The mounded grain shimmered like fairy fruit. With an effort I turned away.
“Come on, Annie. We can’t stay here.”
I pulled her after me. She came reluctantly, glancing back as we walked from the bay into the nave of the Shrine.
“Oh,” I gasped, and stopped.
All around us there were stones. Megaliths, I thought at first, or boulders; but then I saw that they were not stones at all. They were immense carven idols—the most ancient and holy of icons made huge and manifest, in anticipation of the epiphany that was to come. A bulbous-shaped woman who might have been molded of honey, so bedewed with moisture was she—eyeless, mouthless, her hands placed protectively over a swollen belly that flowed into huge jutting buttocks and plinthlike thighs. Behind her stretched rows of tall white figures like alabaster blades, their breasts mere jots upon their torsos, a knife-slit of vulva between their marble legs. There were simple basalt columns and stalactites, pregnant women carved of green serpentine and shining onyx; ivory figures twenty thousand years old, their smooth faces scrolled with indentations and meanders, their hair etched into elaborate braids and knots. Women with the curved beaks of ibises and women with the heads of bees; snake-women, bear-women, women bearing tusks and tails. Their necks were hung with ropes of blossoms, their mouths smeared with honey and wine. Bees crawled across their cheeks and nested in their parted thighs. On the floor the matted petals shivered as serpents made their way through the blossoms. The air steamed, as though the vegetation was already decaying. Sweat streamed down my body and soaked my shirt and bare legs. Mingled with the heady incense of sandalwood and myrrh was another smell, pungent and sweet and malty. Beer, and the unmistakable odor of crushed coriander seed, the fragrance of sandalwood and oranges.
As we approached the altar the stone figures gave way to forms of gold and silver and bronze. Queens in chariots borne by griffins, tiny girls cast in gold, with eyes of lapis lazuli and feathered crowns; a statuette of a monarch with her head thrown back, flanked by crouching lions. A goddess upon a mountaintop looking out to sea. Drowsy mothers nursing their young. A marble madonna holding the broken body of her son; the painted plaster image of a woman crowned with the moon and seven stars, a serpent coiled protectively about her ankle. Faint music sounded from the transepts. Flutes and tabors, a jangling sistrum.
And suddenly I was in that hot classroom again—the smells of chalk and wood polish, a faunlike man dancing across the floor with sistrum raised as a boy recited—
An Egyptian instrument used in the worship of Isis. Fourth Dynasty, I believe…
I started to fall, but Annie caught me.
“I’m okay,” I said hoarsely. “Just dizzy…”
Chanting voices joined with the sound of bones and flutes. Women’s voices—
And now with them chimed the sweet piercing tones of boys or castrati—
High overhead the vaulted dome arched, like a hand cupped above us. I knew its mosaic of semiprecious stones as well as I knew the lines of my palm: the sad somber face of Christ, haloed with chips of gold and jade, hands raised to display the stigmata.
That image was gone. Instead there was the sleeping visage of Othiym—her heavy-lidded eyes, her upturned mouth like the moon’s spar. Within the streaming radiance of her hair a silver crescent was netted. The smell of sandalwood grew overpowering, the sweet odor of oranges so strong my mouth watered.
But I could not tear my eyes from the dreaming goddess. As I stared I realized this was no mosaic, no archaic fresco painted upon a crumbling facade. This was Othiym, and that was the Moon she held. Behind her I could glimpse the smoking towers and edifices of the city, the long shimmering stretch of turbid water that was the Potomac. As I stared the moon began to grow, swelling like a milky bubble that would burst and shower us all with bitter rain.
And then what would there be? When the moon goes black and cold, when Her fire is quenched and her hunger appeased: what becomes of us then?
An icy hand grabbed mine. In a daze I turned and saw Annie. She looked as dreamy as I felt, but I saw that she was pinching the inside of her arm, so hard that it bled.
“L-look,” she said through gritted teeth. Her eyes teared with pain as she cocked her head. “I think we’ve found her.”
In front of us was the altar. Its crimson carpeting was lost beneath the crushed pods and calyxes of fragrant plants. A life-size statue of a woman was there. She wore a pleated flounced skirt of many colors. Her broad hips narrowed to a small waist, cinched with a bodice that opened upon her breasts. Full and round and creamy as some lush fruit, her aureolae and nipples flushed red. Her hair was the color of amber, and fell in loose curls across her shoulders. Upon her brow was a silver crescent, and upon her breast. Her hands were raised. Clutched within them were two serpents that writhed and coiled. This was not a statue. It was a woman, a priestess. It was Angelica.
“Haïyo!”
Her voice rang through the Shrine. Immediately those other voices answered—
“Othiym haïyo! Othiym Lunarsa!”
With a wordless cry Angelica brought her hands together. The snakes braided themselves around each other, their tails lashing at her wrists. And suddenly she no longer held them but instead an axe, a great double-bladed scythe of hammered bronze; but then that too was gone. Her hands were empty. With great reverence she let her fingers slide across the twin spars of the lunula upon her breast. Then she stepped forward and clapped, once.
Her voice rose as she raised her hands to the vast face floating above us.
A clattering noise. From the eastern transept stepped an ungainly form, its hooves cleaving flowers to strike at the marble below. A bull. About its neck loops of ivy were twined, and withered blossoms. It walked haltingly, as though it were exhausted, or drugged, its dark head hanging between its legs. In a low voice Angelica called out to it, in words I could not understand. The bull gave a soft moan, then walked toward her. Those same hidden voices sang out once more, their words counterpointed with the dry rattle of a tambour.