," she murmured as she ducked in. "Classic counter-intel."
Theo followed her into the car. "Drive," he told Marcus.
Marcus eased them away from the curb, smooth and unhurried. The sedan waited a beat, then slipped into traffic behind them.
Sophie's voice cut in from the safehouse feed. "I see your tail on city cams. MI6 domain pinged my fake passports while you were inside. They're checking your identities right now."
Theo: "Let them."
"They'll know you're not just 'Professors.'"
"They'll know enough to hesitate," he said quietly.
Lara leaned her head back, studying him. "So, Britain's finest is already sniffing."
"Expected."
"You worried?"
"No." He glanced out the rain-dappled window, watching the sedan shadow them. "They want to see what I'm hunting. We'll let them watch — for now."
Lara gave a crooked grin. "You're scary when you're calm."
He didn't answer.
Marcus turned them through a tangle of narrow streets. The tail stayed on. Sophie murmured, "If you want to ghost them, I can trip city lights three blocks ahead and run a fake accident feed."
Theo shook his head. "Not yet. I want to see who commits."
"Your call."
Lara raised an eyebrow. "Testing the testers?"
"Exactly."
The Mercedes threaded deeper into the Marais, streets narrowing until stone houses leaned overhead like conspirators. Rain blurred tail-lights into red streaks.
Theo studied the reflections in a shop window as they rolled past. "Two men only. Driver calm, passenger scanning. No backup car yet."
Marcus nodded, eyes on the mirror. "They're careful but not hostile."
"MI6," Theo said quietly. "Running a soft follow."
Lara smirked. "Soft now. Hard later?"
"Depends what they think I'm doing."
Sophie's voice crackled from the dashboard. "I can light the next intersection, fake an accident, and ghost you."
Theo thought for a beat, then: "Do it. But make it look like bad luck, not a hack."
"On it."
Three blocks ahead, a delivery van stalled suddenly across the narrow lane; traffic lights flickered amber, then red. Marcus braked smoothly. Behind them, the sedan hesitated, engine revving, caught in an awkward angle.
Theo turned slightly, just enough to catch the passenger's eyes in the rain-blurred mirror — a silent message: I see you.
Then Marcus whipped the Mercedes into a tiny side street just before the van blocked it fully. Sophie's hack flipped a hidden bollard down long enough for them to slip through; it popped back up behind, trapping the sedan.
"Tail lost," Sophie reported with a grin. "And no trace — they'll think they got unlucky."
Theo leaned back, calm. "Good."
Lara gave him a sidelong glance. "Neat trick."
"Practice," he said.
"Remind me never to play hide-and-seek with you."
They returned to the safehouse townhouse at dusk. Warm lamplight, stone floors, quiet rain on shutters. Sophie spread new intel across the dining table: scans of Girard's documents, maps, shipping logs.
"Confirmed," she said. "Black Eagle Train carried artefacts coded to Sacrum Mens. Nazi occult division lost it near Königsberg spring '45. Veil wants whatever was on it."
Marcus poured coffee, still keyed up. "Means they'll race us to the same site."
Lara flipped a page. "We're faster."
"We're also smaller," Marcus said. "And now MI6 knows we're sniffing around Nazi ghosts. They'll either block us or co-opt us."
Theo looked at the relic cross glowing in lamplight. "Let them try."
Later — Midnight
Paris had gone quiet under rain and distant sirens. Theo moved through the townhouse dark, checking windows and alarms out of habit.
Something pricked at the edge of his soldier's senses — silence too deep.
He touched his comm. "Marcus."
A whisper came back instantly: "I hear it too."
Then a small thunk hit the roof above.
Theo's voice dropped to command mode. "Contact. All up."
The first thunk became a scurry of boots across slate.
Theo grabbed his suppressed pistol and signalled with two sharp hand chops: roof breach.
Marcus was already moving up the stairs with his carbine. Sophie killed every light with a keystroke; the townhouse dropped into blackness.
Lara appeared at Theo's side, gun in one hand, small climbing axe in the other. She grinned in the dark. "Company?"
"Veil," Theo murmured.
Glass shattered overhead — a skylight imploded as two hooded figures dropped in, ropes whispering. Their faces were painted with the raven sigil, knives ready. Theo shot the first in mid-descent; the body hit the floor hard. The second twisted, landed cat-like, and lunged.
Lara met him halfway. The axe flashed, caught his blade, twisted it free. She slammed an elbow into his mask, then shot once point-blank. He went down.
More boots thudded on the balcony outside. Marcus fired short, controlled bursts through shutters; wood splintered but the intruders scattered. Sophie triggered a house defence: steel shutters slamming over lower windows.
Theo vaulted the stairs two at a time, reached the roof door as it creaked under pressure. He flung it open, fired twice, dropped one Veil scout. Another swung at him with a short sword; Theo sidestepped and used the man's momentum to hurl him off the roof into the courtyard.
"Roof clear!" he called.
"Balcony clear," Marcus replied below.
But then a flashbang clattered through the shattered skylight. Theo shouted "Eyes!"; they turned away as it went white and deafening. Two more assassins surged in its wake, fast and ruthless.
Theo met the first with a brutal knee and neck throw; Lara flowed around the second, striking low, finishing with a clean shot. The fight was tight and vicious, but over in seconds. Bodies sprawled across the dark parquet.
Silence again — broken only by Sophie's voice over comm, tight but steady. "External cams: hostiles retreating. We spooked them. But…"
"But?" Theo asked, breathing hard.
"…MI6 watchers just rolled up outside. Black sedan. They saw everything and stayed put."
Theo wiped blood from his cheek with a gloved thumb. "Observing."
"Yep. Didn't lift a finger."
Lara reloaded calmly. "They want to see what you can do."
"Now they know," Theo said flatly.
Marcus came down the stairs, rifle slung. "We can't stay. They'll be back with more."
Theo nodded once. "Pack. We move before dawn."
Sophie already pulling cables: "Where?"
"Rome," Theo said. "The Vatican archives hold the next key."
Lara gave a sharp grin. "Field trip."
An hour later, the team was packed and gone.
Through rain-slicked streets they slipped into a waiting van. The black MI6 sedan remained across the square, lights off, silent. One of its occupants raised binoculars just long enough to watch the van vanish.
On the top floor of the townhouse, broken glass glittered around the fallen Veil sigils. Theo looked back once from the moving van, jaw tight.
"They're not scared enough yet," he said softly.
Lara heard and smiled sideways. "Then let's fix that."
The van merged into night traffic, heading for a private airfield and the Vatican beyond.