Chronicles of Ara: Perdition

by Joel Eisenberg

  Denise didn’t care, and she didn’t question. “Done. Go for it. And if you keep anything, I don’t want to know. As long as both apartments are in shape to rent before you leave, I’m golden. I gotta go.”

  Sidra reminded Denise she would be back from Egypt in six months and

  they only needed a sublet during that time, and Denise told Sidra where she hid the spare key. The publisher terminated the call, and that was that.

  ~~~

  Sidra quickly fingers through Matthius’ eight paintings of the muse in various stages. She finds what she is looking for:

  She places this one in front of the others, returns to her room, and locks her door. Sidra’s open suitcase rests on the floor; she drops all of the paintings but the selected one behind the couch. She grabs her camera from the closest countertop, checks the film and shoots.

  Sidra knew exactly what she was looking at when Officer Palatnek showed her his sketch of the woman who washed onto the sand of the Jersey Shore. She hid her shock well, as she had immediately recalled Matthius’ painting.

  She sneaked into his apartment one evening when he wasn’t home. She was curious to see what he was all about, took a look at his paintings, and left.

  Now, history is primed to be altered by a troubled young woman from Soho, who has incontrovertible “proof” that she has been able to capture a certain elusive photograph when no one else was able. A bit of cropping here and there, some color correction and chem treating there, and no one would ever be able to tell.

  I said it. History will continue to be altered for as long as those who make history are able. Through perspective, through the oral tradition, through censorship, through photography, music, painting, and other such art stuff.

  The Truth has been buried so deeply as to make decoding nearly impossible. Until I figured it out. A kid.

  So I ask you for one thing.

  Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus (the full title, as if you didn’t know), is one of the most influential books ever written. The author (or authors; we’ll get to that in a little bit too) just may be two of the most important and well-publicized writers ever.

  Why?

  Well, I’m learning. No disrespect, but the Shelleys were trainwrecks. Those whose lives they are about to ensnare in their web? Also trainwrecks. You’ll see.

  And so, in yet another effort to get you to finally hear me, I’m going to become a trainwreck.

  I’m in no mood for a Nixon-Kennedy competition with the classically good-looking and respectable Selu Hobbins, so keep your eyes and ears open for what happens next.

  That is all, for now.

  P.S. Well, maybe not quite all, but this time I’ll be quick. Back to the Shelleys for a moment. A common research tool that elaborates upon their travels is Mary’s readily available tome, History of a Six Weeks’ Tour through part of France, Switzerland, Germany, and Holland, with Letters descriptive of a Sail round the Lake of Geneva, and of the Glaciers of Chamouni (and why is it, by the way, like Lewis Carroll and Alice Liddell years later, as covered in our last volume, that several important literary happenings happen in water?). The deal here, though, is Mary, with Percy’s aid, changed key events of their travels in subsequent printings . . . and there goes that revisionist history again.

  Which printing represents the reality? Who knows. The first volume was published in 1817, based on Mary and Percy’s journals and letters to her half-sister Fanny. The book itself was pieced together, as literary detectives have pieced together their clues. Everyone has an opinion.

  History. Welcome to it. Once again, the only way to decipher The Truth is to obsess over exaggerations and lies.

  A hell of a life, I must say.

  You’re welcome.

  MIRKWOOD

  The death of King O’n, Eron’s father and the first king of Mirkwood’s mainland, has left his people without rule. Wars are fought for control of the fallen kingdom, far too many have died, and secretive whispers of a more capable non-human arising from the depths or descending from the skies to assume that rule have begun.

  Not a god, another being as yet defined, and this they call Prophecy . . .

  The world outside of the mainland holds little temptation as the gods have yet to show the mortals the way. Most of the humans take it for granted that life does not exist on the other side, as unexplored distant regions are considered uninhabitable. This prevailing idea has not been wrought from any scientific or empirical evidence; the mortals remain fearful of their gods and are provoked largely by superstition. Lightning, rain, fire, and snow are signs—a god’s wrath has been triggered; they best return to their huts for now. Surrounding land masses could be accessed anyway only by crossing extensive mountain ranges, an unspoiled sea, a taboo forest, a portal beyond the rabbit hole . . .

  And whatever route has yet to be determined. Not worth the effort. Or the risk.

  There are some, though, who do not believe.

  Tools are built for hunting and gathering—“Ar-a, Ar-a” is a common refrain when communicating the need for specific weaponry—though it will be many sunsets hence until modes of transportation are designed and made functional.

  The gods, by their sole design, have ensured that every answer to every problem can be found out there and the natives, man and beast, must rely on their own cunning to advance as a civilization. Out there is the solution to every question, the control and determinant of every issue. Nothing will ever come easy.

  When this aspect of The Truth is questioned and the whispers increase in volume and force, a small group of mortals blaspheme and build their own gods to help define role and place and answer the most obvious question:

  “Why am I here?”

  And then they build their demons.

  “Why the bloodshed? Why the death of innocents?”

  And then word of those new gods and demons spread and carry and the mortals splinter from there, rarely agreeing on anything. And then, the first wars over belief. Dogma. From there, population growth and cultures. From there, recognition and then acceptance that in order to survive, the untouched regions must be found and made habitable.

  Meanwhile, the existing immortals laugh at the naiveté of it all. They laugh . . . but they also worry. About her.

  Ara.

  She has still not yet discovered her own ability, which they all know is imminent.

  And then what?

  ~~~

  Taebal has escaped unscathed from his former master. He questions his reality, but not for long. Not far away, under the ruins of King O’n’s castle, in a tunnel deep inside the bowels of the earth that houses its root . . .

  The mystic S’n Te wanders, tormented by worry. Why is he being plagued by such doubt? Why does the king come to him in vision . . . only to taunt him with an implication of vengeance on behalf of his son, Eron? It has been many sunsets since the king’s passage. Why has he been summoned presently, here, to the ruins?

  “You have betrayed my son,” the spirit-king says. “You have betrayed your king.”

  “I have done no such—”

  “And thus they are upon y—”

  “Dear king . . . dear king, I admit it is I who infected Eron’s sweord . . . but I plead for mercy. There is reason, for every—”

  “To every power is a greater power. This I know when I could not know before.” S’n Te believes the words, though he strives to convince himself otherwise. “Neither god nor mystic rewrites the natural order,” the spirit-king says as he fades, “without incurring the wrath of the dark. It is not I who calls for you. Ara has inspired certain beliefs in the mortals above, which has allowed me to thusly summon . . .”

  The dark.

  Perhaps the warning was not from him? S’n Te thinks. Perhaps I am being tricked. Or, perhaps the king himself works in the dark?

  His latter thought is accented by a glimpse of the king’s writing—his records—as written on dragon flesh and stored in the castle’s dank underground librar
y. To which S’n Te presently approaches. He is haunted along the way; physical sensations he had not heretofore experienced nearly overtaking his will and yet . . . he proceeds.

  From the tunnel into a cave. Down a ladder. Through another tunnel.

  Though they have not ever spoken, S’n Te hears the whispers. Though he cannot see them as they have yet to personify, he is certain that they exist and their combined presence is more powerful than he.

  His instinct has never failed him. He has paid them scant attention before, and, now, S’n Te fears that the king is correct. He fears that he indeed has been usurped by the dark elves.

  Demons. Daemons. All the same.

  And he is curious, so curious, of two things. The first is the reason. The other: If they are indeed more powerful than he, is it possible the demons have also become more powerful than even the muse who inspired them?

  BRADLEIGH BOOKS AND EPHEMERA

  GENEVA, SWITZERLAND, WINTER, 1816

  The unassuming twenty year old, frocked in an overcoat, enters the bookshop.

  “Polidori,” he says. “Doctor John William Polidori.”

  “Bradleigh. David. Pleasure.” He is in his late teens, slim with sturdy features, distinguishable from most gentlemen his age by virtue of a streak of premature gray that runs like a stripe over, around, and below his right ear.

  Polidori struggles to not stare. It’s as if the gray is hiding something, like a scar perhaps.

  “Irish?” the doctor asks.

  “Old English, actually.”

  “I’m a simple doctor. What do I know?”

  “How may I help you?”

  “Are you the owner?”

  “A relative. I work for the owner.” He watches as Polidori peruses the material. “Of late he’s been battling a grip of melancholia. Is there a cure for that . . . doctor?”

  Polidori picks up on a vague antagonism. “Despite my age, rest assured I am a licensed physician,” he responds with forced decorum. “Aches, fevers, and the like.”

  “Oh . . .” David allows the impression that he has no idea. Polidori politely nods at the younger man’s response. “How can I help?” David repeats.

  “This.” Polidori pulls a volume from one of the many shelves. A thin volume, not nearly two hundred pages. “How much for this?”

  David is taken aback. “Truly?” he asks.

  “Why not? I arrived here empty-handed. Are you not happy with a purchase?” He looks around. “I appear to be your only customer.”

  “We are always happy with a purchase here. We are a bookseller.”

  “What then?”

  David’s mouth furrows then upturns to a slow, careful smile. “Apologies are in order.”

  “Not necessary.”

  David nods. “Good enough. May I?” Polidori hands him the volume. “Follow me.”

  “Fantasmagoriana, ou Recueil d’Histoires d’Apparitions, de Spectres, Revenans, etc. From the first two of five volumes of the German Gespensterbuch, translated . . . parlez vous Francais?” David asks.

  “Oui, je parle Francais. Et Anglais.” David laughs; his guard is lowered. Polidori regards the marble-board cover and translates: “Fantasmagoriana, or Collections of the Histories of Apparitions, Spectres, Ghosts, etc.” He looks up. “You didn’t tell me the price.”

  “We’ll work a deal. Frankly, I’d be happy to be rid of it.”

  “I suspected as much.”

  “Mr. Byron stopped here yesterday,” David tests. “He looked at the same book, but he didn’t buy.”

  Polidori doesn’t let on. “Must be my lucky day.”

  David sighs. “And so it is.” He motions him over to the register. “Have you ever wondered,” David continues, “what sort of minds compel a work such as this?”

  “You have read it?”

  “Unfortunately,” he responds. “You’re a doctor. Do you have any explanation for the sickness that must grip a man—”

  “—or a woman.”

  “Or a woman. And I must confess to forgetting my thought. Never the mind. Did you know Sarah Elizabeth Brown Utterson translated the English version?”

  “No.”

  “What could possibly inspire them so?”

  “To your memory. And this, my friend, shall remain an eternal mystery.”

  “Two francs.”

  Polidori is impressed. “You favor my visit.”

  “If I didn’t know any better, I would guess you arrived here specifically for this volume. I would assume you came a fair distance.”

  “There is reason for everything,” Polidori responds, tiring of the inquest. “My arrival here today, my fairly sudden interest in the macabre . . .”

  David completes the transaction, and Polidori hands him the currency. “Come again, sir.”

  Polidori nods. As he steps outside upon leaving the store, his immediate thought is thusly expressed: “How did he know?”

  While—inside—David waits until the doctor is out of sight. He then removes a small stack of papers from under his desk. “Because you were expected, Dr. Polidori.” The opening page of the first notebook reads, “Hate.” Thus is the title. The name of the author also appears on the page: Mary Shelley. Some notes and unsent letters are also included. The second is a stack of pages with Claire Clairmont’s name on its front. “You would have asked me for these, my good doctor, you would have returned these to your dear Mary most assuredly, but they are not for sale.”

  He sits and reads.

  MIRKWOOD

  S’n Te sits against the underground wall, as would an inmate in the hole of a maximum security prison once moving stops, which for both mystic and man is akin to suicide. For now, S’n Te embraces the dark. He has little choice. He thinks but fears he is not alone in his thoughts. He contemplates the king’s words. He envisions Ara’s transformation from god to mortal. He ponders her curse, her mortality so many eons hence, in such a way as though he is struggling to solve a mathematical equation:

  Ara’s journey from immortal to less has begun here and will end in the Infinity Pass, an action that will supplant the natural order and, by so doing, enable a cosmic shift that will splinter our singular universe into a multiverse. Ara will be claimed first by Eron . . . who will return as an Over-dweller. They will be transported to the Infinity Pass by Taebal, the dragon. Ara shall be a muse no longer, though the damage will have been done. And she shall stand trial among her former immortal family unless her father . . . or another . . . finds and releases her first.

  Indeed, S’n Te is not alone, and his grave suspicion—the idea of another—is quickly becoming realized.

  SOHO ARTS DISTRICT, NEW YORK CITY

  AN OPEN LETTER

  “That’s not the way you do it,” X says. He is tied to a chair, bound by clothing around his wrists and ankles in an ironic mimic of Charlie, his imposter. “I can see the monitor from here. I gave up on the all-cap headings last year,” he says, as Daniel types on the apartment’s computer. “They’ll see right through you.”

  “That’s their problem,” Daniel responds. “Let them continue to ask the questions they need to ask. Me doing this, I’m changing those questions.”

  X watches casually as Daniel continues to type. “You shouldn’t have let her go, you know.”

  “She won’t get far, you know. ENIGMA’s dogs are out.”

  “What, they’re gonna kill her now too? Big mistake.”

  “Seriously . . . doubt it,” Daniel answers, still pounding the keyboard. “My guess is they want her alive. They certainly could have killed her earlier.”

  “You gonna kill me . . . brother?”

  “I should kill you. But I may need you.”

  “You know, I had a thought.”

  “What’s that?” Daniel asks.

  “In one of the multis . . . one of the mirror worlds . . . you think I’d ever meet a woman? Really? I mean, sometimes I get into my own head at all, and lose track of loose ends, and—”

  “Wher
e are you, X? Seriously.”

  “So . . . that’s a no?”

  “That’s a highly doubtful, unless she’s as nuts as you are . . . done.” Daniel stands and prints his letter.

  “No, I disagree there, brother. Somewhere, maybe she and I met, at a club. Maybe I watched her from far away. We went to a diner after, she read my most closely guarded writing—”

  “You are out of your mind,” Daniel says. He shows the letter to X. “Take a read.” He bends to one knee in front of X and holds the letter in front of the boy’s eyes. “Did I capture your voice, or did I capture your voice? You’re not the only writer around, you know.”

  “Don’t ever discount me,” X says, before he reads. “The multiverse was created the moment Ara was exiled. That begat the new natural order.” He stops himself as he watches Daniel roll his eyes.

  “I’ve never heard begat in conversation.”

  X concludes: “You have now. Somewhere, maybe the girl you arrived with is still with us. Somewhere else, maybe you freed her like you have here. You see, others had it wrong well before me. They were close. The mystic, he was close, but he was wrong. They were all wrong. Only my Ten Measures has managed to reconcile all the existing worlds, get to the bottom of everything, and determine the one and only Truth.”

  “X!”

  “That’s all.”

  “Read the damn letter,” Daniel says. “I’m losing my damn patience.”

  X briefly eyeballs his captor, then finally reads . . .

  AN OPEN LETTER TO THE MEDIA

  Ladies and Gentlemen,

  “Ladies and Gentlemen? Are you fucking kidding me—”

  “Maybe I will kill you.”

  X reluctantly resumes the read . . .

  Ladies and Gentlemen, as I’ve stated in another letter, before God said, “Let there be light . . .”the dark was unspoiled. Then came the core processes that formed and enabled the universe and then the multiverse (to be partially reflected later by mirror)—the so-called Big Bang, the black holes, creation—light, life, and belief.