Persephone was waiting on the pavement. Beatrice noticed the jeweler placing the lovely silver band in the window. The goddess showed Beatrice a new bronze locket she had procured.
“Talismans,” she stated. “Can never have enough of these either. Love letters and talismans. Come, escort me to the grave of my love. There is much to be done.”
Back at Athens, Beatrice and Persephone cordoned off the third floor foyer with velvet rope. While the goddess was masquerading as a mortal, it wouldn’t do for any administrators, workmen, or teachers to see them while they went about their work.
The goddess bent and began murmuring, placing her new locket at the center of the seal. A bit of blue fire reached up to kiss her cheek, and Beatrice felt that phantom heat course through her body. She supposed it would always make her ache, like the smoke of opium did an addict.
“We must take every precaution,” she heard the goddess say. “Your fire and my blood—precious alchemy. Together they will break down the walls, knit the worlds together, and set the army free.” She lifted the locket, now awash with bluish flame, and hung it around her neck.
Her magical glamor faded and her garish crimson dress became her usual diaphanous robes, now laced with silken red patterns that Beatrice assumed corresponded to her wounds. Persephone fought showing her pain, but could not hold back a cough. Blood pooled at the corner of her mouth and as she dabbed at it with her sleeve, Beatrice saw the fabric turn to crimson silk, and understood what had seemed a garish costume. She felt a stab of empathy.
Persephone was sick, indeed; a consumptive goddess. She was, Beatrice thought mordantly, the very epitome of Victorian beauty. This was her age, after all. And this age would claim her.
Yet the sleeve of her divine robes took what was terrible and made it into something beautiful. Persephone tore free a long crimson strip and wound the lovely shimmering length around her neck. She turned to Beatrice with a grin, fluttering the accessory.
“I’ll have to offer this to Alexi—a bit of flair, a spot of passion. I fear he wears too much black—he’s so serious for such a young man! And you, I feared the same for you, but love quite becomes you, Beatrice. Go! Write your letter!”
She threw out her hand, and the Whisper-world opened, the portal edges sparking. A moment later she had vanished. Beatrice chuckled despite herself, unable to feel wholly lost when at last her heart’s time was at hand.
* * *
Persephone found Aodhan waiting, dreamy-eyed, at the Liminal edge. He bowed his head to her, and his gray face darkened in a blush.
“Cannot help it,” he murmured. “My Jane, she has me in thrall, and I cannot stop watching. Her guardian, her champion—I shall be both.
“Her gift grows stronger by the day,” he continued. “But I have to find ways to help her. They’re so young, all of them. We weren’t this young, were we?”
“You were not,” Persephone agreed. “But everything has changed.”
“How are they faring as a group? How is the Leader?”
It was her turn to blush, and Persephone fondled the crimson swath about her neck. “He’s terribly serious. But my mortal self will find him delicious once she sees the passion within him.” She shook her head and gathered herself. “But I dally foolishly. The Liminal is wise, and I am grateful we are here together, Aodhan. I will need your help.”
“Anything, my Lady.”
“There will come a time when the barrier between Whisper and mortal worlds will come undone. I believe I’ve routed the paths, by blood and fire, onto the very stones of Athens Academy. There we will fight, for there are enough Guard spirits to win.”
Aodhan nodded. “I am eager to defy the will of Darkness at any opportunity.”
“I will take a mortal body. Likely that body must enter this world to see the Guards’ prison break open. But if something should happen…” She stared at the Liminal; lightning crackled across its surface, reminding her nothing was certain, that there were details she couldn’t predict.
“Take this,” she said, handing Aodhan the locket. “It is packed full of phoenix fire. I would a Leader wielded it, but I’m not sure whom I’ll have to spare, should the Cairo Guard, fate forbid, get caught up by Darkness. Be my eyes, my assurance. I do hope Beatrice will help when it’s time, but I don’t know how much more I can ask of her. I know I ask too much from you. From all of you.”
“The Grand Work is both too much and not enough, everything and nothing at once,” Aodhan replied. “But I’m not sure any of us would trade it. Not even those imprisoned.”
Persephone wrung her hands. “I will set them free.”
“We’ll make sure of it. I promise.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-FOUR
During the voyage, though they still saw specters, there was no trouble. Until the day they were scheduled to dock in Alexandria: It was Ibrahim’s turn for a vision.
Not a vision, a nightmare. An echo of his instinct remained—perhaps phantoms of their powers would live on in each of them—and the sense of inevitable doom seized him.
Many years in the future, he and Beatrice and stood side by side like husband and wife. While he had once chafed at the idea of allowing even a portion of his heart to belong to another, now he found himself unsettled by the thought of life without Beatrice Smith. Their time together had led him to discover that they truly complemented each other, not just as Leader and second, but in life, mind, and heart.
She took his hand; he cherished the sensation. Then she died.
Ibrahim’s heart was sundered. A portal opened before them, and it whispered. The Whisper-world was aptly named, and it called for Beatrice by name.
Her beautiful colors had already turned to dull gray, and her piercing blue eyes were now a dull silver, though her lovely face had not much changed. That beautiful smile he had silently adored was at last his, and she gazed at him still with affection. But she was dead.
He would be the death of her. Could there be any other meaning? He brought ill luck, it would seem, to all his friends. He was a curse.
His cry woke Ahmed, and they both sat up, having fallen asleep in chairs in Verena’s room. She had taken a turn for the worse, perhaps because the roll of the sea reminded her of the vicious pitch of the possessor she’d battled. She had told them nothing of her possession, but Ibrahim assumed it had been terrible.
Now the two found the goddess sitting at the head of Verena’s bed, stroking her brow and murmuring that she was sorry. Perhaps their fear had summoned her, but seeing her genuine regret began to ease Ibrahim’s anger toward her.
She evaluated his expression. “Nightmare or vision?”
“Both,” Ibrahim replied.
“Do you want to tell me about it?”
Ibrahim sighed. “I doubt there is anything you can do. You’ve done quite enough.”
She bit her lip and did not press him.
Ahmed, eyes wide, was in the throes of a vision of his own. When it had come upon him Ibrahim could not be sure; they had all been lost to their private nightmares.
“My Lady! I see a black-haired girl and fire. Furrowed ground, terrible, muddy—there’s so much death, terrible noises, monsters, machines … all inevitable,” he sobbed. “The girl says, as if she’s speaking to me, ‘We couldn’t have stopped this. None of us could. All we can do is ease the pain. What little we can do, we must. To ease just an eddy of this ocean of pain…’ Does this mean anything to you, my Lady?”
Persephone blinked as the Sufi leaned toward her. “Alas. I’ve no reference for it, dear Ahmed. My visions have been insular: of Alexi, of the woman I must become. Nothing epic and dreadful like that.”
She frowned, placing her hand on her abdomen as if there was a terrible ache from deep within. “I wonder,” she murmured, “if she could be of my lineage, that dark-haired girl. If a creature like me could bear a child. Not in this form; the rot of the Whisper-world has eaten me alive from the inside out.”
Sadness o
verwhelmed Persephone, her colors dimming. “I couldn’t dare hope—” She choked and shook her head. “No. I can’t say I comprehend your visions. I’m sorry.”
“Perhaps she is a child of the Guard,” Ahmed said.
Persephone was further stricken. “None of the women have ever conceived. Their bodies are full—with a Muse, with fire; there’s no room to spare. Perhaps the Muses even stop it, for the Guard live and work at the threshold of life and death, a dangerous place for a child. And it would change the priorities of the parent. One cannot be the servant of two masters.”
Sensing Ahmed’s disappointment, Ibrahim shuddered. While he couldn’t disagree that such a policy was likely best for all involved, it was a further sacrifice, another forfeiture.
With a shred of hope, the goddess added, “I cannot say, but your case of limited service may be different. It is…”
“Unprecedented,” Ibrahim finished for her. They all nodded, silent.
Ahmed smiled wearily. “You know, I wish you were omnipotent.”
Persephone joined him in the smile. “So I could give you answers to all that troubles you? Ah, but that would be untrue to the Sufi heart, which craves the divine mystery of which we two are a part. All your poetry would be gone.”
Ahmed sighed. “You are wise.”
Verena woke with a tortured cry. Ibrahim stormed out of the room, unable to bear more sadness. His Intuition had done nothing to keep them from harm, and now he had even less power with which to work. His vision of Beatrice’s death, a death that he felt certain his presence assured, refused to leave his mind’s eye.
Leaving Ahmed and the goddess to deal with Verena, he fled to his cramped quarters. At the small writing desk in the corner, his world went as gray as the Whisper-world. He had to write a letter he would forever regret, for it might keep alive the woman who had become his treasure.
* * *
In the deep press of the Whisper-world, Persephone broke from an obligatory promenade, a ritual that surpassed unbearable since Darkness had destroyed the field she had created for her Guard. She no longer deigned to take his flesh-then-bone hand, but occasionally walked with him, if only to keep him from sensing that she was plotting.
He’d insisted on a journey round the stone tower that imprisoned her most beloved mortals.
“What if,” Darkness growled, “I didn’t let you go above anymore?”
“My answer remains, as always, the same. How ever would I heal?” was her reply. “Your hold over me would cease once there’s nothing left to hold.”
Quitting his company, she felt the cool stones of the Whisper-world warm beneath her feet as she fled. Each step left Darkness farther behind, each step brought her closer to her new dawn. Persephone felt the Gorgon following her.
Outside the vast chamber where the Liminal waited, the goddess turned and addressed the creature, saying, “You really should take over. You want it, I do not.”
The Gorgon’s eyes flashed bright green and hungry. “Gladly. I never understood why he wanted you, a simpering weakling.”
Persephone shrugged. “Nor did I.” It was good for the Gorgon to think her weak. To underestimate her. She didn’t need to prove herself to anyone but her Guard and Phoenix.
She fled into the Liminal chamber knowing the Gorgon would not follow to such an unwelcome place.
Before Darkness had claimed her for a promenade, Persephone had been at her task, anointing more stones with her blood and preparing the pins for the future battle between worlds. Her pain from this work grew steadily; at every door she felt beaten and ravaged. Upon the Liminal edge she let go of all façade, yearning for something to cleanse the terrible palette of death.
The Liminal gave her access to her desire, revealing the Rychman estate. She entered, gliding down an oddly silent hallway. Keeping her diaphanous cloak about her, she patrolled the house, unseen.
Alexandra was in the parlor, working on her embroidery, as had become her custom after her fall. Alexi was likely caught up in the long hours of his apprenticeship; she could feel nothing of the Pull that might draw him elsewhere. But where were their parents? The house looked oddly bare, with furnishings and decorative items missing.
To the study she went, knowing it was Alexi’s favorite haunt; she could await him there. Spying a freshly inked letter drying upon the desk, the goddess could not resist reading it.
Alexi,
There is no easy way to say this, but you are a sensible lad, so I’ll be frank. There is something wrong with the house. Your mother cannot abide it. She is full of fanciful and ridiculous notions, as women often are, of hauntings and curses and such. She’s grown distracted, and I can no longer delay in removing her from these premises.
Since the day of the accident, all has changed—you, your sister, our home, even the city.…
We leave this house to you. It was bought with your grandmother’s money and she left her entire estate to you. Your mother says that woman cursed you, but I think it quite a blessing that she should have left you so well furnished for your future.
Mr. Absolom will look out for you, and he’ll make sure you have a proper job when you are ready, perhaps as an academic.
It would likely be best if you don’t ask after us. It would only upset your mother. We feel that it would be easier for you to make a home without the presence of staff who think of you as a child, so we have discharged the few we are not taking with us. In their stead I have employed the Wentworths, a quiet, unobtrusive couple who will think of you as their master.
I have left information about the solicitors retained to handle your affairs on a second sheet. There is more than enough there to see you into adulthood. You shall lack for nothing but our presence. Take care, my boy; I know you will, as you’ve long been independent. You are the master of all you survey.
Sincerely,
Alfred Rychman
P.S. We’ve left it to you to tell Alexandra. We couldn’t take her with us and we know you love her dearly. We’ve hired a maid to look after her, though of course you may choose to put her into a convalescent home should she prove a burden. Such is the unfortunate lot for women who can’t serve their born purpose.
A silver tear splashed onto the paper just as a voice came from the doorway. “It’s you.”
“Hello, Alexi,” she said, allowing herself to revel in his presence a moment.
“It’s you,” he repeated. “What are you doing here? What are you reading?”
She handed it over.
* * *
Alexi couldn’t believe what he read. Finished, he dropped the letter and stared at the beautiful creature before him. Prismatic and silent, she picked up the sheet of paper and set it upon the desk.
She reached out to touch his temple.
“What are you doing?” he asked hoarsely, ducking her hand and trying to keep hold of himself.
“Easing the pain,” she said.
His heart spasmed, his fists clenched, his mind spun. Everything had gone wrong since he was chosen.
“Leave me alone! You must be the curse. Get out of my house!”
He stormed out of the building, tearing through the back garden and plunging into the line of brush and birch trees on the other side. Would he could escape his fate so easily. He didn’t know where to begin, with anger, with terror, with indignation that his beloved sister was relegated to no more than a dismissive postscript?
Anger. Anger was the appropriate response for abandonment with so little courtesy or explanation. A personal encounter was too much to ask for, even from a father. He was left all alone with no more than a Sincerely, Alfred Rychman. If Germans really were so cold, he was glad to count himself an Englishman.
Sadness. This had happened because his parents were frightened. He thought of the things he and his Guard friends had seen thus far: poltergeists, séances gone awry, violent possessions, and swarms of seething spirits. Everyone should be frightened of what floated unseen upon this earth. But to those w
ho did not see, perhaps he was the nightmare.
Anger returned, the violent pitch of his emotions making him sick to his stomach. He wished he owned reason and analytical prowess alone. Feelings he could do without.
Moving slowly back to the house, he entered the parlor, a respite of light and color. Hearing his step, Alexandra wheeled her wheelchair toward the door.
“What is it, Alexi? Why so weary?”
“Mum and Dad are gone,” he said quietly.
His sister gasped. Following her gaze, Alexi turned and saw the goddess standing patiently behind him.
“Who … what are you?” Alexandra asked the goddesss breathlessly.
The divinity moved forward; Alexi tried to grab her, but she nimbly eluded him and glided to Alexandra’s side.
“Stay away from my family,” Alexi hissed, fighting back sudden tears. “You’ve done enough, thank you very much.”
Alexandra began to panic. “Alexi, what is happening? Who is this?”
Placing a hand on Alexandra’s head, the goddess looked at Alexi and said, “Let me help. Trust me, you’ll thank me.”
Before he could take more than a single step, Alexi saw a calm smile wash over his sister’s face. A genuine smile.
“Mum and Dad are gone?” she said. “That’s all right. It was always you and me anyway, wasn’t it, Alexi? I’m not sure they ever wanted us. Now we can do whatever we please.”
The prismatic goddess spoke calmly. “Tell your sister whatever you need to, to keep her safe and make your life easier.” Alexi opened his mouth to admonish her, but the goddess held up a hand. “Later you can rail at me all you like and scream that I’ve ruined your life, but right now you’d best attend Alexandra. We must make sure she won’t break from the strain. For some mortals, ignorance can be bliss. Your sister is one of those.”
Alexi gulped. His mother’s superstitions were right: He carried danger with him. His sister did not deserve such a fate, so he would assure her peace and safety, as best he could.
“Alexandra, I’m buying you a little cottage nearby. It will be far more peaceful than this dreary place. This house is cursed. I’m cursed,” he added in a tone too tortured for a man so young.
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