Circles of Stone. Ian Johnstone

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      “What weird homunculus is this, born from the Dirgh’s dark potion? It is like the ancient gods, forged of both man and beast, and yet it looks more a thing of hell itself.”

      THE GHOR GUARDS STIFFENED and craned their long canine necks, reaching for scythe-like blades. There was a movement at the end of the passageway. The figure was hard to discern in the half-light of flickering torches. One moment it seemed to be human and the next animal; one moment walking and the next prowling, cat-like, with smooth predatory ease, spidering along the floor, riding up the walls. Alarmed by the pace of its approach, the commander swiped its blade over the flagstones, sending a shower of sparks down the passage.

      “Who goes there?” it barked. The figure slowed for a moment and then reared up to its full height, its dark face flashing a white smile of long, cruel teeth.

      It made a strange sound, a gentle rasp something like a purr.

      “It’s Scarpia, you fool!” came the reply.

      And with that she was past his blade, gliding between their mighty shoulders and then rising up on her hind legs in front of the huge ornamented door. The guards turned in bewilderment, then stepped back into the shadows and bowed.

      Scarpia raised a clawed fist and knocked at the door.

      There was no answer, but she cocked her head and listened. She heard a beautiful but doleful music: a cello playing a bewitching lament. Its strains filled the air, the melody seeming strangely out of place in the deathly halls of the Dirgheon.

      As she listened, the junior of the two guards quietly lifted its head to look at her – her powerful, feline limbs, part-clad in rich black fur; her crouching stance, halfway between standing and crawling; her long, sinewy neck, still showing the scars of many burns. But what most caught its attention was the distorted face – that disturbing blend of dark skin and black fur, revealing the angular jaw and heavy brow of a predatory cat, and beneath the brow: one human eye, the other pale and green, its pupil not round but drawn into a slit.

      The green eye flicked to the young guard and a snarl gurgled in Scarpia’s throat. With a sharp hiss she lashed out with bared claws, tearing savagely at its ear and making it yelp and whimper in submission.

      “Do not look at me!” she hissed.

      The guards turned obediently away.

      In that moment, the cello finally fell silent and an answer came from behind the door. It was spoken with many voices: an unnatural chorus of men and women, young and old, boys and girls, all in perfect unison so that the words resonated down the passageway and sent a chill through those who heard it.

      “Enter, Scarpia.”

      She did not hesitate but threw her head back and pushed at the door, stepping boldly into the half-light of the Apex Chamber.

      The great hall was still, the only movement the flickering flames in four giant urns, one in each corner. Scarpia eyed the furthest one, the one now dented and marked, then recoiled slightly as though remembering her pain.

      Her mongrel eyes scanned the room, searching for her master, past the dark pool at the centre of the room, tracing the rich tapestries, the long shelves of books, the great stone table topped with manacles and chains, before settling on an elaborate golden music stand and a lone figure sitting on a simple wooden chair, clasping an exquisitely made cello. Even through the many folds of scarlet robes, he looked cruelly twisted and bent and as he began to play again, his sharp joints protruded at ungainly angles. The hooded head was stooped low over the strings and while an emaciated hand danced the length of the fingerboard, the other guided the delicate bow with precision. The motion never slowed, even when he spoke.

      “So, my child,” came the voice of many, “you are reborn.”

      Scarpia’s eyes flared. “If that’s what you call this … this –” she gestured to her body with a clawed hand – “this abomination!” she snarled.

      The bow halted and there was a brief moment of silence.

      “Perhaps you would rather I had left you as you were?”

      Scarpia hesitated, then her eyes narrowed and the standing fur on the back of her neck settled into a smooth, feline coat. A gentle purr rose in her throat. “No, my Lord Thoth.”

      “I would think not,” was the quick reply. “There was very little left of you worth keeping.”

      For a moment Scarpia looked wounded: she sank a little on her haunches and her cat-like ears dropped back on her head.

      “You will learn to appreciate your new form,” murmured Thoth, coolly. “You are no less beautiful than you were.”

      Scarpia purred once again and lowered her head, as though Thoth were stroking her glossy fur. Instead he resumed his playing, sweeping the bow over the strings. For some moments they were both lost in the strains of the cello.

      “Do you know it?” asked her master.

      Scarpia’s ears rose and turned towards the cello. “The music? No, my Lord. Is it from the Other?”

      Thoth nodded beneath his satin hood. “Their music has always been better than ours,” he said, creating a complex medley of notes. “This is Elgar’s great concerto. They say it is meant for an orchestra, but it is best played alone, don’t you agree?”

      He turned his head slightly in her direction, so that the shadow beneath the hood was partly visible.

      “When you play, of course,” purred Scarpia, edging towards him on all fours, unconsciously brushing up against a chair. She drew close to his skeletal form and sat on a cushion near him, drawing her tail around her. She eyed the bow as it darted through its final strokes, ending the recital as sombrely as it had begun.

      There was a pause as the final strains of the concerto died away. Thoth remained hunched over his cello and for the first time his breathing could be heard: a deep, whistling wheeze.

      He drew himself back in the chair and turned to Scarpia. For a moment, a flicker of lamplight penetrated his hood and part of his face could be seen. It was hardly a face at all, but rather a gathering of features, shimmering and shifting in the changing light. It was in constant flux: his narrow jaw suddenly seeming broad and then long and then narrow; the large sockets of his eyes momentarily waning to those of a child, then widening, then falling under an overhanging brow. All this took place in the blink of an eye, so that none of these features reached any definition at all. They were a blur, leaving a vague impression of shaded hollows for eyes, a protrusion for the nose and a wide gash for the mouth.

      “And so to business,” he said, his empty features stretching and moving as he spoke. “While you have been sleeping, I have been tireless. I have been reflecting and planning. I have decided that if we must be infected by this child from the Other, this young Sylas Tate, then we will take the good with the bad. We will reach into his mirrored world and СКАЧАТЬ