Stealing Sacred Fire

by Storm Constantine

  ‘Now you will speak,’ said Nimnezzar scornfully.

  Shemyaza raised his head, and his eyes blazed blue from the bruises around them. ‘Yes, I will speak,’ he said. It was not the voice of a man who had been recently beaten.

  ‘Do you command the Yarasadi peshmergas?’

  ‘No,’ Shemyaza answered. ‘I spoke the truth when I said I had no kingdom and no army.’

  Nimnezzar shifted on his seat. ‘Then tell me what you are.’

  ‘You have my brother in bondage. Let me speak to him, free him of his chains, and I will tell you what you want to know.’

  Nimnezzar laughed coldly. ‘You are in no position to bargain. Do you desire another beating? Speak, or suffer!’

  Shemyaza folded his arms. He smiled. ‘In the mountains, I was searching for an ancient artefact of great power. It was the stone your vizier took from me.’

  ‘I know this much,’ Nimnezzar said. ‘What is important is how you intend to use that artefact, and more importantly still, how I may use it.’

  ‘It will call down fire from heaven.’

  Nimnezzar frowned. ‘Explain!’

  ‘If you like, it is the ultimate weapon.’

  For a moment, a thought passed swiftly through Nimnezzar’s mind. He remembered the American woman whom Tiy had advised him not to see. Americans: ultimate weapon. The two seemed parallel. Was that the real reason the woman was here? ‘How is it used?’

  ‘First, it must be empowered.’

  ‘How?’

  Shemyaza shrugged, a grimace of pain passing over his face. ‘Take it to the top of your temple and have your priests call down the thunder-bolts. The stone must be held into the fire of a lightning fork.’

  Again, Nimnezzar laughed, but with less sureness. ‘This sounds a dangerous enterprise.’

  ‘Not to an adept,’ Shemyaza said. ‘Speak to your priests about it.’

  Nimnezzar narrowed his eyes. ‘Why should you speak the truth to me? I do not trust you.’

  Shemyaza took a step forward and, unexpectedly, the guards beside him took a step back, almost as if they’d been pushed. ‘You are right, Nimnezzar. The time for angels is past. This is the time of men. I cannot regain my kingdom, but through your dynasty the blood of my ancient line can flow once more in the veins of the world. Your seeress, Tiy, has told me that through your daughter and my brother, Penemue, you intend to initiate a new line of human-angel kings. For the reinstatement of this ancient practice of the sacred marriage, I am prepared to offer you my support. All I ask in return, is that once I have helped you secure the world, you will give me Eden. I yearn only to return to the soil of my ancient home, where I may live out the days this body has left to it.’

  Nimnezzar was astounded by this offer. He flicked a glance at Tiy wondering how the old woman had managed to cajole Shemyaza into co-operating. Visions marched across his inner eye. Glory. Victory. Empire. Lord of the World. He salivated. ‘Shemyaza, if you would swear fealty to me, bend now to my feet and kiss the earth between them.’

  Shemyaza approached, looming larger in the king’s sight, until he cast a shadow over the swaying awning. Nimnezzar was forced to look up. Then Shemyaza knelt gracefully. As he kissed the dirt, his hair fell upon Nimnezzar’s feet, through the straps of his sandals. Shemyaza raised his head. ‘Let me speak to my brother.’

  Nimnezzar’s heart was beating fast. He felt aroused, and gestured quickly at the guards. ‘Take him to Penemue.’

  Tiy stepped forward. ‘I will accompany him — as a precaution.’

  Nimnezzar waved a hand. ‘Go!’

  Sarpanita was sitting in the temple, before the prison of Penemue. She had stared at him for over an hour and her hand-maidens were becoming quite restless. To them, there had been no communication between the captive and the princess. They were deaf to the silent conversation.

  The moment Sarpanita had stepped between the great bronze doors, Penemue had roared a statement into her brain. ‘My brother is here!’

  Sarpanita had had to stoop a little as if she was walking against a strong wind. ‘He is here!’ she screamed in her mind. ‘Don’t hurt me!’

  The pressure lessened. ‘Have you seen him?’

  Penemue’s emotions were an indigo-red maelstrom in Sarpanita’s mind. She could barely think. ‘No, but my mother’s woman, Tiy, will have done so by now.’

  ‘You must see him yourself! I command it! You must bring me tidings!’

  Buffeted by his thoughts, Sarpanita sank wearily into the lion-footed chair that was positioned before the cage. ‘I will try… Penemue, is he really your brother? In blood?’ In the visions he had shown her there had been no hint of family ties between them.

  ‘Blood does not make a brother,’ Penemue answered. ‘The Watchers were all brothers in spirit, but only Shemyaza was the son of Anu’s flesh.’

  He drifted off into his memories then, and Sarpanita’s mind was filled with dusty images, like ancient paintings hung too long in the light. She fell into the dream of them, lived them; saw Shemyaza as a young man, heard his laughter. He was beautiful in the alien way of the Anannage, with his incredible height and his long, serpent face. She knew that Penemue had loved him as more than a brother. He showed her their love-making, and she could witness it without shyness. ‘The woman killed him, killed his soul...’ Penemue thought mournfully and Sarpanita knew he was speaking of Ishtahar. She found herself wondering what the world would have been like if Shemyaza and the others had never disobeyed the laws of Kharsag and taken human wives. She also wondered what business Shemyaza might have with her father. Had he been captured like Penemue or had he ridden into Babylon as a king? Like Melandra, Sarpanita had sensed Shemyaza’s advent. Unlike Melandra, and because of the Magian Gypsy blood in her veins, she had also been able to detect the hot, confusing smoke of his emotions. Since she had been communing with Penemue, her ability to read people’s feelings had been heightened. Strange how people so seldom said what they felt.

  Penemue uttered a physical gasp and opened his eyes. The pageant of his memories was eclipsed from Sarpanita’s mind in an instant. ‘What is it?’ she asked him aloud.

  At that moment, the doors to the chamber crashed open and several of her father’s guard tramped inside. Sarpanita did not like them. Penemue had shown her how they had less honour than dogs. She stood up quickly. ‘What is the meaning of this intrusion?’ she demanded with dignity, remembering to behave like a princess. Her women cowered about her.

  Tiy came into the room and cleared a path for herself through the guards. Sarpanita saw how Tiy appreciated the change in her. You are nearly a woman, and a wondrous woman at that! ‘Your Highness,’ Tiy said, ‘there is an important visitor for Penemue.’

  Sarpanita touched a hand to her throat, as she’d seen her mother do. She knew at once who it was. ‘Then, come in.’ Behind her, she felt Penemue tense. Still! she cried in her mind. We must be cautious.

  She wanted to be tall and aloof, her mother’s daughter, the future mother of kings, but when Shemyaza came into the room, she sank to her knees — not through fear or weakness, but because she could see what he was. His power shone from him. He had been dressed in one of the gold-fringed robes common to the court of Babylon, only the fabric was white rather than of a primary colour. His hair hung freshly-washed over his chest, still half dry. She saw the marks of bruises on his face, and that he looked far more human than Penemue, yet more of a king than her father would ever be.

  ‘Shemyaza,’ Penemue said aloud, then uttered a string of sentences in a tongue Sarpanita could not understand.

  Shemyaza walked past Sarpanita and laid a hand upon her head as he did so. She felt the burn of his touch and was able to get to her feet. He still had not spoken. She watched his svelte back, the bright banner of his hair against it, as he put his hands upon the locks of the cage. For a moment, he bowed his head in concentration, although his fingers lay lightly against the metal. Then, the doors to the cage swung open. Sarpanita glance
d at Tiy; she was smiling benignly almost in the manner of a woman who had just seen her son take his first steps.

  Penemue spoke again, and this time, Sarpanita was able to see beyond the words and intuit their meaning. Is it you? Is it really you? You look so different.

  Shemyaza gazed at him silently, then climbed up into the cage. He took Penemue in his arms, even though he was dwarfed by him. Words at last. ‘My brother.’

  Sarpanita saw that Penemue was weeping. He was telling Shemyaza of his torment since his release from the tomb, how he’d craved only solitude for eternity.

  ‘It is now a time for life,’ Shemyaza said, and his language was the universal language of the heart. ‘Cast off your pain, Penemue.’ He ran his hands over Penemue’s long face, pulled at his hair.

  ‘You are born into the body of a human,’ Penemue said.

  ‘Not exactly. This is the form we have become; Grigori. This body is of a long line of half-breeds. The differences between us and humanity are fewer now.’ Shemyaza turned and glanced down at Sarpanita, where she stood outside the cage. ‘And you are the daughter of Nimnezzar.’

  ‘Yes.’

  Shemyaza nodded thoughtfully for a moment, as if deciding her fate, then smiled. ‘Your future husband is now free.’ He stepped down from the cage and gestured for his brother to follow him. Sarpanita could tell it was hard for Penemue to take those first steps. He had been imprisoned for so long. He stood at the door to the cage, his hands gripping its rim, looking out. With the potential for freedom scored upon his face, he appeared more alien than ever, but he was afraid. Impulsively, Sarpanita walked forward and took hold of his hands. His height terrified her, and her slim fingers looked like the tiny paws of a monkey in his loose grip. ‘Come, my love,’ she said, and her voice shook only slightly.

  Penemue stepped down from the cage and for a moment her arms had to take his weight. She thought they would break, but then his feet were upon the ground, and he was staring over her head around the room, as if he’d never seen it before.

  ‘You must care for him, princess,’ said Shemyaza. ‘He has been away from the world a long time, and a cage is no place to reacquaint yourself with reality. We have work to do, but first give him the comfort of women. Teach him your language.’

  ‘We need no common language,’ Sarpanita said. She leaned against Penemue’s side and his arm enfolded her like a wing. She could hear the boom of his heart, unnaturally loud and strong. Shemyaza joined their hands and uttered a blessing in the ancient tongue.

  ‘I must leave you now,’ he said, ‘but only for a short time.’

  ‘Where are you going?’ Sarpanita asked, for she guessed it was a question in Penemue’s mind. Penemue still found it difficult to speak. ‘Tell us what is to happen.’

  ‘I am about to make it happen,’ Shemyaza answered. ‘Be patient.’

  ‘But my father,’ Sarpanita said, ‘my mother. What will become of them now that you are here?’

  Shemyaza glanced at Tiy, who remained motionless. He stroked his chin for a moment, then spoke. ‘You will make a great and legendary queen.’

  ‘My father…’ Sarpanita murmured, but Shemyaza was already stalking from the room. After a moment, Tiy followed. The guards looked uneasy but made no move to depart.

  Sarpanita stood beside her angel lord in the slanting sunlight of the early evening. The palace seemed very still around her, not a sound. What must she think now? Her life was fracturing, changing. She looked up at Penemue who was gazing down at her, his face full of patience and interest.

  ‘Come,’ she said, and led him to the long windows that opened out onto a balcony festooned with climbing vines. ‘Look, you can see some of the city from here.’ It looked so small below them, like a child’s model.

  For all his height and long disuse of limbs, Penemue was as graceful on his feet as a deer. Out on the balcony, he blinked against the mellow light. The guards had followed them, but it did not matter.

  ‘I do not know this world,’ Penemue said to her silently. He was looking at the domes, the minarets, the towers; so like his memory of the past, yet so different, interpreted as it was by modern minds.

  ‘I do not know much of it either,’ Sarpanita said. ‘This palace has been my life since I was very young. I recall little before that. We must learn together.’

  ‘Do not be afraid,’ Penemue said, and touched her brow with his fingers.

  ‘I am not afraid,’ she answered, and she wasn’t.

  From where they stood, they could see the Hanging Gardens spilling down from their terraces. They could see the roofs of other, lesser palaces, where the men whom Nimnezzar had made into nobles lived with their families. They could see the Museum of the Ancients and the basalt statues that adorned its roof. They could see the long, straight roads that cut through the city, fitting around market quarters, residential areas and parks. The walls of Babylon, some miles away, glinted with gold leaf. Nearer, they saw the temple, Etemenanki, dominating the sky. Smoke rose from its summit, high into the sky, thin and twisted like a tortured djinn.

  Chapter Twenty

  Fire From Heaven

  The temple of Etemenanki smoked against the evening sky, as if a thousand offerings burned upon its altars. The royal party walked along the processional road that led to the temple steps. Magians led the way, holding lit torches and waving thuribles of incense. Behind them came their acolytes with shaven heads, scattering petals. Next came the king, dressed in his finest robes and attended by a group of male attendants. Behind him, Jazirah, with the key held in both hands. Shemyaza walked at Jazirah’s heels, his head tilted back to take in the unimaginable sight of the temple. The party was followed by a formation of palace guards.

  Shemyaza could feel Jazirah’s fear as if it exuded from his spine like a skein of ill-smelling smoke. When the time came, the vizier would not be strong enough to control the power of the key. He was a cunning and forceful man, and therefore clever enough to know that Nimnezzar was demanding from him a performance beyond his capabilities. Shemyaza almost pitied him. Greed had brought Jazirah low. But for that vice he would not have heeded Nimnezzar’s call and hurried to his court to glut himself on Babylonian luxuries. He would undoubtedly still be practising the ancient rites upon the altars of a hidden temple somewhere in India. There would be a price to pay for that desertion.

  The party passed through the ceremonial gates of Etemenanki and walked across the smooth flag-stones of its outer court. Before them, a steep ramp soared upwards to the initial tier of the building. The Magians poured up the ramp in their scarlet robes, trailing perfume and fire. Shemyaza paused at the bottom and breathed deeply. Nimnezzar looked back. ‘Why do you linger?’ he demanded.

  ‘I can smell the cedar wood that burns on the altar of the shrine up there,’ Shemyaza replied. ‘It reminds me of home.’

  Nimnezzar made an irritated sound, glancing keenly at Shem’s face. He seemed unnerved by the fact that Shemyaza’s bruises seemed to have faded greatly already. ‘If you attempt trickery, I will have you killed.’

  Shemyaza looked at him directly. ‘Your vizier holds the key, not I.’

  Jazirah’s face indicated how little he enjoyed the privilege.

  They began the ascent of the great ramp. Beyond the first tier, thousands of steps led up to higher levels. It would take at least an hour to climb to the top of the ziggurat.

  Shemyaza overtook Jazirah to climb beside the king. ‘You have recreated the past so well,’ he remarked. ‘In your position, I would have installed an elevator, perhaps, or a moving stairway.’

  Nimnezzar clearly sensed sarcasm, but Shemyaza kept his face sublime. The king did not to respond to the comment.

  On the first terrace, they entered the temple, and here mute junior priests clad in sepia robes brought refreshment to them. The temple was gloomy, lit only by the light of candles. Tall columns disappeared into the darkness. The air had been hot, but now a cool breeze snaked into the building. Jazirah shivere
d. ‘I smell a storm,’ he said.

  ‘Good.’ Shemyaza went out into the darkening sunlight. The sky was becoming occluded by clouds. He had not summoned them himself, but he felt that someone had. The clouds tumbled about the sky, already muttering with thunder. Tiy came to his side. ‘Let me take your arm for the next stage of the climb,’ she said.

  Shemyaza hooked her fingers through his elbow. ‘Are these your clouds I see above me, mother Tiy?’

  She laughed. ‘I cannot own the sky.’

  Shemyaza glanced down at her. He still wondered whether she had actually carried him in her body or was simply the victim of a delusion. Still, she had advised him well, imbued him with courage. She appeared to know about the Grigori. Whether she was mad or not, she had helped him in an hour of need.

  The knowledge Tiy had given him concerning how the Grigori had manipulated his conception and covertly directed the path of his life was not a pleasing revelation. He hoped it was untrue, a paranoid theory, but some part of him was all too aware how likely it was. The Grigori were skilled in intrigue and conspiracy. It made him wonder whether Nimnezzar’s rise to power had also been organised by some nefarious Grigori cabal. Nothing seemed impossible now. He could only follow his instincts.

  By the time the royal party reached the seventh final tier, the evening had become black, although a weak and troubled sunlight still fought its way through the gloom. The light was altogether eerie. Shemyaza experienced a strong sense of déjà vu. This was the light that had haunted the earth in the days before Anu had released the Deluge to cleanse the land of the Nephilim warriors. Shemyaza could smell ozone in the air.

  Etemenanki’s summit was a wide, flat expanse of open air temple. It was adorned only by a large cubic altar of green stone. Here, a fire of cedar wood burned.

  Nimnezzar approached Shemyaza, eyeing with disdain Tiy’s fingers, which were still hooked through Shemyaza’s elbow. Perhaps he wondered why his seeress seemed to have developed a friendship with the angel lord so quickly. ‘Shemyaza,’ Nimnezzar said, ‘you must now tell us how to use the stone.’