whether the figure was facing me or had its back to me—until the figure rose from the chair and began walking very slowly toward me.
My heart sped up. All I could hear was the blood pounding in my head. The uncanny silence of the approaching figure unnerved me.
I opened my mouth. For a long moment, nothing came out, and then, my voice cracking and ascending an octave, I heard myself say: “Speakee Greekee?”
The figure at last made a sound—a hideous laugh more horrible than the crunching of broken bones. My blood turned cold. The figure reached up with clawlike hands and pushed pack the moldering wreath that obscured its face.
Had the thing once been a woman? It was revolting to look at, with hair like worms and eyes that glinted like bits of obsidian. Its pale, rotting flesh was covered with warts. Broken teeth protruded from the black hole of its gaping mouth. The thing drew closer to me, filling my nostrils with the stench of putrefaction. Its low cackle rose to a sudden shriek.
I scrambled back from the wall, desperate to get away. One of my feet slipped from its toehold and I tumbled backward.
THE NEXT THING I KNEW, I WAS COMING TO MY SENSES, PROPPED UP IN A chair in the common room of the inn.
“Gordianus, are you all right?” said Antipater, hovering over me. “What happened to you? Were you set upon by robbers?”
“No, I fell . . .”
“In the middle of the street? That’s where Mushezib says he found you. It’s a good thing he happened by, or you’d still be lying out there, at the mercy of any cutthroat who happened by.”
Through bleary eyes, I saw that the astrologer stood nearby. Farther back, a few other guests were gathered around. The innkeeper was in their midst, standing a head taller than anyone else. He frowned and shook his head. Talk of robbers was bad for business.
“No one attacked me, Antipater. I simply . . . fell.” I was too chagrined to confess that I had attempted to scale the temple wall.
“The lad must have the falling sickness. Common among Romans,” said one of the guests, turning up his nose. This seemed to satisfy the others, who drew back and dispersed.
Antipater wrinkled his brow. “What really happened, Gordianus?”
Mushezib also remained. I saw no reason not to tell them both the truth. “I was curious. I wanted to have a look at the old temple of Ishtar, so I climbed to the top of the wall—”
“I knew it!” said Antipater. He scowled, then raised an eyebrow. “And? What did you see?”
“Ruins—there are only ruins left. And . . .”
“Go on,” said Antipater. He and Mushezib both leaned closer.
“I saw the lemur,” I whispered. “In the courtyard of the temple. She walked toward me—”
Mushezib made a scoffing sound. “Gordianus, you did not see a lemur.”
“How do you know what I saw?”
“A young man with a powerful imagination, alone in the dark in a strange city, looking at a ruined courtyard, which he has been told is haunted by a lemur—it’s not hard to understand how you came to think you saw such a thing.”
“I trust the evidence of my own eyes,” I said irritably. My head had begun to pound. “Don’t you believe that lemures exist?”
“I do not,” declared the astrologer. “The mechanisms of the stars, which rule all human action, do not allow the dead to remain among the living. It is scientifically impossible.”
“Ah, here we see where Chaldean stargazing comes into conflict with Greek religion, not to mention common sense,” said Antipater, ever ready to play the pedant, even with his young traveling companion still barely conscious after a dangerous fall. “As they rule supreme over the living, so the gods rule over the dead—”
“If one believes in these gods,” said Mushezib.
“You astrologers worship stars instead!” said Antipater, throwing up his hands.
“We do not worship the stars,” said Mushezib calmly. “We study them. Unlike your so-called gods, the vast interlocking mechanisms of the firmament do not care whether mortals make supplication to them or not. They do not watch over us or concern themselves with our behavior; their action is completely impersonal as they exert their rays of invisible force upon the earth. Just as the heavenly bodies control the tides and seasons, so they control the fates of mankind and of individual men. The gods, if they exist, may be more powerful than men, but they too are controlled by the sympathies and antipathies of the stars in conjunction—”
“What nonsense!” declared Antipater. “And you call this science?”
Mushezib drew a deep breath. “Let us not speak of matters about which our opinions are so divergent. Our concern now must be for your young friend. Are you feeling better, Gordianus?”
“I would be, if the two of you would stop squabbling.”
Mushezib smiled. “For your sake, Gordianus, we will change the subject.” He glanced at the innkeeper, who was serving some other guests, and lowered his voice. “Whatever you saw or did not see, it was good of you to calm the fears of the other guests—about the presence of robbers in the streets, I mean. Our poor host must hate all this talk of robbers, and of lemures, for that matter. He tells me he’s negotiating to buy the empty building next door. By this time next year, he hopes to expand his business to fill both buildings.”
Antipater surveyed the handful of guests in the room. “There hardly seems to be custom enough to fill this place, let alone an inn twice the size.”
“Our host is an optimist,” said Mushezib with a shrug. “One must be an optimist, I think, to live in Babylon.”
THAT NIGHT I SLEPT FITFULLY, DISTURBED BY TERRIBLE DREAMS. AT SOME point I woke up to find myself drenched with sweat. It seemed to me that I had heard a distant scream—not a shriek such as the lemur had made, but the sound of a man crying out. I decided the sound must have been part of my nightmare. I closed my eyes and slept soundly until the first glimmer of daylight from the window woke me.
When Antipater and I descended the stairs, we found the common room completely deserted, except for Darius, who was waiting for us to appear. He rushed up to us, his eyes wide with excitement.
“Come see, come see!” he said.
“What’s going on?” said Antipater.
“You must see for yourself. Something terrible—at the ruined temple of Ishtar!”
We followed him. A considerable crowd had gathered in the street. The gate in the wall stood wide open. People took turns peering inside, but no one dared to enter the courtyard.
“What on earth are they all looking at?” muttered Antipater. He pressed his way to the front of the crowd. I followed him, but Darius hung back.
“Oh dear!” whispered Antipater, peering through the gateway. He stepped aside so that I could have a better look.
The courtyard did not appear as frightening by morning light as it had the night before, but it was still a gloomy place, with weeds amid the broken paving blocks and the ugly reddish-brown wall looming behind it. I saw more clearly the stone chairs I had seen the night before—all empty now—and then I saw the body on the temple steps.
The man’s face was turned away, with his neck twisted at an odd angle, but he was dressed in a familiar blue robe embroidered with yellow stars, with spiral-toed shoes on his feet. His ziggurat-shaped hat had fallen from his head and lay near him on the top step.
“Is it Mushezib?” I whispered.
“Perhaps it’s another astrologer,” said Antipater. He turned to the crowd behind us. “Is Mushezib here? Has anyone seen Mushezib this morning?”
People shook their heads and murmured.
I had to know. I strode through the gateway and crossed the courtyard. Behind me I heard gasps and cries from the others, including Darius, who shouted, “No, no, no, young Roman! Come back!”
