The Magic Circle by Katherine Neville (top 10 books of all time txt) 📕

was stacked with papers and writing tools, with more books piled on tables, chairs—even the floor—throughout the room.

Up the next curved flight of steps, on the second tier, was the room Wolfgang said would be mine, with a large comfortable bed, an armoire, a sofa, and an attached bath. The two rooms above were alternate bed-work-living spaces, and by the abundance of research materials and papers, the computer, and other equipment in one of these, it was clear this had been put into use as Wolfgang’s office. Each room had several tall, slitlike fenestrations fitted with windows that opened to overlook the broad, grassy courtyard below.

The top floor just under the skylight was Wolfgang’s suite, which like my room boasted a large private bath. But in other respects it was unique. Suspended almost fifty feet above the ground, it was a sweeping O-shaped ribbon about twelve feet wide that circled the outer wall of the tower, leaving open the twenty-odd feet at the center, ringed by a protective railing of hand-rubbed wood. At night, as now, light from the twinkling lamps embedded in the tower walls was reflected from beneath, as well as the softer lights through the glass walls of the lower rooms that seemed to float beneath us as if supported by clouds.

We walked around the curved space so I could really see it. There was a raised platform for a bed on one side, a seating area with wardrobes and dressing space on the other, and between them a large brass telescope pointed toward the sky.

The stone wall of the tower flared outward from waist level, laced with machicolations—those slits common in the turrets of medieval fortifications, from which the besieged could rain down heavy stones on their besiegers. These machicolations had been fitted by Wolfgang with windowpanes that opened inward and could be locked in place like shutters.

The suite had a much higher ceiling than the other rooms, placed as it was up under the heavy angular beams crisscrossing the dome of beveled skylights. As Wolfgang had pointed out, by day the massive skylight-roof would provide additional light throughout the tower. Now the dazzling stellar array of the night sky fanned out like a giant bowl of light through which shone the whole star-spangled universe. It was a truly wonderful space.

“Sometimes when I am here,” Wolfgang said, “I lie in bed at night and try to imagine what Odysseus must have felt—lost and wandering all those years, with sometimes his only companions the silence of deep space and the cold, immobile indifference of the stars.”

“But in a room like this,” I said, “I would think, if you were very quiet, you could hear the constellations singing: the music of the spheres.”

“I prefer human voices,” said Wolfgang.

He took me by the hand and drew me across the room. In the outer wall he opened one of the windows to let in the fresh, cool air from the river below. Then he switched off the outdoor lights still illuminating the ramparts and outer courtyard, so we could see the countryside. We stood side by side and looked down on the twinkling lights pouring across the rolling hills and, farther out, the double serpent path of lights outlining the undulating Danube. On the river, the moon’s circular reflection was broken into ribbons of silver, all that illuminated the surface of the deep, dark water. In this magical place, for the first time in weeks I began to feel at peace.

Wolfgang turned to me in silence and set his hands on my shoulders. Against the glittering night glow, his eyes refracted light like translucent crystals of aquamarine. Between us a wave was slowly building; I could hear its rumble moving toward a roar. Wolfgang finally spoke.

“Often, it’s hard for me even to look at you,” he said. “You’re so astonishingly like her, it can be devastating.”

Like her? What was that supposed to mean?

“My father took me to see her when I was only a small child,” he went on. Though his hands still rested lightly on my shoulders, he was gazing down at the river, as if lost in a dream. “I remember she sang ‘Das himmlische Leben’ by Mahler. Later, when my father took me backstage to present to her the small flower I’d brought, she looked at me with those eyes.” He said in a strange, choked voice, “Your eyes. The first instant I saw you in Idaho, even though you were wrapped up like a polar bear and all I could see were your eyes; they riveted me.”

Holy shit! Could this be happening? Was this man I was so obsessed with in love with my grandmother? What with the week I’d just been through, all I could think of to remedy the way I felt was to catapult myself through that open machicolation like a medieval cannonball. To make matters worse—though I hardly needed help in that department—my damned tempestuous Irish-Gypsy blood was gushing its way to my telltale face again. I abruptly turned away from Wolfgang, and his hands dropped from my shoulders.

“What have I said?” he asked in surprise, swinging me back to face him before I could get control. When he saw my expression, he looked at me in confusion.

“It isn’t what you’re thinking, you know,” he said seriously. “I was only a small boy at the time. How could I have felt, back then, the way I feel now as a grown man?” He ran his fingers through his hair and added in a frustrated voice, “Ariel, I never seem able to explain myself properly to you. If I could only—”

But he’d grasped both my arms above the elbow, and I gasped as the scorching pain shot up my arm. I felt my face contort.

Wolfgang quickly released me. “What is it?!” he said in alarm.

I gingerly touched my arm and smiled through a glaze of tears.

“Good lord!” he exclaimed. “You don’t still have those stitches?”

“My appointment with the doctor to remove them was