The Illusions In Between

by J M Robison

  “Methinks people live in a constant circle of their choices.” Eudora is not old enough to marry, so it will be me setting the protections around Jaicom and Clarissa, who would be in danger because of me.

  At times I still question if I was selfish for leaving the undercroft, but Brynn’s embraces and kisses remind me. My heart hitches and the hell-fire rage turns my skin hot. I force myself to think of something else before Joseara complains about her clothes starting on fire.

  A thin layer of clouds brushes Varlith’s belly. I check the landscape between the gaps. I perk when I see a river draining into the ocean, and farther inland a cluster of buildings. I could be looking at Brynn and Levi right now. I kick Varlith’s ribs. “I think that’s Rome beneath us.”

  Varlith descends, landing on a hill top to the east of the city. He morphs, and Joseara averts her eyes to his nakedness.

  My heart pounds in my throat so hard my words come out pinched. “What do ye think? Rome?”

  Jaicom shields his eyes against the noon sun. Finally, he nods. “That’s the Aurelian Wall, no doubt about it.”

  I don’t know what an Aurelian Wall is, but it clearly means Rome, and that clearly means I am within ten miles of my wife and son. Energy spikes through me. I shuffle on my feet while I decide on leaving my companions behind so I can run to Rome. I could have Brynn back tonight. It’s suddenly hard to breathe. “Let’s go.”

  “Rest a bit, Zadicayn. We don’t know what we’re marching into. We could use a plan.”

  This is reason. I don’t want reason. I want Brynn safe in my arms and Levi in his crib next to us. I remain standing between Rome and Jaicom, unable to go in either direction.

  “Come. Sit. We’ll head out shortly, I promise.”

  It takes reminding myself I’ll be going up against an unknown number of high-level Black Magicians for me to accept reason and sit next to Jaicom.

  “First, facts.” He rubs both palms together. “What do we know?”

  “My message about finding Brynn at the Pantheon. That they shall be watching for my arrival.”

  “I’m hungry,” Varlith says.

  “And then what? Approach us to tell us what to do next? Deliver a message to us somehow?”

  “The messenger…” I grin wildly as a plan formulates.

  “We capture him,” Jaicom repeats what was in my own head. “We make him talk.”

  “Make him talk and tell us where to find Brynn!” Oh, this plan is coming along fine, just fine.

  “What about Varlith?”

  We both look at the human-dragon. He’s rubbing his horns against the bark of a tree. I brought Varlith along–a dragon who is also a Fae Wizard–to help me fight the Illuminati. The trick is knowing where and when I would need him. If only he looked more human.

  I communicate this to him, and he pushes off the tree.

  “I’ll set a spell on a word, and if you speak the word, I will relocate to your amulet.”

  Joseara is in current possession of my amulet, but that’s only until we get inside the city, since we are likely to be searched upon entry. I’m hoping they will avoid touching Joseara in the search like I saw the Frenchmen doing to the women back at the train. Hoping. I have a very bad back-up plan just in case.

  “What word?”

  “Food.”

  “Too easy to use accidentally.”

  “Cow?”

  “Thy hunger needs to wait. We shall use the word ‘dragon.’”

  He walks to me, stopping close enough to draw the tip of his finger around my lips while muttering in Faery to communicate the desired spell.

  “Right then. Anything else we need to cover?”

  But I’m standing before Jaicom has even finished asking the question.

  He uses his cane to push to both feet and takes the lead, resting heavily on it with every step. He hasn’t complained about any pain, but I can’t pretend he doesn’t have any.

  We walk in line with Joseara at the rear, coming off the hill and onto a road. We join in with the horses, foot traffic, wagons, and carriages moving slowly. Likely the foreseen searches at the gate.

  “Are the uprisings in Europe so bad as to have everyone searched?” I ask.

  “It’s what happens when the government becomes fearful of their own people,” Jaicom replies.

  The wait takes so long, we all sit on the ground between forward movements. I’m getting hungry. The sun drops lower to my right, throwing shadows across us from the buildings and statues on that side–all made of ancient, crumbling stone. I’m craving to use my amulet to relocate us up and over the massive curtain wall surrounding the city, but it’s still light out, and we’re bound to be noticed.

  I’m okay causing a stir with my magic, but I reserve those moments to when it can’t be avoided. I’m entering the pope’s stronghold. If he was eager to seek my demise several countries away, I can only trust my breathing outside his wall made him run to his window in hopes to see me.

  If it gets dark on us, I’ll use my magic with the excuse that it was unavoidable. I’m getting in that city tonight.

  “How powerful are Fae Wizards?” Jaicom is the only one who has remained standing. Despite his bad leg, he’s more careful about maintaining his proud English composure than either me or Joseara. Jaicom’s managed to keep his outer jacket crisp and clean, though I’ve seen his tunic beneath, the one he sleeps in. He started folding his jacket into his rucksack for the dragon rides, so no one would be any the wiser looking at him now and believing the tunic beneath the jacket was dirty, sweat-stained, and torn.

  “Powerful,” I say. “So long as ye know the spells to that power.”

  “Well…” Jaicom rubs his chin, “so you’re not all that powerful, are you?” He grins.

  I take the bait. “Pray tell where ye got that assessment?”

  “I’ve never seen you do a spell greater than creating fire or pulling a bullet out of my leg. If you were as powerful as you claim Fae Wizards are, I would’ve seen it in the six years I’ve known you.”

  In my mind, I zip through all the bigger spells I’ve succeeded, but all of them were in the Fae Realm, vacant of Jaicom’s eyes every time. “I am powerful.” Words are weak, and I’m aggressively anxious to prove myself to this man whom I know is only taunting me in jest. “When I set Rome on fire, ye shall see.”

  “If you say so, Zadicayn.”

  “How are they going to know we’ve arrived?” Joseara looks directly at Jaicom, though it’s me who has the answer.

  “They likely sent a demon to trail us,” I say directly at her. She avoids looking at me. I’m tired of her attitude, despite knowing I caused it. Her holding onto my words of five days ago proves my point that she uses her scarred face as a trophy for pity.

  “A demon?” Jaicom’s body stiffens.

  “Naught to fear, Jaicom. Demons cannot touch what has been baptized and blessed.”

  He visibly relaxes with a sigh, then casts a concerned glance at me.

  “I’ve been baptized,” I mumble to his unspoken question.

  “Good. Coming from the godless dark ages, I wasn’t sure.”

  “The second we leave Rome, I shall spell thee back to those godless dark ages.”

  “You’ve got to prove you can do it, first.”

  I stretch my neck and look forward again. We’ve come closer to the gate. It’s a mammoth structure with three arches side-by-side, the two on the outside smaller than the middle. The smaller ones are blocked off by wire fences to funnel traffic into the middle arch. It looks hopeful we’ll reach it before sundown. We’re close enough I can spy their inspection methods of every wagon, box, bag, and person. The women remain untouched, whereas the men are nearly shaken out of their clothes.

  We’re finally next, and my joints protest as I stand. I didn’t realize shuffling and sitting all day could be so exhausting. I was jittery with excitement at being so close to finding Brynn, but now I’m so tired that I slump toward the law enforcer–soldi
er, constable, I cannot tell–and stand in front of him as animated as a scarecrow.

  He twists at my clothes, along my chest, back, arms, and legs. Joseara stands off to the side, removing only her facial shroud when indicated to do so. She remains untouched, and she’s passed through the city gate ahead of us.

  The law enforcer grunts and thrusts my bag open, half its contents spilling out. I shove it all back inside and move forward, meeting up with Jaicom who’s doing the same to his rucksack.

  He lifts his head. “Joseara?”

  “Already inside.” Hopefully, there’s a hostel just inside the gate. I’d be content to sleep in an alley if not.

  There’s no hostel that I can see when we step under the arch. Only a massive courtyard of paved stone clustered with carriages trying to move around each other to get down one of the three roads at the far end. Twin churches separate the three roads at the fork, and before them, at the center of the square, is an ancient stone pillar with Egyptian hieroglyphics and a lion statue facing outward from each corner at its base.

  “Ye sure this is Rome? I’m certain that is Egyptian writing.”

  “It was brought over from Heliopolis in 10 BC or so.”

  I look at him with a quirked eyebrow. “And ye know this because…”

  “The Holy City was required study in school. Though, because there is so much history to this city, I could have this confused with something else.”

  I turn back to the courtyard. We haven’t gone far from the gate, and though there are plenty of carriages, horses, and blooming dresses filling the massive space, I don’t see Joseara.

  “See Joseara anywhere?” I ask.

  Jaicom shields his eyes against the sun, turning all around. I itch to have my amulet back. I trust Joseara, despite her prickly attitude toward me lately, but what I worry about is the Fae discovering I made an accidental wizard out of her, someone they did not choose themselves and someone they did not approve. The Fae don’t see me; they see my blood, which is how Joseara has been able to command spells out of my amulet. My blood inside her.

  “No.”

  I catch a rise of panic in Jaicom’s voice, but that’s ridiculous because Joseara wouldn’t just leave us.

  “Joseara!” The wall behind me dances my call over our heads. A peddler nearby flashes rugs and shawls at the ladies coming through the gate. It’s almost too dark to make out the highest windows. I hear a few of them snap closed.

  “You definitely saw her come in?”

  “Yea.” My Old English heightens when I’m stressed. “I didst.”

  “Joseara?” Jaicom takes his turn. “This isn’t funny!”

  “I shall inquire from the peddler.” I approach the man, who has started closing up his hand-cart-turned-booth. “Excuse me.”

  He turns to me and continues folding his rug.

  “Parlie inglese?” I learned this two villages ago where we stopped to resupply.

  “A little,” he says.

  Of course, he’d speak some of every popular language if he’d peddle to strangers of all nationalities stepping into Rome.

  “Did ye see a…” I almost say woman, but gender is hard to tell beneath a mask. “Masked,” I rub a hand over my face to indicate, “person come through the gate?”

  “Mask?” He shakes his head. “No mask. Sorry.”

  “Wouldst have been within the last three minutes.”

  “No. No mask.” He jams the rest of his cloth items into the back of his hand cart without the careful folds I watched him do to earlier items. He lifts the pull bar off the street and stalks away from us with his cart.

  Panic surges hot through my bones. I barely hear Jaicom through the blood beating in my ears.

  “…need her anyway? I’m not even sure why you brought her along.”

  Joseara has my amulet. She’s gone. I can’t rescue Brynn without my amulet.

  My voice crackles through a suddenly dry mouth. “Because I couldn’t bring an army,” I snap feverishly. “I dost nary knoweth what to expect, so I bringeth those who wouldst give me options.”

  Jaicom rocks back and forth on his heels, maintaining that cool composure in the face of me losing mine.

  “Forgive me, Jaicom.”

  “Let’s sit beneath that obelisk. It’s in the center of the square, so we are bound to see her, or her us.” He starts off that way, his limp so bad to the point I can’t believe he’s not complaining.

  This is why I brought Jaicom along. To think out facts above his feelings. We sit beneath the obelisk and make ourselves as comfortable as we can on the stone next to the circular pools beneath each lion. And wait.

  I fall asleep before Joseara ever shows.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Darik

  I crouch on the roof above the Pius Conservatory which looks over the Porta del Popolo, watching the throng enter beneath the arch. I keep an eye on the females lured over to the peddler standing on the south side of the building, left of the arch as they enter, who sells rugs and shawls as a front to cover up the kidnap at the back.

  Sigismondo parked his cart up against a large rug he’s hung on the empty building. But I know better; there’s an open doorway behind that rug. He’s hung shawls and parasols around the rug, so when the single ladies are drawn back there to look at his wares, he lifts the rugs and shoves them inside the doorway where another Camorra grabs them.

  I spy a lot of potential Camorra candidates come through the gate: between the ages of sixteen to twenty-eight, pretty is a bonus but not required, and virgins, but that’s anyone’s guess. Preferably those not of Italian descent so they can’t report their plight to the authorities.

  I keep an eye on each girl lured over to Sigismondo. The Camorra has become sloppy. They’re good enough to do this in broad daylight, but loose enough to where I watch them take five girls. I feel good about counting on them to scurry the girls off to the catacombs beneath the Fountain of Trevi because that is the easiest place for them to transport girls to and from the river without much suspicion. They haven’t used it since I infiltrated it two months ago. But now I’m “dead.”

  The evening darkens. Sigismondo will have to close up shop to stay within curfew. I trust the Camorra will nab one more girl before then.

  Their pickings from the gate have worsened because the only females I see awaiting entry is an elder with a cane, a child holding her doll, and a married woman with a baby in her arms. The Camorra won’t take those with children. Guess it’s their way of staying within some sort of moral high ground. That, or–most likely–it’s stark proof the women are no longer virgins.

  A person with clothes I can’t guess from what nationality they come from, and wearing a cloth shroud across the lower half of their face and a hood over their head, steps under the arch.

  I pass the person off as being not of Camorra interest, until Sigismondo catches their attention, waving frantically for them to come over. She’s a female, then, though I can’t tell with her choice of clothes and covered face. She answers Sigismondo’s beckon, though her body posture tells me she’s not buying whatever it is he has to sell.

  This capture is especially sloppy. Sigismondo grabs her arm and forces her behind the rug.

  That’s it. The curfew bell rings down the street. I turn from the edge of the roof and scurry up and over the red clay tiles to the building attached to the Pius Conservatory, down the windows and pipes, and drop into the inner courtyard. Two men leaning against the wall look at me. I see knives in their hands as I pass. Some other vigilante can weed out the cutpurses. I’m much too busy with busting up the slave trade.

  The Pius Conservatory doesn’t connect with other buildings, so I hustle across the square and scale the wall of another which will take me to navigational rooftops. The rooftops have become my highway, and I keep to them to avoid the Camorra and polizia in equal parts since I’m equally the culprit for breaking curfew. Rumors of the middle class rioting have even the pope writing declarations
for peace.

  The twenty-minute walk above the emptying streets brings me to Santa Maria in Trivio. The church is open, and I sit on a bench between the colorful walls in the narrow space and hang my head as if to pray. The priest hovers anxiously, eager to secure the doors for the night, but soon goes inside the sacristy.

  I quietly stand, shuddering with guilt as I spot the cross on top of the altar. It’s not my fault they make handy weapons because of how they’re shaped. I duck under the cloth draping the altar and wait while the minutes lapse until the priest’s shoes click against the marble as he revolves around the nave, putting out candles and lanterns. Finally, a thoom of closed doors signals I’m safe to come out.

  Feeble light smokes in through the windows above and on either side of the main door. I enter the sacristy and throw back the rug on the floor to reveal the trapdoor. I heave it open.

  Dank, ancient air burps up at me, tainted with a touch of archaic pomp and power with an endless loss to it all. I climb down the ladder into a dark space. I pull a candle out of my pocket, light it with a glint of flint and steel, and locate the lantern, which I light in exchange for my candle.

  Crosses, crates of candles, bundles of cloth, and other Catholic vestments crowd the earthen walls beneath a ceiling low enough I have to duck.

  I’m blocked at the back of the room by a feeble attempt at a wall and door; the bricks hastily mortared together to prevent entry except by the door locked by a chain fastened to said wall. Its lock is rusted, and I doubt the temple’s priest knows where the key is. I slide both bolts out of the hinges and pull the door open.

  I walk down the long room, earthen walls turning into long-since-buried crypto porches, arched with stone and rotted wood. I step over bones from an unknown eon or species and down a short flight of crumbling steps that must have been laid before Christ was born.

  A few steps more and I snuff out the lantern, approaching another brick wall the Camorra put in. But as they are slavers and not masons, the mortar job was done by those not getting paid, so the wall bows and sags. The bottom right corner is loose enough I slide a brick out and look through.