“You were telling the truth,” he said in a whisper, so as not to raise an alarm, “Gunnar-Galen is here—what can you do about him?”
“Do?” Michael said. “Why? What’s going on.”
“He’s onstage,” official number one hissed as he opened the door and shoved Michael through, “and he’s waving a sword. Good luck.”
* * *
This was it, thought Galen. This was the performance of a lifetime, and every great person from the ivory towers of the world was here to see it.
Everywhere Galen looked, everyone in the audience had turned into Obscuro, the Zen Illusionist.
They were cheering—more specifically, they were cheering him, Mikaal Gunnar-Galen, on his magnificent and triumphant turn on the glorious stage at Bayreuth.
Tears streamed down his face as he paused for a bow to acknowledge his gratitude, then a second. Then, a soft tugging at his sleeve, perhaps another admirer, wishing for a private moment with the great man.
“Galen—Galen, come on. I’ve got to get you out of here.”
Galen looked around, blinking, and the room seemed to fade. There was a man onstage—did he know him?
Michael shook him again. “Galen, are you all right?”
Galen’s stomach dropped in fear—it was Siegfried, the Sun-King, come to claim the treasure and destroy him. Willing himself to calmness, Galen choked back a cry and instead spoke slowly, voice directed at the Obscuro audience. “I am Hagen, and it is my destiny to rule. I am the pure-son, I am the true-son, and you shall not defeat me, Siegfried.”
“Wha…? Siegfried? Galen, it’s me—Michael Langbein.”
“No,” Galen said, shaking his head wearily. “You try to deceive, like Odin, but I know you. Say it—say your name.”
Looking around at the wealthy Europeans and Americans in the audience who still had no clue as to what had derailed the performance, Michael decided that going with the flow would probably be the least disruptive way to handle things. At least the sword—strapped to Galen’s left arm—was still sheathed.
“All, right, all right,” he said, moving closer to Galen. “I’m Siegfried.”
“Shout it!”
“I am Siegfried!” Michael shouted.
“I claim the treasure!” Galen replied. “I will have it, Siegfried!”
“Fine, whatever,” said Michael, embarrassed at the resonance of his words throughout the Festspielhaus. He hadn’t expected to be arguing at the top of his lungs in the most acoustically-sound building in Europe.
Galen relaxed, as if he was a deflating balloon. That must have been what he wanted, Michael thought. Someone else up here on stage to make his fantasy seem solid. It’s a shame—he had so much potential, and to break this way, so publicly …
“Come on, Galen,” said Michael, “let’s go home.”
“Hagen,” came the rasped response.
“What?”
“My name,” Galen said slowly, “is Hagen.”
“All right,” said Michael, turning to get off the stage. In the wings, he could see the other performers watching curiously—many of them knew who Galen was, and whatever was happening, they were loathe to get involved or interrupt; whether out of respect or fear, Michael couldn’t tell. “Come on Hagen. Let’s go.”
Michael began to walk away, when an odd sensation passed through him. My God, he thought, was that…? Could that have been…? But he shook it off—best to deal with Galen first, then think about inversions and the relative worth of history professors.
“Galen?” Michael asked under his breath as he looked over his shoulder and realized the musician was not following. The audience began to murmur more loudly, some even standing and shouting at the stage.
Time to get out of Dodge, thought Michael. “Galen, what …” But the singer seemed not to hear him, staring instead at some point above and to the right of Michael’s head, his lips moving in a silent incantation.
Suddenly, the room shifted, as if the lens on a projector had both come loose and corrected itself in the same instant. Michael shook it off, then turned to see what had captured his companion’s attention, when he suddenly felt an odd pressure against his chest.
The sword Galen had been carrying was not decorative; he had unsheathed it and driven it deeply into Michael’s back.
“Al-Alberich?” said Michael, looking curiously at the point of the thin blade that extended about eighteen inches from his sternum. “Alberich? Wh-what …?
“I’m not Alberich,” hissed Galen. “I’m Hagen. And you’re dead.”
There was a momentary silence in the great hall: most of the audience had figured out that the replacements had been neither planned nor expected; only dozens knew just how badly the opera had been shanghaied and disrupted; a mere dozen or so had properly guessed that what had just transpired meant the end of the festival; and a single woman in the second row realized exactly what had happened and communicated this epiphany in the form of a long, shrill, scream, and then Hell on Earth broke loose in Bayreuth.
People by the hundreds stampeded the doors, yelling, trying to escape what all of them slowly realized they had just witnessed; people by the dozens stormed the stage, pulling Mikaal Gunnar-Galen into the orchestra pit where the musicians were still sitting in abject horror; no one went to aid Michael, as hardly anyone really knew yet what had occurred, save that there was a weapon drawn, and blood spilled, and the only men on stage were a fallen, insane baritone whom many still adored, and a stranger who should never have been allowed on the stage to begin with.
The orchestra made their escape through the maintenance areas in the rear, and Galen was borne away on a sea of frantic hands. Within a matter of minutes, the whole of the Festspielhaus had been emptied of patrons. Only Michael, face white, his lifeblood draining across the floor, remained to see the briefly exposed light of the entry hall when the doors at the top of the building opened, then closed. He listened as the slow, unhurried footsteps made their way through the aisles, then up the steps at the left of the stage, and through the two-dimensional landscape to a spot a few feet from where he lay.
“Hello,” Jude said calmly as he leaned one hip on the false balustrade just above the orchestra pit. “I thought we could have a few minutes to chat, seeing as all of the excitement has moved outside, and you’re not likely to live for very much longer.”
***
CHAPTER TWELVE
Hat Trick
“You know,” Jude said in a conversational tone, “the most difficult part of this entire year was that first week: cutting every reference regarding a particular murder from every paper in which it appears is an awfully big job. It took hiring almost seventy students in the end, but they managed to get the job done.”
Dizzy from the blood loss, Michael’s head swiveled around as he tried to comprehend what he was hearing. “Students …? You hired …students to … to clip newspapers…?”
“Nearly ninety thousand newspapers, at the final tally. Sure, they complained a lot, but most of them were accustomed to having plasma sucked out of them or wanking into a cup for the same amount I was offering them to pedal around the city and clip articles out of the papers. Not exactly an upwards move, career-wise, but that’s academics for you.”
“I … I don’t understand …” Michael replied weakly.
“I know, and I regret that, if nothing else—that’s why I’m here, to clear a few things up before you die.”
“I’m not … ambulance …”
“I’m afraid you are,” Jude said matter-of-factly, “And I wouldn’t count on the medical team getting here in time. Haven’t you noticed? You’re the one who got stabbed, but right now, the only thing anyone is concerned about is that one of the primary administrators of the oldest University in the entire German-speaking world just went bonkers in Bayreuth. I give it a good ten minutes before anyone even remembers you’re here.”
Michael summoned enough strength to lift himself up on one elbow before co
llapsing back into the sticky crimson pool growing beneath him. “What did the newspapers have to do with this?”
“You had to be prevented from reading this,” Jude said as he swiftly dropped to a crouch and pulled the crumpled newspaper clipping out of his pocket. Spreading and smoothing it, he held it in front of Michael’s face so the weakening man could read it, then put it away when he saw the expected looks of shock and recognition.
“Vasily?” Michael gasped. “Vasily Strugatski? Dead?” He looked at Jude, eyes darting in fear, “Did … did you kill him?”
“Me? Not at all. All I know about him is his paternal lineage and what I read in that clipping. Why should you ask?”
Michael chuckled, a weak, phlegmy sound. “Yeah, right … You’re the great connector, remember? And you … You didn’t know Vasily and I were related?”
“Related?” Jude exclaimed, shocked himself for the first time since he’d entered the opera hall. “In what way?”
“We were married to the same woman—at different times, of course.”
“That is interesting. It’s certainly another piece of the puzzle—and if nothing else, just validates further the course of events.”
“If you didn’t know … Then why go to such efforts to … Hide the newspaper clippings?”
“Because he was the first Erl-King to die in more than a thousand years—and I needed time to discover exactly what that meant and then act upon it before anyone else did. And in this case, ‘anyone’ also meant the same unique group of individuals who could also help me decipher the clues—specifically, you.
Michael blinked. “Back up, now—what was that about Erl-Kings?”
Jude shrugged. “Just what I said—Vasily Strugatski was an Erl-King.”
Michael let his head drop back and he closed his eyes. “Madness …” he muttered, “It’s all utter madness …”
“I can understand where you’d think so,” said Jude, “and I really wish you had the time for me to explain it all, but some things just aren’t meant to be.”
“Please … please, aren’t you going to summon help? We were colleagues…. Are you really just going to let me die?”
“No,” replied Jude, “I’m not ‘letting’ you do anything—the whole point was for you to die, or else all of this would have been a complete waste of time and effort.”
“B-Been working on this a while, h-have we?” Michael said.
“For more than a year, actually,” said Jude. “The first order of business was to locate two Erl-Kings—one who could be sacrificed, and one who could be controlled. I found three, but two of you were in the same city—at the same University, no less—whether by providence, or the machinations of Time, my task was made easier by half. With my credentials, attaining a post at the University was no problem. The next step was establishing a need for yourself and Galen to work together, while simultaneously encouraging your particular passions.”
“Why that?”
“Focus. There were times when I could have told you both that I’d found the book on the moon, and you’d have dismissed the niggling details of how I got there just to hold the manuscript a little longer. Maintaining that sort of focus throughout the year was a priority. With Galen, it was advancement and the promise of a glorious performance here. With you, it was the threat of dismissal.”
“Gee, thanks,” Michael said dryly.
“It’s nothing personal. Some people work better under pressure.”
“My tenure wasn’t anything you could influence.”
“It was when a simple theft could affect the University’s belief in your capabilities.”
Michael blinked. “The Æthelbert Document … you … you …”
“Me. Sorry. I’m also the one who arranged to sell you the Uppsala Dance for a price several times what you could have purchased it for—or did you really not recognize Bertram when you saw him at Obscuro’s performance?”
Michael felt like he would pass out, and not because of blood loss. “The smuggler … He was the man with the crowbar in his head. How could I not have caught that?”
“Focus - one, Langbein - zero.”
“What did you do with the Æthelbert …?”
“It went to good use—the Prince of Wales was very happy to get it, and paid a very generous sum.”
“W-What…?”
“What did I do with the money? I established the Eidolon Foundation. That’s also where the departmental funding went, as well as the previous Rector.”
Michael heard a click in his head as the puzzle began to take shape. The Eidolon Foundation was the name of the company which handed a blank check to Bayreuth for use by the Wagner Festival—on the sole condition that Michael Gunnar-Galen be barred from participating. Talk about focus …
“The most important element was keeping the two of you together until the inversion point could occur. This was the reason for the machinations at the University—if Galen’s ambitions could be channeled into the possibility of redeeming the missed opportunity of his youth, then you would have all of the University’s resources with which to do your work. Galen needed you to stay to translate the two layers of the palimpsest; you needed him to stay to champion your continued professorship at the University.”
“Fat lot of good that did,” said Michael. “I got sacked, remember?”
“Yes, but by that time, the principal work was already done—and the only necessity which remained was to ensure that on August twenty-sixth, the two of you were together.”
“And it had to be at the Wagner Festival? If it was so important, then why the move with Eidolon? Why not just let him do what he wanted, and run the festival?
“Because he is driven by desire—and we always desire most that which we …”
“That which we cannot have, yeah, yeah, blah, blah, blah,” said Michael, coughing. “Awfully convenient, finding that manuscript with the Wagner scumbled in.”
“I’ll confess—I made it all up.”
“What?”
“The margin notes on the Edda manuscript—the Wagner Addendum, or Liszt Addendum, or whatever you want to call it. It doesn’t matter; I created it. Oh, not all of it was mine—I couldn’t create such a thing out of whole cloth in so little time. I researched Wagner’s writings and did find segments of preliminary versions of the cycle which he had discarded—so, in a way, only the writing itself was a forgery. The words were Wagner’s.”
“Why was it necessary to forge at all? Wasn’t the Edda itself enough?”
“The Edda would have been enough to get your attention, of that much I was sure. But more would be needed to entice Galen, and it was the only one of the volumes which also contained elements that would be attractive to both of you at once. A dash of Wagner did the trick.”
“One of the volumes?” asked Michael. “There were more in your possession? More than the one Galen and I worked on?”
“Oh yes—many, many more.”
“And you didn’t show the rest of them to us?”
“No,” said Jude with deliberate emphasis, “I didn’t show the rest of the volumes to you.”
“Why?”
“Three reasons: first, the only one which was integral to my plans was the Edda—the corresponding convergence point of the inversion was ancient Icelandic. Second, I knew that if you had even an inkling that I possessed other volumes, you’d be so inevitably distracted from our principal task that we’d risk missing the correct inversion point. And last, I couldn’t take the chance that you’d discover the truth about the Erl-Kings.”
In answer to Michael’s puzzled look, Jude smirked. “The eighteenth volume—the actual youngest book in the set. It was all spelled out fairly clearly, and Galen enjoyed it a great deal.”
Despite his injuries, Michael nearly sat up with a derisive snort of laughter. “Uh-huh. So you two have been plotting against me the whole time, eh?”
“Not the whole time,” said Jude. “But I digress, and you’re bleeding out.”<
br />
Was Jude waffling? Michael couldn’t be sure—the blood loss was beginning to close in the edges of his vision.
“I suppose while I’m owning up to things,” Jude said, “I really ought to mention that I’m also the one who arranged your firing. A couple of associates of mine snuck into the records vault and replaced the authentic receipts with forgeries.”
“How? They’d have had to have been Zen Illusionists themselves to get into …”
Jude nodded. Another piece fell into place.
“You brought them back with you from Meru, didn’t you?” Michael said. “Two of the anchorites.”
“Yes—the surviving U’s. But you knew them by different names—Rutland and Burlington.”
Michael began to respond, then coughed up a bloody mass to the floor, where he stared at it as if it were from an oracle. “Funny habit, that.” he said, cheeks tightening. “Did you ever notice that it’s very human to examine our discharges? Babies look at their feces, teenagers constantly smell their own armpits, and I don’t think there’s a human on the planet who doesn’t check the tissue after a good sneeze.”
He coughed again and spat out another bezoar-like chunk. “Do you suppose it’s our way of searching for patterns in the chaos?”
“Sounds more like the plot from a bad independent film,” said Jude. “Good try, though.”
The historian was suddenly overcome by a spasm of coughing, and Jude looked on concernedly. “Not in too much pain, I hope?” he asked. “I’m not one to make anyone suffer unnecessarily, and I am enjoying our conversation immensely. I do hope you can go on for a few minutes longer.”
Just long enough, thought Michael. Long enough for someone to come. How long had it been, anyway? Ten minutes? An hour? There was no way to tell.
With an effort of will, he pushed his rumpled cloak further under his side, somewhat staunching the flow of blood from his back, and leaned into it where he could face the young man. “The other books?” Michael asked in honest curiosity. “I’d’ve liked to have seen them.”
The Festival of Bones: Mythworld Book One Page 20