The Hermetica of Elysium (Elysium Texts Series)

by Annmarie Banks

  Nadira was brought into a large dining hall. She glanced side to side as her escort gently but firmly led her by the elbow to the table. Unlike the table at Beniste’s manor, this table had individual chairs set along each side. As her escort left the room, she passed her hand over the smooth surface of the table. The room was very simply furnished. A long table, some intricately carved chairs and a smaller low table against the wall upon which rested decanters and glass bottles. On the floor lay a thick Berber rug. A massive fireplace dominated one end of the room. The high windows along one side were designed to let in air and light.

  She waited a long while before a door at the end of the hall opened and a small man entered the room. He carefully turned and locked the door behind him with a large iron key that he afterwards tucked in his sleeve. He was richly dressed in black with gold and red trim on his doublet. Slashed sleeves revealed a glimpse of scarlet silk. Nadira watched him approach with no sense of fear. He had a pleasant face, finely wrinkled with age. His ample hat obscured his hair, but his mustache and beard were nearly white. “Please, be seated,” he said pleasantly in Latin. Nadira sank back into a cushioned chair. “You are Nadira the Reader?”

  Nadira laughed softly. “’Nadira the Reader’? Is this what they are calling me?”

  The old man smiled by way of an answer. “I am Giovanni Di Marco. His Holiness sent an army for you, and he will see you in time. I am to interview you first, here, in my house.”

  “Am I a prisoner?”

  “In a way. You cannot leave, but you are also not in chains. Let us say you are compelled to be my guest.”

  Nadira smiled grimly. “As you wish, my lord.” She looked about the room to give herself time. Another interview was in store for her. What were her options? Silence? Truth? Lies? After her months with Conti she was getting a taste for what these powerful men wanted from her. And the consequences? Only the pope himself could save her from the Black Friars. She knew she must be implicated in Septimus’ murder. Someone sent the hundred soldiers who came to fetch her from Conti’s tower. Someone knows. I need to humor these new masters, she thought. Like Conti, I must make myself valuable to them.

  Di Marco drew her attention back to him. “Let us get acquainted. I can tell from your responses that your Latin is serviceable, but not refined. Let us speak Castilian. You have not been formally educated?” He asked her in that language.

  “No, my lord,” Nadira answered demurely. “I have had tutors for the lessons I have learned, and those lessons were chosen not with the aim of educating me, but with the desire to train me to task.”

  “And why were these lessons given to a girl and not to a man?” Di Marco could not contain his interest.

  “My master had no man he could trust.” Nadira answered simply and truthfully.

  “How extraordinary. Who is your master?”

  Nadira hesitated. Di Marco gracefully added, “Perhaps you can tell me about your master, then. I am interested in knowing how you were made, for you are quite a curiosity. Surely there is no danger in that?” He leaned forward, attempting to be conversational rather than intrusive.

  “My lord, I was the daughter of a servant to my master. She was the daughter of a great emir, now long deposed and replaced by Queen Isabella’s man. When my father was defeated, his harem was dispersed by the conquerors. My mother was sold in Andalusia to my master.”

  “How old were you, then?”

  “Perhaps five years, or maybe six.”

  “Fascinating. And your education?”

  “My mother was quite literate, my lord. She was very fond of poetry.”

  “You say ‘was’. I take it your mother has departed this world?”

  “She is dead, my lord.”

  “I see. And she taught you to read and write?”

  “She did.”

  “Latin?”

  “No, her native tongue. What you call Moorish.”

  “Ah, then you are a Mohammedan.”

  Nadira sighed. “No, my lord. My mother cursed God when she was taken from her home, when He did not answer her prayers to deliver her from the enemy. She forbade me to practice the religion of my people. She was very bitter.” Nadira looked at her hands, she did not want to talk about the very dangerous subject of religion. Di Marco perceived her discomfort and changed course.

  “Who gave you your Latin?”

  “My master brought in a tutor for me. He is a priest in Madrid, my lord.” Nadira answered obediently, but her mind was elsewhere. Who was this Di Marco? What was his relationship to the pope? What would the pope’s questions entail? She glanced up from her hands. Di Marco was rubbing the thin beard of his chin, deep in thought.

  “And your Hebrew?”

  “My master taught me Hebrew himself, and hired a tutor when he could not spare the time.”

  “This is remarkable, that he would do such a thing. The Jews do not even teach their own women.” Di Marco leaned forward and covered her hand with his. “This is the greatest secret of all. Tell me why he did this? Do you realize how difficult it is to find a good teacher of this language?”

  Nadira paused, remembering the lessons. “You are mistaken, for my master is not a Jew.” She had a vision of Sofir in his frustration whipping off his cap and stomping it with his heel during their very first session. “I can’t say he was a good teacher. I learned my lessons well enough.”

  “If he is no Jew, how did he know the Hebrew? Tell me, girl.” Di Marco’s eagerness was palpable.

  Nadira frowned. “I must admit, my lord, that you are not the first to remark upon my odd curriculum. My master was baptized some years ago. I assure you; at the time, I was merely following the orders of my master to learn what he set before me. His motivations he kept to himself, though I admit I believe he had once been betrayed by his bookkeeper. Thousands were lost and more was suspect. My master took my mother to the counting house and set her to work. After her death, he sent me there. When I satisfied him of my skills, he had me keep his books and write his letters.”

  “It takes no leap of reasoning to see that he trusted me. He had kept all his own documents in Hebrew. This proved to be fateful, however.” Nadira’s voice faded away, remembering the visits of the Black Friars to Sofir’s warehouses. “I had to translate his old documents from Hebrew into Castilian. He did not have the time for it. There were no more Jews left to do it for him.”

  “Yes, of course.” Di Marco intoned, deep in thought. There was a long silence while he digested this material. Nadira waited patiently, rubbing her hands. “Did your master ever teach you more than just the Hebrew you needed to read and write his accounts?”

  “My lord. My master was apostate from his religion for taking my mother to his bed. Then came the Black Friars. I am certain he renounced his religion some years ago. I am no expert, truly. These questions will not tell you what you want to know.”

  Di Marco leaned back, scraping his chair on the floor. A great grin brightened his face and he laughed, shaking the feathers in his hat. “Clever girl. I suppose you know what it is I am searching for!” He chuckled gleefully, and then rolled his eyes. “You are correct. Even in the face of your abilities, I treat you like the innocent girl you appear to be. However, appearances are deceiving, are they not? One can appear to be the trustworthy secretary of a spice merchant, yet be a thief. One can appear to be a harmless servant girl and yet be as sharp and dangerous as a sword.”

  “One can appear to be the faithful servant to a pope…” Nadira interrupted boldly.

  Di Marco went white beneath his red hat and the feathers froze. His eyes hardened. He looked at her as if he was seeing her for the first time. “Yes. Tell me, Nadira. Tell me what it is I want to know.” His voice was no longer cajoling, but had taken on a serious timbre. Nadira allowed herself to extend to him, remembering the feeling of stretching her hand into the bodies of her friends and feeling their thoughts. She stared hard at him, imagining a finger of light connecting her heart to his.
She saw him startle and clutch his chest with one hand. Nadira quickly pulled the finger back into herself. Di Marco stared at her with astonishment and a little fear. He relaxed his hand slowly, never taking his eyes from hers.

  “Well, well, little one. Did you find what you wanted to know?” he asked with a voice like silk.

  She had not. But she had learned something new. This man also possessed the ability to know without seeing, to see without doing. She cocked her head, looking at Di Marco with new eyes. “I see we have an understanding, my lord.”

  “Indeed.” He took his hand from his chest and rubbed the fingers with his other hand. “Try again. I will not stop you.”

  Nadira met his gaze warily. She took two deep breaths, then extended the finger from her breast across the table. Di Marco flinched as the spindly shaft of light entered his chest, but he did not move. He closed his eyes as she inserted the shaft deeper until she felt his heart beating. There she stopped. Nadira closed her eyes, feeling the other man’s heart. He felt like William, full of curiosity. His mind was sharp, there were pages and pages of manuscripts in his head, she saw them move by one by one. It seemed this man did nothing but read, and in the few moments when he rested his eyes, his fingers took up a quill.

  Nadira slowly squeezed the beating heart with her mind and heard Di Marco gasp. She opened her eyes. They were connected across the table; the two enveloped in the light of her mind, Di Marco gazing at her with an incredulous look on his face. Nadira detected no malice, only surprise and apprehension. She withdrew the finger slowly. Di Marco could not contain himself, but clutched at his heart with both hands as she withdrew her finger of light.

  Tears fell from his eyes and made dark splotches on his silk sleeves. Nadira shifted in her seat as the other man wept, rubbing his face. She waited uncomfortably, but Di Marco, rather than ceasing, began to weep harder, lowering his head to the table and cradling it in his arms. His shoulders shook with the sobs and he pressed his head between his two hands. She shifted again, made to rise, then thought better of it. She waited until Di Marco lay motionless before reaching over the table to touch him. He jumped up as if she had touched a brand to his arm. His face was splotched and his eyes red. He backed slowly away from her.

  “My lord?” she asked, rising.

  “No,” he said hoarsely, putting a hand up between them. “Please, don’t ever do that again.”

  “Did I hurt you?” Nadira grew alarmed, as it had never occurred to her that she might harm someone with her mind.

  Di Marco opened his mouth to reply, but no sound came out. He opened and closed it several times while Nadira waited patiently. “No. No, I am not injured.” He said as if saying so made it true. He rubbed his chest absently as he moved toward the sideboard. He kept one hand up between them and poured himself a cup of wine with the other. He drank it in one smooth motion. Refreshed, and his courage restored, he lowered the hand and looked at her again; this time sideways like a lizard contemplating a fly.

  “You do not know what you did, do you?’ he asked.

  “I was testing you, to see if you are true.”

  “Am I?”

  “You mean not to hurt me.”

  “That is true. What else did you learn?” He poured another cup and drank it as quickly as the first.

  “That you are a great scholar. You must have read thousands of scrolls.”

  “More?”

  “Not really. You were obviously upset at my intrusion. I withdrew as soon as I was confident you meant me no harm.”

  “So you did not read my mind, Nadira the Reader.”

  “I guess not,” Nadira replied, shocked. “I had not the intention.” Di Marco’s hand shook as he tried to pour the next cup. “Allow me, my lord.” She moved to the sidebar and took the decanter from Di Marco. She poured him a cup and offered it to him. He took it, drained it, and handed it back to her.

  “You have some,” he offered.

  Nadira smiled and set the cup down. She did not want any wine. “My lord, for some months now I have been carted here and there by interested parties. Men have tied me, gagged me, starved me, fed me, bribed me and threatened me. Each one has been using me to achieve the goal of mastering some obscure power supposedly contained in one small book. Yet, at this moment only have I come to realize something and you have provided me with the key. Tie me if you would. Carry me somewhere else if you wish. None can harm me ever again. You know it now, too, don’t you?” Nadira smiled again, but without humor.

  Di Marco nodded. “Do you know what I have learned? I also have learned that you will not harm me.”

  “Yet you weep, my lord.”

  “Ah, but not from fear.”

  “From what, then? We are not enemies, but neither are we friends.” Nadira sat down in a chair, pushed her hair back from her face. Inside her swelled a surge of confidence. She had his heart inside her.

  Di Marco rubbed his face again; the flush of his emotional outburst had faded with the wine. “Nadira, you do not know how remarkable you are. It is true what you say. Once a person has realized his abilities he no longer needs to fear anyone or anything. How long have you been working for someone else? How long have you been giving yourself to another, living in the fear of his favor or disapproval? This key you say I have given you, you have had it all the while but would not see it.”

  Nadira frowned. Di Marco made a short laugh like the crackle of dry leaves. “Even now you listen too closely to my words. Who am I to tell you what is or is not? Do you see what I am saying?”

  Nadira did not like the turn the conversation had taken. She realized the truth in his words, but the weight of the truth was heavy. She shifted in the chair uncomfortably.

  “What say you then, my lord, for I am still waiting to hear why you weep?” Nadira turned the conversation back to Di Marco, as deftly as a return of the ball in a game of toss. Di Marco examined the ring on his small finger.

  “I weep for me, Nadira. I weep for all the hours I spent in the study of philosophy. Those years I spent huddled over dusty scrolls squinting in the feeble light of an oil lamp or tallow candle. All those years have not prepared me for the shock of feeling your mind in my heart.”

  “I pained you, then. Forgive me.”

  “No. On the contrary.” Di Marco opened his mouth to say more, but instead positioned himself in the chair again.

  Nadira sighed. She wanted to go home. If I had a home. Quickly her mind skipped over the leagues she had traveled. Back to Barcelona? To Coix? The tower was gone now. What had happened to master Sofir these long months? Had the Black Friars paid a visit to his house? Nadira knew that the wealthy were the most at risk from the Dominicans. Sofir was an attractive target for their greed. Her mind flew to Montrose, recovering in the small settlement in the valley below the fallen tower, then to William, sitting in a cleric’s cell somewhere. Why isn’t he with Montrose? Di Marco cleared his throat; the sound cracked the image. Nadira brought her eyes back to Di Marco’s face. He was looking at her curiously.

  “Did you hear what I said?”

  “I’m sorry, my lord.”

  “You looked as though you were a thousand leagues away.”

  “I was. Perhaps not a thousand. Is the world that big?”

  “It is many thousands of leagues around. Nadira, I want you to do something for me.”

  Nadira sighed deeply. “Yes, my lord, you and all the others.”

  “You were reading for Monsieur de Salvo, were you not?”

  “I was.”

  “And he paid you how?”

  “With his mercy.”

  “His ‘mercy’? Then he paid you not at all.”

  Nadira wagged her head slowly, “He kept me very well, my lord, and he gave sanctuary to my...” she stopped.

  Di Marco’s eyebrows had gone up, meeting the trim of his cap. “Your…?” he prodded.

  “Never mind. I was satisfied with my compensation.”

  “Would you continue to be satis
fied if I sent you back?”

  Nadira looked at her hands clasped now on the fine table. She had been wringing them without realizing it. “You must know, my lord, that Monsieur Conti is dead. The tower is gone. I saw it torched myself as I was driven away. I cannot go back even should you send me this day.”

  Di Marco poured another cup of wine. “He may not be dead. If he is, however, then to whom do you belong?”

  Nadira stretched her fingers out over the cloth. The urge to twist her fingers had passed. She glanced up at Di Marco again. With a sad smile she remembered the countless times Montrose had said, “She is mine.” They were the first words out of his mouth whenever a man looked at her. “I belong to Montrose, Lord Montrose.” So be it. She said it too.

  “I see. What do you want, Nadira?’

  “What do you want from me?” She countered.

  “I want you to go somewhere for me. Come back and tell me what you saw.”

  “I want my freedom, and passage to Andorra.”

  “You are not my prisoner. I do not have the power to release you. I do have much at my disposal, however, and I am known as a generous man.”

  Nadira rolled her eyes. “Please, my lord, I have little love of gold, for I have seen it used for more ill than good these last few years. Those who possess it worry over it, perform black deeds to keep it, and darker deeds to acquire more of it. My own desires are modest. I dislike being cold and hungry. I dislike fear and uncertainty. Now I am warm and fed and you have satisfied my concerns for my safety.”

  “Do you imply that there is nothing at all you desire, save your freedom and a boat ride?” His lips curled slightly at the corners.

  Nadira opened her mouth to reply in the negative, but a thought intruded before her tongue could speak. She closed her mouth, eyeing Di Marco shrewdly. “There is something.”

  “Speak.”

  “I wish to be reunited with my companions.” Nadira watched his face.