Would I be punished for intruding?
My curiosity was overwhelming. I knew I could not leave this place without seeing for myself what was happening beyond the closed doors.
They yielded to a gentle pressure from my hands, making no sound. I looked within.
Bowls of flame on stone plinths provided an eerie, flickering illumination. The air was thick with the pink-grey smoke of incense, more pungent than any I had smelled before. There were only four people in the temple. I had expected more.
Letitia was there, standing before the altar, her arms raised high, her fingers curled. She faced me, but did not seem to notice the doors had opened. She was naked to the hips, wearing a skirt of pleated, turquoise silk, her waist hung with metal girdles. Above them glared the crude painting of a great eye, which covered her belly. Her throat and chest were adorned with ropes of coloured beads and upon her hair, she wore a head-dress of peacock feathers and gold wires tipped with jewels, which towered above her.
Behind the altar stood Great Uncle Gerhard, dressed in a long cloak made entirely of peacock feathers. He looked suspiciously younger than when I’d last seen him, his long white hair flowing down over his shoulders, his face like that of a hawk. It must have been him whom I had heard chanting, for even now, his voice sang in a soft murmur the words of a rite unknown to me.
Upon the altar lay Bayard, quite naked. He appeared to be unconscious, one knee slightly raised, his head lolling to the side, long dark hair spilling down over the stone. One of his white arms hung down limply, as if he’d been reaching for the floor before losing awareness.
Before this tableau, in the centre of the circle which was inlaid into the floor before the altar knelt the figure of a man. I recognised him as Peverel Othman only by his glorious hair, which hung loose down his back, over a garment of black feathers. His head was bowed forward as if in prayer.
What were they doing? I had never seen such antics, and such was their preoccupation that my intrusion did not seem to register.
Uncle Gerhard yelled out unexpectedly, causing me to jump and gasp in alarm. I dashed into the temple and fled towards the thick columns stationed down its side. Here, I hid among the shadows, creeping nearer to the altar; every sense, every nerve of me, stunningly alive and alert.
‘Peverel Othman, rise!’ commanded Great Uncle Gerhard.
Slowly, as if drugged, Othman raised his head, his hair shifting over the feathers of his robe like the heavy gold fringes that adorned the hangings on the wall behind the altar. Awkwardly, he got to his feet, holding the garment of feathers around him. I was nearly opposite to where they stood now, a small, insignificant mote of watchfulness that they could not perceive.
Gerhard was now leaning on the altar, ignoring what lay on it. ‘You have sought me out,’ he said to Othman, ‘and, through sinister means and threats, have exhorted me to grant you favours. Am I to take kindly to this?’
‘There was no other way,’ Othman replied, and his voice did not sound drugged at all, but musical and low, like a bell. I could not decide whether they were speaking from the script of a ceremony or merely exchanging remarks. Letitia remained silent, a motionless statue of flesh, her arms raised, her eyes staring.
‘You desire power,’ said Gerhard.
‘I shall take it with me into the future,’ Othman responded. ‘And I shall use it in accord with the desires and directives of your own spirit.’
Gerhard drew himself erect, and stroked Bayard’s white chest. ‘Such jewels you will take from our treasure-house.’ He shook his head and then, after only a moment’s hesitation, turned round and flung wide his arms. A gout of flame roared upwards, revealing the wall behind the altar. I saw that the hangings with which I was familiar were drawn back and secured by golden cords, revealing a great stone face carved into the wall that I had never seen before. It was a face of unbearable beauty and sadness, nearly thirty feet high, framed by coils of hair interwoven with peacock feathers and sheaves of corn.
‘My Lord Shemyaza, I call upon you to witness this rite, from your eternal prison in the stars. One of your children cries out for the light of your kingdom which was taken from you. Grant him your blessing.’
Upon these words, Peverel Othman threw out his arms, and I saw that his garment was a cloak, which when held out resembled a spreading pair of black wings. Beneath them, he was naked, his body glowing like marble, hairless and perfect. I sank to my knees beside one of the concealing columns. Never had I seen such beauty.
Behind them all, the great stone face seemed to become illumined from within. If that was the face of Shemyaza, most feared and revered of the Fallen Ones, it appeared he was signalling approval. I put my fingers over my lips to prevent any sounds coming out unexpectedly.
Great Uncle Gerhard had begun to chant in the ancient tongue, of which I knew very few words. But what I did pick up discomforted me sorely. It seemed he was speaking the words of a marriage ceremony, significantly changed from the usual form. Was he marrying Othman to Bayard? It was bizarre. Should Othman have desired such a match, it could have been conducted at a family gathering, indeed should have done. Also, I had never witnessed a marriage where one of the partners was lying comatose on the altar. How could Bayard possibly speak his responses?
It may seem strange that I did not realise at once that something sinister was afoot. I suppose I was influenced by the fact that Letitia was present, for I could not believe that she would be part of anything illicit or underhand. But ignorant as I was, I knew that what took place next could only be termed outside a traditional marriage rite.
Gerhard sprinkled Bayard’s prone body with heavy white powder, which I took to be salt. Then, after uttering a few more incomprehensible words, he summoned Othman with one hand.
‘He is ready.’
Othman walked up to the altar, while behind him, Letitia uttered a terrifying shriek. The sound of it sent me reeling back into the shadows with shock, my hands over my ears. How she could have created such a racket from her elegant throat I could not imagine. When I dared to peer around the column once more, I was greeted with a less than pleasant sight. Othman was standing against the altar, quite brutally sodomising my nephew, while Gerhard and Letitia shouted out strange, guttural words. They beat at the air with their clenched fists. I could feel a hideous presence forming within the temple, like a great, but invisible, black shadow. I could smell it; the stench of carrion. Yet at the same time, the sight of Othman’s pale pumping buttocks was quite arousing. I was disgusted with myself. I knew I should leave the place. Whatever was occurring was horrible and corrupt. They were using the energy of Othman’s act to conjure something. I didn’t know what, but I did know I didn’t want to be there to see it manifest.
I would have left the temple there and then, but a small, pathetic sound arrested my flight. Bayard moaned. It was a sound of such despair and pain, I knew I could not abandon him. I saw his head turn slowly from side to side, then his eyes opened. He seemed to look directly at me, and his expression was that of utter terror. Above them all, a swirling mass of dark matter slowly pulsed into being. It extended shadowy tendrils down towards the pale body of my nephew. He began to shriek in small, pitiful gasps. Othman was howling now and Letitia spun around on the spot, tearing at her hair. She uttered guttural obscenities. Uncle Gerhard’s eyes were glazed. He was still, but for his right hand with which he was masturbating furiously.
Unconsciously, I had emerged from my position of concealment, so that I stood a few steps out of the shadows. Bayard saw me and screamed my name. The entity above him bunched and condensed, as if in preparation to lunge down upon him. It was too much. I emitted a howl of rage and ran across the temple. I leapt up the steps to the altar and beat at Othman with my fists. I clawed at his hair and pulled at his arms. He turned on me with a hiss and his blue eyes seemed to be on fire. I fell backwards, but in the act of defending himself, he left Bayard free to throw himself from the altar.
To this day,
I cannot clearly recall what happened next. There was a sound of thunder, as of the earth splitting in two. A great crack of white light struck down and then all was in darkness. I came to my senses, huddled upon the floor. When I looked up, I could see Letitia dimly. She was hunched over, sobbing in a low, desperate manner. Bayard was crouched some feet away from me. He looked at me in complete bewilderment. Othman was like a marble statue, still upright, but with his head bowed towards his chest. ‘The gate is closed,’ he said. ‘Still closed to me.’
All that remained of Uncle Gerhard was a dark, sooty stain on the floor.
There are two factions to my family. I’m not sure which one I’d rather belong to, but because of my curiosity, I’ve found myself in the position where I’ve been adopted by more exotic branch.
The rest of the family accepted without question Letitia’s explanation of how Great Uncle Gerhard was called away unexpectedly. Othman left our premises by daybreak, and the implication was that he’d accompanied Gerhard on his business. Bayard, though unharmed in body, seems like a stranger to me. He hardly speaks to anyone now.
I am surprised how ignorant I was in the past, how I never suspected that Gerhard’s spouses and absent children were anything other than faithful adherents of conservative Grigori tradition. How blind I was. Kerubim came and killed my Great Uncle’s husbands. Killed them in our own garden, under the noses of all my innocent relatives within the house. I still don’t know exactly what the husbands were doing out there with the bonfire, and in all honestly I have little desire to know. I shall live my life, venture abroad on my travels, in possession of Gerhard and Letitia’s secret. I might never act upon it, but then again, in the future, who can tell how circumstances might change, and whether I might desire to utilise some of this knowledge I have inherited. The tendency is in my blood; I am heir to it.
Spinning for Gold
In the land of Cos, many years ago, an important master miller lived beside a deep-flowing river. Widowed when his two children were very young, he had acquired along with his wealth a tendency to drink and gamble rather more than was advisable. So much so that quite often, his son, Jadrin and his daughter, Amberina, would lie trembling in their beds at night, waiting for the drunken homecoming of their father, for it was not unknown for him to behave irrationally under the influence of liquor. Sometimes, frenzied at not being able to find the whereabouts of his pipe or tobacco pouch, he would attack the furniture and even any household pets or servants who were too slow to move from his path. Having said that, however, he was not on the whole a cruel father. To be fair, his faults were merely the children of his grief, which had never healed completely, and in the faces of his son and daughter, he could often see the eyes of his dead, beautiful wife looking back at him; he loved the children passionately. Because of this, Amberina and Jadrin led a sheltered, luxurious life, which in creatures of weaker character would have led to them being altogether spoiled and petulant. Amberina and Jadrin, however, were gentle, kindly souls, without jealousy or any other evil temperament. Quite content in each other’s company, the siblings spent most of their time in the great forest on the east side of the River Fleercut, or else scampering over the rolling, bosomy hills to the west, beyond which lay Ashbrilim, the city of the king; a place where they had never ventured.
Alike as twins, even though two years separated their births, they had both inherited their mother’s dark, midnight hair and lustrous eyes. Visitors to the mill-house commented on their beauty to their father, although those of more sensitive nature could sometimes not easily repress an eerie shudder whilst looking into those fathomless eyes and forest-wise faces. Friends of the miller might comment to each other, over mugs of ale, in taverns far from the mill-house, that all was not right with the miller’s children.
‘They spend too much time out in the moonlight,’ one might say, as if to explain their white, white skin.
‘And too much time in the forest.’ another might add, as if to explain their mossy hair and shadowed smiles.
Sometimes, in an attempt to bring Amberina and Jadrin out into the real world, some well-intentioned neighbour might send their own children to encourage the miller’s progeny to enjoy more natural childish pastimes, but the other children always went home fearful and anxious. If their parents should question them, wondering if the miller’s children had deliberately frightened them, they would always answer no. Amberina and Jadrin, though strangely distant, were always polite and friendly to visitors, leading them into the forest glades and weaving their hair with flowers. No, it was not fear exactly. The children could never explain exactly what it was that made sleep come with difficulty for several nights after a visit to the mill.
It was early Summer and Jadrin had just celebrated his sixteenth birthday. Soon Amberina would be fourteen years old. Their birthdays were very close together, both born under the sign of the moon and the water. After a large and cheerful tea-time, enjoyed only with the servants (as the miller had been gone to the city for some days,) the two youngsters went hand in hand down to the reedy edge of the river, some yards south of the tall, lichened mill-house, where the stream widened into a deep, dark pool overhung with waving willows. They knelt down in the soft, damp earth and gazed into the water, not yet brilliant with the reflection of stars, but lazily roiling, dark as if with unspoken secrets. Jadrin sighed and leaned out over the pool. Amberina moved quickly to untie his hair from the black ribbon at the back of his neck, so that the raven waves, like water itself, fell to kiss the surface of the pool, floating out like weed into the dusk.
‘I feel a strange heaviness about me,’ Jadrin murmured in a soft, sad voice.
‘It is only your own hair floating in the stream,’ Amberina answered, mischievously.
‘No,’ her brother replied, looking up and turning to face the hills behind which the sun was still sinking in a blaze of rich colours. ‘It comes from that way, I think.’ He pointed.
‘Then it is probably just our father coming home from Ashbrilim,’ Amberina said. ‘Perhaps he will be drunk again and have lost all the money he earned in the city.’
They both looked at the huge, solid walls of the mill-house rising from the river up-stream, as if fearful it might crumble to dust in an instant. Jadrin sighed again.
‘No, I don’t think it is that either.’
‘You are growing old, my brother!’ Amberina sang and jumped up to dance in the pale owl-light, looking almost like the ghost of her mother; all floating white linen and midnight hair.
Jadrin smiled at her wistfully, but he could not share her joy. He gazed deep into the trees across the river, but could find no comfort in them either. After a moment, he stood up. ‘I think I shall go back to the house,’ he said.
His sister looked surprised. She held out her hand. ‘Won’t you come to the deepest, darkest glade with me?’ she asked. ‘The white deer gather there tonight. Perhaps they shall speak our fortunes.’
Jadrin could not tell his sister that he was no longer sure he wanted to hear his fortune, although it had been their custom to go to this place every year on his birthday. Once the deer had intimated where to find an egg-shaped quartz of power under the bank of the river. Sometimes, when the children gazed into it, they could see the lights of the city glowing within, the tall towers of Ashbrilim and the white road that led to it.
Now Jadrin shook his head and put up his hand in negation. ‘I have to think,’ he said and walked away from Amberina, soon lost in the half-light.
As Jadrin was climbing the bank up to the house, it happened that his father’s valet, Tufkin, came down the path towards him. ‘Be quick, master Jadrin,’ he said, ‘your father has sent me to find you.’
‘Is all well at the house?’ Jadrin enquired, noting the servant’s worried mien. Perhaps Amberina hadn’t been far from the truth in her conjecture about their father’s financial affairs.
‘The house still stands, aye!’ Tufkin replied drily, jerking his head at the thick, grey wa
lls. ‘Come along.’ Jadrin followed him.
If Jadrin supposed to find his father still reeling, red-eyed from the effects of last night’s drinking, he was wrong. Skimblaze the miller stood sober and erect, leaning against the stout wooden table in the kitchen of the mill-house. Jadrin noticed immediately the suppression of a cunning glance steal across his father’s face. All was not well. He waited for Skimblaze to speak.
The miller made several anguished noises, before turning his back on his son and saying, ‘The time has come, Jadrin, for you to go to the city!’
Cool as mint, the boy replied, ‘The time has come? I had no idea it would ever be due!’
‘Come, come, you are nearly a man, Jadrin. What kind of education is it for you paddling about in the river and having only a little girl for a companion?’
‘But why haven’t you told me of this before?’ Jadrin sat down. In his heart, he could feel a shred of guilt, a shred of deception winging its way about the room like a baleful spirit. He had no desire at all to leave the riverside, the forest, or his sister, his only friend.
Skimblaze cleared his throat. ‘You need to learn more about life, my lad. One day all this will be passed onto you and I want to give it to a whole person, not some half-fairy changeling! You need your feet bringing down to earth!’
‘You can’t make me go!’ Jadrin cried. He had never spoken out against his father before. ‘I will hate it!’
‘You’re going, my boy! You’re going! Tomorrow, and that’s an end to it!’
‘Tomorrow?’ Jadrin murmured in bewilderment. ‘Is Amberina to accompany me?’ He asked this without much hope.
Skimblaze cast a quick, furtive glance over his shoulder. ‘No. Amberina is too young. Come now, don’t give me that face. You will learn to enjoy it. All travel is good for the soul. Run along now, you’d better start packing your things.’ Skimblaze faced the window once more, looking out at the gently sloping bank. Perhaps he could see a faint suggestion of his lovely daughter down there, dancing lightly through the dusk, her mind far from cities and partings. Still Skimblaze could not fully face his son.