"Bound?" Hekate echoed. "Who are you? How did such a dreadful fate befall you?"
He smiled again, but his lips were pulled awry into a grimace. "I remember that I sneered when you said you had done nothing to merit punishment. Now I'm about to say the same thing. I—I was, I think, only in the wrong place at the wrong time and saw something I shouldn't have seen . . ." He shook himself suddenly, oddly like a dog shaking water from his fur. "Come," he added, "there's no need for us to stand here in the cold and dark. My fate isn't quite so dreadful as it appears here."
Hekate followed readily, although she wondered at the phrasing. How could the fate of being bound to the caves of the dead appear more dreadful in one place than another? However, the answer to that became partly apparent as they crossed the depth of the cave. The ceiling dropped and the cave narrowed as they moved toward the back wall, which permitted the mage lights to wake myriad gleams and glitters in the rock. The oppression caused by the utter blackness beyond the area lit by the mage lights was relieved by the sparks. It was like being surrounded by a starry sky. Hekate was so fascinated that she nearly walked into a wall.
"Hi! Have a care!" her companion exclaimed, laughing.
He caught hold of her arm and steered her toward one of what she now saw were several dark passages. Immediately aware that he could be drawing her into a maze of caves in which she could be lost, Hekate fixed a marker spell above head height on the wall of the passage.
The opening was dark, without any of the crystal glow that had enlivened the walls and ceiling of the larger cave, and Hekate saw with considerable surprise that that was no accident. The walls and ceiling had been coated with some black substance, perhaps tar or pitch. Then the passsage turned sharply to the right, and Hekate realized the crystal that lit the walls had been deliberately covered. Ahead of her the passage was bright with fixed mage lights, which would have been visible as light from the front of the cave.
The passage turned right again, opening into an irregularly shaped chamber, not as large or high as the first cave, but of a comfortable size and lit as bright as day. Hekate stood in the doorway, gaping. Opposite her, a wall of golden brown water near the ceiling broke up into myriad cascades and poured down the back wall. Instinctively she looked at the floor, expecting it to be awash, but only a shallow trough carried away the runoff. The young man, who had turned to see why she was not following, laughed.
Then Hekate saw that the streams were frozen in stone with no more than a sheen of water on the surface. That gave an even greater realism to what appeared to be a lace of foam at the foot of the cascade. She shook her head in amazement.
"Beautiful, isn't it?" The smile on the young man's lips grew wry. "Thank you. I've been here so long, I don't see it any more. You've given it back to me."
"All of it is beautiful," Hekate said, glancing up and all around, awe in her voice.
To the right and the left, on either side of the cascade, the walls of the chamber were patterned with what seemed to be tightly pleated flows of different colored stone. These too showed a sheen of wet on the surface, which gleamed in the light of arcs of mage light. From the ceiling hung delicate flower-like projections; at first Hekate thought they were very strange flowers with thin, sharp-pointed petals growing from small cracks in the roof without stems or leaves. Then she realized the "flowers" were also of stone, translucent and delicate as feathers. Those too glowed brightly from mage lights caught inside.
Hekate was deeply impressed. She had power, but such an extravagant use was beyond even what Perses could expend. However, the slightly envious awe changed to solid appreciation when her mage-sense told her that the power was not coming from the young man himself. As she had bound the illusion disguising the valley of the Nymphae to the power in the earth, so had he done with the mage lights. The floor and walls of the place were threaded with lines of power and each mage light had its own source. But not many could see or use that earth power.
"That is a very clever use of the veins of the earth," she said. "Not many sorcerers can even sense the blood running through them."
He lifted a brow. "But you can, and you have cleverly told me so. The power warms the room too." He gestured for Hekate to enter. "If you've seen all you want to see, come in. But there are caverns far more beautiful than this chamber. This is only convenient because it's so close to the entrance. If you'd like to see the deeper caverns, I'll gladly show them to you."
He had started to speak in a tone he wanted to be indifferent, but as he mentioned the other caverns an eagerness came into his voice and manner that he struggled to keep in check. Hekate was aware of the painful intensity in that eagerness. Although she couldn't help feeling suspicious of so great a desire of a rather handsome young man for the company of an aged crone, she couldn't help smiling either.
"I would indeed like to see them," she assured him—and it was true. If the caverns were more beautiful than this chamber, they would be a great experience, a thing to remember all her life. "But not at this moment," she added, still smiling. "I have come a very long way today and at a much faster pace than is good for me."
"Of course." He damped down his flickering excitement and smiled ruefully. "Forgive me. I forgot you said you were fleeing some magical threat. Sit down and rest."
He gestured toward a grouping of what must be called furniture. Hekate stared, again impressed. Thick pillars of stone had either grown up from the floor or been carved out of it. Three surrounded a stone table, and that had clearly been worked from a huge boulder, the top broken off to provide a flat surface and the sides chipped away so that one could sit on the flat stones with one's legs comfortably under the table.
"Thank you. I will," Hekate said. When she reached the table and stools, she touched a cushion made of a folded blanket and laughed. "Earth power does many things, but I've never known it to provide cushions and blankets."
He shrugged. "No. I suppose I am a thief. But . . . Never mind. Come, sit down. Are you hungry?"
"Very!" Hekate exclaimed, coming forward eagerly and seating herself. "Who carved the stone?" she asked, touching the edge of the table, which had clearly been ground smooth.
"I did," the young man replied, his voice again flat.
He moved away toward an opening in one wall of the chamber. Now that Hekate's attention had been drawn to it, she could hear water running. A mage light sprang into existence as he entered, and a moment later he came out carrying a crude wooden platter, plainly meant to be left behind with the offering it bore. Hekate's mouth watered; the platter held some slices of meat and some rounds of flatbread, but even her hunger could not distract her from the stone table and stools. One man alone? How many years would that work have taken, unless it was done by magic?
"Did you use the earth power to form the table and stools?" she asked as he came and set the platter on the table before her. "How—"
His laugh was so bitter that she left the question unasked. "I am not the king of the dead, who can shape stone with his hands," he said. "No, I did it the usual way, hammering one stone upon another." His mouth twisted. "There are stones aplenty here and time enough too."
She had reached a hand toward the meat and bread, but did not take them. "Time enough for you to carve these? You alone? Who are you?"
"Who are you?" he countered.
She took a slice of meat, put it on a round of flatbread and bit into it. "My name is Hekate," she answered promptly, if somewhat indistinctly.
The offer of her name without hesitation should reduce his suspicion of her; however, it was more ingenuous than truthful because Hekate knew he could not use that name against her. As soon as she was old enough to speak distinctly and follow instructions—at least some of the time—Asterie had brought her to the Mother's shrine and bade her choose a soul-name, a name that she wanted for herself alone and that she and the Mother would hold secret between them. Then, Asterie said, no man, woman, or god could enslave her by that personal tie.
Since Hekate had already suffered her father laying his will upon her, she was more intent and serious to have the protection Asterie offered than an ordinary child of three might have been. Even so she had no memory of why she uttered the word she did—perhaps it was the Mother's doing rather than her own—but she called herself Pheraea and sealed that into her deepest being.
"I am the daughter of the mage Perses and the Lady Asterie," she continued between swallowing one bite and taking another. "I don't know whether you are acquainted with them."
He shook his head and sat down on another of the padded stone stools. "I don't really know anyone from Ur-Kabos. I'm not from these parts." He shrugged. "I come from the west by way of the north." His mouth twisted again. "The Gifted are not welcome there."
"The Gifted are not welcome anywhere," Hekate said, her lips thinning.
He stared at her, then said, "My name is Kabeiros."
"Kabeiros!" she echoed, again failing to take a bite of the bread and meat she had started to lift to her mouth. "How do you come by—" She stopped abruptly. "No, that's none of my business. If you wish to be called Kabeiros, that's what I'll call you."
Kabeiros was staring at her in astonishment. "Want to be called? It is my name." Then he grinned. "Oh surely, my pranks could not be remembered for so long."
"Your pranks? There is a fountain called 'the water of Kabeiros' in the poorest quarter of Ur-Kabos. It has the best and purest water—only it is pouring from the penis of a bronze dog seemingly urinating on a post. The legend is that the god Kabeiros struck the ground there and brought up the water. Are you telling me you are that Kabeiros?"
"Legend?" he said, his voice rather faint. "Has it been so long as that? To make a prank into a legend?" His eyes were full of tears. "When it is always black, one loses count of day and night. When nothing grows, one loses count even of the seasons." His lips trembled and he firmed them.
"You have been here in the caves of the dead since the water of Kabeiros began to flow?" Hekate whispered.
She was in no doubt that the young man—no, the man far older than she, and had her life span been as that of others, she would have been older than the crone looked—had spoken the truth. His emotion was too raw, and it was all turned inward. It was clear he hardly knew she was there.
What troubled her was that Kabeiros was a local god—a trickster god who plagued people with all kinds of mischief, some good some bad. Kabeiros was far more likely to grant a prayer than the gods worshiped in the temples but to grant it in such a way as to sometimes make it worthless, sometimes make it a curse, and sometimes bring ten times the blessing for which one had prayed.
If one were wise, one prayed to Kabeiros to be ignored, or did not pray to him at all and hoped for the best. And certainly no one had ever named a child after that god, so this young man was not likely to be a distant descendant of one of Kabeiros' naughty tricks. Unless some poor woman driven to the point of madness had cursed the unwelcome fruit of her womb with that name. Poor woman. Poor child.
Hekate examined Kabeiros with care. This being was a sorcerer; she had felt the power of his spell of fear and despair. He was also Gifted by his own admission, although he had not named his Gift. She studied his face, blind-looking, though the eyes seemed to be fixed on the table. Although it was a dangerous thing to do, making her terribly vulnerable, she opened herself as she did in the secret shrine; a moment later she shook her head infinitesimally. Whatever else he was, this Kabeiros was no god.
He was staring downward, one hand moving gently over the table's smooth surface, the other clenched tight. Hekate put her hand over his fist and patted it gently. When he did not respond, she went on with her meal, finishing the bread and meat and drinking the beer. She was not fond of beer, but the date wine was too sweet. Dionysos had told her there was a better fruit for making wine than dates; it grew on the vines of which he dreamed.
Thinking of Dionysos reminded her that Kabeiros wasn't the only one trapped in the caves of the dead. The guhrt, the Nymphae had said, fed full on blood could wait and watch for her for weeks, perhaps months. Would Perses' summoning hold the creature that long? She shrugged. It didn't matter. She glanced at Kabeiros again. He was still lost inside himself; however, she was now reasonably confident that she would be welcome to stay as long as she was willing.
She was also able to dismiss any ideas about such ulterior motives as secret sacrifice as the cause of Kabeiros' suppressed eagerness to show her the other caverns. He would be eager to show her anything that would hold her attention and keep her with him. If he had been alone so long, naturally he would be eager for company, even that of an old hag.
Hekate's lips tightened. She didn't welcome the thought of keeping the form of the crone for any extended time. Not only was it unattractive to others, but it was uncomfortable. However, even less welcome was the idea of letting a total stranger, and a sorcerer at that, know that she could shift her form. And yet she was very tempted to become the woman and to be completely honest with Kabeiros. She snorted gently. Completely honest. She doubted after the many years she had lived with Perses she could ever be completely honest with anyone. Still, the temptation to tell Kabeiros the truth persisted. She had no idea why; there was just something open and childlike about him.
Childlike! Hekate suppressed a chuckle. If he was who he claimed to be, he was hundreds of years old, perhaps as much as a thousand. No, it could not be. He must be the offspring of a woman who truly hated him, or hated herself and his father—and he was a sorcerer. A sorcerer was, if she judged by herself and Perses, a practiced deceiver, far better at playing a role than the best of storytellers. She did not know this man at all and must be cautious.
And yet . . . and yet . . . Cocking her head to see his face better, she felt her heart contract with pity. The yellow eyes were staring wide, searching with the pathetic intensity of a lost child for something on the top of the table or in his own hands, which were now lying open.
"Kabeiros," she said softly.
The eyes lifted to her, but they saw nothing. Hekate sighed. She hoped she had not jolted him into madness by reminding him how long he had been in the caves of the dead. There was nothing she could do, however. She had the feeling that to try to draw him back to the present would do more harm than good, so she swept the few crumbs she had left onto the platter, took it and the empty wooden cup, the two crude pottery pitchers to the opening she had seen him enter.
The chamber behind it was now dark, but the mage light she generated showed her a narrow room, little more than a passage, but with a lively stream falling down the far wall. It sprayed over a thin rock shelf, tilted slightly backward and down toward the entryway, so that the water ran along it and over the back before draining off into some hidden opening. Hekate shivered slightly. The room was very damp and chilly. Cured hides hung over the front of the shelf, protecting whatever was behind them from any direct wetting. Meat and cheese and the beer and wine could be stored there, but the bread would spoil.
A breath of warmth from behind her drew her attention to another hide-covered opening. Hekate went through and found, as she expected, another small chamber, this one dry and heated by the power of the earth. Stone shelves, some seemingly natural and others bearing the marks of work, lined the walls. On them were more crude wooden and pottery cups, more pottery pitchers, more wooden platters and some rough, carelessly woven baskets.
Contesting with the warmth from the walls and floor was a cold draught, coming from the back of the chamber. Hekate went to look and saw a wide crack, its edges partly smoothed as if water had run into it for some time and then stopped. Listening, Hekate could hear the chuckle of water running down below, and at the edge of the crack was one piece of moldy bread, apparently caught there when garbage had been carelessly scraped off a platter. She smiled and kicked the crust in following it with the crumbs she scraped off the platter. Then, with some maneuvering, she managed to relieve herself down the crack without soiling the edges. That was a relief.
She had nothing with which to wipe or wash the platter she still held, so she left it separate from the others on a bottom shelf, squinting a little in the dimming light. Dimming? Hekate found it surprisingly hard to lift her head to look at her mage light, but in a moment realized that she was so tired even that small drain of power was too much for her to maintain. There would be time enough tomorrow and for, she thought, many tomorrows to examine how Kabeiros had lived. Now she must sleep.
In the main living chamber, the young man still sat at the table. Now his eyes were closed and tears marked his face. Hekate uttered a soft sigh and resisted the urge to smooth back his tumbled hair, a lock of which was plastered to his cheek. If he was grieving over his lost years, he was not mad. Although if he were truly Kabeiros, a few hundred years could not matter much.
She smiled tiredly at the thought and stepped softly to the table where she took the blankets from the two unoccupied stools. Then she found a sort of niche in the irregular walls, an indentation that was dry instead of gleaming with a trickle of water, laid one doubled blanket on the ground and drew the other over her. She had much to think about, not least the question of whether it was safe to sleep unwarded in Kabeiros' presence, but whether because she was exhausted or for some other reason, she could feel no fear and was asleep almost before she had settled down on her hard bed.
"Hekate?"
The call rang though the cave, startling Hekate awake but leaving her totally bewildered. She felt bruised all over from sleeping on a stone floor and she had no memory at all of her surroundings until her wildly roving glance caught the frozen-in-stone fall of water. By then, the call had come again, louder, anguished.
"Oh Mother, help," the voice cried, breaking on a sob. "I am alone again."
"No, no. I am here," Hekate called, struggling to sit up, her stiff muscles protesting both yesterday's run and the night's accommodation.
Kabeiros appeared before her, sighing, "Mother, thank you." But then his eyes widened in astonishment. "Why are you lying on the floor?" he asked. "Did you think I would be angry if you took at least part of my bed?"
He had twice called on the Mother. Although Hekate only laughed amidst her groans, her feeling of confidence in the young—well, he looked young—man increased to a near certainty that he was someone she could trust.
"I had no idea where your bed was or if you even had one," she said, still smiling. "You do not look to have slept in it last night."
"No. I slept on the table, I think."
Hekate thought so too, since one cheek was marked with a slightly pebbled look, but she did not interrupt him.
"I was trying to remember . . . to remember . . ." His eyes lost their focus.
"Help me up!" Hekate said sharply, and extended a rather imperious hand toward him. She understood that it would be better for him not to think too much about the missing years. "And you had better show me your privy," she added. "I confess I used the one in the drying room—the warm room—of your kitchen last night. I'm sorry if I did wrong, but I could wait no longer. I was careful not to soil the floor."
While she spoke, he had taken her hand and raised her to her feet. "It doesn't matter. That all goes down the same stream, but the privy is more comfortable. This way."
He guided her to another of the openings on the back wall, this one to the far right, again calling a mage light into being as they stepped into the dark. The arrangement was somewhat like the kitchen, the short passage leading to one chamber, which opened into another.
The first had water running vigorously somewhere below an opening. Here, however, stones had been assembled and fitted together to form a stool with a central opening. Hekate made directly for it, her need too urgent for her to be troubled about modesty, but Kabeiros backed out into an opening on the left wall, entering another chamber so she had privacy.
When she called his name, he came to the doorway but only to invite her in. "This is my bedchamber," he said. "As you can see, there are more furs than one person needs to be comfortable. If you would not feel easy sharing the room with me, I will carry some out to your chosen spot, but it is warmer here because it is a small room and easier to heat."
"Thank you," Hekate said politely, but she didn't try to hide the fact that she was choking on laughter. "I'm not afraid to share your room. I know you've been alone for a long time, but even so I can't believe you would be overcome with lust for me."
Kabeiros was now smiling, which was what Hekate had intended, but what she had said woke a stirring in her. She would not mind sharing not only his room but his bed, she realized, then choked back another laugh. No one would willingly share a bed with the crone, but if she changed to the woman . . . It would be a good test of Kabeiros. She jerked her mind back from that enticing notion. She liked Kabeiros and even trusted him . . . but not enough to expose to him that she was a shape-shifter.