“So there’s just a band of nothing out there?” Querry whispered to Reg, who shrugged silently in response. He had no idea what the old man could mean.
Reg and his comrades pitched their tents and accepted the food and fresh water the Panther People offered. Reg had never encountered people so generous and friendly. Everyone he saw offered him a smile, and they seemed genuinely happy to share. Amazingly, they expected nothing in return. As he snuggled into his bedroll beside Querry, Reg felt safe for the first time in weeks. He propped himself up on his elbow and kissed Querry before settling in. A few minutes later, Frolic entered the tent with strands of beads rattling as he walked, braids in his hair, and an earring made from the feathers he’d collected earlier that day. He looked pleased and kissed Reg and Querry on their foreheads before going, without complaint, to his blankets. As he put out the light, Reg felt good, though he couldn’t help but worry something horrible waited just around the next bend. In his experience, it always did. Happiness never lasted.
THEY SPENT the next day at ease, doing little but lounging in the cool shade as the Panther People prepared for their feast. The natives carried all manner of creatures into the encampment: monkeys, birds, lizards, snakes, porpoises and fish from the river, and creatures Reg couldn’t identify. The women and children skinned and prepared the meat and set it to roasting on spits above the fires or in the coals beneath. Others brought baskets of melons, berries, root vegetables, and the red-skinned fruit Reg had picked before descending into the basin. It tasted very much like strawberries.
Reg, Querry, Owens, and many of the others bathed in the river, the threats of carnivorous fish paling before their desire to be clean of layers of sweat and grime. Like the natives, each of them stripped to nothing, even Cornelia. After a few awkward moments, they all forgot their differences and enjoyed a leisurely swim. Jack Owens stayed close to Corny, and at least once, Reg saw him embrace her in the water and kiss her. Reg swam to Querry, treading water near the center of the river, and ran his hands over Querry’s chilled flesh. They kissed and let their bodies graze beneath the surface of the river. Querry’s sparse, wet hair tickled Reg’s chest and belly.
“This is a paradise,” Reg said. “I could stay here forever.”
“Thinking of going native?” Querry teased, fondling Reg’s nipple as he churned his feet to stay afloat.
“It’s tempting. These people are truly without avarice. They care about each other, and even us. Seeing them, I realize how useless all things I left behind in Halcyon really are. I don’t need any of that rubbish to be happy. I just need food, a place to sleep, you, and Frolic. We’d be free to love each other here.”
Querry kissed along Reg’s stubble-coated jawline. “I’d get bored. It’s too perfect.”
“Why do you need conflict, love? I don’t understand.”
“Just do,” Querry said in his usual way. He took Reg’s hard dick in his fist and stroked it.
Reg reciprocated, and in minutes they’d satisfied each other. The broad, oily, green river swept away all evidence of their tryst, and they swam slowly to the shore. When they reached the muddy bank, Reg and Querry stretched out nude in the sun, just as the natives did. The warmth and light wind felt divine against Reg’s bare body, and his lack of modesty surprised him.
“I would stay,” he said softly, wistfully. “I love this. We’re safe and well provided for. I like the honesty of that. No one gives a damn if we touch each other. I think I could be happy here.”
In response, Querry simply stroked Reg’s stretched waist, tickling him and making him giggle and jerk. “We can’t.”
“I know. But I can dream.”
They did just that, drowsing in the warmth for the rest of the afternoon, slipping in and out of sleep and talking, kissing, and caressing in between. Reg felt like he spent an afternoon in heaven, free from worry of any kind, completely relaxed. No matter what happened next, he’d always hold this gorgeous day close to his heart as maybe the happiest he’d ever been. If only Frolic had been with him, it would have been perfect. When the sun started to sink behind the western hills, they roused themselves, dressed, and returned to camp.
The Panther People handed Reg and Querry flowers and draped beads around their necks. They guided Reg and Querry to the center of their settlement, where piles of meat, vegetables, and fruit waited on large leaves. Frolic joined them as they sat and ate. Reg was famished, and found the food fresh and delectable, despite the burnt skin on the meat.
After the feast, the women and children retired to their huts. Even Corny and Manuela withdrew for some mysterious, female ritual. The native men stoked the central fire, adding deadfall timber, as night fell over the forest. Some of them brought out drums while others danced around the bright blaze, looking to Reg like black silhouettes against the orange light. They moved with grace and speed, performing amazing acrobatics before the bonfire. Some of them juggled torches to the steady rhythm of the drums. Reg, pleased to be a spectator, reached to his sides to hold Querry and Frolic’s hands.
After an hour of appreciating the prowess of the dancers, a native man with a bowl and a dagger stood before them. He said a few words, but Reg had no idea of his intentions.
“He wants us to take part in the ritual,” Frolic said. “It’s quite an honor.”
“I’ll do it,” Querry offered, with his usual haste and lack of forethought. “How?”
“He just needs to make a small cut on your arm,” Frolic explained. “Then he’ll pour the essence of the jungle frogs into your blood. It will lead you to the spirits.”
“All right.” Querry freed his cufflink and rolled up his sleeve.
“I am honored to be invited.” Baron Starling also exposed his naked flesh, holding his arm stiff and proud before the native man.
Reg, though reluctant, also bunched his shirt around his elbow. He wouldn’t cower from experiences the others accepted. He wanted as much in common with his partners as he could get. Still, he couldn’t suppress a shiver of anxiety as he recalled something Manuela had said. “Aren’t those frogs poisonous?”
Frolic relayed Reg’s concerns to the native man, nodded at his answer, then said, “Not in such a small amount. He says it will help you see and understand the Other world. But you can still say no, Reg. He says not everyone is ready to know.”
“No, I’ll do it. I’ve always wondered what it is you and Querry see that I don’t.”
The nude, native man dipped his finger into a clay bowl. He drew three lines across each of Reg’s cheeks with his fingers. Then he painted Reg’s eyes with the bright clay. Next, he made a small incision near Reg’s wrist that Reg hardly felt. The liquid he poured over the wound, though, burned like acid when it hit Reg’s blood. Heat flooded his veins. Reg looked over as the man repeated the ritual. In the black, white, and red face-paint, Querry and Starling resembled the lethal panthers the tribe revered, while Frolic looked more like a kitten with his wide eyes and rouge-stained nose. Tom had declined to take any part in the ceremony, and Jean-Andre had conveniently made himself scarce.
The feeling that washed over Reg about a quarter of an hour later had nothing in common with the warm, relaxed, giddy feeling he experienced after a couple bottles of wine. It had the heat in common; sweat dripped from Reg’s chin and into his eyes. No matter how many times he swept his damp fringe out of his face, it just fell again, heavy and wet, across his eyes. He soon abandoned his foggy spectacles and put them in his waistcoat pocket. When he saw Querry and Starling strip to nothing but their trousers, he followed suit, leaving his waistcoat and shirt in a heap on the ground and his bracers hanging around the outsides of his thighs. He even took his boots and socks off and dug his bare toes into the loam.
The fire the natives danced around grew blurred, the flames spiraling impossibly high into the night. They snaked into the sky as if alive, their flickering tips shifting from gaslight blue, to bright lilac, to the intense pink of a jungle dawn. Reg watched them, m
esmerized, as his heart beat to the rhythm of the drums. A strange energy coursed through him, and he wanted to move. He had to move. Almost as if they lived separately from the rest of him, his arms stretched out to his sides and mimicked the serpentine motions of the flames, each of them leaving bright orange trails in its wake. His feet and legs squirmed, carving trenches in the dark soil. He circled his groin. Reg realized how aroused he’d suddenly become, and his nipples and cock stuck out, but it didn’t seem important.
His location also seemed insignificant, like he inhabited a world of shifting shadow and prismatic flame somewhere beyond the bounds of reality. As Reg contemplated it and realized he couldn’t banish his confusion, he started to grow scared. Panic sped his heart. He didn’t know where he was or how he’d find his way back. His limbs felt weak and shaky; he couldn’t trust them. Everything looked alien, and he feared he’d be trapped forever in the hellish realm. Reg found it hard to breathe as he looked frantically about for anything familiar. Just as debilitating terror threatened to reduce him to a curled-up mass on the forest floor, Querry and Frolic appeared to save him, each of them grabbing one of his arms and hauling him to his feet. With Querry leading and Frolic skipping behind him, they led Reg round and round the fire, and the delight he found in dancing made him forget about his dread.
After he’d been adopted by a wealthy couple, Reg had taken lessons to learn to dance properly. His parents wanted nothing more than to marry him off to a low-ranking noblewoman and thus worm their way into the aristocracy. Reg completely disregarded the reserved techniques he’d been taught as he gamboled around the fire between his lovers, tossing his head from side to side, flailing his arms and legs, leaping into the air, and spinning around until the stars above him smeared to silver streaks.
What felt like hours later, or maybe only a few minutes, Reg stumbled to the edge of the firelight to catch his breath. Querry, Frolic, and the native dancers seemed to glide around the blaze without their feet grazing the ground. They looked ethereal, just like the spirits the Panther People said he’d see. As he watched them, he noticed half a dozen great, black cats stalking the perimeter, and he instinctively reached for the pistols he’d discarded earlier along with his clothes. Then, to his relief, he realized he saw only shadows of panthers, echoes, some primal, otherworldly form of the mighty predators. Perhaps because of the strange elixir singing in his blood, Reg knew the creatures posed his friends no threat, so he looked away from them, into the trees. He almost fell to his knees when he saw the hundreds of small, black, human-like creatures tilting their bodies to impossible angles to look down on the dancers. Seeing them and knowing they’d been watching all along sent an uncanny shiver through Reg, even as he knew they might be apathetic, but they weren’t aspersive.
Reg spent a few minutes watching the bizarre beings before he realized he desperately needed water. His tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth, and his throat felt plastered shut. Looking at the black and orange smudges the jungle had become, he wandered in the direction he thought the river laid. He swatted broad leaves out of his face as he staggered through the trees. In no time, he knew he was hopelessly lost, and he had no idea what he’d do. He felt like the only man inside hundreds of acres of forest. Where were Querry and Frolic? He needed them to give him direction. Then Reg noticed the weirdly proportioned little spirits standing before him, canting their heads toward a footpath in the undergrowth. When they walked or flew in its direction, Reg followed without a second thought.
The shadowy spirits led him to the river even though he’d been going in the completely wrong direction. Reg dropped to his knees and cupped his hands to drink. After he’d slaked his thirst, he flopped down on his back and closed his eyes, just as he had earlier that day. Contentment flooded over him as he listened to the rush of the river and the song of the nocturnal creatures. Reg rolled to his side and reached out to caress Querry. Querry’s skin felt cold beneath his fingers, and he opened his eyes. Querry lay moon-white against the dark bank, his bluish lips parted and his open eyes milky. An array of bullet wounds marred his chest and belly, oozing rancid blood, dark against the pallor of his skin. Querry turned to face Reg, and when he spoke, black ichor sprayed from his lips.
“Reggie, why did you let me do it? I always listened to you. You should have stopped me. You gave up on me when I needed you most.”
Reg clapped a hand over his mouth to stifle a sob as he turned away. On his other side, he found Frolic’s wide, yellow eyes staring back at him. Frolic pushed himself up on his elbows with a screech of metal. From his waist down, nothing remained but the stump of a golden spinal cord twitching erratically. Heaps of metal shards and bent and broken gears surrounded it. Frolic still tried to pull himself closer to Reg with his hands. Reg couldn’t help but recoil.
“You lied to us, Reggie. We trusted you, and you kept secrets from us. How could you do this to me? I wish someone else had found me. I never had a chance with you.”
Reg tripped over his feet to stand and ran from what he knew were horrible, drug-induced apparitions. But did that make what they said less true? In no state to ponder it, Reg just put distance between himself and the horrific sights. Somewhere along the beach, Reg caught his ankle on a downed tree and tripped, sprawling on his chest. Dark mud filled his mouth, and he sputtered to spit it out. As he gasped for air, feeling drowned, Querry and Frolic materialized before him, Querry, pale and covered in gore, and Frolic’s severed form floating above the ground. Instead of saying anything, they scowled and pointed their fingers at Reg. Reg curled in on himself and yanked at his hair, screaming until he lost his voice.
“I tried to tell you. I will. I know it isn’t too late,” he told them. “I won’t let this happen. This isn’t real!”
“We needed you.”
“Shut up! Go away! You aren’t real. You aren’t real.”
“Wait and see, Reggie. You’re going to lose us. You can’t keep anybody.”
“No….”
“If you love us, you won’t come back. But you’re too afraid to be on your own. You’re a coward.”
Reg folded into a tighter ball and cried and trembled. He hoped he’d die, but either way, he never planned to leave this spot. The taste of death and decay was strong in the back of his throat. His partners were better off without him. They could defend themselves; he’d always been an unnecessary addition. He was the one who needed them to protect him.
A warm hand shook Reg’s shoulder, and he looked up to see Tom Teezle frowning down at him. Reg swiped at his teary eyes to get a clear view of the fey in his smart, three-piece green suit. Irrationally, it occurred to Reg that Tom’s suit didn’t get dirty. It looked as fresh, crisp, and clean as the first time Reg had laid eyes on the faerie. It almost made him laugh. Almost. Tom regarded Reg with pity and disgust as he knelt down and pushed his fingertip between Reg’s brows. As soon as he withdrew his hand, Reg felt completely lucid and a bit foolish. He wondered what could have possibly motivated Teezle to give him aid, but he welcomed it. At least Tom had freed him from the nightmare, taken it away somehow.
“Get back to camp, human,” the faerie said. “Your friends are waiting for you. Honestly, I don’t know why, but they want you back, so get moving. Do you need me to show you the way?”
“No, I can make it.” Back in his right mind, Reg easily discerned the trail leading to the soft glow of the camp. To his astonishment, it waited only a few hundred yards away. He easily found his way to their tent and squealed with joy when he saw Querry and Frolic sleeping inside, half-naked, with their foreheads pressed together and their arms wound around each other’s waists like vines around tree branches. Reg wondered if he should take his place beside them, if he deserved it. He told himself the frog venom had made him conjure the horrible visions, and that his partners loved him. A doubt remained at the back of his mind, and maybe it always would, but he needed to feel loved and included so badly. He snuggled up behind Frolic, kissed Frolic’s shoulder, smoot
hed Querry’s damp curls out of his eyes, and pulled the scratchy blanket over himself. Reg vowed, no matter what he might have meant to these men before, he’d be worthy of their love. To start off, he’d share all the secrets he’d been keeping, no matter what it cost him. The decision unburdened Reg’s conscience and allowed him to drift to sleep.
Chapter 22
AS THEY made their way through the jungle, a troupe of malleable, black creatures followed Frolic, running along at his heels or drifting through the canopy above him. One of them seemed especially fond of him and spent much of the day perched on his shoulder. It made Frolic feel good to have a constant companion. When he reached up to stroke his new friend, it rubbed its face against his knuckles like a cat and fluttered its bat-like wings. Frolic didn’t know if these beings had names, but he decided to call his Whisper, at least in his mind.
Since the Panther warriors guiding them knew the forest well, the party made excellent progress over the next week and a half. Frolic couldn’t believe the extent of what the natives called their hunting grounds; the territory had to span twice the area from southern Anglica to the tip of Tartan, maybe more. Yet, it comprised only a fraction of the miraculous wilderness.
During the day, they traveled with relative ease, making only minor alterations to the carts. Their provisions ran low, but the warriors kept them well supplied with fresh meat. Frolic was glad he didn’t have to eat the flesh of the monkeys because, especially when skinned, they looked just like tiny men. At night they ate, made camp, and slept until dawn. Corny continued to keep her work secret from Frolic, covering it up as soon as he came near. He knew she worked on a magic-absorbing device, and he regretted it had ruined the friendship between them.
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