As the fiacre approached the Asylum, Jerame saw the huddle of figures gathered on the riverbank.
‘Dear Goddess, no. Please, no!’
The fiacre drew to a halt in front of the Asylum, the wheels sending up a spray of gravel.
‘Wait here!’
He tried to run but his legs had lost their strength; he seemed to be wading through water, not air.
As he approached, one by one, they drew aside revealing the drowned girl lying on the bank.
‘Orial,’ he said brokenly.
Dropping to his knees beside her, he fumbled for a pulse, listened for a breath. His hands shook so much he could hardly control them.
Tartarus put one hand on his shoulder. He was drenched to the skin, trembling with cold.
‘I’m sorry, Jerame. It’s too late.’
‘There’s still a faint pulse, I can feel it –’
‘I tried everything. I emptied the water from her, I breathed air into her mouth – nothing works.’
‘No, no, I’m sure – look!’ He cradled her limp body in his arms. ‘She’s just cold. Cold and wet. She’ll revive. She’ll be all right once I get her home. I’ll make her warm and dry.’
He picked her up and went slowly back towards the waiting cab, staggering under the drowned weight of her body.
Amaru Khassian the unbeliever stared at the Rose.
In the few hours since he had first seen it, the single flower had swelled from bud to bloom. Now it trembled on the brink of unfurling its petals, petals that were crimson, dark blood-crimson.
The Rose that sprang from the breast of the dead Poet-Prophet Mhir had been red as heart’s blood. And the Blood of the Rose had brought the dying Elesstar, Elesstar the Beloved, back to life.
Why was he – the cynic, the unbeliever – the one to discover this mystery?
And why here, why in Sulien?
Sulien was a place where ancient beliefs and customs persisted, where past and present mingled inextricably. A place beyond time.
Anything might happen here.
If the Rose could bring Elesstar back from the dead, could it also restore a fractured mind?
Could it heal Orial?
Khassian ran across the river towards Pump Street and the Sanatorium, tugging at the bell-pull as best he could with both hands.
Cook answered the door. Her eyes looked red and raw, her lined cheeks were wet with tears.
‘Orial!’ Khassian said between gasps for breath. ‘I must see her.’
‘You c-can’t see her now, sieur.’
‘Can’t see her?’ Something was wrong, terribly wrong, Khassian could sense it.
‘Oh, sieur, she’s – she’s dead. Drowned.’ Cook shook her head, one hand covering her mouth as though to hold back her sobs.
Dead.
The air went dark.
‘Oh no, no…’ Khassian felt as if he was falling from a great height into blackness. ‘She can’t be dead!’
‘She’s gone, sieur. There’s nothing anyone can do. He’s laid her in the treatment room – but now he won’t let anyone near. I’m afraid – afraid he may do himself some mischief.’
Too late.
‘No!’ Khassian howled aloud.
A strange and aromatic fragrance drifted through the neglected cemetery; a rich, dark scent redolent of musk roses and incense.
The Rose had opened.
Its crimson petals had the velvet bloom of black grapes; as Khassian came slowly, wonderingly, closer, the scent grew stronger, potent as red wine.
And there, at the heart of the Rose, glistening in the dappled evening light, drops of dark moisture, redder than heart’s blood.
He knelt beside the grave and reached out to pluck the Rose.
The Rose was not to be plucked.
The black thorns pricked his hands, tearing the burned flesh. Pain flared through his fingers, bright as fire. He gritted his teeth against the pain. He must endure this for Orial’s sake.
The stem suddenly snapped and he found himself holding the precious flower head in his cupped hands.
The door to the Sanatorium was open.
Khassian, carrying the precious Rose, walked in unchallenged.
Dame Tradescar and Cook stood at the doorway to Dr Magelonne’s office. When they saw Khassian, they drew aside to let him pass.
Khassian went in – and then, seeing what lay within, faltered.
Orial’s body lay on the couch, riverwater still dripping on to the floor from her wet hair, her trailing fingers. Jerame Magelonne knelt at the foot of the couch, his face buried in the folds of her gown.
It was not the pallor of her skin that terrified Khassian but the absence of movement. She who had been so vibrant in life now lay still, silent.
Jerame Magelonne raised his head from the couch and stared at Khassian with eyes that burned dark with hatred.
‘What are you doing here? You have no right.’
‘Let the boy pay his respects,’ said Cook.
Khassian came slowly forward. The Rose burned his bleeding fingers – but its musky perfume filled the room, darkly heady as rare Enhirran spices.
Jerame sprang up, placing himself between the couch and Khassian.
‘Keep away from her! Don’t touch her!’
Jolaine Tradescar went to Jerame, catching hold of him by the arm.
‘Leave the boy alone. Let him do what he has come to do!’
Khassian drew closer.
Her mouth gaped slightly open.
Khassian held the soft petals until they brushed her grey lips and watched as the dark roseblood seeped between them.
A dark column of rose-red smoke swirled up, enveloping Orial and Khassian in a cloud of fragrance – and in the heart of the smoke burned a searing, cleansing shaft of flame.
Cradled in darkness, she has lain here lulled by the lapping waters. How long? Time has no meaning.
A bolt of gold suddenly penetrates the darkness, dazzling sun-splinters shiver off into the waters like firesparks.
A splinter of light pierces her eyes.
Daylight.
A splinter pierces her heart. A blaze of sun lights her breast, a pain so vivid it burns white across her darkened vision.
Awake.
Alive.
Khassian opened his eyes.
Everyone was cowering away, their eyes covered, as if to shield them against a light too bright to endure.
The Rose in his hands was burned to ashes.
And sitting up, staring dazedly around her through her strands of wet hair – was Orial Magelonne.
‘Illustre?’ she said, gazing questioningly into his eyes.
‘Orial.’ He reached out to her… and the rosedust fell between his fingers and drifted to the floor.
Tremblingly she raised her hands towards his – and he felt her fingers enfold his.
‘Orial,’ he repeated. He could find no words to express his feeling of wonder, could only repeat her name, over and over again.
She raised one hand to touch his cheek.
‘Goddess save us,’ Cook cried in a faint voice. ‘She’s alive!’
The Priestess set out from the Temple in a black sedan chair, carried by acolytes.
Passers-by stopped to watch the bizarre procession winding its way towards Dr Magelonne’s Sanatorium; the curious followed in its wake and soon a small crowd had gathered in Pump Street.
The black chair meant only one thing: a death.
The Priestess descended from the chair and entered the Sanatorium. Her head was covered in black veils so that none should see her face.
News travels fast in Sulien. A journalist from the Sulien Chronicle sketched in a headline: ‘Eminent Doctor Bereaved a Second Time in Drowning Tragedy’ and, grabbing his notebook, hurried to the Sanatorium to get the details.
I must be dreaming.
Jerame pinched his arm, deliberately taking a fold of skin between finger and thumb, twisting until he winced. The pain was real enough. Unless he was dreaming he was pinching himself. What he was witnessing negated everything in his training as a student of science, a student of medicine. It could not be.
She had been dead. Her heart had ceased to beat. And now she was alive, colour tinged her pale cheeks, she moved, she spoke.
‘Orial –’ he faltered.
She turned to him. ‘Oh, Papa.’
She knew him.
Khassian stood dazedly watching as Orial was smothered in the kisses and embraces of her family.
Jolaine Tradescar turned to him, her eyes moist with tears.
‘My boy, my boy!’ she cried, flung her arms about Khassian and hugged him. ‘You did it! You saved her!’
‘No,’ said Khassian shakily. He had been seared by holy fire. Shivers of heat from the burning Rose still flickered through his body, fierce as fever chills, intense as the dying pangs of ecstasy. ‘It was the Rose.’
Orial gazed at the well-loved faces gathered about her bed: Papa, Cook, Jolaine, Sister Crespine.
‘I have to go to the Temple,’ she said. ‘I know what has to be done.’
‘All in good time,’ said Papa, squeezing her hand. ‘When you’re well.’
‘You don’t understand. I have to go. It is not yet finished.’
‘You called me here to arrange a funeral, Jerame Magelonne, to minister to the dead. What does this mean?’
The Priestess stood in the doorway, swathed in her veils, dark as thunderclouds.
There was silence as the Magelonne household looked at each other in confusion. Then Cook found her voice.
‘A miracle,’ she said. ‘She was drowned. Dead. And the Rose brought her back to life. I never saw such a thing, not in all my born days.’
The Priestess came to Orial’s bedside and, to her astonishment, knelt beside her.
‘You stand between life and death. You are the one.’
‘I am?’ Orial’s eyes closed, letting her mind drift back towards the far bournes of consciousness.
‘You are the first since the fall of Sulien to come through the dark waters.’ The Priestess took hold of her hand, pressing it.
‘I hear them still,’ whispered Orial.
The sombre spirit-threnody still filled her mind. But now she understood, now she knew what she must do.
Once there had been other Lifhendil to spin the intricacies of the spirit-song that would summon the Eä-Endil. Now she was the only one of her kind. Only an exceptionally gifted musician could begin to match her Lifhendil skills…
Orial opened her eyes.
‘I can’t do it alone,’ she said. ‘I need Khassian.’
She saw him, pale and drawn with tiredness, amongst the watchers crowding in the doorway.
‘Amaru,’ she said, ‘we have to sing. We have to spin the song they taught me. It’s the key. It will make all right again. The music will set them free.’