Novel Excerpts

Chapter 1 – The sound and the furies

131.2011
During his penultimate life, Iapyx hides in an abandoned cathedral in Scotland, catching his breath. The Steward and his men have once again tracked him down.  Hunched over and wheezing, his blood drips through the shadows in the attic. Facing a life of captivity, he has only two choices: to stand up unarmed or to start all over. Again.
The pattering drops resound below the timber ceiling, below the muted stained glass and the empty pews, brewing in the ornate silver salver where - in the attic - Iapyx sits hunched, wheezing and injured. The blue light shines from the stained glass, illuminating a small space where a hidden Iapyx, bloody and labouring to breathe, gives the impression of an animal hiding from the moon, under the thickets of the forest longing to die.
He could start his life all over, in exchange for his memories and his desires. He could return to a time in his past, a new branch in the limbs of time, fully grown. He could ‘re-learn’ all the skills he had amassed during all of his lifetimes, as he already had, so many times. He could return and play the part. He would be simply a new face. And none of the performers in his life would recognize him or remember anything he had done in any of his previous lives. He could escape the Steward by simply submerging himself in water. He had restarted over a hundred times. It was an easy choice.
Yet he thought only of Sabrina.
σώσε με (save me)
πως έχω αποτύχει (how have I failed you)
γιατί με εγκαταλείψω (why do you forsake me)
Δίας (Zeus), he chants, sitting slumped on the wooden floor, his back curled as if he were protecting a young child from the cold. He continues to recite, flinching to the sounds of nearby gunshots and birds squawking frantically, followed by the sounds of large sacks hitting the ground. A tear rolls down his eye. He stops reciting. The gunshots stop.
He ceases his chant and looks to the ceiling, muffling Δίας amongst the metallic dripping. He turns to the opening behind him, the staircase that brought him into the attic. Far below, the sound of a chained wooden door rattles. He watches the blood drip into the plate as a violent repetition of gunfire shreds the silence from far below, the metal links slink down, scattering on the hollow wood. The blood in the salver ripples from the vibrations. A kick.  The inevitable thump. And then another as a door downstairs crashes open. Blood dribbles over the side of the plate. His eyes follow blood’s dotted path to the top of the stairwell, that leads down. Darting flashlights seep from the floorboards.
“He is nearby,” the Steward’s authoritarian mouth says from below.  “Find him. ALIVE.“
 The injured man shudders to the Steward’s voice.
“Come out, come out wherever you are!” a younger voice says.
In the silence, Iapyx strains his face to the floor, looking thorough the small spaces.  He hears faint whispering, as their steps, followed by their shadows, disperse in different directions.
Iapyx looks for a place to hide. He focuses on the dark corners away from the light penetrating through the tall arrays of stained glass. He scans the rolls of fabric, the trunks, even looking up into the rafters. In the corner, he sees a cast-iron tub. Full of hope, he darts up and slowly turns the screeching tap, his face grimacing as if the sound did not exist if he alone could not hear it. Nothing.
 On a table rests a holder offering a sabre. The light from the stained glass glints the curved edge. He studies it, gulps deep. “Lord Steward said he is here,” a voice says from below.
 In trying to find a place to hide or escape, the floor creaks. Silent, Iapyx stands still. He hears only the ticking of the salver and his wheezing breath. He remains hunched, frozen, as if the act of standing up were interrupted. With his next creak, he stands up fully, defiant.  A look of annoyance and resolve mark his face. He looks down to the top of the staircase at his feet.  The attic door slowly squeals open. The ladder unfolds and drops, banging the floor. A streak of light shoots up into the attic. Below, two men thrust their rifles into the dark staircase as their cartridges shake and rattle. The first rung of the ladder creaks. Iapyx steps back. The uneven steps of two men mark their ascent up the creaking ladder, announcing the first step of the stair. With every creak from the stair, Iapyx backs up, maintaining his eyes on the stairs, until finally he backs into the window pane. He looks at the glinting sword and steps forward. His left fist clenches as he stands upright. He looks at the stairs as a pair of heads rise slowly beyond the floor’s plane, like erect creatures emerging from the sea.
The salver, surrounded by a small pool of blood, is shaking. The steps drum the wooden floor. Two boots, running, pound the floor, toppling the salver, sending it emptying and crashing like a cymbal. It rotates around, wobbling like a hula-hoop, its edges tracing tracks in the pool of blood. The ammunition belt clinks as they run by. The stained glass scatters and sliods across the floor like blocks of ice. sliding into the overflowing blood, its coloured edges damming the blood from spreading, sending in the light from day into the unsettled, dusty attic.
The pair of armed men stand in front of the shattered pane, dumbfounded. They watch Iapyx drag himself across the green lush lea, under a calm, blue cloudless sky where Seagulls circle in the distance effortlessly. Behind the pair, a well-dressed man pushes them aside. He watches the injured man scurry away. “Find him. NOW,” the steward says. They nod and turn, running frantically down the stairs. Standing in front of the window, the tail of his black Nehru collared jacket flaps, as the Steward reaches into his top pocket, pulling out a smooth square stone with a dial, it is moving slowly. He overlooks the pausing men below, watching them quickly huddle. They point in various directions and disperse, scattering in different directions. A guard dressed like the Steward enters and follows the Steward’s glare out the broken window.
“Water is everywhere,” the Steward warns the guard.
Without receiving any further instructions, the guard nods to the Steward and leaps through the jagged frame, landing on the ground comfortably from the four storey attic. The steward watches the dial twitch at the middle setting.
Under the distant sounds of boats and seagulls calling, Iapyx drags his injured body over the rocks, through the tall, swaying glass to tip of the cliff.  He stops at the edge, looking at the waves crashing against the foaming rocks below. Eight armed men form a horseshoe around him. Two guards approach the horseshoe. They carry a wooden chest, each holding a handle with both hands.  A series of clasps snap open. They reach in and remove two pairs of meshed iron gloves, engraved with the image of the promethean fire, the alpha flame. Placing them on, they slide their hands in to the chest, straining in pulling out the head, the dead weight of a thick chain. Each link clinks as it rubs on the corner of the chest. It slithers out lustreless, like a dead serpent spotted with ancient blood; its skin occasionally showing the jagged scars of talon marks.
The horseshoe of guards slowly closes in. Cornered at the edge of the cliff, Iapyx continues to look over the edge.”Step away. Its over”, an armed guard says. Iapyx backs farther to the edge, the tips of his heels sift the edge, sending clots of earth falling. The same guard, lowers his rifle, and extends his open hand.  Iapyx shuffles farther to the edge, only the balls of his feet keep him from plunging. The wind swoops his dribbling red globules, carrying it vertically, floating as if it were a feather. The long thread of sinewy blood stretches and snaps in the wind.
The steward nears. He is running, calling out instructions frantically. “Stop him. Stop him immediately.” The guard uncoils from the strap and removes the rifle. With his hands held up in the air, the rifle’s cord stirs in the wind as if he were holding up a flag marking his surrender. He slowly lowers the rifle to the ground while holding his free hand up. He stands up, while maintaining his hands in the air, gesturing for permission to put them down.  The wind becomes unnaturally strong. The guard reaches out his hand. Turning his face to shield himself from the wind, he extends his arm fully. The Steward is getting closer, yelling frantically, the stone dial twitching wildly in his hand “Stoop himmmmm! Stoooop himmmm!”
In the wind, the roaring sound of a turbine engine drowns out any further instructions.
Mere metres away, the Steward, accompanied by a well-dressed guard, arrives shouting “SHOOT HIM! SHOOT HIM! The wind seers the saliva from his frothing lips. He witnesses Iapyx let himself go.
All the guards rush to the cliff, joining the Steward in watching Iapyx plummet. “IAAPPPPPYXXXXXX!” the Steward screams.  
The Steward reaches for the gun on the ground and points it into the waves.
“No one could have survived that fall,” the guard says.
The Steward leans over the edge, examining the water far below.
“Perhaps you are right”, the Steward says, backing up. “No man could survive this fall.”
He turns and with the barrel of the gun smashes the guard in the head, sending him into the water. 
“But he is not just anyone, is he?”  he says, turning to address the remaining, bowing men. The Steward hands the rifle to the well-dressed guard.
The well dressed guard dismisses them. They all bow to the steward, take a step back and acquiesce in the now calming wind.
The guard stands beside the steward, looking into the water. They stare at all the life in the busy bay, as if it were a portrait reminding them of another place. Commotion marks the boats as boaters alternate between pointing into the water where two bodies splashed and the two figures from atop the cliff. A police boat circles back around.
“Your thoughts , my lord,” The well dressed guard states, looking into the water.
 “He will be back. There was something here for him,” the steward says.
The steward pulls out the square stone with a dial made of slate. The dial is motionless. The guard leans in, looks at the counter. The Steward places his hand on the guard’s shoulder, his ring clinks against his shoulder.
“No, it did not find him either. But you too will have your revenge,” the steward says. “Now. It is only a matter of time.”
The Police boat stops at the rocks below. “Remain where you are!” the authority signals. “This is the police.” Emotionless, the well-dressed guard cocks the automatic rifle.
***
Warm and etherized, Iapyx floats in blue ripples. His days flicker before him as a motion picture. He sees the stained glass, the shards on the floor, the clinking ammunition. He hears the chain scattering on the floor like a thousand tic-tacs. He floats from the window, soars in the clear blue sky, momentarily climbing and, as if he were too near the sun, his scorched wings fail him. He falls. Fast. 
The images shufffle is sucession.
The stained glass puts itself together.
The salver rights itself.
 The attic door closes. Iapyx chains the door.
White clouds roam the blue sky like a herd of buffalo.
Iapyx boards the plane. He pictures the green lady waving good-bye with her light and her gleaming crown. He watches the busy streets with so many lights, grow smaller and smaller. Good-bye York.  From high above, the lights become streaks of red, flowing, like lava devouring the city, bubbling out of view, becoming only a vagary. Like those red lips.
Speeding-up, the images appear.
The billboards pass.
The people walk by.
Head down.
Some eyes look up, catch Iapyx’s.
A pair of eyes.
The sun rises. Falls. The moon chases.
Again.
Again.
The moon hangs against night’s collarbone, its blemishes surround the circle like a beaded Victorian broach. 
The steam rises like a stygian mist above the gold trimmed tea cups. It rises clenched, like two intertwined, billowing sinews, dissipating among the clatter of spoons and saucers. Two wrists extend across the table and flip over, palms open. Iapyx holds her hands. His face rises. Her arms reach out. She leans forward. Her belly presses against the table. Her shirt is wrinkled at her breasts. The ‘U-neck’ collared sweater marks the beginning of the tanned dune on which Iapyx’s eyes climb her chest, straddle the stalk of her neck, and ascend her chin. And the world he believed he could have known.
Bright light.
Blinding light.
A glimpse of the face.
Inside a Dojo, ancient weapons line the walls: Double Daggers, Double Broadswords and Large Sweepers are mounted matter-of-factly.  Lustreless Sabres with worn hilts, Double Sai - its  brown leather unwinding  from the handle - and Tiger forks lays spread on a table meaningfully, like an array of cutlery.
Iapyx, in a thick, white Kimono bows to the master donned in white. Their swords play, rub, clash. Blue and red veins swell from their feet, pushing the skin forward. Their feet slap the wooden floor, echoing throughout the Dojo and out its windows. The symphony of sweeping feet, swooping and clashing swords is heard outside the wooden temple, escaping out the framed open windows beyond the blossoms and nearby pond in the mountains.
Iapyx bows to his Master, the top peg of kimono comes undone. His master bows back, releasing the chopsticks that keep her long black hair in a bun letting her hair fall. Auburn hair flashes atop the black. She places her hand on his shoulder letting him know he can stand upright. She smiles and clips the peg back in to the loop of his kimono. 
The moonlight traces the tips of a woman’s slender fingers unclipping the pegs of a thin, evening kimono. These lips are different.
Blaze of light.
 Places. Faces all flash. Face of ages. Hollow faces that crash, splitting open, the hardened clay falling in chunks.
The faces flash like locust light, like a million feet stampeding beneath a darkened door, blocking the light from a lit hallway. They flash like jolts of electricity, causing Iapyx to jerk, arch his back. A women’s face is forming. Quickly, a bright, blue light, like a single shaft of electricity, expands, shrouding Iapyx’s view.
Loud.
Disconnected.
Iapyx spasms in the electric light. A blue sea without memory as far as eyes can see. The trilling becomes louder, pulling Iapyx at the seams, fraying his ends, bending his spine. Sabrina’s face flashes before Iapyx. The final face.
Then.
Silence.
And darkness.
Faceless darkness.
Sabrina’s face is no more.
The warmth from her red, lively lips turns bright white then grey. Her eye lashes and nose disappear into the nothingness. Her face trickles away. The after image of Sabrina’s face morphs into a golden light, outlining a leafless tree.
A new branch extends.
It is bright. It is buzzing. It brightens. It blinds.
Iapyx arches his back as if it were touched by an electric whip. It sizzles like white noise. And dissonance replaces memory as he starts his life again.
I am. What am I?