How the Stars did Fall (26 page)

“What are you so irate about?” Olivia asked him.

“Haven’t you heard? We’re to pack up and move out. Orders from Lynch.”

To pass the time, Olivia brought out an old chest of Mecklenburg’s she had found and proceeded to look over each item inside one at a time. It was less a chest and more a sarcophagus. It had taken three men to place it where it was, hidden behind the veil where she worked. Jason watched her while she excavated.

“That painting over there, the one with Atlantis on it, did you get it from Mecklenburg’s things?” Olivia asked him.

“No. I mean, yeah, it was his, but I didn’t take it. He gave it to me before he left.”

“Did you know there are more?” Olivia said, and setting aside a bunch of dusty tomes and rolled-up scrolls, she lifted from the chest a pair of framed paintings. The first had pictured on it the figure of a man wreathed in shadow, riding some sacred shape. Two pyramids, interlocking, with gears upon gears and wheels upon wheels, propelling the being that rode it forward into space. The second far less obscure. It depicted a man, but this one in full detail. Olivia could not mistake that bearded face and knew the man to be Lynch.

Turning it over, Olivia found and read aloud the inscription:

“Dedicated to His Highness and Most Exquisite Lord Chogthan of the Tenth Star, Holder of the Huiron Key, Defender of the White Flame of Taurus and Guardian of the Blue Expanse”

Outside the tent, Jason waited for her at the head of a cart, holding on to the reins of a horse. On the cart something moved beneath a pair of thick fur blankets. Out of curiosity, Olivia moved closer to whatever it was while Jason pulled the blankets aside, revealing an Indian woman all tied up, blindfolded and gagged.

“Is that the Indian that came here with my brother?” Olivia asked.

Jason nodded. “Your brother has hidden things from you, Olivia. This Indian holds the key to the doors we wish to unlock.”

With a marked map Lynch had given him, Jason rode out. Olivia clung to him on the same horse and behind them, pulled by the strength of the animal, Moon looked on, gagged but no longer blindfolded, and she did nothing but stare at her captors all through that morning and into the evening, as the sky reddened as if covered in bloody molasses, the nectar dripping from the coffers of the gods above. At night, Olivia pulled the gag down and fed Moon a tin of heated beans. Olivia waited for the Indian to say something, to protest, but she only ate in silence without so much as a grimace or frown or any other sign of consternation. So Olivia put the gag back in place, tightening it a bit, and left Moon propped against a tree, finding a seat next to Jason opposite the fire he had started. He had a smooth gray pebble in his hand, and it moved and had the makings of a head jutting out like some inorganic turtle of Jason’s own authorship, and with each instance of Olivia observing this impartation of life she further doubted her original hypothesis that there was a god acting through Jason and rather had begun to believe he could, after all, be some kind of god himself. Because, she thought, she had never before known a god and perhaps this was what one looked like, and further, if he was a god, then so was she. A mighty goddess of the sea.

“You should name him,” Olivia said.

“Not a him,” Jason said.

“Then name her.”

“Not a her either. What’s a name that works for both boys and girls?”

“Hmm. How about Saturn or Jupiter?”

“Jupiter. I’ll call it Jupiter.”

Now Jupiter had taken a liking to Olivia and, traveling from Jason’s arm to hers, it climbed up to her neck and then to the top of her head. From that perch it surveyed the darkness and the fire, its little stone heart being filled with the wonder of the world.

“It likes you,” Jason said.

The pair of them locked eyes for a moment and after sharing an unspoken truth, that Jupiter was not the only one that liked her, Olivia soon found that her hand had been covered up by Jason’s own hand. She subtly removed her hand from under his and gave Jason a peck on the cheek.

“I’m so tired,” she said, turning over and lying down, hoping Jason would do the same. And he did.

That night Olivia dreamt intensely of a wide field with no trees or animals, just endless grass in all directions interrupted only by the red heads of the amanita muscaria growing out of the soil. The mushrooms were arrayed in a single column, marking with their flesh a path forward down the field, leading up to something shimmering in the horizon. Olivia trotted forward, trying all the way to discern what it was that waited for her ahead. And to her surprise she discovered what it was before coming in close enough to see it. Olivia could feel that it was water, could even picture in her mind its rectangular shape and something else too, as if the molecules were different from the water of the earth and they reacted to her probing mind differently too. They resisted her sway. Finally she came right up to it and saw that it was a kind of water door and that she could see right through it. The image behind the water door was somewhat blurred but it looked like the inner court of some regal palace, and at the far end she saw an empty throne and an altar beset by unlit candles.

In the morning Olivia awoke to Jason standing over the ruin of the fire. His eyes were darkened as if he had not slept at all and on his shoulders were more pebbles, alive and moving, of varying sizes and shapes as if he had spent the better part of the night working on them. Olivia thought about asking about their names but the graveness of his face dissuaded her.

“You’re awake,” he said. “Good. Eat and let’s move on.”

She ate as fast as she could and returned to the road, finding Moon already tied to the cart and Jason stooped upon the horse, pensive. The pebbles traversed the wide body of the animal, and before Olivia could climb up into the saddle she had to make sure she would not sit on top of one of them by accident. All through their journey, Jason barely acknowledged Olivia’s presence and she began to think that he might have taken her rejection of him poorly. But unable to do much about that, Olivia directed her thoughts to the matters at hand, asking Jason how much longer until they reached their destination as it had been marked by Luke on the map.

“Not long,” he said.

Again they rode until sundown and Jason told Olivia they would keep going for as long as the light allowed.

“The forest should be right ahead.”

And it was. It appeared almost out of nowhere, right after a curve in the road had begun to set them on a northern trajectory. The densely packed trees barred them from riding in, so Jason ordered the horse to a stop right at the edge and took a skin of water and drank from it in a series of little gulps. Then he offered the water to Olivia. Once she had her fill, Olivia removed Moon’s gag and offered it to her. The Indian refused the water, instead starting on a long rant about where they thought they were going, for she knew that forest. All of her people knew it because it was in that grove that the sacred rocks of Oushanis had been gathered and set in unison with the sky. Hearing her tirade, Jason’s pebbles all drew back in horror, hiding themselves in the pockets of Jason’s shirt and trousers. He took the skin of water from Olivia and corked it, putting it back in his pack. Then he bent down to where Moon lay all tied up and covered her mouth up again, but her moaning continued unabated, only muffled and incoherent.

They walked the rest of the way, Jason leading the horse by its reins and Moon squirming and screaming from behind the gag as if she were being carried to her doom and all the trees stood as witnesses to the work of her executioners. As the last of the day died out, Jason took out a pair of wooden torches, and with his flint and steel he lit them, giving one to Olivia and keeping the other for himself. At first the pebbles feared the fire and hid from it, all except Jupiter, who had seen fire before and had grown to love its warmth. And seeing the bravery of one of their own, the other pebbles soon joined Jupiter, taking their places on Jason’s shoulders. Even with the light of the torches, it would have been easy to lose their way. Jason knew which direction he had to go but not much else, so he made sure they never deviated, keeping a compass in his pocket, bringing it out now and again to make sure he had not inadvertently changed course. They walked for one hour, two, before the forest became less dense and the towering canopies of leaves and branches above gave way to the light of the stars and the moon, and Jason, freed from the burden of cutting through thick foliage and navigating around wide trees, increased their walking pace.

Not long after that the forest gave way completely, opening up in a clearing, and Olivia knew they had arrived. Jason tied the horse to one of the trees on the edge of the clearing and took hold of Moon by the ropes that shackled her, pulling her down from the cart and dragging her recalcitrant body forward towards the massive pillars of sandstone that loomed ahead. He dragged her until both of them had entered into the circle and then he let go and touched one of the pillars, feeling it out ahead of time as if he wanted to get to know the stone before proceeding. Then he went on to another stone but this time Olivia could tell he was trying to bring it to life, his effort visible in his posture and contracted muscles. But nothing happened. So he turned to Moon.

“I am to bring these stones to life,” he said while lowering her gag to her neck. “How do I do it? I was told you are the key. Tell me how to do it.”

Moon looked on in horror as full understanding of what Jason’s purpose was entered into her mind. From that point on she said nothing, taking the opportunity to spit on the boy repeatedly until he reluctantly had to secure the gag over her mouth again.

“What do you think?” Jason asked Olivia.

Olivia held her torch up close to one of the rocks and examined it. Then she passed her hand over it, feeling it warm under the gaze of the fire. She found no answer in the stones themselves, so she took a seat next to Moon on the ground and spoke to the Indian softly.

“I understand this place is sacred to you. But it is only one place among many others. I don’t precisely know what all of this means, but I’ve gathered that Lynch or Chogthan or whatever his name is intends to create more sacred places. Real sacred places that will make this grove feel like a distant echo. Places where a woman may travel to and find out whether her heart may be set upon a higher course or whether she be doomed to the low regions of the cosmos, where the greatest pleasures are forgone for tiny, brief ones.”

Moon looked up as if she had understood at least some portion of what Olivia had said and then she motioned with her head for Olivia to come closer. And Olivia did, already reaching for the gag, hoping that she had been able to convince Moon to help. But before she could undo the gag, Moon drew herself back and then leaped forward headfirst, striking Olivia right in the face. No blood was drawn but Olivia did fall to the ground, more out of surprise than from the strength of the blow. But something overshadowed the pain she felt. It was the briefest sensation. She had felt it only for that tiniest moment when Moon’s skin had touched hers. A sensation of unlimited and unbridled power, convincing her for that fleeting moment that with her power she could turn the very earth into water. Immediately Olivia understood what she and Jason had to do and instead of telling him, she decided to show him.

And with her hands she grabbed on to Moon’s flesh and, as she predicted, that same sensation returned greater even than before. With it came a sense that underneath her deep underground were vast reservoirs of pure water hidden in the folds of the earth in complete darkness, and as she began to manipulate these pockets of wondrous water the earth began to shake. Jason looked around as if questioning the very air around him as to the cause of the quake, only to find Olivia on the ground hugging Moon. Then as the shaking intensified Olivia had to draw back some of her power so that the rush of water would not overwhelm her and she and Jason and Moon would not cause the ruin of all that land. Instead, she focused and allowed the water to rush upwards and escape out of the earth only in a few spots, and the water did erupt from the ground like geysers, the force enough to propel it higher than any building, nearly high enough to reach the clouds above. After that, Olivia let go of Moon and the water receded back down into the chasms, leaving those subterranean seas once again at rest. Jason, observing the whole scene, had by now understood what had happened and he happily took Olivia’s place next to Moon so that he might complete his mission.

Olivia could only imagine what he felt when he touched Moon, but she could see the results as the nine stones that surrounded them began to tremble in the moonlight as if summoned, and all at once legs and arms and a head sprouted from each one and eyes and a mouth and cracks opened up on the surface of their bodies, each one in different patterns, unique symbols by which to distinguish one from the other. One of them had concentric circles appear on him as if carved by hand, the other triangles within triangles. All of them arose together, closing in the circle, and they looked up at the moon and roared together—not an animal roar but more like the chortling of rusting machinery—and then all together they stood at attention, facing Jason as if awaiting his orders.

All of this Moon watched, tears flowing from her eyes, for she believed that the destruction of Oushanis signaled the end of all the world, yet not even in her wildest imaginings or those of any of her countrymen had the end played out in such depravity, such wanton and unnatural necromancy, contorting the sacred stones into grotesque aberrations. Living yet not.

Chapter Eighteen

The Good Man’s army passed a ridge within sight of Fort Tancredo. They marched one after the other, their rifles held tight against their chests, their eyes continually scanning the horizon for enemies. And behind the largest group of conscripts, the artillery came wheeling forward. Daniel rode near the rear of the company but as soon as they reached the fort, he rode up and found the Good Man staring in disbelief at the sight ahead.