Elements 03 - Monsters of the Earth (21 page)

Would you like to tear my throat out?
she thought.
Or is it something different you’re thinking? Perhaps one day we’ll learn.

“Lady Hedia,” Melino said, walking toward her with his hands outstretched. He wore a long white robe, opaque but fluttering as though it were made of gauze. “Don’t worry about my doormen. They’re harmless, just there to add color.”

If you believe that, you’re a fool. And if you think you can fool
me,
young man—that’s been tried by fellows who were much more clever at it than you are.

Hedia took his hands. They were surprisingly cool. “I’m glad to hear that, dear,” she said. “They quite frightened me.”

Still holding her right hand in his left, Melino walked with her into the office at the back of the reception room. He had left open the wooden lattice when he came out to greet her.

Hedia paused and looked around the reception room before she left it. “How many servants do you have?” she asked. She couldn’t see or hear anyone else in the house.

“Inside, none,” Melino said, smiling with pride. “No human servants, that is. Would you like refreshments? Of
any
sort, dear Hedia. Just ask.”

Though light came through the opening above the pool just behind her, the reception room was not nearly as bright as the outdoors. In the relative dimness, Hedia noticed again that Melino’s eyes glowed like a cat’s. The ruby on his finger also hinted that there was a flame in its interior.

“Perhaps later, Master Melino,” she said. “Perhaps you should get on to the matters you wanted to discuss with me in private?”

Because this was a rented house, Hedia was surprised to see that twelve death masks looked out through the wicker screen of an upright chest against the wall. The wax expressions were disquieting.

“Are these your ancestors, then?” she asked. Nothing in her voice showed anything but mild interest.

“My ancestors in art, so to speak,” Melino said. He had knelt to open the iron strongbox against the opposite wall. He turned and pointed. “The mask on top is Zabulon’s,” he said. “Are you familiar with the name, dear lady?”

The answer would have been, “No,” but without waiting for her to speak Melino continued, “He was the man who first brought the wisdom of the stars to Earth. He put his knowledge in a book, but the words of the
Book
cannot be spoken.”

The face wasn’t that of anyone Hedia wanted to know better. The features were heavy, the brow scowling. The hair and beard added to the wax image were in tight ringlets of an eastern style. She wondered if Zabulon had been a Persian or of one of the tribes that the Persians ruled.

“I’ve never heard of him,” Hedia said with a toss of her hand. She returned her attention to Melino.

He rose, holding the hand mirror he had taken from the strongbox. The mirror’s back and handle were silver, as bright as if the metal had just been polished. It was ornately molded, but because of highlights from the surface Hedia couldn’t see much of the subject. From the little she could make out, she didn’t regret being generally ignorant.

“Before we go on…,” Melino said. He smiled more broadly, which he shouldn’t have done: it made the falseness of the expression even more obvious. “Has a man named Lucinus contacted you about, well, about anything? He won’t look as old as he is, probably fifty or so. And it’s possible that he’s using a false name, but I doubt he’d bother with that.”

Hedia smoothed the frown before it reached her forehead. “No,” she said. “I’ve met no one like that. As a matter of fact, you’re the only stranger I’ve gotten to know recently.”

She let a wicked smile spread naturally. “Closely enough to matter, that is,” she said.

Melino grimaced instead of reacting to the invitation.
A rather obvious invitation,
Hedia thought with a touch of pique.

“I know he’s close by,” Melino muttered. “He can’t force the wards I’ve put in place around this house and he hasn’t the strength to attack me directly, but he may try to reach you. If he does, you must reject him. Or.…”

His voice trailed off. His ring threw a bloody red reflection from the back of the mirror.

“This Lucinus wouldn’t be the first man to try to make my acquaintance,” Hedia said tartly. “He doesn’t sound like the sort who would interest me, but I’ll make the decision when I believe I have sufficient facts.”

She was beginning to regret this excursion. Though … Melino’s oddity, while irritating, added a degree of interest as well. She wouldn’t second-guess herself just yet.

“That’s why I brought you here,” Melino said. “One of the reasons, I mean. To give you the facts about the man.”

He turned the mirror so that both of them could see its face. To her surprise—concealed by an emotionless mask—the reflective surface wasn’t of silver or highly polished bronze. Rather it was—

“This is a mirror of orichalc,” Melino said. “Only the greatest of magicians have objects of this metal. It was the secret of the Atlanteans, and Atlantis perished a hundred Saecula ago, each of a hundred years and ten years!”

Hedia knew rather more about orichalc—and about Atlantis—than Melino seemed to realize. She saw no benefit in telling the fellow that. In seeming wonder, she said, “My! One could almost take it for gold.”

“It’s brighter than gold,” he said smugly. “And much rarer. Now, look into it and I’ll show you Lucinus.”

He spoke a word. A reddish glow began to form on the mirror’s face.

“Lucinus was the nephew of the magician Vergil,” Melino said. “He was Vergil’s apprentice and had been taught many of his uncle’s spells.”

Melino began to whisper verse, which Hedia heard only in snatches. “
Now take the path and complete the vision
…,” he said, and the mirror’s fiery surface brightened still more. In it objects appeared, at first wisps of smoke but gaining form and features.

An old man bent over a basin in a stone hall. The basin was flat, the shape of a mixing bowl for wine, but it was greater in diameter than the man was tall.

“That is Vergil,” Melino said. “The greatest magician of all time, save Zabulon himself.”

The old man straightened. He kicked off his sandals, then undid the sash of his tunic and pulled the garment over his head. He tossed it on the floor. Nude, he looked even older. He stepped to a marble bench and lay supine on it with the care demanded by creaking joints.

Hedia had known her share of older men.

A younger man appeared in the mirror beside the bench. He wore a breechclout and carried a cleaver with a broad, heavy blade.

“That is Lucinus,” Melino said. “He is our enemy and the world’s enemy. He hopes to gain Zabulon’s
Book
and with it loose the Worms of the Earth. He thinks that he can control the Worms after he frees them, but he will fail. The Worms will destroy all things.”

The image of Lucinus raised the cleaver high. “What is he—,” Hedia said, her hands rising reflexively to her mouth.

Lucinus brought the cleaver down hard, beheading the old man and chipping a notch in the bench. The head rolled to the flagstones. Blood pulsed three times from the stump of the neck, then oozed as the arteries emptied. What else
could
he have been about to do?

Lucinus tossed the head into the basin. Then, bathed in blood, he began methodically to joint the corpse. Each severed portion followed the head into the stone basin.

“He murdered his uncle,” Hedia said. She had seen death outside the arena—and killed—before, but the cold brutality of this dismemberment shocked her. “To gain his uncle’s power?”

“No, no, he didn’t
murder
Vergil,” Melino said in irritation. “He was to add the herb, the
moly,
to the basin to rejuvenate Vergil. Vergil had spent his last eleven years searching the Otherworld for the herb. When he found the place it grew, he plucked all there was and brought it back … but he couldn’t prepare
himself
for the spell. His apprentice was to do that.”

Lucinus dropped the last piece of the body, the left foot, into the basin. The liquid was beginning to boil, though there was no fire beneath that Hedia could see. He laid the cleaver on the dripping table and wiped his hands on a napkin that he took from a three-legged table. Only then did he pick up the small gold coffer that was also on the table.

“Instead of adding all the
moly
to the vat with his uncle as he was supposed to,” Melino said, “Lucinus stole part of it for himself. See!”

What Hedia saw was that if Melino had wished, he could have convinced her—he could have let her convince herself—that Lucinus was a brutal murderer. Instead Melino was so focused on his business that he insisted that she know the truth about his enemy—even though her error had been utterly damning and perfectly believable to anyone not a magician herself.

It meant that Melino was rather a self-satisfied prig, but she’d already been aware of that. It also meant that the fellow was honest, or at least dealing honestly with her.

Lucinus opened the box, looked in, and dropped three pinches of the contents into the basin in careful succession. He closed the box.

The liquid boiled more fiercely. It began to change color from the original bloodred to orange, and then to yellow.

“He thought he could make himself immortal by taking the herb while he was still young,” Melino said accusingly. “But the portion he stole only delayed his own aging, and it prevented his uncle’s successful rejuvenation. The greatest magician since Zabulon has become a monster, because Lucinus betrayed him!”

Lucinus closed the coffer. Holding it in both hands, he stepped beyond the mirror’s image. He was still covered with blood, and he left bloody footprints on the floor behind him.

The basin was at a rolling boil. The liquid was dark blue, but the color was changing to indigo as Hedia watched. Something—was it a hand?—gripped the rim from inside.

“Be closed!” Melino said. The image and the red haze vanished.

He staggered. Hedia caught him in both arms, then held him close with her right and took the mirror from his hand with the other. She set the mirror facedown on the strongbox from which he had taken it.

“Come,” she said softly. “Isn’t there a place we could be more comfortable?”

He looked at her, easing away. She couldn’t read his expression.

“Yes,” Melino said. “We’ll go upstairs now. I think time is short.”

Hedia smiled as she followed him to the stairs in a curtained alcove to the side of the office. One could have a great deal of fun in a short time, if necessary.

*   *   *

W
HILE
A
LPHENA AND HER ENTOURAGE
were still half a block from the house of Aulus Collinus Ceutus, the wife—Collina—rushed into the street with twenty of her servants, all wearing finery. Four maids under the direction of a corpulent steward began tossing flower petals onto the pavement.

“I was afraid…,” Pandareus said quietly to Alphena. “That our large troupe was going to frighten the poor woman. Apparently not, though
I
was surprised to see that we would have so many attendants.”

Alphena heard the disapproval behind—though certainly not in—the teacher’s comment. She smiled smugly and said, “I brought over a hundred, as many as I could scrape together here on the Bay. This is payment for her courtesy in receiving us.”

The attendants began to shout, “
Sax
-a,
Sax
-a,” as the head of the entourage reached the door of the Collinus dwelling. The cheers were ragged—too ragged to understand if you didn’t know what they must be—but the enthusiasm was all that mattered. The households all along the street watched from windows and the roofs as the parade passed.

“I don’t understand,” Pandareus said. The cheering forced him to raise his voice.

“Collina will never forget that the daughter of a wealthy senator called on her at home,” Alphena said. “And her neighbors would never forget it, either, even if Collina was too modest to mention it. Which she may be—you’ve met her.”

“I don’t think she is that modest, no,” Pandareus said with a faint smile. “Your Ladyship, I appreciate your wisdom. And your courtesy.”

“I learned it from Mother,” Alphena said, swelling with pride but trying not to let it show in her voice. “How to think like this, I mean.”

She smiled—at herself, really—and added, “I’ve learned a lot, since I started listening to her.”

“The noble Lady Alphena, daughter of Senator Gaius Alphenus Saxa, Governor of Lusitania and former consul!” cried Balthus. “And her companion, the learned Pandareus of Athens!”

Balthus had been the Annunciator at the Carce town house. When age caused his voice to crack before he had announced half a dozen guests, he had been transferred to Puteoli as a sinecure. He still had the lungs for a task like this, though.

Alphena walked forward between the lines of servants. When Pandareus seemed to hesitate, she tugged at the sleeve of his tunic.

“Mistress Collina!” she said, taking the woman’s plump hands in her own, then stepping back.
I won’t be able to learn everything Mother has to teach, but I’ve learned
some
things
. “You’re so kind to receive us on short notice. I hope to be able to repay your hospitality in the near future, after the business that brings me to you has been resolved.”

Collina, a woman of forty who was trying without much confidence to look younger, seemed dazed at the attention. “Anything we can do for you, we’re just delighted, my husband and I both. And Master Pandareus—”

She turned to the scholar.

“—when I wrote Ceutus that you might edit our letters for publication after all, he was so thrilled! He’s at the estate that came from my family. I—”

She beamed at Alphena, suddenly looking five years younger and prettier as well.

“—well, why would one live on a farm when he has a house here?
I
think. But Ceutus is so proud to own an ancient Etruscan estate that he spends much of his time there, even though his ships sail from Naples.”