Ilrica winked at him. “Just watch.”
The hotel clerk clicked again. “Look, you know what? I have a room I can give you. It’s the vlonohai suite.”
Ilrica feigned astonishment. “But you said you didn’t have any rooms.” She thumbed at the drunken couple. “Are you giving me their room?”
The man huffed and picked up his suitcase.
The clerk nearly jumped. “What? No, of course not. Ma’am please, you are causing a ruckus.”
The clerk stretched to look over Ilrica’s shoulder as the drunken couple turned to leave.
Ilrica’s eyes twinkled. “Before you told me no rooms were available, so it would seem you are only giving it to me now because I am causing a scene.”
The clerk yanked on her antennae. “Look, ma’am, if you push any harder I’ll have to ask you to leave.”
“Ah, so you keep a room in reserve for people who push hard but not too hard. That is quite a strange company policy you have there.”
The clerk snarled.
“I’ll take it,” Ilrica said, swiping her card through the reader before the woman could delete it from the queue.
Ilrica proudly plucked Gerald up and tossed him over one shoulder while the clerk rushed out to stop the couple from leaving.
“Boy, you’re just a big troll, aren’t you?” Gerald commented as she carried him down the hallway. “Why did you give her such a hard time?”
“Because she lied to me.” Ilrica tapped her snout. “I can smell a lie a mile away. She just didn’t want to give a room to someone with Bertulf blood.”
“Regardless, we really shouldn’t be here,” Gerald said, looking around.
Ilrica kicked open the door and tossed Gerald onto the bed.
“We shouldn’t be here? Why not?” She picked up a wine glass off the table and threw the contents down her throat. The sensor on the wall gave off a pleasant little chime, indicating that her card had been charged. “What’s wrong with being here?”
“This is a love hotel,” he said discreetly.
Ilrica laughed and sat down on the edge of the bed. “Ahh, so the innocent little monk knows what a love motel is.”
“Look, just because I’m a monk doesn’t mean I’m ignorant.”
Ilrica leaned in close and studied him. “You’ve been to one of these before, haven’t you?
Gerald looked away.
Her eyes went wide. “Oh my gosh, you have, haven’t you?”
“It wasn’t like that, I...”
Ilrica threw her head back and laughed. “Oh, this is too much.” She reached over and slugged him in the shoulder. “Well, good for you! And here I thought you were a grass-eater, turns out you are a meat roll.”
“What’s a meat roll?”
“A male who appears to be an herbivore on the outside, but is actually a carnivore on the inside.”
She flicked the side of the glass and it refilled itself from below. “Oh, you are good. There aren’t many people who can lie to me without leaving a scent.”
She threw down the glass anew, and another chime rang out.
“Look, I’m not really...”
“So, who did you go to the hotel with?” she asked, cutting him off. “Not Ssykes right?”
“Of course not, and I didn’t...”
“Was it the Trahzi?”
“No, look, I was just...”
“Immestria?”
“Look, I’m trying to tell you that...”
Ilrica’s eyes went wide. “Holy grogs, it was Immestria!” She fell back on the bed, kicking her feet and laughing. “Oh man, you took your childhood friend to a love hotel! That is too funny!”
Gerald just sat there, arms folded indignantly. “You know what? I’m not even going to try and explain it; you’ll just cut me off again anyw...”
“Ahhh! ha ha ha ha haaaaaaaaaaa!” Ilrica laughed, holding her sides. “I can’t stop imagining you two making out.”
“It’s not like it’s that funny.”
Ilrica gasped for breath, tears forming in her eyes. “Oh man, did you like.... hehehe... did you like have like a pink stain on your face afterwards, like a little kid after eating too much candy?”
“She’s not actually made of cotton candy, you know.”
“Ahhhhhh ha ha ha ha haaaaaaaaa!”
When the door chimed, it was barely possible to hear it over her laughing.
“Oh, our guest is here,” she said, leaping over to the door.
“Guest?”
“Yes, I brought you here to meet someone. Why? What did you think we were going to do?”
Gerald looked away and blushed. “Nothing.”
Her eyes narrowed knowingly. “Uh huh. You are a meat-eater after all, arentcha?”
The door slid open and a Bertulf walked in. He was nearly twice as tall as Ilrica, so much so that he had to stoop down and twist himself just to fit through the doorway. His features were sharper than hers too, more feral, his snout longer, his fangs more pronounced. While she stood straight, he was hunched over, with wide shoulders and long strong fingers that ended in razor- sharp talons. While she had relatively short fur, his was long and thick. In many places it was gathered together and braided with bits of bone. He wore only a simple loincloth, and a bandolier made of hides. Blades made from carved bones were sheathed in its length.
Ilrica took a knee in his presence, surprisingly submissive for her. “This is Liufr Ivaylo, he is Aatuu of the Ulric Clan,” she explained.
Gerald’s translator had trouble with the word ‘Aatuu,’ the closest it could come up with was ‘alpha father.’
Liufr looked over Gerald, clearly displeased. He stood there as if waiting for something. Not knowing what else to do, Gerald took a knee like she did.
“I see you have brought me a live offering,” Liufr said, a drop of thick saliva dripping free.
“Oh, no, this is Gerald Dyson, a classmate of mine. He is not for eating.”
The enormous Bertulf sniffed him. “Not yet, anyway.”
Gerald was nearly petrified. The Bertulf’s body radiated power and violence. Just his mere presence was overwhelming.
“You may rise,” Liufr said, as he walked past them.
“This is your father?” Gerald leaned over and whispered. “He looks nothing like you.”
“That’s because he’s an alpha male, you dummy.” She looked over her shoulder at Liufr, eyes sparkling. “And an extremely sexy one at that.”
Gerald stuck his tongue out. “That’s kind of a strange way to talk about your father, isn’t it?”
Liufr growled and turned around. “That is something of a mistranslation. As the Alpha of the Ulric Clan, I would be considered father, brother, and husband to all the Ulrician females. The familial distinctions you prey use don’t apply to hunting packs.” There was something feral in his demeanor, as if everything before him was permitted to live only because he was currently too bored to bother killing it. Just looking at his cold gray eyes gave Gerald the willies.
Ilrica slugged Gerald in the shoulder. “Lucky bunch a girls, wouldn’t you say?” She walked over next to Liufr, as if showing him off. “I’ve seen this guy take down a Ruavu Mammoth all by himself.”
“Yes, very lucky.”
Forgetting herself, she playfully whipped the tip of her tail against Liufr.
“Do not touch me, ilrica faolan,” he snapped.
Ilrica stepped back and tucked her arms and tail away. “Sorry.”
Gerald’s translator gave off a little chirp. Normally proper names were simply transferred over phonetically to English, but when Liufr had said her name, Gerald’s translator had treated it as a title with no English analogue. He wondered if this one was breaking down like the others.
Liufr took her purse and turned it over, emptying the contents out onto the desk. Sifting through them distastefully, he picked up a green tablet that had fallen out.
“I brought him here to show him my school records,” Ilrica explained. “I think you’l
l be very pleased with my performance on the hand-to hand combat trials.”
Liufr sniffed at the tablet and tucked it away into his bandolier disinterestedly. “I shall be leaving now.” He turned around and headed for the door.
“You are welcome to stay for a while,” Gerald said. “Ilrica has been away from her clan for a long time. I’m sure she would enjoy the company.”
Liufr stooped through the door and looked back. “It is not part of my clan,” he clarified, then he disappeared.
Ilrica breathed in relief and slumped down into the chair. “I think I’m gonna need another drink.”
“What did he mean, you are not part of his clan?”
Ilrica snatched up the wine glass and tapped it to fill anew. “It’s nothing. Don’t worry about it.” She threw down the wine and then filled the glass again.
Gerald watched the door slide close. “I apologize if I did anything wrong. That didn’t really seem to go well.”
Ilrica threw the wine down her throat and breathed deeply. “No, that went about as well as it could have gone.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Because we’re both still alive.”
Chapter Eighteen
How does one learn to control aether? Firstly, one must understand that while numbers are useful and often employed, the universe itself is not mathematical. This is because math expresses digitally a reality that is essentially analogue. The simplest example of this is an old-style speedometer. An analogue speedometer has an infinite number of possible positions for each possible speed, while a digital speedometer always rounds up or down to the nearest unit of measure, meaning that it is always warping the results by its very design. Likewise, the laws that govern the growth of a tree, or the behavior of animals are indeed ordered, but they are not mathematical. Understanding this, manipulating and controlling aether is an intuitive and creative process, much less like using a machine, and more like writing a symphony. In laboratory tests, it was found that 67% of humans instantly reject this explanation when they receive it because it is not what they wanted to hear, 24% pronounce it boring, 6% accept it, while the other 3% want to know what is for lunch.
-A Tourists Guide to Earth, 2nd edition, page 7, Valium Press
It took about sixteen more glasses of wine to finally overpower Ilrica’s vigorous alien physiology. Something was clearly bothering her, and she was trying to drown it. She passed out on the bed in her uniform, snoring embarrassingly loud, her long tongue hanging out, while Gerald wondered what to do with himself. He attempted to excuse himself, but the door lock broke, trapping him inside. There were several high-speed connection cables to Central, none of which he could use. He tried to take a hot shower but the hot water gave out, so he took an ice-cold shower instead. Rummaging through the nightstand, he found a copy of the scrolls of Soeck translated into standard, but after his experiences that morning, he found little heart to read them.
The bluish sun was now setting in the violet sky. Gerald sat out on the balcony and watched the floating islands of weli’hi rain petals down on the city below. The solitude forced him to think about things he had been avoiding all day. The desecration of the temple, of the festival. The callous disregard for anything but money. It made him sick to his stomach every time he thought about it. In a way, he was actually grateful to Ilrica for keeping his mind off of it for most of the day. He wondered if that had been her plan all along—to cheer him up.
Gerald took off his necklace and carefully ran the beads through his fingers. The enlightened ones felt so far away right now. Vashrya seemed like nothing more than a dream. For a moment, he struggled with the urge to simply toss the beads over the side, but instead put them back around his neck.
He watched as a skiv took off from the temple grounds, laden with thousands of pounds of fireworks. It ascended into the sky, where one of the weli’hi islands had been prepared to house them. As near as he could tell, it was the one and only part of the festival they were doing correctly.
As Ilrica yawned and walked out to sit with him, he barely acknowledged her.
“Please tell me I didn’t miss the fireworks?” she asked, rubbing her head.
“No, they won’t start for another hour at least,” Gerald said unenthusiastically.
Ilrica wiped the sleep from her eyes and looked him over, guessing his thoughts. “You know, normally I don’t make fun of other people’s make-believe, but I got to say Gerald, this time it’s really hurting you.”
Gerald ran his fingers over his necklace. “Can I ask you something?”
“Sure,” she yawned.
“Have ever met one of the gods?”
“A couple of times. Faelan is mother to the Bertulf...” she trailed off into a yawn.
“Pardon me for interrupting. How come you always refer to them as ‘the Bertulf,’ never as ‘my people’?”
“You want me to tell the story or not?”
“Sorry, go ahead.”
She shook herself awake. “Anyway, I remember when I was just a cub crawling to the top of the pride stones and looking down at the bonfire circle Faelan had come to join in the celebration after the hunt.”
Ilrica looked down, and got a little quiet. “She was feasting and drinking with them, laughing and embracing, warning everybody not to worship anyone else or she’d smite them...”
She looked up and smiled. “The old ones love to say stuff like that, you know? But... she was so warm; there was such a sense of family, and I thought... I would give anything to be a part of that.”
Ilrica’s ears folded down, and she looked out into the distant sky. “...anything.”
Embarrassed at how candid she was being Ilrica pretended to wipe away a tear. “Sorry, feasting always gets me a little teary-eyed. Food is a beautiful thing, you know?”
“I met Odin once,” Gerald boasted.
“Oh really?”
“Yeah, cool guy. He came to the mission in Salt Lake City to help out for the day. Osiris was supposed to come too, but there was a scheduling conflict.”
Gerald slapped his knee. “So, Ilrica, if you’ve met the gods, why in the world do you always treat everyone’s faith with such disdain?”
She wagged her head, considering this a fair question. “Because I think it’s wrong to call them gods. The old ones are powerful, terrifyingly powerful, but they’re also jealous, and they get bored with us. Sure, some of them take an interest in the new races. Heck, some even adopt a people and care for them like their own children. At least, for a time...”
Sadly, she wrapped her arms around herself. “But it’s like with Faelan. If you aren’t one of hers, she could care less about you. I don’t think that deserves my worship.”
Gerald looked at her sympathetically. “Not all of them are like that.”
She looked away. “I know, but mine is.”
“Well then, perhaps you should fix that.”
Ilrica took heart and gave him a wink. “I aim to. I work for it every day.”
Gerald got quiet. “You know, I’ve never told this to anyone, but sometimes I think it might be nice to have a deity. Someone to watch over you. Back home, I am considered a traitor for converting to Soeckism.”
Ilrica looked at him with sympathy, a deep pain behind her eyes. “You’re an outcast, aren’t you?”
Gerald nodded.
“Yeah, I’ve kind of been meaning to ask you. Why join an alien religion? What, your Earth churches not good enough for you?”
Gerald shook his head. “There aren’t any Earth religions anymore. Not really. You’ll find a few believers hanging on here and there, but there’s no real organization anymore. They mostly fell apart after the Second Coming of Jesus.”
“Oh, really?”
He chuckled. “Yeah, if you thought the Super Bowl was a big deal, you should have been there for the Second Coming. They pre-empted everything for that. It was beyond huge. Every channel, every newspaper. It was everywhere. But the only peopl
e he took with him were the Mormons. You can’t imagine how ticked off the Catholics were. Anyway, after that, all the other religions just kind of crumbled. The only groups that are still going strong are the Amish, who didn’t have television, and the Atheists, who are convinced the whole thing was just a trick, and that the thirty million Mormons who disappeared was just some kind of government conspiracy. We call them S.C. Deniers.”
Ilrica scooted a little closer to him. “So, why not just look for another church, then? One that suits you better? Why join one with suck tronky beliefs?”
Gerald tapped his palms together. “You’ve never lived with an addict, have you? You’ve never watched someone waste away. You’ve never watched their eyes grow duller day by day. Never watched a person stripped down of every interest, every thought, every subtlety and nuance. Never watched the layers of who they are peeled off of them until they are reduced to nothing more than a hunger. Never watched them steal from their own family to feed their addiction. Never watched them grow to hate everything they once loved, watched them loathe anything that becomes an obstacle to their craving.”
He looked up, tears in his eyes. “There are only a handful of humans left who are not addicted to True-Life.”
“I... never knew it was that bad.”
“So, yes, I admit it, my beliefs are a little ‘tronky,’ but if you had seen what I have seen, if you had watched your entire race become imprisoned by their own biology, you’d understand why I fear my own flesh so much.”
Gerald took heart and grabbed his necklace with force. “I need my beliefs. My beliefs allow me to survive.”
Ilrica glanced over at the time displayed on the wall. “Well, then, I say we do something about it.”
“What?”
She jumped to her feet. “What do we do when we find something broken? We fix it.”
“I agree with the principal, I am suspicious of the application.”
“Come on, let’s show them what a real Eldireer festival is supposed to be like. Remind them of their roots, their heritage. Break them out of their stupor and stuff.”
Gerald just stared at her.
“What?”
Gerald shook his head. “No, I’m just surprised you know words like ‘stupor.’”
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