by Steve Cash
I stood down from Mowsel’s shoulders and started to tell him what I’d seen. He shook his head and nodded toward the recess in the wall. I turned.
“Bonsoir, mon petit,” a soft, familiar voice said from the shadows.
My heart froze, but I said nothing.
“You are late,” he said. “What kept you, pray tell?”
I took a deep breath and glanced at Mowsel. “Yes, well…it snowed.”
I heard a rustling sound and a gasp from Opari. He pushed her forward and they came into the light. The Fleur-du-Mal was standing behind Opari. He was dressed in black and silver fur and leather. He held Opari’s head at an angle with one hand and a dagger to her throat with the other. Her eyes stared into mine. I saw anger and concern, but no fear. I told myself to calm down. Inside the greenhouse, the music had stopped playing.
“What do you think of Askenfada?” he asked, smiling.
“I think it’s lonely.”
His smile faded. “You are like your pitiful grandfather, Zezen, and all the others—you know nothing of true beauty!” He forced Opari forward slightly, pressing the knife harder against her throat and bringing a trace of blood. “Do you still think of this ancient girl as beauty?” he asked, holding Opari’s head at a severe angle, then licking her on the cheek and neck. He looked me in the eyes. “Shall I kill her now, mon petit?”
Rune saw me start forward and held me back.
The Fleur-du-Mal laughed sarcastically. “You make me sick to my stomach!” He spit at the ground.
I said nothing. Absolute silence surrounded us. Our breathing was the only sound I could hear. Several seconds passed. “Call the others,” he said finally. “I tire of this charade. I know where they are.” He nodded toward each of the entrances. “It is time.”
“Time for what?”
“I have a surprise for all of you,” he said. “Do it!” he whispered through clenched white teeth. He pulled Opari’s head back again with a jerk of her hair, baring her throat to the light. He pressed the knife down even harder, drawing more blood. “And please, Zezen, do not yell. It could prove dangerous.”
I wasn’t sure what he meant, but I didn’t hesitate to do what he said. I stood clear of the entrance and waved to Sailor, ninety feet away, and Geaxi, thirty feet closer. They were barely visible through the falling snow.
Before they approached, the Fleur-du-Mal backed Opari into the shadows of the entrance. As they came closer, he whispered their names, even Nova and Rune. The last to appear was Zeru-Meq. “Well, well, well,” he said, “I never expected you, Uncle.”
Quietly, cautiously, Sailor passed the others and walked up to me. He looked once at Mowsel, then asked, “What have you seen, Zianno?”
I didn’t answer.
In a soft snarl from the shadows, the Fleur-du-Mal said, “The Holy Grail, Sailor…Zezen has seen the Holy Grail.”
All the others stopped in their tracks when they heard his voice. He prodded Opari forward into the light. Sailor glanced at Opari and the dagger at her throat, but showed no emotion or reaction. In his own calm voice, he asked, “What do you mean, ‘the Holy Grail’?”
“The very thing you seek, Umla-Meq, possibly more than me—the Octopus and the old one who stole it.”
Zeru-Meq took a few steps forward. “Happy Birthday, Xanti,” he said.
“Stop there, Uncle! Go no farther or I will take Opari’s life in an instant!” the Fleur-du-Mal snapped. “None of you move,” he said to the rest. Gradually, his smile returned. He looked at Mowsel. “You,” he said, “raise Sailor on your shoulders as you did Zezen. I want Sailor especially to see for himself.”
Mowsel glanced at me, then put his hands on his knees and squatted down, letting Sailor climb onto his shoulders. He stood upright and Sailor leaned against the glass window and gazed inside. When his eyes found Zuriaa and Susheela the Ninth with the Octopus in her lap, he almost lost his balance, then he seemed lost in something else. He stared in frozen silence for thirty seconds. He seemed to be listening more than watching. Slowly, he turned his head, looking at the Fleur-du-Mal with ultimate contempt. Sailor was furious, but his voice remained calm. “What is this about, you madman?”
“Get down now, Umla-Meq, and go stand with the others. You do the same, Uncle.”
Sailor surveyed everything around him with his eyes. He looked once at Opari, then hopped down with barely a sound and took a few steps toward the others. He stopped suddenly and said to the Fleur-du-Mal, “By the way, would there happen to be a Sixth Stone inside the little box? I was just curious, but you are not obligated to answer, of course.”
The Fleur-du-Mal laughed bitterly. “At the moment, the Stone is elsewhere. The ancient black witch refuses to tell me where it is, poor thing. She will surely regret that decision, just as she will surely lead me to it.” He paused. “She is not obligated, of course.” He laughed again, a hollow sound, and no one laughed with him.
“I see Zuriaa does your bidding,” I said. “I thought you told me she was insane and hated you.”
“Oh, make no mistake, mon petit, Zuriaa is quite insane. I simply found I could use her skills and easily directed her hatred to fear and then into worship, of a sort. As long as she continues to be able to function and be of value, she will be used.” He paused again. Sailor had stopped next to Zeru-Meq and Rune. “Enough of this chatter,” the Fleur-du-Mal said. “Zezen, you stand with the others. The moment is at hand.”
“Why are we here?” Geaxi asked.
“Ah, my dear Geaxi, you have surely noticed by now that all five Stones are present, have you not? It occurred to me once I had found the black girl, the other five Stones were no longer relevant, nor the Meq who carried them. I threw some crumbs out and each of you came eagerly, like blind mice. But I digress. To answer your query, Geaxi, you are here to die. It is unfortunate about Uncle being present, but c’est la vie.”
Zeru-Meq spoke. “You and I both know why you want the Sixth Stone, Xanti, and why you are obsessed with these roses. You cannot erase it or make it go away. The Stone will make no difference.”
“Silence!” the Fleur-du-Mal screamed. “You know nothing!”
“I saw what I saw,” Zeru-Meq said.
“You saw what you wanted to see. You always have, Uncle. And now, sadly, you shall have to die with the others. Raza, come into the light!”
The tall Indian man named Raza Vejahashala walked quietly from the shadows, opening the greenhouse door behind him as he stepped forward. The light from inside framed the Fleur-du-Mal and Opari in silhouette. The dagger was still at her throat.
Raza wore a long, full-length fur coat. Before anyone knew exactly what he was doing, he withdrew a coiled black bullwhip from his coat, which he unwound and held at arm’s length. The Fleur-du-Mal said, “Gjensyn, mon petit.” Raza raised his arm in a quick, fluid motion, then cracked the whip as hard as he could. The crack sounded like a high-powered rifle shot. It echoed off the rock overhang surrounding the greenhouse, then rose up the steep ridge above. The stillness afterward lasted ten seconds before we heard something faint and far away. It sounded like a waterfall high in the mountains. In moments, I realized it was not a waterfall—it was snow, a wall of snow dislodged from the ridge by the crack of the bullwhip and falling fast. We had seconds to escape. I looked in Opari’s eyes. She was staring back at me.
In that same instant, the Fleur-du-Mal released Opari, giving her a boot in the back, which sent her lunging toward me. He laughed as loud as he could, telling Opari, “Go die with the others!” He and Raza ducked back into the greenhouse and closed the door. I caught Opari and the two of us turned in one motion and started running for the edge of the terrace. There was no time to take the stone stairway. I glanced once at the others. Everyone was running. Rune stumbled and fell. Zeru-Meq tried to help him and was knocked down. I thought I saw Sailor turning back to help them both. We ran for the edge and bounded into the air, falling twenty-five feet to the next terrace. We tumbled over and over, t
hen regained our footing and ran to the edge of that terrace and jumped again. We landed, ran, and jumped again. Small clumps of snow and rock hit us from behind and above as we ran. I could hear the roar as the avalanche came thundering down from the overhang, burying the greenhouse and everything around it.
Finally, luckily, on the fourth terrace down from the top, we were safe. I was certain I had broken my ankle, but I knew it would heal within hours. Opari had only a few cuts and bruises. Geaxi, Nova, Ray, and Trumoi-Meq all made it without serious injury. Sailor and Zeru-Meq had been partially buried on the third terrace down, but they survived and crawled to safety.
Rune had not been so lucky. He did not possess our speed and was caught and buried under a wall of snow. In seconds, the greenhouse and all the roses inside had disappeared forever. I looked up the steep slope to where they had been moments earlier. Now there was only a giant swirling cloud of snow rising in the silence. The Fleur-du-Mal destroyed his own creation in order to destroy all of us. Except for Rune Balle, his plan failed. But where was the Fleur-du-Mal? It was too late in the day to find the answer or search for Rune’s body. We had been fooled, trapped, and nearly killed. I was the only one with broken bones, but everyone was bruised or bleeding somewhere. We got our bearings and Sailor led the way down to the dock. We found the fishing boat and climbed on board. Ray started the engines. As we pulled out in the cove, I looked down to the covered slip where the speedboat had been anchored when we arrived. The slip was empty.
As we stepped from the boat onto Svein’s dock, Sailor grabbed my arm and pulled me aside. His “ghost eye” was filled with clouds. “She spoke to me, Zianno,” he whispered.
I said nothing at first, then I understood.
“Did she speak to you, Zianno?”
“No, she was bound and gagged,” I said. “How did she speak?”
“From inside with a voice I recognized in my heart of hearts. I heard her clearly.”
Sailor looked across the cove. It was nearly dark. He squinted and stared up the slope to where the greenhouse had been. Then he shook his head back and forth.
“What?” I asked.
“She told me over and over there is no Sixth Stone—the Octopus is an empty box! She remains alive only because the Fleurdu-Mal thinks she has hidden it from him.”
I followed Sailor’s gaze across the cove. I thought about what he said. I had no doubt Susheela the Ninth was capable of speaking with her mind. I knew the instant I looked in her eyes she was older than all of us beyond measure. “Do you believe her?”
“Yes.”
I turned and looked at Sailor. As he stared up the slope his “ghost eye” cleared. He seemed frozen again, detached, more listening than watching. “It was Deza’s voice I heard.” He turned his head and looked deep in my eyes. “She spoke in Deza’s voice, Zianno.” Deza, Sailor’s Ameq, had been decapitated by the Phoenicians in Carthage almost three thousand years earlier. Sailor never imagined he would hear her voice again, but Susheela the Ninth had somehow found what was deepest in his heart and mind and spoken to him in the same voice.
An hour later, after we changed clothes and warmed ourselves around Svein’s roaring fire, we gathered in the kitchen to discuss how we might recover Rune’s body. Svein said he could hire a crew in Voss the next day. The snow must be removed before it built up on the ridge again. Mowsel suggested the rest of us stay out of sight until the crew finished the job, in order to avoid any unnecessary questions. I kept thinking of Penelope and Knut. I knew how this would break their hearts, but I also knew I must be the one to tell them. We would find Rune’s body and I would take him home to them. Opari sensed what I was thinking and held my hand in hers. Together, all of us decided not to discuss anything further that evening. We each knew how lucky we were to be alive. It was time to rest.
As Opari and I climbed into bed, she asked, “What does she look like?”
“Susheela the Ninth?”
“Yes.”
“Except for green eyes and black skin, she looks like you, Opari…she could be your twin.”
Early the next morning Svein left for Voss. He returned soon after with a full crew and they set to work immediately. The weather improved. The sky never cleared completely but snowfall was limited to occasional flurries. By the end of the day the crew had found and recovered Rune’s body. He had been caught on the second terrace down and buried under fifteen feet of snow. Svein and his crew also discovered how the Fleurdu-Mal escaped the avalanche. During his reconstruction of Askenfada, he had completed the abandoned tunnel Svein and Rune had played in as children. By extending and expanding the greenhouse, he disguised the entrance and the tunnel became his secret passageway, not through the mountain, but down the slope and exiting onto the terrace nearest the dock, just above the covered slip and the waiting speedboat.
I hated the Fleur-du-Mal. I hated him for many reasons, all of them personal and fundamental. He was an abomination and an aberration as a living being. He was a murderer, not merely an assassin, and he had nearly killed us all. He was complex, devious, and unpredictable. He was a psychopath with no boundaries and without moral conscience, and he was still a mystery to me. He seemed to have no weakness, no vulnerability, and he only acted with calculated malice. Did he have a Bihazanu, a heartfear? If so, what was it? I had questions for Zeru-Meq. I wanted to know what he meant when confronting the Fleurdu-Mal, he said, “You and I both know why you want the Sixth Stone” and “I saw what I saw.” But I was sick of the Fleur-du-Mal and decided I would ask these questions another time. Sailor, who had never personally pursued the Fleur-du-Mal before, announced that he and Zeru-Meq would leave immediately for India and attempt to find any information they could about Raza or his family. “We must find a way to stop the Fleurdu-Mal once and for all. There is too much at stake,” Sailor said. “And we must do it now. There is no other option. He has crossed a line I never thought he would cross. Zeru-Meq agrees. When we find him, we will send word.”
No one spoke much after that. Even Opari and I said little to each other. We sat together for hours by the kitchen window, drinking tea and watching Svein and his crew far across the cove and high up the hillside, digging in the snow. Once, without looking at me, she took my hand and wove her fingers through mine. In the softest voice in the world, she said, “We are Meq, my love. We go on.”
Later that night, long after Svein’s crew had gone, Opari and I walked outside and down the stone stairs to the small dock. Snow was still falling, but only in great, single, floating flakes. We walked to the end of the dock. Slowly, the sky began to clear. I saw a star, then two, then a three-quarter moon appeared, sending faint shafts of light across the cove. I turned to Opari. She was looking up. One of the last snowflakes in the sky spun down through the light and landed like a frozen butterfly on her cheek. Instantly, it became a tear.
PART III
Time is the reef on which all our frail mystic ships are wrecked.
—Noel Coward
7. Pixkanaka (Little by little)
According to a strange fable long told at sea by Basque whalers and fishermen, there was once an old man in the mountains who one day set out walking, along with a young boy who rarely spoke. The old man had lost much of his memory and nearly all of his eyesight, so he took the boy with him, but the boy had no idea where they were going. They kept climbing and climbing, walking on and on until they were nowhere really, halfway between heaven and earth, alone together and completely uncertain if they were anywhere at all. The old man rubbed and scrubbed his eyes, frantically trying to regain his vision. The boy seemed unconcerned. Finally, after finding nothing at all familiar or recognizable, the old man turned to the boy and asked, “How did we get here?” Without hesitation or even blinking an eye, the boy replied, “Little by little, sir…little by little.”
Rune Balle was laid to rest on New Year’s Day. The air felt frigid but the sky was crystal clear and deep blue. Svein Stigen accompanied Penelope and Knut, along with
Opari and me, to a small stone church and cemetery less than a mile from where Rune was born. We buried him in a grave adjacent to his father and grandfather. Penelope and Knut had taken Rune’s death hard. Opari and I promised to stay as long as we were needed or could be of some comfort. Also, I wired Owen Bramley and Carolina to send a substantial transfer of funds to Bergen in Penelope and Knut’s name. I felt extreme guilt about everything, even though it had been the Fleur-du-Mal who had done the killing. The truth of it is that Rune should not have died. Little by little, he had been drawn in and used, by all of us, not just the Fleur-du-Mal. We had to make it up to them in some way. Money would be a start. Long ago, Solomon had made sure we had it. We could do the same for Penelope and Knut.
Sailor and Zeru-Meq left Bergen almost as soon as we arrived. They bought tickets for the train to Oslo, and from there would begin their long trip to India. Sailor paused to remind me of what Susheela the Ninth had revealed. He said it meant we now knew something the Fleur-du-Mal did not—there is no Sixth Stone. We could use this against him. “It is a significant weakness,” Sailor whispered with a wink of his “ghost eye.” “And I shall exploit it.”
Mowsel stayed behind with the rest of us, but before Sailor and Zeru-Meq had gone, he suggested we all meet in Spain in ten years’ time, which they agreed to do. Zeru-Meq casually mentioned he had not been back to Spain in a thousand years. “Then it is time, my friend,” Sailor said. “The Gogorati is less than ninety years from now.” He turned and looked each of us in the eye. “All Meq should see Spain again.” Both Zeru-Meq and Sailor wore similar clothing, including leather boots laced to the knees. They were the same height and weight. Each had dark hair, though Sailor wore a braid behind his left ear and Zeru-Meq did not. As they walked away in close conversation, they looked like brothers, possibly twins, yet they had been antagonists to one another for centuries. The chase for the Fleur-du-Mal had something to do with bringing them together, but that couldn’t have been the sole reason. I asked Mowsel what happened, what brought about the change? He said, “I do not know what either of them would tell you; however, I believe the answer is quite simple. Sailor had to abandon the question, ‘Why us?’ and Zeru-Meq had to abandon his position, ‘Why anything?’”