Episode Two: Giorgio, Il Grifone
Standing in my doorway is a tall, well built man.
I know him by his silhouette alone, though he says nothing.
“Welcome, Giorgio,” I say, trying not to let the sigh in my voice be heard.
“Hey, Rob.”
His voice is more trepidatious than I think I have ever heard it.
Giorgio is maybe the most confident person we've ever met.
Not more confident that Adalbert.
Well, I prefer to forget about Adalbert.
I don't think that's going to be possible.
“Are you busy? You mind if I come in?”
I laugh, suddenly in good cheer. “When am I ever busy, il Grifone? Come on in.”
As he makes his way across the room, I light the other candle and prepare to replace the first. When he sits down, I ask, “What brings you by?”
“It's the first days of summer.” Giorgio, il Grifone as his friends – and enemies – and frienemies – alike call him – is not a beautiful man. Only a few years my senior, his features are plain, rather than striking. His eyes are dull, but intelligent. But his presence is that of a noble. Today, his bearing is that of someone nervous – anxious is probably a better word. If I didn't know him, I might think he is terrified of me.
“Yes. Year of Our Lord nine and hundred.”
“You going to join the festivities?”
I'd been rolling a Mwg. I look up from my work and across the desk at him. In the dark, the only light that of the twin flickering candles, I can't read his expression.
“Should I be?”
“I might've known you'd say something like that.”
“Will I be missing something?”
“A good time?” He laughs, but it isn't his laugh. I can tell he is perplexed.
He does not understand you.
It doesn't matter.
He can't.
“More like a dagger in my back.” I said this in an attempt to lighten the mood. After it was out of my mouth, it didn't feel like a joke anymore – it felt like the truth.
“Oh, come on. Genoa's not that kind of city and you know it.”
“People are murdered all the time.”
“All right, but—“
Suddenly, with a hiss and the stink of Sulfur, I'm holding a Draig, suspended between my fingertips. I hold it to the Mwg. Puff it, get it lit, and pass it to him.
“Ah! Thank you.” He takes a deep pull on it – the kind of pull where even if you aren't aware of it consciously, your body knows that you need to chill the fuck out, bro. Then he looks down at it like he might pass it back. “You know, I should probably feel something about smoking this.”
Francis sure as shit would never feel that way.
“Don't worry about it. It's what you pay me for.”
“That's the thing – I don't pay you anything.”
I shrug.
“It can't be easy to get.”
“What are you fishing for?”
“Aw, all right. Really though? This is what you spend all your money on? Don't know if I would share.”
“That's what it's for. Enjoy it.”
“Maybe I will.”
He didn't need to know about the opium in my cheek.
“It's hot. Not in here. Well, in here, too, I guess, but— It's hot. I don't remember it ever being this hot. Millennials say that The End is nigh.”
“The End is always nigh. But you're not wrong. It's hot.”
“You don't think it's a good thing?”
“It's good for some, sure. But the bitching will start as soon as Calendimaggio ends.”
“Bitching.” He chuckles weakly. “It is good for farmers, is it not?”
“Good for armies, too.”
“Ah. Then you see war on the horizon?”
“War is always on the horizon.”
“The last two, three hundred years, since Rome—“
“I don't want to talk about Rome.”
“I know, I know, I'm just saying— All anyone's known since then is hardship, war – death. The winters too long, crops failing—“
“And the Vikings. Did you come here to talk politics?” He was grumping me out. After Francis, the last thing I wanted to talk about was more politics – regardless of whether Giorgio was a politician, and disregarding that I knew it, or otherwise.
“Nooo. It doesn't feel different to you?”
“Every day feels the same as the last.”
Miserable.
“Hmm.” He examines his Mwg as though it might contain the secrets of the universe. Or be the cause of the thought he's having.
“That's a shame, I think.”
“Think what you like.” I'm trying to smile at him, but I can't help but hear that everything I'm saying is... decidedly negative.
“Change is coming, Robert Longshore.”
“Maybe the gods have decided they've had enough of people like you, so they're going to scrap the whole human people thing.”
“People like me?”
“The nobility. But, hey – if it turns out to be your Christian god, at least he didn't break his promise. Maybe he or one of his lesser cohorts has decided to roast the world alive in a Brazen Bull.”
“A Brazen... Bull?”
“Yeah. A mythical torture device. Person is forced into the belly of a bull made of bronze. A fire is lit beneath. Horror ensues.”
“I see. Do you really think that?”
“Don't look to me for comfort for your soul. I don't make my living lying to you and your kind – I'll never tell you that any sort of righteous god would allow your soul to pass to any sort of... pleasant afterlife. Go to Santa Maria if that's what you want. There's a priest, there. He can't be nearly as expensive as one in a larger diocese.”
“What if you're not wrong?”
I hadn't expected to hear that out of his mouth. Come to think of it....
“Has anyone ever said that to you?”
He must have noticed my reaction.
They haven't, have they?
“If the Millennial prophets are not wrong,” I correct him, “then they're 100 years early.”
“Yeah, but.... Does anyone know when Jesus actually lived? A millennium, a century— It's been a damn long time. You'd think if he were coming back now....”
“There's a big difference between 100 and 1000.”
He knows that.
He means people don't know what words mean.
They don't!
“No one even knows if he lived.”
“Are you denying Our – Your – Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ?” I can't tell whether Giorgio is being playful or accusing me of blasphemy.
“The only thing we can know for certain is that we can know nothing for certain.”
“Aristotle. Right. You talk about him all the time.”
“Socrates— Plato, really. You Christians really love getting those three mixed up.”
“Not all of us can afford to spend our time reading old books, Sorcerer.”
There it is again. Sorcerer.
My skin tingled. “Don't call me that. It's how rumors get started.”
“Rumors?” Giorgio laughs. “My friend, your sorcery would be the least interesting of the rumors I've heard about you.”
“Hm.” I'm rolling another Smoke.
“You got plans, then? Keeping you from Calendimaggio?”
Another Draig hisses a flame to life.
“My plan for today is the same as tomorrow, as every day since you've known me.”
“To sit in the dark and smoke your face off— alone. Got it. And your wife?”
“You'll have to ask her yourself.”
“Regina?”
“Don't do that. You didn't come here to pry into my life. What do you actually want?”
“Didn't I? … How many times have I sat in this terrible chair and talked to you? Talked, talked, talked – smoked your – what do you call it? Dum— dumbarana? Talking your ear off. Is there a myth about that? Huh, storykeeper? Is there a god with no ears who can't hear the prayers of his people because they've prayed him deaf – or mad from all the talking?”
Is that not what the Christian god is?
“Always me talking. And you sit there, and you say your pithy sayings and ask your wise-sounding questions. And maybe I am just that boring to you. Maybe you really do have all the answers.”
Who is he trying to convince? Me, or him?
“That's what they say about you. That's what my father thinks. My father thinks you're magick. Like the old magick. Like from the bible and stuff. He says that if you are not, that the others – the rest of the Consul – the others believe that you are.”
“Your father is also a rich man.”
“Who puts himself above and before all others, yes. I am very well aware.”
He stops, putting the Mwg to his lips and taking the last drag. Careful not to burn our fingers on the remaining ember, we trade Mwgyn across the desk. I stamp the dead one out in the dish with its kin. I leave it, a tilted monument among the ashes and corpse tombstones.
“What is magick? What is it really?”
I consider him a moment while I roll another Mwg. It's never fun to disillusion someone.
Not like I'm going to change how he feels.
About anything but you.
“Magick is a lie. Magick is... magick is wanting something so badly you lie yourself into believing you made it happen. Magick is a system of systems for teaching yourself to tell and believe the biggest lie of all: that you have any impact on the world.”
“Then magick is also a dream, a wish. Dreams come true. Wishes are granted. People – individuals – do change the world.”
But not because they wished hard enough.
“If you really think about it, I think magick is real. The lie is the lie.”
“If you really think of it, nothing is real and everything is a lie,” I counter
“But if nothing is real and everything is a lie, then what does it matter if magick is real? Why is it wrong to believe that you have some measure of control? Of your imaginary world – of your make-believe self?”
“It's not. It's human nature.” I shrug.
“Then that's all there is? What's the point?”
“The Truth.”
“The Truth?”
“It shall set you free.”
“Yeah?” He laughs. “Free from what?”
“Suffering. Life. Ignorance.”
“I don't think those are in the right order.”
“I don't think it matters.”
“It does if you're writing a book.” He smiles at me, teasing, but genuine. “Have to get your principles in order if you want to be like those guys you talk about all the time. Your philosophers, your Buddha.” When I don't react, he pushes a little sigh out of his nostrils. “Do you think you could get so high that you were casting spells by accident?”
No. Because you have to write spells.
That's not what he means.
“I – I don't know. I've never thought about it.” I didn't. And hadn't.
“What is it you always say that Buddy guy said about the Route to Suffering?”
“It's Buddha and you know it. You just said it.” He quirks an eyebrow and the corresponding corner of his mouth at me. “The first Noble Truth is that life is suffering. The root of all Suffering. And he says that it's desire— Desire is the root of all Suffering.”
“That's what a wish is, right? A dream? Your desire? Your heart's desire?”
I nod. “Yes. Wanting things, anything, leads only to suffering. Getting the thing is never enough. When want is worried after.”
“Then you really don't?”
“Don't what?”
“You really don't do this for yourself. If what you're saying is true, you don't even want your success, your riches, the loves of at least two women – and who knows how many more before you came here. … Yet you desire none of it.” He pauses. Looks into one of the candles, then back at me. “Did you?”
I nod.
“And now you have it. Isn't that magick?”
“If I didn' know that it was my choices that gave me opportunity to see my desires become my Gordian Knot, I might agree with you. But it was no spell. There was no ritual. There was chance – and choice – and many, many people who helped me along the way. And whom I helped, to earn theirs.”
“Is that, like, some kind of food? Do you mean like you're a pretzel? Pretzels are good shit.”
“What? Oh, you mean the Gordian Knot?”
Does he only listen to the first thing I say? Why do I bother saying anything?
“No. I mean— It's a long story. Actually, for folk-lore, it's a damned short story.
“Basically, there was a town in the East. An oracle said that the next person to drive into town on an ox-cart would be their king. The next man to drive into town with an ox cart the city made king. That driver's son – you might have heard of him – his name was Midas. Dedicating the cart to the god the Greeks knew as Zeus, Midas tied it to a post with an elaborate knot. A knot that no one could untie.”
“Did anyone ever untie it?”
“Strictly speaking? No. Later, when that city was a satrapy of Persia, another oracle declared that anyone who could untie the knot would be the king of all of Asia.”
“And?”
“Alexander cut it with his sword.”
“I see. Do you believe the story?”
“Literally? No. It wasn't the gods or the cosmos opening up or whatever you want to call it. Nothing responded to my Will.”
“Doesn't seem like you're talking to me anymore. More like you're arguing with one of those quips you're always saying.”
The eyes to see and the ears to hear.
No. I almost went a whole conversation without think of him.
It's been seven years, Rob....
“You'll find anything if you look closely enough,” I finally say.
“Even the Truth?”
When I say nothing, he suddenly switches conversations on me.
“What do you think of that?”
“Of what?”
“My father. What he thinks about you.” He looks at me hard for a moment. His eyes are conflicted.
“What? Just say it.”
“My father wants me to... I don't know. Take you under my employ. To keep you close to the Consul.”
“To keep me off the Consul, he means.”
“Yes.”
“You think I want a spot on the consul.”
“I do. But every man in Genoa does. I, however, do not wish to....”
“Make me your pet wizard?”
He winces. “You're not a wizard. You have never been false in your dealing with anyone, as far as I can tell.”
“And you've looked. You are vetting me, then. Have you come with an offer, or... are you prospecting?”
“I don't know.” Giorgio's face is as conflicted as his voice. “I felt... I wanted to talk to you, today. I wanted to warn you. You've caught Father's attention.”
“What should I know that you think I don't?”
“My father is a... secretive man.” He sighs. “Have you ever heard of an Order that call themselves the Scholeío Demiourgoi?”
I blinked slowly.
On the inside I'm on the verge of a screaming panic.
“I'm not sure whether they still exist. Or if they ever really did. My father thinks they did. And he... is patient. He says they have a plan. That they used to organize the whole world. Until... well, you don't want to talk about Rome. Genoa is growing restless, Rob. I think that you of all people must know that better than anyone. Following your course through Genoa is... not an happy one. It is not only the Consuls and their hopeful rivals who remember the prosperity before—“
“The Fall of Rome. Yes, yes. Everything goes back to Rome with you.”
“Genoa was burned to the ground!”
“By the Vandals, yes. Or was it the Goths? Visigoths, Ostrogoths... New Wave? Hard to keep your Goths straight.”
“You're trying to be funny. I am being serious.”
“You're telling me that your father believes in an occult cabal of illuminati that control the world. But look at the world. If this is under control, then there really is no hope.”
“Then you have heard of them. I see. Then he is wrong. You are not one of their agents.”
I nearly swallowed my tongue. “I'm not.”
Not anymore.
“Then what are you, Robert Longshore? Is that even your real name?”
“I'm just a human. No different than you.”
“You are plenty different from me, friend. Be honest with me, Sorcerer. If I offered you a place at my side, would you take it?”
“No.”
“No hesitation. Even if I told you I could connect you to an older world of knowledge than that in which you currently reside?”
“You don't know in which world I reside. I've read the old wisdom. I have connections in the East. Not everyone is a target of the Saracens. And besides—”
“Yes. Francis. I don't want to talk about this anymore.”
“What do you want to talk about,then?” I handhim another Draig and Mwg. I've lost track of how many we've smoked by now. He lights it, and, exhaling, asks:
“Do you think about Good and Evil?”
“You know I do.”
“I know you have these books. But I can't know what you think about.”
“Fair enough. Plato said—“
“Not what Plato thinks. What do you think?”
“...I don't think Evil exists.”
He chuckles. “But that's... silly. Of course Evil exists.”
“Does it? You can't hold it in your hand.”
“Well, no, but—“
“And does the evil man think he is Evil? Or does he think that he is doing what's necessary? Was Julius Caesar Evil when he and his soldiers raped and pillaged their way through the Germanic tribes? Was Charlemagne Evil when he Christianized the Franks and Saxons, et al?”
“I'm not sure what you mean, Sorcerer. Caesar's men profited. The Roman people benefited. His actions weren't Evil.”
“Do you think the people they killed, the lands they salted, believed the Romans were Good? Evil, friend, is in the eye of the beholder.”
“You just called me friend.”
I glare at him.
“All right, yeah, but there are people who are objectively Evil.”
“Are they Evil, or are the Selfish?”
He pauses. “Explain.”
“Imagine a man whose greatest joy is taking life. When the wolf kills the rabbit, the rabbit and its loved ones do not name the wolf as Evil. The wolf is hungry. The rabbit became food. Is a man who hungers for human lives Evil – or is he a Wolf in men's clothing?”
“He's Evil!”
“Then a soldier who enjoys killing is an Evil man? His killing benefits his king and his country. For them, he is Good. A tool serving its function. Under the correct command you might even say in skilled hands.”
He looks into his lap. “What of me, then? Am I Evil?”
I say nothing.
“If an Evil man is not Evil, but is selfish....”
He looks down, then away.
For a moment, I wonder what he is thinking, whether I've gotten through to him. Then he looks at me.
“Is the wolf selfish that he has his fangs? Am I selfish that I have my father's wealth – that I was born to power? Am I selfish for wanting to use it?”
I look at him a long while. There is a lot to say, and no way to really satisfactorily answer his questions. I try anyway.
“The wolf is not sorry. Are you selfish? I wouldn't ever call you selfish. Aristotle said that a man is not his profession, he is his habits – he is what he does. Things are what and how they are. There is no reason. There is no Good. No Evil. Justice, Honor, Order – these are words, nothing more. If you want my advice—”
“But people believe in them. They shape their lives by them.”
“People shape their lives around fairy tales and lore, too. People believe in plenty of things that aren't real.”
“...You know, sometimes I wonder whether there isn't some truth to those old stories.”
“...I'm – I've got to say – I didn't expect you to be skeptical.”
“Of the Church shit? I've heard the stories. None of them happened here. In Genoa. Why didn't my people spawn the Christ, you know? Were their gods false? How could they be so foolish to worship false gods?”
“They're all false.”
He laughs. “No. No way. Too many people believe.”
“Look at Muslims, friend. Their kingdoms grow in wealth and power, but already the holes, the... cognitive dissonance, the space between what the Word says and how the Elite....”
“Christendom is no different.”
“Like Father, like Son. The line of Abraham is doomed to repeat his sins.”
“Then what is the answer?”
“What is the question?”
“I am a member of the Consul.”
“That is not a question?”
He sighs hard through his nose. Looks at his Mwg. At me. The conflict in him – between his heart and his mind, you might say – is written all over his face.
I want – I wish I could help him.
Then do it. Tell him what he wants to hear.
That what he is doing is already what he should be? How could I lie to him like that?
It's not a lie if you believe it.
“How do I... be Good?”
“That's what you were put here to find out, don't you think?”
“That is a shitty answer, Robert.” He laughs, then” “I am finding out. I'm asking a wizard friend. A friend I've helped make among the wealthiest men in Genoa.”
“I don't have an answer for you. I don't even know why I'm alive.”
“I see. I – and the Consuls – am aware of your dealings with Francis – and his dealings with the Muslims. I nearly tripped over him on the way here. I hid myself, don't worry. He didn't see me. If he did – well, everyone knows why someone would come to this part of town, and it's not to visit the Synagogue or enjoy some hallah. But Francis – and Regina – cannot offer you the Power, the Prestige—“
The guaranteed capture and subsequent execution—
“That I can.”
“Giorgio, I do not want either power, nor prestige. You are not the only person who needs me.”
“Need. That is an ugly word. Am I to abandon this life that was given to me? My responsibilities, and be as you?”
“I would never recommend that anyone be as I am.”
“Then what? I give my wealth to the poor so that I am likewise poor and powerless?”
“Do what you want,” I shrug. “What difference does it make in the end?”
“What do you want, then, huh? You want to sit here, in the dark, reading your old books and wasting what you've been given?”
You don't even read them. How many of them have you read? All the way through.
He takes a breath and smiles.
“I'm not sure that was meant for you. Forgive me, friend. I should go. Change is come to Genoa, and I mean to carpe diem.”
He stands, then looks down at me. “You are a valuable resource to a man like me. I could convince you. Others will try. But you are not for me, I think. I.... You have influenced me, whether you like it or not. Perhaps I use my power to enrich all of Genoa, eh? All of Italy? Will you be proud of me then, Sorcerer?”
“My opinion of you matters for nothing. Do something you can be proud of, that your children can be happy to continue for you. That's a good life.”
Giorgio nods, slowly, looking into the candles. “Be safe, Longshore. You may want nothing more from this life, but your journey has only just begun. I only wonder what it is you need.”
“You need to get that letter out of your secret drawer before you forget about it and think it's stolen.”
He laughs. “How did you— You know what? Nevermind. Thank you, Strega. If you are right, I will owe you one.”
“I'm sure you will.” I tip my cap to him and stab the Mwg in the dish.
I sit, trying with only middling success to keep myself from thinking about how... strange it is that two people this day have visited me with kingship and war on their minds. When I realize that the candles have burned themselves out and I am sitting in darkness and the opium is no longer in my cheek, I stand.
To the tavern, then?
Before I can agree, the door opens once more.
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