“Let’s say ten,” Mitch said.
Lewis cleared his throat. “The other question I have is this,” he said. “What about it? The demon, I mean.”
“It’s bound to try to stop us,” Jerry said. “It knows we’re here, it saw me. It has to be able to guess what we’re doing.”
“That we’re going to try to bind it, sure,” Mitch said. “But not the details. It doesn’t know where the other tablet is — does it?”
He looked at Lewis, who gave an embarrassed shrug. “I don’t know.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Alma said. She stood up briskly, opening the chain and reaching down to slide the amulet back on it. “We need to be prepared. It may be armed, and it’s certainly willing to kill. We probably can’t get guns, but we need knives and whatever else we can think of to defend ourselves. The advantage is that there are four of us and one of it, so if we stick together, we should be able to overpower it, even if it’s gotten a strong host. But we have to stay alert and be careful when we do things like dive.”
Mitch nodded. “We’ve got hours until nine o’clock. I’ll go see what I can do about finding us knives.”
“That’s a plan,” Alma said. “We’ll do this tonight.” And perhaps with Diana’s help the price wouldn’t be too high.
Alma had no idea where Mitch had gotten the boat, or how he’d managed to borrow a car from one of the Ruggieri cousins, but she was grateful he’d found a way. He’d gotten knives, too, and a heavy leather object that Alma had recognized after a moment as a blackjack. The Ruggieri cousin was definitely an interesting sort, she thought, but knew better than to say anything. Jerry was looking thoroughly unhappy already, and she didn’t need to make things worse. At least there was a mist rising, tendrils curling off the still water like threads of smoke. That would help some, that and the clouds that seemed to be building. The moon was a waning quarter, but it hadn’t risen yet, and wouldn’t for some hours. By then the clouds should be thick enough to hide it, or, better still, they’d be safely off the lake.
They manhandled the boat out to the water, all of them with their pants rolled up and their shoes dangling from their laces around their necks. Jerry staggered and swore in the soft mud, but Alma couldn’t spare a hand to help him. The mist coiled around them as they went, blurring the lights on the far shore.
They reached the edge of the water, and Mitch and Lewis walked it in far enough to float. Jerry stood for a moment with his head down, catching his breath, then dragged himself out and into the broad-beamed boat. Alma followed him, heard him say to Mitch, “You told them we were stealing artifacts?”
It was the tone another man would have used for “robbing churches.” Alma fumbled for the oars, found them and readied herself to push off.
“I didn’t tell them that,” Mitch said. He stopped, wincing, and Lewis nodded for him to climb into the boat. “They may have assumed….”
“Do you have any idea what that will do to my reputation?” Jerry began, and Mitch shook his head.
“Look, Jer, there’s no good reason for you to be out on the lake in the middle of the night. The point is not to get caught.”
There was enough truth in that to silence Jerry, and Lewis walked the boat a little further into the chill water, Alma poling them along from the other side. He was up to his waist before he scrambled in, and settled himself on the thwart beside Jerry. “I’ll start,” he said softly. “Then you can take over.”
Jerry nodded, though he didn’t look very happy.
The lake wasn’t very big, but in the dark and the rising mist it seemed larger. Lewis rowed steadily, strongly, pulling them toward the sound of the pumps. The mist parted reluctantly before the blunt bow, the boat rocking with every stroke.
“Those pumps,” he said. “I’m a little worried about them. Won’t they be a danger to Alma?”
“No,” Jerry said. He twisted on the seat, trying to see how far they had to go. “No, they’re far enough away that they won’t disturb the ships. She’ll be fine.”
“I hope so,” Lewis muttered, and kept rowing.
“There,” Jerry said. “Stop.”
Lewis pulled the oars in, and the boat drifted, slowing, until suddenly a low platform loomed out of the dark. Jerry leaned out to grab a piling, pulled them in tight against it.
“No watchman?” Mitch asked.
“No,” Jerry said again. “Harris said they’re more worried about the artifacts in the workshops. It’s too much of a long shot for most of the locals to risk diving out here.”
“That’s something,” Alma said. Jerry unwrapped the hooded flashlight, flicked it on for a moment to study the wreck, and switched it off again.
“Back a little.”
He pushed them away from the platform, and Lewis worked the oars again, bringing them close to where the first fingers of wood reached out of the water. “This is it,” he said. “I think.”
“Good enough for me,” Alma said, and Jerry nodded.
This was the tricky part, and she wouldn’t let herself think too much about it. She slipped off her blouse and slacks, tucking the necklace with the amulet and Gil’s ring tighter into her underwear. The air seemed colder than before and made her feel more naked somehow. Not that it mattered, not that anyone could really see her, here in the dark, but she felt vulnerable, afraid.
And that was reasonable, she told herself. It was reasonable to be afraid of searching a wrecked ship in the dark: it was a dangerous thing to do. The main thing was to be careful, not to take unnecessary risks.
“Ok?” Lewis asked, and she smiled at him even though she doubted he would see even the gleam of her teeth. That was something he shared with Gil, something she hadn’t known she could expect or ask for, that willingness to let her run her own risks.
“I’m ready,” she said, and slipped over the side.
The water was cold, like any mountain lake. She suppressed a curse, clung to the side of the boat while she got her breath back, then stretched her feet down to feel for the ship’s hull beneath the surface. She found it quickly enough, unpleasantly soft between her toes, let go of the boat to feel her way toward the space where the deck had been.
Abruptly the wood vanished, and she slipped under the water before she could stop herself and came up shaking wet hair out of her eyes.
“Alma?” That was Lewis again, voice soft but carrying, and she saw that Jerry had the oars now, moving slowly toward her, and Lewis was in the bow.
“I’m fine,” she said, and caught the gunwale as Jerry backed oars again. “I’m going to have to dive, though.”
“Hang on,” Mitch said. “How are you going to find it?”
“It’s there,” she said. She was as certain of it as if she felt the tug of her chain, dowsing, as certain as if she saw it through the dark. When she had dowsed for it before, she had called on her memory of flight, of Gil and the Jenny skimming above the clouds. Now the mist swirled about her, as the clouds had done, and she could feel the metal beneath her, a little to her right.
Lewis caught her hand. “It fell,” he said softly. “After the ship sank, a long time after, a fisherman came and hooked a piece of ivory, an ivory box covered with nymphs and satyrs. And when he came back for more, all he did was pull up a length of the deck, and the tablet fell. It’s right there where it landed, just a little further….”
“How far down?” Alma asked, and he started and shook his head.
“Eight feet? Nine? Not far.”
“Thank you,” she said, and squeezed his hand. She pushed herself gently away, letting the current and the metal itself pull her, then took a last deep breath and let herself sink beneath the surface.
It was pitch dark, no more than she’d expected, but before she was even half out of breath, her feet touched more of the soft wood. There was debris as well, hard and painful; she doubled over, drawing her feet up, and let her hands sweep through the mud. Hard things, metal, a round thing that felt like stone — the head
of a statue? — but still not the tablet. Her air was running out. She kicked off, broke the surface, and dove again.
It was closer this time, further to her right. The deck and the tangle of objects slanted away a little, and she touched them more lightly, not wanting to set anything moving. Closer — she could feel it, like a spot of sunlight in the water, and then her hand struck something hard and thick. Rope, she thought, rope caught on the wreck? No, more than just a piece of rope. It was a net, a fisherman’s net, wrapped in a tangle around some post. And the tablet was beneath it.
She kicked off again, surfaced to wave the boat closer.
“Do you have it?” Mitch called, and she shook her head, scattering drops of water.
“It’s right here. I need a knife.”
Lewis handed it to her without question or hesitation. She clung for a moment to the side of the boat, breathing deep, and dove again.
She found the net quickly enough, traced the knotted length until she thought she’d found the place just above the tablet. She could feel its warmth, worked one hand into the strands of rope, trying to see if she could feel the metal. Yes, there it was, the same square shape, and something brushed across the back of her hand. She kicked back instinctively, and the net tightened, pulled tight by the movement, wrapping around her wrist. She jerked her arm back, the rope scraping along her skin, and could have screamed at the touch of bony fingers running across her hand. Fingers, definitely fingers, flesh long eaten —
She stilled herself with an effort and brought up the knife to saw at the ancient rope. The fingers tapped her knuckles, moved toward her wrist — No. There were no fingers, there was nothing there, nothing that could harm her. It was fish, or debris caught in the net; if it was more, she would know, she would feel it, and there was nothing there.
She put her knife to the rope again, her chest aching, let out a little more air to ease the pressure. Another strand parted, and then another, and then her wrist was free. She reached for the tablet, and in that moment, she felt a presence, a darkness, rising out of the net itself. She snatched the tablet, kicked away, and felt something wrap around her ankle. She kicked with all her strength, slashed blindly with the knife, and her head broke the surface long enough for her to catch a breath.
The net tightened around her foot and dragged her under again. She kicked again, hard, clutched the tablet tighter to her chest, close to the amulet. This wasn’t the creature, it was something else, something slow and stupid and inexorable. She bent double, trying to find the strands of the net to cut them, but her knife passed through only water. Her chest was tightening again, and she reached for the strength of the earth, but she was cut loose, floating — drowning — and there was nothing there.
And then a light flashed, the vivid reflection of a word, and she shot to the surface, the tablet still clutched to her chest. She hung there for a moment, treading water, then swam slowly toward the side of the boat. Lewis was kneeling in the bow and reached out to gather her in, but she handed him the tablet instead.
Behind him, Mitch stood frozen, the gesture of unbinding just completed. He saw her hands on the side of the boat, and collapsed soundlessly onto a thwart. “God, Alma —”
“It wasn’t the creature,” she said. “Something else….”
Lewis handed the tablet carefully to Jerry, who stuck it in his pocket, and reached to help her over the side. She came over awkwardly, thrashing like a fish, sat up dripping in the bottom of the boat.
“There was a net,” she began, and broke off, realizing that there was still a length of it around her ankle. Jerry flicked on the flashlight again, keeping it below the edge of the boat.
“Thrax,” he said. “The Thracian.”
He hadn’t sounded so shaken since Gil’s death. Alma reached out to pat his good knee, and Mitch said, “What are you talking about?”
“The thing’s first host,” Jerry said. “The gladiator, the Thracian retiarius — that’s a net-thrower, Al, a gladiator’s nightmare of a fisherman. That’s the man who killed the Rex Nemorensis, that’s what freed the creature. Harris showed me a tablet today, a funeral tablet for the man. That’s why it was there, to bind his soul to the lake. Part of the profanation….”
“Are you all right?” Lewis said. He had brought a towel, wrapped it around her shoulders and held her through it. Alma leaned back, grateful for his touch.
“I’m Ok,” she said. She leaned down and unwound the last piece of net from her foot. It looked ordinary, unremarkable, and she dropped it overboard with a shudder.
“He’s gone now,” Mitch said, grimly. “You sure you’re Ok, Al?”
She nodded. “I’m fine. The main thing is, we have the tablet.”
Jerry looked up, flicking off the flashlight. “And it’s the only one.” His voice was steady again. “This completes the binding.”
“Good,” Alma said, and reached for her trousers. “Then we can go on from here.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
It watched them from the grove. It felt when the woman touched the other tablet. It knew they were coming, certain as a hunted man hears the baying of hounds.
This one gave it no trouble. He was a strong young man with a whole body, but he was afraid. He believed in demons and their power to destroy. It could rule him.
Once it had waited thus, in the dark places beneath the Nemeton. Long years it had lain silent, held by a goddess’s silver power, held by rites as old as men. It had waited. It knew patience. Sooner or later, one would come.
The Thracian had walked into the woods without fear. He was a big man, and strong, but that was not why he sought the grove’s king. He did an emperor’s bidding. He did not come as a fugitive but as an assassin. He came to the dividing paths with sword and knife, walking the forest pathways with his mind filled with an emperor’s treasure, riches promised in return for death, and there he slew the king of the woods, spilled out his blood like a stag’s on the thirsty ground.
It came.
And it tasted.
The Thracian came out of the woods in triumph, priest and king and something more besides. It held him. It ruled him. It savored power and blood.
But why settle for the sham of kingship when true dominion might be had? What could be better than to be ruler of the world?
It was easy, so easy, to take the young emperor. It was so easy to slake every thirst.
But now they came, her hounds. It saw them stop beside the lake, speaking together. The cripple and the woman bent their heads one to the other, the big one beside them. But the other….
His eyes sought it, raked the tree line, tension in every fiber of his frame. His eyes saw more than mere light illuminated, an oracle’s eyes, the eyes of a priest. He knew it waited. And he watched.
The young man dodged back, a reflex born of its alarm, and it let him go, let him fade back behind the trees. It was going to have to get rid of them, now, or all its plans would come to naught. It paused in the deeper dark, the young man panting his fear. One man against three, and even if one was crippled there was still the woman. It had learned already not to underestimate her. Perhaps more mundane methods? There were men in plenty sleeping at the site, ready to defend what they had found. There was a pleasing irony in turning them against the hunters. It rose, enjoying the lithe play of the young man’s muscles, and slipped further back into the trees.
“It’s here,” Lewis said.
Alma broke off. “What?”
“The thing. It’s there in the edge of the wood, watching.” Lewis scanned the trees, frowning.
“Is it the same host?” Jerry asked.
“I don’t know,” Lewis said, and Alma shook her head.
“It doesn’t matter. It won’t have picked on anyone weaker, that’s for sure.”
“Unless it’s gotten to one of the archeologists,” Jerry began, and Lewis thought he looked sick at the idea.
“It’s young,” he said, knowing that was only ambiguous reassurance.
“And — it’s moving away.”
Mitch let out a long breath. “Ok,” he said. “So what do we do now?”
“We have to get further into the woods,” Jerry said. “We have to be far enough in that fresh digging won’t be noticed. Then we do the binding. That’s what we have to do.”
“Wait,” Alma said. “Lewis, where’s it going?”
Lewis paused. He couldn’t really see into the dark between the trees, but he could feel its movements, feel it fumbling through the brush — heading along the shore, back toward the ships, toward the dig site. “Damn. It’s going back to the dig.”
“To raise the alarm,” Mitch said.
Lewis looked at Alma, who lifted her face to the sky as though she was trying to guess the time from the occluded stars. “Jerry, how long will it take —”
“Too long,” Jerry answered, grimly. He reached into his pocket, brought out the first tablet in its wrappings.
“Jerry,” Mitch said, warily, and Jerry peeled back the layers of burlap and silk, exposing the bronze.
“Creature of darkness!” Jerry’s voice wasn’t loud, but it had a peculiar resonance that sent a shiver down Lewis’s spine. He heard Alma take a breath and hold it, her eyes wide. “By the virtue of the holy names that bound you, I defy you, you who are abhorred of mankind. You were bound, you are bound, you will be bound. As you were before, so shall you be.”
The air was very still, echoless, but the words seemed to reverberate. Alma let out her breath with a sudden sigh. “Oh, Jerry.”
“That — was not a good idea,” Mitch said, tightly.
“Do you have a better one?” Jerry asked, winding the tablet back into its wrappings.
Lewis looked back at the woods. He could feel the creature hesitate, turn back, and then it was lost again, vanished into the trees where not even his Sight could follow it. “What was that all about?”
“Jerry challenged it,” Mitch said. “Threatened it.” He paused. “Lewis, do you think it has a gun?”
Lewis frowned. “No. If it had a gun it would already have shot us.”
Order of the Air Omnibus: Books 1-3 Page 33
