Bound by Rites

by Thomas Cleckler

  Sixteen

  The key Fayette had given Nebanum did not open their door. They scoured the room for anything that could be used to persuade the lock open. Nebanum found some loose nails as he searched the frame of the bed. Using his white robe for protection and traction, he wriggled one around until it finally came loose. Rhone worked the head of the nail in the keyhole, scraping along the crude mechanism. He had all but given up when he heard the sound of success.

  The door opened slowly. Darkness saturated the hall. They moved slowly through the perfumed air, walking softly on their bare feet. Among the sweet scents were the acrid smells of rape: sweat, semen, feces, and blood. A quiet slapping came from one of the rooms; from another, a woman panting and whimpering. Rhone was terrified that everyone could hear his heart panging in his throat. Nebanum led them. At the mouth of the stairs, Rhone peered below. A giant was snoring, slumped over and sitting on the bottom steps. His bulk would swell, hold for just a moment, then deflate again with a slight whistle. They crossed to the other side of the hallway.

  Apparently all the guests on the other side were either sleeping or nonexistent. The silence drove them to skulk even more carefully. Their silent footfalls seemed to boom in the stillness. A bar of orange, flickering light was at the end of the hallway, growing as they neared. Above it, midway up, light shot out of the keyhole. They moved through the black towards the rod of light. Nebanum put his eye to the hole, the orange licking his dark pupil. All he could see was a fire chewing on logs in a soot-stained fireplace. A sharp, earthy smell was emanating through the door from the room inside, the same from the day room. There was another odor that was shared in the hall.

  There was some light commotion, but nothing discernible. Nebanum slid the key in slowly, trying to minimize any clanking it may make as it worked the mechanism. It would enter no further, so he twisted it. He felt the resistance of the latch, the teeth sliding along their grooves. Some doors just want to be opened, Rhone thought as the door swung noiselessly.

  The room was as opulent as the rest of the hideous home. Light from the fireplace cast fierce shadows on the desk, bookshelf, table, bedposts... It was between the bedposts that the commotion, and smell, had been coming. Fayette’s white dress squatted in its ruffles on the floor. It took Nebanum’s eyes a moment to adjust to the movement at the edge of the bed, distorted by the swelling and shrinking shadows. When the forms focused in his eye; when his mind understood the scene; when his eyes locked with Gorenberg and followed his arm down to Fayette’s throat, meeting her cold stare, the rage came. He knew at once she was dead. Geysers erupted inside him, the earth split and spilled its molten blood. He took hold of Gorenberg, pulled him off of the child and threw him to the ground. The man babbled and mumbled words of bargain and persuasion, but fury had deafened Nebanum’s ears. Rhone was whispering to the cooling child on the bed, wrapping her with the bedsheet. Nebanum lunged at Gorenberg’s neck, feeling it’s soft ropes strain under his grip. The feeble man, naked and helpless, clawed at Nebanum in vain. When his eyes began to float up, Nebanum turned him loose. He whispered to himself like a madman, not so easily, not so easily, not too quick, not too quick...

  Nebanum closed and locked the door as Gorenberg sucked the perfumed air into his bruised throat, coughing and trying to cry out. Nebanum dug his heal into the softness between the old man’s legs. The wrinkled creature whimpered sharply and curled on himself. There was no need to worry about muffling his cries; such lamentations were common in the House of Love. Rhone cradled the young martyr while Nebanum unwrapped the clammy body and beat at the abuser’s genitals until they were black with blood and bruise in the dark room. Nebanum pulled back to watch the writhing creature. The veins under his skin were worms, the sinewy muscles constricting around his limbs were snakes. He returned to the throat and held. The snakes lashed at him and bit him, but he held the throat. He held as if it were his life that would end if he let go; as if he would fall into the bottomless chasm of death if he let go of the ledge. The gray tongue flopped out, the eyes bulged, their sockets bluing, but he held. He held and held, trying to force the life back into Fayette, trying to squeeze away the scars on Rhone. The worms bulged in the neck, swollen with fluid not allowed to pass. His hands felt cramped, his forearms burned, and finally, convinced that the King of Worms would feed no more, he released.

  Gorenberg’s corpse exhaled the last reserves of air that had been trapped inside it and vacated its bladder. Nebanum rose, breathing slowly but heart racing. He wanted to turn to Rhone but was terrified of seeing Fayette. Words came garbled from behind him. Eventually he was able to make them out.

  “Nebanum, are you alright?”

  Rhone watched the blood streak down Nebanum’s sides. The old man had put up a good fight, taking with him ribbons of Nebanum’s flesh to his grave. He held Fayette, swaddled like a baby in his arms. Nebanum spoke, but the words came fast and hushed and made no sense.

  “Nebanum?”

  “Find the hide and lets leave.”

  They scoured the room, digging in drawers, running their hands along shelves. One of the drawers on the great desk that sat opposite the bed was locked. A tiny brass diamond held a small keyhole. Too many locked doors at night, Rhone thought. They were turning over the old man’s clothes when a tiny key fell out and skittered across the floor.

  There were many documents inside the drawer. Rhone proceeded to pull them out one at a time and examine each, informing Nebanum as to their contents.

  “This one looks like a ledger of all the people here. Our names are at the bottom,” he looked up at Nebanum on the other side of the table, “It says we’re ‘wolves.’ It has prices here, too.”

  Fayette’s name was on the list as well, but he didn’t read it aloud. The word “wren” was scrawled next to her name and price. He placed the papers on the desk and continued to thumb through the private files. There were letters, all with the same broken seal. Rhone held the flap down to see the crest in the wax. The figures were small and hard to make out in the dark, but it appeared to be a lion eating a horse. He opened the first letter and read aloud.

  “‘Mr. White, I am glad to hear of your success with your wolves. I’m afraid we’re running short on wrens this month and will not be able to reserve your usual room, but you know you’re always welcome at the Abattoir. Your friend, Mr. Abraham.’”

  He put the letter on the stack he’d started on the desk and withdrew another, older than the first. Nebanum had ventured over to the bed and was watching Fayette sleep.

  “‘Mr. White, I am short a shepherd. Do you have any men to spare? At this point I’d take a woman if I thought she were up to it. Your friend, Mr. Abraham.’”

  Rhone looked into the drawer where a dozen other opened letters lay flat with their broken seals.

  “Who’s Mr. White?” he asked the dark drawer as he removed the letters. There was no response from Nebanum, who was now seated beside Fayette. Rhone watched him remove the malachite necklace and place it on her cold, pale chest.

  “They’ll just steal it you know,” Rhone said.

  “No they won’t,” Nebanum grabbed the stack of papers from the desk and went to the fireplace. He threw them in where they were hungrily gobbled up by the starving flame. He pulled a curtain down and laid one end of it on the crackling log.

  “What’re you doing?” Rhone asked.

  “Making a fire, what does it look like?” Nebanum answered.

  Rhone smiled. Some life had gone back into Nebanum’s eyes, some voice in his words. Rhone assisted by tearing pages from books and throwing them in. As he pulled one book off the shelf, something plopped onto the floor. With the fire leaping out of its stony hut, clawing at the floorboards, licking up the curtains, coughing smoke into the room, Rhone looked down at the grinning runes on the lambskin.

  Some of the symbols made sense to him. It was strange, but he felt he’d always known what they meant; unable to remember until that moment. He hesitated in pic
king it up, afraid his understanding would fall off the cloth. The room was hot and dense with the heat of the barking fire. Rhone held the lambskin to the light. Yes, I can read it! I know what it says!

  “Come on!” Nebanum shouted from the door. He had his arm across his face and was ducking under the smoke that poured into the hallway; a black river flowing across the ceiling. They ran to the stairwell. The sleeping giant, having grown accustomed to all manor of odd and animalistic sounds, had ignored the ruckus completely.

  “Hey!” Nebanum shouted.

  The giant’s head perked up and he looked around sleepily. He looked up at them, confused. The fire was sending its orange glow—its warning—up the lightless hall. All Nebanum needed to do was point. The giant came thundering up the stairs and pushed past Rhone and Nebanum. He stood gawking at the fire. In one of the rooms that they thought abandoned, right next to Gorenberg’s, two men came running out, one naked and one in a white robe. In the dark, someone yelled “Fire!” and that was it. A stampede of abusers and of the abused cascaded down the stairwell, blowing through the front door as if it weren’t locked at all. The ghosts ran off into the night. A shrill voice called after them, “Stop! Get back here!” It was Davidson, clinging to a pillow hiding his manhood. The agitation had worked the dogs into a frenzy and they barked frantically to be let loose to tear at the flesh of any creature who was foolish enough to be caught.

  Any late night pilgrim, traveling a back road to Thallfoot to sit in on a sermon from the young, witty, cool mannered Pastor Wallop, would surely be stricken with nightmares as they passed the burning building; swarming with giants, plagued by the wailing of a madman, the braying of hellhounds, and the flying of ghosts into the night.

  Seventeen

  “So, you’ve gotten even with that old bastard. Good on you.” the gray head said.

  “How long do you think we can stay?” Nebanum asked.

  “Oh I don’t know. That’s up to the master of the house.”

  “The man with the... face?”

  “Old bug brain?” the head fell and a laughing one rose, “He’s no master! Master of maggots, maybe! Ahh hah hah hah!”

  “Who then?”

  The laughing head fell and a new head rose, black running from its forlorn eyes, dead lip quivering, “Oh, you don’t want to meet the master of this house. I promise you... I promise you...”

  Nebanum woke with a start, heart racing. The breeze under the bridge chilled his sweating chest and neck. Rhone lay beside him, breathing steadily. In the confusion of the previous night, when they had fled their prison with the other livestock, they had chosen a direction randomly in the dark. It wasn’t until the sun rose the next morning that they learned they were heading east. Nebanum listened to the whirring and clicking of insects. It would be dawn soon; the sky was beginning to lighten. His stomach gurgled and moaned. It’d been nearly two days since he and Rhone last ate. Upstream of the bridge they huddled under, a group of reeds moved while the rest stood still. Nebanum watched the spot until the sun rose, but never saw what had moved them.

  When the imprisoned fled from the House of Love, some had stuck together out of instinct. As they moved further and further away, and the threat of recapture dwindled, they had began to split—realizing that whatever bond they felt towards one another was artificial and linked inseparably to suffering. Rhone and Nebanum didn’t attract any followers; they were too new and callous. They had watched the groups glancing around as the sun rose on their first day of freedom, as if they were waiting for the dream to end. The few ghosts that lingered near Rhone and Nebanum talked in hushed voices about various cities and villages where they might flee or return to. Evidently, some had been captives since childhood—and they spoke like children. Nebanum had never noticed that while he sat in the day room. It’s over now, he thought of Fayette, no use dwelling on it now. It’s done.

  “What’s done?” Rhone groaned, still asleep.

  “Nothing. Go back to sleep.”

  Rhone woke alone under the bridge. A fleeting feeling of abandonment came and promptly went as he saw Nebanum stomping up the dew heavy grass towards him.

  “Do you remember how to tell mushrooms apart?” Nebanum asked.

  “Maybe a little.”

  “I found some. They could either taste like ham or they could kill us.”

  Rhone looked into Nebanum’s dirty hands. Four clumps of wrinkled brown and tan rocked steadily. A memory surfaced:

  “‘If it’s hollow you can swallow, if it’s thick drop it quick,’ isn’t that how it goes?”

  Nebanum peeled one in half. It was hollow.

  Rhone rolled his lip as he and Nebanum walked through the overgrown trail. They hadn’t discussed where they would go or what next they should do. It felt as though it didn’t matter—that whenever they planned to do one thing, another happened, so it was better to not plan at all.

  Rhone picked at a wedge of mushroom between his teeth with his tongue. They hadn’t tasted at all like ham. The beast in his belly temporarily appeased, Rhone’s mind was able to wander.

  “Nebanum, what do you suppose those letters where about?”

  “I don’t know, you’re the one who read them.”

  “Oh!”

  Rhone dug the lambskin out of his trousers, hands trembling with realization.

  “Nebanum, I can read this! I read it that night!” he squatted and unfolded the hide onto the ground.

  “Read it?”

  “Yes! They’re not words really, they’re situations, feelings, umm...” he traced his finger along the rows of characters, “Here, like this one. This one is like... you know when you’re walking and you feel like someone’s looking at you? This one is that. And this one, this one is blood. Not the word, but the color, the smell, the taste...”

  Nebanum looked from the alien figures back to Rhone’s excited face. Is he going insane?

  “I’m not crazy!” Rhone looked up, insulted.

  “Rhone, you just read my mind.”

  “What?” confusion mixed with his scowl.

  “I thought I’d noticed it once or twice but wasn’t sure—I didn’t say you were going crazy, I thought it!”

  Rhone’s eyes darted back and forth between Nebanum’s then back to the lambskin at his feet.

  “I think we’re changing,” Nebanum continued, “like that guy. Remember?”

  “Allisieri?”

  “Yes.”

  A breeze tickled the trees and they laughed birdsong. A beetle lumbered across the lambskin. Rhone and Nebanum were both lost in thought; running back in time, errant thoughts leaping across to the other, trying to piece together the significance of this new knowledge. Rhone’s lip cracked under his rolling, painting itself and his fingers crimson. Nebanum watched him, his tongue tasting the iron. Chills ran up his head from his neck like the ruffling of feathers. It was both pleasant and painful.

  “Stop,” he said as the sensation bristled him elsewhere.

  Rhone gathered the hide and stood. Thin trees rose around them, impossibly tall for their thickness. Rhone rolled a ball of dried blood between his fingers and thought of painting himself in red.

  A shaded creek provided welcomed libations and hollow mushrooms. They sat at the edge of the cold water among the moss and newts. Rhone ran a hand along Nebanum’s gooseflesh, wishing the bumps would stay.

  “We should try again,” Nebanum said suddenly.

  “To go back?”

  “I think we’ll be able to stay a while this time.”

  “What makes you sure?”

  Nebanum looked to Rhone. His lips were still red from his nervous habit. He leaned over and kissed the dry and cracked lips, inhaling and tasting the metallic paint. He bit Rhone’s lower lip, drawing more of the wine. When at last they separated, each had a purple mouth. Rhone grinned under his silk hair.

  “Read some more of the lambskin,” Nebanum said. Rhone unfolded it and studied the characters.

  “It looks like
it flows around, in a spiral,” he wound his finger around the biting marks, “like I said before, it’s not something you can just repeat. You have to think on each symbol. They kind of fill you with the sensation.”

  “Well, you said they flow. How does it go?”

  “It’s opening something—no, knocking? It’s like, someone has invited you over but you’re not sure if it was today or tomorrow but you’re at the door anyway.”

  Nebanum chuckled and ran a thumbnail over where an eyebrow would be if he had any. “That’s specific.”

  “This one is falling. I would say more like falling back than forward. Can you see it?”

  Nebanum leaned over the hide and squinted at the symbol above Rhone’s finger. His eye followed the curves. He studied it, trying earnestly to pull some sense from the three jagged strokes. His body lightened as though he were floating in water. A sudden drop made him gasp, like a misplaced step. He looked to Rhone. He could read them too.

  “There’s a part about gifts or offerings,” Rhone continued, pointing deeper in the spiral, “but I’m not sure what it means.”

  Rhone sat back and let Nebanum take in the hide. From the look on his face it was obvious he could not read—experience—each character yet.

  “I think you’re right, Nebanum.”

  “That’s often the case. What about?”

  “Now that we can read the hide, maybe we’ll be able to stay longer.”

  “You can be in charge of the reading,” Nebanum said pulling off his robe, “I’ll be in charge of the folly.”

  It was another day before the forgotten trail yielded any destination. It was a collection of three buildings. One of them had smoke in its chimney. The village, if it could be called that, was completely in the shadow of the woods. Birds sang and chirped, swooping and playing in the space between roof and canopy. Blades of light appeared then disappeared as the trees oscillated in the breeze.