And he was joined by another, an elder man in scholar’s robes; his contribution was by far the less, even next to Will’s, but not unwelcome for that! With he and Peele occupying their foe, the articulate savagery of the Moor and skilled passion of Marlowe, and Will’s own efforts besides, the tide was turning; the repeated script in that alien meter fell the quieter, dying on lips with their utterer’s fall. With the last’s end, silence reclaimed the scene, save the gasping breaths of the victors.
‘Who... are they?’ Peele enquired, holding a hand to his wounded side.
‘Seaman of a most mentally aberrant type,’ the elder man answered, ‘of mixed blood, some indeed from the New World. But enough time for that l...’
He turned to look where Will did, to the dark of the treeline, the memory of that glimpsed personage and now its inhuman waddle catching at Will’s faculties. It had the outline of a man but hunched forward and wider, fattened by an oversized cloak – but the thing beneath could hardly be mistook for human. Its skin glistened the white-grey of the moon, where eyes would be there were none, and where a mouth...
‘What...?’ Will began but, were there even words to come, they were eclipsed by the roar of the Moor. In seconds he’d crossed the distance and half-took the thing’s head from its shoulders with but one blow.
‘We must be gone,’ said the elder man, ‘and presently.’
The Moor carried an unconscious Nashe and Will gave support to the wounded Peele, the strange fellowship crossing the heath by moonlight and in silence, after some little exchange.
‘And what is your name, sir?’ Marlowe enquired of the old man, unwilling to let otherworldly peril, the quiet dark, or unfamiliarity make a coward of his tongue.
‘There will be time for such matters later, when stout walls divide us from the cold, and malignant ears.’
‘But, by your speech, I fancy you to be Italian, and of breeding,’ Marlowe scrutinised, no more sober in manner but tight with meaning.
The man’s face became guarded, then softened. ‘You have the truth of it, or what once was true at any rate. But I renounced my title as I renounced the name I then bore. Now I am a man of words and of no country.
‘Let silence be our watchword ‘til we reach yonder wood. We have a friend ahead,’ he added. ‘Do not be alarmed.’
There was lantern-light in the trees to which they were heading, held by a figure and...
Marlowe drew his sword. ‘By God!’ he exclaimed, quite pre-empting Will. The face, features etched in shadow cast by the lantern, had no business being on this earth, and they were at once afeard.
‘Avaunt!’ Marlowe enjoined. ‘Avaunt and quit my sight, false whoreson loggerhead!’
The man seemed hardly less shocked but recovered his wits the sooner.
‘If I am false,’ he riposted, ‘then I’d not have declared him a counterfeiter.’ This last was to Will.
‘Greene?’ he breathed. Then, somewhere within the indignity of being posthumously pamphleteered, gave anger its edge over fear. ‘Aye well, dead or alive, I’ve a mind to counterfeit more.’ (He had a few plans for Greene’s Pandosto if truth be told).
‘Our way is clear?’ the old man interrupted. ‘Well then, the time for explanations is nigh, just as soon as we reach the house.’
Shortly, in some otherwise abandoned cottage, Will and Kit were sat before a crackling fire and the nameless man. He’d seen to Peele’s wounds – Peele now slept in the next room with Nashe – and he’d given tasks to the un-deceased Robert Greene, his dark companion, and one other who was quite the opposite yet equally as shocking in their manner of meeting as Greene.
Walls or no, there’d been a breeze; far less the surprise than the fair-seeming man’s appearance, as if he’d been there all along when but a moment past he hadn’t.
‘I apologise,’ the nameless man had said. ‘No further shocks I promise you, at least for now.’ He turned to this last arrival. ‘Is it done, Ariel?’
The voice was soft: ‘They will not find us here.’
‘And our allies?’
‘Oh yes, I’ve crossed the threshold of the mortal world, gone ahead and sealed your bargains. And yes I know of what next I must do. Mayhap you have a broom for me to place twixt my buttocks and sweep as I go.’
But the voice was mild if unearthly, no true anger or disdain therein.
‘You are too saucy, minion.’ The old man’s response came with a smile and the comely man left them. ‘Well then, to names and truths. You may call me Titus Prosperus.’
‘And that fellow?’ Kit asked, nodding to the passing Moor.
‘You may call him Otho.’
This Otho was apparelled in frayed finery that would once not have looked out of place in the courts of Italy, though his turban would have him more at home in one of Morocco. One hand brushed close to the hilt of that curved sword. The other was girdled by and held to a kerchief; not just once had he already brought it to his lips in thought.
‘But not an Italian Otho,’ Kit stated.
‘I met him there, but he hails from Iberia. He’d left sadness behind, only to find it again in my homeland. Like me he was the victim of the plotting of insidious men, but unlike me was undeserving of it. One was jealous of his marriage with a lady of their own country, whose love had brought him peace. They martialled his own jealousy ‘til he took the life of his beloved, then his own – or so it seemed.’
Prosperus paced the stone, gathering his thoughts.
‘I was, as you rightly said, a man of no little status – also of no little arrogance – and I was usurped. If not for my counsellor we would have starved on the vessel in which we were cast adrift, my daughter and I. By his kindness we did not, and through the employment of my learnings we came upon an island untouched by mortal feet in many a year. Even then we might not have survived if not for the discovery of Ariel, imprison’d as he was, hag-bound in a cloven pine.’
‘Hag-bound?’ Will asked.
‘The blue-eyed hag of Algiers,’ Prosperus mused, ‘Sycorax, who herself found the isle in her banishment, she the dam of a creature yet more foul, at least in form. She was twelve years past when we arrived, but I give thanks for her example which I very nearly followed.
‘I pressed Ariel to my service and through him, in time, caused my usurpers to come to the island. Perhaps I cared not enough to become as Sycorax, if vengeance it meant, but if my daughter were then to be as wretched Caliban... It brought me to myself. I made final use of my arts and of Ariel to ensure the restoration of my position though not for myself. I installed my daughter and her gentle husband in my rightful place. Then my staff I broke and my books I burned, and Ariel I set free. I left my name and my title behind, and them to their happiness.
‘Ariel became a friend. It was he, of course, that led those present to believe that Otho had indeed triumphed in self-murder. Instead he brought him away and to me.’
Quiet, then Will asked, ‘What is Ariel?’
‘A spirit of the air – a sylph perhaps, if you hold with Paracelsus; an elemental, but one of this globe. In my time on that isle, through the spirits that called it home, I glimpsed a whole other place and the creatures that dwelt there, including the like of the creature you saw. They are servants of personages that make our reckonings of Jove, aye and the Titans too, seem twice over mortal man and then again. They are from beyond this orb and their power is vast.
‘One has slept here for a span beyond the apprehension of mortal man, unliving and deathless, awaiting the stars’ turn to a certain aspect in the cycle of eternity, ‘til then moulding men’s dreams. The wretches you witnessed – their earthly devotees – believe that soon the object of their worship shall waken and take its place on earth.
‘They are not wrong.
‘I met Otho in Venice shortly after I took my leave of Milan. He was an excitable young man, eccentric and possessed of a febrile mind; he’d dreamt of strange cities. More remarkable, while a-slumber, he’d sculpted a bas-
relief, the like I’ve which I’d seen during my travels in Araby in encounters with mad monks and more besides, the specific like I’d seen on that island – the image of that sleeping horror.
‘I asked him for reports of further dreams and summoned Ariel as once I had. Sharing my concern he went forth into the world, returning with tidings of poets and artists who’d dreamed the very same... Of a master mason who’d been moonstruck, railing for salvation in the cell in which the church had secured him, after months expiring... He told also of a nocturnal suicide in London, which conjured something in that part of my mind that once had dealt with the Arts: it told me that this was where we were required.
‘Well that was when poor Otho’s tragedy played out. But I’d had Ariel watching him and pluck him from his resort. He went into a fever for a week, during which I had the most discrete physicians watch him. When finally he woke he told me of his dream, of a thing a mile high that lumbered about.’
Prosperus halted in his pacing.
‘Millennia ago its servants ventured from their island city, enslaving all around in readiness for their master’s return. Only Athens stood against them – if you take Plato at his word. It seems our native gods, if such there were, raised portentous quakes and floods of such magnitude that R’lyeh was washed beneath the waves.
‘But the cult still lived, lurking in lonely and desolate places. They say Medea was one, that mighty Theseus, before he Hippolyta married, had slain both men and otherworldly beasts that were in service to the Great Old Ones; and that Medea attempted to poison him as much to prevent what he might further do, as secure her issue’s claim to the throne. I have evidence of their presence in Egypt in the time of Euclid, and in the Orient, and in Persia, and others besides, all throughout the long millennia.
‘Still, our domestic orb was safe – until something disturbed that which deathless lies, the very day that Otho seized and fell to his week-long fever. I knew the time bequeathed by the gods’ gambit was running short.
‘And so we brokered a deal that we might take the fight to them, to deal with the dread Cthulhu before it awoke. Three unflinching fellows I needed and three I had, with a crew and ship besides. They fell upon us as we sailed up the Thames while Ariel was away, came at us in a sinister black galley before we made landfall at the Pool of London, fanatics all. We put an end to them – but at the cost of my three bold companions.’
Will wondered at this math. ‘Ariel was not one of your quartet?’ he asked. ‘Or Otho?’
‘By choice Ariel here may by unseen; in the place we go his presence would announce ours and bring our enemies to us directly, or have them waiting. And, alas, would that Otho could lend his sword to the task it would be the more possible. Yet it is through his wild unwakened imaginings that the journey may at all be made.’
‘The journey where?’ asked Marlow.
‘Through the othergates, of ivory and horn, into dream itself. But that is not the destination. R’lyeh lies some five or six thousand leagues hence, yet through dream we may put a girdle half-round the earth. This then is our office and our intent: to reach that island city where dread Cthulhu deathless sleeps and, in some form, circumvent its rising if nor its waking.
‘Ariel found your Robert Greene who’d made discovery of the cult and was to be the target of their poisonings. In similar manner to his saving of Otho he made away with Greene who agreed to aid us in our task. And now you know what I would ask of you.’
The fire burned on as Will paced the room, left alone with Marlowe for deliberation (whatever that draught this Prosperus had brewed now having quite returned them to sobriety).
If it required his life for his family, let alone his country (or the world!) it was a tax he’d unhesitatingly pay. Yet this venture was too great to comprehend, its labours more the meat for such wild and adventurous souls as...
‘Our doubts are traitors, Will,’ said Marlowe, who was, of course, quite inclined to the enterprise, ‘and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt’.
‘Kit, I have not your eloquence with the pen, and certainly do not possess the same with a sword.’
‘Nor the same in my consumption of the juice of the grape. What of it?’
‘You want Raleigh, Ned Alleyn even.’
‘Who knows what deeds are required of us, Will – it may be the wider repertoire of the Johannes Factotum that will serve the world better than wit with the blade. It shall be a collaboration. Let the origins of our works be debated by base scholars, and let this work be likewise; if unrecognised then eternal nonetheless. Do not falter. I know you, Will, and I know you will not. One note of the buffoon Greene rings true: your player’s hide wraps the heart of a tiger. You will prove him right, upstart crow.’
Will wondered if Greene then passing was chance or intent on Kit’s part, but he stopped and looked in with disdain.
‘And how’s your afterlife, Greene?’ Marlowe queried.
‘It awaits me still,’ Greene replied, ‘as does yours. You should amend your ways.’
‘Do thou amend thy face, and I’ll amend my life.’
Greene’s face amended itself to a sneer, but then to resigned normalcy. ‘And have you decided?’
Marlowe looked to Will. ‘Of course,’ Will said. ‘If I’m needed then of course I’ll come.’
‘We’ll make a hero of you yet, Will Shakespeare,’ Marlowe grinned, ‘and a playwright.’
The four of them were gathered round the table in the back room where Otho now dozed in a chair. The door at the back – Prosperus explained as he packed a few things, including a small wooden box and an oil lamp of eastern style – would serve as their gateway. Will wondered at the absence of Ariel but guessed he’d been despatched to other tasks required elsewhere, if his presence imperilled them on their journey. Prosperus interrupted his musings.
‘To the place we travel we must armour ourselves with other names. Prosperus is mine. Consider yours – take some time.’
‘Hah,’ said Marlowe directly. ‘Very well, Prosperus: Faustus.’
A grave look crossed Prosperus’ countenance, but faded. ‘So be it. And you?’ he asked Greene.
Greene faltered in his response. Marlowe looked about to speak...
‘Groatsworth,’ quoth Will.
Greene’s dark look to Faustus became one of surprise to Will; then he assented ‘Groatsworth.’
Prosperus nodded, Faustus shrugged. ‘And you?’
Will had dreaded this.
‘Crow,’ said Faustus, but there was no bite in it, not at Gr... oatsworth or Will, or anyone else.
Will shrugged himself.
‘Crow.’
Their journey had indeed been strange, but the moreso because it hadn’t been near as strange as might be imagined. The door led, as one would assume, outside, only an outside different from that from which they’d entered. It was an arid place and exceedingly cold to their left, the sun lying low on their right, hazing the horizon green with the promise of trees.
‘We walk the border of Leng and Ooth-Nargai,’ Prosperus had told them. ‘Leng is a place where other places meet; the Sunset Land is unchanging. Their border is most suited to our ingress, and there our allies, who have granted it, attend.’
One had been a tall man in attire not dissimilar to theirs, though he was as pale as the moon with hair as black as night; his eyes were hidden in the darkness beneath his brow. The other stood pensive, a man of some two-score years in a curious robe with sleeves that spoke of nightwear and made Will think of London. When Prosperus went to commend themselves to the men, Marlowe’s sharp ears had apprehended the latter’s accent. ‘A Cornishman,’ he’d said. But it was the former who’d captured Will’s attention; Prosperus seemed surprised when Will spoke.
‘Sir,’ he’d addressed, ‘we have met methinks.’
‘Indeed Will,’ the stranger replied, ‘but not yet.’
Prosperus led them away, perhaps not overly disapproving of Will’s addres
s to their benefactor, taking a perpendicular to the line on which they’d approached the men.
‘We have Kuranes’ blessing to cross his lands,’ Prosperus announced. In the distance had been a city, not their ultimate destination, of which poets and madmen had dreamt. ‘That is Celephais. We walk another border now, that of the Sunset Land and the Summer-Lands, where our last ally has the means by which we may affect our salvation.’
They passed from grassy sun-blessed plain to the darkness of the wood, warm regardless with the heat of a summer’s night. A hare had accompanied them a ways, then a hound, a hog... there’d been an untended fire after, but Prosperus led them on. In between they’d been distracted as, by one, they turned at the tap or pinch of another. But Prosperus showed no impatience at such undue frivolity, whoever was the culprit. By and by, up on a low tree branch ahead, a figure waited, hands clasped. By height he was a small man or a tall youth and seemed both hare-young and oak-ancient. His smile across was merry but in what measure between innocence or wickedness Will could not have said.
‘Welcome wanderers.’
‘You are the hobgoblin,’ said Prosperus, ‘the Goodfellow who is called Robin?’
‘Thou speak’st aright,’ the figure approved in some gentle mocking of their speech and dropped to the ground.
‘I thank you for coming, honest Puck, and would take time to offer such courtesies as befit you, yet time is the coin wanting in our purses, so I must just enquire: do you have it?’
‘Indeed,’ this Robin replied, producing a package, ‘retained since ancient times for sport; yet such sport as would be in short supply should your purse run empty. A gift then, and freely given without obligation.’
Shakespeare Vs Cthulhu Page 37
