4 – HOW'S YOUR LATIN?

'Noa Drury?' he says again and once more I hesitate.

Most look to me to tell them what's going on. This one seems ahead of the game.

I consider avoiding the issue and telling him Noa Drury no longer lives here. Somehow I don't think he'd believe me. 'Yes,' I manage at last.

The shadows move on his face as he smiles slightly. 'You are the messenger?'

I nod.

'Deliver this to Ross Dwyer: Polaris viam ad divinationem circumvertit;

Et hominis spiritum transcendit.

Tu sorbeus vinum infinitatis;

Priusquam acquirant salutem labra humilitatis.'

I stare at him in horror. 'What?'

The hooded man nods. 'Deliver it for Scrydan. Ábéodan.' He bows and begins to fade away.

'Wait!' I exclaim, forgetting my fear and scrambling off my bed. 'Wait, I don't know what that means!'

The spirit disappears and the temperature creeps up.

I jump off my bed to look for him. 'Blast! Can we call him back?'

Max looks dubious. I realise he's never actually been here when I've received a message before.

'Are the spirits that visit you always that creepy?'

Scrydan's not hiding in the cupboard and he's not outside my door either.

'No, never. Who was that guy?'

'Scrydan?' Max suggests helpfully.

I rush back to my laptop and wince. 'Oh no, I'm forgetting it already. I don't know Latin.'

'What are you doing?'

'Trying to write down his message before it goes completely.'

'Polaris viam ad divinationem circumvertit – no, V.I.A.M. –'

I look at him in surprise. 'You know Latin?'

'Of course. I had to learn it at school…'

He recites and spells the rest of the message to me and finally I can look at the screen where the message is safely recorded and relax. But I still have no idea what it means.

Max is quick to assist.

'Polaris pivots the track to divination;

And transcends the spirit of man.

Thou sup'st the wine of infinity;

Before lips of humility gain salvation.'

I stare at him. 'Okay, that makes marginally more sense than it did before. But still, who was that guy? What century was he from?'

'If his native tongue is Latin it could be anywhere from the first to the fifth century,' says Max. 'But what kind of name is Scrydan?'

'And what does "Ábéodan" mean?'

'Will your computer know?' he asks.

'Isn't it Latin?'

Max shakes his head. 'Not to my knowledge.'

I type it into my trusty search engine, hoping I've got the spelling correct. We strike it lucky with a Google suggestion. 'It's Old English or Anglo-Saxon according to this site. It means farewell.'

'Which should make him from between the fifth and the eleventh century.'

'And the name Scrydan is also Anglo-Saxon,' I add, typing again. 'So if he speaks Latin and Old English, then presumably he must be from around the transition time when the Roman Empire fell in England?'

Max looks impressed with my knowledge of British history. To my credit, history is one of the few subjects I enjoy at school.

'Very good, but not necessarily,' he replies. 'Latin continued to be used in the church because of the influence of Rome and the Catholic faith.' I pause to consider this, but Max carries on. 'But what century he's from is surely not as important as who the message is for? He said to give it to Ross.'

'You're right,' I say, refocussing my attention. 'I've never had two spirits – one after the other – have messages for the same person. Coincidence, maybe?'

'Seems doubtful,' Max says with a shrug. 'Don't you think?'

'Yeah.' The more I think about it, the less coincidental it becomes. 'There's usually a gap between messages too. But it's only been a few hours since I gave the last message to Ross.'

'That Scrydan must have been waiting for his chance.'

I nod. One of the 'rules' of my engagement with the spirit world is that I can only receive more messages once the last has been delivered. I don't know if this is to prevent a bombardment of spirits at my door or what, all I do know is that failure to deliver a message also prevents Max from visiting… so, I keep doing it, even the ones I don't want to do.

'What is Ross going to think when I knock on his door with this next message from some medieval dude talking in Latin and Old English riddles?'

'To be fair, the last message from Grant wasn't exactly clear as day either, was it?' Max points out. 'Yet he didn't freak out too much about that one. Look on the bright side, at least you don't have to explain yourself to him again.'

'Yeah, great,' I say without enthusiasm. 'Now he'll just go from thinking I'm a little odd to thinking I'm out and out insane.'

The following day, I'm sitting at the breakfast table munching through another bowl of choc-pops – my staple diet at the moment – when the telephone rings on the wall beside the fridge. I glower. I don't have the patience for cold callers this time of day. Nevertheless, I swallow my mouthful and get up to answer.

'Hello?'

'Curtis Drury, please,' says a man with a wheezy voice. He doesn't sound like he's trying to sell us life insurance.

I look through the kitchen doorway in the direction of the stairs. I can just make out the faint snores of Dad coming from his bedroom upstairs.

'He's not available right now,' I say, my inner-receptionist kicking in. 'Can I take a message?'

The man huffs. 'Who is this?'

'I'm Noa, his daughter.'

'Well, Noa, my name is Mr Alfred Preston and I'd appreciate it if your father would return my calls.' There's a steely edge to his voice which rises as he continues. 'He promised he would find my Renoir!'

I presume this has something to do with the painting photos on Dad's corkboard – the same one that hasn't had any new leads pinned to it for days. Nevertheless, I summon up the remains of my civility and do my best to assuage his client. 'Sorry, Mr Preston, I'm sure he's doing his best to find it. I'll let him know you called. Does he have your number?'

'Yes, thank you. Please do.' The annoyance in his voice is replaced by surprise. Hasn't he heard a teenager be polite before?

I hang up and glare up at the stairs where I can still hear Dad snoring. He doesn't appear to be working very hard on finding Mr Preston's Renoir, which presumably has gone missing.

I've got more pressing things to think about though. I return to my breakfast and open my laptop. I type in a search for the Calix Puritatis and settle down to read while I eat.

Just then Max appears and sets off the smoke alarm with his presence (I don't know if it's something to do with electro-magnetic energy or what, but fire alarms don't like him).

'Morning!' Max shouts above the noise.

I get up and laboriously drag my chair into the middle of the room to stand on and switch the alarm off.

'Morning,' I reply when finally it's quiet.

Max beams at me. 'That's better. Thank you. How are you today on this bright and breezy morn?'

'Fine,' I grumble, dragging my chair back to the table and sitting down to my breakfast again. I'm not fine really. I barely slept and when I did I kept dreaming that that creepy spirit Scrydan was evicting us from our home. 'You sound cheerful.'

'And so should you.' He gestures to the kitchen window. 'The sun is shining and the world is alive with the joys of summer.'

'Except you,' I mutter into my choc-pops.

'Why are you in a mood?' he asks.

I sign and nod to the wall clock. It's past ten o'clock. 'Dad still hasn't come down for breakfast. Him snoring in bed isn't going to pay these,' I say, gesturing to the pile of final demand letters.

Max sobers. 'He has his good days and his bad, right?'

It's difficult to recall any good ones recently, but I suppose there are some. 'I guess. Seems to be having more bad than good nowadays.'

'Then let's chalk this up to a bad day and look forward to his next good day, shall we?'

I nod and try to smile. I can see Max is trying to cheer me up. And although I'm cross with Dad, I'm also worried about him. I know he doesn't mean to get drunk, that there's a reason for it, an unhappy reason which I can't or don't know how to fix. I look at Max, see his hopeful smile and already my spirits lift. I wish I could make Dad feel better the way Max does for me.

'Are we going to deliver that message to Ross today?' he asks.

'Hmm,' I say through a mouthful of choc-pops. 'First I want to find out who this Scrydan person is, and maybe try figure out that riddle of a message I'm supposed to pass on.'

Max sits down and leans across the table keenly. 'Oh yes, let's. I love riddles!'

'I hope you're better at solving them than I am. I'm useless.'

'I was the champion of all riddle games at parties,' says Max proudly.

I give him a heavy-lidded look. 'You played riddle games at parties?'

Max looks offended. 'Don't knock it. My parties were a good deal different to the chaotic mayhem you call parties nowadays.'

I snort. 'Yeah, like you regularly see me going to parties and getting stoned.'

'Well, come to think of it, opium was rather popular in my day so maybe they're not so different, after all.' He grins and rubs his hands together. 'So, what have we got?'

'Nothing at the minute.' I reach over my choc-pops and click a link on my laptop. 'Actually I was just about to read an article about the Calix Puritatis.'

'Oh yes, the magic chalice?'

I can tell he's teasing me, but I ignore him. It's too early. 'Cup of Purity, if you will.'

I move the laptop so he can read too and get up to fetch some orange juice from the fridge. I turn back to see Max sitting up as alert as a meerkat, his eyes wide. He stares at me.

'Have you read this yet?' he says.

'No. I just told you I was about to. Why?'

'Listen to this: "The Calix Puritatis, otherwise known as the Cup of Purity, is believed to pardon a person of their sins, allowing them safe passage to Heaven without fear of condemnation for their wrong doings…" Okay, okay, we know all that,' he says catching my look of impatience, 'but then it says "The Calix Puritatis is said to have been blessed by an eleventh century monk serving at the abbey church where now stands Ely Cathedral in Cambridgeshire, England. The first stone of what would eventually become Ely Cathedral was laid in 1083 by the presiding abbot, Simeon. However, the late 1000s was a particularly turbulent time as the abbey endured the Siege of Ely, and it is not known how the monk came to possess the Calix Puritatis or what became of it. It is commonly accepted that he stored the blessed chalice somewhere in the ruins of the original monastery, the whereabouts of which are still unknown, despite numerous archaeological excavations." Guess what the monk's name was?'

Max and I stare at each other. I forget the bottle of orange juice in my hand poised for pouring. 'Scrydan?' I say.

'Yup. That's what it says.'

I rush back to my seat to double check the article. I think back to last night's visitor. I can't quite convince myself. It seems too surreal. 'Do you really think it could be the same guy?'

'Has to be, surely,' says Max. 'First, there was Grant Fitzpatrick's message about the Calix Puritatis to Ross, and then the original owner of the chalice turns up with a message for him too. It's all connected, it must be.'

'Wow.' I gaze across the room as the magnitude of Scrydan's visit hits home. 'That means the Calix Puritatis must definitely exist. I've never had a visitor from so far back. Apart from you, they've all been really recent, like recent enough to still have direct relatives alive.'

'He had to have pulled some strings to make it happen. Transpiriting ten centuries is no small feat.'

'I guess it explains his wardrobe then if he's a monk from the eleventh century – that robe and that hood.'

'Not really my style,' says Max with a sniff. 'Presumably his message also has something to do with the Calix Puritatis. You wrote it down, didn't you?'

'Yes…' I open a folder and retrieve the document I saved the riddle in. 'Do you want the Latin or the English version?'

'Let's go English. I never much liked Latin class.'

'Okay. "Polaris pivots the track to divination;

And transcends the spirit of man.

Thou sup'st the wine of infinity;

Before lips of humility gain salvation."'

I pause to think, but like I just told Max, I'm hopeless at riddles. I turn to the 'champion' riddle master. 'Any ideas?'

Max frowns at the screen for a few moments more. 'Honestly, I don't know exactly what the message intends, but I think now we know who he is, it's pretty obvious it's about the Calix Puritatis. "Polaris pivots the track to divination…" I don't know. What do you think?'

'Polaris is a star, I know that much,' I reply. 'But I don't see what all the pivoting tracks to divination could mean. Maybe dancing to Heaven? I don't know. What about the next line? That might shed some light on it.'

'"And transcends the spirit of man…" That must mean something to do with cleansing the soul, surely? That's what the Calix Puritatis is supposed to do.'

I have no alternatives to offer. 'Sounds good to me. "…Thou sup'st the wine of infinity…" Wine is often associated with the church and holy water, isn't it? So it could mean drinking blessed water…'

'Or from a blessed chalice,' counters Max. 'Then lastly, "Before lips of humility gain salvation."'

'The drinker's lips become humble and so they get into Heaven?'

Max looks far from confident but he nods. 'In a nutshell, yes, I think so. What's it saying all together then? That something or other happens in order for the soul to be cleansed, and that by drinking from the blessed cup they become humble enough to pass into Heaven.'

We look at each other, trying to figure out what the message is telling us that we don't already know from the Internet. Just goes to show how useful Google is sometimes.

Max shrugs. 'Well, if it's not telling us anything new, I don't see any harm in giving Ross his message.'

I shake my head. 'No, I don't think we've got it completely. We haven't got that first line right. We're missing something – something important.' I pause to consider what we might be missing, what was so important that Scrydan transpirited ten centuries to tell me. 'I – I think it's a clue as to where the Calix Puritatis is.'

Max looks at me in surprise. 'You mean where it's been hidden for nearly a thousand years?'

Put like that, I can appreciate the enormity of my claim. 'Kind mindblowing, but yeah.'

Max is too deep in thought to make a joke of it. He nods soberly. 'Okay, so we give the location of the Calix Puritatis to an archaeologist. You can't get much safer than that, can you?'

I sigh. 'Yeah, I know, but even so…'

'What?'

'What if he is responsible for Grant's death?' I point out. 'If we tell him how to find this chalice that absolves a person of their sins, he'll never be held accountable for murdering Grant.'

Max sits back in resignation and holds his hands out wide. 'What do you want to do then? We can't not tell him. You know what will happen.'

I nod. 'Yeah, I know,' I say quietly.

It's in the rules of spirit engagement. If I don't deliver a message to its intended recipient, eventually Max won't be able to gain access to the mortal world and I'll never see him again. At least, not in this lifetime. And I just can't live without him around. I need him. But if it means a murderer could cheat his way into Heaven then surely it would be the right thing to do? I consider a life without Max, of just me and Dad and his gin bottle, and wince. I know I'm being selfish, but still…

'There's only one other option,' I say.

Max looks wary. 'Oh no, you have that look on your face. What are you going to do?'

'We find the Calix Puritatis first, and then give Ross his message.'

Copyright © H.R. Aidan, 2017.