In silent defiance Magenta struggled to resist the high priestess's iron-bound will. She had no need of an inst.i.tutionalized belief system to show her how she should live. She needed only to rely on her own inner knowing. She would obey only higher laws, universal laws that even the G.o.ds must obey. In her gentle heart she believed self-mastery, growth, and achievement need not only be accomplished through affliction, but through all experiences. Love, sorrow, and joy are the great educators. Love is the greatest of all, for one is always enn.o.bled and uplifted when having truly loved or been the recipient of such a love.

Shrouded in a miserable atmosphere, Magenta did her duty and endured the rest in a quiet despair. The warm blood flowing through her was scarcely adequate to keep the ebbing cold from embittering her soul.

Magenta was heading inside the temple when she saw the wicked scurrying of one of the preternatural things that lurked in the wood. It was heading down toward the water to return home. And she knew that someone was taken. The creatures served only the high priestess.

Tall and austere candles cast a livid light over the majestically adorned walls. Drifting down the empty hall, her head inclined, her thoughts inward, Magenta found her heart was soon struck cold. To her came sounds horrible beyond conception: bellows of agony and torment. The voice was distinctly male. The cries carried up from deep within a ceremonial chamber. It was not the first time she had heard such sounds.

She rounded the corner and slowly drew toward the dark pa.s.sage. Much moved by the man's desperate, inarticulate entreaties, she gathered up her long gown and carefully descended the narrow steps. There was something of the sensation of a catacomb about those stone stairs leading down into darkness.

Magenta came to the heavy wooden door that separated her from the afflicted individual. From behind she could hear his low moans and cries. By degrees they died off. Amid the deep silence she listened for any sigh of life, praying most ardently that it was ended. Then came a cry so piercing, so desperate, Magenta started violently. Placing her hand upon the door with the intent to enter, she heard another voice along with the pitiable one that caused her to wait. It was forbidden for Magenta to be here, but she made her mind up to do that which she had never before attempted.

The door was fastened with a latch secured by an advanced charm, but its intricacies were not beyond her capability. With a gentle motion of her hand, the bolts were propelled and withdrawn. She entered secretly, concealing herself among the shadows. There were many burning candles, yet only the feeblest light broke the darkness, which was needed to commit their abominations. The air was laden heavily with the acrid vapours of poison.

Upon an ornate and austere altar lay the motionless form of a man. The glow of candle light was the only warmth upon his flesh, of which the upper half was naked. He appeared in an altered state of consciousness, trapped in dark visions. Now only the feeblest of moans would escape his lips. Occasionally he would bare his teeth as though in pain.

Besides a single scratch down the centre of his chest there were no visible signs of mortal wounds, but there was no doubt that he had been tortured by the acutest measures. The high priestess had forced entry into the deepest recess of his mind and filled it with dark images. She did not sacrifice her offerings with knives or any such weapon. It was crude to use such instruments against the flesh. Any man could easily be made to bleed. Her methods were far more internal. She weakened their resolve, enfeebled their minds, and broke their will, until the desire to live was utterly spent.

Next to his tormented form the high priestess stood, the flames casting a lurid light upon her ghastly white face. She had no colour, no sound, no heart. She bathed the lips of the unconscious sufferer with a damp cloth. "With death comes life," came her chilling words to Magenta. From amid the shadows she watched, secretly, with a sense of dread. Never before had she witnessed a sacrifice. She knew the memory of it would not die.

For one last time the high priestess anointed his eyes with a potent herb, the juice of which entered the delicate flesh and into his blood. This excretion, laid upon sleeping eyelids, would trap a man or woman in a state of unnatural slumber, from which it would be impossible to rouse him with usual methods, leaving the slumberer vulnerable to any thoughts and suggestions. Whispering hateful fantasies into his ear, she then left him to die.

When quite certain she was alone with him, Magenta came out from her place of concealment and went to the altar. The young man lay suffering severe mental anguish, his head lolling side to side, eyes squeezed shut, trapped in some evil dream. There was something so pitifully innocent in his features, despite who he might be or where he came from. With hesitating fingers she touched his face. All her life she had been imposed to hold herself severely aloof from physical contact. Now, with a certain tender abandonment, she allowed herself this contact. He was so vulnerable, so defenseless. She tried to comfort him, stroking his brow with the utmost gentleness.

Within herself Magenta was in conflict. She was not allowed to be here, but she felt a deep sentiment of sympathy keeping her at his side. She could see how helplessly he struggled to keep hold of the thin thread of existence. Closing her eyes against the piteous sight of him, Magenta left him to his fate. There was little hope to successfully steal him away, and the consequences if she failed would be considerable.

For many hours his face haunted her. Only by a persistent ache of compa.s.sion was she finally compelled to make an attempt to help him escape. Deep in the night she returned to him. Trembling, she untied the black scarf which had been drawn so tight round his throat as to stifle his cries, but she did not release his hands from their restraints. She feared in the impaired state of his mental faculties he might become violent.

In her bed the high priestess was roused suddenly from sleep. Whispers in the dark told her of the betrayal taking place down in the ceremonial chamber.

From a small wooden chest Magenta took several vials, each containing substances derived from plants. Deeply moved by his situation, she endeavoured to awaken him by every means she could. For one instant the heavy lids were raised from the dream-laden eyes, but he then relapsed into a condition of partial unconsciousness. At length she succeeded in dispelling his stupor and attracting his attention. Kindly she smiled into his eyes. It seemed the soul had returned to them. Upon the sight of her, bent over him, he uttered a plaintive sound. Gently she hushed him, speaking softly and rea.s.suringly, as one does with a frightened child.

In every aspect of her countenance there was a strangeness that set her apart from ordinary women. Her cheeks had a transparent fairness in which the colour never rose, and her shadowy eyes, a haunting deep blue, made her appear that which she was not, but it required only a little acquaintance with her face to see the beauty of compa.s.sion within its delicate lines.

As she unfastened his hands, he watched her, still in a daze of trying to distinguish between dreaming and reality. When he realized that the woman before him was flesh and blood, not some morbid creation of his own mind, he took hold of her, and sitting up, burst into a frightful fit of sobs and pleas, clutching her like a man drowning.

For a moment she was drowning with him. She attempted to pull apart, trying for gentleness at first, but then, with increasing force, pushing against his chest, struggling in desperate silence. He held her fast in bewilderment and terror. He thought she was going to leave him, abandon him to this waking reality of horror.

At last, his strength failing him, she broke free. He tried to follow but sagged down against the altar, bunched in a shaken heap. For a moment she would not approach him. When the paroxysm had somewhat spent itself, she kneeled down, touching him with a quiet warmth of manner that placed both him and herself at ease with one another.

"You must be quiet now," she said. "Gather your strength, and I shall see you out." A sound-a drawing of bolts-forced them into quicker action. "Do you have strength enough?" she whispered urgently. With some difficulty he seemed to comprehend her meaning and a.s.sented with a feeble nod. a.s.sisting him to his feet, she draped his arm over her shoulders. He staggered with uncertain steps, leaning heavily upon her.

They made it to the safety of shadow not a moment too soon, before several servants-Draegers-entered the chamber. The eerie forms didn't so much walk as they did glide. These women were blood-begotten but had become something else, something dark and spectral, bodiless and insubstantial. However, they could become substantial at will. Quickly they saw that the sacrifice no longer occupied the sacrificial altar.

Hidden in the shadows, quivering against one another, the two waited, silent and motionless. His body was heavily pressed to hers, and the wall at her back a.s.sisted in supporting his weight. His face hung near to hers. She could feel the warmth of his breath shudder against her cheek. The effect was strange, as if she had been near him for some time and yet had only just become aware of him.

They remained deathly still and could hear as the servants conversed; their tones expressed no emotion, but it was evident they spoke of him. Briefly his brow creased, and the gentle brown eyes lifted to hers with thankful devotion. They waited some moments before the opportunity to steal out the door undetected presented itself. They got as far as the stairs, when half way up, he slumped against the wall, excessively drained of strength. He leaned there a moment, perfectly motionless. "Please," she said with gentle urgency. "We mustn't linger." Struggling, he gathered his energy and pushed away from the wall, once more depending upon her.

It was a small triumph that they reached the top of the stairs. Their pulses beat high with fear and the fragile hope of escape. With unfaltering purpose, he leaning over her as they walked, she led him down a long hall. She knew exactly where to take him.

They rounded a corner and came upon the high priestess, standing far down at the end of the pa.s.sage. Their hearts sank when they saw her. She came forward with unhurried steps, as if knowing they had no place to go. She walked with sweeping majesty, her splendid form impressive in stature. Yet she seemed brittle, as if she concealed some secret pain.

Magenta glanced frantically back over her shoulder to see another escape route, but coming up through the floor and through the walls the Draegers swarmed and prevented them from making a move. The high priestess came to stand before them, very near, terrifying in her beauty. Her countenance was severe, an unwholesome white, yet her skin was smooth in spite of her age, which could not be less than fifty years. She was tall, straight, and magnificent, a pa.s.sionately proud woman-a woman to be afraid of.

The young man and the priestess remained clutching one another; each feeling the need to protect the other. "Please don't hurt her," was all he could utter, with no strength in his body to protect the one who had risked her own life for his. Before either could make a move to prevent it, the high priestess struck out. Neither saw the sharp implement she held as she did so, but in an instant his throat was opened.

Magenta gave a gasp that ended in a stifled sob as he fell from her arms; she could not hold the dead weight. He writhed only a moment at her feet, bleeding, before he stilled. She turned startled eyes, wide and wet, toward the high priestess who took her hurtfully by the arm. She would show Magenta what it was to lose favour with her.

Chapter23.

Magenta -n a grove cast in subdued light, somewhere deep within the woods, Deacon sat alone. Ghostly mist drifted about the trees, and the air was sweet and thin and quiet.

An elusive fragrance, like that of a rose borne on the evening breeze, softly awaked his senses. Presently, he became conscious that a faint voice flowed through the silence. Rising slowly, he caught haunting fragments of a hymn. Almost unconsciously, like one in a dream, he followed.

And there, pa.s.sing through a stream of moonlight, a dark tranquillity pervading, was the maiden whose voice had so entranced him. Her uncovered hair was smooth and black as night. With sombre despair she drifted through the trees, her head downward. Beyond the gentle murmur of her voice, an intense stillness prevailed. When she turned her dark gaze upon him, he saw that it was she! He saw now that the perfect face was stained with tears, the eyes filled with such sadness, that a deep throb in his heart urged him to go to her. But though he would, he could not. The holiness of her person put her out of reach, made her unapproachable, otherworldly, mysterious. Fain to stay where he was, he stood and watched, with the agony of mingled dread and of hope, hoping that perhaps she would come to him. Sorrowfully, she drew away, and he watched her, like a faded dream, pa.s.s from his sight.

When Magenta returned to the temple her countenance was carefully controlled, so that not one visible sign of anguish remained. It was a hollow, solitary place, with walls that seemed to lie in perpetual silence, absorbing everything that came to pa.s.s within. Here and there worshipers kneeled at prayer.

Magenta saw her father, Orsious, standing with the high priestess. They conversed in a tense and intimate fashion. Her father rarely came to the temple unless it was for a matter of great importance. He was an impressive man in stature, his features strong and distinct rather than handsome. His age could not be less than seventy. Nevertheless, he was able, and inclined, to make any who doubted his authority feel it in the cruelest fashion.

Magenta hoped to pa.s.s them by without notice, when, without turning his face, but instead pointing his finger, Orsious said, "Don't go far." He had the unanswerable voice of authority which keeps one fearful, obedient. "I will speak with you in a moment."

Magenta lingered near the base of the staircase, then went to observe some flowers that were of the deepest red, almost the colour of black blood. Not far from her father stood one of the rangers who worked for him. It was not necessary to possess the power of discriminating character to judge this man as savage. His unshaven face bore a sword-cut from temple to mouth. Rangers were rough and ready men, always able and willing to do violence on Orsious's behalf. He waited like a guard posted behind the older man, regretting that he could not smoke. He had rather long, untidy brown hair. He seemed made to endure, fit to wield a sword with the greatest of ease. In every other respect he was a weak man.

Not required at present, Fraomar wandered over to Magenta, on whom his eyes had long lingered. His air was fierce, his step strong, but he was careful always to maintain some distance. The priestesses were considered nothing short of sacred and were both venerated and feared. Magenta maintained a reserve, distant and uncommunicative. Drifting about the room, she would pause and look at pictures that lined the walls. Her long figure and absorbed expression gave her an air of unattainability. He remained at her side, haunting every step of the beloved creature, her every movement watched with worship. The forced words and trivialities of speech were equally as oppressive as the silences.

Magenta came to stand by the inviting glow created by open-flame lamps. Fraomar waited at her side, standing as near to her as possible without drawing suspicious eyes in their direction. She was exquisitely remote, something unknown. Restless inside himself, Fraomar threw his head back, looking up at the ceiling. "It feels longer than three months that I've been gone," he said. "Doesn't it?"

"I suppose," came the neutral reply.

He seemed to meditate awhile. Then, looking down at her, with strangely communicative eyes that filled her with unease, he said, "The time away has given me an opportunity to consider many things, of what's important and meaningful. There is so much you just don't recognize, till it is taken. And then you realise that it was there all the time-it was always there before your eyes. And then you are never the same, if you understand what I mean."

This was received in silence.

"I overheard that you have been asked to commit yourself to an appointed office?" said Fraomar, in some doubt.

"Yes."

"That's what you'll do then, is it?"

The face of the young woman darkened, but she looked downwards at her hands, immutably. The flame illumined the ranger's hard face with an unnatural warmth, his eyes shining as he watched her, an illicit longing burning through his veins.

"I see that you suffer," he said in a lowered voice, wetting his lips, an urgency to express his desires in the brief time they had alone. "But it need not be," he added as he came a step closer, leaning as near to her as he dared. As his voice became lower and grew more intimate, his intentions became clearer. "You cannot be blind to the fact that you have captured my interest more than any other woman." Magenta cast a piercing look into his keen eyes, but said nothing. "Let me take you away from here. You're perishing. I can see how you wither for want of affection and common society."

"Do not speak of things about which you know nothing." She moved from his side, but he moved with her.

"How can I pretend I don't see what is plain before my eyes," he said in a tone of dismay unusual for him. "You're like mist, perpetually dissolving. It burdens me to see you so. This is not your choice, I know. Are you certain you do not suffer needlessly?"

Magenta cast a plaintive sidelong glance over to where her father stood, unaware of her and the officious ranger, who was smothering her with his persistent and unrequested sympathies.

"He'll never take you away from here," said Fraomar. "He doesn't know of your suffering. He has no care for your suffering." Her eyes were dark and stricken when Magenta looked to Fraomar, and he grew hopeful and more anxious than ever before to secure favor in her heart. "Come away with me," he said. "If not, you will continue to fade, to diminish, till youth and beauty are utterly spent, and all hope of love and happiness is unrecallably exhausted. In the midst of your darkest doubt, bound to grief and despair, there will be no beloved to hear your plaintive cries, to comfort and ease the pain which makes your heart grow so cold. You will be in darkness, and you will be alone."

Fraomar continued in this vein. He wanted to appear sympathetic, hoping thereby to secure the elusive and ever-desired priestess, but he was not understanding or helping, only hurting. He would use fear and hopelessness in an attempt to imprison her in his own cage. She would not, however, go away with him. Should she leave with him, he would own her body, and she would merely exchange one misery for another. His mere presence hara.s.sed and provoked her. He seemed desperate to have her convinced of the grief she would endure without him.

He was perspiring. His roving, restless gaze settled on her lips, but he was so acutely aware of those who would punish him for such an action that he attempted nothing beyond taking her hand, glancing first over his shoulder to make certain they were un.o.bserved. But even her hand she withheld from him.

Every time he visited, if they were alone, he made an attempt to touch her. He had a fixed notion that sometime she would let him. Brooding over her closely, he could not make out her expression. She looked as if she were going to cry, yet her face remained composed, her lofty calm unbroken. She would not answer him, nor let him in on her thoughts. The persistent silence and impenetrability of this woman, whom his violent nature demanded, disconcerted him. He was unable to keep the silence, and said, "No man could be more devoted to you than I am. For long years I have loved you in silence. You cannot be ignorant of this."

"Speak not another word." She silenced him in a voice lower even than his own.

He remained quiet only a brief moment. The conviction that she was the woman for him urged him to continue. "You belong to me-the hope that you will come to this realization has sustained me." Then he clenched his hands, pleading with her to renew his sentiments after she had time to pause and reconsider.

"I would rather you didn't," she said, her words like a knife. She made a move to leave. He took a step as if he would prevent it but merely remained at her side, anger mixed in his disappointment.

"You will be brought to reason," he said. "It's you and I together, and I'll have you convinced before I'm through."

To such arrogant persistence Magenta had no desire to respond. She left, silent and untouched. Fraomar watched after her vanishing form as she ascended the magnificent staircase. There was something immeasurably enraging in its cold forbiddance, in the utter impossibility of getting at her once she had retreated up it. He swallowed bitterly and blinked back the pa.s.sion as he became aware of her father standing at his side, looking up also. Orsious looked angered that his daughter had disobeyed. "Send her down," he demanded, the moment the high priestess joined them. "I will speak with her."

"I shall have her see you tomorrow," she said dismissively, for the single purpose of ensuring he remembered the abdication of all his rights the moment he had placed his daughter in her care all those years before.

"I will speak with her this night!"

Not shrinking from his anger, the high priestess remained persistent in her authority, yet accommodating for the sake of their alliance. "I shall see that she goes to you at first light."

"Noon," he said, handing over a piece of parchment. "And have her bring these things also." His final word on the arrangement satisfied his feeling of control.

"I'll attend to it, and see that you retrieve for me what I desire," she said smoothly, and when he parted his lips to protest, she added coldly, "Spare no pains to acquire it."

He relented and nodded. He could not refuse her. She provided him with things necessary for his life's work, and she had possession of his greatest treasure, this side of death, and would not turn her against him.

Chapter24.

First Attempts -ate in the night, unable to sleep, Magenta went out into the garden where black hollyhock grew in abundance, clinging to and consuming the stone walls. The air was burdened with the perfume of many flowers, some of which only bloom under moonlight. The seductions of their scent, haunting and unsettling, mingled with the stillness of the night and induced a dim sense of longing and disquiet to any unfortunate enough to inhale the bitter sweetness of their commingled perfumes, which conveyed an elusive sense of some forbidden and hidden qualities.

Magenta drifted listlessly through the lonely, enclosed garden, her quiet carriage like the slow gentle sweeping of a breeze. It was not a prim establishment with well-tended flower beds but was dark and overgrown, choked with plants that seemed to mourn and to shy from flaunting their graces. Yet the garden was of uncommon beauty, its vanities characterised by a sweetness, shaded with sorrow, and subdued by resignation rather than pa.s.sionate life.

However, not all the garden was in sedate beauty. Lurking within the melancholy was a sting of treachery. Plants were apt to seize and torment any who ventured too near. Their caustic flesh would sting and irritate and burn. Not all the perfumes which sweetened the air were kind. Many were decidedly injurious, burdening the air, verging on the excessive. Yet the very worst was not to be wholly despised. Its attributes often inspired sentiments of yearning and insufferable desire, tempting the organ of smell insatiably.

Resting in its shadow, a stranger leaned against the stone wall. The figure was hidden by darkness, but the stature and broadness of shoulder indicated it was a man. He watched the form of beauty in her every motion, eagerly, greedily.

As she approached, the unshaven, disheveled figure of the ranger languidly stepped out into view. "Four times I sent request to have you see me," he began, hoping at once to gain her sympathy. "What a torment a woman can be!"

Magenta greeted him without smiling and waited for him to come forward to her, as she knew he would. She was dismayed to find herself alone with him but would not let him see. "The hour is late," she said with a shade of reproof.

"And yet here you are," he said, antagonistic, "wandering the garden, alone." He moved toward her gradually, cautiously, so that she would not attempt an escape before he was near enough to prevent it. "I wasn't expecting to speak with you until morning," he said, as if addressing a long known friend.

"Perhaps I shall leave and not disappoint your expectations," she replied but did not act upon the statement: although he made no such attempt, he positioned himself in such a way as to give her the impression that should she provoke such an action, he would lurch and seize her.

"I will not hold you here," he said, as if her thoughts could be read plainly on her face. "But first I will plead that you stay awhile and listen. I wish to speak on a subject important to your future happiness." He did not allow her look of mistrust to discourage him. "You will not ask me the nature of the subject?"

"My freedom?" she said. There was no sarcasm, but contempt and suspicion in her voice.

"Yes." Fraomar smiled, though he was filled with a sore irritability. "Have you given consideration to my offer?"

"There is no need. Without reflection, my answer is the same as before."

"You gave no answer before," he said, then added as he came closer, "Now that we are alone, let us talk openly together." His look urged her to mistrust him more wholly than she had previously.

"There is nothing to be said between us that has not already been spoken," she said, removing herself from his reach and walking over to where a thick flowering vine grew, hanging down with insufferable indolence. Fraomar watched the delicate creature, feeling relaxed and calm. He felt now that he had her in the seclusion of the garden, with only himself and the plants, that he was in command of the situation. She could not put him off.

"Mind yourself," she cautioned, "not to brush too close by them."

He saw the plant of which she warned him, and with a smile, moved from its grasp. For a time he left her to herself, then to renew conversation said, "You are to see your father tomorrow?" His eyes looked to where a pretty flower hung carelessly near to her face. "Perhaps afterwards, for a short moment, you would permit me to see you, away from here?"

As he spoke he approached near. She did not withdraw but stood constrained, untouchable, her contemptuous eyes fastened on him. In his hand he materialized a dagger, swiftly cut down the pendulous blossom and took it in his hand. Then with a languid gesture, the same insufferable ease with which he conjured it, he dismissed the weapon with a smile on his face. He knew the use of magic at the temple was forbidden and took a strange pleasure in it. To Magenta he offered the flower, which she did not take. Despite her refusal, already his heart began to beat high with the hope of success. He felt from her the clinging, faltering resistance that precedes surrender.

The refused flower he did not toss aside, but instead, lowering his face, offered himself. He would, within plain sight, taste of her lips. He no longer cared. "They will not see," he said, lifting his hand to caress her. She withdrew before the touch of rough fingers had chance even to brush her cheek.

"You forget yourself and the customs of my kind," she said.

There was something that angered yet amused him about the lofty manner in which she disregarded his entreaties. With a peculiar, quivering smile, he bowed his face to the flower, caressing his lips with the soft petals. The scent made him shudder. It was hurtfully sweeter than she. From over the blossom he observed her in silence, and she remained the same elusive creature whose secret soul he could never touch. She did not meet his advances as he had hoped. She did not, however, succeed in making a man with such determination hopeless. He tossed the flower aside and said coldly, "It might a.s.sist you a little to estimate your obligations to the priestesshood, if you knew-"

"There is nothing you can tell me I don't already know of their infamies," she answered, equally as coldly.

"Then why remain with them? You cannot believe what is told to be anything but false. You know of what they do. Perhaps it is that your heart has turned as black as theirs?"

She did not answer, but as he looked at her it seemed to him that she was somehow defeated. Nevertheless, she did not lower her eyes.

He went up to her and, in a low voice, said, "I can take you away from all this; just speak the word." His face was shrewd and intelligent, rather than tender and sympathetic. He already exulted in her capture.

Magenta wondered with dismay how she had fallen prey to such a man. It was not known quite what he was capable of, but that he was a man of uncommon gifts was plain.

"Why do you look alarmed?" he said, bewildered. "I cannot think of reasons for you to refuse." He pa.s.sed a hand over his brow. He began to suffer mildly. The odour of the flowers was oppressive. The untended plants had abundant disregard of s.p.a.ce and the breathing of others, yet he could not have longed for s.p.a.ce around them. He felt that now, within this moment, while alone, he must get her settled upon him.

"Tell me," he said, his voice gentler. "What are your wishes? What aim do you pursue?" She remained before him, her dark, steady eyes fixed on his wild, excited ones. "I wish to know and understand you. I can help, if you would speak with me." In excitement he drew forward an inch. "You recoil from me," he said, almost amused. "If I didn't know you well enough, I should think you were trying to play a game with me."