“Let’s go.” I pushed against the door, and we entered the Shrine.
The wind died. The ornate windows admitted no light from outside, and a pervasive grey haze clouded the air. Marble vessels that had once held holy water were now filled with glowing chunks of charcoal, from which rose thin columns of scented smoke. Blossoms carpeted the marble floor: crushed narcissus and purple hyacinth, tiny white rosebuds, anemones and cyclamen, wilted poppies and jonquils. There were figs, too, their black hearts bursting with pink juice; and small hard apples, and pomegranates big as gourds, their rinds cut away to reveal the moist seeds within like so many wine-stained teeth. And ears of corn no bigger than my hand, and barley sheaves and maize; clusters of grapes that oozed red and black where we trod upon them, and the swollen knobs of opium poppies whose blooms were spent. Everywhere we looked there were flowers and fruit wreathed in that dreamy haze.
I turned and saw Annie staring transfixed at a pile of grain.
“Look,” she breathed. She reached to touch a single white kernel like a glistening pearl. “It’s so—so perfect.”
The mounded grain shimmered like fairy fruit. With an effort I turned away.
“Come on, Annie. We can’t stay here.”
I pulled her after me. She came reluctantly, glancing back as we walked from the bay into the nave of the Shrine.
“Oh,” I gasped, and stopped.
All around us there were stones. Megaliths, I thought at first, or boulders; but then I saw that they were not stones at all. They were immense carven idols—the most ancient and holy of icons made huge and manifest, in anticipation of the epiphany that was to come. A bulbous-shaped woman who might have been molded of honey, so bedewed with moisture was she—eyeless, mouthless, her hands placed protectively over a swollen belly that flowed into huge jutting buttocks and plinthlike thighs. Behind her stretched rows of tall white figures like alabaster blades, their breasts mere jots upon their torsos, a knife-slit of vulva between their marble legs. There were simple basalt columns and stalactites, pregnant women carved of green serpentine and shining onyx; ivory figures twenty thousand years old, their smooth faces scrolled with indentations and meanders, their hair etched into elaborate braids and knots. Women with the curved beaks of ibises and women with the heads of bees; snake-women, bear-women, women bearing tusks and tails. Their necks were hung with ropes of blossoms, their mouths smeared with honey and wine. Bees crawled across their cheeks and nested in their parted thighs. On the floor the matted petals shivered as serpents made their way through the blossoms. The air steamed, as though the vegetation was already decaying. Sweat streamed down my body and soaked my shirt and bare legs. Mingled with the heady incense of sandalwood and myrrh was another smell, pungent and sweet and malty. Beer, and the unmistakable odor of crushed coriander seed, the fragrance of sandalwood and oranges.
As we approached the altar the stone figures gave way to forms of gold and silver and bronze. Queens in chariots borne by griffins, tiny girls cast in gold, with eyes of lapis lazuli and feathered crowns; a statuette of a monarch with her head thrown back, flanked by crouching lions. A goddess upon a mountaintop looking out to sea. Drowsy mothers nursing their young. A marble madonna holding the broken body of her son; the painted plaster image of a woman crowned with the moon and seven stars, a serpent coiled protectively about her ankle. Faint music sounded from the transepts. Flutes and tabors, a jangling sistrum.
And suddenly I was in that hot classroom again—the smells of chalk and wood polish, a faunlike man dancing across the floor with sistrum raised as a boy recited—
An Egyptian instrument used in the worship of Isis. Fourth Dynasty, I believe…
I started to fall, but Annie caught me.
“I’m okay,” I said hoarsely. “Just dizzy…”
Chanting voices joined with the sound of bones and flutes. Women’s voices—
Hail Hecate, Nemesis, Athena, Anahita! Hail Anat, Lyssa, Al-Lat, Kalika. Great Sow, Ravener of the Dead, Blind Owl and Ravening Justice. Hail Mouth of the World, Hail All-Sister, Othiym Lunarsa, haïyo! Othiym.
And now with them chimed the sweet piercing tones of boys or castrati—
Othiym, Anat, lnnana.
Hail Artemis, Britomartis,
Ishtar, Astarte, Ashtaroth,
Bellona, More, Kali,
Durga, Khon-Ma, Kore.
Othiym Lunarsa, Othiym haïyo!
High overhead the vaulted dome arched, like a hand cupped above us. I knew its mosaic of semiprecious stones as well as I knew the lines of my palm: the sad somber face of Christ, haloed with chips of gold and jade, hands raised to display the stigmata.
That image was gone. Instead there was the sleeping visage of Othiym—her heavy-lidded eyes, her upturned mouth like the moon’s spar. Within the streaming radiance of her hair a silver crescent was netted. The smell of sandalwood grew overpowering, the sweet odor of oranges so strong my mouth watered.
But I could not tear my eyes from the dreaming goddess. As I stared I realized this was no mosaic, no archaic fresco painted upon a crumbling facade. This was Othiym, and that was the Moon she held. Behind her I could glimpse the smoking towers and edifices of the city, the long shimmering stretch of turbid water that was the Potomac. As I stared the moon began to grow, swelling like a milky bubble that would burst and shower us all with bitter rain.
And then what would there be? When the moon goes black and cold, when Her fire is quenched and her hunger appeased: what becomes of us then?
An icy hand grabbed mine. In a daze I turned and saw Annie. She looked as dreamy as I felt, but I saw that she was pinching the inside of her arm, so hard that it bled.
“L-look,” she said through gritted teeth. Her eyes teared with pain as she cocked her head. “I think we’ve found her.”
In front of us was the altar. Its crimson carpeting was lost beneath the crushed pods and calyxes of fragrant plants. A life-size statue of a woman was there. She wore a pleated flounced skirt of many colors. Her broad hips narrowed to a small waist, cinched with a bodice that opened upon her breasts. Full and round and creamy as some lush fruit, her aureolae and nipples flushed red. Her hair was the color of amber, and fell in loose curls across her shoulders. Upon her brow was a silver crescent, and upon her breast. Her hands were raised. Clutched within them were two serpents that writhed and coiled. This was not a statue. It was a woman, a priestess. It was Angelica.
“Haïyo!”
Her voice rang through the Shrine. Immediately those other voices answered—
“Othiym haïyo! Othiym Lunarsa!”
With a wordless cry Angelica brought her hands together. The snakes braided themselves around each other, their tails lashing at her wrists. And suddenly she no longer held them but instead an axe, a great double-bladed scythe of hammered bronze; but then that too was gone. Her hands were empty. With great reverence she let her fingers slide across the twin spars of the lunula upon her breast. Then she stepped forward and clapped, once.
Blessed, blessed are those who know the mysteries of the goddess.
Blessed is she who hallows her life in the worship of the goddess,
she whom the spirit of the goddess possesseth, who is one
with those who belong to the holy body of the goddess.
Her voice rose as she raised her hands to the vast face floating above us.
Blessed is he who is purified,
who has given himself in the holy place of the Lady.
Blessed is he who wears the crown of the ivy god.
Blessed, blessed is he!
A clattering noise. From the eastern transept stepped an ungainly form, its hooves cleaving flowers to strike at the marble below. A bull. About its neck loops of ivy were twined, and withered blossoms. It walked haltingly, as though it were exhausted, or drugged, its dark head hanging between its legs. In a low voice Angelica called out to it, in words I could not understand. The bull gave a soft moan, then walked toward her. Those same hidden voices san
g out once more, their words counterpointed with the dry rattle of a tambour.
With reverence we welcome you
With tender caresses we stroke
the violent wand of the god!
Let the whirling dance begin!
With a soft laugh Angelica raised her hand, then struck the bull upon the muzzle. It shook its head distractedly, as though she were no more than a fly. She struck it again, harder, and yet again, with such force that I could hear the blows, as though she had struck a drum. The bull snorted, then bellowed loudly.
“Come now!” cried Angelica. She struck at the bull again and darted away, beckoning at the shadows. “Children!—”
The chanting voices grew louder. From the darkness of the western transept figures came, a slow procession of men and women—boys and girls, really, scarcely more than children. A sandy-haired boy and one blond as the sun; a girl with shaven head and a frayed pigtail running down her back. Seven and seven; and I remembered then the old story of Theseus sent to slay the minotaur, the monster given tribute every one hundred moons, of Athens’s fairest children. Seven boys and seven girls, sacrificed to the bull…
But there was an older tale beneath that one: of a time when there were no gods, only men and children and bulls, and She who gave birth to all of them. She who must be worshiped and fed, She who must be appeased. The oldest tale of all, perhaps, and here it was now, before me.
Strabloe hathaneatidas druei tanaous kolabreusomena
Kirkotokous athroize te mani Grogopa Gnathoi ruseis itoa
Their voices intertwined, unpolished voices but sweetly poignant.
Gather your immortal sons, ready them for your wild dance
Harrow Circe’s children beneath the binding Moon
Bare to them your dreadful face, inviolable Goddess, your clashing teeth
They walked to the bull, unafraid, and I saw that in their hands they held vines still wrapped about with leaves, and slender ropes.
All You have loved
All that is best
Is thine, O Beautiful One
They chanted, lashing the bull with ivy and hemp, their voices rising and falling in a cadence that kept time with my blood until I could feel their words inside me, and the whicking sound of the vines was one with the beating of my heart. I felt enthralled, no more capable of flight or thought than a stone…
All that is holy is thine
All that is meat
All that flowers and gives birth
All that is fecund.
Darkness is thine
The stealth of the hunter
That strikes in the field…
As one they turned from the bull, eyes raised to the sleeping moon overhead. I saw how deathly pale they were, their faces and bodies drained of blood and life. I knew then they were the chosen ones, those who had been given to Othiym—
“No!”
I flinched, turned to see Annie screaming.
“Joe! Baby Joe—”
She pointed to the last two in the line of the dead. Their skin faded to the color of oiled parchment, their hair bound with white fillet.
“Baby Joe!” Annie howled. “Hasel!—here—
I looked desperately among the others, trying to find Dylan among them, looking for his face, his beautiful eyes drained of all fire; but he was not there.
“Hasel!” Annie wailed. “Oh, no…”
They did not hear her. Instead they turned with the rest, and as slowly as they had entered they left the Shrine, arms hanging limply at their sides and ivy whips behind them.
“Oh god, get me out of here,” sobbed Annie. “Please, oh please, let’s go—”
I hugged her to me. I was alert now—seeing those walking corpses had made me feel the blood still pulsing in my own veins, made me taste rage like salt in my mouth.
“Angelica!” I shouted. I stepped away from Annie so that I stood in the center of the nave. “Angelica! Your son Dylan—where is he!”
She did not so much as glance at me. My voice echoed in the empty air; I might have been one of those basalt columns.
“Angelica!” I cried again. But this time there was desperation in my voice, and real fear.
On the altar Angelica stood beside the bull. She ran her hands across its back, soothing it. She tugged at the circlet of dried blossoms around its neck, breathed into its nostrils and stroked the hollow beneath its chin. Her bronzy hair spilled across its muzzle as she bent and kissed the smooth spot between its liquid eyes. With a gently lowing sound the bull knelt before her, its head moving back and forth, then rolled onto its side.
A soft echoing boom as it hit the floor and lay there, its sides heaving. For a moment Angelica stood above it. Her hair tumbled over her shoulders, her bare breasts gleamed with sweat. Above her the reflected face of Othiym stirred, mouth parting to show teeth like walls, the tip of a tongue red as blood.
Then, smoothing the layers of her flounced skirts, Angelica knelt beside the bull. She looked more beautiful than I had ever seen her, as serene as one of those faience images. Her eyes were brilliant, a flush spread from her breasts to her throat and cheeks. With sure hands she stroked the bull’s side, all the while whispering to it; then very slowly she let one hand slide to where its groin was hidden in a thick mat of black hair.
I held my breath. One of its hind legs twitched; I glimpsed the dark flash of its hoof, large enough to crush a man’s skull as though it were a bale of hay. Still Angelica kept murmuring. A shudder passed through the bull’s entire body.
Angelica let her other hand slip beneath its leg and gave a quick satisfied smile. I sucked in my breath: she held its erect phallus between her hands, a thick dark column so big it was like watching a child put her fingers around a tree.
“Ugh—I’m going to be sick—”
Annie buried her head in her hands. I looked back at the altar, repulsed but also fascinated. It wasn’t the idea of Angelica coupling with that huge creature—by now, I could imagine Angelica with anything. But she looked so frail and otherwordly, a woman spun of light and flowers; her glowing eyes green as elderflower, her lovely mouth mirroring the endless dreamy smile of the sleeping Othiym. If the bull were to move suddenly, it would crush her; its hooves would trample her carelessly as if she really were one of those scattered blossoms…
Rise up to heaven and arouse my son after his sovereign mother.
Rise up to the abyss, and arouse the heart of this bull;
arouse the heart of Osiris after Isis;
arouse Othiym after the light; arouse the heart of he whom I have borne…
It would not harm her. I stared in disbelief as Angelica stood, her hands still firmly wrapped around the animal’s member. All about us the air grew warm and sweet, a cloying sweetness, like narcissus or a blood-soaked rag. The soft chanting and skirling that had been a constant undercurrent ceased. High, high above us the pale face of Othiym wavered, as if seen through smoke; then suddenly Her eyelids fluttered. I had a glimpse of a blackness so profound as to make the Shrine’s cavernous space seem daylit. Her mouth opened in a yawn, wider, wider, wider; and my head reeled, seeing the void that lay within Her, that ever-hungering maw poised to engulf us all.
A susurrant sound, like a silk train being dragged across the floor. I looked down and saw an enormous sidewinder lazily throwing its coils across the floor. With a smile Angelica turned and gazed down upon it; then slowly she let her fingers slide from the bull’s phallus. She drew her skirts up around her waist, those long slender legs honey-golden, her hips thrusting forward as though she would lower herself upon the bull.
I watched appalled. She would impale herself, she would be crushed and trampled into blood and pulp…
But then I saw that she had slid the lunula from her neck. Her skirts spilled behind her in folds of ocher and saffron and blue, the muscles in her thighs tensed as she held herself completely still. She gripped the necklace in both hands, its razored curve aimed at the bull’s throat. A rumble sho
ok the floor beneath me. I saw Othiym in the sky above us, Her eyes open now—Angelica’s eyes, green as summer but uncomprehending and heavy with sleep, so huge that she would shed entire cities in a tear. Her expression mirrored Angelica’s, rapt with desire but also avid, famished.
For an instant all was frozen in a grotesque tableau. The mute animal with its throat exposed for sacrifice; the priestess poised above it with her shining blade; and hovering above us all the moon, waiting, waiting…
Then with a cry Angelica fell upon the bull. Blood misted the air and spattered her face; there was a smell of dung and offal. With a howl it reared its head, then fell back upon the floor, its legs kicking uselessly. Angelica only smiled. She lifted her face and sang.
All that is beauty,
All that is bone
Is thine, Ravaging Mother
All You have loved
All that is best
Is thine, O Beautiful One.
Haïyo! Othiym!
Othiym Lunarsa
The bull stirred convulsively. From the transepts came the echo of triumphant voices. Beside me Annie crouched and refused to look up. But I could do nothing but look, though my whole body ached from the horror of it, as Angelica’s hands tightened upon the lunula. With a single quick motion she moved to slash its throat.
“Ne Othiym anahta, Ne Othiym—praetorne!”
Through the sanctuary a shout rang out. A woman’s voice, commanding, so loud that the stones trembled. As though a wind had risen from the night country, the hungering face above us shivered. With a cry Angelica stumbled backward.
“Who would profane this place?”
The other voice cried, “Ne Othiym anahta, Ne Othiym—praetorne!”
Annie looked up at me, her eyes wild.
“That’s Oliver!”
I drew my hands to my breast. “Oliver’s dead—”
Waking the Moon Page 56