Flint scowled. “From what I remember, she wasn’t exactly … pro-male.”
“That’s an understatement.” In her godhood, Selene had rarely paid much attention to cults beside her own, and the Great Mother, whom the Greeks called Cybele and the Romans called the Magna Mater, wasn’t even an Olympian. Just an eastern goddess who eventually joined their pantheon. Still, Selene had always admired her proto-feminist bent. “From what I remember, her Roman priests dedicated themselves through a sword dance in front of her statue. Cymbals crashing, drums pounding, hair flying. Eventually, they threw their offerings onto the statue’s lap.”
“What kind of offerings?”
“Their testicles, of course.”
Flint shifted in his chair, looking ill, but the thought of castrating a few syndexioi made Selene feel considerably better.
“I was thinking,” she went on eagerly, “that next time, we need to have a tracking device ready. If we’d managed to get one into a syndexios last night, we’d be hunting Saturn down right now and finding whatever mithraeum he’s hiding in, instead of sitting here like useless idiots, hoping he doesn’t track us down first.”
“A tracking device might work,” Flint agreed. She waited for him to go on, but he didn’t.
She heaved an exasperated breath. Holding up a one-sided conversation was utterly exhausting. How did you ever stand talking to me, Theo?
“If you show the device to me,” she urged, “I can try to attach it to an arrow.”
He mumbled something that sounded like assent, then fell mute.
Five minutes of awkward silence passed before Selene slammed her fist on the table. “If you want to say something, just say it.”
Hurt flashed across Flint’s face. He reached for the pocket of his sweatpants, resting his hand there as if unsure whether to withdraw whatever was inside.
“What?” Selene pressed. “Are you being surly for no reason? Or do you just not care about finding Saturn anymore?”
Flint’s jaw twitched beneath his bushy beard. “He killed my brother, too. Of course I care.”
“So then why the silence? Do you want to talk this through, or should I just go back to the river and talk to myself? Because honestly, it’d be just about as useful.”
His fingers curled around his pocket. Something in his hesitation, in the tension that rippled across his wide forearms, made her worry that she’d pressed him too far. That he’d lash out. Or perhaps just walk away. She braced herself for either, unsure which would be worse.
Instead, he pulled out a piece of card stock, gilt-edged and embossed with a mass of curlicues and flowers. A wedding invitation.
She couldn’t see the names on the paper. Didn’t want to see them. She could feel the boar’s hot breath on her face.
Flint shifted in his seat to face her and braced his hands on the arms of the chair, as if to rise. He had that invitation printed up as a proposal, she knew suddenly. He’s going to kneel down on those withered legs and ask me to marry him.
“I have an idea,” he said finally. “You’re just not going to like it.”
It was Selene’s turn to be speechless. No, please no, she begged silently.
He sighed, a slow exhale like a volcano venting steam. “I know this is the last place you want to go, and the last person you want to see, but she might help us understand the Magna Mater connection.”
“She?” Selene stammered. “Wait … who?”
He passed her the invitation. “My mother’s getting married right here in Rome. Tomorrow morning.”
Selene could breathe again.
Flint’s lips twisted into a grim smirk that she suspected was his attempt at a smile. “So, Selene Neomenia, I’m officially asking … do you want to be my date?”
Chapter 8
THE LION-HEADED GOD
Artemis watched him.
At least that’s how it felt to Theo every time he walked through the Greek and Roman collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He avoided the far end of the gallery entirely, where an ancient bronze of the young Huntress, her arms flung wide after just releasing her arrow, stared over the tourists’ heads with silvered eyes.
But the goddess was everywhere. Her sharp profile painted on vases, her lithe body sculpted in metal or clay or marble. Each image reminded Theo of the woman he’d loved and lost, yet none of them were his Selene. The short tunic and knee-high sandals were nothing like the baggy clothes and heavy boots she favored. The youthful archer in the bronze statue had none of the cares that had creased his lover’s brow. The simple terra-cotta figurines could not move with her grace. The flat vase paintings forgot her smile—and her more frequent glare.
Apollo watched, too, of course. Artemis’s twin brother with his sculpted lyre and laurel wreath. And Mars. Hades. Prometheus. All those Theo had been unable to save when the Host began to hunt down the city’s immortals. He felt the reproach in their eyes and walked faster. Today, he had a different god to meet.
A long line stretched before the entrance to the special exhibit, nearly blocking the banner: MITHRAS AND MAYHEM.
“The sensationalist alliteration was your idea, I take it,” he said to the man waiting for him beside the crowd.
“You know it.” In a faded Wrath of Khan T-shirt, Steve Atwood looked more like the head of a college sci-fi club than of the Met’s Onassis Library for Hellenic and Roman Art. He’d proudly refused to conform to the museum’s unofficial male dress code: glasses, balding, white. Instead, with the dreadlocks gathered on top of his otherwise shorn head and the perennial gleam in his eye, he looked like a mischievous black samurai—an impression he proudly admitted to cultivating.
Despite the doubts of many an Upper East Side dowager, Steve had managed to pull together the Met’s most popular exhibit ever in the span of only six months. The existence of the Olympians—and Mithras’s direct connection to Jesus—remained a secret. But the final battle atop the Statue of Liberty, when Selene and Theo had defeated the Host, had been impossible to hide completely. The bodies of the dead syndexioi had led to the discovery of the hidden mithraeum beneath Saint Patrick’s Cathedral, full of ancient artifacts and high-tech torture devices. The existence of a secret temple practicing human sacrifice in the middle of Midtown had sent the city into a frenzy of conspiracy-theorizing and ignited a passionate interest in Roman cults.
Theo eyed the crowd skeptically. “All those years I spent trying to make classics cool through compelling lectures and witty essays—I should’ve just killed a few people instead.” He barked an angry laugh. “Works like a charm.”
Steve, oblivious to his misery, flashed his museum ID to cut the line. “If people keep reviving ancient mystery cults, we’re going to have to make this a permanent exhibit. I’m thinking Classical Crazies: Making Sacrifices for All of Us.” He winced before Theo could. “Sorry, man. I keep forgetting about—you know.”
“It’s okay.” But it wasn’t. As Steve well knew, the first cult to terrorize Manhattan had claimed Helen Emerson, Theo’s ex-girlfriend, as its victim. Less than three months later, the Mithraists had killed Selene. He’d trade every minute of renewed interest in classics for one more second with the women he’d loved.
“By the way, thanks for the dinner invite last night,” Steve said, clearly trying to change the subject. He didn’t know Selene was a goddess—but he knew Theo had loved her. Even more than Ruth, Steve tried to avoid the “dead girlfriend” subject whenever possible.
“Wish I could claim credit, but the invitation was the ladies’ idea,” Theo admitted. “I think they wanted to make sure I had a friend to talk to when Minh’s coworkers started rattling on about quasars.”
Steve laughed. “Yeah, even Ruth Willever looked bored when that came up, and I thought she was incapable of expressing any emotion besides polite engagement.”
“No, she definitely has plenty of other emotions.” Theo thought of her hand settling on his thigh.
“Yeah, I’m starting to get
that impression.”
On another day, Steve’s admiring tone would’ve invited closer scrutiny. But as they walked past the various artifacts on loan from museums around the world, Theo could think of nothing but his research. Most of the pieces in the gallery were tauroctonies: statues, reliefs, and frescoes of Mithras standing astride a bull with his knife at its throat, surrounded by a scorpion, crow, snake, and dog.
“I’m afraid I never want to see another tauroctony,” he grumbled. “I’ve spent way too much time with them already.”
“Don’t worry,” Steve assured him. “What I’ve got to show you is much cooler than the same old Mithras-kills-the-bull crap.” He led the way through the throng and into a darkened gallery.
A three-foot-tall statue of a creature with a man’s body and a feline face stood in a pool of light.
“Say hello to the Lion-Headed God.”
“Holy Roman Empire,” Theo cursed, taking a step closer.
“Yeah. Except not exactly holy. He looks more like a demon, doesn’t he?” Steve sounded like a kid gleefully shivering over his first horror film. “Or a fallen angel, you know, with the wings.”
“I didn’t even notice the wings, there’s so much else going on.” Four small feathered appendages grew from the lion-headed creature’s body, two from his shoulders and two from his hips, like a grotesque butterfly. A thick snake twined its way up his naked form, leaving just enough space between its coils to display the lion-headed creature’s very human penis. The snake’s head rested atop the lion’s mane like a diadem. In each hand, the creature held a strange, L-shaped implement.
“You recognize him?” Steve prodded.
“I’ve never seen anything like him. With the animal head and his posture, he looks almost Egyptian. Where did you—”
“Archeologists found similar statues in several Mithraic temples around the world, side by side with the tauroctonies. This particular beauty was originally found in the ruins in Ostia, but the Vatican Museum owns it now. You know those Catholics—nothing they love more than collecting pagan art, hypocrites that they are. My bosses got it on loan because it’s so freaking bizarre that it gets more press for the exhibit. They didn’t think our own version was dramatic enough.”
“Your own version? I’ve never noticed anything like this in the Met.”
“Turn around, buddy, and meet our newest acquisition.” He gestured to a small display case on the opposite wall. “We found this little guy down under Saint Patrick’s.”
Theo pulled himself away from the larger statue and peered into the case. A crude terra-cotta figurine, no more than six inches tall. It had the same lion’s head and twisting snake, the same L-shaped tools and four wings. But this creature balanced atop a sphere like a clown at the circus.
“We think the ball he’s standing on could be a celestial sphere,” Steve offered. “Especially since you explained that our local cult members believed Mithras controlled the movement of the heavens.”
“Mm-hm,” Theo murmured. He’d walked a fine line for months, sharing most of his Mithras knowledge first with the police and then with Steve, while withholding the ultimate secret of the cult leader’s identity. Not for the first time, Theo wished he could explain to his friend that Saturn—the ancient Greco-Roman god who just happened to be his dead girlfriend’s grandfather—was the cult’s true focus. Steve would shit himself if he knew. But having Gabriela and Ruth in on the secret of the Olympians’ existence was dangerous enough. Steve would never be able to resist mounting a whole exhibition about it. “Gods-zilla” or “Gods-smacked” or some other nonsense.
“I haven’t even gotten to the good stuff yet,” continued Steve. “You asked me to keep an eye out for anything related to Pythagoras or the tetractys figure, right?”
“Yeah …”
“Well, I got nothing on number theory. But you also said to look out for anything about rebirth or reincarnation.” Steve gestured Theo toward the next gallery and led him to a marble relief of a young man emerging from a broken eggshell. A thick snake wrapped his naked body, and feathered wings hung from his shoulders. The animals of the zodiac surrounded him in a perfect oval border. His face was human rather than leonine, and he carried a torch instead of L-shaped tools, but otherwise the resemblance to the Mithraic lion-god was undeniable.
“You know what that eggshell means.” Steve looked immensely proud of himself.
“Creation, life cycle, and—”
“Resurrection. You’re welcome, by the way.”
“But the lion-headed god was on a sphere,” Theo began.
“Yeah, I know, but come on! They’re obviously just different versions of the same god. Like Zeus and Jupiter—or Artemis and Diana.”
Theo tried not to flinch at the reference. “But what god?”
“I didn’t recognize him at first either,” Steve said with only a hint of condescension, “but I did a little digging and found several similar figures depicted on mosaics and frescoes in a few European museums. Young man. Snake. Wings. He’s not an Olympian—not part of the standard classical pantheon at all. But he shows up in a couple different sources as the ‘Protogonos.’”
“Like … a proto-god?”
“Ding ding ding! And not just any old proto-god. This one’s specifically worshiped by initiates into the Orphic Mysteries.” He held up a hand. “I know what you’re going to say … there’s never been a connection between followers of Mithras and followers of Orpheus. But check it out.” Steve pointed to the faint Latin words inscribed at the base of the relief. “This beauty was once owned by an ancient initiate into the Mithraic cult. And look at the zodiac border! You’re the one who told me the bull and scorpion on the tauroctony were constellation references. So the symbolism is definitely both Orphic and Mithraic.”
Theo couldn’t even protest. He’d seen how cults combined—and stole—rituals and deities from each other. Saturn had inserted Mithraism into Christianity, after all. But was it really possible that he’d injected Orphism into Mithraism as well?
“I only know the usual Orpheus myth.” He’d found the story of the legendary musician’s journey to the Underworld especially poignant since Selene’s death, although he didn’t need to admit that to Steve. “I don’t know anything about his cult or his followers.”
“Of course not,” Steve said with a grin. “No one does. It’s one of the most mysterious of all mystery cults! They left behind no temples—only a few of the gold leaves they put around the necks of their dead. But we do know the Orphics were big into hymns, and we’ve still got a bunch of the texts, each dedicated to a different god—including one to our friend the Protogonos. They thought he was the first god. A primordial deity who cracked open an egg to create the world. Then the Mithraists popped a lion’s head on him and turned his egg into a celestial sphere.” He finally paused for breath. “Now as to why they did that?” He pointed a finger at Theo. “I was hoping you could tell me. You’re the Mithras expert.”
Because Saturn was trying to regain his omnipotence—and he’d steal power from any number of gods to do it, Theo almost blurted. He settled for, “Because the cult initiates thought they could resurrect Mithras. They couldn’t resist any god associated with rebirth and reincarnation.”
Steve laughed aloud. “I get that the ancients thought that. But the dudes hanging out under Saint Patrick’s? They really believed they could resurrect their god? Totally looney tunes.”
Theo forced an answering smile. Except they weren’t crazy at all. Saturn did get more powerful through his ritual sacrifices. Everything he did had a purpose. Which means if the Mithraists believed the lion-headed creature could help resurrect a god … then he can help me do the same thing. He sucked in a breath. The key to reincarnation lies not in some divine numerical pattern—but in the Protogonos. He can bring back Selene.
He felt as if an abyss had suddenly opened in what he’d thought was solid ground. He teetered there on the edge, arms pinwheeling to remain u
pright. Was he really about to abandon his research into Pythagoras and start down the path of a far more esoteric cult instead? And would this Orphic-Mithraic deity even hold the answers he sought?
The Protogonos should be the farthest back I can reach—the very first god, he thought desperately. But I know better. If I look beyond his myths, I’ll find someone else. And someone else again. And when there are finally no gods left to study, I’ll fall tumbling into Khaos, the chasm of nothingness from which the world was born. And I may never climb out again.
“You look a little green, my man.” Steve cocked his head.
“No, just putting it all together,” Theo lied.
“I thought you’d be psyched.” Steve rubbed his hands gleefully. “Now that we know about the Mithras connection, I’m going to bust open the whole Orphism mystery like the Protogonos cracking the World Egg. You should go check out the Rodin sculpture on the second floor. I put a little extra Orphic something up there that I think you’ll appreciate.”
Theo nodded distractedly and turned to go.
“Hold up! I didn’t mean right this second. Don’t you want to see the collection of zodiac-symbol branding irons we found in the Saint Patrick’s mithraeum? They’ll blow your mind.”
“No, trust me, I’ve seen them.” He scratched self-consciously at the Mercury symbol hidden beneath his shirt. At Steve’s bewildered stare, he added hurriedly, “I’m fine. I just—this is a lot to take in. I’ll go look at the sculpture. I just …” He wasn’t even sure how to finish the sentence. Just wasted six months of my life on Pythagorean number theory for no reason?
His feet carried him out of the gallery and up a flight of stairs to the Nineteenth-Century European Sculpture wing. He stood before a white marble Rodin. A naked man in polished stone raised a hand to cover his eyes. Behind him stood a woman, her lips parted as if in exhaustion or pain, her half-carved hair emerging from the rough-hewn stone that loomed behind them.
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