Analiese Rising

by Brenda Drake

  “Hey,” Marek calls. “Why are you stopping?”

  The wind flips my hair into my face when I snap my head in his direction. “We can’t leave. They’ll kill him.”

  “What can we do?” Marek is practically stomping over to me. “He’s a god, and we’re not. We’re mortals. He can take care of himself. Besides, he told us to run.”

  He holds his hand out to me. “Come on.”

  Another glance in the direction of the library. I can barely see the roof from where we stand. “How did we get so far?”

  “We’ve been walking a while.” His hand slips into mine, and he gives it a light squeeze. “Remember, he’s a trickster god. He was changing into an old man when we left. He’ll be all right.”

  “I hope so.” I let him lead me down the narrow sidewalk, if you could call it that. It’s a slight ledge at best.

  “Look, there’s a bus,” he says with saccharine optimism.

  We take off, my Vans hitting the cobblestone street hard, hurting the soles of my feet. Marek bounds up the steps. “Scusate,” he apologizes to the round Italian man behind the wheel. He doesn’t move, making sure I get in before the door shuts.

  “Grazie,” I say, my eyes locking with the driver’s. It’s like someone hit him with a stun gun.

  He smiles. “American?”

  I don’t answer him.

  “Is okay,” the man says. “Bus comes every twenty-two minutes.”

  After paying the fare, we find two vacant seats, but they’re not together. I sit across the aisle from a Chinese man in a wheelchair with shocking white hair and beard. He’s braiding thin red strings into a bracelet, a canvas knapsack on his lap. Marek gets the only other seat on the bus, toward the back. I smile at the man, then look out the window.

  “Having a good time in Rome?” the man asks. His voice is smooth, a sound that if you listen to it too long, it could lull you to sleep.

  I pull my stare away from the window and put it on him. “Yes, it’s such a beautiful city.”

  “It’s a city for young lovers.” He smiles, his gaze forward, and I realize he’s looking at Marek.

  “Oh, we’re not…” I’m staring at Marek. He runs his hand through his wavy hair. His face is weighed down with the strain of the morning. Not focusing on one thing, he’s searching for any threats. Making sure no person or thing is following us. There are shadows under his eyes. He must be as tired as I am.

  I want to rub his shoulders, give him some relief. He keeps looking better and better to me. We’ve come so far. If we make it out of this alive, I don’t think I could let him go. With every kind thing he does, he takes a little bit of my heart.

  “It is a great city for young lovers,” I say instead of finishing the other sentence I’d started. “What are you making?”

  “Reminders,” he says, tying a knot at the end of one of the braided strings. “An invisible red thread connects those who are destined to meet. Do you believe in fate?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  His smile reaches to his eyes, deepening the wrinkles around them. “Those destined to meet will, regardless of time, place, or circumstances. Just as you and he. It was meant to be. Do you see the red thread between you?”

  I try to keep all emotion off my face, not wanting it to show that I think the old man is a little bit out of touch with reality. But who am I to say. I lost my grasp on reality a few days ago. My gaze travels down the aisle of the bus to Marek.

  “I don’t see anything.”

  “Have faith,” he says. “Look again.”

  Having faith isn’t my strongest trait. There was a time when I was happy. A time when Dad was around and our family was whole. All my scars are hidden, but they’re still there marring my heart. Losing parents will do that to a person. Faith is something for happy people. Not for someone jaded like me.

  The bus slows, preparing to stop.

  “Even the most broken of people have faith,” the man says as if he heard my thoughts. “If a man without the use of his legs can have it, so can you. Look again, Analiese.”

  I’m starting to get used to people knowing my name. “Who are you?”

  “My name is Yuè Lâo.”

  The Chinese god of marriage and love.

  “It’s nice to meet you,” I say.

  A smile so warm it heats my face spreads across his lips. “The proof is right there.”

  I look at where he’s pointing. There’s a red line, so faint that if you didn’t know to search for it, you wouldn’t see it. The thread is wrapped around my wrist and stretches out to Marek’s.

  I shift in my seat to face the man, and he’s gone. His wheelchair is almost down the ramp exiting the bus. A man in his twenties rushes over to aid him.

  “I am not in need of assistance.” Yuè Lâo smiles. “Just because I’m in this chair doesn’t mean I’m helpless.” He comes off the ramp without help.

  I lower my head and smile. A peace settles inside me that I know is the god’s doing. My hand brushes against something on my lap. It’s a red thread bracelet.

  “I have faith in you, Analiese,” his voice whispers in the air to me.

  I glance out the window, and he’s pushing his chair down the cobblestones. Pinching my fingers together, I slip the red thread bracelet over my hand and around my wrist. It reminds me of something my cousin wore when I visited my family in Israel a few years back. Many cultures have their versions of the tradition.

  The red thread going from me to Marek isn’t visible anymore, but something is breathing new life into me.

  …

  The line into the Colosseum moves at a relatively fast pace around the spiral structure. The grand facade commands the sky, a noble ruin with the whispers of thousands of untold stories. Of people put to death for merely living in the wrong place or having the wrong belief. Of the roars and whimpers of animals silenced for sport. It’s a monument to a brutal past.

  I rise on the tips of my toes, trying to see over everyone’s heads. Where is he?

  The towering columns remind me of how small we are. How short our time is on this earth. The creators of this place, the spectators who cheered in the stands, this is their legacy. This is what they chose to leave behind for generations to remember them by.

  Maybe he didn’t make it out of the library. I try not to think about what those beasts could do to Lugh. And trying not to think about it makes me think about it.

  “He’s not coming,” Marek says. “It’s been over an hour. He’d be here already.”

  He’s probably right, which crushes me. I haven’t known Lugh that long, but he was my parents’ friend. They trusted him. He helped them.

  “I hope he’s okay.”

  “Stop worrying,” Marek says. “You said yourself he’s a trickster. He probably just didn’t want to lead them to us.”

  “Yeah, maybe.”

  The line moves through the gate, and we enter the arena.

  I might not like what the Colosseum represents, but the architecture astonishes me. We follow the other tourists along the designated pathway through the ruins. I pause, imagining the arena filled with over fifty-thousand spectators. A losing gladiator waits for his fate, the crowd pointing their thumbs down, his opponent ending the gladiator’s life with a blade across the throat. It almost feels real to me.

  I shake the thought away. “So, any ideas of what your grandfather would’ve left here for you?”

  “I’ve been here before,” he says. “When I was twelve. My brother was eight. This is the same walkway. My brother and I kept running around, pretend-fighting, and our mom kept scolding us. Gramps would tell her to leave us alone. That we were burning off energy.”

  “Fitting for this place.” I pause and peek through one of the window-like arches at the many other ruins surrounding the Colosseum. It’s a fading
memory of a time when people worshipped gods and goddesses.

  I spot a woman with dark hair the length and style of Inanna’s nearby the Arch of Constantine.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  I hurry to the next window to get a better view, but the woman disappears behind one of the arches. It’s hard to tell from this height if it was Inanna or not.

  Marek shuffles up to my side. “That’s a long way down.”

  The woman walks across the next window, holding the hand of a little girl who resembles her. It’s not Inanna.

  “Any idea where your grandfather would hide the clue?”

  “Nope.” He backs away from the arch. “Maybe if we walk around, something will come to me.”

  A few hours pass and still nothing jogs Marek’s memory. Every sign and marking we pass, we look for clues. Something to decipher. But there aren’t any.

  I’m about to tell him we should give up when he suddenly halts in the middle of the walkway.

  “The Forum,” he says. “We were bored out of our minds. My grandfather played a game with us once we went to the Roman Forum. A treasure hunt for coins. It had to be secret. If we were caught, we’d get kicked out, and that would’ve pissed off my mom.”

  “Okay. So let’s go there.” Even though it’s a chilly day in April, the bright sun beating down on me heats my skin. It’s hot. I’m thirsty and hungry.

  The Forum is a vast graveyard of crumbled buildings with some columns and arches remaining intact. A pathway for tourists snakes through the ruins. Marek stops every few feet, examines the area, sighs, and moves on. It continues like this until we come to a large complex beside the Forum. We learn it’s the House of the Vestal Virgins and where priestesses lived.

  “This is it.” Marek’s pace quickens, his head turning right and left, searching the grounds. In the middle is a grassy yard with a square pond. Marble statues of women, many missing their heads, line one side of the path.

  I follow close behind a tour group, curious about the place. The woman speaks in an accent thickened by her excitement, explaining every tiny detail. Six virgins lived at the temple, keeping the sacred fire lit. If the flame went out, whoever was on watch would be beaten. One priestess was buried alive after being accused of losing her purity. When the tour guide notices me, I pretend to study one of the statues.

  Marek is staring at one of the statues with a missing head. I double back to him.

  “Whatcha doing?”

  “This,” he says. “Tell me when the coast is clear.”

  “Why? What’s ‘this’ mean?”

  He checks up and down the pathway, then whispers, “I got upset. My brother kept finding his hidden treasures and had more coins than I did. My treasures were more difficult to find. It was right in this spot. I yelled at Gramps. Said I quit.”

  “He was harder on you ’cause you were older?”

  “Yeah, I think so.” He glances over at me. “This is the spot. Where I wanted to give up. Gramps told me it’s when people are closest to reaching their goals that they give up. It’s why so many fail. Then he walked off. Joined the rest of the family. He just left me there.”

  I try to picture a twelve-year-old Marek standing in the exact spot we’re in now. “What did you do?”

  “I kicked some dirt around. Tried to hide the fact I was crying.” He chuckles. “I must trust you enough to tell you that.”

  I laugh. “I’ll take it to my grave.”

  He moves the soil around with the toe of his shoe. “So I was kicking around in the dirt, and I see it.” A smile tips his mouth, and he motions to the wall with his head. “One of the bricks, behind that bush, is missing mortar.”

  From where I’m standing, I spot him, but he hasn’t noticed us. “We need to go. Now. Horus found us.”

  Marek doesn’t care who’s around now. He darts around the statue and searches behind the bush. He’s struggling with something. Horus is about to turn the corner and will see us.

  “Hurry,” I urge, my heart racing as fast as a hummingbird’s wings. “What are you doing?”

  “It won’t come out. I need a tool or something. A knife or screwdriver.”

  I roll my eyes. He knows we don’t have that stuff with us. My stomach is bouncing—rise, fall, rise, fall—and my hands are shaking. We need to get out of here, and fast. I frantically search the ground. A stick. No. Doesn’t look strong enough. Rock? No. Too thick. A rusty nail. Yes! I hurry to his side and hand it to him.

  People walk by, but they don’t say anything to us. Horus is at the end of the row, about to come on this one.

  “We have to hide,” I urge.

  Marek abandons his work on the brick, and we hide behind the statue.

  I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but I do anyway. “I’m going to lead him away. You get whatever is hidden behind that brick. We’ll meet…” I’m not sure where the safest place would be.

  “Meet me at the Mercure Hotel,” he says. “When you leave, you’ll see a cluster of hotels. It’s a few buildings down. Only place I know around here. It’s where we stayed with my grandfather.”

  “Okay.” He catches my hand before I go out from behind the statue, and I glance at him.

  He’s worried. “Be careful. If they—”

  “I will.” Before I can freak myself out of doing it, I nonchalantly move around the statue, pretending to study it, folding my arms and tapping a finger against my lips.

  Horus comes around the corner. He doesn’t see me at first, but when he does, I act as though I don’t notice him. I stroll down the path and catch up with the tour group. Not daring to look back, I can feel him behind me. The tiny hairs on the back of my neck prickle. When the tour group leads me around another corner, I lower my head and peek through the hair draping my face. Horus goes right by Marek. He’s following me, and my stomach flips.

  How am I going to get rid of him?

  As soon as I’m out of Horus’s sight, I sprint-walk for the almost two or so city blocks of the Forum. Wherever Horus is, usually Inanna and Bjorn aren’t too far behind him. Every movement in my periphery makes me jump a little. I pass the Arch of Constantine and end up on a busy road that runs in front of the Colosseum. I’m not sure if the hotel is right or left.

  I spin around to see what is nearby. Maybe some sort of landmark or hotel signs. To my right, the way everyone is going, where the gelato and food trucks and buses are lined up, is Inanna. Her back is turned. I take off in the other direction up the sidewalk. There’s a slight incline, and it kills my legs.

  Bjorn towers over the tourists he’s trying to mix in with, but I spot him from my position down the sidewalk. I cross the street. His head snaps in my direction. He sees me, too. The road I’m on has restaurants and bars on one side, and a fenced-off area with ruins on the other, which doesn’t give me any cover.

  When I reach the top, I go right, then I take a left. I need to hide, but the cut-through I’m on only runs along the back of buildings. My heart thumps hard, in sync with my pounding feet. Turn after turn, and I’m getting lost. Not that I know where I’m going in the first place. I’m on a road with a parking lot on one side that ends at a broader street.

  Traffic zips back and forth. I wait with an older couple for an opportunity to cross. My heart leaps into my throat. With their backs to me, Inanna, Horus, and Bjorn head down the street in the opposite direction. Just one of them has to turn around, and this cat-and-mouse chase is over.

  I shadow the couple to the other side of the road, keeping them between the gods and me. The building in front of me is ancient. It’s made of brown brick and has a large arched door with a tiled mosaic of a saint and a cross above it.

  The couple goes into the next door over. I keep going through an arched tunnel that leads to a thin road between two high walls. The stucco is marred and showing the brick underneath it. Dark w
ater stains drape the tops. I come to a square. Cobblestones cover the ground and cars are parked against the buildings. Potted palms line one side.

  The wind stirs dried leaves around my feet.

  Analiese, it seems to whisper, and I pause, whirling around on my heel. I’m alone. There’s no one there.

  I pass under several more arches. Tiny cars line the road, and it ends at an expansive three-level staircase that leads up to a commanding Roman-style church.

  The soles of my feet burn. My legs are about to fall off, so I sit down on the steps. I’m definitely lost. I place my elbows on my knees and rest my chin in my hands. No phone, maybe thirty euros to my name.

  “I’m so screwed,” I mumble to myself.

  A cool breeze ruffles my hair and pushes a discarded Styrofoam cup across the ground in front of me.

  Analiese. That doesn’t sound like the wind. It’s a voice. A woman’s? I shoot to my feet and walk in a small circle, searching everything that comes into view as I go—the steps, trees, the parked cars, more trees on the other side, and back to where I started.

  Analiese. It’s in my head. The voice. And it’s not my internal thoughts. It’s too feminine and soft to be.

  I feel a presence behind me. It’s just the whispering in my head freaking me out. I stay forward, not sure if I want to see if something’s really there. No one’s there. Only my shadow stretches out before me.

  A pungent smell wafts past me. It’s sort of a cross between the mothballs in Safta’s attic and sulfur. The crunching of gravel under heavy feet causes me to choke on my breath. A hulking shadow joins mine on the steps of the chapel.

  I spin around.

  Pazuzu’s menancing glare could turn me to ash. My skin’s suddenly hot, like that time when my fever was so high Dad had to rush me to the emergency room. I back up on trembling legs.

  “Wh-what…” I can’t find the words. He looks like an ordinary man in some ways. A little unkempt, but dressed nice. Except for those eyes.