Marius nodded. “I have long suspected that some among my cohort maintain special and secret contacts among the Seekers.”
“Like you’ve maintained me?”
“Just so,” he said and sipped his tea, as if he had not discerned the venom in her words. “That’s why secrecy was imperative in my dealings with you, Deirdre. I could not hide from the Philosophers the fact that you were in contact with one of us. But as long as you didn’t know which of us it was you were communicating with, then they couldn’t know either. And since Phoebe—and no doubt most if not all of the others—have such illicit helpers within the Seekers, none would dare press too hard to learn who you were in contact with, lest their own minions be exposed.”
“What a trusting bunch you are,” Deirdre said, making no effort to disguise the irony in her voice.
Marius laughed. “Oh, we’re a perfect family all right. We all loathe one another, and we’d each have murdered the others outright centuries ago if we were not all of us bound to one another.”
“Only now you have me to do your dirty work.”
He did not look at her, instead gazing out the window at the failing day. “They’re close, Deirdre. For centuries they’ve searched for the Philosopher’s Stone. They crave it above all else. And now it’s within their reach.”
“Immortality,” Deirdre breathed. “That’s what you mean, isn’t it?
Philosopher’s Stone
is just a name alchemists give to a substance that can bestow perfection and immortality.”
“Yes, true immortality—like that possessed by the Sleeping Ones.” His lip curled in disgust. “Now, if we did not drink a sip of their blood at least once a decade, we would grow decrepit and die. Nor are we truly safe from death. Illness and age cannot harm us, but we might still be slain. However, the Sleeping Ones themselves are perfect. They do not decay, but remain ever beautiful. And when they are wounded, their golden bodies heal instantly. That’s what the others desire for themselves.”
“And you don’t?” Deirdre couldn’t keep her voice from edging into a sneer.
“No,” he said, meeting her eyes. “I don’t.”
There was no reason to believe him. He had shrouded himself in mystery for more than three years, manipulating her to suit his ends. All the same, she did believe him.
“You want to keep them from reaching it,” she said. “You want to stop them from getting to Eldh and finding what it was that made the Sleeping Ones immortal. From finding Orú.”
The change was sudden. The smooth demeanor, the languid motions were gone. He slammed down his cup and clenched a fist, banging it on the arm of the chair. “They do not deserve it! They are fools and devils, and they are not worthy of everlasting life. No one on this Earth is. And if anyone could possibly be worthy of such a thing, then it was—”
He didn’t speak the name, but it sounded in her mind all the same.
Alis.
After a long moment she spoke. “That was Travis’s sister’s name, you know. Alice. He loved her more than anything. She was only a girl when she died. He believed it was his fault. For the longest time, he didn’t forgive himself. Only then . . .” She smiled, thinking of Travis. “He did.”
Marius leaned back in the chair, the rage gone, those gold eyes haunted. “I know,” he said, his voice soft. “I know.”
Deirdre was no longer full of awe. Marius was a Philosopher; he was over three hundred years old. However, he was still a man, and after reading the journal she felt, at least in some small way, that she knew him.
“You’re still not telling me the whole truth about why you’ve kept your identity a secret,” she said, and she knew that once again it was her Wise Self speaking. “I can understand you needed to be certain none of the Philosophers knew which one of their number I was in contact with, but that wouldn’t have prevented you from letting me read that journal. I think by now you know I can keep a secret, and you could have given it to me without their knowledge. So why didn’t you tell me the truth about the Seekers sooner?”
His eyes were intent upon her. “But don’t you see? I couldn’t simply give you the answers to all these mysteries. You’re clever, Deirdre, and you have deep powers of intuition. I knew, if given just a few crumbs, you would discover the answers yourself. And in so doing, I hoped you would solve the mysteries I myself have not been able to answer all these years.”
Deirdre clutched the arms of her chair. “You mean just like the way you watched Alis Faraday, wondering if she would discover her otherworldly nature on her own?”
The words were sharp, and she could see how they stung him, but she did not soften her tone. “You’ve used me, Marius. You used me just like they used Alis—just like they used you. And it could have killed me. It nearly did, several times over. Only you still kept the truth from me. Why?” Her voice rose into a snarl. “What did you hope I’d learn?”
“The answer to everything.”
All the anger rushed out of her in a soft gasp. “
What?
”
He learned forward in his chair, a fervent light in his gold eyes. “They’re waiting for something, Deirdre. The Sleeping Ones. For over three thousand years they’ve lain there in their stone sarcophagi in peaceful repose, their eyes shut, arms folded over their breasts, their skin as smooth as polished gold.”
As he spoke, it was as if she could see them reflected in his eyes. She leaned forward herself, her face drawing near his.
“Phoebe and the others, they believe the slumber of the Seven is eternal. But I don’t. I believe they’re simply waiting for the moment when they will awake. And I think that moment will soon come.”
“Perihelion,” Deirdre said, once again understanding when perhaps she shouldn’t. “You think they’re waiting for perihelion.”
An eager light illuminated his face. “Yes. For centuries I’ve studied the symbols written on the walls of the tomb where we found them. It was in their tomb that we found the clay tablet, the one whose photo I gave you. The others left the task of translating the symbols to me, for it had been my master’s work, and the rest of them were too bored by such a tedious chore. Through the tomb writings, I learned much of the story of the Sleeping Ones. And I rejoiced when what I learned was confirmed by your own reports, the ones in which you described the history of Morindu as told by the woman Vani. I knew my theory was correct—that the Sleeping Ones indeed came from the otherworld, and that they are waiting for a time when they can return.”
Deirdre tried to absorb this. Marius’s story made sense. The Seven of Orú had been forced to flee Morindu after interring it beneath the desert sands; surely they had intended to return to their home someday. And now that day was coming. Perihelion approached; things long buried were coming to light. “But they don’t have to wait for perihelion to return to Morindu,” she said aloud. “They could use the arch—the gate.”
Marius shook his head. “I don’t think they’re waiting just to return home. From what I deciphered in the tomb, I believe that when the worlds draw near enough the Sleeping Ones will awaken.”
“And then what will they do?”
“My master believed they sought some sort of transmutation.”
“You mean like alchemy?”
“Yes, like alchemy in a way. I believe the Sleeping Ones seek to transmute something. Only what it is, and what they wish to transform it into, the tomb writings did not tell me. Nor did the symbols indicate what catalyst the Seven will use to bring about the transformation.”
Deirdre had studied alchemy in her first days as a Seeker; given the origins of the order, it was something of a prerequisite. She thought back to everything she had learned. “The catalyst—that’s something that permits a base substance to be evolved into a state of perfection. Except the catalyst itself isn’t changed by the transformation. It’s like the—”
“Like the fabled Philosopher’s Stone, yes. The catalyst is that which will grant the Philosophers true and perfect immortality. But in so doing, the catalyst itself will remain unchanged.”
Deirdre considered this. Orú’s blood could cause transformation; a single drop had changed Travis into a sorcerer. Only how much of it had the Seven of Orú drunk? Surely they had consumed great quantities. What transformations might be worked with it? For some reason, she found herself murmuring the final words to a song. “ ‘Then after fire and wonder, we end where we began.”
Marius stood up. “What’s that?”
She looked up. “It’s a song that originated on the otherworld. A copy of it was found among James Sarsin’s—”
“Yes, yes, I know the song. I’ve read it many times over.” His gaze seemed to cut her like a gold knife. “But why do you sing it now?”
The back of her neck prickled. Her subconscious had made a connection, one her conscious mind had not yet grasped. What was it? She leaned back in the chair, thinking aloud. “It was the phrase
fire and wonder
that made me stumble onto that computer file. The girl in black—Child Samanda—told me to seek them as I journeyed. So once I received Echelon 7 clearance, I performed a search on those words, and a file came up, an archive from the year you died.” She winced. “Or became a Philosopher, I suppose. Only the file was deleted before I could read it.” She glanced up at him. “So what was in that file?”
“My final report as a Seeker,” he said, waving a hand dismissively. “Everything it contained was in the journal, and more.”
She nodded. No wonder the Philosophers had not wanted her to read it. “Paul Jacoby was able to translate the words
fire and
wonder
on the stone arch. That reminded me of the missing file, and it was studying the name of the file that led me to you, and to this place.”
Marius was pacing before the fire now, shaking his tawny hair like a lion’s mane. “I know all that. By why did you sing the song now? It’s those instincts of yours. You’ve made a connection, haven’t you?” He stopped, gripped the arms of her chair, and leaned down, his face inches from her own. He smelled sharp, like lightning. “What is it? What has your clever mind put together?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know. I—”
“You
do
know, Deirdre. What is it? What were you thinking?”
The words tumbled out of her. “The song—it’s just that in a way it’s like what you said about the catalyst. How in the end it’s the same, unchanged.”
He pushed away from the chair. “Sing it,” he said. “All of it.”
She was afraid she wouldn’t remember the words. Only they came to her lips easily, and she sang in a quavering voice:
“We live our lives a circle,
And wander where we can.
Then after fire and wonder,
We end where we began.
“I have traveled southward,
And in the south I wept.
Then I journeyed northward,
And laughter there I kept.
“Then for a time I lingered,
In eastern lands of light,
Until I moved on westward,
Alone in shadowed night.
“I was born of springtime,
In summer I grew strong.
But autumn dimmed my eyes,
To sleep the winter long.
“We live our lives a circle,
And wander where we can.
Then after fire and wonder,
We end where we began.”
The last verse faded into silence. Marius was pacing again, a fist clenched to his chest, murmuring the words of the song. At last he stopped, looking at her. “What does it mean?”
Understanding tickled in the back of her brain, but it fluttered out of reach every time she tried to grasp it. “I suppose it’s about beginnings, and about endings. And how maybe they’re the same thing.”
Only they wouldn’t be the same thing anymore, would they? Not if the rifts in the cosmos continued to grow. Not if scientists like Sara Voorhees were right, and the rifts signified the end of the universe—of all possible universes. Then there would be no ending or beginnings. There would be only . . . nothing. Didn’t the Philosophers understand? If the rifts kept growing, there would be no world left for them to dwell in as immortals.
But Marius had said they were blinded by their quest; they could think of nothing else. Or did they believe that by going to Eldh they could escape Earth and destruction? She shuddered and reached for her teacup, taking a sip to warm her, only it had gone cold.
Marius sank back into his chair. “I had hoped we’d have more time to try to understand what it is the Sleeping Ones are waiting for, what it is they mean to do. But perihelion comes, and it has brought the gate to light. The Philosophers mean to use it to travel to the otherworld. That’s why I led you here, Deirdre, why I let you read the journal. It’s why I’m speaking to you now, despite the peril. There’s no more use in secrecy. At this very moment, in London, the Philosophers await the delivery of seven crates that have been shipped from Crete. I think you can guess what those crates contain.”
She could. “How did they get the sarcophagi out of the archaeological site? It has to be guarded, and I can’t believe the authorities on Crete would simply let priceless artifacts be shipped out of the country.”
He gave her a scornful look. “Honestly, Deirdre, do you think such things are difficult for us? Our wealth and resources are beyond your imagining, amassed over centuries. And the Seekers are hardly the only servants of the Philosophers. We have contacts in nearly every government in the world—contacts who can be directed to do as we wish with a single letter, phone call, or electronic message. How do you think we’ve so easily arranged passports and new identities in the past?”
Deirdre shuddered. In that moment she remembered that he was a Philosopher. “And do they know how to operate the gate?”
“Yes, they do. That much they learned from their experiments with the folk at Greenfellow’s Tavern.”
His words made Deirdre sick. “How long?” she said.
“The crates are to arrive in London tomorrow. The location is here.”
He handed her a slip of paper. She stared as if he had handed her a kipper. “What do you want me to do with this?”
“You know what I want.”