The Mona Lisa Sacrifice (11 page)

I didn’t know how Judas was involved in my search for Mona Lisa, but I knew he was. I had no doubt he’d killed the real art dealer and then sat across from me in that train, masquerading as the dead man while he told me to go to America. I just didn’t know why. I ran things through my mind again and again at breakfast, but the only answer I could come up with is that he had somehow learned about Cassiel’s promise to deliver him to me if I found Mona Lisa. But then why show himself at all? Why not go deeper into hiding, so that even Cassiel couldn’t find him?

It was impossible to think like Judas, which meant I’d never have the real answer. And, in turn, that meant there was only one thing I could do.

Carry on with my original plan like I didn’t know Judas was involved.

I went to Heathrow and lifted the wallet of an American businessman from his pocket while he complained to someone on his phone about the bad weather. Like there was any other kind in England. I used his credit cards to buy a plane ticket to Dublin and a new backpack. I try to change my gear as often as I can while travelling. With all the DNA testing and drug dogs and chemical sniffers and such these days, you never know what’s going to get you into trouble. I once got thrown into a jail cell in Turkey because of some traces of hash in my bag—and I’d stolen the bag from the pilot of a Lufthansa flight. No more of that. Do your part for the economy and buy new, everyone.

On the plane, I settled into my seat and ordered a couple of drinks. I pretended not to see the businessman whose wallet I’d stolen a few seats ahead of me. I didn’t feel any vague sense of danger like I had on the train, so I just passed off his presence on the plane to one of those coincidences. And it was.

I figured the businessman had already cancelled his credit card, so when we landed in Dublin I stole a new one from an airport cop. I also took the cop’s driver’s licence, because I’d be needing a car. I left the businessman’s credit card in the cop’s wallet. I was going to see the faerie, so I was trying to think like them.

I rented a car at the airport with my new ID and picked a random direction out of the city. I didn’t know where I was going. Looking for the faerie is like trying to summon Alice. They’re right here among us but you still have to search for them. And you never know what you’re searching for.

I found them in the deep, dark hours of the night a short distance outside of Dublin. Or maybe it was the wee early hours of the morning. Or just really foggy. Whatever. The difference only matters to vampires. I could give you the exact location, but it doesn’t matter. They wouldn’t be there if you went looking for them. They won’t be there if I go looking for them again. The faerie get bored easily. Let’s just say this time they were camped out in an abandoned pub set back in a field shortly after Conolly’s Folly. If you don’t know that particular landmark, it’s a strange archway made of stone slabs and obelisks on the grounds of Castletown House. Another faerie hangout for a while, because of the things it used to attract. These days, though, its only visitors are tourists.

I could tell the pub was abandoned by the boarded-up windows and For Lease signs nailed onto the walls. But even in the car I could hear the music and laughter from inside. And the parking lot was crowded, with only one empty space. That sort of invitation is a sure sign of a faerie pub. And if you’re still not convinced, well then, you’ll just have to trust my experience in this matter. I parked and stretched a bit while looking around for other signs of life nearby. But there weren’t any, not even another car on the road. When I was done putting things off, I took a deep breath and went inside.

It was wall to wall with people. I had to tap a man on the shoulder just to be able to step inside enough to close the door behind me. They were a friendly bunch, though—everyone who looked my way toasted me with their drink, and when I finally made my way to the counter the bartender poured me an ale without me even asking.

Yes, definitely a faerie pub.

I leaned against the bar and sipped my drink, which tasted of flowers and spices and charcoal and a few other things I couldn’t identify. The good thing about faerie ales is that no one glass tastes the same as another. They didn’t have the patience for mass brewing. Or recipes.

I looked around for a few moments before talking to anyone. I wanted to get a feel for the mood of things before I went to work here. You had to be careful with the faerie. They can buy you another round or stick a blade between your shoulder blades with the exact same smile on their faces.

A band on a riser in a corner played snippets of songs that sounded familiar—a lyric I recognized here, a drum beat or a guitar chorus there. They switched from electric guitars to acoustic and then to banjos and violins. The stage was littered with instruments. The drummer turned to pots and pans sometimes, then back to his drum kit. It was a chaotic, never ending jam session, and it should have been a mess, but I found myself tapping my feet to the hidden rhythm that began to emerge from it. I toasted them. They nodded at me and kept playing, sweat on their faces and soaking their shirts. Everything seemed pleasant enough so far, but I knew that didn’t mean anything with the faerie.

The bartender pushed me another ale, and I discovered I’d finished the first one he’d given me already. Some of the people around me crowded closer. They asked me questions all at once.

“What year is it?”

“Are the Troubles still on?”

“Can you take a message to my wife?”

They smiled and laughed as they talked to me, but I could see the desperation in their eyes. I tried not to look too deep. They were the fey, people who’d been tricked and taken by the faerie, doomed to spend the rest of eternity entertaining them. And being the faerie. Because the faerie didn’t have bodies of their own anymore, at least not bodies in the world you and I move about in. Those had rotted away a long time ago, and now the only way they could exist in this world was by possessing the fey. I didn’t know the mechanics of it, and I chose not to think about it too much. They were a little like ghosts in their own way—an entire race of ghosts.

More of the fey kept coming, crowding around me until I turned my back on them. Fools, every one. They were upset about their fate. Didn’t they realize there were worse fates?

I instinctively looked for my reflection in the mirror behind the bar, but there wasn’t a mirror behind the bar. There are no mirrors in faerie dwellings. It reminds them that the bodies they possess aren’t their own. Just as well. All the people in here were reminding me of my own losses, and I didn’t want to see the emptiness in my eyes. Or to be reminded I wasn’t that different from the faerie when it came to the matter of possessing bodies.

The band stopped playing their instruments all at once, and the singer stepped to the front of the stage and sang the first few lines of “Silent Night,” only he sang the German version—

“Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht,

“Alles schläft; einsam wacht.”

—and just like that I remembered huddling in a trench with my fellow soldiers at Ypres in the First Wold War. It was Christmas and we’d used candles to decorate the few trees that still stood. Those of us with whiskey passed our flasks around, and we sang Christmas carols. I was with the Germans that time—you can’t always pick the right side, or the winning side. Whichever. It didn’t matter. Everyone from both sides was dead now. Everyone but me.

After a couple carols, the English in the trenches across the way joined in. We went back and forth with the lines, singing to each other.

“Sleep in heavenly peace.

“Schlaf in himmlischer Ruh.”

It was one of those moments that happen sometimes in war, when soldiers realize we’re all on the wrong side. We’re all tired of fighting.

“Silent night, holy night.

“Hirten erst kundgemacht.”

The next day we got up out of our trenches without our rifles and marched across the field, and we met the British halfway. They’d also left their weapons behind. We exchanged what gifts we could with them—jam, cigars, chocolates. It was almost enough to give me faith in humanity, until the generals ordered the artillery to start firing again.

“By the angels’ hallelujah,

“Tönt es laut von fern und nah.”

The men and women around me now started singing along with the song, and I wanted to join in. I wanted to relive that time. I wanted to recapture that feeling of belonging to a group that loved me and would die for me as I would die for them. I wiped the tears from my eyes. And I realized we were all singing the song now.

“Christ the Saviour is here.

“Christ, der Retter ist da.”

This is how the faerie trap you.

I slammed my hand down on the bar instead. The singing didn’t stop, but it did grow quieter. The bartender pushed me another drink but I pushed it back.

“Where is your queen?” I asked.

“The only queens we have rent by the hour and they’re upstairs,” he said with a grin.

Laughter around me.

All right then. If this was the way it was going to be.

“Tell your bitch queen her former lover is here,” I said.

That did the trick.

Now the singing stopped and the room grew quiet. I turned and looked for her, but I didn’t have to look too hard. People moved aside until there was an open aisle from me to a table in a far corner of the room. A red-headed lass with freckles and a mischievous grin sat there, surrounded by a group of men. The kind of woman every man desires but knows he can never keep. All of them wore muddy hiking clothes, like they’d been wandering the fields all day. Maybe they had been.

She was the most beautiful woman in the room. She was always the most beautiful woman in the room. Some had known her in the past as Titania, others as Gloriana. But those were all human names. To the faerie, she was simply and always the queen.

Me? I knew her as Morgana le Fay. And that was the root of my current problem.

The men at the table didn’t have the same looks of despair as the others in the pub. Their mirth as they regarded me seemed genuine. I figured them for more faerie rather than fey. I didn’t recognize them, but I’d probably encountered them in the past.

She smiled at me, and I smiled back. Perhaps time had righted all wrongs between us.

“Cross,” she said.

I toasted her with the glass. “My queen,” I said.

“Put him in irons,” she said.

You may have guessed by now that Morgana and I have a bit of a history. In fact, it’s a rather long history—it dates back to when I was one of the knights of Camelot.

As is usually the case, the legends have everything wrong. Camelot wasn’t exactly what it’s portrayed to be now. It wasn’t some shining castle on a hill in a pastoral countryside somewhere. It was far from that. Very far.

I first heard about Camelot when I found myself drinking with Gawain in a roadside tavern somewhere in the English countryside. He was a haggard shadow of a man, gaunt and scarred, with tangled hair and a beard that hung to his belt. He wore a sword on his back, and the handle was well worn from use. My kind of fellow drinker.

At some point in the night I asked him where he hailed from and he said Camelot. When I said I’d never heard of it, tears rolled down his cheeks.

“It’s the most beautiful place in the world,” he said. “The centre of civilization. Castles that reach the very heavens themselves. A thousand knights who each have more honour and martial skills than a thousand men combined. The most beautiful, pure women you’ll ever meet. Magickers that build wondrous new devices that make life easier for all, not just the rich. Led by the greatest king of all: Arthur. It is the city of dreams.”

It sounded like the place for me, mainly because of the thousand knights he mentioned. I was on the run from . . . well, that doesn’t matter now. Let’s just say I needed to surround myself with people who knew how to wield a weapon.

Gawain left me in the tavern at some point after I passed out on the table. I slept until the sun came in through a window and roasted my face a bit. The bartender looked like he hadn’t left. Maybe he hadn’t, but he was serving breakfast now. I asked him which way to Camelot, and he just shook his head.

“You don’t want to go there,” he said. “Nothing good comes of Camelot.”

“You take care of the porridge,” I said, “and I’ll take care of myself.”

So he gave me directions and I gave him a handful of coins for the previous night, and I went down the road to Camelot.

Instead of finding Gawain’s city of dreams, I found a small camp of tents by a river. More haggard, hairy men lay dozing by fires or tending to horses that looked as worn as them. A few of them glanced up when I rode into their midst, but none bothered to be friendly. Except for Gawain, who came stumbling out of some bushes and scratching at his privates. He stopped when he saw me, and I could see his mind struggle to figure out where he remembered me from.

“I think you may have exaggerated the charms of Camelot a little,” I said to him, getting off my horse. It snorted a sigh of relief to be done with me and wandered over to the river for a drink or two. Gawain had the good grace to at least look a little embarrassed.

“He exaggerated nothing,” said a voice from behind me. I turned to see an old man emerge from one of the tents. A ghost of a man, thin and pale, with a white beard that went to his knees. He leaned on a sword like a cane. The sword was as black as the blackest night. I noticed the others all looked at him with expressions that were equal parts respect and weariness.

“Whatever Gawain told you of Camelot was but a hint of its true glory,” he said. “Because it cannot be summed up in mere words.” And Gawain quickly nodded, no doubt happy to be let off the hook.

I eyed that sword for a bit and then looked around the camp. “What’s this place then?” I asked.

“The foundation of Camelot,” the old man said. “And we are its building blocks.”

I didn’t think this particular bunch of blocks would be able to hold up too much, but I kept the thought to myself. As I mentioned earlier, I was still on the run and needed to lose myself among men with weapons. And weapons was the one thing this group had plenty of. Perhaps the only thing. I eyed that black sword again.

“I take it you’re the king of Camelot,” I said. “Arthur.” His sword looked like a king’s sword, after all.

“In Camelot, every man is a king,” he whispered. I wasn’t sure if he was still talking to me or thinking out loud.

I shrugged it off. “I’d like to add my hand to your labours then. It sounds like a pleasant enough place to live once it’s built,” I said.

His arm shook on the sword, and for a moment I thought he was in danger of falling and was trying to support himself with the blade.

“We do not need any more lost souls,” he told me. “We have quite enough of those.”

Some of the others lying around their campfires laughed, but not many of them.

“Trust me when I say when I’m not like any other knight you’ve met,” I said.

“I don’t care,” he said. “I don’t want your death on my conscience.” And he gazed around at the others like they were already dead. Like he knew things we couldn’t.

But I knew how the drill worked in those days.

“Give me a test,” I said. “To prove myself to you.”

And now the blade lifted off the ground for a moment, and I realized he wasn’t leaning on it but was instead holding it down. I didn’t really know what to think of that, so I didn’t think anything at all.

“Let him free her from Meleagant and his minions if he wants a quest so badly, Arthur,” said a man trying to hammer the dents out of his armour, and the others laughed.

Arthur did nothing for a moment, then nodded. “Do as Percival says and you may join us,” he said. “Because if you survive that then you’re as cursed as the rest of us anyway.” Then he went back into his tent and closed the flap behind him.

I looked at Percival. “Which way to Meleagant?” I asked.

“You can’t miss him,” he said, pointing down the road. “Just follow the skeletons to the haunted castle.”

“And who does he hold prisoner?” I asked.

Percival grinned. “We wouldn’t want to ruin the surprise for you,” he said.

And the others waved their farewells to me. None waved harder than Gawain.

So I rode down the road, past the skeletons hanging in nooses from the trees, and to the castle made of black stone deep in the woods. Although it was more of a tower with a wall around it than a proper castle. I blasted the door open with way more grace than I needed to, just to be flashy. Which was a waste, because the guards were all under some sort of enchantment and unimpressed. They shambled at me and I hacked off a couple of their arms to scare them away, but they didn’t seem to care. So I had no choice but to kill them all, and that turned out to be a lot of work, given that they paid no attention to their mortal wounds. Let’s just say I could have built another wall around the tower with their body parts.

When I was done that and had caught my breath again, I went into the tower and encountered another group of guards. I sighed and got on with it. I could see why Arthur’s gang of knights had laughed at me. This was an annoying quest.

So I took care of that lot and then went up the stairs, hoping there weren’t any more guards. There weren’t. Instead, there was just Meleagant in his sleeping chamber. An old man dozing on a bed with a young woman at his side. I ran my sword through him and the bed and lodged it in the stone floor underneath. He didn’t make a sound as he died. He didn’t even try to defend himself, not that he had anything to defend himself with in his bed. I don’t think he was ever aware that I was in the room.

Now, the legends all say it was Guinevere, Arthur’s love, that Meleagant had with him there in his castle, but it wasn’t. Guinevere never existed. She was made up, just a character meant to balance out all the blood and gore of those tales. Guineveres never exist. Instead, it was Morgana in Meleagant’s bed, although I didn’t know who she was at the time. She was a blond woman back then, with blue eyes and ample cleavage and all that. She woke up and smiled at me when I slew Meleagant, and said, “I didn’t know I’d been waiting for you until now.”

She didn’t care that I’d just massacred Meleagant and all his men. She didn’t care that I was covered in blood and gore and stank like a hellhound. She pulled me into bed with her, and then I did the things you do with a faerie queen in a bed with a man you’ve just killed.

I think she wanted to put me under a spell like she had with Meleagant and his followers but, well, I’m who I am and she didn’t know how to work her charms on me yet. So when we were done I put my armour back on and tied her hands with some ribbons I took from her hair and ignored her screams and threats as I slung her over my horse and took her back to Arthur’s camp.

If you know your Arthurian legends, this story may seem familiar to you. Yes, I was going under the name of Lancelot back then. But the legends have taken a few liberties with the truth here as well. I wasn’t pure of spirit and a champion of virtue. I was just my usual unkillable self, which meant I won most of my fights and the people who make up stories about such things had to come up with a good reason why I was so hard to kill. It’s funny how close they were, and yet so far away.

Anyway, I took Morgana back to Arthur’s camp and was met by a group of very surprised knights. They gathered around and stared in amazement when I dumped her from the horse to the ground outside Arthur’s tent. Gawain actually crossed himself, because that’s the way he was. Percival spat on the ground near Morgana but not, I noted, on her.

She swore and shrieked at us, and promised what she’d done to Meleagant was just the beginning of what she’d do to us.

And then Arthur came of his tent with that sword, and Morgana grew very still.

“My love,” she said. “It has been too long.”

“It has been an eternity,” Arthur said, but I had the feeling he was talking about something else.

“Will you not put down that thing and hold me in your arms?” Morgana asked, and the knights all looked at each other.

“You know I cannot do that,” Arthur said and raised the black blade. He seemed to be fighting against it, but it was a losing battle. It dragged him forward, and then it swung down upon her.

And met my blade. I had to expend grace to push it back because, well, because that’s the sort of blade it was. A strange thing, but I guess I’d seen stranger.

Anyway, I parried the blow and then dropped off the horse and stood between Arthur and Morgana.

“Killing her isn’t part of the deal,” I said.

Yeah, I was a real gentleman back then.

“Arthur, my love,” Morgana said with a mischievous smile I’d come to know better over the ages. “I can give you something more powerful even than Excalibur.” I took that to be the name of Arthur’s weapon. It was the sort of blade that deserved a name.

Arthur managed to wrestle the sword back to the ground. “I am doubtful such a thing exists,” he said, but it wasn’t in any sort of bragging fashion.

“Free me and let me be on my way, and I’ll give you the Holy Grail,” she said. “The goblet used to catch the dying blood of Christ himself.”

Nobody said anything for a moment. I wondered if she knew my secret. But she didn’t know who I was back then. Not yet.

“It is but a myth,” Percival said, and a few of the others murmured their agreement.

“It is lost to history,” Gawain said.

I didn’t really have any opinion on the matter. I’d heard about the Grail before, but I’d been blinded by Judas when I was dying on the cross, so I had no idea if anyone had caught my blood in a goblet or not. They could have showered in it for all I knew. But I was curious about whether or not it existed.

Arthur studied Morgana. “You know where it is?” he asked.

“It is not myth and it is not lost,” she said. “I know where the Grail lies.”

“Tell me,” Arthur said.

“First swear you’ll let me be,” Morgana said.

Arthur nodded. He ran a thumb down Excalibur’s length, and his blood disappeared into the blade. Now it seemed to settle down. I’ll stick to regular swords, thank you very much.

Morgana sat up and slipped her hands free of her bindings. I wondered why she hadn’t done that earlier. The faerie were a tricky bunch to figure out.

“The dragon has it,” she said.

“A dragon?” Percival said and laughed. “Well, that’s just perfect.”

“Not
a
dragon,” Morgana said. “
The
dragon.”

The knights all looked at each other in confusion and scratched various body parts. I have to admit I was surprised. I’d never before seen a dragon and I believed them creatures of the imagination only.

“Where is this dragon?” Arthur asked.

Morgana smiled at him. “That is not part of
our
deal,” she said.

“Slay her and be done with her madness,” Percival said. He moved to draw his own sword, but stopped when Morgana looked at him.

“You should be careful how you address a queen,” she said. “There are worse fates than Meleagant’s.”

And Percival dropped his sword back into its sheath.

“Begone from my land,” Arthur said. “Our arrangement only extends to the next time we meet, and not a second longer.”

“Oh, I don’t think we’ll meet again,” Morgana said, turning to leave. But she paused to look at me again.

“Except for you,” she said. “I will make you mine one day.”

“I am ever at your service,” I said.

“Yes,” she said, smiling. “You will be.”

And then she went into the woods and disappeared.

We were all silent for a moment. Then I cleared my throat to speak.

“This Grail,” I said. “What does it do?”

“It is a powerful weapon,” Galahad said.

“It will cleanse the land of evil,” Gawain said.

“It will bring us riches,” Percival said.

We all looked at Arthur.

“It will return my soul to me,” he said and stared down at Excalibur.

We all looked at each other but didn’t say anything else, because there was nothing to say to that.

“Break the camp,” Arthur said. “We go to find the dragon.”

So we went out into the land searching for it.

And we found Merlin instead.