by Torey Hayden
“He remained seated behind the table and I was keenly aware of how much more easily he was able to size me up as I crossed the vast space than I was him. I tried to stride confidently. He watched me closely. I watched him watching me.
“As I came up to the table, he rose to his feet and reached out to shake my hand. With a name like Fergus I’d been expecting a tall, ruddy-haired Celt, some kind of William Wallace or Rob Roy. In fact, he was no taller than I was and looked Latino to me. Loose black curls fell down over his collar and two or three days’ growth of stubble gave rebellious virility to his features. He wore cream-coloured safari-type clothes, the kind with all the pockets, and this, along with his stylish shaggy hair and dark looks, gave him the aura of Che Guevara. A very handsome Che Guevara, I might add. All the information I’d had about the Prophet, and no one had mentioned he was drop-dead gorgeous, but he was. It broke my concentration.
“The allure was in his eyes. They were dark and deep and had this magnetic vitality to them that enabled him to effortlessly fix you to the spot. Very gently. You only ever realized afterwards that he had sapped your will.
“‘Hello,’ he said in a soft, honeyed voice. He shook my hand firmly. Then he sat down and gestured that I do likewise. Folding his arms on the table, he leaned forward towards me. ‘So, how can I help you?’”
Laura smiled. “I was struck dumb. It’s not too much of an exaggeration to say it was love at first sight. All I could focus on were those melting brown eyes, so dark they looked black in that low light. No mystery here why so many women were parting with serious money to have fifteen minutes of his undivided attention. Two weeks of groceries meant nothing in comparison.
“He was unperturbed with my silence. He just said again with almost hypnotic slowness, ‘How can I help you?’
“I said, ‘I just wanted to see you.’
“He nodded gently and smiled. ‘Very good. And why is that? There’s something you’d like to discuss.’ This last wasn’t a question. He was still studying my face intently. I grew aware of the sustained eye contact and found it hard to keep up. I lowered my head.
“‘You have a problem you’d like some help with?’ he asked sweetly. He smiled but kept up the unflinching gaze.
“I found it impossible to look at him. I couldn’t get my thoughts to organize, which was a weird sensation. They were there, but I couldn’t pull them together into coherence. All I could really think about was how handsome he was, how masculine, and, oddly, how good he smelled. It wasn’t a scent. Not like aftershave or anything. Just him. Just this warm male odour.
“He stretched his palms, upward, out across the table. ‘Here, give me your hands.’
“I held them out. Taking them in his, the Prophet held them in his open palms and regarded them before slowly closing his fingers over them. His skin was startlingly hot. ‘You’re going to be famous,’ he said, still looking down at his hands, holding mine. ‘You’re going to be very famous indeed.’
“This broke the spell, because I laughed out loud. ‘What a great psychic chat-up line’, I was thinking.
“The Prophet looked up in surprise. ‘I’m mistaken?’ He seemed slightly taken aback. ‘I can’t be. I read it very strongly. Are you famous already, then?’
“‘Hardly.’
“‘Ah, but you will be.’ He had regained his confidence. ‘I sense many people knowing who you are. Communication figures very strongly. TV, perhaps? Because I sense you communicating with millions.’
“Withdrawing my hands, I sat back and smiled. ‘I bet you tell all the girls that.’
“It was his turn to laugh then, and he did, heartily. ‘Ah, a sceptic.’ He laughed again. ‘I love your kind.’ Then abruptly, mid-laugh, he stopped. His gaze grew intent. He searched my face.
“This time I kept eye contact. Torgon came into my mind. There are small necessities one must learn, the Seer had said, that others might recognize you are holy. Never look away first. The lowering of eyes is for those lesser than yourself.
“‘You are not who you say you are,’ the Prophet said in a quiet voice.
“I held his gaze.
“His eyes narrowed, as if trying to see me from a great distance. ‘Who are you?’
“His gaze grew so intense that I started feeling uncomfortable in an odd sort of way. In the muted light of that corner of the room, his eyes appeared absolutely black.
“‘Who are you?’ he asked again, his voice barely audible. ‘I sense the presence of another. Shimmering around you. Enveloping you in its light. Becoming you … becoming separate … becoming you.’
“Instantly, I thought, ‘He’s seeing Torgon’, and the weirdest sensation went through me, like a shake of ice shards falling inside my body. I physically shuddered. ‘I’m Laura,’ I whispered.
“When I said that, the Prophet bounced forward in surprise and his chair banged against the table, shattering the eerie moment.
“‘You’re Laura?’ he asked with undisguised surprise, his honeyed voice gone into hoarse astonishment. ‘You’re Laura? Oh my God, really? Alec’s friend?’
“‘Yes.’
“Falling back into his chair, he let his shoulders sag in an expression of utter disbelief. ‘Why didn’t I know?’ he cried out. ‘Shit! And I’ve been waiting for you for so long. Shit. God. I’m so overwhelmed.’
“I was feeling overwhelmed myself but with something darker. How could he have detected Torgon? What was he doing? The preceding few minutes had been so intense and so weird that I couldn’t take this sudden lightness in.
He smiled broadly. ‘I’ve been waiting for you.’
“‘How do you mean?’ I asked.
“‘I knew you were the one. They told me it would be you. They said, when I called you, you’d come.’
“‘Who are they?’
“‘The Voices.’
Confused, I just stared at him.
“‘I brought you here, Laura. I called you. You may think you came of your own accord, but I called you, with my mind. And you came because you heard me.’
I just sat there. Because what could I say? I didn’t know. I didn’t even know what to say to myself at that moment. I stumbled to my feet and said, ‘I have to go.’ Lifting up my handbag, I began to take out payment for the session.
“‘Oh no, no, no,’ he said, waving off the money. ‘You keep that. I’d never take money from you.’ He grinned knowingly.
“Still overwhelmed, I shook his hand, then turned and started towards the door.
“‘Oh, and Laura?’ he said after me.
“I paused and turned to look at him.
“‘You will be famous.’”
Chapter Twenty-Three
When the session was over and Laura had left, James went over to the filing cabinet and pulled out the bottom drawer. It was easy to see how the lure of attention and real-life friends had proved too much for this lonely, isolated girl and Torgon-the-imaginary-companion began to fade into the shadows of Torgon-the-spirit-guide.
James was curious, however, about the “real” Torgon. Laura had still been writing about her, even while channelling the fake Torgon. He paged through the thick file of stories, each carefully dated, to see which ones corresponded with the year Laura was twenty-three.
“Four turns of the moon and I haven’t talked to you a single time,” Mogri said.
Leaning forward, bracing her elbows on her knees, Torgon covered her face with her hands. “I’m sorry, but it has been going ill for me.”
“Aye, I can tell. Has there been winter sickness among you at the compound?”
“No, it is the old man. He has fallen into a deathly sleep. His spirit left his body to dwell among the dead some weeks ago, but his body has refused to follow. He must be cleaned and fed like a suckling babe, but there is no reward for it. He never wakes.”
“Surely you don’t do these things,” Mogri said. “What of the holy women?”
“They do much of it, but all his holy tasks
fall to me. I must now be the Seer and the benna both. And I feel Dwr would have me spend some time in the old man’s presence, so I bring his food to him.”
“Remember Old Grandfather?” Mogri said. “So it was the same with him. He similarly fell into a deathly sleep and his body followed soon enough of its own accord. Comfort yourself meanwhile with thoughts of Ansel, for now his coming isn’t far.”
Mogri looked over and grinned. “And he is so blessed with manly looks, Torgon. You are a lucky one! Fill your time now with dreams of how he’ll touch you. I know I would, that’s for sure!”
At this, Torgon smiled slightly. Crossing her arms over her knees, she rested her head on them.
“Look how tired you look,” Mogri said and reached a hand out to stroke her sister’s hair back.
“Do you think it’s tiredness? Or am I simply looking old?” Torgon asked. “This gives me worry. I’ve passed twenty-nine summers, Mogri. I am no longer young. Look. Lines have come across my forehead.” She leaned over to show Mogri. “I’ve wasted all my youth on his aged father. I fear now that Ansel will not wish me for his holy mate. He is handsome and might not want someone whose looks don’t equal his.”
“I wouldn’t worry. You’re comely yet, and from what I’ve heard, Ansel beds happily with any who are willing. And even a few who aren’t.”
“I’ve heard the same, but that’s just the rutting fever, Mogri. I speak of the holy union. Once it’s made, it can’t be broken. He won’t be bedding any others then.”
“He’s waited a longer time than you to marry. By his age, he won’t want youth from you. He’ll only want a mother for his unborn children.” She smiled again. “Just think of his lovely curls and beard. And of the many pretty children he will give you. His kind breeds well. No doubt his manroot is as handsome as his face.”
Lowering her head, Torgon nodded.
“Poor love. Listen, shall I cheer you with my news?”
“Aye. Aye, of course. I’m sorry I hadn’t asked. So tell me what is happening at home?”
Mogri said, “My prospects aren’t as grand as yours. I’ll never bed a holy-born, but I’ve done well enough for me. I carry Tadem’s child.”
Torgon lifted her head abruptly. “I don’t believe this. What? My little sister? Oh, now I do feel old, Mogri. I’ll have grey hairs next.” Torgon cuffed her sister’s shoulder playfully. “So when’s the wedding planned?”
“In the month of flowers. Tadem’s family wouldn’t have me until they knew I’d quicken. Now the baby comes in summer, so the wedding feast is set.”
Smiling, Torgon leaned forward to hug her sister. “I’m so glad for you. It cheers me very much knowing you are happy.”
“Things may well change for you too,” Mogri said. “There’s two months until the marriage. Perhaps it will be Ansel who comes to perform our rites. Who knows? Perhaps we both will carry babes.”
In the month of the first sowing, Torgon came to feed the Seer. The night was bright with a full moon, so she didn’t bother with a candle. She entered the darkness of his private cell and in the wan moonlight saw him lying on his bed, his mouth gone slack in death.
Relief flooded her with tears. She wiped them back with her fingertips. “What? You think I cry for you? No, old man. You taught me better manners than that. I cry for joy. I cry for me …” Reaching out, she gently stroked his cooling hand and, through the moonlight, the tears on her fingers left glistening trails across his aged skin.
The acolytes were sent home for the mourning period and the pyre women came in and washed the Seer’s body. After that, it was Torgon alone in the compound. Kneeling beside the body laid out on the stone flags in the altar room, she poured the death oils and anointed him, then said the prayers of intercession, that he might journey safely and find peace among the dead.
Torgon had never met his son Ansel face to face. As a low-born woman, she could not speak to him or even look him in the face in those years before her calling. Matters now, however, were very different. Their roles had been reversed. Holy-born though he might be, hers was the divine calling. He’d be the novice in the compound, although Torgon knew he’d never be the homesick innocent she had been. Destined from birth to take the holy robes, he’d been raised in the compound, receiving a special education apart from the other acolytes, and initiated into the ways of holiness even before his manhood rites. Moreover, Ansel was no longer green with youth. His father had lived such a span of years that Ansel had passed the best part of his manhood among the warrior band and, some would say, had had to wait too long to take up the position due him.
The investiture was held on the sixteenth day of the month of the first sowing, when winter had passed away and the world was just greening up with spring. It was a hard month for lavish feasting, for the storage huts were empty and the crops were yet all seed. Two half-grown bull calves were roasted for the feast and Torgon sacrificed a twelve-point stag in Ansel’s honour.
When the ceremony was at its height, she brought the holy robes to him and laid the golden circlet on his head. It was their first time face to face and there should have been a modest dropping of his eyes at the sight of the divine anaka benna. But not so. As she came before him, he looked her fully in the face and smiled, his expression both casual and intimate, as if they’d been secret lovers all along. Torgon’s cheeks burned red for fear the elders saw his look and thought it might be true. And yet … She met his gaze. It would unseemly if she did not. In the end, she couldn’t help but smile too.
Chapter Twenty-Four
“When I came out of the hospital after my seminar the following afternoon,” Laura said during her next session, “there was the Prophet, leaning against my car. I was startled to see him, to say the least. He laughed and said jokingly ‘You doubted my ability?’
“If anything, he looked more handsome there in the waning light of a winter’s afternoon. He knew how to dress well. He had on casual clothes – a sheepskin coat, a hand-knitted sweater and a very long scarf – but they were expensive and fashionable. His loose curls fell roguishly over his collar and his cheeks were reddened by the cold.
“I don’t think I’d even been in love before that night. I had genuinely liked Alec and had expected love to develop from it, but it didn’t happen. To be honest, I was secretly afraid Steven might have ruined me permanently and I wasn’t capable of falling in love. Then I met Fergus and everything changed.
“What was so incredible, however, was that he felt exactly the same way about me. There he was, standing against my car in the hospital car park less than twenty-four hours after our first meeting. He opened his arms and embraced me in a heartwarming hug and I felt like I was coming home. I pressed my face into his coat and breathed in his marvellous smell, like woodland and sea at the same time, and it felt so undeniably right to be hugged by him. We kissed then, for the first time. Or perhaps it wasn’t the first. Who knows?
“The second kiss was with a passion I’d never experienced. It was almost as if he was going to devour me. I’d never been kissed anything like that before, but far from being startled by it, I was desperate for it not to stop. My body responded with such unexpected intensity that if he’d asked me to strip and make love to him right there in the hospital car park, I’m sure I would have considered it. The only thing I could think was: ‘This is it. Mr Right. Prince Charming. The fairy tales really are all true.’
“‘Come with me,’ he said when we broke apart. ‘Let’s go eat.’
Of course, I went without question. We got into his car and he headed off towards the city centre. All the way he chattered. Fergus was bursting with vitality. This was his most enchanting quality: he was always just so temptingly alive. It was almost a kind of electricity, fizzing and crackling around him. There was none of the eeriness nor profundity of the night before. He talked to me as if we were good friends, as if I had simply been away somewhere on a long journey and had now at last returned. When I called him ‘Prophet’, he chasti
zed me good-naturedly, saying, ‘What’s with this false reverence of yours? It’s not as if you were one of the acolytes.’ Even with the unexpected use of the word ‘acolyte’ my mind did not stray from giving him my full attention.
“We went to a small, rustic Italian restaurant – like something out of a lost corner of Sicily with red gingham tablecloths, candlelight, a Verdi aria playing softly and the room redolent with the scent of fresh-baked bread and olive oil.
“I loved this scooped-up-and-embraced sensation of belonging to him, but it was still overwhelming. I had only met this man the day before. At one point, I sat back and blinked in surprise at what I was doing.
“Fergus was such a master at reading emotions. His expression melted into sympathy. ‘Oh, poor darling,’ he whispered. ‘You don’t remember any of this, do you?’
“‘Remember what?’ I asked.
“He reached out both his hands and put one either side of my face. Then he leaned forward across the table until we were sitting almost forehead to forehead. ‘Close your eyes,’ he murmured. His breath touched my skin as he spoke.
“Pressing his fingertips more firmly against my temples, he whispered, ‘We’ve been evolving upwards together all these eons, you and I. Inextricably connected through countless lifetimes. Blackness. Let your thoughts go. Give your mind over to blackness.’
“With my eidetic ability to visualize, the moment he said the words, it was as if black velvet dropped across my thoughts.
“‘Accept the visions the Voices give you,’ he whispered so softly as to be more a breath than a sound. His head was touching mine. To others in the restaurant we must have appeared as if we were praying. ‘Remember, remember, remember.’ His voice was hypnotic. ‘You will still possess some shadow of memory, for we’ve been together so long, you and I. Since Egypt. Since Atlantis. Since time before the stars.’
“Stars and planets spun across the velvet blackness of my mind as he spoke. Helixes formed, like the DNA models I’d seen in the lab at the university. A flash of gold appeared and then the masks of Egyptian sarcophagi.