Of Gaea (20 page)

She paused as Ari fumbled to get the wheelchair over the
doorjamb to the back porch. There was no ramp on the front of the
house, but there was one out back. Ari heard Nasya’s sigh before
her wheelchair was given a swift and firm nudge.

“Anyway,” Nasya continued as they started moving
again.
“The
politicians believe they are at the top. The Envoys of Gaea
actually keep the Faith and the balance. The thaumaturges are under
them, then the merchants, the agronomist, and lastly the scholars.
Well, not completely last because the laborers and indentured are
at the bottom. Sasha, by birth, is very close to the bottom of the
totem pole. In the case of Leonidas, he is Envoy and Priam is a
thaumaturge child he was best friends with in school. Their
childhood friends Achilles and Hektor are politicians’ children of
varying rank. Technically above Leonidas, and technically not. It’s
a complicated system. You can see how Sasha would bear the weight
of discord being placed with Kleisthenes.”

“That’s
unfair.”

“That’s Sparta.” Nasya jumped over something Ari didn’t
see. “There is a master guild, The Grand Masters’ Circle that runs
all of Sparta. They are a sort of monarchy among Sparta.
Kleisthenes is at the top as he owns the land the Spartan city and
village sit on and are paid a tithe for its use and exchange for
safety and yada yada. It’s more technical and complex than that but
you get the idea.”

The door to Goddess Ink chimed when they entered. Ari
didn’t recall it doing that on the first visit but she had been
distracted.

The space was still as splendidly open and bright as the
first time.
Still, no one sat behind the counter. Before Ari could
voice her opinion on the lax security she heard the tap, shuffle,
pause that was too hard to disguise as anything other than
Leonidas’s walk.

“I am not taking any clients today,” He began as he came
through the curtain then frowned when he saw Nasya and her.
“You’re early. You
don’t need to be here until sundown.”

“Um…”

“I thought,” Nasya cut in, “she could talk to you while
you’re preparing. You’ll still need her measurements and such
right? Or however it is you do inks?”

He scowled at her. “And her payment.” His smile made Ari
uneasy. “I was distracted last time and forgot to mention the
fee.”

“Use this.” Nasya tossed something at him that he was
forced to catch before it smacked him in the face.

Even from the
distance Ari could see the gold label of a credit card.
“Nasya…”

“Don’t worry about it, Ari. I don’t use it for anything but
books anyway.” Nasya smiled. “At least now it’s going to good use.”
She stepped towards the door. “There’s no way to max it out Leo, so
don’t bother trying. I’ll see you guys tomorrow. Remember, what you
promised Leo.”

“Sasha has my ring.”
He muttered obstinately but Nasya was already
gone.

They faced off
in tense silence for a few moments before he sighed.

“Can’t be helped.”
He leaned on his cane. “Follow me.”

“My chair
can’t fit in your hallway.” Ari interjected quickly before he could
begin to walk away.

He cut a glare at her and studied the wheelchair.
“Do you always have
the habit of stating the obvious?”

Ari lifted her chin just barely. Leonidas smiled amused in
return. He hadn’t missed the gesture.

“Not the hallway, Ariadne.”
He shuffled slowly behind the counter and
she followed cautiously.

When the wall slid back at his touch she clenched her jaw
to keep it from dropping. Ari hadn’t noticed it before, and even
studying it now, there was no way to discern the pocket door. It
blended perfectly into the wall.

“It’s ingenious.”
She examined the joints as she rolled through.
“It’s…”

Her voice failed as she took in the next room. The heat of
it hit her first, so extreme that in seconds her tunic was
plastered to her with sweat. In all her life, she had never seen
anything so beautiful. It was the largest solarium she had ever
witnessed outside of the internet.

Ari moved slowly, studying everything. It looked and felt
like an exotic jungle. Flowers rioted along the walkway in
explosions of color. Hanging pots spilled over with vine plants,
and trees reached up to the ceiling blocking out some of the sun in
shaded patterns.

“It’s beautiful. You have your own little Eden
here.”

He chuckled. “Thank you. I used to be able to maintain it
myself. However, since, my handicap developed, I’ve had to bring in
gardeners to do most of the work.”

How could such a cynical man own something so ridiculously
beautiful? It proved life was neither what it was expected to be
nor people either.

Ari reached
out to touch a flower and Leonidas’s hand grabbed her before she
could touch.

“Nothing in here is technically poisonous if used
correctly.
However, I would advise against touching the exotic flowers
until you know what they are.” He let her hand go. “She’s a type of
eater plant. Her petals have a toxin in them. A bug lands, gets
paralyzed then falls to the open mouths of the pods below at ground
level.”

Ari glanced down; the pods looked deceptively like shallow
pools of water. Probably the plant’s version of stomach acid. Ari
shuddered. The flowers had lost some of their beauty.

The path opened up to a circular courtyard the size of her
house.
Patterns of shade curiously decorated the stone pathway
that had her looking up to investigate. The glass above them was
domed and clear, the sun rested on a gold line to the west. Around
the base of the dome various scenes were painted. Ari couldn’t make
out the paintings so she had to guess from the shadows on the
floor.

“We’ll do your tattooing in here.
No one will interrupt and the circle
is already protected. No one that does not belong to the Goddess
will be able to enter once the circle is opened.” He gestured to
what looked like a really long, low table in the center of the
circle. “You can sit there if you’d like.”

“What are you
going to do?”

He stopped in the process of walking away.
“I’m going to go
get what we’ll need for tonight and bring it out here. Remember
what I said about the plants.”

Ari watched him shuffle away, leaving her in the company of
potentially dangerous plants. Truthfully, the plants were more than
thirty feet away from the center of the circle but she still eyed
them warily. With her luck, one of them was probably some kind of
moving vine eater thing that had a boa constrictor move as its
favorite form of attack.

Unable to bear the heat any longer Ari pulled her tunic
over her head and wiped her face with it.
Then she rolled it up neatly and made
a pillow on the bench. Ari received a surprise when she gingerly
moved over to the bench.

It moved and creaked, and rattled like bamboo.
If she could have
jumped up in surprise she would have, instead she closed her eyes
and counted to ten to make sure it didn’t collapse under her. When
she laid down on it, it moved like a bean bag chair and conformed
to her shape. Which was really cool. Ari rolled over to her stomach
and it moved with her and conformed to her new position. She
instantly wanted one of her own. It was the most comfortable thing
she had ever reclined in.

Ari stayed on her stomach and studied the shadows on the
stones in front of her.
As the sun moved so did they and it was very
nearly like watching a movie. A tree stood by itself then it looked
like a woman stepped up next to it. Since the sun wasn’t moving
very fast that’s all she could really decipher.

“I see you’ve
gotten comfortable.”

Ari glanced up to see Leonidas pushing a three leveled
cart.
Bottles of dark liquids and clear ones, a case of needles,
some white clothes, and varies antiseptics and jelly like
substances covered the shelves. A folder sat on top of everything
else pinned closed with a paper clip.

“I want this bench.”
Ari stretched lazily. “It’s super
comfy.”

“Have Sasha make you one. You can’t have mine.” He sat in
her wheelchair that still remained next to the bench. “I didn’t
want to mention this in front of Sasha, but what you want to do… it
requires we do things the old way. Ah, the Japanese call it
tebori
, but we’ll be doing it in a safer manner than they do. It
requires me to do your inking by hand and with inks made from the
plants you see around us. The needles are also natural; nothing
that isn’t of Gaea can be used for this.”

Ari smiled despite what he was telling her. “Sasha would
disapprove.”

“Sasha is more
a pain in the ass than anything else.”

“Why do you belittle him? He’s always been my
protector.”

“You remember as a child you’d play dress up?”
Leonidas pulled the
folder from the cart and the book from beneath it. “Sasha is
nothing more than that. When the Guild gets their hands on you, and
trust me, they will eventually, Sasha will be removed from your
life.”

“No one is
doing anything with Sasha.”

“You say that now.” He sighed and then looked her square in
the face. “Listen, carefully. If we were in Sparta, Sasha would
have never been allowed to even speak to you. Such is his rank. You
would have been protected by an Envoy or someone higher. Not a
lowly scholar but Kleisthenes found you first and for reasons
unknown to me, fostered Sasha.” He leaned forward. “In Sparta,
Ariadne, you would not know Sasha existed and when you go back, he
will cease to exist.”

It was unimaginable. Ari couldn’t… a life without Sasha was
not something she wanted to contemplate. It wasn’t something she
could do. Everything she had was drawn to a single person. Ari felt
the very real fear and the very real panic. “Why am I so
important?”

He must have seen her expression because he leaned back and
sighed. “It’s possible… very, very unlikely, but possible, that he
could be assimilated into an envoy house or higher. He could be
made a member of someone else’s house. Only then would it be
possible for him to stay with you.”

Ari tensed. Every muscle in her body went completely rigid.
“Sasha stays with me, always, or I go nowhere with no
one.”

Leonidas studied her face and laughed. “The Guild has no
idea.” He took her hand, pried her stiff fingers open and kissed
the palm. “You will be unexpected.”

“I hope
so.”

He released her hand and opened the folder.
“Let me show you
what we’re doing.”

“Will you teach me what it says? How to read it?” Ari
wasn’t even thinking about the tattoos anymore but of
Sasha.

She thought she had known what pain was when she woke in
the hospital and couldn’t use her legs.
There was no pain even comparable to
this sickening, panicky, ache that filled her chest. There were so
many things she hadn’t said to him, things she hadn’t done.
Somehow, the threat of losing him, even an empty one, put things
Ari never knew existed before into perspective.

He studied her face and nodded. “If that’s what you
want.”

Ari tuned back in to Leonidas. “It is.”

“Well then,” He pulled the book to the top. He made no
comment to what was probably a long wait on a response from her.
“We’ve got time. We should start here.”

Ari had noticed, he had not answered her other question.
She had a feeling, he wouldn’t need to. If what she was trying
worked, then it would be all too obvious why she was so important
to Sparta.

W
hen the sun was
nearly
gone Ari began to
fidget. “You should turn a light on.”

“Afraid of the
dark?”

“It’s not the dark I fear, but what resides in it.” Ari bit
her lip as she scanned the growing shadows. “I’ve seen things in
the shadows, things I’d rather not fall prey to.”

He didn’t laugh or jeer but slowly stood and walked over to
the edge of the circle. From his pocket he lit a match and then
dropped the lit match to something she couldn’t see.