As they made their way back, the cymbal clashed out eleven beats. There were more strokes every time it called. John imagined that the miners’ intrusion kept troubling something’s slumber and that with every disturbance it was getting closer to waking.
That wasn’t exactly how things felt, though. With dazed passivity once more overtaking him, it was more like the sleeper still slumbered soundly and dreamed a dream that was swallowing him and his companions.
The miners passed a second goddess statue, then a third, and sometime after that, he lost count. John smiled drowsily to imagine all the labor it would have taken for Pascal to defile each and every one of them.
That reflection stirred another. When the thought came into focus, he felt a stab of fear. “Stop!” he said.
Blinking, casting about, the others once again appeared to be waking from befuddlements of their own. “What’s wrong?” Amadour asked.
“The idol Pascal wanted to destroy,” John said, “was the first one we came to. Now, we’re passing others. That means we aren’t really retracing our steps. We’re lost.”
“I thought you were leading us!” said Colm.
“I meant to,” John said. “I paced off distances and noted the turns going in.” Or at least he had at first. He now realized that at some point he’d forgotten the necessity. “But heading back… I don’t know. I suppose I assumed one of you knew the way back and I simply followed along.”
Amadour shook his head. “Something, maybe bad air, is turning us into sleepwalkers.”
“Then when we get back to the mine,” John said, “and fresher air, we’ll be all right.” It would only encourage panic to point out that, whatever else stagnant, poison air could do, it couldn’t strike a cymbal.
“How will we get back?” Colm asked.
“Easily,” John said, squaring his shoulders. Up until now, with his taciturn melancholy, he likely hadn’t inspired a great deal of confidence as a leader, but that needed to change. “If a man in a maze goes right every time he comes to a fork, he inevitably finds his way out.” Somebody had told him that once. He couldn’t remember who, but he hoped it was true.
Once they put his rudimentary plan into practice, he kept hoping to round a corner and spy the opening into the mine or, barring that, a passage free of crowned goddesses. The latter might at least be a sign he and his companions were traveling in the right direction. But in each new tunnel, white faces smiled from out of the murk. Stone lips seemed to quirk as the lantern-shine kissed them.
Still, at least belated anxiety was shielding the miners from stupefying influences lurking in the air or anywhere else. No matter what else befell them, they wouldn’t lose their wits again.
Or so John assured himself. Then the cymbal resumed its clashing and this time didn’t stop after several beats.
Fearing its influence, he placed the looping handle of his lantern around his elbow. The flame inside was uncomfortably hot in proximity to his body, but the repositioning enabled him to use both hands to stop his ears.
That failed to muffle the clashing. Before, he’d never managed to determine in which direction the metallic beats originated. Now he wondered if they arose inside his head as much as any place else.
He was again striding in time to the rhythm. He struggled to alter his pace, but it was difficult. As soon as he shifted his concentration elsewhere, his marching feet resumed the tempo.
He tried stopping, standing still, and the beats tugged at him. He doubted he could resist for long, and besides, pace by pace, Amadour, Pascal, and Colm were striding ahead of him. He couldn’t let them disappear into the dark without him.
He trotted, caught up, and they turned their terrified faces in his direction. “Sing!” he shouted. “Drown it out!”
“Oh splendor of God’s glory bright,” Pascal caterwauled, “Who bringest forth the light from Light—“
Naturally, the pious little tinker had chosen a hymn, and perhaps, in this extremity, he had the right idea. John, Amadour and Colm joined in.
Unfortunately, the hymn didn’t drown out the cymbal, nor, they discovered, could they resist singing in time to the beat. A few lines in, a flute shrilled, its melody unrelated to that of the sacred music and as dominant and corruptive as the metallic rhythm. It made it impossible to stick to the hymn’s original tune, and John struggled to fit the lyrics to the new one.
Not for long, though. New words welled up inside his head, and even though he didn’t understand the language, they supplanted the verses he’d known since childhood.
John strained to stop singing, but his voice proved as recalcitrant as his feet, and then, somehow, understanding flowered. He’d come on Crusade seeking only peace, but more was possible. Cybele could grant him ecstasy. He need only accept it.
Acceptance meant giving in to the intoxication of the Magna Mater’s music, and, despite their initial resistance, that was what John’s companions were doing. Marching gave way to capering, whirling dancing. Amadour tripped Pascal with his pick and howled with laughter when the small man staggered and nearly fell. Colm drew his dagger and sliced gashes in his cheeks.
They were all bewitched, John realized. It was his duty to break the spell, but how could he muster the resolve when, after two years of mourning, his misery was finally falling away? Striving to resist the magic for his comrades’ sake, he sought to recall the hardships and close calls he and the others had shared, the kindness they’d shown putting up with his sullenness, but another skirl of piping smeared the memories into a meaningless blur.
Bare to the waist now, his face a bloody mess, Colm slashed his chest. Amadour tore open his shirt.
John still couldn’t find it in himself to care, not enough to stop singing and dancing and intervene. He still knew who Colm, Amadour, and Pascal were, but any bonds of affection or obligation were burning away in the fire of a greater devotion.
Indeed, he realized, every part of him that fretted or sorrowed was burning away. For a few dancing steps, he was grateful, and then he recognized the cost.
As it was with his fellow soldiers, so too must it be with Elizabeth. He might still remember her sly smile and teasing, her green eyes and way with dogs and horses, but they’d no longer evoke evens a wisp of feeling, painful or otherwise. Henceforth, all his love would belong to the Mountain Mother.
Back in York and in the days since, he’d believed his grief unbearable, but it was preferable to the alternative. He’d rather suffer for the rest of his days than become a creature who no longer loved Elizabeth or cherished the time they’d had together.
He contrived to dance clumsily, entangled his feet, and fell. Amadour, Pascal, and Colm capered obliviously onward into the dark.
John pounded his forehead against the floor. It hurt, but that was all to the good. Each jolt diminished the music’s power. Eventually he stopped singing and felt no urge to start anew or to dance, either.
Rubbing his throbbing brow, he rose and took stock. His lantern was still alight and intact despite his deliberate tumble. He hadn’t cast away his sword in the midst of his delirium. So all that was as he needed it to be. Now he had to hope that, without witchcraft guiding him, he could nonetheless locate his companions.
He stalked onward, and Cybele smiled from her alcoves over and over again. Then the music changed, the wild dance giving way to something slow and solemn.
Quickening his pace, he came to a spot where the passage he’d been traversing intersected another. Yellow light glowed at the end of the length of tunnel on the right, and after a moment, Amadour, naked now, gashed and bleeding like Colm, appeared amid the glow. The big Norman had his back to John and seemed to be paying close attention to whatever was happening in front of him.