Stealing Sacred Fire (22 page)

‘Not at all,’ Salamiel said
smoothly. ‘Shemyaza is certainly known to Gadreel, but perhaps not
acquainted.’

‘That is a strange
distinction,’ Qimir said, biting into an almond. ‘Gadreel is not
here of course. You did realise that.’

Shem shrugged. ‘I do not expect
to find him easily, but I believe you can get word to him. We have
travelled a long way and have waited a long time to meet him. Now,
we are with his people. The next step must be a meeting with
Gadreel himself. We would be most grateful if you could arrange
this.’

Qimir threw back his head and
laughed, which seemed an inappropriate response. ‘I can ask for a
meeting,’ he said. ‘If your request is granted, you can expect a
surprise.’ He sobered slightly. ‘Tell me, what can I reveal that
would entice our prophet into your presence?’

‘Tell him that his brother,
Shemyaza, wishes to speak with him.’

Now it was Daniel’s turn to
squirm. As yet, they had no proof that Gadreel was Grigori, never
mind the individual Shem believed him to be. If Gadreel showed up,
it could be embarrassing, if not dangerous.

Qimir laughed again. ‘Brother
to Gadreel, heh? I take it you have not met your brother?’

Shem shook his head. ‘No… well,
not in this life.’

Qimir nodded. Shem’s answer
seemed to have satisfied him. ‘I shall see to it that your message
reaches the right ears. But you may have a wait. Until then, the
hospitality of my household is open to you.’

‘It is more than we hoped for,’
Shem answered.

Presently, Qimir summoned one
of his staff, a young woman named Shirin, and directed her to
arrange accommodation for their guests. Shirin’s head was
uncovered, although she was dressed, as the men, in long, dark,
embroidery-encrusted robes. Her abundant hair, which was henna red,
hung unbound down her back. Into it was woven small mountain
flowers. Her wrists were braceleted with curling tattoos. She led
Shem and his companions to a small tent that smelled strongly of
goat. Lifting aside an entrance flap, she revealed a dark interior
where thick, hairy hides were laid out on the floor. Daniel
suspected the hides might be alive with vermin. Nor was there much
room for three grown males to stretch out. Still, it was more
private than the quarters given to them by Fatime.

Daniel and Salamiel went back
to the jeep to fetch their belongings, watched by curious Yarasadi.
‘Qimir knows more than he’s letting on,’ Daniel said.

Salamiel nodded. ‘I thought
that too. Yazid, of course, might have delivered a report.’

Daniel sighed. ‘God, I hope we
don’t have another month of waiting to endure. I get the feeling
this Gadreel character is playing with us.’

‘Perhaps he needs to be sure of
us,’ Salamiel said. ‘If we are who we say we are, then we will
wait. Gadreel would know this.’

‘I hope you’re right.’

That night, Daniel dreamed
coherently for the first time since he’d left England. The wind cut
through the valley with an eerie cry, and its noise intruded into
Daniel’s restless sleep, creating a maelstrom of sound that was
like the advance of a great army or the summoning of a sorcerous
storm.

He stood upon wind-swept rocks
above a black sea that heaved beneath a boiling sky. It seemed as
if he’d entered the dream half-way through, as if a part of him had
been existing within it for some time. Echoes of words recently
spoken resounded in his mind, but he could not remember them.

A shimmering blue sphere hung above the
sea, illuminating the angry cresting waves. Daniel peered at it,
feeling that he’d invoked it, although the memory of doing so had
vanished. It would be Ishtahar, his goddess, bringing more puzzles
to him, and obscure answers to his questions. He saw her again as a
child, hovering with drooping feet above the water, encased in her
own bubble of light.

‘Ishtahar!’ he cried and as if
in response, a wave crashed against the rock beneath him, soaking
him with spray that smelled strongly of brine and rot. Ishtahar
looked odd to him; at once familiar and a stranger.

‘Don’t you know me, Daniel?’
she asked, and the voice was that of a mature woman. The child
smiled and spun before him in the air. ‘You have chosen to stay on
this path, now follow it... The time of your rite of passage is at
hand.’

Then a blinding flash crashed
across the sky, like thunder. The rock shivered beneath his feet;
he heard the crack of stone. When his vision cleared, he found
himself standing within a plain chamber that was conical like a
bee-hive. The air was noticeably drier, almost sterile, and a low
hum vibrated all around him. The walls exuded a perfect white glow
that seemed to occlude his surroundings rather than illuminate
them.

Daniel turned round in a
circle, and looked down at his glowing limbs that were absorbing
the light. He could hear strange whispers speaking in an unknown
tongue, and distant echoes as of metal and stone ringing
together.

Presently, a darkness formed in
the light before him and out of it came a shape; an immensely tall
male figure robed in white. He looked like a man, but Daniel sensed
he was not. His towering body seemed full of light, as if he was
made of it. Long, eburneous hair fell over his chest, and his face
was like a caricature of Grigori features; attenuated beyond what
seemed possible, with slanting eyes of a piercing blue. His skin
was so pale, Daniel could see mauve veins pulsing with life beneath
it, yet despite an undeniable grotesqueness of appearance, the
figure was in his own way beautiful. In his outstretched hands, he
held a conical crystalline object that he seemed to be offering to
Daniel.

Daniel stepped forward and held
out his hands, but the stranger would not relinquish the object he
held. He loomed over Daniel, perhaps seven feet or more in height.
His mask-like face held neither compassion nor any other emotion
that Daniel could recognise as Grigori, whose personalities were
often more complex than human. He sensed a total amorality, a mind
that viewed the world in a manner entirely alien to anything he had
encountered before, in waking life or in vision. He was afraid of
the creature, yet transfixed.

The tall being seemed to be
aware of Daniel’s feelings for the faintest suggestion of smile
stretched his lips and he nodded almost imperceptibly. His features
began to quiver with minuscule movements; his eyes blinked like a
cat. Daniel sensed that this was a language of expression, beyond
words. He could not understand it, although it seemed to him that a
stream of communication was flowing across and over him. There was
no impatience. The stranger appeared to think that Daniel could
understand every nuance of expression.

Daniel stood there for what
seemed like half an hour, until the figure appeared to give up his
attempt at communication. He shook his head and retreated into the
white glow. Daniel felt he had left something important unsaid,
failed to pick up a vital clue. The light grew dim around him. He
hung in a void, wanting only to wake up.

It was the hour just before
dawn. Daniel, feeling restless, crept out of the tent and stretched
his limbs in the clear air. Goats moved like ghosts between the
dwellings and the sentinel pillars of stone, chewing at the short
grass. From far away, some distant peak, came the eerie lament of a
woman’s voice; no song, but a succession of wordless vowels. The
hiss of the wind was its percussion, and also its strings, as it
whistled through the trees and howled through the rocky passes.
Daniel felt the hairs upon his arms rise. There was magic here.

He walked away from the cluster
of dwellings towards the far side of the valley, where the caves
were. Smoke from dampened fires curled lazily in the predawn light,
and the scent of flowers was very strong. Sleepy guards made no
move as Daniel passed among them, almost as if he was
invisible.

His footsteps echoed loudly in
the caves as he passed them. He was drawn to a fissure in the
cliff-face, which proved to be the start of a steep, upward path,
little more than a gully. Daniel paused, and once again caught a
ghost of the lilting refrain, as if someone was singing alone high
above.

The path led to a narrow valley
that sloped upwards away from him, oppressed on either side by
steep rocks veined with startling green malachite. The grassy floor
was starred with white flowers, which exuded a heavy, fresh
perfume. Daniel stepped onto the grass, and as he did so, caught
sight of two pale figures flickering ahead of him. They appeared to
be flashing in and out of reality, gambolling like children on
their way up the valley, although they were too tall to be
children.

Every hair on Daniel’s body
felt electrified. He smelled ozone, and his head began to ache. The
figures became clearer in his sight; two males, completely naked,
their skins unnaturally white. He could not make out their facial
features, and their hair was a waving blur of indistinct colour
around their heads and shoulders. They seemed to be involved in a
game of some kind; their arms waved as if in the movements of a
dance, and they were laughing. Facing each other, they moved
sideways up the valley, gesturing at one another. Daniel knew
immediately, without understanding how, that they were
brothers.

One is incomplete, he thought.
Unmade somehow…

As he watched them, the reason
for this became apparent. The figure on the left looked perfect,
graceful of limb with flawless skin, while his brother’s movements
were jerkier. Daniel also realised that the second brother’s flesh
was scored with long lesions along the flank, almost as if his body
were seamed and splitting apart. The image was at once revolting
and compelling. Daniel could not work out what it must mean.

Then someone called his name,
and the image shattered, sparks of light and colour flying out to
either side to be absorbed by the watchful cliffs.

Daniel turned and saw Shem
strolling towards him. He uttered a low sound of annoyance.
‘Thanks!’

Shem frowned. ‘For what?’

Daniel sighed, shook his head.
‘I saw something, and your voice dispelled the vision, that’s all.’
He related what he’d seen.

Shem nodded thoughtfully.
‘Could have been a memory of people who once lived here — Watcher
descendants. The nomads of the mountains are referred to as ‘pale
tall trees,’ did you know that?’

‘No. But I don’t think the
vision was simply that.’

Shem put a hand on Daniel’s
arm. ‘This country: you can feel the magic, can’t you?’ He inhaled
slowly. ‘Smell it.’

It was almost touching how at
ease Shem felt in these surroundings. Daniel glanced around him.
He’d always thought of Eden as being an oasis in a desert, but of
course that was not so. It had existed somewhere in the mountains.
How much did the Yarasadi know of their heritage? Was it all demons
and angels to them, or did they realise that the Grigori still
walked among them?

Shem put his hands upon Daniel’s
shoulders and looked directly into his eyes. ‘Well, it has to be
said by one of us, so it might as well be me. Can we rescue what we
once had?’

Daniel forced himself to hold
Shem’s gaze. He felt cornered, unable to organise his thoughts. ‘I
don’t know.’ He shook his head. ‘No. We can only move on.’

‘Together or alone?’

Daniel could feel himself
responding to Shem’s presence. He wanted to curl his arms around
Shem’s body, hold him close, but something still prevented him.
Instead, he rested his hands upon Shem’s arms. ‘I was only a child
when you showed to me the secrets of your history and gave me
extended life. I was in awe of you, Shem, dazzled by your beauty.
You have to remember I had only recently discovered my own
sexuality. You were a god to me then.’

Shem smiled sadly. ‘Are you
telling me that your feelings for me have gone?’

Daniel shook his head,
frowning. ‘I don’t know what I feel. After you retreated into
yourself, I could not think of becoming close to anyone else. I’ve
been alone for five years. That’s a long time to live without love.
It’s changed me. I think I ‘shut down’ more than just my psychic
abilities.’

Shem brushed the fingers of one
hand down Daniel’s face. ‘Perhaps the two are connected.’

Daniel pulled away, nodded.
‘Could be. I have to work it out.’

Shem folded his arms. ‘Come
back to me, Daniel. I will wait, but I want you back.’ He paused.
‘Is this anything to do with the fight we had at Fatime’s
village?’

Daniel stared at him. ‘No. I
can’t say that helped, but...’ He waited for an apology, but none
was forthcoming. Resigned to the fact, he sighed. ‘Anyway, what
happened there is irrelevant. I know we have to talk, Shem, and it
will be soon, but I don’t feel ready yet.’ He looked around
himself. ‘Maybe here, I can think more clearly.’ He smiled. ‘No
doubt I’ll have plenty of time. How long do you think Gadreel will
make us wait?’

Shem accepted the change of
subject without comment. ‘Who knows? But he will come, Daniel. I am
convinced of it.’ He slung an arm around Daniel’s shoulders. ‘Come
on, let’s forget our differences for a while and just walk. This
country should be enjoyed through the senses.’

That evening Qimir decreed that
a feast should be set for his guests. Gone now was the reticence of
when they’d first arrived at the camp. The settlement was decked
with garlands of flowers, and the atmosphere was light and joyous,
as if the tribe were happy to forget their problems for the
slightest cause and give in to the urge to celebrate. Fires burned
among the dwellings, sending cascades of sparks into the night sky
and filling the air with the scent of wood-smoke. Musicians
practised around the tents, playing stringed instruments named
tamburas, an oboe-like object called a zurna and drums they called
duhuls. Everybody’s feet seemed to itch to dance; robes swung more
widely as people walked around the settlement and eyes sparked with
a desire for childish wickedness. Daniel was caught up in the
atmosphere of it, and felt his heart soar like a bird over the
mountains. Deep, throbbing echoes seemed to boom from crag to crag,
and he had a vague sense as of vast wings flapping ponderously
overhead. Something was due to happen; he could sense it.