by Rice, Anne
In a flash Akasha’s right arm rose and pulled Eudoxia forward in a brutal and tight embrace.
An awful groan rose from Eudoxia.
Down came the reddened mouth of the Queen, with only the slightest move of her head, and I saw the sharp teeth only for an instant before they penetrated Eudoxia’s neck. Eudoxia was helpless, head wrenched to one side, as Akasha drank from her, Eudoxia’s arms hanging limp as her legs, Akasha’s face as blank as ever, as the grip tightened and the drinking went on.
I stood horrified, not daring to challenge anything that I beheld.
No more than a few seconds passed, perhaps half a minute before Eudoxia gave a raw and terrible scream. She tried desperately to raise her arms.
“Stop, Mother, I beg you!” I cried out and with all my might I took hold of the body of Eudoxia. “Stop, I beg you, don’t take her life! Spare her!” I pulled on the body. “Spare her, Mother!” I cried. I felt the body shift in my grasp and quickly I drew it back from the curved arm which remained poised in space.
Eudoxia still breathed, though she was livid, and groaning miserably, and we both fell back off the dais, as the arm of Akasha returned to its age-old position, at her side, fingers laid on her thigh as though nothing had occurred.
Sprawled on the floor I lay with the gasping Eudoxia.
“Did you want to die!” I demanded.
“No,” she said desperately. She lay there with her breast heaving, her hands shuddering, seemingly unable to rise to her feet.
I looked up searchingly into the Queen’s face.
The sacrifice had given no blush to her cheeks. And on her lips there was no red blood.
I was stupefied. I picked up Eudoxia and rushed to get her out of the shrine, up the steps, through the various tunnels, and finally into the house above ground.
I ordered all the others out of the library, slamming tight the doors with the Mind Gift, and there I laid her down on my couch so that she might at least catch her breath.
“But how?” she asked me, “did you ever have the courage to take me from her?” She clung to my neck. “Hold tight to me, Marius, don’t let me go just yet. I cannot.… I do not.… Hold tight to me. Where did you get the courage to move against our own Queen?”
“She was about to destroy you,” I said. “She was about to answer my prayer.”
“And what prayer was that?” she asked.
She let me go. I brought up a chair to sit beside her.
Her face was drawn and tragic, her eyes brilliant. She reached out and clung to my sleeve.
“I asked for a sign of her pleasure,” I said. “Would she be given over to you or remain with me? She’s spoken. And you see how it is.”
She shook her head, but it was not a negation to anything that I’d said. She was trying to recover her clarity of mind. She tried to rise from the couch and then fell backwards.
For a long time, she merely lay there, staring at the ceiling and I couldn’t know her thoughts. I tried to take her hand, but she withdrew it from me.
Then in a low voice, she said:
“You’ve drunk her blood. You have the Fire Gift, and you’ve drunk her blood. And this she has done in answer to your prayer.”
“Tell me,” I said. “What prompted you to offer yourself to her? Why did you say such words? Had you ever spoken them in Egypt?”
“Never,” she said in a heated murmur. “I had forgotten the beauty.” She looked confused, weak. “I had forgotten the timelessness,” she whispered. “I had forgotten the silence gathered around them—as if it were so many veils.”
She turned and looked at me languidly. She looked about her. I sensed her hunger, her weakness.
“Yes,” she sighed. “Bring my slaves to me,” she said. “Let them go out and obtain for me a sacrifice, for I’m too weak from having been the sacrifice myself.”
I went into the courtyard garden and told her little gang of exquisite blood drinkers to go to her. She could give them this disagreeable order on her own.
When they had gone on their dismal errand, I returned to her. She was sitting up, her face still drawn and her white hands trembling.
“Perhaps I should have died,” she said to me. “Perhaps it was meant to be.”
“What’s meant?” I asked scornfully. “What’s meant is that we must both live in Constantinople, you in your house with your little companions and I here with mine. And we must have a commingling of households from time to time that is agreeable. I say that is what is meant.”
She looked at me thoughtfully as if she were pondering this as much as she could ponder anything after what had befallen her in the shrine.
“Trust in me,” I said desperately in a low voice. “Trust in me for some little while. And then if we should part, let it be amicable.”
She smiled. “As if we were old Greeks?” she asked.
“Why must we lose our manners?” I said. “Weren’t they nourished in brilliance, like the arts which still surround us, the poetry that still comforts us, and the stirring tales of heroism which distract us from the cruel passage of time?”
“Our manners,” she repeated thoughtfully. “What a strange creature you are.”
Was she my enemy or my friend? I didn’t know.
All too quickly, her blood drinker slaves appeared with a miserable and terrified victim, a rich merchant who glared at all of us with bulbous eyes. Frankly he offered us money for his life.
I wanted to stop this abomination. When had I ever taken a victim under my roof? And this was to happen within my house to one who appealed to me for mercy.
But within seconds, the man was forced down upon his knees and Eudoxia then gave herself over to drinking blood from him with no regard for my standing there and watching this spectacle, and I turned on my heel and went out of the library and remained away, until the man was dead, and his richly dressed body was taken away.
At last I came back into my library, exhausted, horrified and confused.
Eudoxia was much better for having feasted on the poor wretch and she was staring at me intently.
I sat down now, for I saw no reason to stand indignantly with regard to something that was finished, and I felt myself plunged into thought.
“Will we share this city?” I asked calmly. I looked at her. “Can that be done in peace?”
“I don’t know the answer to your questions,” she said. There was something wrong in her voice, wrong in her eyes, wrong in her manner. “I want to leave you now. We will talk again.”
She gathered her band of followers and all of them left quietly, by request, through the rear door of the house.
I sat there very still and weary from what had taken place, and wondering if there would be any change in Akasha who had moved to drink Eudoxia’s blood.
Of course there would be no change. I thought back to my first years with Akasha, when I’d been so certain that I could bring her back to life. And here, she had moved, yes, she had moved, but how ghastly had been the expression on her smooth innocent face, more blank than the faces of mortals after death.
An awful foreboding came over me, in which the subtle force of Eudoxia seemed both a charm and a curse.
And in the midst of this foreboding I came to know a terrible temptation, a terrible rebellious thought. Why hadn’t I given over the Mother and Father to Eudoxia? I would have been rid of them, rid of this burden which I had carried since the earliest nights of my life among the Undead? Why hadn’t I done it?
It would have been so simple. And I would have been free.
And as I recognized this guilty desire inside of me, as I saw it flare up like a fire fed by the bellows, I realized that during those long nights at sea, on the voyage to Constantinople, I had secretly wished that our ship would meet with misadventure, that we would be sunk and Those Who Must Be Kept would have gone down to the bottom of the ocean, never to surface again. I could have survived any shipwreck. But they would have been buried just as the Elder in Egypt had l
ong ago mentioned to me, cursing and carrying on, saying, “Why do I not sink them into the sea?”
Oh, these were terrible thoughts. Did I not love Akasha? Had I not pledged my soul?
I was consumed with self-hatred and dread that the Queen would know my petty secret—that I wished to be rid of her, that I wished to be rid of all of them—Avicus, Mael, Eudoxia most certainly—that I wished—for the very first time—to wander a vagabond like so many others, that I wished to have no name and no place and no destination, but to be alone.
These thoughts were too dreadful. They divided me from all that I valued. I had to banish them from my mind.
But before I could get my wits about me, Mael and Avicus came rushing into the library. There was some sort of disturbance outside the house.
“Can you hear it?” Avicus said frantically.
“Yea gods,” I said, “why are all those people shouting in the streets?”
I realized there was a great clamor, and that some of these people were beating on our windows and doors. Rocks were being thrown at our house. The wooden shutters were about to be broken in.
“What is happening? What is the reason for this?” Mael asked desperately.
“Listen!” I said desperately. “They’re saying that we seduced a rich merchant into the house, and then murdered him, and threw his corpse out to rot! Oh, damn Eudoxia, don’t you see what she’s done, it was she who murdered the merchant! She’s caused a mob to rise against us. We have only time to retreat to the shrine.”
I led them to the entrance, lifted the heavy marble door, and we were soon inside the passage, knowing full well that we were protected, but unable to defend our house.
Then all we could do was listen helplessly as the mob broke in and sacked our entire dwelling, destroying my new library and all I possessed. We did not have to hear their voices to know when they had set the house ablaze.
At last, when it was quiet above, when a few looters picked their way through the smoldering rafters and debris, we came up out of the tunnel, and stared at the ruins in utter disgust.
We scared off the riffraff. Then we made certain that the entrance to the shrine was in fact secure and disguised, which it was, and finally, we went off to a crowded tavern, where, huddled at a table amid mortals, we could talk.
Such a retreat was, for us, quite incredible, but what else could we do?
I told Avicus and Mael what had happened in the shrine, how Eudoxia had been nearly drained of all blood by the Mother and how I had intervened to save Eudoxia’s life. I then explained with regard to the mortal merchant, for they had seen him brought in, and seen him removed, but had not understood.
“They dumped his body where it would be found,” said Avicus. “They baited the crowd to gather as it did.”
“Yes. Our dwelling is gone,” I said finally, “and the shrine will be lost to us until such time as I go to bizarre and complex legal measures to purchase under a new name what already belongs to me under an old one, and the family of the merchant will demand justice against the unfortunate individual, whom I was before, if you follow me, so that I might not be able to buy the property at all.”
“What does she expect of us?” asked Avicus.
“This is an insult to Those Who Must Be Kept,” Mael declared. “She knows the shrine is under the house, yet she incited a riot to destroy it.”
I stared at him for a long moment. I was too ready to condemn him for his anger. But quite suddenly I had a confession to make.
“That thought had not occurred to me,” I said. “But it seems to me that you are precisely right. It was an insult to Those Who Must Be Kept.”
“Oh, yes, she has done an injury to the Mother,” said Avicus. “Surely she has done that. By day, thieves may chip at the very floor that blocks the passage to the shrine below.”
A dreadful gloom took hold of me. A pure and youthful anger was part of it. The anger fed my will.
“What is it?” Avicus demanded. “Your entire countenance is changed. Tell us your thoughts, right now, from your soul.”
“I’m not so certain I can voice my thoughts,” I said, “but I know them, and they don’t bode well for Eudoxia or those whom she claims to love. Both of you, seal your minds off from everything so that you give no hint of your whereabouts. Go to the nearest gate of the city, and leave it, and hide yourselves for the coming day in the hills. Tomorrow, come immediately to meet me here at this tavern.”
I walked with them part of the distance to the gate, and seeing them safely on their way, I went directly to Eudoxia’s house.
It was a simple matter to hear her blood drinker slaves within, and I commanded them brusquely to open the door.
Eudoxia, ever the arrogant one, commanded them to do as I had requested, and once inside, seeing the two young blood drinkers, I began to tremble with anger, but I could not hesitate, and with all my force, I burnt them both at once.
It was appalling to watch, this violent fire, and it set me to gasping and to shaking, but I had no time for observation. Asphar ran from me, and Eudoxia shouted to me fiercely to stop, but I burnt Asphar, wincing as I heard his piteous screams, all the while fighting Eudoxia’s enormous powers with all the might I could command.
Indeed so hot was the fire against my chest that I thought I would die, but I hardened all my body, and hurled my own Fire Gift against Eudoxia with full force.
Her mortal slaves were fleeing out every door and window.
She rushed at me, fists clenched, her face a picture of rage.
“Why do you do this to me!” she demanded.
I caught her up in my arms as she fought me, the waves of heat passing over me, and I carried her out of her house and through the dark streets towards the smoking ruins above the shrine.
“So you would send a mob to destroy my house,” I said. “So you would do this after I saved you, so you would do this while deceiving me with your thanks.”
“I gave you no thanks,” she said, twisting, turning, struggling against me, the heat exhausting me as I fought to control her, her hands pushing me with stunning force. “You prayed for my death, you prayed to the Mother to destroy me,” she cried. “You told me yourself.”
At last I came to the smoking heap of wood and rubble, and finding the mosaic covered door, I lifted it with the Mind Gift, which gave her just time enough to send a scorching blast against my face.
I felt it like a mortal might feel scalding water. But the heavy door was indeed opened, and I protected myself once more against her, as pulling the giant stone down behind me with one arm, I held her with the other, and started to drag her through the complex passages to the shrine.
Again and again, the heat came to burn me, and I could smell my hair scorched by it, and see the smoke in the air around me, as she made some victory no matter how great my strength.
But I fended her off, and I never let go of her. Clutching her with one arm, I opened the doors, one after another, pushing back her power, even as I stumbled. On and on I dragged her towards the shrine. Nothing could stop me, but I could not hurt her with all my force.
No, that privilege was reserved for one far greater than me.
At last we had reached the chapel, and I flung her down on the floor.
Sealing myself off from her with all my strength I turned my eyes to the Mother and Father, only to see the same mute picture which had always greeted my gaze.
And having no further sign than that, and fighting off another crippling wave of heat, I picked up Eudoxia before she could climb to her feet and holding her wrists behind her back, I offered her to the Mother as closely as I dared without disturbing the garments of the Mother, without committing what for me was a sacrilege in the name of what I meant to do.
The right arm of the Mother reached out for Eudoxia, detaching itself, as it were, from the Mother’s tranquility, and once again, Akasha’s head made that slight, subtle and utterly grotesque movement, her lips parting, fangs bared. Eudoxia scre
amed as I released her body and stepped back.
A great desperate sigh came out of me. Ah, so be it!
And I watched in quiet horror as Eudoxia became the Mother’s victim, Eudoxia’s arms flailing hopelessly, her knees pushing against the Mother, until finally the limp body of Eudoxia was allowed to slip from the Mother’s embrace.
Once fallen onto the marble floor, it looked like an exquisite doll of white wax. No audible breath came from it. Its round dark eyes did not move.
But it wasn’t dead, no, not by any means. It was a blood drinker’s body with a blood drinker’s soul. Only fire could kill it. I waited, keeping my own powers in check.
Long ago, in Antioch, when unwelcome vampires had assaulted the Mother, she had used the Mind Gift to lift a lamp to burn their remains with fire and oil. So she had done with the remains of the Elder in Egypt, as I have already described. Would she do this now?
Something simpler happened.
Quite suddenly I saw flames erupt from Eudoxia’s breast, and then flames run riot through her veins. Her face remained sweet and unfeeling. Her eyes remained empty. Her limbs twitched.
It was not my Fire Gift that had brought about this execution. It was the power of Akasha. What else could it have been? A new power, lain dormant in her for centuries, now known to her on account of Eudoxia and me?
I dared not guess. I dared not question.
At once the flames rising from the highly combustible blood of the preternatural body ignited the heavy ornate garments and the whole form was ablaze.
Only after a long time did the fire die away, leaving a glittering mass of ash.
The clever learned creature who had been Eudoxia was no more. The brilliant charming creature who had lived so well and so long was no more. The being who had given me such hope when first I saw her and heard her voice was no more.
I took off my outer cloak and, going down on my knees like a poor scrubwoman, I wiped up this pollution of the shrine and then I sat down exhausted in the corner, my head against the wall. And to my own surprise, and who knows?—perhaps to the surprise of the Mother and Father—I gave way to tears.