Bliss River

by Thea Devine

  It was time, finally, to scout out the enemy. Time to bring all his plans to fruition and escape this hellhole.

  Time for the wrath of the heavens to fall.

  The simple plan was always the best: a quick strike in the dead of night, and gone before dawn.

  He edged his way along the back alleys of the houses on the avenue.

  Her house was set slightly apart, at the end, more gran­diose than the rest. A fitting throne room for the king of this universe, and his wife.

  His mother...

  It still sat odd in his mind. He still felt that shard of pity for her, more so after having spent these days in her hus­band's wicked paradise, and watching what her life had become.

  But that did not negate her sins. Nor did it wash away the blood oath he had taken. He would bathe his hands in it, exactly the perfect vengeance he had promised all those years ago. He would cut out her perfidious heart and bury it in the sands of Saffoud, so she would dwell in the tents of his father's people forever.

  But there was blood everywhere—

  And Lydia, on the floor, drowning in it.

  Lights, suddenly, blasting into the darkness.

  People. A buzz of words, around him, incomprehensible.

  And Moreton, triumphant, standing over him, a kero­sene lamp held high, revealing the brute violence of the scene.

  And Lydia, in a flood of blood, stone dead on the floor.

  Olivia was inconsolable. "Of course he did it, Georgie. He was there. He didn't deny it. Oh, my beautiful Lydia— all those years, everything we went through, everything we shared ..."

  Including Moreton, Georgie thought balefully, not in the least moved by Olivia's tears.

  "We should have known," Olivia wailed. "We should have protected her."

  "And how exactly would you have done that?" Georgie murmured. Her mother didn't normally dramatize things to this extent. If anything, she reacted with little or no emotion to everything.

  But then, it was her only sister. It had to be such a shock, especially because someone they'd let into their se­cret, someone who had been vouched for, someone they had trusted had come in their midst with murder in his heart.

  These things were not possible in the Valley. It was one of Moreton's guiding principles, and it only proved how clever, how insidious the stranger truly was.

  "I don't know," Olivia sobbed, in answer to Georgie's question, "but we ought to have done something."

  "But did you even know?"

  Olivia raised her sodden eyes to her daughter, gauging the depth of her indignation, her commitment now that she knew the full story of Lydia's misbegotten past. A past that could have been her own, Olivia thought mordantly, had she succumbed to the fascination of Ali Bakhtoum. "Of course we knew. We just didn't know the boy was still alive. It was thought the brigands killed everyone."

  "Except Lydia."

  "Would that she could have been that clever this time ... the ungrateful bastard, coming after his mother like that— oh my God, Lydia-a-a-a ..." And Olivia collapsed on the settee, tears streaming down her cheeks. "I just can't con­ceive of a world without Lydia ..." She put out her hand, a futile gesture commanding sympathy, demanding con­tact.

  Georgie didn't know how to give sympathy. Olivia had never asked that of her, but then, there had never been a violent death in the Valley.

  And Georgie didn't even know how she felt. This wasn't someone she had felt was family. Even though Lydia was her mother's sister, they were never that close: There was some great divide there, probably because of Moreton, probably because Lydia had been much more restrained than most of the women in the Valley, probably because she hated Olivia and her wanton ways.

  Probably. But what did Georgie know?

  And yet Olivia cried, the incessant tears blurring her features, contorting her pretty mouth. Olivia pounded her chest, rent her clothes, threw herself on her bed, her keen­ing cries cutting like shards of glass through the air.

  A gray cloud settled over the Valley, almost tangible in

  its presence.

  They'd taken Charles Elliott to the Fawzi house a mile out of the village, constructed a makeshift prison of the outside shed, and incarcerated him there.

  The following day, they buried Lydia, the first grave in a cemetery they had to mark out in a hurry, not far from the Fawzi house.

  Everyone was in attendance. It was thought that Charles Elliott could view the interment through the one window in the prison.

  Olivia cried. Those who had known Lydia from the be­ginning wrung their hands, and murmured words of so­lace to Moreton, and then they went on to the Nandina Club to celebrate Lydia's life.

  "What life?" Olivia muttered.

  "A life clever enough," Moreton whispered, coming up behind her, "that in the end it left the legacy of this—" His arm snaked around her, and in the flat of his palm was a diamond large enough to make Olivia gasp.

  "Oh yes—I knew there was more—I knew it. Lydia was always one to hedge her bets. And Bakhtoum was infatu­ated enough with her to have given her something like this in their first days. Well, she left it to us, my darling. To the one who was clever enough to figure out where she was hiding it. In the place of life, Olivia"—he clenched the stone in his hand, squeezing it as tightly as he could have wrung Lydia's neck—"and you know exactly where I mean—"

  Olivia shuddered. Clever Lydia. Too clever for her own good.

  "A gift to fund another dream. In my hand, my darling Olivia, the key to England, to Aling, and—our new life ..."

  "And so, we must decide, what do we do with him?" Moreton asked at an impromptu meeting of the Valley el­ders that evening after dinner.

  "An eye for an eye is what," someone said, to immedi­ate approving murmurs.

  "I mean, who'd know? It's not like he's got family." A titter at that comment.

  "And consider this: Do you want the nuisance of calling in the authorities and everything that might derive from that?" Moreton asked. "People, this is no simple matter. Nothing we could have planned for all those years ago. This was meant to be a colony of like-minded people liv­ing and sharing minds and bodies, in harmony and with mutual consent. And I promise you, people, just the idea of that will impede any reasonable investigation. They'll sit high on the gallows with that and how we live our lives in our Valley. So I ask you to think about all of that, as we try to determine just what to do with this murderer in our midst, and if you're still of a mind to bring in outside au­thorities, then so be it. Or, if you're of a mind to execute Valley justice on a man who used our good will and our money for his own nefarious purposes, so be that too."

  ***!•.«.-.

  You scared them," Olivia said admiringly, as they hud­dled in a corner after the meeting. Everyone had gone, ex­cept a few stragglers and Georgie, who looked a little lost. But Olivia couldn't concern herself about that now. A mo­ment later, Georgie slipped away, and Olivia turned her at­tention back to Moreton to give him his due.

  "You absolutely put the fear of God into them over out­siders spoiling their party. You're a damned genius, More-ton, my darling. I don't know how you do it."

  Moreton waved away the compliment. "Everyone's afraid to be sexual. Sex equals the forbidden. They still haven't excised that rattlebrained foolishness from their heads. It's like they're still in England, and just sneaking around here. But they don't want anything to be forbidden, and that is all the better for us, my dear. They're much easier to ma­nipulate when there's a little undercurrent of fear."

  "You managed it beautifully, my darling, eliminating two impediments with one strike. It could not have worked better."

  Moreton smiled. This had been child's play. And now his subjects, his lemmings, were playing right into his hands. "How long do you think, before they vote to hang him?" Olivia asked.

  "I'll make sure it's as soon as possible. We don't want anyone to reconsider. Two days—no more. And to put the cap on it, I'll keep pounding them with the idea tha
t any authorities we allow in the Valley will take away all their fun. They don't want anyone to take away their fun." He patted her hand. "And we have only just begun ..."

  They had killed Lydia? They?

  Dear heaven, she knew Moreton was capable of any­thing., but her mother? Who had cried a river of tears over Lydia—her mother complicit in Lydia's death?

  Chapter Six

  It was inconceivable. And it was utterly believable. More-ton, the man with no feelings; cold-blooded, amoral, and utterly rapacious; king of his kingdom, ruling with an iron fist that would wipe out any opposition to anything he wanted .. .

  A monster .. .

  And her mother—his consort, his queen—

  She had never in her life been so terrified. If they had no compunction about killing Lydia, what wouldn't they do in the name of preserving their secrets?

  Now, for certain, there was nowhere for her to hide ...

  Act natural... Oh, she knew how to act. What had she done with Charles Elliott? What had she done every day of her life in the Valley, with Moreton, with her mother?

  Act as if you heard nothing ...

  She could do that. She would take her cue from her mother. She would immerse herself in hypocrisy, pretend sorrow and rage, and support the verdict of the death of Charles Elliott.

  Yes, that would do it; that was what they wanted to hear, and it would reassure Moreton and her mother that she was still one of them.

  One of them—while she plotted to make her escape. This was what it took to galvanize her—the anarchic jus­tice of Moreton Estabrook.

  Georgie sat staring broodingly out her bedroom win­dow until the early hours of the morning. From that van­tage point, all she could see were the rooftops of the houses in the Valley and the purple mountains ringing it just on the horizon. But she knew full well that hundreds of miles of desert and flat plains with brittle scrub grass, palm trees, and little else lay beyond, a barrier as hard to breach as a maidenhead for someone who had never gone beyond the mountains.

  Moreton had planned it so: Bliss River was a very hard place to get to. And equally as hard to get away from, even discounting the practical things you needed just to travel.

  So just how did she think she was going to manage to leave?

  Well, Charles Elliott would soon leave and in a most ig­nominious way, with the stain of blood on his hands.

  She closed her eyes, envisioning him. Not one nuance of emotion in his face when they sentenced him. Not one shard of regret that his mother was gone. Not a word or a gesture of remorse.

  What kind of man was he, this man from away, whom Moreton had welcomed, encouraged and taken into the fold?

  He was not a murderer, by evidence of what she had heard. But it didn't mean he hadn't had murder in his heart... so what was she thinking?

  She was thinking, she was wondering, how exactly Charles Elliott had come to the valley. By caravan, by night? He must have, because of the ponies ... a dozen of them for which Moreton had paid a sultan's fortune. They'd come by ship from the south and then by caravan to the Valley.

  It just seemed that suddenly one day the ponies were there, and Elliott too, and the arduous trip, the stultifying heat didn't seem to faze him: he was chalking the field and lining the ponies almost from the moment he arrived.

  He was a seasoned traveler, obviously.

  She wanted to believe that, to believe that he knew his way around, and were he able to leave the Valley, he would know exactly where to go and how to get there once he was beyond the mountains.

  Even England.

  And she knew how to get him away from the Valley.

  How desperate was she?

  Where would she go?

  England. Not a moment's hesitation there.

  But then what?

  Aling?

  Her father would set the dogs on her.

  Aling...

  Child of the desert, transforming herself into a proper English lady?

  There was a nightmare, for herself and her father, even if he were to let her in. There would be things hard to give up, proprieties to be observed. Rules and structure for the first time in her life ...

  She felt a wave of longing for it, as a part of herself, that she might never know. Olivia had told her stories, all of which could be fairy tales for all she knew, painting a pic­ture of a life so unlike the Valley that she wanted it to be true, and she yearned to be part of it, too.

  Her father, at least, was true. And for all that he had abandoned them in the Valley, surely after all these years he would show her some mercy.

  He would, she knew it. He would enfold her in his arms, tell her he was sorry he'd left her; he'd welcome her and tell her how courageous she was to escape them.

  He'd tell her she'd come home.

  Home...

  She'd never had a home. She'd had a room, she'd had meals, education, companionship—of a sort. But she'd never had a home.

  Her father would give her a home, rfe couldn't turn her away, she thought, not after all it was going to cost her to leave the Valley.

  But every sacrifice would be worthwhile, she thought, if only she could get to England ...

  Elliott... her best chance, her last hope. She made the decision sometime in the early hours of the morning, after she'd fallen asleep and dreamed of castles and country houses in England.

  She had something to barter now. Knowledge, money, admittedly her father's money, but how could he not offer a reward to the intrepid adventurer who'd rescued his daughter from the gates of a hedonistic hell?

  Or, barring that, her body. There was always sex, and Charles Elliott was not immune. She could seduce him: The trip was probably long and onerous. He would have needs, and it would be one way of compensating him for taking her on. But that was all for later. She had much planning to do before she even approached him with the scheme.

  She had but this day to put it all into place.

  "Georgie! Georgie!"

  Oh dear heaven, Olivia.

  She slipped on a loose-fitting housedress and hurried downstairs.

  "Yes, ma'am?"

  "I thought we might take breakfast together."

  They never "took" breakfast together. Georgie obedi­ently sat herself at the table, and Olivia rang for the serv­ing girl, who came with a steaming pot of tea and a plate of biscuits to start. "The usual," Olivia told her, which meant eggs, toast, bacon, oranges and pineapples, some fried eggplant and marinated beans.

  "Well then," Olivia said. "Tomorrow morning, the evil man will pay for his crime. An eye for an eye, as they say. And I will feel that Lydia has been avenged."

  Georgie said nothing. Olivia slanted her a look. "Don't you think, Georgie?"

  "What?"

  "That Charles Elliott's death will avenge Lydia's?"

  "Absolutely. You can do no less."

  "So everyone agrees," Olivia said placidly, pouring the tea.

  One of them .. .

  "I hate that this must usher in a new era in the Valley," Olivia went on, taking a pair of tongs and delicately set­ting a biscuit on Georgie's plate. "Everyone's loyalty to our way of life must be vetted. If a viper like Charles Elliott can find his way in, then who knows what might ar­rive on the next camel. Don't you agree, Georgie?"

  She felt a chill flitter down her spine. "I... what are you getting at?"

  Olivia helped herself to some eggs and toast, which kept her busy enough so she didn't have to look at Georgiana, and thus she could speak in that flat tone of hers that was meant to convey honesty.

  "I'm getting at the fact that you haven't enthusiastically embraced the life here. That you think you own the word no, and that you even have the right to say it. That some­times it seems as if you'd rather be someplace else. But that isn't possible, and you know it. What I want to see, what Moreton wants to see, is you participating more fully, and your servicing your share of the men who want to cork

  you."

  The chill turned to ice.
"What if I don't?"

  Olivia turned a cold eye on her. Georgie was ever resis­tant to her duties as a child of the valley. Never could fully engage in the life of a voluptuary. Georgie was and had al­ways been a problem, and she had to be brought to heel now. "But you will, Georgie. Because we must do every­thing we can to preserve our way of life here, and let noth­ing take it away from us. And you know there are people who would want to take it away."

  "They'd never find us," Georgie muttered.

  Oliva snorted. "Charles Elliott found us."

  "He only wanted to take Lydia away."

  "Georgie!"

  "I don't see why I have to lie on my back for just any lob-cock in the Valley."

  "You never listen. This is your power, my dear girl. They want what's between your legs. It's nothing for you to give, and they always want more. They'll do anything to get more. So use that power. Show your loyalty. Tell me you won't fight me anymore on this."

  No, / won't; I'll be gone.

  "I won't fight you anymore on this," Georgie parroted obediently.

  "Well, good. I thought we'd come to blows on it, given your usual obdurate behavior. I'm satisfied you under­stand what's at stake," Olivia said, ferociously buttering a biscuit. "You do understand what's at stake?"

  "The whole world as we know it," Georgie said with a trace of irony in her voice.

  "Exactly," Olivia said, biting hard into the biscuit. "Exactly."

  What did one need to travel in the desert? Two fleet horses. A supply of food? Dates, nuts, oranges, beans, rice, coffee—anything that wouldn't spoil. A pot of some sort, something to eat and drink out of—she couldn't think; she had to think.

  What did she know about traveling in the desert? Knives. Water. Robes. Boots. A tent. Dear heaven, where would she find a tent in the Valley? Sheets would have to do. Blankets. A compass. Were there even such things in the Valley?

  She hadn't yet propositioned Charles Elliott, and she was racing around like a dervish trying to gather every­thing together before she approached him. There was no time, either, to think or to plan. Spur of the moment. She would die if she stayed. And she couldn't be certain he'd agree to go—of course he would agree to go; he wasn't ready to martyr himself to the hypocrites of Bliss River Valley.