Down These Strange Streets (George R.R. Martin) (Kitty Norville 6.50)

“You’ve come to see the ziggurat,” speculated Antipater.

“Or what remains of it,” said Mushezib. “There’s also a very fine school for astrologers here, where I hope to find a position as a teacher. And you?”

“We’re simply here to see the city,” said Antipater. “But not today. I’m too tired and my whole body aches from riding yesterday.”

“But we can’t just stay in all day,” I said. “Perhaps there’s something of interest close by.”

“I’m told there’s a small temple of Ishtar just up the street,” said Mushezib. “It’s mostly hidden from sight behind a high wall, and apparently it’s in ruins; it was desecrated long ago by Xerxes and never reconsecrated or rebuilt. I don’t suppose there’s much to see—”

“But you can’t go there,” said the innkeeper, overhearing and joining the conversation. He, too, looked like a type who might have stepped out of a stage comedy. He was a big fellow with a round face and a ready smile. With his massive shoulders and burly arms, he looked quite capable of breaking up a fight and throwing the offenders onto the street, should such a disturbance ever occur in his sleepy tavern.

“Who forbids it?” said the astrologer.

The innkeeper shrugged. “No one forbids it. A deserted temple belongs to no one and everyone—common property, they say. But nobody goes there—because of her.”

My ears pricked up. “Who are you talking about?”

Finding his Greek inadequate, the innkeeper addressed the astrologer in Parthian.

Mushezib’s face grew long. “Our host says the temple is . . . haunted.”

“Haunted?” I said.

“I forget the Greek word, but I think the Latin is lemur, yes?”

“Yes,” I whispered. “A manifestation of the dead that lingers on earth. A thing that was mortal once, but no longer lives or breathes.” Unready or unable to cross the river Styx to the realm of the dead, lemures stalked the earth, usually but not always appearing at night.

“The innkeeper says there is a lemur at this nearby temple,” said Mushezib. “A woman dressed in moldering rags, with a hideous face. People fear to go there.”

“Is she dangerous?” I said.

Mushezib conversed with the innkeeper. “Not just dangerous, but deadly. Only a few mornings ago, a man who had gone missing the night before was found dead on the temple steps, his neck broken. Now they lock the gate, which before was never locked.”

So this was the nocturnal menace Darius had warned me about, fearing even to name the thing aloud.

“But surely in broad daylight—” began Antipater.

“No, no!” protested the innkeeper’s wife, who suddenly joined us. She was almost as big as her husband, but had a scowling demeanor—another type suitable for the stage, I thought, the irascible innkeeper’s wife. She spoke better Greek than her husband, and her thick Egyptian accent explained the Alexandrian delicacies among the Babylonian breakfast fare.

“Stay away from the old temple!” she cried. “Don’t go there! You die if you go there!”

Her husband appeared to find this outburst unseemly. He laughed nervously and shrugged with his palms up, then took her aside, shaking his head and whispering to her. If he was trying to calm her, he failed. After a brief squabble, she threw up her hands and stalked off.

“It must be rather distressing, having a lemur so nearby,” muttered Antipater. “Bad for business, I should imagine. Do you think that’s why there are so few people here at the inn? I’m surprised our host would even bring up the subject. Well, I’m done with my breakfast, so if you’ll excuse me, I intend to return to our room and spend the whole day in bed. Oh, don’t look so crestfallen, Gordianus! Go out and explore the city without me.”

I felt some trepidation about venturing out in such an exotic city by myself, but I needn’t have worried. The moment I stepped into the street I was accosted by our guide from the previous day.

“Where is your grandfather?” said Darius.

I laughed. “He’s not my grandfather, just my traveling companion. He’s too tired to go out.”

“Ah, then I show you the city, eh? Just the two of us.”

I frowned. “I’m afraid I haven’t much money on me, Darius.”

He shrugged. “What is money? It comes, it goes. But if I show you the ziggurat, you remember all your life.”

“Actually, I’m rather curious about that temple of Ishtar just up the street.”