by Jim Ware
“Mind you pay attention,” called Rury. “Look out for the signal!”
Eny nodded and smiled. Staring off lazily toward the shore, she held the currach steady and let her thoughts drift away to Santa Piedra. As she gazed, a hazy veil seemed to fall across the scene. A picture of the tide pools below the Cave of the Hands emerged before her eyes. Slowly, by imperceptible stages, the dazzling strand of Luimneach became the white crescent beach of La Coruna Inlet. The pinnacled tower of St. Halistan’s rose up tall against the violet backdrop of Beinn Meallain. Almost choking with a painful yearning, she leaned forward in the boat, imagining her father hurrying through the halls of the church with a bunch of keys at his belt. She heard the voice of her mother taking calls at the switchboard. She saw Simon Brach, a mop in his hand, opening the little green door underneath the tower stairs.
Suddenly the vision ceased and the Sidhe was the Sidhe again. A flock of geese—or were they wild swans?—swooped down from over the mountains of Beinn Meallain. Alighting along the shoreline, the birds lifted their heads and buried their feet in the sand. Once firmly planted, they elongated their bodies and stretched their necks up toward the sky. Then they began to grow. Taller and taller they grew until they were no longer birds at all but trees.
Eny blinked. As she sat there bobbing over the waves in her little coracle, an inexplicable chill took hold of her. A shadow fell over the sun and she shuddered from head to toe. Was she still daydreaming? Or could this actually be happening? Before her very eyes the trees that had been birds were sprouting arms and legs. Their leafy crowns were turning into huge hairy heads. An instant later the transformation was complete, and a host of gigantic human shapes stood ranged along the beach just in front of the little village of Luimneach. Shaking their massive arms and lifting their heavy feet, they lunged forward and stepped into the waves. Eny cried out and looked over at Rury. She knew at once that he had seen them too.
It was in that very moment that Erc turned and began to haul up his corner of the fishing net. He took two pulls at the rope; then dropped it and began gesticulating and pointing and shouting at them.
“Behind you, you squinting clowns! Behind you!” he yelled.
Eny twisted in her seat and looked back. A mist like the one she had seen on the face of Laguna Verde was rolling down upon them, swelling and filling the entire space between the mainland and the steep shores of Rachra. In front of it another troop of giants, as many as ten or fifteen of them, were wading straight toward her through the deep water, so huge that the shining of the waves could be seen between their legs. She dipped her oars and began to pull toward Rury with all her might.
“Not this way!” he cried, standing up in his currach and frantically waving her off. “Go that way! East! Around the head of Rachra! Make for the mouth of Inber Domnan!”
She could see at once that he was right. The Fomorians from the beach had cut off their retreat toward Luimneach and the nearer shore. Already they were so close that the dull flames of their eyes were clearly discernible. Closer and closer they came, their great stomping feet sending up the spray in colossal iridescent fountains. As she watched, they bent down, extended their enormous hands, and crushed the fragile currachs of Gann and Erc. They they flung the shrieking Fir Bolg fishermen into the sea.
Eny screamed. Turning back to Rury she saw a huge leg, like the trunk of an ancient oak, come crashing down into the water just in front of his little boat. “Row, Eny, row!” she heard him shout as the ocean rained down around her head in a cataract of foam. She bent to her oars and pulled for all she was worth.
As she came around the wooded point of Rachra her ears were assaulted by a deafening roar, a din like the sound of a thousand oceans thundering over bottomless cliffs at the edge of the world. Trembling and aching, cold and sick with dread, she turned to her right and saw it: the Morslogh, the great whirling maelstrom, a seething, steaming tempest of boiling brine, a monstrous glassy green funnel wheeling and spinning endlessly down into the bare, black rocky depths at the bottom of the sea. If only she could steer a course between its inescapable brim and the razor-sharp reefs along the shore! If only she could get to the beach! Once at the river she could hide among the reeds and willows. From there she could make her way upstream to the mountains and the fortress of the Tuatha De Danann. It was her only chance.
Gripping the oars and biting her lip, she began to pull for the shore. Cautiously, hesitantly, her head and her fingertips tingling, her stomach churning with nausea, she rowed steadily toward the small inlet at the mouth of Inber Domnan, constantly shifting her gaze from the right to the left, every moment expecting to crunch up against a rock or fall prey to the irresistible tug of the whirlpool’s current.
On and on she rowed. When at last she found the courage to glance back over her shoulder, a lightning bolt of hope flashed through her heart—the shoreline was definitely drawing nearer! But there was something else as well: a black spot between her currach and the shimmering strand, a dark shape moving swiftly toward her over the water. She stopped paddling and peered out across the tossing waves.
It was a boat. A big black high-sided, deep-keeled boat with a furled red sail, its lofty prow carved in the shape of a screaming raven. In the bow stood a little man like one of the Fir Bolg, his face averted so that she could not see it clearly. On a bench in the stern, his broad back toward her, sat a huge, round-skulled oarsman. Amidships, leaning on the mast with one slender white hand, stood a tall, dark-haired woman, wrapped and muffled in black to her piercing green eyes.
Eny’s heart sank. Salt tears stung her eyes and clouded her vision. Gann and Erc were lost. Rury could hardly have fared any better. The village of Luimneach was doomed, and she had no reason to believe she would ever see Santa Piedra again. In the midst of the darkness and confusion she could think of only one thing: She was under geis. She had made a vow to Rury. She had promised that, come what may, she would never allow herself to fall into the hands of the Morrigu.
Precious seconds passed, each one like an eternity. The grim black boat drew nearer. The woman’s mouth and face remained hidden, but it seemed to Eny that her green eyes smiled.
There was only one thing to do and she knew it. She set her jaw and pictured her father’s flashing grin. She remembered her mother’s infectious laugh. She thought about her fiddle and the tower stairs. Then, with one last desperate heave, she drove the nose of the currach sideways. Tossing the oars overboard, she leaned heavily into the deadly current. There was a howl of whirling winds and a roar of rushing waters. And then her little boat slipped over the edge and went hurtling down into the depths of the Morslogh.
Chapter Seventeen
The Legend of Compostela
Morgan felt the earth tremble beneath his feet as the church door clicked shut behind him and the sounds of Eny and Simon Brach playing fiddle went silent. At the curb he nearly collided with a dark shape emerging from the mist. It was George Ariellos, just arriving at the church office with a bundle of supplies under his arm.
“Morgan! I’m glad I ran into you!” he said. “Dinner tonight, the Reverend’s coming. He can only stay a little while, he’s got some kind of meeting at seven. But he especially wants to see you.”
“I’m sorry, George, but I can’t make it. I have to go somewhere.”
“The hospital, eh? Well, we’ll save some for you.”
He was turning to go when a thought struck him.
“George,” he said, “you said there were other stories. Other stories of the Stone?”
George sat down on the curb and motioned for Morgan to do the same. “The old Californios—my people—they also have stories. Stories of missions and miracles. Stories of saints and relics. Stories of signs and wonders.” His teeth glinted white in the dusky mist. “You’re asking about the tale of La Santa Piedra and the legend of Compostela.” George said softly, “O
ur story about a Holy Stone. A tale of Old Spain and Old California and Santa Piedra itself. A story that’s been in the Ariello family for generations. A story about the Ariellos.”
Morgan looked through the mist at the monolithic shape of the church tower. Another holy stone? he wondered. Another stone of power?
“Well,” he said at last, “are you going to tell me about it?”
George leaned back into the grass. Gradually his smile faded, settling into a straight-mouthed, thin-lipped, firm-jawed expression of solemn pleasure:
“It happened during the reign of the second Alfonso, king of Asturias, descendant and heir of Pelayo the Goth—the one who drove the Moors out of Spain. Jorge de Ariel was a poor but pious shepherd who lived in the foothills above Brigantium in Galicia.
“In the early springtime, when the nights were clear and the sky sparkled with a thousand million stars, Jorge penned his flock in a steep and narrow glen at the back of a high meadow overlooking the sea. Then he lay down to sleep, pillowing his head on an odd-looking stone.
“But sleep fled from him—or so it seemed to Jorge. For into his brain came seeping a persistent and swelling light, hot and blood-red behind his tightly closed eyelids. He turned his face to the earth and covered his head with his manto. But it was no use. He could not keep the light out. So he threw off the cloak, lifted his head from the stone, and sat up.
“What a sight it was that met his poor, bedazzled eyes! The brightness around him was like the brightness of the night when the heavenly hosts sang the birth of the Holy Child! Jorge knelt trembling on the stony ground, one hand upon the pillow stone, the other shading his eyes against the terrible glare. He swallowed hard and looked up.”
“What was it?” pressed Morgan. “What did he see?”
George smiled sublimely. “Angels. Angels going up and down on a golden stairway. It rose from the ground just beside the strange stone and climbed higher and ever higher until it disappeared among the swarms of swirling stars. At the very top shone a single star, more radiant by far than any other, a star to be compared with the star of the Nativity. Down to earth it cast its pure light in a bright, narrow shaft, straight down to a spot of ground at the bottom of the field.
“Up jumped Jorge de Ariel. He wrapped his cloak about his shoulders and ran over the rough ground, through the chill of the night, directly to the place where the star’s light touched the earth. There, in a grassy meadow near La Coruna, where the sound of the crashing waves is never far distant, he discovered yet another wonder. For amid a heap of sod and stones, as if it had just been unearthed, stood a marble box like a coffin, milky white and gleaming softly in the heavenly light. Words were engraved on its lid in the Latin tongue: Reliqua Sancti Iacobi, apostoli, martyri, et fratris Domini nostri.
“Poor Jorge! Don’t you think his mind was spinning like a windmill in a gale? He thought he must be dreaming! But it was not so. He pondered what he should do, then ran to fetch the priest from the town of La Coruna. The priest examined the marble box and told him that it held the bones of no less a person than Saint James, the brother of our Lord!
“The townspeople built a chapel on the spot and enshrined the marble coffin in an alcove at the back of the chancel. At Jorge’s request, the strangely shaped pillow stone was also laid to rest in the little church, just below the altar.
“In time the chapel became a magnificent cathedral. The place was given a name: Santiago de Compostela, ‘St. James of the Field of the Star.’ For hundreds of years it was the destination of many holy pilgrimages.”
The voice ceased. Morgan, like a sleeper waking from a dream, came to himself. George gathered up his supplies and made as if to stand up and leave.
“Wait a minute!” said Morgan. “You can’t stop there. You said this story was about Santa Piedra. You said it had something to do with the Ariellos.”
George knelt down next to Morgan. “So I did. For centuries Jorge’s pillow stone was regarded with great reverence. When the first Franciscan padres came to the New World, they carried it with them in the ship as a holy relic. From Vera Cruz in Mexico they brought it north along the Camino Real. It made stops at San Luis Rey, San Juan Capistrano, Santa Barbara, and San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo, always under the supervision of a young Franciscan novice named Juan Bautista Alvarado de Ariello, companion to Father Junipero Serra and descendant of that same Jorge de Ariel of Galicia. Its last known resting place, according to the tale, was in the mission church of Santa Compostela.”
George paused and gave Morgan a significant look. “You see what that means, don’t you?”
Morgan stared back, bewildered. Perhaps he was just too tired to think.
“It means the stone is here,” said George. “Here in Santa Piedra.”
And with that he vanished into the church.
By the time Morgan reached Front Street the fog was lifting and a light rain was beginning to fall. The sidewalk was oddly deserted for four thirty in the afternoon; except for the distant boom of the surf and the high, thin cries of the gulls, everything was wrapped in an eerie silence. Turning up his collar, he hurried down the street, not stopping until he stood shivering beneath the swinging, creaking image of the White Hand.
There he paused, chewing his lip while the rain dripped off the end of his nose. Slowly he reached for the door-handle, then hesitated and pulled his hand away. Maybe Eny was right about the strange woman. Maybe she couldn’t be trusted. Then again, Eny might be jumping to conclusions. Madame Medea was an adept—an expert in the art of alchemy—and he needed her help. His mother’s life was at stake. Eny was too timid, too superstitious.
“Crrawwcckkk!”
A brash, grating, cackling noise over his head stopped him dead in his tracks. He froze and looked up. Directly above him, perched on the iron rod from which the wooden signboard hung squeaking in the wind, sat a huge black crow. It cocked its head and regarded him sharply out of a beady eye. Instinctively, Morgan ducked and shied away. But then another sound—a sharp whisper—recalled his attention to the shop entrance.
“Psst! Young mister!”
It was Eochy, the odd little man he and Eny had encountered upon their first visit to Madame Medea’s, beckoning to him from behind the red door. “A word with you, sir!” he said. “That’s all I’d be asking!”
Again Morgan hesitated. He was about to run when the door of a neighboring establishment—La Coruna Gifts and Cards—flew open and out stepped two painfully familiar figures: Baxter Knowles and his father, the wealthy and highly regarded Brevard Knowles. Except for the pin-striped blue suit that marked him as a formidable man of business, the elder Knowles was just a larger and thicker version of his imperious offspring. Morgan looked from father to son, cursing his abysmal luck. They hadn’t noticed him yet, but it was plain they were moving in his direction. There wasn’t a moment to lose. With a quick glance up and down the street, he made a dash for the door, pushed past Eochy, and stumbled into the dusky interior of the shop.
“What do you want?” he gasped.
“Just this,” said the little man with a cautious sidewise glance. “I’m thinking you’d best be out of this.”
“Out of what?”
Before Eochy could answer, a sharp jolt set the entire building rattling from floor to ceiling. The front window clattered. The glassware and ceramic flasks and wind chimes tinkled and rang along the shelves. The door slammed shut as if moved by an invisible hand.
“Who’s there?” said a dark, melodious voice.
The strains of harp music, which Morgan had not noticed until that moment, suddenly ceased. There was a sound of clacking beads at the back of the room. A moment later Madame Medea appeared.
“I’ve been expecting you,” she said, a broad smile slowly overspreading her smooth oval face. “Come and sit down. You like hot chocolate?”
Morgan
gazed up into her round green eyes. Instantly a throng of hopeful possibilities leaped forward and took possession of his confused and overcrowded brain. He nodded mutely and took her proffered hand. She led him to a chair at one of the wrought-iron tables, lit a candle, and sat down across from him. “Bring us cocoa, Eochy,” she said with a wave of her delicate white hand.
She looked different than he remembered her: friendlier, more inviting, more down-to-earth somehow. Gone was her gypsy turban. Her black hair flowed loosely over her shoulders. The robe she wore was soft and white, plain yet elegant in its simplicity. At her throat hung a five-pointed silver star. From her ears dangled two dainty pink nautilus shells.
“Now then,” she said as Eochy, head bowed and eyes downcast, set two steaming mugs of cocoa on the table. “What have you come to see me about, Morgan Izaak?”
Morgan took a sip of chocolate, conscious all the while of the unblinking green eyes. When he was finished, he set the mug down, looked straight into her face, and said:
“I think I’ve found the Stone.”
The large green eyes grew larger. As if in answer to their questioning stare, he reached into his shirt and pulled out the sealed flask. Carefully he placed it on the table beside the candle as a single drop of sweat trickled down his forehead. Then he sat back in his chair and looked up at her, a trembly, fluttering feeling rising in the pit of his stomach. He swallowed hard. “That’s why I’m here. I was hoping it might be the Philosophers’ Stone, but I’m not sure. I thought you’d be able to tell me. I’ve been slaving over it for a long time. You said—”
She stopped him with a raised finger. Scraping back her chair, she rose to her full height and again held out her hand. “Come with me,” she said.
Slowly he got to his feet and followed. “Falor!” he heard her cry as together they ducked through the screen of hanging beads at the rear of the shop. “Prepare the athanor!”
