She shook her head angrily. No wonder Malcolm felt the need to exercise such control over his younger brother and sister, if these were the kind of childish, self-indulgent pastimes they pursued. And she was angry at herself for her own passivity. It was time to leave. If they tried to stop her, they’d have a fight on their hands. And at Whitethorn while they taught you that ladies didn’t fight, they also taught you the concomitant lesson, that if you did have to fight, you needn’t do it like a lady.
She pushed open the door of the side chamber, and stopped dead.
It was lit by candles, huge church candles she suspected. But it wasn’t these that held her attention. Amine and Jonathan were there. And they were both naked.
Amine knelt before her brother, not in a posture of adoration but because she seemed to be giving him a sponge-down from a basin of water she carried, and apparently she had reached his legs. The rest of his body gleamed damply, as did hers.
Zeugma prided herself on being a tolerant liberal being, but this she found too much. Besides, indignation was a good emetic for fear.
‘For God’s sake!’ she said in disgust. ‘You must please yourselves, of course. But I’m leaving !’
They paid her no attention still; Amine continued her careful washing, Jonathan seemed to be in a semi-trance. The bare stonewalled chamber they were in offered even less in the way of possible exits than the other room and Zeugma turned and ran back in to see if she could force a way out. Neither of the two locked doors reacted in the slightest to her solid shoulder charges and all the physical effort did was to cause her enough pain to let fear come rushing back in.
She began to hunt around for something she could use as a weapon for an assault on the woodwork of the doors or, even though she still tried to refuse to admit this possibility, to protect herself. There was nothing. No fire-irons, no furniture, nothing.
Amine entered, still naked, and with a grace of movement and posture few women achieve even expertly clothed and rehearsed, she placed the two huge candles on either side of the goat-tapestry. She went into the small chamber again, returning almost instantly with a bowl the contents of which she proceeded to sprinkle on the fire. It crackled and spat and burnt with a blue flame, emitting a pungent sulphurous smell admixed with traces of camphor and, more faintly still, laurel.
Zeugma had had enough.
‘Look here, Amine,’ she said, grasping at the woman’s arm as she passed. But the washing ceremony must have involved an oiling of the body too, for her grip slipped vainly on the smooth skin and at the same time a wisp of the fumes from the fire caught at her throat and doubled her up in a fit of choking and coughing.
When she recovered, Jonathan was in the room. Her basic prudery made her glad to observe that he at least was now clothed, though his chosen dress was not reassuring. It was a single black khaftan-like garment which fell almost to the floor. In a way, it was remarkably becoming and he wore it with the ease of one used to robes. Most Europeans out of trousers and jacket look as if their backbones have been liquified, but Jonathan looked as if he could stride across the desert with the best. Unfortunately sun and sand were a million miles away and in this darksome room the robe spoke of other more fearful traditions.
Jonathan had stooped to the floor on which he was drawing something with a large block of chalk. He was in fact, Zeugma realized, following an outline already traced on the floor or perhaps imperfectly erased after a previous ceremony.
So, they played these black-magic games, thought Zeugma. What role they proposed for her was not yet clear, but she doubted whether it was intended to be a very comfortable one. So far, neither of them had attempted any physical intimidation which, she assured herself grimly, was just as well for them. And if they thought they were going to put the frights on her by thought alone, they had better think again.
Jonathan had completed a circle with his chalk, all except a small arc of about eighteen inches. He was now carefully drawing another shape inside and contingent with the circle. It consisted of two interlocking triangles, forming a six-pointed star.
‘Ah,’ said Zeugma brightly. ‘I see you prefer the hexagram to the pentagram. The Seal of Solomon, isn’t it?’
Amine now reappeared carrying with her a small brazier which she set in the hexagon formed by the intersection of the triangles. She was careful to enter the circle through the gap left by her brother which he now carefully filled in, and though only a thin line of chalk separated her from them, Zeugma felt a chilling sense of exclusion.
Jonathan now moved slowly around the circle, anticlockwise, pausing four times raising his clasped hands above his head and gabbling some incantation with the speed and inaudibility of a parson eager to get morning service over and head for the golf course. The likeness amused Zeugma and she made herself laugh out loud to demonstrate her amusement. The sound jarred; either the room’s acoustics of her vocal cords were not fitted for laughter.
Amine meanwhile knelt by the brazier and blew gently on the contents which from the even redness of the respondent glow seemed to be charcoal. She really was incredibly attractive, thought Zeugma. Every line of her body was smooth and taut without any bit of athletic muscularity. School captains like this would have been easy to love.
Now the brazier glowed bright and the woman rose and started sifting on to it handfuls of material she drew from a small black satchel. Clouds of dark grey smoke began to rise and rapidly spread, filling the room with pungent, acrid fumes which made those previously emanating from the fire seem like attar of roses.
Through the swirling smoke and its resultant tears, it was almost impossible to see the figures in the circle, but Zeugma heard Jonathan’s voice, no longer gabbling but resounding loud and clear.
‘I conjure thee, O Euronymous, Prince of Death, I conjure thee, strengthened by the power of Almighty God, and I command thee by Baralmensis, Baldachiensis, Paumachie, Apolorosedes, and the most powerful Princes Genio and Liachide, Ministers of the Seat of Tartarus and … ’
Now a new bout of coughing prevented Zeugma from hearing any more and she moved away to the furthermost corner of the room in an effort to avoid the fumes. It wasn’t just the discomfort she feared; her knowledge of so-called magical rites was sketchy, but she knew that the numerous eye-witness accounts of successful spirit-raising had to be explained as hallucinations rather than frauds. Self-induced hysteria alone could result in visual delusions, but it seemed likely that some external help was given and the brazier was the most probable source. She was not expert enough to identify whatever it was Amine was sprinkling into the red glow of the charcoal; it might contain Indian hemp, hemlock, black hellebore, henbane (what an evil letter H was, she thought reproachfully) or any combination of narcotic plants known and unknown.
A clever idea suggested itself to her and she made for the small inner chamber, hoping to find refuge if not an escape route. It was difficult to see, or indeed to recollect, where the door was, but by pressing herself against the wall (whose smooth panelling seemed to yield and mould itself most sensuously against her body) she was able to edge her way round the room till she found it.
It was locked. Of course. She felt no surprise. Her mind, still in control, had expected this. Now it must work at other ideas. She sat down on the floor – to get beneath the fumes, she told herself – but the cloying smoke wreaths were heavier than air; had she forgotten those smelly laboratory classes where in a few dull hours Whitethorn girls learned everything about science a lady needed to know? She tried to rise again, but the effort was hard and her body seemed ponderous and bulky beyond even the worst fears of her teenage nightmares.
Jonathan’s voice still continued; it had risen in pitch and anger. Euronymous, Prince of Death, seemed reluctant to put in an appearance (perhaps the poor sod’s got stuck in the Underground rush-hour, giggled Zeugma to herself) and Upas was threatening all kinds of unpleasantness, backing up these threats with ‘the Most High Names of God, Hain, Lon, Hilay, Sabaoth, He
lim, Radisha …’ Radisha started her giggling again and she missed a couple … Tetragrammaton, Sadai …’ It really was too like a Czechoslovakian football team; now a long ball from Hilay finds Agios, he crosses to Helim who beats two, three defenders, chips on to the head of Tetragrammaton and it’s there ! England are out of the Underworld Cup by a narrow fifteen-goal margin !
But jokes are nothing if not shared, and Zeugma began to crawl forward to let the Upases know how ridiculous they were. The smoke cleared a little and she saw them now, he with his arms stretched wide and the skin of his face taut and death-pale, she alongside him, her body a-shine with oil and perspiration, and rounded and soft-looking now, as though ready for the act of love.
What’s it all about? Zeugma asked herself. Why all this jiggery-pokery and gobble-de-gook? No one’s shown any desire to tie me to a cross and rape me. Or to cut me in half with a magic sword. Why?
‘Am I not good enough?’ she shouted indignantly, but it came out as an incoherent screech.
Her cry seemed to urge them on to redouble their efforts. Jonathan’s voice rose to a scream Amine’s body was shaken by some vast internal convulsion as she poured more and more of her odoriferous fuel on the charcoal fire.
It’s too simple, thought Zeugma. They’re trying to frighten me ! They get their kicks from seeing me terrified. Them in their circle, me out here with the demons. Euronymous gets to grips with me, and they … well, it might come to incest, but at the moment they both look as if they can manage very well by themselves. When old Euronymous shows up, they’ll probably explode !
She threw her head back and laughed, but again the sound was not quite right. The tone of Jonathan’s voice had changed. Still commanding, it no longer threatened, but began to sound approving, almost welcoming. Uneasily Zeugma glanced over her shoulder. Nothing was there. Just smoke. Then the wall. And on the wall the goat tapestry between the two candles.
Her gaze focussed on this; the pattern was almost invisible and she felt some compulsion to try to pick it out. And as she watched, it was as if an electric current passed slowly along a filament, for the silken thread of the picture began to glow, softly at first but with ever-increasing radiance, brighter and brighter, till it seemed as if the monstrous outline was detached from it background and floated in air, a hideous luminescent apparition.
An illusion, Zeugma told herself, a simple illusion. But suddenly it seemed best of all ideas to get into the circle with the Upases, who were at least, if perhaps a trifle over-obviously, flesh and blood.
She turned once more and resumed her crawl. She could see them clearly, their eyes fixed on her slow-moving body, their faces alight with evil joy and triumph.
Damn them ! she thought. They shan’t see me afraid.
She halted. Glanced over her shoulder. The shape of the goat was gaining bulk and substance. The red eyes glowed and moved and fixed themselves on her own. The snakes encircling the penis raised their heads, darted long forked tongues and hissed.
It was no time for pride. She couldn’t take her eyes off the goat, but now she pushed herself backwards towards the circle, bringing her knees up to her chest, then straightening her legs, like an oarsman on his slide. Her long skirt was a hindrance, so she dragged it up over her thighs and thought she detected a visible reaction in the goat. I suppose I should feel gratified, she told herself in a desperate effort at cheerfulness. Especially when the competition is Amine, starkers.
But Amine was in the circle, out of reach. This goat was clearly a pragmatist. She pushed back desperately once more. Surely she must be there now? And her back struck something so solid she felt sure she must have missed her direction and come up against the wall.
But a glance over her shoulder showed her she had not been wrong. She was at the circle’s edge. The two Upases towered over her, huge beyond mere human dimension, gleeful beyond human joy, but still preferable still infinitely preferable to the obscene horror which filled the room behind her. She thrust herself against the circle once more. There was nothing there, no visible barrier, yet she could not cross the chalk line.
She heard herself making screaming noises again. There was some small satisfaction in this. At least she wasn’t trying to laugh or to speak – this time she was just trying to scream.
The goat-monster was almost on her now. She tried to close her eyes to it, but couldn’t. Perhaps the Turkish Officers’ Manual was a work of compassion after all; perhaps blindness in these circumstances was a blessing; perhaps …
No ! This was submission ! Whitethorn girls did not submit. If devils could seek the pleasures of the flesh, presumably they could also feel the pains of the flesh. And in all conscience the target was huge enough.
Supporting herself against the invisible barrier round the circle, she kicked upwards with all her strength between the monstrous, hairy and scaled goat-legs.
At the same moment, with a noise like an explosion, the corridor door burst open and a blast of cold, fresh air swept across the room, dispersing the brazier fumes and blowing out the candles. Zeugma’s foot met nothing, the barrier behind her dissolved and she fell backwards into the circle, from which undignified recumbent position she saw that the goat was once more just an almost invisible tapestry pattern, the Upases had resumed normal human dimensions, and standing in the open door, his face strained and white as though from some great effort of will and strength was Crow.
15
The number of the dead long exceedeth all that shall live. The night of time far surpasseth the day and who knows when was the Aequinox?
Zeugma’s first reaction was to shout with joy. They had been right after all at Whitethorn. Virtue would triumph; the U.S. Calvary did arrive in the nick of time.
But, she quickly realized, in the present case there was something not quite right. Whereas the mere sound of bugles was generally enough to send the Indians running, the Upases did not look terrified but full of rage.
Crow advanced into the room, his steps slow and difficult, almost as if he had been drinking. Zeugma would not have blamed him if he’d felt it necessary to down a gallon or so of his brose before coming to the rescue. But clearly he was in no state to effect the rescue unaided.
This was underlined by Jonathan, who leapt out of the circle and with contemptuous ease caught Crow’s outstretched arm in a judo lock and flung him against the wall. With difficulty Zeugma pushed herself up from the ground and staggered to Crow’s aid, but a hand seized her by her short unruly hair and forced her head backwards till she was staring, pop-eyed, up into Amine’s face.
Zeugma looked at her more in sorrow than anger. She really was beautiful. But the one thing that Zeugma had been best at at Whitethorn was fighting and she had never found the beauty of her opponents anything but an advantage. Carefully she reached up with her hands clasped them behind Amine’s neck and brought the exquisitely sculpted head swinging down so that the long, delicate nose crashed solidly into her forehead.
Amine screamed, released her grip on Zeugma’s hair, put her hands to her face for an instant, then stared unbelievingly at the sticky redness which stained them.
During this instant Zeugma turned, picked a spot midway between the navel and the mound of Venus, and attempted to bury her right fist into it. Amine doubled up, gaping like an air-bound goldfish. Zeugma smiled apologetically and turned to the other contest.
For Crow things had gone from bad to worse. Jonathan was demonstrating his mastery of most forms of combat, Oriental and Occidental, and Crow was close to total destruction. Zeugma knew her limitations; her own techniques were fine for disposing of female opposition, but Jonathan could break her neck without quickening his breath. She looked desperately around for a weapon. There was only one possibility, so she used it.
Seizing the brazier by its legs and thrusting it high into the air, she staggered towards the black-robed youth. Amine recovered her breath sufficiently to croak a warning, Jonathan turned from his near-unconscious opponent and screamed
in pain and fury as she poured the red-hot charcoal over him.
The initial effect was dramatic, but the respite could only be momentary. Upas danced around, brushing cinders off his robe and out of his hair. Zeugma stooped to urge Crow to his feet, but there was no immediate hope of that. Instead the old man (for now the face seemed creased and lined with many, many years) looked up at her through half-closed eyes and said, ‘Flee.’
No one had ever told her to flee before, she thought. It was not a word in common use.
‘Flee ! ’ gasped Crow urgently. ‘To the centre !’
Behind her she sensed a change of movement. She turned. Upas seemed to have quenched his various conflagrations satisfactorily. Only his eyes still burned, with a flame of vicious, unbridled hatred.
‘Flee!’ cried Crow.
She fled.
Upas, she surmised later, must have hesitated between pursuit and finishing the work he had started on Crow. Quickly he decided that Crow was no longer a source of worry and in any case Amine was much further on the road to recovery. But the hesitation gave Zeugma a few seconds’ start and she was already at the front door when he came out of the room. She vaguely remembered leaving the key in the Range Rover’s ignition. She prayed that her memory was true. If she could not get the car started, she was finished. Her head was still muzzy from the fumes and her legs felt weak beyond support of even the most sylph-like frame.
Gasping raucously, she dragged herself into the vehicle and fumbled in panic at the dashboard. She could not even recall where the ignition was. Lights, screen-wipers and radio all went on before her fingers closed on the cool metal of the key. No vampire-pursued Christian ever grasped the protecting crucifix with greater fervour.
Beyond the Bone Page 16
