Anne Rice - Servant of the Bones

“Marduk, unseen by him, only listened to him and said nothing. But the High Priest lost his temper. ‘There is no god in that chair! Our god is neglected by our king and has gone into a deep sleep from which no one can wake him.’

“ ‘Look,’ I said, ‘why call me into this? What have I to do with it? You have right here in Esagila the statue of Marduk that you need for the procession. You ride with him on the great wagon, and you hold his hand, and he holds your hand and you are King of Babylon. If the priests will let you take the statue, what’s it to do with me? Have you heard some rumor, Majesty, that I can control the god or turn him against you? You need a golden idol for your work! It’s there, over there in the chapel.’

“ ‘No, my son,’ said Cyrus, ‘all that might have worked just fine if you had had a procession year after year with the god, and if the people had seen the golden idol, as you call him, and they had cheered him and your King Nabonidus, but those processions were not held, and the precious statue is not going to enter into any procession with me now, even if I wanted it to. What I need is the ceremony as it was done of old.’

“A chill passed through me. Marduk looked at me and said, ‘I know little of what he is talking about, but all spirits see far, and I see horror for you. Don’t speak. Just wait.’

“Meantime the priests were in a commotion. They had brought in on a bier a great heap of something, which was draped in linen and, now bringing it near to our table, with several torchbearers, they drew away the linen and we all gasped at what we saw.

“It was the processional statue and it was broken, and out of its rotted inside stuck bones which appeared to be those of a man, rotted, too, and half the skull showed where the thick gold-plated enamel had turned to dirt, and the whole mess lay a disgrace and an insult.

“The High Priest glowered at me. He folded his arms. ‘Did you do this, Hebrew?’ he asked. ‘Did you cause Marduk to leave the statue! To leave this city? Was it you rather than our King here whom we have so accused?’

“I understood a great deal in a moment. I looked at my god who sat staring coldly at the heap of ruin.

“ ‘Are those your bones, my Lord?’ I asked Marduk.

“ ‘No,’ he said, ‘and I only vaguely remember when they were put there. The spirit of that young one was weak, and I vanquished it and continued my reign. Perhaps it invigorated me that I was to be replaced? I don’t know , Azriel! Remember, those are the wisest words I have for you. I don’t know. Now they mean to put you in my place, that much we both know.’

“ ‘What do you want, Lord?’ I asked Marduk.

“ ‘For you not to be hurt, Azriel,’ he said. ‘But do you want to become what I am? Do you want your bones encased three hundred years in that! Until it then crumbles and another young man must be lured for the sacrifice? But let me get to your point.’ He leaned towards me.

“ ‘I forget how large your heart is, Azriel. You ask for my sake. I can tell you this, I can come and go as I wish. I banished the last replacement with a wave of my arm, and back into the fog he went. For a mortal man to be murdered in this fancy way does not necessarily make him either a god or a strong spirit.’ He shrugged. ‘Think of yourself and yourself only. What I am is…is what you know.’ Then the sadness of his face shocked me. ‘I don’t want you to die!’ he whispered.

“The High Priest could stand this dialogue no longer. He couldn’t see or hear Marduk. He was sputtering with fury. But Asenath was hearing it all and looking from me to the god with great curiosity, and Remath the sly one wouldn’t give himself away, but he knew something sat in the empty chair. He knew it. He understood something of what it said also.

“ ‘You’re speaking of a statue of gold,’ my father spoke up. ‘You can’t make a statue of gold without my son?’ he asked.

“ ‘The bones are the bones of the god!’ declared the High Priest. This is why our city is as it is, why we need the Persian deliverer. The god is old, the bones are rotten, the statue will not stand, and there must be a new god.’

“ ‘But the statue in the High Sanctuary?’ my father asked, which was a childish question.

“ ‘That can’t be carried through the streets,’ said the priests. That’s a mere hunk of—’

“ ‘Metal!’ said the prophet Enoch with a cruel smile.

“ ‘You are wasting time,’ said Cyrus. ‘The ceremony has to be done in the old way,’ he said, looking at me. ‘Explain to him, Priests, don’t just stand there. Explain. And you, my brave Azriel, what does Marduk say to you?’

“It was old white-haired Asenath who spoke up, stamping the floor first with her serpent staff to let everybody know they had better shut up for her. ‘The god says he will go or stay as he pleases, that the bones inside the statue do not matter to him, they are not his bones, that’s what he says!’ Then she looked directly at Marduk, ‘Well, isn’t that what you say, you miserable little god who trembles in the light of Yahweh!’

“The Priests were thoroughly confused. Were they to defend the honor of their Marduk, who wasn’t even supposed to be there?

“ ‘Look, my boy,’ said Cyrus, ‘become the god. Walk in the procession. You will be delicately covered in gold, though the old formula seems somehow to be…missing?’ He cast a glance at the High Priest. ‘You will be alive beneath the covering. You must live long enough to hold my hand, and to raise your other hand to your subjects. And you will live the three days it will take to fight off the forces of chaos, and then return here with me to the Courtyard of Esagila, where I shall be proclaimed King by you. We shall do it faster if we can think of some way to make that acceptable.’

“ ‘Alive, covered with gold.’ I was amazed. ‘And then?’

“Asenath spoke up. ‘By then the gold will have hardened and you will be dead. You will see and hear for a while, but you will die inside, and when they see that your eyes are rotting, they will take out your eyes and replace them with jeweled eyes, and the statue of Marduk will be your shroud.’

“My father put his face in his hands and then looked up. ‘I never saw it done in the old way,’ he said quietly. ‘But my father’s father saw it once, or so he said. And the poison in the gold is what will kill you. You’ll die slowly as the gold penetrates, as it reaches your heart and lungs, and then…as they say, you will at last be at peace.’

“ ‘This,’ said Asenath, ‘after you have been carried the full length of the Processional Way, gold and gleaming, raising your hand, even taming your head ever so slightly as the thick coating gets harder and harder.’

“ ‘And for this!’ said Enoch. ‘We will return to Jerusalem, all of us, including those in prison, and we will have the means to build the Lord God’s Temple again according to the measurement of King Solomon.’

“ ‘I see,’ I said. ‘So in the old days, it was a real man! And when the statue finally crumbles . . . ’

“ ‘You blaspheme!’ said the High Priest. ‘Those are the bones of Marduk.’

“This was too much for Marduk. Invisible or not, he stood up, throwing over the chair, and with a great thrust of his left hand sent the bones swirling in all directions. They shattered and crumbled against the walls. Everyone cowered. Even I lowered my head. Cyrus did not but stared with wild, childlike eyes, and old Nabonidus put his head down on his arm as if he would go to sleep. The prophet Enoch sneered.

“Then Marduk turned to me. He looked hard at me and then at Asenath. ‘I know your wiles, old woman. But tell him everything! Tell him the full truth of it all. You know the dead. What do they say to you when you call them up? Azriel, do what you want to do for your people and your tribe. I will be here afterwards as I am now, and whether you can see me then and give me strength, and whether I can see you and give you strength, no one knows. Whether I can talk to you, no one can say. Your soul will be tested by this grand procession, this right with chaos, this courtyard coronation, this torment! But this torment will not necessarily give you spiritual life. And you may fade in the mist with all the other weary and wandering dead. The dead of the whole world, regardless of gods or angels or demons or Yahweh. Do what you will as an honorable man, Azriel. For after it is done, I don’t know that even I, strong as I am, will be able to find you or help you.’