Midway to the house blackberries grew over the flagstones of the path, so he moved to the left. The canes were lovely earlier in spring when they were covered with white flowers, but their barbs made as good a barrier as any horse of cedar trees laid with their branches facing outward around a marching camp.
Lucinus waited with a smile. Corylus didn’t want to describe the magician as looking self-satisfied—if not triumphant—but he couldn’t think of more accurate terms.
He and Varus had decided that returning to Lucinus was the best choice under the circumstances, just as the magician himself had claimed it was. Corylus had no right to think slapping the expression off the fellow’s face would feel good … but it would.
“I’m glad to see you so promptly, Corylus, Lord Varus,” Lucinus said. “I fear that there is even less time to waste than I had already believed.”
He turned, adding over his shoulder, “Come in and I’ll show you.”
He led the way through the half-ruined house again. There was no need of small talk if the fate of the world depended on quick action, but Corylus realized that because he didn’t trust Lucinus, he didn’t take the prediction of imminent disaster seriously. He supposed he should, since it echoed the vision Varus had described.
He smiled. Because he distrusted—and disliked—the messenger with bad news, he was less worried than would otherwise have been the case. That was good, since it wouldn’t prevent him from dealing to the best of his strength and ability with whatever
did
happen.
The garden in back looked the same as when they had seen it the day before. Varus looked around and said, “Where are the goats, Lucinus?”
“What does it—,” Lucinus said, then remembered who he was snarling at, and remembered how willing the target’s friend was to respond physically. The magician swallowed and said, “I had Charax pen them up before he left ahead of your arrival. I’ll need them later, or one of them.”
Corylus smiled faintly. Varus had struck Lucinus off-balance in a socially proper, even courteous fashion as ably as Corylus could have done by slapping the fellow. The courts of Carce were losing an effective advocate by Varus’ disinclination to enter the profession.
Corylus stroked the bark of the peach tree. The dryad huddled within the trunk, a nervous shape within the shadows of his mind.
You’ll be all right,
he thought. The sprite couldn’t hear him, but the touch of his hand seemed to soothe her.
Corylus’ mother had been a hazel sprite, or so Pulto had told him; he’d never discussed it with his father. He had been born with an affinity for trees, and the magic bathing Carce in recent months brought Corylus increasingly closer to that half of his ancestry.
“I told you about Melino,” Lucinus said. He bent to pick up another clod and crushed it with his thumb. “He has returned to the Waking World with the demon ring. My uncle sent him to bring it from the Otherworld, but Melino stole it himself. The demon gives him great power, but the ring alone does not have sufficient power to loose the Worms.”
Lucinus tossed the pulverized clod into the air as a yellow-gray haze. He muttered under his breath,
“Flames dance in her marrow and lust wounds her breast!”
The vision sucked Corylus in wholly, and the world around him vanished. He was watching a dinner party. He didn’t recognize any of the men, but Hedia and Alphena reclined on the right-hand couch and the handsome youth on the cross couch was in animated conversation with Hedia.
They were flirting. Corylus didn’t have to hear the words to know that from the body language, from the gestures, from Hedia’s flashing smiles. She looked radiant.
“That was last night,”
said Lucinus’ voice, filling the image. The words had no echo.
The vision sucked into a vortex, then re-formed as a rented sedan chair made its way down the Naples Road out of Puteoli. The curtains were drawn, concealing the female passenger’s face and torso.
“Melino has become a demon,”
Lucinus said,
“and he works through a demon. He gains power for his magic by blood and pain, and he uses a female counterpart to effect his spells.”
The sedan chair in the vision stopped in front of a house of moderate size with a high-walled garden in the rear. There was nothing exceptional about the dwelling save for the pair of guards wearing swords and body armor who were lounging in the entryway. That wasn’t strictly illegal—the armed men were on the householder’s property—but it was extremely unusual and risked being reported to the imperial authorities.
The Emperor spent more time on the island of Capri, nearby in the Bay of Puteoli, than he did in Carce, and he was a notably paranoid man. Corylus for one wouldn’t want to presume on what the Emperor considered sufficient evidence that someone was planning the armed overthrow of the Republic.
“In order to release the Worms,”
Lucinus said,
“Melino must gain the
Book
, which my uncle replaced on Zabulon’s Isle. He is enlisting a confidante to help him do this—and to destroy all life thereby.”
The woman from the hired chair was concealed beneath a full veil, but a servant had been walking behind the vehicle. She followed her mistress up the flagstone walk. The servant was unquestionably Syra, Hedia’s chief maid.
“This will happen today,”
Lucinus said.
“In days or even hours, Melino will have the
Book
unless I can forestall him. That is all the time we have, and all therefore that Mankind has!”
The vision twisted into itself, drawing Corylus’ soul with it for an instant. He was back in Lucinus’ garden, back in the Waking World. Gasping, he fell to his knees, then reached out to grip the rough trunk of the peach tree again. This time the touch of the wood was to settle him rather than to settle the faintly smiling sprite within.
Corylus opened his eyes—he didn’t remember closing them—and got to his feet. To his surprise Varus seemed undisturbed by the experience; he was helping to support Lucinus, who was even more wrung out by this experience than he had been by the vision he had created the day before.
“Are you all right?” Varus said to the magician.
“Yes, yes,” said Lucinus snappishly. “Just let me get my balance. There.”
He straightened and stepped away from Varus. Stress explained his tone, but Corylus wasn’t—he realized with a smile—willing to give Lucinus the benefit of the doubt.
Though at this point—his smile faded—Corylus was furiously angry with Melino, whom he had never met. In all logic, he had even less reason for that than he did for disliking Lucinus.
Lucinus walked inside without asking his guests to accompany him. Varus looked at Corylus and raised an eyebrow; Corylus grinned—seeing the magician’s exhaustion had improved his mood—and gestured his friend ahead of him.
Lucinus seated himself on a chair facing the table and apparently realized for the first time that there were only two chairs in the room. He looked startled.
“Gaius, you take it,” Corylus said. He backed against the sidewall and waited, holding his staff. Plaster that had flaked off the brick core crunched under his heavy sandals. He wondered what sort of frescoes had once decorated the house of Carce’s greatest poet.
Lucinus looked at Corylus. In a fierce voice he said, “Melino is using Lady Hedia to gain Zabulon’s
Book
. His spells protect the interior of his dwelling from my observation, but you’re a man.
You
can imagine what is going on—besides the magic.”
Corylus didn’t speak. He kept his face expressionless—he hoped it was expressionless—as he glanced at Varus.
“I don’t believe…,” Varus said in a deliberate voice, “that my mother could be coerced into aiding in harmful magic. As for what else the Lady Hedia may do, that is none of my business until she requests me to become involved. As for you…”
He gave Lucinus a slight smile. It looked like an expression one might see on the face of a reptile.
“If you make any further comment which could be considered a reflection on my mother’s character, I will have you punished. I would not dirty my own hands with you—”
“I would,” Corylus snarled.
I really
am
angry.
“—but I will have some of Father’s servants beat you to whatever they consider a sufficient degree. Do you understand?”
“I understand,” said Lucinus. To Corylus’ surprise, he smiled also—much as he had when Corylus and his friend started up the walk. “Now, Lord Varus: Do
you
understand? Do you understand that unless I have your help, Melino will gain the
Book
and will have the power to do whatever he wishes?”
He paused. “You do not have to believe me that he, or at any rate the demon wearing his flesh, wishes to destroy all life, though that is true,” he said. “But that Melino will have the power to do whatever he wishes—do you believe
that
?”
Corylus believed him. He didn’t like Lucinus—the fellow was bumptious and patronizing—but he was completely believable, as much because of his flaws as despite them. He seemed too full of himself to see the need of lying, and he was beyond question a magician.
But it wasn’t Corylus’ decision. He said nothing, instead looking again at his friend.
“What do you envisage me doing?” Varus said quietly, meeting Lucinus’ eyes.
“We will go to Carce,” Lucinus said. “I have arranged for us to begin our real journey there. If we can leave soon—”
He gestured, apparently indicating the garden and the visions he had created in it.
“—it would be better than not.”
“We can leave tomorrow morning,” Varus said. “I’ll inform Father that I’m returning to Carce in normal fashion. There’s no reason to concern him.”
“And I’m coming with you,” Corylus said, his fingers tightening on his cornelwood staff. He glared at the magician.
“As you wish, master,” Lucinus said with a shrug. “You may do anything you please here in the Waking World. When Lord Varus and I set out for Zabulon’s Isle, however, you will have to find your own way. The boat will only hold two, so you could not join us. Not even if you were a magician greater than me.”
“Gaius?” Corylus said. “Is that true?”
Varus looked at him sadly. “I don’t know, Publius,” he said. “I’m not a magician. At least not a magician by study; I don’t know what I am now.”
His face hardened. “I think it may be true,” he said. “I would be very glad of your company, my friend, but just for your presence. I’m not concerned about Master Lucinus attacking me.”
“There will be much to fear,” Lucinus said, smiling at Corylus. “Nothing that your undoubted strength would be of any use against, however.”
Varus lifted his chin in agreement. “Stay home, Publius,” he said. “There’s enough happening that I don’t doubt you’ll find a use for your talents.”
“There is one thing that Master Corylus could do that is beyond my abilities and yours, Lord Varus?” Lucinus said, cocking an eyebrow at Varus.
“Speak, then!” Varus said.
“Melino has protected his dwelling and garden against spells,” Lucinus said, including Corylus in his explanation. “But he has guards who live in separate housing, and he has gardeners come in to care for the herbs growing behind the house. A man of Master Corylus’ sort might be able to talk to the servants when they’re off-duty and learn something about his plans.”
“There’s an umbrella pine in the back corner of Melino’s garden,” Corylus said, recalling the vision. “Yes, that’s something I might be able to help with.”
“I’ll leave our house on the Bay at dawn,” Varus said to the magician. Corylus noted again that while his friend was a scholar in all senses of the term, he didn’t dither in making up his mind. “I’ll pick you up. Have whatever you need ready to load. If there’ll be more than will fit in two carriages, tell me now.”
“I will have very little,” Lucinus said. “I’ll need one of the goats, but I think I will take both for safety’s sake.”
“As you please,” said Varus. He raised an eyebrow. “Publius? Do you have more to do here?”
“Let’s go,” Corylus said, gesturing his friend toward the door and the waiting cart.
Corylus had work to do back in Puteoli. He grinned at the thought.
He had no right to be jealous of Melino’s friendship with Hedia. Hedia had made a very clear offer to Corylus when they first met, and Corylus—who had done foolish things, but never anything as foolish as becoming involved with a senator’s wife, let alone the mother of his closest friend—had rejected her.
Nevertheless, Corylus
was
jealous. He was too intelligent to deny that truth even when it was embarrassing to him.
He grinned more broadly.
* * *
“
Y
OUR DAUGHTER HAS COME HOME,
Your Ladyship,” Syra said quietly to Hedia. “Balbinus himself is escorting her to you, as you requested.”
Hedia nodded without turning around. She hadn’t directed the chief steward—or anyone else—to escort Alphena to her when she returned; she had merely said that when Lady Alphena arrived she should be informed that her mother would like to see her. Hedia hoped the girl wouldn’t be offended by the servants’ presumption, but it couldn’t be helped now.
Realistically, someone who was determined to be upset could always find a reason. That would have been a description of Alphena a few months ago, but more recently the girl had been a pleasure to be around. She remained her own person with her own interests, skills, and opinions, but she had ceased to be a screeching brat.
Which made the coming discussion all the harder.
“Yes, Mother?” Alphena said as she walked around the marble bench where Hedia sat facing the fishpond. “Balbinus said you wanted to see me.”
Hedia turned. She intended to offer a pleasant smile anyway, but the sight of the steward on the back porch of the house with an agonized expression brought her to the edge of open laughter. Obviously, Alphena had decided she didn’t need an escort to find the fishpond and had made her wishes known to Balbinus in a sufficiently forceful fashion.