Dark Horse

Forty-Eight

With Qus keeping a watchful eye on Lydia, the mistress he'd never stopped serving in his heart, Claudia felt there was no better time to investigate the crystal which had been such a bone of contention between the big Ethiopian and his master.

'Curiosity killed the cat,' she whispered to Drusilla as she slipped behind the laurels, but the blue-eyed, cross-eyed, dark Egyptian feline had no interest in proverbs. Now that the mice had been driven from their nests beneath the grain store by the fire, Drusilla felt it incumbent upon her to make their short lives even more miserable. With one fluid movement, she slipped between Claudia's ankles to fuse with the shadows.

There was no sound from the slave quarters save that of creaking bedsteads, breaking wind and snoring. Hardly surprising. Those who weren't required in the kitchens tonight would be rising at the first hint of dawn. On the mainland, farmhands would be busy turning straw into haystacks and bringing in the end of the harvest. Cressian soil was too thin for wheat, but there were still thistles and goose grass to weed out of the vegetable crops, vines to be watered, animals tended and figs to be pollinated. Claudia tiptoed silently past the snoozing porter to the bailiff's quarters, plucking a torch from the wall along the way. I ask you. What could possibly be so sinister about a bit of glass that it's considered capable of bringing on a miscarriage in a healthy young worn 'Janus bloody Croesus!'

The torch fell from her hand. Holy Mother of Mars, the Fiend must stand six feet eight! Black like Qus, the same five parallel tribal lines stood out bone-white on its forehead. The Fiend was leaning against the wall before a meal of apples, wine and honey-roasted crispy duck. Its blue eyes bulged in delight at its glamorous midnight caller, and its teeth bared in a bloodcurdling smile.

'Don't move,' Claudia said. At least, she hoped she said. Her teeth seemed to have a mind of their own. 'You just stay where the hell you are. Don't come any closer.'

'Speak to him firmly enough,' an amused baritone suggested in her ear, 'and he does exactly what you tell him.'

Orbilio. Thank Jupiter! Because if Qus has been hiding this… this thing in his quarters, there had to be a bloody good reason. 'This must be the man who killed Leo,' she hissed under her breath.

'Who? Qus's brother?'

'I don't care if he's the bloody Emperor. He found out that Leo wanted him out and he killed him out of revenge. Now if I'm wrong,' she said, 'I'll be the first to make it up to the boy, I swear. But to be on the safe side, Orbilio, I suggest you clap him in irons.'

'You don't mind if I put the fire out first?' Orbilio picked up the fallen torch and proceeded to stamp out the flames, which were now licking their way up the cotton coverlet on the bed. And still the Fiend kept on grinning.

'Orbilio!'

'Don't worry. You're safe enough with Qus's brother,' he said, and it was impossible for him to contain his laughter any longer. 'He's dead.' He crossed the room and held up the torch. 'In fact, he's been that way for over three months.'

'D-dead?' She peered at the creature standing against the far wall. 'Dead?'

Under the light, she could see that the smile was a death rictus, drawing his lips back over his brilliant white teeth, and that the eyes, those bulging delighted eyes, were coloured glass inlaid in empty sockets.

'The rest of him, though.' I mean, those hands.

'The muscular demeanour is down to padding inside his clothes,' Orbilio explained. 'And the lifelike appearance owes much to skilful body paint, but much of it's due to Ethiopian embalming techniques.'

The Egyptians didn't have the monopoly on corpse preservation, then. 'What about the meal?'

'I rather suspect that's Qus's supper,' he said, helping himself to a sliver of duck. 'The custom, you see, is for the next of kin to keep the body in their house for a year before it can be buried, head facing east.'

All right, all right, body paint, glass, and padding I understand. But — 'What's keeping him upright?'

'This.' Orbilio's knuckles rapped against something Claudia could not see.

She peered closer, and as she did so, she realized that there was a sheen around Qus's brother. Glass? Surely not? Glass is too opaque, too reflective. Then, of course, she understood. 'Crystal!'

The body had been sealed inside a tube of hollowed out crystal from the Ethiopian mines. Which, when placed against a white wall, became… invisible! Leo had been taking no chances when he insisted on a no-shock rule for his new bride. The question was, did this change one damn thing?

Saunio was standing in the doorway of the atrium gazing into space as flutes and lyres made sweet music on the terrace. Grey faced and hollow-eyed, the maestro had pushed himself to the edge of his physical limits, and even though he had still managed to create the definitive Judgement of Paris, it was about time, Claudia thought, that someone told him that grief cannot be expunged in work. That he can run all he likes, but he can't hide, that fate catches up with everyone in the end.

Silently, she mounted the steps. Carefully positioned oil lamps illuminated the gold leaf coating the capitals of the soaring marble columns. Sweet resins burning in wall-mounted bronze braziers filled the air with mysterious, exotic scent, and a fountain splashed and chattered, its silvery arc reflected a thousand flickering times in the mirrors.

'You must have loved Bulis very much,' she said quietly.

Surprised, Saunio spun round to face her. 'You have no idea.'

Oh, but I do, maestro, I do. If the eye can be led, so can the mind. The art of illusion is everything, and that was what he had been trying to tell her, both here in the atrium and the following night in the garden, the night the Soskia dropped anchor below the cliffs. It had struck a chord with her then that, of all people, it was Saunio who had concerned himself with the welfare of the rose-grower's daughter. Emotions are not an architect's plans on a page. They are not lines to be rubbed out, edited, and redrawn. Of course not. He worried for a thirteen-year-old girl in the way only a parent can worry. Hence his raising the question of heirs. Do you agree, he had asked, that a man is entitled to take whatever action he deems necessary when it comes to the question of sons?

'You wanted people to think he was your lover, when in fact Bulis was your own son.'

Saunio wouldn't compromise his monumental reputation by leaving behind a trail of gossip about bloodthirsty rituals and unnatural practices, so why hadn't he quashed it? Why travel with an inflated entourage? Why this dogged insistence that the artists kept themselves to themselves? Do you agree a man is entitled to take whatever action he deems necessary when it comes to the question of sons? That had sod all to do with Leo's obsession for heirs. Saunio couldn't give a toss about Leo. No, there was only one reason why a man of his standing would allow the rumours to persist. He was covering up. And who but a son was precious enough for him to lay his international reputation on the line? Bereft and bereaved, he had been on the brink of confiding the long line of pay-offs and compensation packages that night in the garden.

'No young boy was safe,' Saunio said sadly. 'The scandal made my wife kill herself from the shame. But,' he let out a shuddering sigh, 'Bulis was my son, my own flesh and blood, he was all I had left in the world. Better, I think, that I was around to control him than let him run wild.'

Claudia swallowed. Suddenly Saunio was no longer such a repulsive little worm. Not such a pretentious bore who shaved his lips, dyed his hair and curled his silly beard. He was just one more lost and lonely father. In an effort to control a corrupt, debauched son, Saunio had created a package — an illusion — of pompous homosexuality combined with an inflated artistic temperament. Bulis might have suffered horribly, Claudia thought sadly, but the truth was, he was no loss to the world.

'You knew straight away that he'd died chained, like Odysseus, to the mast, didn't you?'

That was where he had been standing that night in the portico. Not eavesdropping on her conversation with Volcar. Lost in his grief over his only son's murder.

Saunio nodded. 'Somebody killed my boy, because he had listened to the call of the Sirens and followed his bestial nature as a result. But that doesn't make it right, my lovely. It doesn't make it right at all.'

'Bulis wasn't killed out of revenge,' Claudia told him, and goddammit there was a lump in her throat. 'Neither was Leo.'

How wide were the ripples from death. Bulis's light might have been snuffed, but the real victim of the tragedy that night had been Saunio, just as Silvia's children would have suffered had her throat been crushed as had been intended. Ditto, Leo. Think of all those people whose debts could no longer be repaid. Men such as Volcar, who had been left destitute in his old age. And not simply material deprivation. Lydia might be pregnant, but she would never know how much Leo, in his silly distorted vision, had loved her. As a result of his murder, his legacy to her was the coldness inside her heart, but worse was to come. In killing Leo, the lives of hundreds of slaves had been thrown into jeopardy. Lydia would not be remaining here on Cressia. When the estate was sold, the chances were, and whatever undertaking they might give, that the new owners were more likely to bring their own people in, selling the existing slaves on for profit. Severing hundreds of men, women and children not just from their family and friends, but from the land they'd grown up in.

Jason must not get away with this. He must be stopped before any more lives could be destroyed. Which meant she had to devise a trap.

How?

Claudia's life had not been in danger away from this island. It was here, on the paradise island of Cressia, that the Odyssey had to be recreated in its heroic splendour. This wasn't a killer who disassociated himself from his crimes. He revelled in them. Think slow handclap. Think bow. Think howling wolf heads. Bottom line, Jason was a compulsive showman. He thrived on an audience. He needed people to know that his ancestral blood had empowered him, how superior he was to the human race. With the palace of the Enchantress long fallen into the ground, the Villa Arcadia had become his amphitheatre. This was where his drama had to be enacted. This was where the trap had to be set. All that needed to be established was what — or who — should be the bait. Why did Claudia think it would be her?

The steward called the second hour, but there was no indication of the party breaking up. People came, people went, drifting back and forth, laughing, joking, their spirits as high as the star-studded night sky as they applauded the dancing girls and acrobats, the singers and the jugglers. Claudia had been gone longer than most, Orbilio noticed, but he wasn't remotely worried. Now that he'd proved conclusively to her that their homegrown psychopath wasn't Jason, she wouldn't be so stupid as to wander far, especially without her diligent Gaul. In fact, he imagined her right now beating old Volcar hands down at dice in his bedroom, or slipping titbits to Drusilla down in the kitchens.

'Nikias,' he said cheerfully. 'Why don't you give us another Corinthian love song?'

Apart from a clutch of playful kittens, the stables were utterly silent. No flies buzzed round the dungheap. None of the horses had so much as snickered when Claudia eased open the heavy, wide door. She had desperately needed a place where objectivity could function away from the intoxicating drag of the villa. Somewhere quiet, and nothing fitted the bill like the stables. The estate dogs had been rounded up and kennelled long ago, and if the nightwatchmen had been making their rounds, Claudia hadn't seen them. The perfect place to be alone with one's thoughts. Settling herself on a hay bale, she'd drawn her knees up to her chin and watched dust motes dance in the moonbeams as she considered various traps and vicarious baits.

With a soft whoosh, a bat darted between the thick wooden beams in search of moths and, three stalls along, a sleeping hoof gently nudged the partition.

Horses.

All this started with horses. Right from the moment on the Field of Mars in Rome, when Claudia Seferius fed a sedative to a four-year-old mare belonging to a certain Hylas the Greek. That one simple action had set a trail in motion. First, it brought her into contact with a member of the Security Police, who in turn talked his cousin into suckering her out here to Cressia.

Bloody nags. Can't get away from them. Even Jason chose the stables to deliver his second war spear. Now Shamshi's lisping whisper echoed in her head. Beware the Trojan Horse. Bloody stinking rotten nags.

Like a shattered urn, the pieces were there, Claudia thought. They just weren't in the right shape and goddammit she wished she hadn't partaken so freely of Leo's cellar tonight! Sitting on the hay bale, her eyelids grew heavy. Pictures and sounds merged together. Give back what is mine. Silvia's three small boys. Geta and his Scythian tattoos. In a haze of wine, the blue menagerie swam before her: bulls, water snakes, lynx. Then there was the Amazon priestess who served the moon. The sun god who demanded human sacrifice. Gilded skulls. Wolf heads. Breasts. Something to do with big breasts.

Claudia jerked awake. Of course. Breasts. Clio could never have fitted into that tight, white shirt on board the Soskia. Her curvaceous hips could never have squeezed into those pantaloons, which meant Clio was no pirate's moll. Jason might have introduced her to Leo, but it must have been purely as a recommendation. No, wait. Claudia tried to rub the sleep out of her eyes and failed miserably. Her throat was too dry to swallow and she knew she should be in bed, but dammit, the game had to stop now. She tried to concentrate. Why should Jason go around recommending harpists to Leo? Why, for that matter, would Jason have any contact with Leo? Shoot, that vintage was strong. Exhausted from play, the stable kittens had fallen asleep in a furry, communal heap. A rat scuttled across the open doorway.

What she needed to clear the cobwebs from her head was a good walk. The moon was waning but it was still full, the sky clear, she should have no trouble locating the hilltop cottage in the dark. Leaving in a hurry as she had, Clio would have had no time to pack. Maybe the answer lay there? Give back what is mine. Because what did Leo owe Jason, if not money?

But the vintage was strong and Claudia's feet felt like they'd been strapped into lead, instead of light, leather sandals. Her gown weighed a ton; every bone resisted the orders despatched from her brain. As though Medea's evil was crushing her spirit as well as her movements… What a mix, island superstition and drink! But as she approached the tiny stone cottage, with its piles of whitethorn and heaps of slimy innards being pulled apart by scavengers scuffling away at the sound of her footsteps, the hairs on the back of her neck started to prickle.

The door creaked as she pushed it open, flooding the single room with silvery moonlight. She sniffed. The cottage smelled of burning. Roast meat. Recently, too. From the corner she heard the whimpering of some poor injured animal. It was too dark to make out what kind of creature or where it was hiding, but if the animal was in pain, it would show no mercy to anyone it perceived as a threat. The stiletto slipped from the strap on her calf as she stepped across the stone threshold. The whimpering grew louder.

'Help,' it rasped. 'Please.'

The knife clenched in Claudia's hand. 'Who's there?'

'Help… me.'

As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, they made out a bed, and on the bed something which had once been human. Except now there was not a shred of skin left which wasn't blackened or raw.

'Clio.' The long black hair was burned away. What few wisps remained were welded to the remnants of her skin in treacly strands. 'Clio, listen to me. Don't be frightened.' Sweet Janus, there was nothing left of her. 'I'm going for help.'

'Don't… leave.'

'I won't be gone long.' Her head was spinning with the shock. She wondered whether she would make it out of the cottage before she was sick. 'You'll be fine, Clio, I promise.'

As she backed away from the twitching creature on the bed, the moon slipped behind a cloud, plunging the cottage into blackness.

'You are foolish to make such a promise,' a husky voice whispered. What cloud? The night was clear. 'Clio is dying.'

Oh, shit. Moonlight had been blocked by the closing of the door.

'You'll be in Hades before her.' Claudia reached for the stiletto. Then remembered she'd dropped it when she ran to help Clio.

'Three days and three nights will pass before she succumbs to her injuries.' The voice purred. 'Without balm to soothe the burns. Without poppy juice to ease the pain.'

Clio, Clio, why did you have to come back? Claudia inched backwards. Why the hell hadn't she rammed that stiletto into his chest when she had the chance? 'You sick bastard.'

'Delirious only with pleasure. Talking Clio into disembarking was a master stroke, don't you think?'

Claudia's toe probed the floor. With the door shut, everything was fuzzy and the steel cast no reflection in the dark. She knew she had just one chance before he jumped her. She had to make it first time.

'As I explained to Clio, although I'm not sure she could hear me through her screams, when Odysseus visited his ancestors in the Kingdom of Decay, he had to first navigate the River of Flaming Fire.'

Stall. Stall for time, while her feet located their deadly steel target. 'Kill me if you must, but for heaven's sake do it quickly, don't bore me to death.'

Yet even as he laughed in the darkness, a jolt of terror shot through her. This wasn't wine making her head thick. This wasn't shock making her limbs leaden and disorientating her co-ordination. Sweet Jupiter, she had been drugged. You bastard, Jason. You dirty, rotten conniving sonofabitch, I even took the goblet from your hand while you continued to charm the pants off us as we debated the Quest for the Golden Fleece. Nikias's opinion was that it would have been a raid along the Black Sea to break the Scythian monopoly on trade. Llagos, of course, being local born and bred insisted it was a delegation of amber merchants. But you. You insisted, it was the stolen death cloak of a Scythian king, without which his soul was unable to rest. In other words, a quest to return the embodiment of the king's spirit, the way your own soul would be doomed without sons to carry the bull tattoo on their chests.

And I fell for it. Even though I had Junius standing closer than your own shadow, to ensure you could cause no more harm!

'Your knees are buckling, Claudia. You cannot stand up, no matter how hard you try.'

I can! I can stand up. And when I do, I'll kill you, you bastard. If only I could find that bloody knife.

'Circe plied her victims with moly. It made them forget, but that is not what I have planned for you, Claudia. Your fate is to remember.'

'Go to hell,' she said, but her voice was slurred.

'I've been there,' he said. 'It's a grey place, without power, without control, without domination. Hell is a place to which I can no longer return.'

But Claudia could no longer hear the boasts of the demon. The drug had sucked her too deep into oblivion. Although in the moment before it claimed her totally, she recalled the doctored goblet of wine being passed to Jason by a thinner, much smaller hand.