by Dyrk Ashton
PATERNUS
Dyrk Ashton
Paternus Books Media
Paternus is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination and are used fictitiously. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is entirely coincidental.
2016 Paternus Books Media Trade Paperback Edition
Copyright © 2015 by Dyrk Ashton.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
Paternus Books Media, DBA
P.O. Box 1027
Perrysburg, OH 43551
www.paternusbooks.com
Paternus/ Dyrk Ashton.—1st ed.
ISBN 978-0-9971737-0-3
Book Layout ©2013 BookDesignTemplates.com
Cover Art: Lin Hsiang
Cover Design: Brie Rapp
Author’s Photographs: Lee Fearnside
To:
Richard & Harriette Ashton
Nelson Sr. & Alice Campbell
Ralph & Maggie Ashton
And
Tom Oldham
“I seem to remember someone very close to me,
and wise, or so I thought, once telling me—”
“—anything is possible.”
CONTENTS
Prologue
PART ONE
Flowers & Figs
Kabir
Obsidian
Mendip Hills
Order of the Bull
Flowers & Figs 2
Order of the Bull 2
Flowers & Figs 3
Order of the Bull 3
Flowers & Figs 4
Order of the Bull 4
Flowers & Figs 5
Order of the Bull 5
Flowers & Figs 6
Order of the Bull 6
PART TWO
Il Capro
Flowers & Figs 7
Mendip Hills 2
Flowers & Figs 8
Mendip Hills 3
Flowers & Figs 9
Mendip Hills 4
Flowers & Figs 10
Mendip Hills 5
PART THREE
Flowers & Figs 11
Flowers & Figs 12
Flowers & Figs 13
Flowers & Figs 14
Flowers & Figs 15
Flowers & Figs 16
Flowers & Figs 17
Mendip Hills 6
Flowers & Figs 18
Epilogues
Acknowledgments
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About the Author
PATERNUS
Prologue
“Humankind has had its groundbreaking discoveries, mighty wars, great nations and saviors’ births by which you mark your timelines of history. We Firstborn have also seen events that might seem resounding and important, and they were. Earthquakes that tore continents apart, volcanic eruptions and meteor strikes that shook the world and turned day into everlasting night. We have endured bitter glacial periods, mass extinctions and wars countable only by Father himself. Grand civilizations have risen, prospered for millennia then crumbled to dust. And yet, even the eldest among us gauge our lives in relation to four major occurrences: The Cataclysm, The First and Second Holocausts, as well as, of course, The Deluge.
“Now, my children, if any of us survive, there will be this.”
* * *
The stories told here all begin today, at the same time on the same day in late September. Odd as it may seem, the eastern-to-middle portion of the United States and the Amazon jungle of western Brazil are in the same time zone. England is five hours ahead, and the eastern Anatolia region of Turkey is seven hours ahead.
* * *
Parvulus: n. human [negative; derogatory]. pl. parvuli.
Mtoto: n. human [neutral; affectionate]. pl. watoto.
PART ONE
CHAPTER ONE
Flowers & Figs
Blue-silver moonlight bathes slate rooftops of aging Victorian and Edwardian homes in the Old West End, a neighborhood near downtown Toledo, Ohio. Neglected maples and oaks line streets of cracked asphalt like weary crooked sentinels, nudging up worn flagstone sidewalks with their roots—which doesn’t help Fiona Megan Patterson because she’s clumsy, and tonight she’s mad as hell.
It’s just after midnight and Fi is walking home. The walk of shame. Or at least it would be if she’d actually had sex tonight. Fi will be 18 in a month and after countless nights of wistful yearning she thought tonight would be the night—her first time.
It started out well enough, an impromptu date after work with the quiet yet affable, disheveled but incredibly handsome Zeke Prisco, a guy who works at St. Augustine’s Hospital where she has an internship. They had a pleasant dinner, then retired to his small but cozy (in a bohemian sort of way) attic apartment. A couple glasses of wine helped her relax. They made out on the couch, and when she thought the moment was right, buzzing with anticipation at the heat and tingling thrill of his closeness, she took off her shirt. Half naked and vulnerable, she leaned in for another kiss—but he pulled away and started mumbling about the time, that it was late and they both had to work tomorrow. She was too embarrassed to argue. She tugged her shirt back on (backwards, so she had to awkwardly spin it around). He offered to walk her home, insisted when she declined, but she insisted right back.
Possible explanations whirl through her mind. Maybe Zeke was even more nervous than she was. But he’s been with a zillion girls, has to have been! Why not me?! Maybe he was worried because he’s older, 22, and she’s legally underage. Maybe the bottle and a half of wine he put away all by himself rendered him incapable of doing the deed. It could be he just doesn’t like her that way. Or, Fi groans inwardly, I’m not pretty enough...
She tucks her thumbs in the straps of her backpack and scowls at the sidewalk. What am I so upset about, anyway?, she scolds herself. She and Zeke have only been out a couple of times, and it isn’t like she’s looking for a serious relationship. Who has time for that?!
Sure, Zeke’s ridiculously good looking. And talented. When he plays the guitar, everybody melts. That’s what he does at the hospital for extra money while he’s in college, play for the old folks. He actually went to Julliard on a scholarship right out of high school, though he dropped out halfway through first year to take care of his foster mother when she was diagnosed with cancer (he is definitely sweet), and never went back after she passed away.
An uncanny feeling she’s being watched suddenly creeps over her. She halts, glances behind her, scrutinizes shadows of trees and shrubs, between parked cars and homes on both sides of the street, listens to the sounds of distant traffic, leaves shuffling in the breeze, the yowl of cats brawling down the block. Then she looks up and catches sight of the brightest full moon she’s ever seen. It stalks her from beyond the trees as she proceeds along the sidewalk, peeking around maple branches, sneaking behind curtains of red-brown oak leaves. Like a bright white donut hole stuck splat in black pudding, she muses in momentary distraction, with a corona of powdered sugar. The shadows it casts are jet black with edges crisp as the late September air and fallen leaves that crunch underfoot. She breathes in the clean leafy scent of autumn. It smells wonderful, but does nothing to improve her mood. She almost trips over the crappy sidewalk—again. Dammit!
So here she is, frustrated, bewildered, ashamed, more than a
little pissed off, and now she has to go home and face her Uncle Edgar. He expected her shortly after 8 PM when she got off work, but she couldn’t bring herself to call and let him know she’d be late and hear the disappointment in his voice, thinly veiled by his ever-present and infuriating stoicism, so she sent him a text. He didn’t respond, but that’s no surprise. She doesn’t think he knows how to read a text, let alone send one, though she’s shown him how at least a dozen times. She guesses he’s somewhere in his sixties or seventies (he’ll never tell), but it isn’t his age that makes him technologically averse—it’s his inability to accept change—his steadfast, quintessential Englishness.
Normally Edgar goes to bed at precisely 9 PM, but tonight he’ll be waiting up, sitting in the living room (the “parlor,” as he calls it), reading by candlelight like he always does, no matter how many times she’s told him it’ll ruin his eyes. And he’ll be reading the Bible, in Latin or Greek, no less.
She approaches the dilapidated building that slouches at the back of her uncle’s corner property. It was once a carriage house, back when the house was built in the early 1900s, then used as a garage. Now it’s collapsed in the middle and leaning in on itself from both ends. It has a melancholic feel of abandonment, but that’s precisely why it was one of her favorite places to hide away in, read, and indulge childhood fantasies when she was younger, having been more than a little melancholic herself much of the time after her mother died.
She’s just past the building and angling off the sidewalk to the back yard when the sound of footsteps running up behind her causes her to whip around in alarm.
“Fi!”
She recognizes the voice, and in the light of the moon and a nearby streetlamp, the handsome features and slim figure of a young man dressed in jeans and button down shirt under a denim jacket. “Zeke?”
“Fi! Yeah, hey!” He doubles over, breathing hard and clutching at a stitch in his side.
“What are you doing here?”
“Whew! I need to get more exercise,” he gasps. “Ugh... and not drink so much wine.” He swallows hard and his eyes go wide. Clapping a hand over his mouth, he points in an indication for her to wait, then bolts to the corner of the carriage house and pukes.
Fi looks on in disbelief. “Zeke, are you alright?”
“Oh yeah, no worries,” he gulps, wiping his mouth on his sleeve. “Much better now. Sorry about that.”
He combs his fingers through his hair—dark brown, wavy and full, long enough to flow down over his collar. Once. Twice. A habit that never fails to make Fi catch her breath. Even now, it’s almost enough to make her forget he totally rejected her less than an hour ago and just barfed on her uncle’s garage.
“I’m glad I caught you before you got home,” he says, then nods over her shoulder. “Is that your house?”
Fi turns to view the narrow yard with its withering lilac bushes, untrimmed forsythia hedge along the sidewalk, and uneven stone walkway that leads from the carriage house to the back of the hulking three-story Edwardian home with flaking blue paint.
“Yeah,” she answers. “My uncle’s house.”
“I guess I caught you just in time.” He offers a small smile. “I thought I was going to have to knock on every door in the neighborhood.”
Fi grimaces. This is awkward enough, but Zeke showing up at the door would have been worse. She hasn’t told Edgar about him, and hadn’t planned to anytime soon.
“Why are you here?” she asks.
Again with the fingers through the hair. “I just couldn’t leave things the way we left it. The way I left it.”
When Fi finds herself in tense situations, she goes into default mode—hide her true feelings, smooth things over. This definitely qualifies. “It’s fine, Zeke, really.”
“No, Fi, it’s not.” He takes a step closer—and freezes at the sound of a low menacing growl.
An enormous dog stalks from the shadows of the hedge, hackles up, head held low, teeth bared in a vicious snarl, eyes gleaming with predatory intent. Zeke’s skin goes tight and clammy.
“Mol!” The dog halts. Fi has one hand on her hip while pointing at the beast with the other. “What are you doing out here?”
Warm relief floods over Zeke, but he remains very still. “That’s your dog?”
“My uncle’s dog,” Fi corrects.
“You told me he was big, but, Jesus...”
“Some of the largest breeds can reach 250 pounds.” Fi winces, feeling like she’s just channeled her uncle. Edgar’s always quick with a random fact—especially when you don’t ask for it—drawn from his seemingly unlimited supply of eccentric knowledge. She finishes the statement as if in apology. “He’s only 210.”
“Only...” Zeke responds. He studies the dog. Thick and incredibly muscular, with longish golden-brown hair and a giant pit-bullish head. “Maul. That’s appropriate. I’ll bet he can do some ‘mauling.’”
“It’s M.o.l., not M.a.u.l.”
“Oh! Like Molossus, the ancient Greek war dogs? Cool!”
Mol tilts his massive head inquisitively.
Fi smirks. Of course Zeke knows that sort of thing. In addition to being good-looking, talented and sweet, he’s smart, too. After his foster mother died, he spent three months in South America doing volunteer work, just to get away and clear his head, then another three in Africa (so he’s handsome, talented, sweet, smart, and a humanitarian). When he returned he went back to school and has almost completed a general studies degree with concentrations in history, literature and philosophy already. He’ll graduate after Spring semester and has a chance at an assistantship for grad school at Harvard, of all places. He’d wanted to go for their Folklore and Mythology undergrad but he couldn’t afford it, just like he never could have gone to Julliard without a scholarship, but now there’s a competition he’s been taking part in and the winner will have their tuition and fees paid for. As a finalist, he has to deliver a paper at a conference in Atlanta on Tuesday. Some kind of comparative analysis of Korean and Norse mythologies. He told her “the similarities are striking for such distant and disparate cultures, so I’m proposing they share certain mythemes that go back much further than anyone previously considered”—and at that point he quit explaining because Fi’s eyes had glazed over. Whether it was because of the subject matter or that she was mesmerized by his pretty face, she wasn’t sure. Probably both. His goal is a PhD in Philology, whatever that is. He’d be taking classes in classical archaeology, classical philosophy, and ancient history. And mythology, of course. Mythology is Zeke’s thing. He and Edgar would probably get along great, Fi thinks, considering their shared interest in all things old and irrelevant. Another reason not to introduce them.
“The Molossus are extinct, though,” Zeke continues, still watching Mol. “He looks kind of like a Great Pyrenees, but... some kind of Mastiff mix?”
“He’s a mutt.”
Now Mol tilts at her.
“Am I safe?” Zeke asks. “I mean, is he dangerous?”
Fi snorts, “Mol?” She pats her thigh. “Here Mol! Come on boy!” The dog grunts and sits in the grass. Fi shrugs. “He isn’t overly friendly, but he’s a big baby.” Mol groans and lies down with his head on his paws. “I think he’s still mad at me for riding him around like a pony when I was little.” Fi snaps her fingers and points at the house. “Mol! You get home, right now!” He pays no attention, rolling his big brown eyes to gaze at Zeke instead. Fi huffs, “Like I said, he’s my uncle’s dog.”
Keeping an eye out for any reaction from Mol, Zeke takes a tentative step toward Fi. Once fairly certain he isn’t going to be eaten, he says, “Fi, I—”
“Zeke,” she interrupts, “it’s okay.” Of course it isn’t, but she really doesn’t like uncomfortable conversations of any kind. Especially heart-to-hearts. Or—gulp—breakups. Her mind races recklessly, as it often does. Even if she did want a relationship with Zeke—which she doesn’t—she wouldn’t know what to do in one anyway! She hasn’t had
the best of role models. Her father left her mom before Fi was born and her Uncle Edgar has never been married, and he certainly doesn’t date. The only woman Fi’s had in her life since her mother died is Mrs. Mirskaya, the brusque Russian immigrant widow who babysat Fi for much of her youth, and whom Fi worked for at her Russian store through most of junior high and high school. Not the kind of person Fi can talk to about boys. Besides, relationship-equals-vulnerability-equals-heartbreak. Fi’s had enough of that in her life, thank you very much!
But who am I kidding?! I’ve got nothing to worry about! Zeke can have any girl he wants. Any woman he wants. He’s brilliant, talented, focused, driven—everything Fi’s damn sure she isn’t. All they really have in common is they’re both busy all the time, they’re both “only children,” having no brothers or sisters, and they both lost their parents when they were young. His died in a fire when he was a baby, Fi’s mom in a plane crash when Fi was seven. That could be why they bonded in the first place. The shared tragedies, that they’re both orphans. Well, at least she thought they’d bonded!
Zeke wishes Fi would listen, and look at him with those beautiful green eyes of hers. He watches her hand go anxiously to her lips. Full, wide lips, great for kissing, and smiling. A smile that beams sunshine. But she’s far from smiling now, and he knows it’s his fault. She presses her fingernails to her teeth as if she’s going to bite them, but instead pushes a wayward strand of red hair that’s escaped from her ponytail back over her ear. He loves it when she does that...
He takes a deep breath, gathering his resolve. “Look, Fi, I don’t know why I shut down like that tonight. I wasn’t thinking. Or maybe I was thinking too much. Shit. I like you Fi.”
Great, he “likes” me, Fi groans to herself. Here it comes, “we still have to work together, so let’s be friends.” Fine with her, that’s definitely for the best.
Zeke squirms. “I mean, I really like you.”
Fi frowns. Oh, that’s much better. Just get it over with, will ya?