Epic Of Ahiram (Book 1) (51 page)

In the months that followed, he tried to understand why he had fallen in love with her. What was it that had touched him so deeply? Was it her smile when she stopped to greet him? Was it her eyes when she looked at him? Was it the light touch of her hand on his arm that had ignited fire in his heart? He could not tell anymore, but he still remembered vividly how, in that first encounter, he had been on top of the world, higher than the highest tower, elated beyond measure. Ever since, however, he had lived in crushing anxiety. Slowly his will had crumbled, yielding to the devastating passion that possessed him, until it had turned him into a faithful dog, a slave content to live in her shadow. He could not bear being away from her, yet being in her presence was constant torture. Thus, his life oscillated between the night of her absence and the shining light of her presence when she spoke to him. He lived for crumbs: a passing smile, a polite greeting, an evasive gesture.

His agony perdured until that fateful day when he had been abruptly told to meet the Queen in Whisper Grove just after midnight. He had gone to the meeting an hour and a half early and waited patiently in the cold for Ramel. He could hardly breathe. She had met him wrapped in a mantle of green velvet with a hood framing her lovely face in the moonlight. Her perfume had entranced him, and her words inebriated him. She had held his hand and told him of her high esteem for his work, her admiration for his knowledge, and her appreciation of his fidelity. She had kissed him on the cheek before leaving. He had remained on the bench, oblivious of time and space. Eventually, the cold had gnawed at his flesh, and he retired to his room with an everlasting feeling of love.

These meetings had become more frequent and lasted longer. Ramel’s physical traits hypnotized him. He drank every one of her words, and they had fallen on his parched soul like rain in the desert. Her words had become a divine elixir that kept him coming back for more. Spring had turned into fall, and golden leaves danced in the wind like Garu’s soul in the sea of love.

Then, abruptly, and for no apparent reason, Ramel had withdrawn from him. Life became an eclipse, his soul the playground of titanic forces. Anxiety had exploded in volcanoes of shame and self-recrimination. Bitter flows of burning lava had consumed his hope and exhilaration, leaving behind a scorched desert where winds of despair toyed with him and doubt tore him apart like an earthquake shatters the face of the earth. He nearly went mad and had tried to kill himself with a mixture of hemlock, thickened duck blood, and stale well water. Instead, he had ended up with a stubborn stomachache that no remedy could permanently heal.

Eventually, his strength gave out, and the storm that had ravaged his heart subsided. A dull emptiness had taken its place. Garu had felt thin and hollow, nearly nonexistent: a mere wraith, a shadow haunting deserted corridors like a ghost. Servants had laughed at him behind his back, even to his face, yet he did not care. His only hope, his only aspiration, had been to glimpse the Queen, even if fleetingly. Soon, he had lost his appetite and spent most of his nights awake, unable to sleep. He could barely speak, and whenever he would chance upon her walking with her retinue, she would glance indifferently at him as though he were a fly on the wall. These encounters had left him breathless and afflicted him day and night.

Soon, Garu’s haggard face haunted the castle and had become the butt of the court’s jokes. If Ramel overheard a nobleman deride Garu, she did nothing to stop it; instead, she laughed gaily at the inferred compliment. This behavior had not endeared her to the commander of the Silent Corps, who informed the King that Master Garu had lost his countenance and was an embarrassment to the royal court. All along, Jamiir had known that a daughter of Babylon, well versed in Baal’s art of seduction, could drive a man to madness. He had rebuked his wife and met with the scholar to assess the situation. Garu could no longer carry a conversation. He would remain silent for long periods of time, downcast and oblivious to his surroundings. The King had resolved to send him to his summerhouse in the mountains for rest. Garu had been relieved.

No sooner had he arrived at the summerhouse than an unexpected visitor was at the door: Ramel. He had nearly fainted. She had entered and was her former warm and joyful self. She had spent most of the afternoon with Garu, and when night came, had asked him to swear an oath of complete obedience to her, under the curse of Baal. He agreed, even though he knew Baal’s curses were of the worst kind. It was sheer folly, he knew, but he could not resist Ramel’s charm. He had willingly accepted to become her slave. She had left him with the command to wait for her instructions.

Weeks went by without any news, until one day, Ibromaliöm came with a Zakiir. It had been the worst day of Garu’s life: a day of shame, but a day of reckoning. Ibromaliöm had remained impassive, and told him he was to learn from the Zakiir everything he could possibly learn about spells and counter-spells. “Her Majesty the Queen wants you to learn all you can on the breaking of Baal’s spells. This Zakiir is sworn to her Majesty. He will recite the
Libre of Sureï
for you. Learn as much as you can, as quickly as you can. That is all.”

Now that the deception had been revealed, Garu felt strangely calm and recollected. He had not become angry; he had not even thought of revenge. Rather, he had felt as though he was regaining his reason—or at least a small part of it. He had been duped. Ramel had overtaken him and had compelled him to put himself under a curse. Still, he knew he had done it willingly for love, and as senseless as it seemed, he would do it again out of love for her.

He had thrown himself into the study of spells and counterspells with such ardor and vigor that he learned far more than the Queen or Ibromaliöm had anticipated. They had simply underestimated his mental capacities. In short order, Garu had learned how to deflect the effects of the curse by a careful use of hexes that required a small, personal item from an unsuspecting victim. Not too long after, Ibromaliöm had come to check on his progress and inadvertently had left a handkerchief on the table. After his departure, Garu had gazed at the object long and hard. He hated Ibromaliöm, suspecting him to be behind this odious ruse. In a fit of madness, he had considered using his newfound knowledge to his advantage.
All I have to do,
he had thought,
is place a few hexes on Ibromaliöm. In time, he will fall into my hands, and I can then use him to coerce Ramel to do my bidding.

It had been tempting.

But wrong.

Confusedly, Garu had understood that his love for Ramel was pure. True, though she was married to the King, he had wanted her to divorce Jamiir and come live in the depth of the forest with him. He knew this was an impossible dream. Nonetheless, it was an honest dream. He would rather carry this curse like a badge of honor than sully his love for her in another man’s blood, even if this man was as wicked as Ibromaliöm. That day, when Garu had thrown the handkerchief into the fire, he knew he had achieved a great victory. He was still the Queen’s slave, and the curse hung over him like a cloud of bad dreams, but inside, he refused to harm another man out of love for Ramel—which meant that he was not without hope.

Three months before the start of the Games, the King had called him to Taniir-The-Strong Castle and put him in charge of overseeing the preparations. The Queen then informed him that she had chosen him as head judge. She also picked Ibromaliöm and Hylâz, the Zakiir who had been reciting the book to him as auxiliary judges. None of them were surprised to see Ramany—a local merchant and notorious informer of the Temple—appointed as the fourth judge.

Once more, his heart had become the battleground of intense feelings of self-loathing, burning love for the Queen, and raging hatred for Ibromaliöm. He knew that the curse he was under was gnawing at him, worming its way into his heart and soon would possess him—it was only a question of time.

Despite Hylâz’s best attempts to hide the truth from him, Garu managed to piece together the few hints Ramel and Ibromaliöm had carelessly shared with him and guessed what they were after.

The
Libre of Sureï
was broken down into two parts: the first dealt with various curses and countercurses; but Garu understood only the general structure of a curse. Since Sureï had meant for accomplished masters of the spell world to hear this libre, he did not provide details on the creation, deployment, or control of curses.

The second part of the libre dealt with a series of lengthy descriptions of locales and objects that Sureï had cursed. Hylâz could only recite the section concerning the Lone Tower and the ancient castle ruins of Taniir-On-High, which overlooked Taniir-The-Strong Castle.

Garu knew this libre was highly confidential. He had asked Hylâz why he was permitted to recite it to him, a non-member of the Temple. The Zakiir had reminded him that as a priestess of Baal, the Queen was duty-bound to neutralize centers of magic by whatever means necessary.

“Every priest and priestess of Baal is allowed to use acolytes—slaves usually—to help in this task, provided these helpers are under a curse that will kill them in short order or cause them to lose their minds,” he had said softly. “Every learned person knows that,” he had added with a sarcastic tone.

“I see,” Garu had replied softly. “The Queen is performing a good deed, and she has found a fool to do her bidding.”

Hylâz had shrugged his shoulders and did not answer.

“This seems to make sense, ”Garu had continued. “Explain this to me then: why is Ibromaliöm involved?”

The sudden flash of terror in Hylâz’s eyes had confirmed Garu’s suspicions. “This is a cover-up,” he had said, “a story she used to get her uncle, Sharr, to loan her a Zakiir who knew the
Libre of Sureï
. Is that not so? Ibromaliöm has other plans now, does he not, Hylâz?”

“Do not involve me in this madness, Garu,” had spat Hylâz contemptuously. “I am a Zakiir bound to recite this book whenever my client asks me to do so. High Priest Sharr is my customer. He instructed me to recite this book to you at the Queen’s bidding, and so I did. I am not involved in this scheme, and I have no intention to divine the Queen’s plan.”

Garu had not pressed this point. Sureï’s recitation resumed: “Deep beneath Taniir-The-Strong lay a hidden temple to Tanniin where two sources of great power were intertwined. The first is the
Ithyl Shimea,
a libre of dark power that the Temple cannot control. The second rivals the
Ithyl Shimea
in power and is beyond the reach of mortal men. I laid a curse of destruction on this place. Woe to those who dare enter.”

“To seek what you do not understand is to misunderstand your quest. To quest after a shining unknown is to let darkness shine within you. Like a dying firefly, it will consume your soul, and turn you into a ghost.

“Then again, a ghost is what you may have been seeking all along. Truth renews you and fills your being with life. Ghosts are the fruits of ignorance. Indeed, ignorance is to knowledge what a ghost is to a body; it retains the form and loses the substance.”

–
Memoirs of Shalimar the Poet

Garu finally understood that the Lone Tower was never meant to be an observatory for stargazing. The star readers were questing for the hidden place, but Baal eliminated their order before they succeeded. And now,
he
, Garu, was about to succeed where they had failed. He figured out that this odd handle was meant to open a hidden door leading to the strange place. He also knew this place was somewhere beneath the tower in the depth of the mine. He had had no hopes of unraveling Sureï’s curse, but when Hylâz recited a passage about strange objects called
absorbers,
he perked up.

According to Sureï, absorbers were pebbles made from a dark stone found in the spell world. They had the ability to absorb the effects of a curse for a short time. “There may be a need for a priest of Baal to momentarily enter a cursed location,” Hylâz had recited in his usual, soft voice. “Absorbers will deflect the curse for a few minutes. As they absorb the curse, they will produce a reddish glow, which will die down when they can no longer sustain it. They must be allowed to cool before they are used again. After repeated use, they will grow brittle and break into small particles. If the one carrying the absorbers is within the range of the curse when the absorbers fail, the curse will kill him.”