The storm of Heaven ooe-3

by Thomas Harlan

  Maxian's eyes gleamed and the discarded wine cup jiggled and danced on the tabletop. Tarsus stopped, feeling power build in the air like the tense humidity before a thunderstorm. He raised a hand, summoning calm and quiet. The cup, teetering on the edge of the wooden table, spun to a halt and then lay still.

  "There is more. The man stood up, hale and filled with life. With great joy, both husband and wife returned home. Asklepius, pleased, continued on his journey. But above, on high Olympus, Zeus, father of the gods, looked down in anger. Here was a man-yes, half god, but still mortal-who took the privilege of life and death upon himself. Here was a man who mocked the ferryman and the guardians of the underworld. In this, the order of the world was set awry and Zeus, foremost guardian of the pattern of things, struck him down forthwith.

  "Asklepius was slain on the road, riven by a lightning stroke from the fist of thunder-shielded Zeus."

  Maxian cursed and sprang up from his chair, his face dark with anger. "This is a tale for children! There are no gods, no power that moves the storm cloud or the sun. Any man with the sight can see the pattern of the world, its warp and weft. Each priest may call thunder and storm, cast lightning. We make our own destiny, find our own path. I have beaten death before, I shall do so again! If you help me, I know that we can succeed. I have the power to my hand; I but need your skill, noble Tarsus, to guide me."

  Tarsus shook his head, his face marked by old and bitter pain. "You are a child, to believe this. This is beyond you. Her soul, her ka has fled into the darkness beyond the river. You are not a god, you cannot make a new soul from common clay. You may summon life to cold limbs, but you cannot make her live again. She is gone."

  Maxian snarled, clenching his hand into a fist, and Tarsus felt, for the first time, the enormous strength in the Prince. The room flickered, the walls becoming insubstantial, the light of the lamps dying. A sound rose from the stones, the voices of tens of thousands crying out in fear. Tarsus leapt to his feet, his mind filled with a vision of burning cloud covering the sky. His shield of Athena, once so perfect and white, rippled and fragmented. The power flooding forth from the Prince beat against him.

  It touched the body, seeping into skin and bone.

  The corpse convulsed, rattling like dried peas in a gourd. Tarsus cried out, but the stones creaking and groaning all around him drowned the sound. The cabinets shattered violently. Where each splinter fell, roots grew out with dizzying speed. They writhed like pale worms on the floor. From them saplings grew. The body on the table suddenly lay still, smooth white flesh covering the bone and rich dark hair spilling down from the skull.

  The Prince lowered his hand and the room snapped back into focus. The roaring and the lamentations stopped. Tarsus gaped, imprisoned by a stand of young pines filling the room. The branches dug into his sides, pinioning his hands and legs.

  A woman, live and whole, lay on the tabletop, her breast rising and falling as she breathed.

  "Rise, my love," the Prince said. He did not seem tired, but his eyes were haunted.

  The body sat up, rich, dark brown eyes open. Tarsus saw that she was comely and well made. Her flesh, recently so tormented and ravaged, was ripe with youth. She came up upon her knees, then stood, her head brushing against the curling vines and flowers crowding against the roof.

  Tarsus shook his head, seeing the blank look on her face and the stillness that lay behind her eyes. It is ever so…

  "Lad, your strength has grown far past any master of the order. But look upon her! Where is her heart? Her spirit? Those things come from the gods, they are beyond us. You will never make her as she was before. Those eyes will never sparkle with mischief or look upon you with delight."

  "But…" Maxian turned, his face intent, "I have done it. Two men, long dead, I raised up. They are filled with life! By the gods, sometimes they show too much liveliness! Why them? Why them and not her, she who is worth far more to me?"

  Tarsus pushed back one of the branches, easing himself out of the close grip of the dwarf trees. The room filled with a heady aroma of crushed pine needles. "I know not. Who were they? Were they friends, newly fallen?"

  "No," barked Maxian in abrupt surprise. "Not friends! I struggled against an invisible enemy. I needed power. A man, now dead, advised me to seek a lever long enough to move the world. I did. I found them both, still moldering in their tombs. But they were long gone to dust."

  "Who are these men?" Tarsus put his hands on Maxian's shoulders. "Were they masters of the art? Could they have hidden their spirit away, holding it back from death, from poor, grim Charon?"

  Maxian laughed again and took his teacher's hands in his own. Something like true humor was in his face. Fond memories of his time as an apprentice to the dour and proper Tarsus fluttered at the edge of his thought. The older priest had seemed so harsh and unyielding when first they met. Could he have foreseen the genuine warmth and friendship that would grow between them?

  "Masters of the art? Not those two rogues! Abdmachus advised me that some men, in death, become powerful by their memory. The greater their legend, the vaster the power that they might contain. Did I need all that strength for my long battle? I did! So I sought out two of the greatest men that have yet lived."

  Tarsus felt a cold chill grip his heart.

  "I woke him from a cold bed, this Gaius Julius Caesar." Maxian's voice was filled with a near hysterical gaiety. "But he was not enough! Oh no, master, he was not quite strong enough to let me shake the earth. I needed a greater legend, someone who would dwarf that old Republican tyrant as the sun blinds the moon. It was a long, dangerous task, but I found him too, hidden beneath the sand. Locks and wards and guardians ringed him about, but they could not hold me back. He, too, the golden-hair, the living god, this Alexander, son of Olympia, best of the Greeks, master of the Persians, I woke, my hand on his shoulder, letting him rise up and walk under the sun!"

  "No…" Tarsus breathed, staggered by the words. "Not that butcher, the parricide, the drunken thug, the kin slayer!"

  "Yes," Maxian snapped. "Both of them, the scheming, duplicitous pair, I filled with life and thought. By my will, they walk this earth, a merry pair of rogues. I needed them, and by the gods, they did not fail me. All that I asked, they gave."

  Tarsus grasped the edge of the table, his mind busy with this revelation. Maxian stood staring glumly at the girl. She looked down at him, quiet and motionless. He smiled wanly. She remained quiescent, watching him with flat, dead eyes.

  "What were they like, these men you raised from the cold ground?"

  Maxian shrugged, saying, "As you would expect. Alexander is young and vigorous, eager, charming, always rushing to the front, delighted in new things. He craves battle and adventure. He cannot sit still, but who could gainsay him? Any man would love him.

  "The other? Old Gaius? He is gray and sly, the politician's politician. His mind is subtle and filled with tricks. He seems an affable old fellow, the country farmer or the senator on holiday, but his heart is as black as any Parthian chief's. Do not turn your back on him, or leave anything in his care! They are, I suppose, just as you would expect."

  "Yes," Tarsus said slowly, "…but they are strong, they have power."

  "Indeed! In the hidden world, they burn like bright stars." Maxian held out his hand to the girl. She took it, her arm moving smoothly and mechanically. The Prince frowned and the trees that blocked the door writhed back, leaving a passage. "Krista, go and find yourself clothing, then return here."

  Without a word, the young woman walked out, her bare feet rustling in the pine needles on the floor. Maxian turned back to the older priest.

  "A man lies dead, as an old friend once said, but his memory lives. Men swear by him-Praise Caesar!-or worship at his tomb. Each time such a devotion is made, some tiny spark accrues to his memory, this dead legend. Over centuries, if he is well loved, then great strength may be in him. But-is this not rich?-he lies in the grave! The man may not use this strength, but that which
raises him up? Oh, then this power may be tapped… Alexander is like the sun! Do you know, they still fear him, worship him, in far India? Barely a year was he among them, the sudden, unexpected invader, and still, still they know him. And Gaius? He does not burn so bright, yet he is cunning and served me well."

  The thought of attack, of striking out at the young man, crossed Tarsus' mind. His oaths forbade him, though the enormity of what his pupil had done seemed adequate excuse. A swift blow with a dagger, into the brain, into the heart of thought and motion, might slay him.

  But how can this be, if he speaks truly? Could he have brought back these legends as living men?

  "Where are they now?"

  Maxian shrugged, turning away. "I don't know. I sent them away from me, from my mother's house at Ottaviano. I told them to trouble me no more."

  "Ottaviano?" Tarsus' voice was sharp as new fear blossomed. "When were you there?"

  Maxian shrugged, avoiding the priest's eyes. "Some time ago… a week, perhaps two…"

  Tarsus turned gray. Now he knew what curled and drifted around the Prince. It was the stench of mass death, of entire cities consumed by fire, by choking gas and burning stone.

  "You were at Vesuvius." His voice was flat with horror. "You were there when the mountain burst. The girl-she was burned in the explosion? How close were you?"

  Maxian smiled sickly and Tarsus could see guilt and shame in his face.

  "We were," he whispered, "on the crown of the mountain. Men came to kill me. My brother sent them. I saw his face in my mind, when the red-haired woman had the knife at my throat. My own brother sent hired men to hunt me down. Is this possible? Can you believe it?"

  Tarsus backed away, edging for the door with his hand. Now he could make out the screams of the dying, faint as the sound of dolphins beneath azure waves. The aura around the Prince was so plain and clear, so violent with the taste of dying, fled souls, that the older priest shuddered in reaction.

  Here is the source of this unexpected strength. He has drunk deep of the dying, gaining their power like one of the K'shapacara of legend! By the gods, what a horror!

  "Get out," Tarsus snarled, face flushed with disgust. "You are a monster, an abomination! How could you come here, to the sacred precincts themselves! You have violated every oath, every binding, every restriction of our order!"

  Maxian blanched at the vehemence of his old master's words.

  "What have I done?" the Prince cried in despair. "Defended myself, kept my own life? Do you shout at the fox, or the dog, that kills for its supper? What of the man beset by brigands-do you chastise him if he lays about him with a stave?"

  "No," Tarsus bit out, "I do not. But you have drunk deep of the souls of the dying and the dead, growing fat on their suffering and pain. You are a ghoul, a corpse feeder."

  The Prince's eyes widened in astonishment.

  "Do you hear them?" Tarsus felt bile rise in his throat. "Can you feel them, the shadows of the dead? They are in you! I can feel them, smell them, hear their lamentations-"

  "But I did not mean to drink them up!" Maxian's face burned with shame. "It happened-I was at the helm of the engine-the cities were aflame below me and all those souls, all released at once, rushed into me. I could not stop them!"

  Tarsus shook his head in disgust and turned away. "Go away from this place," he said. "If you come here again, we will strike you down, if we can. Get out."

  – |The Prince, feeling a great emptiness in his chest, watched in bewildered pain as the older priest hurried away up the stairs. With each step, he felt the air grow cold and loss mount.

  "But… what about…" Maxian stared around the little room, surprised to see the crowded trees and vines. He looked at his hands, then at the room again. One of the vines was beginning to bloom, sending out small white flowers with pale orange pistils.

  How can my power be so great, yet fail?

  Rousing himself enough to move, he climbed out of the room, stepping over the thick roots that crowded around the door, and stumbled up the stairway.

  – |The moon was still bright, throwing deep shadows under the porticoes of the temple. Tarsus watched, his entire body stiff with tension, as the Prince crossed the square. His conscience raged at him, demanding that he lash out at the monster creeping away in the night.

  I should raise an alarm, light the night with fire, summon lightning and storm to rage against him.

  Remaining still and utterly quiet, Tarsus waited until the Prince had disappeared up the steps. Then he moved quickly along the line of columns that bounded the plaza, reaching the entryway. He looked out into the night, and saw at the far end of the colonnaded road the dim flicker of that fey blue light. The Prince was gone.

  Tarsus breathed easier, leaning on his staff.

  O praise you gods, that gave me some small common sense! He is so strong, so filled with vile power, reeking of the abattoir… He would overmaster us in a sudden duel, each priest woken from a deep and dreaming sleep!

  The priest, his heart still thudding with fear, turned from the gate and hurried away. The elders and the council of the temples had to be informed. They must do something, and quickly, before more innocents were consumed. Plans would have to be laid, friends summoned. Hopefully, the boy would not go far. Tarsus hurried down the steps, his sandals making a quick slap-slap sound on the pavement.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The Bucoleon Palace, Constantinople, Capital of the Eastern Empire

  Dim yellow candlelight illuminated a smooth wooden wall. The close-grained surface was carved with rows of curling flowers and vines. Fat-tailed sheep, heads low, alternated with stiff figures of hunters and farmers, frozen in the field or at the hunt. A thick Serican carpet hung from the wall, covering most of the panel.

  It creaked and moved, sliding open, revealing darkness. A hand came into view, stubby fingered and webbed with scars and old cuts. A man followed, stocky, broad shouldered, with lank dark hair and the ghost of a beard on his chin. His eyes were narrow and cautious, surveying the room carefully before he set foot within. He moved with the ease of long practice, his feet bare, avoiding those tiles that might creak or make a noise. Behind him, equally quietly, came a taller man, younger, with long blond hair tied back in a single plait behind his head.

  Set into the far wall of the room was a sleeping platform draped with silk and linen. A figure lay there, asleep, though the sound of breathing was labored and thick with a watery cough. The dark-haired man approached softly, his nose wrinkling at the thick smell that hung in the chamber. He was used to the stench of the battlefield, the raw-sewage smell of corpses bloated in the sun, the buzz of the flies. This seemed worse, for the man in the bed was still alive.

  Is this the punishment of the gods? Are these whispers in the Hippodrome true?

  Rufio, captain of the Faithful, the red-cloaked barbarian guardsmen of the Emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire, knelt on the woolen covers, his face pensive. Here, in the darkness, where there was no one to see, not even Sviod, who shared this secret, he let some of the worry show in his face. The man in the bed, his master, Emperor Heraclius, avtokrator of the Greeks, was dying. He was not dying of a spear thrust taken on some battlefield, or even of old age, with his grandchildren about him. He was not dying facing his enemies, the men of the Legions at his back. The Emperor was not dying the death Rufio desired.

  This was a cold and lonely death, suffered in silence and isolation. A slow, wasting disease ate away at the Emperor from within.

  This, they said in the markets and the streets of great Constantinople, is what comes of flaunting the laws of the gods, of flying in the face of decency!

  The illness had come suddenly, striking the Emperor down as he returned in triumph from the eastern frontier. Peace had been forced upon the ancient empire of the Persians. The mad king Chrosoes had been cut down, his capital of Ctesiphon burned to rubble. Vast sums in coin and bullion had been taken from the golden palaces, from the rich houses of the no
bles and the merchants. The vaunted Persian army, which had previously besieged Constantinople itself, had been smashed at the Kerenos River. The great nobles that formed the backbone of the Persian state squabbled amongst themselves. Chrosoes had left no living male heirs. Rome, at last, after a thousand years of conflict, was triumphant.

  It was the Emperor himself who was failing. Some decay had come upon him as the army had marched up out of the plains of Syria into the high Taurus Mountains. His flesh swelled, distending with clear, noisome fluid. His limbs betrayed him, failing to support his weight. Skin bulged and grew thin and transparent, strained by the water that accumulated in his flesh.

  And the smell… always the smell.

  Rufio grimaced again but put these thoughts aside. There was delicate and careful work to be done. He focused his mind, blocking out the rasping breath of the man lying before him. First, with a delicate hand, lighter than a feather, he opened the Emperor's lips. A bubbling sound rose from the throat. Rufio reached behind him and felt Sviod press a small glass vial into his hand. It was closed with a cork and Rufio thumbed it out with care. It made a popping sound and he palmed the stopper. A fresh smell of juniper and pine cut into the thick air. Rufio kept his mind on the task.

  With the swelling of the flesh, the Emperor had conceived a terrible fear of any kind of liquid. He would not drink, seeing that his flesh pouched and distended with bile. In his extremity, for he was tormented by thirst, he would sometimes take small sips of wine. He would take no medicine or potion offered by the Imperial physicians or the priests of Asklepius. Even the master of their order, summoned up from their sanctuary at Pergamon, had been unable to halt the disease.

  After that sour incident, the Emperor had banned any priest or sage from his side. He had never trusted them and now held deep hatred for their kind. Rufio, who had seen men laid open by the blow of an ax restored by the powers of the ancient order, did not think this was wise.