by Adam Vine
I shook my head no, covering my glass with my hand as Queen Rat tried to pour me a refill from the nearly empty bottle. “I’ll have a splash,” Zaea said.
“Hey, wait just a damned minute,” Gator said, slamming his fist on the wall. “She already had two glasses. What about me? Y’think I been sufferin’ all this yik-yak for the pleasure of hearin’ you people speak? Pay the musician.”
THE BURROW
I DIDN’T IMMEDIATELY return to the tiny apartment Gator had set up for me next to the barracks. I wanted to see the man I’d killed.
I was glad Spider was dead. The image of his head splitting open, splattering his blood, brains, and skull fragments across the smooth stone of the church floor, gave me deep, intoxicating satisfaction. I wanted one more drink of it before I went to bed.
I found him in the morgue, next to the mushroom farm. I was careful to avoid being seen by the random shadows of guards and Vermin passing through the Station’s halls. When the air got chillier, I knew I was close.
Spider’s body was laid out on a table under a woolen blanket, entirely covered save for a jagged mountain range of toes poking out of the bottom. They had laid him next to a block of ice so huge it took up half the room. A few other cloth-draped corpses adorned that shadowy sepulcher, forever immune to the rotten stench permeating from next door.
I pulled back Spider’s sheet and cringed. His wounds had been splashed with water and patted dry, but there was no way to truly clean them. His head was cloven into a blooming, pink flower of ragged flaps of flesh. Both of his eyes were closed, but the one Zaea had thrown her spoon into wore a monstrous, swollen bruise. One side of his wiry, milk-blue body bore a dozen puncture wounds from where the queen had stabbed the assassin with his own knife.
“Not so tough now, are you, asshole?” I said.
A hostile, alien thought entered my head that maybe the queen was wrong. What if Spider wasn’t a spy, but another Visitor? No, I told myself. No way. But what if…
I’d dreamed of Ink drawing the Spiral in the dust on the outside of my window. If this curse could bring Zaea and me together, two strangers from opposite ends of the universe, if it could bring Helm to the Night Country, and who knows how many others, then was it really so crazy to think that Ink might be here, too?
I searched Spider’s body for tattoos or any other kind of distinguishing marks, but found nothing other than his wounds. I must’ve been drunker than I thought, because I didn’t hear Bob o’ the Knob slip out of the shadows and walk up behind me. I didn’t even know he was there until I felt his blade pressing into my side.
I spun around in time to see to see the old man in the bear suit relax his spear and give me a sour glare. He spat the nut he was chewing into a leather cup, lifted his free hand to his face, and pointed at his own eye.
Slowly, carefully, I nodded and bent over Spider’s corpse to pinch his eyelids open, first the eye that was uninjured, then, with considerable more difficulty, the one that was swollen shut. Neither of Spider’s eyes bore a golden spiral.
“Thanks,” I said to Bob. Bob stuck a fresh, green nut in his mouth, chewed, and spat into Spider’s face.
I went back to my room as fast as I could and climbed into bed. Despite the lightning speed of my pulse and the booming thunder of my own thoughts, I fell asleep quickly, drifting off to an uneasy blackness where I floated and dreamed of City.
IV
It is a lie to think men small
Ice-hearted leaders most of all
For they exist, though cruel and crass,
Only to turn this world to glass.
So into glass, the Good Knight gazed:
Spectacles seated upon a face.
The Good Knight's blade at last made free
The dead man stuffed inside the tree.
He ordered all the trees cut down,
Their black trunks growing sanguine frowns,
The peasants inside not hours dead,
Curs'd souls buried in cursed beds.
"King Mirek thinks us weak of heart,"
Arkadius told his silent lot,
"We bury them in Christian soil.
Then douse every tree in oil."
That beacon burned bright as a star
For days he watched it from afar
The ashes gave the light a scar
And the nights the blessed taste of tar.
For history is an open ring,
Coiling outward, not recurring,
A spir'ling, toiling, endless thing
That does not see the might-have-been.
THE CITY
“SORRY, DOCTOR. I don’t mean to be rude. But, do you really not see what I’m talking about?”
Doctor Lekarski stared at me over the rim of his glasses, polishing the lenses with the corner of his starched white hospital coat. “I don’t see anything. I think there is nothing wrong with your penis. Please, Daniel. Put your pants back on.”
How does he not see it? It’s right there. I gazed at the black spot, incredulous. It was twice the size it had been the week before. I pulled my pants back up. The doctor motioned for me to sit down with one hand, typing something into his computer with the other.
“Do you have any history of mental illness in your family?” the doctor said.
“No. Not that I’m aware of. But I guess I have been feeling somewhat… not like myself lately,” I said.
“What do you mean?” the doctor said.
“I had a bad stomach virus last week.”
Doctor Lekarski made a note. “And that was when you found the spot?” he said.
I nodded vigorously. “Yes.”
“What were your other symptoms?”
“Vomiting. Diarrhea. Headaches. Nausea. Trouble sleeping. I went back to work a few days ago, but I still feel a little sick, and I’m always tired. I wake up exhausted after a full night’s rest, then I lie awake for hours before I’m able to fall asleep at night.” I didn’t tell him about my dreams of the Night Country.
Doctor Lekarski sniffled and wiped his nose with the back of his sleeve. “Those are normal symptoms for a stomach virus. As for this spot you think you see on your penis, I don’t see it. You are probably dehydrated. Severe dehydration can cause hallucinations and trouble sleeping.”
“Are you sure it isn’t herpes or something?” I said.
Doctor Lekarski smiled. “Did you ever have it before?”
“Definitely not,” I said.
“Then I am 100% sure. I think it was dehydration.”
“All right,” I said, though I wasn’t convinced.
“Your immune system might be low,” the doctor continued. “I would like to do a blood test to make sure. The other possibility is that it was mononucleosis.” He pulled out a pad of paper and a pen and wrote something. “I am making you a prescription for antiviral medication. You need to take the whole cycle, three tablets per day for ten days.”
He handed me the note. There were three Countryish words, none of which were the names of any drugs I recognized, except the word for vitamin.
Vitamins? He’s the only English-speaking doctor in City according to Google. And he prescribes me vitamins?
I mumbled the Countryish word for thank you, shoved the prescription in my pocket and returned to the reception desk, where I paid the equivalent of twenty American dollars for my visit. I still didn’t have health insurance in Country, despite Filip’s promises I would be getting a comprehensive government plan as soon as the paperwork cleared, but health care costs in Country were so cheap that it didn’t matter.
My next stop was the pharmacy. Pharmacies in Eastern Europe aren’t much different than they are in the U.S., though you never see them attached to supermarkets. Most pharmacies in the nations of the Former Soviet Union are still mom-and-pop’s stores.
The nearest pharmacy was in the galeria next to the train station. I window shopped for a bit after picking up my prescriptions, which cost me a grand total of seven USD.
But I’d read on Ink’s website that one of the first things a woman notices about a man is the way he’s dressed, in particular his coat and shoes. Ink recommended that the cornerstone of any man’s wardrobe should be a suit with a skinny tie and pocket square. Many of Ink’s articles about going out to meet girls at the bars in Country started with him getting “suited up.”
I ended up not just buying myself a jacket, but an entire three-piece gray suit, complete with silk tie and pocket square, as well as a new belt and a pair of wingtip leather shoes, from a boutique men’s clothing store on the top floor of the mall, where the nicest shops were. All of it was hand-made in Country, and cost a quarter what the same suit would’ve cost back home. The clothes looked more stylish, too, fashioned with that Old World panache you saw in movies where playboys sat in parlors smoking cigars and drinking whiskey.
It was already dark by the time I started walking home. I was about halfway there when I saw her.
I usually watched the trams going by any time I walked on a main street in City. I’d look in the windows to see if there were any pretty girls I could hold eye contact with. It was a dumb game, but a harmless one. What I found was that people who ride trams spend a lot of time looking out of them, probably for the same reason. A few times a day, a pretty girl would catch me staring at her and smile; I’d smile back, and the game was won.
The tram trundling toward me in the direction of the main square was number 24. There was a pretty raven-haired girl with a pointed chin and big, sad eyes sitting in the window, her face framed by a forlorn finger and thumb. Damn, I thought. That is one attractive Countryish… wait, is that? Oh, shit.
Kashka’s eyes met mine. Her face remained blank, her lips an emotionless, taught little heart, but the sadness in her eyes washed away and instantly became two smoldering coals, tracking me as the tram rattled past on its half-century old tracks, casting sparks off into the ruddy night.
If it sounds far-fetched that it took me that long to recognize a girl I’d dated for more than a month, it shouldn’t. A lot of Countryish girls look alike, to the point where Ink had even written an article about it on his website.
The dirty look Kashka gave me from the tram turned to cinder as it lumbered by. She held my gaze until the tram passed and didn’t look back. Then she was gone, and I was alone again on a street full of strangers all hurrying to escape the gnawing bite of the cold. I leaned into the wind and traipsed my way home over crunching patches of old snow, thinking of her, and how much I didn’t want her, and how much I did.
I checked the time on my phone. Kashka was on her way to work. She’d probably already met a new guy at the square by now.
When I got home, I went straight for my laptop, logged into my email, and opened the compose message box. My fingers trembled over the keys.
Hey. Saw you on the bus. I miss you.
Not more than a minute later, my new message notification dinged. The email was from Kashka. It was not a bus. It was a tram, Kashka replied.
You know what I mean, I said.
Hi Dan, she wrote back. Yes, I do. You did not smile at me.
You gave me a dirty look, I wrote, then added a smiley face.
You deserved it.
I probably did. Are you at work?
Yes. I work whole night.
Do you want to meet me on your break? Or did you mean what you said about never seeing me again?
Obviously I didn’t.
Then why did you say it?
Because you were bad to me.
I growled and waited a minute before replying, You were bad to me, too.
Yes, I can meet you, Kashka wrote, dismissing what I’d said without comment. I will have thirty-minute break at midnight. Maybe we can go to Castle of Beer.
THE CITY
“WHAT IS the worst thing you ever did?”
“Hmm. I don’t know. This is difficult question.”
“Think.”
“I guess it would be sleeping with Maciek’s friend after we broke up.”
“Maciek was the guy you were with for seven years?”
“Tak.”
“Damn. I thought you said you left him.”
“I did. But I was still very hurt that he cheated on me. So, yes, I did it. I went to his friend’s place one night, we got very drunk together, and I slept with him.”
“Did he ever find out?”
“Maciek? Tak. He did.”
“Ah-ha. Okay. So that’s why he hates you. I get it now.”
I reached out to smooth her hair, but she recoiled and reached down to grab one of the pillows off the floor.
“Hey, I’m not judging you,” I said.
“Yes you are.”
“I mean… that’s pretty bad. But it’s no worse than my past,” I said.
Kashka propped herself up on one elbow, eyes narrowing. “What do you mean?”
I grabbed the pillow. “C’mon, will you put that down? You’re being crazy.”
“I know. Tell me what you mean.”
She didn’t let go. I pulled harder. “Kashka, seriously?”
Kashka harrumphed and finally let go. I threw the pillow back on the floor, and she crawled under my arm, resting the small weight of her head on my chest. I stared at the ceiling, playing with her hair and debating with myself about how much of the truth I was going to tell. The beer and post-sex endorphins got the better of me.
Finally it came out, a frozen memory belonging to another person who had once been me. “I killed my ex-girlfriend. Carly. The one in the picture you saw.” I’d long since stashed that picture in the drawer of my nightstand.
Kashka’s breathing paused, and resumed. “I know who she is. Tell me, how did she die?”
“I didn’t murder her, if that’s what you think,” I said. “It was an accident, but I was the one who was responsible. I drove drunk, so it was my fault she died. Y’know, it’s weird. I’ve never actually said that out loud.”
“What happened?” Kashka said.
“You want the details?”
“Tak. And I think you need to tell them. Do you say, to get it on your chest?” Kashka said.
“Close enough. I was driving very fast and we were arguing. I swerved into oncoming traffic and almost hit another car. The car we were driving in flipped and rolled three times. The other driver and I were both fine, but Carly… she died.”
“I’m sorry, Dan,” Kashka said.
“Yeah. Me too.”
Kashka slid from under my arm and propped herself up again. “I mean it. You loved her. Part of you still does.”
I shook my head vigorously. “No way. It was a long time ago. That wound has long since healed.”
“No it hasn’t,” Kashka said.
I mirrored her pose, reaching to stroke one of her bare, alabaster breasts. “Oh yeah? And how would you know?”
She batted my hand away. Guess she’s not in the mood. “You still wear her necklace,” she said.
My hand instinctively reached for the obsidian arrowhead around my neck. I had no defense. It hung like a pendulum in the empty air between us. I clutched its familiar weight and hard, defining edges. “Do you want me to take it off?”
“No,” Kashka said, rolling over so her back was to me. “I don’t.”
“Then why even bring it up? Did you say that just to hurt me?”
“I said it because it looks strange. We have a saying here.”
“Oh, Jesus Christ…”
She kept talking as I got up and put my clothes o
n. “We say that rain is worse than snow. Sometimes, when it is close to freezing temperature, and it starts to rain, you would much rather it start snowing, because rain is wet – it can get you sick. There are many worse problems from the rain, even though it is warmer.”
“And what exactly does that have to do with us?” I said.
“It means I would rather you be bad to me than gray. At least then I would know your intentions,” Kashka said.
The black spot on my penis caught my eye as I was pulling my boxers up, but Kashka had claimed she couldn’t see it, just like the doctor had. Was I really the only one? Or was I losing my mind?
“I’ll bet you would,” I said, and got dressed. There was still about a quarter left in the bottle of plum-flavored vodka she’d brought over after getting off work, so I drank it, downing the sanguine liquid in one long, scorching-sweet pull. I checked my phone. It was five in the morning.
I sat back down on the bed and ran my hand along Kashka’s shoulders. They were cold, so I pulled the blankets up over her, but she pulled them down just as quickly and got up so she could get dressed, too. Then she surprised me by saying, “I don’t want to argue. I love you. You are still healing from losing her. I think you will be for many years, maybe your whole life. I will wait for you. I will wait forever if I have to.”
“No you won’t,” I said under my breath.
Kashka picked up her purse and started for the door. “You are really cruel, Dan.”
“Wait,” I said. She halted with her hand on the doorknob, but didn’t turn around. “Let’s not leave things like this again. I don’t want it to be like this, always breaking up and getting back together, not seeing you for weeks at a time. I’m sorry for what I said. Do you forgive me?”