“That was strange, Garreth.” Alisdair set his pack down and rubbed his forehead. Garreth grunted his question and Alisdair answered. “I just saw the lass in my head. Like a wraith.” He crossed himself.
Encouraged, Nadira touched him again, this time with her entire hand.
“Sweet Jesu!” Alisdair cried, both hands on his head. Garreth was in front of him now, very concerned. “It’s the lass again. She’s callin’ me. She says to follow the river upstream. Rob is with her.” He frowned as he took his hands from his hair. “How did she do that?” Both men exchanged looks. Garreth made two horns with his fingers and placed them on his forehead. Nadira laughed. Both men looked up.
“You hear that, lad?” Alisdair slowly turned around, peering into the darkness. “You did, didn’t you?”
Garreth nodded, reaching his hands into the air above his head. Nadira touched one of them; it was snatched back.
“What is happening?” Alisdair cried.
Garreth put his hand to his throat, pointed down to the river and lifted his pack.
“You think so, eh?”
Garreth nodded and turned toward the river.
“Aye, you daft brute.” Alisdair shouldered his pack.
Nadira imagined Montrose’s strong arms and found herself there. “That was easy,” she said.
“And…?” Malcolm asked.
“They will be here by daybreak. How is it that they were so close? How did they know we were here?” Nadira sat up and rubbed her eyes, still dizzy from the potion.
Malcolm tossed a branch into the fire and they all watched the sparks fly up to join the stars. “It seems strange to you now, but in time you won’t even question such things. Let us sleep. Calvin has first watch.” He got up and left the circle of firelight.
William stood as well. “I am so tired, I may fall into the fire and provide the auto da fe I’m sure I deserve…”
“William…” Nadira warned.
“I jest, dear one, I jest.” But Nadira could see his answer was a half-truth. She took his hand and put it to her lips before he pulled away and retreated to his bedding.
Montrose pounded the earth with his fist, “They are safe, they are safe…”
“Yes, my lord, and will be here on the morrow.”
He snatched her up. “And you are here now.”
“I am.”
“Right here.”
“Yes.”
“Not flying about in the dark, haunting the unsuspecting.”
“No, my lord,” she smiled.
“Then I shall kiss you soundly.” And he did. Then he lifted his head so she could see his blue eyes, indigo in the starlight. He whispered, “My love, I so wanted to take you home.”
She whispered back, “I am home.”
THE NECROMANCER’S GRIMOIRE
BOOK TWO OF THE ELYSIUM TEXTS SERIES
ANNMARIE BANKS
KNOX ROBINSON
PUBLISHING
London • New York
“FINALLY, you come before us.”
The voice was soft, yet piercing. Nadira strained her eyes to see the source, but all around her the flickering torches revealed no presence beyond her own. She did not know what was proper in the presence of a priestess. Kneel? Curtsy? She shifted uncomfortably, unable to answer, confused and she admitted to herself, frightened.
“You are smaller than we imagined, yet you are strong of heart and mind. Come forward into the light.” This instruction was accompanied by a flare from the flaming brazier.
Nadira did not hesitate but stepped forward; relieved to be given a command she could easily follow.
After a long silence, punctuated only by the popping and crackling of the fires, a figure stepped out of the shadows and into the light. Nadira knelt and bowed her head, afraid to meet the woman’s eyes. Her bow doubled as an excuse to hide her fear but it was foolish considering to whom she was presented.
“Nadira. You do not escape so easily. Stand and look at me.”
Again, Nadira obeyed. The priestess was tall and slender. Only after the second look did she see the woman’s great age. Her long hair was white, caught in a beautiful deep blue veil that covered her head to foot over a shimmering white stola. Deep wrinkles creased her face, and the hand she extended to Nadira was thin and fragile looking.
Nadira leaned forward to take the hand, which was dry and cool to the touch. She allowed the older woman to lead her up the shallow steps to an opening in the stone wall which had been hidden in the deep shadows.
“Please. Sit here.” The priestess led her to a marble bench, then released her hand. “We have much to talk about and I would have you comfortable.”
She shook her arm and the tinkle of tiny bells echoed in the chamber. Her bracelets summoned a young girl with an ewer and goblets, followed by another with a tray of fruit. The priestess said nothing until the girls had retreated, then she gestured toward the tray.
“Eat and drink while I look at you.”
Nadira was too nervous to be hungry, but there was no thought of disobedience. She plucked a grape with one hand and lifted the goblet with the other. The liquid was sweet, almost cloying, and the grape was sharply tart. Her eyes watered at the contrast. The priestess laughed softly.
“Nadira. A beautiful name. ‘The precious one’. Lovely. You glow with cerulean light, my daughter. A rare precious light. A thousand stones of lapis lazuli could not compete with your radiance. It pleases me so much to have you here and to have the promise of your many years with us.”
Nadira set down her glass. “Many years?” she asked.
The priestess raised an eyebrow. “You have come to stay with us, of course.”
“I came because I was summoned by a beautiful voice in my head. I came because I was brought here by a man I respect and admire. I came because I am curious, and I want answers to my questions. I do not intend to stay beyond my purpose.”
“And you shall not. Though I see your purpose has not yet been revealed to you.”
“I…”
The priestess interrupted, “You believe you are traveling. You think you are passing through. You have an idea of a life with a man,” she paused and her eyes appeared to look inward.
“A dark man,” she smiled. “Handsome and strong.” She frowned. “And damaged. His body and his soul. Violent. Even vicious…”
“Not vicious!” Nadira’s hand flew to her mouth in horror at the rudeness of her interruption. “Not vicious,” she whispered. “ Forgive me,” she mumbled from behind her fingers.
The dark eyes focused on her. “Do you deny his fervent desire for a vengeance even I tremble to describe?”
“No.” Nadira wiped her eyes. “No. He will not release the idea that he must punish his brother’s murderer.”
“Do you deny that this brutality lives in his heart? That it consumes his mind and tears at his soul?”
Nadira blinked, for she could not deny this truth, as much as she wanted it to be false.
The priestess continued, “Do you think that linking your life to the life of this vicious man will not consume your own soul? That you will escape corruption? You must break that bond to save yourself. He is beyond your help. Your ties to him are based on false emotional beliefs.”
Nadira whispered, “No…” She took a few deep breaths to calm herself, but found they only made her lightheaded. The thought of leaving Montrose forever caused a great pain in the center of her body. She put a hand over it, but the pain did not abate.
The voice of the priestess became soft and cajoling.
“Then let us think together, my dear. All the evils of the world are caused by men. The story of Pandora was created by men to deflect the truth. The story of Adam and Eve was created by men to deflect the truth. One does not need a story to see what is clear before one’s own eyes. Who starts the wars that lead to famine, disease and grief? Who takes the lives of young men and boys and puts swords in their hands and orders them to take the lives of other young men and boys? W
ho takes girls from their mothers and forces their legs apart in agonizing subjection? Will you answer that it is women who perform these evils?”
Nadira could not respond. The images the priestess evoked twisted her heart and clutched at her throat.
“Who enslaves the ‘other’?” the priestess continued. “Who preaches from the churches that innocent people do not deserve to live and must be cleansed from the earth like rats? Do women go house to house and demand poor peasants give up their few coins in the name of the king, or take their stored food and leave whole families to starve even though they worked day and night all summer in preparation for the icy blasts of winter? I ask you. Do you see women with long hair and flowing gowns baking bread that is full of sawdust, selling sacks of rotting vegetables to the unsuspecting? Stealing, raping, beating…”
“Stop. Please stop.” Nadira wept, thinking of Alisdair and his laughter, Garreth and his strong arms, William’s soft eyes and gentle voice. She met the priestess’ gaze. “Not all men…”
“No. And there are evil women, too. I have met them, I know. But we are talking about all of this world. Not one individual or another. Men cause the suffering we try to ease. You cannot be the servant of a man, a violent man, and be a priestess. It is impossible.”
Nadira closed her eyes. How could I have not seen this coming? Because I saw myself as the wife of a man, with the duties of a wife. That is why. She opened her eyes.
“I did not think I was to be a priestess,” she said truthfully.
“I know.”
“I thought I was coming here to learn, to be taught. To finally understand what the Book was trying to tell me.”
“And you will. But first you must be rid of this man.”
Nadira clutched her throat and the tears came again. “I cannot.”
“Do you not carry a great secret?”
She sniffed, “What?”
“Do you not know exactly what this man needs to ease his pain, yet you withhold it?”
“Ah. Yes.” Nadira blinked her tears away. “I will never tell him. Never.”
“Why? You are his woman? Then he owns you. You break the bond of man and wife by withholding this knowledge.” The priestess turned her head with a sly smile. “You defy your own logic.”
“I…I am not his wife, exactly. I am his, uh…well…I am his…”
The priestess pointed a long finger at her.
“Exactly. You are ‘his’, as he is so fond of explaining endlessly to all who will listen, but he has not claimed you as other men do their women.”
Her eyes became far away again.
“He has not pierced you with his body and forced his seed within you.”
Her face twisted with puzzlement.
“He desires your body as fiercely as he desires vengeance, but has shown remarkable self-control.” She raised her eyebrows.
“And you have desired to have this man’s body be joined with yours…”
Nadira felt her face get hot and she fidgeted on the cool bench, wondering just what exactly the priestess was seeing and in what detail.
“…but both of you have denied the yearning of your flesh. Why?” The priestess turned questioning eyes upon her and they demanded an answer.
Nadira met her gaze.
“He will not take my body. He fears my death. I will not take his body, for I will not torment him with his fear. I will say to you, now, that I know I will not become with child unless it suits me, and I know I will not perish bringing it into the world. He will not hear these truths, though. His fear screams too loudly in his ears.”
“Remarkable.” She turned her head away and frowned. “He will die in agony…”
“No!” Nadira leapt to her feet. “No prophecies! Please! Please, no…” She fell to the floor and covered her ears, but the priestess’ voice was inside her now.
“Let me finish, girl. He will die in agony if he is not released. He will destroy himself from within if not joined with you. Is one man’s life worth all the goodness you could do with your own?”
Nadira rolled herself over on the stone floor and gazed with exhausted resignation at the dark ceiling.
“Can we not do both?” she sighed. “Is there no compromise? Why must it be one or the other? Surely there are priests who have concubines in their chambers. Cannot a priestess have her own? Are men the only ones who are permitted some comfort in the night? If all things are possible, why must we follow rules blindly?”
The last word echoed off the walls and faded to silence. Nadira closed her eyes and breathed the perfumed air into her body. She did not expect an answer from the priestess. She was too busy asking herself what it was she really wanted. Do I give up my love and my friends to focus my life on the pursuit of knowledge? Do I return to the world of violence and greed to exist as a servant to others? Even as a free woman I would be servant to customers. As a wife to a man, as mother to a child. There is no true freedom outside these walls.
Her reverie was broken by the soft laugh of the priestess.
“’Cannot a priestess have her own?’” She laughed again, harder this time. “In all my years no novice, no acolyte, nor priestess, has ever suggested she needed a kept-man in her quarters. Never.”
Nadira sighed again and shook her head.
“It has happened now.”
“Yes. And I have an answer for you. No man may stay in the temple, for it is certain the women and girls will fear him. But this does not mean that he cannot be kept in the city.”
She extended a hand to help Nadira to her feet.
“You know that he will not stay with you until his enemy is dead.” Nadira nodded, reluctantly acknowledging the truth.
The priestess continued, “Tell him, or not. The decision is yours. You can do remarkable things, Nadira the Precious One. But you cannot turn a wolf into a lap dog.”
“No. Indeed, I cannot.”
“This small brown one, however.” The priestess paused. “This one…he is yours as much as the tall dark one. He is a lap dog that you are turning into a wolf. He loves you and cannot have you. He takes risks and his soul becomes darker with his need and frustration,” she smiled, “ yet he will not place his seed inside you either. What is it with you, Precious One, that these men withhold their manly desires when you are present?”
Nadira struggled with an answer before she realized the older woman was teasing her. She let her breath out slowly. “Please, it is no laughing matter to either of them.”
“No. Forgive me. I see the scars on the back of the brown one, the scars on the soul of the dark one. It is no laughing matter. But I will tell you that I have never seen this before, and I have lived nearly ninety years. I have never seen men deny themselves a thing that they wanted. In this world, men struggle to take what they want. They lie, murder and steal to get it. Those that don’t get their desire regret that they have been bested by others and mete out their anger and frustration on the weak and innocent. This is what I have seen. You come here to learn the knowledge of the ancients, Precious One, and on your first day you teach the ancient one a new lesson. Go now. Come back on the morrow. Come back. We will share what we know. Both of us.”
When she emerged from the cave entrance, Garreth stood and held a hand out to her. He smiled.
Nadira took his hand and he led her down the path to the sea and along the shore back to the city. As they walked in silence she looked up at him. He had aged more than the others since Richard’s death. Gray hairs were entwined in his golden braid that hung down his back to his belt. Deep wrinkles creased his eyes and the skin on his arms was no longer tight, but seemed to cover his flesh like a loose tunic.
She could not look at him and think of the evils of the world. His body was still hard and strong, his pace steady and a bit too fast for her. She trotted along beside him until the sounds of her panting slowed him out of courtesy. He looked down at her and grinned, pointing to the buildings in the distance.
“Yes. I am
eager to get there, too.”
He pointed back toward the cave and raised his eyebrows.
“I met with her. It is good.”
He nodded and turned his attention to the path on the rocky beach. Those few words were enough for him. He was not a man of complicated ideas. Nadira squeezed his hand with affection and was rewarded with a smile and a grunt.
Montrose was alone in the room when Garreth pushed the door open for her. He was sitting on the low stool, his weapons laid out in a series of shining lines on the bed beside him. It was warm in the room and he had removed his shirt, it lay folded neatly beside his horn cup on the table.
He had a soft cloth in his hand and was rubbing the steel of his broadsword that lay across both knees with a mixture of olive oil and beeswax he had melted together. The sweet honey scent permeated the room.
He looked up as she entered and gave her a soft smile in greeting, but did not cease the back and forth motion of his hands.
Nadira could see the evil of the world here, in her own room, and wondered at it.
“Did you meet with her?” His voice was low and deep, slow and steady. He did not look up for her answers, concentrating his cloth on the joints of the steel where the hilt joined the blade.
“I did.”
He glanced up for a moment, the blue eyes merry, the black lashes framing them in peace now. He was happy. This work with the instruments of death gave him peace. Nadira wondered at such a thing. He returned to his polishing, turning the blade to work on the other side. He dipped his cloth in the small bowl beside him.
“Did she love you at first sight, as I did?”
Nadira laughed softly. “She did.”
“I had no doubt.”
She watched him work for a long moment. The warm Mediterranean sun had bronzed him about his shoulders. The muscles of his arms and back moved to and fro with his work. The dark curling hairs of his chest and arms glistened with the heat and with his labor.
Nadira lowered herself to the other stool and rested her chin on her hands, elbows on her knees. She smiled as he pushed a lock of hair up and over his forehead; it immediately fell back over his eyes. He made a grim line with his mouth.
The Hermetica of Elysium (Elysium Texts Series) Page 34