The Secret History Book 4: The Keys of Saint Peter

Written by Jean-Pierre Pécau
Art by Leo Pilipovic

I'm finding, as I'm getting closer to historical eras I'm more familiar with, my enjoyment of this title is going up.  Perhaps some more exhaustive footnotes or endnotes explaining some of the historical context would have been helpful; I don't know if that was done for the collected edition.

This issue has Nostradamus, a servant of Aker's House of the Sword, traveling with a group of  Swiss mercenaries to discover the identity of the person creating Ikons, symbols which represent the same powers as the Runestones, in Rome.  Of course, war is breaking out, as is plague.  The maker of the Ikons, Cellini, works with Nostradamus to fight off Dyo's soldiers, and there is the usual mayhem.  Add to this the possibility of a fifth Archon existing, and things start to heat up even more.

The art in this issue is handled by Leo Pilipovic, an artist I am unfamiliar with.  He works in what I've come to recognize as the standard French style, and the art is consistent with the issues that have come before.