Tears of the Furies (A Novel of the Menagerie) (20 page)

Ears pricked forward, the cat prowled to the next crypt. The
next one along the circle was his destination. Something shifted in the
darkness now, and it did not come from ahead of him, but behind.

Clay turned, tail twitching, and scanned the cemetery and
the branches of the strange grove of trees that surrounded this circle of the
dead. All was still. The leaves hung seemingly lifeless, no wind at all to
disturb them. Still the cat let its gaze linger a moment. Then, out of his
peripheral vision, he saw something else move. Twisting to the right, he saw a
patch of moonshadow beneath a distant monument give birth to Squire. The
hobgoblin crawled carefully, silently onto the ground. His eyes gleamed in the
dark. When he spotted the cat, the gnarled little man stood into a crouch and
nodded slowly. He tapped the side of his nose, indicating that it had led him
to this spot. The cat curled its tail around and used it to point at the open
crypt. Squire took a step forward, and Clay shook his feline head. For once the
hobgoblin did as he was told and remained still.

As he crept across the ten-foot expanse that separated his
hiding place from Medusa’s lair, the cat darted a glance all around, on guard. Something
else was here. He was certain of it. A ripple in the air at the center of the
circle of crypts caught his eye, and he saw the ghost of Dr. Graves taking
shape.
Excellent
. If he could grab Medusa from behind to avoid her
stare, he ought to be able to choke or beat her unconscious. If not, Graves and
Squire were there to help him immobilize her.

Her
. Not a monster anymore. Not after hearing that
sigh. No matter how hideous she was, no matter how insane her curse had made
her, there was still a part of her that was the sensuously beautiful creature
she had once been.

This thought was still echoing in Clay’s mind as he willed
himself to change once more. Not a human. Not a cat. Not a monster, this time. He
transformed into his natural body — or the one with which he was most
intimate — a seven-foot-tall, hairless, man whose flesh was his namesake.
Clay. Lined with cracks, cool and dry. And strong.

With uncanny swiftness he crossed the last five feet to the
stone coffin and reached for Medusa.

An earsplitting, almost musical whistle split the night.

The sound disturbed her, and even as Clay reached for the
Gorgon, Medusa dropped the rabbit she had been gnawing on and erupted from the
crypt. The nest of serpents on her head hissed in chorus and lunged at him,
snapping, even as Medusa turned toward the sound of the whistle . . . toward
Clay.

He did not have a chance to avert his eyes.

Clay heard Squire shout in alarm and saw Dr. Graves’s
spectral form flying down at the Gorgon, even as he felt paralysis take hold. Horror
blossomed within him. He was malleable, ever-changing, ever in motion. But now
he froze, solid, unable to move or change.

No longer clay, but stone.

The fishing boat rocked beneath his feet, and Conan Doyle
was surprised by how quickly he regained his sea legs. His mind briefly flashed
back to his military service during the Boer Wars, when he had traveled to
South Africa across turbulent seas on a British steamer. It had been years since
he had thought of that part of his life, but he did not often ruminate on his
more mundane existence, before his supposed death.
Memory is such an odd
device of the mind
, Doyle mused, gazing out over the emerald green waters,
stimulated
by the most random things
.

The winds blowing off the waters of the Ionian Sea were
invigorating after the long day of travel from the island of Lesbos, and he
greedily filled his lungs with the rejuvenating Mediterranean air. It wasn’t
the rest his body craved, but it would have to do.

Conan Doyle turned to look at the weathered fisherman in the
wheelhouse behind him. He had found him in a small tavern at the bay of
Marmari. While his companions waited outside to avoid arousing any unwanted
suspicions, the mage had gone in alone to hire a boat. All the fishing boats
were in for the day, and none of the seamen present would even entertain the
thought of taking their crafts out again, especially at the request of a
foreigner — and an Englishman to boot.

He had reached the point where he was seriously considering
using magick to manipulate one of their minds, when Danny had grown tired of
waiting and come in to find him. The appearance of the boy had cast a pall of
silence over the establishment. Even though his head was covered with the hood
of his sweatshirt, in such close confines it was impossible for them not to
recognize that the boy was not normal. His eyes, his teeth, his skin . . . The
atmosphere of the tavern had grown immediately hostile, and Conan Doyle had
decided that it would be best for them to leave at once.

Now the captain returned Conan Doyle’s gaze, yellow eyes
glinting like polished gold in the last rays of the setting sun.
A kindred
spirit
, he had called himself.

He had intercepted Conan Doyle and his group at the rear of
the tavern, introducing himself as Captain Lycaon. Conan Doyle had sensed
immediately that there something not quite human about the fisherman — something
unnatural, but there seemed no malice in him, no duplicity. If he was an agent
of Gull’s, well, that was the risk.

The captain smiled now through the wheelhouse window as he
piloted the boat, and Conan Doyle could not help but notice again that there
were far too many teeth in the man’s mouth. He doubted that Captain Lycaon
smiled much around his fellow fisherman, or even that he had much contact with
their like at all, other than to occasionally partake of some refreshment in
the same establishment.

Kindred spirits.
Lycaon said that it was Danny who
had changed his mind, that he had sensed their kinship and would never have
forgiven himself for not helping one of his own. Conan Doyle had considered
asking the old man for his story, but decided against it, choosing instead to
simply offer their destination.

"We’ll need passage along the coast to Cape Matapan
— or Cape Taenarus as it used to be called."

The old man had nodded slowly, removing a pipe from his back
pocket, preparing to smoke.

"Let me guess," he had said between puffs, the
sweet smell of his tobacco causing Conan Doyle to crave the relaxing pleasures
of his own briar pipe. "It’s the Ayil Asomati caves you seek."

"Precisely."

Lycaon spoke with a strange accent, not Greek, or anything
else familiar, but with the hint of the Mediterranean in it nevertheless. "At
night I hear the call of the caves sighing upon the winds, and they ask me if I
am ready to lay down and sleep my last, but I tell them that it is not yet my
time, that there are still many fish to catch, and much ouzo to drink."

"Will you take us then?" Conan Doyle had asked
after a moment of silence during which the old captain puffed on his pipe,
seeming to listen for the sounds of the caves.

"When would you like to leave?"

"Immediately."

They were on their way in a matter of minutes.

Now upon their journey, Conan Doyle took stock of his
Menagerie. At the back of the boat Eve, Danny, and Ceridwen sat, enjoying a
moment of respite before the next phase of their mission. They were tired and
could have used some time to rest and regroup, but Gull had a healthy lead on
them, and if they had any thought of catching up to him and his Wicked, they
could not afford to tarry even for a moment.

Eve must have felt his eyes on her, for she glanced up,
brows knitted in consternation. She rose to her feet and strode toward him,
tugging at her torn leather coat, which was stained with her dried blood.

"I’m going to stink like fish for days," she
complained, the wind whipping her hair around her sculpted features.

Conan Doyle always marveled at her beauty. Here she was only
hours after battling a Hydra to the death, and she looked as though she could
have stepped from the pages of
Vogue
.

"You don’t smell of fish," he assured her. "Blood,
yes, but not fish."

Eve stared at him then, dark, almond-shaped eyes boring into
his own. "Are you all right?" she asked. There was empathy in her
gaze, but a steely judgment as well. "Back on Lesbos, with the Hydra, you
were a little off your game."

"I was momentarily distracted." His concern over
Ceridwen’s injuries had left him embarrassed and a bit ashamed. Matters of the
heart needed to be set aside when dealing with conflicts of this magnitude. "I
assure you it will not happen again."

Eve slowly nodded. Sometimes she seemed so very modern, so
young, and at other times her gaze revealed the profoundness of her age, and an
ancient wisdom lay within. "That’s good to hear. Danny and I almost got
our asses handed to us today."

Conan Doyle glared at her, leaving no doubt that the
conversation was over.

She put up her hands in defense. "It had to be said."

The boat’s engine cut off, and Conan Doyle watched as
Captain Lycaon emerged from the wheelhouse. The old man was smoking his pipe
again and said nothing as he pointed to the promontory that was gradually
coming into view as they rounded the headland from Cape Matapan, the
southernmost point of continental Greece.

Danny and Ceridwen had joined them, each peering out into
the darkness for a glimpse of their destination.

"Is that it?" Danny asked. "I don’t get it. Why
do you think Gull wanted to go there? It’s just a big cliff."

Ocean-blue cloak fluttering in the wind, Ceridwen extended
her arm, fingers splayed, feeling the emanations from the great stone
projection. "So much more than that," she said in a voice tinged with
foreboding. "So much more than is obvious."

Eve made clicking noises with her mouth as she placed her
hands on her slender hips. "Isn’t that always the way," she said,
giving Conan Doyle a quick look from the corner of her eye.

The high rocky formation loomed above them, and Conan Doyle
moved to the front of the boat for a better view, searching for the area that
was rumored to be an entrance to the Underworld. The Ayil Asomati caves were
the most famous of Hades’ ventilation shafts, favored by mortals on quests.

Captain Lycaon joined him. "I’ll get you as close as I
can," he said, eyeing the towering rock formation as he suckled the end of
his pipe. "But you’ll need a raft, if you’re planning on climbing to the
caves."

"Bring us as far as you dare, Captain," Conan
Doyle ordered. "We’ll make do from there."

The sound began as a distant warble, and Conan Doyle at
first mistook it as the cry of some lonely night bird. It was a song, perhaps
one of the most beautiful he had ever heard, and it was coming from somewhere
on the cliffs of the promontory.

"Look!" Eve called, distracting him from the
unearthly tune.

Conan Doyle followed her gaze, again enveloped in the
overpowering beauty of the song, and saw three figures standing on one of the
small ledges jutting out from the promontory. It was Gull and his people, and
the deformed sorcerer was using his damnable gift to sing in the voice of
Orpheus.

They were closer now, and Conan Doyle could make out the
words of the song in the language of time long past. Plaintively it asked for
the entrance to the Underworld to be revealed.

"It’s beautiful," Captain Lycaon whispered, and
Conan Doyle saw that the old seaman was crying.

As he looked back toward the promontory, he realized that it
was not only they who had been affected by the song of Orpheus. Conan Doyle watched
transfixed as two towering gates of solid rock parted in the face of the
mountainous cliff.

The Underworld.

Clay is falling.

Deeper and deeper he plummets into the darkness within
himself, the oblivion into which he has been cast by the gaze of Medusa. After
a while, he finds himself comforted by the darkness surrounding him, the desire
to escape slowly draining from him.

He wonders if this was how Medusa’s other victims had
felt? Suddenly trapped within themselves, gradually losing the will to be anything
but stone.

For a brief moment he again struggles against the sucking
pull of the abyss, but to little avail. He is drowning in shadow, the ebony
pitch attempting to work its way into his mouth and nose. It wants to be inside
him — to consume him. It wants him to forget that he ever existed.

And it almost succeeds, but then he hears Eve’s voice, as
he had that day they lunched on Newbury Street.
"Do you remember
?"
she had asked, a longing in her voice that made his heart break.

And he does. He remembered then — and he remembers
now, and his unremitting fall into oblivion is slowed by the recollection. Memories
flash before him, curtains of darkness are savagely torn aside. Clay recalls a
murk deeper and darker than the one that now envelops him, but it lasts for
only a brief instant, before it is banished by the brightest flashes — the
light of creation. And the inky black is replaced by entire constellations.

Creation
. It is his first conscious memory.

The memories give him buoyancy, and he begins to ascend.

Clay remembers the hands of the Creator, molding and
shaping him — preparing him to take on the forms of the wondrous life
that would inhabit these new worlds. He is the imagination of God made
malleable flesh.

He is the Clay of life, and God was his sculptor.

Oh, the creatures he had become. Clay remembers each and
every one as he climbs up from the darkness, suddenly able to resist the pull
of the depths. He tries to alter his form, there in the dark, to become
something more acclimated to swimming in the sea of black, but realizes that he
has no shape here, that he is nothing more than conscious thought.