by Rice, Anne
“No, you don’t need it, Eudoxia,” I said. “Unless such blood is always a blessing.”
She looked at me for a long moment and then she nodded her head slowly, almost drowsily and her dark eyebrows came together in a small frown.
“Always a blessing?” she asked, repeating my words. “I don’t know if it is always a blessing.”
“Will you tell me more of your story? What happened after you first drank from Akasha? After your Maker went his way?” I put these questions gently. “Did you reside in the temple once your Maker had left?”
This seemed to give her the moment of recollection that she required.
“No, I didn’t remain there,” she said. “Though the priests coaxed me, telling me wild stories of old worship, and that the Mother was imperishable, save from the sunlight, and should she ever burn, so would we all. There was one among them who made quite a point of this warning, as though the prospect tantalized him—.”
“The Elder,” I said, “who eventually sought to prove it.”
“Yes,” she said. “But to me he was no Elder, and I did not heed his words.
“I went out, free of my Maker, and, left with his house and his treasure, I decided upon another way of life. Of course the temple priests often came to me and harried me that I was profane and reckless, but as they did no more than that, I paid them no heed.
“I could easily pass for human then, especially if I covered my skin with certain oils.” She sighed. “And I was used to passing for a young man. It was a simple matter for me to make a fine household, to acquire good clothes, that is, to pass from poor to rich in a matter of nights.
“I gave out word in the schools and in the marketplace that I could write letters for people, and that I could copy books, and all this by night when the other copyists had quit and gone home. And arranging a big study in my house, with plenty of light, I set to doing this for human beings, and this was how I came to know them, and came to know what the teachers were teaching by day.
“What an agony it was that I couldn’t hear the great philosophers who held forth in the daylight hours, but I did very well with this nocturnal occupation, and I had what I wanted, the warm voices of humans speaking to me. I befriended mortals. And on many an evening my house was filled with banqueting guests.
“I learned of the world from students, poets, soldiers. In the small hours, I slipped into the great library of Alexandria, a place that you should have visited, Marius. It is a wonder that you passed over such a treasure house of books. I did not pass it over.”
She paused. Her face was horridly blank, and I knew it was from an excess of emotion. She did not look at any of us.
“Yes, I understand this,” I said, “I understand it very very deeply. I feel the same need for mortal voices near me, for mortals smiling on me as though I were their own.”
“I know your loneliness,” she said in a rather hard voice. And for the first time I had the feeling that the passing expressions on her face were hard as well, that her face was nothing but a beautiful shell for a disturbed soul inside her, of which I knew little from her words.
“I lived well and for a long time in Alexandria,” she said. “What greater city was there? And I believed as many blood drinkers do that knowledge alone would sustain me over the decades, that information could somehow stave off despair.”
I was quite impressed with these words, but I didn’t respond.
“I should have remained in Alexandria,” she said, looking off, her voice low and suddenly full of regret. “I began to love a certain mortal, a young man who felt great love for me. One night he made his love known to me, that he would give up all for me—his proposed marriage, his family, all—if only I would go away with him to Ephesus, the place from which his family had come, and where he wanted to return.”
She broke off as if she did not mean to go on.
“It was such love,” she said, her words coming more slowly, “and all this while he believed that I was a young man.”
I said nothing.
“The night he declared his love, I revealed myself. He was quite horrified by the pretense. And I took my revenge.” She frowned as though she wasn’t quite sure of the word. “Yes,” she said, “my revenge.”
“You made him a blood drinker,” I said softly.
“Yes,” she said, still looking off as though she were back in those times. “I did, and by the most brutal and ungraceful force, and once that was done, he saw me with naked and loving eyes.”
“Loving eyes?” I repeated.
She looked pointedly at Avicus and then back to me. Then she looked at Avicus again.
I took my measure of him. I had always thought him rather splendid, and assumed from his beauty that the Gods of the Grove were chosen for their beauty as well as their endurance, but I tried to see him as she saw him now. His skin was golden now, rather than brown, and his thick black hair made a dignified frame for his unusually beguiling face.
I looked back to Eudoxia and saw with a little shock that she was looking at me.
“He loved you again?” I asked, locking in immediately upon her story and its meaning. “He loved you even when the Blood flowed in his veins?”
I could not even guess her inner thoughts.
She gave me a grave nod. “Yes, he loved me again,” she said. “And he had the new eyes of the Blood, and I was his teacher, and we all know what charm lies in all that.” She smiled bitterly.
A sinister feeling came over me, a feeling that something was very wrong with her, that perhaps she was mad. But I had to bury this feeling within me and I did.
“Off we went to Ephesus,” she said, going on with her story, “and though it was no match for Alexandria, it was nevertheless a great Greek city, with rich trade from the East, and with pilgrims always coming for the worship of the great goddess Artemis, and there we lived until the Great Fire.”
Her voice became small. Mortals might not have heard it.
“The Great Fire destroyed him utterly,” she said. “He was just that age when all the human flesh was gone from him, and only the blood drinker remained, but the blood drinker had only just begun to be strong.”
She broke off, as though she could not continue, then she went on:
“There were only ashes left to me of him. Ashes and no more.”
She fell silent and I dared not encourage her.
Then she said:
“I should have taken him to the Queen before I ever left Alexandria. But you see, I had no time for the temple blood drinkers and when I had gone to them, it was as a rebel, talking my way in proudly with tales of the Queen’s gestures to me so that I might lay flowers before her, and what if I had brought my lover, and the Queen had made no such gesture as that which she had made to me? And so, you see, I had not brought him, and there in Ephesus, I stood with the ashes in my hands.”
I remained silent out of respect for her. I couldn’t help but glance at Avicus again. He was all but weeping. She had possession of him, heart and soul.
“Why did I go back to Alexandria after this terrible loss?” she asked wearily. “Because the temple blood drinkers had told me that the Mother was the Queen of all. Because they had spoken of the sun and of our burning. And I knew that something must have befallen our Mother, something had caused this Great Fire, and that only those in the temple would know what it was. And there was a pain in my flesh, by no means unbearable, but something which I would have healed by the Mother, if I had found her there.”
I said nothing.
In all the years since I’d taken Those Who Must Be Kept, I had never come upon such a creature as this woman. And I should say as well that never had such a blood drinker come upon me.
Never had anyone come armed with such eloquence, or history, or old poetry such as this.
“For centuries,” I said, my voice low and gentle, “I kept the Mother and Father in Antioch. Other blood drinkers found me—warlike and violent creatures, creatures badly burnt and bound
upon stealing the strong blood. But you, you never came.”
She shook her head in negation.
“Never did Antioch enter my thoughts,” she confessed. “I believed that you had taken the Mother and Father to Rome. Marius, the Roman, that is what they called you. Marius, the Roman, has taken the Mother and the Father. And so you see, I made a severe error in going to the Imperial City, and after that I went to Crete, and I was never to be close to you, never to find you by the Mind Gift, never to hear tell of where you might be.
“But I was not always searching for the Mother and Father,” she said. “I had my passions. I made blood drinkers to be my companions. The centuries healed me as you have seen. I am now far stronger than you are, Marius. I am infinitely stronger than your companions. And though touched by your fine Patrician manners and your old-fashioned Latin, and by the devotion of your friend, Avicus, I must lay down for you some hard terms.”
“How so, Eudoxia?” I asked calmly.
Mael was in a rage.
She was quiet for a long moment, during which her small delicate features wore nothing but an expression of sweetness and kindness, and then she said with courtesy:
“Give over the Mother and Father to me, Marius, or I shall destroy you and your companions. You will not be allowed either to stay or to go.”
I could see the shock in Avicus. As for Mael he was, thank the gods, dumbfounded. And as for me, I was again stunned.
I waited several moments, and then I asked:
“Why do you want the Mother and Father, Eudoxia?”
“Oh, Marius,” she shook her head crossly, “don’t play the fool. You know the Mother’s blood is the strongest. I’ve already told you that every time I ever appealed to her, she gave me the welcoming gesture, and allowed me to drink. I want her because I want the power in her. And also because I would not have this King and Queen, who can be burnt again or put in the sun, given over to others who might do such rash things.”
“Have you thought this through?” I asked coldly. “How would you keep the shrine secret? From what I’ve seen of your blood drinker companions, they are almost children both in mortal years and in the Blood. Do you know the weight of this burden?”
“I knew it before you ever existed,” she said, her face suffused with anger. “You play with me, Marius. And I won’t have it. I know what’s in your heart. You won’t give up the Mother because you won’t give up the blood.”
“Perhaps so, Eudoxia,” I said, straining to remain civil. “I want time to consider what has been said here.”
“No, I give you no time,” she said, her voice angry, a blush coming to her cheeks. “Answer me now, or I destroy you.”
Her rage was so sudden it caught me off guard. Yet quickly, I recovered.
“And how do you mean to do this?” I asked.
Mael jumped to his feet, and moved behind his chair. I gestured for him to be still. Avicus sat in mute despair. The blood tears had begun to flow from him, and they moved down his face. He was far more disappointed than fearful. In fact, he seemed rather solemnly brave.
Eudoxia turned to Avicus, and at once I sensed a threat in her posture. Her limbs stiffened, and it seemed that her eyes became unusually hard. She meant to do something evil to Avicus, and there was no time for me to wait and see what that might be.
I rose, and rushing at her, took hold of her by both wrists, turning her so that inevitably and furiously she looked up at me.
Of course this physical strength could accomplish little here, but what more could I do? What had my powers become over these years? I didn’t know. But there was no time to ponder or experiment. I summoned, from the very depths of my being, all the destructive force I might possess.
I felt a pain in my belly and then in my head, and while Eudoxia went limp in my grasp, with her eyes closed, I felt a dreadful heat come full force against my face and chest. But I was not burnt by it. I repelled it and drove it back whence it had come.
In sum, this was a battle, and I had no idea who might win it. I sought again to bring all the force that I could command into action and again I saw her weaken, felt her weaken, and yet there came the heat once more against me but it had no effect.
I threw her down on the marble floor and I stood over her, gathering the force with all my will and directing it towards her, and she writhed on the marble, her eyes closed, and her hands shuddering. My force held her pinioned. My force would not let her rise.
At last she went still. She breathed deeply and then she opened her eyes, and she looked up at me.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw her acolytes Asphar and Rashid coming to assist her. Both brandished huge glittering swords. I looked desperately about for one of the oil lamps in the hope that I could burn one of them with flaming oil, but then my thoughts went before me with all my strength and with utter rage: Oh, if I could only burn you! And Rashid stopped, cried out, and then burst into flames.
With utter horror, I beheld this. I knew I had done it. And so did all present. The boy’s bones were visible but for an instant and then they collapsed and the flames leapt and danced on the marble floor.
I had no choice but to turn to Asphar. But Eudoxia cried out.
“Enough.” She struggled to rise but she couldn’t do it. I took both her hands and lifted her to her feet.
With her head bowed she backed away from me. She turned and looked at the remains of Rashid.
“You’ve destroyed one who was dear to me,” she said, her voice quivering. “And you didn’t even know you had the power of Fire.”
“And you meant to destroy my Avicus,” I said, “and you meant to destroy me.” I sighed as I looked at her. “What choice did you give me? You have been my teacher in regard to my powers.” I trembled with exhaustion and fury. “We might have all lived here in accord.”
I looked at Asphar who didn’t dare to come any closer. I looked at Eudoxia who sat weak and useless in her chair.
“I mean to leave now,” I said, “and take my two companions with me. If you try to harm any of us, I’ll turn my full power on you. And as you said, I do not even know what it is myself.”
“You threaten from fear,” she said wearily. “And you won’t leave here without giving me a life for a life. You burnt Rashid. Give me Avicus. Give him to me now of your own free will.”
“I will not,” I said coldly. I felt my power gathered inside me. I glared at Asphar. The poor child blood drinker quivered in terror.
Eudoxia sat sullenly in her chair, her head still bowed.
“What a loss there has been here, Eudoxia,” I said. “We could have given such riches of mind to each other.”
“Stop your golden talk, Marius,” she said, looking up angrily, her eyes full of blood tears. “You still fear me. Bring me to the Mother and the Father, and let the Mother decide who shall be her keeper, you or I.”
I answered quickly,
“I won’t have you under my roof, Eudoxia. But I will take the matter before the Mother and the Father. And after they speak to me, I will speak to you.”
I turned to Asphar.
“Lead us out of this place now,” I said, “or I’ll burn you as I did your companion.”
He obeyed without hesitation, and once he had led us speedily to the street, we fled.
11
We fled.
There is no other way to describe it. We were in terror and we fled. As soon as we reached our house we closed off every window and door with its heaviest shutters.
But what did all this matter against a power such as Eudoxia possessed?
Gathering in the inner court, we took stock of the situation. We must discover our own powers. We must know what had been given us by time and blood.
Within a few hours, we had some answers.
Avicus and I could move objects easily without touching them. We could make them fly through the air. As for the Fire Gift, I alone possessed it and we could find no limit to my gift in terms of the space of our
house. That meant I could burn wood no matter how far it was from me. And as for living things, I chose the unfortunate vermin for my victims, and ignited them from a great distance with ease.
As for our physical strength it was far greater than we had ever supposed. Again, I excelled in this as in everything. Avicus was second to me, and Mael was third.
But I had sensed something else when I was with Eudoxia, and I tried to explain it to Avicus and Mael.
“When we fought, she sought to burn me with the Fire Gift. (And we did use those words then in one form or another.) Of this I’m certain. I felt the warmth. But I was confronting her with a different power. I was using a pressure against her. And that is something I must come to understand.”
Once again, I chose the unfortunate rats of our dwelling for my exercise, and holding one of these, I exerted the same force I had used when struggling with Eudoxia in my arms. The creature virtually exploded, but there was no fire involved.
I knew then that I possessed a power different from the Fire Gift, which I might call the Killing Gift, which I had used in my defense. Should I use this pressure against a mortal, and I didn’t intend to, the mortal’s internal organs would be exploded and the poor creature would die.
“Now Avicus,” I said, “you being the eldest of us, see if you possess this Killing Gift, for you very well might.”
Having caught a rat, I held it as Avicus directed his thoughts with all due concentration, and within seconds the poor creature bled from its ears and mouth and was quite dead.
This had a sobering effect upon Avicus.
I insisted that Mael attempt the same thing. This time the rat squirmed furiously, letting out terrible little squeaks or cries, but did not die. When I put the little creature down on the mosaic floor of the court, it could not run, or even climb to its small feet, and I, out of mercy for it, put it to death.
I looked at Mael. “The power is growing in you,” I said. “The powers are increasing in all of us. We have to be more clever, infinitely more clever, as we face our enemies here.”
Mael nodded. “It seems that I might cripple a mortal.”