The Shadow Master (29 page)

 

 

LIX

Lorenzo wondered if he could beat the Shadow Master in a fight. He was certain that if he tried to rescue Lucia first he would appear and try to stop him. Frantically, he searched through the scientific devices he still had in the leather bag with him, looking for one that could be useful to him. Perhaps the night glasses would help him see better than the Shadow Master and evade him? He had to find the puce priest. If he had tried to murder Galileo he could just as easily harm Lucia.

He looked at the mole harness, but it was too badly burned to be of use again. Galileo might have been able to advise him, if he were not lying on the ground by him, near insensible. It would undoubtedly have been something wise about using logic and observation to conquer his emotions and find the best path forward. But his emotions refused to be stilled. He had to rescue Lucia first! He stood and looked at the multiple passages that led out of the chamber. One of them would take him to Lucia and the others would not.

He ground his teeth. The Shadow Master would know which way to go, but would not show him. He closed his eyes and tried to think. There must be a logical way out of this. It was like one the puzzles that Galileo sometimes set him. There must be a way to determine which tunnels not to take in order to find the right one.

His feet and his urgency dictated his decision though and he set off quickly down the nearest tunnel, hoping against hope it would prove the right one. Yet he had barely turned the first corner when a dark shape rose up blocking his path. Lorenzo took up a fighting stance, prepared to fight his way past, but a sword appeared under his chin before he even saw it coming. Only one man could move that fast.

“Shadow Master,” Lorenzo said, not dropping his offensive position.

“Shhh,” said the Shadow Master. “Remember. I don't exist.”

“You have to move out of my way,” said Lorenzo. “That mad priest has Lucia. I must save her before he harms her.”

“He will not harm her,” the Shadow Master said firmly.

“Which path will lead me to them?” Lorenzo asked.

“Not the path you must now take,” the Shadow Master said.

Lorenzo shook his head. “No. I must go after her. I must save her.”

“You will,” said the Shadow Master, “But you must save civilisation first. Remember.”

Lorenzo felt himself growing angry. “I must save her first. Civilisation can be saved afterwards.”

“That is not your choice to make,” the Shadow Master replied, pressing his sword tip into Lorenzo's throat. Lorenzo took a step backwards, but the sword tip followed him. “Well, strictly speaking it is your choice to make,” the Shadow Master added, “But it would be the wrong choice.”

Lorenzo took another step back and came up against the tunnel wall. He had the Shadow Master”s other sword in his hand and looked down at the blade now at his throat. It was longer, heavier and looked quite a bit more dangerous than the sword he held. The Shadow Master looked at him and he glared back at him. “I know what you're thinking,” he told Lorenzo. “But you can't save Lucia this way.”

“How do you know what I'm thinking?” Lorenzo asked.

“You forget, I know you very, very well.”

“How can I believe that?”

“I just told you. You've forgotten.”

Lorenzo gritted his teeth and shifted his grip on the sword hilt a little. “I wouldn't do that if I were you,” said the Shadow Master.

“How do you know what I'm going to do?” Lorenzo asked.

“Let's not go through this all again,” he said. “Look. It's simple. You save the city and save civilisation, and I'll save Lucia. That's just how it has to be.”

Lorenzo looked at him carefully and felt the sword point at his throat not waver at all. Then he nodded his head. Very slowly. “What do we do?” he asked.

“You need to go back down to the chamber of the ancients,” said the Shadow Master.

Lorenzo frowned a little, as if not understanding, but then said, incredulously, “You want me to wield the power of the ancients?”

“
Bravissimo
!” said the Shadow Master.

“But… but… how?” asked Lorenzo. “Surely only the ancients had that power.”

“What if I told you you're older than you look?”

Lorenzo wanted him to stop his stupid word games. “And that will save Lucia?” he asked.

“Without a doubt,” said the Shadow Master. “Well, without much doubt. Certainly more than you running around lost in the tunnels down here would.” But still Lorenzo hesitated. “Don't worry, it always turns out well in the end,” the Shadow Master said. “Trust me.”

“Alright,” said Lorenzo reluctantly. “I'll do it.” He turned and started walking back the way he had come.

“Uh, one more thing,” called the Shadow Master.

“Yes?” asked Lorenzo.

“It would please me greatly if you took the right tunnels.” And he threw Lorenzo a small device. Lorenzo caught it and looked down at it and saw it was a small glass-covered disc that had a glowing arrow on it. “Just follow the arrow,” the Shadow Master said. “It”s an intelligent compass. Probably more intelligent than many people you'd ask directions of.”

Lorenzo turned it around in his hand and the arrow stayed pointing in the one direction.

“And just one more thing,” he called to Lorenzo.

“What?”

The Shadow Master moved his fingers up and down in front of his face like an imbecile might and said, “Remember, you haven't seen anything.” Then he stepped back into the shadows. Lorenzo shook his head. It seriously worried him that the man sometimes seemed more crazed than any of the crazed men they were fighting.

 

 

 

LX

“It is the time of reckoning,” the mad cleric Savonarola muttered, as he made his way through the streets of the Walled City, looking around to see what other obstacles might be placed in his path to test him. But the streets seemed deserted. The citizens of the city were either asleep in their beds, or hiding indoors, too wary of the enmity of the two Houses to wish being caught up in it. He looked up into the sky every now and then to see if he could see any sign of his former devotee, Damon. Another traitor. “His time will come too,” he muttered.

He kept to the back streets and alleyways, walking quickly and holding the glass sphere close to his body. It was best that he no longer had the girl with him, he decided. It would be too dangerous trying to carry both her and the artefact of the ancients. If she had caused him to drop it before he'd reached his destination, it would be disastrous.

The sphere had been passed down from one High Priest to the next over generations, entrusting the secret to no one else. It was the last treasure of the ancients. A reminder of how they had destroyed their own great civilisation. It was a secret that he had discovered, so it was fitting that it now be used by him to presage the end of days.

He came out onto a square and saw a small group of men on the far side. They were militiamen from one of the Houses. They seemed in a stir about something, sending men running away in different directions. That was good. It would keep them too distracted to observe him. He made his way quickly across the far side of the square and saw one of the men glance quickly in his direction and then look back to his comrades. Nothing strange about a clergyman walking across the square, after all, thought Savonarola.

He was only a block or two away now. He turned another corner and saw the wall of the city ahead of him. There were guards atop the walls calling and shouting to each other. Now, men with arms ran past, but no one challenged him. He saw Medici men and also Lorraine men climbing the walls together. He heard them shouting to each other about a plague army. The foretold army of the night had come and were at this moment at the gates, demanding to be let into the city!

Savonarola made his way down the last street before the wall. At the far end he would emerge by the main gates to the city. Those gates had not been opened fully for many years, but today they would open wide for him and the city would pay the price for its sins. Would be filled with a terrible fear. Would share the horrors and sorrows of his childhood. Would understand what had shaped him. He walked on quickly now and reached the end of the street. He saw a large mob of defenders on the walls, but none of them were at this side of the gates. They did not stop to think that disease spreads from the inside.

He walked closer to the gates and held out the sphere. The yellow liquid inside glowed like a small sun. It was a wonder that it was not hot. He looked about and saw a guardsman call to him. Challenging him. But it was too late. He cast the orb at the gate. It hit the large wooden doors and shattered and flames leapt forth as if a large demon had been freed from its prison. There was an horrendous shrieking noise and Savonarola was knocked off his feet by the blast. He lay there dazed and saw men had fallen off the walls and lay about the gates. Others were on fire, running around, vainly trying to put out the flames. And the gates were off their hinges, burning.

He struggled to his feet and held his hands aloft. He had been tested over and over and had not proved wanting. His followers would now emerge onto the streets and cast all their vanities into the flames. They would hunt out and find all objects of science in the city and would build a giant pyre whose flames would lick at the feet of that traitor Damon and he would fall from the skies, and the plague army would run riot through the city, all as he had foretold. And the few who survived would be just like him.

He would no longer be alone.

Then he saw the flames on his garments. One sleeve was alight. He flapped it to try to extinguish the flame, but the more he flapped the more it grew. It crawled along his arm and took hold his robes. He felt the heat rising up to his face. Felt the flame spreading around his whole body. It was embracing him tighter, eating at his flesh. He felt the pain like a hundred daggers cutting into him.

“No,” he shouted, knowing that the flames of the ancients could not be extinguished by earth or water or smothering. They would burn until there was nothing left to consume. He threw his arms into the air and ran about madly, his time of reckoning illuminated by his staggering, flaming body. His own trial by fire.

 

 

LXI

Lorenzo felt unequal to the enormity of the task before him. He walked around the huge chamber of the ancients trying to concentrate on what he had to do, and not be distracted by the awe of it all. That they had built all this under the city was so wondrous that he could easily give in to his yearnings to climb amongst it all and examine it from all sides, learning how it was all put together and how it worked. If only he had time in this chamber, what mysteries he would uncover and what learnings he would possess. Then he would bring Galileo down here and the master would become the apprentice.

He looked up at the vast machinery over his head and wondered what power could possibly drive it. There were huge cylinders and cogs of stone and metal that would take over a hundred oxen just to move them a fraction. He walked over to the large metal wheel that the Shadow Master had shown him on their first visit. He had told him that this was the key to operating everything. He looked at it carefully. The huge wheel, which was taller than he was, had a five sided star carved into it and was set firmly into a large block of stone.

Around him stood the statues of the ancients, as if watching over him to see what he did, but unwilling to be his instructors. He stared at the wheel and examined the stars and celestial objects that were inlaid on it, and then ran his hands around the outer rim. It was clearly designed to be turned. But how to turn something that did not even have handholds on it? And something so huge. He tried to grasp the outer edge and pushed at it. It did not move. He looked back at the statues around him and frowned.

Then he tried to move it the other way. Still nothing happened. It made him feel small and insignificant. And not a little angry. He had not come all this way to be defeated by an inability to solve the puzzle before him. The Shadow Master knew how this worked, but would not tell him. Why did he have to discover it himself? And why was he the only one who could do it?

He stared again at the large wheel and then, on a whim, stood firmly against it. Pressed his palms to the metal and felt a warmth there. Then he suddenly knew what he had to do. He turned around and stood with his back to the wheel. Spread his arms and legs out so that each was a point of the star and his head made the fifth. He felt it in his chest first, like his breathing was being constricted. Then his hands started melding with the metal. But nothing else. He slowly detached himself and considered this a moment. Then he placed one hand on the metal wheel and waited to feel the warmth. Then he placed his forearm against it. Nothing. He rolled up his sleeve and tried it again. He felt the warmth all along his arm.

He sighed deeply and then started taking off his clothes, glad this was a secret that was going to stay a secret. He stood back up against the metal and felt his whole body warming and melding with it, like he was sinking back into the metal. This was a bigger metamorphosis than becoming the mole. He was becoming a part of the wheel and a part of the cogs of the vast giant machinery that the ancients had built. He was becoming one of the ancients himself.

He felt the whole machine about him now. He understood how it all fitted together, and its power. He was a part of it. This was knowledge that he had never dreamed of. And all he had to do was turn the wheel to operate it all. He started turning slowly, feeling his body, now a part of the metal wheel, fighting against the resistance of centuries. Stones and dust fell from the edge of the wheel as it turned and he felt the grinding of stone upon stone and metal upon metal as the long disused machine began to awaken.