The Rot
Page 15
Hirka picked at the green leaves in front of her. She wasn’t going to eat anything. The food here was tasteless. Lifeless. Despite the bright colors. And didn’t they know raw meat could make you ill? They were all out of their minds.
“He’s nowhere near as beautiful as he thinks he is,” Hirka replied, and she meant it. Naiell was beautiful, in a scary way. The way the blind were. But she didn’t really see the appeal.
Allegra mixed raw egg yolk into the bloody patty before looking at Hirka. “Your restraint is inhuman, my dear.”
Rime. His name is Rime.
But Hirka said nothing.
“Eat up,” Allegra said. “There’s someone I want you to meet when we’re done.”
BOUND BY BLOOD
The room was far too cluttered. But with things Hirka recognized. Things she understood. Dark bookcases. Swords fixed to the wall in the shape of a fan. A full suit of armor, with a metal helmet, gloves, and boots. The first she’d seen since leaving Ym. Hirka ran her fingers across the metal, suddenly feeling like the victim of some big joke. She’d never be allowed to forget. Every time her homesickness eased a little, the gods put something familiar in front of her. Rubbed salt in the wound.
Allegra put her hand on Hirka’s back and steered her toward some chairs in front of the fire. “Silvio, we have a guest,” she said.
The man sat in one of the chairs, squinting at a book. He looked up. He looked to be around seventy, with white hair and a fastidiously trimmed beard. Smart clothes, brown shoes. He and Allegra both wore shoes indoors—probably because they didn’t have to clean the house themselves.
“This is my husband, Silvio,” Allegra said.
“Hirka.” Hirka held out her hand. He got up and shook it but was unable to hide his uncertainty. He hadn’t been expecting anyone. His eyes shifted between her and Allegra. “I … I was …” He turned and walked over to the window. Rested his palms on the sill. He seemed confused. As if he were looking for something that used to be there. “I was trying to find something,” he said at last.
“Your dictionary,” Allegra said. “You were trying to find your dictionary.”
He nodded and returned to his chair. The book was open on the seat. He looked up at Allegra and she nodded in approval. He picked it up and sat back down. Hirka furrowed her brow. She knew what this was. He was suffering from memory loss.
Behind him, a door stood ajar. Through the opening she could see a wall covered in pictures and drawings. She had a feeling she was looking at something important, without knowing what. Allegra followed her gaze and quickly went to shut the door.
“That’s his study. You must forgive him, it’s in a terrible state,” she said. “It’s because—well, it may not seem like it, but he’s ill. I realized some months ago.”
Hirka stared at Allegra in astonishment. “Haven’t you given him ylir root?”
“Oh, sweetie, I’ve given him everything money can buy. No one and nothing can help him.”
Hirka gaped at her. She suddenly felt unsteady. They didn’t know. They actually didn’t know. She’d stopped memory loss before. It wasn’t complicated. Right enough, you lost a lot of weight, and you couldn’t eat much of what you used to without feeling nauseous, but that was a small price to pay when the alternative was slowly forgetting yourself and the people you loved.
I haven’t seen ylir root since I got here.
The room started to spin. The game the gods were playing seemed to grow before her eyes. The big joke. There were things in Ym that could save people here. And things here that could save people in Ym. Two worlds. An ocean of problems. And no trace of the Might. No way of getting through. The only one who could open the gateways between worlds was the one who wanted to destroy them.
Hirka collapsed onto a foot stool. Allegra crouched down next to her. “I know, sweetie. It’s horrible. There are no words.” She brushed Hirka’s hair behind her ear again. “But you can help us.”
Hirka shook her head. She didn’t have so much as a tea leaf left. Nothing. She was powerless to heal. “There’s nothing I can do,” she said. The words came out as a croak.
Allegra got up. “You can talk to him. You speak his language. And you can save Silvio.”
Hirka closed her eyes. Stefan’s stories raced through her mind. Graal, who spread the rot. The sickness. Kept people alive past their time. If he could keep people alive, then so could his brother. Naiell.
Allegra wanted to turn her husband into a blood slave.
Hirka stared up at her. “You hunt them, yet you want to turn the person you love into one of them?”
Allegra twisted the ring on her finger, as if it had suddenly gotten too heavy. “I don’t hunt them. Stefan hunts them. He’s always hunted them. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. He’s a simple man. He doesn’t understand that the source can also save lives, not just take them.”
Hirka shook her head. She’d come up against the forgotten. Seen what blood of the blind did to people. “They rot … they smell …”
“They don’t smell! They live! They remember! And they’re stronger and better than any normal person could ever be! Stefan has already manipulated you. He doesn’t see the possibilities. His past has blinded him. He’ll never be able to do more than hate them. He’ll never be able to give you a clear picture.”
Hirka looked at Silvio. He was leafing through the book, faster than he could possibly read. He didn’t know what he was doing. Just turning pages. He was nothing more than a shell that would get emptier and emptier with every passing day.
Allegra held out her hand. “Hirka … my dear. What would you do? If it was someone you loved? Would you save him?”
A thousand times if I had to.
But she didn’t say that. She took Allegra’s hand and pulled herself up. Allegra led her out onto the balcony. It had started to rain again. “I understand your hesitation. He’s painted a picture of the devil. But Stefan doesn’t see clearly. And he must never know. I understand them better than he does.”
“Understand them?”
“There’s a family legend concerning one of my ancestors. An artist. A respected painter who simply vanished in his youth. Some said he went off and drank himself to death. Or took his own life. But pictures that could only have been painted by him kept turning up, even after what would have been his one hundred and fiftieth birthday. In his diary, he tells of a man he encountered. A man who had seen all that the world had to offer. Who had razed cities then built them anew. Venice was one of them. His new friend was a founder, destroyer, doctor, scientist, adventurer … This man enthralled him so much that he abandoned everything to follow him. Neither wife, child, nor fortune could make him stay. His powerful new friend had teeth like a predator. Sanuto. Fang. That’s my family name.”
Hirka rested her hands on the wet railing. Looked at the houses huddled together along the canal. The rain formed rings in the water, rippling the reflection of the city. Nothing seemed solid anymore.
“I know,” Allegra said. “It’s a story that would make any vampire lover swoon, right? But it’s not like in the stories. Of all the forgotten I’ve encountered in my life, none of them has had the teeth of a predator. Or sucked blood. They’re like you and I.”
“So why do they go crazy? Why do they kill?”
“That’s the tragic part. I believe the forgotten are those who were once close to him. Friends. They live for as long as they’re useful to him. After that they have to manage on their own, and they rarely manage long at all. I think them randomly attacking people is simply the result of withdrawal.”
“I don’t know what that is.”
“Withdrawal? It’s what happens to your body when you don’t get something you’re addicted to. Do they not have stimulants where you’re from?”
Hirka ignored the more difficult words. She knew what she was getting at. Father had sold opa. She’d hated it. Yes, it had its uses, but many people were unable to control their need for it.
Hirka had to turn away. The memories came thick and fast. Rime. His white hair, heavy with rain. He’d pulled her close and pressed his lips to hers. She’d caught fire. Burned. Forgotten the world. Forgotten everything. Apart from the rot.
She’d left him because she believed in something that didn’t exist. She’d had proof. Urd’s throat. He’d said it himself. That he’d gotten the rot from her father.
Hirka stiffened. Her mind stopped racing, her thoughts all converging on one in particular. The box of poison opened, and the poison flowed through her. Ice-cold. Merciless.
She knew.
Child of Odin? Human?
No. She might have looked human, but she wasn’t one of them. Never had been. Urd had gotten the rot from her father.
The rot. From her father.
And who spread the rot here? Among the humans?
Graal.
Allegra seized Hirka’s arms. “Sweetie, don’t look so terrified! You’ve nothing to fear! The wounded king might as well be a legend. Nobody can get to him, but we don’t need to. We have a new source now, and he’s very real. His actual brother. I need his blood. Just a little. Nobody will know. You have the power to save a life, Hirka. There’s no wrong in it. No shame. There is no god or devil here. No magic. It’s just chemistry.”
Hirka had no idea what chemistry was. Or magic, for that matter. But she had a feeling they were exactly the same thing. Either way, they couldn’t help her now. Nothing could.
She looked up at Allegra. “Could I have a glass of water?” she whispered.
DESIRE
A lone flute played. It was all that could be heard, even though hundreds of men were crowded in front of the stage, all gaping mouths and stupid smiles. Spellbound by Damayanti’s dance.
Rime knew he shouldn’t be there. If he’d let them put the mark of the Council on his forehead, he wouldn’t have been able to set foot there. Or walk alone through the streets of Mannfalla. The symbol that was meant to give him all the power in the world would have become a prison.
And now it had lost all meaning.
The Seer didn’t exist, but people had other altars to worship at.
He followed Damayanti’s movements. Fluid enough to impress even Kolkagga. She was naked. Completely naked. Her body was painted in orange and red. Flames licked their way across her breasts and up her sides. The colors grew darker and darker the lower they plunged, fading to black at the junction of her thighs.
She fell backward as if her back had been broken. The melody from the flute stopped. Men gasped. An illusion. A game intended to make people think that something had gone wrong. The flute started to play again. Damayanti twisted around until she was standing on her forearms with her feet stretching toward the ceiling. Her back blazed orange. Then she lowered her feet. Slowly, slowly, until her toes touched the back of her head.
The men around him hollered and applauded. Sweaty faces glistened in the darkness, likely because of the paler seam now visible in the black between her thighs.
Rime lowered his eyes. What was he doing here? Did he really think this dancer had anything to tell him that he couldn’t find out for himself? Or was it something else that had drawn him here?
It was hard to argue with the warmth he felt in his body. He’d never been with a woman. As a son of the Council, an An-Elderin, he’d led a sheltered existence until he was fifteen. He was the successor. The child everyone had been waiting for. After the Rite he’d fought tooth and nail to be Kolkagga, and as far as he knew, there were only a handful of female Kolkagga among thousands of men, none of whom were in his camp. His training and his disdain for the Council had kept that fire at bay. He hadn’t craved female company. Or so he’d thought.
Is the rot the only thing you choose to believe in, Hirka?
His words. Back in Blindból. After the fall of the Seer. After the death of Ilume. Halfway up a mountain with the rain pelting down around them. She’d sat close to him. Held his face in her hands so all he could see was red hair and green eyes. Until the senselessness of it all had stopped hurting. And he’d kissed her. Deeply. He’d known then. She was ready. There was no doubt in his mind that she wanted him just as much as he wanted her. But she wasn’t an ymling. She didn’t belong in this world, and her fear of the consequences had been too great.
He was suddenly overcome by the feeling of being in the wrong place. There was nothing for him here. He pulled his hood down over his face. Squeezed past a row of men to get to the door. Then he felt a hand on his arm.
“She’ll be pleased to see you.”
The girl was much too young to be in a place like this. She was barely Rite-ready. Her fair hair had been pulled into a ponytail that curled at the end. She looked up at him. She was blind in one eye. It was milky and colorless. “You can wait upstairs. Follow me,” she said, slipping between some tall men.
Rime followed her up the stairs and into a pleasantly quiet room. The smell of sweat was replaced by perfume. The girl pointed at a low chair and left him. Rime looked around. The stifling room was lavishly decorated. Shiny tiles covered the pillars. Red and gold fabrics shimmered on the ceiling and hung in folds down the walls. A lamp made of colored glass hung over the table, smoke puffing out of small holes. A smaller table with a mirror stood against one wall.
An opening led into another room. It was too dark to see anything, and a curtain of thousands of small stones hung across it. They rattled discreetly in a draft from an unknown source.
Rime raised his hand to his breast pocket to check that the beak was still there. It felt strangely heavy. As did his head. Maybe it was the smoke.
Whoops from outside told him that Damayanti was done. Men whistled and hollered. Music started to play. Rime looked at the door, but no one came. He ought to leave while he still had the chance.
No. He needed to talk to her. The dancer knew something. Something she thought he should know as well. He was sure of it.
The curtain rattled, and Damayanti entered. The painted flames seemed to flicker as she walked. Many would have considered it highly indecent. But it was a nakedness that was difficult to object to. Her nipples were nothing more than bumps amid the flames. And the paint between her thighs was so dark that you’d have to look twice before you realized she was naked as the day she was born. Even the tip of her tail was smooth.
The last time they’d met, she had kept her eyes averted, only occasionally glancing up at him. A temptress, but a coy one. There was nothing coy about her now. The woman before him was a snake, blazing passion on two feet, and she was smiling at him. Inviting his gaze.
Two young girls entered the room. One of them was the girl who had shown him in. The other was a dark-haired beauty, a few years older. They set down basins of water and kneeled on either side of the dancer. Damayanti lifted her arms and the girls started to wash the paint off. Rime turned away. He could sense her smiling. A while later he heard the girls disappear through the curtain.
“You’re not like the men out there, are you?” Damayanti said, right behind him now. Closer than he’d thought. He glanced over his shoulder. She’d put on a short top that pushed her breasts together, and a skirt with small rings that jingled as she walked.
Her hand slid across his back before she crawled onto the sofa opposite him. He sat down, getting the distinct impression that she’d done this many times before.
“I’m not here to see you dance,” Rime replied. “Although it is impressive,” he hastened to add.
“I know what it is, Rime
An-Elderin. Would you like something to drink?”
“No, thank you,” he replied, immediately regretting it. His throat felt dry.
“That’s fine. We don’t always know what we want, Ravenbearer.”
“We don’t always give in to what we want,” Rime replied. A shadow of disappointment passed over her face.
He pulled the raven beak out of his pocket. It had been scrubbed clean but still felt dirty in his hand. A rough surface with rust-colored blood in the scratches. He put it on the table. Her eyes widened. She leaned forward to pick it up. He did the same. Her hand ended up on top of his. She had reacted instinctively, and he could tell she regretted it. There could no longer be any doubt that she knew what it was.
She devoured him with her eyes. Her lips parted. Full. Moist. She dragged her thumbnail across his palm. Rime held his breath. It would be so simple. And he already knew she would never tell anyone. But what would that make him?
He shook his head and she withdrew her hand, smiling as if to say it was worth a try. But she wouldn’t sway him. Or make him forget what she’d just revealed.
Damayanti got up. Her muscles formed a line down her stomach, as defined as a spine. Her skirt jingled on her hips as she walked over to a gleaming cabinet and pulled out a decanter and two glasses, which she filled. She handed him one. It smelled sweet and fermented. He took it, but didn’t drink. He set it down next to the beak, which lay half-open on the table.
“Do I come across as a strong woman to you, Ravenbearer?”
“Strong in your own way, certainly.”
She sat down again and crossed her legs.
“I know what you’re thinking, Rime. You’re thinking that I’ve underestimated you. That I’ve tried to beguile you with my feminine wiles. The truth is a good deal simpler: this is me. This is who I am. But a lot of men have thought the same. My strength lies in seeing the difference between them. But what you don’t see, Ravenbearer, is that I have no choice.”