The guests in the room seemed to exhale in unison.

In the abrupt silence, Edmond’s voice returned at a whisper.

“My friends,” he said softly. “I know you are here because I promised you a discovery, and I thank you for indulging me in a bit of preamble. Now let us throw off the shackles of our past thinking. It is time for us to share in the thrill of discovery.”

With those words, a low creeping fog rolled in from all sides, and the sky overhead began to glow with a predawn light, faintly illuminating the audience below.

Suddenly a spotlight blazed to life and swung dramatically to the back of the hall. Within moments, nearly all the guests were sitting up, craning backward through the fog in anticipation of seeing their host appear in the flesh. After a few seconds, however, the spotlight swung back to the front of the room.

The audience turned with it.

There, at the front of the room, smiling in the blaze of the spotlight, stood Edmond Kirsch. His hands were resting confidently on the sides of a podium that seconds ago had not been there. “Good evening, friends,” the great showman said amiably as the fog began to lift.

Within seconds, people were on their feet, giving their host a wild standing ovation. Langdon joined them, unable to hold back his smile.

Leave it to Edmond to appear in a puff of smoke.

So far, tonight’s presentation, despite being antagonistic toward religious faith, had been a tour de force—bold and unflinching—like the man himself. Langdon now understood why the world’s growing population of freethinkers so idolized Edmond.

If nothing else, he speaks his mind in a way few others would dare. When Edmond’s face appeared on the screen overhead, Langdon noticed he looked far less pale than before, clearly having been professionally made up. Even so, Langdon could tell his friend was exhausted.

The applause continued so loudly that Langdon barely felt the vibration in his breast pocket. Instinctively, he reached in to grab his phone but suddenly realized it was off. Strangely, the vibration was coming from the other device in his pocket—the bone conduction headset—through which Winston now seemed to be talking very loudly.

Lousy timing.

Langdon fished the transceiver from his jacket pocket and fumbled it into place on his head. The instant the node touched his jawbone, Winston’s accented voice materialized in Langdon’s head.

“—fessor Langdon? Are you there? The phones are disabled. You’re my only contact. Professor Langdon?!”

“Yes—Winston? I’m here,” Langdon replied over the sound of applause around him.

“Thank goodness,” Winston said. “Listen carefully. We may have a serious problem.”

CHAPTER 21

AS A MAN who had experienced countless moments of triumph on the world stage, Edmond Kirsch was eternally motivated by achievement, but he seldom felt total contentment. In this instant, however, standing at the podium receiving a wild ovation, Edmond permitted himself the thrilling joy of knowing he was about to change the world.

Sit down, my friends, he willed them. The best is yet to come.

As the fog dissipated, Edmond resisted the urge to glance skyward, where he knew a close-up of his own face was being projected across the ceiling and also to millions of people around the world.

This is a global moment, he thought proudly. It transcends borders, class, and creeds.

Edmond glanced to his left to give a nod of gratitude to Ambra Vidal, who was watching from the corner and had worked tirelessly with him to mount this spectacle. To his surprise, however, Ambra was not looking at him. Instead, she was staring into the crowd, her expression a mask of concern.

Something’s wrong, Ambra thought, watching from the wings.

In the center of the room, a tall, elegantly dressed man was pushing his way through the crowd, waving his arms and heading in Ambra’s direction.

That’s Robert Langdon, she realized, recognizing the American professor from Kirsch’s video.

Langdon was approaching fast, and both of Ambra’s Guardia agents immediately stepped away from the wall, positioning themselves to intercept him.

What does he want?! Ambra sensed alarm in Langdon’s expression.

She spun toward Edmond at the podium, wondering if he had noticed this commotion as well, but Edmond Kirsch was not looking at the audience. Eerily, he was staring directly at her.

Edmond! Something’s wrong!

In that instant, an earsplitting crack echoed inside the dome, and Edmond’s head jolted backward. Ambra watched in abject horror as a red crater blossomed in Edmond’s forehead. His eyes rolled slightly backward, but his hands held firmly to the podium as his entire body went rigid. He teetered for an instant, his face a mask of confusion, and then, like a falling tree, his body tipped to one side and plummeted toward the floor, his blood-spattered head bouncing hard on the artificial turf as he hit the ground.

Before Ambra could even comprehend what she had witnessed, she felt herself being tackled to the ground by one of the Guardia agents.

Time stood still.

Then … pandemonium.

Illuminated by the glowing projection of Edmond’s bloody corpse, a tidal wave of guests stampeded toward the back of the hall trying to escape any more gunfire.

As chaos broke out around him, Robert Langdon felt riveted in place, paralyzed by shock. Not far away, his friend lay crumpled on his side, still facing the audience, the bullet hole in his forehead gushing red. Cruelly, Edmond’s lifeless face was being illuminated in the stark glare of the spotlight on the television camera, which sat unattended on a tripod, apparently still broadcasting a live feed to the domed ceiling and also to the world.