Neither did Kelley.
Dee cleared his throat, squirmed in his seat. "It is a difficult concept to communicate clearly, Highness."
"Try."
That nervous laugh again. Dee wiped his brow with a handkerchief. Kelley had to admit he enjoyed Dee's discomfort. On the other hand, anything that happened to Dee would surely also affect Kelley. Like it or not, he and Dee were a team. Come on, Dr. Dee. Let's see some smooth talk, and make it fast.
Dee grabbed a silver cup from across the table, set it in front of him. "Consider this silver goblet, Highness."
Rudolph leaned forward, looked at the cup.
"If you broke it in half, each piece would be smaller," Dee said. "But both pieces would still be silver."
"Obviously," Rudolph said.
"Uh... yes. And if you kept breaking the goblet into smaller and smaller pieces, each piece would still be silver. Now imagine you break it into a thousand pieces. Ten thousand pieces. Ten thousand times ten thousand individual pieces."
"That would be impossible."
"In theory, Highness."
Rudolph shrugged. "In theory then."
"Your Highness is most patient," Dee said. "Imagine you've somehow broken the goblet into as many pieces as you can possibly break it. Pieces so small they cannot even be seen. Now take one of these pieces-a piece that cannot be broken any further-and break it again. You are now breaking it past the point where it continues to be silver. Break it any more, and it will no longer be silver."
Rudolph considered a moment, then asked, "Then, if not silver, what is it?"
"Ah." Dee thrust a finger in the air. "Therein lies the mystery, Highness. What, indeed? But a more pertinent question, I would contend, is, once having deprived this infinitely small piece of matter of its innate... silverness, what then can be done to change it, manipulate it into something else? Could we not build it back as something different? What I am attempting to do with our experiments is to attack the very force that holds the silver together."
The pause this time was much longer. Kelley would not ask Dee to come to Sicily with him. The deranged alchemist was on his own.
"I do not fully understand what you say," Rudolph admitted. "But I sense you have an understanding of this matter that is simply beyond me, and I am intrigued. The lodestones you asked for. I take it they are another attempt to manipulate these energies you speak of?"
"Your Highness is most insightful," Dee said.
Rudolph said, "What if I were to tell you that my astrologers might have discovered another possible way for you to address these energies?"
Dee spread his hands. "I would naturally be most grateful for any additional tools that would aid in the pursuit of Your Highness's ultimate goal."
Rudolph nodded. "Stand ready, then. It could happen at any time. Thank you, gentlemen, that will be all."
They stood, bowed, and left. On the way out, Kelley became determined to make Dee talk. What in blazes was this ultimate goal? No, Kelley was tired of being in the dark. He'd need to figure some way to loosen Dee's tongue.
He put his hand on Dee's back, an uncharacteristically friendly gesture. "Well done, Dr. Dee. I think the emperor was impressed with your explanation. How about a quick drink to celebrate?"
THIRTEEN
Dr. Dee might have been a gigantic prick, but I had to give him credit. I'd had no idea at the time that he'd been speculating about the nature of matter on an atomic level. Nobody had had the vocabulary. Protons and electrons and so forth had been centuries away.
And then there had been the darker forces, which science has yet to explain.
I should have gone to Sicily.
It's true that I have a facility for languages. In the hundreds of years I've haunted Prague Castle and its environs, I've become more fluent in Czech than any Czech. I've learned German and Russian. Even a smattering of Japanese. The castle draws tourists from all four corners of the globe. My French is good, but even now, my Spanish is still weak.
There is a room behind one of the gift shops where the cleaning staff can lounge and have a smoke. They have a TV in the lounge. I've seen every episode of Hogan's Heroes dubbed into German. Prague gets German TV. It's easier to spy on TV than it is to read a book over somebody's shoulder, but I've done that too.
The problem is that I can't touch anything, so it's hard to turn pages. I can float through walls and doors, drift the night gardens, haunt the tombs beneath St. Vitus Cathedral. There is no nook or cranny of this place I haven't seen a hundred times. But I can't turn pages. I still haven't made it through all the Harry Potter books. For the first three volumes, I stood over the shoulder of this nice woman who worked in the kitchens. She'd take her break on a bench outside and read while taking a quick lunch. She was a slow reader. But she got married and moved away, so I don't know when I'll get a chance to read the rest. I think Harry and Hermione will get together. I just have a feeling.
I am confined-mostly-to the castle and its grounds. I experimented with this quite a bit the first few decades. With great effort, I can make it to the little pub I loved so much at the bottom of the castle steps. On certain nights, when the moon and stars align just perfectly, I'll feel the cosmic energies stir. On these occasions I can make it into the tourist areas below the castle.
I've never made it as far as the Charles Bridge.
When I attempt to leave the area the cosmos has approved for me, things go gray. The real world bleeds away, and I feel myself in a fog. I try to trudge forward, but it's like walking through mud. I feel a tug at my back, like there's an invisible line hooked to my belt.
I always turn back. I am here. I will be here forever.
The Hapsburgs fell, and I remained. I watched the Nazis come and go. The Communists. The latest invasion has been the tourists, men and women from the UK and the USA. So many students. They all flock to cheap beer and old-world charm. The prices are starting to go up now, and Prague isn't the bargain it used to be. Travelers are discovering Budapest and Warsaw.
But Prague is mine, or the castle-the symbol of the city-is anyway.
There are other ghosts in Prague Castle. I've talked to them. Well, I've tried to talk to them. They seem to lack the gift of conversation. These spirits are stuck in some kind of loop, acting in the same play over and over again, saying the same lines. They spend eternity reenacting their unjust murders or roam the halls looking for the road to the afterlife. They're only half there. Insubstantial even for ghosts.
Only I see all. Only Edward Kelley retains his faculties, listens, learns, grows. I am like some recorder destined to bear witness. What exactly I'm supposed to see or do has been unclear for centuries. I have never tasted a McDonald's hamburger or Yoplait yogurt. I watch with longing as tourists knock back cold pilsners. I want to cry when I think how long it's been since I've had a glass of wine, but I can't make tears.
I have not been deprived of human desires. I simply no longer have the means to fulfill them. Nothing physical, I mean. I can't tell you how long I spent loitering in women's restrooms, watching ladies take down their pants to pee. That's pathetic, isn't it? Like I said, a man with a man's desires, trapped in the nothingness of my existence.
So, yeah. I get horny.
But since I am utterly deprived of physical sensation, it must all be in my mind, right? I spent a hundred years on that one.
Only recently have I detected some change, a shift in the nature of my own existence. Something is coming. Happening. And it's all tied up with Allen Cabbot and the strange adventure that he finds himself smack in the middle of at this very moment. But Allen can keep a moment.
First there is the matter of Dr. Dee and a very large pitcher of cheap wine.
FOURTEEN
Kelley and Dee sat at a rough wooden table in the corner of Kelley's favorite pub. It was a dark establishment, thick with the smoke of oil lamps and candles. Kelley could barely make out the faces of the other patrons. They'd gone through half a pitcher of wine, and Dee had loosened up a bit.
It helped that the doctor could not hold his liquor.
Kelley told a bawdy joke and Dee laughed. Okay, thought Kelley. He's ready for more probing questions.
Kelley tilted the pitcher, refilled Dee's goblet. "I can't help but wonder what all this secrecy is about, Dee. If I knew what was happening, I could help more."
Dee's frown was plain even in the dim candlelight. Instead of talking, he sipped wine.
"Is Rudolph impatient with us?" asked Kelley. "Are we not turning lead into gold fast enough for His Highness? Because I have to tell you, Dee, it's going to take years. Frankly, I don't think it's possible at all."
"Lower your voice." Dee looked from side to side, but nobody seemed interested in their conversation. "It's supposed to be a secret."
"Supposed to be," Kelley said, "but everyone knows. People whisper about it all the time, or they used to. It's sort of old news now, actually. Guess what they call the alleyway outside our workshop. The Golden Lane."
"I thought they called it that because the soldiers use it as a convenient place to urinate."
"There's that too."
Dee leaned across the table, motioned for Kelley to lean in also. Dee's hushed whisper was barely audible. "I can tell you this much. Transmuting lead into gold, all that nonsense, it's a cover story."
"Then why the hell have I been cleaning beakers and handling toxic chemicals for the past five months? And why the hell would we have a cover story and then act like it's a secret?"
"It's the oldest trick in the book," Dee said. "A couple of alchemists up to God knows what until all hours of the night. People are bound to be curious. They can't help themselves. So we make up a story and let people discover the secret. Once they think they know what's going on, they stop asking. The curiosity abates."
"What about me?" Kelley asked. "My curiosity hasn't abated."
"In time, Edward."
"And if we're not transmuting lead into gold, then what was all that talk about breaking a silver goblet into thousands of pieces until it's not silver anymore?"
"We're not transmuting lead into gold," Dee said. "But we are transmuting... something."
"Dee, you must confide in me."
"I've already said too much. This is a dangerous secret, Edward. Rudolph will have both our heads if it gets out, so please ask me no more."
"I'm just trying to help." Kelley sipped wine. "At least tell me when I might be able to know more. For pity's sake, throw me a bone."
"Rudolph's astrologers are the key," Dee said.
"I thought we were the key."
Dee cleared his throat. "Well, naturally. But next to us the astrologers are the key. Soon they will bring us an object, and then, my dear Edward, then I will most certainly need your assistance. Until that time, I beg you to ask me no more."
Kelley sat back and nodded. Clearly he would get no more out of Dee until Dee was ready. "Our pitcher is empty. I'll get us more wine."
"Please no," Dee said. "My head is swimming. But I thank you for the drink. I've been working so hard lately, I feel like I might come apart."
Kelley smiled. "I know just the thing to ease your troubles, my friend."
Kelley's eyes creaked open at the first hint of sunlight. He sat up in bed, pushing the girl's naked leg off his chest. The rest of her was hidden beneath the bedcovers. Which one had he ended up with? The one with corn-yellow hair, he hoped. She had big tits. He couldn't tell from the leg.
He cast about, squinting his eyes, but didn't immediately see Dee and the other wench. Kelley's head throbbed. It tasted as if a small, oily creature had defecated in his mouth and then crawled down his throat and died. His skin felt slick and clammy. The first stirrings of something unpleasant were beginning in his belly. It seemed impossible that a man could feel this bad and still live. The entire chamber smelled of sweat and wine.
Kelley crawled out of bed. His legs felt like jelly. He went to the plush sofa and pulled back the heavy quilt. The naked girl underneath whined, curled into a fetal position, flinching from the light. It was the yellow-haired girl with the large breasts. Damn. That meant Kelley had been with the bucktoothed one. He shrugged. No matter.
Kelley found his breeches, slipped into them, and went downstairs.
There was a water trough in the courtyard directly across from the tower door. Dee was on his knees, his head dunked in the water. His white skin glowed a dirty orange in the rays of the rising sun. He wore only his underwear. He lifted his head out of the trough, water streaming and dripping from his hair and beard.
"You okay, Dee?"
"You did this to me, you evil bastard." Dee wiped water from his eyes. "What infernal scheme led man to invent wine?"
Kelley knelt next to Dee at the trough and splashed water into his face. "At least you hit it off well with Natasha."
"Who the hell is Natasha?"
"The young naked wench asleep in your chamber."
"Oh, God. My wife."
"She's back in England."
"Praise the Lord for small mercies." Dee suddenly grabbed his stomach, his pale skin fading to green. "Oh... no."
Kelley backed away.
Dee convulsed and heaved, spewed acidic, partly digested wine into a puddle to the side of the trough. "Oh, God." Dee shuddered and puked a second time.
"You should feel better now." Kelley didn't think Dee would recover quickly. With a little luck, the doctor would be out of commission all day and into the night.
Dee was stuck in a kneeling position, hunched over his own puddle of puke, a gooey strand of spittle still clinging to his beard. "I can't move. This is disgraceful. I have several experiments to see to today. I feel like there are tiny devils with pitchforks in my head, stabbing the backs of my eyes."
"I can't help but feel partly to blame," Kelley said.
"You are entirely to blame."
"I understand," Kelley said. "In that case, let me shoulder the burden today. You get back up to your bed and rest. I'll check in on the experiments."
Dee cast a sideways glance at Kelley. Kelley knew what the doctor was thinking. Did he really trust Kelley to handle his delicate experiments? In truth, nothing very important was happening in the laboratory, but Dee was obnoxiously fussy about his boiling pots and beakers.
"What will you tell people?" Dee asked.
"Anything you like."
"I command a certain amount of respect at court," Dee said, "and I would hate to see that respect tarnished."
"Of course."
"Tell everyone I've eaten bad goat cheese, and that I'm waiting for some digestion issues to resolve themselves."
"No problem."
Dee sighed. "Very well. Thank you, Edward. I think I will stay here and vomit a little more before crawling back up to bed."
"Take your time."
"One more favor, if you please," Dee said. "Can you please tell those women to leave? I don't think I can bring myself to look them in the eye, especially the blonde. Not after the unspeakable things I asked her to do."
Kelley didn't ask.
Kelley dressed and pulled himself together. Dee's shadowy, partial revelations had piqued his curiosity. Kelley shooed the wenches out of the White Tower, as he began to see his vague plan coming together. He needed Dee incapacitated and out of his hair for a day.
He looked briefly into Dee's laboratory. Nothing was exploding, so Kelley closed the door, locked it, and left for the main castle courtyard.
He made his way past the throngs of workers to the entranceway of St. Vitus Cathedral. As planned, he fell into a line of men pushing empty wheelbarrows. He'd intentionally worn his oldest, most threadbare clothing in an attempt to pass for one of the laborers. He still looked a little too clean, but nobody seemed to notice, so he pushed the wheelbarrow inside.
The interior of the cathedral was awe-inspiring, the ceiling arching high above him, dusty light spilling in through the elongated windows. Kelley had not attended mass regularly in years, but the presence of God never impressed him more than when he entered this cathedral. He felt dwarfed by the grandeur. The effect was spoiled somewhat by the line of sweaty men with wheelbarrows.
He dropped off the empty wheelbarrow and followed the line to a wheelbarrow full of dirt. He had only a split second to glance down the rough stone steps into the burial vault before he was swept toward the exit. A glance over his shoulder showed him grimy men coming up from the vault with buckets of earth, filling the empty wheelbarrows. He marched his new wheelbarrow outside, through the courtyard, and up a wooden ramp, where he dumped the dirt into the back of a wagon. Kelley presumed full wagons were driven someplace out of the way to dump the dirt, perhaps to farms that needed rich soil.
Dozens of men were participating in the dirt-moving endeavor. Kelley couldn't figure out a way to break the line and get down into the vault without drawing attention, so he plodded along, bringing back empty wheelbarrows, getting a load of dirt, dumping it into a wagon. Repeat. It was getting hot, and his hangover weighed him down.
Kelley was about to call it a day and slip away for a bath when a foreman shouted, "Water!"
A dozen boys toted water buckets hanging from ox yokes. The dirty men crowded around, dipping cups into the buckets. Kelley realized just how dry and dusty his mouth and throat were, but he saw his opportunity.
He went to one of the smaller boys, lifted the yoke off his shoulders. "Let me help you with that, little man. I'll take it inside for the others."
The flushed boy nodded. "Thank you, sir."
Kelley carried the water into the cathedral, set the buckets at the top of the steps that led down to the vault. He descended, and the temperature cooled. He was greeted by the moist smell of fresh earth.
"Water up top," Kelley shouted down the passage. "Take a break."
The clank and scrape of tools. Muttered voices. They came into view, about a dozen of them walking past him. They were caked with dirt from head to foot. They thanked him and trudged up the steps to the water buckets.
Kelley waited ten seconds, then went back down the passage.
He'd never been inside the vault beneath the cathedral, but he'd heard the same as everyone else, knew that dead rulers and bishops were entombed here. The most important figures had been granted tombs inscribed in Latin marking the brief history of the deceased. Lesser nobles had been given more modest accommodations. Skeletal remains, their hands folded over their chests, lined the broad shelves along the passage. Kelley paused to examine one of the hollow-eyed skulls and crossed himself.
He turned the corner and saw that the passage terminated with a hole in the masonry, about two feet wide and four feet tall. There were mounds of dirt on either side. They'd knocked a hole in the wall and had begun a new tunnel.
Kelley edged toward the hole and felt a cool, damp breeze on his face, less musty than among the tombs. He took a flickering torch from a nearby sconce and squeezed through the opening.
The tunnel was narrow; his shoulders scraped both sides in some places. He had to duck as he scooted through. Short beams had been installed haphazardly to discourage cave-ins. He sensed that the tunnel angled slightly downward, but maybe that was just his imagination.
The light from the vault faded behind him, and the darkness all but swallowed the orange light of the small torch. How far did this tunnel go? He was contemplating turning around when a rushing sound caught his attention. He cocked his head, listened a moment. He increased his pace forward, and the sound of rushing water grew with each step.
Abruptly the tunnel opened into a wide cavern. A light spray of cold water hit him suddenly. Kelley held the torch out before him, and the light was barely enough to give him the full picture. A small underground river rushed and foamed in front of him. He swung the torch one way, then another, trying to take in the whole scene.
The river flowed from left to right in front of him, angling down and swirling into a pool about forty feet across. Kelley lowered the torch and saw a muddy, narrow path in front of him, following the flow of the river down to the pool. There seemed to be some sort of construction on the far side of the pool, rough beams across the edge. He'd need to get closer to see.
Kelley put one foot on the muddy path. His foot slipped out from under him. He upended, landed hard on his butt, and began sliding, picking up speed and heading for the water. He dug a hand into the mud, felt rock beneath and felt a fingernail rip. But he halted his slide before tumbling into the river.
"Damn it."