by Dana Fredsti
The smashed ruins of even more vessels still littered the eastern arm of the harbor.
She crouched behind the chunky limestone blocks of some unfinished palace, rough piles of ruins that clung like barnacles at the end of a rocky jetty. There was a partial inscription on a broken beam of stone gable.
TIMONIVM M ANTONI DOMVS
Her language implants suggested a translation—The Timonium, House of Marcus Antonius. Marc Antony’s house? She was hob-nobbing with grand folks these days. The ruins afforded her the ideal catbird seat to observe the ongoing commotion in relative security.
Facing the city, to her left stretched a finger of land covered in lush gardens and groves of palms and fruit trees—the grounds of the royal palaces, beautiful, gleaming pillared structures overlooking both city and sea. From the gardens there came cries of peacocks and baboons, and the occasional glimpses of strolling giraffes and ostriches. Its high walls were well guarded.
Surely the Lady Hypatia was somewhere in one of those regal buildings, advising their ruler. If only she could find a way to slip in there—but with rioting in the streets, and the city watch prepared to arrest her on sight, was there anyone she dared ask for help?
Still, what other option did she have?
To her right stood market bazaars and rows of warehouses, all dominated by a large pillared temple complex fronted by two gigantic obelisks keeping watch over the Harbor—Cleopatra’s Needles, she realized. One of them had been placed in New York’s Central Park just a few years past—she had admired it there more than once.
The Roman-style temple appeared to have been converted into a Christian church, but it still bore its previous name.
CAESAREVM
The Caesareum. Why did that name ring a bell?
At any other time, the harbor’s piers and docks would have been alive with sailors, fishermen, stevedores, merchant captains, and more—the scene of constant activity at most any hour of the day, with cargo and travelers coming in and going out to and from all the reaches of the Mediterranean world.
Today, it was a war zone.
All morning and well into the afternoon, from her hidden vantage point on the jetty she watched roving bands of angry men stalking the streets and back alleyways of the dockside. When opposing groups met, they fell upon one another savagely, staining the flagstones red and littering them with broken, twisted bodies. A sickly copper tang of spilled blood and the stink of butchery blended with the overpowering scents of salt air and fish.
When the sun began to dip below the western walls, Nellie decided it was time to move. The city streets would not be any safer once night fell. Wrapping herself once more in her purloined makeshift shawl, she emerged from her stony refuge and skulked down the jetty, slipping back into the looming shadows of the closest waterfront alley.
She affected the stooped, hobbling gait of a poor old woman, hoping to avoid attention. The maritime warehouses and drinking haunts quickly gave way to military barracks, and then to more upper-class districts, great houses of the well-to-do, a variety of fancy public buildings, and the other side of the palace grounds.
Normally Nellie would have felt safer in the upscale districts of a city, but even here among the well-heeled citizens, tensions were palpable. She cringed away from every passing soldier, certain that she would be recognized at any moment, keeping unobtrusively to the edges of the busy streets.
Her best bet seemed to lie in the public gardens outside the entrance to the palace. Perhaps if she made herself as inconspicuous as possible, she might have a chance of spotting Hypatia’s coming or going, or find an unguarded way inside.
Gathering up her courage, she shuffled her doddering way across the main thoroughfare toward the safety of the park. While she was still only halfway across the street, however, shouts of alarm rose from down the block. Men ran down the avenue, crying out.
“The parabolani! The parabolani are coming to attack the Jewish quarter!” The Jews on the street near her gasped and ran the other way.
Parabolani? She didn’t recognize the word, and her language implants seemed to think parabolani meant “nurses.” Nellie turned to see a huge mob of fierce black-hooded men all armed with staves, swords, or clubs, chanting unintelligible slogans and tramping down the street in her direction. A young Hebrew woman stopped and seized Nellie’s arm, frightened concern in her eyes.
“Yafa sheli, are you Jewish or Greek? Come, it isn’t safe. You must come with us!”
Nellie met the girl’s eyes with gratitude. “You go. I’ll be alright. Go!”
The girl hesitated, then nodded and joined those running for safety. Nellie rushed toward the palace gardens without any further pretense at infirmity and hid behind a stand of jasmine flowers. As she watched, the angry stream of black hoods continued past, making the street look like the back of an enormous swollen crocodile.
A fresh new commotion broke out, and she pulled aside the jasmine branches to see what it was. The sharp clatter of horse hooves echoed off the cobblestones, as armored riders in glittering mail thundered down the street from the east, facing down the mob. Prefectural guards, escorting a chariot back toward the palace. Nellie’s eyes lit up at the sight of the passenger.
Maybe her luck was changing for the better after all.
“Make way for the Lady Hypatia!” the captain of her guard ordered the surly crowd. “Disperse at once, by order of the prefect!”
The mob roared back its defiance. There were many more of them than the mounted guards—and the guards knew it.
“This is your final warning!” The tendons in the captain’s neck stretched taut. “Return to your homes! Obey this instant, in the name of the Emperor himself!”
For a heartbeat or two the crowd seemed to waver. Then one of the leaders stepped forward. His flowing, long-sleeved fawn-colored robe and his black pointed hat all made him look like a wizard—a clergyman of sorts, Nellie guessed. He pointed an accusatory finger at the captain.
“There is no more Emperor! All the earthly princes and authorities have been overthrown and the Lord cometh soon in judgment!”
“Insurrectionist!” The captain drew his sword and raised it high. “Seize him!” The guards formed a line around their captain, urging their mounts forward. The priest turned to his flock with a wave of his arm.
“Obey God, not men!” he bellowed. “Take them!”
With another roar, the parabolani rushed toward the charging horsemen.
50
From the chariot, Hypatia and Aspasius stared in horror at the unfolding scene.
“Mistress! We must turn the chariot around!” the Hyrcanian urged her. “We cannot get through!”
Hypatia looked out at the palace grounds, so tantalizingly close, then at the howling mob boiling around the horsemen. Aspasius was right. Soon they would all be overwhelmed.
“Do it!” she told her slave, and called to her remaining guards. “Bring the other soldiers back! We can’t hold the crowd off here!”
They nodded, reining in their steeds to give Aspasius room to maneuver. But he could not control the turn. The frightened horses panicked at the sight of the embattled throng. Thrashing and stamping to pull free of their yokes, they effectively trapped the chariot in place mid-turn, and the tide of the mob engulfed the cavalrymen up ahead.
Hypatia cried out for the captain to retreat, but he could not hear her. Even as he and his men continued hacking with their swords, she watched as the swarm brought them down, plucking them off their horses with hooked staves, spearing them with makeshift lances, or simply overwhelming them with waves of grasping hands and fists. The rest of the crowd surged around the doomed soldiers and toward the stalled chariot.
* * *
Nellie stared, stunned by the sight of the guards being swarmed by the homicidal mob. She looked at Hypatia’s stranded chariot, and the sight triggered a sudden jolt of memory—of a story that had horrified and repulsed her as a child.
Her schoolmaster, a
veteran of the War, had seen terrible things at the Battle of Gettysburg, instilling in him a perverse tendency toward gallows humor. One day, he wished to instill a lesson about the proper sphere of womankind. To make his point, he related to his class the ghastly cautionary tale of the ancient scientist Hypatia, and her dreadful demise.
“She made herself an object of fear and hatred to the Nitrian monks and fanatical mobs of the local orthodox bishop,” he’d said with poorly disguised relish, “by whom she was ultimately murdered under circumstances of revolting barbarity. She was torn from her chariot, dragged through the streets to the Caesareum, there to be stripped naked and butchered, cut to pieces with sharpened tile shards, and her limbs finally burned piecemeal.”
“She was torn from her chariot.” His unpleasant voice echoed in Nellie’s mind. “She was torn from her chariot…”
“It’s happening,” she whispered, her horror growing. “Good Lord, it’s happening now.”
Time to put her cards on the table. Standing, Nellie cast off her cloak, then pulled her ace from her boot—the German pistol Blake had given her. Holding it tightly in one hand, she strode out into the street.
* * *
The mob smashed into the chariot’s sides like waves crashing against the rocks. Furious men rushed them, faces red with rage, their clawing hands grasping for Hypatia. Aspasius was shouting, but she could hear nothing but her attacker’s howls, the screams of horses and bystanders, and the shattering of pottery.
Hypatia raised a hand to defend herself, but beefy fingers clamped down on her wrist and yanked hard, pulling her over the side and to the cobblestones below. She screamed in pain and fear, the sound lost in the roar surrounding her. Cruel hands dragged her away, others kicking and striking at her as she was hauled across the unyielding flagstones. Then she was dropped to the street again.
Groaning, she raised up on her elbows, trying to stand. There was no sign of Aspasius or any of her guard, nothing but her assailants encircling her. The robed lector who had challenged the captain loomed over her. Hypatia recognized him. He had been her student, once.
“Petros, please!” she pleaded. His face was a stone.
“You Jezebel! You who would corrupt the prefect with your witchery and whoredom!” He raised his voice to his flock. “This is the word of the Lord,” he commanded. “You shall throw her down, this cursed woman. The dogs shall eat her flesh, and her carcass shall be as dung upon the field. Take her away!” The closest two parabolani reached down and grabbed her arms. The crowd parted to let them haul her off.
“Let her go now, or die where you stand!”
* * *
The ringleader gritted his teeth at the interloper.
“Seize that witch, too! They are both condemned!”
Nellie strode up to the so-called holy man until they were face to face, and without another word, shot him in the head. He dropped dead on the pavestones, his expression a rictus of outraged confusion. Someone screamed, and the crowd froze in shock. Without pause, Nellie turned on the two brutes holding Hypatia and shot the larger man in the center of his forehead before turning the pistol on the other man and pulling the trigger.
There was a hollow click.
Nellie froze. If the crowd understood that her weapon was out of ammo, she and Hypatia would be torn to pieces in seconds. Locking eyes with the man, she raised her gun and put on her best poker face. The terrified parabolani’s face was pale and running with drops of sweat.
“You,” she said. “Go! Go and… and sin no more.”
With a gulp, he gave a shaky nod and backed off step by tentative step before turning to break into a sprint and flee. The rest of the stunned mob took to their heels like a startled flock of birds.
Nellie watched them go, allowing herself a sigh of relief only when the last of the mob had fled out of sight down the street. She turned to Hypatia, who stood trembling like a faded ghost, before her head lolled and she went limp.
“Oh! Oh!” Nellie ran to catch her before the woman fainted dead away. “It’s alright now, I’ve got you. They’re gone.”
Hypatia’s eyes fluttered. She looked up to the woman who had just saved her life, and went bright with recognition. “It’s you…” she murmured.
Nellie smiled and nodded, suddenly so happy she thought she might start bawling like a baby. The face of her unpleasant childhood schoolmaster flashed into her mind.
Put that in your history books, you despicable old man.
“Yes. It’s me. Come, let’s get you out of here.” She looked at the battered chariot, now on its side. There was no sign of the horses, or of the charioteer, or of Hypatia’s guard. Slipping an arm around the woman’s shoulders, Nellie gently led her back across the grounds to the safety of the palace.
* * *
Twilight descended upon the city. From the balcony of the palace, two women stood with the Prefect Orestes and looked out at the dimming light. Sounds of violence still echoed in the distance. Nellie pointed to the rising dust trails off on the western horizon, illuminated by the last ember of the reddening sunset.
“That’s the real enemy,” she said. “When they get here, we’ll need the strength of everyone in the city to resist their war machines. And even that may not be enough.”
“Should we flee the city?” Hypatia asked, her eyes wide with fear.
Nellie looked at her. “Where would we go?”
51
Place: Unknown
Time: Unknown
Amber woke up. She found herself standing in a pitch-black enclosed space. God, was she was dreaming again? Another irritatingly incomprehensible dream, where the mysterious figure with Merlin’s face and voice continued to screw with her mind?
Then her hands brushed up against cold stone and she froze, a stab of pure horror piercing her thoughts.
“Oh my god,” she breathed. Her voice fell flatly into the darkness, reinforcing the fear. She wasn’t in a coffin or even a sarcophagus, but Egypt had plenty of burial chambers.
“Ohgodohgodohgodohgod…”
Her breath came in hyperventilated gasps. She quickly became light-headed as panic raced through her body, the adrenaline rush and dizziness dropping her to her knees with a jarring thud. The effect speeded up, the sound of her shallow, frantic breaths filling the stale air until it was all she could hear.
Buried alive. I’ve been buried alive.
She forced herself to regulate her breathing.
In for four counts. Hold it for seven. Exhale for eight. She repeated the pattern four or five times. It was a trick her dad had taught her to help stave off panic attacks, something Amber had been prone to up through high school graduation. Funny she hadn’t thought to use it up till now. Then again, real fight-or-flight situations didn’t lend themselves to breathing exercises.
When she finally had it under control, Amber went back to her first thought. Could this be a dream? Maybe she was still on the Star of the Dawn, her subconscious playing nasty tricks on her.
No. No, this was real. Her throbbing knees were a testament to that. She’d have bruises, maybe even swelling. If she hadn’t been wearing the leather cavalier boots, it could have been much worse. Shifting her weight off her knees, Amber sat gingerly on the ground, tugging on the straps of her backpack as its bulk threatened to pull her off balance.
My backpack.
Her phone was in her backpack, and the phone had a flashlight app. If it had enough charge left to turn on.
Shrugged out of the straps, Amber brought the backpack around in front of her, between her thighs. Slowly, carefully, she reached inside, feeling along the interior until she found the zippered compartment where she kept her phone. She pulled it out with trembling fingers, found the “on” switch and pressed it, holding it down for a few beats before releasing it.
Then she waited. When the screen lit up and the black apple with the bite out of it appeared, Amber nearly wept with relief. She still didn’t know how much battery life remained,
though.
“No time for that,” she muttered as the password screen came up. She quickly checked the battery life—twenty percent. It’d do.
It would have to.
The flashlight app wasn’t much—she’d have preferred a Maglite—but it was better than the alternative. Holding the phone up, Amber shone the light in front of her, illuminating a stone wall. No hieroglyphs or art, no pillars encrusted with semi-precious stones… just plain stone. Crude flagstones formed the floor, which vanished into blackness on either side. A tunnel, then, with no end in sight. For all she knew it went on for miles.
There’s only one way to find out. She got to her feet, putting the backpack on again. But which way? She had no way of knowing which way she’d come from.
There was a sudden pressure in her skull, like the moment before her ears popped when the elevation changed. It didn’t quite hurt, but it made her turn her head to the left and look into the impenetrable darkness in that direction. Yes, that looked right.
This way, Amber…
“What the hell?” Amber whirled around, even though she knew she wouldn’t see anyone. That damned voice in her head. The same siren song that’d led her to that bizarre underground bunker, enabled her to re-route the Vanuatu, that had diverted her across the desert, and called her away from her friends—all to bring her to this tunnel. She felt violated.
This way, Amber… this way.
The pressure in her mind increased, the compulsion to go to her left growing more imperative. Something inside her snapped.
“I’m sick of this shit!” she yelled, her words deadened by the stone walls. “I’m not a goddamn puppet! If you want something from me, then ask!”