Labyrinth

CHAPTER 81

Pic de Soularac

MARC 1244

Guilhem couldn’t catch Alais. She was already too far ahead.

He staggered down the tunnel in the dark. Pain pierced his side where his ribs were cracked, stopping him breathing easily. Alais’ words reeling in his head and fear hardening in his chest kept him going.

The air seemed to be getting colder, chill, as if the life was being sucked out of the cave. He didn’t understand. If this was a sacred place, the labyrinth cave, why did he feel in the presence of such malevolence?

Guilhem found himself standing on a natural stone platform. A couple of wide, shallow steps directly in front led down to an area where the ground was flat and smooth. A calelh was burning on a stone altar, giving a little light.

The two sisters were standing facing one another, Oriane still holding the knife to Bertrande’s throat. Alais was completely still.

Guilhem ducked down, praying Oriane had not seen him. As quietly as he could, he started to edge around the wall, hidden in the shadows, until he was close enough to hear and see what was happening.

Oriane tossed something down on the ground in front of Alais.

“Take it,” she shouted. “Open the labyrinth. I know the Book of Words is concealed here.”

Guilhem saw Alais’ eyes widen in surprise. With shame, he recognized Oriane’s supercilious expression.

“Did you never read the Book of Numbers? You astound me, sister. The explanation is there for the key.”

Alais hesitated.

The ring, with the merel inserted in it, unlocks the chamber within the heart of the labyrinth.“

Oriane jerked Bertrande’s head back, so the skin on her neck was pulled tight. The blade glinted in the light.

“Do it now, sister.”

Bertrande cried out. The noise seemed to run right through Guilhem’s head like a knife. He looked at Alais, frowning, her bad arm hanging uselessly at her side.

“Let her go first,” she said.

Oriane shook her head. Her hair had come unbound and her eyes were wild, obsessive. Holding Alais’ gaze, slowly, with deliberation, she made a small incision on Bertrande’s neck.

Bertrande cried again as blood began to trickle down her neck.

The next cut will be deeper,“ Oriane said, her voice shaking with hatred. ”Get the Book.“

Alais bent down and picked up the ring, then walked to the labyrinth.

Oriane followed, dragging Bertrande with her. Alais could hear her daughter’s breath coming faster and faster and she was losing consciousness, staggering with her feet still tied.

For a moment, she stood, her thoughts spiralling back in time to the moment when first she had seen Harif perform the same task.

Alais pressed her left hand on the rough stone labyrinth. Pain shot up her damaged arm. She needed no candle to see the outline of the Egyptian symbol of life, the ankh as Harif had taught her to call it. Then, shielding her actions from Oriane with her back, she inserted the ring into a small opening at the base of the central circle of the labyrinth, directly in front of her face. For Bertrande’s sake, she prayed it would work. Nothing had been spoken; nothing had been prepared as it should have been. The circumstances could not be more different from the only other time she had stood as a supplicant before the labyrinth of stone.

“Di ankh djet,‘ she murmured. The ancient words felt as ashes in her mouth. There was a sharp click, like a key in a lock. For a moment, nothing seemed to happen. Then, from deep in the wall, there was the noise of something shifting, stone against stone. Then Alais moved and, in the half-light, Guilhem saw that a compartment had been revealed at the very centre of the labyrinth.

“Pass it to me,” ordered Oriane. “Put it there, on the altar.”

Alais did as she was told, never taking her eyes from her sister’s face.

“Lether go now. You don’t need her any more.”

“Open it,” shouted Oriane. “I want to make sure you’re not deceiving me.”

Guilhem edged closer. Shimmering in gold on the first page was a symbol he had never seen before. An oval, more like a tear in shape, set atop a kind of cross, like a shepherd’s crook.

“Keep going,” said Oriane. I want to see it all.“

Alais’ hands were shaking as she turned the pages. Guilhem could see a mixture of strange drawings and lines, row after row of tightly drawn symbols covering the entire sheet.

“Take it, Oriane,” said Alais, struggling to keep her voice steady. “Take the book and give me back my daughter.”

Guilhem saw the blade glint. He realised what was going to happen the instant before it did, that Oriane’s jealousy and bitterness would lead her to destroy everything Alais loved or valued.

He threw himself at Oriane, knocking her sideways. He felt his cracked ribs give and he nearly passed out with the pain, but he’d done enough to force her to loosen her hold on Bertrande.

The knife dropped from her hand and skidded away out of sight, in the shadows behind the altar. Bertrande was thrown forward in the collision.

She screamed, and banged her head on the corner of the altar. Then, she was still.

“Guilhem, take Bertrande,” Alais screamed at him. “She’s hurt, Sajhe’s hurt. Help them. There’s a man called Harif waiting in the village. He will help you.”

Guilhem hesitated.

“Please, Guilhem. Save her!”

Her last words were lost as Oriane staggered to her feet, the knife in her hand, and launched herself at Alais. The blade sliced into her already damaged arm.

Guilhem felt as if his heart was being ripped in two. He didn’t want to leave Alais to face Oriane alone, but he could see Bertrande lying white and still on the ground.

“Please, Guilhem. Go!”

With a last backward glance at Alais, he picked up their daughter in his wounded arms, and ran, trying not to see the blood pouring from the cut. He realised it was what Alais wanted him to do.

As he staggered clumsily across the chamber, Guilhem heard a rumbling sound, like thunder trapped in the hills. He stumbled, assumed it was his legs unable to hold him. He moved forward again, clearing the top of the steps and going back into the tunnel. He slipped on the loose stones, his legs and arms burning with pain. Then he realised the ground was moving, shaking. The earth beneath his feet was trembling.

His strength was almost gone. Bertrande was motionless in his arms and seemed heavier with every step he took. The noise was getting louder as he plunged on. Chunks of rock and dust began to fall from the roof, plummeting down around him.

Now he could feel the cold air coming to meet him. A few more steps and he had emerged into the grey dusk.

Guilhem ran to where Sajhe lay unconscious, but breathing steadily.

Bertrande was deathly white, but she was starting to whimper and stir in his arms. He laid her down on the ground beside Sajhe“, then ran to each of the dead soldiers in turn and ripped their cloaks from their backs to make a covering. Then he tore his own cloak from his neck, sending his silver and copper buckle flying into the dirt. He folded it beneath Bertrande’s head for a pillow.

He paused to kiss his daughter on the forehead.

“Filha,” he murmured. It was the first, and the last, kiss he would ever give her.

There was an enormous crack from within the cave, like lightning after thunder. Guilhem ran back into the tunnel. The noise was overwhelming in the confined space.

He realised there was something hurtling out of the darkness towards him.

“A spirit… a face,” Oriane was gibbering, her eyes crazed with fear. “A face in the centre of the labyrinth.”

Where is she?“ he shouted, grabbing her arm. What have you done to Alais?”

Oriane was covered in blood, her hands, her clothes.

“Faces in the… the labyrinth.”

Oriane screamed again. Guilhem spun round to see what was behind him, but could see nothing. In that moment, Oriane plunged the knife uto his chest.

He knew she had dealt him a mortal blow. Instantly, he felt death taking possession of his limbs. He watched her running from him through clouds, his eyes darkening. He felt revenge die in him too. It no longer mattered.

Oriane ran out into the grey light of the passing day, while Guilhem stumbled blind down into the chamber, desperate to find Alais in the chaos of rock and stone and dust.

He found her lying in a small depression in the ground, her fingers wound round the bag that had held the Book of Words, the ring clutched in her hand.

“Mon cor,” he whispered.

Her eyes flickered open at the sound of his voice. She smiled and Guilhem felt his heart turn over.

“Bertrande?”

“She’s safe.”

“Sajhe?”

“He will live too.”

She caught her breath. “Oriane…”

“I let her go. She’s badly hurt. She will not get far.”

The final flame in the lamp, still burning on the altar, guttered and died. Alais and Guilhem did not notice as they lay in one another’s arms.

They were not aware of the darkness or the peace that descended over the chamber. They knew nothing but each other.