Marlise’s smile is grim.
I don’t like this house. It is too old; harbours far too many echoes. It has presence and I wouldn’t at all be surprised if it is haunted. No, I know it’s haunted. Something here is aware of us, but whatever shade has taken up residence slips at the edge of my vision, reluctant to allow me access to its past. Perhaps I should be glad I am sensitive still. As for my full daimonic powers… I need time.
The room I am given has a sloping roof and two small windows overlooking a rambling garden. Below a rectangular swimming pool is visible between the boughs of a massive camphor tree. Marlise sits next to me on the narrow bed, watching me stare into the nothingness. Mr and Mrs Kennedy have at least offered us some privacy. Now if only the young woman would take the hint. I clasp my hands loosely in my lap.
“Ash?”
What do I say to her? “I’m tired. I’d like to sleep.” I lean over to slip off my trainers. The mattress offers little resistance as I lie down and study the ceiling. Anything is better than to suffer this scrutiny of strangers. Can none of them understand that I need to be left alone?
While this stolen Kha is tired, and my sense of dimensions warped, I can’t help the sense of curiosity. For the first time since my awakening, I have an opportunity to be truly on my own. Marlise must understand that I don’t need her pitying gaze, so filled with hunger, her hands constantly straying to touch, just like Mrs Kennedy’s.
Marlise doesn’t move from her position on the edge of the bed, however. Her worry extends into the environment. I can taste its bitterness. The girl shifts and leans down, brushing her lips against mine.
I stiffen against the unwanted contact and raise a hand to cover my face and turn my head to the side. “Just leave. Please. I need to rest.”
An indrawn breath is my only answer before she obeys, closing the door behind her with nary a snick. God, I’m such a bastard. If it weren’t for the accompanying claustrophobia and the fear of being eternally lost, I’d welcome the oblivion offered in the Sea of Nun.
Chapter 3
No House to Call Home
The following morning I wake early, just as the darkness bleeds out of the dawn and the world outside my window resolves into recognisable objects taking form out of the inkiness. From here I can see into the house next door, a bathroom window perhaps because the glass is opaque, a rectangle of gold. Occasionally a figure passes in a ruddy blur before this aperture.
Beneath me the house is as silent as a tomb, save for the insistent hissing of tinnitus in my ears. Is this further residue of the damage the previous tenant in this Kha incurred during his tenure? Like a thief I slink downstairs once I’m dressed, pausing on the landing to listen for any other signs of life. It is weekend. Most people sleep late, I’m assuming, except for me. I don’t think I managed more than one or two solid hours’ solid rest throughout the night.
The roiling nothingness of the Sea of Nun lapped at my awareness whenever I slid from consciousness, and each time I’d awoken on the verge of crying out in fear. Now I’m scratchy behind the eyes and my centre of gravity is ever so slightly off kilter. The ground keeps shifting each time I place a foot before the other.
It’s as I make my way down the passage to the kitchen, my footfalls muffled by almost threadbare carpets, that I realise I’m not the only one awake. The static-filled buzz of a radio reaches me, shrugging aside the cloying silence pervading this old house. The kitchen door is slightly ajar and I pause here. I’m thirsty. My stomach coils in knots because I didn’t eat supper last night. I can’t keep pretending I’m not here. At some point I have to face these people to whom I’ve become a stranger.
After a deep breath I push the door open, blinking in the sudden illumination of the kitchen. Mrs Kennedy, paused in mid-stir of her tea, is seated at the kitchen counter. She stares at me with big eyes. I glance instead at a photo stuck with magnets to the fridge. A young man with shoulder-length hair smiles at the photographer. That’s supposed to be me, but the pieces don’t fit.
“Morning, my dear. Are you feeling better?” Her smile is tremulous, like she’s about to start crying.
I don’t want to have this conversation. “I’m fine.” The words come out more like a growl as I close the distance to the fridge. Part of me wants to beg her for help, to share every lurid detail of my predicament, but instead I turn in on myself. No one must know. Imagine what this knowledge, the truth of my existence, would do to her?
“Can I make you some tea?” she asks. “Some oats? It used to be your favourite when you were younger. You had it with honey and butter.” Her words make me cringe.
The interior of the fridge is filled with an assortment of covered plastic containers, all neatly sealed, and I have no desire to rummage through them to find something edible. Vegetables in the drawers look more like wax replicas. My hunger evaporates yet I continue to stare before me.
“No. Thanks.” I turn then, closing the fridge behind me, and lean against the appliance to watch the woman who would be my mother.
Mrs Kennedy lifts the mug, which depicts some orange cartoon cat with a too-wide smile, and takes a gulp of her tea, her gaze never once leaving my face. Her lips are too pale without lipstick, her skin ashen.
“Where does Marlise stay?” If one thing’s for certain, I cannot remain another moment in this house, to be examined as though I am some sort of freakish exhibit in a zoo—a wild animal that has just been released from its cage to pad from enclosure to enclosure looking for a way out.
A visit to Marlise seems the lesser of the two evils. Plus it will give me something to do, a sense of progress. I can find a way to ask questions so I can reconnect with this new age.
“She’s at fifteen Ophir Road in Plumstead,” Mrs Kennedy says. “Would you like Uncle Stanley to lift you there?”
The thought of spending even five minutes, let alone a twenty-minute car journey alone with the man makes my flesh crawl.
“No.” I brush past her to stomp down the passage and leave the house, glad that I thought to shrug into my leather jacket before coming downstairs, as though on some cellular level I already knew I wasn’t going to go back upstairs. Voices whisper at the edge of my hearing, shadows linger where there should be none. This Kha I inhabit is leaden with exhaustion and hunger but if I don’t get out now, I’ll go stark raving insane. That’s if I’m not already a complete loon stuck in this nightmare.
What would the doctor say if I spilled my little tale of woe? I laugh at that thought and push open the gate’s latch, and stride into the morning, envisioning padded walls and strait jackets. Needles and pills. A snatch of a tune ghosts on the edge of my hearing, but as soon as I strain toward it, it’s gone.
It’s winter. The day before Lizzie’s death returns to me with full force now that I’m outside of the confines of the gloomy house. It stings thinking of my other self as some old dead lady. It’s this body I now inhabit. It’s changing the way I think and act. Too much testosterone? I’ve been avoiding mirrors of late. Looking at this stranger’s face makes me feel as though the Kha doesn’t fit properly. Of course it doesn’t. Who am I fooling? I’m too tall, too broad-shouldered.
The sky is clear but pale, as though the blue is misted through a thin veil of gauze, but the air holds a chill that immediately nips at my face. It’s Sunday. All the good people are going to church. Many years ago I’d walk with Leonora along the main drag in Simon’s Town. We’d stop by a coffee shop for a slice of chocolate cake and a cuppa. Or occasionally scones laden with whipped cream and strawberry jam. A real English lady’s treat. We’d watch all the Christians pull up outside the church for the first service before returning to the chapter house and our books. We’d wave at the Major, out walking his Great Danes. Some say the dogs were descendants of the legendary Able Seaman Just Nuisance. Simon’s Town was like that, always with one foot in the past, and stories behind stories waiting for the curious.
I need to get to the chapter house. I’ve been abo
minably foolish to alienate Marlise, the only person who might be sympathetic to my cause. There’s no way in hell Uncle Rodgers is going to lend me his car. Not that I could drive it anyway. Ashton’s parents are insipid, all too aware of their benefactor’s displeasure. This prodigal son of theirs is an unwelcome beast trapped in a cage, pacing and snarling—an inconvenience. Besides, there is nothing for me to do. The television bores me, the shows’ presenters talking down to their audience. And, for goodness’ sake, the only books on the shelves are either crime novels or decades-old hard-backed condensed books.
The most bizarre part of my situation at present is just getting used to this damned body, moving in it. Ashton’s height measures at more than six feet. With proper muscle tone, he’d be damned intimidating. Today, however, is the first I feel well enough to even consider walking. I shove my hands into the pockets of the old biker jacket I suspect was probably part of Ashton’s “uniform.” My hands now—so large, the fingers thicker. And the hair. I still can’t decide whether I want to cut it. It seems better to scrape it back into a ponytail so it doesn’t annoy the living hell out of me, like everything else does at present.
I have to pace myself while I walk to the station. My shortness of breath forces me to pause every so often so that the wiggling sparks stop flying in my field of vision.
People avoid me when I pass them on the sidewalk. Bent grannies observe me with great trepidation etched upon their features, and step away as I pass. This is a novel experience, to say the least. When I was Lizzie, I was content to be almost invisible, one of these self-same old ladies who now glance up at me with mingled fear and awe in their gazes. I look rough. That’s the understatement of the century.
Ashton had great power. People either gravitated toward him or lurched back in fear. In another age he might have been a general or a despot. That much is a certainty. I shudder to think how he wielded his natural charisma. And, it’s no joke. He’s a ghost of his former self with me in command yet still imposing despite the ravages of the long illness.
If only I could remember what my old face should look like, the soft grey curls, the hands gnarled by time. I’m losing my grip on Lizzie’s identity. This is as it should be, but I mustn’t be in this Kha, not here, not now. The terrible wrongness is an ever-present gnawing at my heart.
Marlise was the one who looked after the Kha in the spirit’s absence. She cared enough to keep the nails short, the face free of stubble. Now I resemble a bergie, a vagrant. All the better to keep you at arm’s length, my dear.
What will Marlise say when I pitch up on her doorstep unannounced? I’ll worry about that when I get there. I have no idea of what sort of reception I’ll receive. Perhaps it is better this way. I’ve really been a right royal idiot, haven’t I?
The dreams from last night seep through as I walk—night terrors I’ve tried to block since waking, without much success. A sticky grey limbo stalks me, the Sea of Nun sucking at my limbs and I shudder, as much from the cold as from this nothingness that threatens to swallow me whole. If only sleep would offer sanctuary, like it always did when I was Lizzie. Am I forced to dwell in torment in the realm of Morpheus? Will I have no rest in the waking world either?
The trains still run but the carriages are vastly different from the wood-panelled beauties I recall. These are all hard plastic edges and grey vinyl. What possesses the youth of today to cover the walls and more with reams and reams of illegible scrawl in black or coloured marker? The trains have definitely gone backward since the old days…
Are these scribble-scrawls a stab at immortality? I watch a young couple at the other end of the carriage. They purposefully avoid making eye contact with me. That’s fine by me. I can’t be much to look at right now. The training and reassurances I had in Per Ankh have not prepared me for this, a naked cold reality immersed in conflicting desires. Part of me wishes I could sink into the oblivion offered by sleep, to allow my Akh to untether from this Kha, to let the Ka and Ba fly loose, a schism I’m certain I could bring into being. Instead I’m the walking dead trying to make sense of a world gone mad. And I’m too scared to reach out with the powers I took for granted the last time I lived. What if I try and fail, yet again?
Plumstead station is tired. Weeds push up between the cement paving and a ficus sends its red, threadlike roots from a gutter. If no one takes care of that it may soon strangle the building. An aloe leans at a drunken angle, a dried candelabrum remaining from last season, with this year’s new bloom shoving through in a solar-phallic outburst of inflorescence. It being a Sunday, not much is happening here apart from a bergie taking advantage of the lack of Metrorail security to chase her from the platform. She sorts through her shopping packets while muttering incoherently to herself. The crazy old woman is a stark reminder I don’t have much further to fall before I’m like her. This is not a pleasant thought to entertain.
Marlise still lives with her parents, in one of the original homesteads in the neighbourhood. I remember visiting here once, in this very street, almost a century ago. It is a strange sensation to view a space in time from dual perspectives. Apart from the walls topped with razor wire and electrified fencing, and the silver streamlined vehicles parked in the road, little has changed.
I stand in the scant shade offered by a bare-branched syringa when I push the doorbell. About thirty seconds pass before someone answers.
“Can I help you?” a man asks.
“Um, Li-Ashton here. To see Marlise.”
The electronic connection crackles.
“Oh.”
I’m left outside for a long time, enough of a pause to watch a pair of laughing doves court above on the telephone wires. The male has his chest puffed out, his feathers fluffed, but the smaller bird keeps hopping away from him.
Footsteps slap on the paving on the other side of the timber fence. “Ash?” Marlise speaks from behind the closed gate.
I swear I’m about ready to slap the woman every time she says my name with that exact tone but I’m glad she’s here. I don’t want to be left standing out in the cold, for the chill bites at my bones despite the watery sunlight. I don’t want to be turned away.
“Marlise? We need to talk.” Frankly, I’m just bloody relieved she’s home and willing to see me, especially since I’ve been such a dreadful person to be around. Bastard.
The latch hums and clicks open, something else I must grow accustomed to—automated systems, the stuff of science fiction. Maybe, given enough practice, I could harness my daimonic powers to trigger electronics. Back then, as Lizzie, I’d developed some telekinetic ability, but then there hadn’t been nearly as much to experiment on as there is now.
Once I push the gate open, I pause. Marlise stands right in the doorway, as though she would bar my entrance. She pulls the oversized maroon cable-knit sweater closer to her and blinks up at me with her dark gaze. “Ash.” She looks even younger than I remember and it’s difficult to remember that this Kha I now inhabit can’t be that much older than hers.
“Hello.” I shove my hands deep in my pockets. She expects me to hug her, I’m certain.
She says my name with so little hope all I can do is stare at her wordlessly while I fumble for something to make this entire mess right. But nothing will be right, will it? It’s a case of making do with the resources, of which there are pitifully few. I need to see the chapter house. I need to speak to Leonora, if she still lives.
“We need to talk,” I say, “somewhere where we won’t be interrupted.”
“We can go to my room.” She gestures behind her then steps aside so I can follow her up the narrow passage between the house and the garage. More than a physical distance yawns between us, the way she keeps looking over her shoulder as if to check whether I’m too close. It’s as if the air between us buzzes.
The implications bother me. I don’t want to be somewhere so private, so intimate with this woman but I don’t have a choice, do I? She’s not dumb either. She can tell I don’t want her
to touch me, and she’s wary, like a dog that’s been beaten before, her eyes focusing anywhere but my face. Oh gods, Ashton, what the hell did you do to this woman’s mind?
Marlise stays in a room that once must have been the maid’s quarters. It’s at the back of the house, off the veranda by the kitchen. The garden stretching out behind the residence is large, and is filled with a small orchard. Pear, peach or apple, I can’t tell. The branches are brown and naked. The house itself is locked tight, but a curtain twitches from the interior when my shadow darkens the panes.
The interior of Marlise’s room gives off an essence of darkness. The windows are covered in heavy black-out curtains, the floor a deep mahogany. An unmade double bed takes pride of place in the centre of the far wall, the bedding a rich burgundy. She lives in a tomb. My blessed memories suggest adherence to subcultures, but all I can do is shake my head. Posters on the black-painted wall depict groups of long-haired men wearing sombre clothing, in various serious poses: in graveyards, desolate landscapes or decayed urban environments. One poster in particular captures my attention.
Ashton stands with three other long-haired males beside a mausoleum. My heart almost stops. It’s Maitland cemetery, not far from where Richard and my previous Kha are buried. This is a poster for some sort of music group. The heading proclaims the band’s name as Anubis rendered in Gothic type. Is this some sort of sick joke? Ashton here is a lot bulkier, a supercilious sneer playing across his lips. Muscles bulge beneath a tight black t-shirt, lustrous black hair framing his face.
“You don’t remember anything, do you?” Marlise has been standing right beside me the whole time and I haven’t noticed. The small hairs on my arms prickle at this proximity. Almost, but not, touching.
I can’t help it. I start and spin round to face her, my back to the wall. “No.” There’s no point telling her I’m not even a man. Or I am now but I’m not quite sure what I must do about it. Or that the last I knew I was almost ninety, an old woman alive during the mid-1960s.
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