Chapter 30

MAKARITES

Theo crawled through the entrance in the statue’s base and pulled the sliding panel shut behind him. From somewhere above, he could hear a whisper of movement and knew the zodiacal ring had shifted back to its original position. With his cell phone clutched between his teeth as a flashlight, he started his descent.

He hadn’t gone far when a dim light appeared below him. He turned off his phone and kept going. His palms were sweating—only his winter gloves prevented him from slipping off the rungs. Finally, his feet touched bottom. The low tunnel before him headed eastward. He had to crouch to avoid smacking his head.

He walked for about forty more yards—just far enough to cross beneath Fifth Avenue—before the tunnel ended at a large wooden door banded with iron. On either side of the entrance hung electric lighting fixtures made to look like torches—they even flickered convincingly. He figured he stood right below Saint Patrick’s Cathedral.

It was hard to feel any satisfaction at having guessed the mithraeum’s location correctly when the door before him looked like the entrance to a medieval dungeon. He was, without a doubt, about to walk into a metaphorical lion’s den. Then he thought of how Selene had walked into a very literal grizzly bears’ lair without a sign of trepidation. It was his turn to be fearless.

He tested the door handle. It didn’t budge. No visible keyhole, and he had no experience picking locks anyway. Grabbing the handle, he pulled with all his strength. Nothing. He tried pushing instead. Not a creak.

Finally, he knocked tentatively on the wood, feeling only slightly less idiotic than he had on the steps of the cathedral. Of course, no one answered.

He took a step backward to examine the entrance. It had no Mithraic symbolism he could see. No signs of the zodiac engraved into the wooden door. No snakes or bulls or dogs carved on the lintel. Just two torches. Then he nearly laughed aloud. Cautes and Cautopates: the torchbearers who flanked Mithras in so many depictions of the tauroctony. Cautes, signifier of Day and Birth, held his torch facing up. But Cautopates, who brought Night and Death, always held his facing down.

Theo reached up, grabbed the right-hand lighting fixture, and rotated it downward. The door swung open.

He entered a bare white chamber only slightly larger than a closet, furnished with a metal desk and one chair. The ceiling paint had browned in the corners, the linoleum floor peeled at the edges. But the round steel door on the opposite wall, bolted and barred with a wheel-shaped handle like the entrance to a bank vault, made it clear this was no storage room.

Theo stood uncertainly. He scanned the ceiling, knowing there must be security cameras but seeing nothing besides the light fixture. After a long moment, he cleared his throat. “Um. Hello?” His voice sounded weak and reedy in his own ears. Already making a great first impression, as usual.

He tried again. “It’s Theodore Schultz.” All the gods had agreed there was no point in hiding his identity. The cult members had seen him at Selene’s home and in the Rockefeller Center skating rink. And if they’d done any research at all, they’d find that he’d worked as a police consultant the last time a Mystery Cult stalked the city. “I’ve come to speak to your Pater Patrum.”

Theo stood in silence for another interminable span. I’m going to feel like a complete idiot if it turns out I’m talking to myself in an empty room. But just then, the wheel on the far door rotated slowly of its own volition, and the door swung open. Solid steel, six inches thick.

As imposing as Theo found the door, the figure that emerged was even more so. It was not its appearance that sent a shiver of terror through Theo’s gut—but its lack of one. A long, gray veil obscured the face and head; it looked like a ghost come to haunt Theo’s waking nightmares. Beneath the waist-length veil it wore simple gray woolen slacks and shiny black loafers. Looks like a very shy stockbroker, Theo decided, trying to see the veil in a less disturbing light.

“Theodore Schultz.” A man, then, with a surprisingly deep voice. Somehow, with the veil, Theo’d expected it to be light and mincing. He scolded himself for his heteronormative preconceptions and nodded.

“I’ve come to help.”

The man extended his hand, and Theo clasped it in his own. That was easier than I thought it’d be … but the man was shaking his head as if Theo’d already done something wrong. He took a seat behind the desk. With only the veil now visible, Theo felt as if he were being interviewed by one of the ghosts from Pac-Man. Then, with a click, the door to the tunnel locked behind him, and he decided it felt more like an interrogation by the Grim Reaper.

“How did you find us?” asked the veiled man calmly.

“Atlas. Pretty obvious for anyone with an Internet connection.” They didn’t need to know how close he’d come to missing the clues. “Let me guess, John D. Rockefeller Jr. was a member of your cult.”

“Our membership remains secret. That is the first rule.”

“Right. Sorry.”

“We know who you are. What makes you think we won’t just kill you? You work with our enemies.”

“You think I do,” he said, trying to look the man in the eye. A difficult task when his entire face was just a gray sheet. “I’ve gained their trust, so I can work from within to destroy the Olympians. You know who I am. I know what they are. And I also know, with the utmost conviction, that they have no place in this world.”

“And you have no place in ours. Membership is only for those sent by a syndexios, Professor.”

Syndexios? A ‘joining of right hands’? Theo surmised, translating the Ancient Greek. Ah, that’s where I went wrong. I didn’t know the secret handshake. Handshaking itself was an Eastern custom, not originally a Roman one. It made sense that the Mithraists, with their interest in Persia, would’ve incorporated it into their secret rituals. “I don’t need to be initiated into the cult,” he said quickly. “I just want my life back.”

The veil swung back and forth as the man shook his head. “Only initiates may enter the Templo. Only initiates may know our secrets. If you want to work with us, you will have to join the cult. Surely, as a classicist, you understand that is how it works.”

Somehow, Theo didn’t think he could just say, “My bad,” and turn to go.

“But you’ve intrigued me,” the man went on. “You would work to destroy the very entities you’ve spent a life studying.”

“I studied them as figments of imagination. As creations of a society long dead. I never dreamed they were real until I met Selene.” That much, at least, was true. Theo mentally crossed his fingers and hoped his interpretation of Mithraism had been correct. “I believe our lives are our own,” he went on. “Yet I’ve become a pawn, subject to a pantheon of gods who try to bend me to their will. You believe in man’s ability to find salvation, right?”

The veiled man nodded slowly.

Theo considered trying to claim that he was a true believer in the power of Mithras, but he didn’t think he’d be particularly convincing. Better to keep the lies modest. “I’ve never been a particularly spiritual man, as you know if you’ve been following me around all this time. So I’m not sure what ‘salvation’ even means. But I do believe that if it exists, it’s something transcendent, something that lifts us past the material world. Selene and her family—they reduce divinity to something pedestrian. They’re like schoolyard bullies, convinced of their own mastery, turning what should be magical and mysterious into something utterly mundane.”

“You believe this strongly enough that you’d risk their wrath by pretending to be their ally? You’d pollute your body by joining with the Pretender named Diana? You’d come willingly into our Templo and offer yourself up to us, without knowing what such an offer entailed?”

“There are forces at work beyond those we can comprehend.” This sounded like something a Mithraist would believe. “I’m a Makarites. Did you know that?”

The veiled man didn’t reply. Theo explained. “That’s Greek for ‘Blessed One.’ It used to be that only the ancient heroes could earn such a title, but someone like me, who’s spent a lifetime studying the gods’ stories and—”

“There are no gods,” snapped his interviewer. “There is only one God. That is the first thing you must understand.”

“Sorry. I’ve picked up their language. I should say the ‘Pretenders’—is that it? Okay, then I’ve spent a lifetime studying the Pretenders’ myths. It’s given me an understanding of them that borders on … well, the supernatural, although I don’t want to sound pretentious. Let’s just say that they’re drawn to me, and I to them. I’m like Greek catnip.” He tried for a charming smile, but couldn’t tell if the veiled man responded in kind. Probably not. “Why would I be given such a power if not to use it?” he continued. “I must have a role to play. And that role is to rid the world of their pollution.” It wasn’t hard to imitate the Mithraist’s rhetoric. It reminded Theo of the language used by fundamentalist believers of all faiths. Throw in some “moral corruption” and “false idols” and you fit right in.

“I have no reason to believe you, and every reason to distrust you.”

“But if I’m right, I can tell you how to find them.”

“We already know there are other Pretenders hiding in Manhattan. We don’t know where they are, but it will not take us long to root them out.”

Theo tried not to let his relief show—at least the cult didn’t know about the Four Seasons yet. He tried for wide-eyed fervency instead. “The New York Pretenders are just the beginning, my friend.”

The veiled man sat in silence for a long moment. Theo could almost feel the intensity of his regard, despite being unable to see his eyes. Finally, the man said, “I will take you to the Pater Patrum. He will decide.”

Theo nodded solemnly, but inside he let out a small cheer. Score one for the mere mortal. Ten minutes in the mithraeum and I get to meet the Big Bad.

The man opened the massive steel door and ushered Theo into a bright, sterile hallway. None of the antechamber’s dinginess here. Instead, sleek curves of stainless steel and molded fiberglass formed the walls, floor, and ceiling. Theo felt like he’d entered the Starship Enterprise, but without the friendly ensigns. The corridor continued for at least a hundred yards. At the very end, he could just make out another large vault door. Smaller, less imposing doors appeared every twenty feet. None of them, Theo realized, had knobs. At one of these doors, the man stopped. He didn’t knock, but rather pressed his palm to a sensor on the wall.

The door swung open with a slight exhale. The veiled man gestured for him to enter, but remained in the hallway himself. Theo stepped inside, and the door hissed closed.

The only illumination came from a small fireplace at the far end of the long chamber. He took a careful step forward on what felt like thick carpet.

As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he could make out the richly carved mahogany of the walls and the ornate plasterwork ceiling. Niches held statues and paintings, but with no lamps to illuminate them, their subject matter remained hidden. Large furniture cluttered the room with great hulking shadows.

Only when he squinted could he make out a figure sitting in an armchair beside the fire, his back to the flames and his face concealed in shadow. Theo took another step forward.

“Stay where you are.” The voice was rough with age, but resonant with authority. Theo felt frozen in place like a moth pinned to a wall. “You seek to work with the Host?”

“Yes,” Theo said, trying not to sound confused. The Host? Why would they call themselves the Host?

A small movement in the shadows beside the chair alerted Theo to another figure. The person leaned down to whisper in the Pater’s ear.

“The Hyaena says I shouldn’t trust you. She says your loyalty lies with the one who calls herself the Huntress.”

Theo took a deep breath and prepared himself to betray the woman he loved.

Selene tried to wedge her fingers into the nearly invisible cracks around the food slot in the top of her cell door. She tried to kick out the lower panel with her bare feet. She only managed to bruise her toes and rip her fingernails. Finally, she sat down to conserve her strength. She left the hand mirror facedown, afraid of what it might show her.

So far, she’d had no visions since the flashback to the massacre of Niobe’s children, but she knew the reprieve wouldn’t last. What next? she wondered. The metamorphosis of Acteon, the murder of Coronis, the killing of Orion? She had caused so many deaths in her day, could she bear to relive them all?

She tried to busy her mind with happier thoughts instead, to push away the future that Aphrodite’s mirror had foretold and imagine a different one instead. When I get out of here, she decided, I will take Theo to Greece. She hadn’t been to her homeland since the Diaspora, but Zeus’s prohibition would no longer stop her. They would visit Knossos where the Minotaur once lurked in the Labyrinth. They would climb the steps of the Acropolis and sit in the shadow of the Parthenon’s colonnade. They would hike to the summit of Mount Olympus and stand above the clouds. And all the while, she would tell him stories of her past—not the tales of bloody vengeance, but the moments of joy and peace and laughter. Those are true too, she reminded herself. I helped women, I danced with my nymphs, I protected my cities. It was not all terrible. How Theo’s eyes would grow wide! He would smile and laugh, and she’d bask in a warmth far kinder than the merciless Mediterranean sun.

Then a faint humming, like a speaker turning on, broke her reverie. She stood and craned her neck toward the vent overhead. “Prometheus?” she called softly. “What is that?”

He didn’t reply. Instead, a familiar voice blared through her cell.

“You are mistaken, Pater.”

“Theo!” She couldn’t help herself from crying out. But an instant later, as the conversation continued, she realized he couldn’t hear her.

“I bear no loyalty to Diana, or Artemis, or whatever you want to call her,” Theo went on, his voice stern. “At first, I didn’t know what she was. And when I found out, she warned me that if I left her, she would kill me. You’ve heard the myths—you know how possessive the gods are. How jealous and petty. So I stayed because I had no choice, and I bided my time, waiting for allies strong enough to help me escape. By capturing her, you made my life a hell of a lot easier. But the others hold me in their thrall now. I’ve got the whole pantheon trying to make me their slave. I need you to help me get rid of them, so I can find my own path. My own salvation.”

Selene sat back down with a thud. She could barely hear the voice of Theo’s interviewer over the pounding of the blood in her ears.

“And you claim to be able to find them. All of them.” That must be the Pater speaking, Selene decided.

“I know their aliases,” Theo said. “I know what they do. Hermes is Dash Mercer, Hollywood movie producer. Apollo is Paul Solson, the musician.”

“We know that.”

“But do you know of the goddess Demeter, living in Peru?”

Another voice came over the speaker. “Our brethren abroad have not spoken of her,” it said softly, as if murmuring to the Pater.

So there are more of them, Selene realized, her heart sinking. Even if they defeated this branch, the cult would survive.

As the Pater urged Theo to continue, Selene could hear the note of excitement in his voice.

“Aphrodite in Paris. Dionysus right here in New York.” Theo kept talking, revealing all the gods’ secrets, until finally, with only a breath of hesitation, he said, “Zeus in his cave in Crete.”

Selene could hear the Pater’s intake of breath.

This must all be part of a plan, she assured herself. Theo didn’t know where my father lives. So my brothers must have told him to reveal the location. Unless Theo’s betraying them in order to save me. Does that make it any more forgivable?

“You’ve taken Selene, but you won’t be able to break her,” Theo continued. “I know what happened to Mars at the end. He slowly went mad until he was resigned to his fate. You probably did the same thing to Hades.”

“A sacrifice must go willingly,” the Pater replied calmly.

“Or it doesn’t carry the same power. Yeah, I know how the old cults worked. So you send the Pretenders hallucinations until they lose the will to live. But Selene thinks herself the Relentless One. She’ll never submit to torture—no matter if it’s nightmares or thumbscrews. But I know all her weaknesses. I can get her to crumble.”

“Go on.”

“She’s scared.”

“The all-powerful Olympian?” The Pater’s voice carried the barest hint of amusement.

“She’s not all-powerful anymore. She’s supposed to be so fierce. The Stormy One. The Untamed. But inside she’s still a little girl. Afraid of growing old. Afraid of looking weak. She’s as scared of being unloved as she is of being loved. So for all the hold she has on me, she’s still vulnerable.”

He must be trying to infiltrate the cult, she reminded herself, so he’ll say anything. But in her heart, she knew that if he could imagine such horrible things to say, at some point, he must have considered them. Awful, dangerous, disrespectful things. Selene searched for her old accustomed fury, but found only despair. She had said terrible things to him—should she be surprised that he could say terrible things in return? Things that, for all their viciousness, bore the ring of truth?

“She’s even scared of her own body.”

Selene put her hands over her ears, but the speaker’s volume only increased. They’re watching me, she realized. She put down her hands and squared her shoulders. They wanted her to grow weak and afraid—she refused to give them the satisfaction.

Theo’s voice continued, merciless. “I try to touch her and she flinches away even as her flesh cries out for mine. She’s the ultimate prude. Wanting to be fucked and hating to be touched all at the same time. She’s completely neurotic, unfriendly, and so egotistical that she can’t imagine that I would ever betray her. It makes her an easy target.”

Selene wished for a vision, no matter how devastating, to take her away from this moment. But for once, she remained rooted to the present, listening to Theo rip their relationship to shreds.

The Pater Patrum raised an arm, silhouetted in the firelight, and beckoned Theo closer. As he approached, the female syndexios at his side backed farther into the shadows. Theo could just make out the leather mask she wore—a hyena with a toothy grin. Beaten gold covered the Pater’s entire face, like the death mask of some ancient Mycenaean king. Thick white hair hung to his shoulders and arthritis swelled his knuckles, but he sat with a king’s poise.

“Theodore. You cannot progress any farther without initiation into the Host.”

Theo nodded. “If that’s what it takes to be free of the Pretenders, then sign me up.”

“Yet you know almost nothing about us.”

“I’ve done a fair bit of research—”

He held up a hand. “You know nothing. As such, you may only be initiated as a syndexios of the lowest rank, where you will not be privy to our secrets. We risk little by allowing you this far. You risk all.”

All? He’d barely formed the thought before the Pater spoke again.

“If we find you false, you will be killed. No more mercy will be shown to you than was shown to the Pretenders Mars and Hades. And be assured, if they, who survived for so many millennia, could not escape the arm of our justice, then you will not either.”

Theo swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. He’d gotten this far, but he had little faith in Flint’s plan. To make matters worse, he’d have to get deep enough into the cult to learn its motives and methods. The way the Pater was speaking, he doubted he’d make it that far before they saw right through him.

“Now we will see how genuine your desire to help us is.” The Pater stood and moved toward the fireplace. Only then did Theo notice the metal rods hanging from the mantel. Not a shovel and poker like you might see in a cozy hearth, but a row of seven instruments, each topped by a different wrought iron design. Too late, Theo realized the planetary symbols the syndexioi bore weren’t tattoos at all. He tried not to let the panic show on his face. He failed.

The Pater’s laugh scraped like metal on metal. “Did you think this little talk would be the end of your initiation, not the beginning?” He picked up the leftmost branding iron, lifting it so Theo could see the symbol at the bottom: Mercury. “I told you that you knew nothing of our ways. This is only the first step—the initiation into our humblest rank: the Corvus. A way to weed out those who aren’t serious. Trust me, when we are done with you, you’ll think this is the easiest part.”