Location from Twilight by Stephenie Meyer
An ancient Tuscan hill city that conceals the underground fortress of the Volturi — the oldest and most powerful vampire coven in the world, who enforce the laws of secrecy from beneath its medieval streets.
Volterra is real irony made architectural. The city celebrates its freedom from vampires with an annual festival while the most powerful vampire government on Earth operates directly beneath its streets. The Volturi have been here for over three thousand years — Aro, Caius, and Marcus, the three leaders, predate the Roman Empire. Their underground fortress is part castle, part courthouse, part museum. The throne room is where judgments are passed and sentences executed, usually in the same motion. The guard — Jane, Alec, Demetri, Felix, Chelsea — are the Volturi's enforcers, each selected for a specific supernatural gift that makes the coven nearly unassailable. The primary law they enforce is simple: keep the secret. Any vampire who exposes the existence of their kind to humans is destroyed, along with whatever mess they've made. The Volturi frame this as noble governance. In practice, it's a protection racket run by collectors — Aro covets gifted vampires the way others covet art, and the law is selectively enforced when it serves his acquisitions.
Honey-colored stone walls bake in Mediterranean sun. The city sits on a hilltop surrounded by Tuscan countryside — olive groves, cypress trees, terracotta roofs. Tourists crowd the piazza during the St. Marcus Day festival, celebrating the saint who supposedly drove the vampires from the city. Beneath the clock tower, a drain grate leads down to tunnels that are very, very old. Underground: vaulted stone chambers lit by torches, a throne room with three ancient chairs, and hallways that smell of cold stone and blood.
Also known as: Volterra, the Volturi fortress, the Volturi stronghold, the city of the Volturi