Chapter Thirty
Kathleen stood in the vast and vaulted chamber which had once been the ancient Temple of the Great Serpent. Ever since she had conceived the idea of coming here, she had heard the ominous pounding of a great heart thumping in her ears, and it had seemed to call her to this place despite whatever fears she professed. She had been shocked to see the library newly-restored, but Barrett's notes had not told her very much that she didn't already know. Indeed, what didn't she know about the temple? After all, hadn't she been its honoured guest in another life?
"So, why am I here?" she had asked the empty shelves and cabinets.
"To see the power that can be yours if you reach out and take it," said the voice of Jacques Eloi Des Mondes, or perhaps it was her imagination. "I think you'll find your way to the temple cleared of all obstructions." So, pausing here no longer, she had stood up from her reading and had followed the heartbeat's inexorable and insistent tug at her soul which led her, little by little, down the stairs from the great hall and into the dreaded crypt.
Now, as the walls of ancient stone covered with eldritch and fantastic paintings surrounded her, she compared this latest journey into the depths of the house with the three other times she had gone down those stairs and through that archway. The first time, it had been Julia who had led her there, (Julia who was really Erica, she reminded herself now,) and she had been shocked that someone might want to sleep in such a horrible place. Then, she and Julia had again come down the stairs, hoping to put an end to the portrait of Jacques Eloi Des Mondes. Together, they had just managed to move the cryo-capsule on top of the painting, but that had been to no avail. Then just this morning--or perhaps yesterday morning by now, she thought--Vangie had stood with her by the side of the bed of Julia's sleeping body and she had felt the Conjure Woman's hand in hers chilled to the bone. She would have done anything to help Vangie then, but only a little while later, she had begun to see the truth, the truth that now lay in her mind as an unyielding and solid fact. Vangie was a liar, and she felt certain now that she meant to use her as she had used her former self. Perhaps she would not kill her this time, but she was not the kind and caring woman whom Kathleen had loved just a few short hours before. She was an enigma, an unknown variable which had to be dealt with.
At the bottom of the stairs, she had peered through the archway, and the beam of her flashlight had shown her a large pile of rubble which had been moved from its habitual place and a door which she had never seen before standing open and seeming to beckon her to enter. She had paused for a moment, uncertain of what would happen to her, but then she felt what she had come to regard as the heart of the temple compelling her forward, and as soon as she had entered the tunnel on the other side of the previously-hidden door, she had heard that door close with a bang and something heavy thump against it.
"No way back," she had said to herself, so she had followed the tunnel until it had opened out into this strange and secret place.
The walls were still intact, but in the beam of her flashlight, Kathleen could see that all else in the temple had been destroyed or defiled. The lustrous stone serpent she had seen in her visions lay shattered pell-mell across the floor, blurring the phantasmagoric paintings which covered the tiles with a film of green dust and broken shards, while the blood-basin, that dreaded thing which had risen before her like a death-doom--was it only since this morning?--lay overturned in the dust as if it had been no more than a milk-pitcher on a breakfast-table.
"There is no power for the Conjure Woman here," she said, smiling to herself. "Still, there's power for me, of that I'm sure."
She looked again at the altar, and in lurid crimson which looked uncannily like fresh blood, there was a strange sign written. She had never seen anything like it before, but she recalled Erica's spirit mentioning something about a mark when she and Vangie had questioned her that morning. Could this be that mark? What did it mean? It looked almost like a tree with a curly tail, and there wasn't anything terribly evil-looking about it, and yet she felt certain that the heartbeat was connected to it somehow.
"Is this the source of the power then, this sign?"
"It is more than you might think at first glance," said a voice near her. She thought she recognized it, but it took her a moment to realize that when she had heard it last, it had been speaking French."
"Madame Raxl?" She found herself using the title that the servant-girl Sophie had used in her vision.
"So," said the voice coldly, "you know yourself at last, do you? Then you must know what the Conjure Man's daughter did to you in a former life."
"I do, and I am afraid that she might do it again."
"And so you seek power to match hers?"
"Yes, Madame."
"Very well. Concentrate on the sign on the altar and open your mind. The power will come to you and you will be able to use it as you will. But first, tell me what exactly you wish to do?"
"I wish," said Kathleen, rapidly becoming transfixed by the scarlet sign in front of her, "to save my friend Julia Desmond and the priest Stephen Dawson from the evil that surrounds them."
"And if that means killing the Conjure Woman?"
"I'll do it!"
"Good! Now, turn off that light and light the candles, and concentrate!"
The mark seemed to twist and writhe before her eyes in the flickering light from the tall candles that surrounded the altar and which she had lit with the matches she habitually carried in her pocket. She found herself kneeling before the altar, almost in an attitude of prayer, and the heartbeat continued to pound and throb in her ears, and then suddenly, with no warning, she felt a surge of power entering her body. It was like the night in the cabin of the Conjure Woman, but, she thought, this was different somehow. It took her a while to figure out how, but when she did, she smiled to herself.
"There, Vangie was only feeding me what she felt I should have," she said. "Now, I can take all that I need for myself," and with that, she rose to her feet in a single and fluid motion, and allowed the power to flow into her and to expand her soul and her mind. She suddenly found the walls of the temple growing transparent. She could see Stephen and Vangie toiling down the cliffs with a bundle in their arms which must be the body of Professor Barrett. Even now, a part of her mind wished she was with them, but she allowed that thought to be moved aside by the power which was now suffusing her and filling her with strength and assurance.
Then, as she stood there, she felt a wind begin to rise, causing the candle-flames to dance and caper over the paintings which now looked puny and primitive to her newly-opened eyes. There had never been any real power in this place, she now realized, only a tribal people's superstitious faith. The only true power was what she was now tasting, and she intended to feast on it for as long as she could. Around her, the wind gathered and grew, and soon, she knew herself to be more than a mere human. She could, if she wanted, pass through the very walls and find the Conjure Woman and destroy her, but she knew that it would be better for Vangie to witness the destruction of the temple where she had thought to find power for herself. So, in a voice which was not her own and which she felt certain could pierce the barriers of time and space, she began to speak:
"I call now to the Conjure Woman! Come now, self-styled Regent of the Realm Beyond Time, and meet the doom prepared for you! Your power may be great, but it cannot stand against mine! Come now and be tested! Too long have you escaped the prophecy that you yourself made long ago! Now is the time to face it! Come, if you dare!"
Faintly, and seeming to come from an infinite distance, she heard the voice of the woman she had summoned. It sounded very small to her where she stood in the wind of the power that was now hers, and it spoke words of warning and dismay:
"No, Kat! Don't do it!" and even now, a part of her mind responded to this with love and sorrow. Still, the power was hers now, and she had no intention of giving it up. She wants to limit me, she thought. She doesn't care about me at all. She just wants a disciple to worship her and to look up to her, so of course she doesn't want me to have access to this power. Well, it's too late now. I've gone beyond her, and she stood there, wind whirling around her, and waited till her summons was answered.
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