Inkarna

by Nerine Dorman

  “Marlise?”

  “Um?”

  “How well do you know the caves above Kalk Bay?”

  “Oh no, Ash, I don’t like the direction your thoughts are taking.”

  “I need to hide this thing, and burying it in your parents’ back yard won’t be enough.”

  “You’re crazy!”

  “Better crazy than dead. Do you know about the caves?”

  “Sort of. Not quite. Never went there, but my brothers did.”

  “We’re going there. Now. The place I need is about half an hour’s walk from the hairpin bend.”

  “Jesus, Ash! You’re crazy! That’s not half an hour! That’s at least two hours up and two down.” She turns away from the road long enough to give me a death glare.

  “Fine. Then stop the car. I’ll walk.”

  Marlise clutches the steering wheel, over-revving the engine when we take off from the traffic lights outside Simon’s Town. “I’ll wait for you in the car.” Her tone is resigned, tired.

  “Thank you. That’s all I need.”

  The only response I receive is a deep sigh and I can’t help but smile to myself, allowing my eyes to go unfocused as Marlise takes the corners too tightly.

  It’s almost fully dark when we arrive at the parking area at the hairpin bend curving up Boyes Drive. By now the rain sifts down in a steady downpour and the windscreen wipers do little to improve visibility.

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” Marlise says as she pulls up the hand brake. A particularly heavy gust of wind sideswipes the vehicle. “We could go home, sleep on it, then I’ll take tomorrow off from college and we can do this together, with proper gear.”

  “Do you want us to get killed?” I can’t take chances with this thing. All the small hairs on my arms prickle at the stone’s proximity.

  “What is this thing? It’s just some antique, right? No one knows you’ve got it?”

  “I don’t know.” I clench my fists. “If Leo could find me, it means they can, too. Anyone could have seen me meet with her today.”

  “Ash, you’re scaring me. Who’s looking for you? What have you done?”

  “Stay in the car. It’s safer.” With a low growl rumbling in my throat I step out of the vehicle into a raging tempest. The contrast between the warm interior and outside knocks the breath from my lungs, my skin screaming at the cold. This is not a time to question my judgment. Yes, Marlise has sense suggesting we sleep on this and return tomorrow but, by equal measure, if I don’t lay this thing to rest, now, who knows what sort of trouble may hound me. For all I know, House Montu could be after us already.

  I’ve gone about a dozen steps up the steep path, tripping over rocks and tree roots, all but blind, when a torch beam pierces the night. Whenever I slip, I press my burden tightly against my chest. Pain slashes through my knee when I skin it on some obstacle. Damn Ashton for wearing jeans with holey knees.

  “Ash! Ash! Wait! I’m coming with!”

  Relief and concern wash through me when I stop and wait for Marlise to catch up.

  I hug her to me, feeling how her hair is already plastered to her skull. “Thank you for coming.”

  “You’re a fool. I don’t know why I’m tagging after you.”

  “Neither do I, but I appreciate the company.” My laugh is choked. By all rights I should get her to turn back.

  Hand in hand we make our way up the narrow footpath, stumbling more often than not. Where the one slips, the other saves. Marlise wields the torch only when it’s necessary. We have to conserve the batteries. I silently bless the woman for keeping the device in her car’s glove compartment. No other sounds reach us, save for the steady patter of rain through the bushes, our occasional oaths and the clatter of moisture-loosened stones.

  We lose track of time but eventually reach a point where the path flattens, the stone steps giving way to sodden sand that gleams whitely even in the low light. Below us, to our left, Fish Hoek shines, a festive scattering of white and orange lights, the cars small moving points of illumination. Here we pause, shivering in the incessant wash. Marlise presses herself into me and I offer what shelter I can, positioning myself so that I have my back to the wind.

  The Blessed memories suggest taking the right turn soon and, satisfied that this is the correct choice, I give Marlise’s shoulder a squeeze. “You okay?”

  She’s shivering so much her nod looks like a shake of the head. I should never have allowed her to come but I worry also what would happen if she’d remained in the car. Boyes Drive at night is never the safest of places. Here I can still offer some protection.

  There is something I can do. I’ve never tried it and it’s dangerous at best, but I can channel some of my daimonic essence into her. It’s there, not far below the surface. All I need to do is nudge a little, visualise the power blossoming in my heart. It’s a slow fire I can push, willing it to travel, to spiral down my arm where we make contact.

  I have no idea if this will work as I imagine her essence flare in sympathy with mine. I nuzzle her hair, drawing strength from the scent of her, a sweetness beneath the mint that is the first to spring to mind.

  “What are you doing?” I feel her look up and our lips graze accidentally.

  Pulling back, I say, “I’ve just tried something I’ve only read about. Feel better?” In this rain, I have no idea whether I’m suffering another nosebleed but there is no pain, so I assume I’m doing all right.

  “I feel… Not so cold.” The wonder is evident in her words.

  “It should last for a while, until we get there. But it won’t last forever. We’ll need to rest at some point.”

  Although the rest of the climb is taxing, it’s almost as if this exertion doesn’t matter as much because we climb in concert. Yes, the Inkarna are tougher than ordinary people. We are more in tune with our environment and how our bodies react to stimuli. Mind over matter, they say, but my answer to that is synthesis, the daimonic self which lies hidden within all mankind for those brave and foolish enough to reach beyond the limitations of the flesh.

  Each step we take is carefully calculated in the darkness, more a sense of when and where our feet will make a connection with the earth. At first Marlise draws heavily on my essence but, after about ten minutes we reach an equilibrium. It pains me to know that I’m forcing her into a heightened state. She has no conception of what it means to be Inkarna, to number among Those Who Return.

  This won’t be a permanent state. Later I can discuss this with her, to see whether she wants to take things further, but right now this could mean the difference between her freezing to death or making it through the night. Let this rest on my conscience for allowing her to tag along.

  Our path grows steeper and the first scrambles begin, the cliffs looming as a darker patch against the cloud, which reflect a weird orange glow that could only be light from the town. Light pollution, but for once I’m glad for it, for offering us some visibility on this mad quest.

  Another small mercy is that the rain lets up when we near the top and are plunged into thick brush. Here it’s not always easy keeping to the path, and we have to double back a few times until we pick up on subtle cues, a branch rubbed smooth from countless hands here, a boot print preserved in the relative shelter of an overhanging rock. Droplets drip-drip from foliage and the muted rumble of traffic reaches us from Boyes Drive—the remainder of the evening rush from the city centre. Above, ragged holes are torn in the clouds that, before closing, display a faint sprinkling of stars. I’m just glad the wind has died down. It’s not going to be as pleasant when we get to a higher elevation.

  “Tell me about your other life,” Marlise says when we pause before a particularly nasty scramble.

  “I don’t really want to. That person is dead.” The torch’s beam illustrates a precipitous series of hand- and footholds.

  “What was your life like?”

  “I lived through the Anglo Boer War. My name was Elizabeth Rae, but everyone called me
Lizzie. It kinda stuck.”

  “A woman?” Marlise’s laughter rasps in her throat.

  This salient fact obviously didn’t sink in the first time I told her the story, and I snort softly. “You laugh now, but you never know, if and when you decide to come back…”

  “So, what did you do?”

  “I was a schoolteacher for a while. That was until the man I married swept me off my feet and into his very bizarre world. Believe it or not, we travelled a lot, and I even met Aleister Crowley once while he owned Boleskine House on the shores of Loch Ness.”

  “Who’s Aleister Crowley?”

  “Never mind. I’m sure I’ll educate you at some point. Besides, the man was a buffoon, so full of himself he pretty much lost the plot.”

  “Right.”

  The talking helps keep my mind off our goal, because once we reach the cave, I still have to find a niche or some hidey-hole slightly off the main path. Spelunking is the last thing I’d have considered myself involved in, especially on a night like this.

  Marlise whimpers once or twice during the hairiest climbing but doesn’t complain. We have a heart-stopping moment when she slips, and it’s only because I’m right behind her that I stop her from taking a nasty tumble. Dense bush screens us from the view of False Bay but the mountain before us looms, a forbidding presence. I can feel the weight of the sandstone. It’s as if the mountain watches us, aware of the puny humans clawing along its flanks.

  If I listen carefully, I can hear whispers of the hundreds of souls who’ve tramped here before us. Marlise uses the flashlight for the last stretch. The beam cuts through the murk to eventually illuminate a dark slot before us once we reach a flattened area. The reflection off the frowning folded stone lends harsh shadows and I can’t help but feel a flutter of trepidation at the yawning blackness waiting for me.

  “Wanna switch that thing off?” I ask.

  Both of us groan as we collapse just within a metre of the opening, the night’s cold beginning to seep into my bones for the first time since I drew upon my daimonic essence. A little voice of self-doubt niggles, suggesting I’m going to pay for this expenditure come dawn. Right now I can’t care. The hand clutching the stele has gone numb, the stone far too heavy in my grasp.

  “What now?” Marlise says. A tremor passes through her body and I pull her to me, willing more strength from my reserve into her. Her voice echoes down into the throat of the mountain.

  “We rest a bit then we go in a little way. We don’t have to go far, just until we find a suitable crack so I can stow this thing.”

  “Good, because I don’t like the dark.”

  “That’s a fine time to be telling me this now.”

  “People have died up here in the caves.”

  “We’re not going to die.” I hope I can reassure her to stay calm. “But you don’t have to come in. In fact, I need you to stay here, to look after the entrance for me. I will be about half an hour at most. Don’t fall asleep. If you hear anyone come, call my name and get the hell out of here.”

  “Who’d come up here at night? Besides us? This is crazy.”

  I sigh. “Well, things are about to get a lot crazier, especially if I don’t sort out this stele.”

  After I give her my jacket—though it will do little good as even the lining is soaked through—I rise, wiping first one hand then the other on my jeans. In this impenetrable night, Marlise is reduced to just one more blob of shadow moving against the darkness, silhouetted against an inky background.

  “I’m scared.”

  “Don’t be. I won’t be long. I’ll only go about twenty or thirty metres into the cave. Will you give me the torch?”

  She hisses but I feel the object batting against my legs and I take it from her. I should do something; make her feel that this is somehow not the end of the world, that the shadows won’t eat her.

  “While I’m gone, I want you to visualise that you’ve got a coal in your stomach. Every time you breathe in, I want you to imagine that it flares a little brighter. You know, like when people are starting up a fire that’s down to embers? I want you to imagine the warmth radiating off that coal, that you keep it at the point where it’s just about to burst into flame but doesn’t. Breathe regularly, in for three, hold for two, out for three, hold for two, okay?”

  “Why?”

  “Just do it. It will keep you warm. But don’t forget to listen out for anything unusual.” On a whim, I kneel and hug her, placing a kiss on her cold cheek. She’s so brave. I’d never have had the sheer guts to do what she’s doing now, following a madman into danger. The gods know Richard never expected anything like this of me when he went off on his jaunts to Rhodesia and central Africa.

  I feel her nod then I rise. She should be fine, I hope. The exercise I’ve given her is one that’s used to train initiates when they hold vigil for a full night. The body rests but the mind falls into a calming trance, and the daimonic powers are nursed, warming the Kha. It’s one of the ways we learn to control our bodies.

  Taking the first faltering steps, I switch on the torch long enough to discern the tunnel with its slowly downward-sloping roof, rounded rocks convenient stepping stones. Previous visitors have painted in scrawling white letters the name of this slot: Boomslang. Tree snake. Soon I’m crouching, feeling my way forward, my nose tickling from the mustiness of centuries of damp. I try to move without disturbing the ground too much. The constant drip of water tells of continuous moisture. My hands come away slick with a rusty grime. I switch off the torch to preserve the batteries.

  The problem with inching along in darkness so thick is that one’s eyes create disturbing visuals to compensate for the lack of light. Violet and silver blossoms keep forming, exploding then starting all over again. My breathing is loud to me, ragged gasps that echo just ever so slightly to make me think I’m not alone. Every few metres, or what I consider a decent distance, I flash the torch briefly, checking that the ground doesn’t plunge into some bottomless abyss. Wouldn’t that be a joke? I make it this far and manage to hide the stele by plunging to my death?

  Blessed memories tell me there’s a cave, one of many in this mountain, where a chasm opens so abruptly that people have slipped to their deaths in such a hideous fashion. Luckily none of the recollections I access involve such a drama here, but I’m not about to take any more chances—other than already being a colossal fool for going through with this tonight, of all nights. We’re here now. No point in turning back without completing the mission.

  Presently a narrow gap opens to my right on ground level, a small indentation that seems suitable. The cave’s ceiling is so low here my back is pressed against it while I crawl, and I try very hard not to think about how much rock squeezes down. That leads to a tightening of the chest and an intense need to turn and scramble out. The torch reveals that the slot continues at least ten or so meters into the rock and I probe carefully with my hand, feeling for a spot that will be right for the stele.

  Is it such a wise thing to be leaving it here, hidden? I don’t know. Carrying it with me seems a worse option, for if I’m caught, this knowledge will belong to someone else. The method of the ritual remains etched in my subconscious. I understand now why Richard didn’t want Leonora to read it. This knowledge makes her almost too dangerous to continue existing. I pray she remains safe when she reaches Per Ankh.

  The fewer who know about this the better, and it makes sense why House Adamastor wanted to keep beneath the radar.

  With a flat shard of stone, I scratch a depression in the earth, far into the lateral tunnel. It’s not easy work and I bite back a few choice curses when I skin my knuckles. While I intend laying a compulsion on the stele anyway, it’s important the thing is buried, that it doesn’t look as though anything is hidden here.

  A peculiar reluctance overwhelms me when I place the damned thing in the hiding place I’ve created for it. I want to unwrap it, gaze over those hieroglyphs one more time, trail a finger along the edge and fe
el how soap-smooth the serpentine is. Some objects of power hold compulsions of their own. No, it’s safer that I let this thing go. The chances of anyone ever coming up here are slim, even more so finding this thing with its dire words.

  With a sigh I place it, feeling in the dark for small pebbles to pack over the cloth, followed by handfuls of dirt until the soil is flat. For good measure, I pack larger fragments of stone on top, as randomly as possible.

  The real work comes at this point and, cross-legged, I crouch before the opening. Terrible shivers wrack my body. Only now am I aware of how this evening’s physical abuse is taking its toll. Biting the inside of my cheek to quell the chattering of my teeth, I draw deep breaths, pulling at that ember within me. I will this into flame. Hell, I’m going to pay for this tomorrow but first I need to get through tonight. If House Montu is becoming more militant, I cannot, in good conscience, allow this information to slide into the wrong hands. As it is I’m taking a risk having Marlise with me, involving her in this debacle. Of its own accord my thoughts slip to those fateful words inscribed on the tablet. Once read, impossible to forget.

  You could kill her now, a nasty whisper suggests. If you kill her now there won’t be any loose ends.

  The thought is so appalling I grimace, because, unbidden, at least three or four methods come to mind. I could push her down the mountain. I could bash her head in with a rock. I could stalk back and strangle her and hide her body where it won’t be found for a very long time. Or, I could use the knowledge I’ve gained from The Book of Ammit and separate her souls and send them hurtling into the Devourer’s slavering jaws—bypassing the Hall of Judgment so no one need know of my crime.

  At this moment I realise something with a horrible, sick certainty. I’m not capable of bringing about such an evil. Isfet, that’s the word for it. I would deviate from the path of Ma’at and I would become a twisted parody of all that Per Ankh stands for. Such an act would place an indelible stain on my Akh.

  But why hold onto such knowledge? To what purpose? Surely it would be better to destroy these words. Knowledge is power, that much I know, but even more powerful is he who holds power and chooses to withhold it.