The echoes in my head.
During the decade I had been running from my shadow, I had been using the energies of stolen souls to complete myself. I was whole with them, and while I couldn't quite ground myself like other magi and open myself up as a conduit point, I could still exert my Will on the world around me. I was a schizophrenic with a dominant personality matrix, and that ego consciousness was the singular point around which my world spun. The rest were echoes, trailing ghosts caught in orbit. But the spirit of Philippe seemed like it had its own satellites.
Like looking in a mirror and seeing another mirror. And the more you compare that reflection to the endless parade of fainter reflections, you realize each one is subtly different.
Could an organization have memory? Could it have the same sort of eternal life that a pile of old stones did? I didn't really know what it meant to be Hierarch of the Watchers, but the echoes of Philippe's history in my head had a peculiar edge that wasn't like other lives that I had absorbed. Granted, the Chorus was different since I had been changed by the explosion of souls in Portland, but my relationship with the memories-with the other personalities-was still the same.
Each soul that has passed through me changed me. I was no longer who I was prior to being initiated into the mysteries, which isn't to deny the fact that all experience changes us. But profane experience builds upon the history that has gone before. We remember things because they remind us of other events and sensations, and the strength of any given memory is commensurate with the amount of like material it can bind itself to. Our ego identities are raised up by this tower of memory, but when I examine the stones of my memory, I find them strange and alien. I do not know where they came from, or how they came to be lodged in my mind, but time and energy has welded them to the foundation. I was the sum of the history of all those who have been touched by the Chorus, and as my shadow was intent on poisoning me for a long time, a lot of this history was black and vile. Fear, loathing, hate, sexual release.
If a core sample were taken from this pillar of rock, like a geologist examining strata of stone, the bottom layers would be akin to compressed layers of black shale and the topmost layers would be lighter. More porous, like sandstone. In there were untainted memories: Marielle as a child; an auburn-haired woman who I knew without knowing was Detective John Nicols' wife; and cathedrals, lots and lots of cathedrals. St. Mark's in Venice, the Basilica in Rome, the cathedral at Ulm, Sacre-C?ur, Saint-Sulpice, Mont-Saint Michel, Notre-Dame.
And this tiny church, nearly lost in the shadow of the surrounding tenements. Nearly lost in the relentless progress of modernity.
Was it the solemn serenity of this place that I was supposed to See? The glass Christ. The Chorus kaleidoscoped under my pressure, splintering into a rain of colored glass. Some of the shards formed pictures, panels that turned toward me for an instant before shattering again. I stood, and wandered over to the mounted stained-glass panels. Yes, some of those images were here. The north side detailed the Stations of the Cross. But there were subtle differences: the inclusion of extra figures, not typical of the iconography; alchemical symbols, inscribed on clothing and floating in space above characters; and the expressions of the figures weren't as traditionally sorrowful.
Not these, the Chorus sighed. They drifted across the glass, making the white cloaks glow so that the soldiers of Christ became floating ghosts. Not here.
I prowled further, investigating all the tiny niches. The rain in my head had stopped, and the only image left was a Christ figure, floating on the cross, his heart a flaming ball in his chest. Like Dali's hypercube Christ, but without the geometric overtones. The picture was there in my memory, but I couldn't find it in any of the panels.
"Can I help you?" The priest was dressed in gray-pants, jacket, t-shirt-and his white collar seemed more like a nod to couture than a religious vestment. He was a head taller than me, and clearly in shape. The loose cut of the jacket couldn't hide the breadth of his shoulders. His eyes focused on a spot beyond my left shoulder, and his face, though weathered, was calm. His right eye was surprisingly green, a vibrant emerald, in contrast with the empty whiteness in the center of his left. He stood quietly, hands clasped like he was holding a small moth, waiting for me to find my tongue. His hands were harder than his expression. He hadn't always been a priest.
"Salve, Pater," I said. "I am a weary traveler, seeking guidance." Seeking a sign.
"In corde prudentis requiescit sapienti," he said, nodding.
Wisdom lies in the heart of one who has foresight. One of the Old Man's favorite lessons.
The priest had just offered me a countersign to my mention of "traveler."
"I have lost my faith, Father," I said, as the Chorus swirled in response to his phrase. It wasn't the church itself I was here to see, but the man inside it. "I wonder if you might have a place where a frater such as myself could pray, where I might receive such wisdom."
"Of course," he nodded, acknowledging my recognition of his countersign. "I have a private study. Let us adjourn there. Please, follow me."
He led me to a narrow panel set in the wall on the left side of the sanctuary. It turned out to be a door with no knob. I felt a brief whisper of magick and the door opened, swinging silently inward, and after we passed through, it clicked shut as quietly as it had opened.
No knob on this side either, the spirit of Detective John Nicols acknowledged.
I had thought the priest was leading me into a sacristy, one of those tiny rooms off the main area of the church, where the priests usually stored all of the mundane tools of their profession. But this was a hallway, a narrow, low-ceilinged corridor that inclined downward. Tiny paintings hung along the walls. Watercolors. They were lit by tiny spotlights that ran along a strand of fine wire. I was about to ask who the artist was, when I realized why they seemed so familiar.
In the converted studio at the farmhouse, along the Aude. Where Marielle chased the geese. I painted them. No, I corrected that thought. Philippe painted them. That was his memory, tying itself to my soul.
The paintings weren't copies; they were studies, preliminary versions of the stained glass in the church, and in them, the differences from canon were even more pronounced. Especially when I examined them with Chorus-sight. The silver symbols filling the open spaces became sea creatures floating on vibrant waters.
The last painting was the truly radical departure: Mary Magdalene, accepting Christ's flaming heart. It was close to the one I had been looking for, but broader in scope, and I wondered if what was in my head was a detail, a small scrap of this picture.
At the end of the hall, there was another door-one with a knob this time-and it opened into a long, narrow room. High windows, narrow slits in the stone, ran along one wall, providing pale and indirect light for the room. Bookcases filled most of the wall space, and along the wall opposite the windows were a rectangular desk and two chairs. A single book lay on the table, open, and its page was covered with tight rows of dots. Past the table, a woolen screen afforded a little privacy for a small niche, complete with a narrow cot, neatly made, and an unremarkable wooden wardrobe.
In the far end, beneath a large oak cross mounted on the wall, was a kitchenette. Hot plate, microwave, refrigerator, sink, free-standing pantry. Another table-this one more square-was pushed into the corner, and two more chairs-matching the pair next to the reading table-were loosely arranged at the table.