“Was it Cugel? Tell me!”
The pelgrane glared at him, loosed its hold on the edge and slipped away into the darkness without a sound.
At the apex of the summit, pale light that emanated from no apparent source spilled from a shaft enclosing a spiral staircase. With her prey close at hand, Derwe Coreme lost all regard for modesty. She ripped off the diaper and, a knife in each hand, began her descent. Thiago’s diaper caught on the railing and he, too, rid himself of the garment.
The shaft opened onto a circular room into whose walls the windows Thiago had seen from the ground were cut. It was absent all furnishings and lit by the same pale sourceless light. A second stairway led down to an even larger room, pentagonal in shape, its gray marble walls resplendent with intricate volutes and a fantastic bestiary carved in bas relief. The air retained a faint sourness, as of dried sweat. Cut into the floor, also of gray marble, was a complicated abstract design. Five curving corridors angled off from the room, receding to a depth Thiago would have believed impossible, given the dimensions of the tower; but this, he reminded himself, was a magician’s tower that cast no shadow and likely was governed by laws other than those to which he was accustomed.
They went cautiously along the first of the corridors, passing a number of doors, all locked, and came at last to a door at the corridor’s end that stood open and admitted to a room, a laboratory of sorts. Derwe Coreme made to enter, but Thiago barred her way with his arm.
“Look first,” he said.
She frowned, yet raised no objection.
Many-colored light penetrated the room from panels in a domed ceiling, shifting from dull orange to peach to lavender. Volumes of obvious antiquity lined the walls. Upon a long table, vials bubbled over low flames and the components of a mysterious device, a puzzle of glittering steel and crystal, lay scattered about. An immense bell jar contained dark objects suspended in what looked to be a red fluid. Several more such jars held items that Thiago could not identify, a few of which appeared to be moving. Then the scene changed. Their view was still of the same room, yet they were considerably closer to the table. The objects submerged in red fluid were fragments of a sunken ship. Gray creatures with sucker mouths, elongated hands and paddle feet crawled over the wreck, as if searching for something. Another jar enclosed a miniature city with a strange geometric uniformity to its architecture whose two tallest towers were aflame. Beneath the largest glass bell, a herd of four-legged beasts with flowing blond hair and womanly breasts fled across a mossy plain, pursued by an army of trees (or a single multi-trunked tree) that extended root-like tentacles to haul itself along.
Unsettled, Thiago and Derwe Coreme returned to the room of gray marble and entered a second corridor, passing along it until they reached a door at its nether end. Through it they saw a valley of golden grasses lorded over by hills with promontories of corroded-looking black rock that might have been the ruins of colossal statuary rendered unrecognizable by time. They could discern no signs of life, no movement whatsoever. The absence of all kinetic value bred a sense of foreboding in Thiago. At the end of a third corridor they stood overlooking a vista that could have been part of the Sousanese Coast south of Val Ombrio: a high reddish sun, barren hills, a stretch of forest, and then a lowland declining to water that glowed a rich pthalocyanine blue. All seemed normal until a flight of winged serpents the size of barges soared low along the coast and in the eye of one that flew straight at the door, veering aside at the last second, Thiago glimpsed their terrified reflection.
They had quit trying the doors, but as they retreated toward the marble room, Thiago idly turned a doorknob and thought to hear a gasp issue from the other side.
“Who’s there?” Thiago gave the door a shake.
He received no answer. Again he rattled the door and said, “We have come to free you. Let me in!”
After an interval, a woman’s voice cried out, “Please help us! We have no key.”
Derwe Coreme pressed on; when Thiago called to her, she said, “Whoever she is, she can wait. I have two more corridors to inspect.”
Before he could speak further, she passed beyond the bend in the corridor. He felt diminished by her absence and this both surprised and iritated him.
He examined the hinges of the door. The bolts were flush to the metal and he did not think he could loosen them with a knife. He set his shoulder to the planking and gave it a test blow. Solid. The corridor, however, was narrow enough that he could brace his back against the opposite wall and put all his strength into a kick. He did so and felt the lock give way the slightest bit. The sound of the kick was startlingly loud, but he drove his foot into the lock again and again until the wood splintered. A few more blows and the door swung open. Two beautiful dark-haired women attired in gauzy costumes that left little to the imagination stood gaping at him in the center of a room furnished with a bed, an armoire, and a mirror. In reflex, Thiago covered himself as best he could.
The younger of the women, scarcely more than a girl, prostrated herself. The older woman regarded him with a mix of hauteur and suspicion; then she stepped forward, standing almost eye-to-eye. She had the well-tended look and fine bone structure of the patrician women with whom he had consorted in Kaiin. Her hair was bound with an ivory and emerald clip. He could not picture her ladling dumplings onto a farmer’s plate in Joko Anwar.
“Who are you?” she asked in a firm voice.
“Thiago Alves of Kaiin.”
“My name is Diletta Orday. I was traveling in…”
“We have no time to exchange personal histories. Is there somewhere you can hide? I cannot fight and watch over you both.”
Diletta’s eyes darted to the side. “There is no hiding place for us so long as the avatar lives.”
The girl on the floor moaned and Diletta said in a challenging tone, “Ruskana believes you will rape us.”
“That is not my intent.” He cast about in the corners of the room. “There were more of you, were there not?”
“We were nineteen in all. The avatar led seventeen along the corridors. None returned. He claims they are with Yando.”
Cugel, Thiago told himself, must have been testing the open doorways, sending the women through and observing what happened. Chances were, he had not liked the results.
“He is no avatar,” Thiago said.
“I am not a fool. I know what he is.” She pointed to the armoire and said archly, “If your intent is to fight, you may need your hands. His clothes are there. Perhaps something will fit.”
Within the armoire was an assortment of men’s clothing. The shirts fit too snugly, hampering his freedom of movement; but he found a pair of trousers that he could squeeze into.
“Can you tell me where he is?” he asked.
“Oh, you will see him shortly.”
As he turned, made curious by the lilt in her voice, he felt a sharp sting in his neck and saw Diletta pulling back from him, wearing a look of triumph. He staggered and, suddenly dizzy, went to one knee. Something struck him in the back and he toppled on his side. A second strike rolled him onto his back. The girl, Ruskana, was engaged in kicking him, grinning like a madwoman. He tried to focus on Diletta, but his vision clouded. Her voice echoed and faded, losing all hint of meaning and tone, becoming an ambient effect, and the kicks, too, became a kind of effect, no longer causing pain, each one seeming to drive him farther from the world.
Voices, too, ushered Thiago back to consciousness. A woman’s voice complaining…Ruskana? Another woman, lower-pitched, asking what she should do. Diletta. Then a familiar man’s voice that brought Thiago fully awake. He lay on his back, his hands bound beneath him, and began to work at loosening his bonds even before he opened his eyes.
“There must have been a woman with him,” said Cugel from a distance. “The pelgrane would not have flown him to the summit, otherwise.”
“Hunger may have overwhelmed its sense of duty,” said Ruskana.
“I attribute no sense of
duty to the pelgrane,” said Cugel peevishly. “I suggest that if Thiago had come alone to the field, it would have gained nothing by flying to the summit. It would have eaten him where he stood.”
“We have searched most of the night,” Diletta said. “If a woman was here, she is not here now. Perhaps she took refuge at the end of one of the corridors. If that is the case, we have no need to worry.”
Thiago could not make out Cugel’s response. He slitted his eyes and saw he was lying in a small featureless room with gray marble walls close beside a bluish metal egg some fifteen feet high and ten feet wide, supported by six struts. Beyond lay a stair on the bottom step of which Ruskana stood. It led upward to a ceiling of gray marble. Thiago assumed there was a concealed exit and this would open onto the room with the five branching corridors. He redoubled his efforts at loosening his bonds.
“Is it ready?” Diletta asked, moving into view.
“I must refer to Iucounu’s notes. Minor adjustments may be required.”
Cugel came out from behind the egg. He wore a high-collared black cape, gray trousers, and a velvet tunic of striped mauve and black. On his right thumb was a ring of black stone. His sharp features seemed a perversion of Thiago’s own. What had once manifested as a roguish quality, the product of a quick wit and a penchant for irreverence, seemed to have been eroded by the years, resolving into an imprint of cruelty and capriciousness. The sight of him captivated Thiago. It was as if his view of the world had lacked only this lean figure to complete it. Now, seeing him in the flesh, his loathing for Cugel was given such weight and substance that he understood what he had felt before was a shadow of his true hatred of the man. He was so overwhelmed with revulsion that he could not even make a pretense of being unconscious; he stared at his cousin like a hawk watching supper emerge from a hole until Cugel directed a cursory glance his way.
“Cousin!” A smile sliced Cugel’s features, but did not touch his eyes. “I would not have recognized you if you hadn’t declared yourself to Diletta. You’ve grown so formidable. You have been exercising, have you not? All those scars, so much gray in your hair! I trust life has not treated you unkindly.”
Thiago was unable to muster speech.
“What has led you to seek me out after all these years?” Cugel asked. “A desire to rekindle our childhood bond? Judging by your expression, I think not. An old enmity, perhaps. But what? I cannot recall ever having done you injury. Certainly none to warrant so desperate a journey as you must have made.”
Thiago managed to croak a single word: “Ciel.”
Cugel squatted beside him, tipped his head to one side. “Ciel? It has a ring, I admit, but…” He smacked his forehead. “Not that blond poppet you were smitten with during our formative years? A sweet bite of the apple, that one. By now, she must be a grandmother. Is she well?”
“You know she is not.” Thiago worked at his bonds.
“Ah, yes. I remember. A pity you weren’t there to save her, but you had your priorities in those days, always busy at your brutish sport and your revels. Blaming me for Ciel’s death…you would do as well to blame a bee for sipping from a flower.”
Thiago tried to sweep his legs out from beneath him with a kick, but Cugel, agile as ever, avoided it and caught his ankle. He dragged him forward and left him in front of the machine.
“I have better to do than listen to you whine about a girl dead a quarter of a century.” Cugel flung open a transparent door in the face of the machine and indicated the ovoid chamber within—it contained two padded seats. “In moments, we will be away to a pleasant world far from this moribund planet and its dead sun.”
“Sylgarmo’s Proclamation has yet to be proven,” Thiago said.
“Has it now?”
Smirking, Cugel went to the wall and pressed an indentation. With a grating noise, a portion of the wall retracted, creating as it did a large circular window.
“Welcome to the last morning of the world,” said Cugel.
The sky as revealed by the window was black. Not pitch black, but black pervaded by a sickly glow, the source of which hung nearly dead-center of the window: the sun. Though it was at ten o’clock high, he could look directly at it and for a long moment he could do nothing else. Pale orange plasma filmed across the surface of a sphere that resembled an ember left over from a blaze, a great round ball of crusted carbon cracked and seamed with fire. From points on opposite sides of the sphere there arose enormous crimson effulgences, plumes of solar flame with the aspect of two mismatched horns, flares flung out into space that seemed as though they would eventually form into pinchers that would pluck the earth from its orbit. It was a ghastly, soul-shriveling thing to see. A dread weakness invaded Thiago’s limbs. Ruskana clapped a hand to her mouth and Diletta put a hand on the wall for support. For his part, Cugel appeared enlivened by the sight.
“Ruskana! Take a last look around,” he said, rubbing his hands together. “We want no interruptions. Quickly, girl! Diletta! See to the provisions.”
The sound of Cugel’s voice enlisted Thiago’s hatred once again. He had made progress with his bonds, but needed more time.
“Ruskana!” he shouted as the girl mounted the stair. “There are only two seats inside the machine. Do you believe he will be here when you return? Every woman he has ever known, he has played her false.”
“Ruskana is to ride astride my lap,” said Cugel. “This has been discussed. Now go!” He waved her on.
“There have been a thousand Ruskanas before you,” Thiago said. “Beginning with my Ciel. We quarreled, she and I. Cugel lured her to a solitary place on the outskirts of Kaiin, under the guise of offering advice on how she might repair the relationship. There he drugged her and she died…whereupon he fled. Do not expect better of him, I caution you.”
Ruskana hovered near the top of the stair, the picture of uncertainty.
“Did you expect me stand my ground while you raised a mob?” Cugel made a derisive noise. “That was ever your way. To choose someone you believed was weak for a scapegoat and excite the public temper. But there is no mob here, only these two devoted women. I have come too far and endured too much to be thwarted by the likes of you.” He held his fisted right hand to Thiago’s face, showing him the ring of black stone. “This is Iucounu’s ring. I bested him with his own magic. I have bested demons, giants, creatures that would leave you trembling. What did you hope to achieve against me?”
Cugel stood over Thiago, his face a neutral mask. He reached into the folds of his cape, produced a parchment scroll and tossed it onto Thiago’s chest.
“A gift, cousin,” he said. “The Spell of Forlorn Encystment. It is an option you may wish to exercise. Ask yourself if life is worth living imprisoned within the earth when there is no other choice, and act according to your answer.” He turned to the stair. “Quickly now, Ruskana!”
The girl darted up the last few steps and pressed a stud in the ceiling; a section of the ceiling began to lift.
“She was done with you, Thiago,” Cugel said. “She complied with my every desire.”
Ruskana shrilled a warning. Derwe Coreme had slipped through the opening and stood at the top of the stair, wearing a man’s shirt and trousers. The two women grappled briefly and Ruskana fell, cracking her head on the marble floor. Derwe Coreme spied Cugel and came toward him, knife in hand, face twisted with rage. Cugel darted for the egg and she screamed—it seemed ripped from her chest, furious like a raptor’s scream. She hurled the knife, but Diletta pushed Cugel aside. The knife took her in the throat, penetrating both sides of her neck, and she collapsed. Derwe Coreme hurled a second knife, but it clanged off the door of the egg, with Cugel safe inside. Spatters of Diletta’s blood dappled his cheek, lending him a clownish aspect.
Derwe Coreme sprinted down the steps and pounded on the door, screaming all the while. Cugel’s expression was one of bewilderment. It was as though he were asking, Who is this scarred termagant? He busied himself with final preparations, ignoring
her screams…if, indeed, he heard them.
Thiago burst the cords that constrained him.
A humming proceeded from the egg as Cugel, eyes closed in concentration, spoke the activating spell. Thiago got to his feet, and, standing beside Derwe Coreme, confronted him through the door. His spell complete, Cugel opened his eyes and smiled at them with the sweet tranquility of a man gone beyond judgment. The humming rose in pitch.
Thiago gave the egg a tentative push. He cleared Derwe Coreme away from the door, backed off several paces, and ran at it, striking it with his shoulder.
Cugel’s smile faltered. Thiago had another run at the egg, and this time moved it slightly. His shoulder ached, but he made a third run. Concern was written on Cugel’s face, but then the humming evolved into a keening and the egg appeared to be covered in sparkling silt, a film that vibrated over the metal surfaces. Cugel’s smile returned. Thiago charged again, but was repulsed violently and thrown onto his back. The egg rippled, winking bright to dark. Soon it grew insubstantial and vanished, leaving a translucent afterimage in the air.
Thiago studied the afterimage as it faded. Was there a trace of desperation in Cugel’s smile? The beginnings of fear? Was it a true smile or a rictus leer, a sign that his cousin was at the end in extremis? Perhaps Thiago’s bull-rushes had taken a toll, or perhaps Pandelume’s egg had borne Cugel to a less pleasant world than he had imagined and his expression was the initial register of that place. It was useless to speculate. One could but hope. He sank to the floor beside Derwe Coreme, who sat with head in hands.
“He did not know me,” she said mournfully.
Thiago thought to reassure her, but had not the energy to do so. After a bit, he put a hand on her shoulder. She stiffened, but permitted the contact.
“What happened to you?” he asked. “You were gone the entire night.”
“It was strange,” she said. “They searched for me carrying tubes of blue concentrate. I might have killed one, but not both, so I hid in the room at the end of the corridor we first explored.”
Songs of the Dying Earth Page 39