The Hermetica of Elysium (Elysium Texts Series) (37 page)

“He will come without struggle if he knows I have sent for him.”

“And how will he know?” Di Marco raised his eyebrows.

“I will send a message.” Nadira thought. Montrose could not read, but he would recognize something she sent him. She reached for the elixir, but stopped when her fingers were a tantalizing inch away, keeping her eyes on Di Marco.

The old man was deep in thought, probably used to political machinations of this type. Nadira was patient.

“I agree to your terms. I will send a man to de Salvo’s tower to find your companion, and you will do this thing for me.”

“Excellent! Give me some paper and I will create a message for Lord Montrose.”

Di Marco opened a drawer in the table and brought out a beautiful sheet of creamy paper. He pulled out a pair of shears and carefully trimmed the paper so that all four sides were smooth. Then he uncorked the inkbottle and pushed it toward her. He pulled a quill from the drawer and examined its nib before handing it over to her as well. “Explain to me how you can write a message to a man who cannot read,” he asked.

“He cannot read, but he can think,” Nadira answered, bending over the paper. With a steady hand she drew from memory a few figures from the bird script she had copied so many weeks before from Marcus’s back. When she was satisfied, she reached for the shears and cut a lock of her hair from close to her scalp.

Di Marco frowned. “What are you doing?” he asked.

Nadira did not answer. She laid the glossy black strands on the desk and plaited them. When she finished, she tied off both ends with more hair and smoothed the tiny braid flat. Nadira tucked the tiny braid into the sheet of paper and folded it into a small packet. “Have the messenger give this to him. He will follow.”

Di Marco took the packet and tucked it into his wide sleeve. “I will.”

“Let me have the elixir, now.” She reached for the tiny bottle.

Di Marco pulled it back. “Not so fast. This is a powerful potion. We must prepare you first.”

“How is that?” Nadira leaned back in her chair.

“You must relax, we should keep it dark and cool in here.”

“I am relaxed. It is dark and cool in here.” Nadira was impatient.

“Shall we pray for guidance and protection?”

“To whom shall we pray?” Nadira asked.

Di Marco looked shocked. “Why, to God, of course.”

Nadira smiled. “You go ahead. Are you afraid?”

“Of course not.” Di Marco made a face, looked up at her again, and then glanced away. “I shall pray for a good outcome and for our safety.” He knelt, his elbows on the bench, hands clasped. Nadira watched as he crossed himself, then mumbled his prayer. She took a long breath as she waited for him to finish. He closed his eyes, his lips moved silently for what seemed a long time. Nadira watched him cross himself again. The prayer was over. Di Marco opened his eyes and moved to sit on the bench.

“I am ready.” Di Marco poured a tiny amount of the elixir into a shallow little porcelain dish. Someone had painted a little fish on the bottom. The dark elixir covered the image slowly until the fish was completely submerged. Di Marco lifted the vial, measuring how much remained with a practiced eye. He lifted the tiny dish carefully and offered it to Nadira. “Drink it all at once. It is very bitter. I have some honeyed wine for you to wash away the taste.” Di Marco lifted the small wineglass. Nadira took the porcelain dish from him and swallowed the brown elixir. Immediately she reached for the wine. The soothing sweetness of the rich wine chased the bitter bite of the elixir down past the point where she could taste anything at all. She gasped for air.

“That was wretched!” she coughed. “More wine.” She pushed the wineglass toward him.

“Not too much, you should not be inebriated,” he answered, but he obediently poured a half cup for her.

“I know what it tastes like, Nadira.” Di Marco said.

She drained the wine quickly, moving her tongue around inside her mouth to get at any corner that might not have touched the sweet wine.

“Very well, then, my lord. What is next?” She leaned closer to the small man.

Di Marco reached out for her and took her hands in his. “Come with me. I have a soft place for you to lie while you are gone.” He led her to a velvet couch beneath the volcano fresco. Nadira allowed him to arrange her neatly on the couch and cover her with a light shawl he pulled from the back of the chair beside her. “This will keep you warm, should you have a chill. How are you feeling now?” he asked.

“I’m fine, my lord.”

“Let me know immediately when things start to look different to you. Then I will know it is time.”

“Very well. Will you tell me where I am to go?”

“Not yet. Just lie quietly here for now. Can I get you some water perhaps?”

“Yes, I think I will be grateful for it later.” Di Marco stood and left the room. Nadira heard the tumblers fall in the lock as he left. She lay back and relaxed herself, looking at the fresco above her. The volcano was spewing a lovely orange fan of molten rock from its summit. On the shoulders of the great mountain, villagers were fleeing their homes, running toward the shore where fishing boats waited to take them away. In the clouds angels drifted above their heads wielding mighty swords. She looked across the room at the ocean. There was turmoil in that painting too. Waves crashed against a cliff, spraying a cottage with foam and pulling a craggy tree from its precarious perch upon the cliff. Angels floated above this painting too. The room blurred at the edges and it seemed that all four frescoes came to life, all coming into extreme focus as they backed away from her.

Nadira blinked. The angels began to fly back and forth across the volcano, their arms waving the swords up and down just inches from the heads of the fleeing villagers. She shifted to get a better view of the drama. Di Marco entered the room with a scratch of his key and a clink of glass. Nadira tried to look at him but the room spun about confusingly. She could hear him, but which painting was he in? She looked at the ocean painting. There he was coming out of the cottage with a tray and glasses. She reached out a hand to steady the tray for him.

“Nadira. Can you hear me?”

That was very interesting. Di Marco’s voice did not come from his mouth, but from somewhere overhead. Nadira looked up. The cherubim on the ceiling smiled down on her as they fluttered about the roundel.

“Nadira!”

She focused her eyes with effort. Di Marco coalesced into her line of sight. His mouth was moving, but it was a few seconds before the words made a sound, then a few seconds more before the meaning became clear. “Yes?” she whispered. Her voice sounded bumpy to her ears.

“Nadira, listen to me; hear my voice as I speak. Look here.” He pointed to the center of his forehead as he spoke and she obeyed. It was so easy to do as he said and so difficult to move her eyes anywhere else. “You will go to the place where this person is.” Di Marco held up a miniature of an ugly little man wearing fine robes and a crown. Nadira looked at the picture, trying to focus so that the image stayed still. Di Marco spoke again,” Go to this man, tell me what you see. Go now.” Di Marco emphasized the last word, and as he did, Nadira felt the familiar snap and blur as part of her obeyed Di Marco without question.

She found herself moving through bright colors until she abruptly stopped outside a tent by a stream. Unlike her other journeys, she could hear everything that was going on around her. She heard the twittering of the birds above her in the trees as well as the tinny sound of the brook rippling by her feet. The beauty of the woods on this winter day distracted her. She knelt to examine a brilliantly colored leaf, but found with disappointment that her hand moved through it quite without purchase. Beside her, the tree spoke.

“Nadira, go into the tent.”

She obeyed the tree immediately. Inside the tent sat the French king surrounded on three sides by larger, fierce men in armor. They were speaking. Nadira knew several languages, but very little French. Merely enough to read some items on a manifest, she knew no verbs, no articles. Her eyes crossed, but the tree reached into the tent with a branch and tapped her shoulder.

“Repeat what you hear out loud, Nadira. Now.”

She opened her mouth to protest that she could not understand this language especially when spoken so quickly, but to her surprise her tongue produced the French words without her having to think at all. She stood there, incredulous, as she heard herself echo the words spoken by the king and his generals. Presently they all stopped talking and the generals left the tent. The king’s servants entered soon after with food and wine for him. Nadira remembered something. She turned and ran from the tent, continued running through other tents, trees, baggage, a horse. As she passed through each object, she could feel it inside her. It was fascinating and she made a mental note to explore that facet of this elixir later. Now she moved with a purpose toward a shining light near the edge of the camp.

As she ran the tree called her back, but she ignored him. At last, she found what she was looking for. A small tent beside a smaller fire, and beside it sat a very large man. “Garreth!” she cried. The man immediately looked up and scanned the faces around him. He waited, but the call was not repeated. He went back to oiling his boots. With joy, Nadira moved to embrace him. As before, she passed right through him. Disappointed, she sat beside him instead, watching his face. She could see that he sensed her presence, for he stopped his task and looked around suspiciously. Nadira did not want to frighten him, but she had to know.

“Where is Alisdair?” she asked loudly. She saw Garreth frown and rub his ears. “Yes, Alisdair,” she said slowly. Garreth looked up, squinting into the distance. Nadira followed his gaze. Another head rose above the seated men a few tents away looking in her direction. Nadira allowed a squeal of joy to escape her lips and she was instantly beside Alisdair at another fire pit. She threw her arms round him, knowing she would end up hugging herself. Alisdair stepped back, crossed himself.

“Jesu!” he breathed.

“What is it?” another soldier looked up from sharpening his sword.

“I don’t know, but I felt something clutch my heart!”

The other men laughed, continuing with their tasks. “Aye, it was that dinner. They say it was beef, but I think it was that cart horse went lame yesterday, eh, François?”

“Nay,” Alisdair rubbed his chest, his eyes circling around him. The men laughed again.

“Yes, that is exactly what that cart horse said when the cook led him away!” Guffaws cycled around the fire, but Alisdair did not laugh. His eyes narrowed a bit and he crossed himself again. Nadira was so excited she wrung her hands and bounced on her heels, but refrained from touching him again. It was exciting to hear him speak, and though she did not understand most of the French, here were a few mercenaries speaking English enabling her to share their conversation. This new skill flashed another memory for her, and though the tree beside her called her name, she closed her eyes and thought of Montrose.

Without any sense of movement, she opened her eyes. She was in a dark cottage; the only light came from a lamp which hung in the center from the crossbeam. Below her on the floor a man lay sleeping on a pallet. She knelt down and caressed his head. He startled her as he immediately awoke and sat up, the thin cloth that served as a blanket dropped to his lap. His eyes were bloodshot, his hair unkempt. She reached out to touch his face, and as she did so, he flinched.

“Oh” she cried out as her heart twisted with grief at finding him in such a miserable place. Montrose looked about, his eyes resting briefly on the shuttered window and the drafty fireplace beside him. He got to his feet stiffly. Nadira reached out to steady him, but moved through his body and then through the wall until she stood outside. “Oh no,” she thought, then moved back through the wall. Montrose was opening the shutters and peeking out the window, then the doorway.
He hears me
, she thought,
or
at least he thinks he hears me.
Montrose walked outside where the light was better.

Nadira could see that the cottage was really a woodshed, the fireplace just a pit with an opening in the wall, and the shuttered window was where the kindling was shoveled. Montrose stood before the door, his eyes moving side to side as he scanned the horizon. Nadira could not resist another call. She deliberately stepped inside him and remained quite still, feeling his heart beat inside her throat, for she was so much shorter than he. Montrose froze and then slowly put a hand to his chest. Nadira closed her eyes and willed herself to think of her love for him. She brought back memories of eating together, talking in the evenings, how he lifted her onto her horse. Very carefully, she said his name.

“Robert.”

Montrose started; he stepped out of her and looked back. Nadira saw his face twist in frustration. She followed him as he strode back into the woodshed and sat heavily on the pallet, his head in his hands. She glanced at his hands as he did so. The thumb has healed. The other arm was black and still sore from the wounds he received in the tower. Nadira could see no sign of rot on either wound. She sighed with happiness, floating just behind his head. She spoke to him softly.

“Stay here. Someone comes with a message. Be here to receive it.” She knew that last part would not be heard. She tried to blow through him again, but just as she touched his sleeve, a tree reached out a barky finger and snagged her back. She stopped; clearly, nothing should be able to touch her when she was traveling, yet this tree had her in its grip. She struggled to free herself, but another branch snaked about her waist, scratching her with its rough bark. Nadira pushed back as the trunk drew near to her face. She was astonished when the bark parted and the tree spoke.