The Wishstone and the Wonderworkers coaaod-6

by Hugh Cook

  By daylight she looks every bit the young royal, preening herself for her admirers, delicately supping upon fresh fish or zabaglione, accepting (as of right) those compliments and courtesies which come her way. But now it is night, and she is out for action. She is hot, hot, there’s no doubting it. She walks with a strumpet’s roll, her xanthic eyes alight with a leam of lust as she quits Lak Street and ventures down Skindik Way. Swiftly she reaches the depraved depths of Lubos. There she does not vacillate, but recklessly plunges into the stews.

  One does not expect such things from the aristocracy. But there it is. The truth must be told, and the uneffaceable truth is that she is pursuing carnal satisfaction with no sense of aidos whatsoever, shamelessly strutting her stuff in the streets, ready (more than ready!) for the first male with the energy to take her.

  She has not gone far through the wagmoire of the waterfront slumlands when she encounters a virile young mariner. He is a sailor fresh off a ship, a mangy street-fighter who has but one ear. Hunk is his name, and he has sailed the waters of the Great Ocean from Yam to Manamalargo. He has seen the cruel cliffs of Odrum, the jungles of Quilth, the storm-torn shores of Wen Endex and the limpid waters of Parengarenga Harbour.

  He has tasted the exotic pleasures of a thousand ports, yet still is ready for more. Furthermore, the glamour of his pintle is alone sufficient to persuade the Princess Sabitha that he is the one. For when appetite goads the flesh sufficiently, questions of class, decency and caution go right out of the window.

  Thus Hunk meets Sabitha, and, in the manner of all idiothermous animals lusting in heat, they decide without preparation or preamble to engage in that interesting activity which the scholarly Arwin has dealt with in such exhaustive length in his five-volume magnus opus, On The Generation Of Species.

  But before genetic data (or organic secretions and their concomitant diseases) can be transmitted from one to the other, the would-be lovers are interrupted by the advent of an apparition in appearance formidable indeed.

  It is a Thing which hangs in nightdark heights near the gable of the nearest speakeasy. A globular Thing the size of a fist. It crackles with electric auras of gangrene blue and corpse-love yellow. Then it speaks unto them in a voice of brass and cymbals, saying:

  ‘I am the demon-god Lorzunduk. Behold! And know your doom!’

  Whereupon the Princess Sabitha flees, yowling.

  Hunk stands his ground. His back arches, his hair stands on end, and he hisses and spits ferociously as the apparition descends. Then his nerve breaks, and he too flees.

  Which is just as well.

  For if the lovers had not been thus separated before the consummation of their passion then this chronicle would have had to touch in some way upon that aforesaid consummation. Which would have been unfortunate. For this work is meant for the literate, and the literate are by definition more interested in the life of the intellect than the life of the organism, the life of the aforesaid organism being — is it not? — essentially repetitive and thus tedious.

  So let us be glad that we are not forced to waste our time by contemplation of an unoriginal act at which frogs, newly-weds and blowflies are equally competent. Let us be glad that we need here insert no account (doubtless to be skimmed or impatiently skipped by those in search of deeper revelation) of the shimmering scream of pleasure with which the Princess Sabitha accepted the hard-driving Hunk into her body, about the thrust of his drive questing deep in the humid velvet of her tight yet tender Well, you know the rest.

  Anyway, to return to our chronicle. Both cats have fled in terror. Yet the glowing ball still hangs there in the air.

  Sniggering.

  Those of you who have been to Untunchilamon yourselves or who know the place by reputation will likely have guessed already that the glowing ball is nothing more than Shabble.

  Shabble?

  Yes, Shabble.

  ‘Shabble! Shabble!’ the children are wont to cry as they go chasing through the streets. ‘Shabble, come play with us! Shabble, Shabbiful, Jabiful, Shabajabalantiful.’ And sometimes Shabble will. Or, if not in a cat-chasing mood, then Shabble may condescend to amuse Shabbleself with a kitten to the kitten’s delight.

  (Shabbleself? Itself. Himself. Herself. Theirselves. Choose any one at will or at random — and you will know at least as much about Shabble’s psychology as the so-called experts.)

  Shabble, then.

  In appearance, a miniature sun, though coloration tends to be changeable and idiosyncratic. In voice eccentric, speaking at will in any of the accents heard ever on Untunchilamon, even those unplaceable foreign accents otherwise voiced only by the conjurer Odolo. In behaviour feckless, for Shabble has scant regard for consequences.

  That is Shabble.

  While Shabble is still hanging there in the air, an untoward incident occurs. There is a massive energy drain which affects all of Injiltaprajura. Lights darken. Fires go out. Gandies die. Then, to Shabble’s horror, Shabble feels Something trying to seize Shabble’s own energy. Shabble squeaks in fright and flees down the nearest drainpipe. The drainpipe (naturally) leads Downstairs.

  Downstairs!

  There is horror down there, and Shabble fears it greatly. Yet the alternative is death.

  Thus Shabble flees.

  We in our mortal flesh, living never more than a skin away from pain, are like to think of Shabble as a careless immortal. But, while it is certain that Shabble lives longer and safer than any of us — for Shabble’s body is a full-size sun, set in its own separate universe, interfaced with the local cosmos only by means of a cunning transponder which outwardly looks like a sun in miniature — yet even Shabble can be hurt, and has been. It is difficult to hurt Shabble, but the therapists of the Golden Gulag knew how. Oh yes! They knew how, and on occasion put theory into practice.

  The therapists?

  The Golden Gulag?

  These will have to await their own chroniclers. For this is but a modest tale, dealing only with a few days in the life of Untunchilamon, with a struggle for the wishstone and the fate of some of the wonderworkers (and others) who became involved in that struggle.

  This is not, then, the Omnium conceived of by the literary theoretician Sinja Larthelme, he whom those who would have themselves thought of as wise must pretend to hold in such high regard. In this account, many things are touched upon which ‘thou must pursue in scholarship thyself if thou wouldst know more of them,’ as Eric the Wise said to the over-valorous Uri of legend on the occasion of their famous debate outside the notorious Stench Caves of Logthok Norgos (into which the bright-smiling Uri ultimately ventured alone, and may be venturing still for all we know).

  [The Golden Gulag mentioned by the Originator appears to be his personal invention. Despite the claim made above, the Originator does later elaborate this invention at length, claiming in the course of such elaboration to reveal the Truth which lies hidden behind the veils of the Days of Wrath. Yet an exhaustive search of the Archives for collaboration of these tales of the Gulag uncovers no mention of it whatsoever. In truth, scholarship knows virtually nothing of humanity’s mode of existence before the wars of the Days of Wrath. This Insertion by Order of Indorjed, Archivist Superior.]

  [The naive should note that the unrelenting labours of the world’s best scholars have failed to produce even so much as a definitive date for the Days of Wrath. They are generally supposed to have taken place between 9,000 and 20,000 years Before Present; it is generally agreed that no closer dating can be arrived at. The airy exactitude of the Originator should be seen against this background. This Insertion by Order of Than, Chronologer Superior.]

  [Here seventeen spurious Insertions by various hands have been deleted. One suspects that Insertions by some are valued for their own sake. That some see careers in terms of the creation of quantity rather than quality. The over-ambitious younger generation must learn that, in scholarship as in other things, continence is a virtue. By Order, Jonquiri 0, Disiciplinarian Superior.]


  Well, then.

  You have seen the start of our history.

  A malign Power of some description — most probably a hideous demon in the process of breaking through into our innocent and unsuspecting world from the World Beyond — has subjected Injiltaprajura to a massive energy drain. Shabble, the bright-voiced imitator of suns, has been forced to flee Downstairs lest this energy drain end Shabble’s life entirely.

  What now?

  Why, the tale of the wishstone and the wonderworkers begins, and proceeds to its conclusion.

  You know the setting and the scope of the action. If then you deem our history to be worthy of your attention, read on. If not, then may the mephitic stench of a million dead scorpions enfold you, may cesspool fevers rack your bones for the next five thousand years, may worms the colour of mastic ooze from your ears, and may your flesh decay until it becomes soft as a mango lost for a month in a dungheap.

  And may you dwell in the house of your mother-in-law forever.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Chegory Guy was a knifefighter. Perhaps that is not entirely accurate. If truth be told, he had never been in a knife fight in his life. Yet it is still far from misleading to describe him as a knifefighter since he owned a number of blades and had been trained to kill with them. Furthermore, he trained with his weapons on a daily basis, practising feinting, shifting, slashing and slicing, stabbing and hacking.

  Once you know this, you will not be surprised to hear that he was an Ebrell Islander. These people are, of course, notorious for their violence. Such generalisations are, or so we are told by the Ashdan liberals, odious, untrue and misleading; nevertheless, it would be hard to make sense of the world without them, and in the case of Chegory Guy they make a great deal of sense.

  This dangerous young man dwelt in the fair city of Injiltaprajura (or, shall we say, the bloodstone-complexioned city of Injiltaprajura?). To be precise, he was domiciled in the Dromdanjerie.

  The Dromdanjerie.

  What and where?

  What is easy. The Dromdanjerie is the lunatic asylum of Injiltaprajura. It is a huge building fabricated from the native bloodstone of Untunchilamon. It has 2 kitchens, 27 showers, 44 stench holes, 6 high-security cells and 19 dormitories. One of the many fountains sourced Downstairs has been linked directly to the plumbing. This provides unlimited fresh (potable!) water for the showers with their floors of glistening green tiles, for the sluice rooms, for the kitchens gay with sun-faced representations of flowers, and for swabbing out those filthy dormitories so drearily painted in institutional brown and grey.

  The Dromdanjerie, then.

  What of it?

  Does my acquaintance with the place seem too intimate? If so, know this: the Brin think me normal enough. Though what is ‘normal’ if one metabolises silicon, as do the Brin? Never mind. Enough of that. Let us not return to it again. Let us return to Chegory Guy. And to the action:

  As Shabble was sliding down a drainpipe to escape the massive energy drain which threatened Shabbleself’s very' existence, the Dromdanjerie was waking. All the lights had gone out, waking those many who could not sleep in the dark. They screamed as if they had swallowed acid. They raved as if fresh-returned from hell. This set off most of the others. The dogs in the Dog Worshipper’s Temple at the back of the Dromdanjerie began barking and howling. So, with uproar rising to heights unendurable, the staff of the Dromdanjerie was waking.

  Chegory Guy was not on the staff — he was in fact a rock gardener who worked on the island of Jod — but as he boarded in the Dromdanjerie’s staff quarters he too was wakened by the racket.

  He kindled fire, then helped light (or, as the case may be, relight) lanterns by the dozen. Jon Qasaba took the first dozen, and, carrying them on a bablobrokmadorni stick, strode away into the depths of the bedlam. Guy loaded a second bablobrokmadorni stick for Qasaba’s daughter.

  Olivia.

  Olivia Qasaba. She of the uncertain moods, at one moment a playful gamine, then on an instant a sophisticated ice lady, as remote and as distant as the stars. A female creature who was suffering that confusion of the blood which besets a girl who is in the process of becoming a woman. There are several symptoms of this confusion, the most notable being a propensity for slamming doors and a tendency to burst into tears upon provocation which should by rights produce (at the very most) no more than the briefest of scowls.

  Chegory Guy was at least in part responsible for her erratic emotional weather. What did he do? He was there! That was enough. Sometimes Olivia wished to romp with him like a boy at play with a peer, giving expression to simple high spirits and the natural ebullience of youth. At other times, she imagined him as an ardent suitor into whose arms she could swoon in a waking dream of passion.

  Either way, Chegory disappointed her, for he daily grew more remote. Why? Because he had a nice regard for his own safety. He sensed her confusion. (He sensed it: but to most of the other people in the Qasaba household that confusion needed no sensing whatsoever, as it was clearly written in the girl’s every action.) He feared that if he let her within his guard, she would one day go further than she was ready to, and would then scream rape. Or, alternatively, that she would go hardly any distance at all, and that he would then yield to temptation and rape her in truth.

  Why did the young man take this business of rape so seriously? He was not one of those earnest young philosophers who pass through a phase of diligent asceticism at the age of eighteen. No: it was a survivor’s caution which governed his flesh.

  Chegory Guy was, as we have said already, an Ebrell Islander. By breeding at least, though not by birth. Yes, though Chegory Guy had been born on Untunchilamon, his parents had both been of Ebrell Island stock. Now the Ebrell Islanders are a race of drunkards, knifefighters and fornicators cursed by a genetic tendency to wanton dissipation. You doubt this? Are you then one of these Ashdan liberals who hold that hereditary traits are but illusory, and who believe (or at least claim to believe) that all things are possible for all people? Read on! And you will be enlightened.

  The Ebrell Islanders had long been a troublesome minority on Untunchilamon. They had always been for the most part unemployed. Gambling, drug abuse, violence and venereal disease were rife amongst them. They were customarily involved in smuggling, theft, prostitution, extortion and organised crime. They were a cancerous blotch upon civilisation.

  Therefore, when Chegory Guy was but nine years of age, the wise and magnanimous Wazir Sin had organised a pogrom against the Ebbies. The slaughter had been efficient in the extreme, and only a few of the underpeople had escaped into the wilderness. Among those few were the nine-year-old Chegory Guy, his father, his uncle Dunash Labrat and his cousin Ham.

  Strangely, the slaughter of the Ebrell Islanders failed to end unemployment, crime and prostitution in Injiltaprajura. Wazir Sin was vexed. He decided he had not gone far enough. So he drew up a Program of Purification. First he would hunt down any and all Ebbies who had fled into the Wastelands. Then he would slaughter the few survivors of the Dagrin — the aboriginal race of Untunchilamon. Then he would kill the crippled, the insane, the mutant, and anyone over the age of seventy. Then he would But it is pointless to detail further this Noble Experiment, for it was not to be. Before the saintly Wazir Sin could enact his visionary program, the horrors of Talonsklavara threw the Izdimir Empire into disarray. The Yudonic Knight Lonstantine Thrug took advantage of the confusion, overthrew the innocent Sin, then murdered that upright imperial servant. Two years later, Thrug was imprisoned in the Dromdanjerie when his mounting insanity had reached the point where it had become undeniable. His daughter Justina installed herself in the belfried palace at the top of Lak Street and proclaimed an amnesty so general that its provisions extended even to the few remaining Ebrell Islanders.

  Some of the Ebrell Islanders who still survived in the wilderness returned to Injiltaprajura. Dunash Labrat came home to reclaim his properties, which had been managed in his absence by his wife. Though Chegory Guy’s f
ather stayed in the heartland of the Scorpion Desert, Chegory himself came back to Injiltaprajura with his uncle (the aforesaid Dunash Labrat), and began an apprenticeship as an apiarist. This was aborted when young Chegory proved to be allergic to bee stings. Thereafter he took various forms of irregular employment until at last he landed himself a steady job on the island of Jod.

  On Jod, Chegory came into contact with Ivan Pokrov, and thus met Pokrov’s friend Jon Qasaba. An Ashdan. An Ashdan liberal, in fact. Jon Qasaba and his sister-in-law Artemis Ingalawa found the civilisation of Chegory Guy to be a project which appealed to their hopelessly optimistic liberal tastes. They collaborated with Ivan Pokrov on this civilisation experiment, arranging for Chegory’s working day to end at midday so he could study throughout the afternoon while still drawing his pay from Jod’s Analytical Institute. Soon enough, Chegory was boarding with Jon Qasaba in the Dromdanjerie’s staff quarters, and was thus thrown into daily contact with the nubile Olivia.

  Is there any need to further elaborate the reasons for Chegory’s caution? He was a member of a despised minority which had recently been almost hunted to extinction on Untunchilamon. By reason of his race, people would expect him to rape, kill, cheat, steal and lie, and also to indulge in the worst forms of drug abuse. Therefore he acted always with the greatest of caution, avoided compromising situations, and showed his thorns to Olivia.

  This delicious young damsel, seeking friendship at least (and sometimes thinking she might be seeking more), found his remoteness hard to endure.

  By now you may be asking: how are such things known? How have the dynamics of Chegory’s relationship with Olivia been discovered? How can we be sure that this is how it was?

  Why, because there is such a thing as gossip, of course. You must realise that institutions (prisons, armies and asylums) are great places for gossip, because there is intimacy, the cheek by the jowl, the free speaking of the loquacious in front of those so familiar they have become invisible, and because there is time. Time to study hints, to theorise on fragments.