by Andre Norton
There were two other occupants. The one who acknowledged Arshaka bowed stiffly. He could have been thirty or fifty, his unlined face keeping his years a secret, but his long hair and beard were shot through with streaks of silver. His hands were thin, the fingers long and decorated with tattoos where rings should be. He was a tall man for this time, well more than six feet, but his shoulders and waist were narrow, like they belonged to a smaller person.
“The Hand of Nebuchadnezzar graces our den on this Night of Portent.” The man’s voice was clear, each word perfectly pronounced and measured, reminding Arshaka of a practiced politician. “The gods bless you.”
Arshaka extended his right hand, allowing the man to kiss his largest ring. “And the gods bless you, Belzu-Mar.”
Belzu-Mar swept his hand behind him, indicating the other occupant. This one was clearly elderly, with dark, age-spotted, and deeply wrinkled skin that reminded Arshaka of a walnut shell. His hair was as thin and white as cobwebs, accenting a high forehead. He sat on a wide, low stool, humped forward and giving his back the shape of a turtle shell. If he breathed, it was so shallowly that Arshaka could not discern it.
His eyes had been closed, but they opened at Belzu-Mar’s gesture, and immediately fixed Arshaka in place. They were as pale gray as the fog that clung to the Euphrates on winter mornings, yet there was nothing gentle or soft about them. Cold and hard were the words that came to Arshaka’s mind. He’d been in the Old One’s presence twice before, each time getting caught by his gaze.
Arshaka did not know the Old One’s true name, and though by his position in the city he could have demanded it, he’d stayed silent on the matter. Arshaka only needed the Old One’s expertise. In fact, better he not learn the man’s name, he decided, as that would bring him one step closer to the Old One, something the Hand of Nebuchadnezzar did not desire.
The Old One blinked and released his hold on Arshaka.
Belzu-Mar glided to a cabinet Arshaka had not noticed before and retrieved three rolled pieces of parchment that he brought to the Old One.
“The center one, Belzu-Mar. It carries the best hope for success.” The pale gray eyes closed again.
Arshaka had not heard the Old One talk before, the voice sounding brittle and eerie and sending a chill through him.
Belzu-Mar returned the other two parchments to the cabinet, then retrieved four stones off a shelf and carried them in one hand. He took the parchment in front of the bench and stretched it out on the floor, using the rocks to hold the corners down. His long arms made the task easy, and when he finished, he stepped back so nothing obstructed the candlelight.
The parchment was thoroughly yellowed from age, the edges flaking off like snow. There was nothing near the margins, however, that was in danger of being lost, as the markings were in the center, and Arshaka struggled to understand them.
“The text is secondary,” Belzu-Mar said.
The scrawls that twisted across the surface looked vaguely Aramaic to Arshaka. He was certain he could decipher it if he took it back to his room and studied it carefully. But the parchment would not leave this den—the Old One would not allow it, Arshaka knew, and neither did he want to have possession of such a thing. Arshaka was too important a man to be caught with evidence of dealings such as this.
“Perhaps the writing is not needed at all,” Belzu-Mar continued. “In this case, it is fragments of a spell that is meant to be spoken aloud. But the ones who created such works, this one in particular, felt compelled to…”
Arshaka shut out the rest of Belzu-Mar’s words and stared at the design. Images of creatures, the largest no taller than three or four inches, were scattered amid the words. Not one of them looked completely manlike, though there were pieces of each drawing that resembled humans, such as an arm or a leg, and in one case a head. Horns protruded from shoulders and chests, and extra eyes looked out from chins and palms and kneecaps. Each was grotesque, yet artfully rendered, and in vibrant colors that had not faded with the decades.
Arshaka caught himself gaping at the image closest to him. The figure had one leg, muscular and wrapped with laces from a sandal. Its torso was that of a bull, with snakes extending from its shoulders. There were hands where the snake heads should be, and wide-open eyes graced each outward-facing palm. The feminine-looking head rested atop a thick neck that was detailed with ropy veins. Scalloped marks indicated scales on its cheeks and jaw, and skin was pulled back from its forehead and tied with tendrils of inky dark hair.
“When the time is right,” Belzu-Mar continued, oblivious that Arshaka had not been paying complete attention, “I will convey this pattern onto the vessel, and I or—if he favors us—the Old One will recite the necessary spell.”
Arshaka blinked.
His eyes were so dry, both from this arid room and because he’d held them open for so long. He wrung his hands.
“And the others … will you use the same drawings for those?”
Belzu-Mar shook his head. “None should be alike. This parchment will be destroyed when the transcription is complete. The others will carry designs from the two parchments I also brought out. They are equally powerful, simply different than this. I believe the Old One personally knew the crafter of this, and so chose it to be the first.” Arshaka glanced to his left, to the far recesses of the room where the candlelight only faintly reached.
“I am satisfied,” he told Belzu-Mar.
The taller man smiled, showing teeth as yellow as the parchment. “Then I am pleased, Hand of Nebuchadnezzar.”
“Twice you’ve called me that now.” Arshaka shook his head. “That is not a title I’ll accept here, for this is my business we are about. The King of Babylon is not a part of this. Understand? And so the Hand of Nebuchadnezzar has never been here.”
“I understand completely.” This came from the Old One. Again his eyes were open, but this time they were trained on the parchment.
Arshaka could not tell what, precisely, the Old One stared at.
“The time for this is yet to be settled,” Belzu-Mar said. He, too, looked at the Old One.
“Soon,” Arshaka returned. “Days, perhaps. Hopefully only a matter of days.” He reached into one of his pouches and pulled out a thick, gold chain. A grape-sized topaz dangled from it. He held it out to Belzu-Mar as payment. “Send a messenger to the courtyard at sunset tomorrow. I will be there. Then I might have a more precise time for the ceremony.”
Despite his bulk, Arshaka nimbly spun on the balls of his feet and climbed the stairs, his mood buoying him. He brushed aside the beaded curtain and strained to see the room beyond. The lone candle had burned down to a stub and glowed no brighter than an ember from a dying fire.
Many minutes later, Arshaka paused at the corner of a narrow street that pointed toward the Hanging Gardens.
The massive park had been one of his greatest achievements, though he knew historians—those who believed the Gardens existed—credited Nebuchadnezzar with the marvel. Arshaka had given the plans for this to the king, along with other diagrams for various buildings and devices. It curried favor and ensconced him as the Hand. Arshaka was closer to Nebuchadnezzar than all in the city, save the king’s wife. The position brought him wealth and a certain amount of power, and at the same time it afforded him opportunities to pursue his own agendas … as he had in the western den.
He slipped into his apartments through a concealed entrance only a handful of his attendants knew about, climbing a curving set of stairs and easing himself into his massive chair before the first rays of the sun came up. The bath and the wine would wait, he decided, as he put his feet up on the hassock. He closed his eyes, expecting to be notified soon of the girl’s capture.
Within moments he was asleep.
And moments later his mind was far from Babylon.
* * *
Arshaka stood on a curb, clutching a flag in one hand, the other hand in his pocket and clamped around his wallet. Public gatherings were rife with pickpockets
, and he wasn’t about to lose a single dollar to some lowlife working the crowd. Children were thick at the edge of this side of the street, and across it, where shaded by the awnings of a clothing store and a pharmacy, eight elderly women sat in lawn chairs. Each of them wore purple—a mix of dresses and pantsuits—and each had a red hat. The oldest wore a red sequined baseball hat that had a plume of purple netting hanging off one side. The Red Hat Society, they called themselves, and they wouldn’t accept any members under the age of fifty. He knew there’d be more of them on a float in the parade.
His feet were tingling, falling asleep, by the time the parade finally started. The local drum and bugle corps was out front, blaring an old Sousa march that bounced off the downtown’s brick storefronts. He closed his eyes and listened to the music, and when it got almost deafening he opened them again. The corps stood directly in front of him, finished the piece, then marched again, a blur of blue, black, and white, knees raising high and every member twisting at the waist so the bugles would catch the sun.
Arshaka waited for the Shriners. He liked them best, whizzing around on their miniature race cars. He’d always wanted one of the cars. Some of the Shriners were so pudgy he wondered how they were able to cram themselves into the little vehicles. If they could, he could. And a few were older than the Red Hat Society members; he figured those Shriners no longer had real driver’s licenses, but were permitted to drive in the parade.
The sun was high in a cloudless sky, beating down and making almost everyone sweat. When he’d attended the parade last year, it was so hot that two of the drum corps buglers passed out; he’d watched them get smelling salts.
A little girl edged along the base of the curb in front of him, trying to get a better view. He passed her the flag so he could have his other hand free, which he used to wave to a pair of friends across the street.
They didn’t see him, probably couldn’t see much of anything since they were standing behind the women in the gaudy red hats. Arshaka knew he’d see them later—they would meet up for sandwiches after the parade. Nearby stood a girl with short red hair and freckles across her cheeks and the bridge of her nose. His guards would catch her soon. There were other bands, though none so good, in Arshaka’s opinion, as the corps that led off the parade. Baton twirlers, one of which dropped hers a few times; dogs in ballerina outfits; floats with streamers; clowns of course, their makeup running in the heat; and fire trucks rounded it all out. The horses came at the end of the parade, and behind them the folks who picked up after the horses.
Arshaka stood on the curb while the people faded away around him, the old women in purple with their red hats melting into the sidewalk like a big chalk painting caught in the rain. Soon he was all alone, studying the buildings across from him, then turning to look at the ones behind.
The American street vanished, replaced by the Processional Way. Grandly decorated walls and buildings sprung up, and music from reed instruments floated on the air. The tune was not so impressive as the drum corps’ Sousa march, but it better suited this place. He floated down street after street, alley after alley, seeing no people … as it was his dream and he didn’t want anyone else here at the moment. Again he found himself on the narrow walkway between buildings on the western side of Babylon, the place where he’d physically been a few hours ago. It looked different in the daylight, so simple compared to the buildings near the Ishtar Gate.
Arshaka smiled. The simple building and its inhabitants held the key to a complex, wonderful plan.
12
No Child of Sigurd Clawhand
Shilo was surprised to still be alive.
She’d fully expected death to claim her. It would have been an escape from this cave and the monstrous dragon and a land removed by more than two thousand years from her own time. It would have been an opportunity to see her father again, and to tell him things she should have said more often in life—like that she loved and appreciated him.
Her heart skipped a couple of beats, and her chest tightened like she’d been caught in a powerful vise. She wondered if her father had felt such pain when he’d had a heart attack and died. But her heart started again, and she managed to back up a little more to gain some space from the dragon.
“Do not call me that,” the dragon hissed. “I am not the Talon of Marduk or the Dragon of the Ishtar Gate.”
Again the words came inside Shilo’s head; she wasn’t really hearing them.
“Ulbanu was the name given to me upon my hatching. I am not the aspect of a god, and I am not the protector of kings. Ulbanu is what I wish to be called. Only that.”
Shilo finally realized the dragon was not going to kill her. It would have done that already, had that been its intent. She breathed as shallowly as possible, hoping that might cut the stench of the beast, and she circumspectly rubbed her sweating palms against her robe in an effort to dry them.
“I am merely a dragon, Child of Sigurd. Ulbanu. One more creature born to this earth, with no more right to the ground than any other.”
“My name is Shilo.” She was tired of the title the dragon had bestowed upon her. Sigurd didn’t exist. “You say you’re not the Talon of Marduk. Well, I’m no Child of Sigurd Clawhand. I’m the daughter of a man named Sigmund, and he died less than a month ago.” Again she felt her father’s loss. She wished she’d have done more things with him, especially toward the end … more picnics and movies, more talk. Maybe if they’d talked more, he would have mentioned his youth and the puzzle. How had he gotten home after he’d played with the puzzle?
“Shilo,” the dragon pronounced.
“And I want to go back to Slade’s Corners.”
Neither Shilo nor the dragon spoke for several minutes. The hiss of the dragon’s breath—even and sounding like a fall wind blowing piles of raked leaves across the ground—filled the uneasy interval. There was the plop of more saliva dropping on the floor, and from somewhere outside came the skree of a hawk.
Shilo’s head continued pounding, from lack of food and from the intensity of her predicament. All the aches in her body magnified. I’m fifteen. This shouldn’t be happening to me.
Fifteen!
“I can send you home, Shilo.”
“Thank you,” she mouthed. “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”
“Though I first require your assistance in the most important matter in the world.”
Shilo closed her eyes. What service had her father performed to get back home? If he managed a task regarding a dragon, she could also. But what could a creature this size not accomplish that she could? What could be the “most important matter in the world”?
“Anything,” she said. “I’ll do anything to get out of here and back home.” She brushed her hood back and raked her fingers through her hair. “And I’ll never ever ever play with the magical puzzle again.” Burn it, she thought, spread the pieces between the garbage cans at Big Mick’s Pub and the church, chop them all into tiny bits and …
The dragon raised its lip in the approximation of a smile. “The ‘relic’ is not magic, Shilo. The thing you call a puzzle is merely shards of wood and colored paper.”
“Not magic?” She sputtered and waved her arms, surprised at her ire, and not caring that the dragon knew she was upset. “That puzzle—that relic as you call it—brought me here. The magic in it wouldn’t let me leave it alone, made me hide it under my bed. Then the magic made me take it out and put a dragon together … you … put together a picture of you! I wouldn’t be here if that puzzle…”
“The relic has no magic about it, Shilo. The magic is in you.”
The words hit Shilo like she’d been punched in the stomach, and she fell back on her rump, catching herself with her hands. “Not possible,” she mouthed. She quickly recovered and shook her head. “No! My father played with the puzzle, and his friends did, too. They all traveled to different times and places. It was because of the puzzle.”
“Because of the magic in them.” The dragon let ou
t a great sigh that struck Shilo like a strong, hot breeze. The scents of rotting vegetation and scorched ground became unbearable, and Shilo clutched at her stomach and fought to keep from retching. The only thing that saved her was that she’d not eaten in some time.
“There is no magic in me, Ulbanu. And there was nothing magical about my father or his friends.” Shilo continued fuming. “It was that puzzle. That…”
“The relic is wood and parchment, I say, and was found by the sage who I once called a friend. I will grant you that the relic is a conduit.”
“A what?” Shilo picked herself up and took a few more steps back. She would have run, despite the ache in her battered feet, but the dragon had told her it could send her home, and so she couldn’t leave.
“A conduit, a tool, a focus, Shilo. The relic lets you center your thoughts and relax your mind so that the magic flows within you. There are other relics in the world, all different than the thing you call a puzzle, and all in pieces that the wielder must assemble.”
Shilo could not bring herself to believe the awe-inspiring dragon. It’s lying to me, she thought. It was teasing her for some reason, a cat playing with a tiny mouse. And since it was lying to her about the puzzle, it no doubt was lying about being able to send her home.
“You are the most magical of those who touched the relic, Shilo, even more magical than the sage.”
The sage? The world traveler who died and whose house her father and his friends had snuck into? The one who originally owned the puzzle?
“Only a handful of people in all the world went beyond the strictures of that relic and others. You are one of those rare people; you saw beyond the face of the relic and reached inside.”