by Assaph Mehr
He extended the cup with the spiced wine to me, and I took it from his hands. He raised his cup toward me. “To free knowledge and a better Egretia!” he exclaimed and drank deeply. All eyes were on me.
“To free knowledge and a better Egretia!” I repeated and drunk from my cup.
* * *
Borax must have been quite concerned at the look of my face, for after I climbed back to the main room I hastily made my way straight out of the tavern. He followed my outside and saw me pushing my fingers down my throat, retching and vomiting repeatedly on the corner, until nothing was left in my stomach.
I walked shakily to the nearest crossroads, and rinsed my mouth with water from the public fountain. Only then did I respond to Borax’s concerns about my health.
We went back to the Dented Skull and sat at our previous table. I wanted to think about the events that have just transpired, but I also wanted to remain close to where the cabal met. By now the place was quite busy, with patrons drinking, eating, and socialising; with whores scouting for customers, and thieves scouting for victims. As we sat down, I fished out of my tunic the small pouch I always carry with me and took out a few herbs of my own. I chewed on them slowly, and washed down their bitter taste with wine.
Zymaxis must be a veneficitor, an incantator that specialises in the veneficium branch of enchantment, concerned with herbs and poisons. If he was using concoctions and potions to achieve his ends, it would explain why I could not feel any magic taking place here. Any extra enchantment required to bring out the potency of his admixtures, could have been performed well in advance and in another place. I could only hope that my immediate expulsion of the treated wine together with the antidote herbs I was chewing would eliminate any effect Zymaxis intended.
I didn’t want to stay here long, however. When Didia next walked by I drew her close and pretended to request her favours again. From the corner of my eye I saw the proprietor shrug and nod upstairs at her.
Once in her room, I held her hands from taking off her tunic and looked into her grey eyes. “Lovely as the idea is, right now I need to ask you something. I will pay you just the same. I saw you bring the wine to Zymaxis’ gathering. Have you noticed the three little boxes, the pyxidae he keeps on the table next to the wine?”
She nodded and I continued. “I came in the room together with him, but the boxes were already there. Does he keep them here?”
“My master keeps the pyxidae locked for him in a special trunk, and Zymaxis is the only one allowed to open them. He comes and refills them at times, usually on the day before their meetings.”
“Do you have access to them? Could you get me a sample of their contents?”
“No! My dominus would beat me! He keeps the chest locked in his room, and even if I could open it, if my master caught me poking in his room he would have me whipped!” She was shaking.
“No, we wouldn’t want that.” I hugged her and waited until she calmed down.
“I will have to think up another way to get them then. My employer is most interested in their contents, and would be quite generous.” I hummed for a bit. “Say, do you ever help set up or clean the room after their little gatherings?”
“The master sets it up in the evenings. He has specific directions from Zymaxis, and sometimes they have… other things there,” she shuddered again. “Sometimes though, if dominus is too busy or just too tired when they are done, he will send me down there to clean up before he puts the boxes and paraphernalia away. This is how I know he locks them.”
“Well now, that suggests a plan. I could tire out your master with songs and drinks. If he sends you down to clean after tonight, will you be able to steal a small quantity of the contents of each of the pyxidae? Even a pinch would be enough. My employer would be most grateful, and reward accordingly for all your risks.”
In the end the promise of monies that would make a significant contribution to her freedom fund made the most impression. I also promised her ten denarii for every name of the cabal she overheard. I left her five silver denarii as a down payment for the herb samples and the names.
With the money on the table and my hands around her shoulders, we ended up again in bed.
Back at the main room, Borax was patiently waiting for me at our table. Rather than risk drawing attention to myself by staying there, we settled our account and we left. Out on the street I outlined my plan to Borax. He wasn’t a natural actor, but the role suited him well enough.
We started to wander the streets of the Clivi Inferior, like two old chums gone carousing. Whenever we passed others on the street we discussed, loudly, the merits of the wine and whores at The Dented Skull. We marvelled at that randy old goat who was marrying the sweet teenager tomorrow, and was so happy he was buying drinks for everyone present there. We told each other of the serving maids at the Dented Skull, their relative merits and measurements. We even sat for a drink at a few other taverns, drank the wine, complained bitterly on how lacklustre it was compared to the one served at the Dented Skull, and declared loudly that we are making our way back to that elysian place of sweet wine and kindly prostitutes. Finding celebrants was not hard that night, as this was the first day of the Megalenses Ludi, and a great number of people were out and about looking for thrills.
By the time we circled our way back to the Dented Skull, it was packed. New customers were eagerly ordering wines and food, giving the local ladies a brisk night, running into old friends and colleagues, and generally making merry. The proprietor must have been surprised at the sudden turnout, though he was too busy to really care once the money started flowing in.
Borax and I waited mostly outside, near the public fountain at the square up the alley. Only occasionally did we go to take a look. As the night progressed, so did the revelry. Whenever things seemed in danger of calming down, we found a way to get a round of drinks to all the patrons without drawing attention. I have not seen Zymaxis or any of the other members of his cabal leave the tavern, but with the crowds that were there I might have missed them. Of Didia I barely saw more than a glance, as she was kept busy with the night’s activities.
It was well past midnight when affairs started to calm down. The patrons were getting tired and the whores were getting frayed. By two hours before the dawn the Dented Skull was mostly deserted. When I peeked inside there was no sign of Septimius or Didia, and only one of the other maids remained, cleaning up the place.
I waited patiently with Borax in the alley outside the Dented Skull. A while later Didia came out, emptying a bucket into the gutters, looking haggard. A square of folded linen and a small pouch full of coins quickly exchanged hands without a word, and Didia went back inside. There was nothing left for Borax and me but to head back home.
Chapter VIII
I awoke late and spent what little remained of the following day analysing the samples Didia got for me from Zymaxis’ pyxidae. I had no way of telling which one he put in my drink, so I was interested in all three samples to see what else he might have used. My knowledge of herbs, poisons and potions was limited to practical titbits, and I could not hope to match a trained veneficitor. I ran all the tests I could think of on the tiny samples Didia had risked getting for me. I detected no poisons, only mild hallucinogenics, which relieved me somewhat. I also did not detect any enchantment, however veneficium doesn’t necessarily involve a raw power called into the potion. Besides, as much as I hate to admit it, it could just as easily have been too subtle for my meagre skills.
I needed to find more information, and wanted to carefully consider my options first. While I had met with Zymaxis and his cabal I still knew very little about them, and in fact didn’t even know any of the names of the other members. Asking around after a military man with an unknown rank or affiliation of an unnamed senatorial family, or of an ageing, failing incantator of unspecified speciality and with bad manners will not get me anywhere. The answers I was likely to get would be “aren’t all of them like that?”
&
nbsp; And what if these men heard I was asking after them, and decided they did not like this turn of events? Of course, some of them might be asking after me regardless; if I didn’t try to find out about them I would be facing an unknown cabal, completely in the dark if they took exception to me and chose to strike. I was beginning to feel paranoid, and washed my face in the fountain to cool my head.
That left asking around after Zymaxis himself. The name was foreign, vaguely Assyrican, though he spoke perfect Quirite with hardly an accent. I had learnt about him from Caeso’s friends and from Mahatixa, and both times only in relation to The Dented Skull. I had not seen him or any of the other members of the cabal leave last night, so I could not follow any of them. And so again, a dearth of leads. The proprietor of the Dented Skull was in Zymaxis’ employ, and my feeling was that he would not talk to me — and would alert him in detail later. I also felt that I had extracted all the information I could out of Didia.
So I had to consider other options available to me, in addition to fishing out about the men of the cabal. For my task, I was told their next meeting there would be on the night eight days before the Kalends of Maius, the free night between the festivals of the Parilia and the Vinalia, sixteen days from today. The one after that again on the Nones of Maius. They might meet at other times, or they might not, but those were the days I was told to show up to impress them with my solution to their puzzle.
I paced around the unkempt peristyle garden in my old and empty house, mocked by the grinning faun and his enormous phallus.
Still, a man such as Zymaxis, a man with charisma, with an agenda, a man who managed to recruit — and possibly kill — from all walks of Egretian life, a man like that must surely leave tracks. I left my house determined to sniff them out.
* * *
I started with my friend Akhirabus, herbalist and specialist embalmer. His shop was located near to the Porta Fulvia on the street of the embalmers. When walking down that street between all the shops of those whose business is the end of life, one is accosted by many fragrances. Funeral wreaths, fresh flowers to lay about corpses, unguents and balsams for the preparation of dead bodies — all very aromatic, to mask the unsavoury smells accompanying death.
When I entered the shop of Akhirabus my nose was blatantly assaulted, like a green recruit facing his first enemy cavalry charge. It was not so much that the smells were strong or clashing — although there was plenty of that too — but just the sheer variety of them was overwhelming. With every small draft, with every step, with every turn of the head, new heady smells and perfumes clamoured for my attention. Akhirabus was not a mere embalmer, he was a master herbalist as well, and his shop was stocked with amazingly varied supplies from all over the known world.
Happily I found Akhirabus on the premises, and he greeted me warmly as I entered. “Thank you for the commission, my friend. The money was good, but more than that — the interest! I have not had so much fun with corpses for a long time. In my business, human innards start to all look the same after a while. But this! An intriguing puzzle. You Egretians do not like tattooing yourself, and place so many restrictions on the magia vita as you call it, so I rarely get such interesting corpses to prepare.” His jet-black eyes were twinkling, set in an old and wrinkled face, brown leathery skin covering his head without a single hair to be seen. “Your friend with the funny name — ‘Brew-in’ — and I worked together on the young man’s remains. He is a professional too, it was a pleasure see him remove the tattoos.”
“What can you make of it? Have you seen the likes of this before?”
“Seen? Oh no, not seen. But heard. A long time ago, in the old country. It reminds me of tales by my old teacher, tales of ancient rituals transforming the ib, the heart. None of them have been practised for aeons, and I fear the knowledge might be lost. For good reason too. You saw what happened to the poor boy, his whole ka was torn horribly from his body,” said Akhirabus.
“It reminded me of something I had read about before, in the libraries of the Collegium. It was named the Rite of Pelegrinus.”
“Pelegrinus, Amon-Ib-Khat — names change, the essence does not. How did the child become involved?”
“That is what I am trying to find out. I was hoping you could help me.” I said.
“I am afraid my knowledge of these matters is flawed, and I am most ashamed that I cannot offer you more than you already know.” He shook his head in genuine sadness as he spoke this.
“Would you make a guess as to what was required?” I asked. “Even with flawed knowledge, your opinion is still better than anybody else’s.”
“You flatter me,” Akhirabus said. “For what it’s worth, I would advise that you should not limit yourself to the specific ritual you mentioned. Search for the essence. The peak of a mountain can be reached by many paths. The mountain is still the same, but the view on the way up may be different.”
I asked Akhirabus for help with the spice mixtures I got at the Dented Skull as well. Herbalism being his passion he was delighted at yet another puzzle, although he was not able to tell me anything I did not already know. “If you leave them with me,” he told me, “I will be able to examine them with more care later. These things take time, you understand. The samples are small, and I will need to carefully consider each test, use them most sparingly with the utmost care. If you come back in a few days, I will tell you what I find.”
* * *
This was the Nones of Avrilis, the fifth day of the month named after Fortuna Virilis, and the city was on holiday due to the Megalenses Ludi. Virilis is the aspect of Fortuna dedicated to hiding the imperfections of women from men. Only fitting that the games dedicated to the Great Mother would be held then. These games were not like the usual circus games with chariot races and wrestling bouts; after the opening ceremonies of discordant chanting by self-flagellating eunuchs, most of the celebrations consisted of theatre plays. Everywhere people were attending theatres, from formal Egretian masked dramas and comedies to the most debased street mime with bare breasts and bottoms. A cultural melting pot at its best, as the Great Mother is not an Egretian presence.
In this atmosphere, I decided to spend the rest of the daytime on locating Mahatixa’s troupe and query her in further details about Zymaxis.
Easier said than done. I spent hours walking streets full of happy revellers, chasing rumours of a foreign troupe with the sign of the sphinx. Mahatixa’s troupe remained elusive. Whomever I asked, from tavern owners to sailors and passing citizens in the street, had either never heard of them or swore on his mother’s shade that they have just been spotted on the other side of the city from where I was. There was no shortage of mime troupes in Egretia during the festivals of the Megalenses Ludi, many apparently even with dancing dark-skinned beauties, though the one I was after was nowhere to be found. After walking for miles around the city and visiting neighbourhoods from the fancy to the slums, when it was getting late at night I gave up.
In between chasing the entertainers, I attempted some discreet queries about Zymaxis. Most people were in a happy and festive mood, and I tried my best not to stand out like a diseased facial wart. I stopped at taverns where I knew seditious elements visited, I asked friends known to follow the town gossip, I bought wine and chatted, asking oblique questions and getting oblique answers. Nothing concrete, no rumours of an Assyrican, veneficitor or otherwise, dissatisfied with the current regime. I could not be too open with my questions, and thus did not get informative answers.
I ended up feeling like a dog chasing its tail, trying to talk to people I have already spoken to and get them to reveal things they probably did not know.
* * *
I trudged up the hill back to my home. I was tired from little sleep the night before and much walking today, and knew I had a lot more pounding of pavements to do over the following days. I opened my front door and stepped into the vestibule. Something did not feel right. I put my hand inside my tunic and clutched my dagger’s hilt. I close
d the door quietly behind me and walked into the house.
I stepped into the atrium and froze. Sitting on folding chairs and facing each other were Dascha and Araxus, staring and giving each other the evil eye, looking for all intents and purposes like two mangy cats hissing and spitting at a deadly rival.
I relaxed. A little.
“He pushed right in, domine! He said he has a message for you, but if he’s a messenger I am a young nymph.” She sniffed in indignation.
“Dascha, this is Araxus. He used to come here quite often. You should remember him.”
She peered at him incredulously. “Araxus? But he looks as old as me, domine. That can’t be your old friend, can it?” Araxus scratched his side under his filthy garment and chewed on the end of his unkempt beard. Dascha turned away in disgust. “I never knew what you saw in him, young dominus.”
“It’s all right Dascha, I can address this from now. You can go back to your duties.” She went away, shooting a last disgusted, spiteful look at Araxus over her shoulder.
“Dascha said you have a message for me. Did you find something?” I said, with vague hopes that my attempt at trusting him would not be frustrated.
He looked up at me with his green right eye, while his left black eye kept following Dascha. “It’s the light, don’t you see?”