The Shape of Rain

by Michael B. Koep

  Drowse still fogs Astrid’s periphery, but she steps back and nods to Howard. “Of course. Please come in.”

  The old man wheels into her chamber and positions himself across from two leather armchairs. Astrid closes the door and joins him.

  “May I offer you—”

  “Please, nothing for me,” Howard interrupts. “As I’ve said, it is likely we won’t have much time. There’s little that goes unseen under this roof—and I’m quite sure that my visit is perhaps not completely secret. Whether anyone will mind our speaking together, I do not know. Nevertheless, I felt I should take the chance.”

  Astrid attempts to focus by blinking her eyes. She waits.

  “What I’m about to share is between you and me. As far as I know, no one has yet discovered—” he breaks off. His heavy lids blink three times. He starts again. “You have found yourself in the whirlpool—in the Center. I would imagine you’re feeling the vertigo?”

  Astrid nods and appreciates his simple tone and genuine demeanor. She intuitively feels at ease with this new acquaintance. “I’ve spent my life studying and searching for the stuff of myth—and I—I found it. The past couple of days are beyond rational explanation.”

  “And shall continue to be,” Howard smiles. “Yes. Yes. I’ve had a similar shock—many years ago, of course. It landed me in this chair.” He grips the sides of the wheels and glances at his motionless legs. “I looked at a piece of art not meant for me—or anyone—then everything was different. So very different.”

  Astrid looks at her hands in her lap. “Everything was different,” she echoes. “I’ve done something similar—I’ve looked at Loche’s Journal. Another art piece that has changed—”

  “Yes,” Howard nods, “I’ve read the Journal, too. Which brings me to why I’ve come.” He stares at her for a moment. “I’ve read your books.” She is about to reply with her usual, Oh, those things, but she holds her breath instead. “I’ve read your books… and they are wonderful, if you ask me,” he says. “Professor, I’ve come to speak with you about your books. Since my accident with Basil’s painting and the condition it has left me in, I’ve spent all of my time exploring and fact-finding to learn about my son Basil, his gift, his place in this world and his relation to the mythic audience that surround us all. Loche’s depiction of my research and findings in the Journal is accurate to a point. Accurate as far as his story can tell. Yet, for all of his divine talent, the story he has made is making itself.”

  The pit of Astrid’s stomach clenches. Worry and fear pour into her bloodstream. The feeling she has tried to explain to Albion and Marcel when she thinks about how the past shifts—how new memories form from out of a void of nothingness.

  “Your books,” Howard says, “I read some time ago.” He pauses and looks away. His expression reads as if he is deciding if he should jump into a cold lake or simply turn and walk away. “Your books I read a few years ago—but your books have only just appeared in my memory. Today! When I heard you were here, Professor Finnley. If I concentrate I can track other changes in my memory’s timeline. I don’t know why I’m able to do this and others are not—notably Albion Ravistelle and others. Maybe it’s because of my experience within the Center that left me crippled. Maybe because Loche wanted me to see. I don’t know.”

  Astrid reaches her hand out and rests it on the man’s knee. “I can somehow feel the same things. As if the past is changing—and when it does there is a brief time when the change can be seen or felt. A profound sadness or worry—”

  Emphatic nods from Howard. “Yes,” he agrees.

  “—like something incredibly important you failed to see, or forgot or were unable to understand—then suddenly—it’s clearly before you. Wyn Avuqua was like that. Discovering it.”

  More enthusiastic acknowledgment. “Your books…”

  “My books?” Astrid says, “You keep saying.”

  “Your books have changed, too.” With a wave of his hand gesturing to the ancient book upon the table, he says, “And I would expect the Toele has amended as well.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “For me, this knowing lasts for a brief time before it slips into memory and the feelings of worry we’ve described. I’ve even written journal entries of my own only to find them slightly changed days later.” He stops, scratches his head and puzzles for a few seconds. “Or, goddamit, at least I think they’ve changed. Clarity is dependent upon reference frames…reference frames, some relativity and a goddamn stiff drink!”

  “What about the changes in the texts?”

  “Professor?” he asks. “Do you recall writing about the death of an innocent at Wyn Avuqua before the city fell?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The killing of the One God, Thi before the gates of the city?”

  Confusion squeezes Astrid’s forehead. “No. In all of my research I’ve never—” An avalanche of fear crashes into her abdomen. “I don’t remember the…” But she does remember.

  The boy god. The Queen of the city dismembers the innocent boy to buy peace with the Godrethion horde, only to be betrayed.

  Howard watches her. His face seems to mirror the shock of her own revelation—her own discovery.

  “Hold on to it,” Howard offers, “it can slowly slip into memory—as if it has been there since the moment Loche’s timeline placed it.”

  She inhales the cool atmosphere of the chamber—the scented candle wax, the smell of the old tapestries, the taste of anxiety. Howard digs into his document bag, produces one of Astrid’s books and holds it up. Astrid raises her hand and lets the pads of her fingers touch the cover. She traces the shape of the pyramid below her name. She remembers the section about the boy god, the killing, the bloody aftermath. Like a déjà vu—like a fading dream after waking—like a forgotten thought pressed back into the subconscious, she teeters on a line between memory and discovery.

  “Oh God,” she whispers.

  “Precisely,” Howard replies grimly.

  “The boy god.” She lowers her hand. “The boy god is Aethur’s son. Thi is Loche Newirth’s son.”

  The Death Mask: Ithicsazj

  1010 A.D.

  The Realm of Wyn Avuqua

  He is dragged from his cell. He is wrestled and shoved along a high battlement. When he resists, he is struck. When he falls he is kicked until he stands. He is pulled and pushed up a coiling stair, shoved through a door and out onto a high parapet overlooking the eastern field. Guards chain his ankle to a brick pillar to keep him from jumping to his own death. They leave him there alone. He hears the gears of the door lock bolt.

  A freezing rain falls, turning to snow. He does not raise his hood.

  Below, between the city wall and the distant tree-line, a small stage has been constructed. It is blanketed with snow. Upon it is a long, butcher block of a table, and three men in sable cloaks, each holding different weapons. Beyond, issuing from out of the trees like blood from a wound flows a Godrethion throng of some five hundred soldiers. Their banners hang lifeless in the cold. They form a line a stone’s throw from the sacrificial dais. Cynthia is at their center upon a high wagon. Beside her is Erinyes and Etheldred.

  From out of the gates of the city to meet them rides Vincale, leading a force of Itonalya on horseback. They position themselves in a formation on the opposite side of the stage leaving an aisle open to the gate behind them.

  Loche’s hands shake uncontrollably. He tries to see Edwin’s face in his mind. He struggles to hear his voice.

  “Are you almost finished with your book, Dad? Are we still writing the good stories?”

  “Yes, Edwin. We are still writing the good stories.”

  “Will you be at Heaven when I go there?”

  “Yes, I will find you there.”

  “How do you know? How do you know you’ll find me?”

  “Because I am your Dad. I will always find you.”

  “I don’t want to go, Dad. I want to stay with you
. With you and Mom.”

  “I know, Bug.”

  “If I go, will you come and find me?”

  “I will always come to find you.”

  Far to his right he can see another high parapet and two figures waving to him. It is difficult to see through the weather, but it is apparent that it is William Greenhame and Julia Iris. He does not wave back.

  A horn sounds. A fully armored Queen Yafarra exits the city and starts down the narrow aisle toward the stage, holding the hand of a tiny figure—a boy—a child—Edwin Newirth. The boy’s stride seems unbalanced and confused. Loche notes a slight stagger. Behind them trails Lornensha. She is carrying a basket of what looks like plants and herbs.

  Loche feels his hands gripping his own head. His finger tips digging into his scalp. Cold rain and snow blow into his wide, horrified eyes. His mouth forming the word “No,” over and over but without voice.

  The three climb the short stair to the stage. The boy turns in circles, taking in the massive audience. Loche can see the Ithicsazj mask glowing pale like a dead face in the winter gloom. He remembers Vincale describing the sedative qualities of the mask.

  Yafarra leans down to the boy as if to speak. She then points in the direction of Loche’s parapet, and the boy waves. Loche’s hand rises. He cannot breathe.

  “Oh sweet mercy,” his lips move, but no sound.

  “No. No. No.”

  The Queen lifts the child onto the table and turns to receive a long handled axe.

  “Stop. Stop. Stop.” Loche can hear his whispering mouth now. “Please, God. Stop.”

  For a long moment Yafarra stares at the sacrificial innocent upon the table. Her white and gold cloak glowing in the gloom. With one last turn to face the father, she whirls and the axe arcs overhead. The head of the small boy is cut from the body and it drops into a basket. An instant later, the crack of the cleaving blade through the spine to the thick table reaches Loche’s ears. Clop.

  What follows is deafness. Loche can feel a tearing, seething pain in his throat. He is screaming. His chest cavity convulses as every living cell within him struggles to understand what he has seen. When he collapses and his mind gives way he rolls over onto his back. His lungs slowly, reluctantly suck at the grey November air. All above is a blur of silver streaks. He tries to trace single drops of rain from their highest slipping point in Heaven until the sockets of his open eyes are filled like pools—as if he were a drowning god peeking up toward home from beneath the clear waters of a lake.

  The Map To Heaven

  November 15, this year

  Venice, Italy

  10:10 pm CEST

  Tears flood Howard’s eyes. “What? How can that be?”

  The sequence of happenings ticks through Astrid’s mind. “You have heard that Wyn Avuqua has been found?”

  “I have. Albion told me.”

  “There is an archeologist. Tall. Thin. His name is Graham—”

  “Graham Cremo,” Howard says. “Yes, he is here, too.”

  “Is he alright? He was shot—”

  “By that bastard Rearden…” Howard says. “I don’t know Mr. Cremo’s condition, Astrid. I’m sorry. But I do know he is under the care of Dr. Catena.”

  Her own rush of tears begins. She shakes it off.

  “I have read of Dr. Catena,” she says.

  “Yes.” His voice drops to a near whisper. “A talent beyond talents, if you ask me. He has developed a path to cure illness. All illness. I don’t know enough—but I understand that in his laboratory he has taken an ancient root or plant and has cultivated it into—well—the Tree of Life. They are calling it The Melgia Gene.”

  Astrid’s jaw slowly drops.

  Howard continues, “A truly remarkable thing, if you ask me. With more research, Albion and Catena will be able to give the gift that was once reserved only for the gods. The gift of immortality.”

  “Thus,” Astrid says, “Albion’s Heaven on Earth.”

  “So it would seem,” Howard says. “Somehow I don’t think it will be that simple. But with immortals, they tend to find solutions where mortals leave problems for their children—and on and on…”

  Astrid lines up what she knows and tries to order it into understanding. She does the arithmetic. She feels her eyebrows scrunch together.

  “Have you heard the Prophecy has been found?”

  “Yes.”

  “Have you seen it, yet?”

  Howard shakes his head. “No.”

  “Do you know that Queen Yafarra is here in Albion’s House?”

  “I have heard that, yes. But I don’t understand how—” Howard stops speaking as he watches Astrid try to weave a lifeline to throw out to him.

  “I was there when Yafarra was discovered—inside the sarcophagus. There is no record of how or why she was put there…”

  “No record, yet…” Howard says. His tone is dark.

  “Yes,” Astrid says, reluctant to fully agree. “But within the tomb, just as we were expecting, was the Prophecy.”

  “And…” Howard says glancing at his watch.

  “The preserved book is a red spiral notebook like one a middle school student would use—the Red Notebook, it’s called.”

  Howard gapes.

  “Aethur is Loche Newirth. He was there—or he is still there. And his son was the innocent—the Red Notebook must speak of these things…”

  “And to fill in a blank or two: Albion and the others will not allow anyone to read—”

  “That’s correct,” Astrid finishes. “There is a fear it will again twist the story further.”

  “As if we need more of that,” the old man says to himself. “Professor Finnley, our conversation must come to a close. Time is short—and I’m sure it is already known throughout the house that we are together.” Concern rises in Astrid’s expression—Howard eases it with a kind touch to her upper arm. “Ah, don’t worry. When you live in a house with immortals it takes a little time to learn that their fears and senses of urgency are quite different than ours. They do not see change as we do. They are more apt to allow you to do what you want so they might slowly craft a future to house it. It is said that the only way they change is because we do. We cause the waves, they command the tides.”

  “And who rules the oceans, I wonder?”

  Howard grins. “Loche Newirth, it would seem.”

  He twists in his chair and digs into his document bag again. “But being under this roof doesn’t mean you should not be careful. Simply be as true as you can. Truth outlasts everything—or so they say. Before I go, take these.” He hands her a rolled piece of parchment and a light rectangular object swathed in a black velvet bag. “Inside the bag—you can guess. It is one of Basil’s paintings. There is rumor that something is changing within his art. The Centers are closing. Of course there are a great many paintings—and many are still devastatingly powerful. This one’s window is fully open.” He touches her arm again. “You will not lose your mind looking upon it,” he smiles. “This one Basil made for me years ago. It will take you there and return you—but what you’ll see, I cannot say for sure.” He points to the scroll. “And this—this is a map of Albion’s House. I believe he himself drew it. You can find your way around—”

  “I get the feeling Albion would not want me wandering his halls,” she says setting both of the items down on the table between them.

  “You’re probably right. But as I said, what you do he will watch and react to—and he’s likely already planning what you’ll do before you’ve even thought of it. The fellow is over one-thousand-years-old. He has a knack for forethought. And he’s not afraid of anything.” Howard shrugs, “Not afraid of anything that I’m aware of anyway.”

  “Why are you giving these to me?” Astrid asks.

  A light glints in the old man’s eyes. “So you can continue your search—so you can continue searching for what has haunted you your entire life.”

  Howard turns his chair abruptly to the door and rolls tow
ard it. She follows him.

  “Will I see you again tomorrow? I have more questions…”

  He looks up at her. “You’ll see everything tomorrow—and nothing. Tomorrow is the Masque. Tomorrow the wheels will be set in motion for a new world, or what Albion calls his New Earth. All will don masks.” He frowns looking at the door. Astrid opens it and he wheels out into the hall. His chair spins and he faces her. “Good night, Professor. May your search continue. What will you find, I wonder?”

  Astrid closes the door.

  She returns to her chair and stares at the black velvet bag containing the answer to every question she has ever had; beside it, an aged piece of rolled parchment—a map—a map of Albion’s House.

  She grasps the rolled paper and unknots the leather tie. Dropping to her knees she spreads the map out on the wood floor. She scans the staircases, the connecting corridors, the lobbies and chambers both secret and open. There are rooms hidden within rooms, parlors deep below the Sun Room and tunnels leading out of the House beneath the canals to the West and East. When her eyes find Dr. Catena’s laboratories, her index finger begins to draw a path back to her room. She plots her course to Graham Cremo. She stands, grabs her bag and steps out into the dark hallway. Looking back she notices the black bag with all the answers inside of it still sitting on the table. The door latch clicks shut as she turns toward the first staircase—toward Graham—toward what has haunted her her entire life.

  The Seige of Wyn Avuqua

  1010 A.D.

  The Realm of Wyn Avuqua

  “I’ve got you!” a woman’s voice keeps saying over and over. “I’ve got you!” Her face is familiar. Loche has been staring at her for some time now, maybe five or ten minutes. She was the first through the parapet door after he heard the tumblers turn. Behind followed a rather tall man, mid to late thirties, though, something about him seemed far older. His hair is dark and shoulder length. A weighted worry shadowing his face. The two kneel beside him. She cradles his head. The man stares. He is crying, but strangely in control.