by August Li
“I know. That’s why I need you to call in every favor I’m owed. Talk to your people; talk to everyone who holds me in high regard. Gather them. Have them meet us at Gardegris Towers, and tell them to come armed for a fight. This ends tonight. I’m not letting these Nazi scum gain another inch of ground. Not one.”
She narrowed her eyes and smiled. “Aye, now you’re talking my language. I’ll be there with all of Hell behind me, ready to kick some arse. What about Dante?”
I shook my head. “Forget him. I’m not sure if he can be trusted, and we can’t afford to take chances. Those pendejos learned the location of my shipment somehow…. They said they had allies.”
“I meant what I said before, Raphael. I know you’ve always favored the lad—”
“I know. It will be dealt with.” I leaned in and kissed her cheek. “This first. I want an army at that estate, Moirin.”
“You’ll have it. Where will you be?”
“I have something I need to take care of… in case I don’t make it back.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
“ALL I’M saying, love, is ‘I’m gonna shag you hard on the sink and then fix you a drink’ is not ‘Stairway to Heaven.’”
We’d been sitting in this expensive hotel suite while Inky and Jet argued and Emrys quietly flipped through the TV channels. I was trying my best to be patient, to be satisfied that we’d be getting my sister back soon, but I felt like they were being dismissive, talking about this bullshit without a care in the world, and it was starting to annoy me. But I’d been on edge ever since Jet showed up without Blossom and told us he’d wandered off. Sure, it sounded like something he’d do, and I couldn’t even pretend I was surprised, but I didn’t like the idea of walking into whatever we’d be walking into without him at my back. He was the strongest of us all.
“I’m not disagreeing with you.” Jet packed a fat, greasy bud into a blue glass pipe and held it close to their face like they were examining a diamond. “I just don’t think you can claim nothing of merit is being produced now, like the last decade or so has been an anomaly and creative achievement is abnormally stunted. Yeah, a lot of music sucks. But a lot of it sucked in the seventies, and I’m sure plenty of it sucked in Mozart’s time, but we never heard about it because it didn’t last. Because it sucked.”
“Maybe, maybe not,” Inky said. “Truth is, these things can be cyclical. They called the Dark Ages that for a reason. It could be the timing thing. Maybe as we get closer to whatever’s going to happen, human energy is moving elsewhere.”
“It’s hard to deny that intellectualism is vilified at the moment,” Emrys offered. “And things have only gone downhill since the 2016 election. Being ignorant and believing falsehoods is almost a badge of honor now. Not a fertile environment for artistic excellence.”
I thought about that, about what Raf had said about the climate encouraging people like those fucking Nazis. It pissed me off. I clenched my fists. There wasn’t a damned thing I could do, and that just pissed me off more. All my life I’d been standing at the bottom of a hill, too busy dodging the shit that rolled down it to think about climbing up a few feet. These guys were the first people who might understand that, but I still wasn’t comfortable trying to explain and risking getting labeled a whiny pussy.
“Don’t think Sekhet-Aaru isn’t doing this on purpose,” Jet said as they lifted the swirly glass pipe to their lips. “Uneducated people are easier to control, and so are divided people. Encourage tribalism and you effectively distract the populace from how bad you’re screwing them, even while you weaken their ability to stand together to stop you. But still… people are resisting. Artists. They might not be the ones getting rich doing it, but are they ever?” Jet was just about to spark up when there was a knock at the door.
“Ooh, I bet that’s room service!” They jumped out of their overstuffed chair and went to the door, then came back with a cart covered in food under shiny silver domes—and half a dozen bottles of that expensive champagne with the orange labels, Veuve Clicquot. I recognized it from the dinner parties Raf threw sometimes, and I knew it cost a lot. I said as much.
Jet winked at me as they popped a cork and uncovered a plate of fresh strawberries and fancy little cakes. “Courtesy of the American Family Association, so drink up.” They filled several glasses and handed one to me before sitting back down. Their eyes never left me. “You’re cute.”
I almost dumped my wine on my crotch. “What—me?”
Jet laughed, but it wasn’t mocking. “Yeah. You straight? Gay? What do you like?”
I can’t say the attention made me uncomfortable, but it was tiring… like being pestered by a salesperson when you had no interest in what they were selling. “I’m not down. Sorry.”
Jet shrugged. “Figured I’d offer. Man, I know I wouldn’t turn down a chance to burn off some tension.” They hit the bowl, held it, and then sighed out a stream of smoke before offering the pipe to the room.
Inky reached over to take it, a funny glimmer in his eye as he watched Jet. “You, uh… you in need of a shag, then?”
“I’d kill for one,” Jet said. “You?”
His eyes lit up like somebody handed him a winning lottery ticket, but almost as quickly, the light went out. “I’ve had this spooky feeling, like I’m a piece in a puzzle I can’t see, a fucking marble rolling down a track…. I’d love something to distract myself for an hour or two, but—” He glanced at Emrys. “I don’t want to step on anybody’s toes here.”
Emrys chuckled. “You think I claim any measure of control over Jet? No. I have no desire to restrict anyone’s freedom. By all means.”
Inky coughed out the smoke he’d inhaled. “You sure, mate?”
“Absolutely. Have a good time.”
That lottery-winning smile was back as Inky looked over at Jet. “Yeah?”
Jet stood up and brushed some weed crumbs off their thighs. “Oh yeah.” They gestured toward the door to one of the bedrooms, and Inky followed.
“Just so you know, I can do a lot to fulfill your fantasies, but I can’t spring a set of tits or anything.”
“That’s okay,” Jet answered. “I like it all. Cock, pussy, whatever. I know my way around whatever you’re packing.”
“That’s good to hear, ’cause I’ve got a big fucking cock—”
“That’s great, but you have to know how to use it too.”
“Bloody hell. You kidding me right now?”
Jet laughed. “Actually I am. But by all means, keep feeling like you have something to prove. In fact, how about a peek at what you’re working with? I wouldn’t mind doing a—”
Thankfully, the door shut, and a second later, Daft Punk’s “Get Lucky” drowned out whatever else they were saying. I let out a breath and took a sip of wine. Across the coffee table, Emrys was smoking leisurely and flipping through the channels again. Finally he stopped on some fantasy movie with elves and dragons. I guess he didn’t see enough of that kind of shit in his day-to-day life.
Before long I heard the telltale bang of the headboard against the wall. Somebody squealed; I couldn’t tell who. I looked over at Emrys. “So… this is super fucking awkward.”
He blew out a line of smoke, and it drifted up to the ceiling to join the cloud that had formed. How they weren’t throwing us the hell out of this place, I had no clue. “Is it?”
I tipped my head toward the bedroom door. “You don’t think so?”
“Hmm.” He leaned forward to poke through the foods under the shiny domes. “I guess I’m used to it. Jet has a healthy libido, especially when they’re stressed. There are worse coping mechanisms.”
“Right.” I nodded, remembering what he had said outside Corazón’s house. “And you don’t like to fuck.”
“Do you find that unusual?”
“No, actually…. I, uh, I always thought it was just me. Everybody I know, the people I work with, it’s like their whole damn world revolves around getting ass. Like it’s the ult
imate prize. I never got it. The lengths they’ll go to…. Backstabbing friends, lying, even killing. It’s like, they let it have so much power over their lives.”
“Ever done it?” Emrys asked.
I shook my head and stabbed a fork into one of the small, round steaks he’d discovered. “You?”
He nodded as he chewed a mushroom. “I’ve had sex with Jet.”
“Is it, like… fun? Is it everything everybody makes it out to be?”
“It’s pleasant. It feels good. But then again, so does a foot massage. Now will I let the pursuit of a foot massage sway my every decision? No. I agree with you about people giving it too much power. It can be like watching animals in heat.
“And I don’t understand the claims of intimacy. For me, with Jet, talking, sharing experiences and communicating on a deep level, is intimate. Rubbing genitals together is just that. Almost silly. I’ve never been able to understand how it demonstrates love or devotion. Jet says I’m wired differently than most people.”
“Yeah?” I leaned in. I couldn’t help it; I had never met anyone who understood. Usually when I expressed indifference about sex, people either thought I was lying or that one day something would kick in and I’d be chasing down ass like my life depended on it, like they did. “Have you always felt that way?”
He nodded. “Where I grew up, it was isolated. Rustic. We didn’t have the internet, and we only got a few TV channels. I had no idea how obsessive people were about sex until I left home. I just assumed everyone was like me. The concept of structuring your life around it, sacrificing so much to secure it… I couldn’t understand. I still don’t, not really. People will stay in miserable relationships, pretend to be what they’re not. Rearrange not just their lives but their entire personality. Jet says I’m missing the connection most people have that ties an appreciation of beauty to the desire to put my genitals against the person I find beautiful.”
“Yeah, I know what you mean. I guess I’m missing that connection too. I see girls I think are good-looking, even a guy sometimes, but it all shorts out somewhere between my head and my dick.”
“So you’ve never been curious?”
My cheeks heated, and I took a deep swallow of champagne.
“I don’t mean to make you uncomfortable,” Emrys said. “I know in our culture for a man not to have had sex is perceived as some sort of a failing, but I assure you, I don’t see it that way. Still, you don’t have to answer.”
What he said made me feel better. It was the truth. Moirin and Devereux and the others made fun of people for not being able to get laid, called them losers and other nasty shit. It had always been hard for me to fake a smile and nod along. It felt good to admit “I haven’t had sex. I don’t want to. It all seems… kind of messy. Like more trouble than it’s worth. I haven’t told many people, and when I have, they think I was molested or some shit.”
Emrys chuckled. “Isn’t that ridiculous. I’ve heard the same. That and pity… people who feel sorry for me because I’m ‘missing out.’”
I’d heard that too. “Shit. I always thought there was something wrong with me. Truth is, sometimes I think… I feel….”
“Superior?” Emrys asked. “Because you’re above its influence?”
I nodded. “The shit I’ve seen people do just for some ass…. It’s like watching addicts.”
“Well, anything you need has power over you, and I understand the temptation to feel that way,” he said. “But we should always endeavor to respect everyone’s differences. Jet has helped me to understand a great deal, though they, unlike most, attach very little sentiment to the act. But in the end, we’re all beholden to something.”
Things in the bedroom were heating up—and getting really loud. Despite the enlightening conversation we’d just had, I still didn’t want to hear the play-by-play. I stood up and went to get my coat from the closet by the door. “I’m going to go check on my mom in case shit goes bad tomorrow. Make sure she has a week or so’s worth of food in the house.”
It surprised me when Emrys also stood. The guy was still a mystery to me, and I wasn’t sure I believed his story about helping us out of the goodness of his heart, but I liked him, and I liked being around him, especially now. So I didn’t refuse when it was obvious he wanted to come with me.
WE HIT up a grocery store, where I bought bread, peanut butter, canned soup, and some frozen dinners—shit that wouldn’t go bad. It was also the most preparation Mom would put in before she decided it was easier to go without. When we got there, I carried the three plastic bags into our apartment with Emrys quietly following. It was cold and dark inside, and it smelled like piss and BO.
I flicked on the light. The coffee table shards still covered the floor, and Mom was passed out on the couch clutching a bottle of vodka. I left the food on the kitchen counter and shoved the past-due electric bill into my coat pocket. If I didn’t die up in the Poconos, I guessed I’d pay it. But one thing was for sure: I wasn’t coming back here, and I wasn’t bringing Ros back here. I didn’t know if Raf’s offer of the apartment still stood—shit, I didn’t even know if he would want me working for him anymore after how badly I’d flaked lately—but I would figure out something. No more of this.
No more.
“Dante? Are you all right?” Emrys laid his hand on my shoulder, and surprisingly, I didn’t want to tear his arm off.
“Shit, I…. Yeah. Sometimes I feel like crap for letting my sister grow up in this dump. Like I should’ve done better.”
“I’m sure you did the best you could,” he said quietly. I guess he didn’t realize an atomic bomb wouldn’t wake my mom when she was drunk and coming down off glass.
But he was right. “I did. I do. I… I don’t know. It just isn’t fair to her. Fucking dumb luck. She could’ve been born into a different family, had a big house, nice clothes, gone to a private school. But to the rest of the world, my sister is worthless. They see her and… and she’s nothing.” I ground my teeth to keep from yelling even as tears stung my eyes. “All because of this tweaker bitch. She had her chance, and she wasted it. But I can’t… I can’t just walk away and let her die. She’s my mom. I should, though.” I turned to him. “I should walk. Shouldn’t I?”
His eyes were shiny and big. “I can’t answer that for you. I’m sorry.”
I shrugged his hand off even though I knew he didn’t deserve it and I was being a complete dick. I ran my fingers through my hair and pulled on the strands above my temples. In this light, Mom almost looked the way I remembered her from when I was a kid—when she would take me to the park, or we would make a stage out of an old cardboard box and put on a puppet show. She wasn’t an evil person. She was just weak—soft in a hard, sharp world. I’d figured out pretty quickly that this world chewed up soft people, and I’d realized I couldn’t be one. I had to cut away everything soft, like Mom hadn’t been able to. Should she be left to die for that weakness? “I’ll never get anywhere if I keep taking care of her. She’s grown. Is it okay to walk away?”
I didn’t expect Emrys to answer, and he didn’t. I looked away from my mom, and I did what I usually did. I prioritized. I couldn’t worry about this now. Not yet. “Let’s get the hell out of here,” I said to Emrys, forcing a smile in the hope that he’d know I wasn’t pissed at him—or ungrateful. “We have a lot to do to get ready for tomorrow, and even if we do everything right, odds are we aren’t walking away from this one.”
“The probability is… not in our favor, but—”
“But what?”
“I sense some outside influence on the probability, like something is constantly rearranging the odds and elements toward… some outcome. But before I can even begin to analyze it, it changes, like the original probability is straining to reassert itself, almost in a tug-of-war. I’ve never experienced anything like it. It’s… vast, so faceted, with so many pieces, I cannot even begin to imagine what they’re trying to form. When it all comes together, though, I suspect the resu
lts will really be something.”
“Great.” I wished I had a hell of a lot more guns. I wished Blossom was with me. I wished I had never heard of any of this shit, let alone gotten tangled up in it. But I had been wishing for things as long as I could remember, and never once had it done a damn bit of good. I suspected it would get me just as much now, if not less.
Chapter Twenty-Five
THE EVER-CHANGING display of lights and symbols surrounding me almost distracted me from fantasizing about the thousands of forms of suffering I planned to inflict on Jet Zama. If they feared the machinations of the assassins we had visited together, then the most trifling example of what I had in store would likely make their little mortal heart seize up in terror. And rarely had I anticipated something as much as seeing the moment the realization of what they had done struck terror into their eyes, like a bolt of lightning hitting the ground and scorching everything around it. Possibly they would fall down dead as surely as if my description were more than a metaphor.
And I couldn’t have that—not until I spent several decades showing them the folly of leading me to this dank little room and imprisoning me between the glossy squares covering the walls.
The insolence to assume they could deceive me—one of the fey! And yet they had, and with greater ease than I cared to admit. It had taken only the promise of seeing further wonders, of experiencing something novel after so long. Following the brilliant display at the mosaic garden, I had believed it. I had been eager, excited to ride in Jet’s small carriage and follow the duplicitous mortal into the old block building and down the stairs into the darkness.
Then I had approached a table covered in peeling green paint—the same one where I now sat—to examine an orchid made from filaments of light growing out of a tiny silver square. The flower bloomed gloriously before slowly starting to die and curl in on itself and disappear before the process began again. In the few heartbeats I spent enthralled, Jet flicked a switch, and the dozens of squares surrounding the table crackled to life.