I awoke with a start. Sunlight gleamed beyond the open window. Morning had arrived. Had I fallen asleep during the hallucination? Apparently so, since my towel still hung lose around my body. And what a sleep. Again, the dream had seemed so real. As if I were there, experiencing what she was experiencing. Even the sex. As if I were there. Which was unsettling, to say the least.
I sat up on the side of the bed and allowed my head to clear. Like the two times before the images faded fast, lingering only a few moments, like smoke from a fire. Their fleetingness made me question their reality. But there was no denying that the potion in that glass bottle had power.
And now two names were stuck in my head.
Sir Helians of Gormet and Morgan le Fay.
I forced my mind to calm.
Last night I’d brought Nicodème’s laptop upstairs with me. I reached for the machine and opened to a search engine, typing in the two names.
Morgan le Fay possessed an uncertain past, most likely from Welsh mythology, a Celtic goddess figure. She rose to fame as the invention of Sir Thomas Malory in his Le Morte d’Arthur as one of the half-sisters of King Arthur. An apprentice to Merlin and a redoubtable adversary to the Knights of the Round Table, she was fiercely independent and sexually voracious. She became Queen Guinevere’s lady in waiting and fell in love with Arthur’s nephew. Guinevere put an end to the romance and, as a result, she eventually betrayed the queen’s affair with Lancelot to Arthur. Overall, she seemed a fairly wicked, conniving character with few redeeming social values, her personality darkening each time the Arthurian legend was retold. She was usually cast as a healer, villain, enchantress, seductress, or a combination thereof. In modern times feminists had adopted her as a symbol of power, choosing to cast her as a benevolent figure with extraordinary abilities.
Helians of Gormet seemed much more mysterious, with little to nothing noted about him except that the various poets who retold the Arthurian legend liked to cast him as one of Morgan’s countless lovers.
What in the world was happening?
Never had I read Le Morte d’Arthur or any of its many variations. Clearly Morgan le Fay wasn’t real. Just part of a legend. Of course, the debate had raged for centuries. Had Malory simply made the entire tale up? Every detail in his story fiction? Or had he adapted actual stories that had existed for years prior to the mid-15th century, when his book first appeared?
Nobody knew.
I showered and found an overnight bag waiting outside the door. Thank goodness. My people had come through. I dressed and located Nicodème downstairs in the kitchen. Over coffee and fresh croissants from the local baker, he told me he’d checked with the hospital but no one matching Antoine’s description had ever been admitted.
Which was troubling.
We explored the various possibilities but got nowhere. His disappointment at losing the Sabbat Box seemed almost as great as his concern over Antoine’s disappearance.
“Are you still willing to track down both the box and Antoine?” he asked.
I nodded.
But first it was time to come clean.
I told him about the glass bottle and the three visions.
“Why didn’t you tell me this yesterday?” he asked.
“I’m not sure. Maybe I wanted to explore them further first. Now I know. They weren’t dreams. I wasn’t an observer. I was there, as someone else.”
He smiled. “Not someone else, Cassiopeia. They were past life memories. Your memories, released. That bottle does exactly what the legends claim. It opens a door in your mind.”
Which was hard for me to accept since I don’t believe in reincarnation.
“You do realize,” he said, “that your fascination with medieval times and your desire to rebuild a castle stems from a past life experience.”
I’d never considered that possibility. But I’d also never quite understood my obsession with the project either. Especially considering the millions of euros it cost.
“I want to know more about that formula,” I said. “I want to know if and how it’s causing those hallucinations.”
“Then that’s where you should start. Go and see my cousin in Paris and ask her what she discovered. She can explain it far better than I. But I can call Claude at the auction house and have him meet with you too.”
“And the glass bottle?”
“Take it with you.”
I climbed the stairs back to my room and gathered my things. When I descended, ready to go, Nicodème met me at the door with a brown paper bag. “A baguette with Camembert and ham. For the train ride from Nice to Paris.”
I smiled, appreciative of his efforts.
“Stay safe,” he told me.
* * *
It was seven p.m. when I arrived in Paris.
The Montalembert was a boutique hotel on the Left Bank housed in a lovely 1926 building, just off St. Germain des Prés. I often stayed there not only for its old-world ambiance, but modern functionality. I texted Cotton from Nicodème’s phone to let him know how to find me, but he didn’t answer. After a light supper from room service, I watched an old black and white movie and was about to go to sleep when a gentle beep interrupted the silence. Cotton replying? I read the phone’s screen alert and was shocked.
Called the shop and Nicodème provided this number. I’m in Paris. Antoine.
I replied and told him we should meet.
Not yet. Soon.
I debated what to do, but decided I had no choice. He was calling the shots. I glanced at the stoppered bottle lying on the dresser, debating whether to again allow an intrusion.
No. Not tonight.
So I slept.
Without dreaming.