This is the moment in the movie when the villain laughs maniacally and says, “Did you really think we would brand someone as unworthy as you?” and puts down the red-hot poker. Or a messenger bursts in and distracts the Big Bad by saying, “Sir! Someone’s breaking into our secret lair!” and he puts down the red-hot poker. Or the consiglieri whispers into the evil genius’s ear and he turns to the hero and says, “Dominic’s correct—we will wait until the time is right,” and then he PUTS DOWN THE RED-HOT POKER.
But the poker just kept coming.
The pain burned so hot it felt like ice.
Worse was the sound. A sizzle like bacon. Then the smell of cooking flesh. They’d given Theo a leather strap to put between his teeth—he nearly bit through it as he stifled the screech that climbed up his throat. Then the Pater removed the iron, and the pain dissipated.
Theo looked down at the wound in the center of his bare chest. An upside-down Mercury symbol, the size of a man’s hand. He’d thought it’d be red with blood, or black like charred barbecue. Instead, it gleamed pale yellow, edged with white. His flesh wasn’t burned—it was just gone. Until that moment, he realized, he’d secretly held on to a child’s conception of his own body, imagining somehow that he wasn’t just muscle and tissue, but rather some glowing essence. But here lay the truth: nothing under the skin but a thin layer of yellow fat that melted and sizzled just like any other meat.
He tore his eyes away from the burn. The Hyaena removed the leather strap from his mouth. Her hands, he noticed, were veined and calloused like those of an older woman. He saw no brand on her wrist or neck. The Pater’s mark, if indeed he bore one, was similarly concealed. The woman placed a gauze bandage over the brand.
“Until your ordeal is complete,” the Pater explained, “the brand remains simply a wound. Only once you’ve finished your initiation into the rank will we color it.”
“My ordeal?” Theo couldn’t help asking.
“Didn’t your ‘research’ mention the ordeal pit?”
“Pit?” He could do little more than repeat the words, hoping he’d heard wrong.
“The Host is an order of soldiers, and has been for nearly two thousand years. To become a syndexios you must prove that you can withstand whatever pain the battle brings.”
The battle? Theo nearly parroted. But he kept his jaw clenched shut. Whatever happened from here on out would be beyond his control.
The door to the Pater’s chambers opened behind him. A Roman legionary stood waiting to escort him out. He wore a gilded helmet, complete with an armored face mask and red horsehair crest. His leather breastplate rippled with carven muscles. Beneath a short, pleated skirt, his thick legs shone with oil. The mask bore an uncanny resemblance to the god he’d seen laid out on the banquet table at the Rainbow Room. Not in its features—the mask was an exaggerated visage with an overlarge jaw and a slash of brows—but in the eyes. They’d been painted onto the mask, steely gray, flat, and dead.
The Pater spoke. “This is our Miles Primus,” he said, drawing out the first syllable—Mee-lais—as if savoring the Latin word for “soldier.” “Someday, you may ascend to his rank. But only if you survive this one.” He turned to the legionary. “Take our new Corvus to the Templo.”
The Miles gestured curtly for Theo to follow him into the hallway.
“You’ve got quite the revealing uniform,” Theo commented. He knew the only way to combat his escalating terror was to pretend he felt no fear at all. If they weren’t going to give him a mask like everyone else in this place, he’d make his own out of humor. “The leather muscles were very hip in the second century AD.”
The soldier didn’t react. His thigh alone was as big around as Theo’s waist. Did they make him a Miles because of his physique, or did he get the physique after he became a Miles? These were mortals—surely their ranks had no supernatural effect on their appearance—but he wasn’t ruling anything out. Maybe I’m about to start cawing and flapping my wings like Corvus the Crow. Unlikely, he decided. I probably won’t survive long enough for any sort of interesting metamorphosis. Just plain old Theo Schultz, lanky and nearsighted and distractible, meeting his untimely end at the hands of another homicidal—or should I say deicidal?—Mystery Cult. Awesome.
A few steps down the hallway, the Miles came to a sharp halt. He finally spoke, his voice as deep and stern as would be expected from his rank. “It’s time.”
“Time for dinner?” Theo said hopefully. “Time for a bath? ’Cause let me tell you—”
“Remove your clothing.”
“Ah, the bath then.”
“Remove it now.”
“I’d rather not.”
“Then fail the ordeal.”
“Right.” He didn’t have a good comeback for that one. The Miles simply stood silently. Waiting.
Theo kicked off his shoes then peeled off the rest of his clothing. He stood naked, resisting the urge to cover his dick like some medieval Adam. This was an all-male cult, after all, with the exception of the Hyaena woman. It seemed like the kind of place where men would walk around loud and proud. “So do I get a ceremonial robe or something?” He tried not to sound too hopeful. “Maybe something in a soft terrycloth?”
The Miles just turned and continued his progress down the hall. Theo took a deep breath, squared his shoulders, and followed. Thankfully, the hallway stood empty. He tried to ignore the way his balls had retreated in the chill air—he expected them to disappear completely at any moment.
The Miles stopped at the end of the hall, where a large round portal with an iron knob in the center signaled a chamber of some import. The mithraic sanctuary, Theo thought, his heart picking up speed. But he refused to look scared before this lunk in a helmet.
“Very Lord of the Rings,” he observed, nodding at the circular door. “I feel like I’m entering a hobbit hole.”
At that, the Miles shot him a stare, his anger evident despite the mask. “I will inform the Pater that you make a mockery of the rite.”
“No, no, just a nervous tic,” Theo replied hastily. “I tend to crack jokes at the most inappropriate times. Like a teenager giggling through a drunk driving video. See, there I go again.”
“You have a mouth like a leaky faucet. Drip-drip-drip-drip-drip.” The words conjured an image of blood, slowly dripping from a slit throat.
That finally shut Theo up.
The Miles continued in a monotone. “Once your meditation is complete, I will return to take you inside the ordeal pit. There, we speak only Latin. We train many years to speak the holy tongue. The Pater Patrum must believe you able, or he would not allow you to enter.”
“I’ve got a Ph.D. in classical languages, so carpe linguam Latinam.” He spitefully tried to recall all the Latin puns he’d ever learned.
“We will see what happens in the midst of the ordeal.”
“Ah. So if I start cursing in English …”
“You fail.”
“And if I fail …”
“No one can be allowed to know the secrets who is not an initiate.”
“In other words …”
The Miles just stared at him with his flat painted eyes.
“I see.” He pushed his glasses more firmly up his nose, wishing they were held on with one of those elastic headbands like a 1970s NBA player so that when the lion jumped out at him—or whatever monster inhabited the “ordeal pit”—he’d be able to see it coming.
“For now, inside the Templo, you will sit in silence, meditating on the images that are revealed to you. Do not speak.”
Theo opened his mouth—
“I said, do not speak. It seems that may be the hardest ordeal of all for you.”
Theo stifled a snarky retort only because he didn’t want to prove the Miles right.
The round door swung open to reveal a long, stone chamber with a low, vaulted roof. It looked very much like the mithraea Theo’d seen in his research. The Miles led him down the narrow central aisle. To either side, a wide stone ledge ran the length of the chamber, providing a place for the syndexioi to recline during the cult’s feasts. Detailed frescoes covered the walls in bright hues. The ceiling above dripped with small plaster stalactites, giving it the appearance of a cave.
Like most mithraea, the chamber was fairly small. He doubted more than twenty men would fit along the room’s ledges. That meant the cult’s forces, though well armed, might be small enough that three Athanatoi could defeat them—especially if they had Captain Hansen’s Counterterrorism task force as backup.
At the end of the aisle stood a small rectangular altar decorated with carved reliefs. Behind it sat an elevated chair for the Pater. But the central image of the temple was the tauroctony itself. A large marble statue, twice the height of a man, that glowed in a beam of artificial sun pouring through a “skylight” above.
The bull lay with his legs curled beneath him and his neck thrown back. Mithras, one foot upon the bull’s back hoof and the other knee bent upon its back, held the animal’s nostrils in one hand and a knife in the other. Like the statues in antiquity, this one was painted in bright colors. From the wound in the bull’s throat, red blood drops streamed down its neck. A wiry brown hound and a thick green serpent each pressed their tongues to the blood. An ochre scorpion scuttled at the bull’s side. A black crow perched upon its back.
It was all just as Theo had expected—except for Mithras himself. No Phrygian cap covered his head. Instead, he wore the rayed crown of Sol Invictus, made not of marble but of hammered gold. His face, too, was gilded, as were his hands. He was the Sun incarnate, glowing so brightly Theo had to squint. From the god’s back hung a cloak painted cinnabar red, its brilliant blue lining spangled with stars, as if Mithras, like Atlas, bore the solar system on his shoulders.
“On your knees, initiate,” the Miles ordered. “I will return when you’ve finished contemplating the glory of the God.”
Theo found himself alone, his bare knees sore from the stone floor after only a few seconds. He folded his hands across his lap and tried to look pious. Okay, he decided, this is the calm before the storm. A chance to prepare for the ordeal ahead. He felt like an idiot college student, walking into a final exam, knowing for sure that he should’ve studied a damn sight harder. He wished he’d had just another few hours to review the research on Mithraism. Instead, he had only the mithraeum itself to teach him more about the cult he’d just joined.
He looked at the frescos. The figures processing down the wall must be syndexioi, ordered according to rank. On the back of the right-hand wall stood a man with a black crow’s head, carrying a caduceus: the Corvus. The familiar symbol of the planet Mercury floated above his head. Before him strode a veiled man beneath the hand mirror symbol of Venus. He wore a diadem on his brow, and looked like a Roman virgin bride. Let’s hope I’m never elevated to that particular rank, Theo thought with a shudder, imagining what duties the bride might perform for the other initiates. Next came the familiar Miles, the Soldier, walking below the symbol of Mars.
The left wall bore paintings of three other types of syndexioi—clearly the higher ranks. At the back of the procession walked a man in a lion-head mask. The thunderbolt in his hand indicated he was under the protection of Jupiter/Zeus, the Sky God.
In front of the lion-man was a figure with a Phrygian cap and a curved sword. A Persian, or Perses. His tutelary planet was not a planet at all, but the moon. Selene would appreciate that she gets a higher rank than her father, he thought. But she might bridle over the fact that her twin brother was even higher still.
The next man in line stood beneath the symbol of the sun. He wore red robes and a rayed crown, not unlike that adorning the head of the Mithras statue, and carried a whip in one hand. That must be the Sun-Runner, Theo decided. The rank for whom the “Procession of the Heliodromus” was named.
The Hyaena did not appear anywhere in the fresco. Six ranks depicted in all, corresponding to six of the seven heavenly bodies, and to the celestial spheres theorized by Plato. As initiates climbed from rank to rank, they likely learned more of the cult’s secrets and, supposedly, moved closer to ultimate salvation. A bit like a first-century version of Scientology, Theo reflected.
One other figure was missing—the seventh rank, the seventh celestial body. Theo finally found his image on the altar itself, holding a sickle just like the one Saturn used to slice the balls off his father Uranus in the Roman creation myth. Strange, Theo thought, that Saturn, rather than mighty Jupiter, protects the Mithraists’ most revered leader. Then again, the Romans always had a thing for Saturn, an indigenous agricultural god whom they’d syncretized with the Greek Kronos. They’d stored their treasury beneath his temple in the Roman Forum and considered the winter Saturnalia one of their most important feasts—another reason the December timing made sense for the Mithraists’ rituals. Still, Theo couldn’t quite make sense of any of it. And considering scholars have been trying to figure out this cult for over a thousand years and still have no idea what went on, I probably never will either.
Theo wasn’t sure how long he knelt in the mithraeum. He only knew that he expected his knees to start bleeding at any moment. When the Miles finally returned, Theo welcomed it. Whatever ordeal awaited, it had to be better than the torture of anticipation.
He tried to school his face into a solemn mask, lest he be faulted again for not correctly revering the god. The Miles led him past the altar and the Pater’s seat, through a small door behind the tauroctony.
The large circular chamber they entered dwarfed the mithraeum. Torches hung in brackets along the wall, casting flickering shadows around the room. A round pit, at least ten feet deep, dominated the center. Surrounding it stood the syndexioi, each in the garb of his rank, their faces concealed behind a variety of masks. Two members of each of the five higher ranks were present, but only one veiled man and a single crow-headed Corvus. Two men had died on Governors Island, he knew, which explained the gaps. Glad I could help shore up the ranks, he thought grimly.
The higher ranks stood on the far side of the pit, and Theo could only dimly make out the two figures in their lion masks and the Persae with their Phrygian caps. The two Heliodromi, however, were hard to miss in their bright red robes, matching silk masks, and rayed crowns. One held a torch upright. The other held one facing downward.
Between them stood the Pater Patrum. The firelight illuminated the old man in the gold mask so that Theo noticed his clothes for the first time. He was clad in a white, long-sleeved tunic with red piping, baggy Persian trousers like those worn by Mithras, and a long red cloak. Sort of M.C. Hammer meets Magneto, Theo decided with a desperate attempt at levity.
The Miles at Theo’s side escorted him to the edge of the pit. Around him, the syndexioi stood in silence. As he put a foot on the first rung of the ladder, a waft of cold air circulated up from the pit to shrink his testicles still further. Then his mind momentarily went blank with terror, and he found himself standing in the center of the empty pit, the ladder pulled up to the rim, removing his only means of escape.
The slick stone walls around him reached far overhead—even Selene would’ve been hard pressed to scale them. At the thought of her, Theo felt a rush of adrenaline through his veins. She’d once told him that at the height of her powers, she could hear the prayers of the faithful as they entreated her for aid. Worth a shot, he decided.
I sing of Artemis, Protector of the Innocent.
I sing of She Who Helps One Climb Out.
Hear my prayer, Good Maiden, and lend your mighty arm in my moment of need.
It would’ve been better in Greek, but he was having a hard enough time getting his terrified brain to remember Latin. And this is before anything enters the pit. Maybe this is all it is—ordeal by anticipation. I stand here awaiting some unknown torture for half an hour, nearly shitting myself, and then they all take off their masks and yell, “Surprise!” and buy me a drink.
Then the flames began.
All around the circumference of the pit, a ring of fire shot six feet into the air. He could feel the waves of heat licking his skin. A voice sounded from beyond the flames. The Pater.
“Corvus per ignem intactus volat. Ita suo deo se probat.”
Somehow, Theo’s churning brain managed to translate the Latin: A crow flies through fire unscathed. Thus does he prove himself before his god.
Wait … did he say … through fire? he wondered belatedly. Only then did he notice the narrow channels in the floor running toward him from the ring of flame like the spokes of a wheel. Even as his eyes traveled their length, the fire poured down the metal paths. Instinctively, he raised his arms to shield his face. He tried to dodge out of the way, but found that the tongues of fire formed a new circle, this one only three feet across, with him at its center. He wondered how much longer he could withstand the blistering heat.
Dimly, he realized that the outer ring of fire and its spokes had vanished; only a single line of flames stood between him and safety. Now the object of the ordeal became clear. Pass through.
He peeked out from behind his arm, but had to close his eyes against the heat. Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, he thought, biting back the English words. Okay, just like passing your finger through a candle flame. The kind of thing a fifth grade boy does to impress the girls. Theo’d always preferred to charm the ladies with an erudite joke or two, but it was never too late to regress. Indian fakirs do this all the time, right? It’s just a mental exercise. Of course, they at least have loincloths.
He kept one arm in front of his face and decided to forgo manly pride and cover his groin with the other. He took a few heaving breaths, not unlike a woman in labor, then sprinted through the flames.
He thought he’d made it through, miraculously unscathed, until he realized his hair was on fire.
“Merda sancta!” he cursed, batting at his head ineffectually. Then water poured down on him from an overhead pipe, a blessed, healing flood that doused the flames instantly. He patted his skull, relieved to find he wasn’t bald. The hair on his arms and legs, however, had all been singed off. But the water’s a good sign, he decided. They don’t actually want me to die.
Except the water didn’t stop. He tried to step out from underneath the deluge, but it tracked him like a follow spot on an opera singer. He could still breathe, barely, if he ducked his head and sucked air. Then he started shivering uncontrollably in the icy torrent. Maybe I’m shaking from shock, he hoped, not hypothermia. He knelt down anyway, clutching his arms around his knees for warmth. Still the water didn’t cease.
He could barely hear the Pater’s voice over the roar. “Auctor luminis … illuminare lumine intelligentiae … dignus gratia Baptismi tui effectus … doctrinam sanctam.” Theo didn’t catch every word—his teeth chattered too loudly—but he heard something about “baptism” and “enlighten him with wisdom.” A pleasant liturgy for a torturous experience.
His shivering slowed. At first, he thought that was a good sign, then he realized it might mean his body had simply stopped fighting. He pushed hard against the torrent to stand up on numb feet and tried to slap some warmth back into his arms and flanks. He reached back to childhood memories of books about the high Arctic. Keep moving, he decided, that’s the key. He did a few jumping jacks, head still bowed beneath the water. Then he tried to jog in place. Next, he resorted to a medley of 1980s dancercise moves, forgoing all dignity in the pursuit of survival. The water only came harder. The gauze ripped off his brand, and the water struck his raw flesh like a hammer.
Baptism, his frozen brain remembered. It’s supposed to be a baptism. The Miles had made it clear the rite required solemnity. Theo sucked in a deep breath, then forced himself to turn his face upward into the pounding water. It slammed against his eyelids and cheeks, it streamed up his nose, but he held out his arms to welcome the cleansing of his sin and stood as still as a crucifix. Even as his lungs screamed for air, he tried to look calm, composed, a willing supplicant. His outstretched arms began to shake with the strain, and he felt the floor beneath his feet tilt as the oxygen left his brain. In another second, he’d have to either bend his head away from the water or pass out.
The water ceased.
He found himself standing in a puddle, with only a few frigid drops falling on his skull like Chinese water torture.
The assembled crowd hadn’t moved. But the Pater nodded his head slowly, as if in grudging approval. Theo tried to look calm and confident, even though he felt like begging for a cup of hot tea and one of those foil emergency blankets.
He dared not trust that the ordeal was over. Good things always come in threes.
Sure enough, a hidden panel in the side of the ring slid open. Now come the lions, Theo decided. Very gladiatorial. If only he had a short sword and net …
Instead, the goddess Diana stepped into the pit.