“I’m not sure a lecture on colonial sins is going to help me navigate this, Jago.”
“Navigate what, exactly? Your latent powers, assuming they exist? Or are you hoping to understandmypowers? All right, let’s talk about the entropy of colonialism, since we’re on a theme. God rolls the dice of history. Nation A destroys nation B and takes what it possesses. Now, what if this had happened in reverse? Would nation B have destroyed nation A, given the chance? For greed? Religion? Sheer cruel fun? All are human temptations, and all played a part in nation B’s destruction as fate has played out for us. Now, let’s jump forward a little way. Nation A—Spain, in case that wasn’t patently obvious—has now squandered its ill-gotten gains and lost its once formidable place in the world. It falls into dictatorship a few decades later. Cut off, forgotten as the world goes to war, left to fight its own hellish dispute for a soul it has long lost. Perhaps this dictatorship is the nation’s time in Purgatory? Perhaps the religions of the East are right, that Hell is merely a temporary state to clean one’s karma before starting life anew. Let’s be honest, if in the next century tourists are lined up around the block for churros at San Ginés, I think we’re going to be okay.” He cradled Alex’s chin in hishands with sensual confidence, then put an arm around Alex’s shoulder, pointing to the hilltop building on the other side of the gardens.
Alex shuddered, recognizing the Templo de Debod. The shallow waters that had drowned Si-Man reflected the moonlight, bathing the temple’s shadow in a strange glow.
“You just never know when or where accidents will happen. What if he’d chosen not to be there at that time, in that place? Yet the poor fellow did, and his death grants us opportunity.
“That’s cold, Jago.”
“That’s entropy, and you accepted it. It’s neither good nor bad, simply fate. Like the death of an empire. Egypt falls so Greece can rise. It then falls to make way for Rome. Today, we celebrate them all. Creation grows wild in the compost of tragedy.”
Alex eyed him cautiously. “Meaning what, exactly?”
Jago put his arm around Alex’s shoulders, turning their backs on the temple and facing the palace, which rose in full illumination over the darkened gardens. “It’s too beautiful a night for this.”
“Jago?” When he got no answer, Alex slipped his arm off his shoulders and turned to face him. “You didn’t… surely?”
A conflicted look filled Jago’s eyes. “If youareone of us, then you’re the one working the magick of will here, mister director, not me.”
“Look, no more riddles!” Alex gripped Jago’s wrist. “No more bloody metaphors or grand talk about lost empires or tourists from the future. What did you do, Jago?”
“You’re hurting me.”
“Sorry.” Even as Alex let go of Jago’s arm and backed away, he felt himself shaking. Whether it was with rage, fear, or the hurt of betrayal, he couldn’t be sure. Perhaps a combination of all three, or perhaps none. “You owe me the truth.”
“The truth of what? That Si-Man lost his footing on a bender, hit his head and drowned in a few inches of water in the shadow of an Egyptian temple? I hope for his sake that Anubis isn’t a theatre critic.”
“That’s not funny.”
“Can you possibly think me so malevolent? If someone meets their fate—whether it’s a self-described artist or a hustler thieving wallets from unwary fairies on a night out—itisfate.”
Paco, the hustler. Alex remembered the flashing lights, his fleeting glimpse of his broken body. “Jago? Look at me, please.”
Jago turned his head, seeming tired all of a sudden. “I don’t murder people, Alex.”
The look on Jago’s face all but crushed him, appalled that for all his pains to dissuade and deflect his questions, to explain the inner workings of a world to which Alex, in no small act of confidence, had been invited, it still had to be said aloud.
“I saw you both nights.”
“Exactly. You were with me both nights. So why even consider such a thing, my beautiful alibi?” Jago took both of Alex’s hands in his and kissed his fingers.
“Promise me, then. Put my mind at ease, if nothing else.”
“Alex...” Jago gripped his hands tighter. “I promise you I didn’t murder those two men. I also promise that I will have yourback whenever you need me, for as long as you want me. And, if you’ll let me, that means doing everything I can to make this damn show the best thing it can be, even over two weeks, if that’s what you want. We’ll make it happen somehow.”
“Somehow?”
“I’m powerful, not inexhaustible. Whatever transpired between the four of us tonight to create what we saw…” Jago looked up at the temple again, as if its stones might reveal an idea.
“Inexhaustible? What are you telling me?” asked Alex.
Jago said nothing, rocking back and forth on his heels.
“Right. Forget it,” Alex shook his head. “If it’s that dangerous, we’ll find another way.”
“Is that all it takes for you to give up?” Jago at last smiled at him. “We’ll make it work.”
Alex shook his head, trying to do as he was told while Jago’s revelations ran roughshod through his mind. “I just want this to be great, and I felt that for the first time tonight.”
