Before Tamara, Shemyaza stood motionless, allowing the song to wash through his entire body. All the glyphs carved upon the rearing stone stele before him shone with a fierce light; it seemed they crept and crawled upon the surface of the portal. Instinctively, he reached out and placed his hands upon them. At the same moment, the resonance of the Lament reached an ear-splitting climax, and a deep vibration started up from somewhere behind the cliff, as if the song had woken a giant, sleeping heart. These sounds streamed painfully through every bone and muscle in Shemyaza’s body, as if they would shake him apart. He knew he must somehow move beyond this stage of the ritual, otherwise it might destroy him. Steeling himself, he pushed the boundaries of his perception beyond the inflexible surface of the stone portal, threading his sight through the atoms of the rock. As he concentrated on this, the vibrations of the Lament seemed to die away. All he could hear was the steady, rhythmic thumping, emanating from deep within the earth. He perceived that a huge, pulsating ball of white light hovered beyond the portal, almost as if it were a spiritual guide that had been awaiting his arrival. Within it, Shemyaza could see moving spirals and gyrating lines of brighter light. He sensed a watchful intelligence within the radiant sphere; it seemed to be examining or assessing him.
‘Do you know me?’ he asked, within his mind. ‘Can you feel me?’
The sense of vigilance increased. Shemyaza was certain it heard him.
‘I have come to the gate of your abyss,’ he told it, ‘led by a dark and impenetrable void inside me. Are you the light that should be within me? Are you what I am to become?’
The flickering brilliance made no response, merely spun upon the air in front of him.
‘Take me unto you,’ Shemyaza said. ‘I need to pass through the portal, to look upon the source of your creation with living eyes.’
The light began to retreat away into the darkness. Shemyaza felt a brief tug of grief within his heart. He could not follow it, and the rock still stood firm before him. As the light faded from his inner sight, he became aware once more of the eerie tones of the Lament around him. It no longer seemed to emanate from Tamara’s throat, but from all around him, as if every living thing, every rock, every grain of sand, raised the voices of their essence in song.
Shemyaza opened his eyes. He gazed up at the face of Azumi and the eyes of the guardian changed from red to a deep, radiant gold. The Lament abruptly ceased, and the silence around him was absolute; no sound of wave or wind, not even a sea bird’s cry. The waves themselves were stilled, as if holding their breath.
Shemyaza turned round to face Tamara, and became aware of the sound of her rasping breath. Her face looked sickly and pallid in the strange greenish light. Delmar was a starved, pale shape beside her. Shemyaza wanted to speak to them, tell them about the light beyond the cliff. The Lament had ended, it was used up, and the guardian within the cliff had assessed him, but they had failed, for the portal had not opened to him. Tamara’s eyes stared back at him wildly. What could they say to one another now?
Shemyaza opened his mouth, but before he could utter any words, an immense cracking sound split the air around them. Tamara staggered into Delmar, and Shemyaza wheeled round to face the cliff. His vision seemed blurred, then he realised that the rock face before him was shaking. The cracking of stone bones resounded all around them, and slowly, so slowly, the stone portal between the sphinx’s paws began to roll backwards. All that could be seen beyond it was a dense blackness.
Shemyaza glanced back at Tamara. Now was the time! There was no going back. Her image seemed smoky before him, somehow insubstantial, as if she was fading away out of existence. Then, as if a veil of dusky air was being drawn aside, her form solidified once more before him. Her body had become wreathed in a shifting smoke of diaphanous blue veils, but her face was visible. He uttered a low, agonised cry. It was not Tamara’s face he saw, but that of his lost consort, Ishtahar. Her black eyes, dark as the waters of life, stared directly at him. Her fine lips were drawn into a shy, sad smile. She projected an air of pleading and yearning, yet there was no hint of weakness about her. The spirit within her was strong and determined.
Shemyaza felt as if a black crust that had encased his heart, broke and fell away, to be absorbed by the tides of his blood. She had come to him at the final hour. She was here to guide and protect him. ‘Ishti,’ he murmured.
‘Yes, I am she,’ the vision responded gently.
Shemyaza could not see that beneath the cloak of illusion, Tamara stood strong and still, gripping the serpent talisman in her hand. She was wreathed in the breath of the serpent, and it spun a deceitful image in Shemyaza’s mind. ‘I am she, my beloved,’ Tamara crooned. ‘Behold, the way lies open to you.’
Shemyaza turned back to the cliff. A lightless maw now lay between the paws of the sphinx. Steam purled out of it, accompanied by a long, sibilant hiss. As the vapour touched him, Shemyaza was engulfed in a fetid stink, the sulphur breath of the underworld. At first, the steam was cold, but as it coiled and twisted around his body, a snake of breath drawn from the deepest pit of land, it gradually became hotter, until he felt it would sear the skin from his bones. A deep thudding sound boomed through it, as if giant machinery churned beneath the earth.
‘Enter!’ cried Tamara.
Shemyaza hesitated, and looked back at her. ‘I can’t!’
‘You must!’ she cried. ‘Shem, do it now. Do it for me, your love. Remember who I am. Unless you do this, the world will become barren. I will be barren. For the sake of our love, enter through the gate!’
Shemyaza stared at her for a moment. He was still unsure, having no idea what he would find beneath the earth, or even if he would be able to escape afterwards. Over the past week, he’d been lulled into accepting his fate by the succubus Tamara, but he knew that his heart was still poisoned by bitterness. Should he face the serpent feeling that way? Yet Ishtahar had come to him at last. How could he deny her? ‘Come with me!’ he cried.
The image before him shook her head. ‘No. You know I cannot. You must go alone.’
Shemyaza was afraid. If Ishtahar was not at his side to soothe his negative feelings, he felt he would be vulnerable in the underworld. He did not trust his own heart.
Then a cold hand touched his arm. Shemyaza saw that it was Delmar.
‘My Lord, enter the gate. Go willingly. Do it for love, yes, but do it also for the liberty of this land, for I can see its light within you.’
This was his vizier speaking, the one who advised him. How could he ignore the boy? How could he ignore the woman he loved?
‘Wait for me,’ Shemyaza said, and stepped into the darkness.
At High Crag, the Parzupheim gathered in the temple. Enniel made ready to lead a ceremony designed to help Shemyaza accomplish his task in the underworld.
In the garden of the Penhaligon house, the Pelleth prepared for their cliff-top ritual. The women had smeared themselves with flying ointment. Now Meggie stood before them with her arms raised, and the warm, unnatural wind lifted her hair. ‘When the serpent comes, my sisters, we must fly with it! Fly!’
Emma moved closer to Daniel’s side. ‘Will it happen? Can you sense anything?’
Daniel sighed in perplexity and shook his head. ‘It’s so confused in my head. I can’t tell.’ He uttered a furious sound. ‘Emma, I feel like I’ve been blinded!’
Emma squeezed his arm. ‘Have faith, my Daniel.’
Lily felt on edge and jumpy. Salamiel had not been in the house all day, and she’d barely seen Nina. She knew that tonight, everyone expected something momentous to happen. Surely she wouldn’t be left alone at that time? Restlessly, she roamed the house. Beyond the tall windows, the wind moaned in a horribly human voice. Shutters clattered, as if worried by spindly fingers seeking ingress. And below the harrying whine of the wind was a more terrible sound; the flexing of the muscles of the land as the serpent writhed at the threshold of wakefulness. Every few minutes, the ground shook, making the ancient artefa
cts that ornamented the shelves and nooks of the house rattle and wobble. Occasionally, a crash could be heard as something fell from its niche.
The library, normally the room Lily found the most welcoming, unnerved her. She thought of withered ghosts sitting in leather chairs, the creak of fleshless bones. In the cavernous hall-way, the chandelier swung and chinked. Somewhere in the far reaches of the house, something uttered a cry; perhaps an animal. Lily hugged herself and spun around in the meagre sweeping spotlight of the chandelier. She felt as if the house was closing in on her. She emanated a psychic call to Daniel, but sensed only darkness. She called to Salamiel with her body and mind, but even though she had no idea where he was, she knew he was beyond hearing her. Even Nina’s presence would be welcome now.
Lily mounted the stairs, resisting the urge to look back over her shoulder at the library door. Nina must be in her bedroom, probably painting her toe-nails ice-pink and listening to the radio. Despite the fact she was a Grigori dependant, she seemed an unimaginative, unshakeable person. But where was Nina’s bedroom? A noise like a heavy chest dropping echoed through the house. It seemed to come from the cellars.
Lily ran up the stairs.
She paced up and down the main corridor on the first floor, pausing to listen at doors, hearing nothing but the restless shift of drapes at windows laced with draughts and the occasional rattle of objects on their shelves. Plucking up her courage, still fearful of ghosts, she opened a few of the doors, but found only desolate bed-chambers beyond them, lying under the thinnest patina of dust, illumined by the sick, green light from the sky outside.
Again, a heavy crash came from somewhere below the house. Lily ran to the stairs that led to the next floor. All lay in darkness above her, threatening and alive, yet she felt an intense compulsion to mount the stairs. Was it simply because she wanted to look for Nina or Salamiel? If she couldn’t find them on the next floor, she’d go outside, try to use her psychic sense to locate the house where Daniel was staying. She couldn’t bear to remain alone in this place. Why had Salamiel deserted her? Wasn’t she to be part of Shem’s destiny?
The second floor was silent and empty. Lily entered the bedroom she had slept in on her first night. She sensed a tension there, the phantom of her own anxiety, and shut the door on it quickly. Her feet led her down a narrow corridor and at the end was a door. Drawn to it, almost against her will, Lily turned the worn metal handle. Beyond the door, a narrow flight of stairs, illuminated by low-burning wall-lights, led up to the final floor.
The upper storey, where the long attics lay, was dark and cold. Lily put her hand on one of the ancient cast iron radiators and found it chilly to her touch. Here, the wall-paper was old and fading, and the overhead lights were eerily dim in their small glass shades, hanging from ancient fabric-coated wiring, strung with cobwebs. The air smelled musty and damp.
What am I doing here? she asked herself. Nina would not have a room up here; she was far too fond of warmth and light. Lily felt frightened, yet driven. As she crept along the thin carpet of a long corridor, a booming sound came from outside, and all the light fittings began to shake. Lily reached out for the wall. Her blood felt thick in her veins. She was close to screaming.
Try the doors, she told herself, but the thought of looking into the rooms terrified her. She was walking towards the end of a corridor, where a round window, with an arrangement of wedge-shaped panes, overlooked the garden. Some of the panes were cracked, and all were thick with grime. Lily expected to see a tall shape manifest before this mouth of leprous light, something hideous with arms outstretched, its hair waving around its head like a halo of vipers.
She found her hand upon the door to her left, even before she heard the sound.
It was a low murmuring, at once like a song and a litany of complaint.
The dull brass knob turned beneath her fingers and the door swung open. It neither creaked nor scraped upon the floor. Once the door was open, Lily’s ears were assaulted by the wail of children, children in terrible pain, terrible fear, but there were no children in the tiny, black room, only the ghosts of their terror. She stood with frozen feet, gazing in horror and awe at the tableau before her.
The woman sat cross-legged in a shifting pool of dead snakes and serpent blood, as if she’d lately mutilated each reptile. Around her gory couch, black candles were stuck onto the floor, a flickering sea of light. Behind her, half cradled by the ripped snake flesh, lay a small, withered form. Lily dared not look too closely; it seemed too much like the corpse of an infant, sucked of life and juice. The woman wore a cloak of owl feathers, spiked with a cruel forest of severed beaks and claws. It was Sofia. She did not seem able to see Lily standing in the doorway, for her eyes were rolled upwards in their sockets. She seemed so far gone into some arcane trance that even her sharp senses were ignorant of the girl. A strange gibbering sound, which might have been torn words or the chittering of night creatures, came from her lips, which were stained with black saliva. As she mumbled, she chewed. Lily could smell the scent of haoma, but it was almost eclipsed by the stench of rotten meat rising from the coiled carcasses. Sofia was naked beneath her grisly cloak, her body smeared with the black blood of the snakes. She was the most wretched and dark thing Lily had ever seen, or could ever imagine seeing. Even Peverel Othman in his worst guise had not been so close to abomination. Lily wanted to back from the room, deny what she’d seen, and uttered a sad sound of disgust.
Sofia’s head snapped forward. Her eyes fixed on Lily. She held out her bloody arms, flexing the fingers like claws. ‘Ah, my pretty, pretty, here you are! Did you hear me call you? It is our time now.’
Lily’s stomach burned and an acid taste rose to her tongue. ‘No... Where is... No...’ She felt sick, aware now that she had obeyed a silent summons. Some dark, hideous part of her had heard Sofia’s call and followed it to its source.’
Sofia uttered a chilling cackle. ‘Oh, come to me, my pretty one! Come sit upon my lap and I will take you to the secret places beneath the earth. Don’t you understand your purpose? You are here because we hunt the Prince of Truth. Your husband, your lover, your despoiler.’ She extended a clawed hand. ‘Here, take my fingers in your own. Share my sight. He walks beneath the earth alone. He needs us now, my lovely one. You are to be his sacred bride.’
‘You are no part of Shem,’ Lily managed to say. She wanted to back from the room, but was incapable of moving. Sofia’s eyes were locked with her own, and the strength of that pitiless stare would not let her leave.
‘Oh, but I am part of him,’ Sofia said. ‘More so than the fools who sing his praises and litter his path with flowers. There are Grigori upon this planet, Lily, who are so old, you could not imagine them. They have waited for this hour, when their Dark Prince comes to lead them in the final battle. I am their Queen, their Priestess. When the Shamir wakes, its power shall be ours, and Azazel our king. With you, he will create a dynasty of kings who shall rule the earth for eternity. We shall take back all that was lost and the stargate will open unto us. Humanity will be cleansed from all the lands. Their love for war will climax in the war of all wars, and from the ashes Grigori will rise victorious, to reclaim their world.’
‘You are evil!’ Lily cried. ‘Shem won’t do what you want!’ She wished she could be sure of that.
‘Oh, will he not?’ Sofia laughed again. ‘Why fight it, Lily? You know that you want and need him. He is confused now and we must help him. The drivel and cant of the weak New Age must not seduce him. Come now, join me, for we must extinguish his light, lead him to the Lie. We must help him initiate the true renewal.’
‘No!’
Sofia shook her head slowly, her mouth stretched into a grin. ‘Ah, you are a wilful girl! Still, that is all to the good. Azazel would scorn a milk-thin maid.’ She pursed her mouth and nodded, as if coming to a decision. ‘Lily, at this moment, Salamiel is calling to his lord. He is our tool, and weak from love. You have bewitched him, which I applaud. Come here to me, and
we will augment Salamiel’s call. Azazel will hear you both. We must tell him to put out the serpent’s golden eyes. In its blind rage, it will energise this land with the true power that is beyond all comprehension. Listen to me, Lily. Feel your own power in your belly. Don’t you know that a child grows there? Your daughter will be a great priestess. Make the way ready for her. Take what is yours by right!’
‘I’m... I’m pregnant?’ Lily felt she would be sick at any moment. To hear this news in this terrible place, from the lips of a she-demon, was too much to bear. Perhaps it wasn’t true.
‘Of course it’s true,’ Sofia said softly, her eyes a mere slit. ‘It is the child of the black-skinned one, your sacrificial lover.’
‘Israel!’ The word was uttered in a shocked whisper. All the grief she had held in check, the revulsion, shame and horror, erupted from some hidden corner of Lily’s mind. The thought of Israel’s death and the fact she might be carrying his child gave her the strength to act. It was perhaps the last thing Sofia had anticipated. Lily knew she could not fight Sofia, but now at least she had the freedom to escape.
In one swift movement, Lily backed out of the room and slammed the door. She heard Sofia’s hideous laughter echoing out and the cries of ghostly children shrieked louder, as if instruments of torture had been tightened upon their flesh.
‘Run, then, my darling! Run! You will be back! You have nowhere to turn but to the one who rules your heart!
With her stomach churning, Lily fled the upper storey. She was in such haste, she felt she flew down the stairs without her feet touching any of the treads. She had to get out! Was Salamiel part of Sofia’s evil ritual? Had he lied to her?
Oh God, Owen! She couldn’t leave him here. Skidding on the landing, Lily pelted down to Owen’s room. She half expected to find Salamiel there, enacting some filthy rite upon her brother’s body, but Owen sat upright in his bed as always, staring at the door, absurdly tranquil in the chaos of the night.
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