Aetherium (Omnibus Edition)

by Joseph Robert Lewis

  “The undercity.” Bastet pouted at her. “I just said that.”

  “But what does that mean?” Wren asked. “A sewer, a cellar, a dungeon?”

  “No,” Bastet said slowly. “It’s the undercity. It’s a city. Under. The city.”

  Asha and Wren exchanged a quick look of confusion, and the herbalist asked, “And you live there?”

  “Sure, with the rest of our family. But not here. Not this part. It’s not safe here anymore, and hasn’t been for a long time,” the Aegyptian girl said.

  “Not safe for you? But you’re immortal,” Wren said. “What’s made it dangerous?”

  This time it was Bastet and Anubis who exchanged the uncomfortable look.

  The dour youth sighed. “It’s complicated. Suffice it to say that if your friend was taken by the beasts into the undercity through this door, then he is already dead, or soon will be.”

  “I don’t think so,” Wren said. “He’s immortal, too.”

  “What?” Bastet slipped off the fountain and deftly caught her cat mask to keep it from slipping off her head. “He’s immortal? What’s his name again?”

  “Omar,” Wren said. “Omar Bakhoum.”

  Bastet gasped and grabbed Anubis’s arm and began shaking it violently. “That’s it! That’s the name he was using right before he left! Yes, that’s it!”

  “Are you sure?” Anubis asked. “It’s been at least ten years now. And he’s used hundreds of names over the years.”

  “Yes, I’m sure!” She slapped his arm and turned back to Wren with a wild-eyed smile. “It’s him, he’s back! I was right, it was him! He’s back!”

  “Who?” Asha asked.

  “Grandfather!” Bastet exclaimed. “Your friend Omar is my grandfather, Thoth!”

  Asha paused, watching the various expressions of excitement and confusion play over the faces of the two girls. The grim youth merely raised an eyebrow and snorted.

  “Oh gods,” Bastet whispered. “But that means they took him. That he’s down there.” She turned to look at the fountain again. “That she has him. Oh gods.”

  “You only just realized?” Anubis sneered. “This is the end of everything.”

  “End of what?” Asha asked. “Who has him? What are you talking about?”

  Bastet said nothing, but her hand covered her mouth and her eyes narrowed as tears gleamed on her lashes, and she gasped. Anubis stepped away from the fountain wall and put his arms around her, and she cried softly into his tunic.

  Asha and Wren looked at each other, and at the fountain, and waited.

  Anubis looked up. “Our grandfather was the first immortal, and he made others immortal, over time. First our family here. Then others in the east and the north. There were three in Damascus. A soldier, Gideon. A nun, Nadira. And a courtesan, Lilith. They were supposed to help Grandfather in his studies. Gideon was to study sun-steel, and Nadira was to study aether. They both did this for a time, and then moved on to do other things.”

  “And Lilith?” Wren asked quietly.

  “Lilith was tasked to study the art of soul-breaking,” Anubis said. “The science of dividing an immortal soul, to manipulate flesh through the soul. You are both examples of this. You, with the dragon, and you, with the fox. This is what Lilith has studied for the past two thousand years. But unlike the others, she never lost interest in her task. And several years ago, she came here to Alexandria to continue her work.”

  “Why here?” Asha asked. “Did she come here to see you?”

  “She did ask my father for his help,” Anubis said. “But he refused her. Still, she stayed. There was something else here that she needed to continue her work.”

  “Sun-steel,” Wren said. “She needed sun-steel. She was taking it from the Sons of Osiris, wasn’t she?”

  Anubis nodded. “She was. I suspect that is why she sent her servants to dig through the temple ruins. To find more of the metal. Seireikens, jewelry, even raw ingots.”

  “So, it was Lilith who made those two creatures?” Asha said. “She took that man and woman, and put animal souls inside them to turn them into beasts? Into slaves?” She felt a familiar old anger begin to burn in her belly, and deep within her breast the golden dragon’s soul coiled and growled.

  “Yes.” Bastet stepped back from her cousin, her arms wrapped tightly around her belly, her cheeks glistening with tears. “She’s done it hundreds of times. Maybe more. They usually don’t last very long. They kill each other, or they kill themselves. And if they tried to come out of the undercity, then Anubis or Horus would kill them. Or Gideon.” She sniffed loudly. “But those two tonight. They were… They were family.”

  “My parents,” said Anubis. “The man with the head of an aardvark is my father, Set. And the winged woman is my mother, Nethys.”

  “Lilith tricked them,” Bastet said, wiping the tears away. “She took them one by one, trapping them and turning them against each other, luring them into her home where she imprisoned them, and changed them.”

  “I’m so sorry,” Wren said. She took the girl in her arms and the two embraced in a soft collision of black skirts and loose hair, with Jagdish squeaking between them.

  Asha looked up at Anubis. “Are there are others like them? Are there more?”

  The youth nodded. “Lilith also has our cousin, Horus, and his mother, Isis. They too have been… changed.”

  “I’m sorry,” Asha said. “I assume you’ve tried to find them, or rescue them?”

  Anubis nodded. “We know they live in Lilith’s refuge in the undercity, but it’s too dangerous for us to go there now. If we venture too close, Lilith releases her monsters to chase us away, or to capture us. I assume she would also take us, transform us, and make us serve her as well.”

  “But why?” Wren asked. “Why do that? Why do any of it?”

  Bastet sniffed and said, “I don’t know, really, but I think she fell in love with the knowledge that Grandfather gave her. The ability to cut and weave souls as a tailor does with cloth, to reshape living flesh, to bend it to her will. I don’t think she has any particular use for them. She just likes doing it. I mean, she’s never sent her servants out here to get gold or anything. She’s never tried to move up into one of the city palaces, or to seize the throne of Alexandria, let alone Eran.”

  “Bastet is correct,” Anubis said. “Lilith is not a creature of greed or politics. She’s in love with her own power, and if left unchecked, I believe she would live on forever in the undercity, stealing her servants from above and twisting them into strange shapes for her own amusement. It’s a sickness in her. An obsession.”

  “What about Lilith herself?” Asha asked. “Has she transformed her own body, too?”

  “I don’t know. We haven’t seen her in years,” Bastet said.

  The doctors, the Sons of Osiris, and now Lilith. It never ends. Go a little deeper into the shadows, and you’ll always find yet another monster waiting for you, yearning to destroy innocent lives for no reason at all.

  Asha rubbed her eyes. “What will Lilith do with Omar? Transform him like the rest of your family?”

  “Most likely,” said Anubis.

  “How does she do it?” Asha asked. “Tell me what she does, exactly. Maybe if we know enough about it, we can undo it.”

  Wren shook her head. “Omar taught me all about soul infections. He couldn’t cure the fox plague in Ysland. He couldn’t take the fox souls out. That’s impossible. They mix together, your soul and the second soul, like fresh water and brine. The best you can do is what he did to me, and the rest of my people. Add a third soul, another element to keep the second one under control. But it’s very delicate. This third soul must be stronger than the second one, and able to balance it perfectly without causing any new symptoms.”

  “What did he use?” Bastet asked. “To fix you, I mean. What was the third soul that Grandfather gave you?”

  “His own,” Wren said. “He’s immortal. Healthy. Sane. And very human. It keeps the fox s
oul inside me from changing my body beyond my ears and eyes.”

  “Maybe we can do the same thing,” Asha said. “We have two immortals right here. Maybe if we can give pieces of your souls to the people Lilith took, they’ll change back.”

  “Maybe.” Anubis crossed his arms and frowned.

  Asha said, “Well, it’s an idea. Do any of you know how to break souls and move them around into other people?”

  They all shook their heads.

  “Grandfather was very careful with his secrets,” Anubis said.

  Asha sighed. “Very well then. Tomorrow, we’ll go down to the undercity and see for ourselves. Perhaps I can find a way to save Omar and the others.”

  They all nodded glumly.

  “Do you have somewhere to sleep?” Bastet asked.

  “No,” Wren said.

  “Then you’ll stay with me.” The Aegyptian girl smiled. “It’ll be fun.”

  Anubis grunted and stepped away from them. “I will see you in the morning, then.” He nodded curtly, and cracked the butt of his staff on the street, and his entire body shattered into a white mist, which blew away on the evening breeze.

  Asha and Wren stared, their mouths hanging open.

  “Oh, right,” Bastet said with a giggle. “That’s a little trick he and I learned. We’re the only ones who can do it, so far. Don’t worry though, it’s not a long walk back to my place.”

  The young girl grabbed Wren’s hand and started off down the road back toward the intersection. Asha slipped down from the fountain wall and followed them slowly. She glanced back once at the silent stone fish, but the fountain gave no hint of what might lie beneath it, so she turned back again to catch up with the others.

  Immortals. Monsters. Gods. What sort of place is this?

  Bastet led them back down the main thoroughfare in the direction of the new temples and the new palaces, the large gated estates where elegant colonnaded mansions sat amidst vast flowering gardens, and where all manners of soldiers and guards paced quietly through the shadows, ever vigilant against the threat of thieves and assassins.

  The eager young girl with the cat mask on her head trotted down a small side street to an old watch tower between two fine houses. A rusty chain hung across the rusty iron grate on the door, but Bastet merely drifted through the iron bars as a shimmering mist and appeared on the far side. “One moment!”

  She fiddled with the lock and the chain, and the grate swung open, allowing Wren and Asha to enter while Bastet relocked the door. Inside, they climbed a sturdy stone stair and found themselves on a landing high above the street overlooking the two neighboring houses with the Middle Sea sparkling in the moonlight to the north and to the west they saw the great white eye of the enormous lighthouse sweeping across the horizons.

  The room itself was filled with pillows and blankets from wall to wall, so that every place was a bed and every bed was decadently soft and inviting.

  Bastet curled up in one corner of the room, covered in soft fabrics of every color. “Asha?”

  Asha sat down in the opposite corner and set her bag aside. “Yes?”

  “I’m sorry about your friend. The blind lady. I saw what happened. I’m really sorry.”

  Asha nodded and whispered, “Thank you.”

  Strange. I passed an entire hour without thinking about Priya on the very day that she died. It’s already begun. My life after Priya. My life without her. And I didn’t even notice.

  Wren sat down gingerly in her own corner, moving carefully as though she was afraid her shoes might tear the huge nest of bedding.

  “Good night, Wren,” Asha said. “And don’t worry. We’ll find your friend soon. And if we don’t, then you can come back to India with me, if you want. But either way, I don’t want you to worry about being alone. All right?”

  “All right.” Wren hesitated, and then said, “Asha, are you serious? About going to India?”

  Asha shrugged. “Perhaps.”

  Wren paused. “Good night.”

  “Good night.”

  Chapter 6

  Asha woke the next morning from a dreamless sleep and sat up, squinting around the huge bed in some small state of confusion. Gradually the memories settled back in. Priya and Omar. Wren and Bastet. The tower. She looked over at Jagdish curled up in the dark red mass of the northern girl’s hair.

  Little traitor.

  She stood and stretched, and leaned out one of the narrow unglazed windows to look out over the bright blue waters of the Middle Sea sparkling in the early morning sunlight. Gulls were crying and steamers were tooting and all around her rose the chorus and chaos of life. People were already up and about, working and playing, fighting and laughing. Animals lumbered through the streets, and Asha’s golden ear heard the patters and thrums of their souls, some huge and rhythmic and deep, and others small and melodic and light. It was a dull storm of noise, not unlike standing in the middle of a crowded marketplace filled with voices speaking strange languages and musical instruments playing out of tune and out of time with each other.

  Asha remembered a time when the soul-sounds were oppressive, when they drove her out of cities, even out of small villages, leaving her to wander the wilderness alone where she could hear her own thoughts. But time had overcome that pain and distraction, and she had learned to cope with the noises of cities, and now it all merely roared quietly in her golden ear and did not trouble her at all.

  Bastet slept curled up in a tight ball on her side, wrapped up in her blankets, and sighing softly into her shining black hair. Wren, on the other hand, lay sprawled on her back with the blankets kicked off, the side of her face shining with drool, and a growling snore marking her every exhalation.

  Asha shook her head.

  That was me, once.

  She turned back to the window to watch the tiny boats sailing out from the harbor, the little fishermen cutting through the water alongside the massive freighters and trawlers.

  Priya, where are you? Are you sleeping in the earth, or in the sky? Will you ever wake up and walk in the world again? I suppose you will, some day. Your soul was so strong, so vital, and so loud. I don’t think I ever told you that. I should have.

  And when you do wake up, I know you’ll find someone else to help. Someone else to teach. And you should. But, if there’s time, if you can find me, then find me. Please.

  She sighed and pulled back from the window, lost her balance on the soft carpet of pillows and fell back into a pair of strong arms.

  “Careful,” Anubis said softly.

  “Thank you.” Asha stood up and looked at him, and then at the entrance to the stairs. “You didn’t come in through the door, did you?”

  “No.” He raised an eyebrow, and turned to wake his little cousin.

  Asha woke Wren, and when everyone was done stretching and wiping their eyes, Anubis said, “I went back to the fountain at dawn to check on the entrance, and I found an old friend of ours there, waiting. But he can wait a little longer. I had a thought last night. Zahra.”

  Bastet scrunched up her face into a thoughtful pout. “You want to talk to her? Really?”

  “We need to learn more about how Lilith has been transforming people into slaves and beasts,” Anubis said. “But at the moment, all we know is that she needed sun-steel for her soul-breaking, and that she got her sun-steel from the Temple of Osiris.”

  “Too bad we can’t ask the Sons of Osiris about her,” Bastet said.

  “Sorry,” Asha said, without a trace of regret in her voice.

  “Don’t be. Not all of them died when the temple fell,” Anubis said. “There is a place where they often go to do business with foreigners. The Cat’s Eye. The woman who runs this establishment may know something valuable about the Osirians, or the sun-steel, or Lilith. I thought we might visit her this morning before she opens her doors to her usual clientele. It will be quiet now. Less chance of trouble.”

  Asha nodded. “All right. But if it’s a dangerous place, I don’t
want Wren to come.”

  “Agreed.” Anubis looked at the younger girls. “The two of you might want to go back to the fountain and keep our wayward friend company until Asha and I return.”

  “Who is it?” Bastet asked.

  “The only person who always comes running when he hears death and disaster in the distance,” Anubis said.

  “Gideon!” Bastet grinned.

  “Yes,” Anubis said. “And he was very amused, though not entirely surprised, to hear that the Temple of Osiris had been destroyed by a mysterious golden figure in the span of an hour.” The youth gave Asha a pointed look. “He’s been following you for quite a while, apparently.”

  Asha nodded. “Oh.”

  What does that mean? Why would he be following me? Was he worried about my safety, or was he worried about the safety of the people around me?

  “Come. We have a long day ahead.” Anubis led them down the stairs and out the iron door to the quiet, shady lane, and then onto the bright, bustling avenue through the grand district of princely estates.

  Bastet took Wren’s hand and the two girls hurried off in the direction of the fountain.

  “Will they be safe?” Asha asked.

  Anubis nodded. “Bastet knows more than a few tricks for staying out of trouble. And that friend of yours is quite formidable as well.”

  “Wren? Formidable?” Asha frowned at him as they started walking in the opposite direction.

  “Of course. Ah, but you were still in your dragon form. Perhaps you did not see,” Anubis said. “In your fury last night, you attacked Wren several times, but each time she forced you away, hurled you aside with a wall of aether with just a wave of her hand. She is quite talented, really, for a mortal.”

  “I didn’t realize. I only just met her yesterday,” Asha said.

  I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. She was traveling with this Omar person, who apparently was the grandfather of these immortals. She had to be special.

  “So we’re going to this Cat’s Eye now?” Asha studied the buildings around her, noting that once again they were moving away from the better-kept homes and marketplaces and moving into an older, dustier district. At first the transition was gradual, with slightly fewer people on the road and slightly shabbier doorways and signs. But then they crossed a wide boulevard and the transition was suddenly complete. Bits of trash fluttered about the street, most of the signs were gone or faded beyond recognition, windows were boarded over, and the only people she saw were leaning out the windows, frowning at the two people walking down the center of the road.