ã€ŠWealthgiverã€‹


 Prologue: The Maiden and the Wealthgiver

    1868, October 15

    Kori Chthamali was sixteen when she realized that the myth of Persephone was about her.

    "Now, Hades was the eldest son of Chronos and master of the underworld," Madame the Classics teacher had said. "Attributes: scepter, cornucopia, rooster, key, Cerberus, the dog-skin cap of invisibility, snakes, narcissus, cypress. Also called Polyd¨¦gmon, ''Host of Many,'' Plo¨²t¨­n, ''Wealthy,'' Ploutodot?r, ''Giver of Wealth.''" His bride was Persephone, also called K¨®r¨¥, Maiden, whom he carried off."

    That was all Kori needed. The prophetess of the Good went out upon the Earth to learn and returned to the Sacred Depths every winter. When she bore a daughter, she stayed, and that daughter went out in her place. Knowing that, Kori had never once wondered who her father might have been, or who the father of her children might one day be. Kori had felt as if she''d walked into a wall.

    Now, as she climbed the slope of the graveyard, Kori berated herself again for her naivety. Ten years in a Balkan cave learning the mysteries and disciplines of the Good, and the third Classics lessons in a Swiss boarding school taught her what any of it meant. Hadn''t she been listening during her initiation? Hadn''t she known who it was whose words had poured from her mother''s mouth?

    Kori stopped herself. Her gaze rose, captured by the Moon and the thought that opened like a pit before her. She would fall into that thought upon waking, or eating, or walking between classes. Her mother was dead. Now, when Kori finally understood her purpose, there was no one left to ask about it. Carried off by Hades, indeed.

    She lowered her gaze to the ground, laden with sticks and dry leaves, rocks that might roll and make a sound.

    Kori put her arm over her face, tucking her eyes into the hollow of her elbow to block out the Moon. On the hillside cemetery far from her home, she flexed her toes in her shoes, and breathed, and listened.

    Sounds returned from the Earth below, were lost in the empty sky above. A mountain rose under Kori, but it turned about another, the Mountain that hid her people. A few old men and children stared into the dark, asking their questions with no one to speak the answers. Their old Mistress was dead, and their Maiden was in a boarding school in Switzerland.

    This is fear. Fear of being trapped.

    Kori saw herself as if from above. She struggled against bonds she hadn''t known existed. Behind her stood a figure of deepest black: her only certainty.

    Her lips moved soundlessly: how can I escape?

    The answer came like an echo: your kidnapping.

    Kori had been raised to believe that fate was a gift. The Wealthgiver pushed things out of the ground¡ªgold, wheat, plagues¡ªand left the rest to mortals. Now that Kori understood her fate, how should she use that knowledge? The answer was the same every time Kori asked: your kidnapping.

    The October wind chilled her, but heat still rose from the Earth. The smell of dying leaves was like wine in her nose, and the Moon raged unopposed in a cloudless sky. Even the stars were banished by that terrible shine.

    Normally, under a full Moon, Kori would shield her eyes and use her ears to navigate. Better, she would keep a stone roof over her head to block the influence of the goddess of insanity. Tonight, she was grateful for the unholy light. It allowed her to see and step around the fallen leaves, and it might dazzle her pursuers.

    No, she told herself. There would be no pursuit. Her guardians would be watching the girl Kori had convinced to sleep in her bed. Or they would be at the train station, having found the receipt for the tickets she had bought. In the library, where she had been found on her last attempt at evasion.

    Kori''s eyes skipped from gravestone to tomb roof to wind-whipped treetop. Flinched away from moonlight. A life was at stake. How could she be sure? She could not. Certainty was impossible above the Earth. One could only take the gifts that came into her hands, and run with them.

    Nikolai was waiting for Kori, sitting on a stone bench in front of a grave, the moonlight shining on his hair. Kori glanced up, wincing. The goddess of insanity might protect them, might keep away the devout agents of the Good, she hoped. Or else she was mad herself, and had doomed this boy to die.

    He was from Moscow, an orphan, and technically a prince. She found him sitting in a corner, reading, during one of their schools'' periodic dances. Kori had sidled up to him, seen the title of his book¡ª?¦Ò¦Ó¦Ï¦Ñ?¦Á¦É¡ªand loudly quoted: "For if one were to offer men to choose out of all the customs in the world such as seemed to them the best, they would examine the whole number, and end by preferring their own." From there, they had worked out a system of correspondence.

    There were policies in place specifically to prevent unsupervised conversations between the young ladies of the school with young gentlemen, but Kori was the heiress of more than thirteen centuries of cryptic ritual and espionage. She could use a Vigen¨¨re cipher.

    Nikolai had taken to the game easily. He was expected to serve his government one day as a civil engineer, but every moment he wasn''t doing the minimum required to scrape by in his mathematics and physics classes, he devoted to philology. Latin, Greek, Sanskrit, and the relations between them.

    For more reasons than one, therefore, Nikolai was delighted to come to Kori''s school''s library and examine Gothic psalms or Zoroastrian gathas. He would leave notes of page and verse numbers, which would lead Kori to words in Herodotus'' Histories. Kori would drop her notes in a specific wastepaper basket the morning before Nikolai was due to arrive, and check for responses pressed between the pages of a book in the library. She had loved that library.The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

    But Nikolai was a good choice for several reasons. First, he was an orphan, and his paternal great uncle in Moscow cared more for his historic collection of cavalry sabers than for his ward. Nikolai had resources without many strings attached to them. Second, he was quite tall, and in fact Kori didn''t know very many other young men who might carry her off. Third, Kori knew exactly how to snare this boy''s interest.

    "Meet me behind the cathedral at midnight," her most recent message had read. "Bring clothes and money. The Thracians are after me."

    Nikolai could not resist correcting a misapprehension. "The Thracians cannot be after you," he said, hands clasping hers. "I looked it up after I got your message. The last tribe of the Thracians were the Bessi, who Christianized in the fourth century, then died out. Did you make a mistake with the cipher?"

    Kori knew that "no, I did not make a mistake," would not be the most useful response. Instead, she said breathlessly, "You''ve researched them?"

    "Oh, yes. As much as I could find." The boy shrugged like a griffon vulture. "There isn''t much. Herodotus mentions them. A wild and warlike people; worshipers of Ares and Dionysus."

    Kori lowered her lashes and smiled at a patch of shadowed Earth. Not any more, we aren''t.

    "Their language is almost entirely unknown, of course. Some glosses. Some borrowings into Greek. Rhamph?, the hooked beak of a bird of prey, and rhomph¨¢ia, a curved Thracian sword ¡­"

    Kori''s neck prickled at the memory of cold water around her hips. The burning chill of the sickle-shaped blade around her wrist. Kori''s blood had been the only hot thing in that deep, cold cavern.

    "Herodotus mentions the god Zalmoxis, which Porphyrius says is from zalm¨®s, possibly cognate to English helm and Sanskrit ?¨¢rman."

    The dog-skin cap of invisibility. The shroud on the face of the priest as he said, "Press your thumb to the wound." Kori kept her face a mask, but she remembered the blood running down her wrist, the only hot thing in that deep, cold cavern.

    "And another deity name," said Nikolai. "Pleistoros. It could mean ''The Extreme One.''"

    The pronunciation wasn''t right, but it was close enough to spell death for a Fool. Kori held her breath. Kori''s right ear pricked. Was that the rustle of a hedgehog in the rose-bush behind the tomb? Was that a fox breathing on the slope behind her, or was she about to kill this boy?

    No attack came. No sounds in the cemetery but hers and his.

    "It means ''Giver of Wealth,''" Kori said, resigning them both to their fate.

    "Well!" said Nikolai. "Indeed, it could. If you assume the devoicing of the¡ªwhy are you grabbing at me like that?"

    Kori put her face close to his, cheek by cheek, and whispered. "Me ¨¦ma B¨¦ssatsa."

    "B¨¦ssatsa," Nikolai repeated. "Now that is interesting."

    "We are the Good," she said. "We have been hiding for fifteen hundred years."

    Nikolai pulled back and glanced around the silent cemetery. "Is this a game?"

    "Listen. There aren''t many of us left. All of us, aside from spies sent out to learn the ways of the Fools, live around and under the western Rhodope mountains in the Ottoman Vilayet of Edirne."

    "I know where¡ª"

    "Sht! We kill any Fools¡ªoutsiders¡ªwho might discover us." Kori spoke lower, faster, rushing to get out the words she had prepared. "We are delvers for gold and secrets, herders of sheep and men. For fifteen hundred years we have twisted the great game of empires toward the revealed will of The Wealthgiver and his wife."

    Nikolai leaned back, head on one side. "And you are," he said, "A princess of these¡­Pluto-worshiping Thracian cultists?"

    "We don''t say ''Thracian,''" said Kori, "and I''m not a princess. My destiny is to speak the words that the gods pour into me."

    "These gods being Hades," said Nikolai thoughtfully, "and Perseophone."

    "Yes, but what if that isn''t my destiny?" With an effort, Kori kept her voice low. "What if I''ve been miscast in this role? Shouldn''t I escape," she asked, "and find something better to do?"

    Nikolai hung his head, curly hair falling between his eyes and hers. "That''s the question I ask myself, too."

    "I know." She took his hands. "You feel the same way I do. We can spend the night in a tomb, and then tomorrow, while they''re searching the rail stations, we can hire a coach."

    "Ha." Nikolai smiled bitterly, and turned his face up and away. Chill moonlight washed his forehead, his nose. "I''ve had similar plans myself. But even my uncle would send someone to retrieve me. What would your worshipers do?"

    "Not my worshipers." Although the priests'' agents would indeed hound her to the ends of the Earth. Kori shook the thought off. "I don''t care," she declared. "They can find a new avatar of Persephone."

    "Avatar?" Only now did he look at her. "Does the goddess really speak to you? Is she really real?"

    Kori had often imagined revealing herself to a Fool, but she hadn''t thought he would be so desperate. What was it that made this prince look like a orphan begging from a gutter? "She is more than real."

    "How do you know? How can you know for certain that she isn''t just a myth?"

    Kori''s throat ached at the need in his voice. She tried to comfort him. Words. He liked the histories of words. "Myths are what is mysterious, and mysteries are truths that are hidden." That was what the priests had told her, at least.

    "Yes!" said Nikolai. "That is so. Can you show me these truths? Can I hear the gods speak to me as well?"

    Kori tried to think of an answer that would bring them back to the essential problem of escaping. Her eyes caught on a shadow behind the tomb. Was that another gravestone, or a concealed head rising? She shoved the fears away, remembering her vision. The solid, black figure behind her, and the answer to her question: your kidnapping!

    "No," she said. "I speak for the goddess and the priests interpret what she makes me sing. Nikolai, stand up."

    He obeyed. "Can I do that, then? Can I be one of your priests?"

    "No." Kori could not think to answer. Chill terror lapped up her legs, as if she stood in a pool. That was not the sound of a hedgehog in the rose-bush. That was an agent of the Good. They knew she was here. They had followed her. She had been insane to hope. "No, you can''t."

    "But please! I can learn the mysteries. I can join your people. Go on, ask your gods." Nikolai spread his arms, but not to sweep her up and carry her away. Looking up at the sky, the lonely boy spun, head tilted back, demanding answers from the sky. "Just tell me what I have to do!"

    And a man stepped out from behind a tomb. He was dressed in dark, tightly-fitted clothes and wore a shroud below his eyes. The curved dagger in his hand flashed silver as it rose for the strike.

    She stepped in front of Nikolai, but Kori could not defend him with her body. The assassins were all around them, and a dagger punched between his ribs would work just as well as one ripped across his throat.

    "Stop!" she ordered in Good, although she knew that would not help either. It was death for a Fool to hear the Good language, and Kori was no princess to order these men about. She was only their prophetess.

    So she closed her eyes, shut out the light, and spoke.

    <blockquote>X¨¥th¨®peti p¨®s ia?</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("With Master at hand")</blockquote>

    <blockquote>stas zyn X¨¥th¨®pania</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("The Mistress will stand")</blockquote>

    "What was that?" asked Nikolai. "Then, who are you?" He had finally noticed the assassins.

    "My Maiden," hissed a voice from behind her ear. "From what source issue those words? Why did you bring us here?" And, more practically. "Who is this Fool?"

    "Brother Theodoros." She recognized the other by his pattern of breathing. "Brother Murad. This boy is mine. The Master will stand behind the Mistress. When I am Mistress." Her voice was too high. She strengthened it. "Would you work against this oracle of the gods?"

    They clicked their tongues, calling forth echoes from the stones, considering.

    "Kori," asked Nikolai, "what are you saying to them? Who are these men?"

    She turned to him. "Nikolai, I''m sorry. I was wrong. You will have to come with us," she said. "And you may never leave our Holy Mountain."

    "Stay with you, you mean?"

    Kori shook her head, teeth gritted. "You don''t understand. We can''t escape. It is my fate to speak for the gods, and you - "

    He took her hands. "It''s alright!" he said. "Kori, I want this! My Lady, I am yours."

    A weight settled onto Kori''s shoulders. A weight like a mountain filled with souls.

    "The correct form of address," she said, "is ''My Maiden.''"

 1: Escape

    1878, March 4

    The Simeonoglou House stood on the shore of the Sea of Marmara, in what was probably still the Ottoman Empire, surrounded by Russian troops. One of these, Junior Physician and Baron Andrei Trifonovich Voropayevski, dragged his boots across the threshold of the house''s dining room and tried to pull himself to attention.

    The previous owners of this room had once entertained here, but now the smells of meat and wine were, like the tables, buried under paper. Stacks surrounded the uniformed man before Andrei, who still hadn''t looked up. His head down, he scratched his pen methodically across the bottom of a document.

    Andrei could not be the one to speak first. He rubbed the back of his neck and tried not to calculate the number of hours he''d gone without sleep. It was, it seemed, morning. This silver spring light didn''t come till April back in Russia. It played across the water of the bay and the British warships that floated there.

    The guard to the left of the door stifled a yawn, and it was all Andrei could do not to yawn back. He looked down, blearily watching the patterns and boot prints on the carpet. His hands, chapped from too many washings with bad soap in frozen water, clenched around the coins in his pocket.

    Don''t jingle them, Doctor. Don''t slouch.

    Andrei didn''t know he''d muttered the words aloud until the other guard made a noise in his throat. A little laugh of fellow-feeling from a man whose job it was to keep his back straight all day and maybe kill somebody.

    The man at the desk set his pen aside and looked up, expression bland.

    "The Well Born Junior Physician, Captain, and Baron," the laughing guard announced, "Andrei Trifonovich Voropayevski."

    Andrei swayed and jingled. He should be in the field hospital, either preparing for surgery or conducting it. How many died, even now, as the Russian Imperial Army wasted its physician''s time?

    Better not to calculate that, Doctor. The number would only upset you.

    "The physician, yes," said the Major General. "Come." He had recently shaved his chin, which gleamed between a pair of voluminous brown muttonchops.

    Andrei tried to pull himself to attention again.

    Imagine a string, Doctor, he told himself. A marionette''s string, yes, and hooked to your spine. Would you prefer a noose?

    The door shut behind him.

    "Doctor. You operated on one Junior Unteroffizier¡­" The Major General glanced across the papers in front of him. "I don''t seem to have his name to hand, but you were the surgeon and the patient was under your observation while he recovered, is this not so?"

    Observation. Recovery. The words did evoke some distant memory. When was the last time Andrei had seen a nurse in a starched uniform? The medical rail car in Romania? When he closed his eyes, Andrei saw a knee. He would hold it here and press the saw blade there.

    "Junior Physician!"

    Andrei rubbed his hand over his face. "Pardon, sir?"

    "I asked you why you didn''t think to bring your records with you."

    "Sir." There seemed to be more expected of him. Andrei squeezed it out. "The records are in a state such that collecting them and carrying them here would be, would constitute, I mean, a major logistical operation."

    "Enough of that humor, Captain."

    "Yes, sir."

    "This is a serious matter. This is death."

    "Serious," Andrei repeated. He wanted to ask this officious twit what he knew of death. Instead he used his remaining willpower to bottle up the horrible laughter he could feel bubbling in his belly.

    The Major General prodded a word on a particular sheet of paper. "Look here. You operated on a soldier, a Junior Unteroffizier, as I said, whose duty it was to stand guard outside the door to this very room."

    Andrei thought blearily of the guard who had yawned. Then, even as his own hand rose to his mouth, the realization swept down upon him. He didn''t know the Junior Unteroffizier''s name, either, but he did remember the patient. The babbler.

    "I didn''t operate," said Andrei in growing horror. "He has typhoid fever."

    "I know that." The Major General put a hand to his face and pulled irritably on his mutton-chops. "When I said ''operate,'' of course I was speaking broadly. You administered some sort of care, did you not, for this case of fever? What medications did you prescribe, Doctor? For example, willow tea?"

    Andrei would have laughed at that if his stomach hadn''t felt so full of ice. "Our supplies are quite limited, sir. The patient received boiled water and rest." Watering the corpses, the men called this treatment.

    The Major General let go of his whiskers. "I see. And what did he say?"

    Andrei''s hands trembled. A numb warmth like the first stages of frostbite traveled up his wrist. If only he could grab a scalpel and calm himself. "As far as I can recall, sir, the patient pleaded for death."

    The Major General flicked his fingers impatiently. "I won''t tell you again to control your sense of humor. Your patient, as I said. What did he tell you?"Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

    Andrei looked out the window, trying to think. He imagined the ships of the Crusaders sailing into this bay, heavy with impatient commanders.

    "The man under my care spoke, sir, but he was in no state to tell anyone anything," said Andrei. "He has been delirious since he was admitted to my care."

    "Yes." Light flashed across the Major General''s glasses as he nodded. "This would be yesterday morning?"

    "If you say so, sir."

    "I do say so. The patient was sent to the infirmary after chastisement for failing to muster at roll-call. He was found still in his billet." The Major General cleared his throat. "Is he infectious?"

    "Our first action with all new patients is to bathe them and crop their hair. The lice. Bedsheets and linens are not washed as often as they should, but insecticides¡ª"

    "Good, good, I''m sure." The Major General made a face and scratched at a muttonchop. "He is in a state of, what did you call it? Semi-consciousness?"

    "I believe I said delirium, sir."

    "He babbles, as I said. On what subjects?"

    Here it was. The Junior Unteroffizier had told Andrei to make it stop, to fetch a priest, to save his manhood. Maybe he''d thought he had syphilis. But that wasn''t what the Major General cared about. Andrei knew what occupied the man''s little mind. He''d know since he''d heard the words, "in this very room."

    It was in this room, two or perhaps three days ago, that the Treaty of San Stefano had been signed. With it, the representative of the Sultan had ceded the territory of his European lands to the Tsar.

    Oh, the new territory would be called autonomous, but Count Ignatyev had no intention of withdrawing his troops. The Russian Empire now extended, in fact if not yet on paper, to the Mediterranean.

    Andrei knew all this because one of the guards at the door had heard it. A guard who had waited until after the historic occasion to succumb to his fever. And in his fever, he babbled.

    What is more deadly than a fever, Doctor? A diplomat''s suspicions.

    "He told me." If this suspicion proved contagious as well as virulent, the Major General might well kill Andrei just for treating his patient. God damn him, but he was tired of this. "He told me nothing of consequence, sir."

    The Major General eyed him. His finger tapped his desk, but did not rise to point at Andrei''s chest. No hands seized the doctor from behind. "He speaks, you say,¡ªbabbles¡ªonly of personal matters?"

    "Yes, sir."

    "But you were not at his side the entire day and night, were you? And there are other men billeted within earshot." The Major General shuffled his papers as if consulting a list of all the army''s men and where they slept at all times. "Yes." He nodded to himself. "Better to overdo than underdo. And I did bring you all this way. It would be a shame if I sent you back with no orders."

    The Major General''s eyes flicked up and narrowed in annoyance. Andrei realized he was jingling his coins again, and stopped.

    "Junior Physician, you expect he will recover?"

    "Sir." Sweat chilled Andrei''s back. "If I can keep him from lapsing into a coma for the next two weeks, sir, maybe."

    "Very well." The expression of official annoyance did not change. "See to it that he does not."

    Andrei imagined the string around his neck, and kept himself upright. Metallic light reflected off the waters of the bay outside. This house had been built right up against the shore. A man could jump out that window and right into the Sea of Marmara.

    "The man is a traitor," the Major General continued. "He revealed state secrets during a war. Makes no sense to revive someone who''ll only be shot anyway. Two weeks is far too long. Remove the body from the bed so it can be given to a loyal soldier."

    "Remove the body." Andrei did not ask it as a question. He repeated the phrase in anger and disgust. That the man who had planned the Blockade of Plevna could now not muster the courage to say, "kill this man" in so many words. That this officer wasn''t even going to make up some excuse. Just call the patient a traitor and trust his doctor to murder him. The war wasn''t over; it had only turned around to gnaw on itself.

    The Major General tilted his head and light flashed again off his spectacles. "And of course you, Your Well Born, heard nothing of his ranting."

    A terrible cowardice seized Andrei. Fingers seemed to close around the back of his neck, and a deep, cool voice spoke through his mouth. "No, sir."

    Not "no, I will not kill my patient." Not, "no, kill me instead, because I''ll be a corpse before I''ll be a murderer."

    Andrei simply told his superior "no, sir." He had heard nothing. "Yes, sir." He would obey orders. "Yes, sir," and whatever else he needed to say to get out of this room. This house. This entire occupied territory!

    Andrei stumbled out of the Simeonoglou House and into the late morning sunlight. The sky burned blue between black branches of the trees in the mansion''s garden. Seawater washed the beach cobbles and a breeze blew through his coat to dry the sweat on his back. It was a beautiful God-damned day.

    Andrei shoved his shaking fingers into his pocket. The coins there.

    Better a corpse than a murderer? Better a traitor than a corpse. Better a deserter.

    Without a look at the house and its guards at his back, Andrei walked down the road until he found a Turk on horseback. It took a bit of walking.

    Andrei did not know how to say "sell me your animal" in Turkish, so he held out his fistful of coins and pointed at the ground. "Get down."

    The horseman looked down at Andrei and showed his teeth.

    "Coward!" Snarling, Andrei seized the sash around the man''s waist. Dense felt pressed against the nails of his hands. "Get down here! Take the coins. Para!"

    People were staring, but no one shouted. The horseman, although livid with rage, dared not defend himself. Andrei was a member of an occupying army, and he was no weakling. He hauled the Turk off his horse and forced gold down the collar of his undershirt.

    The horseman spat on the ground and dug for the coins as if to throw them in Andrei''s face, but by now Andrei was up on the horse. He looked down. The Turk started, made a sign against the Evil Eye, and ran off.

    It''s your face, Doctor. If only you could see yourself.

    Andrei did not pursue that line of thought. He only escaped.

 2: The Unseen is Seen

    Under the Holy Mountain, there floated a woman.

    Currents writhed slowly around her. Fumes rose from a three-legged burner on the edge of the underground pool, mixing the scent of sulfur with sheep fat, pine pitch, and mint. Drops of condensation formed and fell with a sound like tiny clocks. Their echoes scattered and rebounded across the six faces carved into the ceiling.

    The Maiden''s own face was slack. The surface slid up and down her sides, warm and cold. Her eyes were open, but could see nothing in the darkness. Behind those eyes: more darkness.

    Her people called themselves the Good. All of them but their spies lived around and under their Holy Mountain. They herded sheep, robbed travelers, delved the Sacred Depths, and used the gold they found to twist the game of empires toward the will of their Wealthgiver.

    Hot waves followed cold, down from the crown of Kori''s head, around her cheeks and throat. Her heart beat.

    A drop struck the water and clarity spread in every direction.

    Echoes defined a shape to the south: a new nation, hungry for land. To the north, another birthed itself, while empires to the East and West fractured along their own lines of language and history. Squeezed between them all, the Holy Mountain ran with rivers of red.

    Kori named the fear and it passed, revealing a sense below her of a great and sacred depth.

    "How can I protect my people?"

    Kori''s prayer hung between the water and the stone. Another drop fell from the nose of a graven face. Her heart beat and glowing spots flashed before her eyes. Glints of gold, she thought. The sheen of sunrise off gun barrels. She could guess whose hands held them. She could guess what she had to do. But.

    "But what if I am wrong?"

    The darkness around and within Kori did not answer in words. She simply knew: the opposite of growth is death.

    Whose growth? Whose death? Whose wealth and war? Kori''s hands lifted invisibly, pushing the rest of her body deeper into the water. "Yours, Master."

    The echo of the last word returned like confirmation.

    Kori swashed her legs around and found the floor with her toes. Wringing out her hair, she waded toward the door. Some of the images were already fading, but she held on to the red mountain and the glitter that ringed it. The interpretation of those symbols would be clear enough. After ten years of practice, the rhyme and scansion would come when she needed them.

    Her ears twitched. The priest waiting on the other side of the door was breathing too rapidly.

    "Elder brother," Kori called. "Nikolai. What worries you?"

    The breathing caught. A door opened in the darkness and a curtain parted. The tacks on a man''s slippers clicked on the stone floor.

    "The Maiden hears much." The words were in the Good language, the pronunciation impeccable. From their sound, the high priest stood far back from the pool, facing away from her.

    Nikolai had been Kori''s one girlish rebellion: an attempt to convert someone to the worship of the Wealthgiver. To turn a Fool into one of the Good. She had succeeded terribly.

    "My Maiden," he said. "What were you shown?"

    "You first." She climbed the steps out of the pool. "What news?"Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

    "News? No, I would not contaminate the Fruit-Bringer''s prophesy."

    Kori''s ears pricked at the disgust and anger in his voice. The worry. Nikolai sounded the way he did when someone spilled soup on the books, or forgot to put lye in his cham berpot. Something had worried him, and Nikolai had rushed, not to the library or a washroom, but to her.

    Kori clicked her tongue, illuminating the walls around them in harsh sound. She caught his flinch. "Nikolai, has something happened in San Stefano?"

    "My Maiden."

    That was relief. Kori couldn''t bully the other priests like this, but Nikolai was special. He was hers.

    The high priest cleared his throat. "Count Ignatyev and Saffet Pasha have signed the treaty."

    Kori capped the incense burner and picked up her robe. "Ignatyev stabbed Austria-Hungary and Germany in the back?"

    "As we knew he would." A smile in his voice. "He has put us within this so-called Principality of Bulgaria."

    And so the world intruded, exactly as Nikolai had warned. Kori held on to the memories of her vision and cinched her robe tight. "The western Powers will step in, with diplomats if not soldiers. We might find ourselves back in the Ottoman Empire, in Greece, or split down the middle by a new border."

    The old priests said it didn''t matter where Fools drew lines on their maps, but they were wrong. Census-takers roamed the mountains now, ethnographers, recruiters from revolutionary committees. The Good could no longer tell the Turks they were Sarakatsans, the Greeks they were Pomaks, the Bulgarians that they were Aromanians. Whatever new nation found itself in possession of Kori''s Mountain, it would demand to know what language its citizens spoke and what gods they worshiped.

    Metal and blood. Armies surrounded her, and behind her rose the shadow of Death.

    Kori inhaled as the poetry snapped into place.

    <blockquote>K¨­gai¨® i¨®</blockquote>

    <blockquote>P¨®des x¨¦nai. Dym¨®</blockquote>

    <blockquote>D¨®ubous tous me</blockquote>

    <blockquote>I¨¦rous phl¨¥st¨¦.</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("On Holy Mountain foreign Feet.")</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("You make Sacred Depths with smoke replete.")</blockquote>

    It was more like reciting lines than composing them.

    <blockquote>Porostreiyn ia?es</blockquote>

    <blockquote>¨¢paes t?s rh¨®daes</blockquote>

    <blockquote>Pephl¨®n i¨¥n t¨®us</blockquote>

    <blockquote>S¨¦lkanthas se stra?tous."</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("Rivers ruddy stream around")</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("The armies tugging at her gown.")</blockquote>

    "My Maiden." His voice swung past Kori as the priest turned. "The signs are clear." He turned again. "The Good stand poised at the peak of another war." He was pacing now, muttering to himself. "Assassination and bribery will not save us again. As I told them. The next international council might come together before the end of the year. We shall have to speed our preparations."

    "Wait," Kori said. "Why ''might?'' Don''t you know when the Powers will meet? What reaction from the Western ambassadors? What else did our spy tell you?"

    Nikolai stood at the curtain, hand on the door beyond. "He doesn''t know, My Maiden. He didn''t stay long enough in San Stefano to find out, but rode west immediately to bring us the news. He arrived only a little before this Russian soldier."

    "What Russian soldier?" asked Kori.

    "Oh." Kori''s mind was clear enough to detect the tremble in her high priest''s voice. "A Fool on the mountain. We watch him from the scopes even now."

    "Who is he?"

    "Some lost wanderer, My Maiden, whom the shepherds failed to turn away. Nothing."

    Something. Something more important than the Treaty of San Stefano, or at least in Nikolai felt it so. Otherwise his breath would not catch like this. His teeth would not grind. What was he hiding? Why was this stranger important?

    Kori opened her mouth to ask, and a word came to her in the ancient language. Another followed it, and she found her prophesy had been incomplete.

    <blockquote>X¨¥th¨®peti p¨®s ia?,</blockquote>

    <blockquote>Stas zyn X¨¥th¨®pania.</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("With Master at hand, the Mistress will stand.")</blockquote>

    Nikolai whirled toward her. "But," he said. "My Maiden. I know that prophesy. It was mine!"

    Kori let the words continue.

    <blockquote>Z¨¥lt¨®n ze gr¨ªssma t¨®n</blockquote>

    <blockquote>No ¨ºan d¨¦symei xin¨®n.</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("If gold and debt with welcome''s met.")</blockquote>

    "There''s more?" Nikolai''s voice tossed with confusion. "And in the context of what you have already revealed. Gold? What gold? Does this change¡ªnever mind. The gold is ours, of course. The debt that the Fools owe to us." His tone firmed. "If they but welcome their obligation to bow, yes. To bow their necks to our yoke, My Maiden!" He bowed, trembling with fervor. "Praise the Wealthgiver! Praise his bride!"

    Like water rushing down the mountain, the pang of disappointment passed. Kori''s thoughts became calm. Cold dark, and deep as they must be, for so much depended on her. Armies tugged at her skirts, Death stood behind her, and Fool climbed her Mountain.

    "Nikolai," Kori ordered. "Take me to the scopes.

 3: Earth, Protect Me

    Under the Holy Mountain, there floated a woman.

    Currents writhed slowly around her. Fumes rose from a three-legged burner on the edge of the underground pool, mixing the scent of sulfur with sheep fat, pine pitch, and mint. Drops of condensation formed and fell with a sound like tiny clocks. Their echoes scattered and rebounded across the six faces carved into the ceiling.

    The Maiden''s own face was slack. The surface slid up and down her sides, warm and cold. Her eyes were open, but could see nothing in the darkness. Behind those eyes: more darkness.

    Her people called themselves the Good. All of them but their spies lived around and under their Holy Mountain. They herded sheep, robbed travelers, delved the Sacred Depths, and used the gold they found to twist the game of empires toward the will of their Wealthgiver.

    Hot waves followed cold, down from the crown of Kori''s head, around her cheeks and throat. Her heart beat.

    A drop struck the water and clarity spread in every direction.

    Echoes defined a shape to the south: a new nation, hungry for land. To the north, another birthed itself, while empires to the East and West fractured along their own lines of language and history. Squeezed between them all, the Holy Mountain ran with rivers of red.

    Kori named the fear and it passed, revealing a sense below her of a great and sacred depth.

    "How can I protect my people?"

    Kori''s prayer hung between the water and the stone. Another drop fell from the nose of a graven face. Her heart beat and glowing spots flashed before her eyes. Glints of gold, she thought. The sheen of sunrise off gun barrels. She could guess whose hands held them. She could guess what she had to do. But.

    "But what if I am wrong?"

    The darkness around and within Kori did not answer in words. She simply knew: the opposite of growth is death.

    Whose growth? Whose death? Whose wealth and war? Kori''s hands lifted invisibly, pushing the rest of her body deeper into the water. "Yours, Master."

    The echo of the last word returned like confirmation.

    Kori swashed her legs around and found the floor with her toes. Wringing out her hair, she waded toward the door. Some of the images were already fading, but she held on to the red mountain and the glitter that ringed it. The interpretation of those symbols would be clear enough. After ten years of practice, the rhyme and scansion would come when she needed them.

    Her ears twitched. The priest waiting on the other side of the door was breathing too rapidly.

    "Elder brother," Kori called. "Nikolai. What worries you?"

    The breathing caught. A door opened in the darkness and a curtain parted. The tacks on a man''s slippers clicked on the stone floor.

    "The Maiden hears much." The words were in the Good language, the pronunciation impeccable. From their sound, the high priest stood far back from the pool, facing away from her.

    Nikolai had been Kori''s one girlish rebellion: an attempt to convert someone to the worship of the Wealthgiver. To turn a Fool into one of the Good. She had succeeded terribly.

    "My Maiden," he said. "What were you shown?"

    "You first." She climbed the steps out of the pool. "What news?"Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

    "News? No, I would not contaminate the Fruit-Bringer''s prophesy."

    Kori''s ears pricked at the disgust and anger in his voice. The worry. Nikolai sounded the way he did when someone spilled soup on the books, or forgot to put lye in his cham berpot. Something had worried him, and Nikolai had rushed, not to the library or a washroom, but to her.

    Kori clicked her tongue, illuminating the walls around them in harsh sound. She caught his flinch. "Nikolai, has something happened in San Stefano?"

    "My Maiden."

    That was relief. Kori couldn''t bully the other priests like this, but Nikolai was special. He was hers.

    The high priest cleared his throat. "Count Ignatyev and Saffet Pasha have signed the treaty."

    Kori capped the incense burner and picked up her robe. "Ignatyev stabbed Austria-Hungary and Germany in the back?"

    "As we knew he would." A smile in his voice. "He has put us within this so-called Principality of Bulgaria."

    And so the world intruded, exactly as Nikolai had warned. Kori held on to the memories of her vision and cinched her robe tight. "The western Powers will step in, with diplomats if not soldiers. We might find ourselves back in the Ottoman Empire, in Greece, or split down the middle by a new border."

    The old priests said it didn''t matter where Fools drew lines on their maps, but they were wrong. Census-takers roamed the mountains now, ethnographers, recruiters from revolutionary committees. The Good could no longer tell the Turks they were Sarakatsans, the Greeks they were Pomaks, the Bulgarians that they were Aromanians. Whatever new nation found itself in possession of Kori''s Mountain, it would demand to know what language its citizens spoke and what gods they worshiped.

    Metal and blood. Armies surrounded her, and behind her rose the shadow of Death.

    Kori inhaled as the poetry snapped into place.

    <blockquote>K¨­gai¨® i¨®</blockquote>

    <blockquote>P¨®des x¨¦nai. Dym¨®</blockquote>

    <blockquote>D¨®ubous tous me</blockquote>

    <blockquote>I¨¦rous phl¨¥st¨¦.</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("On Holy Mountain foreign Feet.")</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("You make Sacred Depths with smoke replete.")</blockquote>

    It was more like reciting lines than composing them.

    <blockquote>Porostreiyn ia?es</blockquote>

    <blockquote>¨¢paes t?s rh¨®daes</blockquote>

    <blockquote>Pephl¨®n i¨¥n t¨®us</blockquote>

    <blockquote>S¨¦lkanthas se stra?tous."</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("Rivers ruddy stream around")</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("The armies tugging at her gown.")</blockquote>

    "My Maiden." His voice swung past Kori as the priest turned. "The signs are clear." He turned again. "The Good stand poised at the peak of another war." He was pacing now, muttering to himself. "Assassination and bribery will not save us again. As I told them. The next international council might come together before the end of the year. We shall have to speed our preparations."

    "Wait," Kori said. "Why ''might?'' Don''t you know when the Powers will meet? What reaction from the Western ambassadors? What else did our spy tell you?"

    Nikolai stood at the curtain, hand on the door beyond. "He doesn''t know, My Maiden. He didn''t stay long enough in San Stefano to find out, but rode west immediately to bring us the news. He arrived only a little before this Russian soldier."

    "What Russian soldier?" asked Kori.

    "Oh." Kori''s mind was clear enough to detect the tremble in her high priest''s voice. "A Fool on the mountain. We watch him from the scopes even now."

    "Who is he?"

    "Some lost wanderer, My Maiden, whom the shepherds failed to turn away. Nothing."

    Something. Something more important than the Treaty of San Stefano, or at least in Nikolai felt it so. Otherwise his breath would not catch like this. His teeth would not grind. What was he hiding? Why was this stranger important?

    Kori opened her mouth to ask, and a word came to her in the ancient language. Another followed it, and she found her prophesy had been incomplete.

    <blockquote>X¨¥th¨®peti p¨®s ia?,</blockquote>

    <blockquote>Stas zyn X¨¥th¨®pania.</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("With Master at hand, the Mistress will stand.")</blockquote>

    Nikolai whirled toward her. "But," he said. "My Maiden. I know that prophesy. It was mine!"

    Kori let the words continue.

    <blockquote>Z¨¥lt¨®n ze gr¨ªssma t¨®n</blockquote>

    <blockquote>No ¨ºan d¨¦symei xin¨®n.</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("If gold and debt with welcome''s met.")</blockquote>

    "There''s more?" Nikolai''s voice tossed with confusion. "And in the context of what you have already revealed. Gold? What gold? Does this change¡ªnever mind. The gold is ours, of course. The debt that the Fools owe to us." His tone firmed. "If they but welcome their obligation to bow, yes. To bow their necks to our yoke, My Maiden!" He bowed, trembling with fervor. "Praise the Wealthgiver! Praise his bride!"

    Kori''s breath leaked from her throat. A weight pulled on the belly. Here was the love that Nikolai gave her. Furious, barren worship.

    Like water rushing down the mountain, the pang of disappointment passed. Kori''s thoughts became calm. Cold dark, and deep as they must be, for so much depended on her. Armies tugged at her skirts, Death stood behind her, and Fool climbed her Mountain.

    "Nikolai," Kori ordered. "Take me to the scopes."

 4: Comes the Wealthgiver

    Andrei dug his walking stick into the mud and mounted another switchback.

    The moon, full and enormous, cast crazed shadows over the mountainside. It was all the light Andrei had, now that he''d passed out of sight of the shepherds'' house.

    After the Rhodopes, he would keep going west, through what was still nominally Ottoman Territory to Durres. From there, a ship out of Montenegro? North into Austria-Hungary?

    "Or across the Ocean to Batavia, where I can learn to sleep with a pistol under my pillow for the pirates and tropical mosquitoes," he said. "God, let this be the most exciting part of my journey."

    He shouldered his way out onto an open, grassy slope. Shelves of rock thrust like glowering brows over steaming cracks in the earth. Lovely. Those would make beds both warm and dry. He wouldn''t have found a better place to sleep in that shepherds'' house, even discounting the poison.

    Andrei stopped. "Oh, Doctor, you stupid ox. So used to carrying that heavy pack, were you?" He unslung it. "So desperate to get away from those people that you spent the night hauling a load of poisoned food up this mountain."

    Metal jingled as he dropped the sack onto the soft earth. From its mouth, Andrei pulled and discarded a pair of those unboiled bagels that the Turks called simit. Next came a wicker basket of crumbly white cheese, and a bag of dried fruit. None of it was safe to eat, and all of it was far heavier than it should be, given the ache in the small of Andrei''s back.

    He saw why when he removed the layer of provisions. Hidden under a rawhide shroud, treasure gleamed. Gold coins, broaches, rings, earrings, bangles, a whole platter, now rather bent. Silver forks and spoons, as well as wooden ones. A strange little sickle, sharp as a razor on its inner curve. A fox-fur cap just like the one the old man wore. And under that were the little clay figures. A clay horse, carefully wrapped so that its legs wouldn''t snap off, a seated figure, possibly male, and a standing one, definitely female.

    Andrei hit the bottom of his pack. His own food, canteen, knives, tinderbox, and blanket were all gone.

    His curse echoed off the mountain on the other side of the valley.

    When had that demented old man emptied out Andrei''s whole pack? Why, in God''s name, had he replaced the worn equipment there with this fantastic, useless treasure hoard? Were they framing Andrei as a thief? Setting up an excuse to gather a posse and hunt him down? Or using him as a mule to smuggle gold out of the country? Where the devil did the little clay idols fit in with that? And Andrei was sure that the old man had not faked his madness.

    He looked out over the moonlit meadow. Water bubbling out of stone. Blood through the cracks in a mask.

    "No matter, Doctor," Andrei muttered to himself. "Best to get rid of this stuff right now."

    The soil of the hillside was warm and damp. It wouldn''t take long to bury this strange treasure.

    ***

    Nikolai could not see his Maiden, but he could hear her breath quicken. She stood beside him, warm in the dark, her eye pressed to the lens of the periscope.

    "Yes," she said, "there he is."

    "My Maiden," said old Brother Bogdan. "Why use your eyes? That the light you see by is cast by the Moon, and almost as maddening as wine. These visions before you are nothing but nightmares. Come away from the scope."

    Nikolai agreed this was all most improper. He should never have obeyed when his goddess had ordered him to bring her here. He had been weak, but he would look weaker still if he voiced his agreement with the old man and Kori still refused to listen. As he knew she would.

    "The lenses," he said, "transmit light, as the bends of a corridor direct sound. What the Maiden sees is not the terrible lies of the lunatic Binder, but something tamed and directed. Do we not say that the lie is the deepest truth?"

    Brother Bogdan''s robes whispered as he folded his arms. "As you say, Elder Brother."

    Brother Murad, tapped his foot for attention. "My Maiden, what is the Fool doing?"

    "He has a sack," she reported. "A large one. He''s unpacking it. Removing food. Did he carry that all the way up the Mountain?"

    "Or else the shepherds gave him those supplies," said Nikolai. "After failing to kill him or even turn him aside."

    "Maybe the food is poisoned." Hope was clear in Murad''s voice.

    "We shouldn''t have to rely on poison," Nikolai grumbled. "Someone should have slit this Fool''s throat before he was halfway up to the entrance. How did he evade all the other Good?"

    "It''s the equinox coming," said Theodoros, the third Brother in the chamber. "They''re all staying here with us."

    "Perhaps." Though Nikolai had other suspicions.

    "Is he eating the food, My Maiden?" asked Brother Murad.

    "No. He''s setting it all inside and reaching into his sack for more."This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

    A wail rose in Nikolai''s throat. He turned it into a growl. "What is that Fool about? What does this mean?"

    "I think he''s preparing to sleep," said the Maiden. "The set of his shoulders¡ªhe looks tired."

    "I can still poison him," Brother Murad suggested. "The Fool need never awaken."

    Brother Bogdan clicked gentle negation. "There is no need for that. Here, above our Depths, we can simply rip out this throat."

    "I would rather interrogate him," said Nikolai. He had not entirely convinced himself with his rationalizations about lenses and corridors, and he did not like the way his Maiden was breathing. Fast and shallow, as if frightened, but with a shape to her mouth that indicated happiness. What did she see now, by the light of the Moon? What was this stranger, and how did he figure in the prophesy?

    "Elder brother, why did you volunteer to interrogate him?" Kori asked.

    Nikolai''s own breathing had betrayed his feelings. He cleared his throat. "He is Russian, Maiden."

    "You think he was sent by your family?" she asked, a smile still on her lips.

    "I never had family in Russia. Only people paid to take care of me." Nikolai recognized his own old bitterness and deepened his inhalation. "Yes, Maiden. I believe that man was sent for me. It would be easy enough to slip an agent into the Tsar''s army."

    "We certainly did," Brother Murad put in.

    "Yes," said the Maiden. "He is burying the treasure. But now he''s picking something¡ªI see it coiling. A small snake."

    She was speaking almost as if reciting a vision. Nikolai tried to put a stop to this. "My Maiden, remember that you¡ª"

    She did not interrupt him with speech, but Nikolai''s stomach twisted at the overtones in her sudden gasp.

    "My Maiden approves of something?" Brother Bogdan, sounding as embarrassed as Nikolai felt. "What sights meet your eyes?"

    "He killed it," she breathed.

    The priests clicked at each other in consternation. All the Brothers felt the same. There was something in her voice that should not be. No, something up on the surface of the Holy Mountain!

    "The serpent came to him and he crushed it in his fist," said Bogdan.

    "What the hell does that symbolize?" asked Theodoros.

    "Obviously¡ª" began Nikolai, but once again the Maiden interrupted him.

    "It means he solves problems."

    Nikolai clicked his tongue. The Maiden still pressed her eye to the periscope. She still watched the stranger, her breathing quick and excited.

    "May I observe the Fool?"

    She started, hesitated, but stood back. "No need to ask my permission, Elder Brother."

    "No, My Maiden." Nikolai tried not to reveal his relief as he leaned past her. He put his eye to the periscope, still warm from her skin. A blink. A shiver.

    The Moon''s lurid light shone upon the hidden entrance to the Holy Mountain. Silver grass, silver fog, and the outline of a man, black as a mole''s fur. He was certainly a brute. Broad, rather than tall, with thick arms and legs and a barrel chest. A square chin, and, when he looked up, a mouth and brows that formed a pair of serious, parallel lines. One might call that expression "grim."

    "What does he have in that bag?" wondered Nikolai, squinting. "Jewelry? Cutlery? Dried apples? Did he steal all that loot from the shepherds?"

    The Maiden breathed on his ear. "Is he, by any chance, digging a pit to bury his sacrifice to the Earth?"

    "He''s returning gifts to the Earth?" Theodoros had also heard the confirming catch in Nikolai''s breath. "Then he is one of the Good after all."

    "No," growled Nikolai. "He''s a Russian! A Fool! A damn drunken Christian. We know he doesn''t speak the Good Language. The shepherds'' report was very clear. He''s, he must be burying loot so he can come back to it later."

    "Maybe the shepherds didn''t tell us everything," said the Maiden. "Why did they give him all that stuff? Why did they fill his sack-of-plenty?"

    "He stoleack-of-plenty?" It was one of the Wealthgiver''s most common symbols. This man might as well have come up the mountain with an invisibility cap and a three-headed dog. "It is no sack-of-plenty. Just a sack." Moonlight glinted. "Filled with gold."

    Kori pitched her voice low. "Nikolai. Is that man giving his treasures to the Earth?"

    Nikolai''s fingernails tapped the shaft of the periscope, creating echoes that showed him her posture. Poised.

    "Elder Brother?"

    He twitched, shut his eyes, and found clarity again. "These are distractions. May the Light not dazzle and the Wine not blind me." He pulled his face away from the scope and straightened.

    never

    The Maiden opened her mouth and drew in breath as if to speak. Nikolai''s own lungs filled in sympathy, but it was not thanks that issued from her mouth, or even more inappropriate orders. It was not her voice at all that filled the chamber, but the keen of prophesy.

    <blockquote>Pleistor¨®s ¨ºrgetar. Sar? ton d¨¦saitar!</blockquote>

    <blockquote>("Comes the Wealthgiver. May you him give her!")</blockquote>

    The optative verb implied a certain impatience.

    "My Maiden." Nikolai shuddered as his doubts and fear dissolved in worship. "Yes."

    Brother Bogdan offered his interpretation. "We stand ready to run towards nationhood and war. Now, with the vernal equinox approaching, there comes a grim-faced stranger with a sack-of-plenty to the main entrance of our Sacred Depths. A warning."

    "But remember the rest of the prophesy." Nikolai''s voice still shook with the echoes of revelation. "Remember the armies, the gold. We must seize these treasures with our own hands. Not a warning. A trophy. We take our first victim!"

    Kori inhaled and all four men fell silent. But she did not prophesy, only speak. "We welcome our first guest."

    The verb they both used might equally mean "take" or "welcome," or "accept" or even "seize." Nikolai considered the implications.

    "Perhaps the Maiden refers to Miltiades," suggested Bogdan. "According to Herodotus, he offered hospitality to the Dolongi. Is that the welcome of which the prophesy speaks?"

    ""

    "But does the Tsar not claim¡ª"

    "I think," said the Maiden, "it''s a more ancient debt than that. What about the welcome the Wealthgiver gave the Reaper-of-Grain?"

    Another interruption. Another pollution of prophesy with interpretation by the prophetess. But Nikolai could not correct his Maiden. He could not even breathe. His mind''s eye turned away from images of gripping hands and crushing kisses.

    "That is," Nikolai could not complete the sentence. "How could one call "blasphemy" the words of the Holy Mountain''s only living prophetess? "That is an extremely surprising interpretation," he temporized.

    "Then what is yours, Elder Brother?" Her voice was so sweet.

    Nikolai pulled his hands away from his face and closed his eyes against the memory of Moonlight. "''Comes the Wealthgiver. May you him give her!'' A brutal rhythm. A rhyme that teeters on the brink. Death comes to all of us, but now we hear its clap and rumble, as if black lightning struck our very periscope!" The walls rang with his words, true echoes that defined four expressions of shock and awe. "War masses and thunders above us. If we ignore it, if we turn our faces away and hide, we are greater fools than that stranger with his sack. He is the war! He is the death that we must accept, welcome, and take as a gift. May we give him to her. Our Mountain. Our Darkness. Our," he could think of no other feminine noun. "Our prophetess."

    His weight fell back onto his heels. Nikolai lowered the arms he hadn''t known he''d raised. The echoes faded away.

    "Your orders, Elder Brother?" asked Murad.

    "Wait until the stranger sleeps," said Nikolai. "Then, we shall welcome him, indeed."

 5: A Thousand Lives

    Andrei pinched the snake behind the head and lifted it from the grass. The tail clenched up toward his fingers and the mouth gaped, displaying tiny fangs.

    Andrei squeezed the viper until it was no longer a problem and tossed its body aside.

    "Too many enemies on this mountain already," he muttered.

    He could see, though, what had attracted the cold-blooded creature. The air coming up from the crack was warm and wet, if sulfurous.

    "Must be caves down there. Hot springs. Maybe tomorrow, I''ll find a way to take a bath."

    He knelt and pressed the new grass with his palm. Water squelched as if he''d squeezed a sponge and the flowers nodded. Crocus, and taller stalks of narcissus. Only one of these had so far bloomed. The trumpet-shaped head gleamed in the moonlight, more perfect than the work of any mortal silversmith, the same apparent color as the viper.

    Andrei walked a few paces uphill and spread his blanket on a drier patch. He lay back, staring up at the moon and the star that hung under it. Probably Venus. Somewhere in the valley below, a fox barked.

    Would the old shepherd follow him up here? Would Andrei hear him as he approached, breaking thorn-branches and babbling?

    "Stop that," he told himself. "He couldn''t walk from his stump to his house. He''s not about to hike up this mountain just to slit your throat."

    An early cricket chirped. Andrei remembered the old woman. Her false smile, and real one on the face of the mad old man. "Why did he fill my pack with fetishes?" he asked himself. "And why, Doctor, did you bury them?" He could answer neither question.

    Andrei''s arms ached. His hands were black with soil. He''d had some notion of coming back to this mountain one day and retrieving the treasure. Now, he just felt like a fool. He''d never come back to this accursed place again. Assuming you manage to escape it. He didn''t speak that last thought aloud, but it rang in his head anyway, deep and sardonic.

    Exhaustion rose like a wave up Andrei''s body. His hands, folded over his chest, felt warm and leaden. The fingers loosened, relaxed, clenched tight.

    No!

    Fear rocked Andrei''s head back against the ground. He had almost fallen asleep! Let his guard down and the imperial agents would get him. The cracked face of the witch. The smell of old mice in the soup.

    Andrei''s heart raced. His cheeks flushed with heat. He squinted against the too-bright moon, trying to remember what he was supposed to be doing on this sweaty, chilly, viper-infested mountainside.

    Sleeping. He was supposed to be sleeping.

    "Damn it." Andrei opened his eyes. Clamped them shut again and flung his elbow over his eyes for good measure. It didn''t work. If he threw off his too-warm coat, he would be too cold. "This is more trouble than I ever had on the march."

    He had slept in lice-infested straw, and half-buried in freezing mud. He had slept on his feet. He had slept on the damn march. This warm, grassy hillside should be paradise. And God knew he was tired enough.

    Andrei groaned and rolled over, trying to find a less uncomfortable position. His knees hurt. And his calves. And his quadriceps and hamstrings. He could see them as if on an anatomy chart, pulsing dully. His glutei maximi felt as if someone had pounded them with hammers. His right knee throbbed.

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    "Treat with hot pack and immobilization, Doctor. If the meniscus is leaking, you know how to sew it back up."

    Andrei imagined performing the operation on himself, alone in the wilderness, as his enemies circled closer. "Stop it!"

    He forced himself to lie still. He needed to climb tomorrow. To run. He needed sleep in order to escape the danger that was keeping him from sleep.

    Tomorrow he would run again, putting just a bit more distance between himself and his enemies. His feet would tread the soft mountain grass. The grass that splits around a hole¡ª

    Andrei''s leg spasmed and sparks flashed behind his eyes. "Ow!" He sat up, cursing. "What the devil is wrong with me?"

    Don''t you recognize a hypnogogic jerk when you see one, Doctor? I diagnose a prickly conscience.

    Andrei rolled onto his left side. There was the mist rising out of the crack, like a curtain drawn over the view of the valley.

    What did his conscience have to prick him about? Hadn''t he helped that old shepherd? Snowdrops and move him into town. Find any doctor who could give a better prescription. And for free. And he''d saved the life of the feverish Junior Unteroffizier.

    Saved him for the firing squad.

    "And if I''d stayed, I''d have been executed too," Andrei protested. "Better I stay alive and find more patients to patch up, right?"

    If you had let that one man die, you could have stayed with the army and helped others.

    Another twitch. A flush. His heart raced. The smell of sweat and smoke was stronger now. Sulfur. A flooded crypt, feverish and wet. Andrei rolled onto his back. Maybe he wouldn''t stay for that bath, after all. Run away again.

    And when you last ran, how many wounded were there? A thousand? Fewer now, of course.

    "There was no other choice," he whispered. "It was escape or kill. For God''s sake, I swore an oath."

    The moon stared down at him. The wind ran its fingers through the rising mist.

    "For all the gods'' sakes, Doctor." Andrei told himself, and chuckled darkly. "''By Apollo Physician, by Asclepius, by Hygieia, by Panacea, and by all the gods and goddesses, making them my witnesses.''"

    The wind rose and fell. Mist pulsed in and out of the crack as the mountain breathed. The words came back now as easily as they had on the day of Andrei''s graduation.

    "''Into whatever houses I enter, I will enter to help the sick.''" His breath caught in his throat. He''d had to run. Run or kill. There''s been no other choice. "Better a deserter than a murder."

    A convenient slogan, Doctor. It allows you to escape with your life and without your duties.

    "What duties?" Andrei asked the night sky. "To help every house I enter? I do. I did! I don''t need to remind you I was recently poisoned for just that."

    Why?

    "How the hell should I know? Madness! Evil, insane, in-bred mountain-people, probably getting ready to make me into soup."

    Not after they poisoned you, surely. No amount of boiling would have rendered you hygienic.

    "Shut up!" Andrei growled at himself. "Let me sleep, damn you."

    Look at it this way, Doctor. You saved one life at the cost of a thousand. All you need to do is find nine hundred and ninety-nine more, save them, and your soul will be safe.

    Andrei turned angrily onto his other side. "No deal."

    ***

    Behind the Fool''s back, a hand rose from the crack in the Earth.

    Fingers spread, casting a spider''s shadow over the moonlit ground. They reached, curled towards the darkness they cast, dug in. Next crowned the head.

    The priest of Death gripped a cleverly-shaped ledge of rock and heaved himself out of the Sacred Depths of the Mountain. He stood for a moment, back bent, breath steaming, hating the Moon.

    He was dressed in a fox-fur cap and a robe of felted wool. A blindfold of the same material protected his eyes, which he did not need.

    His tongue clicked. His neck slowly twisted around.

    The priest bared his teeth at the outsider and stretched the binding rope between his hands.

 6: Ill Take you

    Andrei gasped and there they were, all around him. The men he''d killed.

    Robed figures crouched around his spread arms and legs, eyes covered, sickles gleaming at their waists. He could not move. There was pressure on his chest, and leaden heaviness in his limbs.

    "I''m sorry," Andrei told them. "I''m sorry I left you behind. Forgive me!"

    Get a hold of yourself, Doctor. They certainly have.

    They stood, and Andrei rose too, pulled off his blanket like a pike from a stream.

    His ankles and wrists were wrapped in something soft and warm. The hands around his wrists and ankles were warm as well. Odd, for corpses. And one of the specters had terrible breath.

    Andrei was starting to wonder whether he might actually be awake, but then he saw the woman.

    She was standing waist-deep in the crack in the earth, robed in mist and crowned in moonlight. Braids of dark hair escaped from under a white head-scarf and flowed like water down her round shoulders. At her hip, impossibly yellow in the moonlight, nodded the narcissus.

    Andrei''s eyes watered. The smell of smoke and sulfur was overpowering. "Am I dreaming? Or does the Tsar''s army employ beautiful women to hunt down deserters?"

    She lifted her chin. A sheer veil stretched in clinging ridges across her cheekbones and nose. Andrei couldn''t see her eyes, but her expression seemed cold, patient, and darkly amused. I make no mistakes, she seemed to say. I find a use for everyone.

    What was happening to him? What the devil did any of this mean?

    No deal, you said. As if you were in any position to bargain.

    Andrei gritted his teeth. Whether he was dreaming or captured or damned, it didn''t matter. Delusions, men, or the spirits of the dead, he had the same command for them all. "Take me, then," he said. "Take me back."

    He did not know if the woman heard him, or understood him, or cared what he said. She sank into the earth, and Andrei followed, feet first. Feet first, down. Down.

    He gasped in a mouthful of warm, sulfurous air. His arms and legs jerked in the grips of, of¡­"Who the hell are you?" he shouted. "Let go of me!"

    His kidnappers popped him through the crack in the earth as if they''d done this a hundred times before.

    Andrei looked up as if for help. He saw only the moon disappearing behind a ledge of rock. They stepped down. Down again.

    With little "oofs," the men holding his hands and feet hefted him. The one in front called out, "D¨¦sma vu tan. ¨ªratsa D¨²ba tan vu d¨¦sit." Chuckles rippled down a long, narrow corridor.

    There was just enough light now for Andrei to see a rocky ceiling above him, furred with some kind of pale moss. Stone scraped on stone and even that light faded. They were closing a lid over the crack. They were shutting him up in this stinking blackness. Entombing him. Where was the woman? Forget about the woman. Forget what he had just promised himself. Andrei had to escape!

    With all the strength in his stomach, he pulled his knees toward him.

    "Mad¨ª!" grunted the man holding Andrei''s feet, and swatted him. That meant he was only holding on with one hand!

    Andrei kicked out.

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    A muffled yell from one of his captors and his feet came free. Still bound together, they dropped. Touched the floor!

    Andrei pushed off it, and his head smashed into the chest of the man behind him. He doubted the spirits of the damned would curse like that.

    And they weren''t soldiers, either. Andrei had fought children with better instincts. His muscles were stiff from his unrestful doze, and his own cramps were more of a hindrance than the fluttery hands of his kidnappers.

    Oh, yes, Doctor, very good. With any luck you can cause them enough trouble to convince them to kill you.

    Shouts echoed off the furry walls. Andrei''s shoulder hit the floor. He swung out with his legs, knocked someone over, twisted like a worm up the corridor.

    No, not up. They would know that he would go that way, wouldn''t they? Back toward the light. What light? The tunnel was pitch-black now. But they would have to see him to stop him. Just block the entrance and wait.

    So Andrei would have to fool them. He gathered himself up and squirmed down the tunnel, deeper into the cave.

    No one stood in his way. They had gathered at the entrance! Ha!

    Andrei held on to hope. The tunnel would have to widen at some point. He could roll out of the way, or wait behind the entrance to a side-passage if there was one. The woman, if not a hallucination, if this wasn''t all a dream, or else a manifestation of hell, she would be deeper in the cave than any of his other captors. Maybe he could trip her. Grab her and use her as a hostage.

    Best not to think of how poor a plan that is.

    The floor was smooth stone, the darkness absolute. And, Andrei realized, silent. Could they hear the buttons of his coat scraping the stone? Could they hear Andrei''s breath? His heartbeat? Were they still waiting for him at the mouth of the cave? Who the hell were these people, with their sickles and narcissus flowers and hissing speech? Were they coming for him even now?

    "Ku~u? Ku i¨¦ ti~i?"

    The floor and walls reflected a voice, so weird with echoes as to barely sound human.

    "Brik," said another man. "Birik, bi~iryiirkk!" The vowels tuned in and out of harmonies in the wall, creating echoes so bright they hurt Andrei''s teeth.

    A third made a noise as if calling a horse. A tsk-tsk of the tongue.

    Feet clicked over stone as if hob-nailed. Fingernails tapped on the walls.

    "Ku~u?"

    A whistle passed over and, it felt, through him.

    "Bre~ema."

    The basso growl vibrated the floor against Andrei''s cheek on the floor. Were they singing? But this didn''t sound like music. It sounded purposeful, like the shots gunners fired to test the range of their weapons.

    Andrei wriggled faster, the noises of his pursuers clicking and humming past him liked missed shots. There was something ahead. Echoes came sooner and sooner, bouncing off what must be a wall. No, Andrei felt as he ran his still-bound hands up it, this was a vestibule, with niches for guards to stand on either side of a heavy, metal-plated door. Closed.

    Andrei turned at bay.

    "Ta?ma i¨¦." That was the woman''s voice, high and bright as a bird call. Andrei he leaped at her.

    A rush of air. A huff of surprise. Andrei''s left shoulder struck painfully against a wall, but he made a hoop of his bound arms and passed them over her head. He pulled tight around her waist, pressing her to him. Hobnailed feet clattered toward him. She smelled like herbs and minerals.

    "Release¡ª!" Andrei got no farther before a cold pressure closed around his throat.

    There was no hesitation, no groping in the dark. One of the men had simply walked up and pressed his sickle up under Andrei''s chin.

    "Release the Maiden at once." The words were in Russian.

    "Wh-huh?" said Andrei, flabbergasted. He hadn''t heard an accent like that in three months. The officers tried to fake it, but one had to be born into vowels that soft. Like a drizzle of sacred oil on Saint Peter''s Day.

    "Release. The Maiden!" A torrent of emotion ran under the accents of a cultured Muskovite.

    Rage, Andrei diagnosed.

    The sickle shivered against his throat. "Or die!"

    Andrei considered it. Dying now, throat cleanly cut, seemed like a better deal than living through whatever grotesque torture this cult of Balkan troglodytes had in store for him.

    Troglodytes who spoke Russian like princes. Was this all just madness? Damnation? The sort of dream from which one never wakes?

    None of that matters. Stay alive, Doctor, and save those thousand patients.

    Andrei released the woman. "All right," he said. "I''ll take you."

 7: Host of Many

    "What did he say?" asked the Maiden.

    Nikolai could not speak. The darkness pressed in from all directions, like water. Like soil. Even as his sickle pinned the defiler to the wall, Nikolai himself stood immobilized in the grip of his outrage.

    I''ll take you. He wouldn''t translate such filth into the Good Language. What was the meaning of this? What did it portend?

    "Elder Brother!"

    Nikolai''s ears twitched. The vessel of his goddess was breathing heavily. More frightened, no doubt, than she had ever been.

    She had reason to fear. This Fool had smeared his dirty hands all over her. Nikolai licked his lips and tried to stop his trembling.

    "He s-said. He s-s" Nikolai cleared his throat. "Brothers! Help me. Turn him around, face to the wall, and bind his wrists behind his back." Only then, while robes rustled and slippers tapped to mask the fear in Nikolai''s voice, could he translate for the Maiden. "He said, ''So shall I welcome you all.''"

    The word he used was the same as that which the Maiden had used at the scopes. A prophecy might be "welcomed" by a priest, or a gift by a maiden, a guest by a host.

    "Host of Many."

    Who had said that? In the dark, Nikolai couldn''t tell. Had he spoken it? Or Kori? One of the brothers? Had they all spoken at once the epithet of the Unseen One? Or had the walls whispered? An echo, a shadow with no one to cast it.

    Nikolai''s hands shook as he hung his sickle back at his hip.

    "Earth, protect me," he whispered, but found to his horror that three fingers of his right hand had pinched together and risen to his right shoulder, as if to begin the sign of the cross.

    Nikolai flicked his hand as if a cockroach crawled upon it. This was what came of bringing outsiders into the Sacred Depths. What could Kori be thinking? No, Nikolai corrected himself, brushing his hands down his robes. The Maiden had received a prophecy. She had been pointed toward an opportunity. Like so many of the gods'' gifts, this one only looked like a cruel joke.

    Faith. Nikolai must grope for it. Either believe that the Fool deserved to die as all custom and law dictated, or believe the voice of his Maiden.

    "Earth protect me," he said again, this time with thumb, pointer, and middle finger properly splayed. "May Heaven not blind and Madness never touch me."

    The prayer brought clarity at last. Nikolai was no drunken Christian or lunatic Muslim. He was bound to not just one god. Nikolai had many objects of worship.

    He straightened and clicked his tongue. "My Maiden," he said, "what did he do to you?"

    "I''m well." She stood a little away from the men and the prisoner, head turned toward him. "He didn''t hurt me."

    Something in her voice yanked on Nikolai like pliers on a bad tooth. "Hurt you?" he snapped. "Earth protect us, he could have killed you right there. Those dirty hands around the throat of the Torch-Bearer? The Fruit-Bringer''s heart beating against his chest like a dove in a cage?"

    "Nikolai, ask him why he came here."

    The other priests clicked disapprovingly. More orders from the Maiden. And Nikolai needed none! He rounded on the Russian. "Fool," he demanded in his prisoner''s language, "why did you violate the purity of these our Sacred Depths?"

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    "Ask yourself. You''re the one who dragged me down here." A voice rose from the bound man on the floor, deep and cold as buried obsidian.

    "Y-you," Nikolai shook off his sudden sense of dread. "Who sent you?"

    "I sent myself."

    "What brought you here?"

    "My feet."

    Murmurs from the brothers. Nikolai raised his voice. "Who led you to this, our Holy Mountain?"

    "The voice in my own head," scoffed the stranger. "Listen to me, you people, this is all accidental. I deserted the army and found myself in your cave."

    "How can it be true?" Nikolai raged. "How can a Russian come up here? Now of all times! He all but tumbled headfirst into our main entrance. It cannot be mere accident!"

    "I agree," said Kori. "It is no accident."

    Into the silence that followed, the stranger spoke. "A pleasure to make your acquaintance, gentlemen and lady. You may call me ''Your Well Born, Baron Voropayevski.''"

    Nikolai wiped the sweat from his face. "The titles of Fools mean nothing to us. I myself was once addressed as ''Your Serenity.''

    "Then I suppose I can''t expect you to call me Captain or Doctor, either." The ropes around his wrists creaked as the prisoner tested them. "Since our relationship is still rather cool, you may call me Andrei Trifonovich."

    Nikolai drew back. Trifonovich! In Russia, Saint Tryphon of Campsada was the patron of gardeners and keepers of birds, but here on the Balkans he was venerated by wine makers. A more terrible omen could scarcely be imagined.

    "No answer?" said Andrei Trifonovich. "I supposed you would tell me you''re the Minister of Health and Admiral of the Tsar''s Subterranean Fleet."

    "I am prince Nikolai Igorevich Gurskalin," said Nikolai, then realized what a prat it made him sound. "That is, such was once my title. I have a new name now, a Good name."

    "Oh. Good. I wish I could say it was a pleasure to meet you, Your Serenity."

    "Well?" asked the Maiden. "What is he saying? Who is he?"

    "He is a physician in the Russian army." Old Brother Bogdan had stayed inside during the prisoner''s capture and out of the way during his attempted escape. Now, he clicked slowly closer, translating. "His name is Andrei Trifonovich Voropayevski."

    Of course Nikolai wasn''t the only one here who spoke Russian. He must master himself!

    "Andrei," said Kori.

    "Yes?" answered the prisoner, and Nikolai gritted his teeth until sparks flashed before his eyes.

    "She will replace you."

    No mistaking it for an echo, now. The voice spoke in his ear, as if a whispering bat clung to his hair.

    There must be some mistake. Some other interpretation of the signs. Master at hand. Foreign feet. I''ll take you. Give him her!

    Rage clotted in Nikolai''s throat. He was robbed of speech, unable to direct the priests to kill this interloper. Instead, it was the voice of the Maiden that filled the silence.

    "Take him to my chambers."

    "Your chambers?" Nikolai whirled toward her voice, horrified. "My Maiden, no! There''s no telling what the drunken Fool might do!"

    "We have bound him securely," said Brother Murad, unhelpfully.

    Brother Bogdan spoke. "Guests are not received alone by prophetesses, My Maiden. The council must be convened."

    "I do not recall the prophesy mentioning a council meeting."

    "''May he give him her,''" quoted Brother Bogdan.

    Kori added her own weight. "I wasn''t thinking of seeing this man alone in my bedchamber, of course."

    Yes, because it was the other way around, wasn''t it? The Host of Many sprang out of a crack in the Earth to carry off the Maiden. This situation was utterly, completely different.

    "The gods'' warning is clear, and so is our custom. But before I kill him, I would interrogate this Fool."

    "Nikolai, he is not a lost census-taker for you to cut into pieces. He is"

    "No," mouthed Nikolai. If anyone heard his lips move, they didn''t say so.

    "something greater."

    "Gold and debt", the prophecy said, and "welcome," which in the Good language could equally mean "accept," or "take."

    Yes.

    "Elder Brother?" asked the Maiden. "What''s wrong?"

    Brother Murad dusted off his hands. "Time for some tea, I''d say. After that we can reconvene and decide what to do with our, ah, guest."

 8: The Sacred Depths

    "Monsieur le Baron, me comprenez-vous?"

    oui

    Juste comme ?a,

    Mais

    You

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    Thrax

    ow did you know it was poison?"

    "I could smell the hemlock."

    "Of course it would be hemlock." Murad clicked his tongue. "Grandmother! I''ve told her that strychnine is more effective and more modern, but the first thing she does when she sees a stranger is reach for the hemlock. Still disguising it as dried parsley, is she? Putting it next to the fireplace? One of these days she''ll forget and poison herself and Grandfather Rado."

    "Brother Murad," said Nikolai, "this is hardly the time."

    "If you''re concerned about their health," said Andrei. "You should keep them where you can take care of them." His head turned. "And, Mademoiselle, I agree. This secrecy has to go."

    "What do you mean?" asked Kori before anyone else could yell ''Silence, Fool!''

    "The Turks don''t care much about the Western Rhodopes, but the Tsar certainly will. I''ve seen the ethnolinguistic maps they''re drawing up. The justification of this war rests on the libration of our fellow Slavs and Christians, and you''re neither."

    "We know all this already," said Nikolai.

    "In other words," said Kori, "you agree with him. Doctor, what comes next, in your opinion?"

    A surprised chuckle. "Amputation. Or so I''d prescribe to my commanders, if they asked for my opinion. Cut off the Greek and Albanian lands and throw them back to the Turks. I will grant that from the perspective of the appendage in question, the prognosis looks grim."

    "We''ve discussed this scenario as well, and why we should avoid it."

    "What do you suggest?"

    "A rational scheme of social hierarchy."

    "With you at its top, I assume. The Good."

    "Who better?"

    Kori held her breath, listening. Nikolai spoke as if to another priest. No, as if to a respected superior.

    "Our numbers are yet small," Nikolai explained. "Even before the last plague, there were too few of us."

    "There are never enough Good men," said Brother Bogdan.

    And younever leave the mountain at all. Of course you see nothing but the inside of your own skull.

    is

    And who are you, mortal, to make that promise?

    Unless I can find someone who is good at rowing.

    stranger is to be washed, fed, and changed. He is to be given a novitiate''s cell, where he will await his instruction in the Good language."

    "Perhaps after he has slept," said Kori.

    The angle of Nikolai''s voice dipped with his bow. "My Maiden, it is best I begin in instruction at once. I shall attend to this myself."

    Both Theodoros and Murad shivered audibly.

    "We must act quickly," Nikolai went on. "The equinox approaches. By the time of the Rite of Un-Descent, we must know whether this Andrei is a worthy vessel for the Wealthgiver." His voice dropped as his thumbnail rang softly on the edge of his sickle. "Or not."

 9a: A Narcissus from a Viper

    In a cave under a mountain, a doctor pressed his back against a corner of his cell and stared into nothing. He had scratches all down his back from the rocks of the cavern floors. His fingertips still throbbed from when he''d tried to claw his way back out, and the iodine stung like the very devil.

    "Better than Crossing the Balkan Mountain in January," he told himself.

    At least there was no snow. No mud or bombs. Nobody was shooting at him. Just silence and cool, absolute darkness. Andrei might as well close his eyes as open them.

    What good was light to him now? No need to plan or run. Andrei had been well and truly caught. Just not by the right people.

    Was a hissing collection of trogladytic cultists better than a court martial? Was it better to be sacrificed to some pagan god or cleanly executed?

    The devil you know, Doctor, or the devil you don''t?

    Andrei had been given a basin of hot water, a cloth, a bowl of bread and milk, and a bundle of clothes. Doing the appropriate things with the first two had used up maybe a half an hour. Now the rest of the night stretched before him. The rest of his life, however short that might be.

    He reached for the clothing. Groping in the dark, Andrei first found the undershirt and drawers, which seemed to be cotton as modish as any found in Paris. Under them, however, lay a voluminous, ankle-length robe, and a broad woolen sash to hold it tight, like the vestments of a monk or a dervish. The robe was lined with felted wool, but its outer covering was some coarse, papery fabric that rustled loudly with even the slightest movement. Andrei understood why when his fingers found the slippers. Their soles had been pierced by an arc of metal tacks. Wearing these clothes, Andrei would click with every step and rustle with every gesture.

    That was all. There didn''t seem to be any fox-fur cap included in Andrei''s kit. Maybe you only got one once you''d sacrificed somebody to Hades.

    What would these people do to him? Why do any of this to a runaway physician? Why march Andrei across a continent, kill his patients as quickly as he fixed them, chase him up a mountain, and imprison him in the darkness? What next?

    Andrei sank to the chilly floor, pulling his knees closer to his chest, and stared at his hands.

    He frowned. Rotated his wrists. Wiggled his fingers. Was his skin glowing?

    In green and purple blotches. That can''t be healthy.

    Andrei closed his eyes. No difference. The bruise-colored outlines continued to wave against the blackness.

    He opened his eyes again, again to no discernible effect, and traced up the green and purple outlines of his arms and shoulders. His waving hands stood out much more clearly than his unmoving torso. When he breathed, though, there was his chest, clear in his non-sight. When Andrei stretched his legs and wiggled his toes, he could see them right through his slippers. The corner of the cell''s bed, however, failed to reveal itself until Andrei''s kicking leg whacked it.

    Ow! So. No preternatural senses, then. Andrei was only hallucinating.

    A man could always feel where his own body was, and he could remember the general positions of the few items in this room. Starved for real light, Andrei''s brain helpfully confabulated vision for him. Why should that lie make him feel better?

    How many times have you told a doomed patient that he would recover?

    Andrei hissed out a breath through his teeth, and the walls of his cell seemed to brighten.

    Lies and hope. What was the difference? When these cave-Thracians told him that if he passed their tests, they wouldn''t kill him. What did that even mean? Would they only torture him to insanity? Crown him emperor? Put him to work polishing the idols and sorting the snakes? Or whatever work it was that cultists needed done.

    And what work do you need to do, Doctor?

    Andrei blinked, and green and violet wheeled. He''d said he''d take these people. He''d entered their house, certainly, and there was sickness here for him to cure.

    He pulled his knees back up to his chin. There was no point in thinking about medical ethics. What Andrei needed was to work out a way to convince them to let pass their "test" and live. Did they need a doctor in this mountain? Or did they already have one?

    Ask instead if they need a god.

    "Shut up." The walls of the cell rang with his voice. They seemed very close.

    Andrei stood with the convulsion of an insomniac and groped along the wall until he came to the bed he''d kicked. Now, along the bed to explore the opposite wall.

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    He had made three dozen laps around the cell when something clicked in the darkness. Wood scraped against stone and the breeze on Andrei''s face shifted. Someone had opened the door. He turned to face it, breathing hard, trying to remember what he''d planned to say to his captors.

    "What do you mean to do with me?"

    "I would have that this was already clear." The voice seemed to come from a long way up, as if a goblin clung to the ceiling. It spoke in Russian.

    "Oh," Andrei said. "Nikolai Igorevich. Look, I don''t suppose you''ll drop this idea of ritually sacrificing me and just join me in my escape? Two sons of Russia together, eh? Making a break for freedom?"

    An aggravated pause, followed by "No." The very darkness seemed to scowl.

    Andrei essayed another try. "Is this how you treat a guest? So as to make him want to run away? I''m a doctor who could be useful to you, not a sacrificial victim."

    "We are all victims in the end, Andrei Trifonovich. And in the end, use can be found for all of us, as well." Nikolai chuckled, pleased at his own insight.

    Andrei nodded. So much for the hope that he''d been wrong in his first estimation of Nikolai''s character. High priest of Pluto or not, the man fit a mold. He reminded Andrei of his youngest brother.

    The family''s plan was for the boy to study agriculture, but somehow he''d fallen in with the Narodniks. After Andrei''s intervention and certain other disasters, his brother had left both his friends and his university to become a monk.

    At the time, Andrei had breathed a sigh of relief. His youngest brother had a tendency to follow, to find people to worship. Now, Andrei wondered what might happen if ever his brother was so unfortunate as to be elected abbot.

    "How about breakfast, then?" he asked. "Fatten me up before you pop me into the oven?"

    Note thisDoctor: he thinks you worth frightening

    "You have come to us as a gift, Andrei Trifonovich, but it is left to us to determine the nature of that gift. We must hone your shape. Cut away the worldly clay so that the divine metal may ring true. Only then can we hear your resonances."

    "Comforting," said Andrei.

    "I see." Andrei squinted into the pitch-blackness. "I understand, in any case."

    You''re in for a surprise, priest.

    Ah, thought Andrei, a lie.

    you, Andrei Trifonovich, do the same for¡ª"

    Un-descent, right? So, I''ll have to, what, let Persephone go?"

 9b: A Narcissus from a Viper

    "May the Wealthgiver guide you or not, as he wills." The smile had grown. "Now. Attend. Ind¨¦sa na Bessik¨¦se gl¨®e!"

    Andrei''s neck prickled. The smell of the old man. The hissing gibberish he''d spoken. ¨¢dass ni vu it.

    Nikolai tapped Andrei on the forehead with a fingernail. "Attend, I said."

    "Uh?"

    "Bessik¨¢ta gl¨®a! Repeat it!"

    Andrei considered making a break for it. He could push this misplaced princeling aside and run down the corridor, but no. They would only re-capture Andrei and punish him with even more language lessons.

    "Bessik¨¢ta gl¨®a!"

    "Bessik¨¢ta gl¨®a?" Andrei said.

    Robes rustled. "That was not bad," Nikolai admitted. "I expected you to have more trouble with the pronunciation."

    "I picked up some Romanian and Greek on the march down here," said Andrei. "And this Bess¡ª"

    "Sht!"

    Nikolai smacked Andrei on the mouth.

    "Ow! Why did you do that?" Andrei rubbed his face. "How did you do that? You can''t see my face."

    "In tamss¨¦se, vu br¨¦mat tsiss put. That is, ''In the dark, it is clear what pules.''" Nikolai''s voice was smug. "As to why: it is permitted for initiates to speak and be spoken to in their Fool languages when that of the Good is still unknown to them. However, a Good word may never be embedded in a Fool sentence."

    "That''s ridiculous," said Andrei. "How am I supposed to learn this language of yours if neither of us can utter a sentence such as ''the Thracian word for darkness is tarabara or whatever."

    "Good. The Good word." A foot-tap on the floor. "An Bess¨ªke, ai¨® ¨¦sta ''t¨¢mssa.'' Repeat that."

    "In Bess¨ªke, ai¨® ¨¦sta ''t¨¢mssa.'' What does that mean?"

    "In Good, it is ''dark.''"

    "Oh, like temnota," said Andrei.

    "Yes. The Russian for ''dark'' is kin of the Good word." For the first time, Nikolai''s voice took on an emotion other than sullen rage or sneering arrogance. He sounded eager. "Good is part of the great family of languages that includes Russian, as well as Latin, Greek, and Sanskrit. In many ways, in fact, it is a bridge between these ancient languages and the modern Slavonic."

    "Uh, oh?"

    "Let me think. What''s an example that would make sense to you?"

    Andrei had the impression that Nikolai was waving his hands.

    "Take for instance the Good word for ''land.''" In Russian, that was zemlya. "The Reaper of Grain uses the name Kori Chthamali amongst Fools. Chthamali is Greek. The Latin cognate: humilitas. Do you see the resemblances?"

    Nikolai continued without waiting for Andrei to say "no." "La Bess¨ªkit i¨¦ nim ¨¦sta Sa?ra Zem¨¦la. Do you hear? Sa?ra Zem¨¦la. That is her true name."

    Zem¨¦la did sound a bit like zemlya, but Andrei was still inclined to think that Nikolai just one of those over-studious boys whose mind had cracked under the weight of old books.

    "Does humilitas mean ''land'' in Latin, then?" he asked.

    "Well," said Nikolai. "No. But! Greek preserves da for ''earth'' in such constructions as the Doric D¨¡ M¨¡?t¨¥r. Demeter. Mother Earth, you see?"

    "Da doesn''t sound like any of those other words."

    More hand-waving. "The sounds have shifted!"

    "And wasn''t the Greek word for Earth gi?"

    "Shut up! You''re just like the rest of them! Bessik¨¢ta f¨¢la ¨¦sta ''Da.'' Da, d¨¦la mi Don''t you see? Da, d¨¦la mi! Da! Think of the don in ''Macedonia,'' the dun in ''London!''"

    Ah. So it was insanity. "I might study better after breakfast," Andrei suggested.

    Nikolai clicked his tongue. "You have no need to practice eating. Now begins your practice of language."

    "We haven''t begun that yet?"

    "Sht! We begin, as I say, with the conjugation of the verb ''to be.'' Vas em B¨¢tsa ¨®rpei. Vas em kaft. Repeat that. Yes. Now. Vas em nir. Repeat that. Ti i¨¦ tse nir. Repeat that.

    "But what does any of that mean?" asked Andrei.

    The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

    Nikolai tapped the floor. "It means ''I am a man.'' ''You are a man, too.'' The cognates should be obvious."

    Rather than ask "what the devil is a cognate," Andrei said. "This would be easier with a slate and chalk. And a candle to see them by."

    "Light dazzles. The eyes distract. No light may enter the cells or corridors of the Sacred Depths. And the Good language has been taught this way for over a thousand years, novitiate. Now." Another tap. "Repeat after me. Vas em nir. Ti i¨¦ nir. Sara?ta ¨¦sta sa?ra."

    Meaning ''I am a man, you are a man,'' and what? Sa?ra? Andrei remembered Kori''s cave-name. "Does Kori''s name literally mean ''maiden?''"

    "Of course."

    "Does she plan to change her name once she marries?" Andrei wasn''t sure whether he was digging for information now or just trying to get out of more conjugation exercises.

    "She will not marry," said Nikolai, "any more than will I. I must be pure to hear the voice of the Maiden, and she must be pure to hear the voice of the goddess Persephone, also called Maiden."

    "But Persephone, I mean, didn''t Pluto¡­?"

    "Carry her off? Yes. He sent a hatchling viper to bite her and bring her to his realm, but she transformed it into a yellow narcissus."

    That wasn''t the myth as far as Andrei knew it, but who was he to argue with a madman? Nikolai got upset enough over sound shifts in Greek. "That''s a good trick," he said.

    "Ta kn¨¦ssa a?partka u a?prake," pronounced Nikolai. "This is an aphorism: ''to know a narcissus from a viper.'' It means that one must understand the difference between a danger and an opportunity."

    "I see. Or rather, I hear and understand. What happened after she got carried off?"

    Nikolai sniffed. "After their marriage, she became the Mistress of the underworld, but she was still the Maiden. Her relationship with the master was what one might call ''Platonic.''"

    That definitely wasn''t how Andrei remembered the myth. He wondered how the other priests interpreted it. And what about Kori? Andrei wondered how much of his current predicament had been caused by the loneliness of a young woman.

    "But Mademoiselle Chthamali has a mother, presumably," he said.

    "Some prophetesses do become mothers," admitted Nikolai. "In these degenerate times, the previous Maiden may change her name and resign from the duties of prophetess when her daughter comes of age. But in the past, things were purer. My research indicates that the original Maidens were elected, not born, and remained chaste their whole lives."

    No need to ask why they did away with that tradition.

    "Soon¡­" Nikolai''s voice trailed off. "But we have wandered from the lesson. Novitiate, attend!"

    Click went his slipper against the floor and Andrei''s spine stiffened. Terrible memories of his Latin tutor surfaced.

    "Say, ''I am a man'' in Good!"

    "Vas em nir!" Andrei surprised himself. The words came as if spoken by someone else.

    "N¨¦i."

    "No?"

    "No. It means ''yes.''"

    "What?"

    "''You are a man.'' ''She is a woman.''"

    This time, Andrei thought more, and so did less well. "Um, ti¡­nir?"

    "Ti i¨¦ nir. Ai¨® ¨¦sta z¨®na. Repeat that."

    Andrei repeated. You are a man, she is a¡­woman, he assumed.

    "Say, ''You are a priest.'' ''She is a prophetess.''"

    "I don''t know those words."

    "Then attend more closely. Vas em kaft. Ai¨® ¨¦sta sem¨ªa."

    "Vas em¡­" Andrei shook his head. "I mean, Ti¡ª"

    A slap on his cheek. "No embedding!"

    Andrei tried his best to sigh in Good. "Ti i¨¦ kaft."

    "''I¨² ¨¦na,'' nel¨¢he. Remember that I am your teacher. I¨² ¨¦na."

    That must be the plural "you are," appropriate for a student addressing a teacher. "I¨² ¨¦na kaft," said Andrei. "Ai¨® ¨¦sta s¡­suh?"

    "Ai¨® ¨¦sta sem¨ªa." A smile crept into the priest''s voice. "Sem¨ªa dzam¡ªIt means ''she who is compelled to song.'' From the ancient¡ª" He cleared his throat. "¨ªmata i¨¦ f¨¢la ¨¦sta ''saggeim¨¦nia.''"

    "Oh." Andrei had no idea what he was talking about.

    Nikolai sighed in Good. "Repeat your lesson, novitiate. I¨² ¨¦na¡­?"

    "I¨² ¨¦na kaft. Ai¨® ¨¦sta sem¨ªa. Vas em¡­How do you say ''I am a doctor?''"

    "You are no longer a doctor, Andrei Trifonovich. You are a vessel for the Unseen, or you join his household."

    As a corpse, Andrei understood. He had forgotten that he was not 10 years old and speaking to his Latin tutor. He was a prisoner and his tutor was a mad priest, working for a lovelorn prophetess. Where were these broken characters coming from? Who sent them to Andrei and why?

    Why indeed, Doctor.

    To heal them? Andrei could saw open a skull if he had to, but then what? Andrei could do nothing with this a diseased mind, but grab hold of it and put it to use. He had to, if he wanted to ever see daylight again.

    Andrei rubbed his face, spots dancing in front of his eyes, and tried to think. How could he escape? By playing along? Play Hades for this ritual, always one misconjugated verb away from execution?

    No, his previous plan was still the best. Make himself useful.

    Andrei leaned forward, smiling. "Hey, Nikolai Igorevich."

    "Have you not been listening to anything I''ve said? The verb ''to have''¡ª"

    "What''s your god''s name?" asked Andrei. "In Good, I mean."

    "Na Bessik¨¦se," said Nikolai. "In the Good Language, the god has many epithets. ¨¢i vu k¨¢lit Plistra?ss tse Des¨¦stass na Plest, Tabra?ss Stopa?n na Tama?t na N¨ªstet."

    Andrei was certain he recognized words in that stream of nonsense, but he didn''t hear the one the old man had used. "¨¢dass ni vu it," Andrei recited.

    A click. Those were Nikolai''s teeth when he snapped his mouth shut.

    "What is it?" asked Andrei as the silence stretched. "I thought you would correct me."

    "What did you say? How did you know that name?"

    Andrei didn''t answer. "What does it mean? Teacher, instruct me."

    Nikolai drew in a breath and let it out. "It means ''We see the Unseen.'' Literally, ''the Unseen One sees himself by us.'' Third person reflexive, which I believe replaced the older mediopassive¡­" His voice sharpened. "Who taught you how to say that? Was it the shepherds? Someone in Russia?"

    "Who do you think?" said Andrei, his mouth buying time while his brain thought, the old man must have been repeating that to himself, trying to remind himself. Not to forget that Death had appeared to him, when he slipped, and I caught him.

    Nikolai breathed deeply. "You are playing a game more dangerous than you can possibly imagine, Andrei Trifonovich. Tsi i¨¦ ti?"

    Andrei didn''t understand the individual words of the question, but he didn''t let get in the way of answering. Like stringing beads on a necklace, Andrei clicked the sentence together. "Vas em ¨¢dass."

    Silence swelled huge between them. Then, a muffled chatter that might have been Nikolai''s teeth.

    "Enough," said the priest. the echoes of his voice changed as he stood. "This lesson is over. Repeat it to yourself. I shall test you. You will be tested!"

    The door screeched over the stone floor, the brass lock clanked, and Prince Nikolai Igorevich, high priest of the cave-Thracians, fled in a flap of robes.

    Andrei stared after him, eyes uselessly wide. "What about breakfast?"

    There was no answer, except, perhaps, in Andrei''s mind.

    Good work, Doctor. You have certainly seized that narcissus. Or is it a viper?

 10a: An Echo Speaks

    Everyone knew when Elder Brother Nikolai fled the cell of the novitiate, breath rapid and teeth chattering. Everyone knew why.

    The Sacred Depths had first been natural caves, then mines for gold. In the chaos of the first Descent, the mines had become a refuge, then a prison, then a temple. Corridors and cells were cut to house the sibyls and their attendants, as well as shafts for light and air. When darkness came into fashion, most of the light-wells had been shuttered. Now, the shafts behind the walls carried air, and air carried secrets.

    A novitiate priestess with scarlet fever had been quarantined in a cell just under Andrei''s. Her name was Vlada, and she was thirteen years old.

    "What happened?" Kori asked. "What did they say?"

    "Mostly they just conjugated verbs," the girl told Kori.

    "Oh no."

    "And they talked about you a lot. My Maiden, what''s ''Platonic''?"

    Kori took a seat at the little girl''s bedside.

    "Little Echo," she said, "your curiosity has returned. You must be feeling better."

    "I''m still cold."

    The girl''s forehead was damp and hot. "I''ll give you some water," Kori said. "And comb that hair. Was it Elder Brother Nikolai who used that word? ''Platonic'' means the ideal of something. The perfect form."

    "The Maiden and the Wealthgiver have a ''perfect relationship''?"

    Kori''s fingers combed through Vlada''s hair, finding tangles and teasing them apart. "That depends on what the Elder Brother meant by ''perfect.'' The new novitiate might disagree."

    At first, Kori had thought the high priest was simply pretending to go along with her schemes, waiting for his chance to get rid of Andrei Trifonovich. The most expedient route would be to allow the outsider to take part in the Un-Descent, then kill him when he made an inevitable mistake. As Kori questioned Vlada, though, it became clear to her that Nikolai took his role of teacher seriously. He seemed to really mean to teach Andrei the Good language. Why? What for?

    This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

    "You''re sighing again."

    Kori twitched her mind back into her body. "Sometimes grownups sigh, Vlada."

    "You say that as if I''m a child, and I''m not."

    "Calm, little sister." When Kori could find no tangles with her hands, she gave a click to locate the tortoiseshell comb on the table. The comb, running through Vlada''s hair, found more tangles. She started at the tips and worked her way up again.

    "Ow! I''m gentler with you."

    "Maybe I don''t cry out as much as you do. Maybe you''re very rough and you don''t know it. What else did he say?"

    "Who? The Fool?"

    "Not a Fool," said Kori. "He''s a novitiate to the Good. His name is, well¡ª"

    "He said his name! I just¡­" Vlada hesitated. "I don''t want to say it."

    "Little Echo doesn''t want to repeat?" Kori smiled and waited. Vlada''s hair flowed like warm water.

    "He said ''I am the Unseen.''"

    Kori kept combing. "That must have given Nikolai quite a shock."

    "Did you," asked the sick girl, "bring him for me?"

    No, thought Kori, for me.

    "You still live, Little Echo." Kori told the girl. "The Host of Many will welcome you in his own time."

    "I mean, did you bring him for me because he is a doctor?"

    "Oh." Kori paused, momentarily stricken by guilt. She hadn''t even considered using Andrei in that way. "His profession is useful, but that is Apollonian thinking," she said, mostly to herself.

    "Ugh," said Vlada. "I know about that."

    "Logic has its place, but logic is only the knife. It is the hand that drives the knife to cut, and the intentions of the mind."

    "My Maiden, I know."

    Kori passed the girl''s hair from one hand to the other, thinking. She had one man who might heal or rule and another who might teach or kill him. She had a sick little girl, a nation to build, and a Mountain full of echoing voices.

    Kori clicked and found Vlada''s right hand. Gently, she held it while her nail traced the shape of a letter over the hot skin. It was ¦«, the first letter in the Good word for "game."

    Vlada found the back of her hand and traced ¦­, the first letter of "yes."

    In abbreviated form, Kori wrote: I will find the doctor.

    Vlada''s hand vanished while she used it to stifle a cough. Kori held her hands still, so the little girl could find them again.

    Once she had, Vlada wrote, ¦±?

    Love?

    Kori took her hands away. "Tell me something, Vlada. What happened after the doctor named himself? Elder Brother left?"

    "Yes. His teeth sounded scared."

    "I understand." Kori stood. "All done. May Heaven not blind and Madness never touch you, Little Echo."

    The high priest would be confused and upset. He would seek clarity and reassurance, but since he could never lower himself to ask for them, he would retreat into solitude and a place of safety. Kori would find him in the library.

    "Are you going to talk to the doctor?" Vlada called after her. "Will he come cure me?"

    Kori stopped, her fingertips on the door latch. "Trust the signs."

 10b: An Echo Speaks

    Slippers clicking, Nikolai fled through the corridors. What had that been? A god pouring from the mouth of his vessel. Anyone listening to their conversation would think so, yes. And someone had been listening, hadn''t they? In the Sacred Depths, someone was always listening.

    Nikolai had adapted well to life under the Mountain. His ears could paint the walls with echoes. His fingertips could read the peaks and valleys of Good writing. He no longer awoke at night clawing at the walls, mouth stuffed with smothering black. He loved and worshiped his Maiden, and so he survived.

    Would Andrei become the same in time? What would he become? What?

    Wind brushed Nikolai''s face and he flinched back. What was that? A puff of air from a ventilation duct? A stray bat?

    Nikolai walked faster, bent over, grasping his elbows. He had adapted well to the Sacred Depths, but he still didn''t like bats. Their guano, which had to be cleared from the air ducts, the bones of their corpses, crunching unexpectedly under one''s slippers. The papery noises of their flight. Their chittering, just at the edge of hearing.

    Do you think yourself important, Kolya?

    You were not sent here to enjoy yourself, young master Gurskalin.

    We''re just waiting for our chance to abandon you.

    He imagined them like that, sometimes. Lodged in his hair, their folded wings parting to reveal flat, questing little faces.

    She will replace you.

    Nikolai shook his head. "Madness," he cursed. "This is madness."

    The Maiden would never replace Nikolai. His brother priests would not abandon him. No one had a better command of the language and lore of the Good. No one else feared the gods so much as he.

    A puff of air, as if from a laughing mouth. Nikolai stopped and tapped his foot, sounding the walls around him. The empty corridor stretched ahead and behind.

    No, they would not abandon him. Nikolai had deciphered texts un-read for a thousand years and brought back the original words and spirit of the worship of the Shrouded One. He had redesigned the airflow system of the Holy Mountain, brought in the fans and water pumps. Who but Nikolai was responsible for the Good''s high standards of health and hygiene? No plague would again strike down the priests and priestesses, not because of some doctor.

    It''s not enough.

    Nikolai batted at the air. It pressed in on him from the walls on either side.

    Then, ahead! The darkness ahead, wherein lay the glorious future of the Good nation. The truth of Hades would burst from the Holy Mountain in an explosion of fire and smoke. Nikolai would stride across the crumbling continent and sweep up the remains of the Fool nations into his army. His Host of Many.

    Nikolai chuckled at his pun, and felt better.

    He put a hand to the wall and brushed his fingers over the way-signs carved into it. Ah. So his feet had brought him to the library. Good. He would study here, then meditate, then find the brothers and give them his orders.

    The creak of the door revealed the broad, manifold volume of the chamber. Stand-desks and lecterns littered the floor around them, and a labyrinth of stone bookcases curled off into the soundless unknown. From the carved niches whispered the echoes thrown by paper and parchment, leather and cloth, their surfaces marked with beads of wax or knots of thread. More robust were the sounds reflected by the wood, clay, stone, and metal tablets.

    Nikolai had barely had time to seat himself in the library''s sunken lounging pit before the door scraped open again. The timbre of the ringing tacks in the soles of their slippers identified Brothers Murad and Bogdan. A homely clinking announced plates and cups. A clatter as Brother Murad set down his tray, and Nikolai caught the scent of yogurt and dried apples, pale moss and valerian tea.

    In the Depths, where an ear pressed every wall, Nikolai''s brothers had heard his fateful conversation with the prisoner Andrei. They came to him, and they brought breakfast.

    Nikolai did not know how to thank them, so he remained silent.

    Brother Bogdan groaned into his seat. "Oh, my back. Oof. It has been long since the Mountain had a doctor," he said.

    "Don''t be fooled by the Fool," snapped Nikolai. "He only used his profession to bargain for his life." He reached for a slice of dried apple and knocked his fingers against the teapot. "Earth protect me! A doctor! Just what I would expect of an Apollonian Fool."

    Brother Murad spun the tray around until the bowl of fruit was under Nikolai''s hand. "I thought you said he was a drunk. That would be Dionysian."

    "I know what it would be. Are Fools constrained in their foolishness? He can well be both." Nikolai chewed savagely.

    "He passed your test," said Murad.

    Nikolai swallowed. "I would not say ''test.'' Nor would I say ''passed.''" He sounded weak. He sat back, stopping himself from reaching for more food. "In any case, this test was not the last."

    "And if he passes that one, and the one after that?" pressed the priest.

    "Then we rejoice, Brother, for the truth of the Unseen pours from his mouth. We rejoice and we obey, for the prisoner will be our Master." Nikolai let his voice swell to fill the library. "He will stand behind the Holy Mountain as we pour blood and smoke down upon our enemies!"

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    "Tea?" asked Brother Murad.

    "Thank you." Nikolai put out his hand, and with a tongue-click, his brother priest found it. Warm ceramic pressed against his palm, and Nikolai felt his face muscles relax. "We have already drawn up our battle plans and distributed them to our agents," he said. "Send word now to them to begin final preparations."

    "What if our novitiate is not a god, but only a hero?" asked Bogdan.

    "What? What hero?"

    The two others were silent. Was this a test? What hero or demigod could the doctor¡ªof course. "His resonance is not with Asclepius," said Nikolai. "Whatever he¡ª"

    His ears pricked. Nikolai''s brothers were rising to their feet, which could only mean they had heard someone approaching in the corridor.

    Nikolai rose as well, and so was ready to greet Kori when she scraped the door open.

    "My Maiden bears the dark torch of insight," he said, hearing the voice at his ear: she''s been spying on you too.

    "So," said Kori, "Nikolai. Are you looking for an excuse to find Andrei unworthy and kill him?"

    Nikolai made an effort to keep his voice even as he said, "My Maiden, I believe fervently that my novitiate may become a fit vessel for the Unseen One. This is the glimmer toward which I reach."

    "And if your reaching loses us our doctor?"

    "There are many false echoes in this imperfect world. We must not allow ourselves to be distracted by them," Nikolai bowed, "My Maiden."

    "Anybody would be distracted by what you heard, Elder Brother," said Bogdan, serenely admitting to eavesdropping.

    Sweet, metallic jinglings as the Maiden lowered herself into the pit across from Nikolai. "The novitiate named himself in the Good Language, Nikolai. How much clearer can a voice be?"

    "Tea, for the Hungry One," said Murad.

    "Thank you."

    A teacup clinked. Murad brought a cup for the Maiden as well. Had they all planned this together?

    Nikolai seated himself again, groping for clarity as well as his teacup. "My brothers, My Maiden, do not allow yourselves become frightened over nothing."

    "There is no shame in fear," said Bogdan. "Fear is often the most reasonable response to the Earth''s gifts."

    "A vessel of Asclepius would be no bad thing to have in the mountain," said Kori.

    Nikolai twitched and clicked his tongue, probing her expression. "But, you said you wanted the Wealthgiver!" He cleared his throat. "My Maiden."

    "I only conduct what is given to me by the Mistress of the Mountain."

    And was there not also a Master of the Mountain? Was it his voice in the mouth of the prisoner? Was it her voice in Kori''s? What was the real message here? Which of those echoes rebounded off of truth, and which from wishes and delusions? His hand shook as he pressed the rim of his teacup to his lip. Empty.

    "Confusion," muttered Nikolai. "Chaos. Madness. There is more here, brothers, than we know. Currents run deeper than we guess. Currents cold, but unclean."

    Bogdan sighed and Murad said, "More tea, Elder Brother?"

    "Not now! I remind you all of the oracle." Nikolai recited it to them again, but was met with no audible response. He resisted the urge to tongue-click and get a sounding of their expressions. That would look weak.

    "There is our sign," Nikolai pushed. "A verse directly from the curved lips of our goddess. Our prisoner spoke the words himself. He resonates with the Unseen, the Master who stands behind the Mistress. Or else he is nothing."

    "My question," said Murad, "is how our prisoner could know the Good name of the Unseen One. None of us spoke it in his presence."

    "Grandfather Radoslav," said Brother Bogdan. "You know his mind is not good."

    "So then you think it was the Free God who spoke through him?" asked Nikolai. "Our greatest enemy on the very slopes of our Mountain so soon before the Un-Descent?"

    Murad made a sound in his throat. Nikolai was about to tell him that his personal feelings were inconsequential next to the machinations of the gods, but Kori interrupted him.

    "I have just been to see little Vlada."

    Nikolai squinted. "Who?"

    "One of the novitiate priestesses," said Bogdan. "The one with a fever."

    "Oh, yes," said Nikolai, although he still didn''t remember. "Is she properly quarantined?"

    "I worry for her," said the Maiden, avoiding his question. "And I would like our new doctor to examine her."

    Nikolai did not bother to ask "what new doctor?" He knew they had all heard Andrei begging for his life. "If he is the Unseen One, then infirmary is no place for him. And the time before the Un-Descent is short enough. I have much to teach him."

    Murad''s sleeves rustled. "But, Elder Brother, it seems he needs no instruction in Good. Our guest need do nothing but wait for the Un-Descent."

    "No," said both Nikolai and Kori together. They paused in confusion.

    "It would make more sense if the doctor were our Asclepius," said Brother Murad.

    "Sense!" Nikolai spat. He couldn''t believe the man''s foolishness. "May light not dazzle you! These are the Sacred Depths, little brother, not the outside world. Here, of all the places on Earth, we do not strategize! We do not deceive each other. We act in perfect trust, for it is only in that state of trust that we can hear the breath of the gods."

    Silence from his brothers. Were they listening? They must be!

    "Either this man is a narcissus," said the Maiden, "or he is a viper."

    "But is not venom also the first ingredient to medicine?" asked Bogdan.

    Murad clicked agreement. "All I suggest is that we grab him by his jaws, squeeze out what he''s got, and put him back in his cage with a nice juicy mouse."

    Bogdan chuckled. "I bow to the master poisoner''s expertise."

    Nikolai waved his hands. "Don''t you see? The narcissus is itself a sign, a symbol, that of which nations are built. It is too early to recruit staff for the Sacred Depths; what we now seek is to raise our people up. We need a leader, we need our god! It is he who must stand at the peak of our mountain, he who must stride across the Fool-stolen lands, spreading the cleansing fire before him!"

    "More tea?" asked Murad.

    "If there''s any left."

    "Please, Elder Brother," said the Maiden, as Nikolai drank, "what is your decision?"

    "I have already told the brothers to activate our agents," he said.

    "I mean about the girl. Vlada. May the doctor examine her?"

    Brother Bogdan grumbled. "A man in the women''s quarters¡­"

    "I''ve had her moved to the infirmary," said Kori.

    Nikolai heard Brother Bogdan''s breathing grow shallow. The old man remembered the plague, when the infirmary had last been full. The chamber was practically abandoned these days, like the Mountain itself.

    "The Master of the House of the Dead," mused the old man. "Perhaps he does belong in such a place."

    "Perhaps," said Kori. "Who can say?"

    "I," said Nikolai, "will be the judge of that." An idea had come to him. A test. "Yes. Yes, escort Andrei Trifonovich to the infirmary, by all means. There, we will discover whether this man resonates with the god, or with nothing at all."

    "Brother Nikolai," began Murad, but Kori stood.

    "I will go to the Narcissus Pool," she said. "I will meditate again and I will prophesy. Clearly, we do not yet know what the gods want of us."

    Nikolai stood to wish his Maiden farewell, then sat again to finish the tea. He dismissed his brothers and sat in the dark, thinking. Murad did not approve of the test he planned, and nor did the Maiden. He was certain, though, that if she was granted one, her prophesy would support the wisdom of Nikolai''s plan.

    If she does not lie, came the bat-whisper.

    Nikolai swatted at the air over his right ear. There was nothing there.

    "Earth, protect me from Madness," said Nikolai. If he began to distrust the Maiden''s prophesies, he would be utterly lost.

 Chapter 11a: The Infirmary

    Andrei spoke into the darkness. "Give me light."

    "Ma." That meant ''no.''

    He stood in the doorway to the mountain''s pitch-black infirmary, holding the papery hand of the old man who had led him here. Brother Bogdan, Andrei was to call him when not speaking Good.

    The old man tapped the floor with a foot, releasing echoes that bounced off the walls of what must be a rather large, rectangular space.

    The air in the medical chamber was warmer than out in the corridor, and damper. The infirmary smelled nothing like anywhere Andrei had worked. Cold wet stone, a bit of sweat and sulfur. He wondered how the cave-Thracians managed to get rid of the smells of blood and vomit.

    "Your patient is on the cot closest the door," he said in French. "You need only put out your hand and take a step forward.

    "I also need light so I can examine my patient," said Andrei.

    Brother Bogdan clicked his tongue in a way that suggested irritation and tugged Andrei back toward the door. "Novitiate, what you ask is not possible. The afflicted girl is a novitiate priestess, and so must be surrounded by purely chthonic influences. No light, no alcohol."

    "What about medical spirits?"

    Brother Bogdan didn''t dignify that with a response. "We should not even speak in this outside language in her presence. Please speak only in Good."

    "Vas em nir. Ti i¨¦ nir."

    Brother Bogdan slapped him, but only gently.

    "Br¨¦ma?" called a voice from inside the infirmary.

    "Is that a child?" Andrei pulled himself out of the old man''s grip and stepped away, arms outstretched.

    "Tsi ¨¦sta?" It was the voice of a little girl. Who is it?

    "Vas em¡­" But he still didn''t know the word for doctor. "Vas em¡­um¡­"

    "Ti d¨®a ola m¨²a."

    He didn''t understand.

    "Ti d¨®a mi d¨¦la."

    D¨¦la! He''d heard that word. You something protect me.

    "N¨¦i," said Andrei, thinking. Into whatever houses I enter, I will enter to help the sick.

    Stolen novel; please report.

    "I''m here," the girl said in Bulgarian.

    "Nel¨¢ha, mad¨ª ta f¨¢la ist," Brother Bogdan remonstrated.

    "Mi f¨¢lsa, Br¨¢t Zesst¨¢ne," said the girl apologetically. "Z¨¦sam vu ma¨ª bass."

    A reluctant pause from Bogdan, then, "She says she''s feeling better."

    "That is good." Andrei said in Bulgarian, groping toward her voice. "Because I cannot very much help you this way." Stumbled over a groove in the floor and barked his knee hard against the edge of another cot.

    Andrei cursed in Russian and switched to French. "Unable as I am to examine my patient, give her half the medicines I might, and am only able to say to her, Vas em nir."

    A squeak from the girl and another click from Brother Bogdan. "One does not embed the Good Language, novitiate."

    "Does one allow a young girl to die because her doctor is blind?"

    "I am blind," said Brother Bogdan. "Even under the Sun, darkness follows me, and yet I do my duties."

    "I''m sure you''re very proud of that, but I must see," Andrei insisted. "Surely you would rather bend your religious rules than allow this little priestess to die." Hopefully she didn''t understand French.

    Silence from Brother Bogdan until Andrei gave up. "What," he fumbled in Bulgarian. "What is the pain, little one?"

    "Everyone calls me little, but I''m not a child."

    She was right under him. The cot he''d struck was hers.

    "I apologize, miss. What is your name?" Andrei felt for her hand.

    "Vlada." She grasped his wrist. Those fingers were too warm. "I have scarlet fever. I was better this morning, but then I got worse. But now I feel fine."

    "Vlada. A pretty name." Andrei brushed his fingers up the sweaty sheets until he found the side of her face. "A nice round cheek you have, too."

    It was too hot, as well. The skin was rough, as if with rash. Vlada had diagnosed herself accurately. "Fever. When was your last¡­thing?" He used the Russian word, "Bout?"

    "It was worse earlier. The Maiden came to me."

    "That was nice of her." Andrei felt the girl''s thyroids. Still a bit swollen, but not badly.

    "The Maiden''s voice is so beautiful," said Vlada, which gave Andrei an idea.

    "Look," he said in French. "I mean, listen to me, Brother Bogdan. Your Maiden. She''s the Light-Bringer, right? The Torch-Bearer?"

    "Among many other things," came the old man''s voice.

    "So, I suppose she has some sort of special dispensation to bring light? Would you summon her if a doctor ordered it?"

    Brother Bogdan spoke like a father asked for the dozenth time to buy a toy that he cannot afford. "That is impossible, novitiate."

    Andrei ran his hands down the girl''s arms, feeling the rash there. Very probably, the girl was past the point of crisis.

    He should be relieved he had been given a patient who hadn''t been blown to pieces. All Andrei had to do was keep her fever down tonight and she''d be recovered by morning. But what about next time?

    Will there be a next time? Do you intend to become the doctor to these people?

    Andrei turned his head toward the sound of the other man''s voice. "What if, Brother Bogdan, your god the Wealthgiver demanded to see his Maiden?"

    A little chuckle. "Do you think He speaks through you? In French?"

    Andrei considered. This girl wasn''t really ill. Was that Andrei''s good luck, or the cave-Thracians'' test? To see if Andrei would be a good Pluto. Cold shivers. Did they expect him to kill this child?

    No. Andrei massaged his temple, staring into the nothingness. He was thinking wrong. This wasn''t about him. He''d been in situations like this, where he got nonsensical, contradictory orders because of some bureaucratic snarl further up the chain of command.

    A turf war. One faction of priests against another. The sibyl versus the priests. Kori Chthalmali seemed to want to open up the Mountain. Tell the world about the cave-Thracians. She thought Andrei could help with that. Look, we captured this outsider and didn''t execute him. We must be all right after all.

    Except there was more to this than politics and pragmatism. The cultists really thought he might be an embodiment of their god. Or could be made into one.