by Jack Conner
“This way.” Layanna led down a connecting hall to a grand stairwell, its white balustrade tipped in gold leaf.
“Beautiful,” Avery said, as his eyes found the great chandelier. A thousand candles blazed inside, reflecting the crystal facets, making the gold-leaf glow.
“You should see the lanterns of the deep,” she said.
“Tell me.”
“Imagine lamps, each lit in a different sphere, each plane affecting the light and sound and smells and more in unique ways, the lamps bleeding through the dimensions, from several at a time, different in every one.”
“It sounds amazing.”
“It is. But my description is ... inadequate. Imagine vast beings, you would perceive them as formless, bending through the spheres even as the spheres bend them, some joining, some passing through each other, some separate, lamps bleeding, winking, a part of the beings and yet not part, all around you echoing the great songs of worship to the High Ones who dwell in their palace in Vat’ala....”
“Who are they?”
A dark look crossed her face, but also a look of awe. “Powerful beings, as unfathomable to us as we are to you. Heralds of the Outer Lords ...”
He felt a chill and was relieved to find that that’s all she seemed prepared to say on the matter.
“This way,” she said.
They had reached the bottom of the stairs and she pulled him on.
“Speak Ghenisan,” he reminded her. “I know it’s late, but still ...”
She made a sound of frustration. Still in Octunggen, she said, “I sound like an idiot when I speak Ghenisan.”
“But a loyal idiot, not an Octunggen spy.”
“Very well. Is this with you right better?”
She tugged him into the Throne Room, though he could have found it on his own. Once more he marveled at its massive dimensions and opulence. The party had wound down in the late hours of the night, but there were still people drinking and copulating. Many rested on the furs on the floor, some with blankets thrown over them, some naked and uncovered. Others lay slumped in drunken stupors along the tables. Against the walls heaped countless animal corpses, their various bloods and ichors staining the altars before them. The stink when Avery traveled close to them was unimaginable. He’d smelled many corpses in his time, but never so many different kinds so close together symbolizing so much waste. How much would the starving masses packed into the city beyond pay to have access to this room? It was beyond obscene.
“Haemlys must be desperate to venture outside his own gods,” Avery mused. “By sacrificing these animals, he’s even suggesting that he doubts his own divinity. His connection to even greater deities. He’s risking open revolt.”
“Desperate—or mad.”
“Yes.” Avery had considered that as well. He looked about furtively as they passed through tables heaped with old food and hunched forms. Some snored loudly. Others shifted. A few still ate, drank and talked, though their voices were subdued. They paid no attention to Avery and Layanna. “You think it might be possible?” he asked.
“Honestly I little care. He can be mad. Just give us what we need. Only ...”
“Yes?”
“Only it seems shame that his people must suffer him. Yes.”
That almost sounded human coming from her. Avery was encouraged. They passed the last line of feasting tables and made their way toward the throne, picking their way around sleeping or mindlessly rutting forms. Avery supposed the God-Emperor might still be out here somewhere, spent and huddled together with his fellows. More likely he was in his stately bedchambers on the top floor. Avery had heard it took up a third of that level.
They rounded the bend, and Avery heard Layanna’s breathing increase in pace, almost as if in sensual excitement.
As they passed through the curtain of coral beads, she gasped. He came through right behind her, prepared to find someone lying in wait for them. Instead he found her staring in joy at all the rotting corpses. Their stink was foul, even worse than the ones outside because of the tight quarters, but she acted as though she sniffed an epicurean banquet. Almost girlishly, she hopped forward and leaned against the lowest basin. She eyed the corpses eagerly, as if trying to pick out the juiciest one. She fairly trembled in excitement.
Avery thought he actually heard her laugh as she tore off her clothes, exposing smooth white flesh, rounded buttocks, long shapely legs. She didn’t seem to care whether Avery watched or not. He felt himself grow hot in embarrassment.
Then, to his immense disgust, she climbed up the lowest basin and leapt in. Bodies bobbed up and down, water sloshed over the side, and crabs scuttled away. Up to her waist, Layanna grabbed the nearest, freshest corpse, hauled it close to her, and then, with no further ado, bent over and began ripping at it with her teeth. She used her hands to stabilize it while her mouth gnawed, tore, and pulled a chunk free. She lifted her head and swallowed, then shivered in ecstasy. Avery shivered, too, but not in ecstasy. She bent over and began again. Sometimes she lifted her head to swallow, other times she simply gnawed on the corpses like a dog, like a wolf, swallowing pieces whole. She gorged and gorged. Avery turned away.
He took up station at the bead curtain. Sticking his face partway out, not far enough to be observed, he kept watch while Layanna feasted behind him. He tried not to hear the sounds, the rippings, the tearings, the sloshing of water, the crunch of bone, the creak of gristle, the growling noises she made as she ate, but it was no use. He tried not to imagine her naked, swimming in inky blood, gnawing on the inhuman dead one after the other, half-clotted blood spraying her face, neck and breasts, but he could not.
She gorged for what seemed like hours, and his legs grew tired from standing, his back sore from bending forward. For a time he leaned against the archway. For a time he sat. That position encouraged sleep, and he pushed himself back to his feet. The sounds of feeding became mere background noise, and he hardly noticed it.
Finally, however, he became aware that the noises had stopped.
He waited. Nothing.
Hardly daring to look, he turned around.
Layanna lay slumped against the second tier, surrounded by bodies and pieces of bodies bobbing idly in the water. She breathed tiredly, a sated look on her face. Inky blood spattered every bit of her, dripped from her hair, ran from the corners of her mouth, and yes, trickled over her breasts and slim belly. He tried not to look.
“Satisfied?” he asked her.
Half smiling, she met his gaze. “I feel ... better.”
“Good. Then let’s leave.”
She stood. Inky water coursed over her, making her body seem to shimmer. She almost looked dyed in blue. Some of the fluid tangled in her pubic mound, dripped from it down her long legs. He forced his gaze away.
She stepped forward. Water sloshed. Inadvertently he looked back. She reached the lip of the fountain, poised there, and leapt nimbly off. Little droplets of water sprayed in all directions as she landed, and her breasts shook at the impact.
He felt the back of his neck grow warm.
She stalked toward him, a strange smile curling from one corner of her lips. As before, the smile was hungry. Something glittered in her eyes.
“I feel better,” she repeated. “But no. I am not ... satisfied.”
“Um ...”
She was very near. He could smell her now, the odor of the sea. Perhaps he had become used to it. It almost smelled good. Enticing.
She stopped before him. Her eyes stared into his, and they were even bluer than the rest of her. Her breasts rose and fell, rose and fell. When they rose, the nipples just slightly, just barely, touched the front of his shirt. After a few moments he could feel the wetness soak in.
“Ah ...”
She reached out a hand. Gently, authoritatively, she touched the side of his head and traced a strand of hair to behind his ear. “It has been years since I’ve known a lover,” she said. “And you ... you have saved my life time and again.” She said
the words impatiently, as if she knew they were obligatory for him, but she was in an animalistic mood; he could see the fire in her eyes, feel it radiating off her. She was an unstoppable force, a being of sex, of sensuality. There was no point in denying her, no reason why he should. His head swam.
She stared into his eyes, and he felt something stoked deep inside him. Warmth spread outward.
She stepped even closer. Her breasts mashed up against his chest. They were warm, wet, full and firm.
“Are you sure ... ?”
She leaned her face in hungrily, as if to kiss him, but her lips just lightly grazed his. She ran her lips over his one way, then another, almost roughly. He could just about hear her growl, feel it through his bones.
The warmth he felt inside him spread lower. He realized he had been feeling a stiffening for some time. His member strained against his pants.
She rubbed one of her legs against his side, stroked his back with her free hand. She was everywhere, surrounding him, inviting him. He could taste her on his tongue. He realized he had not known a woman, not happily, since Mari, a decade ago.
Slowly, almost hypnotized, he reached up and ran a hand through Layanna’s hair.
Her breathing quickened. He felt the hot puffs of air on his face.
His breathing quickened as well.
“We should move this to the suite ...” he started. “The bodies ...”
“They haven’t affected him.”
She caressed his crotch.
“No,” he said. “Please. Shower first. Come.” He took her hand and led her from the chapel. Ten minutes later, her fire undiminished, she stepped from the shower in their suite and joined him in his room. Her skin was hot from the water, and she had not bothered wrapping herself in a towel.
She reached down, helping him free of his zipper. He felt a belt snapping, and his pants fell around his ankles.
She leaned forward. Her lips touched his.
He responded.
* * *
The next day Avery awoke in his bedroom, afternoon sunlight streaming in from a window. He sat up with a start, wondering if it had all been a dream. He felt strange. Lighter somehow. Clearer. He glanced idly around. Layanna was not in bed beside him. Yet he saw the sheets in disarray and was reassured it was not a dream.
Gingerly, head reeling—he’d had too much to drink last night—he climbed from the sheets and began his morning rituals, including a vigorous washing. One of the joys of the suite was its opulent private lavatories. As he cleaned himself, he tried to remember last night. It was only a vague, mad blur of passion and physicality, her moaning into his mouth, him thrusting inside her, squeezing a breast, her raking nails down his back, gyrating against him. It had been the first time he’d finished inside a woman since his married life.
He dressed slowly, his head pounding. The Ungraessotti had provided new clothes for them all. He could not help smiling as he donned a set.
In the main room, Avery discovered Janx entertaining Hildra with a naughty sailor’s ballad. When he was done, Hildra clapped and whistled. Janx bowed. He looked to Avery, and Avery wondered at the knowing light in his eyes.
“Have a good night, Doc?”
Avery tried to hold himself with dignity. “Rather, yes.”
“I’ll bet,” Hildra said.
Some tea had been made, and Avery sat down and helped himself to a cup, grateful to have something to do.
“Mmm. Delicious.”
“Yeah,” Hildra agreed, looking around. “I could almost get used to this.”
Janx had come to stand before one of the portraits of the old emperors. The man in the picture looked distinctly fishy, quite like Tallis, the emperor the fountain was built after—or like Muirblaag. Staring at it, Janx looked suddenly morose, and Avery didn’t have to wonder why. As if there was any doubt, Janx suddenly rubbed his arm right over his newest tattoo. During the jeep-ride through the mountains, Janx and Hildra—and Avery, by his own volition—had tattooed themselves with the names of Muirblaag and Byron, having borrowed the inking equipment from a refugee. Avery hoped Muirblaag’s name was the last tattoo he ever received.
Hildra squeezed Janx’s shoulder. “It’s all right,” she said. “He’s better off now.”
Janx said nothing, but the lines around his mouth deepened and turned down.
“How’d you and Muirblaag meet?” Avery asked him, honestly curious, but also hoping that the recounting would put Janx in a better mood. Avery leaned back, feeling the heat of the flames in the fireplace behind him.
Hildra groaned. “Don’t encourage him. Story changes every time.”
Janx glared at her mildly. “The truth never changes.”
“Does when you’re tellin’ it.”
Janx grinned slowly, and Avery was heartened to see it.
“Mu and me, we met out at sea,” Janx began. “This was back during my pirating days. Mu had lammed it from Hissig to get out on a debt he owed Boss Tarl. Made his way halfway across the water ‘fore his ship got hit and he wound up in the slave pens of me old ship, the Sara Ann. Captain Pink Eye—an albino from the west—he liked to sell mutes to alchemists on Crimlaw. Well, me and ol’ Pink Eye, we never did get on, and things came to a head when ‘e said I was cheatin’ at cards.”
“And you never did,” said Hildra.
“I’m wounded at the merest suggestion. So, ol’ Pink tries to put me in irons. I had enough mates, though, that I made a fight of it. Knocked me way down to the slave holds and told the mutes if they fought fer me I’d set ‘em free. Never did truck with slaves or ‘chemists, an’ I’d had half a mind to do it earlier. Well, with them at my back, I made a stand of it. Pink got the drop on me, but Mu stuck him right in the neck with an old rusty shiv. I kicked him overboard, and a big ol’ crab-fish scoops ‘im up in its pincers and takes him down. Me and Mu fought side by side against the rest. Afterwards I made ‘im first mate.
“‘course, Pink Eye wasn’t independent. The wee admiral of our fair privateerin’ company was the one and only Red Sethyc, and he didn’t ‘preciate me takin’ over for Pink Eye. This was especially ‘cause I refused to take slaves, which were good money. He set his dogs on me, and me and the crew of the Sara Ann had to haul it but good. Mutiny after leaving Hakk-na. Mu was the only one that stuck by me in the end. They had the decency to give us a boat an’ a ragtag suit. No food or water, though, an’ only a day’s supply of air in the tank.”
Hildra cleared her throat. “Last time it was two days’ supply.”
“Quiet. I’m about to tell of the mad scientist’s isle. Me and Mu, parched and hungry, wash up ashore on this fabulous island ...”
Someone knocked on the door, and all heads bent in that direction.
“Come in,” Avery said.
Jynad peeked in. He looked pale, even fearful, and for some reason he seemed unable to look any of them in the eye. Avery leaned forward, suddenly experiencing a wave of foreboding.
“What?” he said. “What is it?”
Jynad swallowed. “Lord Haemlys—he’s invited everyone to a feast.”
“A feast?” Hildra said. “Isn’t his whole life a feast?”
Jynad shook his head wretchedly. “You don’t understand. He’s given up on the intervention of the gods. He’s decided to treat with Octung directly.”
Avery and the others stared at him. None could find anything to say.
“The Octunggen delegation should arrive soon,” Jynad said. “He’s holding a formal dinner to receive them.” In a low voice, he added, “He’s not expecting many to attend, so he’s inviting everyone. Please come at once.”
As soon as he left, Layanna emerged from her bedroom, yawning, and said, “What did I miss?”
* * *
The Throne Room was empty of revelers and orgies. Only a small, grim gathering hunched around the largest, most central feasting table. To Avery’s surprise he did not find Haemlys there. A score or so of the God-Emperor’s cronies sat sipping ale and
wine and looking miserable. Long faces stared at each other, then glanced hastily away.
Some glanced up at the approach of Avery and the others, but they said nothing as the newcomers sat down, even those that moved aside for them. Avery perched on a sturdy oak bench and rested his elbows on the table. Greasy plates heaped atop it with random joints of meat thrusting out. Bejeweled goblets had toppled and stained the beautifully-polished wood, and flies buzzed about, alighting on one plate, then another. Some of the nobles made halfhearted efforts to swat at them. Evidently there had been a minor feast before the main one. The vomitorium would be well used today.
“Excuse me,” Avery said, “but where is Lord Haemlys?”
Hostility and pain flickered across their faces. It was the latter that intrigued him. Just when he didn’t think anyone would answer, one woman—middle-aged, in the elaborate dress and headgear of a duchess of antiquity—said, “I rather think he’s hiding his face.”
“And with good reason,” said a man across the table from her. His butcher’s countenance belied his puffy sleeves and pantaloons. He gazed at Avery and the others, as if mildly curious at their general otherness.
Janx leaned forward. “Why’s he done it?” His Ungraessotti was better than Avery’s. “Why’s he agreed to talk to the Octs?”
One foppish young man snorted in a rather un-lord-like fashion. His floppy green velvet hat slouched over the side of his head. “He’s decided Ungraessot can’t hold back Octung much longer, and if it tries it will only be destroyed,” he said.
“Which it will,” added the middle-aged woman that may or may not be a duchess. “But we would die with dignity.”
Avery gazed around at the greater room, thinking of the debauchery that was starving the general populace. “Right,” he said. “But to simply give up ...”
She nodded, the folds under her neck bunching. The white powder coating her face had begun to liquefy under the barrage of her sweat, and the resulting grease drizzled down her ample cheeks, her forehead and tangled in her carefully-trimmed eyebrows. “We can’t believe he’s decided to treat with them,” she said.