“Mine?” marvelled Hamar.
“To use, not own. It carries the authority of your Master. Wearing it you will carry out his will among the regions. It is a robe for ordinations.” There was no life in the spectre’s voice.
Hamar had had no choice but to walk to the stand. Beside it were the Chaldean turban and a number of gold boxes.
“Leave those boxes, you need only put on the robe and turban for now,” the creature ordered. As Hamar gingerly lifted the robe onto himself the size was too big, but wearable, with long sleeves almost to the ground. He bunched up the sleeves, positioned the turban. The spectre said,”From now on these will remain in the main room ready to be worn, a mark of the Master’s rule, and your tokens of office as his Chief Astrologer.”
With that, a number of the boxes levitated and sailed ahead of them out of the doorway! Then the turban and robe pulled themselves off Hamar, and they too sailed along the hallway to join the other items! Then the phantom took Hamar back into the main room, and the robe, hat, and boxes were already positioned, lifeless, at another stand. Hamar recognized the tactic of subordinating someone via a mystery, and he tried to keep unfazed.
Staring at the show were the latest two seekers who apparently had just arrived into the cave. “They will be staying,” the spectre declared. “It is needful.” He didn’t say why, and Hamar gave way to confusion after all, while the two new men looked at each other in wonder; clearly, they’d only expected an audience with Hamar to ask him questions.
“You are Chaldean, Hamar, and can cast horoscopes,” the creature continued. “The astral charts are in another room. Come,” he motioned, and they left the two men waiting childlike behind them.
The spectre went down another long corridor and stopped him at one of the locked doors. “Parchment is there, the wooden rulers, the dial, callipers, inks. When you put your hand to the lock on the door it will open for you. But not for those other two; they are not to go in.” Hamar concentrated harder against the spectre’s control and, as if nonplused by the news, didn’t raise his hand to the latch. Then the creature’s ghostly eyes turned to the door across the hall.
“Over here is the collection of anointing oils,” it said. The door creaked open as the creature spoke, revealing rows of alabaster bottles and ornate jars on a shelf. As Hamar’s eyes adjusted he saw faint colours emanating from the containers, cut across by a buzz of tiny shadows in front of their light. “The bottles contain spells, spirits, locked into oils. Chant and they will activate on the man you anoint for rulership. No spills.”
“How will I know which one to use?” Hamar asked.
“First you’ll be visited in dreams and learn of the designated territory, the chosen ruler’s title and what the Master wants the man’s reign to do. Cast your chart of him. His details will show what powers he’ll need, and which god will govern him.”
Hamar recognised some names of demons written on the jars: Destroyer, Dessicator, Temptor, Deceiver. One odd bottle of oils was locked behind a lattice-work screen and glowed with a strange light, but the label on it was in some ancient form of Habiru he couldn’t read through the mesh. “Leave that Jewish one!” the creature said. “Come!” The door relocked behind them. “Again, only your hand will open or close these doors.”
As they filed back down the hall to the main room the creature told him that certain transporter demons would arrive each time to escort him to the new ruler’s camp or palace. Hamar would be whisked away by vortex to the ceremony where he would appear in the flesh, and read out the horoscope, and the local Priests would assist him by invoking their gods as he poured the anointing oil on the man’s head.
“You must talk with no one you see at the time,” it said. “No other Maji will dare arrive after you. Your reputation and appearance will set you above anyone else, no one will question you. Perform the rites, that is all. Do anything else and pains will come upon you that dry you out to leather.” After saying this, the spirit’s form rippled faster and faster until it disappeared from the air. Hamar was left staring.
“Ravi Melakiar Pindar, – shastri,” said the Indian man beside him, bowing low, and his African companion doing the same as he named himself as, “Kaspara Shakka, Chief medicine-man of the lion mountains.” Then they proclaimed, “Your servants Most Noble.” Hamar slowly shook his head.
He didn’t smile.
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