The layer of stone felt like curtain of a waterfall. Although not exactly painful, but I could feel some pressure bearing down on my body. The pressure was filled with tiny, odd swirling currents that brushed against the energy that naturally emanated from me. These currents seemed to continuously scrape the surface of my body, before smoothing out the disturbed areas forming an endless cycle.
What made me wary, was my inability to use my perception to feel anything. It made sense since I had not been able to observe the other side of the wall, but I felt uneasy when my senses were completely blocked once I had entered the wall. Unwittingly, I had become completely reliant on the ability to monitor my surroundings without obstructions and now I felt how dangerous could that be.
It took only a few steps to pass through the obstacle. Immediately, I confirmed that my perception returned to normal. In front of me, I saw the man who had invited us in. For an instant, I felt his previously steady heartbeat accelerating and his eyes widened in surprise, but then he returned to normal.
He walked to the side and politely gestured for me to move aside. I stepped away from the wall while taking in the view. Somehow, I could not fully understand how, I was in a huge, brick-and-stone cellar space. It resembled a big medieval underground cistern similar to the one in Istanbul, but with brick pillars that were much thicker and rougher than their Byzantine counterparts. However, I was sure that there was no such suitable space near the bridge where we had entered from.
Logically, just a few meters to my left there should have been the river, while the road and street would have been expected to be located at the height of my outstretched hand. Space magic? Warped dimension? The passage through the wall did not feel like the portal Eala had created, but I had no idea if it was any good to use that as a reference. I inwardly marked that down as another example in my growing stack of “weird shit I have to learn more about ASAP”.
—
In the hall, I saw numerous people, but their number was not enough to fill out such a spacious room. All sorts of stalls, opened boxes, carpets and makeshift shelves were spread out evenly with a lot of free space between them, allowing people to walk around and browse things without interfering with each other. High above the floor, basketball-sized globes of white light provided ample lighting. No electricity or any other signs of modern communications in sight, I noted.
Behind me sounded some huffing, and from the wall appeared Aitan and the rest of the team. As I turned to look at them, those in front jolted and took a step back, which almost resulted in Rabbi squashing a smaller man behind him into the wall.
“What?” – I asked, raising an eyebrow. I had not expected such reaction from Rabbi Es, who called me a ruach, bowed and all that.
After a second of silence, Aitan Es bit the bullet: “Emm, your…eyes.”
That made me to suspect something. I pulled a strand of my hair to my face. Yep, it was blood-red again. And unless I was very wrong, my eyes had also regained their red and gold glowing irises. It was quite obvious that the wall was not just an entrance, and the swirling currents of power somehow managed to restore the original look of this body despite the physical alterations I had done to it.
I shrugged and replied: “You didn’t bring contacts, so I had to find a way myself.”
SAS men nodded silently, as if it made perfect sense. Only Aitan looked somewhat unconvinced, but still chose to say nothing.
It was not the best time to change my looks back, and it would be counterproductive to do so anyway. So I looked at the doorman who stood silently nearby: “So, what are you called and introduce the place.”
The man patted his thin hair to make it stay in place and explained: “Masters call me Gnaeus.” – hmm, Roman name, in a place related to Ancient Rome?
Meanwhile Gnaeus continued: “This market, as you well know, is organized by our Bull’s Blood. But we only provide the place, access and some small services. We take a small cut from the auction, brokering and appraisal. We do not interfere with interpersonal matters, but you can recognize our people from this.” – he showed a palm-sized golden circular plate which was embossed with an image of a wounded, bleeding bull surrounded by grooves or rays that radiated from the central point towards the edge.
Gnaeus pointed out the directions towards the appraisal, brokers and reminded us to participate in the auction which was supposed to start on midnight. Then he excused himself, saying that he had to watch the doorway. Me and Aitan’s team moved away from the entrance and walked until there were no strangers in our vicinity. Aitan pulled off his high-tech glasses while the others began fiddling with their visors.
“No signal” – they stated after checking their equipment. They also checked their radios and backup systems, but all of these were unresponsive.
“Huh, we have now the situation that permits us to ‘act according to the situation’.” – Aitan announced. Then he continued: “We work according to our initial plan, but don’t count on backup.”
“Yessir.” – SAS men nodded seriously.
The second shortest SAS man in the team asked: “What’s with that Bull’s Blood?”. Everyone shrugged in response, while Aitan grumbled: “Should’ve taken, err, Tomb with us. She would know, perhaps.”. He glimpsed at me but did not ask.
But surprisingly, I remembered something from the “history of religions” course I had had.
So I told them my suspicions: “In later Roman Empire there was a cult Sol Invictus, ‘Invincible Sun’. And it was related to Mithraism, a mystery religion related to Persian god Mithra. And it was centered around the image of tauroctony, slaying of a bull. In addition, they really liked to use caves.”.
Amazing what details one may remember thanks to eidetic memory.
I heard some hushed whispers between soldiers as they voiced their suspicions about the likelihood of two millennia old cult organizing magic markets, but I did not care. I was not sure about my conjecture myself, as there was only a short paragraph about Mithraism in the textbook. And even there it was only referred to as a curious example of Roman spiritual crisis during the late Empire.
Aitan looked at me: “What would you suggest us to do?”
I turned my head to observe the room: “You don’t know the value of your artifacts. I suggest you try the appraiser.”
“But what about their cut?”
“You want accurate information? Just write it down as payment for the market knowledge.”
“But what about people?” – Aitan pushed.
I quickly scanned my surrounding before answering: “We need to know the situation first anyway. I am not familiar with the local community, so you better be careful.”.
It was good to use others as a reason for my actions. Now, instead of me looking for the knowledge, there was SAS searching for information. I maintained my psychological advantage while they would get their job done. Win-win situation, if you asked me.
—
While we walked towards the appraisal services Gaeus had talked about, we passed by several people who were selling, buying or just window-shopping. I could hear, how people either conversed in different languages, mostly English, or simultaneously touched small, knee-high steles that stood near each stall. As I saw it repeat multiple times, I gained an understanding that these steles were some sort of translation devices. And as the familiar bull symbol depicted on the surface suggested, these steles were most probably provided by the organizers.
The loudly thumping heartbeat and quickened breathing of the SAS proved that they were as bewildered as was I, seeing the scenes around us.
First of all, at least a quarter of all people present were pairs of twins, which was much higher percentage than in general population. Second, the height varied from real midgets less than a meter tall to almost-giants reaching the height close to three meters. And third, the variety of deformities, colours and clothing styles was simply mind-boggling.
But most of the people had looks close to humans, while their energy circulation showed completely insane variety. Some giant, odd-coloured people with extra limbs had energy circulation as ordinary as any average Londoner. On the other hand, multiple persons with their looks as ordinary as any random office clerk boasted massive whirlpools of powerful energy flow patterns so complex that they seemed to bend the space. And there were even quite a few who simply did not radiate any energy. Such differences made it easy for me to distinguish different individual people. But as a result, I had no idea what to think about the principles of the energy channels. I kept thinking about that while we walked.
At one stall, an ordinary-looking man in tweed suit was haggling about the price of a child-sized pure white skull with a plump, almost round woman whose face was so red that it made one worry she had apoplexy and who had thin feathers instead of hair. To make things worse, she was dressed in feather cloak.
Under a pillar further away, there was laid out a pitch-black carpet that nobody approached. On the carpet there were numerous colourful gems, creating a fantastic scene of mesmerizing night sky. But the seller was a very tall man dressed in a ragged, acidic green T-shirt that barely covered his stomach and a beekeeper’s hat with thick veil. Instead of pants he had haphazardly wrapped around his waist a long piece of black fabric that was tied up with a wide sash. The skin on his hands and bare feet was yellow and looked dry like parchment, making him look like a corpse or heavily diseased person. I observed the people who took a wide berth to circle around him, and to be on the safe side I guided Aitan and his men to avoid that ominous spot.
Midway, one of the SAS men, the one who was unfortunate enough to get the codename Maple, took interest in a stall with a portable forge. The table in front of the stall was full of all sorts of short bladed implements: knives, daggers, razors, scalpels and others. The one behind the stall, working by the forge, was a short man, almost midget, with a long beard that was protected by a leather flap attached to his blacksmith apron. Dwarf? Gnome? I was not going to ask that, who knew what sort of racist, or in that case, speciest, connotation that might have. Instead of asking for the artisan’s species, Maple tried to go for the safe option and compliment the work.
He pointed at one of the blades: “Nice dagger, sir.”
What nobody could have expected was what followed next. The small man dropped the whetstone he had held in hand and jumped up to face Maple. His height was just a little over half of Maple’s, but that did not seem to mean anything for him. His eyes bulged out and his body shook as he pointed at Maple’s visor.
And then he screeched with ear-piercing, shrill voice: “DAGGER?! YOU CALL THIS ATHAME A DAGGER? YOUR GRANDMOM’S DICK IS A DAGGER, YOU IDIOT!”. Uh, apparently, supernatural profanities were also all about genitals. Some things were eternally cross-cultural.
A SAS man who stood near Maple tried to cover for him and made an attempt to pacify the midget by distracting his attention.
He patted a blade in front of him and nodded, saying: “Yes, true. Really good athames here.”
That resulted in a rain of spit showering his visor: “ATHAME?! YOU CAN’T TELL APART AN ATHAME AND ASI?! YOUR MOMMA’S DICK IS AN ATHAME, YOU DIMWIT!”. Ohoh, and quite obviously, profanities were not highly diverse either. What is “asi” anyway?
The midget stopped for a moment to breathe in before continuing with enough decibels to rival a space rocket launch: “FUCK OFF, YOU RETARDS, GO…”, but before he could specify our new movement vector, another man appeared soundlessly from behind and smashed something that looked suspiciously like a piece of thick rebar into the screeching man’s head.
What baffled me and the SAS was the fact that the crazy smith did not drop unconscious from such hit, but instead simply shut up with an “Ouch.”.
He looked accusingly at the man who hit him and asked in low voice: “What? They ARE dimwits!”
Meanwhile I observed the new man. He looked around fifty, average height, with brown, slightly greying hair and a pot belly. He wore a loose robe with several layers of soft fabrics visible from his collar and sleeves, making him look like a rotting cabbage.
He briefly glanced at us and said “Excuse us.” without looking at anyone in particular. Then he turned back to the midget and angrily said something in a language I could not understand. The midget replied him in the same language and they continued like that, clearly arguing about something.
On the other side, Aitan was reprimanding Maple and the other guy, promising them all sort of unpleasant experiences once they got back.
I tapped my foot and said: “Perhaps, we better move? We have already done well in drawing attention, I believe.”
Circle of Shards 